The Mainstream Media and a large swath of the American people defend the past and/or present policies of the US government whether it be the use of the death penalty or the torturing and abuse of POWs to the invasion of sovereign nations and the killing of hundreds of thousands of Iraqis or the slaughter of Native Americans or the enslavement of a few million black slaves or using American backed death squads in Central America or in Iraq or ignoring the suffering of their own citizens whether traumatized Iraq veterans or the homeless and the poor or those left to suffer after Hurricane Katrina or the BP oil spill or the wanton destruction of Mountain Top Removal Mining in which mountains and forests and rivers and streams are destroyed all in the name of profit . We are told that we shouldn't be picking on America or its past or its present . But America to outsiders is like a rogue elephant lumbering about the globe creating even more misery rather than less.
I Couldn't Find It in My Heart to Celebrate Thanksgiving by Russell Simmons at Huffington Post , Nov. 28, 2010
I personally don't celebrate Thanksgiving because I don't cherish the invasion, killing, enslavement and impoverishment of indigenous Americans, and the ritual annual slaughter of millions of innocent animals at the alter of our great nation's founding, and the madness of "Black Friday" that our founders, both political and spiritual, would have detested
As an act of kindness and friendship, in the beautiful New England autumn of 1621, members of the Wampanoag tribe, who for thousands of years had inhabited the land around Plymouth, Massachusetts, offered a thanksgiving feast to the newly arrived Pilgrims who had come to "settle" the Americas. It was a bond that quickly developed as the Native Americans taught the Pilgrims tools of agriculture which enabled them to survive in their new found homeland. Unfortunately, history would not remember this friendship well, and the suffering of our native people is a deep scar our country has yet to heal. For the tribes who were "lucky" enough to survive the massacres, killings and hard dirt reservations we have placed them on, I write this piece for you.
...We have to be constantly awake and aware of our history and make decisions based on an acute, enlightened awareness of reality. The Buddha reminds us not to follow the masses but instead to check deep inside ourselves and see if what our teachers tell us is true. Christ turned over the tables in the Jerusalem Temple that included burnt offerings that were desecrated by commercialism and hypocrisy
...We somehow pushed aside the death of hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqis and Afghans since 2001. ... We somehow pushed aside the death of Haitians from cholera, Africans from malaria and Cambodians from drowning. We no longer can afford to push these harsh truths aside, as our world becomes more connected everyday, we must stand together not with just our countrymen and women, but citizens from all countries.
and here's an update of Israel's Ongoing collective punishment of the peoples of Gaza:
Israel continues the illegal and immoral collective punishment of the people of Gaza . America still continues to support Israel unconditionally no matter how many innocents are left to suffer because of their draconian inhumane treatment of the people of Gaza and the Palestinians in general.
Israel claims though it will stop the building of new settlements in the West bank in return for another large supply of arms from the USA. And yet we know very well the Settler's Movement gets its support from the Israeli government and the IDF. Settlers kill Arabs, destroy their homes and their Olive groves etc. with impunity. Of course Israel will from time to time to appease the Americans and other allies with a temporary crack down on settlers but it is just for show. The Israeli government has though no real intention of giving up its illegally occupied territories or treating Palestinians as equals.
What would happen if a Muslim country herded the non-Muslim citizens into Ghettos and restricted their freedoms and even their freedom of movement, freedom of association, freedom of speech the freedom to protest , the freedom to defend themselves when attacked etc.
Israeli Government Documents Show Deliberate Policy to Restrict Food to Gaza by: Saed Bannoura ,International Middle East Media Center | Report Nov. 6, 2010
In 2007, when Israel began its full siege on Gaza, Dov Weisglass, adviser to then Prime-Minister Ehud Olmert, stated clearly, “The idea is to put the Palestinians on a diet, but not to make them die of hunger.” The documents now released contain equations used by the Israeli government to calculate the exact amounts of food, fuel and other necessities needed to do exactly that.
The documents are even more disturbing, say human rights activists, when one considers the fact that close to half of the people of Gaza are children under the age of eighteen. This means that Israel has deliberately forced the undernourishment of hundreds of thousands of children in direct violation of international law and the Fourth Geneva Convention.
