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Shove this in the face of every ignorant and amoral wretch who ever dared to ask you if it would be better for Saddam to have remained in power…

Saddam asked Bush for $1bn to go into exile

It wasn’t toppling Saddam the Bushies wanted, but the war itself. They could have got rid of him cheaper and with less bloodshed. Bush literally wanted to waste lives and money — and he played to all of the racism, xenophobia, chauvinism and jingoistic nationalism that you bastards possess in order to do it, Republicans. The convenient naivete, cowardice and corruption of the Democrats is no better.

Regardless of one’s thoughts about actual religion, there are few words sufficient to describe such evil as the average war supporter has engaged in and enabled besides this one — “Satanic”.

We of the Agorist Action Alliance and the Alliance of the Libertarian Left today work to draw frustrated and disenfranchised freedom activists from �left� and �right� together into a vital anti-state, anti-war, libertarian Leftist movement. And granted, the task seems overwhelming. But back in 1971, after three decades of political �homelessness� and being stonewalled in his efforts to unite libertarian strains from both Old Right and New Left, eternal optimist Murray Rothbard still maintained his dream of building such a coalition. Listen to this rallying cry, the closing paragraphs from The Betrayal of the American Right.

�And so we now face an America ruled alternately by scarcely differentiated conservative and liberals wings of the same state-corporatist system. Within the ranks of liberalism there is a growing number of disaffected people who are increasingly facing the fact that their own credo, liberalism, has been in power for forty years, and what has it wrought? Executive dictation, unending war in Vietnam, imperialism abroad and militarism and conscription at home, intimate partnership between Big Business and Leviathan Government. An increasing number of liberals are facing this critical failure and are recognizing that liberalism itself is to blame. They are beginning to see that Lyndon Johnson was absolutely correct in habitually referring to Franklin Roosevelt as his �Big Daddy.� The paternity is clear, and the whole crew stands or falls together.

�Where, then, can disaffected liberals turn? Not to the current Right, which offers them only more of the same, spiced with a more jingoistic and theocratic flavor. Not to the New Left, which destroyed itself in despair and random violence. Libertarianism, to many liberals, offers itself as the place to turn.

�And so libertarianism itself grows apace, fueled by split-offs from conservatism and liberalism alike. Just as conservatives and liberals have effectively blended into a consensus to uphold the Establishment, so what America needs now � and can have � is a counter-coalition in opposition to the Welfare-Warfare State. A coalition that would favor the short-term libertarian goals of militant opposition to the Vietnam War and the Cold War generally, and to conscription, the military-industrial complex, and the high taxes and accelerated inflation that the state has needed to finance these statist measures. It would be a coalition to advance the cause of both civil liberty and economic freedom from government dictation. It would be, in many ways, a renaissance of a coalition between the best of the Old Right and the old New Left, a return to the glorious days when elements of Left and Right stood shoulder to shoulder to oppose the conquest of the Philippines and America�s entry into World Wars I and II. Here would be a coalition that could appeal to all groups throughout America, to the middle class, workers, students, liberals, and conservatives alike. But Middle America, for the sake of gaining freedom from high taxes, inflation, and monopoly, would have to accept the idea of personal liberty and a loss of national face abroad. And liberals and leftists, for the sake of dismantling the war machine and the American Empire, would have to give up the cherished Old Left-liberal dream of high taxes and Federal expenditures for every goody on the face of the earth. The difficulties are great, but the signs are excellent that such an anti-Establishment and antistatist coalition can and might come into being. Big government and corporate liberalism are showing themselves to be increasingly incapable of coping with the problems that they have brought into being. And so objective reality is on our side.

�But more than that: the passion for justice and moral principle that is infusing more and more people can only move them in the same direction; morality and practical utility are fusing ever more clearly to greater numbers of people in one great call: for the liberty of people, of individuals and voluntary groups, to work out their own destiny, to take control over their own lives. We have it in our power to reclaim the American Dream.�

You can read this 36-year-old passage and be inspired by it, heartened by the fact that Rothbard never surrendered his vision. Or you can bewail three decades of experimentation and (so far) failure and suggest that our current efforts are a tremendous waste of time.

