Monday, September 11, 2006

Now, more than ever...

I am so sick of 9/11 memorials, retrospectives, tributes, charities, ice cream pops, you name it I've had enough of it.

It's been five fucking years people, you'd think by now you'd have gotten over yourselves. But if there's anything powerful people enjoy it's playing the victim, and for the last 5 years people have been creaming their pants over the sweet sweet self-pity and self-righteousness that they can excuse with three little numerals and a single punctuation mark.

Three thousand people died in an act of terrible murder. Yes, it was indeed a tragedy and a wake-up call...a wake up call that went un-answered.

9/11 was a direct result of America's apathy and self-interest. We've been in bed with so many different groups only to then jump out and declare them demons as soon as it suited our purposes that we were way past due for our comeuppance.

Most of the atrocities Saddam Hussein is on trial for were carried out when he was an ally of the United States and he committed them with Reagan's blessing and protection.

Remember Rambo III? Remember the clean faced, plucky Afghan Boy who befriended John Rambo and helped him fight the evil commies? That was Bin Laddin and the boys. After 9/11 the major TV networks brought the ex-CIA agent who trained Al-Qaeda as an expert witness and then politely pussy-footed around the fact He was the one who taught them how to make a superpower bleed in the first place.

The public records released by this administration show that if Bush had just read the goddamn reports on his goddamn desk instead of clearing brush back at the ranch we could have been on alert for terrorist activity BEFORE planes smashed into buildings.

So if we can forget all about how much 9/11 is at least in part our own damn fault, why must we 'never forget' the attack that took place that morning. Most Americans wouldn't even have noticed those 3,000 people were gone if they weren't told every 12 minutes.

More than 3,000 American women die of cervical cancer every year. That's 5 trade centers since the attacks and counting, lives that could be saved if the HPV vaccine was implemented on a large scale. That vaccine is currently being fought by the religious right, the same right that supports bombing the shit out some poor Iraqi's who didn't have anything to do with 9/11 in the name of those who fell from the towers.

If you're so eager to be indignant and dramatic about a national tragedy how-the-fuck-about Katrina? WAYYYY more people died there, victims of the incompetence and indifference of the people who were sworn to protect them. Where's the outrage, where's the commitment to hound those responsible to the ends of the earth when it comes to this?

But more than all the rest, I am so fucking DONE with assholes using 9/11 and the resulting 'war on terror' to excuse their Racism and Bloodlust.

If you've ever defended 'interrogation tactics', racial profiling, domestic spying, secret prisons, called the Geneva Conventions 'outdated' or used the phrase 'glass parking lot' I want you to stop and take a deep breath through your nose. Go on, I'll wait....

...smells funny, doesn't it?

That's because you're head's so far up your ass you're breathing shit as well as talking it.

People, if you wanna do something to honor the fallen souls of the eleventh of September, 2001. Stand up for yourself and the rights that America is supposed to be founded on. Rather than slapping another jingoist sticker on your SUV why don't you get up and make sure that there will still BE an America here for your grandchildren to live in. Why don't you tell the 4th estate to stop trying to scare you into watching their bullshit and insist that they use YOUR AIRWAVES to hold YOUR GOVERNMENT accountable.

Why don't you stop saying 'Never Again, Never Forget' and put your money where your mouth is, and start amending the global fiasco that is your foreign policy so people stop wanting to smash planes into your buildings, 'cuz until you do anytime anyone invokes 9/11 I'm just gonna know you're a hypocritical asshole.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

The following is a transcription of the comments string posted with this blog on Myspace. If any of the parties involved object to my re-posting their comments here, lemme know and I'll delete them.
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I always enjoy reading your blogs, Llyw; you're definitely the best blogger out of our little cadre of PA peeps. In fact, I wish that you'd put your stinking blog on a real, dedicated site, rather than just using the MySpace function.

MySpace blogs are so freaking ugly, they are painful to read. If you mirrored your stuff on a better site, I'd still read it. I promise.

Posted by Mondenkind! on Tuesday, September 12, 2006 at 1:54 AM
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As Noam Chomsky said, the attacks were unprecedented, in that it was the first attack from a grossly over-dominated force back at us, rather than the other way around (it isn't like Nicaraguans were mining OUR ports).





I always think about how Britain reacted to the IRA's terrorist attacks in their country. Did they over-react? Well, yes. They continued to push an aggressive military occupation that fueled the terrorists' anger. While that element is similar to our reaction (although they didn't start launching air strikes against Dublin to topple its government), I'm more interested in the most significant difference: they never NEVER spoke as if a bombing outside a pub was going to end their very way of life. It was a tragedy, but not of Bruckheimer proportions. Could be because they, unlike us, took horrible losses in WWI, and they, unlike us, suffered terrible damage to their cities during WWII. Perhaps it puts it all in perspective. But since the burning of DC in the war of 1812, we've always been the bully, and no one's ever come to our house to punch us in the nose for it.



Posted by Ian on Tuesday, September 12, 2006 at 11:53 AM
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I thought I'd throw in my two cents and say that I'm not necessarily ethically opposed to torture under very restricted circumstances. I am, however, against ignoring international law, so that more or less makes me against torture in practice.

I thought about posting something myself, but I didn't want to make a big deal out of it- but then I got into an argument, of all things, while playing City of Heroes.

A guy was going on with the standard line, and I instinctively replied that that was the anniversary of the day we gave in to terror.

There are a lot of people who will disagree with what I said(but probably not here), but since that day we have allowed fear, terror, to dramatically change the way we live. It's lowered most american's standard of living, taken away our liberties and placed more power into the hands of the least trusted edition of one of the very least trusted governments in the world.

