MatthewLB@aol.com

602-989-2642

gigs-276004156@craigslist.org

On Friday, February the 9th, 2007, there was an ad on craigslist with the following headline: "Envrionmentally friendly writer wanted". Above is the e-mail and phone number of the dude who placed the ad, so feel free to call/e-mail his monkey ass like a stalker to protest what he did to me today ...

We met and talked a week ago. The plan was for him to run this literary serial of mine (see below) on his eco-friendly website. As you can see, the literary serial I proposed was clearly pro-environment, but when I showed it to this fuck stick a few hours ago, he rejected it because IN HIS OWN WORDS my literary serial was "too radical and intellectual for 'Bubba'" ...

... this is not without historic precedent ...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cage_(TOS_episode)

NBC reportedly called the [Star Trek] pilot "too cerebral", "too intellectual" ...

... this bastard said he was going to pay me $125 per week/episode to do an eco-friendly literary serial--just the sort of job I've been looking for ever since I was censored by the CityLife--and now he's yanked the football away just as I was about to kick it the same way Lucy would do Charlie Brown ... as I've been saying since Day One: whites would rather put the planet at risk rather than offend or alienate "Bubba" (AKA the average white American) ... well, FUCK Bubba!

I'm beyond sick and tired of everything in life being watered down for Bubba's benefit. No one ever waters down all these cop TV shows out of fear that they might alienate victims of police brutality; no one ever waters down all these soldier movies out of fear that they might alienate victims of war crimes, so it's clear that this tone-it-down bullshit only and ultimately benefits the rich and the powerful--otherwise known as the right-wing ...

As bad as my homeless ass needed dude's money, I'd rather die like a samurai than tone anything of mine down--ESPECIALLY for the benefit of the very ig-nant motherfuckers who voted for/invested in this nightmare we all have to wade through every day. Again, this is all the proof you'll ever need that censorship occurs in America and that it usually occurs in order to stroke white America's fragile ego--as if it ain't been stroked enough as it is ... and now, on with the show ...

* * * *

Hemp fuel powers her rocket pack, her hemp twine will ensnare you, her hemp-woven body armor shields her from harm--she's known to the world as Hempwoman ..!

Episode 1

Whenever a decision--be it major or minor--is made in life, the universe splinters and replicates. When Adolph Hitler wrote off atomic research as "Jew science", at least two new universes were created: One in which his anti-Semitism cost him World War II and one where developing an A-bomb allowed him to enslave the entire planet.

With literally an infinite amount of these universes simultaneously existing on different frequencies, there's no point in trying to determine which universe was the original one, so the term "multiverse" is much more accurate. It's a term commonly known on worlds where sideways time travel is taken seriously and not dismissed as science fiction. And since the forces of planned obsolescence that have dominated so many other versions of Earth never gained a foothold on one world in particular, it could afford to travel sideways through time--all because one choice made by a single individual steered global history down a truly unique path.

Secretary of the Treasury Andrew Mellon--a banker who helped finance the Du Ponts' budding petro-chemical dynasty--appointed his nephew-in-law, Harry Anslinger, to head the Federal Bureau of Narcotics for the express purpose of demonizing cannabis ('least the Du Ponts and other industrial elitists have to compete with something that can be grown in every back yard).

On other Earths, Anslinger would go on to scare the United States Congress into confusing industrial hemp with marijuana via his racist horror stories of dark-skinned men using marijuana to sedate and rape light-skinned women. Except on this Earth, Anslinger fell out of favor with the Mellon clan when he was caught with a very swarthy prostitute named Marmalade (while smoking opium, no less). And without his bigoted testimony to goad it along, congress never passed the Marijuana Tax Act in August of 1937.

Again, it doesn't matter if the decision is major or minor, for Anslinger's withdrawal from the political arena was but the first domino in a long line of history-altering dominos to fall. Without the ban on hemp, the anarchists of the Spanish Civil War were barely able to turn the tide against General Franco's mutinous coup with an influx of hemp products that would've been unavailable otherwise.

Without a Franco victory, Italy immediately emulated Spain in the form of an internal, anarchist overthrow of Mussolini. Meanwhile, Stalin and Hitler turned on each other like a pair of rabid dogs until their regimes exhausted themselves trying to destroy one another. And without an Axis, there never was a World War II--or an atomic bomb ...

Without a Cold War, there wasn't much drama during the 1950s and '60s to speak of. The Japanese Empire attempted to conquer all of Asia but only succeeded in totally embarrassing itself. In America--the last of this world's imperialistic powers--a second Civil War broke out between those who accepted Paul Robeson's 1960 presidential election and those who wouldn't (and without the CIA, Robeson was able to survive re-election and the North won again). After which, both Japan and America finally joined the United Nations--this one being based in Paris, not New York City ...

The dominos Anslinger inadvertently set in motion would eventually result in Earth being renamed Hemptopia since, by the early 1970s, the world's industrial base stemmed from hemp. The effect this alone had on Humanity in general and the economy in particular was immeasurable. Since hemp can be grown in most any climate, mass starvation was eradicated thanks to the nutritional value of hempseed and its many derivatives. Since paper/fabric can be made from hemp fiber, the surplus of trees made it all the easier to breathe. And since hemp is ideal for pyrolytic conversion into fuel, Texas and the Middle East were at peace.

Utopian as they were, the Hemptopians only had two major hurtles: Overpopulation (thanks to life being just that good and love being easier to come by) and ... something less tangible. If necessity is the mother of invention, and if Hemptopia ensures that everyone has what they need to survive, then the kind of innovation that comes with struggling under utterly hellish conditions obviously wouldn't exist there.

Knowing the Hemptopian population would rather die than intentionally introduce any form of suffering in order to inspire itself, its scientific community decided to kill two birds with one stone. Their overpopulation problem would be solved by investing in space colonization and the geniuses needed to perfect the necessary technology would be recruited from those versions of Earth where planned obsolescence ruled.