I choose to be inspired by Rothbard�s spirit and stay the course.

This is my latest at the Partial Observer. Excerpt:

The Ruling Class succeeds when the masses are both economically comfortable and economically vulnerable, where they are addicted to the consumerist lifestyle but their finances are in a precarious state. If they are too poor, they might revolt. If they are economically self-sufficient, they would be free to walk away from their jobs to chase their dreams � instead of being cogs in The System, they would be able to create their own systems and do their own thing. And this would threaten the economic and political power of the Ruling Class. As it is, however, the people will tolerate unwarranted government searches of their person and property if that is what it takes to preserve the conveniences of air travel and the Internet. And they will remain wage slaves for the secure income and health insurance. Economic and national security crises must be created every now and then to keep the people fearful and protective of what they have, even if it means surrendering more of their civil liberties and economic freedom to the Ruling Class.

On the news everywhere it seems there is some coverage about the government attacks against protesters in the city of Yangon, Myanmar, the country formerly known as Burma. From the Mail and Guardian, South Africa.


At least 50 000 people, many of them youths and students, swarmed into Yangon undeterred by the deaths of at least four protesters, including three Buddhist monks, the day before, repeatedly defying orders to disperse.

As the shots rang out, they ran for their lives, only to regroup and face down the might of Burma's junta, which has exerted iron rule over the impoverished country for more than four decades.

At least five people, including a Japanese photographer, were killed in Yangon on Thursday when soldiers and police fired on crowds protesting against decades of military rule and economic hardship.

It was the 10th straight day that large protests have erupted against the ruling junta, which caused outrage in this impoverished South-east Asian nation by doubling fuel prices on August 15.

British diplomatic sources said there was evidence that monks whose monastery was raided before dawn were "badly beaten", with large amounts of blood found in their dormitories after they were hauled away.

The raid was one of at least three in Yangon's east, which each triggered clashes as hundreds of supporters tried to prevent monks from being hauled away by authorities in an apparent bid to prevent them from leading the protests.

In the city centre, at least 100 other people were taken into custody, thrown into military trucks after troops issued an ultimatum threatening "extreme action" unless they dispersed.

Groups of people were forced to lie on their stomachs while they were searched, and if found with cameras or cellphones -- which are rare in Burma -- they were beaten and their equipment was smashed.

The mass protests have been led by disciplined lines of saffron-robed monks, but following overnight arrests and the monastery raids only a handful of monks were spotted in the crowds on Thursday.

From the BBC here is a description of the country including mention of Nobel Peace Prize winner, Aung San Suu Kyi, one of the most noted pro-democracy campaigners who had various restrictions placed on her activities since the late 1980s. Below is a news clip on the police attacks yesterday morning.


LabourStart the online trade union journal is also covering the Burma situation. They have a link to an item on the "wear red" campaign for this friday.

Questions for Bakunin fans…

If the following excerpt from the summary of Bakunin’s collectivist anarchism on Wikipedia is approximately accurate:

“Collectivist anarchism (also known as anarcho-collectivism) is a doctrine spearheaded by Mikhail Bakunin that advocated the abolition of the state and private ownership of the means of production, with the means of production instead being owned collectively and controlled and managed by the producers themselves. Workers would be paid in democratic organizations based of the amount of time they contributed to production. These salaries would be used to purchase commodities in a communal market.”

1. Is there any reason not to consider each collective a “firm” or “company” for purposes of using the academic understanding of how markets work to bolster the case for the practicality of such a system of production?

2. Is the production of a service potentially just as valid of an economic pursuit for a collective as the production of material goods?

3. Is there any reason not to consider production of security the production of a legitimate service?

When you read about President Bush denouncing tyranny, you really have to acknowledge the hypocrisy. I mean; seriously.

Bush denounces tyrants from Cuba to Zimbabwe
James Bone for The Times in New York

US President George Bush urged UN members today to join in a “mission of liberation”, denouncing tyrants in Belarus, Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Syria and Zimbabwe and announcing tightened US sanctions on the junta in Burma.

