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1. Your first link proves that the US did nothing to help the Jews fleeing fascist persecution. The infamous Evian conference as your own cited source actually states
Roosevelt noted that none of the participating countries should be expected to modify its refugee admission policy.
and says in an earlier part of the same
document that
The restrictive immigration practices of the major overseas countries vis-à-vis Jewish refugees reflected a global climate of economic protectionism tinged with xenophobia and outright anti-Semitism. An international conference on refugees at Evian (France) in July 1938, initiated by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, proved to be a complete fiasco. Except for the Dominican Republic, none of the representatives of the 32 countries invited offered prospective Jewish refugees from Germany and Austria any hope whatsoever.
So....what do we have. We have the US refusing to help Jews out of economic interest. Nice example.
2. Your second link is to a contextless, un-analytical but accurate piece on US entry into WW2. It shows that the US tried to stay out of this conflict because of anti-Semitism, but then entered because it was afraid of the growing German threat? So what? I'm arguing that the US intervenes out of economic interest and had done so well before WW1 and WW2. Ask the Filipinos. Ask the Mexicans. And then the US enters because it is afraid of a growing threat. You consider this moral in some way?
W.r.t you putting your life on the line, I'm not surprised that you'd rather be in a plane dropping bombs on ground troops than actually fighting. On the other hand maybe the Taliban will use some of the US-made and paid for Stinger missiles (transported by the Pakistani ISI special intelligence services) to shoot you down? You'll be dead, but Lockheed share-holders will have a profit boost to look forward to. So in summary, well done. A moral and carefully thought out response. Your analogy is flawed. Here is a better one:
You and your wealthy neighbours frequently knock down the children in the poor barrio on your way to your well paying jobs. Sometimes they protest and elect city officials to erect speed bumps and make you and your neighbors slow down. Then the cops shoot the city official and install their own corrupt politicians. Finally a group of nuts from the barrio hijack a car and run down your neighbor's kid. He starts firing mortar shells at them. You help pump up emotion in support of him. Where's the good guy?
I'm glad you don't want to blow up Arabs "blindly". I hope you also don't want to do it with your eyes open and your mouth lying.
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Do you put no blame on the governments of those countries for their financial troubles?
Yes I do. Most of them consist of corrupt elites who are supported by our "democracy". But why are they there? Mostly because we keep them in power so we can strip their raw resources.
We actually tried to help the jews as early as 1938,
Cite me some article or book that I can check this assertion in.
It's true that we ignored the suffering for a while, we were at the time trying to stay out of world affairs as much as possible.
Again, exactly how does your assertion of "staying out of world affairs" square with the actual historical facts of massive US intervention in Spanish America? China? Russia?
to name but a few?
Something everyone says we should do now, it's seems we can't win either way. Of course we would get involved when it began to affect us, wouldn't you try to fight something that could potentially hurt you?
Your can't win either way complaint is bogus. We have never been "not intervening". Yes, I certainly would try to fight something that might hurt me. I would fight the urge to steal and bully, I would fight (with words) the elites of my country who advocate the policies that cause ME to be threatened for THEIR gain.
As far as your rant about lifespan you seem to completely ignore things such as vaccinations to deadly illnesses, transplants of vital organs, bypass surgeries. To pretend that many people would not be dead if not for those things is disengenious (sic) at best.
No, I don't ignore them. I discount them as being a significant factor in the elongation of human life-span. Read the reference I gave you. I don't pretend that many people would not be dead for those things. I DO assert that the fabulous capital driven bio-medical research produces mainly trivial products. It does this with capital stripped from 3rd world countries and hence kills more people than it cures. I want less choice of cough-medicine and more money going to democratic 3rd world countries basic sanitation infrastructure (christ how many times do you have to be told things?).
The basic flaw in your position is that you assume a very primitive human flaw, greed, would suddenly go away if we were to switch to socialism, or some other economic model.
No. I believe that some greed is innate but that a lot of it is due to socialization and the moral climate you live in. If you live in a society where greed is thought to actually be a good thing (capitalism) then it gets hyper-developed. Communism recognises that this is part of the human organism and attempts to control it to the benefit of all.
You need to realize that maybe if the socialist countries you hold so dear had the resources of the US, that they might just be as imperialistic and "evil".
When have I said that I hold socialist countries dear? Again you attempt to put words in my mouth. I don't like any of the so-called socialist or communist states that exist or existed. I consider them to be flawed authoritarian, non-democratic implementations of socialism. I think those that exist and have existed are definitely imperialist and evil. That's because they were morally bankrupt. They didn't believe in democracy any more than you do.
After all, I hate to tell you, but domineering government has existed LONG before democracy or capitalism, and greed probably even before government.
I agree that domineering government existed long before either the political system democracy or the economic system capitalism or the facet of human nature greed. So what?
And since you are calling me hypocritical, what about you? On one end you are saying that we have no business in Israel, and on the other you are suggesting that I enlist?
I feel that if you are advocating WAR then YOU should be the one to put your life on the line rather than me or my family or my friends or anyone else. I'd rather you came home in a body bag than someone that is a humane, rational, educated being.
Do you think that the big bad evil American government is going to use a growing military to back out of a war against a people that very likely just killed thousands of Americans? I didn't think so.
I don't think so either. But I am again appalled at your ignorance, jingoism and stereotyping. What do you mean by "a people that very likely just killed thousands?". Are you seriously talking about going to war with a whole nation or ethnic group or religion because some of them are murderers? You are definitely a hypocrite. You are also a volitional murderer. You are more fitted to live with the terrorists than in a nation that aspires to democracy. Finally you might try reading the following (Turning the Tide:Noam Chomsky, The Dark Side of Europe:Geoffrey Harris) to see the lovely things the US did against fascism in Europe (actually I know you're too lazy to read so here's the skinny: they kept large networks of Nazi and Fascist military intelligence and special police in place so that they could attack the communists. They rewarded the capitalists who had been members of the Nazi party by not hanging them. Instead they made them rich with our tax-dollars. (A movie you might see is "The Nasty Girl" dir. Paul Verhoeven (Total Recall)).
No it's not ALL our fault. It's partly our fault. I too hope that people remember at the mass funerals that there is a large circle of blame. I hope that those funerals are not turned into a jingoistic carnival of grief. How mind numbing it is to see people wrapping themselves in the flag, refusing to accept that things just as bad have happened and are happening in order to maintain an Empire. I condemn all terrorism, all bloodshed, all murder. I condemn the NYC terrorists and their supporters, I condemn the people that bombed Iraq and is starving it's people and I condemn their supporters. I condemn the people that invaded Chechnya and their supporters. I condemn the Indonesians and their supporters. I condemn you for you support of all these things.
Ah...Israels willingness to negotiate would be indicated by their occupation of Jericho perhaps? B.t.w. Arafat and his Fatah/PLO friends that we are trying to "help" regularly use torture and repression against democratic dissidents in their little statelet. Third world countries ARE looking at their governments and they don't like them.....hence terrorism. You are not naive, you are jingoistic, mis-informed and dangerous. Yes, stupidity and ignorance are dangerous. You have a responsibility as a citizen to become informed.
Which history books? Which facts are not straight? What does your non-sequitur about multi-culturalism have to do with it? Also the US is more of a melting-pot than Britain. It's time you stepped out of Little-Know-Nothing-By-The-Wold-Upon-Dickhampton
Robust capitalism is necessary for democracy because the flow of capital gives the middle class a voice.
