Monday, November 29, 2010
Saturday, November 27, 2010
THE ELECTRONIC HALLUCINATION & MEDIA HOLOGRAM
We've Let Corporations and Media Rob Our Souls
The most chilling accomplishment of American capitalist culture is that we have commodified our own consciousness.
At the Houston airport, where I spent two hours listening to a Christian religious fanatic tell about Obama running a worldwide child porn ring out of the White House. Entering the country shoeless through airport homeland security, holding up my pants because they don't let old men wear suspenders through security, well, I knew I was back home in the land of the free.
I am forced to talk about three things -- corporations, television and human spirituality.
World does not exist except through media. Is not a cultural history course. It is a real place with fast-developing disasters, economic and ecological collapse, cultural conditioning working against them. You are as conditioned as any trained chicken in a carnival. You have been generally indoctrinated and deeply conditioned to do -- mostly along class lines
20 percent coordinating and managing, the other 75 percent, the greater mass of working-class citizenry by the empire's approved methods, and toward the same end: Maximum profitability for a corporate-based state.
Seems so normal, psychologists have prescribed so much Prozac that it now shows up in the piss of penguins. A teacher has no objection to 20 percent of her fourth-graders being on Ritalin, in the name of "appropriate behavior," dupes or pawns of a corporate state a corporate-generated reality.
Financialization of all aspects of our culture and lives. True democracy is dead, and a corporate financial state has now arrived. An ever-merging global corporate system masquerading electronically and digitally as a nation called the United States. Or Japan
The corporation now animates us from within our very selves through management of the need hierarchy in goods and information. The American psycho-socio-medical complex, authorized to manage public consciousness. The entire pedagogy is itself immersed in a corporate financial state
This financialization of our consciousness under American-style capitalism has become all we know. We fear its loss. Hence the bailouts of the thousands of "zombie banks," dead but still walking, thanks to the people's taxpayer offerings to the money god so that banks will not die. We dare not let corporations die. Corporations feed us. They entertain us. They heal us when we are sick. Corporations feel like a friendly, benevolent entity in
American consciousness, are, of course, deathless and faceless machines and have no soul or human emotions
Makes us a corporate cult and makes corporations a fetish of our culture, like the weather -- just there. All of us live together in this corporate fetish cult. We agree upon and consent to its reality. Aztecs agreed upon Quetzalcoatl. Easter Island agreed that the great stone effigies had significance.
A population mass operating under unified corporate management machinery, most Americans believe they are unique individuals. Americans fear loss of uniqueness. Yet you and I are not unique in the least
Just because we come from the manufacturer equipped with individual consciousness, does not make us the center of any unique world, private or public, material, intellectual or spiritual.
We are all replaceable parts in the machinery of a capitalist economy. "Oh but we have unique feelings and emotions that are important," Psychologists specialize in this notion.
We are swimmers in an ancient rushing river of humanity, the child in Bangladesh, the millionaire frat boys who run our financial and governmental institutions with such adolescent carelessness. We will eventually be absorbed without leaving a trace.
We can meaningfully differentiate in the way we choose to employ our consciousness, to own our consciousness. We are either in charge of our own awareness, or we let someone else manage it. We nevertheless remain one of the most controlled peoples on the planet, especially regarding control of our consciousness, public and private. And the control is tightening. It doesn't feel like that, but therein rests the proof. Everything feels normal; everybody is doing the same things, so it must be OK. Stockholm Syndrome of the soul, the prisoner identifies with the values of his or her captors
In our case, the American corporate state and its manufactured popular culture. We feel life is normal and act accordingly, we become helpless. Learned helplessness. Americans believe there is little they can do in personally dealing with the most important moral and material crises ever faced, both in America and across the planet, beginning with ecocide, war making and the grotesque deformation of the democratic process we have settled for
Citizenship, simple consumer-group consciousness. 6 percent of the planet's population, we use 36 percent of the planet's resources, this we experience as normal and desirable, evidence of being the most-advanced nation in the world, reduced to a mere marketing demographic.
Digress outside the marketing demographic. Belize. True, it ain't Zimbabwe or the Sudan -- there are no dying people in the streets. But food security is easily the biggest problem, and growing by the day. Yet, despite much government corruption, people are still citizens, not marketing demographics
Citizens who struggle toward a just society, more progress than the United States, A level of free medical care for the poor. Maternity pay if either you or your spouse is employed. Retirement on Social Security at age 60. Worker rights, mandatory accrued severance pay, own their homes outright, entitled to a free piece of land upon which to build one. Employment is scarce, and that has a down side: Many folks waste a lot of valuable time having sex.
American and Canadian tourists drive by in their rented SUVs scared as hell of those barefooted black folks in the sand around them. A whole lot of very poor people trying to get by and make a decent society. North Americans live in a parallel universe conditioned to see everything in terms of consumer goods and "safety," as defined by police control. Outside of the parameters of the cultural hallucination they call "the First World" represents fear and psychological free fall.
