The first American President I remember is(was) President Richard Nixon. I didn’t know anything at all about Nixon except that I had seen his face on television – and he looked pretty mean to me. At my school there was a fad. A kid would draw the following set of lines on paper, or in the dirt, or by laying out twigs: | | | / | | | | Then ask “Who’s the devil?” Even if you had seen…
I am concerned about the Peace Not Poverty site. It holds up for me as a very good summary of some of the ethical and practical issues of the USA and its relationship to the world. Nothing seems to have been going on there since the Declaration was completed. What happened? Have the co-sponsors gone on with something further? And if so, where is the link? Please comment if you know. I am posting the declaration here, just in case….
Most of the people of Iraq want us to leave. I wonder why we don’t start asking them why. Where are the interviews? I am not referring to the latest appearances by Chalabi or Cheney, but real current in-depth interviews with people who are there – people of all the groups, all the areas – let’s get some perspectives. If soldiers are not allowed to state their opinions, then it’s even more important to be asking in their stead. Might…
See William S Burroughs perform his Thanksgiving prayer-poem here From BBC Interviews: Naked Lunch is regarded as Burroughs’ masterpiece, the template for all his work. Written in a stream of consciousness style, it is a nightmare peopled by secret agents, mad doctors, gangsters, zombies, phallic monsters, vampires and extraterrestrials, involved in sadomasochistic orgies, transformations, diabolical plots and interplanetary warfare. Its nihilistic humour, visionary intensity, strong social satire and brilliant style received critical approval in 1962, when American writer Norman Mailer…
Stop the Patriot Act Expansion The Senate Intelligence Committee has voted to expand the Patriot Act to give the Justice Department and the FBI more powers to secretly acquire secret information about American citizens without any judicial review in advance, and without the knowledge of those being investigated. This is a clear violation of the Constitution and against the wishes of the people and of many state and local governments. But Congress appears set to do it anyway. Combine this…
From Africa Action: Recent reports coming out of Darfur indicate that the security situation is deteriorating rapidly. There have been fresh assaults on villages and the Janjaweed, with Sudanese government air support, have attacked a camp for internally displaced people, who had already lost their homes in previous attacks. In the past month, the United Nations evacuated all but essential personnel. Some aid agencies are no longer able to reach the camps in some areas of Darfur because insecurity has…