Interconnected

[A house for sale that won't sell in Holcomb, Kansas]

About four months ago, Shusli and I were driving by the Baghdad Theater on Hawthorne Boulevard in Portland, Oregon. They were playing "To Kill a Mockingbird." Shusli asked if I had ever seen the movie. When I told her no, her jaw dropped. She asked if I knew what it was about. I informed her that I had no idea. "You have to see that movie. It's about racism."

About two months ago, Shusli informed me that we are eligible for a certain type of loan to purchase a house. This is exciting news, considering we never believed we'd be able to buy our own house. We've gone to classes at the Native American Youth and Family Center about how purchase a home where we were informed on the first day of the two day class that Indians, Native Americans, were not allowed to purchase a home in the Portland, Oregon area prior to 1974. Wasn't the Civil Rights Act signed in 1964? I don't remember.

It is a buyers market out there, and Shusli and I are taking steps to buying our own home, with our own garden, where our landlord won't show up without notice and spray some chemical in the yard that he won't inform me of what it is. Indians could not purchase a house in Portland, Oregon prior to 1974. My mom and dad bought a house in Aloha, Oregon (west of Beaverton) in 1971. Our people, however, were no longer federally recognized at the time. We were legally non-existent from around 1956 (termination) until 1978 (re-recognition). If the statute effected that Aloha area as well, maybe my parents were able to purchase a house because my dad wasn't legally an Indian? I don't know.

I got a hair up my backside and checked out the audio book of "To Kill a Mockingbird," by Harper Lee, as well as the movie with Gregory Peck playing Atticus. Check this out, the 50 year old novel is still on hold by numerous folk at the Multnomah County Library. When I finally received the audio book about a month ago, I listened to it as I headed back and forth to Eugene for my work. The book was read so wonderfully, gloriously, by Sissy Spacek. Jean Louise Finch is the main character's name. She and her brother live in the small town of Maycomb, Alabama where their father, Atticus, is a lawyer. They are poor, and it is in the 1930's during the depression. Jean Louise (Scout), and her brother, Jeremy (Jem), make a new friend during the summers named Dill. They are intelligent and active children. Their father, Atticus, is appointed to defend a black man accused of rape. Of course, the racism that goes on throughout is raw and terrible and well described. The oppression of blacks in the South was horrific. The injustice a normal part of life. (Some things really haven't changed.) Although Atticus proves the man innocent, he is still found guilty by a jury.

I looked up Harper Lee on the internet and found out her novel, still popular 50 years later, was the only novel she ever wrote. She received a presidential award from co-King George a few years back for "To Kill a Mockingbird." I read that she was best friends with none other than Truman Capote. In fact, Harper Lee stated that she designed the Dill character after her best friend Truman. She even helped Truman in his research for his best known novel, "In Cold Blood," about the true multiple murder of the Clutter family in 1959.

"In Cold Blood" takes place in Holcomb, Kansas, where people are so friendly, or at least were prior to the murders, that they make one and all welcome. They even leave all their doors unlocked. On the morning of November 15, 1959, friends went to pick-up Nancy Clutter to discover her murdered in her bed. Her, her brother, and her parents were all tied up in various rooms of the house and shotgunned in the head. The father, Herb, had his throat cut as well.

With relatively few clues, a witness comes forward to tell the investigators who he believed did it and why, then the hunt is on. Eventually captured and confessing, Richard Eugene Hickock and Perry Smith were hanged in 1965 for these murders. They got to hang out with a few other mass murderers on Death Row such as Lowell Andrews who murdered three family members in order to have some sort of financial gain. Lowell, it was written about a few years previous, was the nicest kid in Kansas. Latham and York were a couple of their Death Row mates as well. Latham and York, a couple of youth from the military, went on a killing spree across the Southern states killing 7 people before they were caught. Interesting novel, "In Cold Blood."

