MAKING MORE ENEMIES ENSURES LONG WAR

It's been a busy past few days in Afghanistan-Pakistan for the occupiers and "liberators" of the people there. U.S. drone strikes killed more innocent children (above) thus ensuring more enemies will be created. You can count on the fact that the family and relatives of these latest victims will rise up to throw the U.S. and NATO out of their country. That should keep the Pentagon busy at least up through 2014.

Additionally Press TV is reporting the following:

The daughter of an Afghan politician has reportedly died of her injuries after being raped by American soldiers stationed in Afghanistan's southwestern province of Farah.

US forces aboard five Toyota vans transferred the teenage girl along with several other Afghan women and girls to a military base in the province. They then sexually assaulted them, alleged Afghan sources.

Medical reports indicate that a young girl died as a result of severe bleeding that was caused by tears in her genitals from violent sexual penetration.

Two other victims were admitted to a nearby hospital and are currently receiving treatment for serious injuries they suffered following multiple rapes.

The incident comes as violence in Afghanistan has spiked to record highs since the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in 2001.

Statistics about civilian death tolls in Afghanistan are not available. However, it is estimated that between 14,000 and 34,000 Afghan civilians have lost their lives since the US-led war.

The American army has lost 1,455 soldiers in Afghanistan since the beginning of the war.

How much longer will the people of the world allow this madness in Afghanistan-Pakistan to continue?

BECK CONTINUES PROMOTING HATE

This is a very important segment from today's Democracy Now. It should be seen by everyone.

For more than a year, Fox News host Glenn Beck has been increasingly targeting Frances Fox Piven, a 78-year-old distinguished professor of political science and sociology at the Graduate Center, City University of New York. Beck has repeatedly accused her of advocating violence and of hatching a plan in 1966 to overthrow the system.

I've known of Piven's work for years and it has been all about empowering the weakest people in our society. To see her being demonized by Glenn Beck is just unbelievable. But this is how the oligarchy is setting up the "angry right" to go after the "left" as the economy collapses instead of directing their frustration toward the corporate Wall Street elements that truly pull the strings in America. This is the brown shirts at work in our time.

BROKEN PROMISES ABOUND

Not only is the closing of Guantanamo a broken promise. Now we are hearing this:

“We are not leaving in 2014,” V-P Joseph Biden assured President Hamid Karzai during a news conference in Afghanistan on Tuesday, insisting that the U.S. was prepared to continue with its military occupation “well beyond 2014" if Karzai wants us to stay.

Guess what? Karzai will ask us to stay. Of course he will. All very neat and tidy. Now if George W. Bush did this the "liberals" would be howling from the top of Capital Hill. But when a Democrat plays the shell-game there is virtual silence in Washington and from much of the peace movement. People still will find a reason to excuse Obama-Biden on these broken promises. Why are they afraid to challenge their own party? How can "liberals" expect to have any credibility any longer?

Currently there are some 150,000 NATO troops, predominantly from the U.S. in Afghanistan. In November, NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen signed a long-term partnership agreement with Afghan President Hamid Karzai under which "NATO will stay as long as necessary to support Afghanistan until it can no longer become a safe haven for terrorism."

How do we pay for these occupations, now costing us $10 billion per month?

Here is a song for those out there who are "too scared to complain".

CIVILITY DOES NOT MEAN CENTRISM

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Two black leaders being interviewed by a passel of mainstream media folks.

TWO FEET OF SNOW

We are having a big snow storm here now. So far we are well over one foot and by the time it finishes I would bet we'll be up to two feet of snow.

Three of us from the Addams-Melman House went out shoveling this morning for about an hour. We have two driveways and several paths that lead to the wood pile, shed, back doors, and compost pile. We are going back out again in another hour and it will likely seem as though we'd never done the first round.

One of my housemates told us that she saw on the Internet this morning that 49 states in the U.S. currently have snow on the ground, including Hawaii that has it on a mountain top. Only Florida is reportedly without snow. We'd be happy to send some down that way to our friends and relatives in the sunshine state. We can ship it overnight express if you'd like. We have plenty to share.

I've never heard of so much snow all over the nation at once before. It confirms for me that the present and the future will be all about very crazy weather patterns. It's happening everywhere. In the video below about farmers in India, one of them mentions the unpredictable weather that is messing up their crops. How can anyone so blindly deny climate change?

I feel just a bit frustrated because I got an email from the local newspaper that prints our Global Network newsletter Space Alert. It is ready to be picked up but I'd be insane to try to go out there now to get it. I am anxious to see the final product. We went to 20 pages in this upcoming edition. Many thanks to Selma Sternlieb in Brunswick for doing the layout work. It's a huge effort for her but she tells me she loves to do it.

