Or- The Ideological Ruminations of a “Jinglebrained Ninnyhammer”

by R.G. Ryan

An Economics professor at Texas Tech University was arguing with his students over the benefits of capitalism versus socialism. The professor was a proponent of capitalism while the majority of the class was largely socialistic in their ideology. So he said, “For the remainder of the year we will be Socialists and conduct our grading based on an average of the class grades so that everyone is equal.”

The students were thrilled.

The first test came: About half the class studied and got A’s while the rest of the class slacked off and got D’s and F’s. Luckily, on the strength of the A’s from the students who studied, everyone in the class got a B. So far, so good.

Second test came: Only a quarter of the class studied and got A’s while the rest of the class slacked off and got D’s and F’s (many of the “slackers” this time around were students who had studied hard on the first test only to see their high grades marked down). Based on the class average, everyone was given a C-minus. The first murmurs of discontent were heard.

Final exam came: Upset about studying hard for two tests only to get low grades based on class average, no one studied. The students capable of getting A’s didn’t study because they were angry over the other tests, while those students who slacked off in the beginning lacked the knowledge to score well on the final. As a result,everyone failed the course.

Amid outraged cries of, “But that’s not fair! Why should we suffer for the laziness of others?” the professor simply smiled and said, “Welcome back to capitalism.”

I share this story because at the heart of the “Occupy Wall Street” movement exists a bubbling cauldron of anger largely fueled by class envy. Oh sure, there are those who are mad as hell over government bailouts of the big corporations and resulting lack of accountability, the collapse of the housing market and overall economic malaise, and perhaps rightly so. But with, “We are the 99%!” as the movement’s battle cry, the implications are clear: Those in the 1% should be sharing what they have with the rest of us; any profit making is suspect; and the “bourgeoisie” arrived at their station on the backs of a downtrodden, oppressed proletariat. Or, in the immortal words of David Byrne, “same as it ever was; same as it ever was; same as it ever was…”

Sadly, there are those in political leadership who are stoking these fires of class warfare for political gain rather than working to arrive at a credible, viable solution. As a result, the movement ─ which started out as having no stated political agenda ─ has now been co-opted by a surrealistic hodgepodge of left-wing radicals, anarcho-syndicalists, aging sixties counter-culture radicals, neo-socialists, Marxists, and others who are basically broke, busted and disgusted! I get it. I’m there, too! The difference being that I expect nothing from the one percent. I expect nothing from my government save the freedom to succeed or fail on the basis of my own investment and effort.

All the anger directed toward that now legendary one percent—those über wealthy few—seems to miss the inarguable fact that in order for societies to thrive, one thing is needed above all else: wealth! It drives all cultures, whether a monarchy, democracy or socialist republic. Someone has to generate money, and providence seems to place individuals into every new generation who have a knack for doing just that.

In a movement and a current administration that leans ever more toward socialistic ideology than capitalistic, one wonders where the “distribution of wealth” is going to come from if no one is, well, wealthy. The reason every socialist experiment has failed throughout history (and the argument that it has never had a “fare chance to succeed” is a sad canard) is that socialism requires an endless supply of money. The problem is that while everyone wants to share in the profit, not everyone is willing to work to insure that monetary supply,that continuation of wealth. Like the students in my opening story, what motivates me to hand over the “profit” I produce if there is no incentive for me to keep producing?

Let’s use a hypothetical: Say you have a privately owned business employing 160 people and generating fifty million per year in revenue. One family has owned the business for over forty years having built it to its current level from scratch. The family members not only own the business, but also work, putting in more hours than any employee. Is it fair for this family to profit more than the workers? Of course! Why? Because the company was built as a result of their collective sacrifice and investment long before any of those workers were present. Additionally, when the company was slapped with a million dollar lawsuit, the family absorbed the loss, not the employees. And yet, I sense a dangerous shift in our nation’s collective soul moving us ever closer to “entitlement” mentality wherein the expectation is that businesses such as the one in this hypothetical example are expected to equally share whatever profit is gained, while at the same time continuing to absorb all the risk.

Our President obviously wants to do something about the severe problems facing our country and claims that the pathway out of our economic woes lies in the direction of higher taxes on the “wealthy.” That’s an interesting theory. Winston Churchill said, “Raising taxes to increase prosperity is like trying to pick up a bucket while you’re standing in it!” I’m pretty sure he’s correct. Our President, with his back to the wall and facing a rough re-election campaign, has promoted another theory that says the way to stimulate our economy is by introducing more government programs, more government subsidies, more government jobs, more government ─ period. I have a problem with this as well, because having “more” provided to you by the state plays into the law of diminishing returns. At some point, as it always does, the money will run out, because those few producing the wealth will grow weary of doing so and either stop entirely, or move their production to a more favorable economic climate. If the President really wanted to “stimulate” the economy, he should throw his inestimable weight behind the small business owners of this country and give them the help they need to put the growing ranks of unemployed back to work.

The individuals comprising the disparate crowd known collectively as the “Occupy…” movement are exercising their constitutional right. People have been demonstrating against one thing or another throughout most of history. Some demonstrations have even been successful. If you feel strongly inclined to do so, join them. Let your voice be heard. Personally, I think you’d be better served by “occupying” a voting booth come election time. But that’s just me.

If this movement isn’t enough and you feel inclined toward Socialism, then go be a socialist. Get together with all your friends who want to be socialists, provide 0% interest loans for each other. Pool your resources. Pay for each other’s houses. Buy group medical insurance policies. There is nothing stopping you from being a socialist. Really, though, pure socialism is only a theory and cannot be truly tested. The only way to find out if it works is to put it into practice, which requires a revolution by the “working class.” However, the working class will not revolt in a capitalistic society because they’re all satisfied with the status quo. Besides, redistribution of wealth already occurs. It’s called, “taxation.” And I am among the 53% who actually pays taxes.

Here’s the bottom line: The wealth of the world is now, and has always been unbalanced because people are selfish, not because of a particular political ideology. You want to break the back of poverty in this country, champion generosity.

R.G. Ryan is the author of “The Voices In My Head: The Danny Gans Biography” and the “Snapshots at St. Arbuck’s” series. He lives in Nevada with his first wife and their miniature schnauzer of some renown. Can sing a little. Visit his website at: http://rgryan.com/

by Deborah Grabien

First things first: I should say, up front, that this is not going to be a particularly unbiased look at the Occupy movement. As much as I would have liked this to be an exemplar of classic journalism – with the author’s opinion tidily tucked into the background in favor of impartiality – that’s not happening. What started out, conceptually at least, as a balanced overview has become an op-ed piece, with heavy emphasis on the “op”. I should also say, up front, that I’ve now taken part in Occupy San Francisco, so I’ve had the chance to see for myself.

Look what’s happening out in the street –

Got a revolution! Got to revolution!

To some degree, we are almost all in the same boat: the good ship 99%. We are the unemployed, who are being told that not only are the jobs thin on the ground, but that unregulated corporate America is free to discriminate by hanging signs above the door: No unemployed people need apply. Only lateral movement welcomed. We are the middle class who, with ten-plus years of greed-run governmental policy behind us, are the middle class no longer; we’re now the slave class, thanks to our elected officials and the insidious stupidity that is the legacy of Milton Friedman and the Chicago School of Economics. We are the homeowners forced to guard our doors against banks who mismanaged their assets and forced their own customer base into usurious interest rates and ruinous mortgages – and foreclosure.