(This was possible because in 1987, Hemptopia's version of Dr. Stephen Hawking discovered a way to mathematically extend the geometry of a black hole into its counterpart--the white hole, "into which matter cannot fall, but only go out", as Hawking put it. By 2003, these white holes were used as portals between the infinite Earths of the multiverse.)

Marginalized as they'd surely be on their own worlds, these geniuses would be approached and asked to defect to a world which would truly appreciate them. Hence the Refugee Retrieval Program (or RRP), a grass roots collective of scientists and explorers. This is the story of one of those explorers, Marilyn Janeway.

Copyright Saab Lofton, 2007

* * * *

http://www.etext.org/Politics/MIM/faq/tone.html

http://www.lasvegascitylife.com/articles/2003/02/19/export274.txt

http://www.lasvegascitylife.com/articles/2004/03/10/scorched_earth/fear_no_evil/fearnoevil.txt

But use protection, don't know where Bubba has been...

Excellent Piece Saab .... this is a form of censorship when one of our finest writers is fired 1st bcuz the media conglomerate which bought out his small Weekly paper fires him for being essentially a threat to the status quo then he cannot find a new home over a year later ...... who needs Stalin when you have Capitalism ....

I read the premise about hemptopia, and I must say it's quite clever. Just think that none of the historical events that the US has been involved in (at least as far as its foreign policy is concerned) would have occurred had only hemp been declared legal. Damn you, Du pont!

I think this Matthew guy is intellectually castrated. There is simply not enough original/intellectual stories out there in the first place, and to have this guy critique your work in such a manner is a slap in the face. Who is he to decide what is too radical or too intellectual? Leave it up to the readers/viewers. As a sci-fi fan, I want radicalism, I want intellect, but i want escapism as well. I want infotainment. The entertainment/culture industry, sad to say, is full of hacks, which explains why I'm more choosy and critical as to what I watch or read. There is no hack here, my friend.

I think your take on 'The Emperor Wears No Clothes' combined with the Star Trek universe reminds me of Rod Serling's Twilight Zone, in that there is a socio-political message there, but it's spread and told in a way that most people can accept (the sci fi genre).

Peace. I'm out.

I want to thank everyone for their support. I also want to let folks know that I'm not alone: Here's why Amy Littlefield has now taken the top spot insofar who's my favorite superheroine ...

http://www.commondreams.org/views07/0216-32.htm

Published on Friday, February 16, 2007 by the Brown Daily Herald / Rhode Island
Protestors, Don't be Afraid to Show Your Anger
By Amy Littlefield

... something about the Jan. 27 march felt insufficient, and I think it was the lack of rage that we should all rightfully be feeling about our government's actions. More than 3,000 U.S. troops have been killed in Iraq. The occupation has killed 655,000 Iraqis, according to a Johns Hopkins report. Guantanamo Bay is still open, despite the flagrant torture taking place there ... and it's looking more and more likely that the same spirit of corporate greed that has destroyed Iraq will bring us into Iran.

It's easy to forget these things when so many people are standing around holding signs with puns that insult the president's intelligence or portray him cartoonishly with devil horns or a Pinocchio nose. Perhaps humor is a way for people opposed to the war to deal with the terror and anger they feel towards the current administration, but humor is also an extremely effective way to ignore the true depth of the problem [ASK AL MANCINI OF ABC RADIO ABOUT THE CONVERSATION I HAD WITH HIM ABOUT THIS VERY SUBJECT] ...

http://lasvegas.staughton.indypgh.org/news/2005/12/4132.php

Joking about George Bush is unproductive -- he is already a laughing-stock, and laughing at him more is not going to end the war.

Not that I think a protest should necessarily be all business. I found the overall tone of the march to be joyful -- it was a nice day, and people were happy to see so many others out in support of the cause. Someone was handing out stickers with smiley faces on them. Does it detract from the cause to wear a smiley-face sticker and rejoice in the fact that we are united against the war? I don't know. I wore one. I'm still not sure.

We need to find a balance between being happy to see each other and sending a clear message about the fact that we won't tolerate U.S. occupation in the Middle East. Scripted marches, though important, have become something the government and the public expect -- it is no longer a novelty if half a million people turn out to an antiwar protest. Though I was not part of the small group of young people who attempted to storm the Capitol building and I'm not sure I see that as the most pragmatic approach, I at least have to commend them for expressing the sort of unbridled rage that we don't see enough of in our so-called democracy. Actions outside of the normal repertoire of protest express a profound sense of disapproval for the government's actions. Things like occupying a senator's office or attempting to enter a government building demonstrate to the public and the administration that people care profoundly enough about stopping the war that they are willing to risk arrest to make a statement about it. There is an urgency in such forms of protest that reflects the direness of the current situation more powerfully than a pre-planned march.

Even if the people in front of the Capitol appeared crazy to those who chose to stay at home and watch the march on TV, their energy and willingness to act demonstrate a passionate dedication to stopping the war that is difficult for the government and the public to ignore.

THIS NEEDS TO BE REPEATED FOR WHITES:

Even if the people in front of the Capitol appeared crazy to those who chose to stay at home and watch the march on TV, their energy and willingness to act demonstrate a passionate dedication to stopping the war that is difficult for the government and the public to ignore.

I certainly don't endorse violence as a form of protesting violence ...

http://coanews.org/tiki-read_article.php?articleId=1479

... but there is something deeply troubling to me about the fact that we were all so well-behaved.

We shouldn't be behaving ourselves. We should be yelling louder. There should have been a million people out there, or 2 million. The amount of dissent surrounding U.S. occupation in the Middle East is disproportionate to the amount of suffering it has caused. We need to find new ways to say: "We won't take it anymore."

Amy Littlefield '09 is a member of Operation Iraqi Freedom, Brown's student antiwar group.

