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3.15.2007
CONSUMER DRONES VS. POLICE STATE
 What we face is what we have become, consumer drones are not worth a damn in facing the police state. You could say that the transfer of power from the people to the chosen few elites is to become a consumer, it is the handing over of citizenship for a few choice toys - selling out.
As consumer drones nobody cares if their rights are infringed upon, as long as you can purchase the next bobble, or sip the next latte, or maintain that consumer status quo however you conceive having "arrived." At this point you have become one with those who control you, you get what you think you want and they have YOU. It is nothing but the old principle of divide and conquer!
FUCK THE WORLDIn the above video all Turbonegro does is play back not only the image of what those in power are in the process of doing, but what has also become the common goal of each individual - in a most visceral and raw manner. . We become bereft of any concern except ourselves, and that makes us very ineffectual for any change.
What many have embraced at this juncture is profit over people, because those who sell you this bit of garbage merely have the bottom line in mind - and screw people. We enhance it by saying screw people and the only thing we care about is ours and our own. You have effectively dismissed the laws of citizenship, and with no citizens massing together there is no collective power - just people admiring their own deceptive self-image in the mirror.
Posted at 09:18 pm by deadringer
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3.13.2007
 For the French challenged the above title is Assault On The Academy. When I speak of the "academy" I mean the hall's of higher education in this country. It seems that in the country those who are in power are not satisfied with running it into the ground with fascistic intent in the direction of Empire (regardless of what history teaches us about the demise of empires), but wish by the means of bald and brute power to shut down dissent in the said academy.
This, because history teaches us once again, that without absolute control of higher education, there will be voices of learning which oppose their mad course! In the process they hope to extinguish critical thinking and all dissent.
(Ward Churchill)
So what they do is chose an individual, making sure he is in a tenured position - like Ward Churchill and have him pilloried in the public square of the mass media. This, of course, sending a chilling effect throughout academia, and thus attempting to silence any dissent to the status quo (or, what has been made the mad course of the status quo) - effectively saying to professors publicly that you must watch what you say or you will meet the same fate (especially those without tenure).
Along with the loss of job security in America, tenure has gone the same way. It has decreased significantly in the last 10 years, so that the academics chances of every gaining such security shrinks rapidly. What comes along with tenure? The ability to speak in regard to anything that has been made controversy without having ones head handed to them on a vindictive platter!
Essentially we are seeing what is called in military terms a pincher movement being made on academia, on the one side is political censorship, on the other is the precarious nature of employment, and this is aggravated by attacks of different sorts on professors. There is a third element, we will get to this next.
 This (above) is an example of the third part of this pincher movement. The use of students to monitor their teachers, especially in areas of Middle Eastern studies, or quite frankly, anywhere where the classic views of how good and great America is can be questioned - ethnic studies in the indigenous population in the case with Ward Churchill. Horowitz, who is supported by corporate money starts this grass root brown shirt movements among the youth (who are easily exploited), to put the pressure on professors at campus to "watch what they say." I understand that this tactic is used on 150 or so campus'.
Horowitz money is directly linked to the ACTA (American Council of Trustee's and Alumni), founded by Dick Cheney's wonderful wife (sarcasm). Another example is that of Cheney's wife who is fond of spawning articles like "How Many Ward Churchill's Do We Have?"
 "Today, students should shout at the president and ask why liberal and secular university lectures are present in the universities" - just who said this? Look no further than that famous document called PNAC, Project for the New American Century! To really get to the point, this is just one more stroke in the "war on terror."
Along with this bogus war on terror, and the encroachment on the rights of American's, is this war against critical thinking and the voice of dissent. You see, those who teach at the university and college level are supposed to those types of authority figures that people believe in, and this current administration cannot stand the fact that what is supposed to be one of their props, boots them in the proverbial ass!
THEY WANT TO ROB YOU OF ANY OBJECTIVITY, YOUR CRITICAL THINKING APPARATUS, THEY NOT ONLY WANT YOUR BODY BUT THEY WANT YOUR MIND. WE NEED, AS A PEOPLE, TO STOP THE PERSECUTION OF BRAVE ACADEMICS THAT STAND UP FOR WHAT IS TRUE AND RIGHT! LET'S STOP THESE FASCISTS FROM RUINING WHAT IS OUR RIGHT, MINDS ENDOWED WITH INDEPENDENT THOUGHT, AND CRITICAL THINKING CAPACITY.
Posted at 05:38 pm by deadringer
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3.12.2007
JUST ONE DAY IN NABLUS - BALATA REFUGE CAMP
 2/23/06– Nablus, Balata Refugee Camp Palestinian death toll from Israeli assault rises in Balata refugee camp
Palestinian Center for Human Rights "Israeli Occupation Forces (IOF) continued their military operations in Balata refugee camp and the eastern part of Nablus for the 5th consecutive day. On Thursday, February 23, Israeli forces killed five Palestinians, including three in an extra-judicial assassination. PCHR's initial investigations indicate that at approximately 06:00 in the morning of Thursday, 23 February 2006, an armored IOF force consisting of 30 military vehicles resumed military operations in Balata refugee camp and the eastern part of Nablus. Helicopter gunships provided aerial support for the ground forces. 
