India's "Pink" Vigilante Women...

I just found out about this from a cool blog (check it out btw) "The self organisation of the working class."  Awesome!  Like someone else said, they should totally make a film out of this!!  (Though they probably will not...or mess it up if they do...)...Enjoy...

India's 'Pink' Vigilante Women

By Soutik Biswas BBC News, Banda

The 'pink' gang has staged protests against corrupt officials

They wear pink saris and go after corrupt officials and boorish men with sticks and axes.

The several hundred vigilante women of India's northern Uttar Pradesh state's Banda area proudly call themselves the "gulabi gang" (pink gang), striking fear in the hearts of wrongdoers and earning the grudging respect of officials.

The pink women of Banda shun political parties and NGOs because, in the words of their feisty leader, Sampat Pal Devi, "they are always looking for kickbacks when they offer to fund us".

Two years after they gave themselves a name and an attire, the women in pink have thrashed men who have abandoned or beaten their wives and unearthed corruption in the distribution of grain to the poor.

They have also stormed a police station and attacked a policeman after they took in an untouchable man and refused to register a case.

Poorest

"Nobody comes to our help in these parts. The officials and the police are corrupt and anti-poor. So sometimes we have to take the law in our hands. At other times, we prefer to shame the wrongdoers," says Sampat Pal Devi, between teaching a "gang" member on how to use a lathi (traditional Indian stick) in self defence.

We are a gang for justice Sampat Pal Devi

Banda is at the heart of the blighted region that is Bundelkhand, one of the poorest parts of one of India's most populous states.

It is among the poorest 200 districts in India which were first targeted for the federal government's massive jobs-for-work programme. Over 20% of its 1.6 million people living in 600 villages are lower castes or untouchables. Drought has parched its already arid, single-crop lands.

Banda is one of the poorest districts in Uttar Pradesh

To make matters worse, women bear the brunt of poverty and discrimination in Banda's highly caste-ridden, feudalistic and male dominated society. Dowry demands and domestic and sexual violence are common.

Locals say it is not surprising that a women's vigilante group has sprung up in this landscape of poverty, discrimination and chauvinism.

Sampat Pal Devi is a wiry woman, wife of an ice cream vendor, mother of five children, and a former government health worker who set up and leads the "pink gang".

"Mind you," she says, "we are not a gang in the usual sense of the term. We are a gang for justice."

'Uproot the corrupt'

Her seeds of rebellion were sown very early on when in face of her parents' resistance to send her to school, she began writing and drawing on the walls, floors and dust-caked village streets.

She finally ended up going to school, but was married off when she was nine in a region where child marriages are common. At 12, she went to live with her husband and at 13 she had her first child.

Sampat Pal Devi says nobody helps the poor

To keep the home fires burning, Sampat Devi began to work as a government health worker, but she quit after a while because her job was not satisfying enough.

"I wanted to work for the people, not for myself alone. I was already holding meetings with people, networking with women who were ready to fight for a cause, and was ready with a group of women two years ago," she says.

Sitting outside a home in Attara, Sampat Devi waves her calloused hands, breaks into a rousing song to "uproot the corrupt and be self reliant", and animatedly talks to women - and men - who flock to her with their problems.

A mother brings in her weeping daughter who has been thrown out by her husband demanding 20,000 rupees from her parents.

"He married me for the love of money," sobs Malti.

Sampat Devi tells her "gang" that they will soon march to the girl's house and demand an explanation from the husband. "If they don't take her back and keep her well, we will resort to other measures," she says.

'No handouts'

The pink sorority is not exactly a group of male-bashing feminists - they claim they have returned 11 girls who were thrown out of their homes to their spouses because "women need men to live with".

That is also why men like Jai Prakash Shivhari join the "gulabi" gang and talk with remarkable passion about child marriages, dowry deaths, depleting water resources, farm subsidies and how funds are being stolen in government projects.

"We don't want donations or handouts. We don't want appeasement or affirmative action. Give us work, pay us proper wages and restore our dignity," he says.

The women in the "gulabi gang" echo the same sentiment - but Sampat Devi has a separate agenda for women.

The women thrashed a policeman in protest against the arrest of a poor man

"Village society in India is loaded against women. It refuses to educate them, marries them off too early, barters them for money. Village women need to study and become independent to sort it out themselves," she says.

Where do the pink women go from here?

They already claim to have done some work in combating crime and corruption in the area. Last year, Sampat Devi contested the state polls as an independent candidate and mustered only 2,800 votes.

"Joining politics is not my chosen way to help people. We will keep up our good work, so the state does not take us for granted," she says.

In the badlands of Uttar Pradesh where nothing seems to work for the poor, this itself is a laudable aim.

The World Continues to Look Away. Don’t. -- CONGO...

The World Continues to Look Away. Don’t.

“Darfur is nothing compared to what’s going on in the Congo,” says Schuler Deschryver, who despite constant death threats, continues to raise the plight of Congolese women. “My father was the founder of the National Park in Rwanda, which is home to rare silver back gorillas. During the war here, just one silver back was killed. And when it happened, within 48 hours millions in funding was sent to ensure the rest of the gorilla population was protected. Why isn’t the same done with our women? I’ll tell you why, because in the eyes of the international community animals have more value than humans in this part of the world.”

Some stories, as horrific as they are, need to be read by everyone. This is one of them.
by Brian O'Connell

Ombeni is late. School starts in 20 minutes and she still has to get her son Daniel’s books sorted, make his lunch and do a few odd jobs around the house. Her home is a two-room mud shack, in a honeycombed complex of corrugated iron and twisted branches dug into the hills surrounding Bukavu, in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

It’s a half hour’s walk from her front door to Daniel’s school, where she fixes his collar and kisses him goodbye. He gives a quick look around to make sure none of his classmates is looking, and returns her affection. Ombeni continues her journey another kilometre down the road, to her own classroom. This is her first year back at school, and her headmaster says she is a model pupil: “If only everyone was like her.”

By rights, Ombeni should be nearing the end of her university life, perhaps fending off marriage requests or applying for teaching posts in the city. But her schooling, and her life’s journey, were brutally interrupted almost five years earlier.

Back then she was a typical 15-year-old with dreams of university and a better life. Her home was a village in the countryside, where, when she wasn’t studying, she helped in the fields. It was while out working one evening that rebel forces captured her carefree innocence. For months she became their slave, both sexual and physical, as they lived in various wooded compounds along the Rwandan border. Heavily pregnant, and near death from lack of food, the rebels returned her to her village so her parents could watch her die.

But she didn’t, and now, five years on, she is picking up the pieces of a fragmented life.

