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7.9.2007
UNITED STATES OCCUPATION FORCE KILLS 10,000 OR MORE IRAQIS PER MONTH!
This (the title) is probably no news for those who follow reliable sources, but for those who listen to the nonsense that comes out of corporate news it is probably shocking. This article was on Alternet, written by Micheal Schwartz. That wasn't the worst of it, because the death rate was increasing precipitously, and during the first half of 2006 the monthly rate was approximately 30,000 per month, a rate that no doubt has increased further during the ferocious fighting associated with the current American surge. The U.S. and British governments quickly dismissed these results as "methodologically flawed," even though the researchers used standard procedures for measuring mortality in war and disaster zones. (They visited a random set of homes and asked the residents if anyone in their household had died in the last few years, recording the details, and inspecting death certificates in the vast majority of cases.) The two belligerent governments offered no concrete reasons for rejecting the study's findings, and they ignored the fact that they had sponsored identical studies (conducted by some of the same researchers) in other disaster areas, including Darfur and Kosovo. The reasons for this rejection were, however, clear enough: the results were simply too devastating for the culpable governments to acknowledge. (Secretly the British government later admitted that it was "a tried and tested way to measuring mortality in conflict zones"; but it has never publicly admitted its validity). Reputable researchers have accepted the Lancet study's results as valid with virtually no dissent. Juan Cole, the most visible American Middle East scholar, summarized it in a particularly vivid comment: "the US misadventure in Iraq is responsible [in a little over three years] for setting off the killing of twice as many civilians as Saddam managed to polish off in 25 years." 
Despite the scholarly consensus, the governments' denials have been quite effective from a public education point of view, and the few news items that mention the Lancet study bracket it with official rebuttals. One BBC report, for example, mentioned the figure in an article headlined "Huge Rise in Iraqi Death Tolls," and quoted at length from President Bush's public rebuttal, in which he said that the methodology was "pretty well discredited," adding that "six-hundred thousand or whatever they guessed at is just ... it's not credible." As a consequence of this sort of coverage, most Americans probably believe that Bush's December 2005 figure of 30,000 Iraqi civilian deaths (less than 10% of the actual total) is the best estimate of Iraqi deaths up to that time. Counting how many Iraqis the occupation has killed These shocking statistics are made all the more horrific when we realize that among the 600,000 or so victims of Iraqi war violence, the largest portion have been killed by the American military, not by carbombings or death squads, or violent criminals -- or even all these groups combined. The Lancet interviewers asked their Iraqi respondents how their loved ones died and who was responsible. The families were very good at the cause of death, telling the reporters that over half (56%) were due to gunshots, with an eighth due each to car bombs (13%), air strikes (13%) and other ordinance (14%). Only 4% were due to unknown causes. The families were not as good at identifying who was responsible. Although they knew, for example, that air strike victims were killed by the occupation, and that carbomb victims were killed by insurgents, the gunshot and ordinance fatalities often occurred in firefights or in circumstances with no witnesses. Many times, therefore, they could not tell for sure who was responsible. Only were certain, and the interviewers did not record the responsible party if "households had any uncertainly" as to who fired the death shot. The results are nevertheless staggering for those of us who read the American press: for the deaths that the victims families knew for sure who the perpetrator was, U.S. forces (or their "Coalition of the Willing" allies) were responsible for 56%. That is, we can be very confident that the Coalition had killed at least 180,000 Iraqis by the middle of 2006. Moreover, we have every reason to believe that the U.S. is responsible for its pro rata share (or more) of the unattributed deaths. That means that the U.S. and its allies may well have killed upwards of 330,000 Iraqis by the middle of 2006.  The remainder can be attributed to the insurgents, criminals, and to Iraqi forces. And let's be very clear here: car bombs, the one source that was most easy for victims' families to identify, was responsible for 13% of the deaths, about 80,000 people, or about 2,000 per month. This is horrendous, but it is far less than half of the confirmed American total, and less than a quarter of the probable American total. Even if we work with the lower, confirmed, figured of 180,000 Iraqi deaths caused by the occupation firepower, which yields an average of just over 5,000 Iraqis killed every month by U.S. forces and our allies since the beginning of the war. And we have to remember that the rate of fatalities was twice as high in 2006 as the overall average, meaning that the American average in 2006 was well over 10,000 per month, or something over 300 Iraqis every day, including Sundays. With the surge that began in 2007, the current figure is likely even higher. Why don't we know about this? These figures sound impossible to most Americans. Certainly 300 Iraqis killed by Americans each day would be headline news, over and over again. And yet, the electronic and print media simply do not tell us that the U.S. is killing all these people. We hear plenty about car bombers and death squads, but little about Americans killing Iraqis, except the occasional terrorist, and the even more occasional atrocity story. How, then, is the US accomplishing this carnage, and why is it not newsworthy? The answer lies in another amazing statistic: this one released by the U.S. military and reported by the highly respectable Brookings Institution: for the past four years, the American military sends out something over 1,000 patrols each day into hostile neighborhoods, looking to capture or kill insurgents and terrorists. (Since February, the number has increased to nearly 5,000 patrols a day, if we include the Iraqi troops participating in the American surge.) 
These thousands of patrols regularly turn into thousands of Iraqi deaths because these patrols are not the "walk in the sun" that they appear to be in our mind's eye. Actually, as independent journalist Nir Rosen described vividly and agonizingly in his indispensable book, In the Belly of the Green Bird, they involve a kind of energetic brutality that is only occasionally reported by an embedded American mainstream journalist. This brutality is all very logical, once we understand the purpose and process of these patrols. American soldiers and marines are sent into hostile communities where virtually the entire population is supports the insurgency. They often have a list of suspects' addresses; and their job is to interrorgate or arrest or kill the suspect; and search the house for incriminating evidence, particularly arms and ammunition, but also literature, video equipment, and other items that the insurgency depends upon for its political and military activities. When they don't have lists of suspects, they conduct "house-to-house" searches, looking for suspicious behavior, individuals or evidence. In this context, any fighting age man is not just a suspect, but a potentially lethal adversary. Our soldiers are told not to take any chances: in many instances, for example, knocking on doors could invite gunshots through the doors. Their instructions are therefore to use the element of surprise whenever the situation appears to be dangerous -- to break down doors, shoot at anything suspicious, and throw grenades into rooms or homes where there is any chance of resistance. If they encounter tangible resistance, they can call in artillery and/or air power rather than try to invade a building. Here is how two Iraqi civilians described these patrols to Asia Times reporter Pepe Escobar: "Hussein and Hasan confirm that the Americans usually 'come at night, sometimes by day, always protected by helicopters.' They "sometimes bomb houses, sometimes arrest people, sometimes throw missiles'" 
If they encounter no resistance, these patrols can track down 30 or so suspects, or inspect several dozen homes, in a days work. That is, our 1,000 or so patrols can invade 30,000 homes in a single day. But if an IED explodes under their Humvee or a sniper shoots at them from nearby, then their job is transformed into finding, capturing, or killing the perpetrator of the attack. Iraqi insurgents often set off IEDs and invite these firefights, in order to stall the patrols prevent the soldiers from forcibly entering 30 or so homes, violently accosting their residents, and perhaps beating, arresting, or simply humiliating the residents. The battles triggered by IEDs and sniper attacks almost always involve the buildings surrounding the incident, since that is where the insurgents take cover to avoid the American counter-attack. Americans, therefore, regular shoot into these buildings where the perpetrators are suspected of hiding, with all the attendant dangers of killing other people. The rules of engagement for American soldiers include efforts to avoid killing civilians, and there are many accounts of restraint because civilians are visibly in the line of fire. But if they are in hot pursuit of a perpetrator, their rules of engagement make it clear that capturing or killing the insurgent takes precedent over civilian safety. This sounds pretty tame, and not capable of generating the statistics that the Lancet study documented. But the sheer quantity of American patrols -- 1,000 each day -- and the sheer quantity of the confrontations inside people's homes, the responses to sniper and IED attacks, and the ensuring firefights add up to mass slaughter. The cumulative brutality of these thousands of patrols can be culled from the recent inquest into the suspected war crimes committed in the city of Haditha back in November 19, 2005. The investigation seeks to ascertain whether American marines deliberately murdered 24 civilians including executing with point blank head shots nineteen unarmed women, children and older men in a single room, apparently in retribution for the death of one of their comrades earlier in the day. These horrific charges have made the incident newsworthy and propelled the investigation. 
