Casey Sheehan

Dit kruis is ter nagedachtenis aan Casey Sheehan, een Amerikaanse soldaat die op 4 april 2004 in Bagdad bij een granaataanval in de buurt van Bagdad op 24-jarige leeftijd gedood werd. Zijn moeder Cindy kreeg in august 2005 landelijke en zelfs internationale bekendheid door haar langdurig verblijf in een vredeskamp net buiten de ranch van George W. Bush in Texas, waar ze tegen de oorlog in Irak protesteerde. In Truthout schrijft Cindy Sheehan nu: 'From Camp Casey, to Katrina, to use of chemical weaponry and extraordinary rendition, to illegally spying on American citizens without due process, BushCo has miserably failed our country and the world. We as Americans said "enough is enough." We sacrificed a lot when we showed up in DC and other cities around the country in the hundreds of thousands to protest and show that we withdraw any consent to be governed by murderous thugs. We started to peacefully but forcefully resist the notion that this government has any right to govern us when they have betrayed their offices and their sacred trusts as "defenders" of the Constitution so horribly. This was also the year that we also began to hold such Republicans in Democratic clothing like Hillary Clinton, Joe Lieberman, Joe Biden, and Diane Feinstein (list is my no means all inclusive) accountable for their support of what George is doing in Iraq. When we as Democrats elect our leaders we expect them to reject and loudly repudiate the murderous and corrupt policies of this administration, not support and defend them... In 2005, we learned that we have the power. We learned that we can't rely on the propaganda media or the empty promises of most of our elected leadership. We learned that we need to be the change that we desire to see. We learned that one person can and does make a difference. We cannot relax in 2006. We cannot slip back into the evil of apathy and complacency that the neocons rejoice in. We need to keep pounding, working, and fighting. We need to support organizations like Gold Star Families for Peace, Veterans for Peace, Code Pink and Iraq Veterans Against the War, or the Peace organization of your choice so we can continue our struggle for peace with justice. We need to support true American patriots like John Conyers who is calling for an investigation and censure for the lies that have cost us so much of our national human treasure. 2006 will be a great year for the people of our country. I know it. It won't be easy, but we will prevail and the struggle will be worth it.' Lees Verder: http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/122805A.shtml Dit jaar heeft de diepe kloof in de VS zichtbaar gemaakt tussen de mensen die zich bedrogen voelen door de Amerikaanse beleidsbepalers en de mensen die blind achter hun leiders aan blijven marcheren. De onthullingen over het grootschalige bedrog heeft dit jaar vele goedgelovige Amerikaanse burgers de ogen geopend. Dat is de eerste stap op weg naar een verandering in de oorlogszuchtige politiek van onze machtige bondgenoot. Nu wij nog. Alvast een gelukkig nieuwjaar voor u en de uwen.

De Neo Conservatieven

Dr. Richard Drayton, die geschiedenis doceert aan de Cambridge University, schrijft in The Guardian een uitstekend achtergrondartikel over het ideologisch failliet van de Bush regering. 'Shock, awe and Hobbes have backfired on America's neocons Iraq has shown the hubris of a geostrategy that welds the philosophy of the Leviathan to military and technological power Richard Drayton. The tragic irony of the 21st century is that just as faith in technology collapsed on the world's stock markets in 2000, it came to power in the White House and Pentagon. For the Project for a New American Century's ambition of "full-spectrum dominance" - in which its country could "fight and win multiple, simultaneous major-theatre wars" - was a monster borne up by the high tide of techno euphoria of the 1990s. Ex-hippies talked of a wired age of Aquarius. The fall of the Berlin wall and the rise of the internet, we were told, had ushered in Adam Smith's dream of overflowing abundance, expanding liberty and perpetual peace. Fukuyama speculated that history was over, leaving us just to hoard and spend. Technology meant a new paradigm of constant growth without inflation or recession.' Lees verder: http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,1674403,00.html Of: http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article11398.htm

