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Thursday, November 4, 2004 |
THE QUOTE:
"Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing."
- - Arundhati Roy
THIS DATE IN HISTORY: November 2nd
1920 -- Imprisoned anti-war & labor activist Eugene Debs receives over 1 million votes for US President.
1930 -- Ras Tafari Makonnen is crowned Negus of Ethiopia, taking the name Haile Selassie. Signifies to thousands of Jamaicans & Garveyites in the US the fulfillment of the prophesy of their leader, Marcus Garvey regarding the first black crowned King of Africa.
1965 -- On Election day, Norman Morrison, a 32 year-old Quaker, father of 3, douses himself with kerosene & sets himself on fire below Secretary of Defense McNamara's Pentagon window to protest the Vietnam War.
Friends at the Stony Run Friends Meeting in Baltimore, Maryland, say his suicide was preceded by months of grieving over the escalating U.S. war in Southeast Asia.
1971 -- In the US, 18 to 20 year olds vote for the first time. Part of the Nixon administration's efforts to defuse youth rebellion & opposition to his Vietnam War activities.
1972 -- 500 Native American protesters on the "Trail of Broken Treaties" march, occupy the Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) offices, in Washington D.C., for 6 days.
1983 -- President Ron Reagan signs a bill to establish a federal holiday in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s birthday. Culmination of the efforts by many civil rights organizations & entertainers to name King's birthday as a national holiday, despite opposition of many states &Dick Cheney who voted against the bill. .
1989 -- Guatemala: American nun Diana Ortiz is kidnapped, beaten, raped & tortured near Guatemala City by US-backed & trained (at The School of The Americas) Guatemalan military. The US Embassy claimed Ortiz staged her own abduction & rape.
1991 -- Burmese Nobelist Aung San Suu Kyi enters a coma from a hunger strike.
2004 -- George Dubya Bush elected to a 2nd four year term as US President by the American voters & The Diebold Corporation.
RHINO SEZ:
Dear Friends, Relatives & Rhino's Blog Readers
The Rhino loves you & offers fond regards.
In the aftermath of the Presidential Election, he's hibernating, licking his wounds, thinking of those who will be hurt economically, hurt mentally, hurt physically & those who will be killed by the bush administration's actions over the next 4 years. He's also pondering possible courses of action.
There are so many perspectives being offered around on what happened:
- the people voted from their fears instead of from their anger
- the right thinks they're morally superior; the left thinks they're intellectually superior
- there are really 2 countries; The Red States of America, and The Blue States of America
- the election was cleverly stolen by the right, as was feared, by use of paperless electronic voting machines
- Kerry blew it by pandering to "the undecided voters" instead of differentiating himself from bush on the war
- it took the right 2 decades to build the power they now have. It will take the left longer than 2 decades to bring to fruition, what we have begun in the last 2 years.
- some good news maybe? when things go from bad to worse in the next 4 years, as they always do for 2nd term presidents, shrub & company will have no one else to blame
- more good news? As David Corn of The Nation put it, "half of the electorate rejected Bush's leadership, his agenda, his priorities, his falsehoods... half concluded that Bush had caused the deaths of over 1100 American GIs and literally countless Iraqis (maybe 100,000) for no compelling reason. Nearly half saw the emperor buck naked and butt ugly. Nearly half said no to his rash actions and dishonest justifications. Nearly half realized that Bush had misrepresented the war in Iraq as a crucial part of the effort against al Qaeda and Islamic jihadism. Nearly half desired better and more honest leadership. Nearly half knew that Bush has led the country astray."
(o/)
The Rhino will return, though in a different form, with a different focus & on a different schedule.
Until then, here are 2 offerings:
1) Go see the movie entitled, "What The Bleep"
Rhino couldn't bear to listen to the broadcast pundits on election night & chose instead to see this movie.
There has not been a clearer explanation of the real nature of God, and the human potential.
It's in theatres now (worth seeing on the big screen) and will be available in the near future in DVD.
SEE THIS MOVIE!
http://www.whatthebleep.com
2) The words of Ms. Arundhati Roy, delivered on the eve of last year's invasion of Iraq.
What Can We Do?
Arundhati Roy, Porto Alegre, Brazil, January 27, 2003:
What can we do? We can hone our memory, we can learn from our history. We can continue to build public opinion until it becomes a deafening roar...We can re-invent civil disobedience in a million different ways. In other words, we can come up with a million ways of becoming a collective pain in the ass.
When George Bush says "you're either with us, or you are with the terrorists" we can say "No thank you." We can let him know that the people of the world do not need to choose between a Malevolent Mickey Mouse and the Mad Mullahs.
Our strategy should be not only to confront empire, but to lay siege to it. To deprive it of oxygen. To shame it. To mock it. With our art, our music, our literature, our stubbornness, our joy, our brilliance, our sheer relentlessness - and our ability to tell our own stories. Stories that are different from the ones we're being brainwashed to believe.
The corporate revolution will collapse if we refuse to buy what they are selling - their ideas, their version of history, their wars, their weapons, their notion of inevitability. Remember this: We be many and they be few. They need us more than we need them.
Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.
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9:27:48 AM 
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© Copyright 2005 Gary Rhine.
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