It hasn’t been easy. Locals are wary of her son, thinking he will grow up and assume the same characteristics as his father. Ombeni says she can feel suspicious eyes on her every time they step outside, and unless she can get Daniel away from the village, she fears for his safety.

Daniel is oblivious, as any four-year-old should be. He likes school and gets on well with everyone in the playground. Next year his mother will start training to be a teacher. Two years after that, she hopes to have enough money to leave the village and get a house somewhere safe. A fresh start. Despite everything, she considers herself fortunate. For an increasing population of silent victims though, life in DRC has become a hellish pattern of sexual and physical torment. Along the eastern border region, a daily horror show is playing itself out, bolstered by the ambivalence of the world and the political vacuum created by decades of regional conflict.

The perpetrators include the Interahamwe, the Hutu fighters who fled neighbouring Rwanda in 1994 after committing genocide there; the Congolese army; a random assortment of armed civilians; even United Nations peacekeepers, and increasingly, local civilians.

Christine Schuler Deschryver, who works for a German aid organisation and has been a staunch and stubborn advocate for victims, says the perpetrators are difficult to identify. “All of them are raping women,” she says, “It is a country sport. Any person in uniform is an enemy to women.”

The problems have their roots in the Rwandan genocide in 1994, when thousands of victims and perpetrators fled across the border. Upwards of 10,000 Rwandan rebel forces remained, living in forested areas and terrorising local populations at their will. Rwanda doesn’t want them back, and even if they did, many refuse to return. The Congolese Army, it seems, has neither the collective heart nor the political will to forcibly remove them, and with many soldiers not receiving pay for months on end, they too are guilty of looting and pillaging. So the forces remain, intent on the sexual and social destruction of the local population.

So far they are succeeding on a spectacular scale. For those who are apprehended, there is little impunity, thanks to antiquated gender laws. The attacks grow more numerous and sadistic by the day and the normalisation of sexual violence continues largely unabated.

“Darfur is nothing compared to what’s going on in the Congo,” says Schuler Deschryver, who despite constant death threats, continues to raise the plight of Congolese women. “My father was the founder of the National Park in Rwanda, which is home to rare silver back gorillas. During the war here, just one silver back was killed. And when it happened, within 48 hours millions in funding was sent to ensure the rest of the gorilla population was protected. Why isn’t the same done with our women? I’ll tell you why, because in the eyes of the international community animals have more value than humans in this part of the world.”

Schuler Deschryver’s anger is also felt a few kilometres away, on the outskirts of Bukavu, where Dr Denis Mukwege, an obstetrician for more than 20 years, tries to deal with the aftermath of sexual violence. He runs Panzi Hospital, set up in 1999 in response to the emergency crisis after the so-called African war; it houses more than 350 patients. Each day, 10 new cases are admitted, some as young as nine, so badly damaged that reconstructive surgery is often required. The victims sit on benches, lining urine-soaked corridors, alone and frightened. On eye contact, there is nothing. No expression, no acknowledgement, no smiles - just a fleeting confirmation that behind their eyes, a pained suffering lies deep.

Mukwege can’t say for certain if the attacks are on the increase. In general, the hospital estimates it sees just 10 per cent of all sexual violence victims, but certain patterns are developing. Attackers are now identifiable by their manner of attack: one group, after raping the woman or girl, inserts the barrel of a gun into her vagina and shoots, thus destroying her vagina, bladder, rectum and causing massive blood loss. Some force males at gunpoint to rape mothers or sisters, often in front of the whole community. A large percentage of the attackers are HIV-positive and knowingly try to infect their victims.

These aren’t just random acts of grotesque inhumanity; it is the systematic sexual and social destruction of whole populations in eastern Congo. And little, it seems, is being done to stop it.

“I have seen men literally lost,” Mukwege says. “Emotionally ruined and unable to go on after witnessing the destruction of their wives and the resulting destruction of their families. They are permanently haunted by thoughts going through their head - ‘I raped my wife and family and didn’t stop it.’ Some men flee and abandon their families. In cases where the perpetrators don’t kill their victims outright, they kill them slowly and painfully, not just physically, but psychologically and emotionally. It is the destruction of society.”

British and American journalists have passed through Panzi, yet Mukwege says nothing has changed. The hospital still turns away patients and those responsible for the violence are seldom brought to justice. “I have spoken to everyone from the international media who have visited, but still the rapes continue. I have to keep hope otherwise I’d take off my shirt and stop my work.

“I know the situation can be resolved if people really get involved and international political will is behind it. We cannot ignore what’s happening here and portray it as barbaric African culture, as it is sometimes portrayed.”

The sense of exasperation is palpable, and as Mukwege is called away, victims who have queued outside hobble into the room to tell their stories.

Chibalonza Nsinire, 16, was asleep when the Interahamwe came. After tying her hands, they led her to a forest and over three days, took turns raping her and other women. After being raped, the women were forced to prepare meals for the forces, using food pillaged from their own houses.

Mugoli Muhamiri was expecting wedding guests when she answered a knock at her door six months ago. Instead of relatives, a group of men poured in and began a rampage. She was tied up and the men took turns raping her. From the corner of her eye, she saw her husband’s throat being slit, and two of her children being mutilated. They were two years old. She says she counted seven men raping her, before she lost consciousness. Now she clings to her only surviving child, Stephen, who is unaware of the HIV that infects his mother’s body.

“I have been given great medical support here, but I know one day soon I have to die. I cannot keep the medicine for the HIV in my stomach because I have no food. I feel bad for my child who remains, because he will have no mother and no father. That brings great sorrow to my heart.”

Heavily pregnant 15-year-old Furaha Tajiri is from the Ninja province. The forces came for her at night, tied her hands and started beating her and her parents repeatedly. “I then saw them take my parents and kill them,” she says.

“After that they took me with them to the forest. They started raping me there - I counted 17 who attacked me. I stayed in the forest for six months and each day I was raped by two men.”

Furaha gave birth to a boy the day after telling her tale. She was distraught, and needed food. Without a husband or family, she was only too acutely aware that much hardship lies ahead.

Throughout the eastern Congo, the stories were of the same horrific magnitude. There is little hope and little in the way of happy endings. Words such as rehabilitation and justice are no longer part of the daily vocabulary.

One group trying to help is the Irish aid organisation Trocaire, which believes UN troops should patrol the areas particularly prone to attack and protect vulnerable communities, notably women and girls.

The organisation also believes the DRC Government has a responsibility to seek a solution to the conflict in the east, and to do so while respecting human rights.

For many working on the ground the destruction is total and the task often overwhelming. Efforts to deal with the problem are only grazing the surface, in a country rich in resources but poor on relief. Fewer than 50 non-government organisations ply their trade in eastern Congo, in contrast to Rwanda, which is something of an NGO haven.