(Boy shot in stomach for throwing rocks)
IOF troops embarked on a house to house search in the target area. Scores of children and youth gathered in the Daheya area, and started throwing stones at the IOF vehicles. Immediately, IOF opened thick fire at them. Ibrahim Mohammad Ali Sa'idi, 19, was injured by a bullet in the abdomen. He was evacuated to Rafedia Hospital by ambulance. Efforts to save his life failed, and he was pronounced dead 30 minutes later. 
At approximately 11:00, IOF fired at Na'im Mohammad Saleh Abu S'reis, 22, from Balata refugee camp. He was hit by a bullet in the abdomen. An ambulance evacuated him to Rafedia Hospital, where he was pronounced dead at 13:12 after efforts to save his life failed. IOF claimed that they fired at him for breaking the curfew imposed on the refugee camp. 
(Khaled's Walweel's uncle runs while he bleeds to death, shot by IOF, blocked by Israeli IOF from reaching an ambulance)
In a new crime of extra-judicial assassination, IOF killed 3 citizens in Balata, and claimed that they were "wanted." PCHR's initial investigations indicate that at approximately 15:15, IOF besieged the house belonging to Mohammad Abu Khamis in the Qar'an neighborhood, in the center of the refugee camp. IOF fired rockets at the house; and gun-ships fired heavy machine gun at the house. Three Palestinians who were inside the house were killed: Hammouda Esh'teiwe, 38; Mohammad Abu Khamis, 32; and Hasan Fathi Hajjaj, 22. Furthermore, IOF gunfire since the morning resulted in injuring 7 civilians, including 2 whose injuries are serious. The two are: Issam Fathi Radi Makhlouf, 22, bullet in the abdomen; and Maher Walwiel, 40, bullet in the abdomen. 
(Deserted street in Balata, Israeli imposed curfew(s))
In an incident of targeting medical personnel, IOF deliberately fired at an ambulance tending the wounded. The driver of the ambulance, belonging to the Union of Palestinian Medical Relief Committees, was hit with two bullets, in the hand and left leg. His name is Jarir Zakaria Qanadilo, is 37 years old, and is from Nablus. Based on eyewitness accounts, PCHR's fieldworker indicated that the ambulance driver was injured while attempted to tend to Zakaria Abu Asab, who was hit with a bullet in the shoulder, in the center of the refugee camp. In addition, two international volunteers, both females, were injured. A Dutch volunteer was injured by shrapnel in the shoulder; and an American volunteer was hit with a bullet in her hand. 
PCHR strongly condemns the continuing IOF war crimes perpetrated in Balata refugee camp and Nablus since Sunday, 19 February 2006. These crimes have led to the death of 8 people and the injury of 45 others. These crimes are fulfilling previous Israeli threats to impose additional sanctions against the Palestinian people. The Centre points to the fact that these actions against Palestinian civilians increase tension in the area and threaten to cause additional casualties among the Palestinian population. The Centre calls upon the international community to intervene immediately to put an end to these war crimes. The Centre calls upon the High Contracting Parties of the Fourth Geneva Convention to fulfill their responsibility to ensure the right of protection of Palestinian civilians in the OPT." VIEWING PARTS OF THE DAY BY VIDEO
NABLUS JANUARY 2007 NABLUS JANUARY 18TH, 2007 BALATA TODAY (02/07) CHILDRENS SHADOW PUPPET SHOW - FROM SCREEN TO STREET
Posted at 07:05 pm by deadringer
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3.11.2007
BRIDGES TO THE PEOPLES PARTICIPATION
 I think by now individuals have to come to the conclusion that we do not have a true democracy in the United States. We have a mere shell, one with all of the trappings - elections, lots of talk about freedom, with none of the substance. After all, it was created for just this purpose - for the enrichment of the few and the disenfranchisement of the masses.
This was it's design from the very beginning, all of the supposed changes that came since the start are merely cosmetic - all the the supposed advances were legislated by conflict, and can just as easily be legislated away (and are being). The present function and form of this government is to isolate us from governance and confound the will of the people!
 There is this luscious garden of fruit and abundance for all, but standing between us and our freedom is this deceptive web. We are offered this mere pittance of what belongs to the people, so many have settled for the what appears to be all that is available, never entering the luscious garden beyond the deceptive web. We need to discern illusion from reality.
So it is necessary to build these effective bridges to wealth and power that rightfully belongs to the people. However, we must not to carry any delusional baggage - that is, that the present system provides for or has any intention of care for the people. All the present system does is perpetuate the old class divisions that have haunted humanity almost since the beginning of time - it has just mutated into various forms of oppression.
Therefore, there must be structural change in the very form of government. First, there must be immediate limitation placed on the laws and policies that effect the people. All of those bills that are passed pell mell by those who say they represent us, without our complete knowledge and approbation must stop.
Instead there must be a working and rotating body of people who become official watchdogs placed in the halls of power. Each act which would change the status, or reduce the benefits accrued to the people must be put to the national vote. Roles must be reversed, rather than a mere shell of democracy for the people - the offices that presently adorn this form of government must be turned into mere shells.
The "representative power" of the local, state, and federal bodies must be severely curtailed. There can be no serious change for the betterment of the people without a reduction of decisive power brought to those who supposedly represent us.