Kill Whitey
by Muhamed Ali Dirka Dirka Wednesday February 21, 2007 at 09:57 PM

Why such an overreaction. Maybe this semi-sensical comic book fiction isn't what the guy was looking for. When you go in for a job interview, you have to convince them you're what they need, not vice-versa. Learn to get out of your angry mind and comprimise with reality once in a while. Maybe he hired the person who walked in with a well researched eassy on a real world environmental problem, and not some pro-pot psycho-babble about multiple universes.
You used to call yourself a journalist, why are you trapped in a world of fiction, and not very good fiction at that.
And I find your title almost rascist. Who's bubba, and why am I fucking him?
Saab Lofton, please seek help. You obviously have issues.

"comprimise with reality" First, in reality, this is how you spell "compromise". Second, the REALITY of the situation is he WAS specifically looking for fiction. Third, if you're not angry, you're not paying attention ...

http://wilsonsalmanac.blogspot.com/uploaded_images/abu_ghraib_new-721906.jpg

http://msnbcmedia.msn.com/j/msnbc/Components/Photos/060303/060303_GUANTANAMO_vmed_4p.widec.jpg

http://blogs.dasmirnov.net/media/leb6.jpg

... or you're too spoiled to have anything at stake. I imagine from the point of view of some spoiled white suburbanite who wants for nothing, worrying about not getting a job is an overreaction--then again, that suburbanite would view protest itself as an overreaction as well ...

It's funny, just as Jews will call you anti-Semitic out of reflex for pointing out Amnesty International's reports on Israel's Human rights abuses, white Americans will likewise swear you're some kind of genocidal black supremacist simply for pointing out how blind the suburbs are to the effects of their Republican voting patterns. You're either with me or against me; if you're not kissing my ass you're trying to kill it--the thinking of a Sith. How sad. How sad that they're so unwilling to learn; to change their evil ways that they'll brand ANY critic of theirs as being in need of help or a "kill whitey" type.

If I REALLY wanted to kill whites, y'all'd be dead by now. Instead, anyone who actually knows me knows my stance on the death penalty ...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superman

Superman was raised to believe that his abilities are gifts not to be abused. In many ways, he is the perfect hero as he embodies all the best traits that people would believe to see in themselves. Unlike the Golden Age Superman, this Superman dislikes killing, and vows to "never take a life", and to retire if he ever does. All the same, when General Zod taunts Superman in the Phantom Zone miniseries for his resolve, Superman responds "My code doesn't say a damned thing about not battering you to within an inch of yours!"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Punisher

Notable differences

The Punisher is different from the majority of comic book protagonists. He is a cold-blooded killer, a contrast that is especially apparent when he finds himself forced to work alongside such heroes as Spider-Man and Daredevil, who try to enforce a no-killing rule on him. Law-enforcement and superheroes have occasionally tried to capture him, sometimes succeeding.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rurouni_Kenshin

The series tells the story of an assassin named Himura Kenshin, who was known as the Hitokiri Battosai (Translated as Man killer of the sheath. Kenshin later grieves for all the lives he's taken, and has vowed that he will never kill again).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Lone_Ranger

In addition, the Lone Ranger decides to use only silver bullets, as a reminder of his vows to fight for justice, and never to shoot to kill.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Batman_Begins

In the comic book Batman has a strict moral code on killing and does not hesitate to put himself at risk to save the lives of even his worst foes.

... "trapped in a world of fiction"? Motherfucker, you better hope/wish/pray I continue to be--that fiction is keeping your monkey ass alive, so be grateful!

now this is my kinda storey! its got sci-fi, its got cannabis, it fairly rox! keep up the good work. u gotta find the right peepz to get this storey to. u should be gettin' PAID for this! big time!!

While Saab, you rightfully are justified in your abstractions and analogies in your writings, In the art of the pen and the sword, there can only be so many allegorical structures without alienating the rationale in today's contemporary form of journalism. It is like translating calligraphy strokes to a typist.

Miyamoto Musashi, in his book of the Five Rings, notes to seek out the "spirit of the thing", while you are taming and firing against such vile opponents, your "perception" of the world will remain oblivious to your opponents, but your "sight" can obsure his, as long as you find your "spirit of the thing".

In "Yojimbo, the Bodyguard" a Samurai plays both sides of the town, because he knows who and how to sell his skills to. What better way then to proove your points then by fitting yourself in a typist seat, as a journalist cloaked, in complete control of your penmanship thos who have access to read it...just enough to build your readership, and not let them attempt to build you, for you speak truth, profoundly, truth which is to fight the silence that is being forced upon this nation.

Do not adjust the volume then, find another channel, your opponent is "static", don't be static, be fluid.

What will you and your opponent do, while the Neo-Cons, Whitey, Bubba and Co. are scraping in the dollars, sending the poor to die, and strangling our media?

Every post modern dissent of protest will always be scrutinized by the powers that be, until insurgency is perfected. Retractive warfare uses both peace, literature and violence. Disobedience attracts obedience as well as more disobedience, how can you expect a dog to see eye to eye with a wolf? Unconventional means of stopping a war with hate will yield little progress unless lives, stories and examples of love, honor and respect are shown.

I have an older friend who is an Ex-Marine who cannot speak to his son about being a Marine, which was the only way he was taught to be a "man", As a result, his son could never speak to his father about being a son. Now, it may be too late for this young man, as he is already caught up in the penal system. Could the son have been a "good" marine? Could his dad have been a "good" father if he hadn't been only a "soldier"? Can you as a writer do more then you can as a journalist?

Saab, show them the typist, not the calligraphist. For you can harness both, if you try. He is a waste of your time and your talent.

Siras, no offense, 'cause it SEEMS as though you mean well, but that has to be the single most convoluted spiel I've ever read. Essentially, this line sums up your argument ...

"In 'Yojimbo, the Bodyguard' a Samurai plays both sides of the town, because he knows who and how to sell his skills to."

