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The Evolution Of Goliath
Concert-4-Palestine
“I have stood in front of tearful Palestinian women as they nursed the bruises of their children who had been attacked by soldiers or settlers. I have listened to their sobs and wails as bulldozers plowed into their houses while Israeli soldiers laughed and cheered. I have seen men picking up little bits of people stuck to asphalt, walls, and trees. I have seen Israeli soldiers beckon settlers to come and spit on terrified young men at a checkpoint. Israel makes me wish that my theology permitted me a purgatory where folks like Ariel Sharon would have to experience every bit of the pain and terror they have inflicted on their victims over the last decades.”- Kathleen Kern, Christian Peacemaker Teams
Afghanistan, the graveyard of empires or just a graveyard with a pipeline running through it?
William Bowles
“The US does not need a final victory over the Talibs. Despite their widely advertized ferocious conflict, the US and the Talibs manage to coexist quite successfully in Afghanistan…”[1]
Come on folks, it’s just good sense, there is no way the Empire can actually win the war in Afghanistan. As I have stated before it’s not about ‘winning’ but occupation. Afghanistan is basically a stepping stone on the way to some place else and leaving an oil pipeline behind with a friendly government in place to protect it. Ah, but the best laid plans of mice and men etc...And this is why it bears no comparison to the idiotic occupation that the Soviets got sucked into, except for the slaughter of course. But from a strategic and economic perspective, along with Iran, Pakistan and India, Afghanistan commands the entrance to East Asia and there’s gold in them thar hills!
Rendition prosecuted abroad while U.S. courts do nothing
Mary Shaw
The George W. Bush administration was the target of much criticism from human rights groups for, among other things, its policy of extraordinary rendition, in which detainees have been transferred for interrogation in other countries that are known for their use of torture. And human rights groups and individuals have long been calling for an end to rendition, and accountability for all those who have enabled or participated in the use of torture in the "war on terror".
Unfortunately, it doesn't look like any kind of accountability will be achieved here in the U.S. anytime soon. The latest evidence of this came on November 2, when the Second Circuit Court of Appeals dismissed the case of Maher Arar against U.S. officials who had sent him to Syria, where he was interrogated under torture for a year.
How Zionist lobby stooges in Congress brought shame to their institution
Alan Hart
As expected, the U.S. House of Representatives voted, on Tuesday 3 November, by 344 votes to 36, to urge the Obama administration to oppose endorsement of the Goldstone Report. But for those who are interested in truth and justice, not to mention democracy, the highlight of what passed for debate was the two-minute contribution of Dennis Kucinich, the Democratic Party’s representative for Ohio’s 10th district (and a starter candidate for the Democratic nomination for the presidency in 2004 an 2008).
His statement was a damning indictment of 344 of his colleagues. The following is the full text of it (my emphasis added).
Today we journey from Operation Cast Lead to Operation Cast Doubt. Almost as serious as committing war crimes is covering up war crimes, pretending that war crimes were never committed and did not exist.
Because behind every such deception is the nullification of humanity, the destruction of human dignity, the annihilation of the human spirit, the triumph of Orwellian thinking, the eternal prison of the dark heart of the totalitarian.
36 HOUSE MEMBERS DEFEND GOLDSTONE REPORT / 344 CONDEMN IT
Allen L Roland
In what has to be the most blatant act of allegiance to AIPAC versus their constituencies ~ the House of Representatives denounced the balanced and responsible Goldstone Gaza war crimes Report 344 to 36 despite the fact that every Israeli human rights NGO denounced the Gaza war and supports the Goldstone Report:
Despite the fact that a Rasmussen poll during the Gaza war found 55% of Americans opposed it and only 33% supported it ~ 344 spineless members of Congress followed the money, sold their souls to AIPAC ( American Israel Public Affairs Committee ) and their generous pro-Israel campaign contributions and refuted a truly balanced and responsible UN Report by the highly respected Judge Goldstone.
