Monthly Archives: June 2007

Farfour Mouse vs Mickey

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It’s hard to believe how lost in LaLaLa Land are America’s proZionist conservatives. One big issue for some of them is the supposed ‘hostage taking’ of Mickey Mouse by Gaza Strip’s Farfour Mouse. I’m not making this stuff up either! See Farfour for yourself.

These lunatics of the American Right don’t get riled up about what Israel and the US have done to the million plus people of the Gaza Strip, way over 50% of them children. It matters not the least to them that Gaza has the lowest standard fo living in the world, and that most of the inhabitants living in this total misery are children. No. Instead they are worried about this mouse, Farfour! They’re worried that he’s a terrorist rat teaching the kids to hate! Can you imagine how lost in nonsense these nuts actually are? They’re our neighbors, too. Scary.

Here is another clip with some CNN commentary of Farfour in action, but go read the American posters’ comments and see who is really sick in the head. And nobody seems too concerned about Farfoura. But then again she’s not a mouse, is she? She’s more the butterfly… The Daffy Zionist Ducks can handle that. But don’t pick on Walt’s pre-WW2 made fascist rodent, or they get all upset.

And nobody seems to care about Walt Disney himself. He wa a rather loathsome character.
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Below is the real situation in Gaza, where per capita GDP is now around $500-$600 per year and falling.
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on the 40th anniversary of occupation my statement in the UN
SPECIAL MEETING TO MARK 40 YEARS OF OCCUPATION
BY ISRAEL OF THE PALESTINIAN TERRITORY,
INCLUDING EAST JERUSALEM

UNITED NATIONS HEADQUARTERS, NEW YORK
7 June 2007
STATEMENT BY

DR. MONA EL FARRA
PROJECTS DIRECTOR
MIDDLE EAST CHILDREN’S ALLIANCE

Red Crescent Society For Gaza Strip
GAZA

?Your Excellency Mr. Paul Badji, Chairman of the Committee,
Distinguished guests and Excellencies,

It is my honour to be amongst you today, despite the gravity of the occasion being commemorated, on this 40th anniversary of the Israeli occupation of the Gaza Strip, the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

First, let me say that 2007 is the 40th anniversary of 59 years of the brutal occupation of the Palestinian people.

As we called for an end to apartheid in South Africa and the right of all people to live together and have equal rights, we must now, before it is too late, call for true justice for the Palestinians.

Today, we heard about the economic plight of the Palestinian people. We heard about Palestinians in Israeli prisons which number close to 8,000 men and women, including approximately 350 children under the age of 14, most of whom have been tortured.

How many UN resolutions must be passed by the UN? How many years of calling for 2 States before there is an understanding that Israel continues its aggression on the ground against women, children and men, the demolition of thousands of homes and the continued building of the apartheid wall?

Let us not just speak of the Palestinians in the West Bank, Gaza. We must never forget those who live as second-class citizens inside Israel and most of all, those who were forced from their homes and lands in 1948.

Now is the time to call for a real peace, with justice for all the children in the region. This can only be accomplished by supporting the right of return of all Palestinians.

Now is the time to acknowledge that the two-State solution is not the answer.

From Gaza I came, where the children of my country have no safe homes, no safe streets, no proper and adequate health facilities, no proper food, clean water, or regular electrical power, no recreational activities and no good education. The list of deprivation of their basic needs is too long to count.

I lived this occupation as a child, and am still living it as an adult. I can see it in the eyes of my daughter when she is afraid, tired, restless and exhausted because of the unsafe and unpredictable quality of life in Gaza under occupation. I saw it as soon as we crossed the borders on our way to Egypt, where she sensed something new and different: freedom, safety and space. Gaza is like a big, unsafe prison. And it is a very small place for 1.4 million people, half of whom are children.

I face the occupation every day during my work when hundreds of Palestinian patients are denied permits and accessibility to proper medical treatment, outside Gaza. There are a few lucky patients who get a referral and permit for treatment outside Gaza. The majority, however, have to wait and wait. Many die while waiting.