Democracy is government by ALL the people.
corporations have been beaten on issues like the MAI
And have beaten us on NAFTA, GATT, Kyoto, land-mines They've also heavily beaten the millions that are estimated to be actual slaves. The many, many millions more that are de facto slaves. The millions that are dying due to simple lack of food and clean water. "Democratic capitalism" at its best stinks.
Re:What can be done about terrorism?
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I don't believe you are sincere. Your post has further convinced me that you are trying to use (justified) emotions to justify an appalling system. I will continue to believe that you are a hypocrite until you face up to and admit that ALL acts of terror must be stopped. Most importantly, until you admit that the current world system - Capitalism (which is for the most part dominated by the US) - has brutal and appalling consequences then I believe that you are a hypocrite. Your further defence of this sickening system confirms me in this. To take your points in brief order: 1. The US has lost billions. Untrue. The US has invested billions in (eg the Marshall Plan) in order to stop the spread of communism. This has been amply repaid by the control they have over the slave-labor countries of the third world. Please note also that the US foreign aid interest repayments greatly exceed any original investment and keep the countries that received it in a position where they cannot develop infra-structure. 2. I ignore US deaths (btw America refers to the whole continent, not just the US) in WW2 in defence of freedom. No I don't ignore them. Those soldiers, ordinary people like me, had to die because there was no MORAL US intervention by the US and the rest of Europe against the fascists. Our elites were too busy worrying about the spread of communism. So they allowed the Jews to be exterminated. In many cases they even helped. It was only when the Reich looked like it was going to be a threat that they intervened. See a similar story with that bastard Hussein? As long as he was killing Kurds quietly and not being a direct threat to/our/ power he was allowed.
3. There are two sides to every coin. Yes and there are six sides to a die, and many faces of evil. corporate greed is responsible for saving the lives of millions How can you write this in the same post in which you emote over the death of your mother and the threat to your family in NYC? Do you genuinely not understand or are you so deeply cynical? The average life-span in the developed countries has been extended by 3 years since the turn of the century. That is the advantage that modern medicine has given us (ref: Richard Lewontin, "Massey Lectures" c.1995). The increase in life-span since the mid C.19th is due to basic public sanitation. The wonderful capitalist that are producing viagra and hay-fever medicines and 600 brands of dyspepsia tablets are stripping the majority of countries in the world of the ability to implement BASIC PUBILC SANITATION. Have you ever been in a 3rd world country? Ever seen the shit in the streets?
4.In the US you can say what you wantEver hear of the House Committee for Un-American Activities? Ever been on a peaceful demonstration attacked by the police?
5. Capitalism isn't perfect No, it's deeply flawed and based upon a disgusting model of human interaction that can only result in tragedy.
6.The US tries to stay out of foreign affairs Look at US involvement prior to WW2. Do you think that the Nicaraguans felt that the US was staying out of their business? How about the Mexicans? How about how the Soviets must have felt when the expeditionary force landed at archangel (mostly brits there but US backed). How about the US had intervened MORALLY prior to the war protesting what was happening in Germany? But no, our famous capitalists were busy meeting with Herr Hitler and exchanging mutual admiration notes. Your claim would be laughable if it were not so disgusting. no matter what the provokation (sic) the terrorist action was NOT justified Agreed. I have never for one minute argued to the contrary don't try to justify peoples (sic) deaths because America is evil Again I have never done this. Show me one example. On the contrary I completely condemn this act, as I condemn ALL acts of terror. Unlike you I am not trying to justify these home deaths and the foreign deaths as an "imperfect" but best possible system.
7.save negative comments until after the perpetrators are brought to justice Why? It has happened now. I am outraged and saddened. I consider that part of the blame lies with US foreign policy and with capitalism in general. I want them brought to justice. I don't feel like remaining quiet and pretending that killing the swine that did this will solve anything. Unlike you I don't want this to happen again and I want the similar things that are happening now to stop. We can do that. We have a moral responsibility to do it. Otherwise we're dancing on graves.
8.its just plane (sic) stupid to blame skyscrapers and airplanes for what happened You said it.
Re:What can be done about terrorism?
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People go to war because they either have different beliefs or want each other's land. The Palestinians both have different beliefs than the Israelis and the two want the same land. I don't see what this has to do with globalization Expand the concept of "land" to natural resources and maybe you'll get the picture. At the moment we're getting a huge flow of natural resources from everywhere else in the world. Depending upon who we "favor" (that is, use to control the others) then other players will be more or less angry with us. Currently it is nice to have cheap gas. So we have a base in the Middle East. They call it Israel, but really it's a missile launch site cum munitions dump. To be sure the individual actors in that tragedy have historical justifications for their exclusive claims. They both cling to extremist Nationalist policies that make compromise difficult. By alternately playing them against one another we can keep them weak but viciously engaged.
Israel and Palestine could both drop off the face of the earth without affecting the United States' GDP.
Sure, sure
If the US was really interested in the money it would do well to side with the Arabs (with the oil) rather than the Israelis
with their relatively worthless bit of desert. Unfortunately the Arabs had ideas of their own for a while (remember OPEC and oil shortages?) and it's handy to have base for your missiles to keep down rival capitalists.
Oh sure, the western world caused AIDs
Oh sure, the western world isn't causing the AIDS EPIDEMIC. It's not witholding the right to make medicines that help treat the AIDS EPIDEMIC. It's not collecting billions in debt repayment from countries too poor to afford fscking disposable rubber gloves let alone a safe blood transfusion service. Too poor to eat!. Yeah! Oh sure!
and globalization is the root of the constant infighting in Africa. It has nothing to do with the results of pre-globalization imperialism. It has nothing to do with the aftermath of the cold war.
It has nothing to do with the arbitrary borders drawn by notorious "globalizers" like 1950s Belgium and Holland.
Imagine a fire. It's dark. The wolves are howling around outside the circle of light and a chill wind is blowing. Draw closer to the fire, warm yourself. Enjoy it. Feel the comfort. But....what the...!!! You can see that the fire is made of the writhing, tortured, blackened limbs of millions of people. Some of them you've never seen, some of them you've passed by in your SUV, some of them you've walked past not many yards from where they beg. That fire my friend is CAPITALISM. It brings some pathetic comfort to the few at the expense of the many. Now, take your can of barbecue lighter fuel and splash it on, the flames blaze higher, the people scream louder and you are warmer.....hmmm....that bit of flesh doesn't look too burnt. Globalization is the lighter fuel. You are the cannibal. But beware, the flames have started to spread. You may get burnt.
People have constructed excuses to kill each other for thousands of years. The killing reached its height years before globalization was a term or an idea.
I look forward to two things: first, your date for when globalization began; second, statistics that prove your assertion that "the killing" reached its height at some date in the past. Note that I would like you to get me some figures for not only those slaughtered directly to bring them the benefits of global trade, but also those whose lives are cut short through lack of medicines, lack of food, labor in dangerous environments etc.
People died horribly yesterday because the US is involved in a fight with people who are very desperate.
And the obvious question is why are they desperate, and the even more obvious answer is because they are being attacked. So then one asks, do we really need to attack them? And one answers, only if we want to continue to get their "land" cheap. Personally speaking, I don't. I don't think that death and torture are an acceptable price to pay. Obviously you do though.
Globalization or not, that can only be avoided by withdrawing from the world stage.
On the contrary, it means that the West has to start acting in a humane manner. We have to send medicines, workers, educators. We have to stop bleeding them dry. We have to pay a fair price for their goods. We have to oppose dictatorial regimes whether or not they are prepared to prostitute their peoples to us. We have to be MORAL. Otherwise we create viciousness.
That withdrawl would be a license to
monsters all over the world to follow in the footsteps of Rwanda and Cambodia.
