September 20, 2004
"Perhaps it is universal truth that the loss of liberty at home is to be charged to provisions against danger, real or pretended, from abroad." (Swans - September 20, 2004) TERRORIST BEES ARE STRIKING BIG TIME. Since the terrorist network, led by so-and-so (Fidel Castro, bin Laden, Mugabe, Chávez, al-Assad, Kim Jong II, al-Bashir, maybe Putin, surely China, and possibly Jacques Chirac of France) could only kill 30 Americans in 2003, none of them within the "territories" of the USA, the bees took over. Fifty-one Americans got killed by these predators in 2003. Al Qaeda operatives at work... THEY ARE BACK... THE HUMAN RIGHTS BRIGADES are swarming around Darfur, Sudan, like yellow jackets around your Sunday barbeque. The Soros funded International Crisis Group (remember the ICG's role in Kosovo and the Trepca mines?) has been quite active on this issue. Its Darfur campaign Web page is extensive. According to that page, "over 30 opinion pieces on Darfur by ICG staff and Board members have been published in major newspapers around the world." They applauded the Bush administration decision to label the Sudanese "crisis" a genocide. The Cruise Missile Left has jumped on board, salivating at the very idea of our renewed humanitarianism. They all call for an intervention by the famed International Community. To be fair to Mr. Soros, he is not the only financial supporter of ICG. The usual donors are present, from the Carnegie, Ford, Bill & Melinda Gates, William & Flora Hewlett, Henry Luce, John D. & Catherine T. MacArthur, Charles Stewart Mott foundations, to the John Merck Fund, Open Society Institute (that's Soros), Ploughshares Fund, the Sarlo Foundation of the Jewish Community Endowment Fund, the United States Institute of Peace, and more. Of course, George Soros is a board member; but so is Zbigniew Brzezinski, Wesley Clark, Stanley Fischer (Vice Chairman, Citigroup Inc. Former First Deputy Managing Director of International Monetary Fund), George Robertson (former Secretary General, NATO and former Defence Secretary, UK), and, among many others, Morton Abramowitz, the former US Assistant Secretary of State (under Raygun). By the way, former US Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell is ICG's Chairman Emeritus (he's also Disney's chairman...among other "occupations"). Abramowitz-Soros-Brzezinski, same combat! Abramowitz, the ultimate neo-con; Soros, the ultimate neo-lib; Brzezinski, the ultimate neo-reac. For good measure, they could also have Henry Kissinger, the ultimate neo-real, on board... The dovishly liberal Samantha Power -- a Lecturer in Public Policy at Harvard, founding executive director of the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy, author of A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide (for which she was awarded the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for general nonfiction), and yes, of course, she covered the Yugoslav wars for U.S. News and World Report, the Boston Globe, and the Economist (she also graces the pages of The New Yorker and The Atlantic Monthly, bastions, as is well known, of the humanitarian crowd) has joined the anti-genocide fray. Ms. Power, a true expert in genocide (she comes from Ireland), and a card-carrying member of the Eastern intellectual establishment teamed up with who else but Morton Abramowitz (who happens to have been her political mentor) to advocate intervention -- humanitarian intervention needless to say -- in Sudan (The Washington Post, September 13, 2004). What an eclectic group, no? (Thanks to Chicago researcher David Peterson for illuminating this friendly group.) NOW HEAR THIS: Seven in ten Americans say that genocide in Sudan must be prevented (http://www.pipa.org/OnlineReports/Africa/PressRelease07_20_04.pdf). Don't you love those polls? Did the pollsters ask the respondents whether they could pinpoint Sudan on a map? Could seven in ten Americans be able to tell you that Sudan is in Africa? Where in Africa, East, West, North, South? Where's Africa anyway? Perhaps Oprah knows... Jerry Falwell heard from god himself (there is no herself in Falwell's world, but in the kitchen) that Satan is hiding in Sudan, and Osama bin Laden is in hiding there too, under a Raygun's mask, to learn from the master of darkness. WE ALSO HEAR, through the grapevine of "Swans' News Service," that the "Jews" are behind this colossal satanic conspiracy. According to the last of the America-first Mohicans, Justin Raimundo, the peripatetic holder of the antiwar.com flame, the Israeli Jews are in total control of America through the Jewish neo-cons and the liberal Left, or whoever. Buchanan, Uber alles. They, the "Jews," are controlling America, you know...AIPAC, Sharon, Hollywood, and the neo-cons have highjacked the good ol' federacy... 