What is more heart-breaking than children who do not have adequate food and a healthy atmosphere to grow up to be well rounded adults? According to the Health Work Committees Organization, 42 per cent of children in Gaza under the age of 5 suffer from iron deficiency anemia and 45 per cent suffer from some form of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, due to the experiences that they are subjected to as a result of the non-stop military actions of the Israeli Occupation Forces, which almost always affect civilians in one way or another.

I will never forget the story of a woman in labor, who had to wait several hours at a checkpoint last November, during one of many Israeli military operations in the north of Gaza. Eventually she arrived at the Al Awda hospital in Jabalia refugee camp where she gave birth to her baby. When she left the hospital with the baby to go to home in the village of Beit Hanoun, there was no home; her home had been demolished by the Israeli occupying army. There are many cases and many stories, but I believe it is not the numbers that really matter, even one incident such as the above is one enough human rights violation.

I remember a 4-year old child in the same village who was forced to stay in one room with all members of his family for 48 hours while the Israeli Army commandeered their home. The child was thirsty and the soldier was there with his bottle of water, the occupied and the occupier in the same space. The soldier offered water to the thirsty child. The child said “no, no, no”. The child’s natural reaction was a combination of fear of what the soldier represents and the steadfastness in the face of the occupation. This is what characterizes the Palestinian people: steadfastness and resistance in the face of all adversity; even small children can express it with their natural reactions more than any words or speeches. The soldier on the other hand is a human being that has been forced by the Israeli occupation machine to lose his humanity.

Whenever I think of Palestinian children and their lives under occupation, I always think of the Israeli children. As adults, we have a commitment to both sets of children to provide a safe environment for them to live peacefully. It is not the occupation or the wall or the ongoing aggression against my people that will bring safety or security for Israeli children, only peace that is based on justice will do so. Justice means that the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people must be considered. Israel must recognize its moral responsibility towards the Palestinian refugees.

While Israel is physically outside Gaza, it still completely controls our lives, all aspects of our lives: health, education, economy and freedom of movement.

Life under occupation is degrading to human dignity. It has deprived us of our freedom, and only free people can make peace. It is most peculiar that we are forced to deal with the patterns of life under occupation as normal, well-established facts and when people lost hope and faith in the world or any future chances for change, and when the world turns its head away.

On the 40th anniversary of the Israeli occupation of the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem, it is fitting to call once again on the international community to put pressure on Israel to fulfil its obligations by abiding by the UN resolutions related to Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Israeli occupation should be ended now and the right of return must not be forgotten.

Thank you.

‘The Peace and Stability Industry’ goes to work ‘for’ Darfur

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Yes, there is such a creature that calls itself ‘The Peace and Stability Industry‘. The ‘International Peace Operations Association’ considers themselves to be just that. And they’re for ‘Saving Darfur’.

The money for the Justice and Peace Darfur benefit tomorrow is going to a group called CARE. Here is an article that mentions in passing their general level of awareness of issues regarding US based military contractors and Darfur.
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The Privatization Agenda: Hired Guns and Darfur

The U.S. under the Bush administration has served up more money for Darfur than any other country has to date. But when President Bush announces that he’s giving an impressive $10 million a month to AMIS, as he did in one of his innumerable Darfur press releases last year, where do all those greenbacks actually go? The answer may surprise readers who are unfamiliar with the modern cash cow of private security contracting. Much of it is channeled to Pacific Architects and Engineers (PAE)—an L.A.-based subsidiary of Lockheed Martin, the world’s largest defense contractor. Another significant portion goes to the L.A.-based DynCorp International, a name you may recognize from the child sex trafficking scandal in Bosnia, or the alleged beatings of journalists in Haiti, or the toxic crop-spraying in Colombia. No individual DynCorp employee has been prosecuted in any of these cases. To the contrary, DynCorp went on to win more lucrative contracts in Iraq and Afghanistan … and, yes, Darfur.