In the genocide museum in Kigali, the former UN secretary-general, Kofi Annan, is quoted as feeling remorseful towards the atrocities committed in 1994, when 1 million Rwandans died on the UN’s watch. The world could have and should have done more, he infers. Yet 17,000 UN troops are stationed in DRC, and within a stone’s throw of their bases the most vulnerable in that society are being routinely destroyed.

Two months ago, the UN humanitarian chief, John Holmes, visited Panzi, was horrified when he heard the stories and saw the conditions. He also met Christine Schuler Deschryver. Normally an articulate and measured advocate, her diplomatic savvy deserted her. “I told him what is happening here is a holocaust. I was very aggressive. I said, ‘You are in the Congo, so what are you doing? You came to the hospital and like everyone you cry. Like everyone you leave. And like everyone, we never hear from you again.’ ”

Copyright © 2007. The Sydney Morning Herald.

House Passes Thought Crime Prevention Bill...

I had heard about this...scary as hell...stupid mf'ing Dem's got no backbones whatsoever as usual...


----------------- Bulletin Message -----------------
From: Rebel Diaz-"Periodistas de la Esquina"
Date: 24/11/2007


by Lee Rogers

The U.S. House of Representatives recently passed HR 1955 titled the
Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act of 2007.
This bill is one of the most blatant attacks against the Constitution
yet and actually defines thought crimes as homegrown terrorism. If
passed into law, it will also establish a commission and a Center of
Excellence to study and defeat so called thought criminals. Unlike
previous anti-terror legislation, this bill specifically targets the
civilian population of the United States and uses vague language to
define homegrown terrorism. Amazingly, 404 of our elected
representatives from both the Democrat and Republican parties voted in
favor of this bill.

First let's take a look at the definitions of violent radicalization
and homegrown terrorism as defined in Section 899A of the bill.

The definition of violent radicalization uses vague language to define
this term of promoting any belief system that the government considers
to be an extremist agenda. Since the bill doesn't specifically define
what an extremist belief system is, it is entirely up to the
interpretation of the government. Literally, the government according
to this definition can define whatever they want as an extremist
belief system. Essentially they have defined violent radicalization as
thought crime. The definition as defined in the bill is shown below.

..(2) VIOLENT RADICALIZATION- The term ..violent radicalization' means
the process of adopting or promoting an extremist belief system for
the purpose of facilitating ideologically based violence to advance
political, religious, or social change.

The definition of homegrown terrorism uses equally vague language to
further define thought crime. The bill includes the planned use of
force or violence as homegrown terrorism which could be interpreted as
thinking about using force or violence. Not only that but the
definition is so vaguely defined, that petty crimes could even fall
into the category of homegrown terrorism. The definition as defined in
the bill is shown below.

..(3) HOMEGROWN TERRORISM- The term ..homegrown terrorism' means the
use, planned use, or threatened use, of force or violence by a group
or individual born, raised, or based and operating primarily within
the United States or any possession of the United States to intimidate
or coerce the United States government, the civilian population of the
United States, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or
social objectives.

Section 899B of the bill goes over the findings of Congress as it
pertains to homegrown terrorism. Particularly alarming is that the
bill mentions the Internet as a main source for terrorist propaganda.
The bill even mentions streams in obvious reference to many of the
patriot and pro-constitution Internet radio networks that have been
formed. It also mentions that homegrown terrorists span all ages and
races indicating that the Congress is stating that everyone is a
potential terrorist. Even worse is that Congress states in their
findings that they should look at draconian police states like Canada,
Australia and the United Kingdom as models to defeat homegrown
terrorists. Literally, these findings of Congress fall right in line
with the growing patriot community.

The biggest joke of all is that this section also says that any
measure to prevent violent radicalization and homegrown terrorism
should not violate the constitutional rights of citizens. However, the
definition of violent radicalization and homegrown terrorism as they
are defined in section 899A are themselves unconstitutional. The
Constitution does not allow the government to arrest people for
thought crimes, so any promises not to violate the constitutional
rights of citizens are already broken by their own definitions.

..SEC. 899B. FINDINGS.

..The Congress finds the following:

..(1) The development and implementation of methods and processes that
can be utilized to prevent violent radicalization, homegrown
terrorism, and ideologically based violence in the United States is
critical to combating domestic terrorism.

..(2) The promotion of violent radicalization, homegrown terrorism, and
ideologically based violence exists in the United States and poses a
threat to homeland security.

..(3) The Internet has aided in facilitating violent radicalization,
ideologically based violence, and the homegrown terrorism process in
the United States by providing access to broad and constant streams of
terrorist-related propaganda to United States citizens.

..(4) While the United States must continue its vigilant efforts to
combat international terrorism, it must also strengthen efforts to
combat the threat posed by homegrown terrorists based and operating
within the United States.

..(5) Understanding the motivational factors that lead to violent
radicalization, homegrown terrorism, and ideologically based violence
is a vital step toward eradicating these threats in the United States.

..(6) The potential rise of self radicalized, unaffiliated terrorists
domestically cannot be easily prevented through traditional Federal
intelligence or law enforcement efforts, and requires the
incorporation of State and local solutions.

..(7) Individuals prone to violent radicalization, homegrown terrorism,
and ideologically based violence span all races, ethnicities, and
religious beliefs, and individuals should not be targeted based solely
on race, ethnicity, or religion.

..(Cool Any measure taken to prevent violent radicalization, homegrown
terrorism, and ideologically based violence and homegrown terrorism in
the United States should not violate the constitutional rights, civil
rights and civil liberties of United States citizens and lawful
permanent residents.

..(9) Certain governments, including the United Kingdom, Canada, and
Australia have significant experience with homegrown terrorism and the
United States can benefit from lessons learned by those nations.

Section 899C calls for a commission on the prevention of violent
radicalization and ideologically based violence. The commission will
consist of ten members appointed by various individuals that hold
different positions in government. Essentially, this is a commission
that will examine and report on how they are going to deal with
violent radicalization and homegrown terrorism. So basically, the
commission is being formed specifically on how to deal with thought
criminals in the United States. The bill requires that the commission
submit their final report 18 months following the commission's first
meeting as well as submit interim reports every 6 months leading up to
the final report. Below is the bill's defined purpose of the
commission. Amazingly they even define one of the purposes of the
commission to determine the causes of lone wolf violent
radicalization.

(b) Purpose- The purposes of the Commission are the following:

..(1) Examine and report upon the facts and causes of violent
radicalization, homegrown terrorism, and ideologically based violence
in the United States, including United States connections to
non-United States persons and networks, violent radicalization,
homegrown terrorism, and ideologically based violence in prison,
individual or ..lone wolf' violent radicalization, homegrown terrorism,
and ideologically based violence, and other faces of the phenomena of
violent radicalization, homegrown terrorism, and ideologically based
violence that the Commission considers important.

