5.03.2003
We know the corporate media doesn't serve us; that forty something percent of Americans think Iraq was directly involved in 9/11 points that out pretty effectively
.Q One question for you both. Do you believe that there is a link between Saddam Hussein, a direct link, and the men who attacked on September the 11th?
THE PRESIDENT: I can't make that claim.
THE PRIME MINISTER: That answers your question.
I got that from a White House transcript for crying out loud, there is no big conspiracy to hide the truth, mainstream news just didn't choose to break with the illusion necessary to the Administration's war aims. The interlocking directorates of major corporations may play a hand, oil producers and weapons system manufacturers financially tied into the major advertisers of our popular media influencing what is said and what is kept from "We the People".
Remember when Mr Bush lied about an International Atomic Energy Agency report that he said stated Iraq could have atomic weapons in six months time? Democracy Now! reported that the IAEA said no such thing and were perplexed that Bush could misrepresent them so. Did FOX network? Have you heard this case of Presidential lying discussed in popular media? Memory Hole has the info you are looking for, it seems on April 29th Paul Krugman reported on it. But it happened last September. Amy Goodman reports it and you know Pacifica is as low budget as it is wonderful- very. Common Dreams picks it up from the Washington Times, but no major network reports this?
Stop over at Mousemusings to see how to actively fight what is just about state controlled media, OK, corporate media of a corporate state. Link on over to some crucial news; yup, I'm asking you to rush because there is time critical information to be had... Big changes are in the offing at the FCC allowing for further concentration of who owns the news, a consolidation of ownership rules for all types of media- of who controls a vital ingredient of the recipe that makes for a vital Democracy- Information . Look how far out of hand the nation has gotten with present day media control.
Granted, we can do a lot with the Internet, but for the information needs of the majority of us to be met we need some competition between newspapers radio and TV to keep democracy going...
Now is a good time to act.
5/03/2003
|
Pop on over to Blah 3 and catch a bit of information about Donald Rumsfeld, the only non -Swede on the Board of the Swedish company ABB, and guess what countries they do business with? Yup, Rummy seems to have more North Korean concerns ( things in China are picking up too...)
5/03/2003
|
thursday, may 22nd will be the last full working day before the memorial day weekend, and it's a good time to send a real message of support for our military. (we all know how much work gets done on the friday before a holiday ;) please help to remind people that while publicly declaring their great love for the troops, the budget being submitted this year by the white house will have disastrous consequences for veterans and military families.
i'd ask you to urge people to call their representatives that thursday, to request that full funding for the va be a top legislative priority. to ask legislators to maintain school funding for the children of families who live on base. to keep retirement promises made to veterans of former wars. and to act to correct the shameful fact that many military families require private charity when their service members are called to duty, or if they should lose their lives.
While cruising blogtopia (thanks skippy) I got the above quote from skippy the bush kangaroo referring to an idea that Natasha over at The Watch had about an effective way to support our troops in this time of VA threatening budget cuts: a virtual march on Washington . Both skippy and Natasha have links to others(Seeing the forest is one you'll recognize seeing here) that will give you more background. Our troops deserve more than lipservice from our government, they have served their country (unlike the current White House resident and many of his neocon pals), they and their families need our support - as mentioned here before the majority of United States Marines are of a rank of Corporal or below, making less than 10,000 dollars a year.
A friend I really admire, a truly good and decent and proud individual was eligible for foodstamps after the birth of his child. A man serious enough about his love of country to make it the organizing principle of his life deserves much better for both him and his family.
We can help
Start e-mailing your friends. Talk to your co-workers, your church group...
5/03/2003
|
5.02.2003
Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence (I conjure you to believe me, fellow citizens) the jealousy of a free people ought to be constantly awake; since history and experience prove that foreign influence is one of the most baneful foes of republican government. But the jealousy, to be useful, must be impartial, else it becomes the instrument of the very influence to be avoided, instead of defense against it. Excessive partiality for one foreign nation, and excessive dislike for another, cause those whom they actuate to see danger only on one side, and serve to veil and even second the arts of influence on the other.