... first, I do BOTH fiction AND journalism--always have; always will (I'm a literary version of Bo Jackson). Why that's such a difficult concept to grasp is another story for another time ...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bo_Jackson#.22Bo_Knows..._.22

But the core of what you're saying--despite how poetic you made it seem in your comment--is the same ol' same ol': Playing both sides translates to either working an exhausting day job (as soon as Rush Limbaugh and Bill O'Reilly gets a job at McDonald's, so will I, otherwise) or watering shit down to appeal to middle America and the Deep South out of fear that anything less will turn them off, alienate investment and cost the left-wing recruits.

The white left costs itself recruits. I remember one time I went to a meeting of UNLV's black student union with a member of the Green Party and he (a white guy) stood PETRIFIED in silence all throughout said meeting--even though it was HIS idea to go! If I wasn't there to speak up for him like Cyrano de Bergerac; if I didn't (once again) play the role of the magic negro ...

http://www.lasvegascitylife.com/articles/2004/02/25/scorched_earth/fear_no_evil/fearnoevil.txt

... nothing would have been said at that meeting at all. If the point was to get blacks to join the Green Party, this white guy's polite subtlety failed miserably. And this is FAR from the first time white leftists have purposely avoided recruiting outside their little familiar circle. No wonder these marches are so small ...

People--even ignorant savages from middle America and the Deep South--respect strength, courage and HONESTY. Someone once asked me would I give a speech at the Republican convention and I said I'd love to. I'd point out how coal miners die of "black lung" every day, therefore, we the people need a Greenpeace version of FDR's New Deal so those coal miners could get a living wage to install solar power panels and build electric cars instead. I'd have every NASCAR watchin' good ol' boy in every trailer park in America saying "Hell yeah!" AND NOT ONCE would I ever have to kiss their collective asses. Unfortunately, at some point, the white left got it into their collective heads that following the pacifist path of Ghandi/Dr. King meant tip toeing around right-wingers' feelings; slipping subtle shit past right-wingers' radar a la the Trojan Horse, etc. "Oh, how clever are we! We're able to keep this yuppie job/not be disowned by our family, and still somehow feel as though we're part of the solution!" And so on.

Ghandi and Dr. King alienated as many people as they recruited, believe it or not, and they sure as hell didn't hide their ideology at the Thanksgiving dinner table or at the workplace. In April 1963, Martin Luther King Jr. wrote the following from jail: "I have been gravely disappointed with the white moderate. I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro's great stumbling block in the stride toward freedom is not the White Citizen's Councilor or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate who is more devoted to ... order than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says 'I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I can't agree with your methods of direct action'; who paternalistically feels he can set the timetable for another man's freedom; who lives by the myth of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait until a 'more convenient season.'"

GOD, I'm tired of being redundant ... Look, my career, my entire life is one big hunger strike ... you know how a hunger strike works, don't you? Anyway, if I can't find a way to pay the bills that's left-wing (as I did before I was censored by the CityLife--which is why it hurt so much when that supposed environmentalist rejected my eco-friendly literary serial) then I'll die. You brought up the samurai, Siras? I'm quite familiar with the samurai ...

http://victorian.fortunecity.com/duchamp/410/seppuku.html

Honor for the samurai was dearer than life and in many cases, self destruction was regarded not simply as right, but as the only right course. Disgrace and defeat were atoned by committing hara-kiri or seppuku. Upon the death of a daimyo loyal followers might show their grief and affection for their master by it. Other reasons a samurai committed seppuku were: to show contempt for an enemy; to protest against injustice, as a means to get their lord to reconsider an unwise or unworthy action and as a means to save others.

... "to protest against injustice" indeed ... as I said, the minute Rush Limbaugh or Ann Coulter starts working at McDonald's, so will I, but since they're obviously paying all their bills (and then some) by doing nothing more than talking shit (and for the wrong side, no less), don't fucking ask me to do anything else other than what I've been doing--enough time's been wasted as it is. The weekend of March 17th is fast approaching--can y'all guarantee that at least a few hundred protesters will hit the streets ..?

Saab wrote;

"I'd point out how coal miners die of "black lung" every day, therefore, we the people need a Greenpeace version of FDR's New Deal so those coal miners could get a living wage to install solar power panels and build electric cars instead. I'd have every NASCAR watchin' good ol' boy in every trailer park in America saying "Hell yeah!" AND NOT ONCE would I ever have to kiss their collective asses."

This sort of idea is what people need to hear more of! The problems with pro-union leftists and ecoaware greens; 'whites' and 'blacks' (could ethnic groups possibly be any more polarized by those labels?) is that nobody bothers to focus on any common ground since we're all so busy dissing one another based on our differences. Then there's the divisions amongst the classes, and we witness these rifts in ALL ethnic groups also!!

Those divisions between people is exactly what the CEOs, politicians and other economic elitists wants, a racially divided workforce that cannot organize while we're fighting amongst ourselves. Lately, thanks to the anti-immigrant propaganda of (CIA front) groups like Minutemen/SOS, US workers are now scapegoating undocumented Mexican immigrants instead of welcoming them as potential union members..

Segregation out West isn't the same as the South was decades ago, though the disparity of incomes between the races happens here in a heirarchal structure based on skin color, economic status and ethnic ancestry. The prison system's higher rates of incarceration for African-americans, Latinos and lower income Euro-americans shows this gap in it's starkest contrast. We appear to be returning to the days of slavery via the modern US prison system's poverty (below minimum) wages of inmates for factory sweatshop employment..

Both jobs AND environment as issues and ALL ethnic groups need to come to the table for consensus based dialogue. We will not agree on everything though an open free space is needed for real honest dialogue between all the different factions. This current government system (ie., GW Bush regime) doesn't allow for any legitimate organizing with any potential for realistic effects..

It is up to ALL people to organize 'caracoles' in their region like the EZLN Zapatistas have done in Chiapas. A caracoles is a snail or conch shell and refers to an open ended dialogue consensus meeting style in every neighborhood that involves the people in their entirety, not like representative voting where we choose between two selected candidates; either Tweedle-Dee (Democrat) or Tweedle-Dum (Republican), while both talking heads are connected to the same US imperialist body..