Do you have any idea of how culpable the US was for Cambodia? Have you ever bothered to get off your arse and read John Pilger? Have you sincerely tried to find out WHY this and Vietnam and Laos happened? Are you an educated CITIZEN or are you a slave parroting his master's platitudes?
The US needs to be more engaged in the world, not less. But there may be blow-back. It's the price of getting involved.
See above.
Go ahead. Even today, I would much rather live in New York city than in a city in any of the countries practicing alternatives to democratic capitalism: Havana, Beijing, Pyongyang.
I'd rather not live in any of those horrible places either. Because if I did then I would be working for a lot less so that YOU could have a lot more. No thanks.
Do you have a proposed alternative or are you just
"fighting the machine", "getting back at the man" and all that other stuff that is appropriate to rebellious youth?
Yes, I propose that we try communism again. Not the State Socialism of the USSR under the Marxist-Leninists. Rather, the communism that existed for a brief period in the direct democracy of the workers Soviets in Petrograd before they came under the control of the Bolsheviks. The communism of Gramsci's Factory Councils, the communism of the Friends of Durutti in Spain in 1936 and of the militias, the communism of Ida Mett, Piotr Arshinov, Nestor Makhno and the Platform of Libertarian Communists. Something like that. It sounds a lot better than the disgusting amoral, heartless, murderous, pointless Capitalism that you advocate.
Would you rather live in mainland China or Hong Kong/Taiwan? East Germany or West? South Korea or North?
And have you stopped beating your wife yet? Yes!, NO!, I mean yes!. I'd rather live in a direct-democracy with immediately recallable delegates, communal property and production. You can stuff your miserable Capitalism.
You know what they need in Africa, and Afghanistan and every place in the world where people are oppressed? They need democractic capitalism.
What they need is to not have to pay crippling interest on loans negotiated at the point of a gun. What they need is for you to show some moral responsibility and a little human empathy. What they need is for you to stop licking your master's hand and to stop kicking their heads.
We've done the experiment over and over again and we know the results.
We sure do. Mass starvation in the midst of over-production. Millions of tons of bombs dropped on the innocent. Hundreds of thousands of innocents killed by competing capitalist factions.
You are
just cruel if you want to subject some poor people to yet another alternate system.
Whilst you offer them mass hunger and free bombings when they object. Oh generous one.
I'm a left leaning liberal
What, one of your legs is shorter than the other? Or do you mean that you lean over to the left while you take it from the boss? Or do you mean that when you look out upon the world you lean to one side so as not to see the misery so that you can congratulate yourself.
but I'm not naive enough to still believe we should be pursuing some alternate system.
You're not naive. You're degenerate. You're cynical. You're ignorant. You're un-informed. You're amoral. But you're not naive.
Maybe once we've wiped out poverty and AIDs we'll have the bandwidth to experiment with alternate systems but right now we need to get those people good jobs, good homes and enough purchasing power that they can buy
some influence over their own governments.
I find it hard to disagree with most of what you say. I just believe that there'll be more and more of this sort of thing _unless_ we have a popular movement to stop our "governments" from fomenting this hatred. I agree with what you say about there being a problem with defining exactly where the guilt stops. I think that we can definitely extend it to a wider circle than the terrorists that planned and carried this out. We can also include the policy makers of NATO. That includes most of our political and business elite apart from those that have taken action, no matter how small against NATO/Western brutalities.
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I'm equally disgusted
I don't believe you. You can't be on the basis of what you have admitted. You've said that the lives of millions of innocents are worth it so that you can have air-conditioning. that someone like you could blame the "Evil Capitalist United States" Please don't forget that I also blame all the European client states and their "social democratic" parties that play along with NATO when even our must hated enemies of the past are standing by our side. Such as the human rights abusing Russia, China etc etc......doesn't it make you wonder about a couple of little details of morality called "sincerity" and "honesty" when you write this sentence? Your tears are crocodile tears and they dishonour the dead of all nations from all atrocities.
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what I'm saying is that capitalism works Yes, and what I'm saying is that the results of its workings are to produce a large number of people with a genuine grudge against those that do well out of the system. Face it, capitalism has had a free run of a large part of the earth in recent history. We are seeing the results of that. Your ideological masters are running the world. The problems of the world are now squarely attributable to your preferred system. You can't dodge it. Blaming what happened in NYC on capitalism is the stupidest thing I've ever heard. I've got news for you idiots Insults indicate that you have no rational response to make. If you can't frame a coherent, reasoned response then you should sit back and take a break for an hour or ten and get some thoughts The USA isn't the only capitalist
country.
True. But it is the most powerful country in the world. It is the one that directly intervenes around the world. Take a guess how many nations have been invaded by the U.S. since 1950?
Why weren't any of the others attacked? Because it's about our foreign policy, not about capitalism.
Foreign policy is FOR capitalism! Your masters need a flow of cheap resources to increase their profits. The only way that you can get raw materials (and now labor) cheaply enough is to force people to work in conditions that are barbaric. The easiest way to do this is to find a local military dictator. You finance him and give him moral support and he turns his country into a slave-labor camp. He allows his capitalists to export the goods cheaply to the US, he gets a generous cut as do his capitalists and the goods still cost so much less than they would if the cost of decent living was included in them. (Concrete example you might want to look at - Nicaragua: see what happened in the 1930s with Sandino? The United Fruit Company paid for a detachment of Marines to go down and kick some ass. Don't say I didn't give you a nice example, go check it out before you dismiss it).
Again, as I indicated in an earlier post these terrorists are reacting to the direct stimulus, the immediate proximate cause (for Bin Laden its probably US involvement in the Middle East, for McVeigh its government interference in his liberty, for Iraq its control of the oilfields etc, etc.). There are many different proximate causes. What is important is to find the ultimate cause. Why are there conflicts over these resources? Because we have a world-system, Capitalism that stimulates destructive amoral competition. Until that is removed and replaced with something better there will always be these horrors and atrocities and you are defending them. even if we were all driving around in horse and buggies and raising barns all day, this would have
still happened. This assumes that you are correct about technological development being tied to Capitalism. I don't think it is. It also begs the obvious question - "if technological development were such that there were only horses, buggies, barns, would there then be skyscrapers or airliners?" I really don't see this sentence as meaningful. Terrorists aren't exactly rational people. We need to quit thinking of them as such.
I don't know about their rationality, but suppose that I grant you that they are irrational. Let's say they're as irrational as a.... well, a really angry person that says "get out of my house and stop bombing my neighbour and stop giving guns to the other neighbour". You might ask yourself " Am I really justified in being in his house. Do I want to be here even if I am? Suppose this whacko decides to really do as he threatened and sneak into my yard and burn my baby daughter? Do I really want that?" It strikes me that you and many of the gung-ho types are talking a big-game about war and terrorism and the nobility of capitalism because you don't believe that its YOUR little daughter. Even worse, you can't make the human leap to empathise with the fact that there are little girls and boys dying all over the world so that you can have modern conveniences. In short, I'm unconvinced that Capitalism is the only thing that can provide technology and I'm not prepared to pay the price of murdering innocents in order to make the experiment. Some other way must be found to provide for people of this world.
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I believe that this is wrong. I believe that capitalism is a gross, horrific abomination that produces this sort of terror. If you believe otherwise then I hold you accountable." You'd be well to remember that it was a capitalist country that gave us AC Power, Airplanes, Helicopters, Nuclear Power, Computers, Radio, Television, a large bulk of Space Travel and the resultant satellite
communications networks and pretty much every other modern convienance.
