Naomi Klein - Shock Doctrine & The Bush Regime

Naomi Klein offers an explanation of how the Bush Regime & the Nocons operate , their tactics & motives using natural disasters & terrorist attacks to push their New World Order agenda forward-

Naomi Klein - the Shock Doctrine



Also see:

HuffPost Exclusive:John Cusack My Interview with Naomi Klein September 26, 2007

and:

at Huffington Post John Cusack, Oct. 9,2007
The Real Blackwater Scandal: Build a Frontier, You Get Cowboys
Interview with Naomi Klein about her book The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism


take care,
GORD.

BUSH REGIME ATTACKS ON PRO-DEMOCRACY FORCES IN IRAQ

Again one is struck by the the Burmese government / Junta's brutal attacks on the peaceful pro-democracy protesters & the Bush Regime claims they are appalled at such actions & yet the Bush Regime has done everything in its power to suppress the Pro-Democracy movement in Iraq. But there is little knew about this as historically the United States has been more often in favor of oppressive regimes as in the case of The Shah of Iran , Pinochet dictatorship in Chile , the Marcos regime in the Philippines and so on ...yet the American public has bought into the governments spin & propaganda over & over again ... why because most Americans & most citizens of most countries do not want to have to think about that which they find unpleasant-

This is especially true of those citizens who are fairly successful & are fairly well-off financially - they do not want to know that their success & wealth is built in part upon the backs of the oppressed & poor in foreign countries where Multi-Nationals are able to increase their profits by paying low wages & are able to operate free of any pesky regulations on workers' safety & well being or regulations regarding the protection of the environment & in their view other such leftist influenced policies such as decent medical care & education etc. for all the citizens of a particular country -

For instance American Neocons & their supporters in Canada like Stephen Harper believe that Canada has gone too far to the left & in their view these policies should be reversed that is the Public Schools & Hospitals & all other public programs should be run by the private sector & if an individual can't afford what these private schools or hospitals would charge then these individuals would just have to do without - so one has therefore the freedom to be uneducated & to go hungry & to die an early death because you don't have the money to pay for medical treatments- as the like to say - "There's No Free Lunch" & besides GOD rewards the faithful & punishes by way of poverty & deprivation those who are not faithful to the Christian God or who do not pray enough or do not show enough respect for their " betters " that is those in positions of authority & power who are GOD'S CHOSEN or who are the Chosen by the result of Evolution & natural selection as some social Darwinists claim -

From Real News Naomi Klein speaks about the lack of support of Democracy in Iraq -Iraqi elections as " Performance Art " & that issues & policies of the political parties unimportant-even though Iraqis voted for a party that insisted on a time-table for US withdrawal- the US representatives & THE BUSH REGIME actively attacked all attempts at Democracy in Iraq -

One wonders in what way are the actions by the Bush Regime in Iraq any different from the Burmese Junta against its own people or how is it different from what the Soviet Union did in countries like Poland , Hungary, Czechoslovakia etc.

Naomi Klein - Bush Regime anti-Democracy in Iraq
from the Real News Network:




and for a further example of how the wishes of the people of Iraq concerning their future are ignored by the United States' Government :

Interview on Real News Network of Middle East expert Phyllis Bennis on the U.S. Senate resolution on the partitioning of Iraq 2007-10-05-

Phyllis Bennis is a senior analyst at the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington D.C. She is the author of Before and After: U.S. Foreign Policy and the September 11th Crisis and Challenging Empire: How People, Governments, and the UN Defy U.S. Power.

The US Senate divides Iraq into three parts against the wishes of Iraqis ( ala Caesar's division of Gael )to create a more easily controllable & weaker Iraq from where the Americans can exert more control over all of the Middle East & take full advantages of the resources which America needs ie oil-




Take care,
GORD.

GHANDI & THE BRUTALITY OF EMPIRES

Empires rise & fall and all empires use brute force to maintain themselves from the Roman Empire to the British Empire to the Soviet Empire to the American Empire- And those at the centre of the empire believe that those over whom they rule are less civilized than they are- those inside the Empire are easily persuaded or fooled into believing that there are many enemies at the gates who wish to steal all their wealth & enslave or kill them - This is merely a projection of their fears & their own guilt onto those who are considered to be "the other " even though these so called enemies are not a real threat to those at the centre of the Empire - so as we see America invades the country of Iraq which is not a threat to the United States but it does have a lot of oil & therefore wealth which the Americans & other Westerners believe they have right to buy at bargain basement prices or to control or own outright since this is their God Given Right as The Chosen Nation or as part of their Manifest Destiny or as merely the result of the culmination of Capitalist forces at work - if someone reuses to sell to America their Natural resources which America wants or needs at a reasonable price ( determined by Americans) then America will invade & take those resources -

- the Amritsar Massacre in 1919 in India is just another example of how the foreign rulers of India had dehumanized the People of India portraying the Indian people as not civilized & a little less than human even though the Civilization of India preceded the British Empire by some two thousand or more years -Now the American Empire throws its weight around while demeaning & discounting the achievements of other Peoples such as the People of Iraq or the People of Iran - The Persian Empire existed long before the rise of civilization in Western Europe but those in power in America or the West wish to ignore such real history in favour of their own form of historical revisionism which is based on a racist view which claims that that Europeans & Aryans as such are superiour to all other races , peoples, cultures & religions etc.

