Saturday, April 28, 2007

THIS JUST IN! THE GANG THAT COULDN'T LIE WELL

 
"DO THE LIES EVER STOP?"  THAT'S THE QUESTION THESE REPORTERS ASKED SECRETARY OF STATE AND ANGER CONDI RICE EARLY THIS MORNING ON THE TELEPHONE.
 
"NO ONE COULD HAVE GUESSED!" SHE NERVOUSLY SHOT BACK.
 
THEN SHE ADDED, "I HAVEN'T HAD MY MORNING CUP OF COFFEE.  ARE WE TALKING ABOUT 9-11, THE CLAIMS ABOUT IRAQ OR THE AFTERMATH OF HURRICANE KATRINA?"
 
WE WAITED WHILE SECRETARY RICE FINISHED HER MORNING BREW AND SIPPED.
 
"OKAY," SHE SAID NOW BACK TO HER USUAL SPLIT OF EQUAL PARTS CHEER AND MALICE.  "WHAT WAS THE QUESTION?"
 
DO THE LIES EVER STOP?
 
"THE BULLY BOY OF THE UNITED STATES IS FIRMLY COMMITTED TO COMMUNICATING WITH THE AMERICAN PEOPLE," SHE SAID ATTEMPTING TO SIDE STEP THE QUESTION.  "EXACTLY WHAT ARE WE TALKING ABOUT?"
 
RANDALL TOBIAS, THE DEPUTY SECRETARY OF THE STATE, HER DEPUTY SECRETARY OF STATE, UNTIL HE ABRUPTLY RESIGNED FRIDAY.
 
"OH, RANDY," SAID SECRETARY RICE CATCHING ON.  "RANDY?  HMM.  HIS PARENTS PROBABLY SHOULD HAVE GIVEN HIM A DIFFERENT FIRST NAME, DON'T YOU THINK? AT LEAST HIS LAST NAME ISN'T BOEHNER."
 
 
"LIKE I SAID, IT'S REALLY UNFORTUNATE THAT HIS PARENTS NAMED RANDY," CONDI REPEATED.  "BUT IN FAIRNESS, PLAYBOY REALLY DOES HAVE FUNNY JOKES AND I'D NEVER HAVE KNOWN THAT IF RANDY DIDN'T WALK AROUND THE OFFICE SHOWING THEM TO EVERY ONE."
 
 
THESE REPORTERS HEARD SECRETARY RICE SPIT OUT HER MORNING COFFEE.
 
"HE REALLY SAID THAT? WELL.  HMMM.  THAT'S KIND OF -- IT'S KIND OF PATHETIC.  BUT IF RANDY SAID IT, THAT'S THE TALKING POINT WE ARE STICKING TO.  I SEEM TO RECALL HE HAD PROBLEMS WITH HIS RIGHT HAND.  A PALM CRAMP OR SOMETHING.  HE SAID HE USED HIS RIGHT HAND EXCESSIVELY.  SO A MASSAGE MAY ACTUALLY HAVE BEEN PRESCRIBED BY HIS DOCTOR."
 
AND WHO WOULD THAT DOCTOR BE.
 
"HMM.  I'M NOT SURE," SECRETARY RICE SAID STALLING FOR TIME.  "DR. RUTH?"
 
 
Starting with war resisters, Richard Brown (KXLY) profiles war resister Ryan Johnson who self-checked out in 2005 and went to Canada with his wife Jenny to seek asylum.  Johnson states, "I decided that I didn't want to participate in what I preceived to be an illegal war.  I have no problem serving my country.  I love the United States.  That's where I grew up, that's my home, that's where my family is."  Death of the party Lizzie Knudson shows up to puff out her chest and strut like any macho b.s. artist while expressing her hate and rage by declaring that she hopes he's thrown in prison for life and that she knows people who have died in Iraq.  Pass that rage on over to the Bully Boy, Lizzie, Ryan Johnson didn't send anyone into an illegal war to die.  Had Brown spent less time offering Lizzie's rants, he might have been able to provide some actual information (and it would have pleased War Hawk Liz).  He could have, for instance, noted that the Johnsons share a home in Canada with
Kyle Snyder and Maleah Friesen.  The latter are now married.  Of course their planned February wedding got put on hold when Canadian police -- taking orders from the US military -- showed up at the home to drag Snyder away in handcuffs (and in his boxers -- wouldn't even let him get dressed) with the intent to start immediate deportation on Snyder.  That's a story that would have tickled War Hawk Lizzie even if it has Canadians outraged (whether they support war resisters or not) because (a) war resistance is not a deportable offense and (b) the Canadian police is not supposed to take orders from a foreign government.  The US media continues its silence on that event and also avoids noting that US military crossed over into Canada on a search for war resister Joshua Key.  Brown does note, "In the last seven years, nearly 22,500 member of the United States military have gone AWOL or deserted and every year the numbers rise."
 