'Cause the good ol' republic has always been very keen and good to its constituencies (non-white excluded...but who cares? It's history.) MEANWHILE, under the radar screen, Mr. Bush ordered a cut in US assistance to Venezuela. The U.S. will not support a Venezuelan loan request of $250 million. The reason: an alleged -- repeat, alleged role in the international trafficking of women and children for sexual exploitation. So, let's read between the lines. First, the U.S. tried to unseat the Chavez government through a coup. The coup failed. Second, the U.S. tried to unseat the Chavez government through a recall (a la Schwarzenegger). The recall failed. So, now the U.S. goes for the purse. Next, send in the Marines. THE LEGISLATION is designed to "encourage countries to take decisive action against the practice" -- another creative method concocted by the US Congress to encourage behavioral changes... Funny, one wonders why this legislation has not been used in Kosovo, which is immersed -- not allegedly but actually -- in the international trafficking of women and children for sexual exploitation... "TELL A PERSON the same 'wrong' thing enough times, they will believe it to be right," says Gerard Donnelly Smith. Yep, it begins in the classroom where kids are taught about creationism and other fantasies such as the right to own semi-automatic assault rifles and all the brouhaha surrounding the 2nd amendment is all about the defense of civil liberties, and quickly enough you end up believing that a 10-foot high concrete wall is a fence and Abu Ghraib torture chambers were not that bad, after all -- or someone can be imprisoned in Guantánamo Bay for three years, then released on the account that he was innocent of all charges that in reality had never been charged against him...and no one peeps a word of protest, whether in the main media, or in the halls of Congress -- both sides of the aisle, s'il vous plait -- or, obviously in the administration. From there on, in the shades of this make-believe honeyed land, one can easily fabulate on the major differences between a Bush and a Kerry...which prompts our exile in Poland to blurt, "I just find it all too depressing, support for an outright Imperialist...devoted to MORE war...more colonialism, more destruction of the poor...more covert CIA activity in anything that's not conducive to US business. ALL because we find Bush so, uh, scary. I won't beat the dead horse of these arguments...but for one, it's disgusting." REMEMBER, a vote for Ralph Nader and Peter Camejo is a vote for sanity! PEOPLE who have consistently suggested that the 1991 Gulf War was about oil (confirmed by Cheney recently), the Yugoslav inferno was also fueled by the insatiable thirst for oil & gas (remember the corridors?), and so was/is Gulf War II -- policies that have been consistently supported by both parties (see Gabriel Kolko's article, "Alliances and the American election," in the Sydney Morning Herald) -- should read the Asia Times comprehensive oil resources. They clearly indicate a rapid acceleration of the Great Games whereby alliances are being reshuffled quite significantly. I wonder how the US consensus will react to what is becoming an obvious front of rejection -- France, Germany, Russia, China... More chaos and violent destabilization should be expected. IMO, this goes far beyond the little ABB-non ABB game played in the U.S. One thought: It's quite possible that the Bush/Kerry/Wall Street axis has determined that the rise of energy costs will be more detrimental to the economies of Western Europe, which imports almost 100 percent of its needs (if you take the UK out of the equation), than to the U.S. Then, again, I keep in mind the old expression made by de Gaulle, "Europe, from the Atlantic to the Ural" -- as the U.S. keeps bleeding in Iraq, Latin America is increasingly distancing itself from US interests, China increases it sphere of influence in Asia, etc., Russia can meet the energy needs of Western Europe... Not a pretty picture for the near term. A FRIEND ASKS: "Could it be that the American empire has already started to disintegrate and that 'the mind is the first thing to go?' We are cracking up first, with openly psychotic 'leadership' and a vast mass psychosis in the populace. Dysfunctional thinking, like the neo-con policies that led us into Iraq and our bleeding tax cut, may lead to a string of disasters that propagate the crack-up from the psyche into the material worlds of economics, military failures, and social degradation. Is it possible that Europe and Islam may find each other in a mutual rejection of us? Is it too late to stop the compulsory inclusion of all Americans in the ride down the drain with these nut cases in charge? Is there a way for me to book a different ride than these national suicide bombers? They really want to push the Kool Aid down your throat at gunpoint. Sorry to bore you with my melodrama, but I have dark thoughts whenever I