I'm shocked. I guess I shouldn't be. You're saying that the deaths of the people in NYC are worth it just so that you can have every [...] modern convenience. You disgust me. At least it's obvious what you stand for, unambiguously. I've had arguments about whether or not people like you exist. Now I'm convinced and saddened.
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I believe that this is wrong. I believe that capitalism is a gross, horrific abomination that produces this sort of terror. If you believe otherwise then I hold you accountable." You'd be well to remember that it was a capitalist country that gave us AC Power, Airplanes, Helicopters, Nuclear Power, Computers, Radio, Television, a large bulk of Space Travel and the resultant satellite
communications networks and pretty much every other modern convienance.
I'm shocked. I guess I shouldn't be. You're saying that the deaths of the people in NYC are worth it just so that you can have every [...] modern convenience. You disgust me.
I agree that nobody deserves what happened yesterday. I have a different view of WHY it happened though. I beleive that there are at least two guilty parties here:1. the evil bastards that planned and carried out the atrocity; 2. the people that created the evil bastards.
It is point 2 that is the one that many will disagree on. My take is that the creators are primarily the US/Western elites. I believe that in order to advance Western strategic interests our governments are doing sickening things all around the world that make the NYC/Washington horror a blip. That sounds like hyperbole. It's really hard to say and probably really hard to make you understand in your grief. But I'm sincere about it. I read Amnesty International's Urgent Action Bulletins - every month I get news of slow, deliberate painful torture of women and children inflicted by US/NATO backed dictatorships. My stomach clenches in the same way that it did when I saw those people jump from the buildings. This all happens so that we can have cheap oil and disposable consumer shit. I don't think its worth it. And I don't believe all the shit about "freedom" and "the American way of life" that is being spouted now by jingoistic flag-wavers. There always people that try to capitalize on tragedy and make them selves seem bigger by harvesting emotion. That's why I'm so angry when I read/hear people spouting off about stopping "terrorism". We've got to be serious about it, we've got to treat other countries and people decently. We have to be human. Finally, I am really suspicious of the line that only the people/person that directly commits violence is responsible. What am I supposed to think about someone that cheers as someone is kicked to death in front of them? What am I supposed to think of someone that can't be arsed to go look out the window when someone tells them there's someone being kicked to death? I'm genuinely sorry those people in NYC/Washington were murdered, but how much are WE all responsible? Did we care when civilians were bombed in Iraq, slaughtered in Nicaragua, tortured in Lebanon? Did we bother to find anything out about it? Have we created a bloody, vicious world for ourselves to live in? I believe so and I want it to stop. I want peace, dignity and prosperity for myself and all others. I don't think I can get it through violence, and right now there's a lot more violence in the world than the insane deaths of the people in NYC.
When we say "War on Terrorism", we'd better mean all terrorism, whether it be by Arabs, Irish, Indonesians, Central American Drug Lords
I'd just like to add to that list, the British Army and Government who used and use terror to enforce religious and ethnic discrimination against Catholics, by extension also the people that vote for the government that supports this. Also anyone whose work goes to support this regime no matter how indirectly. I'd also like to call your attention to the people that bombed and are boming Iraq (that would be the USAF and its European NATO allies) and of course their governments. Yes, that means that the US gets a double whammy because it does murder on its own account and also supports dictatorial regimes (Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, Yemen, Jordan, Columbia, Afghanistan....) and of course you and your fellow thinkers - you must be what you mean by those in America responsible for enabling these
people to continue to operate
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Give me a break
OK, I'll help sort out your comprehension problems
Do you really think that Osama is angry about GLOBALIZATION? About the hegemony of McDonald's?
Indirectly, yes. The "real reasons" that you cite later: US bases in the Middle East.
He's probably pissed about the decimation of Iraq are actually surface, proximate reasons. They are the top of the chain of causes, they are the immediate spur to reaction. But it is plausible to argue that the US is supporting the bombing of Iraq and the sanctions that murder so many innocent children, and the butchering of Palestinian innocents with US bought and made weapons and the torture, repression and murder in Central and South America precisely so that a crap, worthless product like McDonalds can be made cheap enough to be bought by gasoline-burning, wasteful consumers. This is all of course a gross simplification. But it's closer to the truth than you are. The rest of the world's "real problems" exist so that the US and its European client states can have slave populations that are better housed, fed and entertained than the majority of the world slaves. And Bill G. and Jack Welch and Phil Knight and Dubya and all the other worthless, pointless, swine can be rich.
Get yourself a break. Construct falsifiable models of world economy and politics and then tell me that globalization is nothing to do with it. Yesterday people died horrifically because the US elite acting in their own interests only have done similar but larger scale things all over the world. I believe that this is wrong. I believe that capitalism is a gross, horrific abomination that produces this sort of terror. If you believe otherwise then I hold you accountable.
How about the hypotheses suggested at the following article which were written at Indymedia.Org. They suggest that it may be that this heinous act of bloodshed will be used as an excuse by the militaristic/authoritarian elements in the US to force their repressive agenda on the public and introduce a roll-back of freedoms.: more like the reichstag?
or
right-wing opportunistic backlash
Good point. And to add to it:
Afghanistan - guess where Bin Ladin is based?
So many places that are the results of CIA intervention in the interests of the US ruling classes that turn out to be threats to the ordinary people of the U.S. Iraq/Saddam is a creation of CIA intervention (Saddam's coup in which he took power of the Ba'athist Party was directly orchestrated by the CIA, the Islamic Nationalists in Afghanistan were backed by the CIA against the Soviets, General Noriega in Panama was another US creation). This brief and incomplete list comprises bloody-handed US backed dictators who have turned against the US. No-one gives a fuck as long as they operate with the US. THey can be carrying out atrocities as bad or worse against innocents all over the world and all those that are "shocked", "appalled" and "horrified" now, don't give a shit. I smell the stench of hypocrisy from you all. Yes, this is an appalling outrage now, but the fact that you only care about this (which is a fscking drop in the bucket compared to e.g. Iraq) makes you into heartless, cynical, stupid, complicit, irrational, hypocritial swine. Enough, I'm not reading or listening to any more of your hysterical shit.
Israel is a US military base that enables Arab nationalists to be suppressed. It means that there is a convenient base to extend US hegemony to the region and slap down anyone that tries to throttle the supply of oil.
The US took extraordinary precautions to minimize civilian casualties in Irag[...] Your are completely mis-informed on this - shockingly so. The war against Iraq continues, hundreds of Iraqi children die every day as a result of US policies. Somewhere around a million Iraqis are dead (many of them against the totalitarian dictator in control there). Tens of thousands of Palestinians are dead as a result of US support of the Israeli regime. So do you think that these civilians have been killed by US terrorism?
I posted a story (rejected) yesterday to slashdot about a "pro-Palestinian" web hoster being raided by an anti-terrorism unit. This was in Texas . One of the knock-on effects of terrorism is the extension of powers to security forces - lots of incredible changes were made to U.K. legislation in response to the P.I.R.A.: things like removal of the right to silence, the ability to be held on suspicion(!) for up to two weeks, trial by non-jury courts. I hope that American citizens aren't bamboozled into giving their security forces undue powers that can be misused.
Wrong. The U.S. gives huge amounts of military aid to Israel in order to guarantee its oil supplies. Hence the support for the genocidal Israeli regime.
1.Just because he's not a U.S. citizen doesn't mean he's not living in the U.S.
2. The point is that the U.S. has the choice to enter into a cycle of violence which will beget more tragedies, or else to take the high moral ground.
3. If you believe in vengeance then presumably you support the right of the approximately 1 million dead Iraqis to exact revenge upon the U.S.? I don't. Revenge is murder and it begets more murder. I'm sickened by this.
