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Thursday, April 3, 2003 |
ON THIS DAY: 1963
Martin Luther King, Jr., launches voter registration drive in Birmingham, AL.
Police Chief "Bull" Connor responds with fire
hoses & attack
dogs.
Sit-ins & demos begun by SCLC & volunteers. The city government & Bull
will get an injunction to prevent demonstrations on April 11, & King & many
others will be jailed on the 12th for violating the injunction.
QUOTE OF THE DAY
"
I don't want to give aid and comfort to the enemy - I just want to be able to
tell the truth."
- - Peter Arnett
RHINO HERE:
Peter Arnett, Pulitzer Prize winner for his coverage of the Vietnam War for
AP, has been offered a job after being fired this week for giving an interview
to
Iraqi TV. Arnett began his career as a teenage cub reporter on the Southland
Times in the New Zealand city of Invercargill, 950 kilometers southwest of the
capital, Wellington. Editor Fred Tulett was asked whether he'd hire Arnett back. "Of
course, yes, immediately. I wouldn't give it a second thought." However,
it appears the strongly anti-war British tabloid Daily Mirror has beaten Tulett,
announcing it hired Arnett to report from Iraq.
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/cms.dll/html/uncomp/articleshow?msid=42
The title of today's blog, "Tigris & Euphrates" refers
of course to the two rivers in Iraq which are considered the cradle
of civilization.
It
also refers to THE BOTTOM LINE essay by the beautiful and talented Arundhati
Roy. It's a must read.
In many ways, life is easier for the Americans who are lapping up the shrub
company
line. No nasty stares as the "patriots" drive past the dissenters'
bumper stickers. (Mine says, "When we kill the innocent, we become
the enemy.")
No nightmares of Ashcroft & Poindexter knocking down your door. No need to
get up to change the channel from Fox News. Ahhh, what a comfort that all would
be. But there are strategies for those of us who wretch when we think of what's
being done in our name. American historian extraordinaire, Howard Zinn wrote
back in 1999, 7 pieces of profound advice.
Howard Zinn On Getting Along
http://www.zmag.org/sustainers/content/1999-03/mar7_1999.htm
This Friday in San Francisco - INTERFAITH PRAYER
SERVICE TO
MOURN THE WAR & LOSS
OF LIFE COMMEMORATING THE ANNIVERSARY OF THE ASSASSINATION OF MARTIN LUTHER KING,
Jr.
AT: SF FEDERAL BUILDING, 450 Golden Gate Avenue, FRIDAY, APRIL 4th 9-10
am
(those who are moved to do so will participate in civil disobedience at 10)
SPONSORS: American Friends Service Committee, Bay Area United for Peace and Justice,
Buddhist Peace Fellowship, EPI/CALC, Fellowship of Reconciliation, Franciscan
Affinity Group, Interfaith Witness for Peace in the Middle East, Jewish Voice
for Peace, Tikkun Community, United Muslims of America. MORE INFO: (415) 565-0201
or mepeacesf@afsc.org
Rhino's Blog reader files federal civil rights suit
Off and on for decades, I've played drums in rock 'n' roll bands with NYC native
Alan Graf. For a long stretch, our band was called "Gross National Product" or
G.N.P. for short. Recently Alan filed a federal civil rights suit alleging that
Portland, Oregon police mistreated protesters when President Bush visited town
last August. He's now amending the suit to include more recent examples of police
abuse, contending they represent a continuing "pattern and practice" of
violating antiwar protesters' civil rights by using excessive force in recent
demonstrations and marches.
Originally Graf filed the suit on behalf of 7 adults & 3 kids who attended
protests of Bush's appearance at an Aug. 22 fund-raising gathering for Oregon
Republican Sen. Gordon Smith. The suit named Mayor Vera Katz, Police Chief Mark
Kroeker, the city of Portland and the Portland Police Bureau as defendants. The
new amended version names nearly two dozen Portland & Beaverton police commanders,
sergeants & officers whose abuse has been video taped by protestors.
Protest suit to allege pattern of police abuse
MSNBC via Jim Redden of The Portland Tribune, 4/1/03
http://www.msnbc.com/local/vcolptld/m283731.asp
THE BOTTOM LINE this
Thursday is, to me, both infuriating and uplifting. Written by Arundhati Roy
who was the first Indian citizen (dot Indian, not feather Indian)
to win the prestigious booker prize for her beautiful novel, "The God of
Small Things". Having received a million dollar book deal and then being
deemed One of People Magazine's "50 Most Beautiful People in the World
1998",
Ms. Roy has become a celebrity and as the web site linked below calls her, a
tall literary lioness persona. I've provided 2 excerpts below with a link to
the entire essay which is insightful & evocative.