Last night, I watched the movie "In Cold Blood." Robert Blake plays the Cherokee Indian, Perry Smith, the trigger man. Robert Blake, who was in "The Little Rascals," the movie "Electra Glide in Blue," and the TV series, "Baretta" (orignally "Toma"), and was arrested and in 2002 for an alleged connection to the murder of his former wife and acquitted in 2005. Weird.

So I looked up the house, as well as other things, about the Clutter murders. I found the house had recently been for sale, but no one would purchase it, so it sits empty. Empty, it is said, except for the possibility of Nancy Clutter's ghost. The house sits empty.

I talked with Shusli last night about the housing market. New housing sales and existing home sales are down greatly in the U.S. Shusli said she heard that one analyst said it will last at least six months like this. During our classes earlier this month, we were told that there will be a second big round of foreclosures in the U.S. from about October/November and lasting about a year because many of the same type of ruthless loans that caused the first foreclosure crisis will be coming due.

And there is a nice house in Holcomb, Kansas, that no one wants to buy, even though folk can afford it, even though it has historical significance.

And thus, a little trip down Hawthorne four or so months ago, has made connections between movies, authors, racism in the South and in Portland, Oregon, us purchasing a house, and recent history.

I smoked a cigarette on our tiny porch yesterday and noticed a spider with an intricate barely visible thread suspended seemingly in mid air, waiting for an insect to feast upon. I looked around the neighborhood, and noticed many webs occasionally shining in the morning light all over, connecting everything.

Cracker

[Were it not for Shusli making me aware of the Russell talking about matriarchy and alleged Dr., Dr. Laura talking about n***ers, I would have not been aware of these things. Thank you Shusli!]

When I hear the likes of Russell Means or any other male wielding their penis of privilege talk about matriarchy, I don't put a whole lot, if any, weight into their arguments because they don't invite the voices of women to join in. Women are commonly oppressed by the male populace ALL OVER THE WORLD! Thus, when I hear men talking about matriarchy, I don't think they have any idea what they are talking about unless they balance it with the voices of WOMEN! If I want to hear about matriarchy, I'll ask my wife, Shusli. Shusli, do you wish to say anything about matriarchy?

In discussions of racism, hearing folk like Dr. Laura, a WHITE woman, profess her expertise on the subject, I'd have to say she is full of shit. Why? Because she didn't talk with, discuss with, allow the voices of people of color to express their experiences, cultural and/or personal, in the discussion of racism. Dr. Laura used the n-word 11 times on a recent show.

Listening to this program, I wasn't as disturbed as much by Dr. Laura using the n-word as much as her BLATANT display of her institutional racism. A woman of color phoned in to discuss how she hates getting racist comments by a friend of her white husband. "Black people like doing this. Black people like doing that," are the types of comments her husbands friend made. Laura stated that the woman was "hyper sensitive." Laura said she didn't think that its racist for the friend to constantly make comments about race in her presence. Laura, to the best of my knowledge, is what a former mother-in-law of mine (also white) called "cracker white."

Laura also made these comments to the caller. "Don't N double A CP me." "If you are that hyper sensitive about color, and don't have a sense of humor, don't marry out of your race." Don't NAACP me? Is she stating that the NAACP is hyper-sensitive to race? Don't marry out of your race if you don't want to be forced to deal with institutional racism! Shit! Shusli and I have to deal with the institutionally racist EVERY DAY, and we're both Indians! Hyper-sensitive? Tell me, Cracker white types, all about the crushing oppression you have felt throughout history because of the color of your skin.

Black folks have been lynched because they are Black. Blacks were enslaved because they are Black. Blacks don't get jobs and housing or loans at times EVEN TODAY because they are Black. Their opinions on race are dismissed by many such white folk as alleged Dr., Dr. Laura, because they are Black. When it comes to race, white folk simply do not want to talk to people of color about it. That would make them feel uncomfortable. Make them feel guilty. Chip away at their sense of superiority and privilege. Well, at least a cop ain't gonna shoot you in the back, LET ALONE arrest you for riding the subway while white, leaving a bar while white, driving while white.

