Chalk And Cheese!

When Dalai met Barmy.

Friends, this week, two leaders met for a chat. They are two very different leaders. The one on the left is known as the Dalai Lama and he is the Spiritual Leader of Buddhist Tibet although he no longer lives there thanks to the Chinese Government. He is a man who has little power and no armies. Yet the Chinese Government fears him because he offers a threat to their control of the Communist State, the one that is now into capitalism in a big way.

The one on the right is the Commander in Chief of the world’s biggest, most powerful army. He can press buttons and launch the war to end all wars (because the world will no longer exist). He is in control of warships, nuclear submarines, fighter jets, cruise missiles, drones, etc. When he gives orders, millions of people jump! He is also President of a nation which holds 5% of the world’s people, a nation which, despite its small population, thinks it should control the world by force if necessary, that it was born to do so.

Now, I was not there during their chat so I don’t have any idea of what they talked about. Perhaps it went along the following lines:

DL. …Tibet is a small country and China is very big and powerful.

B. Not as powerful as America! Do you know how many nukes we…

DL. Killing people is not on my agenda, El Presidente.

B. Are you crazy? Not kill people! Since America started killing people in a big way…

DL. But don’t you understand, your Magnificence? Buddhists are peaceful. They don’t kill anything. Not even an ant.

B. Ants! Ants! I’ve got a red button. If I press it, whole nations disappear.

DL. Disappear! Mmmm. What about China?

B. A piece of cake. We can do China and Russia at the same time. But with China, they’re our biggest potential market. You don’t kill the Golden Goose while it’s laying, Dally. Not yet anyway.

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Armies: Some Good. Some Bad.

The Army of the Killing does this!

The Army of the Caring does this!

Friends, I’ve just come back from treatment and the ironic thought stuck me that there are two major armies in the world: there are armies of people who are dedicated to helping humans and easing their suffering and armies of people who are dedicated to killing people and taking their land and resources.

The people who carry out my treatment, nurses and radiotherapists and oncologists, are the most caring group of people I’ve struck for a long time. They always have a smile and offer a helping hand especially to those who seem to me to be in a terminal stage of illness. They are jolly in the main and tell little jokes so that laughter is frequently part of the scene. They listen to your complaints without complaint and go out of their way to ensure that minor issues don’t become major issues.

Of course, in Australia as in other parts of the world, the hospitals are always short of money. In most hospital emergency sections people have to wait for hours to be seen. Others lay in beds in corridors because there are no beds available in the hospital. There are plenty of rooms that beds can go in but there isn’t the money or staff to look after patients.

But the army of dedicated nurses, doctors, radiologists, continue on despite the money shortage while the politicians keep promising more funds for health services, funds which never seem to materialize. But wait until election time! Then money appears, buckets of it, and, all too often, it goes to fund infrastructure that buys votes rather than into health where it is desperately required.

But of course, taxpayers’ money is always available for the Armed Forces.

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U.S.-Nato Planners Live in La-la Land!

‘This is the way we bring peace to you, peace to you, peace to you…’ *

“The offensive has been flagged for weeks to persuade Taliban fighters to leave so the area can be recaptured with minimal damage or loss of civilian life, in the hope that the roughly 100,000 people there will welcome the Afghan (read American) administration.”

I may be stating the obvious but this deranged, fanciful objective is not the way to bring peace to anyone! Killing people is the way to create infinite hatred and the never-ending desire for revenge.

You don’t believe me? Look at Iraq!

Besides, as with Iraq, bringing peace was never the real objective, was it?

* Sung by the U.S. Marines choir to the tune of  ‘Here we go round the Mulberry Bush’. Photo and text from Reuters.

NATO Assault on Marjah?

“Kill, kill, kill!”

Friends, today the Reuter’s headline read: NATO launches major assault on Marjah yet the photographs provided showed only British troops.

The article claimed the advance of 15,000 soldiers supported by air power was being led by American Marines. So just who is the major participant in this new, major assault against the Taliban? The relative numbers of troops from each country were not disclosed which I found rather mysterious.

I guess the 30, 000 troop surge in Afghanistan engineered by Obomber probably tells the true story. But why make out that NATO was initiating this attack if Americans made up the majority of the troops and did most of the planning?

Perhaps it’s an attempt by America to deflect the focus away from its incessant warmongering and killing? If it claims that NATO is carrying out the assault, when and if the civilian casualties are announced, NATO will get the blame and, given that NATO is an amalgam of countries including America, then any opprobrium will be dissipated, spread around.

This attack is similar to that carried out by the IDF on Gaza. Like Hamas, the Taliban have no regular army, air force or navy. In the main they only have light arms and they hide in mud brick homes.

The members of the U.S.-NATO forces by contrast have every military device known to mankind: attack helicopters, fighter jets, bombers, tanks, artillery, laser-guided missiles, night goggles, spy satellites, drones, etc. If a pocket of resistance springs up, they simply blow it off the face of the earth regardless of who is inside.

The outcome, as it was in Gaza, will be a slaughter.

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Deniers Are Everywhere!

“Jesus? Never heard of ‘im!”

Friends, the world is full of deniers! One of the most famous of them was St Peter who denied the existence of Christ a number of times when being questioned by the authorities.

I won’t go into the details because religious hocus-pocus has no interest for me but the world is still full of deniers. You can find them in any country, any community, even on most blogs (but not this one).

Modern deniers refuse to:

- admit the existence of duplicitous, power-hungry Nations (like the U.S.) that are trying to gain control of the world for their own selfish reasons using immoral military and economic means.

-  admit that Capitalism, and its twin, Greed, are destroying our world and turning people into two-legged pigs.