Mass shooting at Fort Hood: collateral damage from Iraq and Afghanistan wars
David Walsh
The mayhem at Fort Hood in Texas, which has left 13 men and women dead and 30 injured, is a byproduct of the brutal wars in the Middle East and Central Asia. It is a form of “collateral damage” for which the American political and military establishment is ultimately responsible.
The US interventions in Iraq and Afghanistan have now lasted a combined 14 and a half years Not only is there no end in sight in either case, there is the prospect of the wars’ expansion into Pakistan, with bloodier and more disastrous consequences. The invasions have already led to the devastation of Iraqi and Afghan society, the deaths of as many as a million Iraqis alone, and thousands of Americans killed, or maimed.
The wars are not about democracy, overthrowing tyrants, or protecting the American people from terrorism. The US ruling elite is waging these interventions to seize control of critical energy supplies, to strengthen its position vis à vis its rivals in Europe and Asia, to gain global hegemony through its military superiority.
Why Does The U.S. Have An Empire In Asia?
Paul Craig Roberts
The US government is now so totally under the thumbs of organized interest groups that “our” government can no longer respond to the concerns of the American people who elect the president and the members of the House and Senate.
Voters will vent their frustrations over their impotence on the president, which implies a future of one-term presidents. Soon our presidents will be as ineffective as Roman emperors in the final days of that empire.
Obama is already set on the course to a one-term presidency. He promised change, but has delivered none. His health care bill is held hostage by the private insurance companies seeking greater profits. The most likely outcome will be cuts in Medicare and Medicaid in order to help fund wars that enrich the military/security complex and the many companies created by privatizing services that the military once provided for itself at far lower costs. It would be interesting to know the percentage of the $700+ billion “defense” spending that goes to private companies. In American “capitalism,” an amazing amount of taxpayers’ earnings go to private firms via the government. Yet, Republicans scream about “socializing” health care.
Foreign Contributions and the Supreme's Overdue Decision on Campaign Funding
The Supreme Court of the United States will soon announce a major decision on our lightly controlled system of campaign funding. Will it retain some limitations on corporate influence or will the court blow the lid off and cause a perpetual flood of unrestricted corporate contributions?
An additional outcome may surprise and shock the public.
If the Supreme Court overturns the lower court's decision, foreign nationals, corporations, and governments with partial ownership of U.S. corporations will, in effect, end up contributing to and influencing U.S. candidates in federal elections.
DATELINE AFGHANISTAN, Southwest Asia A continuing foreign policy of violence
by Carolyn Bennett
Sanity demands and all sides have said in one way or another that they want foreign forces out of Afghanistan. Yet foreign forces remain - are resisted violently - and continue to kill with careless impunity.
The better course of action, of course, though rarely attempted action, would be to alter substantively and significantly the course and character of particularly U.S. and UK-led relations with southwest Asia. Enter into open, honest, talking diplomacy with all factions in the southwest Asian [Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan] conflict(s). For each sector set a deadline for withdrawal and stick to it. Draw down forces leaving in the place of force respectful civilian relationships among foreign, local and regional factions and countries for the long term. Is this just too much to ask?
Pornographic Past Vs Murderous Present
by Gilad Atzmon
“Why would any writer make up stories about the Holocaust?” asks Melissa Katsoulis on mainstream British media outlet The Independent (1).
Katsoulis has recently published a book about the history of literary hoaxes. She is interested in particular in a unique fictional genre; namely ‘the Holocaust hoaxers’.
On the one hand, she confesses that “special privilege must be given to those increasingly few witness-writers who survived the Second World War in Europe.” She is even willing to accept Elie Wiesel’s peculiar take on ‘truth and fiction’, that "some stories are true that never happened."
On the other hand she says, “those memoirists who think that they can pretend they were there when they weren't ought to remember that hijacking the experiences of others for selfish ends will only end in ignominy.”
Katsoulis suggests that perhaps what “readers seek in trauma stories is akin to what people look for in pornography: something edgy they have never seen before, followed by a spectacular resolution”. Very much like the case of pornography, the dedicated audience of Jewish pain “want to identify (safely) with what they are reading; to try on someone else's crisis for a while and see how it compares to their own.”
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