Real patriots, who may resist the intrigues of the favorite, are liable to become suspected and odious; while its fool and dupes usurp the applause and confidence of the people, to surrender their interest.
The great rule of conduct for us. In regard to foreign nations, is, in extending our commercial relations, to have with them as little political connection as possible. So far as we have already formed engagements, let them be fulfilled with perfect good faith: -Here let us stop.
George Washington
Follow the money: George Scultz, former Secretary of State, Bechtel, and the Bin Ladins...
Lets take a look at some Bechtel employee pedigrees:
“Key Bechtel alumni are Reagan Secretary of Defense Casper Weinburger former Bechtel general counsel, and Reagan Secretary of State, George Schultz former Bechtel President, and current Bechtel board member. W. Kenneth Davis, former vice-president for nuclear development became Reagan’s deputy secretary of Energy and head of the Atomic Energy Commission under Reagan. William Casey, chairman of the Security and Exchange Commission under Nixon, head of the Export-Import bank under Ford, Reagan campaign manger and head of the CIA under Reagan was also a Bechtel consultant,” Montague wrote.
“Richard Helm was CIA director under Nixon and eventually became a Bechtel consultant,” Montague continues. “Robert L. Hollingsworth, AEC’s [Atomic Energy Commission] general manager under Nixon became manager of manpower services at Bechtel. Nixon Treasury secretary William Simon became a Bechtel consultant. Additionally, numerous friends of Bechtel, too long to list, many working in the AEC eventually ended up with Bechtel. The close collaboration between the AEC and Bechtel was ‘so incestuous it is impossible to tell where the public sector begins and the private one leaves off’.”
Bechtel Group has also donated generously to the Republican Party and its candidates. In April 2000, Bechtel Group stroked a $100,000 check to the Republican National Committee. And on October 2000 the wife of a prominent Bechtel associate penned a second $100,000 check to the RNC.
The Center for Responsive Politics suggested that there may be a quid pro quo at hand. The Center calculated that the construction companies involved in the bidding for the USAID contracts have given a combined $2.8 million in campaign contributions since 1999. Bechtel gave the most, $1.3 million.
Quite the haven for the Good Ol' Boys, I mean G.O.P.
Recently there was some talk of Mr Rumsfelds connection to Bechtel and Saddam Husseins Iraq from 1983 or so and a pipeline to Aqaba, Jordan. 20 years go by, a friend becomes an evil dictator, but pipeline dreams stay constant while both US and Israeli hungers for oil have grown.
In 1975, Kissinger signed what forms the basis for the Haifa project: a Memorandum of Understanding whereby the US would guarantee Israel's oil reserves and energy supply in times of crisis.
Kissinger was also master of the American plan in the mid-Eighties - when Saddam Hussein was a key US ally - to run an oil pipeline from Iraq to Aqaba in Jordan, opposite the Israeli port of Eilat.
The plan was promoted by the now Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, and the pipeline was to be built by the Bechtel company, which the Bush administration last week awarded a multi-billion dollar contract for the reconstruction of Iraq.
The memorandum has been quietly renewed every five years, with special legislation attached whereby the US stocks a strategic oil reserve for Israel even if it entailed domestic shortages - at a cost of $3 billion (£1.9bn) in 2002 to US taxpayers.
Jim Vallette of the Institute of Policy Studies has scanned memoranda from the National Archives. That link is in .pdf, here is a streaming audiolink from NPR's "Marketplace". A quick quote from Mr Vallette:"In their own words, we now see that for Administration officials, a dictator is a friend of the United States when he is willing to make an oily deal, and a mortal enemy when he is not" said Vallette.
You might remember Bechtel as a company that supplied Saddam Hussein with communications weapons components. Check this list of 24 US companies that supplied Iraq with products helping their weapons programs. Why didn't loudmouths like Limbaugh and O'Reilly talk about companies such as Dupont, Hewlett-Packard or Unysis furthering Husseins Nuclear Weapon Program? Or Honeywell, Sperry, Rockwell or Eastman Kodak supplying the Evil Dictator's missile programs?
