Cynical humour may well be our best (and only?) defence against western imperial propaganda. Here’s an excellent example in today’s Observer online: Why Look in the Crystal Ball?, by Terry Jones.
Satire vs. Propaganda
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Playground Politics
In yet another fit of U.S. imperial pique on an international scale, I read today with dismay that France, Germany & Russia were conspicuously not invited to an initial planning meeting for a multi-country “stabilisation force” for Iraq. Has the global political situation always been this childish and petulant?
I’m increasingly resigning myself to the dismal realisation that it’s always been like this. As the “might is right” mentality gains widespread political acceptance around the World, and pro-neocon pundits regurgitate past precedents of imperial tyranny (and my “homeland” Britain wrote large sections of the book on the subject) as justification, it’s more & more obvious that we haven’t progressed very much politically in the last two or three thousand years. How sad that a quote by Thucydides referring to the Peloponnesian War written more than 2,400 years ago is still relevant and much-quoted today:
“The strong do what they can, and the weak suffer what they must.”
Denounce the Pacifists
This highly pertinent (and slightly abridged) quote from Nazi Reichsmarshall and Luftwaffe-Chief Herman Goering has been doing the rounds on the Internet recently:
“Naturally, the common people don’t want war; neither in Russia nor in England nor in America, nor for that matter in Germany. That is understood. But, after all, it is the leaders of the country who determine the policy and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy or a fascist dictatorship or a Parliament or a Communist dictatorship. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. It works the same way in any country.”
According to the snopes.com Urban Legends Reference Pages, this quote was part of a private conversation on 18 April 1946 between Goering and psychologist Gustave Gilbert during a recess in Goering’s trial at Nuremberg. The conversation was recorded in Gilbert’s diary, which was published the following year:
Gilbert, G.M. Nuremberg Diary. New York: Farrar, Straus and Company, 1947 (pp. 278-279).
The Smoking Gun
19 days into the illegal war on Iraq, and coalition forces are now claiming to have discovered “smoking gun” evidence of WMD’s (Weapons of Mass Distraction). What a surprise! Perhaps they found them in a parked car, along with a copy of the Koran and a Boeing flight manual…
The Intolerableness of All Earthly Effort
Here is my quote for the day, which I came across while reading Moby Dick on the subway on my way to work this morning:
“that one most perilous and long voyage ended, only begins a second; and a second ended, only begins a third, and so on, for ever and for aye. Such is the endlessness, yea, the intolerableness of all earthly effort.”
Normal Service Will Be Resumed Shortly
Apologies to folks that were expecting some new images on the site this week; the screen on my laptop has died, which means I can only use it at work where there is an external monitor to connect it to 🙁
Normal service will be resumed in a few weeks, when my shiny new Vaio GRX-650 laptop arrives…
Joke
Here is my joke of the week, courtesy of Ms. Claire Sussums (thanks Claire!):
Three Texas surgeons were arguing as to which had the greatest skill.
The first began: “Three years ago, I re-attached seven fingers on a pianist. He went on to give a recital for the Queen of England.”.
The second replied: “That’s nothing. I attended to a man in a car accident. All his arms and legs were severed from his body. Two years after I reattached them, he won three gold medals for field events in the Olympics.”.
The third said: “A few years back, I attended to a cowboy. He was high on cocaine and alcohol when he rode his horse head-on into a Santa Fe freight train traveling at 100 miles per hour. All I had to work with was the horse’s ass and a ten gallon hat. A couple of years ago, he became President of the United States.”
For an entirely more serious (and MUCH less amusing) analysis of the current global crisis, read the excellent article by Nation contributor Jonathan Schell, The Case Against War.
Anti-War Rally
Today I went to the anti-war rally in New York City with two friends, Angus & CK. We couldn’t get anywhere near the epicentre of the rally (1st Avenue north of 49th Street); the whole east side of New York was effectively shut down by a huge, diverse and peaceful crowd of peace protestors who braved bitterly cold conditions to make themselves heard (today’s highest temp in NYC was -5°C, or 22°F).
We got as close as 53rd St and 3rd Avenue, which was supposed to be an access route, but the police aggressively threw up a barricade right in front of us, supposedly because of some disturbance involving mounted police at 53rd St & 2nd Ave.
It was clear that the police massively underestimated the turnout; CNN’s website is currently estimating about 200,000 people attended, but it seemed like MUCH more to me — the police were totally overwhelmed, and responded by trampling through the crowds with riot police on horses (something I haven’t seen since the Poll Tax riots of 1989 in London).
Ignore the scaremongering U.S. media — opposition within the United States itself to the U.S.-led war on Iraq is huge. Today was a good day.
P.S. Message to Tony Blair: I am disgusted by you.
R.I.P. Senator Wellstone
As a disenfranchised inhabitant of the World’s newest democracy, I’ve made a few small political contributions to various Democratic election campaigns recently, in an attempt to help bring the U.S. back from the brink of the insane, unjust and dangerous War to Seize Oil. One of the campaigns I contributed $20 to a few days ago was Sen. Paul Wellstone… And now he is dead. He died in a “mysterious” plane crash…
Stuff Arrives
My stuff finally arrived in NYC just after 9am today, 22 days (i.e. more than 3 weeks!) after it was picked up by Bekins. That’s only slightly less time than it took to ship 5 crates from Britain to San Francisco by boat! A few inconsequential items were physically damaged, and some of the boxes were badly water-damaged — my stereo will need to dry out thoroughly before I try using it. Most of the boxes looked like they’d been bashed around quite a bit; the fact that most of my possessions seem to have survived intact is entirely due to my girlfriend Jessica, who did an amazing job of organizing my packing when I was walking around cluelessly scratching my head, helping me pack, and dealing with the movers in California after I’d already set off. Thanks Jess!