Slashdot Mirror
Roosevelt noted that none of the participating countries should be expected to modify its refugee admission policy.
and says in an earlier part of the same document thatThe restrictive immigration practices of the major overseas countries vis-à-vis Jewish refugees reflected a global climate of economic protectionism tinged with xenophobia and outright anti-Semitism. An international conference on refugees at Evian (France) in July 1938, initiated by President Franklin D. Roosevelt, proved to be a complete fiasco. Except for the Dominican Republic, none of the representatives of the 32 countries invited offered prospective Jewish refugees from Germany and Austria any hope whatsoever.
So....what do we have. We have the US refusing to help Jews out of economic interest. Nice example.
2. Your second link is to a contextless, un-analytical but accurate piece on US entry into WW2. It shows that the US tried to stay out of this conflict because of anti-Semitism, but then entered because it was afraid of the growing German threat? So what? I'm arguing that the US intervenes out of economic interest and had done so well before WW1 and WW2. Ask the Filipinos. Ask the Mexicans.
And then the US enters because it is afraid of a growing threat. You consider this moral in some way? W.r.t you putting your life on the line, I'm not surprised that you'd rather be in a plane dropping bombs on ground troops than actually fighting. On the other hand maybe the Taliban will use some of the US-made and paid for Stinger missiles (transported by the Pakistani ISI special intelligence services) to shoot you down? You'll be dead, but Lockheed share-holders will have a profit boost to look forward to. So in summary, well done. A moral and carefully thought out response.
Your analogy is flawed. Here is a better one:
You and your wealthy neighbours frequently knock down the children in the poor barrio on your way to your well paying jobs. Sometimes they protest and elect city officials to erect speed bumps and make you and your neighbors slow down. Then the cops shoot the city official and install their own corrupt politicians. Finally a group of nuts from the barrio hijack a car and run down your neighbor's kid. He starts firing mortar shells at them. You help pump up emotion in support of him. Where's the good guy?
I'm glad you don't want to blow up Arabs "blindly". I hope you also don't want to do it with your eyes open and your mouth lying.
Do you put no blame on the governments of those countries for their financial troubles?
Yes I do. Most of them consist of corrupt elites who are supported by our "democracy". But why are they there? Mostly because we keep them in power so we can strip their raw resources.
We actually tried to help the jews as early as 1938,
Cite me some article or book that I can check this assertion in.
It's true that we ignored the suffering for a while, we were at the time trying to stay out of world affairs as much as possible.
Again, exactly how does your assertion of "staying out of world affairs" square with the actual historical facts of massive US intervention in Spanish America? China? Russia? to name but a few?
Something everyone says we should do now, it's seems we can't win either way. Of course we would get involved when it began to affect us, wouldn't you try to fight something that could potentially hurt you?
Your can't win either way complaint is bogus. We have never been "not intervening". Yes, I certainly would try to fight something that might hurt me. I would fight the urge to steal and bully, I would fight (with words) the elites of my country who advocate the policies that cause ME to be threatened for THEIR gain.
As far as your rant about lifespan you seem to completely ignore things such as vaccinations to deadly illnesses, transplants of vital organs, bypass surgeries. To pretend that many people would not be dead if not for those things is disengenious (sic) at best.
No, I don't ignore them. I discount them as being a significant factor in the elongation of human life-span. Read the reference I gave you. I don't pretend that many people would not be dead for those things. I DO assert that the fabulous capital driven bio-medical research produces mainly trivial products. It does this with capital stripped from 3rd world countries and hence kills more people than it cures. I want less choice of cough-medicine and more money going to democratic 3rd world countries basic sanitation infrastructure (christ how many times do you have to be told things?).
The basic flaw in your position is that you assume a very primitive human flaw, greed, would suddenly go away if we were to switch to socialism, or some other economic model.
No. I believe that some greed is innate but that a lot of it is due to socialization and the moral climate you live in. If you live in a society where greed is thought to actually be a good thing (capitalism) then it gets hyper-developed. Communism recognises that this is part of the human organism and attempts to control it to the benefit of all.
You need to realize that maybe if the socialist countries you hold so dear had the resources of the US, that they might just be as imperialistic and "evil".
When have I said that I hold socialist countries dear? Again you attempt to put words in my mouth. I don't like any of the so-called socialist or communist states that exist or existed. I consider them to be flawed authoritarian, non-democratic implementations of socialism. I think those that exist and have existed are definitely imperialist and evil. That's because they were morally bankrupt. They didn't believe in democracy any more than you do.
After all, I hate to tell you, but domineering government has existed LONG before democracy or capitalism, and greed probably even before government.
I agree that domineering government existed long before either the political system democracy or the economic system capitalism or the facet of human nature greed. So what?And since you are calling me hypocritical, what about you? On one end you are saying that we have no business in Israel, and on the other you are suggesting that I enlist?
I feel that if you are advocating WAR then YOU should be the one to put your life on the line rather than me or my family or my friends or anyone else. I'd rather you came home in a body bag than someone that is a humane, rational, educated being.
Do you think that the big bad evil American government is going to use a growing military to back out of a war against a people that very likely just killed thousands of Americans? I didn't think so.
I don't think so either. But I am again appalled at your ignorance, jingoism and stereotyping. What do you mean by "a people that very likely just killed thousands?". Are you seriously talking about going to war with a whole nation or ethnic group or religion because some of them are murderers?
You are definitely a hypocrite. You are also a volitional murderer. You are more fitted to live with the terrorists than in a nation that aspires to democracy.
Finally you might try reading the following (Turning the Tide:Noam Chomsky, The Dark Side of Europe:Geoffrey Harris) to see the lovely things the US did against fascism in Europe (actually I know you're too lazy to read so here's the skinny: they kept large networks of Nazi and Fascist military intelligence and special police in place so that they could attack the communists. They rewarded the capitalists who had been members of the Nazi party by not hanging them. Instead they made them rich with our tax-dollars. (A movie you might see is "The Nasty Girl" dir. Paul Verhoeven (Total Recall)).
Good post. Kudos to your mother.
No it's not ALL our fault.
It's partly our fault.
I too hope that people remember at the mass funerals that there is a large circle of blame. I hope that those funerals are not turned into a jingoistic carnival of grief.
How mind numbing it is to see people wrapping themselves in the flag, refusing to accept that things just as bad have happened and are happening in order to maintain an Empire. I condemn all terrorism, all bloodshed, all murder. I condemn the NYC terrorists and their supporters, I condemn the people that bombed Iraq and is starving it's people and I condemn their supporters. I condemn the people that invaded Chechnya and their supporters. I condemn the Indonesians and their supporters.
I condemn you for you support of all these things.
Ah...Israels willingness to negotiate would be indicated by their occupation of Jericho perhaps? B.t.w. Arafat and his Fatah/PLO friends that we are trying to "help" regularly use torture and repression against democratic dissidents in their little statelet.
Third world countries ARE looking at their governments and they don't like them.....hence terrorism.
You are not naive, you are jingoistic, mis-informed and dangerous. Yes, stupidity and ignorance are dangerous. You have a responsibility as a citizen to become informed.
Remember Vietnam? You should really get out there and enlist.
Which history books? Which facts are not straight?
What does your non-sequitur about multi-culturalism have to do with it? Also the US is more of a melting-pot than Britain.
It's time you stepped out of Little-Know-Nothing-By-The-Wold-Upon-Dickhampton
Robust capitalism is necessary for democracy because the flow of capital gives the middle class a voice.