Whereas the lack of accountability for hired guns in America’s current wars has proved to be one of the major stories of the past few years (think Blackwater in Fallujah, or Titan at Abu Ghraib), there’s been hardly a peep about U.S. defense contractors on the ground in Darfur. When I asked a senior official from CARE—a major humanitarian group working throughout Sudan—about the phenomenon, she replied: “Our people are not aware of private contractors in Darfur. Some in Khartoum, but not Darfur.” This oversight is difficult to comprehend, given that the vast majority of AMIS projects in Darfur are managed by PAE and DynCorp employees, from the building of barracks to the provision of strategic transport…..
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This is just an excerpt from the whole article Can Drag Queens and Hired Guns Save Darfur? at Truthdig. One might also mention that Lockheed is the largest military-industrial employer in Colorado Springs.

Impeach! Goodbye Dems.

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Bush is claiming Executive Privilege in refusing to shed light on the possible nefarious dealing of his underlings. The press describes any investigation at an impasse “until one side or the other blinks.” Nonsense. Impeach!
 
Cheney surprises everyone by declaring that the Vice-Presidency is actually a fourth branch of government, out of reach of the checks and balances familiar to all. Congressmen want to joke about cutting off his funding, etc, meanwhile Cheney’s boys elude oversight. Impeach!

The Justice Department acting politically? Impeach! The Supreme Court behaving like cronies? Impeach.

Congress pretending to oppose endless war, yet refusing to cut off the funding? And eschewing that power, preferring false “impasses” to the option(s) above?

Apparently it’s the best they can do, at least that’s how the corporate media has it. But why let the corporations tell us what is or isn’t our prerogative? It’s time to impeach the lot of them. If the Democrats don’t want to do what they were elected to do, let’s leave them. And turn away from the TV.

It’s time for real bipartisanship. Real conservatives and real progressives need to bail from the two imposter parties and opt for representatives of their own. If big-oil interests can conspire with big-pharma, insurance, multi-national, communications and agri-biz to plunder America’s wealth, I’d hope from the people’s side, the Greens could join the Socialists could join the Libertarians could join the Reformers could join everyone else, Ross Perot’s upstarts perhaps. We can address our differences after we’ve wrestled the reins from the corporate greed parties. If even that will be possible. But we’re not going to see national health care, less war, or more equitable and just policies until we do.

And to those Democrats who fear that abandoning their so-called representatives will release them to the dark side, it shows what little faith you had in your candidates in the first place. The results are already in from last election: having a Democratic representative in Congress, unless it’s John Conyers, is like having no one at all. If the politician you elected really has firm intentions, he’ll have them without you. It’s time to nurture someone else, someone with potential, into power.

Have you seen Barack do anything? Hillary? You’ve seen Edwards capitulate to a fraudulent election. Gore too. You’ve seen Kucinich pretend that the Democratic tent was inclusive enough for voices against the war and that turned out to be a lie. The Dems have no one unsuited to do their bidding, and what a surprise, it’s not yours.

Oops! We missed the target…

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So sorry. We missed the target… but there was nefarious activity there. The title to this reportage on MSN is… ‘Attack that killed kids likely missed target- Officials: Military knew children were present but considered risk worth it’

That even sounds like Madelyn Albright is still on the job? Of course, this is Afghanistan we’re talking about now, and not Iraq. That must be different?

Pornology- is it available at Poor Richards?

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I just learned about this book, Pornology, over at alternet where they had an article about it. So I’m wondering whether I should go over to Poor Richard’s and get a copy?

You see, like so many sad individuals of my sex, I have a porn addiction. I wrestle with this devil (sometimes day and night!) for weeks at a time. I am hoping that the female author, named Ayn (wonder if her parents gave her this name due to their studious readings in Ayn Rand Thought?) Carrillo-Gailey, of this work can give me insight to help cure me of this nasty affliction? Wonder if New Life Church could help?

