just so’s y’all can lump me in whatever box of ideas you need me to fit in:
besides being a dedicated and active Green Party activist,
though far to lazy and forgetful for my ‘leadership’ positions;
i also think the following are quite likely:
war always sucks,
but virtual war is rocking good fun,
when you get to take a break and live now and then
high levels of US ‘defense’ and ‘administration’ were involved,
at the very least, in not preventing 911,
certain individuals more so than bureacraticity can explain
we have passed peak oil, deal with it
“burning petroleum for fuel is like burning money for heat” ?Mendeleev
Hugo Chavez is the best single being to happen to the Americas since Simon Bolivar
in this stead he, like Bolivar, is more than a man, he embodies
the progressive compromise with capital, and military hierarchy, but just barely, movement
Anarkik being is all about organization, consensus, and democracy
mob rule is man with big stick rule, chaos does not organize
anarks rule selves collective, organize is only way to do so leaderless
if you are not an anark,
consider it the next time your movement is beheaded
by assasination, or co-opted by excess capital accumulation
it happens every time it matters
the reductionist, determinist, absolutest, inhuman assumptions of the culture of ownership,
esp. as it pertains to communal industrial capital
and it’s control by very few for very selfish prosaic and combative reasons,
has no real human rationale, nor has it ever fit the needs or realities of the majority of humans,
much less other fellow inhabitants of earth
way too much collateral damage occurs every day in Iraq,
our school budgets, our hearts, our minds, our liberties, and our relations,
colatteral human damage from the war is just about everywhere touched by the dollar or english speakers
the most important capital can not be owned,
human imagination is a wage,
it must be earned hourly, and must be fed daily
whatch this space, this is a short list now,
but i have a long list of additions already in mind
A Few Thoughts on the Coup in Honduras – Jeremy Scahill Junne 29, 2009 “Rebel Reports” –
There is a lot of great analysis circulating on the military coup against Manuel Zelaya in Honduras.
I do not see a need to re-invent the wheel. (See hereherehere and here). However, a few key things
jump out at me. First, we know that the coup was led by Gen. Romeo Vasquez, a graduate of the
US Army School of the Americas. As we know very well from history, these “graduates” maintain ties to
the US military as they climb the military career ladders in their respective countries.
That is a major reason why the US trains these individuals.
Secondly, the US has a fairly significant military presence in Honduras.
Joint Task Force-Bravo is located at Soto Cano Air Base, Honduras.
The base is home to some 550 US military personnel and more than 650 US and Honduran civilians:
They work in six different areas including the Joint Staff, Air Force Forces (612th Air Base Squadron),
Army Forces, Joint Security Forces and the Medical Element. 1st Battalion, 228th Aviation Regiment,
a US Army South asset, is a tenant unit also based at Soto Cano.
The J-Staff provides command and control for JTF-B.
The New York Times reports that “The unit focuses on training Honduran military forces, counternarcotics
operations, search and rescue, and disaster relief missions throughout Central America.”
Significantly, according to GlobalSecurity, “Soto Cano is a Honduran military installation and home of the Honduran Air Force.”
This connection to the Air Force is particularly significant given this report in NarcoNews:
The head of the Air Force, Gen. Luis Javier Prince Suazo, studied in the School of the Americas in 1996.
The Air Force has been a central protagonist in the Honduran crisis.
When the military refused to distribute the ballot boxes for the opinion poll, the ballot boxes were stored
on an Air Force base until citizens accompanied by Zelaya rescued them.
Zelaya reports that after soldiers kidnapped him, they took him to an Air Force base,
where he was put on a plane and sent to Costa Rica.
It is impossible to imagine that the US was not aware that the coup was in the works.
In fact, this was basically confirmed by The New York Times in Monday’s paper:
As the crisis escalated, American officials began in the last few days to talk with Honduran government
and military officials in an effort to head off a possible coup. A senior administration official,
who briefed reporters on the condition of anonymity, said the military broke off those discussions on Sunday.
While the US has issued heavily-qualified statements critical of the coup
—in the aftermath of the events in Honduras—the US could have flexed its tremendous economic muscle
before the coup and told the military coup plotters to stand down.
The US ties to the Honduran military and political establishment run far too deep for all of this to have gone
down without at least tacit support or the turning of a blind eye by some US political or military official(s).
Here are some facts to consider: the US is the top trading partner for Honduras.
The coup plotters/supporters in the Honduran Congress are supporters of the “free trade agreements”
Washington has imposed on the region.
The coup leaders view their actions, in part, as a rejection of Hugo Chavez’s influence in Honduras and with
Zelaya and an embrace of the United States and Washington’s “vision” for the region. Obama and the
US military could likely have halted this coup with a simple series of phone calls.
For an interesting take on all of this, make sure to check out Nikolas Kozloff’s piece on Counterpunch, where he writes:
In November, Zelaya hailed Obama’s election in the U.S. as “a hope for the world,” but just two months
later tensions began to emerge. In an audacious letter sent personally to Obama, Zelaya accused the
U.S. of “interventionism” and called on the new administration in Washington to respect the principle
of non-interference in the political affairs of other nations.