This is not only done by legally changing the nature of activity and job description, but by official watchdogs that ensure that the people are informed of their intentions and proposed action(s) - officially, not a hodge podge of disconnected and thereby dis-empowered interest groups. We must demand and force this system by official participation of the people.
There must be change and redefinition of the legal corpus. The nature of property and it's influence must be severely limited. The isolated form and function of the judiciary must be halted and decision processes must be made transparent to the people - this must take place in all judicial strata. Once again, this calls for the official and legal formation of the people within the very halls of justice.
I would say that oppression not only remains by silence, but by institutional perpetuation - institutionalizing oppression of the people. Institutions like the corporation must be redefined, and their influence severely limited. The "person-hood" of the corporation must be subjugated to individual people, and the entire body of law which has been "found" for the corporation must be throughly examined and necessarily expunged when it both harms, limits, and rules over the future of the people.
Once again for emphasis, oppression not only grows by silence - as if your or my outcry will stop encroachment, but by non-participation in the process of governance. To merely petition this form of government in operation accomplishes little to nothing - because they DO NOT REPRESENT you, they represent only the moneyed interests of the elite and the structure that has been erected which isolates and oppresses the people! This must be demanded, ergo, there must be effective confrontation - the limited power of the government must be made to pale by an awakened people.
Mass media and communications must be ripped out of the hands of the corporation. That which portrays itself as "news," is not news by any stretch of the imagination - it is merely the voice of the elite. The corporation has been used as the means to silence the will of the people, and to push the agenda of the few.
The Federal Communications Commission must be dismantled, the concentration of media power must be broken, and the people who own the means of communication must be officially allowed to effectively participate. The subversion of media to perpetuate , in a popular fashion, a way of life which further enslaves them to corporate image which is synonymous with elite will must be stopped. In other words, all overt and subtle forms of propaganda, silence and subversion of vital information must stop.
I have previously mentioned the dismantling of the National Security State, which is perpetuated by the intelligence community, so it does not have to be repeated (read previous posts - "Dismantling" part 1and 2, and "Ending Corporate Rule"). This of course is a more virulent form of democracy based on the realties that we face - it is based on participation not useless and endless petition. If you believe we are presently advancing by the methodology we employ than you probably have faith in the tooth fairy!
We must build critical mass through uniting the people, and this can only be done by understanding what we face. I do not think there is a better explanation of our present reality than what I have written. It debunks the myth of representation in the present form of government. What I propose is revolutionary because we have no effective citizenship - it is what has been portrayed as a government for, of, and by the people in reality - not what we are presently experiencing! I will deal with more uniting methods in future posts.
LONELIEST DAY OF MY LIFEOUR WORLD IS NOT FOR SALE (It has become worse today)MEDIA CONFERENCE
I call this video regarding a major alternative media conference "hope springs eternal." It seems that some are just virtually incapable of working and thinking outside of this box in the U.S. As if there is some redeeming quality to the powers that be - it simply amazes me. However, I would say there are good ideas peppered throughout the video, it is just the framework that is unrealistic.
Posted at 01:19 am by deadringer
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3.9.2007
DON'T PLAY BY THEIR RULES - BREAK THE CYCLE OF EMPIRE!!
The first rule is, don't play by their rules. Nothing is what it seems in our country, almost everything is reversed. It is as if you are surrounded and bound by chains, both soft and hard, but nevertheless the so-called "rules" are meant to bind you so that you will not be an effective change agent, so the status quo remains intact. If the status quo remain intact nothing will change, and the cycle of empire that has been going on for thousands of years will not be broken.
Our entire lives we are set up for subservience, authority figures are touted and we are told that they should be received without question. We go through school, which teaches us not only what we should learn in order to be literate - but how we are supposed to act in society. Every revolutionary bone that we have is removed from our body - we become spineless and mindless drones programmed to do the will of those who do not have our best interest in mind.
We have been taught all our life what we should desire, what acceptable goals are for happiness. So we live in these bubbles, surrounded by another big bubble which reinforces the way life is supposed to be. America has become the envy of every elite which would like to rule over the hearts and minds of a people without even a significant whimper from them. What we have embraced in this country, and what is fed to us and reinforced on a daily basis, is the fuel that feeds empire.
The rules say there is limited access to public decisions, but there is no freedom without equal access to decision making for all. This requires direct participation, not representative democracy. Even the twisted principle of "might is right" is wrong, so that in a democracy it results in majority rule over the few. We instead must be based on the principle of consensus-dissensus, that is arriving at a consensus, and if there is still a failure to agree - than the resources are split by the majority and minority proportional to the percentages.
The rules say "I am rich and you are poor." There must be equal access to societies common wealth for all. Even the distinctions of I am employer and you are the employee, which have become like second nature to our brainwashed minds, have got to go. If there is no decentralization of wealth we will never have equal distribution of power. It is simple and inevitable, those who have more wealth will have the power over the system, as well as the legal system and everything else for that matter.
The only way to get rid of this dualistic state of affairs is to extend the principle of "PARTICIPATION" not representation, to ALL areas of life and the extended institutions. This includes corporations which have become the fascist norm with all decisions coming from the top. Life is not like a corporation, life is like a community!