In case you hadn’t noticed, there’s an awful lot of us. 99% of the population, in fact. That makes us the majority. Hell, that makes us the super-majority.

Hey, I’m dancing down the street

Got a revolution! Got to revolution!

A couple of years ago, a collection of oversized dinosaur institutions admitted they were teetering at the edge of ruin. This had come about gradually, with help from previous political administrations, especially the most recent Republican one, George W. Bush and Friends; when The Powers That Be are big believers in sticking it to the working class and charging 32% interest on the lube they don’t bother to actually use, the fat cats do what they want. And when the Democratic congress cowers and abases itself before the Republican half of the equation, everyone loses. In this instance, what we lost was stability, and our futures. Not very surprising that we’d like a word with the people who lost it – except, of course, that they didn’t lose it. They stole it.

Ain’t it amazing all the people I meet!

Got a revolution! Got to revolution!

With Too Big To Fail entrenched as part of the American political and corporate mindset, certain things became inevitable. One was TARP: According to Pro Publica’s tracking list (http://projects.propublica.org/bailout/list), 926 banks and insurers were given $579,952,314,483 in taxpayer funds. Less than half of that – $277,810,865,263 – has been returned. And in fact, a ridiculous percentage of what was returned was raised by the recipient institutions using a technique that really does boggle the mind: They raised interest rates on their customer base – the same people who provided the government with the money to hand out to those institutions in the first place. They did it because they could; no one from Dick Cheney through Timothy Geithner was willing to impose regulations on these people. In the dimwitted greed-soaked world of Friedman Economics, the market regulates itself, and everyone else should just relax and back off – and, presumably, bend over and assume the position. Purest usury.

Robbing Peter to pay Paul is one thing. Robbing to Peter to pay Peter, whom you’ve already robbed, is in a class of ethical bankruptcy all by itself.

So, what have we got? We have a two-party system which seems, more and more, to be devoted to a common goal: creating a slave class that will rip each other’s throats out for the privilege of paying a 17% mortgage rate to Bank of America or AIG or Citicorp or one of the MAEs, while working a job that requires a name tag and a constant repetition of “you want fries with that?” We have a corporate power structure so bloated, so overweening, so unregulated, that it can wave its arms and sneer booga booga booga, nice little economy you’ve got here, shame if something HAPPENED to it, and a panic-stricken political structure will throw more money at it, with virtually no hope in hell of getting more than a dribble of it back.

In light of that farcically tragic situation, two things strike me as inevitable: the Tea Party and the Occupy Wall Street movement.

I hate the Tea Party. I’ll be upfront about that. The people making the noise on their behalf are, without exception, a collection of jinglebrained ninnyhammers who, presumably, all think they can see Russia from Sarah Palin’s gun rack. Michele Bachman takes government funding to “pray away the gay”; the obviously-named Rand Paul thinks “Atlas Shrugged” is a how-to manual, rather than a bad novel. The Tea Partiers shriek about wanting government out of the lives of the people from one side of their mouths, while trying to control reproductive rights and other peoples’ marriages out the other. They rail about the bad results of deregulation, while howling about how terrible things are when Big Government regulates things. What inconsistency.

They’re also a political movement, with a political agenda. The second inevitability, Occupy Wall Street, is something else altogether. With respect to Vice President Joe Biden (who compared the two movements and who, as a core part of the problem, should probably just shut up now), Occupy Wall Street – which is now in cities across America and has spread to a similarly financially beleaguered Europe – may be exactly what we need to get it right.

I’m not going too deep into the core of the movement. If you rely on Fox News or a Scaife or Murdoch-owned print news media, you’re probably already calling me rude names. I don’t waste time on lost causes. But if you’ve been paying attention in the real world, you know that, from New York to Boise to Atlanta to Miami to Pocatello to Seattle and well beyond, the social movement called Occupy is on the march and on the rise.

Because yes, this is a social movement. It has no political agenda. In fact, I’ve been hoping that Occupy refuses any hint of a political touch, because that would be the wedge the 1% used to break it apart. The moment someone sticks a flag in the movement and claims it in the name of Smaller Government or the Obama Jobs Creation Bill or Get Out of Afghanistan, it’s in trouble. This is about the diversity of the 299 million parts that make up the whole of that 99%. This is one of those rare instances where the sum of the parts and the parts are equally matched. That also makes them equally vulnerable. Hold fast, guys. Don’t let the bastards wedge you into nonexistence.

I spent about seven hours on the ground with Occupy San Francisco, in front of the Fed building on Market and Main. Following OccupySF’s tweets, I read that they were in desperate need of clean socks and underwear; luckily, Walgreen’s had a huge bin of $1.99-for-four-pairs of socks, so I blew my mad money for the week and scored twenty pairs of socks. I loaded up a couple of bags and, with old friend and sister rabble rousing progressive Denise Dunne in tow, we headed downtown to see what was what.

The cops on duty that day seemed very nice, which surprised me. I was expecting flaming Gestapo types – the previous night, interim mayor Ed Lee had dispatched a small army of pissed-off cops to the site of the Fed building on market and Main. Supervisor John Avalos – who is getting my vote for mayor next month – negotiated; the cops promised to leave the Occupiers alone, and then both manhandled them and stole all their stuff on a ridiculous assortment of bullshit charges as soon as Avalos was gone.

This was a new shift of cops, and they were more sympathetic than I’d expected. The new crew had let the protesters know that DPW would be coming by sweep again, and the protesters were worried. I brought my car around and we bundled as much into it as would fit, and I went off to park until DPW had been and gone. Mostly, what I stored safely were their sleeping bags.

Many of us saw what happened during the New York marches: the video of the thuggish white-shirted NYPD cop bragging that his nightstick was going to get a workout, of him and a few like him charging into a crowd of citizens who were breaking no laws, is now viral and imprinted. But this is San Francisco, city of traditionally loopy lefty progressive politics, of beatniks and hippies and the nation’s first openly gay politician. There were no sneering swaggering uniformed button-popping lumps of self-importance, waving nightsticks at the people they’d sworn to serve and protect. Mind you, if the idiot officer handling the media liaison for SFPD is anything to go by, there are still a few bugs in the local system; the man was rude, pompous and left me wanting to reach through the phone and slap him. Still, that’s easier to deal with than armed jackbootery.

For the hours I was there, the cops were fine. They kept the protesters off the property actually owned by the Fed, and made sure they stayed on the public sidewalk; that way, the Fed couldn’t bitch. When the Occupiers were joined by an anti-war march and the numbers swelled by several hundred, the police motorcycle escort were efficient and utterly non-confrontational. To a man (I saw no women officers on duty), they ignored the two completely naked guys, holding up signs.

As an old 1960s Viet Nam asskicker, I had some thoughts on the protest. I couldn’t help thinking it would have been even more effective had the people in the Fed looked down into complete silence, and seen that sea of faces and upturned signs. I was impressed with the General Assembly the Occupiers use to communicate: Information is passed through a widening circle of people, all repeating it aloud to make sure everyone’s on the same page. I was also impressed with the number of MUNI drivers who took part, in their own way; the curbside was lined with Occupiers holding up signs asking people to honk if they support the 99%. There was quite a lot of horn action going on, and a heartening percentage of that came from public transport vehicles. They know exactly what’s happening to their pensions, and who’s responsible, it seems.