The media ,the politicians , the churches, the schools & even our universities continue to insist upon this perverted view of human history & the history of human civilizations- all of course to prove that the Western Christian Capitalist Civilization no matter how brutal is beyond any criticism in how it acts towards other countries- so a million dead Iraqis means very little to Westerners since Iraqis are not Westerners & are not for the most part Christian -

So the British continue to insist against the facts of history that their empire was benevolent when in fact it was the result of the desire for greater power & wealth & the spreading of Christianity in order to undermine & destroy all foreign cultures & religious beliefs-

So the British refer to the India War of Independence in the 19th century as the Sepoy Mutiny as if were a matter of a couple of hundred Indian soldiers rebelling when in fact millions of Indians were part of that uprising which lasted several years & the British without mercy or compassion eventually crushed the resistance of a conquered people - but it is the victors who write the history books & teach their propaganda in the schools & the universities to perpetuate their myth & their claim to be the the Rightful Rulers over much of the world-

GHANDI
Jallianwala Bagh massacre - General Dyer - Legislation meeting
AKA AMRITSAR MASSACRE
"The impossible men of India shall rise and liberate their Motherland"
Mahatma Gandhi, after the Amritsar Massacre.



Ghandi-Civil Resistance
( the salt march)




take care,
GORD.

SAFFRON REVOLUTION- BUSH & TOTURE & WAR ON IRAN

October 5, 2007
by gordon coombes

- Lao Tzu -

Lao Tzu in the distance
walks across mountains
and into clouds
disappearing -


- sea of saffron -

sons of the Buddha
a sea of saffron robes
rising against
crashing waves of bullets -


Crimson Lotus Blossoms

My Buddhist friend
whom I call the Ancient Sage
says we are all in the middle of a storm
keep your composure
keep your seat
keep your mind focused
the lotus blossom opens
its delicate leaves
it captures moonlight
it captures a sweet breeze
it captures the shimmering crimson drops
of the sons of the Buddha -

THE SECOND COMING- W.B. YEATS



Anyway the killing , arrests, torture & intimidation continues in Burma- but here is somewhat optimistic article about this peaceful revolution :

Burma's Saffron Revolution: Goodbye, Generals By Cynthia Boaz and Shaazka Beyerle t r u t h o u t Sunday 07 October 2007

Exiled pro-democracy leaders, monks and students all claim that the movement survives and that, in the words of one refugee the people, "have committed themselves to victory in the struggle for Burma." There are some encouraging signs that this commitment is being translated into a systematic strategy to undermine the junta's sources of support and control.

For starters, the movement learned how to coordinate "lines" or layers of leadership, so that if one group of leaders was jailed or otherwise neutralized, another would quickly step up in its place. And that is exactly what happened after the first wave of arrests, then the second, and then the third. It is believed by some Burma observers that there still more - many more - ready to take their places.

Next, with monks in the vanguard, the movement has revealed the regime's utter lack of political legitimacy and moral authority. By cracking down on the most respected and revered part of its society, the regime has cracked down on the very soul of Burma. This has activated parts of the population that have up till now stayed on the sidelines, including teachers, villagers, and even government workers. A BBC World Asia correspondent recently said, "It is obvious that despite their best efforts to stifle any opposition, the question Burma's ruling generals need to ask themselves is not if the anti-government protests will return, but when."

It hasn't taken long. Already, news has broken that citizens in Rangoon were engaging in "silent protests" - such as turning off the state news reports en masse, or turning off their lights - to symbolize their rejection of the regime's propaganda. Ordinary people have withdrawn their consent to the regime, and are willing to take action - if creative, low risk options are presented to them. They will follow in the footsteps of courageous nonviolent resisters who battled against Pinochet's junta in Chile, the apartheid regime in South Africa, and the Marcos dictatorship in the Philippines. They all faced repression yet devised nonviolent actions to disrupt their oppressive systems and mobilize people.

Rank-and-file members of the military and police are finding themselves in a dilemma. To disregard their orders might get them into trouble, but to obey will only put their souls in peril in this devoutly Buddhist country. If the movement can achieve a critical mass, some soldiers and police may hesitate to repress if they know that people from their own communities or extended families could be the ones being hurt. Such was the case in Serbia during the nonviolent uprising against Slobodan Milosevic, otherwise known as the "Butcher of the Balkans." When police were asked why they did not fully obey orders, some answered that they could not shoot into the crowd because they didn't know if their own children were in it.

