SOME TID-BITS OF AMERICAN HISTORY YOU DON’T LEARN IN THE CLASSROOM

In order to be well informed we have to read everything we can from both the left and the right and make up our own minds.

This one comes from a radical-left outfit that most people including myself would not even consider reading as it is in our nature to reject all that is too extreme. However, there are some pieces of information that no right-winger could possibly refute. There is clear evidence of our involvement in other countries and our insistence in the installation of puppet right-wing regimes across the world.

Why am I reading and quoting this left wing organization? Very simple: to let other people know that what is happening in America is going to eventually cause the total collapse of our already dysfunctional society. It is incumbent upon us to reject right and left wing ideologies but we also have to realize that the conservatives and the Republican Teahadists are setting themselves up and our country placed in peril over their greed and obsession with the establishment of an oligarchy. What the 1% is doing is eventually going to come back and bite them and us in the ass.

I of course have a visceral dislike for anything communist as I experienced the beginning of the Cuban Revolution and the bloody cleansing that followed the fall of the Batista regime. But I also realize that Batista and his cohorts set themselves up for a populist uprising by instituting repression and intimidation, by openly and shamelessly appropriating public funds. But make no mistake about it, the Cuban Revolution is even worse because while before the population in general was repressed the people had a little bit more to eat and was able to function albeit within a dysfunctional society. Now under the Castro regime it is even more dysfunctional because there exists so much theft, corruption and favoritism that it overshadows any if not all of the noble intentions of a populist movement and yet the end result is the same: 1% of the population is privileged and has the reins of government and the ability to survive and even thrive, enjoying all the luxuries and consumer goods the other 99% does not.

This is some of the stuff this Communist outfit claims…while reading it, if you took away the adjectives before each name like “butcher”, etc…I find it difficult to refute:

“A History Lesson
In 1945, the US invades the Korean peninsula and declares a “temporary” partition of Korea. America installs an illegitimate American-friendly regime in the South, backed by a force of 50,000 troops. After 2,617 troop incursions in the Northern Pro-Soviet half, sometimes with as many as a few thousand troops, a war ensues when North Korea finally invades South Korea in response. A three-year war takes place and millions are killed. Thousands of American troops remain in South Korea to this day.

In 1966, a US-backed coup ousted President Sukarno of Indonesia and replaced him with the fascist butcher Suharto. Over a million people were hunted down and killed, including thousands of popular leftist leaders, whose names were given to the military by the American Embassy. Suharto would go on to rule Indonesia with an iron fist for two decades. Newly-liberated East Timor was then invaded by Suharto’s Indonesia the day after President Ford and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger (both butchers of the Vietnam War) gave them permission. By 1989, over one-third of East Timor’s 700,000 people had been killed. Indonesia had US backing, including armaments, throughout its 24-year occupation.

In 1967, a US-backed military coup took place to prevent Greek politician George Papandreou being elected Prime Minister. The colonels declared martial law, implemented torture, beatings, arrests, leaving 8,000 dead in the first month. The coup leaders were fiercely anti-communist and pro-American, working closely with the CIA. The colonels held power until 1974.

Gen. Augusto Pinochet

In 1970, Marxist reformist Salvador Allende was elected as President of Chile. He nationalized the giant US companies. Soon, the right-wing, backed by the CIA and US foreign policy, engineered a 1973 coup lead by the infamous General Augusto Pinochet. Allende was overthrown and replaced by a fascist military dictatorship that used mass executions and torture. Thousands were murdered and disappeared. Chile became an economic experiment that led to economic growth for the richest while leaving many homeless and greatly decreasing economic equality.

In 1978 in Nicaragua, the popular and progressive Sandinista movement overthrows the US-backed dictator Anastasio Samoza. The US then launches a military occupation in order to prevent “another Cuba.” A program of terrorism and economic sabotage is begun, which leads to the US support of the infamous Contra death squads. The Contras prove to be one of the most brutal fighting forces Latin America has ever seen, infamous for burning down schools, churches and hospitals as well as using mass murder, rape and torture. The Contras massacre whole villages though to be sympathetic to the Sandinistas. Over 60,000 die. President Reagan labels them as “freedom fighters.”