The rules say everything must be profit driven. No, that once again is not true, it should rather be needs based - "to each according to their needs, from each according to their ability." This is just common storehouse economics - WHERE PEOPLE IN CONCERT CONTROL THE MEANS OF PRODUCTION, DISTRIBUTION AND EXCHANGE! Where people take what they want during abundance and what they need during times of scarcity.
The rules say consume your ass off and screw everyone else! However, there is no reason why some people should consume more than others. It is simply wrong to be rewarded because of blind luck, some sort of genetic endowment, or to become rich on the misfortunes of others, or because one person is strong and the other is disabled.
Equal access to wealth is not the same as redistribution of wealth, it is wrong to give someone who is more needy the same as someone who has less needs - hence, "each according to their needs." True equality also recognizes diversity and that which is complimentary, it has nothing to do with forced uniformity.
TURN THE RULES ON THEIR EAR WITH THESE PRINCIPLES - OR LIKE BILL MAHER SAYS TO STEAL HIS LINE, "NEW RULES!!" DEVELOPING AND IMPLEMENTING THESE PRINCIPLES IN OUR LIVES, THAN PROMOTING THEM IN SOCIETY, WILL BREAK THE CYCLE OF EMPIRE FROM THE INSIDE OUT.
Posted at 11:40 pm by deadringer
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3.8.2007
 (The Katrina flag)
There are few things about our childhood that brings back more memories than standing with our hand over heart and saying The Pledge Of Allegiance. Yet, in this world of double - speak (to use an Orwell phrase) there is little that rivals our exposure to mouthing slogans that are just plain lies than this pledge. Actually, the public school experience has little to do with the essentials of learning, and everything to do with conformity to the obedient drone mentality that the powers that be wish for us!
"I pledge allegiance to the flag, of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands - one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all." It has all the buzz words that make up a mindless slogan, because it certainly does not bear witness to reality!
To state this in brief, we pledge allegiance to a myth - a fraud, to that which is held up before our eyes and drilled into our tender young minds, it is a denial of reality. Within this pledge we find all the elements of the design of those who rule over us, what they want us to believe - what they want us to cling to when all the evidence speaks to the contrary.
What is a "pledge?" It is a binding promise to give or refrain from doing something. It is an agreement to commitment, to loyalty, a binding promise to swear. I say, if it is a promise to be loyal and to support what words we find in this statement - than we have a lot of work to do! However, those in power have no intention of making this a reality - even though they foist this ritual upon us, it is merely something to mis-direct us with empty verbiage while they rape and pillage both at home and abroad. It is like a smoke screen that hides activity that is less than honorable - despicable activity done in our name.
"Allegiance" is the act of binding yourself (intellectually, emotionally) to a course of action. Once again it (allegiance) carries with it this loyalty that is owed. Presently, in reality, it is stolen loyalty by those in power who wish to merely exploit the people. Given in proxy to a flag which sports the identity of this country, it is supposed to represent all that we stand for, and this is further stated in the pledge - the flag represents the United States of America.
We are told in this pledge that we are a "republic." We are supposed to be a constitutional republic with a representative form of government. In reality we are an oligarchic/plutocracy - run by a few in power who are extremely rich. All of the nonsense of "of the people, by the people, and for the people" is just so much tripe.
If you do not believe it than try as a group of people to exercise true power or attempt to get the ear of your representative with results. Let me go to a visceral level - we all feel it, we know something is not right, it is in the collective consciousness. However, we are supposed to be a constitutional republic with a form of representative government, and we are told to confess such in the pledge from tender youth.
"One Nation Under God" - now this is the one that takes it all! It goes back to the concept of a nation being the special province of God Almighty. Not that we are just one nation among many that the almighty may look upon, but that we are his special concern. That everything we do, and I mean everything, is specifically empowered and sanctioned by God. Manifest destiny, which is really the church's special (sarcasm) contribution to this country's image of itself. A sort of Christian Zionism.
Every day people thank God for all the "blessings" that they have. As if God dropped them from the heavens just for them! It is as if they are oblivious to what their government does to gain these "blessings." All of the pain, and all of the misery caused at home and abroad, the disenfranchisement of the poor and minority, the subversion of other countries for their resources - it just boggles the mind how these human ostriches stick their heads in the ground (or up their arse) to come up with these blessings! This is what our government wants to turn our children into, mindless drones.
"Indivisible," that is undivided - incapable of being divided. Now that's a crock if I have ever heard one! This country is divided in every way possible. It is divided on purpose by the powers that be - by class, racially, economically - every which way. It is divided because of it's philosophical foundations - everything for me and nothing for you. I could go on forever, but the next point is really pertinent because it shows one of the great divisions.
"Liberty and justice for all," this point's back to a previous post of mine "The Rule Of Law??" What a farce, the rule of law. Tell this to the millions of minorities that languish in the prison industrial complex! Preach this to the nations that have been raped and robbed by our "national interest!" This phrase is akin to "everyone gets their day in court," as if that is supposed to mean justice. The "day in court" means time in prison for the poor and minority in this country, guaranteed!
You have a modicum of liberty because of the democratic struggle of the people in the face of this ever encroaching fascism, but it is losing ground swiftly. The entire judicial process is vitiated with corruption, from the law's enacted to the enforcement of these legal dictum's, to the remedy in the breaking of these sham legal enactments. By the mere flick of a pen thousands of people are made felons to feed the prison complex!
