March 2009 archive

Muse in the Morning

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Muse in the Morning

An Opened Mind V

Art Link

Blue Mother

Chapter 6

The Spirit of the Valley

never dies.

It is called

the Mystic Female.

The Door

of the Mystic Female

Is the root

of Heaven and Earth.

Continuously, continuously,

It seems to remain.

Draw upon it

And it serves you with ease.

–Tao te Ching (tr. Lin Yutan)

Blue Mother

Like you

I hang my head

You in sorrow

Me in shame

Blue Mother

I weep with you

for the damage done

to the spirit

of the valley

–Robyn Elaine Serven

–November 1, 2005

Late Night Karaoke

Canadians  

No Prosecutions, No Accountability: Another Day in Torture USA

Sometimes I am truly overwhelmed with both gratitude and awe at the amount of important work being done on the ongoing torture scandal by journalists, bloggers, attorneys, psychologists, doctors, and just plain decent people.

I wanted to highlight a few that seem specially extraordinary, or of current interest. At the close, we’ll look more closely at where the fight for prosecutions stands today. In this diary, we’ll look at a number of articles, including one that highlights the role of psychologists in planning torture, and one that compares the role of solitary confinement in U.S. prisons with the practice at Guanatanamo.

Patriot Daily News Clearinghouse is a Daily Kos regular blogger, who just finished a second installment of the DK Sunday Torture News Roundup (first installment is here). PDNC highlighted the ongoing case of Aafia Siddiqui. Siddiqui was likely a U.S. “ghost prisoner” of the CIA, and is now being held in a Texas prison, where her sanity and competency to stand trial is being determined. You must read the entire piece, for its cumulative impact, which is powerful.

What I Really Think Of Barack Obama, Or WTF Is Going On?

And What I Really Think Of Eric Holder, too.



I suspect, or hope rather, to give them the benefit of the doubt, that what they might be trying to do is rather than fight or go head to head with the plutocracy that has them surrounded and controls foreign and economic policy and the judiciary and the CIA and the NSA and the military and the media, is to find a way to coopt that plutocracy, get them to see that it is also in their best interests to stop all the looting of society and warmongering, and get them on their side.

I don’t know if they have a chance in hell of accomplishing that though, if that is what they are trying, or if they will end up with everyone simply throwing their hands up in disgust and concluding that it is Obama and Holder on the plutocracy’s side, as it looks so far.

A promise kept

Somewhere among my last entries here before the Election SeasonSM began in earnest last year, I promised to post something about why things are not as bad as they may seem stateside.  Please forgive that I’ve not followed up until now.

(Regarding Election SeasonSM itself, well, Metaphorical Carpet Bombing with facts as munitionsSM, TM in the dkos realm worked out pretty well, IMO.  So began the Revolution.  And most of it was televised after all.)

Help me out here

I have a brand new computer problem and must take action.  In being my typical self it appears that either Google or my personal NSA staff has indeed fried another computer.  The virus manifests itself via search engine redirects and brings up lamestream moronic sheeple shit and tells me nobody sells what I am specifically looking for.  Anyway try it yourself and see if your computer is infected.

Weekly Torture Action Letter: If We Don’t Do It, Others Will

Welcome to the fourth in the Dog’s ongoing letter writing campaign diaries. This has two purposes. First off it is designed to, on weekly basis send the President, the Attorney General, the Justices of the Supreme Court, Speaker Pelosi and Majority Leader Reid a letter every week discussing one aspect of why we must investigate, indict, and prosecute those that ordered torture and those that carried it out. The other purpose is to provide those that would like to join the Dog in this effort a letter that they can cut and paste or a topic to use as the jumping off point for their own letter.

This week we will make the point that if the United States does not fulfill our obligations, some other country will.  

Four at Four

  1. The CS Monitor reports China questions US’s financial dominance ahead of the G-20 summit. “Beijing is aiming for GDP growth of 8 percent this year. The World Bank estimates China’s economy will grow by about 6.5 percent… In fact, Chinese leaders have been voicing more concern recently over the US economy than about their own.”

    China has the bulk of its $2 trillion worth of foreign reserves in U.S. dollars. “Beijing is frightened that the fast pace at which the US Federal Reserve is printing dollars could lead to inflation, a fall in the dollar’s value, and big losses for China.” Americans with savings should be concerned about this too.

