Pilger: The True Beacon On The Hill!
First we bring you shock and awe! Then, for those who survive,
we bring a cleverly controlled democracy,
an illusion of freedom,
and a Big Mac!
Friends, John Pilger, a man who I greatly admire, has written an article on ICH which seems to put America in perspective. It should be read by everyone especially Americans!
I have put the link at the end of this post and I have included some excerpts which might frighten or upset you.
- It was a lesson in what historians call “exceptionalism”, the notion that the United States has the divine right to bring what it describes as liberty and democracy to the rest of humanity. That this merely disguised a system of domination, which Martin Luther King described, shortly before his assassination, as “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world”, was unspeakable.
- The countless massacres that followed, wrote Zinn, were justified by “the idea that American expansion is divinely ordained”.
- It was holiday time and lines of people, including many children, shuffled reverentially through a Santa’s grotto of war and conquest where messages about their nation’s “great mission” were dispensed.
- But what of George Washington’s call for a “rising empire” and James Madison’s “laying the foundation of a great empire”? What of slavery, the theft of Texas from Mexico, the bloody subjugation of central America, Cuba and the Philippines?
- The idea of imperialism, the word itself, was all but expunged from the American lexicon, “on the grounds that it falsely attributed immoral motives to (its) western foreign policy.”
- Big business was elevated from its public reputation as a kind of mafia to that of a patriotic force.
- Every aspect of social life was targeted and permeated schools and universities, churches, even recreational programmes. By 1954, business propaganda in public schools reached half the amount spent on textbooks.”
- An oath of loyalty to all things American became an ideological commitment to the leviathan of business: from the business of armaments and war (which consumes 42 cents in every tax dollar today) to the business of food, known as “agripower.”
- Since 1945, by deed and by example, the US has overthrown 50 governments, including democracies, crushed some 30 liberation movements and supported tyrannies from Egypt to Guatemala (see William Blum’s histories). Bombing is apple pie.
- On the contrary, those whose jobs have vanished and whose homes are repossessed see the new president rewarding crooked banks and an obese military…
- “I’ll tell you what ‘anti-American’ is,” she said. “It’s what governments and their vested interests call those who honour America by objecting to war and the theft of resources and believing in all of humanity.”
Friends, please read the whole article and be proud that you are an anti-American!
Perhaps you can convince others to become anti-American too!
America, behind its deceptive rhetoric, is an evil, warmongering nation, one driven by greed, love of violence, and delusions of grandeur.
And countries which support it (like Australia, Britain, etc) are misguided, myopic and anti-peace!
http://informationclearinghouse.info/article23017.htm
As a European I think one can say that the pro/anti-American sentiment in decades has swung between ‘fifty-fifty, up or down in close relation to the kind of goverments, in the diff. European contries, were they left, or right-leaned.
Until 9/11, we all took the good with the bad, coming form America.
( confess !,- much good has come – and there are, thanks GOD, many extraordinary wise, good and right- minded people on the left in America whom, unfortunately, do not get much time in the neocon corporate-Murdock medias.
Was it not for 9/11, every thing would probable had been the same (very well) but unfortunately (after 9/11) the pro-America was on the raise, and as the result there was several (incl. Denmark) contries in Europe who thought it was Ok to ‘coalition’ in a illegal war.
Those ‘goverments’/responsibles has yet to be held responsible, procecuted and punished for this crime, before the World can to go on in an orderly manner. NOT least for all the countries who did upheld and stood by the law.
Thank God for a man like John Pilger, he’s one of the greatest in our time.
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This for sure makes me anti-american and proud of it!
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John, the world has been conned by America. Deceitfully it has gone about its mission of achieving control of the world using slogans which had no meaning, bribery, corruption, and massive military force. We all thought it was the good guy. How wrong we were!
I am deeply ashamed that my country was duped by America and joined in its wars ever since 1945. We have the blood of innocent people on our hands too.
Jeannie, it must have been very hard for you to write what you did above given that it goes against all the massive propaganda that you have received since birth. I expect there won’t be many comments on this post because most Americans will struggle to admit their country’s shortcomings.
For America to change its spots there needs to be a massive re-education programme, one that debunks the mountain of lies and bullshit, one that tells the truth about America.
A country can’t heal itself if it doesn’t know and accept that it is sick!
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Jeannie Reply:
July 15th, 2009 at 1:05 am
It makes me sad and sick what my country is! It could be such a beautiful country using it’s wealth and power to do so much good in the world for all people, instead it only causes more suffering and death.
I can do very little as one person to make the world a better place; I feel very helpless against the forces of the government and corporations that are controlling everything that happens here.
Even if what I can do is small I still keep trying, sometimes only speaking out against some outragous actions, because I feel it is simply wrong to see an evil act and not try to do something to make it right.
But first we need to be able to see the evil which here in the US is often hard to do with all the propoganda we are exposed to every day.