“This great institution must work for great purposes: to free people from tyranny and violence; to combat disease, illiteracy, and ignorance and poverty and despair,” Mr Bush told the 192-nation UN General Assembly. “Every member of the United Nations must join in this mission of liberation.”

Making only a glancing mention of the violence in Iraq, Mr Bush saluted “young democracies” in Iraq, Lebanon and Afghanistan and called on the world to support the “moderate” leaders of the Palestinian Authority.

Avoiding any specific reference to al-Qaeda, the president warned that extremists were trying to impose a “hateful vision.”

“The followers of this violent ideology are a threat to civilised people everywhere,” he said. “All civilised nations must work together by sharing intelligence about their networks and choking off their finances and bringing to justice their operatives.

“In the long-run, the best way to defeat extremists is to defeat their dark ideology with a more hopeful vision - the vision of liberty.”

As protests grow in Burma, Mr Bush announced that expanded financial sanctions and an extended visa ban on members of the ruling junta and their families.

“Americans are outraged by the situation in Burma, where a military junta has imposed a 19-year reign of fear,” he said. “Basic freedoms of speech, assembly and worship are severely restricted. Ethnic minorities are persecuted. Froced child labour, human trafficking and rape are common. The regime is holding more than 1,000 political prisoners, including Aung San Suu Kyi.”

“The military junta remains unyielding, yet the people’s desire for freedom remains unmistakable,” he said.

He excoriated the “brutal regimes” in Belarus, Iran, North Korea, Syria and Zimbabwe and said “the long rule of a cruel dictator is nearing its end” in Cuba.

“The Cuban people are ready for their freedom,” he said. “As that nation enters a period of transition, the UN must insist on free speech, free assembly and ultimately free and competitive elections.”

Although he was speaking just hours before Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Mr Bush made no specific mention of Teheran’s suspected nuclear weapons programme.

He also call for the reform of the UN Human Rights Council, which was only created this year after a revamp that failed to earn Washington’s support.

“With commitment and courage of this chamber, a world where people are free to speak, assembly and worship as they wish, a world where children in every nation grow up healthy, get a decent education and look to the future with hope,” he said.

And I read the above on the day that the Drug Enforcement Administration conducts another Gestapo raid on medical marijuana collectives in California.

Dear Friends of MPP:

Right now, the DEA is currently raiding the River City Patient Center in Sacramento, California � the longest established medical marijuana dispensary in the city. Protesters have gathered outside the building in support of the collective.

And yesterday, the DEA began threatening landlords in the Santa Barbara area who lease space to medical marijuana dispensaries � activity that�s legal under California state law � with federal prison time and forfeiture of their properties. Several dispensaries closed right away.

This follows a similar move in Los Angeles in July � a maneuver that was condemned in a Los Angeles Times editorial as “a deplorable new bullying tactic.”

No matter what state you live in, will you please take a few minutes to write all three of your members of Congress to protest this federal interference in state law? MPP�s action center is easy to use: You can send one of our pre-drafted letters, or you can personalize the letter.

This is just the latest in the campaign of terror the DEA is waging on the sick. In June and July, the DEA conducted extensive medical marijuana raids in several California counties and in Oregon, including raids on at least 10 Los Angeles clinics in late July. Most were aimed at medical marijuana dispensaries operating legally under state and local laws, and in several cases the DEA detained and terrorized individual patients.

If this outrages you like it does me, would you help MPP hire a new grassroots organizer in California, as well as to retain a lobbyist to help push legislation in Sacramento to protect these dispensaries? If enough supporters on this e-mail list donate today, MPP will be able to fully pay for both positions.

These reprehensible DEA attacks � which run counter to state law, as well as the 78% of the American people who support “making marijuana legally available for doctors to prescribe in order to reduce pain and suffering” � are preventing effective local regulation of medical marijuana: Cities and counties in California are passing ordinances to ensure that medical marijuana dispensaries follow the law and serve patients properly. But by treating all who provide medical marijuana to the sick as common drug dealers, the DEA has become the single largest obstacle to effective regulation of these establishments.