Denise and I were interviewed by two nice young men from the Academy of Art college, who were filming a documentary. Their stated hope was to get it before the rest of their school and out into the neural pathways of the internet, via youtube and beyond. We signed waivers and answered questions as to what we believed was happening, why we thought it was happening, how it differed from what we’d seen back in the bad old days of the Viet Nam war protests. That really brought it home to me; my daughter is 32 years old, and it’s just possible the parents of the kids who filmed us, asked us intelligent questions and then listened to, recorded and filmed our answers without interruption had not yet been born when Denise and I were going mano a mano with the ancestors of that thug in the white shirt in New York City. A Moment, really, as telling as it was poignant: I’m old.

There are certain things this movement needs, the main thing being bodies willing to put themselves out there, 24/7. I can’t do that – with multiple sclerosis, certain things are simply not negotiable, and the soma is the last voice in what we do. Old or not, though, I can hold a sign and make noise, and that is precisely what I did. I can use the internet, tweeting what I say and blogging, and that’s just what I’m doing. I can and will make as much noise as I can, because silence, here, is complicity. I don’t choose to continue my dignified and stately progress towards the grave unable to meet my own eye in the mirror every morning. So silence is not an option – nor, if you are one of the 99% or understand what is happening, should it be an option for you. The good ship 99% is finally arming itself, albeit not violently, and it must not be allowed to founder.

That’s one thing about most movements, the thing that kills them, the thing I dread most about this one: that the Occupiers will waver. We have drawn this line in the sand, and told the greed-mongers, the thieves, that we’re on to them and that we’re going to hold them accountable. We’ve announced it, on the rising tide of outrage and smashed hope: We are not going away.

So Occupy can’t go away. It can’t waver. It can’t let itself be disheartened, scared off by misguided cops protecting the very people who are stealing their futures. It can’t let itself be pushed back or defeated by the winter that’s coming; they will need sleeping bags and supplies to keep them going through the cold brutal nights on the street.

Because, if we waver, we’re all likely to discover first-hand what sleeping on the street in the winter is all about.

Deborah Grabien is the author of numerous published books and articles,  and editor at Plus One Press. Visit her website at:  http://deborahgrabien.com/

Quoted lyrics are all from the Jefferson Airplane song, “Volunteers of America”.

Film, I Am Not Moving uploaded by Corey Ogilvie, includes photography from Alex Mallis.

by Amber Burke

Just a few years ago, in August 2008, I was sitting at a party in the home of the Santos family.  Their home was full of love and laughter, and it was then that I was introduced to Luis Santos.  He was a beautiful boy; and I could see him becoming a handsome man in the future.  He was charming and quick to smile and laugh.  He interacted with his elderly relatives, parents, and cousins in a way that was thoughtful and considerate.  I spoke with him for quite a while that day, and he told me all about the goals had for himself, and what sounded like big plans for a really bright future I was both charmed and impressed by him.

Only a couple of months later, on October 5 of that same year, I was told that Luis had been murdered.  How could that be?  He wasn’t the kind of kid to look for trouble.  How on earth could something like that be true?

As I sat as Luis’s funeral, listening to his father sing, “Let it Be” to him, listening to Luis’s young cousin speak, I cried from my soul at this horrendous and senseless loss.  I cried for him, I cried for his parents, and I cried for a world in which such violence and evil should exist.  The pain and loss of all of those people in the packed, large church at his funeral was overwhelming. I didn’t even know how to begin to help his grieving parents.

I watched the news and internet for any new information that would shed some kind of understanding onto this senseless, violent act. As the facts of the case came to light, I listened in horror and frustration.  Luis and his friends had gone to a couple of college parties that they’d been invited to on that tragic Saturday night.  On the way out of the second party, they were accosted by a gang of boys and attacked.   Their attackers had previously tried to crash a fraternity party and had been kicked out, and it seemed that they were looking for retribution for being kicked out of the party.  Three of the Luis’s friends were stabbed, one was punched in the eye so hard that he required emergency eye surgery to repair the damage, and Luis was killed when he was stabbed through his heart.

I was shocked and horrified to learn the identity of one of his assailants. It was Esteban Nuñez, the son of a Former California State Assemblyman Speaker, Fabian Nuñez. Although he was not the one who actually wielded the blade that killed Luis, he was also carrying a knife that night, and stabbed two of the other boys; one of whom was seriously injured by stab wounds to the stomach and back.  In fact, the doctors said that one inch either way, and that boy too, would have been killed in the attack.  The boys in Luis’s group had no weapons on them.

Esteban Nuñez was not some poor street kid from a broken, impoverished home.   This was the child of a wealthy and powerful political figure in California, a representative elected to make and uphold the laws for our state. It didn’t make any sense that his son could be involved with something like this. In the weeks and months that followed, the evidence mounted that Esteban Nuñez was not such a nice boy; despite the wealth and privilege he enjoyed, or the glowing character references that the judge received from high ranking public officials, such as  the Mayor of Los Angeles. Before it was taken down, I saw  Esteban Nuñez’s Facebook page, where he displayed images of himself and his friends torturing cats, showing gang signs, using foul language, and being disrespectful to both women and authority. Furthermore, Esteban was quoted as saying that he would “get away with the murder” because “his father would fix it all for him.”  He’d previously told a police officer who had stopped him for speeding to, “go ahead and give him a ticket ─ did the officer know who his dad was?”

It became apparent as time went on, that he and his friends went out that Saturday night, driving all the way from Sacramento to San Diego, armed with knives, looking for a fight. As the case was heard, the defense pointed out that the attackers had tried to destroy the evidence of the attack by burning their clothes and getting rid of the murder weapons, and colluding in an attempt to throw police off their trail.  Only the closed-captioned TV cameras on the campus, and tips from the public, including one from a cousin of one of the assailants, brought them to the authority’s attention.

I also watched as the victim’s parents, Fred and Kathy Santos, along with their daughter, Brigida, carried themselves with grace and spoke with eloquence on behalf of their dead son and brother.  I watched them suffer financially, emotionally, and physically, with the publicity and the trial process, and   it was a sickening sight for anyone to witness.  I did the only thing I could, and that was to write on my personal blog about the situation.  Maybe it didn’t do anything truly helpful, but I received letters from Luis’s friends and relatives telling me that it gave them something.

That’s why, when Fred Santos announced that they were going to accept a plea bargain, in which the perpetrators would plead guilty to the lesser crime of manslaughter rather than stand trial for murder, I was shocked.  Why would the Santos family be satisfied with such a thing?  But, Fred explained that his wife and daughter were emotionally and physically worn down from the trial process, and to go through a jury trial would take another several years. Between the trials and automatic appeals processes, they had no certainty that the defendants would receive life sentences. They felt that justice would be served by the judge. They trusted the judicial system and prayed for a fair outcome.  It was also believed by their lawyers that the longer that the case was allowed to drag along, the more political power could be wielded by the other side. The Santos family was completely disheartened to hear that the Mayor of Los Angeles had publicly declared Esteban Nuñez innocent even before the courts heard any evidence in the case.

However, when the judge handed down his sentence, he stated that after listening to all of the evidence and reflecting on the heinous crime that had been committed, he had no choice but to inflict the maximum sentence for manslaughter.  The Santos family breathed a sigh of relief that the trial was now over, justice was served, and they could go back to mourning Luis in private.

