Some useful Viet Nam sites worth a look
Cultural Profiles:
http://www.culturalprofiles.net/Viet_Nam/Directories/Vi_ACYAIw-7879_ADs-t_Nam_Cultural_Profile/-1497.html
Vietnam Pictorial:
http://vietnampictorial.vnanet.vn
Excellent maps & location info:
www.vinacarta.com
Sunday, August 26, 2007
Citizens Arrest of Australian Attorney-General Philip Ruddock as a War Criminal.
"...as Philip Ruddock was about to address a symposium on Law & Liberty in the War on Terror, an anti-war activist confronted Ruddock with a formal Warrant, charging him with various war crimes.
Peter McGregor, a retired academic from Newcastle, was himself then arrested, & charged with 'unlawful entry on inclosed lands'.
McGregor also had criticized UNSW, the Law Faculty, & all present, for welcoming such a war criminal. "Ruddock's abandoning of Habeas Corpus, as both Minister for Immigration, & Attorney-General should make him a social pariah, & especially with academics & those who believe in the rule of law & human rights. In order for evil to triumph, it is enough for good people to do nothing."
Contact: Peter McGregor
Is the Empire's Economy Starting to Crumble?
The Vietnam war was basically financed by printing more dollars. The inflation that followed in the 1970s was exported around the world. The current war in Iraq is again being financed in a similar fashion. But it would seem that after 4 years of expenditure on the war that is now running at more than $US 12 billion per month that things may be starting to come apart.
Uncle Sam, Your Banker Will See You Now by Paul Craig Roberts
Iran steps up petro-dollar war with U.S. by J. R. Corsi
From:
Irregular Gippsland Peace Newsletter Summary
(No. 38 September 2007)
Price: free /Donation
Copyright: the Author.
Feel free to send / copy / proliferate all or in part
Peter Gardner (ed) c/-PO Swifts Creek Australia 3896
ngarak@bigpond.com to receive full newsletter by email
"...as Philip Ruddock was about to address a symposium on Law & Liberty in the War on Terror, an anti-war activist confronted Ruddock with a formal Warrant, charging him with various war crimes.
Peter McGregor, a retired academic from Newcastle, was himself then arrested, & charged with 'unlawful entry on inclosed lands'.
McGregor also had criticized UNSW, the Law Faculty, & all present, for welcoming such a war criminal. "Ruddock's abandoning of Habeas Corpus, as both Minister for Immigration, & Attorney-General should make him a social pariah, & especially with academics & those who believe in the rule of law & human rights. In order for evil to triumph, it is enough for good people to do nothing."
Contact: Peter McGregor
Is the Empire's Economy Starting to Crumble?
The Vietnam war was basically financed by printing more dollars. The inflation that followed in the 1970s was exported around the world. The current war in Iraq is again being financed in a similar fashion. But it would seem that after 4 years of expenditure on the war that is now running at more than $US 12 billion per month that things may be starting to come apart.
Uncle Sam, Your Banker Will See You Now by Paul Craig Roberts
Iran steps up petro-dollar war with U.S. by J. R. Corsi
From:
Irregular Gippsland Peace Newsletter Summary
(No. 38 September 2007)
Price: free /Donation
Copyright: the Author.
Feel free to send / copy / proliferate all or in part
Peter Gardner (ed) c/-PO Swifts Creek Australia 3896
ngarak@bigpond.com to receive full newsletter by email
Tomgram: Juan Cole, The Republic Militant at War, Then and Now
To send this to a friend, or to read more dispatches, go to tomdispatch.com
It was the highest-tech military of its moment and its invasion of the Arab land was overwhelming. Enemy forces were smashed, the oppressive ruling regime overthrown, the enemy capital occupied, and the country declared liberated… then the first acts of insurgency began…
George W. Bush's invasion of Iraq in 2003?
No, Napoleon Bonaparte's invasion of Egypt in June 1798. !!!!!!
There are times when the resonances of history are positively eerie. This happens to be one of them.
We all deserve a history lesson about the Napoleonic beginnings of our present catastrophe. (Too bad you-know-who didn't get one before ordering that March 2003 invasion.)