Klimaatverandering 9

Michael McCarthy, milieuredacteur van de Britse kwaliteitskrant 'The Independent,' schrijft: 'Review of the Year: Climate ChangeMercury rising, stormy weather - our world is taking a battering. You see it in heat, you see it in ice, you see it in storms. Climate change without doubt became the critical environmental issue of 2005. The evidence of global warming occurring here and now mounted up during the year and is proving ever harder to ignore, even by habitual sceptics.' In het buitenland mag dit zeker waar zijn, maar niet in Nederland, afgaande op onze massamedia die minimaal of geen aandacht hebben besteed aan de opzienbarende rapporten van diverse internationale instanties die dit jaar verschenen. Lees verder: http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/1230-08.htm Volgens een redactrice buitenland van Radio I die ik vroeg waarom haar nieuwsprogramma geen aandacht aan een belangrijk milieurapport had besteed was de reden van dit verzuim eenvoudig: ‘Milieuonderwerpen moeten wel heel bijzonder zijn willen we er aandacht aan besteden. Waarom? Misschien omdat het geen politiek issue meer is, in elk geval niet een belangrijk issue. Het is ook een vorm van hysterie, dat achter de politici aanrennen. Elke oprisping van Hirsi Ali of Wilders wordt wel breed uitgemeten, ook al zeggen ze niets nieuws. Hysterie ja.’ Zie: http://home.planet.nl/~houck006/birds.html

Olie Voorraden

Common Dreams bericht: 'Oil Market Analysts Issue Dire Warnings. CARACAS - While this year's record high oil prices are unlikely to come down in the near future, analysts are warning the world's traditional and emerging economic powers to curb consumption, saying that at the current rate, proven reserves will only meet demand up to 2030. "The current model (of consumption) is suicidal," Venezuelan Energy Minister Rafael Ramírez recently told journalists. "The United States, for example, will use up its oil reserves in 10 years, and after that it will go after its rivers, lakes and forests." This month, Democratic Party lawmakers in the U.S. Senate narrowly blocked a Republican-led bill that would have allowed drilling for oil in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, which has an estimated 10 billion barrels in reserves. The United States devours one out of four of the 84 million barrels of oil consumed daily around the world, and one out of two litres of gasoline. But the emerging powers are steadily closing the consumption gap. In India, less than 200,000 new cars were sold annually two decades ago, compared to 802,000 in 2004.' Lees verder:
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines05/1230-04.htm Of:
http://www.ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=31614

Kissinger en Pinochet

Op deze foto staan twee mensen die verantwoordelijk zijn voor grootschalige schendingen van de mensenrechten en het omverwerpen van een democratische regering. Links ziet u Henry Kissinger, de voormalige minister van buitenlandse zaken van de VS en rechts generaal Augusto Pinochet, van 1973 tot 1990 dictator van Chili, leider van een regime dat tenminste 3000 Chileense burgers liet doodmartelen of voor eeuwig liet verdwijnen. Kissinger gaf logistieke en militaire steun voor de staatsgreep die Pinochet aan de macht hielp. Kissinger is nooit hiervoor officieel aangeklaagd, laat staan veroordeeld. Pinochet is afgelopen woensdag naar een politiebureau overgebracht voor het nemen van zijn vingerafdrukken en het maken van een portretfoto als eerste stap in een juridische procedure waarbij hij zich moet verantwoorden voor de doden en verdwijningen. Zie: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4565280.stm Zie ook: http://home.planet.nl/~houck006/filosofie2.html De Amerikaanse auteur Marc Cooper schrijft in Truthdig: 'During those horrible morning hours of the first Sept.11, the Chilean military coup of 1973, President Salvador Allende gave his farewell speech to the nation over the radio. I listened to his crackling, metallic voice along with millions of others as Allende raced to get out his final words before the tanks and planes of the military would bombard the radio transmitter, silence him and obliterate Chilean democracy. A long dark night of felonious repression was coming, Allende said. But “make sure you know,” he said to his nation minutes before his death, “that sooner rather than later” Chileans would once again live in a better society where justice would prevail. For more than three decades, that was a tough promise to hang on to. But last Wednesday, almost under the international media radar, something happened that those of us who survived the coup--and the families of those who didn’t--had waited for since Allende uttered those words 32 years ago. Chilean detectives and judicial officers went to the door of 90-year-old General Augusto Pinochet--leader of the 1973 coup and the man who imposed 17 years of bloody dictatorship on his country--and then proceeded to enter his suburban Santiago mansion and fingerprint him and take his mug shot as if he were any other criminal. It was a stunning moment not only for those of us who have always opposed Pinochet but also for anyone in the world who cares about human rights. Here was the arrogant, once untouchable dictator, who during his reign boasted that “not a leaf moves in Chile if I don’t know about it,” finally being brought to justice.' Lees verder: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20051230_pinochet/ Voor meer over de misdaden van Henry Kissinger zie Christopher Hitchens' boek 'The Trial of Henry Kissinger.' Het is in het Nederlands uitgegeven door de Arbeiderspers. En anders via Amazon: 'Christopher Hitchens doesn't mince words when it comes to Henry Kissinger, the former secretary of state and national-security advisor: Kissinger deserves vigorous prosecution "for war crimes, for crimes against humanity, and for offenses against common or customary or international law, including conspiracy to commit murder, kidnap, and torture." The Trial of Henry Kissinger is a masterpiece of polemics; even readers who don't agree that its target is an emanation of "official evil" will appreciate the verve and style brought to Hitchens's fiery brief. ("A good liar must have a good memory: Kissinger is a stupendous liar with a remarkable memory.")' http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1859843980/qid=1136043810/sr=8-1/ref=pd_bbs_1/102-8238213-5061717?n=507846&s=books&v=glance