Yet, America is a Second World nation
We have no universal free health care (don't kid yourself about the plan under way), no guarantee of anything really, except competitive struggle with one another for work and money and career status -- if you are one of those conditioned to think of your job and feudal debt enslavement as a "career" -- high infant-mortality rates, abysmal educational scores, poor diet, no national public transportation system, crumbling infrastructure, a collapsed economy. Even by our own definition we are a Second World nation.
But there is a shiny commercial skin that covers everything, a thin layer of glossy, throwaway technology that leads the citizenry to believe otherwise. The glossy branding of every item and experience, tangible evidence that the slick, conditioned illusion. The American Hologram. If it's bright and shiny and new, it must be better the complete opposite of tropical grunge.
So how is it that we Americans came to live in such a parallel universe? We prefer such things as Facebook, riding around the suburbs with an iPod plugged into our brain, looking for fried chicken in a Styrofoam box? Earth-destroying things over love and laughter with real people We suffer under a mass national hallucination. Now live in a culture entirely perceived inside a self-referential media hologram of a nation and world that does not exist. Our national reality is staged and held together by media, chiefly movie and television images. We live in a "theater state."
We know the world through media productions, which are edited and shaped to instruct us on how to look and behave and view the outside world. As in all staged productions and illusions, everyone we see is an actor. There are the television actors portraying what supposedly represents reality. Non-actors in Congress perform in front of the cameras as the American empire's cultural machinery weaves and spins out our cultural mythology.
Cultural myth production is an enormous industry in America. It is very similar to the national projects of pyramid building in Egypt or cathedral-building in medieval Europe. And in our obsession with violence and punishment, two characteristics of a consensual police state reality, we are certainly similar to prison-camp building in Stalinist Russia... one-fourth of all the incarcerated people on earth are in U.S. prisons -- U.S. citizens imprisoned by their own government.
The media culture's production of martyrs, good guys and bad guys, fallen heroes and concept outlaws, is not just big corporate business. It is the armature of our cultural behavior. It tells us who to fear (Middle Eastern terrorists, Mr. Chavez in Venezuela and foreign made pharmaceuticals), who to scorn (again, the same candidates, along with Britney Spears. Daily news is the modern version of Roman coliseum shows. Elections are personality combat, chariot races, not examinations of solutions being offered. None are offered. What are being offered are monkey models, mimics the behavior he sees around him. Real people or moving images of people, eye-to-brain to mimicry connection does not care. We know how to act and what things are because television and media tell us. Television is the software. Social realism for us is a television commercial for the American lifestyle: what's new to wear, what to eat, who's cool ([President Barack] Obama), what and whom to fear (that perennial evil booger, [Fidel] Castro) or who to admire (Bill Gates, pure American genius at work).
This societal media software tells us what music our digitized corporate complex is selling, but you never see images of ordinary families sitting around in the evenings making music together, because that music cannot be bought and sold and is not profitable
Managing mythology, so instead of a daily life in the flesh, we get 40-inch televisions, YouTube, cineplexes and the myths spun out by Hollywood
Now, for a national mythology to work it has to be accessible to everyone all the time, it has to be all in one bundle. In North Korea a single man, Kim. In America it is the media
Hollywood in particular accommodates imperial myths, melting-pot myths, hegemonic military masculinity myths and glamour myths. It articulates our culture's social imaginary: "the prevailing images a society needs to project about itself in order to maintain certain features of its organization." And the features of our media mythology are terrifying when you think about them. It is watching Man on Fire, with Denzel Washington's tragic pose, to protect us from The Evil. It is the absorption of that electronic mythology that allowed us to cosign the torture at Abu Ghraib. Abu Ghraib photos. Believe me; they picked the gentlest ones to release. Ray Hardy, lawyer. When the media and government people in power made that selection, they were managing your consciousness. Keeping you calmer by withholding the truth. Not upsetting little children so they will continue to quietly behave the way you want. Like children public got bored with the subject of torture. New evidence has been coming out for years short American attention span, created by our rapid-fire media, says, "Move on to the next hologram please
He result is that Americans cannot achieve the cathexis we need. Cathexis is the ground zero psychic and emotional attachment to the world that cannot be argued. It is "beyond ideological challenge, because it is called into existence affectively." Americans are conditioned to reject any affective attachment that does not have a happy ending. We remain mostly a nation of children. We never get to grow up. We tell ourselves that we are a great and compassionate people and that we are personally innocent of any of our government's horrific crimes abroad.
Guiltless as individuals. And we do remain innocent, in a sense, as long as we cannot see beyond the media hologram.
But it is a terrible kind of self-inflicted innocence that can come to no good. We are a nation of latchkey kids babysat by an electronic hallucination, the national hologram.
http://hobopoet.com/the-real-world/
“Severance from the noise and electronic hallucinations of modern existence”.
They believe that this electronic hallucination of human society is the sum total of “life” and “the world”. They live according to the programming presented to them.
Most modern people are asleep... hypnotized by media. A sure way to wake up…
Into the wilderness. Unplug
Electronic hallucination and media hologram
THE HACK THIRTY
About the Hack Thirty
We're listing the worst columnists and cable news commentators America has to offer. Think of this as our all-star team -- of the most predictable, dishonest and just plain stupid pundits in the media.