But, I guarantee you that white folk will get up in arms about my use of the word Cracker. They will call me racist. They will start screaming, "WHAT ABOUT ME?! WHAT ABOUT ME?!" I'll ask, where were you during the Jena Six issue? Where were you during Hurricane Katrina and its aftermath? Where were you during the NUMEROUS racist cop shootings of Black folk? Have you ever heard that old saying, "The silence was deafening"?

Louis CK, a white man, says in his comedy routine, and I paraphrase, you can't call me a name about my race and make me feel bad. He called me a cracker. Wow! That really ruined my day.

Alleged Dr., Dr. Laura said she told her good Black friend and body guard when choosing basketball teams for a game that "white men can't jump, I want you on my team." I have recently seen the movie, "To Kill a Mockingbird." There is a scene in there when a white man tells a Black man to get Atticus, the lawyer, from the house of a Black family. "Boy, go tell that lawyer I want to see him." The adult Black male obliges and goes inside without complaint. Having faced similar shit as far as racism, I'd have to say that it is possible that Laura's Black friend and bodyguard depends upon her for his living. He could probably get a job elsewhere, but would still have to face such racism if he continues protecting white folk. Thus it is possible that he doesn't call her on her racism because he doesn't want to make waves that may cost him his job and possibly her friendship, if he considers her a real friend. Let me give you an example of what I am talking about.

About 3 years ago, I had to ride along with a white guy at my work because he lost his airport badge and I had one. First thing that racist POS says to me, and I kid you not, "Like I always say, give a nigger a fur coat and he thinks he's King Kong." This came out of nowhere and for not particular reason as it was the first words he shared with me on our journey together. My first thought, which I never spoke was, "I left my hatchet in my car. I must kill this man, but I left my hatchet in my car." Thinking it is one thing, doing it another altogether. (I spent our three days together telling him current racist events as well as explaining women's rights as he turned out to be misogynist as well, and what I know of the oppression of women as I couldn't actually hack the man to death with a hatchet and not worry about losing my job). Having experienced such racism in the past and when bringing it to the attention of others being told to put up with it as it puts my job on the line, I kept my mouth shut, did not tell my bosses, etc. Why? Because white folk don't like talking about racism and will get rid of that which brings it to their attention. Example: Laura cutting off the woman of color to express her personal superiority toward the woman in her knowledge of the field of racism. Me bringing racist issues to the table at my job can get me in more trouble than the Cracker's making racist comments. Thus, I truly wonder what Laura's body guard really feels about those racist comments made by that cracker boss of his. Maybe alleged Dr., Dr. Laura, should read "The Help."

As far as Black comedians, etc., using the n-word, I'm fine with it. It is like reclaiming the power that word has had on them for so long. That word that proclaimed them as lesser beings. That word that was a tool to continue their oppression, like the whip. To me, Black folk that use the word are reclaiming its power for their own use. I also understand how many Black folk who do not use the word feel that it is a continued oppression of their people even when it is used by their fellow Black folk. Dr. Laura has no right to use the word as she has absolutely NO understanding of the historical oppression nor the current conditions of oppression suffered by Black folk at the hands of her fellow white folk and their supporters.

That said, I have recently listened to the book, "To Kill a Mockingbird," by Harper Lee. The book is told from the point of view of Scout, a little girl, in 1930's Alabama. Her father, Atticus, is a lawyer defending a Black man charged with raping a white woman. Although the evidence overwhelmingly proclaims his innocence, he is found guilty. Sissy Spacek read the book and did a fantastic job. (Dill, one of the child characters in the book, Harper designed after Truman Capote, her childhood next door neighbor and life long friend.)

The racism and oppression Black folk have had to put up with is terrifying, and something white folk do not want to face up to, let alone face up to the oppression currently enacted by their race and their supporters against Black folk. "WHAT ABOUT ME?! WHAT ABOUT ME?!"

Call me crazy (but don't call me "chief"), but if I'm gonna talk about racism against Blacks, I'm gonna discuss it with Black folk. I'm gonna discuss it with non-Blacks who have an understanding and possibly witnessed racism against Black folk and have been activists on behalf of Blacks and are supported by Black communities. I'm gonna discuss it with non-Blacks who are ignorant, but most of them seem to think their ignorance gives them a knowledge more vast than that of the races whom experience racism.