Klimaatverandering 8

Kelpie Wilson, milieuredactrice van Truthout schrijft: 'Climate Shock: We're on Thin Ice. Climate shock comes from the realization that climate change is not only real, but huge; it is not only huge, but it is now; and it will affect your life very shortly. Not your grandchildren's lives. Not your children's lives. Your life. Soon - if it hasn't already. If you have not experienced climate shock yet, you will when you read Thin Ice by Mark Bowen. Thin Ice is the story of the scientific team from Ohio State University, led by researcher Lonnie Thompson, that has spent the last two decades drilling ice cores in tropical mountain glaciers. Their aim is to retrieve information about climate history from the ice, but there has been a race against time as these glaciers melt, making new history. Thin Ice is an exciting adventure story. The logistics of transporting the scientists and their drilling equipment into the most inaccessible places on Earth bring hair-raising tales. The team members struggle with altitude sickness, windstorms destroy the solar panels that power their drill, crampons get stuck in ladders deployed over widening crevasses, and the crew tries to float ice core samples off the mountain with a hot-air balloon.' Lees verder: http://www.truthout.org/issues_05/123005EA.shtml

Irak 10

Dit is Ahmad Chalabi, die door een Jordaanse rechtbank tot 22 jaar dwangarbeid is veroordeeld wegens het verduisteren van 300 miljoen dollar. De voortvluchtige Ahmad is hier omringd door bendeleden en is momenteel een van de vier vice-premiers van Irak. Bij de recente verkiezingen in zijn land kreeg Chalabi nog geen 1 procent van de stemmen. Desondanks was deze misdadiger voor de neocons in de Amerikaanse regering de beoogde grote man van Irak. (Zie Irak 8) Al Jazeera bericht nu dat Chalabi per onmiddellijke ingang de leiding heeft overgenomen van het machtige ministerie van Olie. De Amerikaanse autoriteiten besloten al voor de inval dat de bezetting van Irak zou worden gefinancierd uit de olie-inkomsten van Irak. Maar door de permanente aanslagen op oliepijpleidingen is deze financieringsmethode hopeloos mislukt en verliest de VS miljarden dollars. Tot nu toe kost de bezetting de Amerikaanse belastingbetaler al meer dan 230 miljard dollar en het eind is nog lang niet in zicht. Zie: http://nationalpriorities.org/index.php?option=com_wrapper&Itemid=182 Voor het bericht van Al Jazeera: http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/35CADFBB-7D78-4847-85E2-3E6AE80BDC67.htm Het inhuren van locale gangsters is een oude en beproefde methode in de buitenlandse politiek van Washington om bepaalde politieke doeleinden te verwezenlijken. Door de aanstelling van een veroordeelde zwendelaar tot hoofd van de olierevenuen probeert de VS alsnog uit het financiele moeras te kruipen. Kennelijk is de Bush-regering zo wanhopig dat ze zelfs de schijn van democratie niet eens meer probeert hoog te houden. Voor meer over Chalabi: http://www.truthout.org/docs_2005/123105Z.shtml