Here are some independent news sources on this story: School of the Americas Watch NarcoNews
Eva Golinger’s Postcards from the Revolution
ALBA representatives reaffirm support to Hondura`s Legitimate Government http://mathaba.net/news/?x=620928
(the Bolivarian Alliance of the Peoples of Our America)
Much has been going on in Honduras this month leading up to this,
from a recent coup attempt (ablove), to an Earthquake, an OAS meeting,
and two important futball games.
Now, what we’re going to do is put the government and the structure of the state
at the service of the Salvadoran people–the totality of the Salvadoran people-
-but fundamentally, of that great majority who are oppressed and excluded from
the country’s social and economic development. [The people who for]
not just the last twenty years but for last 200 years or more
have not had the possibility of participating in the formation of public policies.
A government like the one I’m going to create will give them the protagonist’s role,
which, until now, they have not had.”
Mauricio Funes http://www.thenation.com/doc/20090330/lovato?rel=hp_picks
The Nation magazine is running an interview (following) with Mauricio Funes,
elected a few days ago to be the first leftist president of El Salvador.
Most leftists in the world question his identifying with “the left,”
as he appears to be quite conservative. But make no mistake,
the progressive community of the world sees this victory as a step up for El Salvador,
which has been ruled by extremely brutal right wing fascists for a long time –Jack
A Conversation with Mauricio Funes
By Roberto Lovato & Josue Rojas
On March 15, the Farabundo Marti National Liberation Front (FMLN)
became the first leftist party to clinch a presidential election in the history of El Salvador.
By 10 pm, it became clear to Salvadorans and to the world that the former guerrillas
had ended more than 130 years of oligarchy and military rule
over this Central American nation of 7 million.
In the streets, thousands of red-shirted sympathizers chanted “¡Si Se Pudo!” (Yes, We Could),
while they celebrated the victory of the FMLN’s Mauricio Funes.
Funes captured 51 percent of the vote, to 49 percent cast for Rodrigo Avila of the Nationalist Republican Alliance party, which had been in power for twenty years.
Though Funes, a former journalist, is the best-known Salvadoran on his country’s TV networks,
he is little known outside the region.
Thanks to a collaboration between The Nation and New America Media (NAM),
reporters Roberto Lovato and Josue Rojas had the opportunity to interview
El Salvador’s next president on the night of his election.
What follows is an excerpt from this interview with Funes, who addressed numerous issues:
the meaning of his presidency, El Salvador’s relationship with the United States,
immigration and other domestic and foreign policy concerns.
Immigration has become one of the defining issues of the US-El Salvador relationship.
How will your administration’s approach to this issue differ from that of the outgoing Saca administration?
The fact that we’re going to rebuild the democratic institutions-
-enforce the constitution and make of El Salvador a democratic state that respects the rule of law-
-is the best guarantee to the United States that we will significantly reduce the flows of out-migration.
Salvadorans who leave to go the United States do so because of the institutional abandonment,
the lack of employment and dignified ways to make a living.
This forces them to leave in search of new possibilities in the US.
It’s not the same for us to ask the US government to renew TPS [temporary legalization]
without a Salvadoran effort to avoid further migration flows,
as to do so from a position in which we have undertaken efforts to reduce the migration flows.
What’s the first message you’d like to send to President Obama?
The message that I would like to send to President Obama
is that I will not seek alliances or accords with other heads of state from the southern part of the continent
who will jeopardize my relationship with the government of the United States.
Opinion polls in El Salvador indicate that large majorities of its citizens reject key policies that define,
in many ways, the relationship between El Salvador and the United States,
specifically CAFTA, dollarization and the Iraq war.
What will your approach be to these issues?
We can’t get mixed up in repealing CAFTA…nor can we reverse dollarization,
because that would send a negative message to foreign investors,
and then we’d be facing serious problems because we wouldn’t have enough investment to stimulate the national economy.
What do you think the United States government should be concerned about with regard to El Salvador at this time?
To the degree that we do our part, which is to rebuild our productive capacity
and to create a coherent social policy that improves the quality of life,
there will be fewer reasons to leave for the US and we’ll reduce migration flows.
And that should be a concern for the US.
Where will the effects of the transition in power be felt most immediately?
We’re going to change the way we make policy.
And one of the most significant changes is that we will no longer have a government
at the service of a privileged few.
And we will no longer have a government that creates an economy of privileges for the privileged.
Now, we need a government like the one envisioned by [Archbishop of El Salvador] Óscar Arnulfo Romero,
who, in his prophetic message, said that the church should have a preferential option for the poor.
Paraphrasing Monseñor Romero, I would say that this government should have preferential option for the poor,
for those who need a robust government to get ahead and to be able to compete in this world
of disequilibrium under fair conditions.
This government implies a break from traditional policy-making.
Now, what we’re going to do is put the government and the structure of the state at the service of the Salvadoran people-
-the totality of the Salvadoran people-
-but fundamentally, of that great majority who are oppressed
and excluded from the country’s social and economic development.
[The people who for] not just the last twenty years but for last 200 years or more
have not had the possibility of participating in the formation of public policies.
A government like the one I’m going to create will give them the protagonist’s role,
which, until now, they have not had.