CUBA - UNCERTAIN FUTURE

THE HISTORY OF AMERICA - THE GUN VERSION

From Michael Moore's film Bowling for Columbine

INDIA'S FARMERS LOSING HOPE

Mounting debts, international competition and climate change are all being blamed as the reason for a rising number of Indian farmers who are taking their own lives.

Official figures say at least 17,000 farmers committed suicide in 2009.

Al Jazeera's Sohail Rahman reports from the farming belt in India's Andhra Pradesh state.

AMERICA'S VIOLENCE CONTRADICTION

This photo is from a Junior-ROTC "field day" at a school in the south. The article along with the photo said, in part, "Maj. Hicks speaks to the eager group of Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps Cadets about what it means to be a Cavalryman and what the Cavalry does."

I remember the Cavalry. They were the ones who hunted the Native Americans down and killed them. Now they do it in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.

We weep and wail and wring our hands when domestic terrorists kill innocent people, as was done this past weekend in Tucson, Arizona. But each and every day our kids all over the nation are being brainwashed about the joys of violence, the thrill of war, the glory of killing the "enemy" and few blink an eye. People somehow separate the killing done by our "hero" soldiers from the senseless random slaughter on our streets at home.

But these can't be separated. They are linked. They come from the same wellspring. They come from America's addiction to war and violence.

We glorify the gun and we glorify the shooter. But then, just now and then, the nation says (as in the case in Arizona), "No, not this time. This violence was not good." But to those brought up listening to the overwhelming public support for guns and glory the messages are just a twisted jumble of confusion. The loudest bang is the one that gets internalized by the majority of the citizenry.

It could change, but we'd have to make a serious national commitment to step away from the bar stool where we keep taking just one more drink of the hot red blood of violence. It could change, but we'd have to keep our president home instead of thrilling in his secret holiday trips to visit the troops in Iraq or Afghanistan to remind them that the nation is behind their killing of innocent civilians in endless war. It could change, but the Congress would have to cut the military budget and transfer the money into mental health programs for those who are living close to the razor's edge and are just one radio talk show host's angry rant about "big government" away from a violent rampage.

It could all change, but each of us would have to do more than shake our head in disgust and say to ourselves, "This is a crazy country." We'd have to step up and take some responsibility, do something to publicly express our deep frustration and concern, and demand that we stop putting our children at the trigger end of machine guns.

We'd have to connect the dots between "random gun violence" and our national obsession with occupation and killing people around the world who happen to sit on land that is wanted, for whatever reason, by multi-national corporations.

We could do something, if we..............................

EMPIRE OF ISLAND BASES

One of the many photos the Navy has set up inside the busy tourist-filled Jeju Island airport as a way to "promote" the planned base in the Gangjeong village. These Aegis destroyers, built at Bath Iron Works in Maine, are outfitted with missile offense systems and will be used to surround China's coastline Yang Yoon-Mo, movie critic, has been living on the rocky coastline of Gangjeong village for many months trying to protect this area from being covered with cement to create piers to dock U.S. Navy Aegis destroyers. (Click on this image for the full beautiful view of this coast) Yang Yoon-Mo (on the right) was just released from jail on Jeju Island, South Korea after having been arrested on Dec 27 for attempting to block cement trucks

• As previously reported, on December 27 thirty-four Gangjeong villagers and supporters were arrested for protesting against 66 cement trucks that were the first wave to begin covering their sacred coastline for the planned Navy base. All were released that day except for Yang Yoon-Mo, a movie critic who has been living on the rocky coastline for many months. The government had additionally charged him with several minor offenses from past protests, and maintained his seaside encampment was illegal, thus he was facing very stiff fines. Yang was refusing to pay the fines but Jeju activists raised the funds and sprung him from jail yesterday.

• I was going to drive south to Andover, Massachusetts on Wednesday for a meeting with local activists to discuss the Global Network's 19th annual space organizing conference that is planned to be held in that community on June 17-19. The event is to be called: Raytheon, Missile Offense, and Endless War. But the weather reports indicate a big snow and wind storm sweeping through New England that same day so best I not try to make that drive. I hope to be able to reschedule it for later in the week as I need to get things moving along for the event. Our Global Network members are expected to attend this conference from all over the U.S. and around the world. Raytheon is headquartered in Massachusetts and has a "missile defense" production facility located in North Andover.