..(2) Build upon and bring together the work of other entities and
avoid unnecessary duplication, by reviewing the findings, conclusions,
and recommendations of--

..(A) the Center of Excellence established or designated under section
899D, and other academic work, as appropriate;

..(B) Federal, State, local, or tribal studies of, reviews of, and
experiences with violent radicalization, homegrown terrorism, and
ideologically based violence; and

..(C) foreign government studies of, reviews of, and experiences with
violent radicalization, homegrown terrorism, and ideologically based
violence.

Section 899D of the bill establishes a Center of Excellence for the
Study of Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism in the United
States. Essentially, this will be a Department of Homeland Security
affiliated institution that will study and determine how to defeat
thought criminals.

Section 899E of the bill discusses how the government is going to
defeat violent radicalization and homegrown terrorism through
international cooperation. As stated in the findings section earlier
in the legislation, they will unquestionably seek the advice of
countries with draconian police states like the United Kingdom to
determine how to deal with this growing threat of thought crime.

Possibly the most ridiculous section of the bill is Section 899F which
states how they plan on protecting civil rights and civil liberties
while preventing ideologically based violence and homegrown terrorism.
Here is what the section says.

..SEC. 899F. PROTECTING CIVIL RIGHTS AND CIVIL LIBERTIES WHILE
PREVENTING IDEOLOGICALLY-BASED VIOLENCE AND HOMEGROWN TERRORISM.

..(a) In General- The Department of Homeland Security's efforts to
prevent ideologically-based violence and homegrown terrorism as
described herein shall not violate the constitutional rights, civil
rights, and civil liberties of United States citizens and lawful
permanent residents.

..(b) Commitment to Racial Neutrality- The Secretary shall ensure that
the activities and operations of the entities created by this subtitle
are in compliance with the Department of Homeland Security's
commitment to racial neutrality.

..(c) Auditing Mechanism- The Civil Rights and Civil Liberties Officer
of the Department of Homeland Security will develop and implement an
auditing mechanism to ensure that compliance with this subtitle does
not result in a disproportionate impact, without a rational basis, on
any particular race, ethnicity, or religion and include the results of
its audit in its annual report to Congress required under section
705.'.

(b) Clerical Amendment- The table of contents in section 1(b) of such
Act is amended by inserting at the end of the items relating to title
VIII the following:

It states in the first subsection that in general the efforts to
defeat thought crime shall not violate the constitutional rights,
civil rights and civil liberties of the United States citizens and
lawful permanent residents. How does this protect constitutional
rights if they use vague language such as in general that prefaces the
statement? This means that the Department of Homeland Security does
not have to abide by the Constitution in their attempts to prevent so
called homegrown terrorism.

This bill is completely insane. It literally allows the government to
define any and all crimes including thought crime as violent
radicalization and homegrown terrorism. Obviously, this legislation is
unconstitutional on a number of levels and it is clear that all 404
representatives who voted in favor of this bill are traitors and
should be removed from office immediately. The treason spans both
political parties and it shows us all that there is no difference
between them. The bill will go on to the Senate and will likely be
passed and signed into the law by George W. Bush. Considering that
draconian legislation like the Patriot Act and the Military
Commissions Act have already been passed, there seems little question
that this one will get passed as well. This is more proof that our
country has been completely sold out by a group of traitors at all
levels of government.

Campaign ’08 News and "Ron Paul is Not Your Savior"...

In related Campaign '08 news...You hear about the latest h KKK question planting scandal? Check out some more about it at CAMPUS CONFIDENTIAL......Not that I care that much of course but as a political junkie it is interesting...Meanwhile Obama seems to be doing a bit better picking up the endorsement of a big union recently and his last big speech was very well received not only by his supporters but also the media at large from what I read...

Thanks for posting Jonathan...

Don't Believe the Hype (Ron Paul is Not Your Savior)



----------------- Bulletin Message -----------------
From: Jonathan McIntosh
Date: 15/11/2007


Don't Believe the Hype (Ron Paul is Not Your Savior)
by Aura Bogado

Congressman and presidential hopeful Ron Paul has always opposed the Iraq war, and that's really, really great. I'm happy for him. The right wing ideologue actually gets the war, the CIA's practice of so-called extraordinary rendition and Guantanamo right – but the balance of what he gets wrong is glaring and is almost as frightening as the amount of friends and colleagues I respect that have signed on as Ron Paul supporters. People seem to like that he appears to be an unusual Republican candidate, but right below the surface of the libertarian mask that Paul wears is an ultra nationalist, gun loving Christian conservative that opposes affirmative action, a woman's right to choose and same-sex marriage. And… oh yeah: he hates immigrants.



Paul and the Christian Right

Paul opposes the separation of Church and State. Yes, you read correctly, he opposes it. He says there is a war on religion, and that "Through perverse court decisions and years of cultural indoctrination, the elitist, secular Left has managed to convince many in our nation that religion must be driven from public view." We should remember that when writing about the First Amendment of the Constitution (which clearly states that "government will make no law respecting an establishment of religion"), Thomas Jefferson coined the term "separation of Church and State". If Paul's theocratic concepts were instituted, we would have Old Testament displays at the nation's courthouses, and Christian prayers would be part of each child's school day.



His religious conservatism seems to inform his views on topics as elementary as evolution when it comes to education. When asked if he would encourage presenting so-called facts to contradict the theory of evolution in schools, he answered yes. This "alternative view" on the theory of evolution means teaching the concept of intelligent design– a pseudoscience which real scientists dismiss as another attempt to once again introduce creationism into public classrooms. No thank you. Intelligent design may have its place in church, on the street or at home, but in terms of science, it doesn't propose any hypotheses which can be tested through experiment; it's simply not science. Teachers should certainly not be forced to teach right-wing conservative Christian ideals about God in any classroom. When I take a biology course, I go to learn about accepted theory. When I want to hear about God, I'll go to church.



Paul also says that abortion is the tool by which the State achieves "a program of mass murder". A staunch pro-lifer who writes books on the topic in his spare time, he thinks States should decide the matter (read: allow states to overturn decisions like Roe v. Wade to allow new laws to protect the rights of what the Christian right calls "unborn people"). Under Paul's proposal, States could conceivably pass laws that bar women from obtaining abortions, including in cases of rape or incest, and even when the woman's life is at risk. Any person that values the right of any woman to choose what she will and will not do with her own body should take caution – Paul is to the extreme right of the political spectrum on this issue. I understand that Presidents do not decide abortion policy, but we have yet to see what Bush's Supreme Court appointments will yield in terms of abortion rights in the years to come. Any presidential candidate that would move to allow States to eradicate women's rights doesn't deserve the attention and praise he's getting from the Left.