It is Thanksgiving Day in Canada so here's some food for thought as we all over-stuff & over-drink - but does the day mean anything - for most it is just an excuse for a long weekend & watching football -

THANKSGIVING PRAYER BY: WILLIAM S. BURROUGHS




WAR ON IRAN:
Even the American Democratic Presidential hopefuls want to bomb Iran & reduce it to chaos like that in Iraq to teach those Muslims & Arabs who is boss & that the West & America who have the the right to their natural resources :

Attack on Iran: Morality Lost in the Garden of Deceits By Dr. Abbas Bakhtiar 10/06/07 "ICH"

... In late August, “Iran and the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency released a plan laying out a step-by-step timetable of cooperation with the goal of resolving by December issues that have been under investigation for four years. Agency officials have praised the timetable as a breakthrough and Iran’s president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, on Tuesday said the investigation into his country’s nuclear activities was now closed.”

This agreement was hailed as a success by the IAEA and UN. The problem with this agreement is that it takes away the excuse needed by Bush and Co to implement their strategy of strangling Iran and get their hands on Iran’s oil and gas. Naturally, just like the case in Iraq, they have dismissed the agreement saying that it was not enough. Then the talk of war intensified, with US, Israel and then France talking loudly about an eventual attack on Iran. The main aim of these shrill voices is to take the people’s attention away from the IAEA-Iran agreement and back to some illogical talk of Iran’s threat to the world.

It is said that if you tell a lie big enough and often enough, people will eventually come to believe you. Having used this tactics in Iraq with some success, they believe they can do it again. They believe that people will eventually come to believe that Iran is a serious threat to the world and grudgingly accept another war. And the good thing about this is, so they believe, that this time they don’t even have to produce any evidence of wrongdoing by Iran. They just have to say that they have prevented Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons in the “future”. Very logical, isn’t it?...


The fact that these same countries posses lots of nuclear weapons is irrelevant, so we are told. We are to believe that Israel, Pakistan, India, US, UK, France, China and Russia are all exception to the rules. Other countries that enrich Uranium are also exceptions. It is only Iran with its vast natural resources that is a danger to the world peace and prosperity.

Israel has over 200 nuclear weapons and last year was involved in one of the most savage attacks on Lebanon. She also recently bombed Syria. Yet we hear no protest from the so called “civilized world”. Pakistan, a dictatorship, with its tremendous security problems (Taliban, Al Qaeda, etc) has nuclear weapons and is awarded F16s. India tested nuclear weapons and was awarded trade and nuclear technology transfer agreements.

ON TORTURE still being used by the Bush Regime as if they were the New Inquisition- when the Catholic Church once approved of torture to gain confessions often people confessed to whatever they had been accused of to stop the torture & many later recanted what they had confessed to - the Church did not care if the confessions were true or not - they merely wished to intimidate & terrorize the European populace to conform to the religious dogma & propaganda of that time-

from ICH Bush’s torturers follow where the Nazis led-By Andrew Sullivan-10/07/07 "The Times"

... From almost the beginning of the war, it is now indisputable, the Bush administration made a strong and formative decision: in the absence of good intelligence on the Islamist terror threat after 9/11, it would do what no American administration had done before. It would torture detainees to get information.

This decision was and is illegal, and violates America’s treaty obligations, the military code of justice, the United Nations convention against torture, and US law. Although America has allied itself over the decades with some unsavoury regimes around the world and has come close to acquiescing to torture, it has never itself tortured. It has also, in liberating the world from the evils of Nazism and communism, and in crafting the Geneva conventions, done more than any other nation to banish torture from the world. George Washington himself vowed that it would be a defining mark of the new nation that such tactics, used by the British in his day, would be anathema to Americans...


...Last week The New York Times revealed more. We now know that long after Abu Ghraib was exposed, the administration issued internal legal memos that asserted the legality of many of the techniques exposed there. The memos not only gave legal cover to waterboarding, hypothermia and beating but allowed them in combination to intensify the effect.

The argument was that stripping a chained detainee naked, pouring water over him while keeping room temperatures cold enough to induce repeated episodes of dangerous hypothermia, was not “cruel, inhuman or degrading”. We have a log of such a technique being used at Guantanamo. The victim had to be rushed to hospital, brought back from death, then submitted once again to “enhanced interrogation”.

George Orwell would have been impressed by the phrase “enhanced interrogation technique”. By relying on it, the White House spokesman last week was able to say with a straight face that the administration strongly opposed torture and that “any procedures they use are tough, safe, necessary and lawful”.

So is “enhanced interrogation” torture? One way to answer this question is to examine history. The phrase has a lineage. Verschärfte Verneh-mung, enhanced or intensified interrogation, was the exact term innovated by the Gestapo to describe what became known as the “third degree”. It left no marks. It included hypothermia, stress positions and long-time sleep deprivation.

The United States prosecuted it as a war crime in Norway in 1948. The victims were not in uniform – they were part of the Norwegian insurgency against the German occupation – and the Nazis argued, just as Cheney has done, that this put them outside base-line protections (subsequently formalised by the Geneva conventions).

The Nazis even argued that “the acts of torture in no case resulted in death. Most of the injuries inflicted were slight and did not result in permanent disablement”. This argument is almost verbatim that made by John Yoo, the Bush administration’s house lawyer, who now sits comfortably at the Washington think tank, the American Enterprise Institute.

