Thanks to my older son Miles here's a link to Cornell West visiting the Liberty Plaza demonstrators and their "human microphone"—and Mario Savio in December of 1964 in the UC Berkeley protest against the university's president's, and board of regents', hamhanded response to student requests for some say in the way their lives were regulated, a protest and speech that many believe inspired what followed in the 1960s and '70s, and beyond, in the struggle for freedom for all (I was in the service at the time and married and remember the impact just reading about Savio's speech, just a quote from the segment shown here, had on my wife (Miles' and his sister Caitlin's mother) and me, realizing we weren't alone in our feelings about the changes we hoped for in our schools and governance and society...and future, a future that did fulfill that hope for more freedom for all (until we became complacent and those who would reverse that expansion of freedoms in order to ensure more power and profit for themselves and their corporate leaders, as well as those who knowingly or not serve the interests of those rightwing oligarchs, built a movement of think tanks and media and political lackeys to enable their agenda)...
Hope these young people never get complacent about the fight to keep the greedheads from taking over our world as they so obviously did under Bush/Cheney and continue to resist any effort to take it back from anyone other than their seemingly unwitting defenders (the Tea Party et. al.).
Thursday, September 29, 2011
Wednesday, September 28, 2011
NOW WE'RE TALKIN'
This reminds me of the old days—what people call "the 'sixties" and the media usually characterizes in terms of style and culture and is influenced by the right to portray in negative ways (violent, destructive, etc.) but was actually mostly about the passion to stop the violence and destruction, etc. being carried out by the corporate powers controlling, or trying to, government and society.
I first was turned on to this earlier yesterday and planned to post it when I got a chance today, and then my older son, Miles, posted a link to it in the comments thread of my last post, so you may have already watched this. As he says it gets really good about three minutes in, though it's also emotionally powerful to me right from the git go because of the "human microphone" technique used by the crowd to thwart police regulations against megaphones and loudspeakers etc.
This so reminded me of non-violent protests and demonstrations in the 1960s and beyond, where I was fortunate enough to sometimes be the one speaking, that it brought tears to my eyes to see that the spirit of active protest against those responsible for the misery of so many is still alive and growing. This is the true spirit of hope and change [and I don't mean Michael Moore, I mean the faces and voices of the young people in the crowd amplifying his message and theirs]!
I first was turned on to this earlier yesterday and planned to post it when I got a chance today, and then my older son, Miles, posted a link to it in the comments thread of my last post, so you may have already watched this. As he says it gets really good about three minutes in, though it's also emotionally powerful to me right from the git go because of the "human microphone" technique used by the crowd to thwart police regulations against megaphones and loudspeakers etc.
This so reminded me of non-violent protests and demonstrations in the 1960s and beyond, where I was fortunate enough to sometimes be the one speaking, that it brought tears to my eyes to see that the spirit of active protest against those responsible for the misery of so many is still alive and growing. This is the true spirit of hope and change [and I don't mean Michael Moore, I mean the faces and voices of the young people in the crowd amplifying his message and theirs]!
Tuesday, September 27, 2011
PS TO LAST POST
And here's what's being done to those protesting the banks near Wall Street (you have to read the whole thing and watch the video and click on the links etc. to get the full impact).
THIS SAYS IT ALL [AT LEAST ABOUT BANKS VS. THE REST OF US]
Since the Bush/Cheney economic collapse and bank bailout...
...bank profits are up: 136%...
...but bank lending is down 9%...
...!!!???!!!...
Monday, September 26, 2011
Sunday, September 25, 2011
TODAY'S QUOTE
"If I recall correctly there is a passage in the novel A LESSON BEFORE DYING by Ernest Gaines in which a black man about to be executed shouts out - 'Save me Joe Louis.' I was thinking of this when I read a black activist's account of how President Obama did nothing to save Troy Davis. Really? What was President Obama suppose to do? What can a heavyweight champion of the world do when someone is confronted with death? Reaching out for Joe Louis instead of even Jesus is interesting. We seem to think that some people have unlimited power. We still view the presidency with a degree of mystery. If you're unemployed right now do you think Obama is going to find you a job by next week? Is Obama going to make your bed? Feed your kids? Babysit a race? What is going to happen when Obama is no longer president? Are black people going to return to slavery days? Will there be a new back to Africa movement? Obama's lesson to black people is like something taken from 'The Wiz.'
His message is simply - believe in yourself. Obama wanted to be president and he is. What do you want to do? Do you want to change the world? Well, start doing it before you die. Don't wait for someone to take your life. The lesson before dying is to live."
—E. Ethelbert Miller (from his blog E-Notes)
His message is simply - believe in yourself. Obama wanted to be president and he is. What do you want to do? Do you want to change the world? Well, start doing it before you die. Don't wait for someone to take your life. The lesson before dying is to live."