The Hack Thirty
4. David Broder
5. Marty Peretz
8. Maureen Dowd
10. Peggy Noonan
11. George Will
12. John Fund
13. Roger Simon
14. David Ignatius
15. Mort Zuckerman
16. Michael Barone
17. Bill Kristol
18. Tina Brown
19. Joe Klein
20. Howard Fineman
21. S.E. Cupp
22. Tucker Carlson
23. Howard Kurtz
24. Dana Milbank
25. Mickey Kaus
26. Jeffrey Goldberg
27. Pat Caddell
28. Andrew Malcolm
29. Matt Bai
30. David Brooks
Friday, November 26, 2010
Akin On Thanksgiving: Pilgrims Fled Socialism To Come To America
They came here with the idea that after trying socialism that it wasn’t going to work. They realized that it was unbiblical, that it was a form of theft, so they pitched socialism out. They learned that in the early 1620’s.
Thursday, November 25, 2010
Broadways - Everything I ever wanted to know about genocide I ...
Third graders holding hands
Indians and Pilgrims celebrating new found lands
They tried to teach me that at school
Make the white man look superior, it's always been their rule
Now I can't believe we celebrate Thanksgiving as a holiday of unit...y and peace
If I had my way, we'd all dress in black
And Daddy would serve up the white meat
'Cause genocide is nothing to celebrate, extinction doesn't deserve a parade
And we perpetuate these lies with the turkeys that we buy
I tried explaining to my mom but she's too afraid to admit to herself
That her race is a killing machine
Take a look around your town and who do you see?
The Native American is surprisingly absent in his own indigenous land
Do you want to know why? It's 'cause we killed them all
It's not that hard to understand, yeah
So I go to college and you know what I learned?
That 80 million people were killed by my grandpa,
Your grandpa and all of their friends
They bleached out our continent but that's not the end
The last full blooded Aborigine died a century ago
If it's possible there's a place in the southern hemisphere
With a history even worse than our own
No one finds it peculiar
That a tropical island is full of people just like you and me
But Australia's a piece of shit floating in the Pacific
Buoyed by the blood of the Aborigine.
Buoyed by the blood of the Aborigine.
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
THEN...YOU'RE A BAD FUCKING MONKEY
Actually the terrorists are on the payroll and the authorities generally manage to let them through to conduct the false flag terror operations which then justify all these humiliating procedures and so much more. These unfortunate terrorist incident lapses are generally "regrettable" and typically caused by "human error," and also by the terrorists always being so incredibly wily -- you have no idea, so everyone understands and it's such a bummer and some flunkie might get fired somewhere, but then we all agree (well not all of us) that unfortunately they need to ratchet up the security as a result and we move on, SAFER. Phew.
But it would be unfriendly to call people ignorant on Facebook, your friendly social engineering laboratory, and at this point we think that anyone who is still so woefully confused at this late stage of the game can continue to be the government's monkey and knock yourself out.
If the terrorists do something, we follow. That's the game. Monkey see monkey do.
- A terrorist tries to put a bomb in his shoe. So you take off your shoes now because you could be a terrorist like him.
- There was a woman terrorist once, and she had explosives strapped under her breasts. So you let the TSA feel your breasts now because you could be a terrorist like her.
- A terrorist once had explosives in his underpants. You let the TSA feel your underpants now because you could be a terrorist like him.
And so forth and so on. Powders and gels. Liquids. Nail scissors. Whatever. You are the monkey. The terrorists lead the game.
Imagine the possibilities! They only have to try something once and then you have to FOREVER MORE submit to a check for whatever they decided to try, no matter how humiliating or ridiculous. The government says so. And if you don't like it, you are a bad fucking monkey.
Monday, November 22, 2010
Chalmers Johnson on the Myth of Free Trade
a doctrine they call “neoliberalism is a rerun of what economists suffering from “historical amnesia” believe were the key characteristics of the international economy in the golden age of liberalism (1870-1913)
The complex includes privatizing state-owned enterprises, maintaining low inflation, shrinking the size of the state bureaucracy, balancing the national budget, liberalizing trade, deregulating foreign investment, making the currency freely convertible, reducing corruption, and privatizing pensions.
It is called neoliberalism because of its acceptance of rich-country monopolies over intellectual property rights (patents, copyrights, etc.); the granting to a country’s central bank of a monopoly to issue bank notes, and its assertion that political democracy is conducive to economic growth
Economist, Ha-Joon Chang, All of today’s rich countries used protection and subsidies to encourage their manufacturing industries, and they discriminated powerfully against foreign investors. More important than Adam Smith is Daniel Defoe, “A Plan of the English Commerce” (1728) which develops industrial policy of the woolen manufacturing industry which became the most important export industry. Robert Walpole, the chief architect of the mercantilist system. Protectionist policies with average tariff of 45 and 55 percent
By 1820 Hamilton’s 40 percent tariff on manufactured imports into the United States was an established fact. Hamilton provided the blueprint for U.S. economic policy until the end of the Second World War.