When it comes to same-sex marriage, Paul says that federal government should play no role in the matter and that anyone can get married and call their relationship whatever they want. On its surface, that may sound fair enough. However, Paul was an original co-sponsor of the Marriage Protection Act in the House. Passed in the House in 2004, the bill sought to preclude federal courts from transferring the recognition of same-sex marriage across state lines. For example, a same-sex marriage that took place in Massachusetts would not be acknowledged in Alabama. Addressing the House in 2004, Paul made clear that if he was a member of the Texas legislature he would bar judges from advocating "new definitions" of marriage. Those of us who truly believe that anyone has the right to be married and to be recognized as such should realize that Paul's sometimes careful wording around the issue camouflages his Christian conservatism which defines marriage as something that can solely occur between a man and a woman.



Affirmative What?

Both Malcolm X and Martin Luther King, Jr. headed to Washington in March, 1964 to hear the historic Senate debate on the Civil Rights Act. The legislation, which was passed a few months later, banned segregation in schools and public spaces and made it illegal to discriminate in housing and hiring processes. Malcolm, Martin, and millions of people of color and their supporters knew that such legislation would permanently influence and reduce de jure discrimination across entire nation, including the reach of Jim Crow laws in the South. They also knew that it was a necessary step towards reducing the de facto discrimination that followed. Yet Ron Paul says that the Civil Rights Act was a violation of the Constitution and that it reduced individual liberties. Last year, Paul was one of only 33 Congress members to vote against Voting Rights Act renewal, despite the fact that 390 of his colleagues voted for it. Paul seems to want to go back to the times when racial segregation was the norm and the law.



Paul is against affirmative action because, he says, no one should be punished or privileged for belonging to a group, and everyone should be treated as an individual. In stating this, Paul conveniently ignores the truth that individuals from the white group are treated one way and individuals from the people of color group are treated another way. He detests calls for diversity, and adds that those of us who base our identities on race are "inherently racist". His logic in the latter statement is so far removed from reality that it makes it difficult to respond to – suffice to say that people of color do not have the institutional power to be racist against whites; his statement instead illustrates his own racism. But it gets a lot worse: Paul's political literature has stated that it is sensible to be afraid of black men; that "95 percent of African Americans in [Washington D.C.] are semi-criminal or entirely criminal"; that black male children (but not white ones) should be treated and tried as adults for crimes they commit beginning at age 13; and he referred to two black men that were interviewed by Ted Koppel after the Los Angeles 1992 uprising as "animals". Kanye West was right when he said, "George Bush doesn't care about black people." Guess what? If his own political literature is any indication, Ron Paul loathes black people.



Supporters who have gone as far as to donate money to Paul's campaign should bear in mind that he has knowingly also taken donations from white supremacist and former KKK GrandWizard Don Black. Other white supremacists like David Duke also support Paul's bid for President. It's easy for Paul to dismiss affirmative action as something that violates individual liberty, but what hides behind that is the fact that he is a hate-spewing presidential candidate aligned with some of the most blatant, odious racists on the planet.



More "American" Than You and I

Not surprisingly, Paul offensive terms like "illegal alien", "illegal immigrant" or plain-old "illegals" when referring to human beings who live in the United States without proper documentation. Besides "beaner", "spic" and "wetback", I cannot immediately think of other words that approximate the bigotry that these terms are loaded with. In this regard, however, nearly all presidential candidates and even well-meaning everyday people continue to use these terms – except that Paul is not well-meaning when it comes to the undocumented.



While addressing a group of supporters, Paul claimed that in terms of work ethic, some undocumented workers "are more American than some of us." WASP purists like Paul employ a type of historical amnesia which yields an artificial yet neutral-sounding identity that they call "American". Perhaps if Paul wasn't such an isolationist he would realize that there actually are two continents worth of people that call themselves American, and that the ones that do so in the United States are not a chosen bunch. The truth is that the practice of pioneer colonialism in the U.S. illegally and immorally took land from various indigenous populations. Those pioneer immigrants, who illegally brought African slaves with them, tried to enforce and superimpose their cultural and linguistic practices on this stolen territory while almost completely exterminating the people that they took the land from. Those original populations that were not killed were illegally displaced against their will. In practice, these pioneer immigrants illegally crossed national borders, and as a result their decedents continue to reap the structural benefits that were created. But instead of claiming this pioneer immigrant identity (which requires a truthful look into an uneasy past) they appropriate a fear-based, racist "American" identity and demonize contemporary immigrants instead.



In Paul's fuzzy logic, all immigrants are here to suck the country dry of its welfare, education and emergency healthcare systems. If it was up to Paul, those systems would be voided for not only undocumented, but for documented immigrants as well. Forget that both groups pay into the income, property and retail tax system. Ignore that time and time again, studies indicate that the undocumented pay more into the system than they take out. According to Paul, even documented immigrants should be stripped of any government subsidy. He also says that children born to undocumented immigrants on US soil should not be allowed to hold citizenship. The so-called strict abider of the Constitution wants to overturn the Fourteenth Amendment so that children born to undocumented immigrants are stripped of their birthright. Besides the serious moral dilemmas surrounding his radical proposal, the practical limitations are copious. What if one parent is documented but the other is not? What if both parents were undocumented, but from different countries? What if they were from the same country, but the country of origin refused to recognize the child as a citizen of that land? Paul's scheme (like so many of his others) is completely absurd.

Paul is Not an Anti-Capitalist

Despite his record-breaking online fundraising effort, it's more likely that pigs will fly before Paul wins the Republican primary. Regardless, I'm dismayed at the left-wing, anti-capitalist buzz around him, including the comparisons between him and Noam Chomsky. Paul's vision for the harsh privatization of everything from education to social security would only yield monopolies that don't work for everyday people, much like our current healthcare system. The presidential candidate advocates dismantling the few positive governmental regulations that secure working-class rights and benefits, including welfare – again, clearly not anti-capitalist. And while I can admire that any politician would call for ending the US' support of Israel, it follows in the vein of Paul's nationalist, isolationist concept of abolishing the United Nations and other diplomatic efforts to conserve our own opulence while leaving the rest of the world to waste.



I Loves My Guns

Paul calls himself a strict abider of the Constitution, and says that the relationship between the People and government is important. Unfortunately, I wonder how many people would be left if we adhered to this Texan's ideas surrounding the Second Amendment. Paul, who has earned an A-rating by the National Rifle Association, champions the cause to allow people to carry concealed firearms. And although ruling after ruling has clarified that the Constitution does not guarantee people the right to run around lugging assault rifles, Paul loves his guns and according to him the issue is not even up for debate. Add to this the fact that legislation like the 1968 Gun Control Act (which was approved after the John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King, and Robert F. Kennedy were killed with um… guns) was passed in a way in which Paul would likely interpret as unconstitutional, and you quickly realize how fanatical this man is about the Second Amendment.