• Peace activists in Hawaii are clear about the growing U.S. militarism in the Asian-Pacific region because the Pentagon's Pacific Command (PacCom) is headquartered there. Kyle Kajihiro, who works for the AFSC in Hawaii writes:
  
  Chief of Naval Operations Adm. Gary said “There’s no question in my mind that the importance of this region, the Asia-Pacific region and in particular Hawaii, and the vital role it will play in the future is not going to diminish.” This means that the threat of militarization will continue or worsen for places like Korea, Okinawa, Guam and Hawai’i. Peace and justice movements in this region will have to grow our movements and strengthen our networks within the region and with allies in the U.S. We need to call on peace and justice movements within the U.S. to understand developments in the Asia Pacific region, and especially the importance of small island bases in the expansion and maintenance of U.S. empire, and to step up their own efforts to dismantle the oppressive “empire of bases” (to borrow a phrase from the late Chalmers Johnson). Now that fiscal realities are finally forcing some in Washington to consider the taboo subject of cutting the military budget, the U.S. peace and justice movements have an opportunity to advocate for the reduction of the military troops and bases around the world.

Raytheon's Patriot (PAC-3) missile offense system is being deployed by the Pentagon in Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, Poland, Israel and seven other countries.

SHERIFF DUPNIK'S STRONG WORDS

This video is where Sheriff Dupnik in Tucson talks about the toxic political environment in Arizona and the U.S.

His strong words start at around 2:25

SUNDAY SONG

IN THE CROSS HAIRS

You can click on this picture for a better view. It is from Sarah Palin's political action committee web site during the recent election where she "targeted" Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Arizona) for being taken out. Palin urged followers to "reload" and "aim" for Democrats. Notice the gun site cross-hairs for each candidate on the list. Apparently since the shooting in Tucson, Arizona today of 18 people, including Rep. Giffords, Palin has taken this graphic down from her web site.

Palin, and much of the right-wing in the U.S., has recently been celebrating the joys of guns and routinely used shooting metaphors and violent images when they talk about their political opposition. There can be no doubt that the right-wing in this country is fostering a violent political culture. Thus it is sadly no surprise today when this killer goes on the rampage and kills six people, including a nine-year-old girl.

At one campaign event held by Rep. Giffords in August 2009 the threat of violence led her aides to call the police after one attendee dropped a gun. In last November's election she was hounded constantly by Tea Party members, some of whom were photographed firing rifles at a shooting range while wearing her Republican opponents campaign T-shirt. The Republican governor of Arizona has encouraged armed vigilantes to "patrol" the border between Mexico and Arizona as part of her anti-immigrant policies.

Pima County sheriff, Clarence W. Dupnik offered an emotional indictment of the state of political discourse. “The anger, the hatred, the bigotry that goes on in this country is getting to be outrageous. And unfortunately, I think Arizona has become sort of the capital, we have beome the Mecca for prejudice and bigotry,” he said. “There’s reason to believe that this individual might have a mental issue, and I think that people who are unbalanced might be especially susceptible to vitriol.”

Any self respecting politician should be calling for a scaling down of the aggressive violent talk in U.S. politics today.

We don't yet know much about the killer except that he has had some "anti-government" ideas on the Internet and that he had been rejected for military service.

I am indeed worried that we are going to see more of this as the economy continues to collapse and more "angry" people turn to violence. The worst part is that politicians like many on the right, including Palin, are making a living encouraging this political violence.

The public must speak out loudly against this violent culture that is deep in America's core.

Below is a video from 2010 where Rep. Giffords was interviewed after her office was attacked because of her vote on health care.

OBAMA'S NEW CHIEF OF STAFF - WALL STREET OPERATOR

Journalist Glen Ford interviewed about Obama's new chief of staff William Daley, a J.P. Morgan executive and former commerce secretary during the Clinton administration.

Daley is most remembered for helping Clinton push NAFTA through Congress.

I agree with Ford's analysis in the video that Obama is not a "reluctant" agent of Wall Street. He is more than willing to carry water for the banksters and corporate crooks who now own the government lock, stock, and barrel.

The longer Obama is in office the more we see the outlines of his pro-corporate loyalty.

NEW MAN CONTROLLING PENTAGON GAVEL

Republican California Congressman Howard "Buck" McKeon is the next chairman of the House Armed Services Committee. He doesn't have any military experience -- he spent the Vietnam era on a Mormon missionary retreat.

At around the two minute mark the video gets really interesting as he talks about how the "lord" set America aside for the religous folks and how our military is all about making the world safe for missionaries to go do god's work around the globe.

The American holy warriors you might say.

BITS AND PIECES

I'd hate to be that tree, or the ants who live under it.

