The Progressive Blog Alliance HQ

I know I am but what are you.

It’s a playground classic. Accuse your adversary of the very thing you are guilty of.

Fascism is fascism is fascism no matter where it comes from or how it is wrapped. The unbounded greed of corporate America, invading the world one economy at a time. The Christian fundamentalist breaking down the separation of church and state. The Islamic jihadist blowing themselves and others up for Allah. They all want the same thing.

Power.

The power to control the lives and resources of others for their own benefit.

In America we have called it:

Indian Reservations. Slavery. Immanent Domain. Spreading democracy. National Security. The War on Terror. Foreign policy.

Below is a statement/petition on the current situation in Palestine being circulated by Britain's Palestine Solidarity Campaign. It is currently being forwarded to British public figures, organizations, trade unions and others who are asked to sign it. The British Palestine Solidarity Campaign has asked sympathizers in other countries to undertake similar initiatives in their own countries. The British initiative has already received considerable support. Here is the text of the British statement:

Emergency in Palestine

The Israeli government's behavior at present is to be comdemned. The failure of our government to speak out against Israel's oppression of the Palestinian population is complicit with those actions of the European Union, the United States and Israel. It is in effect a coordinated attempt to collectively punish the Palestinian people for electing a government of which they disapprove .

Did Israel plan and carry out the bombing of the Askari (Al-Askariya) Mosque in the city of Samarra, possibly through local agents in Iraq? The bombing was reminiscent of the destruction wrought in 1984 on Sikhism's holiest shrine, the Golden Temple, in the city of Amritsar by orders from Indira Gandhi (who paid for it with her life less than five months later).

Yes, I know, the appearances are different. Amritsar's Golden Temple was destroyed by regular (foreign/Indian occupation) armed forces, whereas the Askari Mosque has been destroyed by "terrorists." Yet, who are these "terrorists"?

I think a strong circumstantial case can be constructed for Israeli involvement in the bombing of the Askari Mosque.

I would rule out Al Qaeda involvement. Contrary to the White House generated propaganda that has been pounded into people's brains for the last five years, Al Qaeda's targets are not selected at random. Rather, they have included two types of targets, and only two types: (1) American interests, and (2) what I would call "American mercenaries." By "American mercenaries" I mean anyone who works for US interests, whether directly or indirectly. This includes, for instance, all collaborators in Iraq, such as Iraqi police forces and their recruits, Iraqi armed forces and their recruits, and so on, not to speak of members of the Iraqi "government."  (Cont'd)  http://alse.blogspot.com

The recent attacks on the Danish and norwegian embassies have sent a shockwave across the civilized world. Once again it has exposed the intensity of anti western feelings harbored by the islamic world. The western europeans live in relative  ignorance of their islamic neighbors.. Infact immigrants have remained a largely segregated entity in europe.In France and  Denmark they are thrown into impoverished housing estates. Even in the UK (which has a long history of immigration) muslims live in the largely blue collar east end of london.It is a fertile recruiting ground for jihadists!!! The US (for all its faults) is far more successful in integrating its immigrants. Even illegal latino immigrants from mexico have made it big. in fact hispanic have a significant cultural prescence . The reason for this discord: immigration in europe is primarily a post colonial phenomenon while US has always relied on immigration.

THE PRINCE OF THE COVENANT…

The U.S.-Israel Strategic Alliance–Part IV

 

By

So, it seems Ambassador Craig Murray's website has been pulled.

It's a record of his correspondance with the UK Foreign Office detailing concerns about policy toward Uzbekistan and human rights abuses. Also, the UKGovernment's legal advice stating that it is not an offence to use 'evidence' obtained under torture, unless it's used in a court of law. What a load of disgusting shameful shite. It's times like these when i am truly ashamed to be a British Citizen today. Read it now, before they use the Official Secrets Act to gag everybody (download it and repost everywhere):

(and if you are a UK citizen, email your MP: don't let them slime their way out of this one. If you're unsure of your MP's contact details, you can get them here.)

The disgraceful but predictable Amerisraeli campaign of defamation and lies against President Ahmadinejad of Iran continues unabated. Words and phrases are plucked out of the context of long speeches, without any attention to the overall gist and purpose of each speech, merely to be used as ammunition for propaganda against someone whose only crime is that he does not, nor does he plan to, bow down to the will of the Western politico-financial complex, either in action or in spirit, but rather plans solely to follow the dictates of his conscience regarding the good of his nation as well as that of the region at large.  Mohammad Khatami, the former President of Iran, again and again urged a “dialogue of civilizations.”  Khatami’s own mentality, however, was captive to the Western monologue.  Ahmadinejad’s monumental task is to turn the monologue into a true dialogue.  As the West is completely unaware of the existence of a point of view other than its own, Ahmadinejad faces the task of using harsh language to try to break through the legacy of decades of brainwashing.

