We’d all be murderers if we thought that was useful. The divide over whether or not to use violence, or murder in particular, is largely a practical matter about whether or not it works to achieve a worthwhile political objective.

I would like to think that all of us would set up hunting parties to kill Dick Cheney, for example, if in doing so the American Empire would be destroyed. The opposition to such hunting parties is not that murder is immoral, but that it would not have that effect, and would also bring down the wrath of the state.

We would have no problem with terrorism if we agreed with the objectives of terrorists and if terrorism worked in achieving those objectives (and if the outcome was worth the cost – such as achieving perpetual world peace by killing 10o civilians).

“Civilians” are tools used as leverage against the dominant state by the terrorist organization – they are drafted troops who die or are injured in the front lines of a military conflict. They give their lives (usually not willingly of course) for the goals and political processes of the terrorist organization.

Morally speaking, terrorism is equivalent to war.

The extent to which terrorism works is based largely on the undermining of security which the dominant state can give to their subjects. This undermining of security causes the dominant state to lose political power, thus encouraging them to compromise or in some way cater to the desires of the terrorist group. Terrorism is an act of war intended to shift the balance of political power away from the state and toward this emergent “mini-state”.

Terrorism thrives not in a *permissive* environment, but in a politically unstable one. The reason terrorism is a largely recent phenomenon is not technological, but political. Democracy has been a rising force over the last several decades, which causes unrest in both totalitarian and militarist states. This fundamental wedge between the desires of the state and it’s subjects can then be taken advantage of by groups with their own agenda.

The state strategy of establishing a culture of fear and terror for it’s subjects to live under is the correct response (from their perspective) to the democratic threat. Since democratic hope offers the leverage for terrorism to work, squashing that hope destroys the wedge and eliminates the power of terrorism.

The American state needs to use fear and terror on it’s own citizens, such as the establishment of a national surveillance system, in order to ensure they remain in power. Expecting them to do otherwise is ridiculous and forcing them to do otherwise will either be met with massive resistance or will lead them to construct alternative means to achieve the same goal. The only realistic method of an alleviation of the use of fear and terror by the state is to destroy the democratic hope of the subjects.

In these times of both great hope and great oppression, the best outcome is the destruction of the state and emergence of democracy. Anyone who supports the existence of the state supports what it takes for the state to survive – hence the use of fear, terror, and surveillance.

Terrorism is a side effect of the path to democracy.

If anything, tears should be shed because despite this so-called fresh face touting change, said face is getting over big time on all the gullible, desperate voters who placed their hopes and dreams on a false prophet.

I just don’t get people like William Blum. These folks were well aware of the emptiness of Obama’s message long ago but still preface any criticism of him with some feel goodism about Obama’s election being historic, giant step for race relations, blah, blah. WTF good is the first black/woman/latino/martian anything if said first shits all over the best interests of the majority of the population? Can the hats off to Obama accolades and call the man out on his evil assed ways.

August 9, 2005: The panel of three judges of the Court of Appeals in Atlanta issues its 93-page opinion, saying the sentences of the Five must be annulled because of the pervasive biased atmosphere during the trial in Miami-Dade and a new trial is granted in a new venue outside of Miami.
s. http://www.freethefive.org/legalFront/LF11thCirOpinion08-09-05.pdf

Opinion published on June 4, 2008 and confirmed on September 3, 2008:
Compare especially the dissent of judge Phyllis Kravitch
http://www.freethefive.org/legalFront/LFAppealsDecision060408.pdf

Please have a look at the following:

May, 27, 2005: The UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention of the UN Committee of Human Rights in Geneva publishes, after having analyzed the case for two years, its “Opinion No. 19/2005” addressed to the Government of the United States on April 8, 2004. Their conclusion on page 6: “The deprivation of liberty” of the Cuban Five “is arbitrary, being in contravention of article 14 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and corresponds to category III of the applicable categories examined in the cases before the Working Group.”
s. http://www.freethefive.org/updates/Solidarity/SLUNJudgement_052705.htm

August 9, 2005: The panel of three judges of the Court of Appeals in Atlanta issues its 93-page opinion, saying the sentences of the Five must be annulled because of the pervasive biased atmosphere during the trial in Miami-Dade and a new trial is granted in a new venue outside of Miami.
s. http://www.freethefive.org/legalFront/LF11thCirOpinion08-09-05.pdf

