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Friday, January 24, 2003 |
QUOTE OF THE DAY
"I speak as a citizen of the world, for the world, as it stands aghast at the path we have taken. I speak as one who loves America, to the leaders of our nation: The great initiative in this war is ours, the initiative to stop it must be ours."
- - Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
RHINO HERE:
Today I offer you 2 large pieces of thought. Each very different from the other, yet , quite related. The 1st, by poet & writer Eliot Weinberger, known for his translations of Octavio Paz into English.
http://www.poets.org/poets/poets.cfm?prmID=686&CFID=15528632&CFTOKEN=98119665
For that work and more, Weinberger was the first American literary writer to be awarded the "Order of the Aztec Eagle" by the government of Mexico. Paz was a Mexican poet & later in life, Mexican Ambassador to India. He was quoted thusly. "Cannot poetry have as its primary objective, rather than the creation of poems, the creation of poetic moments?"
Weinberger's in-depth piece (excerpted & linked below) effectively sheds light on who's behind the shrub gang & just what they're up to. Shedding a little light on a lot of darkness I'd say is the theme.
THE BOTTOM LINE today, instead of shedding a little light, I believe radiates "a thousand points of light" as daddy bush used to say. Excerpted and linked is the text of the speech given this past weekend by Congressman Dennis Kucinich of Ohio. Commemorating the birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr., Kucinich speaks with a conviction obviously inspired by Dr. King, but also by another source of clarity all his own.
MORE INFO ON THE WORK OF DENNIS KUCINICH AT:
http://www.house.gov/kucinich
http://www.house.gov/kucinich/action/peace.htm#Legislation
8:21:11 AM 
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By Eliot Weinberger, 11 January 2003
For years they'll be debating the future of the empty pit where the World Trade Center once stood, with fantastic or hideous proposals of gardens in the sky or indoor lakes or threatening tic-tack-toe-shaped fortresses. But at the moment, the only thing certain is the fate of the actual towers themselves. The scrap steel will be shipped from the Fresh Kills landfill in Staten Island to the Grumman shipyard in Trent Lott's fiefdom of Pascagoula, Mississippi. There, it will be melted down and turned into the "New York," an $800 million "state of the art" amphibious assault ship. In Bush America, every ploughshare must be beaten into a sword.
War and war and war. 150,000 troops are massed in the surrounds of Iraq, many of them reservists pulled from their normal lives, preparing for what the Pentagon is already declaring the "greatest precision-bombing aerial assault in history," to be followed by an invasion which the United Nations estimates will cause 500,000 casualties. There are troops or "advisers" in India, Pakistan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgzystan, Georgia, the Philippines, Colombia . . . and speculation that Iraq is merely a stop on the road to Iran.
Military operations in Afghanistan are continuing at a cost of a billion dollars a month- compared to the $25 million a month the U.S. is spending there on humanitarian aid, most of it paying for the offices and maintenance of the aid workers, or vanishing into the crevices of local corruption. Helmeted and armored Special Forces troops still move like Robocop through the villages, past the hundreds of thousands of displaced peasants trying to survive the winter.
This year, the Pentagon budget will increase by $38 billion to almost $400 billion. The increase alone is practically the entire budget of the second-biggest military spender, China. Meanwhile, millions of Americans have lost their jobs or have had their salaries greatly reduced. There are schools around the country that will be closing a month early this year because of budget cuts, further evidence of the theory that Republicans never allot any money for education in order to keep the electorate stupid so that they'll vote for Republicans...
THE REST OF THE ARTICLE IS POSTED AT:
New York: Sixteen Months After
8:07:24 AM
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by U.S. Representative Dennis J. Kucinich
Lakewood Ministerial Alliance - Martin Luther King Day Celebration
Lakewood Presbyterian Church, Lakewood, Ohio, Sunday, January 19, 2003
Published on Wednesday, January 22, 2003 by CommonDreams.org
The life of Dr. Martin Luther King shines like the sun through the clouds which hover over this nation, casting a beam of light whenever darkness seeks to envelope us, illuminating our way over the rocky, perilous ground until we can envision the upward path towards social and economic justice.
This evening let us reflect on his challenge to America's prosecution of a war in Vietnam as we ponder an America poised to once again use its destructive power against a nation of people already broken by war, by US sanctions, by an uncaring leader. America stands ready to accelerate the bombing over major cities in Iraq, to destroy lives, families, houses, buildings, water systems, electric systems, to light fires to force populations to move, to engage in house to house combat. All in the name of fighting terrorism. In the name of removing weapons of mass destruction.
In his speech thirty five years ago at Riverside Church in New York City, Dr. King created the synthesis of peace and civil rights. "Somehow this madness must cease," Dr. King said then of the annihilation of the Vietnamese people and their nation. "I speak as a child of God and brother to the suffering poor of Vietnam. I speak for those whose land is being laid waste, whose homes are being destroyed, whose culture is being subverted."
Let us contemplate his words. "Somehow this madness must cease."...
READ THE ENTIRE SPEECH AT:
http://www.commondreams.org/views03/0122-09.htm
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7:58:03 AM
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© Copyright 2005 Gary Rhine.
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