And as the numbers rise, more and more go public and speak out.  As Courage to Resist reports war resisters Camilo Mejia, Pablo Paredes, Agustin Aguayo and Robert Zabala will be speking out from May 9th through 17th in the San Francisco Bay Area.  This will be Aguayo's first publicly speaking appearances since being released from the brig earlier this month (April 18th).  The announced dates include:
 
Wednesday May 9 - Marin           
7pm at College of Marin, Student Services Center, 835 College Ave, Kentfield. Featuring Agustin Aguayo, Pablo Paredes and David Solnit. Sponsored by Courage to Resist and Students for Social Responsibility.


 
Thursday May 10 - Sacramento        
Details TBA

Friday May 11 - Stockton    
6pm at the Mexican Community Center, 609 S Lincoln St, Stockton. Featuring Agustin Aguayo.

Saturday May 12 - Monterey      
7pm at the Unitarian Universalist Church, 490 Aguajito Rd, Carmel. Featuring Agustin Aguayo and Camilo Mejia. Sponsored by Veterans for Peace Chp. 69, Hartnell Students for Peace, Salinas Action League, Women's International League for Peace and Freedom and Courage to Resist. More info: Kurt Brux 831-424-6447

Sunday May 13 - San Francisco 
7pm at the Veterans War Memorial Bldg. (Room 223) , 401 Van Ness St, San Francisco. Featuring Agustin Aguayo, Camilo Mejia and Pablo Paredes. Sponsored by Courage to Resist, Veteran's for Peace Chp. 69 and SF Codepink.


Monday May 14 - Watsonville           
7pm at the United Presbyterian Church, 112 E. Beach, Watsonville. Featuring Agustin Aguayo, Camilo Mejia, Pablo Paredes and Robert Zabala. Sponsored by the GI Rights Hotline & Draft Alternatives program of the Resource Center for Nonviolence (RCNV), Santa Cruz Peace Coalition, Watsonville Women's International League for Peace & Freedom (WILPF), Watsonville Brown Berets, Courage to Resist and Santa Cruz Veterans for Peace Chp. 11. More info: Bob Fitch 831-722-3311

Tuesday May 15 - Palo Alto          
7 PM at the First Presbyterian Church (Fellowship Hall), 1140 Cowper, Palo Alto. Featuring Camilo Mejia. Sponsored by Pennisula Peace and Justice Center. More info: Paul George 650-326-8837

Wednesday May 16 - Eureka  
7pm at the Eureka Labor Temple, 840 E St. (@9th), Eureka. Featuring Camilo Mejia. More info: Becky Luening 707-826-9197


Thursday May 17 - Oakland    
4pm youth event and 7pm program at the Humanist Hall, 411 28th St, Oakland. Featuring Camilo Mejia, Pablo Paredes and the Alternatives to War through Education (A.W.E.) Youth Action Team. Sponsored by Veteran's for Peace Chp. 69, Courage to Resist, Central Committee for Conscientious Objector's (CCCO) and AWE Youth Action Team.
 
The are all part of a growing movement of war resistance within the military: Camilo Mejia,
Ehren Watada, Terri Johnson, Dean Walcott, Camilo Mejia, Linjamin Mull, Joshua Key, Augstin Aguayo, Justin Colby, Marc Train, Camilo Mejia, Robert Zabala, Darrell Anderson, Kyle Snyder , Corey Glass, Jeremy Hinzman, Joshua Key, Mark Wilkerson, Camilo Mejia, Patrick Hart, Ricky Clousing, Ivan Brobeck, Aidan Delgado, Pablo Paredes, Carl Webb, Jeremy Hinzman, Stephen Funk, David Sanders, Dan Felushko, Brandon Hughey, Clifford Cornell, Joshua Despain, Joshua Casteel, Katherine Jashinski, Chris Teske, Matt Lowell, Jimmy Massey, Tim Richard, Hart Viges, Michael Blake and Kevin Benderman. In total, thirty-eight US war resisters in Canada have applied for asylum.
 