Opinion published on June 4, 2008 and confirmed on September 3, 2008:
Compare especially to the dissent of judge Phyllis Kravitch
http://www.freethefive.org/legalFront/LFAppealsDecision060408.pdf

I wonder why not fighting for these concrete persons when at the same time you could rehabilitate your country and could show to the world (the rest of US) the majority of your people is not as what they are regarded for.
You are not able to stop the war against Iraq, Afghanistan, not yet, as it seems, but you would be able to free innocent persons from prison.
There are not only the Cuban Five, but also Mumia Abu Jamal in Philadelphia and Leonard Peltier. At least those are the most famous in abroad.
Pleasse, write respective letters to Barack Obama, Eric Holder, Hillary Clinton, to your main stream papers, within their blogs etc.

So the government doesn’t understand and has no idea what they are doing and the markets do. It sure looks to me that many don’t know what they are doing. A couple of reasons for that could be short term thinking not using reason to overcome there instincts and trying to get back to normal. Normal or what passed for normal is what got us here. Just maybe a new way of thinking is needed. Getting back to normal is probably the wrong approach. The same thinking in December 2008 that got us to this point will solve little we need a new way of thinking. This can be painful at first but in the long run probably work out much better. Knowledge and the use of could help.

I read your intro and your conclusion. But skip to the point(s). Are you happy or regretful that you voted for the Nades?

Is the coming battle domestic or foreign?

Or you just confused, or are you standing in shit?

I suggest that you give yourself a time-out.

I once told my attorney, after listening to him complain about the endless incompetence he saw in the justice system, that if you choose to stand in shit all day then you have no business complaining about the smell.

I do not look to Nader as the next “President”; frankly I don’t think he does. If one must pull a “lever” and is offered a real choice then at least that vote, that voice can be summarily recorded as “This is the new way forward…rather than what the plutocracy provides…”

I am fairly certain that when it comes to securing and protecting and expanding the empire in the name of “vital national interests” there is no real difference between McCain and Obama (or Hillary). Since all things (foreign and domestic) flow from that source we can expect the status quo (inclusive of the one we just lived through for 8 years).

The sorrow of empire is what it is and incompetency/competency one change that one iota.

Those who believe that the system is a murderous deadend, need to plan and act on the alternative: NOW!

I can say with total certainty that the way this power structure has evolved, a fellow like Ralph Nader would never have a chance in hell to be elected, and personally I pray like hell that Mr. Nader will not disappear for the next four years only to come back at the time of the next elections.

Let’s face it. Going to polls in the US is not as bad as going to Las Vegas, but pretty damn close to it. Ninety-nine percent of the time, it’s the house that wins.

Of course, I am by no means advocating a boycott of the elections. Au contraire, if the people had not participated the way they did, we would have had McCain, a much bigger criminal on our hands. I think we would have been worse off, but this is not a reason for complacency.

Real change does not come from above; it never has. McCain or Obama serve America’s ruling classes not common folks. Today, this is not some abstract assertion. You can see it with your own eyes as they steal from the poor to bail-out the rich and the crooks. They just differ in terms of methods to achieve those same goals: making the rich wealthier and keeping them in power.

Real change comes from grass-roots organizing, and not just during elections but throughout the year. We need to understand common people’s frustrations and put forth slogans that reflect those. Ralph Nader speaks quite appropriately when he says that corporate CEOs and other criminals need to be put away. We need to increase our demonstrations and protests and come up with new and creative forms of resistance. It is only through these methods that we will be able to put enough pressure on the ruling classes to get them to back down.

All of you guys don’t get it. That is clear from the absence of the meaning and opportunity of the Obama campaign. I find it amusing that several days ago people on this blog were complaining that their was too much focus on Obama yet the discussion is how Obama is yet another imperialist disappointment. Duh! So what else is new.

The missing analysis is the behavior of the working class and what that means. That is totally missing from the commentary which portends only further marginalization of the Left because if you cannot see what the real issue are then the response to it will be totally incorrect.

What is tell tale sign is that Blum takes pride for voting for Nader this year. Nader was weaker this year than in 2004. McKinney would have been a better vote.

William Blum, quoting Chomsky who callously diminishes the Obama victory is exactly the kind of rhetoric that marginalizes the American Left.