    China’s “Central Bank’s deputy governor, Hu Xiaolian, pointedly suggested last Monday that the International Monetary Fund (IMF) should henceforth monitor the US economy as closely as it has traditionally overseen struggling Third World countries.”

    As a standard bearer for developing countries, China will use this week’s G-20 summit to demand that they should have a louder voice in the IMF, Ms. Hu said. She even took a swipe at the tradition by which the World Bank is headed by an American and the IMF by a European.

    Meanwhile, Bloomberg News reports China and Argentina sign a 70 billion Yuan currency swap. “The move will help ensure the stability of the regional currency system and contain financial risks amid the global financial crisis… China arranged a 100 billion yuan swap with Indonesia on March 23, a 20 billion yuan swap with Belarus on March 11, an 80 billion yuan swap with Malaysia last month, a 200 billion yuan swap with Hong Kong in January and a 180 billion yuan swap with South Korea in December.”

    According to Reuters via The Guardian, “Thanks to the swap, Argentina will not have to pay for imports from China in dollars, the currency in which most international trade is settled”.

    Huang Zhilong, a researcher with the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in Beijing, said the swap set a good example for other Latin American countries to follow.

    “Since Argentina has done this, why can’t other countries like Brazil and Venezuela?” said Huang, who studies Latin American finances. “It’s a big deal that will increase China’s financial presence in Latin America.”

    The U.S. dollar’s days of dominance are counting down.

  2. By the way, the LA Times reports the AIG crisis could be the tip of an insurance iceberg.

    As the economic crisis deepens, it has become clear that AIG’s problems extend across most of its business lines, including its massive life insurance and retirement services operations, which reported a staggering $18-billion quarterly loss this month.

    The company’s situation is emblematic of problems across the life insurance industry, which is suffering deep losses on investments that underlie policies for millions of American families.

Four at Four continues with civil war brewing in Iraq and Obama on Afghanistan.

Obama And Neocons Agree?

PNAC attempts to resurrect themselves?

Neo-Con Ideologues Launch New Foreign Policy Group

By Daniel Luban and Jim Lobe

IPS Inter Press Service, 2009

WASHINGTON, Mar 25 (IPS) – A newly-formed and still obscure neo-conservative foreign policy organisation is giving some observers flashbacks to the 1990s, when its predecessor staked out the aggressively unilateralist foreign policy that came to fruition under the George W. Bush administration.

The blandly-named Foreign Policy Initiative (FPI) – the brainchild of Weekly Standard editor William Kristol, neo-conservative foreign policy guru Robert Kagan, and former Bush administration official Dan Senor – has thus far kept a low profile; its only activity to this point has been to sponsor a conference pushing for a U.S. “surge” in Afghanistan.

Read the rest here…

It appears Mr. Obama is happy to accomodate them, with fearmongering rhetoric indistinguishable from Bush’s.

Obama sets Qaeda defeat as top goal in Afghanistan

Reuters, Fri Mar 27, 2009

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Barack Obama unveiled a new war strategy for Afghanistan on Friday with a key goal — to crush al Qaeda militants there and in Pakistan who he said were plotting new attacks on the United States.

“The situation is increasingly perilous,” Obama said in a somber speech in which he sought to explain to Americans why he was boosting U.S. involvement in the seven-year-old war and expanding its focus to include Pakistan.

The new strategy comes with violence in Afghanistan at its highest level since U.S.-led forces ousted the Taliban in 2001 for sheltering al Qaeda leaders behind the September 11 attacks on the United States. The militia has escalated its attacks, often operating from safe havens in border regions of Pakistan.

“The world cannot afford the price that will come due if Afghanistan slides back into chaos or al Qaeda operates unchecked,” Obama said, stressing that stabilizing Afghanistan required an international effort, not just an American one.

The Afghan Plan, “Mr. Obama’s War”

by Kimberly Dozier, CBS News, March 30, 2009

As I write this, it’s been about 72 hours since President Obama official announced his new Afghanistan-Pakistan strategy.

The only thing everyone seems to agree on is that this is now “Mr. Obama’s war.”

He says it’s “America’s war,” but we in the media have anointed it otherwise. He owns it.

Obama And Neocons Agree?

PNAC attempts to resurrect themselves?

