« March 2007 | Main | May 2007 »
April 24, 2007
Why is the Peace Movement Silent About AIPAC?
Capuano and Kucinich Come Clean About the Lobby
by John Walsh
Dated: April 17, 2007
SOURCE: Counterpunch
"AIPAC!" was the forceful one-word answer of Congressman Michael Capuano when we asked him, "Why was the Iran clause forbidding war on Iran without Congressional approval taken out of the recent supplemental for the Iraq war funding?" I nearly fell out of my chair at his reply - not because this was news but because of who had just said it. Capuano is a close ally of Nancy Pelosi, her fixer and enforcer. That was last Friday morning when a small delegation from Cambridge and Somerville, MA, were visiting the Congressman, known for his bluntness, as part of the nationwide UFPJ (United For Peace and Justice) home lobbying effort during the Congressional recess.
Later that day, Dennis Kucinich made an appearance at Harvard, where he was asked the same question, the reason for removing the Iran provision. "AIPAC," I volunteered out loud. Kucinich looked my way and said, "Exactly." Again my chair almost failed to contain me.
A few weeks earlier we had gone to the offices of Senators Kennedy and then Kerry to discuss the war. (My intention was to call their attention to www.FilibusterForPeace.org to which the Kennedy aide was sympathetic and the Kerry aide predictably hostile.) I raised the question of AIPAC directly with Kerry's aide, inquiring about its hawkish influence on Kerry and other Senators. Suddenly the aide was quite engaged. Leaning forward, he said: "That will never be discussed publicly. That will never be discussed publicly." Clearly even Kerry's office is unhappy with the pressure that comes from AIPAC.
For the full article, click here.
Posted by andrewanissi at 06:12 PM | Comments (0)
April 20, 2007
We Just Marched In (So We Can March Out)
by Congressman Ron Paul
Before the House of Representatives
Dated: April 17, 2007
SOURCE: Ron Paul's Speeches and Statements
All the reasons given to justify a preemptive strike against Iraq were wrong. Congress and the American people were misled.
Support for the war came from various special interests that had agitated for an invasion of Iraq since 1998. The Iraq Liberation Act, passed by Congress and signed into law by President Clinton, stated that getting rid of Saddam Hussein was official U.S. policy. This policy was carried out in 2003.
Congress failed miserably in meeting its crucial obligations as the branch of government charged with deciding whether to declare war. It wrongly and unconstitutionally transferred this power to the president, and the president did not hesitate to use it.
Although it is clear there was no cause for war, we just marched in. Our leaders deceived themselves and the public with assurances that the war was righteous and would be over quickly. Their justifications were false, and they failed to grasp even basic facts about the chaotic political and religious history of the region.
Congress bears the greater blame for this fiasco. It reneged on its responsibility to declare or not declare war. It transferred this decision-making power to the executive branch, and gave open sanction to anything the president did. In fact the founders diligently tried to prevent the executive from possessing this power, granting it to Congress alone in Article 1 Section 8 of the Constitution.
For the full speech, click here.
Posted by andrewanissi at 12:18 AM | Comments (0)
April 19, 2007
The Importance of Daily Magical Practice
by Taylor Ellwood
Dated: April 15, 2007
SOURCE: Witchvox
One attitude that I find to be odd in some magical practitioners is the attitude that you don’t need to do a daily practice of magic. It seems that instead you just cast your spell and sigil whenever you really need it and the rest of the time magic is put to the wayside until needed again. This approach has always puzzled me, mainly because it treats magic as a tool, much like a shovel. I’ll grant that you don’t need to use a shovel everyday of your life (unless you work at a job where it’s an essential tool). Also a shovel is used for a specific set of jobs and won’t fit every circumstance in your life.
For the full article, click here.
Posted by andrewanissi at 07:43 PM | Comments (0)
April 18, 2007
Government and Racism
By Congressman Ron Paul
Dated: April 16, 20076
SOURCE: Ron Paul's Texas Straight Talk
The controversy surrounding remarks by talk show host Don Imus shows that the nation remains incredibly sensitive about matters of race, despite the outward progress of the last 40 years. A nation that once prided itself on a sense of rugged individualism has become uncomfortably obsessed with racial group identities.
The young women on the basketball team Mr. Imus insulted are over 18 and can speak for themselves. It’s disconcerting to see third parties become involved and presume to speak collectively for minority groups. It is precisely this collectivist mindset that is at the heart of racism.
It’s also disconcerting to hear the subtle or not-so-subtle threats against free speech. Since the FCC regulates airwaves and grants broadcast licenses, we’re told it’s proper for government to forbid certain kinds of insulting or offensive speech in the name of racial and social tolerance. Never mind the 1st Amendment, which states unequivocally that, “Congress shall make NO law.”