But it is the defense's version of the story that makes the Haditha useful in understanding the translation of American patrols into hundreds of thousands of Iraqi deaths. First Lt. William T. Kallop, the highest ranking officer in Haditha that day, told the military hearing that he had ordered a patrol "to 'clear' an Iraqi home in Haditha after a roadside bomb had killed a Marine" earlier in the day. Later, after the firefight that this action generated, he went to inspect the home and was shocked to discover that only civilians had been killed: "He inspected one of the homes with a Marine corporal, Hector Salinas, and found women, children and older men who had been killed when marines threw a grenade into the room. "'What the hell happened, why aren't there any insurgents here?' Lieutenant Kallop testified that he asked aloud. 'I looked at Corporal Salinas, and he looked just as shocked as I did.' It is important to keep in mind that Lt. Kallop would not have been shocked if there had been one or more insurgents among the dead. What made the situation problematic was that all the fatalities were clearly civilians, and it led to the possibility that they had not been in hot pursuit of an enemy combatant. Later, however, Lt. Kallop decided that even this situation involved no misbehavior on the part of his troops, after questioning Staff Sgt. Frank D. Wuterich, who had led the patrol and commanded the military action: "Sergeant Wuterich had told him that they had killed people [in that house] after approaching a door to it and hearing the distinct metallic sound of an AK-47 being prepared to fire. "'I thought that was within the rules of engagement because the squad leader thought that he was about to kick in the door and walk into a machine gun,' Lieutenant Kallop said." According to Kallop, the soldiers were thus following the rules of engagement because if the squad leader "thought" that he was going to be attacked (based on recognizing a noise through a closed door), he was authorized and justified to use the full lethal force of the patrol (in this case a hand grenade), enough to kill all the people huddled within the apartment. 
The critical distinction has to do with intentionality. First Lieutenant Max D. Frank, sent to investigate the incident somewhat later, explained this logic: "It was unfortunate what happened, sir," Lieutenant Frank told the Marine prosecutor, Lt. Col. Sean Sullivan, "but I didn't have any reason to believe that what they had done was on purpose." Translated, this means that as long as the soldiers sincerely believed that their attack might capture or kill an armed insurgent who could attack them, the rules of engagement justified their action and they were therefore not culpable of any crime. Note here that other alternatives were not considered. The soldiers could have decided that there was a good chance of hurting civilians in this situation, and therefore retreated without pursuing the suspected insurgent. This would have allowed him to get away, but it would have protected the residents of the house. This option was not considered, even though many of us might feel that letting one or two or three insurgents escape (in a town filled with insurgents) might be acceptable instead of risking (and ultimately ending) the lives of 19 civilians. Later in the hearing, Major General Richard Huck, the commanding officer in charge of the Marines in Haditha, underscored these rules of engagement in more general terms, -- and also ignored the unthinkable option of letting the insurgents get away -- when he explained why he had not ordered an investigation of the deaths: "They had occurred during a combat operation and it was not uncommon for civilians to die in such circumstances. 'In my mind's eye, I saw insurgent fire, I saw Kilo Company fire,' Huck testified, via video link from the Pentagon, where he is assistant deputy commandant for plans, policies and operations. 'I could see how 15 neutrals in those circumstances could be killed.'" 
For General Huck, and for other commanders in Iraq, once "insurgent fire" -- or even the threat of insurgent fire -- entered the picture (and it certainly had earlier, when the American soldier was killed), then the actions reported by the Marines in that Haditha home were not just legitimate(if they reported them honestly), but exemplary. They were responding appropriately in a battlefield situation, and the death of "15 neutrals" is "not uncommon" in those circumstances. Let's keep in mind, then, that the United States undertakes something over 1,000 patrols each day, and lately this number has surged to over 5,000 (if we also count patrols by the Iraqi military). According to U.S. military statistics, again reported by the Brookings Institute, these patrols patrols currently result in just under 3,000 firefights every month, or just under an average of 100 per day (not counting the additional 25 or so involving our Iraqi allies). Most of them do not produce 24 Iraqi deaths, but the rules of engagement our soldiers are given -- throwing hand grenades into buildings holding suspected insurgents, using maximum firepower against snipers, and calling in artillery and air power against stubborn resistance -- guarantee a regular drumbeat of mortality. It is worth recording how these events are reported in the American press, when they are noted at all. Here, for example, is an Associated Press account of American/British patrols in Maysan province, a stronghold of the Mahdi army: Well to the south, Iraqi officials reported as many as 36 people were killed in fierce overnight fighting that began as British and Iraqi forces conducted house-to-house searches in Amarah, a stronghold of the Shiite Mahdi Army militia. This brief description was part of a five paragraph account of fighting all over Iraq, part of a review under the headline "U.S. and Iraqi forces Move on Insurgents." It contained brief accounts of several different operations, none of them presented as major events. There were 100 or so engagements that day, and many of them produced deaths. How many? Based on the Lancet article, we could guess that on that day -- and most days -- the incident in Amarah represented perhaps one-tenth of all the Iraqis killed by Americans that day. Over the course of June, the accumulated total probably came to something over 10,000. 
During the hearing about Haditha one of the investigators addressed the larger question that emerges from the sacrifice of so many civilians to the cause of chasing and catching insurgents in Iraq. Lieutenant Max D. Frank, the first officer to investigate the deaths, characterized is an "unfortunate and unintended result of local residents' allowing insurgent fighters to use family homes to shoot at passing American patrols." Using a similar logic, First Lt. Adam P. Mathes, the executive office of the company involved, argued against issuing an apology to local residents for the incident. Mathes advocated that instead they should issue a warning to Haditha residents, that the incident was "an unfortunate thing that happens when you let terrorists use your house to attack our troops." The Merriam Webster dictionary defines terror as "violent or destructive acts (as bombing) committed by groups in order to intimidate a population. ..." The incident at Haditha was just such a violent act, and was one of about 100 that day that Lt. Mathes hoped would intimidate the population of Haditha and other towns in Iraq from continuing to support insurgents. Essentially, what I am trying to say is that the "sectarian violence" is over-hyped, it is meant to make you think that all of the deaths are cause by the infighting - when in reality they are being killed by U.S. led forces. My question to the American people is simple - how long are you willing to let this go on? Is there no conscience? No rule of law? No voice of the people! THIS NEEDS TO BE STOPPED NOW!
Posted at 10:45 am by deadringer
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7.5.2007
ABANDONING PEOPLE'S REVOLUTION FOR EMPIRE
 (James Madison "Father Of The Constitution") There has been much debate about when the United States took its fateful voyage from that of People's Revolution to one of Empire. Some have posited it early as the Spanish American War, others have placed this departure after WW2 and the build-up of the National Security State. I place it before and immediately after the American Revolution.
In fact, I maintain that with the "founding fathers," and their statements regarding the nature of the New Nation, that this was their aim even before the Revolution. In other words, all of their documents, their recorded statements, the inflaming of the passions of the people, that their aim was an empire to span the world. So you are going to read something here that you were never taught in your traditional classroom.
(George Washington)
You can see it in the descriptions that they attribute to the new country, take for instance some of the statements of George Washington. Who characterized the new country as an empire as "God's American Israel," and that their "mission" was to be a "trustee under God of the civilization of the world." You find abundant similar statements out of the founders of the republic.