This release of documents also severely undermines Israel's oft-made claim that the siege is "for security reasons", as it documents a deliberate and systematic policy of collective punishment of the entire population of Gaza.
Gisha's director, in relation to the release of documents, said, "Israel banned glucose for biscuits and the fuel needed for regular supply of electricity – paralyzing normal life in Gaza and impairing the moral character of the State of Israel. I am sorry to say that major elements of this policy are still in place."
And story of Priest hiring hit-man to kill person accusing him of sexual abuse gets little time in the Mainstream Media - what if this had been a Muslim preacher an Imam. Well Fox News, Limbaugh, O'Reilly , Glenn Beck et al would go ballistic condemning all Muslims of being violent Jihadists based on the actions of one Muslim or a group of Muslims.
Meanwhile no one thinks that because of such actions of a Catholic priest that all Catholics are as depraved as he is.
John Fiala, Texas Priest, Charged With Hiring Hitman To Kill Teen Who Accused Him Of Sexual Abuse at Huffington Post Nov. 23, 2010
SAN ANTONIO (AP) -- A Roman Catholic priest has been arrested on charges that he solicited a hit man to kill a teenager who had accused him of sexual abuse. Authorities said John Fiala first offered the job to a neighbor, who blew the whistle and helped police arrange a sting. They said Fiala got as far as negotiating a $5,000 price for the slaying before investigators moved in.
The 52-year-old clergyman was arrested Nov. 18 at his suburban Dallas home and jailed on $700,000 bond. In April, he was named in a lawsuit filed by the boy's family, who accused Fiala of molesting the youth, including twice forcing him to have sex at gunpoint.
The abuse allegedly took place in 2007 and 2008, when Fiala was a priest at the Sacred Heart of Mary Parish in the West Texas community of Rocksprings, a rural enclave known for sheep and goat herding.
The family's lawsuit also named the Archdiocese of San Antonio and Archbishop Jose Gomez, alleging that church leadership should have known Fiala was abusive.
Meanwhile GOP legislator lurks about Planned Parenthood offices brandishing a hand gun. It is not clear if he was going to kill his girlfriend who secretly went for an abortion or if he was intent on killing staff at the Planned Parenthood centre.
Why wasn't this story on the front page and discussed ad nauseum on Fox News and CNN. The thing of it is is that he was not a Muslim or even a liberal, a Democrat or a progressive so the story gets little play. Besides Fox News uses an inordinate amount of time attacking groups such as Planned Parenthood which they see as anti-Christian and unAmerican.
Anti-Abortion GOP Legislator Cuffed for Brandishing Handgun Outside Abortion Clinic Julianne Escobedo Shepherd | Sourced from AlterNet , November 26, 2010
A Republican legislator in Minnesota has been stripped of his leadership duties after lurking near a Planned Parenthood clinic with a loaded handgun.
On November 16, State House Rep. Tom Hackbarth was picked up by cops after a security guard outside the St. Paul clinic saw him acting suspicious... and brandishing a handgun. According to the St. Paul Pioneer Press, cops handcuffed him and kept his weapon because of his "stalking-like behavior” and ”harassment or terroristic threats." The Planned Parenthood was closed and the legislator later said it was all a big “misunderstanding.” But his explanation was no less nefarious than the implications: Hackbarth was there to spy on a woman he'd been seeing who he suspected of lying to him. He told officers at the scene that he was “jealous”, but later backtracked.
"It's not like I was really jealous, but you know how you meet this person and you really like her, and she's saying all the right things, but you think she's feeding you a line of bull----? She's giving you all this ... and you want to figure out what's going on. Well that's what I did," he said in a telephone interview in which he readily talked about the incident but questioned its newsworthiness. "Sure enough, she lied to me and I'm done with it."
Stalker-like behavior indeed. Hackbarth's position chairing the House Environment, Energy and Natural Resources Policy and Finance Committee has been suspended
and so it goes,
GORD.
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