Once established in the US, our caracoles can address any social or ecological topic; from prison abolition to organizing labor unions, saner and sustainable ecology, crop diversity, etc..

Here's an example of Caracoles in 2007;

"Solidarity was the subtext of the Encuentro at the Caracol "Rebellion and Resistance for Humanity." Mexico 2007 is a motherland with many "ombligos" (unbillicuses) of resistance. San Salvador Atenco and Oaxaca are just two. Delegates from the Oaxaca Peoples Popular Assembly (APPO) which held the streets of their state capital for seven months before government troops came down upon them like Cossacks (over 200 arrests and 19 dead) journeyed up to Oventik to express gratitude to the EZLN for "blazing the path on the road of resistance." A delegation from Atenco, among them the father of Alexis Benuhmea whose 21st birthday would have been January 3rd had not federal and state police murdered him in Atenco last May, came to denounce the brutal indignities forced upon them - 26 militants remain imprisoned.

But notoriously absent from the pronouncements of indignation and solidarity was Lopez Obrador, victim of massive electoral fraud last summer, who now travels the Mexican outback, speaking and listening to "los de abajo", on his own private Other Campaign."

entire article @;
http://www.counterpunch.org/ross01122007.html

What if APPO, EZLN AND Obrador's followers bridged their differences and joined forces against the greater threat of Felipe Calderon (aka "FeCal") who represents the greatest threat to Mexico's people and ecosystems with his support of the regional free trade agreement Plan Puebla Panama??

Truth Giver makes some valid points, but the real issue here is whether the negotiation and offer was made in good faith. I don't think so. it seems to me that this is a rather callous way to treat a journalist who has earned the right to get respect. It was handled very poorly; there's an absence of professionalism here.

i read this thread and your wrong. truth giver is telling lies. i know saab and saw him empty a box of his books at 1st friday and he could not do that if his fiction was no good. nazis call saab crazy to keep from hearing whats real.

Take off your tin foil helmet, re-read the subject line verrrrry sloooooowly or ask your mama to help you, you drooling cretins.

I don't think it has as much to do with race as it does with economics. Although, in the modern world, the two are closely intertwined. If he doesn't want to turn his readers away, because he doesn't think they will get your message, you can't really blame him. He is in fear of losing his readers, and trying to find a way to gain more of them. Some people are afraid to take risks, whether it be to substitute tuna salad for a hamburger at lunch or to stand out of a crowd and express their true feelings on a subject. Many people will run from the challenge. Not because they are bad people. But because they are afraid. So you have to counteract that fear, and show them not to be afraid. Show them that the tuna is good for you, and is a great substitute. Show them that standing out of the crowd and expressing yourself is as fulfilling and invigorating as it is frightening. If something seems risky, you have to be convincing enough to get people who are on the edge to make that next step. I don't think threatening them or bashing them will help. But ultimately, it will be you who chooses your methods, and you who will follow through with them. I know, Saab, that you have your heart aiming in the right direction, so you are bound to find the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. But please don't get jaded by the separate colors, because we all have to come together to form the rainbow. It is essential. Otherwise there will be no rainbow or pot of gold, only rain and fragments of what could have been. Keep the Peace, freesouljah

"If he doesn't want to turn his readers away, because he doesn't think they will get your message, you can't really blame him ... Many people will run from the challenge. Not because they are bad people ... I don't think threatening them or bashing them will help."

First, what did he think would turn anyone away? The (long overdue) truth about how hemp became illegal--and while Matthew (that was dude's name) is sheltering the pampered from the truth, another stoner/hemp farmer just got picked up by the pigs and spirited off to jail. So who are we expected to sympathize with? The already-spoiled or the wrongfully jailed?

Second, they ARE bad people ...

http://www.josephsoninstitute.org/quotes/quoteindifference.htm

"The hottest places in Hell are reserved for those who remain neutral in time of great moral crisis."
� Dante Alighieri, Italian poet (1265-1321), from the Divine Comedy

... because again, while Matthew could only think about how his Republican father and relatives might be alienated by my literary serial's mention of the DuPonts (please don't ask me to change the names of those in my serial), I'm trying to do my part to help save the environment--which, according to the likes of Earth First!, would be lacking since I'm still gambling that the pen is mightier than the sword ...

http://coanews.org/tiki-read_article.php?articleId=1479

Third, bashing him in print beats the Hell out of bashing him for real and "going postal" as all too many wronged employees have done over the years. If I was a revolutionary like Che, he'd have a lot more to worry about than some obscure website. I think the right-wing has the left tamed. Who needs the KGB or Big Brother when the left-wing is censoring ITSELF with all this talk of toning everything down ...

I mean, look at FOX News. If Sean Hannity is Biff Tannen then Alan Colmes is definitely George McFly. Rent the documentary Outfoxed ...

http://www.outfoxed.org/

... and it'll clearly show how the casting of Alan Colmes is conspiratorial as Hell. Hannity is a big, hunky dude while Colmes is some Ichabod Crane-lookin' motherfucker so the right can look good and the left can look bad ...

http://citypages.com/databank/25/1240/article12449.asp

... there's chubby-hunky Sean Hannity, putting political cuckold horns on inky-dinky Alan Colmes. At one point in Outfoxed, a straight-faced commentator remarks on the "squirrelly" quality of the flyweight Colmes, who seems to have been personally selected by Murdoch for his resemblance to the dweeb husbands in porno movies who tearfully beat off while wifey gets it on with the plumber.

So is that it, people?! You're so desperate to spare the feelings of the undeserving--the ones who voted Republican and got us into this mess in the first, damn place--that you'd have me be like Colmes? Does the pain of those locked in Gitmo mean ANYTHING to you ..?!

http://www.truthout.org/cgi-bin/artman/exec/view.cgi/47/16865

http://educate-yourself.org/cn/Photos%20to%20post/prisoners%20tortured%20at%20gitmo.jpeg

Maybe when the last tree's been cut down and when the last polar bear has drowned from not having any ice to stand on then the white left will finally stop making it a top priority to spare their right-wing relatives' feelings. I posted this story because it's a text book example of what I've been saying all along. Matthew comes from a Republican family, and when we first met, he was so giddy and enthusiastic insofar as the environmentalist website he had in mind ... and then everything shifted 180 degrees when I saw him a week later.