5/02/2003
|
Hey, did you check out yesterdays 9/11 linkfest? The post is dense with information- be sure to share what you learn.
9/11 has such a tangled web of "players" you just about need some sort of flowchart to keep them straight. If you make one pass it on...
5/02/2003
|
Missed yesterdays post. I apologize and will try to work up a good one later today.
Working to build community and do good. I missed Mondays posting for the same reason; ideally building consensus to foster a peace/popular education group. That "enlivening democracy" thing again. Communication takes time tempered by goodwill. And time is at a premium.
Thanks for stopping by.
Peace.
5/02/2003
|
4.30.2003
Like everyone else in the United States, the group stood transfixed as the events of September 11 unfolded. Present were former secretary of defense Frank Carlucci, former secretary of state James Baker III, and representatives of the bin Laden family. This was not some underground presidential bunker or Central Intelligence Agency interrogation room. It was the Ritz-Carlton in Washington, D.C., the plush setting for the annual investor conference of one of the most powerful, well-connected, and secretive companies in the world: the Carlyle Group. And since September 11, this little-known company has become unexpectedly important.
I'm not comfortable with the Bush Administration and its stand on 9/11:
The administration’s stand has infuriated the two members of Congress who oversaw the report—Democratic Sen. Bob Graham and Republican Rep. Porter Goss. The two are now preparing a letter of complaint to Vice President Dick Cheney.
Graham is “increasingly frustrated” by the administration’s “unwillingness to release what he regards as important information the public should have about 9-11,” a spokesman said. In Graham’s view, the Bush administration isn’t protecting legitimate issues of national security but information that could be a political “embarrassment,” the aide said. Graham, who last year served as Senate Intelligence Committee chairman, recently told NEWSWEEK: “There has been a cover-up of this."
Graham’s stand may not be terribly surprising, given that the Florida Democrat is running for president and is seeking to use the issue himself politically. But he has found a strong ally in House Intelligence Committee Chairman Goss, a staunch Republican (and former CIA officer) who in the past has consistently defended the administration’s handling of 9-11 issues and is considered especially close to Cheney.
“I find this process horrendously frustrating,” Goss said in an interview. He was particularly piqued that the administration was refusing to declassify material that top intelligence officials had already testified about. “Senior intelligence officials said things in public hearings that they [administration officials] don’t want us to put in the report,” said Goss. “That’s not something I can rationally accept without further public explanation.”
I've already stated my disgust with James Baker for representing the Saudis in a trillion dollar lawsuit brought by victims of 9/11. You may remember that as Secretary of State Mr Baker protected companies that helped Iraq build both conventional and non-conventional weapons:
The IAEA and the U.N. Special Commission have both informed the Committee that they have compiled a list of companies, including numerous U.S. firms, that may have supplied Iraq with the technology and know-how necessary to develop conventional and nonconventional weapons. Both have stated that they are not authorized to provide the Committee with the names of these companies.
While the IAEA and the U.N. Commission did state that the `lists' are available to U.N. member countries, they informed the Committee that the United States Mission to the U.N. has not formally requested copies of the lists.
Why has the State Department failed to formally request a copy of the IAEA and U.N. Special Commission lists of U.S. companies that may have provided Iraq with the technology and know-how to develop weapons of mass destruction?
Then we have James Baker "Attack Iraq":
Strategic Energy Policy Challenges For The 21st Century describes how America is facing the biggest energy crisis in its history. It targets Saddam as a threat to American interests because of his control of Iraqi oilfields and recommends the use of 'military intervention' as a means to fix the US energy crisis.
The report is linked to a veritable who's who of US hawks, oilmen and corporate bigwigs. It was commissioned by James Baker, the former US Secretary of State under George Bush Snr, and submitted to Vice-President Dick Cheney in April 2001 -- a full five months before September 11. Yet it advocates a policy of using military force against an enemy such as Iraq to secure US access to, and control of, Middle Eastern oil fields.