Democracy is government by ALL the people.
corporations have been beaten on issues like the MAI
And have beaten us on NAFTA, GATT, Kyoto, land-mines
They've also heavily beaten the millions that are estimated to be actual slaves. The many, many millions more that are de facto slaves. The millions that are dying due to simple lack of food and clean water.
"Democratic capitalism" at its best stinks.
I don't believe you are sincere. Your post has further convinced me that you are trying to use (justified) emotions to justify an appalling system. I will continue to believe that you are a hypocrite until you face up to and admit that ALL acts of terror must be stopped. Most importantly, until you admit that the current world system - Capitalism (which is for the most part dominated by the US) - has brutal and appalling consequences then I believe that you are a hypocrite. /our/ power he was allowed.
Your further defence of this sickening system confirms me in this.
To take your points in brief order:
1. The US has lost billions. Untrue. The US has invested billions in (eg the Marshall Plan) in order to stop the spread of communism. This has been amply repaid by the control they have over the slave-labor countries of the third world. Please note also that the US foreign aid interest repayments greatly exceed any original investment and keep the countries that received it in a position where they cannot develop infra-structure.
2. I ignore US deaths (btw America refers to the whole continent, not just the US) in WW2 in defence of freedom.
No I don't ignore them. Those soldiers, ordinary people like me, had to die because there was no MORAL US intervention by the US and the rest of Europe against the fascists. Our elites were too busy worrying about the spread of communism. So they allowed the Jews to be exterminated. In many cases they even helped. It was only when the Reich looked like it was going to be a threat that they intervened. See a similar story with that bastard Hussein? As long as he was killing Kurds quietly and not being a direct threat to
3. There are two sides to every coin.
Yes and there are six sides to a die, and many faces of evil.
corporate greed is responsible for saving the lives of millions
How can you write this in the same post in which you emote over the death of your mother and the threat to your family in NYC? Do you genuinely not understand or are you so deeply cynical?
The average life-span in the developed countries has been extended by 3 years since the turn of the century. That is the advantage that modern medicine has given us (ref: Richard Lewontin, "Massey Lectures" c.1995). The increase in life-span since the mid C.19th is due to basic public sanitation.
The wonderful capitalist that are producing viagra and hay-fever medicines and 600 brands of dyspepsia tablets are stripping the majority of countries in the world of the ability to implement BASIC PUBILC SANITATION. Have you ever been in a 3rd world country? Ever seen the shit in the streets?
4.In the US you can say what you wantEver hear of the House Committee for Un-American Activities? Ever been on a peaceful demonstration attacked by the police?
5. Capitalism isn't perfect
No, it's deeply flawed and based upon a disgusting model of human interaction that can only result in tragedy.
6.The US tries to stay out of foreign affairs
Look at US involvement prior to WW2. Do you think that the Nicaraguans felt that the US was staying out of their business? How about the Mexicans? How about how the Soviets must have felt when the expeditionary force landed at archangel (mostly brits there but US backed).
How about the US had intervened MORALLY prior to the war protesting what was happening in Germany? But no, our famous capitalists were busy meeting with Herr Hitler and exchanging mutual admiration notes. Your claim would be laughable if it were not so disgusting.
no matter what the provokation (sic) the terrorist action was NOT justified
Agreed. I have never for one minute argued to the contrary
don't try to justify peoples (sic) deaths because America is evil
Again I have never done this. Show me one example. On the contrary I completely condemn this act, as I condemn ALL acts of terror. Unlike you I am not trying to justify these home deaths and the foreign deaths as an "imperfect" but best possible system.
7.save negative comments until after the perpetrators are brought to justice
Why? It has happened now. I am outraged and saddened. I consider that part of the blame lies with US foreign policy and with capitalism in general. I want them brought to justice. I don't feel like remaining quiet and pretending that killing the swine that did this will solve anything.
Unlike you I don't want this to happen again and I want the similar things that are happening now to stop. We can do that. We have a moral responsibility to do it. Otherwise we're dancing on graves.
8.its just plane (sic) stupid to blame skyscrapers and airplanes for what happened
You said it.
Expand the concept of "land" to natural resources and maybe you'll get the picture. At the moment we're getting a huge flow of natural resources from everywhere else in the world. Depending upon who we "favor" (that is, use to control the others) then other players will be more or less angry with us. Currently it is nice to have cheap gas. So we have a base in the Middle East. They call it Israel, but really it's a missile launch site cum munitions dump. To be sure the individual actors in that tragedy have historical justifications for their exclusive claims. They both cling to extremist Nationalist policies that make compromise difficult. By alternately playing them against one another we can keep them weak but viciously engaged.
Israel and Palestine could both drop off the face of the earth without affecting the United States' GDP.
Sure, sure
If the US was really interested in the money it would do well to side with the Arabs (with the oil) rather than the Israelis with their relatively worthless bit of desert.
Unfortunately the Arabs had ideas of their own for a while (remember OPEC and oil shortages?) and it's handy to have base for your missiles to keep down rival capitalists.
Oh sure, the western world caused AIDs
Oh sure, the western world isn't causing the AIDS EPIDEMIC. It's not witholding the right to make medicines that help treat the AIDS EPIDEMIC. It's not collecting billions in debt repayment from countries too poor to afford fscking disposable rubber gloves let alone a safe blood transfusion service. Too poor to eat!. Yeah! Oh sure!
and globalization is the root of the constant infighting in Africa. It has nothing to do with the results of pre-globalization imperialism. It has nothing to do with the aftermath of the cold war. It has nothing to do with the arbitrary borders drawn by notorious "globalizers" like 1950s Belgium and Holland.
Imagine a fire. It's dark. The wolves are howling around outside the circle of light and a chill wind is blowing. Draw closer to the fire, warm yourself. Enjoy it. Feel the comfort. But....what the...!!! You can see that the fire is made of the writhing, tortured, blackened limbs of millions of people. Some of them you've never seen, some of them you've passed by in your SUV, some of them you've walked past not many yards from where they beg. That fire my friend is CAPITALISM. It brings some pathetic comfort to the few at the expense of the many. Now, take your can of barbecue lighter fuel and splash it on, the flames blaze higher, the people scream louder and you are warmer.....hmmm....that bit of flesh doesn't look too burnt. Globalization is the lighter fuel. You are the cannibal. But beware, the flames have started to spread. You may get burnt.
People have constructed excuses to kill each other for thousands of years. The killing reached its height years before globalization was a term or an idea.
I look forward to two things: first, your date for when globalization began; second, statistics that prove your assertion that "the killing" reached its height at some date in the past. Note that I would like you to get me some figures for not only those slaughtered directly to bring them the benefits of global trade, but also those whose lives are cut short through lack of medicines, lack of food, labor in dangerous environments etc.
People died horribly yesterday because the US is involved in a fight with people who are very desperate.
And the obvious question is why are they desperate, and the even more obvious answer is because they are being attacked. So then one asks, do we really need to attack them? And one answers, only if we want to continue to get their "land" cheap. Personally speaking, I don't. I don't think that death and torture are an acceptable price to pay. Obviously you do though.
Globalization or not, that can only be avoided by withdrawing from the world stage.
On the contrary, it means that the West has to start acting in a humane manner. We have to send medicines, workers, educators. We have to stop bleeding them dry. We have to pay a fair price for their goods. We have to oppose dictatorial regimes whether or not they are prepared to prostitute their peoples to us. We have to be MORAL. Otherwise we create viciousness.That withdrawl would be a license to monsters all over the world to follow in the footsteps of Rwanda and Cambodia.
Do you have any idea of how culpable the US was for Cambodia? Have you ever bothered to get off your arse and read John Pilger? Have you sincerely tried to find out WHY this and Vietnam and Laos happened? Are you an educated CITIZEN or are you a slave parroting his master's platitudes?