Consider that all of the leaders were men of means, and that in the penning of the Constitution there was not one statement which accrued to the benefit and protection of the people - having to be forced in amendments by the people where initially not one "father" voted in favor of such protections for the people, it had to be forced on them. In fact, in the very deliberations found among those who wrote the constitution, the father of the said document, James Madison who spoke in the Federalist paper #10 of the "leveling impulses" that had to be discouraged among the people.
 When White servitude is acknowledged as having existed in America, it is almost always termed as temporary "indentured servitude" or part of the convict trade, which, after the Revolution of 1776, centered on Australia instead of America. The "convicts" transported to America under the 1723 Waltham Act, perhaps numbered 100,000. The indentured servants who served a tidy little period of 4 to 7 years polishing the master's silver and china and then taking their place in colonial high society, were a minuscule fraction of the great unsung hundreds of thousands of White slaves who were worked to death in this country from the early l7th century onward. Up to one-half of all the arrivals in the American colonies were Whites slaves and they were America's first slaves. These Whites were slaves for life, long before Blacks ever were. This slavery was even hereditary. White children born to White slaves were enslaved too. Whites were auctioned on the block with children sold and separated from their parents and wives sold and separated from their husbands.
The Establishment has created the misnomer of "indentured servitude" to explain away and minimize the fact of White slavery. But bound Whites in early America called themselves slaves. Nine-tenths of the White slavery in America was conducted without indentures of any kind but according to the so-called "custom of the country," as it was known, which was lifetime slavery administered by the White slave merchants themselves. So much for the grand early American life! 
These framers of the Constitution wanted three things - a stronger central government for trade (in order to deal with other countries) and interstate commerce, and the last reason, the one left out by your teachers - A STRONGER GOVERNMENT TO PUT DOWN INSURRECTIONS AND REBELLIONS AMONG THE POPULATION, BECAUSE THE MAJORITY OF THE PEOPLE WERE RESTLESS. In fact, people tried to take over state governments, there was broad agitation. THE WEALTHY WANTED A STRONG CENTRAL GOVERNMENT TO PROTECT THEIR INTERESTS, NATIONAL CONTROL.
Shay's rebellion, from whence did this rebellion arise? You would think that we were the ideal country by what is portrayed in school text books. No, the revolution did not bring about an egalitarian society. Most were farmers and servants trying to raise themselves out of oppressive debt, in such soil Shay's rebellion took place. Heavy rents, ruinous taxes, and low income were the lot of most 10 years after the war for "independence." Food riots, beggars in the streets, insurrections attempting to take over state governments.
After Shay's rebellion was put down, there were some very telling words spoken by General Henry Knox to George Washington - " They see the weakness of the government; they feel at once their own poverty, compared to the opulent, and their own force, and they are determined to make use of the latter in order to remedy the former. Their creed is that the property of the U.S. has been protected from the confiscations of Britain by the joint exertions of all, and therefore should be the common property of all."
So the empire expands first internally with the genocide of the indigenous population, and than within proximity over sea, and finally internationally to the present day. The 19th century United States: Louisiana Purchase, War of 1812, acquisition of the Florida's, Mexican War and Oregon territory, establishment of Caribbean and Pacific interests, and the subsequent emergence at the end of the century, with the Spanish American War and Philippine conquest, of the United States as a global power. We end at 1904 with a United States fully involved in Asia (Open Door Policy) and having acquired an overseas empire based on Spanish possessions from the original Columbian-era out thrusts (Caribbean and Philippines).
Empire came in the name of "Interventionism." Although US investment and influence had grown through the 19th century, European ties remained of greater importance for most Latin American nations. However, beginning in 1898, a few key events catapulted the US into a much greater role in the Latin American arena. The War of 1898 [Spanish-American War], the US gained real estate in the Caribbean. We took over Puerto Rico from Spain. Historians debate the exact mix of causes for the war, however it was the expansion of the Empire, plain and simple.
 ("Faces Of American Empire, Lies, Greed, Hubris, Fear - by Garcilazo) We can progress through the expansion of the Empire, unable to stop and thrusting itself and the people into two world wars, where America begins to don the mantle of Empire from it's European counterparts. To the present with over 700 military bases throughout the world, devouring what it can as swiftly as possible to the present day Middle Eastern debacles. The cost of the whole sordid affair being the enrichment mostly a the few elite whom this government is an exclusive franchise for, and to the destruction of people domestically and abroad.
SO THE SUSPICIONS AND THE FEARS FROM THE BEGINNING WERE FOUNDED, AMERICA FROM IT'S INFANCY CARRIED DREAMS OF EMPIRE IN THE VERY BOSOM OF IT'S SO-CALLED FOUNDING FATHERS. IT CUT LOOSE THE TIE IMMEDIATELY FROM A PEOPLES REVOLUTION TO SET SAIL AT THE DESIRE OF AN ELITE AS AN EMPIRE. IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN RECOGNIZED FOR WHAT IT WAS FROM THE BEGINNING, WHEN THE PEOPLE WERE ISOLATED AND EXPLOITED ON IT'S OWN SOIL (OR SHOULD I SAY ON THE SOIL OF THE PEOPLE IT WAS INTENT ON GENOCIDING).
CERTAINLY THERE HAS BEEN DEMOCRATIC STRUGGLE, AND SOME VICTORIES HAVE BEEN WON FOR THE PEOPLE, NOT ALL IS BAD IN AMERICA BUT WHAT IS GOOD HAS ONLY COME FROM THE DEMOCRATIC ACTION OF THE PEOPLE (THE DEMOS) BUT THEY ARE ALL TENUOUS UNTIL THE PEOPLE REALIZE WHAT WE ARE DEALING WITH IN THIS COUNTRY. NOW IT SEES ITSELF AS THE PAX AMERICANA, BUT IT IS BECOMING A POX AMERICANA TO IT'S OWN PEOPLE AND CONTINUES TO PLAY THE ROLE OF EMPIRE THROUGHOUT THE WORLD - WHEN WILL THE PEOPLE WAKE UP AND RETURN TO A PEOPLES REVOLUTION?
Posted at 08:42 pm by deadringer
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7.1.2007
ACADEMIC INJUSTICES - FASTING FOR JUSTICE AT DEPAUL
During the course of the denial of tenure to Norman Finkelstein and Mehrene Larudee's at DePaul University there have been students that have protested with sit-in's, during graduation, and now with classic fasting. One of these students (actually there is more than one) who has written an article, gives us a view of the value of Dr. Finkelstein's teaching and scholarly work saying that he is worthy of tenure.
I have chosen to duplicate one of these articles originally written in Counterpunch HERE. Daniel Klimek does an outstanding job of not only personal testimony but in exposing what is a trend in America's academic institutions today. He does this by not only personal experience, but in reciting for us Dr. Finkelstein's scholarly accomplishments. While reading this one not only gets the sense of the injustice done to Dr. Finkelstein, but the damage done to the image of higher learning in the United States.