... The definition of torture remains the infliction of “severe mental or physical pain or suffering” with the intent of procuring intelligence. In 1948, in other words, America rejected the semantics of the current president and his aides. The penalty for those who were found guilty was death. This is how far we’ve come. And this fateful, profound decision to change what America stands for was made in secret. The president kept it from Congress and from many parts of his own administration.

take care,
GORD.

Brutality in Burma - Blackwater Murder Inc. In Iraq

Armed soldiers on every street corner in Burma as they continue to Brutally Crackdown on Protesters
Monk Murdered By Burmese Army Tossed into A river in Burma
Dead Protester in Burma


Let's begin with a little mood music as backgound to the on-going horror of Man's Inhumanity to Man"(r. Burns) with a great song by Nick Cave:

Nick Cave - As I Sat Sadly By Her Side
(I think the song is apt as it raises some important issues & questions -So should we act to fight injustice or should we just accept the world for what it is - if we act does it just add to the confusion & chaos or is there a way to act which does not merely increase the madness- In Burma the Buddhist Monks have come to believe they must stand up to tyranny by using Passive Resistance including marches & non-cooperation with the Brutal Military Junta - they continue this strategy even when they treated with brutality & violence on the part of the state-GORD)




Real News -On Burma

Larry Jagan : Burma, China's Inconvient Friend




Keith Olbermann Countdown - Interview of Jeremy Scahill author of book on Blackwater-

180,000 PRIVATE CONTRACTORS in Iraq. 40% of the money going to the war goes to contractors. More contractors than American Soldiers- awarded 27 million no bid contract
These mercenaries are above the law & cannot be prosecuted for wrongful deaths-





Keith Olbermann - More on Blackwater October 2, 2007
The Bigger the War the better the payoff fro Blackwater
( Keith refers to Milo in Catch 22 who in that satire turns the army into a private corporation )

In this segment Keith reports on the chairman of Blackwater's testimony in front of Congress. Blackwater eemployees have fired first over 84 per cent of the time.



FOX NEWS - DEFENDS BLACkWATER - Big Surprise Right!

Here is a typical example of poor journalism on the part of FOX NEWS & Jeraldo at Large regarding Blackwater in which the mother & brother of a Blackwater employee who was killed in Iraq are accused of putting forth a law suit against Blackwater just to make a lot of money which they are accused of by a Pro-Blackwater so called expert - when they try to complain that this was ambush journalism the Mother & son are cut off by the Host who is clearly on Blackwater's side- The other journalist interviewed seems to know that Blackwater in the Sept. 16 incident must have been under attack otherwise why would they start shooting even though eyewitnesses including Iraqi civilians & police claim that the convoy was not fired upon- but this one -sided journalism is what Americans & Canadians of course want - they want to be told that America & the West are in the right all the time - We have God on our side so how could we in the West do anything wrong-



And from DEMOCRACY NOW! & JON STEWART ON BLACKWATER




Take care,
GORD.

FREE BURMA & The Phony Concern over Human Rights in Burma by The Brutal Bush Regime & the Fanatical Neocons

And some newly released video smuggled out of Burma broadcast by CNN:

Burma CNN - Brutal Crackdown of Peaceful Protesters




And more reports from Burma:

Al Jazeera Oct. 3, 2007 Fresh wave of arrests in Myanmar

Myanmar's military government has arrested more people under the cover of darkness just hours after the UN special envoy left the country.

At least eight truckloads of people were taken from central Yangon, the biggest city and the centre of protests against military rule and economic hardship, early on Wednesday witnesses said.

There was no word on where the prisoners were being taken or how many they would join.

Military vehicles patrolled the streets blaring warnings from loudspeakers: "We have photographs. We are going to make arrests!"

Al Jazeera Oct. 3, 2007 Myanmar officer flees crackdown -The officer said that as a Buddhist he could not bring himself to open fire on monks

A senior officer from Myanmar's ruling military is in hiding after defecting from the country saying he could not bear the responsibility of opening fire on anti-government protesters.

'Nay Lin Tun' – not his real name - escaped last Thursday, shortly before the army launched its violent crackdown on protesters and Buddhist monks.

He is the most senior military man to have deserted so far, and says he was forced to flee after being ordered to fire on monks, or face execution...

The odd thing about this report of a general actually standing up for Human Rights & Justice is that some in the West will see him as a Hero while others will view him as a traitor since as a member of any military there are those like Bush & the Neocons who believe all military officers & other personnel owe their allegiance to the government of the day & not some airy-fairy notion human rights - like the Nazi before them they believe one must obey the orders given from on-high & not let their humanity or their feelings get in the way - so if General Petraeus had spoken the truth about the insanity of the Iraqi Occupation & on behalf of his troops & on behalf of the American people & the people of Iraq rather than on behalf of the Bush Regime he would have been labeled a traitor by the Fanatical Neocons in their view the killing of innocent civilians is the price they pay for their extravagant life-style which must be maintained at all costs-Indifference is the road to fascism - as the German people once discovered-