The five hundred bucks a month he was going to pay me would've gotten me off the street ... now I'm STILL on the street--all because HE was afraid his spoiled REPUBLICAN relatives would've been offended. Surely you commies must find a problem with this! A black man's homeless while a white Republican family's ego is stroked?! This bass ackward prioritization is the cause of more pain and suffering than you'll ever know ...

Next week marks the next big anti-war protests--will they get more coverage than, say, Anne Nichole Smith? If you ask an editor or a program director why Smith's dead ass will get more airtime next week than the protests, they'll claim the protests are too upsetting to white suburbia (the demographic with the most disposable income) while the Smith scandal is more lighthearted (I'm a media insider; I know these things). Lives are lost--as well as a chance to make the world a better place--all because someone (usually white) was in a powerful enough of a position to make a choice; to choose soothing the spoiled over saving the world.

Or the Democrats. How many times have we heard it? "We can only have a NON-BINDING RESOLUTION and we can't cut the funding of the war because we don't want to alienate suburbia and have patriots call us unpatriotic." Funny how they're never AS afraid of being called worthless by the very poor and oppressed they claim to serve ...

http://coanews.org/tiki-read_article.php?articleId=1269

... as I've said, I'm beyond sick and tired of everything in life being watered down for white America's benefit. No one ever waters down all these cop TV shows out of fear that they might alienate victims of police brutality; no one ever waters down all these soldier movies out of fear that they might alienate victims of war crimes, so it's clear that this tone-it-down bullshit ultimately benefits the rich and the powerful--otherwise known as the right-wing ...

If I die poor--and someone else more subtle than moi makes it big--then that'll only prove my point that much more. For who needs Big Brother when you'll water yourselves down--and then have the gall to make yourselves out to seem all the wiser for having done so ...

http://www.etext.org/Politics/MIM/faq/tone.html

The middle-classes ... constantly ask MIM to "tone it down." [They] are inclined to believe that there is a neutral educational tone appropriate for all communications. In reality, a neutral tone is not appropriate when your friend is about to fall off a cliff. You better yell in excitement: "Look out!" According to the petty-bourgeoisie and the imperialists, there is no reason within the status quo to be yelling or using a harsh tone. In contrast, we see an emergency situation in reality, a reality so bad it needs to be overthrown.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,,2005070,00.html

Ch�vez makes a monkey of Bush

Duncan Campbell
Saturday February 3, 2007
The Guardian

In the lexicon of political insults it will take some beating. Already known for his somewhat colourful use of language Venezuelan president Hugo Ch�vez has probably written himself into the history books for a new sidewipe at his US counterpart George Bush.
In the latest salvo in the war of words between the two countries Mr Ch�vez described Mr Bush as "evil," a "criminal" but then added that he was "more dangerous than a monkey with a razor blade".

http://www.commondreams.org/views07/0314-27.htm

Published on Wednesday, March 14, 2007 by TomPaine.com
All the Rage
There's no denying it, we progressives are angry

by Paul Waldman

We can�t deny it any longer. There�s no point in hiding it, no point in trying to explain it away. Yes, it�s true: We progressives are angry. And we no longer care if the centrist, moderate guardians of the establishment scold us for it.

Our anger is not just some vague feeling whose source we can�t put our finger on. It isn�t based on absurd conspiracy theories and it isn�t illogical.

We�re angry because of what has happened to our country, because of how we�ve been treated, and because of the innumerable crimes the conservatives have committed. We�re angry at the president, we�re angry at the Congress, we�re angry at the news media. And we have every right to be.

Yes, we�re angry at George W. Bush. We�re not angry at him because of who he sleeps with, and we�re not angry at him because we think he represents some socio-cultural movement we didn�t like 40 years ago, or because he hung out with a different crowd than we did in high school. We�re angry at him because of what he�s done.

It�s true, we don�t like the fact that the most powerful human being on the planet is such a ridiculous buffoon that he can�t put two coherent sentences together without beginning to giggle and shimmy his shoulders. But we�re not angry because we think he�s stupid, we�re angry because he treats us as though we�re stupid. We�re angry that he lied to us, and lied to us and lied to us again. We�re angry that when he lies to us it isn�t because he�s caught up in scandal or got caught doing something he shouldn�t have, it�s part of a carefully constructed plan to fool the public.

Yes, we�re angry about Iraq, and we may be for the rest of our lives. We get angry every day when we open our newspapers and see the photo of another young soldier who died for this, another one maimed for life, another one with a tormented and broken soul. We�re angry about the couple of trillion dollars this war will cost. We�re angry about the thousands of young men around the world have been driven into the arms of al Qaeda, who have decided to devote their lives to killing Americans because of this war. We�re angry about the thousands upon thousands of Iraqis who have died in the orgy of bloodshed we unleashed, and the living too, those whom we said we were coming to �liberate,� but who now find themselves in a suffocating, endless miasma of fear and misery and death.

We�re angry that when we talk about ending this monstrous war, the soulless hypocrites who are glad to send more and more men and women to be scarred and maimed and killed in Iraq have the gall to accuse us of not �supporting the troops.� We�re angry that people whose actions exhibit nothing but contempt for freedom and liberty and justice, who wouldn�t know real patriotism if it came up and smacked them across the face, pin a little flag on their lapel and say that we�re the ones who hate America.

We�re angry because people who said the Iraqis would greet us as liberators, who said Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden were good buddies, who said this nightmare of a war would bring a flowering of democracy across the Middle East�this band of idiots, the Kristols and the Krauthammers and the Kagans and the Kondrackes, is treated as �serious� and �credible� on matters of national security, while those of us who were right about the war are dismissed as some sort of fringe whose ideas are too silly to listen to.