I’m wondering, also, if I could go insane as so many have done through the ages due to their inability to focus on realities while under the curse of obsession with their affliction of onanism? Luckily, District 11 has a middle school course in endocrinology and abstinence that will probably inoculate our children from becoming addicted to this vice. I just wish that they had had this course back in the ’50s and ’60s when I was a kid. Plus, I was altered by not having alternet to alert me to finding fine books on this delicate subject such as Pornology seems to be.

Please Poor Richard have a copy available for me when I get to your store. This definitely looks to be good writing!

The Warsaw Ghetto was a two-state solution and so is Gaza

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For many years the world got hood winked into thinking that a two-state solution was supposedly the viable option in the Middle East. The thinking went that this was the only thing that the Jewish population of Israel would agree to in order to make peace.

Unfortunately, as the situation in the West Bank and Gaza shows, the only two-state solution that the US and Israel ever have had in mind for the Palestinians was one modeled on the two-state solution of the Warsaw ghetto of WW2. That being the case, many are now reconsidering the whole issue and have returned to advocating a one-state solution where Palestinian Arabs and Israeli Jews might be given equality inside one country, not dominated by one ethnic group or religion. That would be a secular state like we live under in the US.

See The One State Solution in al jazeera

Anger over Cheney’s privates montage

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The stampeding elephant keeps sailing on! Dick Cheney claims that he is above the law and can do anything, even pretending that the office of vice president is not part of the executive branch of the government. That in mind, the fact that the Democratic Party can’t find the energy to take this claim on in a concerted and serious manner, made me think of a computer enhanced American version of the following… except this time the photo would have Democratic Party leaders ‘suckling’ the vice president even further down below…. See Anger Over Polish Breast Montage

Visualize World Peace!

How sick!

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For lack of a $5 round of antibiotics, a disease called Noma can do this to a kid… Photo of Noma infection Meanwhile, the US spends how much on killing people in Iraq and Afghanistan alone? And some want the US to go on to intervene to ‘Save Darfur’? How about just delivering these kids with this disease a round of Amoxicillin first? See Children Made Faceless

Wikipedia reports that 400,00 suffer from this disease in Africa alone. Also they mention that… ‘It is rarely treated since in some cultures it is considered taboo. Noma was endemic to the section of Auschwitz where the Nazis interned Gypsies.’

Actually, it’s more likely rarely treated due to nobody caring enough to fund the simple course of Amoxicillin needed to treat it. And the parents of these kids don’t have the money to buy the medication.

Mayors take a stand kind of, and so does the J&P kind of

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US Conference of Mayors Takes a Stand: Out of Iraq! …kind of…and so does the J&P. Today at the city council meeting, I couldn’t find anybody attending and speaking out other than myself from the J&P… kind of. Tomorrow at the school board meeting it might well just be as lonesome as today at the city council meeting? Kind of…

Maybe at the next city council meeting the J&P can kind of ask the mayor to kind of take a stand against the war with this US Conference of Mayors kind of resolution? I’m kind of thinking that we might kind of ask him to do that? Can you kind of think about it? We could kind of begin to think about it, and kind of think about other issues (like Solidarity with the St Pat’s Day 7 folk and kind of others). Like maybe…kind of?

Mohammed Abdel Raouf Arafat al-Qudwa al-Husseini’s legacy

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Yasser Arafat’s legacy is death. Fatah is now completely connected with total betrayal in the eyes of the Palestinians. How could it be otherwise now that the US and Israel are all that props up this monstrous remnant of the Palestinian cause called Fatah?

Arafat looked for complete personal power and becoming the ‘president’ of an ethnic Palestinian enclave, and he got that. It was a crumb, and for that crumb he betrayed the idea of struggling for a multi-ethnic Israel-Palestine, where 2 peoples could live together without Apartheid or other forms of ethnic discrimination.

Now we have nothing more than a slow moving Christian Jewish Crusade against the Muslim World, with elements of multiple genocides popping up everywhere. The Evil Empire from Washington DC marches its legions forward still.