ARUNDHATI ROY | A LIFE FULL OF BEGINNINGS AND NO ENDS
Links to her bio, her recent articles on Afghanistan& Iraq, and reviews
of
her books.
http://aroy.miena.com/
7:34:54 AM 
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THE BOTTOM LINE
Mesopotamia. Babylon. The Tigris and Euphrates
Arundhati Roy, The Guardian, Wednesday April 2, 2003
How many children, in how many classrooms, over how many centuries, have hang-glided through the past, transported on the wings of these words? And now the bombs are falling, incinerating and humiliating that ancient civilization. On the steel torsos of their missiles, adolescent American soldiers scrawl colorful messages in childish handwriting: For Saddam, from the Fat Boy Posse. A building goes down. A marketplace. A home. A girl who loves a boy. A child who only ever wanted to play with his older brother's marbles.
On March 21, the day after American and British troops began their illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq, an "embedded" CNN correspondent interviewed an American soldier. "I wanna get in there and get my nose dirty," Private AJ said. "I wanna take revenge for 9/11." To be fair to the correspondent, even though he was "embedded" he did sort of weakly suggest that so far there was no real evidence that linked the Iraqi government to the September 11 attacks. Private AJ stuck his teenage tongue out all the way down to the end of his chin. "Yeah, well that stuff's way over my head," he said...
...In most parts of the world, the invasion of Iraq is being seen as a racist war. The real danger of a racist war unleashed by racist regimes is that it engenders racism in everybody - perpetrators, victims, spectators. It sets the parameters for the debate, it lays out a grid for a particular way of thinking. There is a tidal wave of hatred for the US rising from the ancient heart of the world. In Africa, Latin America, Asia, Europe, Australia. I encounter it every day. Sometimes it comes from the most unlikely sources. Bankers, businessmen, yuppie students, and they bring to it all the crassness of their conservative, illiberal politics. That absurd inability to separate governments from people: America is a nation of morons, a nation of murderers, they say, (with the same carelessness with which they say, "All Muslims are terrorists"). Even in the grotesque universe of racist insult, the British make their entry as add-ons. Arse-lickers, they're called.
Suddenly, I, who have been vilified for being "anti-American" and "anti-west", find myself in the extraordinary position of defending the people of America. And Britain.
Those who descend so easily into the pit of racist abuse would do well to remember the hundreds of thousands of American and British citizens who protested against their country's stockpile of nuclear weapons. And the thousands of American war resisters who forced their government to withdraw from Vietnam. They should know that the most scholarly, scathing, hilarious critiques of the US government and the "American way of life" comes from American citizens. And that the funniest, most bitter condemnation of their prime minister comes from the British media. Finally they should remember that right now, hundreds of thousands of British and American citizens are on the streets protesting the war. The Coalition of the Bullied and Bought consists of governments, not people. More than one third of America's citizens have survived the relentless propaganda they've been subjected to, and many thousands are actively fighting their own government. In the ultra-patriotic climate that prevails in the US, that's as brave as any Iraqi fighting for his or her homeland.
While the "Allies" wait in the desert for an uprising of Shia Muslims on the streets of Basra, the real uprising is taking place in hundreds of cities across the world. It has been the most spectacular display of public morality ever seen. Most courageous of all, are the hundreds of thousands of American people on the streets of America's great cities - Washington, New York, Chicago, San Francisco. The fact is that the only institution in the world today that is more powerful than the American government, is American civil society. American citizens have a huge responsibility riding on their shoulders. How can we not salute and support those who not only acknowledge but act upon that responsibility? They are our allies, our friends...
THE ENTIRE ESSAY IS POSTED AT:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/Iraq/Story/0,2763,927849,00.html
"RHINO'S BLOG" is the responsibility of Gary Rhine. (rhino@kifaru.com)
Feedback, and requests to be added or deleted from the list are encouraged.
SEARCH BLOG ARCHIVES / SURF RHINO'S LINKS, AT:
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Articles are reprinted under Fair Use Doctrine of international copyright law.
http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/17/107.html
All copyrights belong to original publisher.
7:08:21 AM
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© Copyright 2005 Gary Rhine.
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