It is my hope that this has helped to draw back the curtain that those who rule and reign over us have drawn over our eyes. This is just another example of why we need a Democratic Revolutionary Movement in this country. We need to take back the hearts and minds of the people that have been stolen by the few.
Posted at 09:15 pm by deadringer
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3.6.2007
 Do you remember when you were a child, some used to play the game of musical chairs. Unfortunately we are not going to be discussing musical chairs today, but what I will call musical homes - and it is not a game, not by a long shot. You know, it never ceases to amaze me that we have hundreds of billions of dollars for a war of aggression that brings nothing but death and destruction, yet we cannot even house victims of the worst disaster of this nature to befall a wonderful city.
This government can't stop failing people, and that is the issue - it deals with people. However, not just people, but individuals who are poverty struck and have no way of surviving outside of help from a government, which quite frankly, does not give a damn! Isn't this what this administration is about - helping the rich get richer, and stealing as much as possible from people (Iraq) that have been decimated?
Let's hear what Allsee Tobias about this mess, being stuck in the middle of it - "They know how to put me out, but they don't know how to help me out - that's how I look at it." What did they tell them to do in this abrupt move? Let's let Allsee tell you - "Pack and pray, that's what they told us," he said. Why? Because of sewage problems and on and off blackouts. My sources say this had been going on for about a year (which makes people wonder why the "sudden" concern), part of the problem was FEMA paying the bill on time! People have been complaining for a long time, and some have had health problems.
 So FEMA gives a 48 hour warning for 58 families. This brought on worries about extended families being split up. Could FEMA even accomplish this task? NO, they only found housing for 48 families - the other 10 families were put up in "temporary" housing by the Catholic Charities! Oh, FEMA did fit the bill for storage for some that are moving to "tighter quarters."
So the concerns rise - "where are we going, what are we going to do?" The children were just getting used to a routine and are in school, how will this effect their education? Eighty percent of the 5100 New Orleans area public housing remains closed after 18 months! Deborah Jones drives 120 miles into New Orleans every day to cook meals for 300 people, and her group has supplied 18,000 a month with groceries. People are living in gutted out houses with NO electricity and need food, still!!
People still cannot exercise their rights to return, over 250,000 people in the New Orleans metro area alone. Louisiana received 10 billion dollars to fix housing, 109,000 applied for assistance - 1000 have received assistance. If your a rent you are shit out of luck, nothing for you! You know why? Because the "good" people of New Orleans do not want the poor to return. St. Bernard Perish, Jefferson Perish, and Tammany has passed ordinances and do not want, in the words of Sheriff Jack Strain - "thugs and trash - people from New Orleans public housing - people with chee wee hair styles - and if you arrive expect to get a visit from the sheriff's department!"
The clock is being turned back to the 18th century, and property owners alone are able to enact polity which excludes the have-nots. Top this off with a federal administration which listens to "their own," and you have the new, leaner meaner New Orleans. NAGIN!! WHERE IS MY CHOCOLATE NEW ORLEANS!!??
KATRINAI NEVER GOT TO SEE NEW ORLEANSA SECOND LINEMISSING NEW ORLEANSDO YOU KNOW WHAT IT MEANS?GEORGE BUSH DON'T LIKE BLACK PEOPLETHE SAINTS ARE COMING , WHEN? PEOPLE ARE STILL WAITING....YOU KNOW WHAT HAPPENED, IT IS PROPHETIC, FAREWELL TO STORYVILLEI am going to repost a something I wrote in 10/02/05 on this blog, because I think it applies to the current situation. It is a short post that can be seen as a musicians requiem regarding New Orleans, it is called "YOU'VE LOST YOUR HEART AND SOUL." If you look throughout the period of Hurricane Katrina in my archives I believe you can recapture the impact, to a degree, of what took place during this time. My only question for you is this - do you think it has stopped?:
So now you've done it, you have lost your heart and soul New Orleans. You have oppressed and isolated the Black population in abject poverty bereft of any chance to taste a good life - but in so doing, you have condemned yourself. Don't you know? You have allowed your life's blood to escape your collective body....I am astounded. For all your pain you have induced, and multiple misery has been turned into music. Music watered by a mothers tears, melody born of melancholy, a strain of sound birthed by agony, a testimony of endurance. Fear of survival atune to a string, breath given to a horn which we fear may be our last. But you have dismissed this, you have evacuated your life. Oh, you say we can come back and visit, how kind of you. However, you must be entertained - a little bit of song, a tap dance, and a great big smile. Now go away, you can't live here....you can clean my tavern, and serve my tables, but come and leave by my back door, and become so few and so silent that you are virtually invisible. Yet, for all the pain born by music, there is joy by vocal and instrument which is unmatched. How? Even a people, who have moved from private to public slavery, have a joyous moment - it is the contrast, that makes little a sumptuous feast! We have never had the cruelty of heart not to share that with you. What if no one came to entertain you? If that which distinguished New Orleans disappeared like those you have so hastily shipped off? She would become a corpse without life, almost totally forgotten, a fleeting memory of days gone by. All you can claim now is legacy, but you have done away with your future. Can you undo this grave injustice that has spanned centuries and now has culminated in a forced diaspora? "FOR WHAT PROFIT IS IT IF A MAN GAIN THE WHOLE WORLD AND LOSE HIS OWN SOUL?" Posted at 02:54 pm by deadringer BURGUNDY STREET BLUESWALKING TO NEW ORLEANS
Posted at 09:04 pm by deadringer
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3.4.2007
RIOTS IN UNGDOMSHUSET COPENHAGEN
 Anarchist youth were evicted from a home which has been abandoned for a number of decades and used by youth on the street. This has been a youth center for many years for young leftists and punkers. It is Denmarks worst riot in over a decade. It has resulted in dozens of injuries and over 500 arrests. All this not only here, but all over the world, Capitalist's are trying to destroy every vestige of resistance in their blind march behind the US led West.