The US needs to be more engaged in the world, not less. But there may be blow-back. It's the price of getting involved.
See above.
Go ahead. Even today, I would much rather live in New York city than in a city in any of the countries practicing alternatives to democratic capitalism: Havana, Beijing, Pyongyang.
I'd rather not live in any of those horrible places either. Because if I did then I would be working for a lot less so that YOU could have a lot more. No thanks.
Do you have a proposed alternative or are you just "fighting the machine", "getting back at the man" and all that other stuff that is appropriate to rebellious youth?
Yes, I propose that we try communism again. Not the State Socialism of the USSR under the Marxist-Leninists. Rather, the communism that existed for a brief period in the direct democracy of the workers Soviets in Petrograd before they came under the control of the Bolsheviks. The communism of Gramsci's Factory Councils, the communism of the Friends of Durutti in Spain in 1936 and of the militias, the communism of Ida Mett, Piotr Arshinov, Nestor Makhno and the Platform of Libertarian Communists. Something like that. It sounds a lot better than the disgusting amoral, heartless, murderous, pointless Capitalism that you advocate.Would you rather live in mainland China or Hong Kong/Taiwan? East Germany or West? South Korea or North?
And have you stopped beating your wife yet? Yes!, NO!, I mean yes!. I'd rather live in a direct-democracy with immediately recallable delegates, communal property and production. You can stuff your miserable Capitalism.
You know what they need in Africa, and Afghanistan and every place in the world where people are oppressed? They need democractic capitalism.
What they need is to not have to pay crippling interest on loans negotiated at the point of a gun. What they need is for you to show some moral responsibility and a little human empathy. What they need is for you to stop licking your master's hand and to stop kicking their heads.
We've done the experiment over and over again and we know the results.
We sure do. Mass starvation in the midst of over-production. Millions of tons of bombs dropped on the innocent. Hundreds of thousands of innocents killed by competing capitalist factions.
You are just cruel if you want to subject some poor people to yet another alternate system.
Whilst you offer them mass hunger and free bombings when they object. Oh generous one.
I'm a left leaning liberal
What, one of your legs is shorter than the other? Or do you mean that you lean over to the left while you take it from the boss? Or do you mean that when you look out upon the world you lean to one side so as not to see the misery so that you can congratulate yourself.
but I'm not naive enough to still believe we should be pursuing some alternate system.
You're not naive. You're degenerate. You're cynical. You're ignorant. You're un-informed. You're amoral. But you're not naive.
Maybe once we've wiped out poverty and AIDs we'll have the bandwidth to experiment with alternate systems but right now we need to get those people good jobs, good homes and enough purchasing power that they can buy some influence over their own governments.
I take it back. You ARE naive.
I find it hard to disagree with most of what you say. I just believe that there'll be more and more of this sort of thing _unless_ we have a popular movement to stop our "governments" from fomenting this hatred.
I agree with what you say about there being a problem with defining exactly where the guilt stops. I think that we can definitely extend it to a wider circle than the terrorists that planned and carried this out. We can also include the policy makers of NATO. That includes most of our political and business elite apart from those that have taken action, no matter how small against NATO/Western brutalities.
I'm equally disgusted
I don't believe you. You can't be on the basis of what you have admitted. You've said that the lives of millions of innocents are worth it so that you can have air-conditioning.
that someone like you could blame the "Evil Capitalist United States"
Please don't forget that I also blame all the European client states and their "social democratic" parties that play along with NATO
when even our must hated enemies of the past are standing by our side.
Such as the human rights abusing Russia, China etc etc......doesn't it make you wonder about a couple of little details of morality called "sincerity" and "honesty" when you write this sentence? Your tears are crocodile tears and they dishonour the dead of all nations from all atrocities.
what I'm saying is that capitalism works .... well, a really angry person that says "get out of my house and stop bombing my neighbour and stop giving guns to the other neighbour". You might ask yourself " Am I really justified in being in his house. Do I want to be here even if I am? Suppose this whacko decides to really do as he threatened and sneak into my yard and burn my baby daughter? Do I really want that?"
Yes, and what I'm saying is that the results of its workings are to produce a large number of people with a genuine grudge against those that do well out of the system.
Face it, capitalism has had a free run of a large part of the earth in recent history. We are seeing the results of that. Your ideological masters are running the world. The problems of the world are now squarely attributable to your preferred system. You can't dodge it.
Blaming what happened in NYC on capitalism is the stupidest thing I've ever heard. I've got news for you idiots
Insults indicate that you have no rational response to make. If you can't frame a coherent, reasoned response then you should sit back and take a break for an hour or ten and get some thoughts
The USA isn't the only capitalist country.
True. But it is the most powerful country in the world. It is the one that directly intervenes around the world. Take a guess how many nations have been invaded by the U.S. since 1950?
Why weren't any of the others attacked?
Because it's about our foreign policy, not about capitalism.
Foreign policy is FOR capitalism! Your masters need a flow of cheap resources to increase their profits. The only way that you can get raw materials (and now labor) cheaply enough is to force people to work in conditions that are barbaric. The easiest way to do this is to find a local military dictator. You finance him and give him moral support and he turns his country into a slave-labor camp. He allows his capitalists to export the goods cheaply to the US, he gets a generous cut as do his capitalists and the goods still cost so much less than they would if the cost of decent living was included in them. (Concrete example you might want to look at - Nicaragua: see what happened in the 1930s with Sandino? The United Fruit Company paid for a detachment of Marines to go down and kick some ass. Don't say I didn't give you a nice example, go check it out before you dismiss it).
Again, as I indicated in an earlier post these terrorists are reacting to the direct stimulus, the immediate proximate cause (for Bin Laden its probably US involvement in the Middle East, for McVeigh its government interference in his liberty, for Iraq its control of the oilfields etc, etc.). There are many different proximate causes.
What is important is to find the ultimate cause. Why are there conflicts over these resources? Because we have a world-system, Capitalism that stimulates destructive amoral competition. Until that is removed and replaced with something better there will always be these horrors and atrocities and you are defending them.
even if we were all driving around in horse and buggies and raising barns all day, this would have still happened.
This assumes that you are correct about technological development being tied to Capitalism. I don't think it is. It also begs the obvious question - "if technological development were such that there were only horses, buggies, barns, would there then be skyscrapers or airliners?" I really don't see this sentence as meaningful.
Terrorists aren't exactly rational people. We need to quit thinking of them as such.
I don't know about their rationality, but suppose that I grant you that they are irrational. Let's say they're as irrational as a
It strikes me that you and many of the gung-ho types are talking a big-game about war and terrorism and the nobility of capitalism because you don't believe that its YOUR little daughter. Even worse, you can't make the human leap to empathise with the fact that there are little girls and boys dying all over the world so that you can have modern conveniences.
In short, I'm unconvinced that Capitalism is the only thing that can provide technology and I'm not prepared to pay the price of murdering innocents in order to make the experiment. Some other way must be found to provide for people of this world.
I believe that this is wrong. I believe that capitalism is a gross, horrific abomination that produces this sort of terror. If you believe otherwise then I hold you accountable."
You'd be well to remember that it was a capitalist country that gave us AC Power, Airplanes, Helicopters, Nuclear Power, Computers, Radio, Television, a large bulk of Space Travel and the resultant satellite communications networks and pretty much every other modern convienance.
I'm shocked. I guess I shouldn't be. You're saying that the deaths of the people in NYC are worth it just so that you can have every [...] modern convenience.
You disgust me.