On January 2, 2011, the news broke.  I could hardly believe my eyes when I caught sight of the headline: “Schwarzenegger Commutes Nuñez Sentence.”   I started to cry as I read the article with horror.  I couldn’t believe it was true.  I started searching the Internet, trying to find how this could have happened.  I later received a very sad email from Fred Santos, confirming the story.  He was both bewildered and heartbroken. In addition, the governor’s office not only did not contact the Santos family to let them know of the governor’s decision, they also didn’t contact the San Diego district attorney to get any information on the case.  The first the Santos family heard of this decision was from the media, when they asked them to comment.

Fred Santos learned that Fabian Nuñez was seen coming out of the governor’s office just a short time before the pardon was signed.  (Note: This is an unsubstantiated claim made by a reporter who was covering the case).  He was also an invited guest and attended the party for the Governor’s farewell on December 16, 2010.   He can be seen here singing for the Governor at his farewell roast: http://www.baycitizen.org/videos/fabian-Nuñez-sings-schwarzenegger-roast/ Fabian Nuñez was a known friend of Arnold Schwarzenegger, as well as someone who had helped Schwarzenegger in his personal business dealings.  One of these deals, relating to possible illegal gifting of state assets, is being reviewed and challenged in court by the new Governor, Jerry Brown.

Esteban Nuñez had only spent a few months in prison.  He had been out on bail during the whole trial process as his family could afford the one million dollar bail bond for him.  He was only taken into custody May 5, of 2010, to begin serving his sentence after pleading guilty to the reduced charges.

Nuñez accepted a plea bargain, knowing that he would not win in a jury trial, as the evidence against him was too overwhelming.

Therefore, my questions are, why would Arnold Schwarzenegger, who’d used his power to pardon so frugally throughout his administration, choose to intervene in this particular case, unless it was politically, financially, or personally motivated?  And why wait until the last minute, as he was leaving office, to do it?  Why would he not ask for the records from the district attorney to get an understanding of the case?  If he felt the sentence so harsh, why did he not do the same for the other boys who were involved in the death of Luis Santos?  Why single Nuñez out?

Yes, Esteban Nuñez may not have killed Luis Santos, but he tried to kill two of the other boys, and nearly succeeded in doing just that.  California law makes everyone involved in the same crime equally responsible. Esteban Nuñez was carrying a weapon, and used it on unarmed people who wished him no harm.  In the immediate aftermath, he attempted to cover up the crime. So, if not for the identity of Esteban’s father, what reason would Schwarzenegger have to believe that he deserved any leniency?  The reason he cited was that Esteban Nuñez had no prior record, but how many crimes does someone have to commit before murder should be punished to the full extent of the law?  When did it become less of a crime to murder someone just because you don’t have a previous record?

Everyone should be as outraged as I by this entire case.  The governor’s pardon wasn’t put in for political cronyism. So should this practice be allowed to continue, or should a bill be created which states that any official who has the power to pardon not be allowed to use that power within a certain period prior to leaving office. In that way, he or she would have to face the people and suffer the backlash of abuse of that power.

My heart is so heavy as I write this.  I decided to share my friendship with the Santos family, and my belief in the injustice that took place over the death of their son, because I believe that everyone should be aware of what I believe was and is a misuse of power that’s happening in our country. It nullifies our whole justice system and the power of a fair trial.  It highlights the fact that if you’re rich or well connected you can get away with murder.

It’s my hope that this story will touch every reader, and we will all choose not to vote for politicians like Arnold Schwarzenegger or Fabian Nuñez in the future as they pursue their careers.  We may not be able to repeal Schwarzenegger’s decision in the courts, but we can send the message to all of our elected officials that we will not stand for any type of special favors and privilege for the wealthy, powerful and famous.

Apparently young Esteban was indeed correct; his father did fix it for him.

****

Editor’s note: Prior to the time of publication of this piece, Arnold Schwarzenegger had written a letter of apology to the Santo’s family, a letter which was seen as a political maneuver by Luis Santo’s parents.  It should be pointed out that although Nuñez did not kill Luis Santos, he was originally sentenced to 16 years for his role in the brawl ─ the same sentence given to Santos’ killer, Ryan Jett. Schwarzenegger commuted Nuñez’s sentence to six years, and Nuñez is now serving time at Mule Creek State Prison, where, The Los AngelesTimes reports, Fabian Nuñez is already working on his son’s behalf by giving gifts to prison employees.

by Vicola England

Once again the issue of Islam in Britain has raised its head, this time courtesy of the Right Reverend Michael Nazir-Ali, the Bishop of Rochester in case you were wondering. The Bishop has announced that Islamic extremists have turned parts of Britain into ‘no-go areas’ for those who don’t follow Mohammad, stating that ‘those of a different faith or race may find it difficult to live and work there’. And do you know what? He’s absolutely right, although perhaps not for the reasons he thinks. The Bishop believes it’s because non-Muslims will find hostility from the Muslim community. And it’s true that the more radicalised may be hostile–but simply saying that antagonism from the community is the reason only scratches the surface of a far more complex problem in Britain today.

Venture into some of the more ‘financially inconvenienced’ former mill towns in the North or Brixton and the less affluent bits of London and the Midlands, and you’re going to find division staring you in the face. Oldham, in the North West, is a town whose main claim to fame is being the home of the ‘Oldham Riots’ of 2001 which saw 500 Asian youths, a similar number of white youths and 100 armed police engage in a full-scale riot complete with petrol bombs, overturned cars and smashed windows aplenty. Oldham has secondary schools that are so segregated you can find 99% white or 99% Asian pupils. It definitely has areas where non-Muslims will feel hostility, but this works both ways; there are no-go areas for Muslims too. Bradford and Rochdale are similar. What do these towns have in common? Little money, high levels of unemployment, massive reliance on state benefits, poor educational performance and traditional ‘working class’ ethics. If you believe the papers you’d think it was the end of days, but it’s not even new. Less affluent areas have always attracted immigrant populations that gathered together in common areas to keep their identity and community going, from the Irish potato famine that saw refugees sailing from the Emerald Isle to set up enclaves in poor areas of New York, Liverpool and London, enclaves that would brawl with the locals, to the Jamaicans who headed for London in the 60s and were greeted by such friendly gestures as signs in boarding house windows saying ‘No Blacks, No Irish’.

There are a few major difference between the immigrants of old and the recent wave of Muslim immigrants, the biggest of which are the intensity of resentment and fear. People were afraid of the Jamaicans when they arrived, mainly because a lot of them had never seen a coloured person before and it’s human nature to fear the unknown. But the fear today is different and, more importantly, is being fed in a completely new way, thanks to the press.

A quick look at recent headlines from one of the UK’s favourite tabloids, the Daily Mail (nick-named ‘The Daily Wail’ and ‘The Daily Heil’, which gives you some idea of which way it leans) shows that the press are not exactly on the side of our Muslim brethren: 13^th May – ‘Catholic schoolgirl who refused headscarf for mosque trip labelled a truant’, 9^th Feb – ‘Christian teacher “forced out” after complaining Muslim pupils praised 9/11 hijackers as heroes’, 30^th April – ‘Muslim daubs war memorial with “Islam will dominate the world” but walks free after CPS says he was NOT racially motivated’, 12^th April – ‘Muslim nurses CAN cover up but Christian colleagues can’t wear crucifixes’ (covering up is a contravention of the hospital’s policy on infection control which requires arms to be bare so skin can be cleaned and the risk of cross-contamination reduced).

The Daily Mail has a circulation of over 2m papers and 2 million visitors to its website daily. That’s a lot of people getting their information about the Muslim community from this less than neutral source. And it’s not alone; the tabloids have long ago figured out that there’s money to be made from feeding anti-Muslim feelings. These headlines foster the belief that there’s one rule for Muslims and another for the general populace, a belief that one tiny glance through history can tell us is very bad news indeed.