Condoleezza Rice pushes for US into Sudan intervention

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The liberals pushing for US/ European ‘action’ on Darfur seem totally delusional. Right now, they are pressuring Rice and Bush to do what Rice and Bush want to do anyway, which is to push US governmental intervention into Sudan. The Save Darfur crowd thinks that necessary to stop genocide.

And who’s to stop US genocide against the Iraqis and Palestinians? In a decade and half of US intervention in Iraq, 10 times the number of Iraqis have lost their lives compared to those lives lost in the Darfur conflicts. Two million+ Iraqis have lost their lives while the US has lost less than 5,000 dead. In Darfur, several hundred thousand have lost their lives inside their own country of Sudan. It is a civil war, unlike the Iraqi vs US War/ Invasion/ Occupation.

GENOCIDE, that is what the US has been about for decades now. Not just in Iraq, too. How stupid to ask genocidists like the American government to intervene, supposedly all to stop a supposed genocide. It is crazy to be doing just that.

Next weekend, the CS Justice and Peace group will be holding a ‘benefit for Darfur’. I will be there with a sign that demands that the USNATO stay out of Darfur. Those inside will be demanding that the US take ‘action’. That’s what Condoleezza Rice plans to do. See BBC commentary about the Paris Summit and Rice and the result will be a US firmly planted in Africa and yet more bloodshed across that continent.

Map of GDP comparisons

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How does the US economy compare with other countries? Check out The Map. Kind of explains the US ruling elites’ addiction to imperialism.

East Timor has the distinction of being the world’s most pitiable economy, closely followed by other places that US foreign policy has helped make absolutely miserable; places like Somalia and the Gaza Strip.

The Map given above is only one estimate of world and state economies, and may be dated. Here is another grouping of the numbers

John Howard, Australia’s lunatic leader

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Just what type of man is John Howard, Prime Minister of Australia? The answer is that he is the spitting public image of George W. Bush, our own lunatic president. In other words, he’s a bumpkin fool.

Here he is, pushing legislation to outlaw pornography and alcohol for all Australians. Just kidding. He’s just going to outlaw those baddies for aborigines! Aborigines face ban on alcohol and porn But only aborigines in one District! If they behave 1/2 of a year, then they can then drink and do pornography once again if Howard sez it’s OK!

Talk about blaming the victims for their problems, ay? What next? Requiring all Australian gays to wear condoms, while straights will not have that legal directive? With John Howard sniffing cane toad toxins, any ol’ thing might go down?

John Howard needs to be sent to Guantanamo for Australia’s protection it seems. He supports what Guantanamo is all about anyway, and there he can partake of the strict discipline he is in favor of for Australian aborigines and other moral defectives. He’s quite a bit defective himself.

Where does the ruling class get these guys? Tom Tancredo for President anybody?

Comfortably Numb

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lights on
Sitting in a puffy leather Barca-lounger, jacked full of Valium and Demerol, God Doctor enters the room. He squats down so that we are at eye level, introduces himself (as if I don’t know who he is..I’ve driven to Denver three times so far to see him), stares into my nearly blind eyes and says, “Did you take something or are your pupils always this huge?” Even in my half-drugged state I had the presence of mind to say, “I took a handful of ‘ludes before the surgery; I hope that was okay.” He stands up without a word and walks out of the room.

Shit. Here it comes. We are so sorry, Ms. Walden, but we can’t do your surgery. You are destined to stumble around, squinting, creating giant furrows in your brow that even Botox can’t touch, ignoring friends and family waving at you, generating hurt feelings and animosity everywhere you go. People! I am not unfriendly (okay, sometimes I am, but only to stupid and/or boring people and for that I won’t apologize). I am blind! I don’t see you. If I did….I might wave back. I really really might.

