Chris Hedges, a much respected journalist, wrote this speech which he intended to deliver at a conference on Toronto recently but his plane was delayed due to weather. It’s worth reading in full, but here’s a taste:
The elites and their liberal apologists dismiss the rebel as impractical. They brand the rebel’s outsider stance as counterproductive. They condemn the rebel for being inflexible, unwilling to compromise. These elites call for calm and patience. They use the hypocritical language of spirituality, compromise, tolerance, generosity and compassion to argue that the only alternative is to accept and work with systems of despotic power. The rebel, however, is beholden to a moral commitment that makes this impossible. The rebel refuses to be bought off with government and foundation grants, invitations to parliament, television appearances, book contracts, academic appointments or empty rhetoric. The rebel is not concerned with self-promotion or public opinion. The rebel knows that, as Augustine wrote, hope has two beautiful daughters, anger and courage — anger at the way things are and the courage to see that they do not remain the way they are. The rebel is aware that virtue is not rewarded. The act of rebellion defines is its own virtue.
If I said something like this on Facebook, I know for a fact certain folks (you know who you are) would attack me with comments like “oh here we go again, everything is always American’s fault”.
Well it looks like Obama agrees with those of us who have been saying for the last year that the US-lead invasion of Iraq in 2003 indirectly lead to the creation of Daesh. In this VICE NEWS interview, he says (at 11’50”):
“Two things: One is, ISIL is a direct outgrowth of Al-Qaeda in Iraq that grew out of our invasion, which is an example of unintended consequences, which is why we should generally aim before we shoot.”
That’s pretty bold for a sitting American President to admit. He continues to make sense:
What I’m worried about” he said, “is even if ISIL is defeated, the underlying problem of disaffected Sunnis around the world – but particularly in some of these areas including Libya, including Yemen – where a young man who’s growing up has no education, has no prospects for the future, is looking around and the one way he can get validation, power, respect, is if he’s a fighter.”
“That’s a problem we’re going to have, generally. And we can’t keep on thinking about counterterrorism and security as entirely separate from diplomacy, development, education.”
He goes on to talk about why it is in the best self-interests of the US to fund education in the Middle East. I agree. Unfortunately he didn’t go the final step and connect the US’ desire to control to oil of the Middle East, and it’s long history of interfering in the politics of the region to control that oil, with the rise if Sunni and Wahhabist extremism – but it was a good and surprising start.
But then he says legalisation of marijuana shouldn’t be young people’s top priority. Really? When the US has the world’s largest prison population and much of that is being driven by the drug laws? I definitely think legalisation of all drugs, not just marijuana, should be a top priority of American’s youth.
How would you, as an Australian, feel if the majority of the non-Jewish Australian population had been forced by a superior military (supported by the United States) into the green zones on the right image over the last 50 years, with 75% of the white zone being occupied by Jewish settlers? What kind of response would you get from most Australians? Would you sit back and accept it? Or would you fight back with whatever tools you have available to you?
The outrage over the suggestion that Russia might have provided or sold the rocket launcher that downed MH17 and killed 300 civilians is such a joke when the annual total of civilians deaths from small arms sales by the permanent members of the UNSC makes that 300 look like a blip.
My data is a little out of date, but I’m sure nothing much has changed. Here are some facts for you to consider.
1. Some 300,000 to half a million people around the world are killed by them each year. (globalissues.org 2006)
2. World military expenditure in 2012 is estimated to have reached $1.756 trillion. (globalissues.org 2012)
3. The 5 UN Security Council permanent members are generally the largest arms dealers. (globalissues.org 2013)
5. Therefore, if there are between 300K – 500K people killed by small arms every year, and the USA is responsible for 44% of arms sales, then we can assume that the USA is responsible for somewhere in the region of 176,000 deaths every year.
Remember this the next time you hear Obama or Abbott decrying Putin.
Toyota Motor Corp. will pay $1.2 billion to settle US criminal charges that it lied to safety regulators and the public as it tried to cover-up deadly accelerator defects.
Waking up to the American dream. Corporate Sport plays two main roles in modern society – it is an organised distraction from politics and it teaches team mentality (my team vs your team), divide and conquer. People learn at a young age that they have to be loyal to “the team”, then that mentality transforms into blind loyalty for a political party, ideology or religion. I’ve got nothing against actually playing sport, just mindless sport as entertainment.
A professional football player says he walked away from the NFL, leaving more than $1 million on the table, after studying the works of Noam Chomsky and the Dalai Lama. (link)
“I’ve saved enough. It’s not like I’m sitting here and I’m a millionaire,” Moffitt said. “That’s what I kind of realized. I’m sitting here and I got to this point and I was like, what is the number that you need? How much do you really need? What do you want in life? And I decided that I don’t really need to be a millionaire.”