• We've got the weatherization folks at our house doing a total top to bottom intense energy conservation make-over. They've been here since Monday. It ain't cheap but we should get our money back in saved energy costs over time.

• Thanks to my friend Tom who recently sent me a homeopathic remedy while I was suffering from severe back pain. It helped, along with the chiropractor treatment that I swear by.

• We are now into our 4th year of living at the Addams-Melman House. There are currently seven folks here (including two kids). We are having a potluck supper to celebrate on Sunday, January 30 from 5-7 pm. All are welcome to join us. We'll play political bingo after eating.

• A small group of us in our area have come up with an idea called "Vital Connections" where we are going to try to organize a quarterly pot luck supper for all kinds of organizations and small business in the Midcoast community to meet and share our work and struggles with one another. The idea is to build a grand coalition event where we occasionally set aside our separate single-focused agendas and come together recognizing that each of our groups are losing and that maybe by expanding our view of our world just a bit, and meeting new people with good hearts, we can all benefit over time by listening and learning from each other. We are going to begin with a smaller supper in February for some key leaders of some groups to see how they like the idea and then if they go for it we will then undertake organizing the larger events and invite every organization we can identify in the area. The general thought is that at each quarterly potluck three of the groups would get about seven minutes to talk about what they do and what difficulties they face. The hope is that each participating organization would invite their membership to these events and over the course of time we'd all expand our consciousness and our vision. The hope is that we'd have folks sit and talk with people they don't already know and cross-fertilize each other's brains and hearts. Sort of like the dogs in the photo above, they are all different but still are dogs and they share a similar goal - getting at the tree. It's a radical notion - getting to the root of our problems.

MORE ON THE COMING CLAMPDOWN

In states across the country, elected officials and right-wing pundits are calling not just for cuts to wages and benefits in the name of austerity, but even proposing laws to undermine labor unions’ influence, and in fact, their very existence.

Democracy Now hosts a roundtable discussion with New York Times labor reporter Steven Greenhouse; Michael Zweig of the Center for Study of Working Class Life; and Art Levine of the Washington Monthly.

FROM MY INSIDES

Some in my household have asked me to think about and clarify a rant I did earlier this week. It is the one about a meeting I attended on January 1 where I critiqued some of the discussion in that meeting. It appears that I may have offended some with my rather harsh words about "going inside". The feeling is that I was judgemental with those words.

To this charge I fully admit I am guilty and would like to amend my words.

I do not think badly of the going inside process. I think it is a divinely inspired spiritual practice. The native people did it, Jesus and Mohammad did it, Gandhi did it, zillions of people I admire today still do it. Even I at times do it. Let me apologize to anyone I offended for seeming to discredit this spiritual practice.

I also recognize that not everyone is going to go to a protest or go to jail. Not everyone will become a farmer, or a street protester, or a Buddhist. I understand we each have to follow our own path. I respect that.

My blog is like a diary for me - a daily record of what I am politically seeing, and thinking, and speculating about - my observations about the world around me. Things that touch my soul and break my heart. Sometimes my humor comes out, other times my rage. Sometimes my judgements....for good and for bad.

I don't like it when others judge me though I've been around long enough to know that it happens when you do this kind of work so I understand that it is a two-way street. I do alot of judging of people and institutions on this blog .....Obama, the Democrats, corporations, etc. Sometimes I judge others in our movements who I think are off-base on a particular point. Sometimes I go over the edge with it I am sure.

But like basketball, politics is a contact sport. Elbows fly at times and I can have sharp elbows with the best of them. I try not to be mean-spirited with my words but I know at times they can have some very rough edges. Sometimes I want my words to sting - at other times they sting more than I'd like them to.

At this moment people all over the nation, and around the world, are thinking about and debating what we should do to get out from behind the corporate eight-ball that blocks real change. Alot of the debate is very spirited. There are many opinions about what should be done and I have my own very real and strong ideas about what I think is needed to make things happen for the better. I try to use this blog to project my thoughts onto the public wall so people can see what I think. In doing so I also make evaluations of the opinions of others. When I make these judgements I try not to make it personal but sometimes there is a fine line between the personal and the political. I don't mind walking that narrow edge - it is who I am. I put my elbows on the table and say what I think. Sometimes, I acknowledge, I step over the edge a bit and it can be a bit messy.

Let's take Gandhi for a moment. He was alot about "going inside" and walking the spiritual path and learning to love even his enemies. He simplified his life to the lowest level imaginable - I've seen one of his ashrams in India and it was spartan for sure. He grew his own food and spun his own cloth. He rejected the British system fully. I don't come close to measuring up to what Gandhi did with his life. I respect anyone who is trying to follow that path.