 Sympathy protests were held in Germany, Norway, Sweden and Finland. In recent years this center has been the destination of people like Bjork and Nick Cave. It is interesting, if you read the reports in newspapers across the world it is like a regurgitation of the same information - like robots they voice the same facts without any explanation of what is happening on the ground.
I will repeat what I have said on other blogs in regard to this incident, it is neither isolated nor uncharacteristic for Western industrialized countries. The question is the same, do we allow dissent as a "free" country should, and what do we care more about - the people, or property and a small elite? All government is nothing but a franchise of an elite, some governments claim more social tolerance and programs, but beneath all of the facade is a intent to enrich the few - eventually this always emerges.
 We found a similar situation in France recently, as one example. There they tried to disenfranchise the youth from their future. Having very liberal work laws, they tried to overturn them. Their excuse was the same as it is throughout the industrialized world - "we have to be competitive in the world market." However, the real intent is always the same - more money for the few elite, and the people can go to hell!
These elements, or the elite, are always trying to gain precedence, it is like an on and off button that can be pressed at any time. The governments are steeped in a connected framework of social science, if they think something works or shows promise in one country (to disenfranchise the people) they will try it in another country, sometimes it devolves to the full force of state apparatus - they trade notes. What the people need is a worldwide democratic revolutionary movement, to answer the global Capitalistic onslaught!
Posted at 09:44 am by deadringer
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3.3.2007
TOWARD A UNIFIED REVOLUTIONARY DEMOCRATIC MOVEMENT
 A time comes in a nation like America, which is starving for Democratic reform, to consider what it will take to move us from a series of disconnected democratic campaigns to a viable movement. I believe this country has grown weary of the capitalistic atrocities which trample under foot people both at home and abroad, and that they have come to realize that this abuse comes from one fount. So even if it seems like a David vs. Goliath feat to overthrow this system (and it is not, we have the numbers and the will, we lack the focal point and organization) it can and will be accomplished.
We grasp at many instances of the people's disenfranchisement, when our concentration should be on the system as a whole which equally empowers these myriad unjust incidents - both foreign and domestic, racial and economic, gender and political, war and peace, and environmentally both micro and macro (and anything I might have left out here). We have to develope from a series of campaigns to a mass movement, or we will continue to be victims no matter how mighty the struggle in our small area of concentration.
There are TWO EVENTS which graphically depict our condition in the world today, I chose them from the American experience not because we are either superior or more important than the rest of the world, but because they have the same characteristics of what is taking place all over the world, and because this is where my personal experience lies - I am talking about 9/11 and Katrina.
In the aftermath of these two events we have the perfect picture of what not only our government/state has in store for the people, but essentially what all capitalist/imperialistic/empire-like governments/states have in store for their people! I am not going to dwell on who's fault 9/11 (who did it) is, nor will I explore what level of government (local, state, federal) dropped the ball in Katrina - I am solely interested in the answers, the response to these tragedies, because within the response you have the seed of the intent and the future of the people - it is something that we can all see plainly. When we fully grasp the intent of those who "know what's best" for us, than we will get to the specifics of what we need to do together as a democratic revolutionary movement.
In response to 9/11 this government/state rose up as one, and their answer was more oppression of the people, both foreign and domestic. What they did was whet their sword and further fed the military-industrial complex in an unprecedented/unbridled fashion. They said they were going after terrorists, and it a appeared for a short time that this might be the case, but they veered toward their true intent - capital/empire/imperialism in their detour to Iraq, which did nothing to harm us!
They set up a false/straw enemy called "terrorism," blew it out of proportion, and than proceeded not only with their enrichment by sacking Iraq (and sucking dry the people's hard earned money to accomplish this) - but invited all other capitalistic government/states in the world to join them, in the name of fighting terrorism, to oppress their own people to make it safe for trans-national corporations to exploit people all over the world. What it said domestically, to the American people was this - we have no more money for your needs, we are busy fighting terrorism and protecting you - and so all of the democratic advancements that we have made are being rolled back, through either privatization (corporations making profit off the people's commons), or flat-out defunding - this accelerated.
However, they are not satisfied with taking away the democratic advancements of the the last century alone, they want to strike a death blow to any hope you have held from the Bill Of Rights. In the name of "fighting terrorism," they want to spy on you - take away foundational protections - to be able to name you as a "terrorist" and clandestinely imprison you without notice, without warrant, and without legal representation - to disappear you! In the name of some shadowy enemy, they watch you and me - who is the enemy? We have allowed this "National Security" apparatus to grow, and now it will choke out the last vestiges of freedom here and around the world. I say know your enemy, and it is more virile and closer than any threat from a foreign enemy.
