The war on drugs has failed. Drug prohibition does far more damage to society than illicit substances ever have. Every day, especially in South America, people are being slaughtered by vicious drug gangs who’ve grown powerful off the lucrative drug market.
Decriminalization is the only way out of this quagmire. Just ask Portugal, whose decade long experiment with ending drug prohibition has proven itself a resounding success. (more…)
Members of the Icelandic Parliament have nominated Private First Class Bradley Manning for the 2012 Nobel Peace Prize. If there’s any sense of justice left in the Nobel Committee, he’ll win.
Bradley Manning is accused of leaking a video showing the killing of civilians by a US Apache helicopter crew in Iraq. As well, he is charged with sharing the documents known as the Afghan War Diary, the Iraq War Logs, and embarrassing US diplomatic cables, all of which Manning leaked to the champions of transparency: Wikileaks.
Since his arrest in May 2010, Manning has been held in military prison without trial.
The chain of events Manning helped spark include:
In 2009, President Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize “for his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples.” Since then, Obama has increased military spending, expanded US-led war into several new countries, and has furthered the continued erosion of precious civil liberties.
If Pfc Manning doesn’t take the Nobel this year, maybe the Committee should strip Obama of his award and instead bestow the 2009 honors on a more deserving peace-builder.
America (along with sidekick Britain) are imperialist forces hellbent on global domination, President Obama is the lead man in a military coup which took place in Washington, and despite a supposedly free press, most of these atrocities remain hidden from the Western world. And, according to noted journalist John Pilger, all of this has been happening for over 50 years now.
Here’s an excerpt of his latest piece:
Since the Second World War, the US has:
1. Attempted to overthrow more than 50 governments, most of them democratically-elected.
2. Attempted to suppress a populist or national movement in 20 countries.
3. Grossly interfered in democratic elections in at least 30 countries.
4. Dropped bombs on the people of more than 30 countries.
5. Attempted to assassinate more than 50 foreign leaders.
In total, the United States has carried out one or more of these actions in 69 countries. In almost all cases, Britain has been a collaborator. The “enemy” changes in name – from communism to Islamism — but mostly it is the rise of democracy independent of western power or a society occupying strategically useful territory, deemed expendable.
The sheer scale of suffering, let alone criminality, is little known in the west, despite the presence of the world’s most advanced communications, nominally freest journalism and most admired academy.
While past presidents presided over imperialist agendas in foreign nations, Barack Obama is the first to truly bring this war on democracy back home to the American people. Pilger:
A military coup was taking place in Washington, and Obama was their man. Having seduced the anti-war movement into virtual silence, he has given America’s corrupt military officer class unprecedented powers of state and engagement.
Obama’s most “historic” achievement is to bring the war on democracy home to America. On New Year’s Eve, he signed the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), a law that grants the Pentagon the legal right to kidnap both foreigners and US citizens and indefinitely detain, interrogate and torture, or even kill them. They need only “associate” with those “belligerent” to the United States. There will be no protection of law, no trial, no legal representation. This is the first explicit legislation to abolish habeus corpus (the right to due process of law) and effectively repeal the Bill of Rights of 1789.
On 5 January, in an extraordinary speech at the Pentagon, Obama said the military would not only be ready to “secure territory and populations” overseas but to fight in the “homeland” and provide “support to the civil authorities”. In other words, US troops will be deployed on the streets of American cities when the inevitable civil unrest takes hold.
The entire article is certainly worth a read, if only to expand one’s own horizons beyond the typical narrative laid out to those of us the Western world. You know what they say – Knowledge is Power!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rrga8m-V9lI
Dec 31, 2011: While most Americans were preparing champagne and party favors for their big New Years shindig, President Obama coyly signed the 2012 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) into US Law.
This civil rights shredding bill gives the US military the option to detain US citizens suspected of participating or aiding in terrorist activities without a trial, indefinitely.
As you are probably aware, it doesn’t take much to be labelled a terrorist these days. Members of the Occupy Wall Street are now considered terrorists. Trying to expose atrocious animal farming conditions may soon be considered an act of terror. Even creating provocative art might get you locked up in a cell without a trial.
Like I’ve said before, this dangerous legislation takes the US population one step closer to being imprisoned by a fascist state. Seeing as most Americans will be unwilling or unable to move out of the country, the only options left are to become enslaved or to grow empowered.
Which path will you take? Will you just passively observe as your government turns the system of laws into a jail around you? Or will you start taking action right now?
The clock is ticking. Don’t wait any longer.