It’s not solely the fault of the papers, though. There are prominent Muslims fanning the flames too. Take the ever-delightful Anjem Choudary, a lawyer by training so not a man who needs to be out of work; however, Mr Choudary has announced that it is every Muslim’s duty to bleed as much money out of the British benefits system as possible. To give him his due, he is a man who practices what he preaches. Choudary brings in a tax free £25,740 a year; if he were paying tax it would be the equivalent of a £32,500 salary. The national average salary (before tax) is £25,800 and the after-tax cash a private fighting in Afghanistan will see is £13,430, half of what Mr Choudary receives for sitting on his backside preaching hate against the West. Given that it’s the Choudarys who hit the headlines rather than the mild mannered Muslim shopkeeper, factory worker or taxi driver who works long hours for minimum wage, it’s no wonder resentment is simmering away in poorer areas where people haven’t a hope of earning £32k a year. Though of course it isn’t just Muslims making their living from the benefits system: look at the mother of ‘kidnapped’ Shannon Matthews, Karen, who reputedly had 7 children from 5 different men because each time you have another, the amount you receive in benefits rises accordingly. And she’s far from unique.

Fear of Muslims among the non-Muslim community is easy to understand – they gather in groups, they dress differently, they often speak a different language so we’ve no idea whether they are talking about jihad or last night’s Coronation Street. The tabloids are telling us that they want us ALL to become Muslim and if we don’t then we’re going to be blown up in a holy war, plus the last government did its best to convince us that Muslim fanatics were so dangerous that we needed to relinquish civil liberties and rights to privacy which had survived a civil war, Hitler and the IRA. A glance through the anti-terrorism legislation brought in since 9/11 could lead the more cynical reader to conclude that Muslims have been a very useful tool indeed in allowing the government to gain more control than is healthy over its populace and their rights to protest.

Certainly in some respects the wider Muslim community does need to do more. It needs to be educating and controlling its youths. The fact is that a section of Britain does have a negative image of the Muslim community, and so trying to arrange marches through Wootten Bassett, the town where the bodies of dead British soldiers are repatriated, to chant about how soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan are murderers is not going to convince anyone that you aren’t trouble. Somali elders in the UK have a particularly tough time ahead if they’re going to convince the world that they come in peace, for the simple reason that a number of their youths don’t. Somali gangs are probably the most feared gangs in London because of their violence and ruthlessness, social workers are reluctant to work with them, and the turf wars they engage in are utterly brutal. However, why anyone expects any kid who’s grown up in Mogadishu living in a tribal system to arrive in London and magically become a hedge fund manager in a 3 bedroom semi-detached is a mystery. Logically, if violence and living on your wits is all you’ve ever known then it’s what you’re going to continue doing. Which is not to say that the problem doesn’t need addressing—it does—but it’s fair to say it’s not going to be solved by locking up the perpetrators while letting in more and more young Somali men.

So how do we heal Britain’s fractured communities and bring racial peace to the streets? Who knows? Find the answer to that one and you’ll make your fortune. What can be deduced, however, is that no one group can fix this; it’s going to take cooperation from the authorities, the police, the Muslim community, the indigenous community and the press. Most of all it’s going to take time. And the Bishop of Rochester needn’t be too afraid that ‘the influence of Christianity is in decline’ just yet; the current British population contains 42.6 million Christians and 2.4 million Muslims. It’s unlikely that anyone is going to be fitting Canterbury Cathedral for a dome and loudspeakers to call the faithful to prayer anytime soon.

by Ilias Kountoupis

Allow me to put graphically how my fellow countrymen are feeling right now: ridden hard by domestic politicians, pursued by international speculators lurking in the dark, and put away wet, exhausted, and abused. And now our pursuers are closing in for the kill, their appetite for blood reinvigorated just as our government is trying to put to rest the rumors of Greece defaulting on its debt and stop a lengthy panic attack throughout our society.

We want something more than to see embezzled public funds embezzled returned and taxation mechanisms functioning appropriately; we want justice. We want to see people behind bars now, and to start believing again in our judiciary system. We want to see officials held accountable for their missteps. Only then will Prime Minister George Papandreou have the credibility to persuade us of the necessity and worthiness of the hardest austerity measures which have been proposed since the restoration of democracy. If the Greek administration wants the public’s approval, they have to both make and submit to the first cut; we will happily pass them the knife.

On the other hand, Greeks should become more far-sighted. It’s naive to blame the government of the New Democracy alone for our downfall. Greece wasn’t a heaven before 2004. Its predecessor PASOK (Πανελλήνιο Σοσιαλιστικό Κίνημα, the Panhellenic Socialist Movement) had its own run of deception, corruption and bad management during the ’80s, ’90s and early ’00s. I still remember Costas Simitis, the former prime minister, announcing another round of stern and destined-to-fail austerity measures a few years back, at the same time his administration was distributing and digesting amongst each other vast funds provided by the European Union to help Greece achieve social cohesion and financial stability among its European peers. New Democracy replaced a socialist government that had shown, after almost twenty years in power, a polarizing sense of ownership and entitlement when it came to the state’s administrative affairs and functions. Yet the right-center party has proven even more irresponsible and corrupted than expected. They haven’t just continued a tradition of bad practices; they have almost redefined it. I think it’s time we faced the truth. Our problems run deeper than simple political and managerial confusion and misfortune; they have a moral and cultural base.

For the last 35 years, we have based our society on the notion that we can consume more than we can actually afford as individuals, because as a nation we have been deprived of equal chances for development and prosperity due to war and poverty. It was not enough to blend in with the rest of the developed world. No, due to our innate sense of entitlement (thank you, Plato, Socrates, and Alexander), we craved showing to the rest of the world that we were on top. Our pride, conveyed in an unorthodox manner, became greed, and that deadly sin has been the driving force behind many of our actions. But now the party is over and the caterers are asking for their money. Will our European peers share the bill?

Probably yes, since the Greek financial woes challenge the very core of the Euro Zone. If the dream of a unified Europe is to survive, the members of the Euro Zone must show their commitment to it by helping Greece. Otherwise, it will be nothing more than a crystal castle waiting for someone with a sledgehammer to smash up. A tidal wave is threatening the Euro Zone, with the potential to destroy treaties, legislation and common policies. If Greece cannot survive the aftermath of the current crisis, then Spain and Portugal will follow next. The time has come for European leadership to prove its value. Millions have invested their lives and their nations’ stability, voluntarily or not, into the common Euro currency and the vision of a unified Europe.

Will the European leaders betray the idea of the European Union? Their behavior toward Greece will indicate their intentions. There is a choice to be made: either support Greece, and further strengthen the commitment to a politically and financially fused, mutually supportive Europe, or flush it all down the toilet of history.

During his presidential campaign, President Obama voiced numerous times the necessity to recognize what historians assert as the first holocaust of the 20th century, the Armenian Genocide. Unfortunately, after his ascension to the presidency, his words were rendered to an unfulfilled pledge, and this was not the first time this promise to the Armenian community had been broken.

In the midst of the First World War, during the early 1920s, the Armenian population, dwelling on Turkish soil, suffered gravely under the fist of the “Young Turks” government of the Ottoman Empire. Large groups of Armenians were violently uprooted from their homes and died of famine during their relocation, while others were executed during their employment in labor battalions. Even if there is no consensus on the exact number of Armenian deaths, the figures are still out of scale. According to Turkish state sources, 800,000 Armenians perished due to the extremities of that period, while numerous western historians have estimated the number of Armenian deaths as 1.5 million. Even with modern tools and practices, finding a ubiquitously accepted estimation of the fatalities is a difficult task.