Summation
From these examples alone—Korea, Indonesia, East Timor, Greece, Chile and Nicaragua, which are merely the most prominent of many dozens more ready-made examples including the Vietnam War—we can see that United States foreign policy has never been driven by a devotion to any kind of morality, nor by any kind of longing for freedom or democracy. From the start, the United States has been driven by the necessity to make the world safe for investment by capitalism, to enrich US armaments who contribute generously to Congress members, to prevent the development of any society which becomes an example of an independent alternative to the capitalist model and to extend its political and economic control over as much of the globe as possible.
Everyone alive today remembers the media immediately after the events of 9/11. “Why Do They Hate Us So Much?” the newspapers asked. Gee, I don’t know. Perhaps dropping bombs really pisses some “less civilized” people off. This is a simple list of the nations bombed since World War II:

China 1945-46, Korea 1950-53, China 1950-53, Guatemala 1954, Indonesia 1958, Cuba 1959-60, Guatemala 1960, Congo 1964, Peru 1965, Laos 1965-73, Vietnam 1961-73. Cambodia 1969-70, Guatemala 1967-69, Grenada 1983, Libya 1986, El Salvador 1980s, Nicaragua 1980s, Panama 1989, Iraq 1991-2002, Sudan 1998, Afghanistan 1998, Yugoslavia 1999, Afghanistan 2001 and Iraq 2003 (1).

It is worth noting that violence and exploitation are also not limited to outside the US borders, either. Of all western nations, the US has the greatest income inequality. 40% of the wealth is controlled by 1% of the population. The US has the greatest discrepancy in the world between the wealthy and the poor when it comes to health care, and also when it comes to life expectancy.

Finally, the Land of the Free has the highest number of its population in prison than any other state in the world (2). And all this is without mentioning the minute details of the oppressive structure of the class society as it exists for us every day. These sorts of atrocities will continue until this capitalist system is done away with through struggle and revolution in the US.

On the day of American Independence, among all other days, this is a fact for all of us to remember.”

(1) Taken from Australian Options Quarterly No. 31, Summer 2002.
(2) From Scientific American, Dec. 2005

SOURCES: http://theredphoenixapl.org/category/international/cuba/

http://www.senate.gov/visiting/common/image/Korean-War.htm

Clinton: GOP, Democrats Must Work Together to Save Economy

I strongly disagree – Republicans have no intentions of working with anyone unless they can hurt the economy.

The ex-President sounded somewhat wishy-washy in this interview with NEWSMAX. President Clinton seems to be returning to what used to work for him but does not work now. Yes, it was possible then to work together and even get legislation passed, albeit difficult and due to the stubbornness and opposition coming from Republicans.

In his interview with Newsmax conducted last week, the former president noted that the supercommittee’s failure to reach an agreement on cutting the budget by $1.2 trillion over 10 years resulted in a “standoff between the two parties when we actually need the best ideas from both.”

“Part of the problem is that, for the last 30 years, we’ve argued about whether the government was the cause of all of our problems, and whether the answer was always less,” Clinton said. “Now I believe the answer is, ‘Sometimes it’s good to have less [government], sometimes it’s good to have more, and however much you have, you ought to pay for it.’ ”

But that’s true when he was President then, we have seen it in the past three years that the Republicans have opposed, delayed and sabotaged any and all efforts by President Obama and the Democrats to do something about the economy and unemployment.

The Republicans have clearly put their party ideology ahead of country and don’t give a shit about the American people…they only care about those very wealthy ones and the corporations who line their pockets.

These and many other reasons I think make it impossible for any kind of compromise or improvement if we have to rely on Republicans. I do think that it would be best if we don’t even talk to them, leave them alone to their devices, not include them in any discussions about legislation as they will stiff our President as they have many times before while even holding the American people hostage.