The U.S. abandonment of overt protectionism after it became the world’s richest nation still found measures to advance beyond what market forces could have achieved. U.S. government actually paid for 50 to 70 percent of the country’s total expenditures on research and development from the 1950s through the mid-1990s, usually under the cover of defense spending.
During the golden age of capitalism, from the Marshall Plan (1947) to the first oil shock (1973), the United States was a Good Samaritan and helped developing countries
In the 1970s, its position as global hegemon was being undermined and it turned decisively toward neoliberalism. This was to bring the developing countries to heel and slow down economic growth in the Third World. Third World countries were Forced to adopt neoliberal policies, open their economies to more powerful foreign competitors on unequal terms
Because of the shortcomings of neoliberalism it was necessary to find plausible scapegoats. Wolfowitz (now at the World Bank) put forward poor-country corruption
They failed because the didn’t take the good advice of the Washington Consensus
The problem with the explanation today’s rich public life was spectacularly corrupt were that conundrums encountered. Zaire under Gen. Mobutu and Indonesia under Gen. Suharto. Both were flagrantly corrupt. Zaire’s living standards fell. Indonesia’s rose. In Indonesia, the money from corruption mostly stayed inside the country
Free trade, privatization, and the rest of their policies are a historical, self-serving economic nonsense, apologists gave a neo-Nazi explanation, and it was culture. Samuel Huntington’s thesis, clash of civilizations. Francis Fukuyama no trust extending beyond family members, difficult for them to run large firms. It was reminiscent of Max Weber, who in 1904 stated that Confucian/Buddhist countries were backward because they lacked the Protestant ethic
Economically successful nations are almost pathologically afraid of competitors coming up from below.
“Level playing field”? United States and Honduras should compete economically on equal terms? European citizens support their dairy industry with subsidies and tariffs to the tune of 16 billion pounds sterling a year and a vast range of agricultural commodities.
U.S. subsidizes corn and exports it to Mexico. Bankrupt Mexican farmers, who immigrate to the US. Japan lavishly subsidizes its extremely inefficient rice growers and prevents the import of rice that could easily compete. This creates one-party rule by mobilizing rich, protected farmers, who vote for the conservatives.
This is some of the hypocrisy surrounding “free trade”
“Belief in the virtue of free trade is so central to the neo-liberal orthodoxy
Sunday, November 21, 2010
Saturday, November 20, 2010
Declassified: Massive Israeli manipulation of US media exposed
These files are from a sealed Senate investigations senate which includes Foreign Relations Committee and the US Dep’t of Justice
Israel spent36 million dollars to plant stories in the us media, To promote Israeli foreign policy objectives in the US. One objective was to divert from Dimona and track result
Using outlets the Atlantic Monthly magazine to disrupt US peace proposals allowing Palestinian to return to their land
US media fell into line. The Senate Investigation was a failure, heavily censored senate transcript and then put all of the extremely damning files into sealed records.
One result was that Israeli Ops had to register as foreign so they Simply transferred the ops into AIPAC
The Atlantic is on the forefront of a drive to get us to attack Iran nuclear sights.
Important to see the influence and the mechanics, it has only gotten worse.
There is a heavy influence on the part of Israeli politicians that work tightly with Israel without disclosing those relationships
They have successfully built a campaign financing system within the United States that is extremely successful at pushing Israeli objectives by withholding or dispersing campaign funds to us politicians a high degree of control is in place but for the average American it is almost completely hidden
Institute for research Middle Eastern policy Grant F Smith
Friday, November 19, 2010
Thursday, November 18, 2010
Wednesday, November 17, 2010
Gay activists chain selves to gate
If only people were chaining themselves to the White House fence to protest our outrageously extravagant military budget instead of demanding the right to join the armed forces of a country that spends more on “defense” than all other nations of the world combined.
Poll: Most Republicans don’t believe in climate change, but the number has moved from 62 to 53 in three years
In the poll, 53 percent of Republicans said there is no evidence for climate change, when only three years ago 62 percent of GOPers said they did believe in global warming. Almost 80 percent of Democrats and a majority of independents said there is solid evidence for global warming.
Of course they're changing their opinion. Opinion manufactured just in time for the new bubble, the carbon trading bubble, another theft by Goldman Sachs, of course, who else?
"Push Michael Moore Off a Cliff": Health Insurance Whistleblower Wendell Potter Details How the Industry Attacked Michael Moore’s Film Sicko
They are going to make more money by providing less care - Halderman
Spratly Islands
Beijing is encouraging Chinese firms to heavily invest in electricity, coal and gas-oil projects in Indonesia. CNOOC, China’s major offshore oil producer, has reported that its investment in the country will exceed $5.6 billion by 2011. In 2009, Chinese direct investment grew by 29 percent.
On the eve of Obama’s visit, a Chinese delegation led by National People’s Congress head Wu Bangguo pledged a further $6.6 billion of investments in infrastructure and development projects, outdoing the US financial commitments by a factor of 20-to-1.