Let’s be perfectly clear: the federal government has no business regulating speech in any way. Furthermore, government as an institution is particularly ill suited to combating bigotry in our society. Bigotry at its essence is a sin of the heart, and we can’t change people’s hearts by passing more laws and regulations.
In fact it is the federal government more than anything else that divides us along race, class, religion, and gender lines. Government, through its taxes, restrictive regulations, corporate subsidies, racial set-asides, and welfare programs, plays far too large a role in determining who succeeds and who fails in our society. This government "benevolence" crowds out genuine goodwill between men by institutionalizing group thinking, thus making each group suspicious that others are receiving more of the government loot. This leads to resentment and hostility between us.
For the full article, click here.
Posted by andrewanissi at 08:49 AM | Comments (0)
April 17, 2007
Israeli Soldiers Hide Behind Palestinian Children They Use Forcibly As Human Shields
Using human shields scars Israel
Dated: April 14, 2007
by Amy Teibel, Associated Press
SOURCE: Cleveland Plain Dealer
Israel suspended a commander whose troops ordered two Palestinian youths in the West Bank to stand in front of their vehicle to protect it from stones thrown by locals, the army spokesman's office said Friday.
The incident in Nablus on Wednesday, captured on video, is the latest sign that the army continues to use human shields in violation of international law and a landmark Israeli Supreme Court ruling in 2005 barring the practice.
The army statement Friday said Israeli soldiers "apparently made prohibited use of civilians" and the unit's commander would be suspended "from all operational activity, in addition to the ongoing investigation into the matter." The commander was not named.
The footage was filmed by a foreign peace activist during a raid on the home of a wanted militant, and aired on the Yediot Ahronot newspaper Web site. Troops damaged the house, but the fugitive was not inside.
For years, Palestinians had complained about the army's use of human shields, but proof was elusive.
Then in late February, Associated Press Television News captured footage of a Palestinian man forced to lead heavily armed soldiers on a manhunt for militants, in a house-to-house search.
Others, including an 11-year-old girl, have come forward with similar accounts of being compelled to walk ahead of soldiers looking for militants.
For the full article, click here
Posted by andrewanissi at 05:58 PM | Comments (0)
April 14, 2007
Israel tapping American phone lines
by Fox News
Click here for the YouTube news video.
Posted by andrewanissi at 06:42 PM | Comments (0)
April 09, 2007
300 vs. Iran (and Herodotus)
A Racist and Insulting Film
By Gary Leupp
Dated: April 1, 2007
SOURCE: Counterpunch
I always take in the Hollywood period dramas set in ancient Greece or Rome. My film-buff son is into this too, so we went last week to see 300, the Warner Brothers' blockbuster produced by Zack Snyder and based on the graphic novel by Frank Miller about the epic battle of Thermopylae between the Greeks and Persians. It had by that time grossed over 100 million dollars and no doubt influenced a lot of minds.
The film tells a familiar historical tale. (Rather, it ought to be familiar, but history instruction in our public schools is not necessarily comprehensive.) In 480 BCE, Greece was threatened by an invasion by the Persian army, the greatest war machine of its day. The empire of King Xerxes extended from the Indus River to Egypt, and drew its troops from the ends of the realm. The king personally led them in battle against the Greeks.
Or rather, some of the Greeks. Greece at the time was a collection of city-states, politically disunited, divided as much as unified by dialect and culture. Some city-states, including Argos and Thebes, actually aligned themselves with Xerxes. Herodotus, the "Father of History" and perhaps the world's first professional historian, paints a picture of a "free" Greece united against an oppressive "Asia." But that is a chauvinistic simplification. The fact is, Persia and the Greek city-states were all slave-based societies whose notions of "freedom" had little in common with our modern conception.
According to Herodotus (our sole source), 300 Spartan warriors alongside 700 Thespian volunteers defended the pass of Thermopylae against the invaders, inflicting heavy losses on Xerxes' forces. Led by Spartan King Leonidas, they went down in defeat but gave rival Athens time to prepare the fleet that decisively defeated the Persians at Salamis a few months later.
The story has been dramatized before, notably in the 1962 Hollywood production 300 Spartans starring Richard Egan as Leonidas and David Farrar as Xerxes. This new version is distinguished by what one critic calls the "monochromatic, cartoonish quality of [its] computer-generated special effects"---and by its timing. Warner Brothers had been planning a remake of the 1962 film since the late 1990s, based on a novel by Stephen Pressfield entitled Gates of Fire, with Bruce Willis in the role of Leonidas. But that project fell through, paving the way for 300---just in time to help subliminally shape the movie-going public's perception of Persians prior to the attack planned on today's evil empire by Vice President Cheney and his neocon staffers.