A protestor handed President Barack Obama a note during a meet and greet in New Hampshire today. The note (pictured above) reads as follows:
Mr. President: Over 4000 peaceful protesters have been arrested while bankers continue to destroy the American economy. You must stop the assault on our 1st amendment rights. Your silence sends a message that police brutality is acceptable. Banks got bailed out. We got sold out.
Unfortunately, even if the President wanted to do something, his hands are tied… bound by the forces which allowed him to become Commander in Chief in the first place.
See, the American political system is structured to prevent any truly revolutionary figure from getting elected. Only those willing to cater to the oligarchs could ever raise the finances needed to see the White House.
This is precisely why Americans are out in the streets in the hundreds of thousands – because their 2-party dictatorship has failed them. Lacking any other option, they must forge an entirely new channel through which to reclaim their democracy.
And this is why, if you aren’t going to take to the streets yourself, you should at least lend support to the protestors. Power to the people!
It’s got to be tough being President. Especially when your agenda of perpetuating the status quo strays so far from the platform of change that got you elected.
But it’s not Obama’s fault. He’s just one guy, and no matter how liberal he might be at heart, the game is rigged against him. The Left is consistently losing ground to the Right, because the Right tends to have the money needed to buy political clout.
The result is kind of like this cartoon:
The political system in the US, and to a greater extent the entire world, is structured to give people the illusion of choice, when the most important decisions are made in without consulting, or often in opposition to, the voice of the people.
So what hope is there? Well, if all the leading political parties are corrupted, then the solution lies outside the mainstream democratic channels. And what does this mean, exactly?
It means that the change we need will have to come from us, from the regular people. We can’t wait for elected officials to save us, because they’re already lost. It is up to you and me and everyone who wants a brighter future to do whatever it takes to make it happen.
And right now, it seems the establishment could use a good shaking up. It is time for elected officials to be held accountable, and for governments to maintain a healthy dose of fear-based respect for the general population.
(“Exit strategy? I dunno… maybe try rocking it.”)
President Obama is expected to deliver a highly anticipated speech on the troop drawdown, where plans to withdraw 30,000 troops from Afghanistan will be announced.
Great! Way to earn that Nobel Peace prize, Barack.
The US has also begun negotiating a peace agreement with the Taliban for the first time.
Amazing! All it took was a bankrupt economy and hundreds of thousands of deaths, and the diplomatic process has neared the point it could have been at 10 years ago.
(Smoke all you want. In Cuba, the healthcare is freeeee!)
Cuba’s Commander in Chief Fidel Castro was awarded the Olive of Peace by the World Peace Council for being “a constant example in the struggle for the peaceful coexistence of nations.”
Now, it may seem odd that a notorious dictator would be given an award for World Peace, but as for tyrants go, Castro ain’t so bad.
Indicators, like life expectancy and education rates, show the citizens in the socialist state enjoy a quality of life on par with other developed nations. Also, Cubans are amongst the happiest people on the planet.
Plus, how many countries has Cuba invaded? None!
So really, picking Castro as beneficiary for a peace prize isn’t that ludicrous. Especially not when you consider how Obama – the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize winner – has at least three unending conflicts on his hands.
(‘So it’s settled then. You’ll be the villainous thug and I’ll be the heroic savior, and we split the profits down the middle.’)
The military industrial complex is a formidable entity that exercises fiendish methods to get what it wants. And what it wants is war, and more of it. No matter who is fighting, or where, or for what, as long as armed conflict is being waged, war-profits will coming rolling in.
With trillions of dollars floating around the defense industry, there’s billions in profits to be made, so the war mongers can’t just sit around and wait for more war to erupt on its own. They need to stir the pot and hope that some kind of violence will erupt.
And this is precisely what seems to have happened in Libya – a long, drawn out conflict with muddled objectives and no clear end in sight.
A recent Human Rights Watch report leads critics to surmise that the pretense for intervention was grossly overstated. The justification for erecting a no-fly zone was to prevent a slaughter in Benghazi. Yet, when Gaddafi forces entered other large cities, there was no massacre. This suggests that no such brutality would have been imposed on the citizens of Benghazi, outside of the rebel forces.
Then, if you consider the alarming fact that a leader of the Libyan rebellion is a CIA operative, the motivations behind the intervention become evident: Libya is the new Iraq.
Or at least it will be, unless there’s a loud enough uproar from the general population. This is why it is so imperative that we voice our discontent to the establishment now.
Say no to escalation in Libya! Stand against war. Let it be known that we will not idly tolerate any more senseless deaths or the squandering of precious treasure.