—E. Ethelbert Miller (from his blog E-Notes)
THE PALESTINE ISSUE
I was a boy when modern Israel declared itself an independent nation. I had seen newsreels of what our GIs found when they entered the concentration camps, and heard stories from returning GIs in the neighborhood that were passed down to us little kids through older siblings until I'm sure what we ended up with were distortions of whatever the original anecdotes were.
But in both instances what we saw and heard was horrible. It took a while for that to sink in in terms of the ethnic biases of the neighborhood. The main trouble was always between the "Italians" (which stood for both immigrants and their Italian-American offspring whether still little or grown) and the "Irish" (ditto for us).
The other ethnicities in the neighborhood were too few to rally much opposition. They either stayed out of it or sided with one of us as sort of honorary Italians or Irish. Those in the neighborhood who were Jewish or "Negro"—as they said then—got more or less a pass because they were so obviously "other" and yet as familiar in many ways as our own. [PS: And there certainly was a lot of anti-Semitism and racism in attitudes and talk, but there also was a lot of anti-Italianism and anti-Irishism etc. in similar ways depending on who was expressing the attitude.]
To connect our own Jewish friends with what happened under the Nazis didn't seem to happen until we were older, at least for me. By then THE DIARY OF ANNE FRANK and other books and movies (like GENTLEMAN'S AGREEMENT and EXODUS et. al.) had made the Jewish cause seem noble and righteous and worth fighting for, and it overwhelmed most WWII history, at least as it was expressed in the culture in ways that elevated being Jewish and the state of Israel to not just a kind of Gandhi-esque purity of purpose, but also a kind of David (as in David and Goliath) underdog warrior iconic stature.
I was aware that the homes and property of many Arab Palestinians had been confiscated, taken as kind of the spoils of war, but it somehow seemed justified for many years. Justified by the attacks on Israel by its Arab neighbors, or by what the Nazis had done, or by what it seemed the whole world had done at what [another one of those strange post-brain-op typos, I obviously meant "one"] time or another to Jews.
And the continued attacks on Israeli citizens continued to justify much of Israeli policies and actions and support for them...until Rabin was assassinated by a rightwing fundamentalist Jewish assassin and Sharon deliberately provoked the second Intifada by going into the Muslim holy site at the Mount and allowed the rightwing settlers to take over more and more Palestinian land which continued under every Israeli leader since, even when gestures were made to remove some settlers and settlements, more were allowed to go up.
And more recently the taking over of properties in East Jerusalem that have been in Arab families for generations and turning them over to urban Jewish settlers and developers. I have no sympathy for the Palestinian extremists, but also no sympathy for Israeli ones. But Abbas established a functioning West Bank that controlled extremism and showed a willingness to negotiate with Israel with only one precondition, that Israel stop taking Palestinian land by allowing its settlers to, settlers who mostly believe that Palestine should never be a separate state but instead should be incorporated into a greater Israel in which Arabs remain second-class citizens or leave.
It's very dangerous for politicians to speak about this without constantly referring to the present Israeli political perspective as the only one, even though there are as many Israelis against the settler policy as there are for it probably. But as in our own Congress at the moment, a vocal and influential rightwing minority has outsized influence and control of the Israeli political establishment and therefore its policies.
Abbas made a smart move, I think, in asking for UN recognition for Palestine, despite all the talking heads on TV taking a contrary view, because it forces Netanyahu's hand. He would lay it on Obama, a man he treated dismissively until this moment, by setting a trap for the president if he doesn't veto the request of the Palestinians. But no matter how bad Israel has been treated by its neighbors, it's hard to read stories about German and other European Jewish descendants of parents and grandparents who had homes and property confiscated by the Nazis and now want compensation, and not think of the parallel (at least in terms of homes and property) situation with Israel and many of its original Palestinian inhabitants and in more recent times on the West Bank.
Once again I should probably not post so late before going to bed because I'm not being as clear as my thoughts seemed to be when I sat down to write this, and I know I will get flack from even some friends. Especially since the media, I noticed, almost never mentions that Abbas has been willing to sit down and negotiate if a halt is made to new settlements, which doesn't seem like too much to ask for the chance of finally ending some of the volatility in the relationship between the Palestinians and Israelis.
In the past, Israel has often turned down the chance to negotiate with the most reasonable of the Arab Palestinians because of the more extremist ones [and vice versa, of course, the Palestinian leaders have missed many opportunities as well], but that has usually ended up creating even more extremists ones, the exact opposite of what Israeli leaders say they intend. Yes Hammas are bad guys, but their Gaza constituents aren't too happy with them either now that they see what Abbas has helped create in the West Bank. So to treat Abbas and his government like some sort of feudal vassal state [or easily humiliated defeated enemy] rather than an equal partner is, I believe, only creating more future problems.