Persia is Iran. (I want to say, "Persia, of course, is Iran." But I can't assume that all or even most Americans make the connection.) The word comes from "Fars," a region of modern Iran, while "Iran" is related to the word "Aryan" and connotes "land of the Aryans." In 1935 the Persian shah opted to use the name "Iran" but the two terms are basically interchangeable. "Persia" just doesn't have the emotional baggage of "Iran." During the Iranian Hostage Crisis of 1979-81, many dealers in Iranian rugs decided to call them "rugs from Persia." Persia on occasion has thus served as the good Iran, the historical cultural Iran, as opposed to the modern evil enemy. But 300 makes Persia evil too.
For the full article, click here.
Posted by andrewanissi at 09:31 AM | Comments (0)
April 07, 2007
Why is Hezbollah on the Terrorism List?
And Who Isn't But Should Be?
By Franklin Lamb
Dated: April 6, 2007
SOURCE: Counterpunch
It was a sign of the times last week (March 27) when House Armed Services Committee Staff Director Erin Conaton declared in a memo to committee staffers that the powerful committee was scrapping the Bush Administration shop worn phrase, Global War of Terrorism. Conaton's boss, Rep. Ike Skelton,( D-Mo) the new Chairman of the Committee commented that "the overused label had become an embarrassment and had lost its meaning".
Recent research in Lebanon has turned up information previously unavailable which sheds light of the misapplication of the Terrorism label by the Bush administration.
The" T word" is often misapplied as former National Security Advisor Brzezinski reminds us as he tours the country promoting his new book, Second Chance and focusing on the "catastrophic leadership" crisis caused by the Bush administration's foreign policy.
Another area that would benefit from discarding the "terrorist label" is the Bush administration's ongoing campaign against Hezbollah. There is considerable doubt among international lawyers whether Hezbollah should ever have been classified as a terrorist organization.
At the urging of U.S. and Israel, Canada classifies Hezbollah as a terrorist organization, which limits the group's ability to raise funds and travel internationally. . A Canadian peace coalition called Tadamon Montreal is working to remove Hezbollah from the Terrorism list in Canada.
Australia and the UK distinguish between Hezbollah's security and political wings, and other countries like China, Russia, and member states of the European Union and the United Nations have refused US/Israel demands to label Hezbollah a terrorist organization at all.
For the full article, click here.
Posted by andrewanissi at 01:30 PM | Comments (0)
April 05, 2007
Sanctuary To Wind Down U.S. Operation
By Chris M. Walsh
Dated: April 04, 2007
SOURCE: Billboard
British independent music company Sanctuary Group Plc will wind down its U.S. label's front-line efforts this summer, but will continue to run a catalog operation, according to a source within the company.
U.K. execs arrived in New York last Thursday (March 29) and alerted staffers the label would be cutting operations by June 30, according to one source at the U.S. label.
For the full article, click here.
Posted by andrewanissi at 09:30 AM | Comments (0)
April 03, 2007
Dave Zweifel: Amtrak may be rounding the bend
By Dave Zweifel
Dated: April 2, 2007
SOURCE: The Capital Times
No one knew what to expect about a year and a half ago when the Amtrak board of directors unceremoniously fired David L. Gunn as its president.
Gunn had been a fly in the ointment to the Bush administration's plans to effectively dismantle Amtrak by severing its highly successful Northeast Corridor runs from the system, cutting its federal subsidy and doing away with its long-distance trains.
He tenaciously fought the Bush plans and successfully lobbied members of Congress to thwart them. He wound up getting fired.
Some 10 months later, the Amtrak board finally decided on his permanent replacement, a former Union Pacific Railroad freight executive named Alexander K. Kummant. Since the president of Amtrak's board, David M. Lamey, is a Bush appointee, the natural assumption was that Kummant was the proverbial fox in Amtrak's henhouse.
Kummant, however, has been anything but.
He has come down squarely against any dismantling of Amtrak's long-distance trains, likening the City of New Orleans and the Empire Builder (which runs across Wisconsin) to national parks.
"The cost of cross-country trains comes to about a dollar and a half per American per year," he told The New York Times shortly after his appointment last September. "I haven't had the opportunity to go to Glacier National Park since 1976, but I pay taxes every year in the hope that I have the option to go back."
He added that once you do away with long-distance trains, they'll be gone forever.
He strongly opposes severing the profitable high-speed Northwest Corridor from the national Amtrak system and he is sure Amtrak can work with its unions rather than privatizing some of its services, a welcome relief for many Amtrak workers.
For the full article, click here.
Posted by andrewanissi at 01:50 PM | Comments (0)