Same with matriarchy. I'm gonna discuss matriarchy with women. Male experts don't mean shit to me unless they share with me the voices of women and invite the voices of women into the conversation as well. I am no expert on matriarchy because I AM A MAN! I am capable of having an understanding and being supportive, but if I claim to be an expert on the subject, I am full of shit!

Dr. Laura, alleged Dr., is resigning from her show. This is her last year of offering crappy advice to the masses who believe that she is something she claims to be. She may be out a few bucks, but I'm sure she will continue to have a career in spouting her BS to folk somewhere in some other medium. People seem to have a tendency to believe that a-holes like her have something real to offer. Why? I don't know. But who am I to tell folk not to believe in such BS artists like her and so damned many others, most of whom are MEN!

Get Up!

When you said...

Let's get high...

I had something totally different in mind.

Raccoon

This poor guy occasionally visits the back of one of the stores in Eugene. He has bad vision, no tail, and looks like he was hit by a car at one time. Cute little fella.

"Flat"...ulence

I've been listening to "The World if Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-First Century (2005)," by foreign affairs columnist for the New York Times, Thomas L. Friedman. It is 15 CD's read by Oliver Wyman.

"The World is Flat," is a catch phrase created by Thom to explain simply what is happening with globalization. He means that the world is becoming more homogeneous and thus more folk are becoming interconnected from all over the world with new technology.

I enjoyed this book at first, hearing the interconnectedness of all the various nations in this insane world of new technology. How work is being created in areas where there was none. The facts on the ground are pretty interesting; laying of fiber optic lines, the dot com boom to bust, the infrastructure that set up outsourcing, etc.

But then Thomas gets into this corporatization party-line analysis of the whole situation that given the facts since 2005 seems on the verge of ridiculous.

He also starts handing down this message that sounds rather like, "if you poor folk would just pull yourselves up by your bootstraps, you could jump on the globalization bandwagon and become fabulously wealthy like all the other folk who have jumped on it." Can you say, BULLSHIT! That would work in a world of infinite resources. Infinite growth on a finite planet. But he doesn't talk about these things. He barely talks about any of the negative effects of globalization. He does have a lot of cute little catch phrases in this book like "where were you when the world went flat?," "glocalization (act locally, think globally...about how you can hop on the globalization band wagon)," etc. It would seem that he says these things in a way to catch the readers eyes without really explaining the whole picture. Without much, if any, REAL analysis of the negative things that happen with globalization. To hear Thom talk about globalization, you'd think it was the best thing since the orgasm!

I'm only on disc 13, but Thom did finally get to talking about what happens to those not so lucky, or, if you will, unable or unwilling to jump on the globalization band wagon. He finally did start talking about the negative things around disc 12, but he isn't talking with the people that it effects. He talks with those who have successfully jumped on the bandwagon stating that those that aren't on board are simply jealous of those who are. Thus, since they didn't pull themselves up by their own bootstraps, they are left behind to live in poverty.

THANK GOD for John Perkins! The day before yesterday, one of the loaders of the trucks I drive did a ride along with me to see what he and his colleagues put us through. I didn't want to bring him in on the middle of "...Flat," so I stuck in "Confessions of an Economic Hitman: The Shocking Story of How America Really Took Over the World (2004)," by John Perkins. Thank you for the reality check, John! THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU! At points when I was about screaming at the FLATulent analysis of "...Flat," I'd think of this book.

"...Economic Hitman" is about the work done by John and others to bring the economies of other nations to their knees by encouraging vast loans that they would be incapable of paying back and thus could be held in the imperial grip of the American Corporatcracy. The U.S. could then steal labor, resources, votes in the U.N., etc., through extortion by leveraging these loans.

John mentions such crimes as murder, genocide, assassination, environmental destruction, corruption, rape, etc. The real darker side of globalization covered up as simple jealousy thus far in "...Flat."