I got mine from a man whose blog, Informed Comment, I read every morning without fail and whose flow of commentary on Bush's war in Iraq has been invaluable. I'm talking, of course, about Juan Cole who (evidently in his spare moments) has completed a history of the Napoleonic moment of "spreading democracy" to Arab lands, just published as Napoleon's Egypt: Invading the Middle East.
Some of the parallels are enough to make you jump out of your chair (if not your skin). For instance, Napoleon wrote a letter to one of his generals, well into the occupation, forbidding the beating of insurgents to extract information: "It has been recognized at all times that this manner of interrogating human beings, of putting them under torture, produces nothing good." Okay, at least Napoleon could learn from experience, an ability our President seems to lack, but the issue, put that way, rings a terrible bell 200 years later.
Napoleon's Egyptian moment lasted a mere three years. We are already into our fifth year in devolving Iraq with no obvious end in sight.
Last Sunday, the New York Times printed a remarkable op-ed by an Army specialist, four sergeants, and two staff sergeants of the 82nd Airborne Division, now on duty in Iraq (one of whom was shot in the head while the piece was being prepared).
In it, they wrote, "Viewed from Iraq at the tail end of a 15-month deployment, the political debate in Washington is indeed surreal… [W]e are skeptical of recent press coverage portraying the conflict as increasingly manageable and feel it has neglected the mounting civil, political and social unrest we see every day."
Of the military mission of which they are a part they wrote: "In the end, we need to recognize that our presence may have released Iraqis from the grip of a tyrant, but that it has also robbed them of their self-respect. They will soon realize that the best way to regain dignity is to call us what we are -- an army of occupation -- and force our withdrawal."
Whether these soldiers know the history of Bonaparte in Egypt or not, they have grasped the essence of what lurks behind the fine liberatory words of the leaders of the republic militant.
Let's hope it's not too late to learn the lesson of Napoleon and slip out of "Egypt," while it's still possible. Though it hardly scatches the surface of his new book, here is a little taste from the Napoleonic lesson plan of Juan Cole.
Tom
Pitching the Imperial Republic
Bonaparte and Bush on Deck
By Juan Cole
Click here to read more of this dispatch.
To send this to a friend, or to read more dispatches, go to tomdispatch.com
It was the highest-tech military of its moment and its invasion of the Arab land was overwhelming. Enemy forces were smashed, the oppressive ruling regime overthrown, the enemy capital occupied, and the country declared liberated… then the first acts of insurgency began…
George W. Bush's invasion of Iraq in 2003?
No, Napoleon Bonaparte's invasion of Egypt in June 1798. !!!!!!
There are times when the resonances of history are positively eerie. This happens to be one of them.
We all deserve a history lesson about the Napoleonic beginnings of our present catastrophe. (Too bad you-know-who didn't get one before ordering that March 2003 invasion.)
I got mine from a man whose blog, Informed Comment, I read every morning without fail and whose flow of commentary on Bush's war in Iraq has been invaluable. I'm talking, of course, about Juan Cole who (evidently in his spare moments) has completed a history of the Napoleonic moment of "spreading democracy" to Arab lands, just published as Napoleon's Egypt: Invading the Middle East.
Some of the parallels are enough to make you jump out of your chair (if not your skin). For instance, Napoleon wrote a letter to one of his generals, well into the occupation, forbidding the beating of insurgents to extract information: "It has been recognized at all times that this manner of interrogating human beings, of putting them under torture, produces nothing good." Okay, at least Napoleon could learn from experience, an ability our President seems to lack, but the issue, put that way, rings a terrible bell 200 years later.
Napoleon's Egyptian moment lasted a mere three years. We are already into our fifth year in devolving Iraq with no obvious end in sight.
Last Sunday, the New York Times printed a remarkable op-ed by an Army specialist, four sergeants, and two staff sergeants of the 82nd Airborne Division, now on duty in Iraq (one of whom was shot in the head while the piece was being prepared).
In it, they wrote, "Viewed from Iraq at the tail end of a 15-month deployment, the political debate in Washington is indeed surreal… [W]e are skeptical of recent press coverage portraying the conflict as increasingly manageable and feel it has neglected the mounting civil, political and social unrest we see every day."