Deconstructing Ron Paul

It's really not very complicated: people who are or stand with workers, the poor, women, queer folks, people of color and immigrants will need to look far beyond this candidate. Despite his supporter's efforts to ignore the man behind the façade, it's time to get real and deconstruct the pretense. Ron Paul is a free market capitalist who doesn't care for the rights of workers or the poor; he is a gun-loving friend of the NRA, he is a radical Christian conservative who thinks that school prayer and intelligent design have a God-given place in public schools, that a woman's right to choose should be crushed, and that same-sex marriage is repugnant; he is a Congressman that has voted against affirmative action and thinks that desegregation somehow violated the Constitution; and he is a candidate that hates immigrants. Yes, we are sick and tired of Washington, but just because Bush has failed so deeply does not mean we can latch on to the very first presidential hopeful who wants to bring the troops home immediately, yet simultaneously destroy the rights and benefits we have struggled for centuries to achieve. Paul is certainly not the answer and we need to stop pretending that he is. I recognize and can appreciate that he stands against the Iraq War and everything that the so-called War on Terror has wreaked at home and abroad. But even a broken clock is right twice a day.



Aura Bogado is a writer and radio producer. She blogs at tothecurb.wordpress.com

link: http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?Secti..72&ItemID=14282

The American Dream-Whites Only - Dude, Where’s My Vacation?

Of course, black Americans and other people of color still disproportionately suffer from everything poverty to rampant police profiling/brutality...Racism is institutionalized and things need to be changed structurally and not through piecemeal reforms/bandaids...(all this at a time when hate crimes are tremendously increasing while agencies and supposed "watchdog" groups are being gutted by b*sh administration)...

However, one thing that is not talked about here is the myth of the American dream for EVERYONE (was there ever really an American dream anyway?)...

Towards this check out the book The European Dream: How Europe's Vision of the Future Is Quietly Eclipsing the American Dream and read my reprised bulletin/blog of the article "Hey Dude, Where's My Vacation?" below the first article...

Reposting all on my blog...

Tuesday, November 13, 2007
The American Dream - Whites Only
Black Americans are failing to climb the social ladder, while a worrying number born into the middle classes are now actually poorer than their parents, according to a study .

The report found blacks were missing out on a cherished American dream that their children will be economically better off.

"Children from middle- and upper middle-class black families experience a generational drop in income that is in sharp contrast to the traditional American expectation that each generation will do better than the one that came before it,"

Two out of three Americans who were children in 1968 grow up to have higher income than their parentsbut less than a third of black children born in the middle classes do better financially than their parents.
Being born into a financially secure home is no guarantee of dying in one, with blacks enjoying significantly less economic protection than white peers .

"A startling 45 percent of black children whose parents were solidly middle income end up falling to the bottom income quintile, while only 16 percent of white children born to parents in the middle make this descent,"

Median black family incomes in 2004 were $35,000, compared with $60,000 for whites of similar age, and almost one-quarter of blacks live below federally defined poverty lines, three times more than whites. There has been the decline in the relative economic well-being of black men , which got worse between 1974 and 2004. In fact, black men now in their 30s earn roughly 12 percent less than their fathers' generation.

"In terms of absolute, relative and integrated mobility measures, white children have substantially more upward mobility than black children of comparable incomes,"

Labels: income inequality, race, racial discrimination, racism, United States of America

posted by ajohnstone at Tuesday, November 13, 2007

----------------- Bulletin Message -----------------
From: Socialist Standard
Date: 15/11/2007


A recent post from the Mailstrom blog:

The American Dream - Whites Only

Hope people find it of interest.

all the best,
Darren
Inveresk Street Ingrate Blog

======================================



How F8cked Up is this seriously????

WAKE UP PEOPLE...LETS CHANGE THIS SH8T!!!!

Hey Dude, Where's My Vacation?

Last year Mary Lou Eckart took her first vacation in five years, a trip from her home in Decatur, Ill., to see her grandchildren in Florida. But the Illinois state government, which pays her to care for a severely disabled teenage girl, provides her no paid vacation time. So Eckart took the girl -- and her work -- with her.

She faces a similar bind if she gets sick. "I just had an incident two weeks ago," she says. "I had an inner ear infection that I didn't know about, and I passed out. My 17-year-old daughter covered for me while I recovered. I get no paid vacation, no time off, no sick leave. But if they put these clients in a nursing home, I know that is very expensive. I'd love to have a vacation. I'd love to be able to get away. I'd love to have someone fill in for me. I feel like we deserve more than what we're getting."

Eckart's story is all too common: Nearly one-fourth of American workers have no paid vacation or holidays, according to a recent study from the D.C.-based Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR), and nearly half of all private sector workers have no paid sick days.

But if Eckart were living in any other industrialized country, she would be legally guaranteed at least two weeks paid vacation and -- in 136 countries -- from seven to more than 30 paid sick days. The United States is the only rich country that does not mandate paid vacations and paid sick days, and Americans who are afforded such benefits enjoy far less time off than workers in other wealthy nations.

Americans now work more every year, on average, than workers in any other industrialized country (except for a virtual tie with New Zealand). With women working longer hours each year, the average annual work time for a married couple is growing steadily, and family time -- including the crucial bonding experience of vacations -- has suffered. Full-time workers in much of Europe typically take seven to eight weeks of vacation and holidays each year -- that's double the American average for full-time workers.

Overall, the average private sector worker in the United States gets about nine paid vacation days and six paid holidays each year. Low-paid, part-time or small-business workers typically get far fewer, sometimes none. The same holds for paid sick leave: 72 percent of the highest-paid quarter of private sector workers get paid sick days compared to only 21 percent of workers in the lowest-paid quarter.

Intercontinental disparity

Why do workers in other rich countries have more paid time off? Mainly because laws demand employers provide it. The European Union requires its members to set a minimum standard of four weeks paid vacation (covering part-time workers as well). Finland and France require six weeks paid vacation, plus additional paid holidays.

Most countries require workers to take the time off and employers to give them vacation at convenient times. Some governments even require employers to pay bonuses so workers can afford to do more than sit at home on vacation. On top of that, unions in Europe and other rich industrialized countries -- whose contracts cover up to 90 percent of the workforce -- typically negotiate additional time off. Meanwhile, the standard workweek is slightly shorter in many European countries, and workers retire earlier with better public pensions.