The time has come to say NO, NO, NO to Republicans because that is the only word they understand …after all they are THE PARTY OF NO

SOURCE: http://www.newsmax.com/Headline/clinton-book-obama-bush/2011/11/27/id/419180?s=al&promo_code=D986-1

http://topnews.net.nz/content/22130-ex-president-clinton-leaves-hospital-post-heart-surgery

YOU CAN’T CLOTHE THE NAKED TRUTH WITH A CLOAK OF DISTORTIONS AND A LOIN CLOTH OF LIES.

At the end, even Fox and the right-wing pundits know they are hurting America even if they try to inoculate themselves from blame and cover their pathetic nakedness with lies.

It seems it is all a validation game, it is the relentless effort of the very rich and the corporations to convince each and every one of us that power and wealth is best left in their hands. It is also an infallible religious dogma that tells us that the meek shall inherit the earth and there is a paradise waiting on the other side at the end of our lives so we can accept being the sheep led by pastors and not complain about our lot in life as is prescribed in the Scriptures -Ephesians 6:5.

Slaves, obey your earthly masters with deep respect and fear. Serve them sincerely as you would serve Christ.

Good Southern Christians used the Bible to justify their slave-owning before the Civil War. There are many quotes like this in Colossians, Philemon, etc. Their capacity for self-serving self-delusions is brontosauric.

Worst of all is the concept of Armageddon that tells you the world is coming to an end the day after tomorrow…so why bother making the world better? Why indeed should we waste our energies in building infrastructure and things that our children and grandchildren would use and enjoy? The result is a me-me-me attitude, to live for today and to forget all our ethics, to surrender to greed and to become callous to the misery others are enduring.

So when you put on that suit and tie and go to Wall Street fully clothed in legalized robbery to shamelessly steal from the 99% remember that your actions are being scrutinized, the repression is being watched all over the world and what you are doing amounts to robbery, fraud, dishonesty and selfishness…surely those are not American values, for certain even if you are an advocate of free enterprise you have to recognize that the only way the system is going to survive and flourish is to have regulations…strong ones, no loopholes or predilections for special interests…and this my friends is totally contrary to the Republican ideology.

People get naked to protest on a wide range of issues. An activist with "Cuba Democracy Now" demonstrates in front of the European Office in Madrid against human rights violations in Cuba and the permissiveness of Spain.

SOURCE: http://www.spiegel.de/fotostrecke/fotostrecke-75459-12.html

PINOCHET AND REPUBLICANS HAVE A LOT IN COMMON.

Somebody please tell me this doesn’t sound like what Governor Walker of Wisconsin has done

Pinochet’s Economic Policies and actions resemble the Republican-Teahadist’s quest to privatize, roll back social programs and you could substitute tariff barriers for lower taxes, imperialist for shitty paying jobs by corporations that get tax breaks and you would have present day Republican governance almost as a mirror image.

“Almost immediately after getting into power, Augusto Pinochet subjected Chile to merciless privatization and social program rollbacks. Tariff barriers were kicked down and trade unions were banned. International finance capital was once again invited into Chile, opening the door even wider for greater exploitation of Chilean employees. Resources were shared out to imperialist governments that consented with Pinochet’s Draconian free market economics. The “Chicago Boys,” a group of young Chilean economists trained at the University of Chicago under Milton Friedman, who Pinochet employed in his government, openly praised this restructuring of the Chilean economy and authored a 700-page book about how the junta should go about the privatization.

The country of Chile is upheld today by the media as a “free market miracle” in Latin America. Typically, they never go into detail about exactly what sectors of society were brought wealth, or how this wealth was built on torture, mass murder and the bodies of thousands of Chileans. It owes its legacy to the Pinochet group, who sold the state-controlled industries, including the copper industry, at criminally low prices to financial oligarchs and corporate sponsors. Education was privatized, making educational centers atrociously expensive and regulating most workers to second-and-third-class schools. In 2006, seven hundred thousand students protested for the de-privatization of the educational system, calling themselves the “Penguin Revolution” after their school uniforms. These policies dramatically increased inequality, unemployment, inflation and poverty as well as ruining human services. In 1982, Chile suffered a monetary crisis because of these policies, which are still upheld (even by the “Socialists”) in Chile’s bourgeois government. During these years, unemployment was at 30% and 55% of the population was below the poverty line.”