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
Daniel Estulin: Bout just a pawn, endgame - to get at Russia
Even if Bout has done all he is accused of and more, and that's not likely, it's still small time. The real money is in state sanctioned 'legal' weapons of war where the U.S. is number one by far - it's the only industry left. Combat planes are the big seller (now we just give 'em away to certain clients). It makes the trade in AK47's and small missiles peanuts in comparison. The only comparable money maker is drugs and with the CIA having a hand in much of that trade in Afghanistan, Columbia and elsewhere, it's only logical that arms, dope and war will walk hand in hand. It makes the bankers smile. It's pretty plain to me that this is about FARC, anyway. I love the smell of napalm in the morning - in Caracas.
NEOCON = LIBERAL HUMANITARIAN INTERVENTION
“Devil’s Game” by Robert Dreyfuss, which agrees 100% with the neocons on the ‘Nazi’ nature of ‘Islamism’, differing with them only on whether the solution is to
- carpet-bomb the whole of south Asia, or to
- subvert it with liberal ‘progress’ instead.
Monday, November 15, 2010
Saturday, November 13, 2010
9/11 Ad Campaign Asks NYC City Council To Investigate Collapse Of WTC-7 ...
What's going on? When Geraldo Rivera on Fox News has a feature on the controlled demolition of WTC 7 that's not a hit piece, it appears there's something stirring.
Rivera even says "It is an intriguing topic, I'm certainly much more open minded about it than I was and it is because of the involvement of the 9/11 families and all these engineers and architects, clearly they know more than I do."
"It is an intriguing topic. I certainly am much more open minded about it than I was, and it is because of the involvement of the 9/11 families and all these engineers and architects. CLEARLY THEY KNOW MORE THAN I DO." ~ Geraldo Rivera
Wow is right! But it is hard to believe that the TPTB would allow this kind of exposure unless they're planning something else. Why would they want this kind of exposure, Unless it a Hegelian move. This is an "END GAME" type of move.
I have always thought that 911 was more than just an excuse for WAR (and making money) for them. They left to many clues. They wanted this thing to get disclosed eventually. Its the next move in the Chess Match.
Check Mate SOON!!!!
He played the clips where the repoorters said "They pulled building 7."
I think Geraldo is waking up. Said he is more open to the idea that it was an inside job.
you can't wake up to something you already know. geraldo is just following the script laid out for him by his bosses.
he knows wtc7 was demo'd and had nothing to do with flying aye rabz. go watch jesse's show on goldman sachs, he spills the beans on that one...... but jesse works for truTV which is owned by TBS which is owned by time warner.
time warner is part of tptb. so why would they start exposing themselves. thats the trillion dollar question... geraldo works for murdoch.. another ptb.
my friends, they are going to blow the lid off 9/11. the american sheeple will be dumbfounded. the only problem is... who are they gonna blame? the spooky illuminati? the bildergers? skull and bones? knights templars.. jesuits.. the pope/vatican?
my point is.... we are seeing the final stages of pre war propaganda. when sean hannity finally looks in the camera and admits 9/11 was a false flag... you better hide the kids and yourself. (they are getting ready to go hot)
Friday, November 12, 2010
LA MISSILE
clipped from: twelfthbough.blogspot.com
Chinese Navy Jin class ballistic missile nuclear submarine
home base on the south coast of Hainan island, launched an intercontinental ballistic missile from international waters
intelligence sources in Asia, including Japan
demonstrate
capabilities on the eve of the G-20
The day after the missile firing, China’s leading credit rating agency, Dagong Global Credit Rating, downgraded sovereign debt rating of the United States to A-plus from AA
a military and financial show of force
Pentagon spin
condensation trail from a jet aircraft
amateur rocket or an optical illusion
There are no records of a plane in the area
The Navy and Air Force have said that they were not conducting any missile tests from submarines, ships, or Vandenberg Air Force Base. The Navy has also ruled out an accidental firing from one of its own submarines.
Missile experts, including those from Jane’s in London, say the plume was definitely from a missile, possibly launched from a submarine
clipped from: twelfthbough.blogspot.com
likely a JL-2 ICBM, which has a range of 7,000 miles, and was fired in a northwesterly direction over the Pacific and away from U.S. territory from a Jin class submarine. The Jin class can carry up to twelve such missiles
transited from its base on Hainan through South Pacific waters, where U.S. anti-submarine warfare detection capabilities are not as effective
The Pentagon, which has spent billions on ballistic missile defense systems
Beijing has been angry over United States and allied naval exercises in the South China and Yellow Seas
Is it a show of force by the Chinese or a false flag
Do the Chinese have an incentive to send a message, a show of force, to the US, given the economic warfare presently underway? Yes.
Do the Chinese want to play into the role of villain being thrust on them by the controlled US media? We would think the answer to that is NO.
Therefore, we are not convinced the Chinese would take this step.