think about these people." A MELLOWING MAN: Robert McNamara, the former US defense secretary (1961-1968) and ardent hawk during the war in Vietnam was in Assisi, Italy, last week for a nuptial occasion. The 88-year old man married 70-year-old Diana Masieri. While he did not sing the Viagra tune like Bob Dole did once upon a time, he found a way to criticize the Bushites indirectly. "They made a mistake," he said, adding, "it's a terrible problem and I don't know how it will end." And for good measure he quipped that they should not have done it "unilaterally." The mistake then was not to have done it, but to have done it "unilaterally." Decidedly not the Viagra tune but unmistakably the party line! ANOTHER UNSIGNED DIATRIBE (sorry, not edited): "Sir,I was just reading one of your articles called "Dictatorship of bullshit" and I could not help to notice the part you included about Castro's Cuba.I am a CUBAN inmigrant to this country and how dare you speak about the things you know nothing about to try to disseminate your communists and hateful ideas.You are dangerous, Sir.But I have good news.The American People dont believe your kind of Communistic Bullshit.Have a nice day" [From a Gonzaleztmp6 at aol.com] AMUSINGLY, A FRIEND WRITES: "It is amazing how people want to steamroll you with their opinions -- you're quite right, the more abusive the more demandingly -- and then after vomiting out a massive excess, they refuse to simply identify themselves. They are afraid of getting shit on by other assholes like themselves (in published critical reviews or rebuttals), and want the cover of anonymity while seeking to bask is some kind of public glory, for superior vision ('being right'). And yet, they're not willing to stand behind their own words. Cowards." TERRORISM ANYONE? Read Anthony Judge's taxonomy "Varieties of Terrorism: extended to the experience of the terrorized" at http://www.laetusinpraesens.org/docs00s/varterr.php ANOTHER SIGN of things to come, from the excellent "Anti-Empire Report," No. 13, September 17, 2004, by William Blum: "Sign-in of the times -- We're all accustomed to signing in when we visit certain office buildings. The sign-in book usually calls for date, your name, time arrived, who you're visiting, time left. At 1779 Massachusetts Avenue, just off Dupont Circle in Washington, DC, the sign-in book now asks: 'Are you a citizen of the USA?' What's next, signing a loyalty oath or undergoing a strip search before you can enter a public civilian building?" BOONVILLE NEWS -- Some readers have inquired about this "Boonville thing." Well, Boonville is a small town in Northern California, in Mendocino County along Highway 128 that winds around from Highway 101 to the Mendocino coast. Boonville is also the home of the famous Anderson Valley Advertiser, whose publisher and editor until recently was the genial Bruce Anderson (more on this another time) and now is the friendly David Severn. It also is Swans' new home since July 28, 2004. To be precise, we are located just about two and one-half miles past Boonville, in the hills. So, perhaps will I turn to be a hillbilly after all... Ironically, after eight years of publishing Swans from what must have been the only spot in Silicon Valley that could not get a high-speed connection to the Internet, and then ending up in the boonies, we are finally able to get high speed access via a satellite, starting hopefully next Saturday. Swans will be flying at last! For the past two weeks, brother Frank -- that would be Frank Wycoff, one of the original Swans' crazies -- visited with me (all the way from Oneonta, upstate New York) to help "winterize" the place and prepare for the coming rains. The night he left, on Saturday, it rained...and a 65-foot tall oak tree with about a 10-foot circumference and a forty-five-inch diameter at the base, fell to its death with a humongous crash. Need to purchase a chain saw pronto! Talking about purchases, does anyone have a Honda Generator, model EU3000is, for sale? All the generators, at least from Northern California, have been shipped to Florida! Power goes down regularly around here. AND so it goes... · · · · · ·
Resources America the 'beautiful' on Swans Gilles d'Aymery is Swans' publisher and co-editor. Do you wish to share your opinion? We invite your comments. E-mail the Editor. Please include your full name, address and phone number. If we publish your opinion we will only include your name, city, state, and country. Please, feel free to insert a link to this article on your Web site or to disseminate its URL on your favorite lists, quoting the first paragraph or providing a summary. However, please DO NOT steal, scavenge or repost this work without the expressed written authorization of Swans. This material is copyrighted, © Gilles d'Aymery 2004. All rights reserved. |
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