 |
Newest Blog Entries:
Nathan Schneider: Ask not who’s co-opting you, ask whom you can co-opt
Schneider at Waging Nonviolence ..Rather than arguing about whether the 99% Spring is co-option or not — spoiler alert: it is — Occupiers can be strategizing about how to co-opt it back even more. How can all these newly-trained troops be mobilized into Occupying? What specific actions can they be drawn into to practice what they’ve learned? How can people in the movement further turn these people’s attention to structures of oppression, rather than to stump speeches and delegates? These are questions that call for creativity — which fortunately the movement, if it still in fact has its mojo, shouldn’t have a problem delivering. If the movement really does have something better to offer than the liberal and reformist bloc, now’s the time to prove it.. read more
Posted by Mike Blaxill, Friday, April 20, 2012
Death, Taxes, and the Continued Insanity of US Military Spending | Common Dreams
Posted by Michael Butler, Thursday, April 19, 2012Julian Assange’s first show on RT – Interview with Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah
Posted by Mike Blaxill, Thursday, April 19, 2012
18 April the fab 4
Posted by Michael Hamilton, Wednesday, April 18, 2012on this day…
Posted by Michael Hamilton, Wednesday, April 18, 2012Democracy Now: Kony 2012 – Ugandans Criticize Popular Video for Backing U.S. Military Intervention in Central Africa
.. read Democracy Now transcript
Posted by Mike Blaxill, Wednesday, April 18, 2012
Truthdig – First They Come for the Muslims – Chris Hedges
Posted by Michael Butler, Tuesday, April 17, 2012FROM LIBYA TO SYRIA: “WAR IS A RACKET. IT ALWAYS HAS BEEN”
Posted by Michael Butler, Tuesday, April 17, 2012Atrios: THE ONE TRUE WANKER OF THE DECADE – Tom Friedman
as expected, Atrios ..[Friedman on Charlie Rose] - "I think it [the invasion of Iraq] was unquestionably worth doing, Charlie ... We needed to go over there, basically, um, and um, uh, take out a very big state right in the heart of that world and burst that bubble, and there was only one way to do it ... What they needed to see was American boys and girls going house to house, from Basra to Baghdad, um and basically saying, "Which part of this sentence don't you understand?" You don't think, you know, we care about our open society, you think this bubble fantasy, we're just gonna to let it grow?.. read more
Well Suck. On. This.
Okay. That, Charlie, was what this war was about. We could've hit Saudi Arabia, it was part of that bubble. We coulda hit Pakistan. We hit Iraq because we could."
... [snip] ...
For years Friedman spent dithering about the war. Oh gee it wasn't going well, but the light at the end of the tunnel might be around the corner in another critical 6 months, leading me to coin the term Friedman Unit, or the F.U. It wasn't just Friedman of course. Basically every pro-stay in Iraq person would utter some version of "the next six months is critical" on a regular basis. For years I put these statements in my calendar, and six months later would remind the world that nothing had changed and we are still in Iraq and the stupid fucking fuckstick is still writing in your newspaper or on the teevee blathering about the next crucial six months. The state of the world is what it is in large part because people in positions of great power think this absurd buffoon of man is a Very Serious Person
Posted by Mike Blaxill, Tuesday, April 17, 2012
The War on Terror Is Corrupting All It Touches
Posted by Michael Butler, Monday, April 16, 2012How Neocons Sank Iran Nuke Deal
Posted by Michael Butler, Monday, April 16, 2012The Man Who Found the Titanic: A Tale of a Secret Expedition – Print View – The Daily Beast
Posted by Michael Butler, Monday, April 16, 2012Kosovo’s “Mafia State” and Camp Bondsteel: Towards a Permanent US Military Presence in Southeast Europe
Posted by Michael Butler, Monday, April 16, 2012A Veteran’s Death, the Nation’s Shame – NYTimes.com
Posted by Michael Butler, Monday, April 16, 2012Dan Rather Was Right About George W. Bush
Fascinating. mbPosted by Michael Butler, Monday, April 16, 2012
Atrios: WANKER OF THE DECADE – 1st Runner Up, Fred Hiatt