It seems to me that whenever an ultra-right wing movement gets a hold of the reins of power the first thing they go after is the middle class, then the labor unions, followed by education and all safety nets. It all fits in very well with the plan to redistribute the wealth where 1% end up owning everything and the rest has to eat shit and like it.

Those same economists trained under the infamous Milton Friedman who doesn’t know the difference between economics and ergonomics are guiding the Republican-Teahadist agenda in economic policies that have been disastrous for the country and have left the majority of the American people in ruinous situations.

That fucking claim of theirs that the wealthy are the “JOB CREATORS” is so perverse, so far from the truth and it is not difficult to refute since we have seen almost a decade of the Bush tax cuts and instead of jobs being created we have seen the loss of more than 5 million jobs in that period of time.

SOURCES: (A communist blog) http://theredphoenixapl.org/category/international/cuba/

IN CASE YOU WERE ASKING YOURSELF WHY OCCUPY WALL STREET IS HAPPENING - AS IF YOU DON'T ALREADY KNOW.

It is a viral and visceral repulsion from the majority of the American people that rejects this status quo of 1% owning and controlling everything.

Perhaps it is because that 99% is not as dumb as the Republican-Teahadists thought they were, the indications are there that they are not and it seems that more and more people are realizing that they have been taken for a ride, they have been taken advantage of and most of all they exist for the pleasure and convenience of the top 1% who owns the wealth and the power and those under them have to keep quiet and accept their misfortunes.

I do get all upset whenever I hear these right wing idiots describe America as this isolated, idyllic place where you have the best, the biggest, the nicest everything. It is a false sense of superiority. Amazingly, America has been falling behind in many areas where we should be leading the civilized world. Health Care is one of them…it is because we insist in having insurance companies who are only the middle man and exist only to skim the profits while serving no purpose or performing a service…they are true parasites.

Then you have the overblown military that has been thriving forever in the minds of these war hawks and they use scare tactics to convince the American people that they should pay taxes to maintain the biggest military-industrial complex the world has ever seen.

It goes equally appropriate to assess our nuclear armaments program where we have a thousand fold more nuclear weapons than it is needed and when we know full well that only three or four explosions of this nature would bring our world to its demise. But the right keeps insisting on bombing other nations that have done nothing to us and even suggesting that nuclear weapons should be used in places like Iran.

All of the Presidential candidates in the GOP with the exception of Huntsman abdicate a pre-emptied attack on Iran. Some want us to get involved in yet another war that is yet not paid for.

From the Communist outfit “THE RED PHOENIX” – Yes, Communist as in Marxist, pinko Socialist…but I read these as I also read Bill O’Reilly and others on the right to see if I can find any reason and make any sense of it.

“It is worth noting that violence and exploitation are also not limited to outside the US borders, either. Of all western nations, the US has the greatest income inequality. 40% of the wealth is controlled by 1% of the population. The US has the greatest discrepancy in the world between the wealthy and the poor when it comes to health care, and also when it comes to life expectancy.

Finally, the Land of the Free has the highest number of its population in prison than any other state in the world (2). And all this is without mentioning the minute details of the oppressive structure of the class society as it exists for us every day. These sorts of atrocities will continue until this capitalist system is done away with through struggle and revolution in the US”.

As a Cuban exile that saw my country ravished, destroyed and left in ruins by the Communists, I have a visceral repulsion of anything Communist; but when I read something like this I ask myself if we are not setting ourselves up for a massive revolution that would destroy America just like it did the land of my birth.

SOURCE: SOURCE: http://theredphoenixapl.org/category/international/cuba/

http://kasamaproject.org/2009/05/13/gary-leupp-the-power-elites-bomb-iran-faction/

I AM A SENIOR CITIZEN, NOT A COMMUNIST, NOT A HIPPIE AND I TAKE BATHS

Once more, the ultra right is on the attack doing what they do best: vilify and dehumanize their adversaries and have to be frustrated as hell because they can’t find a competent candidate to beat our President.