(Mon. John Egan)
"Is this not the fast that I choose:to lose the bonds of injustice." -- Isaiah 58:6 "Each day of this week, while walking through the campus of DePaul University, I passed a statue in front of the university's Student Center of Monsignor John Egan, the late Catholic priest and human rights activist. Below his massive image, the inscription reads: "What are you doing for justice?" "Fasting," I tell myself. As of Friday I, and several other dedicated students, will officially go without eating anything for over 100 hours, five days of fasting and going strong in protest of the university's blatant attack on academic freedom and disregard for our education. That education, which costs over $20,000 a year, has been undermined and put to shame by President Dennis Holtschneider's decision to deny tenure to Professors Norman Finkelstein and Mehrene Larudee, two of the most respected and inspirational professors on campus.  Each day, while conducting our fast in the Student Center, we have received support from the surrounding community, both close and distant. Individuals passing by, from strangers to more students, to DePaul faculty, to faculty from other Chicago universities, have all voluntarily acknowledged the injustice that has taken place at our school, deciding therefore to sit with us and to encourage our efforts of activism. The reason that this injustice has attracted so much attention and support is clear: the implications do not just touch DePaul but the entire academic community, for they display what a sad state of affairs can exist within the American university, that so-called bastion of open thought and ideas. It is absolutely astonishing to have to acknowledge the troubling truth underneath the reality that such an eminent and courageous scholar like Norman Finkelstein can be refused tenure. Dr. Finkelstein's books are international bestsellers that have been translated into 46 foreign editions, more than the work of the entire faculty of DePaul's School of Liberal Arts and Sciences combined. His contributions to Middle Eastern studies are monumental both to our country and to our culture. However, it is no secret that the ideological, pro-Israeli bias of our government has historically penetrated other societal venues as well, such as academia, therefore influencing "scholarship."  When Joan Peters explained to millions of Americans that there, in actuality, is no such thing as a Palestinian, writing the highly successful book From Time Immemorial and, in the process, distorting Middle Eastern history for our manipulated masses, a graduate student at Princeton exposed her work as a colossal hoax. Documenting the hoax, he reestablished an honest debate on Zionism and awakened the conscience of deceived audiences.
That student was Norman Finkelstein.
When Daniel Jonah Goldhagen purported that the secret of the Nazi Holocaust resided in the theory that ordinary Germans were driven to murder by fanatical anti-Semitism, writing the greatly successful book Hitler's Willing Executioners, a scholar exposed the misrepresentations of sources and contradictions within Goldhagen's argument. That same scholar authored The Holocaust Industry, the international bestseller that Raul Hilberg, the most distinguished historian on the Nazi Holocaust, has hailed as "a breakthrough" in the field.
That breakthrough came from Norman Finkelstein.
When Alan Dershowitz argued to millions that Israel is a beacon of democracy and an almost ideal abider of human rights, in the vastly successful book The Case for Israel, a professor at DePaul exposed the book as a monumental fraud, plagiarized excessively from the Joan Peters tract and falsifying the human rights record in the Occupied Territories. Documenting the fraud through excessive detail and observance from the world's mainstream human rights organizations-Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and B'Tselem-the DePaul professor again, through muckraking scholarship deserving of a Pulitzer, reestablished an honest debate on the Middle East by exposing another distorter of history and rebuffing all of his falsifications.
That DePaul professor was Norman Finkelstein, whose contributions to the scholarship of our time is irreplaceable and whose perpetual battle for social justice is a commendable example for all scholars and students to follow.
 Dr. Finkelstein was a professor of mine in the winter quarter of 2007 at DePaul. I soon found out that he is as exceptional of a professor as he is a scholar, thought-provoking, challenging, and inspirational. His extraordinary student evaluations speak for themselves. After only taking one class, I decided to write a letter nominating Dr. Finkelstein for the 2007 LA&S Excellence in Teaching Award, DePaul's most prestigious teaching award. I heard it was not the first time he was nominated.
Yet, this professor, who has impacted history so greatly as a scholar and who has influenced students' minds so abundantly as a teacher, has trouble receiving tenure at DePaul University. Somewhere on the East Coast, however, an exposed plagiarist sits securely in his position as Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. Talk about social justice in American academia. At the same time, after denying tenure, President Holtschneider shamelessly proclaimed, "Academic freedom is alive and well at DePaul." George Orwell must've rolled in his grave."
Daniel Klimek is a student of political science at DePaul, and former student of Prof. Finkelstein. He can be reached at: dpk24g@gmail.comWHAT ACADEMIC INSTITUTIONS EMBRACE IN AMERICA, FOREIGN STUDENTS PROTESTRIOTSTUDENTS AT G8UNIVERSITY CAMPUS IN OAXACATAKE A PILLGRAND ILLUSIONSTHE STRUGGLE FOR HISTORY - PART 1THE STRUGGLE FOR HISTORY - PART 2HOW CAN YOU KNOW ANYTHING WITH MASSIVE SECRECY?NO MORE SERVITUDE Who, Who do you serve?
For whose empire and for whose whims?
Is your honor judged by men?
Will you lie?
Will you lie if they say it's their will?
Will you die or continue to kill?
Until the generals all ahve their fill
Craven Cowards
Armchair Warriors
You will serve Them well
What, what will you write?
For whose pleasure, for whose delight?
Will your readers see your light?
Will you say...That the singer can't blow you away?
That we hate people just 'cause they're gay
Women and children all stay away
To whom, whom do you pray?
Do dollars wash your sins away?
Does God love cold hard cash?
Do you say...If we all just continue to pay
All our ailments will go away
And our souls will be saved
God's not with you
"Holy Roller"
Your heart dwells in Hell
Why, Why do you run?
Our awareness has spoiled your fun
Our eyes see you too clear
Will you hide
From the joy of expressing our pride
For the leaders and people who've died
While combating your genocide
Chains are breaking
Minds are waking
Soon we'll serve no more...
Posted at 08:39 pm by deadringer
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6.28.2007
THE COLONIZATION OF AMERICAN'S
 As of late on a number of blogs, I have noticed that there are some individuals in the United States which gloat and brag about the greatness of the United States. As if it has the right, like it's earlier counter-European parts to move with force at will to continue a process of the colonization of the Third World (made so, the "Third World," by the rapacious exploitation of the First World).
You hear almost every ignorant orientalist quip known to man on the blogs. Like it should be a well known fact of how "backward and barbaric" these countries are in comparison to the "civilized and advanced" Euro-American alliance. In fact, in the United States many times, it seems like some have a view that belongs back in the 19th century - this is what regression creates.
Yet all the while as the years have passed they (Americans and others) do not seem to recognize the fact that they are the objects of a slow and quiet colonization. As their rights recede and their options decrease with the passing of time they are caught in a maze of never ending repetitive cycles that are called the "real life," the epitome of existence supposedly available on the planet.
Of course, there was no violence - except in the periods when people were more democratically minded, and tried to rearrange the landscape to benefit the people. However, those days seem to be a thing of the past, and now they just dance to a beat of a different drum, or should I say sleep. So this colonization has taken place, and the masses of people have literally been subjugated - convinced that all of this is for their own good.
 It happened slowly but surely, first there were these "findings" in the written Constitution, and these wise lawyers saw that the 16th Amendment just did not apply to the Black population - no, it was also true of corporations, that they were persons worthy of the same and even greater rights (eventually) than the organic people. So corporations grew with rapidity, and further rulings (findings) of limited liability.
People were told that it was only natural for these corporations to grow, from local to regional, than to national, and finally international - global. At times people became restless, but their "representatives" in the government that was supposed to be for the benefit of the people ruled in favor for the corporations, and put down the peoples resistance in the form of unions -after all, corporations have rights you know!
 People were told that their only interest should be the accumulation of things, and the joke was coined - "he who dies with the most toys wins." So that we see people roaming mindlessly through malls, getting a god portion of things they do not need, with money they do not have, that they will be spending a good portion of their life paying the interest alone.
They wake up in the morning to their daily routines, rolling out of bed, doing their three S's (shit, shower, shave) drinking their coffee. As they leave they enter the overcrowded freeways inching along through traffic jams, etc. Because you know, "this is the way of life, the good life." However, slowly but surely the corporations begin to own everything - and everything that the people are supposed to desire is attached to the omnipresent corporations.
The people eat, sleep, drink corporations - they listen to corporations on the radios, they see them on TV. The corporations have it all, in fact, you could say the corporations are the NEW "WE THE PEOPLE." The politicians only listen to the monied elite, and they come astride of a corporation. The courts listen to the corporations, and always rule for them.
The "natives" are not listened to any longer, after all, they have been colonized by the corporations. Now the corporations get all of the hard earned money of the people, and the people they just get less and less. Only the people who sit atop the corporations are allowed to get ahead and grow, after all the people are only the colonized masses and the corporations are their masters.