At least it's obvious what you stand for, unambiguously. I've had arguments about whether or not people like you exist. Now I'm convinced and saddened.
I believe that this is wrong. I believe that capitalism is a gross, horrific abomination that produces this sort of terror. If you believe otherwise then I hold you accountable."
You'd be well to remember that it was a capitalist country that gave us AC Power, Airplanes, Helicopters, Nuclear Power, Computers, Radio, Television, a large bulk of Space Travel and the resultant satellite communications networks and pretty much every other modern convienance.
I'm shocked. I guess I shouldn't be. You're saying that the deaths of the people in NYC are worth it just so that you can have every [...] modern convenience.
You disgust me.
I agree that nobody deserves what happened yesterday. I have a different view of WHY it happened though. I beleive that there are at least two guilty parties here:1. the evil bastards that planned and carried out the atrocity; 2. the people that created the evil bastards.
It is point 2 that is the one that many will disagree on. My take is that the creators are primarily the US/Western elites. I believe that in order to advance Western strategic interests our governments are doing sickening things all around the world that make the NYC/Washington horror a blip. That sounds like hyperbole. It's really hard to say and probably really hard to make you understand in your grief. But I'm sincere about it. I read Amnesty International's Urgent Action Bulletins - every month I get news of slow, deliberate painful torture of women and children inflicted by US/NATO backed dictatorships. My stomach clenches in the same way that it did when I saw those people jump from the buildings.
This all happens so that we can have cheap oil and disposable consumer shit. I don't think its worth it. And I don't believe all the shit about "freedom" and "the American way of life" that is being spouted now by jingoistic flag-wavers. There always people that try to capitalize on tragedy and make them selves seem bigger by harvesting emotion.
That's why I'm so angry when I read/hear people spouting off about stopping "terrorism". We've got to be serious about it, we've got to treat other countries and people decently. We have to be human.
Finally, I am really suspicious of the line that only the people/person that directly commits violence is responsible. What am I supposed to think about someone that cheers as someone is kicked to death in front of them? What am I supposed to think of someone that can't be arsed to go look out the window when someone tells them there's someone being kicked to death?
I'm genuinely sorry those people in NYC/Washington were murdered, but how much are WE all responsible? Did we care when civilians were bombed in Iraq, slaughtered in Nicaragua, tortured in Lebanon? Did we bother to find anything out about it? Have we created a bloody, vicious world for ourselves to live in? I believe so and I want it to stop. I want peace, dignity and prosperity for myself and all others. I don't think I can get it through violence, and right now there's a lot more violence in the world than the insane deaths of the people in NYC.
When we say "War on Terrorism", we'd better mean all terrorism, whether it be by Arabs, Irish, Indonesians, Central American Drug Lords
I'd just like to add to that list, the British Army and Government who used and use terror to enforce religious and ethnic discrimination against Catholics, by extension also the people that vote for the government that supports this. Also anyone whose work goes to support this regime no matter how indirectly. I'd also like to call your attention to the people that bombed and are boming Iraq (that would be the USAF and its European NATO allies) and of course their governments.
Yes, that means that the US gets a double whammy because it does murder on its own account and also supports dictatorial regimes (Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Qatar, Yemen, Jordan, Columbia, Afghanistan....) and of course you and your fellow thinkers - you must be what you mean by those in America responsible for enabling these people to continue to operate
Give me a break
OK, I'll help sort out your comprehension problems Do you really think that Osama is angry about GLOBALIZATION? About the hegemony of McDonald's?
Indirectly, yes. The "real reasons" that you cite later:
US bases in the Middle East. He's probably pissed about the decimation of Iraq
are actually surface, proximate reasons. They are the top of the chain of causes, they are the immediate spur to reaction.
But it is plausible to argue that the US is supporting the bombing of Iraq and the sanctions that murder so many innocent children, and the butchering of Palestinian innocents with US bought and made weapons and the torture, repression and murder in Central and South America precisely so that a crap, worthless product like McDonalds can be made cheap enough to be bought by gasoline-burning, wasteful consumers. This is all of course a gross simplification. But it's closer to the truth than you are.
The rest of the world's "real problems" exist so that the US and its European client states can have slave populations that are better housed, fed and entertained than the majority of the world slaves. And Bill G. and Jack Welch and Phil Knight and Dubya and all the other worthless, pointless, swine can be rich.
Get yourself a break. Construct falsifiable models of world economy and politics and then tell me that globalization is nothing to do with it.
Yesterday people died horrifically because the US elite acting in their own interests only have done similar but larger scale things all over the world.
I believe that this is wrong. I believe that capitalism is a gross, horrific abomination that produces this sort of terror. If you believe otherwise then I hold you accountable.
How about the hypotheses suggested at the following article which were written at Indymedia.Org. They suggest that it may be that this heinous act of bloodshed will be used as an excuse by the militaristic/authoritarian elements in the US to force their repressive agenda on the public and introduce a roll-back of freedoms. :
more like the reichstag?
or
right-wing opportunistic backlash
Good point. And to add to it: Afghanistan - guess where Bin Ladin is based? So many places that are the results of CIA intervention in the interests of the US ruling classes that turn out to be threats to the ordinary people of the U.S. Iraq/Saddam is a creation of CIA intervention (Saddam's coup in which he took power of the Ba'athist Party was directly orchestrated by the CIA, the Islamic Nationalists in Afghanistan were backed by the CIA against the Soviets, General Noriega in Panama was another US creation).
This brief and incomplete list comprises bloody-handed US backed dictators who have turned against the US. No-one gives a fuck as long as they operate with the US. THey can be carrying out atrocities as bad or worse against innocents all over the world and all those that are "shocked", "appalled" and "horrified" now, don't give a shit. I smell the stench of hypocrisy from you all. Yes, this is an appalling outrage now, but the fact that you only care about this (which is a fscking drop in the bucket compared to e.g. Iraq) makes you into heartless, cynical, stupid, complicit, irrational, hypocritial swine.
Enough, I'm not reading or listening to any more of your hysterical shit.
Israel is a US military base that enables Arab nationalists to be suppressed. It means that there is a convenient base to extend US hegemony to the region and slap down anyone that tries to throttle the supply of oil.
The US took extraordinary precautions to minimize civilian casualties in Irag[...]
Your are completely mis-informed on this - shockingly so. The war against Iraq continues, hundreds of Iraqi children die every day as a result of US policies. Somewhere around a million Iraqis are dead (many of them against the totalitarian dictator in control there). Tens of thousands of Palestinians are dead as a result of US support of the Israeli regime.
So do you think that these civilians have been killed by US terrorism?
I posted a story (rejected) yesterday to slashdot about a "pro-Palestinian" web hoster being raided by an anti-terrorism unit. This was in Texas .
One of the knock-on effects of terrorism is the extension of powers to security forces - lots of incredible changes were made to U.K. legislation in response to the P.I.R.A.: things like removal of the right to silence, the ability to be held on suspicion(!) for up to two weeks, trial by non-jury courts.
I hope that American citizens aren't bamboozled into giving their security forces undue powers that can be misused.
Wrong. The U.S. gives huge amounts of military aid to Israel in order to guarantee its oil supplies. Hence the support for the genocidal Israeli regime.
1.Just because he's not a U.S. citizen doesn't mean he's not living in the U.S.
2. The point is that the U.S. has the choice to enter into a cycle of violence which will beget more tragedies, or else to take the high moral ground.
3. If you believe in vengeance then presumably you support the right of the approximately 1 million dead Iraqis to exact revenge upon the U.S.?
I don't.
Revenge is murder and it begets more murder. I'm sickened by this.