Why would Mr Bush and Mr Cheney do all in their power to block a 9/11 investigation?
But that is older news than this: Officials of the blue ribbon commission set up to investigate the Sept. 11 terror attacks will be questioned at its meeting Thursday about a decision to let the U.S. government screen materials before releasing them to commission members.
One commissioner, and representatives of the families of the 3,000 killed in the attacks, are concerned that Justice Department officials were allowed to review transcripts of congressional testimony, before deciding whether commissioners should see them.
"There's no entity that should be going through the basic material that the commission is to review and filtering it to decide if or when we should be able to see it," commission member and former Democratic Indiana Congressman Tim Roemer told United Press International. "By statute we are entitled to that information."
Now did you know that Thomas Keans, former governor of New Jersey and member of the Council of Foreign Relations; the fellow tapped to head up the impartial blue ribbon 9/11 investigative commission, has busyness ties to Osama Bin Ladins brother-in-law? A tie he shares with Mr Bush.
Two of Kean's Hess-Delta business partners--Mohammed Hussein al Amoudi and Khalid bin Mahfouz--have been under investigation as far back as 1999 for suspected ties to Al Qaeda (Boston Herald, 12/11/2001). Both men have numerous overlapping oil interests in Saudi Arabia, one of which is Delta. Both men are accused by name in a $1 trillion lawsuit, filed on behalf of families of the victims of September 11, as alleged financiers of Al Qaeda.
Khalid bin Mahfouz, head of Saudi Arabia's powerful National Commercial Bank, has led a storied and very public career in fraud. He was implicated in the BCCI banking scandal during the early 1990s, when the Bank of Commerce and Credit International robbed depositors of $10 billion. He eventually paid a $225 million settlement to escape prosecution. In the mid-1990s, he was caught in a citizenship-for-sale scandal, in which he courted investors for business ventures in Ireland, in exchange for Irish passports and huge tax exemptions.
Shortly thereafter, it appears that bin Mahfouz made the jump from white-collar criminal into terrorist sugar daddy. In 1999, he was reportedly placed under house arrest by the Saudi government on suspicion of supporting terrorism. An audit of his National Commerce Bank discovered that $2 billion dollars had gone missing, and US and Saudi officials feared it was funneled to Al Qaeda via numerous charity fronts. One of the "charities" to which bin Mahfouz may have "contributed" heavily, the Advice and Reformation Committee, was founded by Osama bin Laden himself and financed the 1998 African embassy bombings. US officials also suspect bin Mahfouz to be financially linked to the USS Cole attack, the 1993 World Trade Center bombing, and numerous failed terrorist actions. Bin Mahfouz's son was on the board of the Sudanese chapter of Blessed Relief, a charity whose assets were frozen by the Treasury Department in October 2001 for suspected terrorist links. (Ottawa Citizen, 9/29/2001)
As a final note, bin Mahfouz also happens to be Osama bin Laden's brother-in-law. According to Senate testimony given by former CIA director James Woolsey, bin Mahfouz's younger sister is one of bin Laden's many brides. (New York Times, 11/12/2001)
One may wonder how Tom Kean has, thus far, been able to avoid such scrutiny. He hasn't entirely; Michel Chussodovsky, an economics professor at the University of Ottawa, recently wrote an extensive exposé of Kean's connections at globalresearch.ca, and a number of other alternative news sources have already published articles on the subject. But the mainstream media refuses to pick up the story, possibly because questions about Kean's connections to bin Mahfouz ultimately lead to questions about President Bush's connections to him as well.
In 1979, when Bush started up Arbusto Energy in Houston, one of his investors was James Bath, the US business representative of Salem bin Laden--brother of Osama. Though it has yet to be proven, many suspect Bath's $50,000 investment came directly from Salem. Following bin Laden's death in 1988, his Houston-based interests were absorbed by Khalid bin Mahfouz. As a result, Bush soon found himself in hot water during the BCCI scandal, when investigations into the bank's finances revealed that many of the indicted BCCI executives invested heavily in Harken Energy (a reincarnation of Arbusto). Bush denied any knowledge of the BCCI investment, though this answer appears to be disingenuous at best. Bin Mahfouz, a BCCI principal, was implicated in the collective fraud, though not directly connected to Bush's company.