Thursday, November 11, 2010
CRACK CAPITALISM
Change the World Without Taking Power
you contend that the possibility of revolution resides not in the seizure of state apparatuses, but in day-to-day acts of abject refusal of capitalist society, the struggle against power, not for power.
the possibility of revolution resides not in the seizure of state apparatuses, but in day-to-day acts of abject refusal of capitalist society
struggle against power, not for power
create cracks in capitalist domination
- The Zapatistas
- movement in Argentina in 2001/2002
- MST in Brazil
walking in the opposite direction
focus on social movements, not political parties
drive against the logic of capitalist society
The problem with political parties is that they channel anti-capitalist anger back into a capitalist form, the form of the state. We need to give this anti-capitalist anger an anti-capitalist form of organisation
- Paris Commune,
- the soviets in Russia,
- the anarchist councils in Spain,
- the asambleas barriales in Argentina,
- the communal councils of the Zapatistas with their mandar obedeciendo,
- the cabildos in Bolivia
the state is a form of organisation that was constructed to subordinate social conflict to the dynamic of capital, it separates leaders from led, and that excludes people
state. It can be used to bring change on behalf of the people, but it cannot be the organisational form of change by the people.
Zapatista was a new way of organising against capitalism, of talking against capitalism, a new grammar of anti-capitalist revolution. The argentinazo of 2001/2002 was urban zapatismo.
Your work has irked left-leaning governments like Chavez, Evo Morales, FMLN backed government of El Salvador. Is there a conflict of interest between social movements and political parties? Is the electoral victory of left parties impacting negatively on the grassroots social movements?
I would rather have Chávez or Evo or Dilma or Christina Kirchner to the right wing alternatives, and I think AMLO would have been less disastrous than Calderón here in Mexico, but with capitalist form of government there are too many forces that pull governments back in to the logic of capitalist accumulation.
Left-wing governments champion Progress, we are the anti-progressive left, opposed to the destructive Progress that is at the core of capitalism. The great struggles of recent years against Progress –
- the extension of the línea 12 of the Metro in Mexico City
- paper mills in Uruguay
- Walmarts in Cuernavaca and Puebla
- mining of lithium in Bolivia
- destruction of the Amazon in Peru
Right-wing attacks on left-wing governments are very clearly attacks on the people those governments claim to (but do not) represent. CONAIE in Ecuador defence of the President to criticise his failure to really implement measures of change.
the Zapatista example of the impossibility of attempting to build a revolution without deposing the existing state power
yes, the resonance of the movement is not as strong as it used to be and yes there is a failure to expand and multiply. This can be explained in many ways –
- the growth of a climate of fear in Mexico,
- the impact of the narcos and the growing militarization of the country,
- the ebb of the global anti-capitalist movement for the moment
Of missiles & money - don’t ask, won’t tell
Of course its an aeroplane, just like the one that crashed into the pentagon.
And they're not dangerous unlike that guy over there with a beard and a pair of shoes in his underpants.
Wednesday, November 10, 2010
THE PRICE OF IDOLATRY
The price for the Religious Right’s wholesale idolatry of private everything was that Christ’s reputation was tied to a cynical political party owned by billionaires from the fast-food industry, raping the earth (not to mention our health), to the oil companies destroying our climate. It only remained for a Far Right Republican-appointed majority on the Supreme Court to rule in 2010 (Citizens United V. The Federal Election Commission), that unlimited corporate money could pour into political campaigns – anonymously -- in a way that clearly favored corporate America and the super wealthy who long since were the only entities served by the Republican Party’s defense of the individual against the government. The “individuals” turned out to be Exxon, the Koch brothers, Rupert Murdoch, McDonald’s and Goldman Sachs et al.
Then the internet came along and Fox News came along and Rush Limbaugh, Michele Bachmann et all came along and no fiction was too fantastical to be believed as fact. We passed into a high tech stone age, myth superstition and outright lies gained a new currency.
This was the logical conclusion of the process of delegitimizing the Federal Government that was launched by the Reconstructionists, the anti-abortion movement and of course is fed by the “Left Behind”/Christian Zionist apocalyptic revenge fantasy.
The Billionaire Lynch Mob’s only sacrament is fear. Their reward for cashing in on white religiously-believing middle class American’s addiction to Bronze Age biblical mythology is to walk away with our country. And fear-filled white Americans don’t get anything in return, unless you count their fleeting visceral pleasure of putting “that uppity black man” in the White House in his place.
Frank Schaeffer is a writer and author of many books including Crazy for God: How I Grew Up as One of the Elect, Helped Found the Religious Right, and Lived to Take All (or Almost All) of It Back
Monday, November 08, 2010
Sunday, November 07, 2010
Saturday, November 06, 2010
Friday, November 05, 2010
BILL CLINTON'S GENOCIDE
More than 6 million civilians would later die under Bill Clinton’s eight-year reign – with American money, weapons and political support.
Bill Clinton is the one who established the stranglehold that the murderous gang of Gen. Kagame of Rwanda and Yoweri Museveni of Uganda have on the people of central Africa
In 1990, Gen. Kagame, who was the chief of military intelligence in Uganda, led a violent invasion of Rwanda from Uganda, with the approval and support – financial, military and political – of the United States government. This violent war changed the landscape of that region forever.