John went all over the world and he describes how he made economic forecasts of how the engineers for the company he worked for could design structures for infrastructure that would make a nation fabulously wealthy and self-sufficient. The nations would then take loans from the IMF and World Bank for billions of dollars and be incapable of paying them back after dams and other infrastructure were created. Thus, these nations would be held hostage to do the bidding of other nations. The taking of "a pound of flesh," was how John put it.

John also describes the history of it, mostly starting with the work of Kermit Roosevelt in successfully removing the Mossadeq government from Iran in the '50's and putting in the pro-American Shah who became one of the most heinous criminals in current history according to some of the people that lived under that monster. But the Shah gave America what it wanted, and thus, he was great in the eyes of the American corporatocracy.

These things you don't hear about in Thom's book. You don't hear interviews with women like Vandana Shiva or Arundhati Roy talking about how the new world infrastructure and predatory lending practices have lead to the destruction of the farming community in India. Nor will you hear about Monsanto and other food corporations taking over the farming in India. You won't hear John Perkins talking about how the oil industry destroyed the environment in Ecuador. You won't hear the voices of the indigenous Africans around the Niger Delta and the destruction of their environment and thus their culture at the hands of the oil industry.

You will hear about how great Bill Gates is in offering so generously some of his millions to the African people in search of a cure for various forms of Malaria. But wait, oddly, I didn't hear how any of this is reaching the BLACKS in Africa. I heard how a $230,000,000 grant has gone into research to drug companies to create a vaccine under the pretext of somehow getting it into the hands of the primitive clinics in Africa to help the people there. No mention of using that money to help create a healthier infrastructure in Africa. No mention of helping create a situation where Africans can create their own sovereignty. The only place I heard that money went to is to research and how Bill Gates praised his own philanthropy.

Thomas Friedman does finally mention around disc 12 the numbers in jobs created by the call centers in India. 0.02% jobs have been created by the call centers. Only 2% of jobs in India are created by globalization. There is so much more in the forecasting arena I could discuss here, but how much more is going to bore you?

Here are some current negative aspects of globalization:

The BP oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico is a direct effect of globalization.

The increase in immigration from the south caused by NAFTA and GATT and not "Mexicans" wanting to steal our jobs.

The banking crisis caused by predatory lending.

And the list goes on and on.

If you want to read this book, "...Flat," by Thomas Friedman, I'd suggest balancing it with some John Perkins, Derrick Jensen, Arundhati Roy, Vandana Shiva, etc. to add a little REALITY flavor to the mix

Don't worry about the bootstraps...Haliburton holds the patent on those and doesn't charge too much for you to pull on them.

Remembering Nagasaki

Today is the 65th anniversary of the dropping of the atomic bomb on Nagasaki. Thought I'd reproduce a post I made on Pudgy Indian 2 on November 29, 2008 about George Weller who was the first American reporter into Nagasaki.

George Weller

I picked up a book on tape at the Library called "First Into Nagasaki: The Censored Eyewitness Dispatches on Post Atomic Japan and It's Prisoners of War." The book is about the dispatches of George Weller, the first American who snuck into Nagasaki about a month after the U.S. had dropped the second atomic bomb there.

In these dispatches, he talks a lot about the illness that followed the bombing. As well as the radiation did not stay at lethal levels as long as was projected. Radiation effects the blood. The blood is thinned, as in it reduces blood quantities in red and white cells. It also in many cases kills platelets, which are the parts that give blood the ability to clot.

Geoge Weller, when asked about the bombing of Nagasaki, would also mention that it has to be taken in with bombings like that of Tokyo, where the U.S. killed over 100,000 people in a single evening.

War crime? Yes. The Japanese were willing to surrender a year prior with one condition, that the emperor remain emperor. The U.S. wanted unconditional surrender, yet, let the emperor remain emperor. What's up with that? Thousands, millions of lives could have been spared if the U.S. would have accepted the terms originally. Of course, they wouldn't have been able to drop their wonderful new little toys to terrorize the U.S.S.R., either.