Saudi Sheikh Khalid bin Mahfouz is a defendent in the 9/11 suit brought by the victims of the Saudi Terrorists. Mr Baker is working against our fellow citizens. You tell me, is that Patriotic? In a court of law everyone deserves good representation, but Baker is a former US government official. Presently a business partner with President Bush 1 (the one chosen by voters). It just seems wrong.
What do you think?
Interested in 9/11? Look here there is much food for thought.
4/30/2003
|
4.29.2003
Here is some information on Mike Hawash to link to from Notes on the Atrocities. ReachM High has come across a disquieting detail in his reading; the initial complaints seem to have been phoned in by Hawash's neighbors.
147. On October 5, 2002, the day after the arrests of Ford, Lewis, Battle and Muhammad Bilal, a neighbor of HAWASH, called the FBI Portland Division and stated that his wife and he resided at 2650 NE Aurora, Hillsboro, Oregon, until approximately June 2002. The neighbor stated that his previous neighbors (to the west of his residence in a light blue house, identified as Hawash's residence) who he identified as "Michael and Lisa" (HAWASH) were close friends of Ahmed Bilal and Habis Al Saoub. He observed Bilal, Bilal's wife Corrine, and Al Saoub frequently visit Michael and Lisa's house. The neighbor further stated that Ahmed Bilal occasionally provided gardening services for him.
...
149. On October 20, 2001, FBI Portland Division received a telephone call from a second neighbor of HAWASH in Hillsboro, Oregon, concerning Maher Mofied HAWASH. The caller described HAWASH as a "Palestinian Muslim who works at Intel and is married with three children." The caller wanted to advise the FBI that HAWASH was spending more time at home following September 11, 2001, and that HAWASH was not as friendly as usual. During a follow-up interview with the second neighbor, he told investigators that following a visit by HAWASH's mother in the Spring of 2001, HAWASH changed his attire from "western" clothing to "eastern" clothing, grew a beard, and distanced himself from his neighbors. The second neighbor observed more vehicles driven by other Middle Eastern males coming and going from the residence. The second neighbor further believed that HAWASH had begun attending Mosque on a regular basis.
Does anything sound criminal there? At all?
A story to follow...
4/29/2003
|
Ashcroft is banking that most Americans and public officials have a short or no memory of the colossal havoc the super-secret, and blatantly illegal counter-intelligence COINTELPRO program wreaked on the lives of thousands of innocent Americans during the 1950s and 1960s. The mandate of the program, spelled out in one of the piles of secret documents released by Senate investigators in 1976, was to "disrupt, misdirect, discredit, and neutralize" groups and individuals the FBI considered politically objectionable. Those targeted were not foreign spies, terrorists, or suspected of criminal acts
Go here to see who the FBI thinks we should look out for.
Are you familiar with the counter intelligence program run here in America, by the FBI (Federal Bureau of Intimidation?) , as COINTELPRO? It targeted people that were active participants in the Democratic process rather than just being passive spectators.
African Americans ( Murder of Fred Hampton), Native Americans (Peltier/Pine Ridge), people working for Puerto Rican Independence as well as activists such as Philip Berrigan and the Plowshares Folks (repeat of quote link above), Karen Silkwood and Judi Bari.
Here are their methods (a well rounded article) :
1. Infiltration: Agents and informers did not merely spy on political activists. Their main purpose was to discredit and disrupt. Their very presence served to undermine trust and scare off potential supporters. The FBI and police exploited this fear to smear genuine activists as agents.