The people protest and are enraged, but nothing is done. Everything is now owned by the corporations, at any time they can attach to the organic persons possessions and take them away. The commons are being privatized (just like in the Third World), which is just another name for giving over vital resources - both material and human - over to the corporations.
Yet while all of this takes place the people yell - "God bless America!" Their representatives say they have to go to war with the people "over there to protect them," and the people cheer them on! Somehow they derive a symbiotic sense of power crushing other people who have been proclaimed to be their enemy. AS ALL OF THIS TAKES PLACE THE ONE THEY DO NOT REALIZE IS THAT THEY HAVE BEEN COLONIZED, THEY ARE REALLY NO DIFFERENT THAN THEIR "LESS FORTUNATE" CREATED ENEMIES, THEY JUST HAVE DELUSIONS THAT THEY ARE FREE, BETTER, AND THEY ARE THE "GREATEST!" WHAT A TRAGEDY.
WHO REALLY CONTROLS AMERICA?A RELIGION?CORPORATE COLONYBYOBTHE AGENDATHE PEOPLE NEED TO WAKE UP21ST CENTURY AMERICAN MINDDOMESTIC CORPORATE MANUFACTURINGTEN YEARS SERVICEMONEYCONSUMER CULTURE REWARDSPEOPLE HAVE THE POWERFOR THE WORK FORCE DROWNINGFalling from the top floor your lungs
fill like parachutes
windows go rushing by.
People inside,
dressed for the funeral in black and white.
These ties strangle our necks, hanging in the closet,
trapped in the cubicle;
without a name, just numbers, on the resume stored in the mainframe, marked for delete.
Please take these hands,
throw them in the river,
wash away the things they never held
please take these hands,
throw me in the river,
don't let me drown before the work day ends.
9 to 5! 9 to 5!
And we're up to our necks,
drowning in the seconds,
ingesting the morning commute
lost in a dead subway sleep,
we lie wide awake in our parents beds,
tossing and turning.
Tomorrow we'll get up
drive to work,
single file
with every day
like it's last.
Waiting for the life to start, is it always just always ahead of the curve?
Please take these hands
throw them in the river,
wash away the things they never held
please take these hands,
throw me in the river,
don't let me drown before the workday ends.
Just keep making copies
of copies
of copies
when will it end?
It'll never end,
'til it gets so bad
that the ink fills in our fingerprints
and the silhouette of your own face becomes the black cloud of war
and even in our dreams we're so afraid the weight will offset who we are
all those breaths that you took have now been canceled in your lungs.
Last night my teeth fell out like ivory typewriter keys
and all the monuments and skyscrapers burned down and filled the sea.
save our ship
the anchor is part of the desk
we can't cut free,
the water is flooding the decks
the memos sent through the currents
computers spark like flares
I can see them.
They don't touch me,
touch me.
Please someone,
teach me how to swim.
please, don't let me drown,
please don't let me drown.
(when you are done listen to the song again, or read this as you listen)
|
Posted at 09:46 pm by deadringer
Permalink
6.25.2007
LOOKING FOR A NEW COMPLIANT PALESTINIAN ELITE
 In the course of Empire, colonialism, and the domination of Western Hegemony over the Middle East there are very few things over the last few hundred years that are new - in fact, there is nothing new. Men like Abbas and Dahlan clamor like they always have for both money and power, the eternal cry of colonialism is always divide and conquer.
So when the United States proposed it's ideas of Hamas and Fatah duking it out for who the top dog would be, and than arming the most servile faction, Fatah had to win the new low in the conflicts sordid history. This is because Fatah has always seen itself as merely the instrument of policing the Palestinians while the Israelis were allowed to expand their occupation.
The battle did not work out as intended, as conceived in the minds of men like Elliot Abrams, so there has been a movement to plan B. Plan B is not something new, it has been used by colonialism from the beginning - make a new "privileged" Palestinian, a sort of elite that gets to have a modicum of dignity and perhaps own some property of it's own.
You can see this play out no matter where you look in colonial enterprises in the past, a sort of fat developed around the midsection of the colonial that wishes to exploit the "native." In India the "raj" set up special territory for the people who were supposed to be the "cut above," which in reality meant they were the most pliant, as long as they were allowed to have their little piece of property and their "privileges (few though they were)."
(Author of the road map to nowhere)
What this all boils down to is corruption, and the desire for some form of normalcy (deformity) for the people, at the expense of their "less fortunate" counterparts. Soon there may even be conversations in the West Bank of how bad they feel about "those people over there," and why can't the individuals who are their leaders do something to make their "life easier." It is similar to the structure you see in the United States which is much more fluid, but the contrast will be much sharper in this scenario.
They give the impression that they are going to award them, but the only thing they may receive is just a portion of the tax monies which the Israeli government has withheld contrary to law. The occupier believes that he can isolate the Palestinians, which is just another form of division for the benefit of the occupier. The impression that will be left is that all of the Palestinians could have benefited, but now it has become "apparent" that only the compliant ones "deserve" better treatment.
 (West Bank) The idea being broached here is that an emergency government is possible, and that even though it crosses the Basic Law (2004) anything goes at this juncture. So the colonial power, and it's extended power which is the USA wants them to follow the same formula of lawlessness and to gut the democratically elected government.
As Omar Barghouti has said in his article on June 20th, in the Electronic Intifada "...the bloody clash between the Islamist group, and it's secular counterpart, Fatah, and irrespective of motives, has descended into a feud between two slaves fighting over the crumbs thrown to them, whenever they behave, by their common colonial master." This will never lead to self- determination nor liberation. The only thing that will come from this is the destruction of any PA structure
(Gaza)
There is still an illegal wall surrounding all, and the Israelis have no intention but the complete destruction of the Palestinian people - either in the West Bank or Gaza. What is not needed is some perceived advantage or privilege to calcify so that the Palestinian people begin to abandon each other. They do not need to fall into the all to common trap which has been used for years by colonialists - indeed a division, but one thinking that it is better off than the other. YOU CANNOT ALLOW A SPLIT TO OCCUR BETWEEN THE PALESTINIANS IN OCCUPIED TERRITORY, FROM THE REFUGEES, AND THE PALESTINIAN CITIZENS IN ISRAEL. THE ONLY PALESTINE THAT WILL FINALLY WIN IS A UNIFIED ONE, AND NO LEADER NOR CORNER OF ANY PORTION OF THE PA CAN AFFORD TO BE SET APART FROM ONE ANOTHER. IF YOU THINK ARE SPECIAL AND THAT YOU WILL BE SPARED, LET THESE WORDS RING IN YOUR EARS - "YOU WILL BE NEXT."
Posted at 07:53 pm by deadringer
Permalink
6.23.2007
AMERICAN UNIVERSITIES PRONOUNCE SOLIDARITY WITH ISRAEL'S ILLEGAL OCCUPATION
 (Cal State Berkeley) Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall, Humpty Dumpty had a great fall, all the kings horses and all the kings men, couldn't put him back together again! On June 14th 2007 the Cal State Berkeley University Chancellor, Robert J. Birgeneau pronounces his solidarity with Israeli academics and their institutions. Well if you don't believe me, read it for yourself (as an aside, left and right politically have nothing to do with certain subject matter, as is amply displayed here) HERE.You might ask what brought on this sudden surge of solidarity, he says that he shares a "growing outrage" about a boycott proposed by Britain's University and College Union against these said Israeli academics and their institutions. He lifts high the tattered rags of "free Speech" (tattered by American Universities own clamp down on freedom of speech to those who oppose the illegal Israeli occupation of the Palestinians) in regard to these self same Israeli academics and institutions that support an illegal occupation of the Palestinians!
(Columbia University)
The chancellor at Berkeley is not alone in his outcry, he stands next to Lee C. Bollinger the president of Columbia University. Here stands another champion of the "fundamental values of the academy," read his screed HERE. Mind you now, this is the same institution which took to task a professor in the Middle Eastern studies program for his strong disapproval of what Israel has been doing to the Palestinians in the illegal occupation.