Yet, the following years proved to be equally challenging for the Armenians, because they had to fight for the hearts and minds of the world, and secure the recognition of their blood-soaked past as one of the worst crimes against humanity. So far, twenty countries across the globe, including Greece, Belgium, Chile, France, Italy, Russia, and a handful of international institutions, which include the European Parliament, Mercosur, and the Council of Europe, have recognized the Armenian Genocide. For the USA, this issue remains controversial, despite the spirited efforts of passing a resolution that affirms the events of that period as genocide. The IAGS have repeatedly asserted that the Ottoman massacres of Armenians was genocide, and should be recognized as such by the United States. On March 7, 2009, in an open letter to President Obama, Gregory Stanton, President of IAGS stated, “we urge you to refer to the mass slaughter of Armenians as ‘genocide’ in your commemorative statement,’ just as you urged President George W. Bush to do in a letter, dated March 18, 2005.”

The aforementioned controversy is just hit the House of Representatives last month, when, on February 5, 2010, the Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Mr. Howard Berman, publicized his intention to call a committee vote on the nonbinding Armenian genocide resolution (H.Res.252) on March 4, 2010. This shouldn’t come as surprise, since the Democratic Congressman hails from the state of California, where the biggest Armenian community in the USA resides. H.Res.252 is the second resolution a Democrat from the Golden State has tried to pass through Congressional vote since 2007. It was introduced in the House of Representatives as a bipartisan resolution by Adam Schiff (D-CA), Frank Pallone (D-NJ), Mark Kirk (R-IL) and George Radanovich (R-CA) on March 17, 2009. Similar, thereby, to the previous one (H.Res.106), the new resolution calls on the President to ensure two basic things:

• That U.S. policy formally refers to the massacre as ‘genocide’, and to use that term when he delivers his annual message on the issue in April. (This was something Obama avoided doing last year.)

• The foreign policy of the United States reflects appropriate understanding and sensitivity concerning issues related to human rights, ethnic cleansing, and genocide documented in the United States record relating to the Armenian Genocide, and for other purposes.

Evidently Mr. Herman’s call has come in a timely fashion, because for the last few months, Turkey and Armenia have been trying to overcome their differences, replace their diplomatic relations, and open up their borders. At least, that is the desired direction of the accord the two countries signed on the 10th of October 2009 in Zurich, Switzerland. Although, this accord is at risk since both governments experience strong internal opposition, and Turkey has already shown marks of cold feet. If Turkey and Armenia kindle their relationship, it would profoundly reshape the South Caucasus area and put old allies at odds with the new regional status quo.

As for the USA, if the Congress ratifies the Armenian genocide resolution, a strong anti-American backlash will occur in Turkey. Such a development has the potential to disturb their bilateral relations in and out of NATO and yield obstacles in the deployment of American military efforts in Iraq and Afghanistan. On the other hand, could the acceptance of such a harsh labeling facilitate the path toward the European Union for Turkey? Could this also bring a new sense of regional stability? Or, will it push Turkish nationalists over to the brink of eruption? To be frank, the Armenian Genocide issue is not only a political matter, but also an emotional one in the memories of two nations. It resembles a dramatic chess game where the players hold in their hands the fate of millions. Handle with care, or else it will not end well.

Editor’s update: On March 4, 2010, a U.S. congressional panel has described the killing of Armenians by Turkish forces during World War I as ‘genocide’, despite White House objections. The resolution was narrowly approved by the House Foreign Affairs Committee. Turkey, a key U.S. ally, responded by recalling its ambassador in Washington for consultations. It has fiercely opposed the non-binding resolution.The White House had warned Congress that the vote would harm reconciliation talks between Turkey and Armenia.

___________________________________________________________________________

Ilias Kountoupis is a journalist and student who lives in Athens, Greece. Visit his website and his Facebook page. Photos used in this article are from www.firstgenocide.com

Last 5 posts by Ilias Kountoupis

• In for the Kill: Greece’s Economic Crisis - June 29th, 2010
• Revisiting the Armenian Genocide - March 5th, 2010
• When it Comes to Television, I’m Sworn to Piracy - September 10th, 2009
• Running Out of “Fuel” - One Staff Writer’s Experience with Writer’s Block - April 23rd, 2009
• Greece ─ Remember, Remember the 6th of December! - February 1st, 2009

With the opening of the new Acropolis Museum, Greece has stepped up its efforts in the campaign to return the Parthenon Marbles – and rightly so. Following a visit four years ago to the British Museum, and viewing these artifacts and reading notes of “the head is on display in Athens,” or “the hands are on display in Austria,” really lit my fuse. To me, separating them in that manner was like dismembering a body. Sacrilege! The time is long overdue to bring these treasures back to their rightful home.

For years, the British contended that they purchased the Marbles, which they refer to as the “Elgin Marbles,” named for Lord Elgin who first procured the controversial artifacts, then later sold them to the British government. Others, particularly the Hellenes, correctly refer to them as the Parthenon Marbles. Whatever you call them, they belong to Greece and should be returned without further ado, because the British did not purchase them from their rightful owner. Stolen goods are stolen goods, even if you’ve paid for them.

The British then insisted that there wasn’t a proper home for the marbles in Athens. Well, thanks to the ongoing efforts of former culture minister, actress Melina Mercouri, that argument is no longer valid. The brilliant, state-of-the-art Acropolis Museum opened recently, and according to the Greek News Agenda, received more than 90,000 visitors in the first seven days and more than 260,000 visitors from 169 countries viewed the website.

Just why won’t the Brits relent? Bottom line is… well, “the bottom line”. While Ian Jenkins, senior curator for the department of Greece and Rome at the British Museum was quoted as insisting that in Greece, the marbles are viewed “simply as part of the history of Athens,” whereas in Britain, they are viewed as “part of the history of the world,” the fact remains that the collection brings many visitors to the British Museum. In fact, that was the primary reason for my visit there in 2005. The museum makes a ton of money on souvenirs, books and tours that accompany the exhibit. There is so much there, that if they were to give them back to Greece, there would be a massive hole in their museum, not to mention their revenue streams.

With the opening of the new Acropolis Museum, a new worldwide attention has been garnered with respect to the return of the Marbles. British citizens are beginning to weigh in as well: according to a poll taken at www.theguardian.uk, 94.8% of Brits believe the Marbles should be returned. I wonder what Prince Philip thinks? He is Greek, after all, and he does have the Queen’s ear. Hmmm….

There’s a major effort underway via www.returnthemarbles.com. Here, one may sign an online petition, stating their belief that the Marbles should be returned to Greece. The organizers of this campaign assert that the Marbles are being “held hostage” in Britain, and they are working toward their release. Thousands of people around the world have already added their names to the petition.

Join in the effort and show your support for the return of the Parthenon Marbles to Greece. Visit www.returnthemarbles.com and add your name to the petition. Perhaps Athena can bestow some wisdom to those blocking the return, and we can summon the power of Zeus to make it happen. The fact remains; we are all stewards of Greece’s magnificent cultural heritage. Let our voices be heard. This reunion would not only be phenomenal, but also of great historic proportions. Give the Marbles back to Greece – once and for all.