Neo-Con Ideologues Launch New Foreign Policy Group

By Daniel Luban and Jim Lobe

IPS Inter Press Service, 2009

WASHINGTON, Mar 25 (IPS) – A newly-formed and still obscure neo-conservative foreign policy organisation is giving some observers flashbacks to the 1990s, when its predecessor staked out the aggressively unilateralist foreign policy that came to fruition under the George W. Bush administration.

The blandly-named Foreign Policy Initiative (FPI) – the brainchild of Weekly Standard editor William Kristol, neo-conservative foreign policy guru Robert Kagan, and former Bush administration official Dan Senor – has thus far kept a low profile; its only activity to this point has been to sponsor a conference pushing for a U.S. “surge” in Afghanistan.

Read the rest here…

The Afghan Plan, “Mr. Obama’s War”

by Kimberly Dozier, CBS News, March 30, 2009

As I write this, it’s been about 72 hours since President Obama official announced his new Afghanistan-Pakistan strategy.

The only thing everyone seems to agree on is that this is now “Mr. Obama’s war.”

He says it’s “America’s war,” but we in the media have anointed it otherwise. He owns it.

Humans Vs, The Machine

Let’s start here….with pissing you off.

Attacking Barack Obama, blaming Barack Obama, making Barack Obama the focal point, simply thinking that Barack Obama, all by himself, can magically…

….Defeat The Machine… is counterproductive. And frankly, stupid.

Barack Obama is not the MIC, is not the Financial Sector Robber Barons, is not the Justice Department, is not the Congress…..Barack Obama is NOT The Ruling Class. Barack Obama is not The Machine.

And it is The Machine that is our ‘enemy.’

It is The Ruling Class that runs the Machine, not Barack Obama. The Machine existed long before Barack Obama. And unless WE (not just Barack Obama) defeat The Machine it will be here long after.

Barack Obama cannot defeat The Machine on his own, he needs allies. He is not going to find those allies in The Ruling Class. So who does that leave???

If WE want an ally in a powerful position on OUR Fight Against The Machine, how does transferring our outrage at The Ruling Class on to Barack Obama advance our goals?

That is falling into a trap, a wedge trap, a divide and conquer trap, a smoke and mirrors for the Ruling Class to hide behind trap.

It may be satisfying to have a single person as the enemy, it may be mentally convenient to focus our ire at a single personified target.

I am not going to talk about what Obama has or has not done right or wrong. That is not the issue. The issue is Humans vs. The Machine. People like you and me vs. The Ruling Class.

It is a Class War. A war between 7 billion humans who want to live in peace and a small coterie of the Power Elite who are only interested in power and profit……to the extent that they will allow the planet to become uninhabitable through Climate Crisis and kill billions of us to pursue their self-interest.

If you blame THAT on fucking Barack Obama, if YOU fall for that trap……they win. If you make it about US vs. Barack Obama……they win.

It is up to US, it is up to YOU to fight The Machine. How does making someone who AT LEAST makes noises about being on our side help that at all, in any sense, in any way? We can try to make him an ally, or we can make him THE enemy. Thus ignoring the real enemy and allowing them to continue their destruction.

Barack Obama is NOT going to defeat The Machine by himself. It is up to US to do that.

Use your power and energy to fight the REAL enemy, The Machine.

Some questions about alternatives

I’m not an economist, nor do I play one on the blogs. All of this talk about Wall Street and our financial institutions is something that, up until a few months ago, I was blissfully ignorant about.  

Over the last couple of weeks, I’ve been reading like mad to try and understand, not only what’s happening, but what the potential solutions would be. I probably have enough information about Obama’s plan to be dangerous (I call it Obama’s plan because the fact of the matter is that its his administration. I have no illusions that he is supporting Geithner under duress or that someone is twisting his arm to do so). The so called PPIP has been dissected pretty thoroughly both by those who support it and those who don’t.

Where I am lacking in information is about the alternatives. As I see it, there’s no really painless or “right” way out of this mess. So the fact of the matter is that it is entirely possible that Obama’s plan is the best of the possibilities. And if that case is to be disputed, then I need to learn more about the options. As Saul Alinsky said in his “Rules for Radicals”:

The price of a successful attack is a constructive alternative.

Never let the enemy score points because you’re caught without a solution to the problem.

 

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