Wednesday, October 26, 2005

I Want a Seat On the Bus



A great American Hero, Rosa Parks, has died. When she was 42 she performed an act of informed defiance and nonviolent protest. Despite laws requiring that blacks give up their bus seats to whites, she refused to surrender her seat and was arrested, jailed and fined. Parks said of her action, “I felt I had a right to be treated as any other passenger. We had endured that kind of treatment for too long.”

Parks didn’t know that her solitary act would add momentum to a movement that would result in the 1964 federal Civil Rights Act, which made racial discrimination in public facilities illegal. She didn’t know that she would one day be heralded as the “mother of the civil rights movement.” Rosa said looking back, “At the time I was arrested I had no idea it would turn into this. It was just a day like any other day. The only thing that made it significant was that the masses of the people joined in.”

America is experiencing a similar environment of discrimination and exclusion today. Millions of Americans want a seat on the bus of democracy, but we are told that we have to give up our seats to rich individuals and corporations that have claimed our democracy and our representatives as their own. The rich and the powerful have everything on their side. They control the media. They write the laws. They flood the courts with their representatives. They choose the Tweedle-Dee and Tweedle-Dumb candidates that we are expected to give our rubber stamp of approval to. And we are supposed to ignore the fact that these “candidates” either are already millionaires or quickly become millionaires by playing along when they get to Washington. Republican or Democrat doesn’t matter any longer, they are all on the payroll of these large corporations.

The capitalist elites and their corporate entities sneer when simple people like Cindy Sheehan demand their seat on the bus of democracy. After all, what can a simple citizen do against such a juggernaut of power? But Rosa Parks was just a simple woman. Martin Luther King Jr. was just a simple man. The Civil Rights Movement was made up of millions of simple citizens who resolutely resisted the tyranny of the power elite and demanded their seats on the bus of democracy.

We can do the same. The promise of democracy is a government of the people, for the people, and by the people. What we have now is a government of the rich, for the rich, and by the rich. We must resist this tyranny. We must demand our seat on the Bus of Democracy. We the People must reclaim our government.

Wednesday, November the 2nd, 2005 is the one-year anniversary of the reelection of George W. Bush, the self proclaimed CEO President who has used lies to send our sons and daughters to invade a country that was no threat to the security of America so that his constituency, the capitalist elite and the corporations, could make billions of dollars while bankrupting the U.S. Treasury and handing the tax bill to future generations of tax payers. Bush, the self proclaimed compassionate conservative, orders the dropping of cluster bombs on residential neighborhoods and says that torture is a justifiable treatment of prisoners.

Wednesday, November 2nd, 2005 can be the beginning of the new civil rights movement. Even a simple action can add momentum to a movement. Do not go to school or work next Wednesday. Do not bank or shop. Do not buy gasoline. Do not watch mainstream media. 66% of Americans say they do not approve of the Bush Administration’s war in Iraq. Imagine the message it would send if 66% of Americans did not go to Wal-Mart or report for work. Resist this government of the elite and demand a government of the People and for the People.

Demand your seat on the Bus of Democracy, everyday.
We are just people, but that is what democracy is all about, people.
People like you and me.

http://www.worldcantwait.org/
http://wcwhookup.blogspot.com/2005/10/letter-to-friend-about-nov-2nd.html

Tuesday, October 25, 2005

Strange Days


Strange days have found us
Strange days have tracked us down
They’re going to destroy
Our casual joys
We shall go on playing
Or find a new town
Yeah!
Strange eyes fill strange rooms
Voices will signal their tired end
The hostess is grinning
Her guests sleep from sinning
Hear me talk of sin
And you know this is it
Yeah!
Strange days have found us
And through their strange hours
We linger alone
Bodies confused
Memories misused
As we run from the day
To a strange night of stone
--Jim Morrison & The Doors


Rosa Parks, the mother of the civil rights movement has died.

Then number of U.S. military dead in Iraq reaches 2,000,
just as the Iraqis announced the ratification of their new constitution making Iraq an Islamic Republic.
News of which has the U.S. military so excited that they have revived the popular Vietnam War practice of announcing “enemy body counts” to show us the impact of their counterinsurgency operations, so that there is no doubt in American minds that our troops are kicking the crap out of the enemy.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/10/23/AR2005102301273.html


Meanwhile a triple bombing kills at least 17 in Baghdad.
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/world/12987978.htm
But the President says the war in Iraq is not the cause of rising terrorism.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000103&sid=aduP_7xj9mig&refer=us
And Bush calls on us to spend more time and sacrifice more lives in Iraq and rejected calls for a U.S. pullout.

Back at the ranch, the whole White House staff is waiting for Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald to announce who will be indicted and for what.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1151AP_Cheneys_Role.html
Dick Cheney, Scooter Libby, Carl Rove, are all holding their breath, because they all know they lied us into a war and then lied to discredit the people who tried to expose the lies. The question really isn’t “are the people in the White House criminals?” The question is “will we be able to prove it in a court of law, or whether we will have to try these thugs in the court of the blogosphere?”
http://www.upi.com/InternationalIntelligence/view.php?StoryID=20051023-104217-9679r

On the trivial side, Infinity Broadcasting thinks David Lee Roth can be just as annoying as Howard Stern.
http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financialnews/D8DF9CJO9.htm?campaign_id=apn_home_down&chan=db

And on the Big Brother front, those tiny dots produced by your color laser printer are really a secret code that allows the government to track down who printed what, when and on what printer.
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/1025-08.htm
So don’t print any color leaflets for those November 2nd, Day of Resistance demonstrations.
http://www.worldcantwait.org/

Strange Days indeed, Jim.