CNN & other media report the story as if the United States or other Western Nations were never involved in such Brutality in recent years and they forget that they have backed Brutal Regimes in the past & in recent years from The Brutal Regime of the Shah in Iran or General Pinochet in Chile , or Puppet Regime in Vietnam during the Vietnam War or the Puppet Brutal Regime in El Salvador , Guatemala , The Brutal anti-Democratic Regime of Marcos in the Philippines or the Anti-Democratic Regime in Saudi Arabia or that of Israel which has Ghettoized the Arabs & Palestinians or the support given for decades to South African White Supremacist Apartheid Regime - so the insincerity & hypocrisy of CNN & the Western Media & the Bush Regime is patently obvious to anyone who has been paying attention over the last four decades or so- meanwhile we have American Neocons & even Democrats lining up to defend the Cowboy style Mercenaries in Iraq like Blackwater as Heroic Americans who kill for a buck - while detainees are being tortured by American personnel as I write this & those who speak out in America are accused of being anti-American & pro-terrorist-

Sami-al Hajj - Reporter for Al Jazeera arrested in 2001 still imprisoned - Typical American Draconian Form of Injustice

For instance why is a journalist for Al Jazeera who was arrested in 2001 still at Quantanamo & now is on hunger strike but CNN does not report this -The Bush Regime's intention is clear & that is fro Al Jazeera or any other Media outlet to stop criticizing American policies & the American Bloody Occupation of Iraq-

By Al Jazeera and Agencies oct.3
Al-Hajj was arrested while working for Al Jazeera during the US invasion of Afghanistan in 2001

The health of an Al Jazeera cameraman being held in the US prison at Guantanamo Bay is deteriorating further as he remains on hunger strike, according to a Mauritanian inmate who was recently released.

Ould Sidi Mohammed said Sami al-Hajj had an infection and was not getting sufficient medical treatment.

"The last time I talked to him [Sami al-Hajj] was on the same day when I left, on September 25, Mohammed said. "His health condition is extremely deteriorating. He is losing weight continuously. He suffers from kidney infection and he urinates blood.

"Unfortunately, prisoners do not receive full medical treatment. Prisoners on hunger strike are isolated in special places designated to torture them to hold them back from their objectives."

'Physical pressure'

Mohammed said that he and his fellow inmates had faced harassment by US soldiers while in the jail.

"We have suffered a great deal as we have been under psychological and physical pressure," he said.

"They have used all possible ways to impose psychological and physical pressure on us."

Mohammed said he was attending an Islamic school in Pakistan when he was arrested by Pakistani police in 2002 and then handed over to the US authorities.

He did not know why he was arrested and said he had never had any connection to al-Qaeda. He was returned to Mauritania on September 26 after being cleared for release by a US military review panel.

Al-Hajj has never been charged. Hopes that he would be released at the end of August under the condition that he remain in his country of origin, Sudan proved unfounded

And as for The Blackwater gangs of thugs :

Media With Conscience By MWC NEWS States have an obligation to prosecute perpetrators of war crimes in their courtsoct.2,2007

International law places legal obligations on states in areas under their jurisdiction or control to provide effective legal remedies for persons who have suffered violations of their fundamental rights. This includes state responsibility to investigate and prosecute serious human rights violations and violations of the laws of war by private persons and entities as well as by government officials and military personnel.

In June 2004, two days before the official end of the US military occupation of Iraq, the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) under Paul Bremer revised CPA Order 17 to provide immunity to foreign contractors from prosecution under Iraqi law. CPA Order 17 states: “Contractors shall be immune from Iraqi legal process with respect to acts performed by them pursuant to the terms and conditions of a Contract or any sub-contract thereto.” Contractors are defined as “non-Iraqi legal entities or individuals not normally resident in Iraq, including their non-Iraqi employees.”

Torture & Private Contractors
Wednesday, October 3, 2007 by Agence France Presse Abu Ghraib Prisoners Accuse US Companies of Torture

WASHINGTON - Two US Army subcontractors accused of torturing prisoners at Baghdad’s Abu Ghraib jail go to court Wednesday in a case that highlights the murky legal status of private US companies in Iraq.

Titan and CACI International were hired by the Army to provide interrogators and interpreters at the notorious prison, the scene of well-documented abuses of detainees following the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003.

One former Iraqi prisoner now living in Sweden says that under the companies’ watch, he was sodomized, nearly strangled with a belt, tied by his genitals to other detainees, and given repeated electric shocks.

“This is probably the most important case still standing against Abu Ghraib because the cases against the government have essentially failed so far,” said Michael Ratner, president of the Center for Constitutional Rights.

“This case represents our last hope for getting some accountability for the torture in Iraq and getting any compensation for the victims,” said Ratner, whose group has fielded lawyers to assist in the lawsuit.

The case was filed in 2004 by a dozen former prisoners and the family of a man who died in detention, accusing Titan and CACI of conspiring with US officials “to humiliate, torture and abuse persons” at Abu Ghraib.