[PS: I added a few bracketed clarifications, I hope, this morning, and this caveat that I know this issue is much more complicated than a single blog post can address, but what has now happened at the UN with Abbas asking for recognition of Palestine is the issue I'm addressing and what I mention is relevant to the discussion, I believe.]
But in both instances what we saw and heard was horrible. It took a while for that to sink in in terms of the ethnic biases of the neighborhood. The main trouble was always between the "Italians" (which stood for both immigrants and their Italian-American offspring whether still little or grown) and the "Irish" (ditto for us).
The other ethnicities in the neighborhood were too few to rally much opposition. They either stayed out of it or sided with one of us as sort of honorary Italians or Irish. Those in the neighborhood who were Jewish or "Negro"—as they said then—got more or less a pass because they were so obviously "other" and yet as familiar in many ways as our own. [PS: And there certainly was a lot of anti-Semitism and racism in attitudes and talk, but there also was a lot of anti-Italianism and anti-Irishism etc. in similar ways depending on who was expressing the attitude.]
To connect our own Jewish friends with what happened under the Nazis didn't seem to happen until we were older, at least for me. By then THE DIARY OF ANNE FRANK and other books and movies (like GENTLEMAN'S AGREEMENT and EXODUS et. al.) had made the Jewish cause seem noble and righteous and worth fighting for, and it overwhelmed most WWII history, at least as it was expressed in the culture in ways that elevated being Jewish and the state of Israel to not just a kind of Gandhi-esque purity of purpose, but also a kind of David (as in David and Goliath) underdog warrior iconic stature.
I was aware that the homes and property of many Arab Palestinians had been confiscated, taken as kind of the spoils of war, but it somehow seemed justified for many years. Justified by the attacks on Israel by its Arab neighbors, or by what the Nazis had done, or by what it seemed the whole world had done at what [another one of those strange post-brain-op typos, I obviously meant "one"] time or another to Jews.
And the continued attacks on Israeli citizens continued to justify much of Israeli policies and actions and support for them...until Rabin was assassinated by a rightwing fundamentalist Jewish assassin and Sharon deliberately provoked the second Intifada by going into the Muslim holy site at the Mount and allowed the rightwing settlers to take over more and more Palestinian land which continued under every Israeli leader since, even when gestures were made to remove some settlers and settlements, more were allowed to go up.
And more recently the taking over of properties in East Jerusalem that have been in Arab families for generations and turning them over to urban Jewish settlers and developers. I have no sympathy for the Palestinian extremists, but also no sympathy for Israeli ones. But Abbas established a functioning West Bank that controlled extremism and showed a willingness to negotiate with Israel with only one precondition, that Israel stop taking Palestinian land by allowing its settlers to, settlers who mostly believe that Palestine should never be a separate state but instead should be incorporated into a greater Israel in which Arabs remain second-class citizens or leave.
It's very dangerous for politicians to speak about this without constantly referring to the present Israeli political perspective as the only one, even though there are as many Israelis against the settler policy as there are for it probably. But as in our own Congress at the moment, a vocal and influential rightwing minority has outsized influence and control of the Israeli political establishment and therefore its policies.
Abbas made a smart move, I think, in asking for UN recognition for Palestine, despite all the talking heads on TV taking a contrary view, because it forces Netanyahu's hand. He would lay it on Obama, a man he treated dismissively until this moment, by setting a trap for the president if he doesn't veto the request of the Palestinians. But no matter how bad Israel has been treated by its neighbors, it's hard to read stories about German and other European Jewish descendants of parents and grandparents who had homes and property confiscated by the Nazis and now want compensation, and not think of the parallel (at least in terms of homes and property) situation with Israel and many of its original Palestinian inhabitants and in more recent times on the West Bank.
Once again I should probably not post so late before going to bed because I'm not being as clear as my thoughts seemed to be when I sat down to write this, and I know I will get flack from even some friends. Especially since the media, I noticed, almost never mentions that Abbas has been willing to sit down and negotiate if a halt is made to new settlements, which doesn't seem like too much to ask for the chance of finally ending some of the volatility in the relationship between the Palestinians and Israelis.
In the past, Israel has often turned down the chance to negotiate with the most reasonable of the Arab Palestinians because of the more extremist ones [and vice versa, of course, the Palestinian leaders have missed many opportunities as well], but that has usually ended up creating even more extremists ones, the exact opposite of what Israeli leaders say they intend. Yes Hammas are bad guys, but their Gaza constituents aren't too happy with them either now that they see what Abbas has helped create in the West Bank. So to treat Abbas and his government like some sort of feudal vassal state [or easily humiliated defeated enemy] rather than an equal partner is, I believe, only creating more future problems.
[PS: I added a few bracketed clarifications, I hope, this morning, and this caveat that I know this issue is much more complicated than a single blog post can address, but what has now happened at the UN with Abbas asking for recognition of Palestine is the issue I'm addressing and what I mention is relevant to the discussion, I believe.]
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)