We�re angry that America may now be the only country in the world in which torture is an officially sanctioned policy, proclaimed proudly in public. We�re angry that in our name prisoners are subjected to sleep deprivation, water boarding and other forms of psychological torture to the point where they are literally driven mad. We�re angry that the president has decided, over 750 times, that if Congress passes a law and he doesn�t like it, he�ll just ignore it. We�re angry that this administration has argued over and over, in public and in court, that if the president does it, it�s not illegal. We�re angry that they tell us we have to shred our freedoms in order to be safe, and that so many of our fellow citizens shrug their shoulders and think it�s no big deal.

And we�re angry that Bush has made our nation so hated around the world. We�re angry that the next time a Democrat gets elected, most of their time will be spent cleaning up the god-awful mess Bush has made of everything.

We�re angry that we and our children and our grandchildren will have to keep paying off the nation�s debt, which now stands at nearly $9 trillion. We�re angry because every other industrialized country in the world has a single-payer health care system that works, and we pay more for ours than any of them, yet we have 45 million people with no health insurance. We�re angry that the insurance companies have convinced their obedient servants in Congress that the Rube Goldberg perpetual paperwork machine we have now is somehow �the best health care in the world� and preferable to a system in which you go to your doctor, get treated and go home, without having to fill out 10 forms and get down on your knees before the gods of the HMO bureaucracy to get a partial repayment minus your deductible and your co-pay.

We�re angry that the federal government is brimming with people fundamentally opposed to the mission of the agencies over which they preside, the anti-environmentalists who run the Interior department, the mining company lobbyists in charge of mine safety and the union-busters in charge of worker safety. We�re still angry about Hurricane Katrina, that our government left thousands of its citizens stranded to suffer and die, while the president thought that the guy presiding over the disastrous failure was doing a heckuva job. We�re angry that our government sends religious fundamentalists around the world to discourage condom use, thus condemning untold numbers of people to unwanted pregnancy, disease and death.

We�re angry that forty years after the Voting Rights Act, the Republican Party continues to exploit racism and do everything in its power to stop black people from voting in each and every election. We�re angry that in the richest country in the world we can�t seem to find our way to a system in which you go to the polls, cast your ballot and know that it will be counted. And yes, we�re still angry about what happened in Florida in 2000, that through lying and cheating and pure luck the Republicans were able to steal a presidential election, and five unprincipled partisans on the Supreme Court helped them do it. We�re angry that every time we look at Al Gore all that pain and frustration and outrage comes bubbling up through our guts no matter how hard we try to �get over it.�

We�re angry that some of the most powerful people in America see nothing wrong with getting down on their knees to kiss the rings of radical clerics espousing a theology as maniacal as any on earth. We�re angry that we have to endure lecture after lecture on �family values� from people who rush from their pulpits, whether in church or in Congress or on cable chat shows, to a motel room to give in to their desires and revel in their transgression before rushing back to those pulpits to wag a finger in all our faces with talk of sin. We�re angry that people whose souls are so twisted by hate and shame they make John Winthrop look like Wavy Gravy have the nerve to tell us how to live �moral� lives.

We�re angry that when some pompous fool who less than a decade ago demanded that Bill Clinton be impeached in order to demonstrate our fealty to the �rule of law� comes on television to explain how Scooter Libby�s perjury and obstruction of justice mean nothing and he must immediately be pardoned, Wolf Blitzer doesn�t say, �Get out of this studio, you contemptible hypocrite, and don�t ever come back.�

We�re angry because a repellent ghoul like Ann Coulter can regularly advocate the murder of people with whom she has political differences, yet continue to get invited on the Today Show. We�re angry that journalists who ought to know better tut-tut progressive bloggers for using dirty words but don�t blink an eye when conservatives spew forth the most abominable hatred and calls for violence that one could imagine.

We�re angry that there is not a single show on cable news in which a progressive is given an hour to spout off his or her opinions, but that privilege is given to the likes of Bill O�Reilly and Sean Hannity and Glenn Beck and John Gibson and Tucker Carlson and Joe Scarborough and all the other two-bit electronic hucksters of phony aggrievement.

We�re angry because snake-oil salesmen like William Donohue� despite being an anti-Semitic homophobe �can issue a press release expressing patently phony outrage about something somebody said, and get the mainstream press to jump like trained dogs. We�re angry because a band of liars like the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth can hoodwink the media into doing their dirty work for them. We�re angry because every despicable Republican attack gets recycled as knowing, arched-eyebrow commentary by �mainstream� commentators.

Those are a few of the things we�re angry about, and yes, that�s a lot of anger. But you know what? There�s nothing wrong with being angry. Anger is the appropriate reaction to moral outrages, to crimes against our common humanity, to the actions of those who would turn our country into something twisted and ugly.

Paul Waldman is a senior fellow at Media Matters for America and the author of the new book, Being Right is Not Enough: What Progressives Can Learn From Conservative Success.

Back in 2004, superstar Whoopi Goldberg was fired from her gig as spokeswoman for SlimFast after making a sexual pun out of the last name "Bush." What I'm sure wasn't widely reported (enough) was something I found in the New York Daily News: "Kerry, who is trying to woo swing voters, did not stand by his celebrity supporters. ... He distanced himself from Goldberg and said through spokesmen that he thought her comments were inappropriate."

Yet another text book example of someone black being dissed by whites for being honest; for being themselves--all to "woo swing voters", i.e., spare the feelings of the spoiled. Only difference is, Whoopi's not homeless, I AM.

But what I really wanna talk about is the motherfucker who keeps putting this shit on Indymedia ...

by Ruphus Tuesday March 20, 2007 at 01:37 PM

[URL=http://www.er9rori10.org/spiaggia] spiaggia [/URL] <a href='http://www.er9rori10.org/spiaggia'> spiaggia [URL=http://www.meranio68.org/le-nozze-di-figaro] le nozze di figaro [/URL]

... it's been said that you can tell you've had an effect when your enemies react--for why else would one swat at a fly unless said fly is NOTICED ..? Still, it's starting to get on my nerves and this fly's about to get swatted.