A Sept. 30, 2010, New York Times mentions how in the fall of 1994, a United Nations investigation discovered that Gen. Kagame’s forces had killed tens of thousands of innocent civilians that year. Under pressure from Bill Clinton’s government, the United Nations was forced not to publish that report
But that was 1994, a year that is famous for extremist Hutus who went on a rampage
after that
Gen. Kagame of Rwanda and Yoweri Museveni of Uganda used American money, American weapons and, with American political support, attacked neighboring Democratic Republic of Congo, where their forces butchered so many millions of civilians
Bill Clinton said this about his buddy Gen. Kagame: “Right now I’m not going to pre-judge him because there’s this huge debate about what happened in the Congo and why, and I don’t know.” To which human rights researcher Carina Tertsakian responded to the Daily Beast: “It is not a matter of pre-judging. … The facts are well-established. … There is no doubt that Rwandan troops, together with their Congolese allies, committed large-scale massacres and other grave human-rights violations against Rwandan and Congolese civilians. The evidence is there for all to see. What more does Clinton need?”
see also: http://sfbayview.com/2010/u-s-u-n-cover-up-of-kagames-genocide-in-rwanda-and-congo/
CLASS CONSCIOUSNESS/CLASS ANALYSIS
"Class consciousness is knowing which side of the fence you're on; class analysis is knowing who is there with you."
Thursday, November 04, 2010
THE ISLAMIC ARCH
clipped from: dissidentvoice.org
Islamic arch is the strategic centre of gravity
China’s economic development is freeing the countries of the South
The world balance of power is being completely overturned. And the Indian Ocean region finds itself at the heart of the geopolitical storm.
60% of the world's population
70% of the world's oil is shipped through this Ocean
For centuries the West has been looting, But China is offering higher prices for raw materials and is investing in the countries of the South. China has at the same time abolished import taxes on numerous African products. China has also written off the debts of the poorest African countries. China does not interfere in the internal policies. while western powers which never cease creating and bringing down African governments!
western capitalist countries are going through a severe economic crisis while China
continuing with a healthy rate of economic growth. Brazil continued to grow
south-south axis poses two major threats to the imperialist powers,
removing countries that are rich in raw materials from the western sphere of influence
allowing China to access to all the resources it needs to pursue its stellar growth
Washington is therefore seeking to contain the emergence of China and the control of the Indian Ocean lies at the heart of its strategy.
Somalia is the historic Islamic heart of East Africa. They took Sunni Islam all the way to Mozambique.
Before the Suez Canal was opened in 1869, Ottomans, Persians Moghuls and China dominated. This enabled Islam to expand even to China and East Africa. The Indian Ocean came to be largely dominated by Muslim powers.
But a major event, Sepoy revolt in 1857 began the process of European domination
Karl Marx analysed thusly, "Their methods are barbaric, but we should ask ourselves who led them to display such barbarity – it was the British colonialists installed in India". something similar, 11 September. nobody asks what are the factors that have given rise to this kind of terrorism.
sepoy rebellion had two important consequences ; firstly,
management passed officially to the administration of the British government. And
Great Britain deposed the last Islamic ruler of India, the Moghul emperor, Mohammed Bahadur Shah. He was exiled to Burma where he lived out the end of his life.
11 years after the sepoy revolt, the Suez Canal was opened. It was an important factor in facilitating European domination of that ocean. France seized Djibouti. Britain seized first Egypt and then Bahrain. Empire of the Sultanate of Oman was the last great Arabic power active in the Indian Ocean. Europeans mounted a propaganda campaign around the fact that Omanis were exploiting Africans as slaves. Under the pretext of fighting slavery, Europe mobilised and overthrew the Sultanate of Oman
Pentagon is well embedded, base in Okinawa, accords with the Philippines under pretext of fighting terrorism, Indonesian army, base on Diego Garcia
China has two Achilles heels: the straits of Hormuz and of Malacca. The US could block the Straits of Malacca.
China has developed several strategies
A gas pipeline is now linking Turkmenistan to the Chinese province of Xinjiang, 40 billion cubic metres a year, half of current Chinese consumption. also, pipeline linking China to Kazakhstan Caspian Sea.
entered into accords with Bangladesh to acquire gas and oil. an oil pipeline and a gas pipeline which will respectively supply from Myanmar. third Chinese strategy, ‘pearl necklace’. deep water port of Gwadar for traffic in container ships
build others, in Africa in particular. to China from Latin America. these container ships would rather travel via Africa in their journeys between Latin America and Asia
Mozambique, Somalia, South Africa or Madagascar could join this Indian Ocean network.
This will cause a major economic boom in this part of Africa. Marseilles or Antwerp would decline. South-South axis is being established. The world is being turned upside down.
clipped from: dissidentvoice.org
Until the 19th century, China was a great power.
