31 August 2006
The basis of government [is] wrongly confused with the sovereign [or people], whose minister it is …. It is simply and solely a commission, an employment, in which the rulers, mere officials of the sovereign [or people], exercise in their own name the power of which it makes them depositories. This power it can limit, modify or recover at pleasure. – Rousseau[1]
21 August 2006
One thing is abundantly clear, the empire is in deep shit and like any cornered animal, they are extremely dangerous. The ‘terror alert’ is indicative of just how desperate they are risking even the destruction of the airline industry in order to put the frighteners on the populace. But has it worked? On one level, yes as the events on an aircraft from Spain bound for London reveal, with the xenophobic Brits refusing to travel on the plane with two people who looked “Middle Eastern” onboard. Let the government try and deny that its policy has not had the desired effect of demonising ‘Muslims’ and more generally, people of colour.
17 August 2006 — Media Lens
Since the invasion of Iraq in March 2003, the BBC, like the media more generally, has consistently attempted to delegitimise armed opposition to Britain and America’s illegal occupation of Iraq.
Initial reporting presented the insurgency as a fanatical and irresponsible assault on ordinary Iraqi people. On October 1, 2004, for example, the BBC’s correspondent in Baghdad, Nicholas Witchell, reported that a series of insurgent car bombs in the capital were “intended to undermine the future”. (Witchell, BBC1, 18:00 News, October 1, 2004) Continue reading
12 August 2006
“Sometimes we may have to modify some of our own freedoms in the short term in order to prevent their misuse and abuse by those who oppose our fundamental values and would destroy all of our freedoms in the modern world.” – Home secretary, John Reid
It’s amazing really that nobody sees the paradox of Reid calling for the abolition of what’s left of our civil rights in order to preserve them but then there’s nothing logical about the ‘war on terror’, it is itself a contradiction of terms.
10 August 2006 — Media Lens
“My job in Vietnam was to kill people. By the time I was first injured in combat (two or three months into my tour), I had already been directly responsible for the deaths of several hundred people. And today, each day, I can still see many of their faces.”
So writes Claude Anshin Thomas of his role as a crew chief on US assault helicopters in the Vietnam war. Thomas recounts one particular incident among many: Continue reading
8 August 2006
Consider if you will that the US has, for the past 100 years pursued a policy that would enable it to ensure global dominance through the ownership and control of vital energy supplies and as a result enable it to dominate the world’s economy to the benefit of its own capitalist class. This policy has resulted in innumerable wars and coup d’etats and even the deliberate destruction of entire countries through its control of world trade and innumerable foreign governments.
6 August 2006
Outrage, anger and disbelief seem to be the most common responses to the US/Israeli destruction of Lebanon, understandably given the sheer ferocity of the attack but let us not let it get in the way of trying to figure out why the pirates resorted to such measures that were sure to ignite a wave of resistance and horror.
3 August 2006
Israel’s deliberate and continued destruction of Lebanon is intended to force the Western powers to occupy the country on US/Israel’s behalf
I’ve spent the last couple of days doing (almost) nothing but reading, trying to get a handle on events. Firstly, it’s obvious to anyone who knows anything about Lebanon and the place of Hizballah in Lebanese society realises that the idea of destroying Hizballah is ridiculous regardless that it’s Israel’s stated objective. Therefore what are the real objectives of the US/Israeli onslaught?
The New Dark Age 