Atrios ..Some years back I had a wee epiphany when I realized that, for the most part, we aren't supposed to to read the WaPo editorial page. It isn't actually for us. It's a means for certain elites to send messages to each other, a way for the "Gang Of 500" to take their battles public, to signal their interests and priorities. There are some exceptions to this, some columnists who write for readers, but for the most part it's simply a conversation by and for elites. If you're good enough, smart enough, and, doggone it, Fred Hiatt thinks you're important, there's no limit to the amount of bullshit you can have blessed by him. On his page is where the Washington Consensus is defended daily, truth be damned. Krauthammer. Broder. Hoagland. Kristol. Novak. Cohen. Lane. Cupp. Thiessen. Kurtz. Samuelson. Diehl. Kelly. Noonan. Will. Ignatius. Parker. Marcus. Milbank. Gerson. Some of these people are no longer with us, and I have no idea which ones Hiatt is really responsible for, but I'm a lazy blogger so I'll just throw them all in his column. Imagine assembling this collection of horrors, and being proud of itpretty sure Tommy Friedman will win this contest .. Atrios coined the term "Friedman units," i.e. (from Wikipedia): "One Friedman Unit is equal to six months, specifically the "next six months", a period repeatedly declared by New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman to be the most critical of the then-ongoing Iraq War even though such pronouncements extended back over two and a half years" - mab .. read more
Posted by Mike Blaxill, Monday, April 16, 2012
Atrios: WANKER OF THE DECADE – 2nd Runner Up, Andrew Sullivan
Atrios/Eschaton ..While the horrible events of 9/11 predated, somewhat, THE ESCHATON DECADE, among the numerous consequences was the rise of the warbloggers. Sullivan had a longish media career, but was also one of the early bloggers. And after 9/11, General Sullivan enlisted in the Fighting 101st Keyboard Kommandos, otherwise known as the "warbloggers," whose primary mission was to fight America's most important enemy, the enemy at home known as "Americans." In the Sunday Times of London on September 16, 2001 (!!), Andrew had these lines: "The middle part of the country - the great red zone that voted for Bush - is clearly ready for war. The decadent left in its enclaves on the coasts is not dead -and may well mount a fifth column." This was 5 days after 9/11 (presumably written a couple of days before) .. As we get higher and higher on this list, I get more tired even as the wanking of the wankers becomes greater and greater.. read more
Posted by Mike Blaxill, Monday, April 16, 2012
Washington’s Dangerous Blockade of Iran
Posted by Michael Butler, Sunday, April 15, 2012Democracy Now: SDS Founder, Veteran Activist Tom Hayden on Participatory Democracy from Port Huron to Occupy Wall Street
.. read transcript
Posted by Mike Blaxill, Sunday, April 15, 2012
The Guantanamo war crimes tribunal is worse than a Bush-era horror show: it reminds me of Chinese ‘justice’ : Information Clearing House
Posted by Michael Butler, Friday, April 13, 2012TomDispatch: The Afghan Syndrome
Posted by Bill Swiggard, Thursday, April 12, 2012Left Behind: What We Lost in Iraq and Washington, 2009-2012
Posted by Michael Butler, Wednesday, April 11, 2012Nathan Schneider: How to succeed in reoccupation without really trying
Schneider in Waging Nonviolence ..For lots of organizers, I’ve noticed, the operating presumption is that occupation — something comparable to last fall but somehow surely better — constitutes a prerequisite to further political action. Consequently, a considerable amount of the energy of the most talented organizers in New York (as well as, evidently, in Oakland and San Francisco) has been directed toward failed reoccupation attempts .. What if the first thing people thought of when they heard the word “Occupy” was, “Oh, those are the kids trying to take down the most dangerous bank in America and who saved my friend’s home from foreclosure”? Do stuff like this, and you’re creating a dilemma for the whole society. You’re asking everyone to choose sides — not about a little occupation, but about major features of everyday economic life. Do I want Bank of America to foreclose on my neighbor or not? Do I want my kids to spend their post-college lives enslaved by debt or not?.. read more
Posted by Mike Blaxill, Wednesday, April 11, 2012
OWS.org: Wall Street #Occupied
Occupy Wall St dot Org ..For the first time since our movement against economic inequality and political corruption began, Occupy Wall Street is literally occupying Wall Street. As of 3am eastern time [April 10th], over 40 Occupiers are sleeping on Wall Street near the corner of Broad across from the New York Stock Exchange .. On April 6, [at Union Square] NYPD gathered once again for the nightly ¨eviction theater¨ only to find Occupiers had moved to the sidewalks and erected a sign declaring their legal right to do so. When police moved in arrest them, Occupiers on livestream read the law permitting sleeping on sidewalks as political protest. In Metropolitan v. Safir, the U.S. District Court covering New York City ruled that ¨ the First Amendment of the United States Constitution does not allow the City to prevent an orderly political protest from using public sleeping as a means of symbolic expression." The police backed down. The tactic quickly became a model for other Occupations.. read more
Posted by Mike Blaxill, Tuesday, April 10, 2012