It just makes me laugh and shake my head.

Good Luck.

I whole heartedly agree that environmental awareness is tragically low and that action to begin reversing our adverse effects commence yesterday. I won’t deny what science claims, nor what I witness in global weather phenomena. Ecosystems, however, and the weather they are subject to is dynamic, not static, change is always a constant factor. This present warming trend though is preventing us from sliding into the next scheduled ice age.

Until industrialized society makes a radical change in its petro-based, contaminating policies toward eco-friendly, green technology, nothing is going to change. Only when a profitable angle is found will the changes be made across the board. When it becomes more profitable to preserve than pollute, we will experience a shift. Until then, we are unfortunately screwed and when the Earth is fed up, she’ll simply shake us off like necrotic fleas and take the next 10 million years to regain her equilibrium. She’s is a survivor, we’re the newcomers in jeopardy.

Best to you.

“Our work is never more important because the government cannot solve all the problems alone,” Clinton said in opening remarks at his two-day Global Initiative summit in Hong Kong today. “We need partnership from the private sector and civil society.”

He pointed to challenges from global warming and disease, the scarcity of food, increasing scarcity of water, terrorism as seen in India last week and global trouble in financial markets.

The world needs to invest an extra $45 trillion by 2050 to develop clean technologies to halve the annual production of gases blamed for global warming, the International Energy Agency said in June. Richer nations want help in achieving such cuts.

‘All Pitch In’

Sort of right. Must be a total focus and started yesterday would have been good. So far I keep reading 150 billion in ten years from the new people remember world war 1 and 2 combined. It will be easy too see if we try.

I couldn’t agree with you more about preparing for an alternative civilization, the system we watch crumbling before our eyes is showing its inherent, non-regulated, free traded, privatized and deceptive nature which has financially destroyed country after country in this part of the world. This neck of the woods fell victim to Washington’s SAPs via the IMF/WB and essentially lost economic and political sovereignty out of its subservience, desperation and gullibility apropos greedy and corrupt rulers generally speaking. You know the history, I’m just detailing my concurrence.

I agree that war creates the kinds of deficits we see.

My point about the debt creation is that our monetary system is based on debt (with or without war). When a bank loans it creates debt and generates money in the process. There is nothing to back it up, EXCEPT, in the case of say, a mortgage, a loan based on “nothing” can lead to foreclosure which provides the loaner (bank) with property (a real asset); this is how the transfer of wealth begins. The history of debt is in and of itself a study in how the rich get richer and the poor poorer.

American empire’s ability to generate money out of debt is the basis of the World Bank, WTO, and IMF. At that scale, together, they create incredible wealth for a few. Wealth flows from the worker to the wealthy. Workers create wealth fo the rich. The debtor nation is kept in check and it’s incredible to see what happens. Wealth flows out of the client state (”colony”) to the coffers of the preditory corporate entities.

The fact that Mandela was brought into this scheme is a major disappointment. Many countries in Africa (and, really all over the world) have been driven to this debtor nation status. Today, it is a 21st Century form of colonialism. It is the basis of neoliberalism.

A perfect study in this is when the Soviet Union collapsed. Natural assets (copper, oil, gas, etc.) were taken over (privatized) by a handful of elitists who became billionaires while Russians scrambled for crumbs. Had those assets been kept off the table (common wealth) – instead, had a rent on them (sometimes referred to as a land tax or user fee) Russia would have been debt free. Instead the wealth flowed to a small group of gangsters. Michael Hudson has written exquisitely about this phenomenon which is not unique to Russia, but happens – Naomi Klein has called it the shock doctrine, but the two proponents were M. Friedman in South America and Jeff Sachs in Soviet Union/Russia. The latter is a sly one. He hides behind his neoliberal ways by talking about “ending poverty” when his doctrinaire neoliberalism has created the most poverty.

This is why the only real check on the empire is the energy required to keep it moving. Only net-energy whereby it becomes non-feasible to extract energy (a hard non-negotiable stop) will the empire begin to collapse. I’m more and more convinced that given the demand for endless growth (the economy of growth) and the ability to generate wealth from debt, alternative energy sources will be too little too late. These cannot feed the “beast”.

We must push away from the beast to prepare for an alternative civilization.

That’s why Morales and Chavez are threats to the empire.