As an aside, let me just tell you that if we really wanted to flip terrorists the bird, instead of building a 'freeedom monument' to 'heroes' whose sacrifice included going to work. I mean, don't get me wrong, there's a tragedy, but it's firefighters and policemen who are heroes. Back on track, what we oughta do is build a new world trade center. Exactly the same size and shape. Two towers. It says- You can't change us.

But of course, WE should. Change us, that is.

Posted by Richard on Wednesday, September 13, 2006 at 4:11 AM
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Lemme quickly adress the issue of torture, and the legal, ethical/moral, and practical reasons why we shouldn't do it.

Legally and ethically, it all boils down to the golden mean. We can't expect nations like, oh say, Iran, or Korea, to submit to the rule of international law if we continually flout it whenever it serves our purposes. The message we send there is 'You're not strong enough to do whatever the hell you please yet. Get some nukes and then we'll talk.' That's what the Tae-po-dong escapade was all about. They weren't rattleing their sabre at Japan, they were trying to re-open the dialogues that were closed when Bush came to power. And since the only language this administration speaks fluently is Bully, they took some correspondence courses.

Do unto others what you would have them do unto you. Or in this case don't do unto others what you wouldn't have them do unto you is a big part of the ethical reason to eschew torture. You can't condemn the methods of terrorists as evil if they're your methods as well. Not if you wanna claim any kinda moral high ground. Yes, these are violent, desperate, dastardly people who don't have any qualms about hurting our people to make a point. Which is why it's SO much more important that we be better than them. The, golden mean doesn't work backwards, (i.e. it's not ok to do something bad to someone else even if they did it to you first.)

And finally, torture doesn't accomplish ANY of it's stated goals. It's not an effective means of gathering intelligence. As Pat Murtha, John McCain, and any number of CIA hired psycologists can tell you. If you think about it you can figure out why:

Imagine you're tortureing someone you've been told is a member of a terrorist cell in the US for information about his organizations members and plans. If he tells you he's an exchange student is that gonna make you stop the pain and fear? No, obviously that's a lie.

If he tells you information that clearly conflicts with what you already know is that going to make you stop? No, again a lie.

If he tells you what you already expect to hear will that make you stop? Bingo.

It doesn't matter if later it turns out this kid WAS and excange student, in the torture room that was the wrong answer. If he was a terrorist and did divulge information that was true, but confliced with what you had already accepted as sound intelligence, you still kept torturing him. In essence, torture doesn't get people to tell you the truth, it get's people to tell you what you want to hear.

Furthermore torture is impractial because it hinders the single most reliable source of intelligence: Defectors. As much as people may hate to admit it, the enemy has a consience too. The best and most reliable information has always come from people who get in over their heads and have the balls to stop and do the right thing. The recent twarted plot in london wasn't discovered using torture, it was a voluntary informant. Now, if you're having second thoughts about your group's plan to blow some stuff up, are you more likely to jump ship if the athorites will stop you, arrest your group, and subject you to due process (perhaps cutting you a deal for turning informant) or if the athorities will likely parade you around with a bag on your head as a trophy in their war on an abstract concept before dissapearing you somewhere undoubltedly unpleasant with no chance of trial, appeal, and no sentance to run out.

Torture is a dumb idea.

Posted by Llyw on Wednesday, September 13, 2006 at 2:03 PM
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Let's see if this posts without those weird extraneous symbols. I know I've said this in other places before, but it's relevent, so I'll reiterate.



The "24" idea that many people trot out to defend the concept of torture is especially ridiculous. If I am a fundamentalist religious fanatic with a nuclear bomb placed somewhere in the US set to go off in a few hours and you apprehend me, many people would say that this is a time when employing torture is warranted. And while from a strictly utilitarian theory of good it might be acceptable, it isn't efficacious.



You bust out the rubber hose and hacksaw and I will indeed tell you that the bomb is in the luggage compartment of a greyhound bus that left the station two hours ago, bound for I don't know where (I just chucked it onto the nearest cart). You will stop torturing me, since I told you, and start looking. If by some miracle you manage to stop and search all the buses before my bomb goes off, you'll see it wasn't on any of them. ding! I was lying. The torture recomences. Before it gets too bad I cave and admit I mailed it last week to a bum address in Washington DC with the instructions to hold it at the post office if it was undeliverable for thirty days (the maximum). Unless the guy signed for it without even reading the name on it. I don't know the address in DC, I just wrote down some random one off the top of my head. Again, a massive search is on, and time will surely run out before you realize I lied again. Any sufficiently complicated lie must be followed up, and is exactly as effective at stopping the torture as the truth, so why not make shit up?



It also bears repeating here that people that spend a ton of time trying to create complicated scenarioes where it would be ok for them to torture someone strike me as...leery. If I kept trying to come up with a hypothetical situation that would make you admit that yes, in that case you'd expose yourself to children, wouldn't you start to suspect that I just reallyreally wanted to do that? People that advocate torture on a national scale (I'm looking at you, John C. Yoo, ya goddamn hack) are poorly disguised sadists, and doing noone any good.

Posted by Ian on Friday, September 15, 2006 at 5:29 PM
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Hey hey! I just read this blog. I'm a little late here but I wanted to give kudos for saying what I was thinking this year. I ALMOST blogged it too, but I just haven't got the stomach for politics these days.

Two great books to read are 1000 Years for Revenge and Day of Deciet. The latter is a very well documented book on Pearl Harbor, but there are such lovely parallels that one could almost make the observation: history repeats itself.

In fact, when are these governments going to come up with something new?

Posted by Rock n' Roll Outlaw on Saturday, September 30, 2006 at 7:54 AM