Fortunately, within moments, in comes a cute Asian scrub nurse in a blue surgical hair thing (I am wearing one too…which, I must say, totally proves my point that sexiness is very very very related to hair…more on this later). She takes me into a room, puts me under a huge frightening contraption which is going to make a completely computerized laser cut on my oh-so-thin cornea. THIS is the new technology. In the past, the corneal flap has been created by a blade and has been the source of nearly every resultant complication of laser surgery. The actual corneal correction has been done by laser. The cut…by a BLADE….like skinning a squirrel. This new technology is so precise….they are talking microns….MICRONS. Three MOTHER FUCKING MICRONS. Me likey the precision.

After this first step, I am nearly blind. Kind over-sized women gently guide me to another dark room, put me on yet another comfortable chaise, pillow under my knees so there is no pressure on my lower back. Let the correction begin! Here’s where it gets a bit sci-fi. A soothing voice narrates as I am experiencing Laserium…on drugs…like at CU-Boulder back in the day.

You will see a green light within a white circle ….. Is there anybody out there? ..Try to focus on the green light even when it disappears… There is no pain you are receiving ……Then you will see flashing red lights…..A distant ship floats on the horizon……..Try to focus on the red light. It will appear to move, but that is an illusion…..You are only coming through in waves……Very very good, Marie…halfway there……Your lips move, but I can’t hear what you say…..Now you will see a series of dots…keep looking straight ahead…very good, Marie….When I was a child I caught a fleeting glimpse….Almost there, Marie. Keep looking straight ahead….Out of the corner of my eye.…Very very good. Now we will move to the next eye…I tried to look but it was gone…Marie, shift your shoulders a little to the left….I cannot put my finger on.…Very good, Marie…now focus on the green light again… a child is born, the dream is gone….We are done…you can relax now, Marie….I have become comfortably numb.

Within minutes of beginning, I am back in my Barca-lounger, drinking Gatorade, feeling no pain. Cute Asian nurse comes in…sees me with my wild blond hair everywhere and says, “Oh! I didn’t think you would look like that!” I have no idea what any of this means…maybe she thought my features were so average that I should have a June Cleaver haircut…..can’t really contemplate the comment but I still think it proves that hair is an important part of a woman’s appearance.

Okay…so I am 2 days out. 20/20…..I got glasses in second grade…have struggled with vision my whole life. Have been told by countless opthamologists that I’m not a candidate……Thin corneas, large pupils, astigmatism, poor vision.

If anyone out there is similarly afflicted, Dr. Jon Dishler in Denver….he brought this technology to Colorado…he holds patents on many treatments…..He is internationally known for Intra-Lasik. Usually $4600 for both eyes…through August…because of his 25th anniversity….$3000 for both.

I am not his marketing gal…he doesn’t even know my name…I just know the struggles that I’ve had…and if you have complicated vision, or you know someone who does….let me share this gift with you. I am COMPLETELY AMAZED. And happy as heck.

Two States Why?

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For the last several decades, the dominant ‘solution’ proposed to ‘Holy Land’ conflict has been the idea of having Two States. Far from that having brought about peace to the region, it has brought about increased hatred, injustice, and conflict. Why push for having Two States, when that just reinforces the idea that Apartheid is legitimate? See Israeli Apartheid is the Core of the Crisis There has never been a true Left in Israel

Let me show you Bad Writing

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New Life self awarenessPoor Richard writes that his bookstore will neither carry the Ted Haggard expose nor host a book signing by its author Mike Jones, sex worker to reluctant habitue, Ted Haggard. Skorman can do what he wishes, but to say the reason is because the book is badly written is a cop out. Any bookseller in this city has to admit they carry a not inconsiderable mass of atrocious dreck. Bad books sell, and alas Richard’s stand for a higher literary standard is the first to my knowledge.

I think Jones’ choice of an incompetent writer to ghost his Haggard Days memoir is likely spot-on for a Colorado Springs audience. What’s the best selling book here? The home-grown LEFT BEHIND series! I guarantee you a fourth grader has not encountered less inspired writing.