By: Maria A. Karamitsos

Last 5 posts by Guest Writer

• TRUE GRIT Part Three of Into Africa |African Queens - October 19th, 2011
• Just Take the Shot! - October 19th, 2011
• Bits and Pieces - October 19th, 2011
• The Occupation of America—2011 - October 17th, 2011
• The Thing About Movements… - October 13th, 2011

Anyone care to take a punt on who the racist pictured is? Some ape-knuckled nobody with a string of convictions for football violence, and a promising career in handling stolen goods? Nope. That is one of our brand, spanking new Members of the European Parliament, Nick Griffin. He is no longer in the charming boys brigade that we all know and love, the National Front, made famous for such well- reasoned and politically astute gestures as firebombing Asian shops, starting riots in towns, putting petrol through the letterboxes of Asian families, and having swastikas tattooed on their enormous, ape-like foreheads. No, he is now the leader of the British National Party, who do exactly the same thing by using words instead of petrol bombs, wearing suits instead of ripped jeans with Doc Martens, and choosing to use a knife and fork at the table instead of just shovelling food into their mouths with both hands.

Griffin became famous for saying the holocaust was a “holo-hoax”, co-authoring a leaflet about how Jewish people were brainwashing the British (for which he received a suspended prison sentence) and claiming that men were raping women as part of an Islamic plot to take over the UK. Clearly not wise words, in fact one could claim they are the rancid ravings of an utter lunatic.

Mr Griffin said his victory in the European elections hailed a ‘Huge change in British politics’. You’re damned right there, you bigoted wanker, it’s been 60-odd years since Oswald Mosley and his black-shirted Fascists were derided in this country, and I for one thought the days of a right wing basket-weavers being given political airtime were over. Shows what I know, doesn’t it? Now the nasty little shit has been given a front row seat on the European gravy train, worth up to £395,000 a year, for a 5-year term, and whose fault is it? It’s ours, the people of the North West, because we voted them in.

I say we, I’d like to state here that I didn’t vote for them, I’d have drawn a picture of the Queen Mother on a bicycle, and blue tacked my ballot paper to the polling station wall before I’d have put my cross next to that odious little twerp’s name, but around twenty thousand people in this region thought it would be really clever to send a message to our failing government by voting not for a main party, but for a one-trick pony who knows nothing at all about the economy or domestic politics, but a lot about wanting to horsewhip Johnny Foreigner to the coastline and over the white cliffs of Dover into the sea. And by Johnny Foreigner, he does mean anyone who is foreign or anyone who is not foreign, but is not white. Good thinking people. Really well done.

It’s ironic, and not in a good way, that in the week we remembered those who died at Normandy and watched the veterans gathering for the services, we also voted in not just one, but two fascist thugs to positions of political influence. We really don’t learn, do we? So to the rest of the country, on behalf of the North West and twenty thousand complete fucking idiots, who under the old system of not allowing lunatics to vote, would probably have had their ballot papers taken off them, I have one thing to say…….”Sorry.”

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Hzq7OHn9iI&NR=1

Last 5 posts by Vicola England

• Wills and Kate Tat for Sale - December 17th, 2010
• Harmony or Hatred – What's Really Going on in Multicultural Britain? - July 1st, 2010
• The Stoning of Sister Mc Bride - June 30th, 2010
• A Letter to the (British) Department of Health - March 5th, 2010
• Swine Flu - Preparedness - Are YOU Ready? - May 1st, 2009

In an unusual turn of events for Australia, and more than likely as a measure of relief felt around the country, the inauguration of Barack Obama was telecast on several television stations, which indicated that the expectations in Oz are easily as high as those of his fans in the States.

After an initial acceptance of George W. Bush in his first term, (an acceptance that goes with the job by default), the general perception was very negative towards him, even before the end of his first term. In spite of his affable performances before the camera, and a huge wave of sympathy after the September 11 attacks, folks here in Australia generally realised that the President was especially lightweight when it came to thinking things through.

It wasn’t just the trouble he had with the English language, either. The perception here was that he didn’t understand diplomacy, was making matters worse in the terrorism stakes, and was prepared to utter any old rubbish before the cameras, expecting everyone to buy it. But, with the exception of our then Prime Minister, it certainly wasn’t bought in Oz. Sadly and surprisingly, however, it was bought by the American voters. This not only shocked Aussies, but just about every other country from which we get the news feeds.

Clearly, history has shown that the U.S. voters should have been much more judicious, but the damage was done, and now we here in Oz are wondering just how many fairies there are at the bottom of American voters’ gardens. They certainly don’t demand much of their leaders, and seem more inclined to embrace rather than challenge them.

Now, however, we have a whole new ball game, and Aussies are excited. The new leader is not only not a Republican, but he appears to be a Thinker, too. How this contradiction could occur in the U.S. voting system is perplexing to us, and how Americans will deal with it, is going to be interesting, too.

Rather than just a party change, the U.S. is about to discover an attitude change that requires them to watchdog their leader and keep the pressure on. This is going to be well beyond the party hacks who signed up for life, and it will be invigorating to see how long it takes them to recognise and adhere to the ‘customer-focused’ approach. I am sure Obama will do a good job, but he’ll do even better if regular folk keep him on the ball.

In Oz, we’re looking forward to seeing someone who is not out of his depth, if a problem requires more than applying bombs to it. We’re also very pleased to see that terrorism is going to have to do its own fundraising and recruitment, rather than rely on the efforts of a reckless George W. Bush, and the hard-earned dollars of the U.S. taxpayer. Being the optimists that we are, we hope to see a smarter financial plan, though the reality is that this may be stifled by the U.S. Senate. We also expect to see fewer bombs and more brain applied to foreign affairs, something that shouldn’t see too much resistance from the American people.

Finally, though it saddens me to say it, Aussies are wondering if President Obama can survive a whole term in office. Our expectations of how Americans deal with this change for the better are not good. This perhaps comes from our seeing the absolute worst of the so-called “rednecks” on the news, and having seen the support by this cluster for the last president, even when he was clearly out of his depth, has us worrying that action against a smarter President might transpire before the brains click in.

Time will tell.

Last 5 posts by Peter McCarthy

• The Nun and the Stripper - December 17th, 2010
• Can the Pope Be Detained? - June 29th, 2010
• SPACE - The Final Y Front-ier? - December 1st, 2009
• Pissy Could Drink - July 1st, 2009
• Do Violent Video Games Actually Teach Us to be Peace-loving? - April 23rd, 2009

Photo credits: Al-Jazeera. In the foreground is Samar, a 4-year old girl, who explains in the video footage that she was shot by soldiers in the hand and in the back, with a bullet exiting her stomach. Her father explains in the video footage that she was shot three times, and that her 6-year old and 8-year old sisters were killed by Israeli fire shot at close range. In the background, another women sits by the bedside of her injured daughter.....

On December 27, 2008, shortly before noon, Israel launched a military campaign against Gaza called, ‘Operation Cast Lead. It began with air and missile strikes against various Hamas targets. Israel’s Air Force is the fourth largest in the world. The stated objective of this campaign was to stop Hamas from carrying out further rocket attacks upon Israel by targeting Hamas militants and key members in Gaza. On the evening of January 3, Israel launched its ground invasion as the IDF (Israeli Defense Force) poured into northern Gaza City with tanks and gunships.