President Bollinger, as a spokesperson for the university wax's eloquent about not holding "academic exchange hostage" like he has done in some departments at the University of Columbia. He pleads that it will squelch "cultural exchanges that will lead to enlightenment, empathy..." etc. ad nauseum. That what joining the British academics who deplore what is taking place in the illegal occupation will "hijack the central mission of higher education."
(Conformity by Alfred Gockel)
These universities in the past have had no problem with standing against man's inhumanity to man, in the tradition of the best precepts of the enlightenment. However, now we come to another fork in the road, so to speak, of something which the entire world abhors, an ongoing atrocity in the same vein as Apartheid that has festered as the longest illegal occupation in modern history - but men like Bollinger dismiss it by saying "...we will not hold intellectual exchange hostage to the political disagreements of the moment." Of the moment!
Chancellor Birgeneau while pleading for "free speech" says that he stands proud that Berkeley is the birth place of the "Free Speech Movement." As if free speech has never been called upon to express itself with actions! As if free speech has never pushed itself to civil disobedience to be heard! As if the blood of the forefathers of this nation did not flow in revolutionary heat to gain the prize of free speech!
 It is a known fact that Israeli academics and institutions lend a hand to the illegal and brutal occupation. They write the words which are placed in the mouth of the ruling elite, and the fodder that is fed to their indiscriminate supporter, the USA. They obscure the history of the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian people. They have confounded the political aims of a rapacious Zionism with their goals and aspirations. The very occupation itself is enhanced by the academics who are wed to the military enterprise, and special privilege is given those who serve to oppress the Palestinian people on a daily basis.
So why is it that the institutions in the United States find the proposal of the British academics so objectionable. First, I can tell you that it has nothing to do with what these two spokespersons for well known universities have written. can it be that the academics in the United States, for the most part, are the carbon copy of their Israeli counterparts? Yes, and in some ways even more so. Point for point the same objections made in regard to the Israeli academics and institutions can be made of American academics and institutions. The only difference being that academic institutions in the USA do it for a rapacious empire!
In fact, academia has been the first line of defense for the elite of any current day government franchise. Great pains are taken to make sure that the institutions of higher learning primarily do not disturb the status quo. They have become centers at the disposal of empire, mired in the military industrial complex - besmirched by the new "we the people," modern day multi-national corporations. In other words they are hardly the objective paragons which these two spokesmen (above) make them out to be, in fact, what they are saying is what they WANT you to believe.
So they say "make us the target of your boycott" also, how selfless of them. They stand beside such marvels of virtue like Tony Blair? They might have just as well said George Bush! No, rather than being outside government views and policies, they are the promulgators of what they decry.
 So lets draw all of these things that have been written together for one final thrust. Academia is on the front line of weaving the story of any nation, they are the domestic bodyguards of thought in a given society (one of many). Institutions of higher education, for the most part, are the promoters of the elite ideas that "those who know what's best for you" want you to embrace.
CAN YOU HEAR THE FABRIC OF SOCIETY TEARING? LET IT TEAR, LET THE SOUND REVERBERATE IN THE EARS OF THIS WANTON EMPIRE! WHAT THE BRITISH ACADEMICS HAVE SAID AND DONE IS TO STEP BACK FROM THE WILL OF THE ELITE, AND THEY ASK YOU TO JOIN THEM. THE EURO-AMERICAN CENTER OF INTEREST IS CURRENTLY ON THE MIDDLE EAST, AND CENTRAL TO THE MIDDLE EAST IS THE ISRAELI/PALESTINIAN CONFLICT. IF THE WILL OF WESTERN HEGEMONY, THE SUBJUGATION OF THE ENTIRE MIDDLE EAST, CAN BE BROKEN IN PALESTINE WHERE THE FOURTH MOST POWERFUL ARMED FORCES RESIDES, THAN THE REST FALL LIKE A HOUSE OF CARDS AND THE "NEW MIDDLE EAST" FADES LIKE A NIGHTMARE. SURE, THE BRITISH IN THE PAST HAVE STOOD BY AND SUPPORTED THE VERY ESSENCE OF COLONIALISM - BUT NOW THEY HAVE SAID THAT THIS IS ENOUGH. THEY ASK THE ACADEMIC COMMUNITY OF THE UNITED STATES TO JOIN THEM, THE BALL IS NOW IN OUR COURT, THE END GAME IS ON IF YOU CHOOSE!
Posted at 06:19 pm by deadringer
Permalink
6.22.2007
Posted at 10:04 pm by deadringer
Permalink
6.20.2007
What is colonialism / imperialism all about, what is it's aim, and what are the results of it's activities?
"Imperialism after all is an act of geographical violence
through which virtually every space in the world is
explored, charted, and finally brought under control."
Edward W. Said, Culture And Imperialism pg.225
THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS - PART 1THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS - PART 2THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS - PART 3THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS - PART 4THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS - PART 5THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS - PART 6THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS - PART 7THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS - PART 8THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS - PART 9THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS - PART 10THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS - PART 11THE BATTLE OF ALGIERS - PART 12UNDER SIEGE
"Here on the slopes of hills, facing the dusk and the cannon of time
Close to the gardens of broken shadows,
We do what prisoners do,
And what the jobless do:
We cultivate hope
A country preparing for dawn. We grow less intelligent
For we closely watch the hour of victory:
No night in our night lit up by the shelling
Our enemies are watchful and light the light for us
In the darkness of cellars. .
Here there is no "I".
Here Adam remembers the dust of his clay.
On the verge of death, he says:
I have no trace left to lose:
Free I am so close to my liberty. My future lies in my own hand.
Soon I shall penetrate my life,
I shall be born free and parentless,
And as my name I shall choose azure letters...
You who stand in the doorway, come in,
Drink Arabic coffee with us
And you will sense that you are men like us
You who stand in the doorways of houses
Come out of our morningtimes,
We shall feel reassured to be
Men like you!
When the planes disappear, the white, white doves
Fly off and wash the cheeks of heaven
With unbound wings taking radiance back again, taking possession
Of the ether and of play. Higher, higher still, the white, white doves
Fly off. Ah, if only the sky
Were real [a man passing between two bombs said to me].
Cypresses behind the soldiers, minarets protecting
The sky from collapse. Behind the hedge of steel
Soldiers piss—under the watchful eye of a tank—
And the autumnal day ends its golden wandering in
A street as wide as a church after Sunday mass...
[To a killer] If you had contemplated the victim's face
And thought it through, you would have remembered your mother in
the
Gas chamber, you would have been freed from the reason for the rifle
And you would have changed your mind: this is not the way
to find one's identity again.
The siege is a waiting period
Waiting on the tilted ladder in the middle of the storm.
Alone, we are alone as far down as the sediment
Were it not for the visits of the rainbows.
We have brothers behind this expanse.
Excellent brothers. They love us. They watch us and weep.
Then, in secret, they tell each other:
"Ah! if this siege had been declared..." They do not finish their
sentence:
"Don't abandon us, don't leave us."
Our losses: between two and eight martyrs each day.
And ten wounded.
And twenty homes.
And fifty olive trees...
Added to this the structural flaw that
Will arrive at the poem, the play, and the unfinished canvas.
A woman told the cloud: cover my beloved
For my clothing is drenched with his blood.
If you are not rain, my love
Be tree
Sated with fertility, be tree
If you are not tree, my love
Be stone
Saturated with humidity, be stone
If you are not stone, my love
Be moon
In the dream of the beloved woman, be moon
[So spoke a woman
to her son at his funeral]
Oh watchmen! Are you not weary
Of lying in wait for the light in our salt
And of the incandescence of the rose in our wound
Are you not weary, oh watchmen?
A little of this absolute and blue infinity
Would be enough
To lighten the burden of these times
And to cleanse the mire of this place.