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America is like a clear-cut forest. When you drive down a mountain road and all you see are trees. It appears to be a forest. Then you get out of your car and look for a trail and start walking into the trees. When you get less than a quarter mile in, you will find a wasteland of no trees. it will be clear-cut as far as the eye can see. No birds, just silence. It is like that in the Sierras near Tahoe and now I would imagine the Appalachians are something akin to that. So much of what people are allowed to see looks like it always did. The parts on the restricted roads would shock and disgust any true lover of this land. The high price of gas keeps people from getting in their cars and exploring American wilderness. It is a war on nature. A road to ruin. A ghost town. A movie set front. Darkness of human nature, carefully concealed from the naked eye.
I love this land deeply. But then, I find I have that experience no matter where I go. I love this Earth. Gaia, our earth, is a living, breathing entity of which we are currently a part. I hope some humans will survive and create the world of intertwined harmony we should be existing in.
Preacherman, don’t tell me,
Heaven is under the earth.
I know you don’t know
What life is really worth.
It’s not all that glitters is gold;
‘alf the story has never been told:
So now you see the light, eh!
Stand up for your rights. come on!
-Bob Marley
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David, I have another caption for the photo above…..”If you don’t come to democracy……Democracy will come to you”.
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Grace, I love your analogy. I have used the “Psycho” analogy myself. You know, where the mother died a long time ago, but they prop up her corpse and pretend all is well.
http://wagelaborer.blogspot.com/2008/02/psycho-mother-american-style.html
John LJ, I am always surprised when non-Americans believe that the USA is a freedom-loving, democratic country. Shouldn’t you get a more balanced view?
Our propaganda system is incredible!
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Grace Reply:
July 15th, 2009 at 9:09 am
So right Wagelaborer. For a long time I sensed this but never put into so many words. Your example of the mother in the window in the Bates Hotel, just as though everything were normal, but is concealing a killer! Is so much of how t can be. Shocking movie in its day, the idea of it! Yet, that feeling of living in a movie front set stage is an image that has been in my psyche for some time now. Who are we really? I thought we were an impartial nation of laws. Laws which separated us from the barbarian. It was all just a story to believe, a social experiment that seemed like it would work, but was murdered in its infancy. In its place a monster, “in its name.”
It is sad, David. Things like that are very upsetting for me. When Julia Butterfly sat in the tree Luna to save it, my heart was totally there with that fight.
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Grace, I was touched by your words. I’ve seen Tahoe and it is magic. When we started building concrete jungles we lost the plot!
Kemosobi, just keep hoping that American democracy doesn’t come to Australia!
Wagelaborer, American propaganda reaches across the world. It comes in film, in books, in plays, in music, the media, the television, every which way. It targets our thinking, renders it inoperative!
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Grace Reply:
July 19th, 2009 at 6:41 am
“Kemosobi, just keep hoping that American democracy doesn’t come to Australia!”
David, this made me think – what a different world if natives could have warned each other. Like, ‘Hey , when the white man shows up, run and hide in the hills till they leave!’ Also do what you can to make your island or land seem inhospitable so they will leave promptly. Yo, heads up! Columbus the killer is on his way’
Bush was the King of opposites. If he named it a ‘Healthy Forest Initiative’- you knew that forest was going down. Same with anything. If democracy is coming to your land – just look to Iraq and learn all you need to know about American “democracy” abroad. Cheers!
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Wagelaborer
When I write in positive term about America it’s partly because I do not think any country in this world, be it ‘ North Koria, Iran, Venezuela, should be denoted ‘evil’, AND/but also to honour those who fight for the ‘good’, inside the various countries.
There’s no doubt, America has done ‘a excellent job’ post WWII in painting it self as the good guy, standing up for (the) right and justice.
All those paintings, for me, has bleached with Serbia-bombing 1999, and COMPLETELY since Iraq 2oo3. – though many other, in Denmark are still (even hystericly – against muslims) pro Israel/American .- I don’t know procentage for this – but I am sorry because this can be ascribed to propaganda/ false informations.
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Upcoming Military Robot Could Feed on Dead Bodies. I don’t know where else to go with information like this.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,532492,00.html?test=latestnews
Help!!
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David G Reply:
July 16th, 2009 at 10:29 am
Grace, with robots on the ground and drones in the air, America could run its wars from the White House and the Pentagon and do away with its military forces!
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Ha, no way Jose~ American military personnel are the perfect American. It is a way of life. No one more disciplined – AND unquestioning than a soldier. Keeps their families shut up too. SInce they care about their kid they keep their moths shut. When the kid dies and the parent squacks(sp?), the parent becomes marginalized as a person on the fringes.
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David G Reply:
July 18th, 2009 at 11:11 am
The same programming applies to American citizens too, Grace. Only the thinking ones escape the net!
Take care.
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I was just surfing around and saw you had no one to discuss this topic with (besides people who agree) and decided to take a shot at it.