As well, George Weller was the first to inform many prisoners of war that the war was over. Many did not know, and there were many slave labor camps ran by the Japanese military and their wealthy (like Prescott Bush benefitting directly from Auschwitz slave labor). These were mostly prisoners of war, but some were civilians.

We all know of the Bataan Death March, though could probably not name a single event that happened during that time or how it came about, let alone any that died or survived (I can't). Nor would most even be able to mention the fact that there were 99 American nurses in that battle of the Phillipines and it was the first time in modern military history that women nurses were in battlefield situations. ("We Band of Angels: The Untold Story of American Nurses Trapped on Bataan by the Japanese," by Elizabeth M. Norman). Censorship and American short term memory are wonderful tools for the wealthy to trick us into continuing the horrific behaviors of war for them to gain more wealth and glory for themselves. And I bet most of you never heard of "The Death Cruise" either. The one that George Weller got the story of from some of the prisoners is the only known well detailed story of one of the MANY Japanese Military death cruises. It reminds me of how the British military housed their Scots prisoners after Culloden, in prison cells for months where they were barely fed and forced to live in their own excrement and amongst their dead. Serious stomach turning stuff, if I had a weaker stomach, which I don't. But it is also history that doesn't even warrant a footnote in this nation, for some reason. As is pointed out by George Weller, this is the only well documented "Death Cruise." There are no documented cases of the "Death Cruises" for the comfort women, forced into sexual slavery by the Japanese military.

And then, there is the "King of the Censors," (like Peter Brzika is "The King of the Cutthroats" from the Catholic ran death camp called Jasenovac in Croatia) the American military.

Seen here without his pipe, hat, and glasses, is good ole Dugout Doug, aka Douglas McCarthur. Doug earned the name "Dugout Doug" because he ABANDONED his men on Corregidor after the long hard battle of Bataan and the retreat to the Island of Corregidor. Doug managed to catch himself a boat to Australia to save his own ass, instead of attempting to get those men who fought to protect each other and his lousy worthless ass off the island as well. Dugout ABANDONED his men and his post.

Thus the Bataan Death March and the Death Cruises that followed. Cruises that took prisoners to Japan to be slave labor for the wealthy in horrifically unsafe conditions of the coal mines near Nagasaki. In the case of the Death Cruise recorded by George Weller of the survivors that made it to Japan and those that made it through the mines, torture, and slave labor, there were 1600+ prisoners who were carried out of the Phillipines, only about 450 made it to Japan, 267 came out alive. Most of those killed were killed by friendly fire. (The last surviving marine from Wake Island, was killed by a food drop of Spam, of all things). Even though Dugout had intelligence that their were many ships with POW's aboard them, they also carried military supplies and thus, many of the POW's were killed by "friendly fire." Little known fact of American History.

More importantly, however, the general that ABANDONED his men and his post to save his own glorious ass and create the lie of a mystique of himself being a great man, Dugout Doug, CENSORED the dispatches of George Weller. There could be many reasons for this. One is that Dugout didn't like anyone disobeying his post abandoning ass. Dugout was a pretty arrogant self-righteous bastard willing to sacrifice many Americans as well as enemy to make himself look good. George Weller did not OBEY his prince in order to get out information and truth that he believed needed to be carried to the people. George was a reporter, a real reporter, not these stupid asses you see that get the stories they are told to get in order to create careers for themselves without ever having to put those careers on the line to, say, get out some of the dirty truths that create this world.

Dugout also had a grasp of human thinking. People want to forget attrocities. When they do, Dugout and his likes can then raise themselves to glorious positions like "prince" on the expense of those that actually put themselves on the line. If all of America knew what happens to prisoners of war, they may not want to sign up for horrific military service because they don't want to torture nor be tortured. People may rethink war, and then folks like Dugout wouldn't be considered the great people they like to believe they are.