Until the early '70s, European and American workers logged similar hours. But the pattern then drastically diverged, with Europeans getting more vacation time, around the same time that U.S. income inequality began growing. In the United States, corporations gained the upper hand against workers and their declining unions, and the Democratic Party started shifting away from working class concerns.

In Europe, stronger unions and left political parties pushed for shorter work hours. In some cases, as jobs were lost when traditional industries restructured or work was outsourced, unions saw reduced work time as a way to share work.

But more often, unions were continuing the battle to share wealth in the form of more leisure, which had started a century earlier with the movement for an eight-hour day -- the goal of Chicago protestors in May, 1886, that ended in the Haymarket Massacre, repression of the labor movement, and creation of May 1 as the international workers' holiday.

The difference in work hours between the United States and most industrial countries "is exactly a manifestation of the same forces driving broader inequality," says CEPR economist John Schmitt, pointing to deterioration of the minimum wage, pensions, public services, health insurance and wages under pressure from globalization, deregulation, privatization and attacks on unions. "Workers haven't been able to translate higher productivity gains into higher pay or benefits, and they've been unable to address the time crunch."

"People in the United States don't even understand what could be possible on this issue [of paid time off]," Schmitt says. "This is one of the most important ideological victories of the right in the last 30 years -- to persuade us we aren't rich enough to treat workers well. We're incredibly rich, getting richer every year, and we have plenty of resources to pay adequate wages, pensions, health insurance and vacations, but we've chosen to give that money to the top five percent."

European and other industrialized countries have divided their growing ability to produce differently. For example, Europe has nearly caught up with -- and many countries have pulled ahead of -- the United States in labor productivity (the output from each hour of work), the key measure of an economy's potential.

In recent years, however, American workers have rapidly increased the amount of goods and services they produce each year, in comparison to Europe. These two measurements have largely diverged because Europeans have been enjoying more time away from the job, just as they've been enjoying a more egalitarian society.

According to Harvard economist Alberto Alesina, Europeans are happier, and have less stress and insecurity, which is good for health and longevity. Studies in the United States, for example, indicate that taking vacations cuts in half the risk of heart attacks for men. Longer, mandated vacations haven't undercut the competitiveness of other rich countries, and there's evidence that they increase labor productivity.

Plus, recent increases in the U.S. gross domestic product haven't significantly helped most Americans: The super-rich have captured most of the income gains.

An accurate calculation of the gross domestic product -- subtracting such costs as crime, environmental depredations, militarism and declining social trust -- would actually show that growth in economic output has brought few, if any, real gains in welfare for American society. Indeed, CEPR economists David Rosnick and Mark Weisbrot argue that Europe's shorter work hours help the environment by reducing energy consumption and carbon emissions.

Taking back time

Most Americans would be better off with more paid vacation and leave, but inequality, insecurity and the competitive rat race drives people to work even harder, often just to keep their heads above water. It's very difficult for individuals to demand more time, even if the limited polling available suggests it would be popular.

Major gains will only come from an organized movement and changed laws. One organization, Take Back Your Time, founded by writer and documentary filmmaker John de Graaf, is trying to persuade presidential candidates to support its proposal for mandating three weeks of paid vacation for all workers. "I think the political figure who would pick up on this issue would find great resonance," De Graaf says, but so far nobody has.

At this point, more modest proposals have a better chance to succeed. Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.) and Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.) have introduced the Healthy Families Act, which would guarantee seven days of paid leave for all workers to deal with their own or a family member's illness. Beyond the obvious help to the individuals who need care, such legislation would help businesses economically.

Rather than putting in an unproductive day at work spreading communicable diseases (or sending their sick child to spread illness at a child care center), workers could just stay at home, and it would reduce the employee turnover that results from workers taking off unauthorized, unpaid sick days.

Five states have mandatory temporary disability insurance programs to cover income losses from short illnesses, and last November, San Francisco voters approved the first mandated paid sick days in the United States. The Working Families Party in New York is now campaigning for paid leave for new parents and adults caring for ailing relatives, a protection California passed in 2004 (thus strengthening the unpaid family and medical leave federal law provides).

Mandated paid sick days would help workers like Elnora Collins, a home care worker in Chicago. "If you get sick, you go to work sick. If you show up for work, you endanger your patients. If you don't show up for work, you get no pay. I recently lost a whole day’s pay, because I ended up in a hospital for an overnight stay. It was an anxiety attack, like a heart attack. It's very frightening. And then, when you look at that paycheck, you really cry."

Compare the work time and leisure in the United States to that in other rich countries, and we all have good reason to share in her tears.

David Moberg is a senior editor of In These Times.
© 2007 Independent Media Institute. All rights reserved.
View this story online at: http://www.alternet.org/story/54681/

Serbia/1999 - Book/Article/Film Recommendations...

Here are some recommendations for good resources about the bombing/aggression against Serbia...Feel free to recommend your own...

Resources on Kosovo War
ZNet's Original Essays and Selected Links
Regarding the NATO Bombings

Yugoslavia: An Avoidable War

The Serbs (The Peoples of Europe) by Sima M. Cirkovic



Excerpt: The New Military Humanism: Lessons from Kosovo by Noam Chomsky, In These Times magazine, September 1999

The New Military Humanism: Lessons from Kosovo by Noam Chomsky, Pluto Press, 1999

Fools' Crusade: Yugoslavia, Nato, and Western Delusions, by Diana Johnstone, Monthly Review Press (January 1, 2003)



To Kill a Nation: The Attack on Yugoslavia by Michael Parenti



Masters of the Universe: NATO's Balkan Crusade by Tariq Ali (Editor)



Yugoslavia: An Avoidable War by Nora Beloff



Degraded Capability: The Media and the Kosovo Crisis by Philip Hammond (Editor), Edward S. Herman (Editor)



Inat : Images of Serbia and the Kosovo Conflict by Scott Taylor



Diary of an Uncivil War: The Violent Aftermath of the Kosovo Conflict by Scott Taylor



The Yugoslav Auschwitz and the Vatican: The Croatian Massacre of the Serbs During World War II by Vladimir Dedijer (Editor), Harvey L. Kendall (Translator)




Knife by Vuk Draskovic

Croatia,Bosnia,Serbia,Kosovo: Truth about Wars in Yugoslavia

A Listmania! list by Aaron Aden (Spain)

1999 - Kosovo/Serbia - Know Who You Are Bombing...

March 24 and June 10, 1999 - Kosovo/Serbia

...Know Who You Are Bombing...