But Gandhi did more than that. He also organized virtually his entire country to move into active civil disobedience against the British empire and led active protests over and over again that landed him and many others in jail. Many were killed due to his resistance organizing and still he pressed on - always trying to keep their disobedience non-violent - but still pushing things forward, not ever certain about the short-term implications of his work.

I think the point I have been trying to make, and have not always done so well, is that the inside personal work is important but in my opinion not enough if we are serious about overturning the corporate empire we face today. And I hold to my strong belief that many in our middle class consumptive society, even many so-called liberals, would rather talk a good game than take those unknown steps forward into the uncertain world of resistance to empire.

At the same time many I know are genuinely struggling with what they should do....maybe they are not ready to do certain things, or don't think what I do is right for them, but they are trying to do what they think is best. OK fine....no problem....glad they are moving. It is good they are doing something that they think is important.

I just happen to believe that "we" must all do more to change things. I think we must talk more in our communities about what the next steps are, without judging the things we each are presently doing, but recognizing that we must ultimately move ahead into full Gandhian resistance to empire.

I will keep saying these things, and will keep trying to do better at practicing what I preach.

OIL DIVISION INSIDE SUDAN

On January 9, 2011 the people of Southern Sudan will decide by referendum whether or not to separate from Sudan and form a new, independent nation.

Sudan's North and South have already fought 37 years of civil war that devastated the country and took the lives of 2.5 million Sudanese.

Differences of race, tribe and religion, as well as exploitation of the South's natural resources and unequal development are all major grievances driving Southerners to choose separation from their Northern brothers.

However the Sudanese are also deeply linked by culture, blood and geography, whether they acknowledge it or not.

Filmmaker May Ying Welsh journeyed down the Nile to try and understand the tensions that exist - not only between North and South - but also between the peoples of what may soon be Africa's newest country.

Watch as the Nile current sweeps a nation toward its destiny.

See a longer video on the history of the conflict in Sudan here

CHARGES DROPPED FROM WHITE HOUSE PROTEST

Just as I had figured would likely happen, the government has dropped the charges against those of us arrested at the White House on December 16 who were planning to go to trial. About 2/3 of the 131 who were arrested that day paid a $100 fine and were facing no further charges. One-third of the group refused to pay the fine and intended to go to trial and it is obvious that Obama did not want a bunch of veterans, and their supporters, to go into the courts and shine more light on the Afghanistan occupation. This way Obama helps to limit the "damage" of the protest. There can be no doubt that the protest got the government's attention.

Judge Dismisses Cases Against Military Veterans and Anti-war Activists Following December 16th Washington, D.C. Arrests

For more information, contact: Ann Wilcox (202-441-3265) or Tarak Kauff (845-249-9489)

Washington, D.C. – January 4, 2011: Anti-war military veterans and other activists celebrated a breakthrough victory today in DC Superior Court, when charges were dropped, following arrests in front of the White House, on December 16, 2010. Over 131 people were arrested in a major veteran-led protest while participating in non-violent civil resistance in a driving snowstorm. US Park Police charged all 131 protesters with “Failure to Obey a Lawful Order,” when they refused to move. All remained fixed to the White House fence demanding an end to the continuing wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and further US aggression in the region.

Among those arrested were members of the leadership of the national organization Veterans for Peace , Pentagon Papers whistleblower Dr. Daniel Ellsberg; Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Chris Hedges; former senior CIA analyst Ray McGovern; and, Dr. Margaret Flowers, advocate for single-payer health care.

Forty-Two arrested opted to appear in court and go to trial with the first group appearing in DC Superior Court on January 4, 2011. Prosecutors from the DC Attorney General’s office stated that the Government “declined to file charges due to missing or incomplete police paperwork.” Presiding Magistrate Judge Richard Ringell confirmed that the cases were dropped and defendants were free to leave.

Those who participated in this action make this statement:

“This is clearly a victory for opposition to undeclared wars which are illegal under international law, have led to the destruction of societies in Iraq and Afghanistan, bled the US Treasury in a time of recession, and caused human rights violations against civilians and combatants. Many of us will return to Washington, DC, to support an action on Tuesday, January 11, 2011 to protest the continued use of Guantanamo detention facility, including torture of detainees in violation of international law.”

The defendants were represented by co-counsels Ann Wilcox, Esq. and Mark Goldstone, Esq. Ms. Wilcox stated: “clearly the Government and Police felt that these veterans and their supporters acted with the courage of their convictions, and did not wish to spend the time and funds necessary for a trial proceeding. This is a major victory for the peace movement.”

For more information visit http://www.stopthesewars.org/ or on Facebook.