But US security companies in Iraq occupy a legal gray area, as highlighted by the case of Blackwater USA, which according to a new Congress report has been involved in nearly 200 shootings in Iraq since 2005

And more revelations over the USA torturing detainees :

From The New York Times Secret U.S. Endorsement of Severe Interrogations

Anyway , Before getting too exited over these revelations - one should note the headline does not use the word " torture" as if these techniques are not really or not quite torture which shows how morally bankrupt the American Media has become as they insist on being the Bush Regime's enablers & apologists explaining away any sort of what they see as trivial complaints against the Bush Regime - to many in the media torturing is quite OK by them if their Leader their INFALLIBLE CHANCELLOR that is who is equivalent to the POPE these days if he tells them it is a good thing like the US army Generals they too will obey orders no matter how immoral or inhumane- since following orders is what America now stands for - Like the soldiers at MyLai obeying orders is more important than acting in a civilized manner & how many such massacres have taken place in Iraq who knows & the American people couldn't care less but shed tears over every American killed but Iraqis are just a little less than human so why cry over them !!!

and here is a bit from the article:

by Scott Shane, David Johnston and James Risen.
WASHINGTON, Oct. 3 — When the Justice Department publicly declared torture “abhorrent” in a legal opinion in December 2004, the Bush administration appeared to have abandoned its assertion of nearly unlimited presidential authority to order brutal interrogations.

But soon after Alberto R. Gonzales’s arrival as attorney general in February 2005, the Justice Department issued another opinion, this one in secret. It was a very different document, according to officials briefed on it, an expansive endorsement of the harshest interrogation techniques ever used by the Central Intelligence Agency.

The new opinion, the officials said, for the first time provided explicit authorization to barrage terror suspects with a combination of painful physical and psychological tactics, including head-slapping, simulated drowning and frigid temperatures.

Mr. Gonzales approved the legal memorandum on “combined effects” over the objections of James B. Comey, the deputy attorney general, who was leaving his job after bruising clashes with the White House. Disagreeing with what he viewed as the opinion’s overreaching legal reasoning, Mr. Comey told colleagues at the department that they would all be “ashamed” when the world eventually learned of it.

And about the use of torture on non-terrorists Detainees -

Amy Goodman from Democracy Now! reporting on torture being used in Chicago Prisons -




This is one of the problems of allowing any form of torture in supposedly some special cases ( the unfounded unsound ticking bomb argument); it creates an environment which allows for the torture whenever some soldier or police officer thinks it might be ok now to torture as the Police did in Chile now the police follow the same sort of rules inside America's prisons -


And concerning the various forms of censorship in Bush's New America which is a lot like the old one here is a disturbing story about Allen Ginsberg's epic poem " HOWL " & how censorship is creeping throughout the media & the schools in America- Note they refer to " provocative language " which is vague enough to apply to almost any criticism of the Bush Regime or their supporters or the US military or State governments or even local police forces or strongly worded critiques of the Radical Evangelicals though Evangelicals can call for war on the rights of Homosexuals or on liberals & secularists & on those who are pro-choice or who actively engage in performing abortions etc.

Censorship Howl

San Francisco Chronicle 'Howl' too hot to hear
50 years after poem ruled not obscene, radio fears to air it Joe Garofoli, Chronicle Staff Writer

Wednesday, October 3, 2007
Fifty years ago today, a San Francisco Municipal Court judge ruled that Allen Ginsberg's Beat-era poem "Howl" was not obscene. Yet today, a New York public broadcasting station decided not to air the poem, fearing that the Federal Communications Commission will find it indecent and crush the network with crippling fines.

Free-speech advocates see tremendous irony in how Ginsberg's epic poem - which lambastes the consumerism and conformism of the 1950s and heralds a budding American counterculture - is, half a century later, chilled by a federal government crackdown on the broadcasting of provocative language.

Take care ,
GORD.

J'Accuse ...BUSH CONDOLEEZA RICE & CHEVRON SUPPORT FOR BURMESE' JUNTA - MORE HYPOCRISY

To begin with here is a video which I put together :Bruce Cockburn- Call It Democracy



from Segregation & Civil Rights Movement to Vietnam Pacification & American WMDS & carpet-bombing Cambodia to Coup in Chile to Kent State Massacre to Renditions & Torture to Katrina to Blackwater Mercenaries to a Million Dead in Iraq & Basicly Business as usual & so it goes


First I would be remiss to note first that AOL & other internet servers have been blocking emails from Truthout.Org & they are trying to intimidate or to actually shut down any alternative news sources on the Internet - & yet the Neocons claim ours is a free society but that is as long as you accept the party line - though it seems even the most outrageous sorts of nasty nonsense published on the Internet by the Fanatical Right such as The Army Of God & various White Supremacists organizations on the net are rarely targeted by these servers or the Government -

As for the free flow of information & commentay checkout this bit from TRUTHOUT.ORG
UPDATE: 09.20.07:12:noon:pdt:

It looks like AOL has lifted their ban. While it's still pretty early, it looks like we convinced AOL that you do have the right to read what you want.

Microsoft and Yahoo are still interfering.