- admit what war has never achieved anything except to bring destruction, death and hatred.

- admit that religion is divisive and is based upon silly superstition and myth.

- admit that much of humankind is both deeply flawed and ignoble.

- admit that the ‘me-first’ philosophy, the one that, helped by advertising, drives most humans, is counterproductive and peace-destroying.

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What Does Palin Prove?

Poster girl or President?

Friends, on television I just watched an enthusiastic crowd adoring Sarah Palin. It seems she is the darling of the Republicans, the very ones that elected George Bush twice!

As I watched her, she was asked whether or not she would consider standing for President. She indicated she would if the American people wanted her and her family of Todds approved. She grinned at the camera and, her face alight, she laughed and laughed and hooted while the crowd went crazy.

Friends, I was shaken. Visibly. I thought to myself: self, what does this mean for America, for the world? What does it mean for democracy? After several stiff drinks I came to the conclusion that this possibility of Palin as President has dire implications for 6.5 billion people.

Now you may think I’ve been too hasty, that perhaps I have something against women, or something against Conservatives. But no, I haven’t, well nothing against women anyway.  But just imagine what Sarah Palin would do if she got hold of the reins of the most powerful military nation in the world?

Well for starters, she would probably do the same as Obomber does: do as she was told by the vested interests. Perhaps she might do it with more enthusiasm, might elevate businesses into the realms of holiness, might force everyone to go to Church on Sunday, might decide that markets are next to Godliness, might decide that all ‘terrists’ should be ‘disappeared’ using nukes. She might, but my concerns are much deeper.

If she was to be elected, she an ignoramus, an ex-sport journalist, a shootin’, tootin’, fishin’ soccer Mum who knows nothing, it would prove to me that democracy doesn’t and can’t work!

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Caesar Cometh To Australia!

All Bow To Caesar. Lower!

Friends, the news is out. Caesar Obama is coming to our country. P.M. Rudd made the announcement and you would’ve thought he was announcing the Second Coming! Prime Minister Rudd will lap up the photo ops and, for a few days, believe that he walks on water all the time!

Already the MSM is in a tizzy and, in Government circles, politicians are practicing to doff their caps or curtsy or grovel to the dark-skinned potentate from America, the ‘greatest nation in the history of the World’ (at least according to Americans).

Yes, Aussie pollies think that the arrival of Obama brings great credit to Australia and to them as the elected representatives. All it does is to show to the world that Australia, or at least its government, is another arse-licking country that does whatever America demands. The U.K., the NATO countries, also fall into line when the U.S. cracks the whip as does the U.N., etc.

When I was a child, the British Empire was still in existence and I remember lining up along the side of the road to see her Majesty passing by. I waved a flag, a British flag, and thought that I would faint from seeing such a symbol of military power.

Since then, Australia has swapped allegiances somewhat. We still defer to Britain on occasion but the U.S. has taken the place of Britain, at least in the minds of many. But, fortunately, there has been a significant change in me.

I will not faint at the sight of Obama. I would be more likely to hurl a house brick at him and make offensive signs and boo and hiss.

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The War Drums Beat Louder!

I prefer edible mushrooms, don’t you?

Friends, correct me if I’m imagining things but has there been an escalation in the anti-Iran rhetoric over the last  month or so? Has it become ever more frantic, ever more illogical, ever more untruthful?

It reminds me of the period prior to the invasion of Iraq when we in Australia were being told by our political leaders that Saddam could launch a nuclear-armed missile at Australia and that Iraq had all manner of Weapons of Mass Destruction that could threaten the world.

It was a period when Colin Powell went to the U.N. and told all manner of preposterous lies and we were shown all manner of dubious graphics and we were told that 9/11 and Saddam were intimately connected.

The U.S., either motivated by its own imperial ambitions and/or prodded along by its Zionist manipulators, is talking the same talk as it did prior to its Shock and Awe attack on Bagdad. Its talk is designed to frighten people across the world, to elevate Armadinejad into a Saddam-like monster, to convince us that Iranians have two heads and drink the blood of babies, and to  make out that Iran threatens the survival of the whole world. Why it’s even deployed more missiles in the region recently, ones designed to shoot down Iranian missiles should they be fired, it says.

Of course, if we look at Iraq and what was achieved there, we already know that the American method of solving world problems (bomb, bomb, bomb) achieves nothing except to make lots of money for the  U.S. armament and munitions manufacturers and to give America more places to put its army bases and more access to oil and other resources. That Iraq is now a chaotic mess, worries the Yanks not at all!

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The World Is Awash With Weapons!

Have gun. Will use!

Friends, the U.S. has just concluded an arms deal with Taiwan. It is selling the Chinese folk on the small island off the China coast 6.5 billion dollars of weaponry.

Now, understandably, the Chinese are upset because they see Taiwan as belonging to it and hope that one day Taiwan and China will become one again.

The Chinese see America up to its usual tricks: causing trouble, upsetting the balance of power between nations, sticking its nose in where it doesn’t belong, etc. It has threatened major retaliation against the U.S. but not that of military retaliation, at least not yet.

I seem to remember that the U.S. almost brought the world to its end when Russia tried to bring missiles to Cuba. The American position was that no country would be allowed to bring anything to Cuba that might threaten the States.

Of course, Russia is ringed by American ballistic missiles but that’s different! And China now has a better armed Taiwan sitting close to its mainland thanks to America. And Venezuela now has American troops occupying Haiti. And Pakistan has American drones filling its skies. And Yemen has cruise missiles landing on its soil, thanks to America. And Iraq and Pakistan, both of which are close to Russia, have a strong American presence.

America has one set of rules for itself and the opposite set for other nations. But the point of this post is not to deal just with America.

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