Sometimes, I think we forgot how lucky we are – those of us who aren’t living in conflict-torn places. In our complacency, we tend to ignore things that are going on in other parts of the world, preferring to hide behind our self-reassurance that these things aren’t happening to us, or would never happen to us.  We’re wrong. Because when people suffer around the world ─ no matter who they are ─ we, as fellow humans, collectively suffer. So, in this frame of mind, sitting in safety and security in my apartment in Zürich, I did some more reading on what had been transpiring in Gaza over the last few days and years:

• 1.5 million Palestinians live in the 360 square km (139 square mile) Gaza Strip. More than three-quarters of them are refugees whose families fled, or were driven from their land, in what is now Israel, in the 1948 Arab-Israeli war.

• Egypt captured the strip during that conflict, but lost it to Israel in the 1967 war.(Known as ‘The Six-Days War) Israel withdrew unilaterally in 2005, but kept control of access to and from the coastal enclave.

• Gaza has one of the world’s youngest and fastest-growing populations. About 45 percent are children aged below 15. The median age is 17.2 years. At the present growth rate of 3.42 percent, the population will double in 20 years.

• An Israeli blockade and international sanctions, since Hamas won a Palestinian election in 2006, have crippled Gaza’s economy, especially after Hamas seized control of the territory from President Mahmoud Abbas’s Palestinian Authority in 2007.

• Most Gazans live on less than $2 a day, and up to 80 percent are dependent on food aid, according to aid groups.

• Israel’s ban on exports and on all but humanitarian imports has forced 98 percent of Gaza’s industry to close. The World Bank estimates unemployment at 35 percent.

• The war has put more pressure on already stressed services. Casualties have overwhelmed hospitals and rescue teams. Food, cooking gas, fuel, electricity, and running water are scarce. Last week the World Bank said nearly all sewage and water pumps had stopped working due to fuel and power shortages. (Source — Reuters)

Yet, Israeli Foreign Minister, Tzipi Livni, was quoted as saying, “There is no humanitarian crisis in the Strip, and therefore there is no need for a humanitarian truce.”

Some might disagree when they learn that, despite Israel’s IDF insisting that it was only targeting Hamas, by January 14, 2009, the Palestinian death toll had surpassed 1000 – including over 300 children, and the wounded in Gaza numbered at more than 4,500.

Further, even though chief army spokesman for the foreign media, Major Avital Leibovich, stated, “We do our utmost to avoid hitting civilians, and many times we don’t fire because we see civilians nearby,”  the most recent figures, as put forth by medics in Gaza, are 1,330 dead – 65% civilians – and 5,450 wounded. (Source—MWC)

As well, Israel is using white phosphorus as a weapon. Several sources reported that there is ample evidence to suggest the white phosphorus was being used as a weapon, such as photographs of the incandescent falling rays among the civilians in areas of Gaza, and burn victims with very specific injuries were appearing from those areas.

The UK Times Online reported, “The 1980 Geneva treaty says that white phosphorus should not be used as a weapon of war in civilian areas, but there is no blanket ban on its use as a smokescreen or for illumination. It produces a thick white smoke when exposed to oxygen, but can cause severe burns, and will melt flesh to the bone, if  it comes into contact with skin. The sudden influx of burns patients at Nasser Hospital coincided with Israel’s expanded ground offensive, which included the Al-Qarara and Kuza’a suburbs of Khan Yunis.”

More than 50 people with burns were taken into Nasser Hospital in the southern town of Khan Yunis, in what the hospital director, Youssef Abu Al-Reesh, said was a massive case of exposure to white phosphorus. “We don’t have the medical experience to judge these cases, but we searched the internet according to the cases we have, and it indeed confirmed that it’s white phosphorus munitions. I have been working in this hospital for ten years, and I have never seen anything like this.”

Although there is apparently some debate as to whether white phosphorus is actually a chemical weapon, according to the Chemical Weapons Convention, if the toxic properties of white phosphorus are intentionally used upon a civilian population, then it is prohibited. Although Israel did not sign the CWC, it is beholden to the Geneva Conventions which state that a civilian population must be protected while targeting the opposition and in considering enemy response.

Despite the evidence, Israel vehemently denied using WP in Gaza. However, a few days ago, The Guardian reported this:

“After weeks of denying that they had used white phosphorus in heavily-populated areas of Gaza, the IDF has admitted that Israeli forces may have used the napalm-like chemical in violation of both international law and the Israeli military’s own policy.”

Israel is also using DIME Weapons, which stands for ‘Dense Inert Metal Explosives.’ This was reported on Al Jazeera’s coverage of Operation Cast Lead. Marc Garlasco, a senior military analyst at Human Rights Watch, who is in Israel to investigate both sides’  use of weaponry, had this to say:

“DIME – the dense inert metal explosive, consisting of 25 percent TNT and 75 percent tungsten, [is] a heavy metal. You mix the two in a fine grain, like pepper, and when the bomb hits the ground, it aerosolizes. In less than a second, the mist dissipates and explodes. [The bomb] strikes a very small area, 10 to 20 meters, and the fire it ignites burns out very quickly. If it hits us now, we will die, but no one around us will be hurt. The problem is that when you are killed, you are ripped to shreds and there is nothing left.”

Al Jazeera also reported Dr. Jan Brommundt, a German doctor working for Medecins du Monde in the south Gazan city of Khan Younis, described the injuries he had seen as “absolutely gruesome.” [...] Brommundt also described widespread, but previously unseen abdominal injuries that appear minor at first, but degenerate within hours, causing multiple organ failure.  He said:

“Initially, everything seems in order … but they will present, within one to five hours, with an acute abdomen which looks like appendicitis, but it turns out on operation that dozens of miniature particles can be found in all of their organs. It seems to be some sort of explosive or shell that disperses tiny particles at around 1-by-1 or 2-by-1 millimeters that penetrate all organs, these miniature injuries, you are not able to attack them surgically.”

Another doctor who treated such injuries was Dr. Erik Fosse, a Swedish doctor who worked at Shifa Hospital in Gaza from December 31 to Jan 10.  He submitted a report to the Swedish government accusing the Israeli government of waiting until the aid workers from Western countries had gone home for Christmas before deliberately attacking civilians.

“The Palestinian witnesses, as medical workers, are very accurate in their reports, but if we hadn’t been there to confirm their testimony, it would all have been presented as Hamas propaganda,” he said.

Here is a video of the report:

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_IhXSNTG_k0&eurl=http://a7.vox-data.com/6a00d41430d1e33c7f011016284fd7860c-html

Israel has banned foreign journalists since December 27th, an indication that a country knows it is committing an atrocity. American mainstream news sources, in particular the cable news sources, leave the American people largely ignorant of the real news, especially in regards to these events, which were not reported. The information above comes from BBC World and Al Jazeera. Americans are not getting the majority of real news coming out of Gaza right now, because Al Jazeera has been the only network broadcasting live coverage from inside Gaza. This network is only available from cable providers in the United States in three cities ─ in Burlington, Toledo, OH, and Washington, D.C. – thanks largely to the Bush administration’s propaganda against the network in the early years of Iraq. However, for those who wish a more unbiased footage of events,  the Al Jazeera broadcasts can also be found online, without censorship.

Israel and Hamas have since agreed to a cease-fire. And perhaps taking note of widespread global condemnation for its actions in Gaza, Israel has put together a defence team for the military and civilians involved. All this might leave one wondering whether Operation Cast Lead actually achieved Israel’s goals, because while Israel’s leaders claimed victory, Hamas has also claimed a victory of a different kind. And with this, the old maxim springs to mind, “violence begets violence”.

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