It is up to the soul to come down from its mount
And on its silken feet walk
By my side, hand in hand, like two longtime
Friends who share the ancient bread
And the antique glass of wine
May we walk this road together
And then our days will take different directions:
I, beyond nature, which in turn
Will choose to squat on a high-up rock.
On my rubble the shadow grows green,
And the wolf is dozing on the skin of my goat
He dreams as I do, as the angel does
That life is here...not over there.
In the state of siege, time becomes space
Transfixed in its eternity
In the state of siege, space becomes time
That has missed its yesterday and its tomorrow.
The martyr encircles me every time I live a new day
And questions me: Where were you? Take every word
You have given me back to the dictionaries
And relieve the sleepers from the echo's buzz.
The martyr enlightens me: beyond the expanse
I did not look
For the virgins of immortality for I love life
On earth, amid fig trees and pines,
But I cannot reach it, and then, too, I took aim at it
With my last possession: the blood in the body of azure.
The martyr warned me: Do not believe their ululations
Believe my father when, weeping, he looks at my photograph
How did we trade roles, my son, how did you precede me.
I first, I the first one!
The martyr encircles me: my place and my crude furniture are all that I
have changed.
I put a gazelle on my bed,
And a crescent of moon on my finger
To appease my sorrow.
The siege will last in order to convince us we must choose an
enslavement that does no harm, in fullest liberty!
Resisting means assuring oneself of the heart's health,
The health of the testicles and of your tenacious disease:
The disease of hope.
And in what remains of the dawn, I walk toward my exterior
And in what remains of the night, I hear the sound of footsteps inside
me.
Greetings to the one who shares with me an attention to
The drunkenness of light, the light of the butterfly, in the
Blackness of this tunnel!
Greetings to the one who shares my glass with me
In the denseness of a night outflanking the two spaces:
Greetings to my apparition.
My friends are always preparing a farewell feast for me,
A soothing grave in the shade of oak trees
A marble epitaph of time
And always I anticipate them at the funeral:
Who then has died...who?
Writing is a puppy biting nothingness
Writing wounds without a trace of blood.
Our cups of coffee. Birds green trees
In the blue shade, the sun gambols from one wall
To another like a gazelle
The water in the clouds has the unlimited shape of what is left to us
Of the sky. And other things of suspended memories
Reveal that this morning is powerful and splendid,
And that we are the guests of eternity."
Translated by Marjolijn De Jager
Mahmoud Darwish
Posted at 06:51 pm by deadringer
Permalink
6.17.2007
THE LIE OF WESTERN CIVILIZATION
 (Lewis Meidner, Burning City) We have all been told what "civilization" is supposed to be, what we see in Western Society is held up for the world to emulate. So what I am about to say will probably run contrary to what many people have been taught all their lives. Today there is this quest in the world brought to us by the people who say the have the template of civilization, that everything is supposed to be patterned after the grand example.
What is civilization supposed to be in it's basic element? We can ascertain a small portion from the very word itself - civilization comes from the Latin word civis, meaning townsman or citizen. It is supposed to be an advanced state of social development, depicted by growth from barbarism to civilization (as contrast), it is supposed to be refined and generous. We could go on, but for now we will say that this is the essential makeup, or, what is supposed to be the makeup of civilization.
(Homeless Ones, Lewis Meidner) The real truth of the matter is that this conception of civilization, that is what has been created in the West is a lie - civilization, in terms of what has been portrayed as such by Western Civilization is the lie. "The act or process of civilizing or reaching a civilized state," as opposed to a barbarian existence.
With just a cursory examination anyone can see that the Euro-American alliance is anything but civilized, in the sense of HOW they accomplished this accumulation of wealth and the very infrastructure of their society. This is where Sartre has a very terse statement which applies to what we are discussing - "There is nothing more consistent than a racist humanism, since the European has only been able to become a man through creating slaves and monsters."
(The Last Day, Lewis Meidner)
Civilization - "An advanced state of intellectual, cultural, and material development in human society, marked by progress in the arts and sciences, the extensive use of record-keeping, including writing, and the appearance of complex political and social institutions." While no one can deny this definition there must be several questions asked - is the intellectual development creative or coercive?
The material development dependent on the exploitation of human beings? Are the arts subservient to the State status quo? What is beneficial regarding the science and what is not? Is the record keeping helpful or is it restrictive of the population? Does the writing ask both easy and hard questions whatever discipline? Are the political and social institutions beneficial to the population?
(Apocalyptic Landscape, Lewis Meidner)
So, one could look at both the internal and external aspects of civilization, to get an analysis of this "civilization." Internal on the beneficial nature of what has taken place for mankind domestically, and external on how it relates to nations - both what it terms equals and inferiors, and how it comes up with these specific categories.
I would call the internal and external aspects of this supposed "apex" of civilization insular of one another, that is, in the Euro-American you have a common knowledge of how individuals in the society are treated - whereas, when it comes to dealing with other nations for the most part there is gross ignorance of how these "inferior" (Third World, which is just another title for those that have been exploited by the "first world") are treated. Even internally Western Civilization can see gross inequalities on how people are treated - rich versus poor, minority vs. majority, and there are even different types of "citizenship."
 (Apocalyptic Landscape, Lewis Meidner) When looking at Western Civilization you find this massive gap between the rich and the poor internally, there is both a corporate and ruling elite. One could come up with generalizations, like there is both good and bad both in an internal and external sense - but this hardly covers the preponderance of what takes place.
With all of the wars which have taken place within the West between each other, and on their own people (civil) and indigenous populations, you could say that a good portion of the last few thousand years have been very bloody. In relation to other nations, if you just look at the colonial enterprises there has been the war against and exploitation of peoples all over the world (and now a massive system of domination which does not control through colonial exploits, but through the very aspects of what makes nations viable - it's resources, trade, finances, human resources, etc.)
(Apocalyptic Landscape, Lewis Meidner)
What this brings us to is a very pronounced truth, that civilization, that is civilization in the sense that the West supposedly be the apex. that everyone is supposed to attain - IS A LIE, it is anything but civil. Also, simply by the record, that if this is what is supposed to be good for man, that also is a lie.
What we have are countries, patterned after the West which are nothing but the franchises of the elite, that neither successfully meets the needs of those within nor is healthy for those with whom the West interacts! Internally there is a stilted educational process which tries to quash dissent, and those who disagree are either cut off or ostracized by an equally complicit set of institutions. Most of the basic elements of progress have been actuated through theft of other nations, and the enslavement in one form or another of their people. THE SUM TOTAL MEANING THAT EVEN THE VERY DEFINITION OF CIVILIZATION IS A LIE, AND EQUALLY SO THAT SUCH "CIVILIZATION" IS GOOD FOR MANKIND.
Posted at 08:17 pm by deadringer
Permalink
6.13.2007
CHURCHILL REPORT CHARGED WITH MISCONDUCT
Faculty Group Files Academic Misconduct Charges Concerning Churchill Report
"On Thursday, May 10, 2007, twelve tenured professors filed formal charges of academic misconduct against members of the Standing Committee on Research Misconduct (SCRM) investigating committee that produced a report supporting allegations of academic wrongdoing,including fabrication and plagiarism, by Professor Ward Churchill. The report will form the basis for a recommendation by CU President Hank Brown to either dismiss charges against Churchill or forward the report to the University of Colorado Board of Regents with a recommendation for action, including possible revocation of tenure and dismissal, against the controversial professor. Given the damning nature of the report, it is widely expected to weigh heavily against Professor Churchill.