Information on war resistance within the military can be found at Center on Conscience & War, The Objector, The G.I. Rights Hotline, and the War Resisters Support Campaign. Courage to Resist offers information on all public war resisters.  In addition, the documentary Sir! No Sir! traces the war resistance within the military during Vietnam and it will air at 9:00 pm (EST) on The Sundance Channel followed at 10:30 p.m. by The Ground Truth which examines the Iraq war and features Jimmy Massey and Iraq Veterans Against the War's Kelly Dougherty among others.
 
 
From the topic of courage, we turn to craven -- taking us to the halls of Congress.  As Amy Goodman (Democracy Now!) noted today, "The Senate has voted provide nearly one hundred billion dollars for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan while setting a non-binding timetable for withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq.".  Non-bidning timetable remains one of the most left out aspects of the measure.  Also usually left out is that Bully Boy can reclassify those serving in Iraq (as "military police," for example) and avoid the pleas for withdrawals.  (Pleas because "calls" is too strong for what is now headed to the White House for a signature.)  Marilyn Bechtel (People's Weekly World) reminds that "the Congressional Research Service said that nearly half the $94 billion earmarked in the supplemental for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan would really be used for non-urgent items like sending an aircraft carrier to the Persian Gulf, and funding a U.S.-established Arabic-language TV station.  The CRS report also pointed out that the Pentagon has funds available to continue the war until June or July."  The sense of urgency being pushed by both major parties is as much smoke and mirrors as what left Congress.  Bill Van Auken (World Socialist Web) tackles the realities, noting, "While media reports on the Congressional legislation routinely refers to it as a plan for the withdrawal of US troops from occupied Iraq and ending the war, the language of the bill makes clear that what is involved is a tactical 'redeployment' that would leave tens of thousands of US soldiers and marines in Iraq for years to come. . . .  The bill includes a provision for keeping US armed forces in Iraq for three purposes: 'protecting United States and coalition personnel and infrastructure; training and equipping Iraqi forces and conducting targeted counter-terrorism operation.'  This language would essentially allow the occupation and war to continue indefinitely, with US troops deployed to protect a massive new embassy being constructed in Baghdad to house a virtual colonial government and to guard 'American citizens' sent by the oil companies to reap massive profits off of Iraq's oil fields."
 
Yes, the topic of oil.  In the supposed illegal war that had nothing to do with oil.  The New York Times editorial board pimped the privatization of oil this week as did War Pornographer Michael Gordon today where he noted, "American officials" were "pressing" the passage of the law and that it's apparently so important that even General David H. Petraeus has to stick his nose in (apparently commanding the US military in Iraq allows him much free time) to share that "he considered passage of the oil law, which would distribute revenues from oil production among Iraq's regions, a priority among the so-called benchmark items that the Americans would like to see become law."  It does redistribute the monies -- redistributes them right out of Iraq and into the pockets of Big Oil which, under the proposed legislation, would receive over 70% of the profits in some cases. 
 
In Iraq, Riverbend (Baghdad Burning) reports that her family has decided to leave Iraq which, despite the Operation Happy Talk operatives, never achieved 'liberation' or 'democracy' (but then those were never the Bully Boy's intended aims. Noting the issue of the very unpopular wall in Baghdad, Riverbend writes: "It's a wall that is intended to separate and isolate what is now considered the largest 'Sunni' area in Baghdad - let no one say the Americans are not building anything.  According to plans the Iraqi puppets and Americans cooked up, it will 'protects' A'adhamiya, a residential/mercantile area that the current Iraqi government and their death squads couldn't empty of Sunnis. . . .  The Wall is the latest effort to further break Iraqi society apart.  Promoting and supporting civil war isn't enough, apparently - Iraqis have generally proven to be more tenacisiou and tolerant than their mullahs, ayatollahs, and Vichy leaders.  It's time for America to physically divide and conquer - like Berlin before the wall came down or Palestine today.  This way, they can continue chasing Sunnis out of 'Shia areas' and Shia out of 'Sunni areas'."
[. . .]
 
Finally, Wednesday, May 2nd at 6:30 pm in The Great Hall, Cooper Union (NYC), Howard Zinn and Anthony Arnove will be presenting readings from their  Voices of a People's History of the United States featuring music performed by Allison Moorer and Steve Earle and readings and vocal performances by Ally Sheedy, Brian Jones, Danny Glover, Deepa Fernandes, Erin Cherry, Harris Yulin, Kathleen Chalfant, Kerry Washington, Opal Alladin, Staceyann Chin and Stanley Tucci.  Zinn and Arnove will provide both the introduction and the narration.
 
 
 

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