Microsoft is dug in and blatantly refusing to deliver messages, that's Hotmail, MSN, WebTV and who knows what else. Yahoo too while not communicating any position to us is sending a large portion of our communications to you to your junk mail folders, apparently according to complaints, even though readers are attempting to designate the newsletters as acceptable in the Yahoo mail interface.

And so it goes- J' Accuse... Hypocrisy & NEOCON REGIMES & Their Claims of Concern Over The Fate Of The Burmese People

Though the Bush Regime is publicly condemning the brutality of the Junta in Burma in its treatment of peaceful pro-democracy protesters it is not surprising to discover - as the article below by Amy Goodman points out - that one of the big backers of the Junta is Chevron which is an American company- a company on whose board Condoleeza Rice served so as usual it is all in the family as it were & of course business interest always trump human rights in the Bush Neocon Regime - but of course they will make all of the required noises in public to show they do care but will they insist Chevron & other American owned companies or their subsidiaries stop doing business with the Burmese Junta . What the Neocons & other pro-business lobbies in the US government is to write legislation in order to exempt & shelter certain companies from any form of legal meddling as they see it since how these multi-nationals carry out their practices are their business & as far as they & their supporters & shareholders are concerned they shouldn't be hampered by any government agency & of course they see nothing immoral or improper about backing a brutal regime in Burma or anywhere else as long as they can make a profit which is what the Neocon Revolution & agenda is all about - concerns about using slave labor or child labor or inadequate wages or substandard housing or the forceful evacuation of people from an area so the company can take part in clear cutting whole large areas of forest & take part in strip-mining etc.

Unfortunately a vast number of Americans & Canadians & other Westerners care more for profits than human rights - What they don't like is seeing those nasty pictures of the violence on their Televisions or Computers - this is what they object to when it comes to Iraq, Afghanistan or Darfur or Burma or even the suffering several years ago of people after Hurricane Katrina-

They don't really care if a bunch Buddhist Monks are rounded up or killed they just don't want to see it happening in their living rooms on their televisions which just supposed to entertain them - As for some of them who might care at least for the moment they are easily appeased & then silenced as long as officials make the right sorts of noises then they can get on with their lives even if nothing substantive actually takes place -

If the public is told Iraq is safe then they believe it or if they are told that Iraqis are bunch of blood thirsty Barbarians & that America had good intentions in Iraq & is therefore not to blame as the Neocons now claim then that version of the facts is acceptable to them since they believe that most people outside of America or the West are all uncivilized & have no regard fro human life - they don't love their children as we in the West do -

To this writer it is all of a piece- what the public & those in power want is that only GOOD NEWS be shown on television or in print or on the Internet & then they can all ignore the real world & live on their own little Fantasy Island

We should remember the Bush & Harper & British regimes all see nothing wrong with torturing prisoners or kidnapping people & denying them due process & have thrown out notions like Hebeas Corpus & other legal recourse's which they see as just the out-dated foolish ideas of ineffective liberals & the far left whiners-

For instance I have talked about the destructive practice in the United States of Mountain Removal Mining which utterly destroys forests & mountains & undermines if not destroys the culture of the people who live in these areas - so if Bush & the Neocons see nothing wrong with this practice or with the violation of human rights of anyone who they accuse of being a terrorist whether the accusation is grounded in any evidence doesn't matter once someone is accused then those in power can do what they like with the accused - and the fear is that those in power will start going after anyone who defends these detainees or criticizes these Neocon Regimes as we saw recently in the case of General Petraeus it was made into law that no one should be permitted to criticize anyone in the American Armed Forces including the 50,000 or more Mercenaries working for the Bush Regime - so where does this leave free speech in America -

Anyway here is part of by Amy Goodman from Democracy Now! on Burma & the Chevron connection:

Chevron's Pipeline Is the Burmese Regime's Lifeline - By Amy Goodman Truthdig Tuesday 02 October 2007

The Bush administration is making headlines with its strong language against the Burmese regime. President Bush declared increased sanctions in his U.N. General Assembly speech. First lady Laura Bush has come out with perhaps the strongest statements. Explaining that she has a cousin who is a Burma activist, Laura Bush said, "The deplorable acts of violence being perpetrated against Buddhist monks and peaceful Burmese demonstrators shame the military regime."

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, at the meeting of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, said, "The United States is determined to keep an international focus on the travesty that is taking place." Keeping an international focus is essential, but should not distract from one of the most powerful supporters of the junta, one that is much closer to home. Rice knows it well: Chevron.

Fueling the military junta that has ruled for decades are Burma's natural gas reserves, controlled by the Burmese regime in partnership with the U.S. multinational oil giant Chevron, the French oil company Total and a Thai oil firm. Offshore natural gas facilities deliver their extracted gas to Thailand through Burma's Yadana pipeline. The pipeline was built with slave labor, forced into servitude by the Burmese military.

The original pipeline partner, Unocal, was sued by EarthRights International for the use of slave labor. As soon as the suit was settled out of court, Chevron bought Unocal.

Chevron's role in propping up the brutal regime in Burma is clear. According to Marco Simons, U.S. legal director at EarthRights International: "Sanctions haven't worked because gas is the lifeline of the regime. Before Yadana went online, Burma's regime was facing severe shortages of currency. It's really Yadana and gas projects that kept the military regime afloat to buy arms and ammunition and pay its soldiers."