PEPPER SPRAY GOVERNMENT OF THE 1%

You constantly hear it coming from the radical right, you get it from Fox News, those pervasive and vitriolic lies…they hurl them like shit against the wall hoping that some of it would stick…and for some people it does.

The right wing pundits make remarks like “THE MOBS”, “DIRTY HIPPIES”, “TAKE A BATH”, “GET A JOB”, “LEFT WING COMMUNISTS”, “ANARCHISTS”, “CLASS WARFARE”, “LEFTIST AGITATORS”, “LEFTIST CONSPIRACY”, “COMMUNISTS/MARXISTS” and on and on.

What is it about these people that make them do this sort of thing? To me, it sounds like they ran out of logic and reason, they don’t really have a solid argument so they have to resort to character assassination, to dehumanize and ridicule. We have seen it how they have and continue to do it with our President: “THE KENYAN-INDONESIAN-MUSLIM-TERRORIST-SOCIALIST-UPPITY-INTELLECTUAL-ELITIST” and that too goes on and on. These assholes are relentless, they have no respect for the office nor do they have any idea what they are really doing is slander.

I remember when we went to war with Iraq…an unnecessary war based on lies for the wrong reasons that the President and the Bushists would hurl those same types of accusations if you dared even voice a disagreement. Some people paid a very high price for it as did in the 50’s anybody who would dare criticize Joe McCarthy. A lot of actors and prominent people, including many intellectuals were accused of being communists and even had to go into exile…most lost their careers and their livelihood.

Something similar has been happening in this day and age; remember the FRENCH FRIES debacle? Even if French fries are not really French…and I know because I only found them at McDonald’s on the Champs Elysees….and French toast having been invented far from France because it is a Christmas time dessert in Portugal and Brazil; but they still went after it with a vengeance. French wines suffered a much more humiliating demise in those days…they got poured down the sewers by many of the right wing assholes.

We have now also seen how they destroyed the library of Occupy Wall Street, harkening back to the Nazis and their book-burning orgies. It is typical of a group of people who will not accept reason or logic, facts or a convincing argument…they will invariably resort to this kind of thing.

A group of Nazis hold hands on the steps of the University of Vienna in an attempt to prevent Jews from entering the building. The action led to a day of student rioting which had to be suppressed by the police.

Photo credit: National Archives, courtesy of USHMM Photo Archives

One way the Nazis cleansed the country of "un-German" thoughts was through censorship. A "brown shirt" (member of the SA) throws some more fuel--"un-German" books-- into a roaring fire on the Opernplatz in Berlin. May 10, 1933.

Photo credit: USHMM Photo Archives

In my opinion if we want America to move forward and abandon this quest for a theocratic-oligarchy based on Bircher ideology; is to charge the Koch brothers for treason and put them in jail; we have enough evidence of their ties to the John Birch Society and all the funding of extremist right-wing organizations that have hurt our country with their hatred and divisiveness.

I know this hatred first hand because I keep getting these comments from “ANONYMOUS” no e-mail, no courage to put a name and a face forward…accusing me of being a communist. I have to say that I have been fighting totalitarianism on the left and on the right for more than 52 years because they are in my mind pretty similar: they both give the power and wealth to 1% of the population while the 99% waddles in a morass of poverty and misery.

In their pea sized brains patriotism is measured by lapel pins, how many anti-Obama bumper stickers you have in your car and how much MORE radical you are than anybody else. Following are some of the examples of the thousands of bumper stickers out there that reflect the basest, most odious and crass ideology; in other words, if you don’t accept that the 1% ought to have all the wealth and all the power and disenfranchise the rest of us then you are a fucking communist/dirty hippie who needs a bath

There are so many of these asinine bumper stickers…here are but a few:

SOURCE: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_toast

http://www.bumperart.com/Conservative.htm

http://fcit.usf.edu/holocaust/gallery/01622.HTM