The "NATO Doctrine"

"A military alliance of 19 nations and 780 million people; with over half of the world's gross economic product, possessing two-thirds of the global military power, ganged up on a tiny nation of 10 million. For 78 days, NATO terrorized the people of Serbia, dropping 23,000 bombs and missiles on them in 36,000 sorties. Yet the Serbs remained unbowed and uncowed. This is not hearsay. I saw their defiance with my own eyes during the six days I had spent under NATO's bombardment."

-An excerpt from Bob Djurdjevic's global speaking tour, Fall/Winter 1999

"The 78 days of areal bombardment caused an estimated 10,000 civilian casualties. The material damage has been estimated between 29,6—100 billion dollars. NATO aggression lasted continuously throughout 11 weeks, destroying or damaging the entire infrastructure of the Serbian state, schools, factories, business objects, hotels, hospitals, media centers, cultural monuments..."

-Svetlana Novko - Byzantine Sacred Art Blog

"I don't want you to think that I came here to make an anti-American speech. [laughter] I wouldn't come here for that. I came to make a speech, to tell you the truth. And if the truth is anti-American, then blame the truth, don't blame me."

-Malcolm X (Feb. 11, 1965)

"We believe we can literally 'kill them with kindness', moving our guns forward in a seizure of demented charity. It is when America is in her most altruistic mood that other nations better get behind their bunkers."

-Gary Wills - Rogue State pg. 13

"The attack on Yugoslavia constitutes the most brazen international aggression since the Nazis attacked Poland to prevent "Polish atrocities" against Germans."

-Walter J. Rockler, former U.S. prosecutor at the Nurenberg war crimes tribunal, in a letter to the Chicago Tribune.

"If we're going to have a strong economic relationship that includes our ability to sell around the world, Europe has got to be a key... That's what this Kosovo thing is all about."

-U.S. president Bill Clinton in a speech delivered the day before his televised address to the American people about the crisis in Kosovo. Quoted in "The Case Against Intervention In Kosovo" by Benjamin Schwarz and Christopher Layne in The Nation Magazine on April 19, 1999.

"The pilot dropped the bomb in good faith, as you would expect of a trained pilot from a democratic NATO country to do."

-NATO spokesperson Jamie Shea, speaking about the NATO bombing that killed dozens of Kosovo refugees on April 15, 1999.

I cannot believe I put off posting a blog about this for so long. Well, in a way I can. I mean this is such a complex, and difficult topic to write about it is hard to know where to start. This is for all of my good friends and everyone else...

I guess I can start with what spurred me to write this. I was in conversation with one of my friends who is someone who has traveled extensively throughout the world (a lot through Europe), she is very educated (in graduate school), knows quite a bit about the world and history, and finally I would say she is more than a bit activist. Let me emphasize here that this could be any of my friends (and this is by no means the first time this has happened). Some of my friends may be a little more active or news junkies, etc. then others but overall I would not worry about any of them blanking out on knowing a country or missing a big item of their country's foreign policy. That is why it is so galling, so frustrating, and so perplexing that even my friends, friends that I am proud and very grateful to have almost totally blank out when the issue of Kosovo comes up. I mean it is f'd up that people will know a hell of a lot more about Monica Lewinsky and impeachment which was going on at this time then the fact that our country tis of thee was bombing the f8ck out of another country/civilians homes/hospitals/embassies/etc.

There could be a lot of reasons for this. I would not describe them as being susceptible to media doublespeak and typical propaganda at all. But perhaps some actually do know a bit about the situation and agreed with it...I mean it was hard not to given the blanket/biased media whitewash. As many have pointed out (and definitely I saw this all too often myself) this was one of the first wars in which the "left" (I use this term loosely) were very much co-opted:

"One of the most significant aspects of the US-NATO war in the Balkans was the politically indispensable role played by prominent liberal and “left” academics, writers and intellectuals, who uncritically accepted the justifications given out by US and European officials and placed themselves at the disposal of the pro-war media. Many of those who took for good coin the moralistic phrases of Western leaders and accepted their portrayal of the war as a humanitarian crusade against ethnic genocide had, in their younger days, protested against US military interventions in Vietnam and elsewhere."

-Comment by Barry Grey

Usually it will begin innocently enough. For instance, in the above example we were talking about different antiwar tactics to promote stopping the latest rush to war against Iran by the present administration. Very constructive as usual ;) My friend was having trouble posting a graphic on her profile and asked me for help. It was a little icon thing promoting a group run/sponsored by Wesley Clark. I was like wtf?? And I immediately told her I could not get it working but that even if I could I would not put it up and encourage her not to...Of course, she was curious as to why I had such feelings on this and thus the latest incident which spurred all of this...

War Criminal = Presidential Candidate

Now some of you may know that kkklark was a guy that ran for president in the last (2004) election. However, not as many know he used to be a general. Less to none know that he used to be the Supreme Allied Commander Europe of NATO. What that means is that he was the guy ostensibly responsible for making decisions on what to bomb when, etc. (though there was a lot of influence from political higher ups from what I understand). As Wikipedia describes it "[s]ome of Clark's command decisions during the conflict, such as his statements at press briefings and his actions at Priština International Airport, were heavily criticized." This is a really nice way of saying he is a mfering war criminal with blood all over himself. He was responsible for bombing the f8ck out of a television station for broadcasting things they did not like (journalistic freedom?).

Victim of market cluster bombing...

This "collateral damage"
had a name.

Her name was
Milica Rakic.

Again, as Wikipedia describes it, the bombing campaign targeted "dual-use" targets (mfing Orwellian doublespeak but the most common was "collateral damage" coined before the movie of the same name to describe murdered civilians) which included "bridges across the Danube, factories, power stations, telecommunications facilities" and also the "headquarters of Yugoslavian Leftists, a political party led by Milošević's wife, and the Serbian state television broadcasting tower." "NATO" argued that the last two were potentially useful to the Serbian military so their bombing was "justified." Among other things they also bombed maternity wards, a market full of people with a cluster bomb, the Chinese Embassy in Beograd (known as "Belgrade" to a lot of other people) and just for good measure an ambulance picking up civilians from a previous bombing...

What was most heartening for me was the resistance and unbelievable courage of the people of Srbija-Serbia during the bombing. In the face of tremendous odds. In the face of daily bombardment (24/7). People would have rock concerts around their workplaces in defiance of the mad bombers while wearing targets on their chests. This is what "inat" is about...This is what being Serbian is about...I am proud to be called Serbian.

I could go on and on and go into trying to describe the various reasons I think are behind the war in Bosna and for Kosovo as well...Perhaps I will later. But for now this will have to suffice as another introductory piece. The books and documentaries I list in the previous post should give one plenty of explanation much better than I...

I kind of feel bad ending like this...I feel like I should have written a lot more about all of this, I know I could...But for now I will just send this out because it has been sitting around too long...

I always appreciate any feedback, questions, etc.