2. Psychological Warfare From the Outside: The FBI and police used myriad other "dirty tricks" to undermine progressive movements. They planted false media stories and published bogus leaflets and other publications in the name of targeted groups. They forged correspondence, sent anonymous letters, and made anonymous telephone calls. They spread misinformation about meetings and events, set up pseudo movement groups run by government agents, and manipulated or strong-armed parents, employers, landlords, school officials and others to cause trouble for activists.
3. Harassment Through the Legal System: The FBI and police abused the legal system to harass dissidents and make them appear to be criminals. Officers of the law gave perjured testimony and presented fabricated evidence as a pretext for false arrests and wrongful imprisonment. They discriminatorily enforced tax laws and other government regulations and used conspicuous surveillance, "investigative" interviews, and grand jury subpoenas in an effort to intimidate activists and silence their supporters.
4. Extralegal Force and Violence: The FBI and police threatened, instigated, and themselves conducted break-ins, vandalism, assaults, and beatings. The object was to frighten dissidents and disrupt their movements. In the case of radical Black and Puerto Rican activists (and later Native Americans), these attacks—including political assassinations—were so extensive, vicious, and calculated that they can accurately be termed a form of official "terrorism."
The Bureau's war at home has continued unabated. Domestic covert action did not end when it was exposed in the 1970s. It has persisted throughout the 1980s and become a permanent feature of U.S. government.
Are you aware that the FBI and Secret Service pulled a raid on the home of Michael Moore? Oddly enough it was not the Oscar winning patriot but a twenty year Navy veteran patriot subjected to this indignity- for the text of an e-mail message:
According to Moore -- the North Carolinian who served in Vietnam, the Secret Service agents informed him that "they work with the FBI and National Security Agency (NSA) jointly on national security issues" -- all of which was exclusively reported yesterday via the probingly perceptive questioning of Meria Heller during a live interview on her Meria Heller Internet Show.
One of the agents told Moore that they had "intercepted his email written to an online friend expressing his outrage over the recent election results and that he had called President Bush 'Satan -- the third anti-Christ,' and a 'Communist Republican,' " among other soubriquets.
Further on
"I was also upset when they asked for the names, addresses, and phone numbers of all my family," the Navy vet continued: "They wanted to know if I had a history of mental illness, what I thought about assassinations, if I was going to Washington, DC to shoot the President, when was the last time I was out-of-state, whether I had sniper training in the military, what work I did in the Navy, and if I had a grudge against the Navy, etc."
Fredric A. Maxwell also had the Secret Service checking him out: he whole strange thing began nearly two years ago, when an acquaintance e-mailed me, wondering why the Secret Service had contacted him to ask if he thought I was a threat to George W. Bush. Me? A pretzel is more of a threat to Bush than I am. At the time, I was writing an unauthorized biography of Microsoft's C.E.O., Steve Ballmer. I fully expected the Beast from Redmond to keep tabs on me -- which, of course, it did and which, of course, Ballmer publicly denied -- but the Secret Service?
Private investigators have been known to intimate that they're with the government, so I called the Secret Service's Seattle office to report that someone might be impersonating one of their agents. No, the officer responded, they had wanted to contact me for the past eight months but couldn't find me. Weird -- my name and number were in the Seattle phone book. I went to their office to find out what was going on.
the article ends
Recently, as I sat in a tavern, talking with a few strangers, the subject of George Bush came up. ''He's an idiot going to war for oil,'' said one. ''He's doing his daddy's dirty work,'' said another. ''He looks like Alfred E. Newman,'' said a third. But I didn't say a word.
Now don't let his state repression get you down. The government can do lots worse to us.
And remember, when someone like Rick Santorum, number 3 Republican can get away with slurring gay folks and publicly stating "We the People" should have no right to privacy, things can get worse.
SANTORUM: We have laws in states, like the one at the Supreme Court right now, that has sodomy laws and they were there for a purpose. Because, again, I would argue, they undermine the basic tenets of our society and the family. And if the Supreme Court says that you have the right to consensual sex within your home, then you have the right to bigamy, you have the right to polygamy, you have the right to incest, you have the right to adultery. You have the right to anything. Does that undermine the fabric of our society? I would argue yes, it does. It all comes from, I would argue, this right to privacy that doesn't exist in my opinion in the United States Constitution, this right that was created, it was created in Griswold — Griswold was the contraceptive case — and abortion. And now we're just extending it out. And the further you extend it out, the more you — this freedom actually intervenes and affects the family....