Viceroy Lin Zexu ordered the destruction of 1838 chests full of opium that Great Britain had been importing illegally
first Opium War
Beaten, the Chinese were forced to open
imperialist powers
demanded legalisation of opium sales
Great Britain and France unleashed the “Second opium war” (1856-1860)
sale of opium was legalised and Great Britain and the US devoted themselves to it at great profit to themselves
caused the death of over 100 million Chinese people
1949 and the revolution led by Mao that China re-established itself
Deng Xiaoping
under Mao
7 and 10 percent every year
China could become an entirely capitalist country, but one that is not dominated by imperialism
US will seek to prevent
has
China
become an imperialist power
Confusion exists
over Lenin’s definition of imperialism
export of capital to foreign countries
this economic domination is inseparable from a political domination
if you are an imperialist, you must
clipped from: dissidentvoice.org
export your capital, create a puppet
train your semi colony’s army to organise military putsches if the puppet was to disobey
Honduras
imperialism rests on a two-fold domination, economic and political
China does not interfere in the politics
but on the contrary assists countries that are the victims of imperialism to free themselves
direct military confrontation with China seems improbable
Washington seems still to be mired in the Middle East
other strategies
vassal states in Africa in order to control that continent and block China’s access to raw materials.
applied after the Second World War to contain Japan’s development.
Egypt
Ethiopia
Nigeria
South Africa. But this strategy has failed
snub
Pentagon
Africom
Every country
refused
“collective African decision”
even
Zambia
Currently
based in … Stuttgart
Another US strategy
use India against China
Iran and Iraq in the 1980s
the 1960s
the US
used India
against China
India was beaten
But in the Far East
Washington has failed because of its greed. South-east Asia
1997
clipped from: dissidentvoice.org
started with a devaluation of the Thai currency
attack from speculators
White House
US multinationals took advantage
wipe out their Asian competitors
it was China which saved the region
decision not to devalue its currency
China allowed the countries of the region to rebuild their exports
Malaysian prime minister declared “China
saved the region
China
hegemony
US thought
Indian Ocean would be frightened
seek to be protected
China
relations based on
equality
US has
lost
China
needs energy
US is
seeking to control these resources to prevent them reaching China
major objective
in Iraq and Afghanistan
fiasco
new Iraqi and Afghan government trade with China!
Chinese companies simply bought up oil concessions at auction
one option still open
maintaining chaos
extending it to countries such as Iran, Yemen or Somalia.
Second World War
intervened very late in the conflict
financed (very lucratively) both sides
Finally,
to the assistance of the Allies.
Great Britain
debt
German
destroyed
USSR
20 million dead
clipped from: dissidentvoice.org
then spent all the jackpot
to fight against communism
US economy was militarised
Korea to Iraq, via Vietnam
for every dollar
60 cents goes to the army. It’s a disaster
other major industries have been destroyed,
public schools and hospitals are in a deplorable state
militarisation process has plunged the US into debt
main creditor
China
Thus in financing US debt, China in fact finances the war on terror
Pentagon is waging
control the energy
to contain
China
US has failed and
on the edge of bankruptcy
one option left
reduce its military expenditure and to utilise its budget to kickstart the economy
But imperialist logic
keeps going unto the death. The historian Paul Kennedy
great empires
economy
slowing down
military expenditure increases
great power
disappear
US hegemony nearing its end
return to protectionism
end of globalisation
Regional economic blocs will emerge
Asia will be the strongest
Europe?
two types of leader
pro-US
truly European
are allying with Russia
8 years of the Bush
aggressive policies
clipped from: dissidentvoice.org
massive military expenditure
crushing defeats
accelerated the fall of the US
the reactionary character of US imperialism has resurfaced
Imperialism cannot be changed or adapted. It has to be overthrown
All the world’s peoples have an interest
putting an end as quickly as possible to the western hegemony that has engendered so much aggression and crime
a grand alliance to emerge
to develop themselves independently and in the interests of their people, i.e., by escaping from the imperialist powers’ looting and interference.
To put an end to the hegemony of the imperialist powers will open up great potential for the liberation of the people of the world.
Tuesday, November 02, 2010
Stewart's rally signaled — whether consciously or not — a degree of political backpedaling on his part
In reality, society is torn apart by economic and social inequality, dominated by giant corporations that benefit from low wages and foreign wars. These same corporations — owned by super-rich individuals — also benefit from the lies, anger, and insanity broadcast by the mainstream media. The phenomenon of scare tactics directly benefits giant corporations who want a subdued populace so they can pursue their business-friendly agenda.
Stewart does his audience a great disservice by not recognizing the profit-motive behind the right-wing fear-mongers, who are paid large salaries by corporations to divide and confuse working people.
In fact, these right-wingers are given such large venues because their politics are in line with the foreign and domestic policy interests of a number of very rich people who own TV channels and other corporations.
STALIN'S WAR: FROM "THE POST-AMERICAN WORLD
This is the American narrative of World History, in which Britain and the USA heroically defeated the forces of fascist Germany and Japan. The rest of the world laughs at this narrative. In fact, the eastern front was the central arena of WWII. It involved more land combat than all other theaters of the war put together and resulted in thirty million deaths. It was where three- quarters of all German forces fought and where Germany incurred 70 percent of its casualties. The European front was in many ways a sideshow, but in the West it was treated as the main show. Stephen Ambrose “lavishes [attention] on the US-British invasion of Sicily, which drove 60,000 Germans from the island, but completely ignores Kursk - the largest battle in history, in which at least 1.5 million Soviets and Germans fought, and which occurred at exactly the same time. The struggle against Nazi Germany was primarily, as the great military historian John Erickson called it, "Stalin's War.
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