The group of faculty from the University of Colorado and other institutions as far away as Cornell University in New York filed the charges a few days after newly appointed Vice President of Academic Affairs and Research, Michael Poliakoff rejected an American Association of University Professors (AAUP) Colorado Chapter request the CU administration withdraw the report and rescind misconduct charges against Churchill. The group says the SCRM committee report contains a number of serious flaws including:
*Relying on a biased and flawed source for major arguments;
*Relying on the artificial exclusion of reputable independent sources that contradict the
Report's arguments;
*Suppressing text from a cited source that contradicts the Report's argument;
*Distorting the weakness of the Report's case;
*Artificially limiting scholarly interpretation in violation of norms of scholarship.
*Exaggerating charges of plagiarism that are at best debatable, and relatively trivial in
relation to the great body of his work and the historical treatment of offenses.
Two American Indian Studies experts, Professors Eric Cheyfitz of Cornell and Michael Yellow Bird of the University of Kansas, independently discovered errors and omissions in the SCRM report that seriously compromises its credibility. The faculty group presented extensive documentation backing its request for withdrawal of the SCRM report. Although the administration addressed the Colorado AAUP request, there was no response to the faculty group's letter.
Professor Tom Mayer who joined the group filing charges sounded a bit of irony: "The administration answered the AAUP, claiming it would not allow such 'outside requests' to influence its handling of the Churchill's case, yet it completely ignored an identical request from its own faculty. Given that fact and the role outside forces played in starting the investigation of Churchill in the in the first place, I think we are witnessing not one but two double standards at play here."
 According to University bylaws, a SCRM investigative committee similar to the one that wrote the report now at issue must hear the faculty complaint. According to CU Education professor Marki LeCompte , "the original investigative committee members will soon have to respond to charges they knowingly produced a deeply flawed report based upon a selective presentation of 'evidence' against Professor Churchill."
LeCompte added: "Once we understood from Cheyfitz and Yellow Bird just how incredibly skewed the Churchill report is, we had to conclude that the whole effort to get rid of Churchill is fundamentally political rather than based on any reasonable notion of research misconduct."" The twelve professors filing charges today include in alphabetical order are: Leonard Baca Professor, School of Education, and Director, BUENO Center for Multicultural Education, University of Colorado, Boulder Eric Cheyfitz Ernest I White Professor of American Studies and Humane Letters, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York Elisa Facio Associate Professor, Department of Ethnic Studies, University of Colorado, Boulder Vijay Gupta Professor, Civil, Environmental and Architectural Engineering Fellow, Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental Sciences (CIRES) University of Colorado, Boulder Margaret LeCompte Professor, School of Education, University of Colorado, Boulder Paul Levitt Professor, Department of English, University of Colorado, Boulder Tom Mayer Professor, Department of Sociology, University of Colorado, Boulder Peter Michelson, Professor Emeritus, Department of English, University of Colorado, Boulder Emma Perez Associate Professor, Department of Ethnic Studies, University of Colorado, Boulder Brenda Romero, Associate Professor and Chair, Department of Musicology, College of Music, University of Colorado, Boulder Martin Walter Professor, Department of Mathematics, University of Colorado, Boulder Michael Yellow Bird (Sahnish, Hidatsa) Associate Professor, Center for Indigenous Nations Studies, University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas WRITTEN BY THE UNIVERSITY FACULTY AT BOULDER COLORADO
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SCHOLARS NATIONALLY SAY THE UNIVERSITY OF COLORADO'S "INVESTIGATION"
WARD CHURCHILL IS A SHAM
"The relentless pursuit of and punitive approach of the University of Colorado at Boulder to Professor Ward Churchill is a revealing
instance of the ethos that is currently threatening academic freedom. . . . [T]he proceedings against him were not undertaken be-cause
of efforts to uphold high scholarly standards, but to provide a more acceptable basis for giving in to the right-wing pressures."
Derrick Bell, Noam Chomsky, Richard Delgado, Richard Falk, Immanual Wallerstein, Howard Zinn . . .  Open Letter published in the New York Review of Books, April 12, 2007 "The case against Professor Churchill is flawed on multiple contextual, procedural, and substantive grounds. . . . (1) an unreasonably broad and elastic definition of 'research misconduct'; (2) a near-obsessive interest in dissecting a small number of paragraphs and footnotes from an otherwise 'impressive' and 'unusually high volume' of academic work . . . and (3) a failure to fully appreciate the 'scholar activist' and 'public intellectual' roles. . . that Professor Churchill was clearly expected to fill when hired by the University of Colorado." Teachers for a Democratic Society petition signed by 494 scholars "The Report should be rescinded because it contains 'violations of standard scholarly practice that are so serious that we are now considering the additional step of filing charges of research misconduct against the authors of the Report'". Open letter from Boulder Faculty Ad Hoc Committee to Defend Academic Freedom. "The flaws in the Report are so serious that no legitimate action can be taken on its basis…the Cheyfitz evidence should be thoroughly examined for its validity and effect on the original Report by an independent, qualified, and unbiased panel…No action should be taken…until this investigation is completed." Executive Committee, Colorado Conference of the AAUP 4-23-07 So why is CU making up excuses to fire Ward Churchill? (Tenure procession) The ACTA Connection: What is the American Council of Trustees and Alumni (ACTA)? * Organized by Lynne Cheney, it hopes to quash the "obsession with diversity" and the "liberal bias" in education. * ACTA is financed by rightwing foundations such as Castle Rock (Coors), Scaife, Olin and Bradley. * It is allied with powerful neoconservative groups such as the Federalist Society, American Enterprise Institute, Cato Institute, and National Association of Scholars. * ACTA enlists trustees (regents), alumni, governors and legislators to bring political and financial pressure on universities. * ACTA works with David Horowitz's Center for the Study of Popular Culture to blacklist so-called "dangerous academics" and promote state legislation to monitor political opinions in the classroom. Colorado is an ACTA stronghold CU President Hank Brown: Co-founder of ACTA ACTA Chairman Jerry Martin: Former chair of CU-Boulder's philosophy department Regent Tom Lucero: Strong ACTA supporter Former Gov. Bill Owens: Leader of ACTA's Governors Project; hosted an ACTA conference for Colorado trustees CU's new VP for Academic Affairs Michael Poliakoff: Wrote ACTA's How Informed Trustees Can Ensure Teacher Quality Ward Churchill and the University of Colorado: ACTA's test case  * ACTA member Gov. Owens demanded that Prof. Churchill be fired as soon as the "controversy" erupted; the "research misconduct" investigation is a pretext to legitimize that action. * Regent Lucero immediately called for a review of all CU courses and departments to eliminate those of "questionable academic merit," i.e., those that encourage critical thought, open dialogue and diverse perspectives. * Pres. Betsy Hoffman resigned shortly after warning of a "new McCarthyism;" she was replaced by Hank Brown, who has consolidated his power, converting the top diversity monitor and others into "fire at will" positions, and requiring the Silver and Gold faculty newspaper editor to report directly to the president. * The Regents have "streamlined" the dismissal process, making it easier to fire tenured professors. All of these steps are outlined in ACTA's blueprint for transforming and corporatizing higher education. CU Pres. Brown, one of ACTA's "friends in high places" will soon make his recommendation to the Regents on the firing of Prof. Churchill. Brown has already announced his intent to retire, having accomplished what he "intended to do." (Turnbow Injustice) The true test of Academic Freedom is the defense of the most controversial among us. Effective resistance to the stifling of diversity and critical thought must come from educators, students, parents and all who value freedom and knowledge. If Ward Churchill is fired, ACTA's message will resonate throughout the Academy: Don't challenge the status quo if you want to keep your job. For more information visit www.aaup-cu.org.
Paid for by the Boulder and Denver Faculty Ad Hoc Committee to Defend Academic Freedom. ACTA's "How Many Ward Churchills?" was published in May 2006 to coincide with release of CU's Investigative Report. ACTA concludes: "Ward Churchill is everywhere." Everywhere? ACTA points almost exclusively to departments and courses focusing on "race, class, gender, sexuality, . . . globalization, capitalism, . . . and the destruction of the environment." ACTA wants these issues silenced.
Posted at 07:07 pm by deadringer
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