Thursday, October 13, 2005

Don’t Take Photos to Wal-Mart


Notice to the Secret Service: My name is Jay Larsen, and I approve of the above photo. I took the above photo. It is my right as an American to express my political views and I disapprove of our current President.

Fortunately, I used a digital camera and didn’t have to take my film to Wal-Mart for processing. That’s what a student in North Carolina did and it got him and his teacher a visit from the Secret Service.

The Progressive describes what happened to a senior in Selina Jarvis’ Civics and Economics class. The students were assigned to “to take photographs to illustrate their rights in the Bill of Rights.” So one of the students took a picture of George W Bush with a red thumb tack through his head with his hand making a thumb’s down sign—just like my picture above. The student was doing his assignment and illustrating the right to dissent.

But an employee at the Kitty Hawk Wal-Mart, which developed the student’s film thought the picture posed a threat and called the Kitty Hawk police, who called the Secret Service. On September 20, the Secret Service visited Currituck High, confiscated the poster with the offensive picture and interrogated the student and his teacher, Selina Jarvis. No charges have been filed.

Jarvis describes the incident as “ridiculous.” I agree.

Wednesday, October 12, 2005

Go Granny D


Truthout.org posted a speech by Dorris "Granny D" Haddock.
An enjoyable read about the "two great and growing devisions separating us as Americans: rich versus poor, and left versus right."

She says:
"Let us indeed believe that all people are equal, but let us not assume that all political opinions are equal, for some are toxic and sociopathic and require our loving intervention. Let us intervene. Let us stand up in church gatherings, let us confront our friends. Let us use the tools of mass communication to awaken people to the lies that bind them."
Read the entire speech. I highly recommend it.

Thursday, October 06, 2005

Freudian Soliloquy

The President said he was going to make a “major speech”. He promised us a revealing look at the terrorists and our continuing struggle against them. Support for the Iraq War has been flagging and George needed to rally the faithful. Obviously I was not part of the President’s intended audience because I was not rallied by this morning’s oration, I was sickened.

People have often speculated about Mr. Bush’s intelligence, or lack of it. Some people think he is not very smart. But now it is apparent that George thinks the American People are dumber than he is.

There were the outright lies, like saying that “Today there are more than 80 Iraqi army battalions fighting the insurgency alongside our forces.” When General George Casey, overall commander in Iraq just testified under oath that there was “only one Iraqi army battalion now able to fight without U.S. help” down from three battalions that had that capability in June.

Then there was the rewriting of history, saying that we went to Iraq to fight Al-Qaeda. Which is a lot like saying that you went to Florida for the snowboarding.

And there was a lot of flag waving and the inevitable references to 9-11. That was nothing new.

But what really twisted my gut as I listened to the President’s speech, was the way his descriptions of the “enemy” were also apt descriptions of the Neo-Con Cabala and their Corporate Supporters who have taken power in Washington DC. George W Bush was describing himself. Here are a few examples:

“Evil men obsessed with ambition and unburdened by conscience must be taken very seriously, and we must stop them before their crimes can multiply.
Defeating a militant network is difficult because it thrives like a parasite on the suffering and frustration of others.
The radicals exploit local conflicts to build a culture of victimization in which someone else is always to blame and violence is always the solution.
They exploit resentful and disillusioned young men and women, recruiting them through radical mosques as the pawns of terror.
And they exploit modern technology to multiply their destructive power.”

“We're facing a radical ideology with unalterable objectives: to enslave whole nations and intimidate the world.”

“In truth, they have endless ambitions of imperial domination and they wish to make everyone powerless except themselves.”

George W Bush believes he is describing the Terrorists, and he is. Make no mistake; I am no fan of terrorism from any source. But the President is unwittingly describing his own relationship to the free world. His is a radical ideology with unalterable objectives: to enslave whole nations and intimidate the world.

Do we want to get into a contest with terrorists, to see who can be the most brutal? To see who can instill the most fear and impose their will despite the will of the people? I say no. The question is who we want to be as a people? Who do We The People want to be? I don’t want to be a terrorist. I don’t want to bomb anyone. I don’t want to wage war. Yet these extremists, the terrorists and the Neo-Cons, are proving themselves all to willing to spread war and destruction to get what they want. They are both willing to ignore the cries of the people. These foes on both sides are the enemies of America, the enemies of Iraq, the enemies of Islam, the enemies of Christianity, and above all else the enemies of humanity.

What can we as ordinary people do about this situation? How can we stop these extremists from terrorizing the world and keeping us in fear? Well, while George W Bush was accidentally describing his own motivations and ambitions, he also accidentally told us how to resist and how to end this tyranny:

George said, “Against such an enemy there is only one effective response: We will never back down, never give in and never accept anything less than complete victory. … And whatever lies ahead in the war against this ideology, the outcome is not in doubt: Those who despise freedom and progress have condemned themselves to isolation decline and collapse.
Because free peoples believe in the future, free peoples will own the future. We didn't ask for this global struggle, but we're answering history's call with confidence and a comprehensive strategy.
Defeating a broad and adaptive network requires patience, constant pressure, and strong partners in Europe, the Middle East, North Africa, Asia and beyond. …
We don't know the course of our own struggle, the course our own struggle will take, or the sacrifices that might lie ahead.
We do know, however, that the defense of freedom is worth our sacrifice. We do know the love of freedom is the mightiest force of history. And we do know the cause of freedom will once again prevail.”

For once, I couldn’t agree with you more, Mr. President. We The People will never back down, and you have condemned yourself to increasing isolation, decline and collapse. Freedom will once again prevail when We The People reclaim our democracy from you and your supporters and handlers.