Of the military mission of which they are a part they wrote: "In the end, we need to recognize that our presence may have released Iraqis from the grip of a tyrant, but that it has also robbed them of their self-respect. They will soon realize that the best way to regain dignity is to call us what we are -- an army of occupation -- and force our withdrawal."
Whether these soldiers know the history of Bonaparte in Egypt or not, they have grasped the essence of what lurks behind the fine liberatory words of the leaders of the republic militant.
Let's hope it's not too late to learn the lesson of Napoleon and slip out of "Egypt," while it's still possible. Though it hardly scatches the surface of his new book, here is a little taste from the Napoleonic lesson plan of Juan Cole.
Tom
Pitching the Imperial Republic
Bonaparte and Bush on Deck
By Juan Cole
Click here to read more of this dispatch.
NEED SOME TRUTH?
CHECK OUT TRAVELING SOLDIER
Telling the truth - about the occupation or the criminals running the government in Washington - is the first reason for Traveling Soldier. But we want to do more than tell the truth; we want to report on the resistance - whether it's in the streets of Baghdad, New York, or inside the armed forces. Our goal is for Traveling Soldier to become the thread that ties working-class people inside the armed services together. We want this newsletter to be a weapon to help you organize resistance within the armed forces. If you like what you've read, we hope that you'll join with us in building a network of active duty organizers.
http://www.traveling-soldier.org/
And join with Iraq War vets in the call to end the occupation and bring our troops home now! www.ivaw.org/
CHECK OUT TRAVELING SOLDIER
Telling the truth - about the occupation or the criminals running the government in Washington - is the first reason for Traveling Soldier. But we want to do more than tell the truth; we want to report on the resistance - whether it's in the streets of Baghdad, New York, or inside the armed forces. Our goal is for Traveling Soldier to become the thread that ties working-class people inside the armed services together. We want this newsletter to be a weapon to help you organize resistance within the armed forces. If you like what you've read, we hope that you'll join with us in building a network of active duty organizers.
http://www.traveling-soldier.org/
And join with Iraq War vets in the call to end the occupation and bring our troops home now! www.ivaw.org/
Saturday, August 25, 2007
IWT - International World Television
The Real News is an alternative to the corporate mainstream television
Dear Supporters,
We just hit 101,000 views of The Promise on YouTube!
We want to thank you for helping us reach this milestone by viewing the video, sending it to friends and spreading the word about The Real News vision.
Now help us promote a new video with Eric Margolis.
This video is the first test of a new program called, The Real Story.
Eric Margolis, contributor to The Real News, says television news is misleading people about the responsibility of the U.S. in fueling the Iraq civil war.
Click on the link, rate it and send it to your friends.
Together we are making The Real News a reality.
The Real News is an alternative to the corporate mainstream television
Dear Supporters,
We just hit 101,000 views of The Promise on YouTube!
We want to thank you for helping us reach this milestone by viewing the video, sending it to friends and spreading the word about The Real News vision.
Now help us promote a new video with Eric Margolis.
This video is the first test of a new program called, The Real Story.
Eric Margolis, contributor to The Real News, says television news is misleading people about the responsibility of the U.S. in fueling the Iraq civil war.
Click on the link, rate it and send it to your friends.
Together we are making The Real News a reality.
..........................................................................
Join us at www.therealnews.com as we begin our "Think" programming, presenting a seven-part interview with legendary author Gore Vidal. Hear tales of grotesque adventures, the end of empires, the demise of democracy and much more.
Says Vidal, "I was born 80 years ago in a country called the United States of America and now I live in a Homeland - an expression we haven't heard since Hitler."
After watching the Gore Vidal interview, return to the homepage and click on "Join the Conversation" to talk with us at The Real News Junkies. The Real News Junkies is where The Real News community can discuss political topics of interest with each other, and learn more about our development as a network.
Part 1 of our interview with Gore Vidal is posted today. We look forward to knowing what you think!
Thanks again,
Paul Jay
CEO & Senior Editor IWT/The Real News
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