Not that our city is atypical, even today’s NYT bestsellers play to a descending literary IQ. From Dan Brown to whoever is your cheesy favorite I’ve no doubt. This phenomena was clocked most distinctly when Stephen King was given the 2003 National Book Award for his contribution to [the sales of] American Letters. What a banner year it was, 2003.

So why pick on poor male escort Mike Jones? I think it’s pure political cowardice. The New Life Crew and their fallen gay-bashing leader have done irreparable harm to the progress of acceptance of homosexuals. Here’s a chance to teach them something about from where comes their misplaced hatred, and Mike Jones stands without allies to do it. Jones is not an opportunist, he’s a hero doing a dirty job. Maybe the right man for the dirty job, to crack a cheap joke, but if Jones was truly out for himself, he’d have taken a mega-fortune from a conglomeration of fundie gay-hating institutions interested in keeping Haggard in the pulpit. Remember Bill O’Reilly’s non-consensual phone-sex while penetrating himself with a lifelike vibrating phallus? He and Fox paid an undisclosed fraction of a BILLION to make that story go away.

If I knew THE BOOKMAN could handle the heat of accusations that we were only doing it for the attention –we’ve exceeded our limit, thank you KVOR creeps particularly– my bookstore would of course host this reading and book signing. And I commend Jones for tastefully steering past whatever might have been the unwelcome lascivious play by play.

I believe the Ted Haggard comeuppance is of capital importance for Colorado Springs, not to gloat about Haggard’s suffering or about the humiliation of his flock, but to lift the veil from their self-hatred of homosexuals. Haggard is unrepentant about this by the way, and if I might offer a simplified analysis, he hates gays because he hates himself. What reason has he the temerity to suggest that we should hate them?

Let’s welcome Mike Jones to our town. Jones unmasked the Haggard hate monster, let him claim the lair. Jones can satiate our curiosity, feed the spectacle, accept our thanks for showing personal integrity, and move this story along. I most certainly think it took a lot of bravery for Mike Jones to do what he did. He showed the kind of courage we can’t even summon, as we deliberate about whether to extend him our hand.

Perhaps as a community of independent booksellers we can do it. Why ever are we afraid of the religious right? They don’t buy our books. When Christians do buy a book they buy it new from an Inspirational Bookstore, because it feels like a more deliberate investment in their faith, I’ve heard it explained, sort of like paying down on a tithe or Indulgence.

Do I fear the Fundamentalist wrath? If they’re under-educated, under-literate, bigoted ditto-heads, of course I do. I fear them like I would Brown Shirts or union busters. Fundamentalist have a terrible tradition for that kind of immorality. Ask anyone in retail, if a customer declares themselves to be a Christian, you actually have to watch them closely because experience has shown they are more likely to try to steal or cheat. Probably because that’s the sort of conflicted person who is drawn to simplistic religious dogma in the first place.

Of course I fear them. But Ted Haggard’s fall must not go without every spotlight we can summon. He’s still behaving like a bastard and we really should shout him down. Jones has given us Haggard’s Achilles Heinie/ [Meth]Habit, let’s use it! If no one is really going to step up to ask Mike Jones to town, I most certainly will. I’m sorry I came late to this discussion but good grief!

Dragging antiwar vets through the mud

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Here below is the case of an antiwar vet being dragged through the mud.
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Ron: What are the potential punishments if they bust you?

Liam: It is basically a black eye on my record that makes it difficult to obtain future employment, particularly government employment.
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To read full article about Liam Madden’s case, see Ron Jacobs’, Intimidation of a Vet. There is a similar effort to drag a local antiwar vet through the mud here in Colorado Springs and we’ll write about it later. Stay tuned…

And here’s more about Marine Sgt. Liam Madden from Common Dreams… Vets: Military is Attacking Free Speech

Vacation en Nicaragua

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This post is dedicated to a good friend who got me thinking of Central America once again. It is about a vacation to Nicaragua and more. Let’s start with a beautiful concert at the height of Hope in the early ’80s, before the US government crushed that hope by its horrible imperialist military interventionism. Nicaragua Nicaraguita sung by the great Left folk singer of Nicaragua, Carlos Mejia Godoy.

