Blinding the workers of this country to the crimes of their lords is commonly (perhaps even more commonly in the current age) done with warfare. Warfare allows our lords to excite patriotism in a variety of ways which both eliminate scores of workers from this living coil, as well as blinding many of them to the very criminality of the follies they are cheering on. Our workers are convinced in scores to raise up arms against an enemy they have never met, to revenge against crimes that they have never been the victim of, and to win a victory none of us deserve. It weakens us all to fight their wars by forcing us to become their cannon fodder. For each worker that is killed in an imperialist rich man’s war, that is one less potential knife against the throat of our lords’ grasp on power.
The Veterans’ day holiday is window dressing and charade for celebrating our workers who have fought and died fighting these wars. An effort to convince us that the members of the upper-classes care at all for the sacrifices made for their profits. Though all too often we see what happens to the workers who come back from fighting whatever latest crusade is being waged – they are frequently left untreated with a host of mental, emotional, and physical traumas caused directly by the campaigns they were ordered into. Suicide rates among these people are frequently higher than the amount being actually killed in the wars they are being scarred by.
As workers, we will be shown imagery romanticizing the acts of war; we will be lied to about what it is we are fighting for; and we will be told it is all a noble act that ensures our “freedom”. If you have family members sent away in these campaigns, I hope for their safe return to you. If you are a service member, I hope you are kept safe, and I hope that witnessing the crimes of war awakens a consciousness in you that understands that it is not freedom you are ordered to fight for, but theft. I hope you are able to receive proper healthcare, but knowing that so few Americans actually do, I know that this is unlikely. I hope you are well, as I would for any of my fellow sisters and brothers, but I will not hope for your victory. I wont celebrate your service, because in so doing I disrespect you and all workers.
Ugh, the news of Osama bin Laden’s death has brought forth a cavalcade of jingoism I have not seen since… possibly the news of Saddam Hussein’s capture. We are a culture of grave dancers, are we not? Nothing like a little death to those who would challenge us to really get us in good spirits. I am really ashamed of my fellow Americans. As Jack Crow says, so many Americans this week have proved they are nothing more than “moral and emotional infants who grave dance over symbolic murders while they cultivate a studied indifference to the homeless, the destitute, the war ravaged and the oppressed.” America, do you not see that you are playing directly into the hands of murderers and psychopaths when you march to their pied piper’s tune? You are marching to the tune of your own ruin and death.
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A year ago yesterday the explosion that caused the Deepwater Horizon oil spill rocked the Gulf of Mexico and the infamous pipeline began spewing death into our waters for nearly 5 months. The consequences of this tragedy cannot be fully understood just yet and I’m sure we’ll all see and hear horror stories resulting from these events for many years to come. And as the common refrain goes, those responsible for this destruction are nowhere near being held responsible and are not expected to make good for their misdeeds. Indeed, not a single law or regulation has passed to prevent another disaster. This comes on the heels of learning what we always suspected, the various oil companies’ role in our most recent and tragic invasion of Iraq.
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Rather than see the revolution stagnate into a protracted civil war, the United States and its proxies in the United Nations have decided to usurp the struggles of the Libyan people to ensure a result favorable for the capitalist world order. After watching their puppet dictators failing time and again around the Middle-East, Uncle Sam seems to have decided that if you want something done right, you have to do it yourself. If the people want a revolution, let Sam give them one! Enter Operation Odyssey Dawn (who comes up with the names for this shit?), the latest campaign of death the U.S. government has instigated against humanity.
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This just dedicated to all the people that will still argue with me on the merits of the U.S. occupation of Afghanistan. People who rage against Iraq but still, for some unexplainable reason, see our presence in Afghanistan as some sort of moral imperative – as some sort of cleansing of the world’s evil. I don’t know why I try to engage in these conversations still. My actions express a belief that I’m going to change their minds but my mind knows better and yet I try. One more time, here we go:
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We were told in February of 2009 what President Obama had in mind for our imperial ambitions in Iraq. The history of the state of Iraq is a sad story of Western imperialism. From the British border designations ensuring dependence on foreign powers, U.S. and British backed coups against emancipatory governments, installation of Western-friendly dictators who later became our enemies, and over two decades of bloody conflicts. The terrorism and destruction that is the history of Iraq can only be laid at our feet. The Obama Orwellian diatribe spoon-fed to us about ending combat operations can (and should) only be seen as a continuation of the horrific policies.
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I’ve been watching a bunch of the Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts’ videos lately, and I especially have been enjoying their animated lectures. There’s one narrated by Jeremy Rifkin that talks about the myths of human nature and the need to achieve an empathic civilization. It raises important issues about human consciousness and how humans have related to each other in the past and how we need to learn to relate if our survival is worth ensuring.
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When one takes the time to read liberal blogs a pattern quickly becomes apparent. When one is so entangled in the system of our government it obscures what one is actually cheering for or raging against. The line, ideologically speaking, becomes so blurred that thankfully one is able to determine which people deserve cheering or choking with a simple initial next to their name proudly proclaiming R or D! A member such as Arlen Specter, once a Republican and embodying everything “wrong” with our society, can change his party affiliation and suddenly this baptism allows for the ignoring of his policy beliefs by the liberal masses.
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Keep in mind while reading the following that this president was elected on a campaign of “change.” That he won his election denigrating the “failed policies of the past.” Reminding oneself of these facts becomes a cruel joke when compared to the very things that he has since done. Anyone still defending Obama has to either be doing so out of refusal to admit to one’s mistakes, or has simply embraced a “team Democrat” philosophy and that as long as Barack Obama has a little “D” next to his name, he could skull-fuck Santa Claus and liberals would find some way to defend it. “It’s not what I would have done,” you can almost hear one say, “but he is the president and so knows a lot more about the situation than we do!” I want to know what third-dimensional chess excuse we get now that reports show that the White House has basically given up closing our concentration camp in Guantanamo Bay and his latest public mockery of those who would call for an end to hostilities in Afghanistan.
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With the recent unfortunate events of Israel’s storming of a flotilla bound for the Gaza Strip with aid supplies, one hopes (futilely) that the U.S. rethinks its relationship with the apartheid state of Israel. Though even as I am writing this draft, sources are coming out everywhere denying any possibility of this, with even our vice president coming out to defend the Israel’s murderous actions. I admit up-front that my hopes are futile as the actions of one death-state should hardly offend its death-state allies.
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