A major Los Angeles raid actually occurred at the exact moment that members of the city council were holding a press conference to discuss an ordinance to regulate medical marijuana providers.

Local officials and major newspapers are outraged by the DEA’s actions. After the July raids in Los Angeles, L.A. City Councilman Dennis Zine � a Republican and former police officer with the L.A. Police Department � said, “I am greatly disturbed that the Drug Enforcement Administration would initiate an enforcement action against medical marijuana facilities in the City of Los Angeles during a news conference regarding City Council support of an Interim Control Ordinance to regulate all facilities within the City. This action by the DEA is?contrary to the vote of Californians who overwhelmingly voted to support medicinal marijuana use by those facing serious and life threatening illnesses. The DEA needs to focus their attention and enforcement action on the illegal drug dealers who are terrorizing communities in Los Angeles.”

After a series of DEA medical marijuana raids in San Francisco, the city’s health director, Dr. Mitchell Katz, wrote to the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee, “These actions have resulted in 4,000 persons with chronic illness left without access to critical treatment upon which they rely. Certainly in this post-September 11 environment, it seems that a DEA priority punishing organizations for distributing cannabis for medical purposes to chronically ill individuals is misplaced.”

Would you help us fight back against the DEA’s deplorable attacks on sick patients? Please write your three members of Congress now, and then consider making a donation to MPP today.

Sincerely,

Rob Kampia
Executive Director
Marijuana Policy Project
Washington, D.C.

Could politics get anymore ridiculous? Probably.

Hat tip to the Times Online UK via Antiwar.com, and the Marijuana Policy Project on MySpace.

I had the blog down because of the error message that you hopefully don’t see above every post. I’ll look into fixing it, but I decided that it didn’t really distort the look of the site to the point of it not being readable.

That having been said; any help on fixing the error is very much appreciated. It happened after I upgraded to the newly released WordPress version 2.3.

Anarchist and anthropology professor David Graeber was on Charlie Rose recently, and it was a very interesting interview indeed. Graeber nailed a lot of things on the head, and spoke eloquently against the anti-globalization, protest-loving pseudo-anarchists. You can see the whole thing here.

I receive a occasional email summary from the good people at DeSmogBlog.com the environmental website whose chief target is the climate change denial "industry" [sometimes referred to as the current leadership of the US Republican Party]. Just today they brought Shag's attention to an article, from last July, which summarizes the actions of those who are trying to denigrate environmentalists over the lasting effects of anthropogenic climate change ... you know the stuff that is usually worded in terms of " all the facts are not in " or " there is some disagreement among the experts " or my all time favourite " those guys (on the other side of every issue) are biased " ... so on and so forth. As DSB points out among those who disagree with that "assessment" include the 2,500 scientists of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, the Royal Society of London and the Royal Society of Canada. The writer points out that climate change deniers are not conspiracy theorists in the usual sense.

" They have received extensive, if clumsy assistance from the media, which in a lazy and facile attempt to provide "balance" is willing to give any opinion equal time as long as it is firmly in contradiction with another.This is not just a feature of the point/counterpoint talking heads that have emerged as the principal vehicle for television news. Newspaper reporters are just as guilty of canvassing "both sides" of every argument, often without providing any critical judgment as to the validity or relative weight of either side. On the issue of climate change, journalists have consistently reported the updates from the best climate scientists in the world juxtaposed against the unsubstantiated raving of an industry-funded climate change denier - as if both are equally valid. "

Global Warming Headlines

Does this sounds a bit like creationists disguising themselves under the caption of "intelligent design", a real oxymoron if there ever was one, or neo-cons snivelling about "socialism" while they drive the United States into pecuniary limbo? But the ninth circle is usually reserved for traitors ... there's probably still some room on the bus guys! As one of the comments attached to the DSB posting points out, science is not about some vague "consensus" but of finding evidence for a particular belief. Anyway for those interested the original posting is available here.