Then let’s cut almost 1/4 century later, to see a beautiful vacation film in a visit back home to his country and family made by a Nicaraguan in exile far North. The beautiful music of the Colombian salseros, Grupo Niche, is followed in the second half of the film with more music by Carlos Mejia Godoy once again. A beautifully made film that shows Nicaragua at its best. The music is great and worth listening to on its own merits.

Mystical Machu Picchu

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peru-machu-picchu.jpgI’ve seen it in books, but it’s hard to describe how I felt when I actually saw it. Mists swirling around, emerald green grass, orchids overgrowing the Inka Trail, alpacas standing in our way. Mostly I felt a surreal connection to an ancient culture, sophisticated, brilliant, visionary and REAL. My friend and I stood there quietly for a long time, chewing our coca leaves, taking it all in. Our guide sat quietly as well. Sometimes words truly don’t suffice.
 
Click on the pic to see a bigger version.

War is always about betrayal

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A Culture of Atrocity by Chris Hedges talks about how occupation troops tend to psychologically drift from being a killing machine (fighting machine directed at the other soldiers of the ‘other side’) towards being a murder machine ( a group of soldiers that blames unarmed civilians for any harm that comes their way and then lashes out with atrocities). He mentions that when a society involves itself in supporting such an occupation force of its own troops, that it becomes a culture of atrocity.

Part of such culture is the constant betrayal of one’s own values, as society begins to break down into an ‘every for himself’ sort of mentality, both inside the military and in the larger society as a whole. The only antidote to that, is solidarity with others as opposed to abandonment of them.

It is hard to show solidarity, though, when one is running on fear much as the typical US soldier is as he works at occupying another society’s territory. Any solidarity then often seems like it is more risk filled than if one just acts as a hardliner and mows the seemingly dangerous person down. That’s why so many civilians go down in crossfire.

US Military Spy on Hundreds of Antiwar Demos

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The Pentagon spied on hundreds of antiwar demos says the ACLU. Unfortunately, many activists in the proPeace crowd (and even the ACLU itself) seem to act as if they cannot draw the logical conclusions from this and act accordingly. Instead of helping publicize this reality of police and military surveillance and disruption of Peace proponents and their activism, they act as if doing so might be a hindrance and derailment of the Antiwar Movement! Therefore they run from the fight when it gets down and dirty. Isn’t that sad?

Without battling on behalf of those that might very well be the direct victims of this surveillance and rather instead acting as if they are chickens with their heads cut off who can’t come to the defense of those vilified without cause, is not helpful but harmful to the Antiwar Movement.

We must show solidarity with people when they are attacked and found supposedly guilty without due process. We must act forcefully on behalf of these people. Otherwise, we are accepting of the reality of those that want to make the whole world into one enlarged Guantanamo, where allegations need not ever be proven, but simply accepted as given fact by authority.

Activism without Solidarity is empty of content. The US military spy on hundreds of thousands of us, and we should not act as if the harm that falls upon some of us for our activism merely has innocently fallen out of the sky. If you know this, then work as if those peace activists that have been slandered are in fact innocent until proven guilty. If you do not, then in fact you are working with the saboteurs of The Movement For Peace, and not against them.

The General’s Report- General Taguba, American hero

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The General’s Report really shows how the top Pentagon command and leaders of the Bush Administration fully authorized and supported the continued use of torture on American held Prisoners of War held at Abu Ghraib. They should all be in jail.

General Antonio Taguba deserves a Purple Heart for his valor in not going along with them. Now let’s get Guantanamo closed down and the base given back to the Cuban people.

Cynthia McKinney 2008, I think I love you!

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As a powerful antidote against the nonsensical Juneteenth Day event here in Colorado Springs, thank you, Cynthia McKinney, woman in Green. This is a powerful speech, where she talks about COINTELPRO, the police, and how crappy America currently is now. Cynthia McKinney in Green, 2008. Oh, and LOVE.