There are so many things going on around us constantly that we could not possibly assimilate all at once. We must pick and choose what is necessary for our survival. We choose what we see. We choose what we hear, what we feel, what we smell, what we taste. We select from this chaos around us what we need to know and we ignore the rest until and unless it becomes necessary to our survival. You may respond that there are many things you are aware of that do not contribute to your survival. I would suggest that in reality there is nothing you are aware of that does not contribute to your survival or does not make you feel more secure in your survival.

From The Republic of T.

As shown by the war porn story, it's worthwhile to shine a light in some of the less often travelled places in the blogosphere, because things often start there long before they bubble up in to the places where the air is more rarified. Getting these things earlier than the usual suspects is one of the benefits of seeking out bloggers that the vast majority of readers are perhaps just to lazy to seek out. It's just easier to go where everyone else goes.

But you miss a lot of stuff that way, sticking to the well-worn paths. So when Helena Cobban -- where I first found the war porn story back in August, well before it hit the bigger blogs and the rest of the news -- has a post up about an Iraq withdrawal plan proposed by a progressive think tank, I figured it had to be worth checking out.

Pat Robertson, the American televangelist (of the "700 Club" fame, or rather infamy) has issued a fatwa for the assassination of President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela for "spreading communism and Islamic extremism." The "free press," those obsequious hired hands of the highest bidders for their services, will doubtless laugh it all off, and refuse to discuss the serious implications of the issue.  Robertson has quite bluntly stated that the reason he wants Chavez dead is that the Venezuelan government, according to Robertson, poses a threat to US economic interests. In today's US politics, it is apparently quite acceptable for a religious leader like Robertson constantly to meddle in purely political and economic affairs. On the other hand, when the late Ayatollah Khomeini issued his call for Salman Rushdie's assassination on purely religious grounds, as the latter had, among many other indiscretions, called the Prophet of Islam a whoremonger, Western liberals didn't lose any time in joining their conservative brethren in condemning the fatwa.  Robertson's fatwa came only a couple of days after Pope Benedict's call on Moslem leaders (while visiting Germany!) to fight terrorism (as if real religious leaders were in the business of promoting anything other than religion), without once mentioning the terror inflicted by the US on the people of Iraq for their oil. It is clear that whereas religion in the East is a component of nationalist resurgence against capitalism and imperialism, religion in the West is increasingly a handmaiden to the interests of the Empire.  http://alse.blogspot.com

On this day, all progressive forces are, at some level, “Palestinians,” in that they join in solidarity with the Palestinian nation, and share its joy in today’s victory. Yet we are all “Palestinians” at a deeper level as well. In an age when humanity’s greatest enemies, the United States government and transnational capital, appear to have achieved permanent ascendancy, we all share and feel, to some extent, the experience of oppression and defeat that the Palestinian nation has intimately known for so long. Yet we also share its resolve and resiliency. We share its determination that no matter what obstacles the enemy may throw in our path, the final triumph shall be ours.  http://alse.blogspot.com

Yusef and
His Hidden Love

Trapped in an Oriental world,
my inability to understand blinded
events, my surroundings, the place of birth,

from which a spring sprouts existence
that unfolds and matures into petals with multiple projections
hidden in ache, silenced by the possibility of jail.

I come closer desperate to express,
to calm the madness palpable in his eyes, when
he motions with his hands something

at first undecipherable. He indicated
that our lips
and tongues should unite, demanding a hug,
a hug as an offering of marriage that would never be.

His passion claimed the certainty of other unions,
common between lovers who have reached
the belief that only if they give that which is theirs alone

they have become tied by an unlikely eternity.
Is it not in the
East where the sun rises? Is it not the West
the place from where nothing
has ever come but the void of ones self, produced by the trash coming out of an

existential lust? He finds his way, walks
to the dwelling of his hidden lover,
moribund from the multiple definitions he gives to the West,
where fidelity is an empty crack in the dry desert ground.

Two worlds, two samples, two discernments
lost in the distracted imperfection
of time that stuns and twists all things.