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Friday, April 11, 2003 |
QUOTE OF THE DAY
" I believe that if we had and would keep our bloody, dollar-crooked fingers out of the business of these nations so full of depressed, exploited people they will arrive at a solution of their own. . . . And if unfortunately their revolution must be of a violent type because the 'haves' refuse to share with the 'have nots' by any peaceful method, at least what they get will be their own and not the American style, which they don't want and above all don't want crammed down their throats by Americans"
- - David M. Shoup, General, USMC (ret.),
APRIL X IN HISTORY:
1963 -- Pacem in Terris encyclical issued by Pope John XIII, calling for an end to the nuclear arms race.
Nobody listens.
1968 -- US Civil Rights Act of 1968 signed into law.
The act bars racial discrimination in housing & other areas.
1991 -- United Nations officially declares an end to the Gulf War.
1996 -- Treaty of Pelindaba signed in Cairo, making Africa a nuclear-free continent &, at least in theory, making the entire southern hemisphere a nuclear-free zone.
RHINO HERE:
Most have seen the image of the statue of Saddam being torn down in the Baghdad square & the hundred or so Iraqi people beating it with shoes. The way the tri-letter pom pom girl media is playing that footage, it would seem it's as significant as the fall of The Berlin Wall or the massive worldwide Peace Demonstrations of the past few months. If you want to see the truth of that event, take a look at the photo linked below, taken from high atop a building that sits on that square. It's quite tell tale of the CIA's dog & pony show.
The "toppling" of Saddam
While some Americans are basking in "I told you so" over the U.S. Government's latest response to the 911 tragedy, many other Americans are only too aware of the suffering being experienced in so many places around the world. Hundreds of families in Iraq are mourning & burying their dead. Hundreds more are trying to get their relatives' shrapnel & burn injuries treated but are frustrated by their local hospitals' lack of electricity, water and supplies. And meanwhile, many of the brutal regimes around the world that don't have any oil under their soil are taking advantage of the situation, bearing down on their people while the rest of the world's attention is on Iraq.
Below is a summary & link to a report about what's happening in a few of those countries. Below that is the beginning of a letter from Michael Moore which attempts to encourage those Americans who have been outspoken against this war & who may be feeling frustrated.
THE BOTTOM LINE today is written by my friend, Michael O'Gorman, one of the founders of Peace Roots Alliance, the folks who started the "Peace Is Patriotic" billboard campaign as well as the More Than Warmth, children's quilt making international peace initiative. I believe Michael's brief message will touch those that need to hear it. It strikes a similar chord as Michael Moore's piece but not from the standpoint of someone who's setting bestseller records & who just won an Oscar. Instead, it comes from just one of us.
http://www.peaceroots.org
All war, all the time seen restricting media focus
All war, all the time coverage of Iraq has eclipsed a host of bad-news stories from around a troubled world, diverting media scrutiny away from military conflict, massacres and other human rights abuses. While the world has been transfixed by the story of how U.S.-led forces battled their way across Iraq into Baghdad, with coverage driven by ground-breaking reporting from correspondents "embedded" with military units, scant attention has been paid to many stories that would otherwise have made front pages or played prominently in news bulletins. These include a massacre in the Democratic Republic of Congo, killings and detentions in the West Bank and a crackdown on dissidents in communist Cuba. Curt Goering, Deputy Executive Director of Amnesty International USA, said the rights group had been concerned the media focus on Iraq to the virtual exclusion of most other international news would provide an excuse for repressive authorities to "settle old scores" by cracking down on opponents. "That's been a fear that we had even before the war started," he told Reuters. "In Cuba that's certainly happening."
All War, All the Time
My Oscar "Backlash": "Stupid White Men" Back At #1, "Bowling" Breaks New Records
April 7, 2003
Dear friends,
It appears that the Bush administration will have succeeded in colonizing Iraq sometime in the next few days. This is a blunder of such magnitude -- and we will pay for it for years to come. It was not worth the life of one single American kid in uniform, let alone the thousands of Iraqis who have died, and my condolences and prayers go out to all of them.
So, where are all those weapons of mass destruction that were the pretense for this war?
Ha!
There is so much to say about all this, but I will save it for later. What I am most concerned about right now is that all of you -- the majority of Americans who did not support this war in the first place -- not go silent or be intimidated by what will be touted as some great military victory. Now, more than ever, the voices of peace and truth must be heard. I have received a lot of mail from people who are feeling a profound sense of despair and believe that their voices have been drowned out by the drums and bombs of false patriotism. Some are afraid of retaliation at work or at school or in their neighborhoods because they have been vocal proponents of peace. They have been told over and over that it is not "appropriate" to protest once the country is at war, and that your only duty now is to "support the troops."
Can I share with you what it's been like for me since I used my time on the Oscar stage two weeks ago to speak out against Bush and this war? I hope that, in reading what I'm about to tell you, you'll feel a bit more emboldened to make your voice heard in whatever way or forum that is open to you...
MICHAEL MOORE'S LETTER IS POSTED AT:
http://www.voice4change.org/stories/showstory.asp?file=030409~mm.asp
7:41:31 AM 
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THE BOTTOM LINE
Hold your head up
BY Michael O'Gorman of Peace Roots Alliance
Hold your head up peaceful people.
Baghdad has fallen to the invading armies and the people, many of them anyway, are cheering. Jubilation seems real and deep as the yoke of an evil regime is loosened. The end of the fighting, the future of the country, the "winning of the peace" are all still in question, the hospitals still full of the wounded and disfigured, the graves still fresh. But for this moment the mood in the streets is one of liberation and the mood in America is drunken with victory.
I cannot make myself watch it on TV for the jumbling of emotions I need to sort out. It was not unlike seeing the Berlin Wall fall, though it went much more peacefully. For with it fell not only the tyranny of perverse and sadistic dictatorships but also the betrayed hopes of millions that there could be a more egalitarian alternative to the greed-driven societies of the West. And with it came the depressing intuition that the West would pervert it again and make it a victory for Coca Cola and McWorld.
So while we've found no Weapons of Mass Destruction, we've found a people so enslaved by their country that they cheer for the invaders that they may soon be trying to push away. And while Bush and Blair and the war supporters get to bask in their "I told you so's", the same tax dollars that bombed the countryside get to repair the water systems and deliver the food and mend the wounds that it inflicted.
But hold your head up peaceful people. For you were not wrong to say there can be, there has to be, peace AND justice. You were not wrong to say the cycle of war upon war has to be broken and a world clever enough to make "smart bombs" has to be smart enough to make peace.
You were not supporters of the tyranny. You did not send the tyrants arms for money. You opposed oppression everywhere. You spoke up for people wronged everywhere. And, most of you, rightfully and importantly, said all along that we too wanted the regime change and the liberation of the people, but not by those who profited once by keeping it in power, and seek to profit again by taking it down, from the safe distance of across the world. And in a way that would lead to the liberation of all peoples everywhere.
So feel the sadness and anger and betrayal and hope all mixed together. And the sobering knowledge that erasing the roots of war will be more difficult than standing in opposition to it. And be proud that you stood up for peace.
FOR MORE INFORMATION ABOUT PEACE ROOTS, GO TO:
http://www.peaceroots.org
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All copyrights belong to original publisher.
7:23:48 AM
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© Copyright 2005 Gary Rhine.
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