Did you know that Dugout Doug, Douglas McCarthur, also allied himself with the infamous Japanese military unit, Unit 731. This unit did medical experiments on POW's and other prisoners, mostly to see how much torture folks would take before they actually died. Dugout pardoned many of these folks so he could get the information of torture. Why? So we could have things like the H-blocks in Northern Ireland, Agu Ghraib in Iraq, Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, etc. I'm not saying Dugout Doug is the sole person responsible for this, I am saying he played a rather pivotal role in a societal norm that folks like to PRETEND doesn't happen. Civilization...wonderful stuff!

Knowing that Dugout and the U.S. military were censors, and pretty much ALL militaries are censors (not wanting to get truth to the people because the people just might do something about this crap), it is safe to say that the censors are heavily at work within the U.S. government, military, and in all war actions like those in Iraq and Afghanistan. It is safe to assume that tortures are going on far beyond the reports that we the people were not supposed to hear (thank you Seymour Hersch). That war crimes are happening far beyond what we hear about. That the wealthy, like the 200+ U.S. corporations that helped fund the Nazis during the war, are making billions off of the backs of the victims of the U.S. led genocides in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as our own folks. That you will remember those that like to call themselves heroes, like Tommy Franks, before you would remember names like Darrell Anderson who admitted his war crimes in Iraq to the public, even though he signed a document that makes him LEGALLY BOUND not to talk about these things to the public, FORCED upon him by the U.S. military. We the people are not getting the information that we need to make decisions about what our government is doing, and most of us are rather content with that.

The media doesn't even have to be cencorsed. They self-censor. They know what the government and the wealthy want out, they know how to propagandize in order to keep the people supporting the same deadly system.

And we the people? Most Americans, as pointed out by George Weller, see the U.S. as "There is the U.S., and everything outside our borders are seen as the others." Most Americans have a very limited sense of self and entitlement. Most U.S. citizens have a limited sense of history, and pretty much like it that way. We have many privileges here. Many things to distract us from what is really going on in the world. I mean...

Oh...Look at the time. I have to catch the Chess Boxing Match on ESPN...

Institutional Cruelty

There have been a few items in the news that I would like to mention.

A ban on cluster bombs has been declared. It is said because children and other innocents get wounded by the unexploded bomblets. However, that is exactly what they were designed to do. As I have mentioned on my blogs several times, 2 psychologists were hired by the U.S. to decide what colors most attracted children. Turns out to be fluorescent green and fluorescent orange. Little bomblets were then given these colors and dropped over Vietnam. The idea was that children would pick up these bombs and play with them and blow off an arm or a leg. These were not designed to kill, but to maim children. The idea being that it would take personnel out of the field to care for wounded children. These children would then use medical supplies that would otherwise be used for military folk, folk who can actually fight back. Then as the child grew, they wouldn't be able to work nor join the military and become a drain on society. I have no idea why folk seem to think that these bomblets accidentally reach non-combatants, civilians. That is exactly what they were designed to do. And the U.S. refuses to sign the ban on these as they make money off of them and this cruelty is enjoyed by those that benefit the most, the war mongering wealthy who don't have to fight the battles.

The U.S. has admitted its plans to slaughter Iranians. The excuse, however, is the lie. They claim that it is out of fear that Iran will develop nuclear weapons. IAEA says they are at least 10 years from doing so, but what do a bunch of stupid scientists know. In my opinion: The U.S. is running out of cheap oil and wants at that Iranian oil. Especially since the Chinese have their hands on vast amounts of that oil. Of course, the U.S. being almost or beyond financially bankrupt, is willing to start another trillion dollar war under Bush's third term, also known as the Obomber administration. With Killary Clinton as part of that band of thieves, one is almost guaranteed to have a war with Iran shortly. This trillion dollar war in spite of the fact that the U.S. is in a recession and on the border of economic collapse. The Gulf is dead because of BP and Tony Hayward, and we the people are gonna be paying for it, not Tony and his gang of mass murdering criminals. This in spite of one of the highest unemployment levels in decades. This, in spite of bankers and war mongers making record profits in the midst of mass unemployment, recession, and dare I say, damn near depression. GO KILLERS!