....In every society, the definition of marriage has not ever to my knowledge included homosexuality. That's not to pick on homosexuality. It's not, you know, man on child, man on dog, or whatever the case may be. It is one thing. And when you destroy that you have a dramatic impact on the quality
AP: I'm sorry, I didn't think I was going to talk about "man on dog" with a United States senator, it's sort of freaking me out.
SANTORUM: And that's sort of where we are in today's world, unfortunately. The idea is that the state doesn't have rights to limit individuals' wants and passions. I disagree with that. I think we absolutely have rights because there are consequences to letting people live out whatever wants or passions they desire. And we're seeing it in our society.
AP: Sorry, I just never expected to talk about that when I came over here to interview you. Would a President Santorum eliminate a right to privacy — you don't agree with it?
SANTORUM: I've been very clear about that. The right to privacy is a right that was created in a law that set forth a (ban on) rights to limit individual passions. And I don't agree with that.
New Report Says Administration is Taking Aim at Civil Rights... (found that link at American Samizdat)
Here are some COINTELPRO Resources:
Wake Up magazine has a good section.
cointel.org is a comprehensive assemblage of links concerning COINTELPRO.
Those who don't learn from history are condemned to repeat it.
4/29/2003
|
4.27.2003
Who runs America? Check out this thought provoking article about American governance:
"Why have the most successful governments disdained the ideals of America's founding fathers in favor of the sometimes cruel efficiency of authoritarianism? Because, Kennon asserts, the world has become so complicated, and the pace of change so rapid, that only highly trained, anonymous technocrats invested with enormous authority are capable of guiding a nation's affairs. To trust unskilled politicians, vulnerable to corruption and ignorant of the most basic rules of governing, with the fate of a nation is, in Kennon's view, the height of folly."
The article is nearly four years old but still very interesting reading. It does have an annoying 'pop-up' that you need to close immediately...
Friendly Fascism, The New Face of Power in America by Bertram Gross (South End Press, 1980, paper) is a very thought provoking book.I see at present members of the Establishment or people on its fringes who, in the name of Americanism, betray the interests of most Americans by fomenting militarism, applauding rat-race individualism, protecting undeserved privilege, or stirring up nationalistic and ethnic hatreds. I see pretended patriots who desecrate the American flag by waving it while waiving the law.
further on
In any First World country of advanced capitalism, the new fascism will be colored by national and cultural heritage, ethnic and religious composition, formal political structure, and geopolitical environment. The Japanese or German versions would be quite different from the Italian variety-and still more different from the British, French, Belgian, Dutch, Australian, Canadian, or Israeli versions. In America, it would be supermodern and multi-ethnic-as American as Madison Avenue, executive luncheons, credit cards, and apple pie. It would be fascism with a smile. As a warning against its cosmetic facade, subtle manipulation, and velvet gloves, I call it friendly fascism. What scares me most is its subtle appeal.
I am worried by those who fail to remember-or have never learned -that Big Business-Big Government partnerships, backed up by other elements, were the central facts behind the power structures of old fascism in the days of Mussolini, Hitler, and the Japanese empire builders.
You can read some excerpts from it here at Third World Traveler. Corporate Conservatism, Friendly Fascism; hey, what's in a name... Oh, pardon, Compassionate Conservatism is the widely touted phrase. My bad.
Written in 1980 but seems pretty current, eh?
Food for thought.
4/27/2003
|
Check out Faces for Peace, the online rally. The site seems really kind; it brought a smile to my face that in these troubled times people are taking time to personalize their wish for Peace, putting a human face to their words. I'll probably have my grin up in a day or two... see you there : ).
4/27/2003
|
|
|