Katrina is the second seminal example of what is in store for the people, both at home and abroad - as I said earlier my concentration is not who is specifically at fault, but what has been the response and proposed remedy. The plan in the aftermath is a smaller New Orleans, minus the majority of the black population. A massive plan of gentrification, not accomplished in years but in months.
This plan was regurgitated from the mayor's office, as if it were the redevelopment of governmental process - what it was in reality was a plan devised by the "American Institute Of Architects," and the "Urban Land Institute" in conjunction with big capital! It is more of the same old plan, less for the people and more for the elite few. Now, there was a meeting of activists regarding New Orleans - a handful of experts, it was an uneven, out gunned, match against the afor mentioned. Too little too late, not the force of mass movement but a failed campaign.
So, if we are going to stop this process of capitalism/empire/imperialism, we are going to have to grow from a mass of disconnected campaigns to a Mass Democratic Revolutionary Movement. How do we pull all the pieces together? What specifically does a mass movement concentrate on?
Within those two questions lies the answer, we come together by a specific concentration on specific issues. However, it is not enough to identify the issues (important as that is), we must commit everything to addressing these issues.
These issues must strike more than skin deep at the system, they must hit directly at the heart - in other words, they must sever the root but also plant the alternative. What we must do is make the people and their needs central, while we crush the opposition! You could consider this a political platform - because the alternative is not only more of the same, but the people will remain mere slaves of the enriched few.
We need to stop placing individuals in office who do not represent the people. We have this long trail of elites, who do not identify with any working class people - we have an entrenched class process going on in public office. People who have no monetary cares make policies for individuals that count pennies, health policy is formulated by people who have never sat in a public clinic or have never had the problem of no money for health care - transportation policy is made by those who have never ridden a bus or looked for a parking space - our education policies are legislated by people who have never sent their kids to public school - daycare by those who have high payed nannies to care for their children.
These type of people (above) always say and believe that people of low income are doing just fine, the environment is just fine (they retire from work on their estates). If you put these elites in they will always equate the national interest with the people they rub elbows with, not with the likes of you and I. They see the poor and working class as deserving little because we are regarded as contributing little. This is the same type of person who has brought you the WTO, that was made to fly above the will of the people and national sovereignty! Community interest is subordinated to the interest of finance capital and multi-national corporations. These people meet in secret and do not publicize their proceedings and are not subject to administrative appeal. With this we are in the process of being brought to the lowest common economic denominator "least trade restrictive." The common fallacy is that the elite person you elect is going to rise you higher, or to their station (or so they lyingly say), no - no, they have gotten to where they are by suppressing you, and they will continue to do so in public office! Repeat - watch more carefully who you put in office.
We must stop and reverse the process of privatization, where the commons are put in control of those seeking profit. This not only results in the loss of employment, but the rise of prices for services that used to be available to everyone. We must stop the movement of capital from the private sector to the military. This is the major cause of our debt and infrastructure decay, not to mention the crushing tax burden. We have become the worlds biggest lender to the biggest spender - we must cut this military budget by two thirds within a couple of years. We must also shut down hundreds of military bases all over the world that pose as a protection against "terrorism," when they are merely there to assist worldwide capitalist cronies to oppress people in over a hundred countries.
 The Homeland Security program should be abolished, period! The CIA should be abolished, the FBI, all clandestine agencies! The Patriot Act should be expunged immediately. If not, the budget should be drastically cut along with other National Security Agencies. The Military Commissions Act needs to be wiped out. In fact, all legislation enacted during the reign of this present administration needs to be reviewed and everything detrimental both foreign and domestic needs to to be expunged.
The power of the Executive to act with criminally violent effect against other nations and domestically, should be completely stopped. The Freedom Of Information Act should be enforced instead of ignored by those who say they have nothing to hide and proceed to hide everything. The war in Iraq should be stopped immediately without reservation, troops need to be removed, and the people of Iraq should be left to self-determination!
 US counterinsurgency operations around the world against the poor should be stopped. Eliminate all foreign aid to countries engaged in human rights violations - including capitalistic countries! We do not need to be supporting torture in either Iraq or the rest of the world with our money. The world does not need to be made safer for the Fortune 500. Billions of dollars that flow into the Swiss bank accounts of foreign autocrats could be better spent for human services at home.
Progressive tax needs to be introduced to corporations and the rich elites that reside therein. Those who wish to dodge this requirement by moving offshore should not be allowed to sell or trade within the United States. We need to strengthen the inheritance tax and introduce tax on accumulated wealth rather than just income. Tax relief could be given to the poor and low income levels. We could reduce the regressive Social Security Tax, because it produces a 70 billion dollar surplus that is shifted into the general budget, and that is used to pay all sorts of things rather than subsistence for the elderly.
We need to abolish anti-labor laws like the Taft-Hartly act that makes it so difficult for people to organize into unions. Unions are weak because laws are rigged against them. We need to enforce government national relations acts so that people do not risk their jobs when they try to organize. Owners need to be penalized who do not want negotiate a contract after certification has been won. We need to repeal the restrictive right to work acts and open shop laws that hamper collective bargaining - and the hiring of permanent replacement workers during a strike must be abolished. The minimum wage must be increased to a living wage level!