The U.S. government has had sanctions in place against Burma since 1997. A loophole exists, though, for companies grandfathered in. Unocal's exemption from the Burma sanctions has been passed on to its new owner, Chevron.

Rice served on the Chevron board of directors for a decade. She even had a Chevron oil tanker named after her. While she served on the board, Chevron was sued for involvement in the killing of nonviolent protesters in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria. Like the Burmese, Nigerians suffer political repression and pollution where oil and gas are extracted and they live in dire poverty. The protests in Burma were actually triggered by a government-imposed increase in fuel prices.

Human-rights groups around the world have called for a global day of action on Saturday, Oct. 6, in solidarity with the people of Burma. Like the brave activists and citizen journalists sending news and photos out of the country, the organizers of the Oct. 6 protest are using the Internet to pull together what will probably be the largest demonstration ever in support of Burma. Among the demands are calls for companies to stop doing business with Burma's brutal regime.

Take care,
GORD.

From Burma to Iraq the Horror Continues

For more on Burmese Pro-Democracy check out the website Burmese Bloggers Without Borders : Burmese Bloggers W/O Borders

And from The Independent online Monks vanish as Burmese troops step up presence
By Rosalind Russell in Rangoon 02 October 2007

The gates were open at Rangoon's glittering Shwedagon temple yesterday but soldiers, not monks, wandered its marble-floored shrines and pavilions.

Five days after Burma's military leaders began a crackdown on protesting monks and their civilian supporters, the red-robed Buddhist clergy, normally seen in their thousands around the city, have vanished. And the UN's special envoy sent to confront the military junta was stalled for yet another day.

"The monks are gone. We are worried about them. We don't know where they are," said a young guide at the temple. Usually hundreds of monks would be milling around the golden, bell-shaped, stupa – praying, chatting quietly in groups or explaining the significance of gem-encrusted statues or shrines to visitors.

Soldiers with rifles have taken their place, their bare feet the only mark of respect to Burma's most sacred Buddhist site. There are few visitors, and stall-holders selling paper flowers and incense sticks for offerings have little trade.

"It is strange now," said the guide, out of the earshot of soldiers. "We don't think the army should be at the temple. We think the monks have been taken away. We think they are in jail."

A senior monk told The Independent at the weekend he believed 3,000 monks had been detained by Burmese security forces, and were being held in police and military camps...

From AlterNet & YouTube:
Iceland's One Representative in Iraq Is Heading Home
Adam Howard October 2, 2007.

When Bush said 36 nations were supporting our troops in Iraq, he was including one lonely Icelander.


Iceland just had one "troop" on the ground in Iraq, (actually a press aide, not a soldier--Iceland has no standing army), but that didn't stop Bush from counting them as an equal member of his disappearing "coalition." We aren't hating on you, Icelanders. We're jealous of what you enjoy--a lack of military entanglements, a terrific standard of living, and a genetic predisposition for high cheekbones. Welcome home. Check out the video...for more

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Vote Vets.org
" Phony Soldiers & Rush Limbaugh "




as for Blackwater's Soldiers Of Fortune / Mercenaries aka Hired Killers :

Blackwater Covered Up 195 Shootings and More by Steve Benen October 2, 2007.

A State Department report that largely exonerates Blackwater, was apparently written by Blackwater.

The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform will hold a hearing tomorrow on Blackwater's activities in Iraq, and by all indications, lawmakers will have plenty to talk about.

Guards working in Iraq for Blackwater USA have shot innocent Iraqi civilians and have sought to cover up the incidents, sometimes with the help of the State Department, a report prepared for a Congressional committee said today.

The report, based largely on internal Blackwater e-mail messages and State Department documents, depicts the security contractor as being staffed with reckless, shoot-first guards who were not always sober and did not always stop to see who or what was hit by their bullets.

In one incident, the State Department and Blackwater agreed to pay $15,000 to the family of a man killed by "a drunken Blackwater contractor," the report said. As a State Department official wrote, "We would like to help them resolve this so we can continue with our protective mission."

More on Blackwater from MWC- Media With Conscience
Blackwater faces Iraq deaths probe

The spotlight has fallen on Blackwater's Iraq operations after the deaths of 11 civilians [AFP]
US security contractor Blackwater was involved in nearly 200 shooting incidents in Iraq over the past two years and opened fire first in most of them, a US congressional report has said.

Blackwater is under investigation after some of its troops shot dead 11 Iraqis on September 16.

The private contractor in Iraq hired by the US state department has been the first to fire in more than 80 per cent of shooting incidents in which it has been involved according to a memorandum released on Monday, Henry Waxman, a Democrat, said.

The report said the company had been involved in 195 shooting incidents since 2005.

'First to fire'

"In 32 of those incidents, Blackwater were returning fire after an attack while on 163 occasions Blackwater personnel were the first to fire," said Waxman, the chair of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, which is investigating the company.

take care,
GORD.