“America, behind its deceptive rhetoric, is an evil, warmongering nation, one driven by greed, love of violence, and delusions of grandeur.
And countries which support it (like Australia, Britain, etc) are misguided, myopic and anti-peace!”
It seems that the basic idea of the post is that america has caused untold amounts of violence on this earth and is thus underserving of support from other nations and peoples.
Ok, I will admit that America has commited terrible mistakes in its past but I dare you to take any empire in human history that would have done a better job of it.
We sit here now liveing in a relative golden age of peace and prosperity, using technology created by America and America’s allies, openly critizing the Government of the United States of America. Last time I checked the US government is the most powerful entity on earth. Smart people do not go up to a murderer with a gun and start complaining about how the blood on the walls is ruining their homes feng shui. If the United States is evil and prone to violence that is exactly what you guys are doing. But dont worry we (Even I critize US) arn’t stupid because the United States isn’t evil and is almost the opposite in that it places enormous restrictions upon itself to purposely ward off many “evils”.
General Tirade on how US is the best thing since buttered toast. Check. Sry had to let that out.
Back to the topic. I think I answered the “evil” part.
Warmongering: Lets take the present series of wars in Iraq and Afganistan. For one if we wanted to conquer Iraq and subjacate its people we should have finished the job back in 1991… instead we did what we promised and defended Kuwait and let Saddam stay in power. Secondly Al qaeda attacked us numerous times before we got all riled up on 9/11 and if we were warmongering we would have used one of these numerous incidents to attack Afghanistan beforehand. America behaves more like a dumb elephant than a tiger. The mice can bite and scratch and we wont care but al qeada bit us where the sun dont shine and we kind of over reacted in our attempt to regain control of the situation. I know, I have dissolved the entire rational for afghanistan and our mistep in Iraq into an analogy of an elephant having a run in with a nutcracker, please forgive me for my crude sense of humor and look beyond it. There are numerous other cases where the United States was given an excuse to go to war and stopped itself but I want to get finished with this post eventually so I hope you will trust me that the US is far more restrained than it is “warmongering”.
Ill talk about two more topics: Greed and also why it isn’t all that bad to be a country supporting the US.
Greed: From 1990-forward America has fought in Somalia, Kosovo, Bosnia, Haiti, Afghanistan, and Iraq. All of these except Iraq are about worthless to a 14 trillion dollar superpower. Now Iraq is great with possible un tapped oil reserves greater than even Saudi Arabia. So American’s are greedy bastards intent on stealing the worlds oil? Sorta… The fact is that most Iraqi oil is sold to Asia and Europe and the US only gets about 2-4% of its oil from Iraq. Oh and did I meantion we have to buy it… Thats right we spent hundreds of billions of dollars to invade Iraq to have the imperial pleasure of buying it from them… wtf. The true reason wasn’t greed it was that most americans, from the president on down, believed naively (we americans have truely made this kind of hopeful naivety into an artform) that we could take out our most aggresive enemy in the middle east, secure world oil reserves for future economic security, establish an ally in one of the most anti american regions, establish democracy, and do all this relatively cheaply and quickly. Well cheaply and quickly have definitely been forgotten somewhere and ill leave the rest for history to judge.
US Supporters: Most countries who are allies or support the US have had some big threat to their existance at one time or another in the 20th century where they basically came pleading for help from the US and luckily enough the US was in a good mood at the time and had interests in their survival. Not to put down US allies as cowardly freeloaders… almost all were the opposite fighting valiantly for their freedom but as a said before the US was reluctant to go “warmongering” and wannabe allies had to convince the US to shed blood, lives, and treasure for them. Once you become a US ally nobody really messes with you (existentially that is… unless you count your people voluntarily succumbing to US consumer culture). The US esstentially asks that you dont attack US allies, don’t prolifferate WMD or aggresively produce them, you dont damage the World Economy (aka US liberal free trade), and that you abide by world wide human rights standards (many exceptions and even US is having trouble with this in the form of unlawful combatant and where to detain them “Gitmo”). Overall in my humble opinion this is a small price to pay for protection from being raped and pillaged. As for Allies of the US being anti peace… lets look at the example of Europe which is almost entirely now comprised of US allies. If you had told a European in 1939 that after 1945 Europe would enter a period of extended peace and after 45 years or so the deeply nationalistic and warlike nations of Europe would start cedeing their power to something called the EU they would have looked at you like you were crazy. Though its nice to think after 1500 years or so of constant civil war that Europeans just decided to beat their swords into plows but it would be a fallacy. The truth is that the US enforced the peace and didnt let the Europeans exert their “freedom” to kill each other and once Europeans understood they couldn’t expand their power militarily anymore they decided to compete peacefully. So from my perspective, in Europe at least, the United States has performed miracles and has brought peace and (inadvertantly) unity.
Well thats it and I hope to see what you guys can throw back at me
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