We must establish a single payer health care plan, that provides comprehensive health care to all, and allows patients to go to doctors of their choice. There is no need to spend billions of dollars more on health care insurance, the funds need to go for medical treatment not to giant insurance and pharmaceutical companies! The numbers of the uninsured have only grown, it is a trend that will not stop because this government refuses to step up to the plate regarding national health care - essentially because special interest money keeps filling the pockets of politicians.
At this point some begin screaming - "where are we going to get all the money to spend for this!" But they don't ask that question about the defense budget, or business subsidies, or on prisons and prison guards - we can get more money by cutting these areas! The government needs to stop feeding massive corporations with subsidies, let them experience some of the private enterprise market that they always talk about! The money spent for those things should go for "not for profit" goals, these muti-billion dollar handouts need to be eliminated for corporations and agri-buisness - we need to get them off welfare! They need to live up to their free market rhetoric.
The national debt is a transfer of money from taxpayers to bond holders, from labor to capital, from average people to the wealthy - we mortgage our future to pay off wealthy creditors. The right-wing policy of borrow and spend needs to be eliminated, and the national debt needs to be rescheduled with full payment slated for the small treasury bond holders and only partial compensation to larger ones!
The re-adjusted debt could help us house the homeless, finance public sector housing. People could be put to work competitively against the private market - we need to cut into some private markets. Work needs to take place where capital is not accumulating other capital, whether private business likes it or not. Look at the "New Deal" work, the manufacturing that went on, where the government went directly into production to meet human needs - it brought in revenues to the government both in the sales of the goods, and the taxes on the new jobs created - but private profit is eliminated for those who live off the labor of others. This is what explains private businesses hostility toward government programs that engage in direct production, they hate anything that bypasses accumulation for them.
 (Theft, by Picasso) Finally, the government that we have now serves corporations at public expense, the policy changes proposed would dramatically reverse that flow producing things for public need rather than corporate greed! This would move us from being a privileged nation for the few and closer to being a democratic republic for the many.
This is easier said than done, because those who have the power do not have this desire and those who desire this do not have the power. The few elite rage against anything that would democratize this economy and infringe on their privilege. If these items are brought under one umbrella of Democratic Revolutionary Movement we would be able to change everything for the betterment of the people.
Posted at 09:07 am by deadringer
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3.1.2007
 Today I want to discuss the tools used to imply and invoke what is supposed to be "legitimate" in the United States. I chose the title "Legitimism," which will be defined as the process of burning into the publics psyche of what is acceptable and what is not, what should be trusted and what should be suspect. We will remove the facade from the face of accepted reality.
It is very difficult to approach this subject, it is layered - because the very tools that are used to promote legitimism are not even legitimate! What you have is this State machinery, which does nothing but promote an elite agenda by it's very definition. One example could be the corporate media, which gives time and credence to anything that promotes the status quo - yet I would question this media's legitimate right to exist in it's present form.
When you begin to examine the very foundation of what is supposed to be legitimate you discover things that will shake a thinking person to the core. The basic building block of anything legitimate is the "truth," but if truth is the first building block of what is legitimate than the entire structure of what the United States is as it exists today comes into question. I am not just speaking of our present state and course as a nation, I am talking about it's existence and actions from the very beginning.
 If what I have maintained on this blog is true, that all governments (and specifically the U.S. government) are merely the machinery of the elite to advance their agenda, than everything that is blessed and flows from this is illegitimate! If this system is based upon "checking the leveling impulses of the propertyless people" - "the first object of government" is "the protection of different and unequal faculties of acquiring property" (as the father of the Constitution, Madison, says in the Federalist paper #10), than it cannot be a government of, for, and by the people - and it never was.
The very reason why there are so many groups addressing so many problems in every one of our institutions is because those institutions are all complicit by default in this illegitimate pyramid, which leads to the elite enrichment. No matter where you turn the people are disenfranchised from what is supposed to exist for their benefit, but it does not exist for their benefit - that is the point.
Do I have to innumerate the problems? You have a government in Washington that only listens to the monied elite, you have legal institutions that are for sale to the highest bidder, you have education that is truncated by self-interest and pseudo-historical monopoly, you have media which is the province of mega - corporations, you have medical care held hostage by pharmaceutical and health care monoliths, you have a military which is at the beck and call of monied interest, and you have religious institutions which are mere cheerleaders of the whole charade! Do you understand the depth of the problem we are facing? None of this is legitimate, none of it!!
What we have is legtimism, that is, a system whereby the many are held hostage by the few elite - whatever institution they lodge within. Our "form of government" was created to militate against the participation of the people, it was created that way. Yes, every vote must count - but what did you vote for? You vote for the maintainence of that which moves against us as a viable people. THIS IS A WAR, IT IS A CLASS WARFARE, THE ENEMY IS NOT TERRORISM FROM THE OUTSIDE - IT IS FROM A RULING AND MONIED ELITE WITHIN. IT IS OUR DUTY AS A PEOPLE TO RECOGNIZE AND UNDO THIS FAUX LEGITIMISM !
Posted at 06:41 pm by deadringer
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