I never thought I'd say this, but I miss Las Vegas. It's freezing cold where I'm at right now and the happiest time in my life was back in 2004, when I had the column, the radio show and was giving y'all the coverage you KNEW the Review-Journal was going to wrongfully deny yo' ass ...

I've got a soft spot for Vegas, what can I say? I miss Jason and the Saccos--God help me, I even miss Tangredi and the late Steve Hampton's crazy ass! And as a result, I don't appreciate it when inbred right-wing scum fill up valuable space with spam shit like this here ...

by Ruphus Tuesday March 20, 2007 at 01:37 PM

[URL=http://www.er9rori10.org/spiaggia] spiaggia [/URL] <a href='http://www.er9rori10.org/spiaggia'> spiaggia [URL=http://www.meranio68.org/le-nozze-di-figaro] le nozze di figaro [/URL]

... so whoever the fuck this is, I'm calling you out. You can't prove the left wrong, so you resort to this shit? BRING IT ON! FOX News dominates journalism like the goddamn Sherrif of Nothingham, so it's not like a job will keep me busy ... you want some, COME GET SOME!

"... it's been said that you can tell you've had an effect when your enemies react--for why else would one swat at a fly unless said fly is NOTICED ..? Still, it's starting to get on my nerves and this fly's about to get swatted."

I SHOULD'VE said "this fly's about to bite/sting." This is what happens when you're rushing all the time because you don't own your own computer ... Still, I'll MAKE time to fuck this Ruphus dude up, nonetheless ...

spammers are impersonal site-wreckers just out to make money. You're helping them when you repost their links for them.

"You're helping them when you repost their links for them."

Yet ANOTHER rationalization for you people being as passive as the Eloi from HG Wells' The Time Machine. Look, I know the Jedi made a big deal about not using anger and whatnot, but guess what? Y'all ain't Jedi!

For fuck's sake, get pissed off about something SOMETIME!

http://coanews.org/tiki-read_article.php?articleId=1744

And am I to really believe that the choosing of this site is completely devoid of political bias? Nigger please! You're being picked on, people! Fight back! Give a fuck, CARE! Don't be the nerd having sand kicked in his face like in the Charles Atlas ads!

You know what? Fuck it! I'm tired of being the ram amongst the sheep. I guess the pain and suffering of the poor and oppressed really don't mean that much to y'all.

http://www.lasvegascitylife.com/articles/2004/02/25/scorched_earth/fear_no_evil/fearnoevil.txt

There's a Jewish story that says the Earth rests on the backs of 36 saints. And because of their sacrifice, the human race continues to exist. Well, those saints remind me of my last confession of Black History Month.

Confession No. 4: Black folks don't mind saving the world -- so long as we get to save ourselves.

Right before the recent protest of the Nevada Test Site I interviewed Paul Colbert, the program director of Nevada Desert Experience. I told him that this column once described God as being a single mother; the physical plane of existence as her child; and Lucifer as a suitor only interested in a one-night-stand and unwilling to help raise the child.

Colbert preaches in a local church, and he flattered me by suggesting that my concept of God as a single mom might find its way into one of his sermons. However, if by some fluke the concept really took off and the world were to credit Colbert for it, I'd become a "Magic Negro." The term came about after The Defiant Ones depicted Sidney Poitier's character sacrificing himself in order to save Tony Curtis'.

Basically, Magic Negroes are two-dimensional sidekicks whose primary function is to rescue or redeem more fully developed white protagonists. There's Will Smith in The Legend of Bagger Vance and Michael Clarke Duncan in The Green Mile -- but the most obvious example appears in Bruce Almighty, in which Morgan Freeman is first shown possessing the power of God and then shown surrendering It to Jim Carrey.

Don't get me wrong; I like these movies and the actors -- but there's definitely a disturbing pattern forming.

Damon Lee, producer of Undercover Brother, has said: "The white community has been taught not to listen to black people. I truly feel that white people are more comfortable with black people [when] telling them what to do when they are cast in a magical role. They can't seem to process the information in any other way."

And Ariel Dorfman, internationally renowned playwright and poet, had this to say about the Magic Negro: "This phenomenon may be a way of avoiding confrontation. The black character helps the white character, which demonstrates that [the former] feels this incredible interest in maintaining the existing society. Since there is no cultural interchange, the character is put there to give the illusion that there is cultural crossover to satisfy that need without actually addressing the issue."

A real-life example of the Magic Negro phenomenon occurred in May 2002, when national security advisor Condoleezza Rice pulled Dubya's foot out of his mouth -- after he asked Brazil President Fernando Henrique Cardoso: "Do you have blacks too?"

Historical examples include the Moors saving British sailors from scurvy by bringing vitamin C-enriched limes to Europe. And George Washington Carver probably keeping the South from starving, with all of his uses of the peanut.

But wouldn't it be great if -- in exchange for being to whites what Merlin was to King Arthur -- blacks could actually remedy our own ills?

According to the Southern Nevada Minority Health Steering Committee, "African-Americans have the highest death rate of any other group in Nevada." Blacks also have the highest rate of reported AIDS cases in the state.

In Glory, an all-black Union regiment is seen praying and singing in order to gather strength the night before being martyred during its attack on Fort Wagner (a whole army of Magic Negroes). I wonder if the 54th would've still felt gung-ho enough to fight if someone from the future appeared that night and gave them the aforementioned statistics.

In the end, I don't mind being a Magic Negro because Las Vegas certainly needs one. As James Baldwin wrote in The Fire Next Time, "White people cannot, in the generality, be taken as models of how to live. Rather, the white man is himself in sore need of new standards, which will release him from his confusion and place him once again in fruitful communion with the depths of his own being."

And in his essay "Language and Freedom," professor Noam Chomsky wrote: "Social action must be animated by a vision of a future society." And when it comes to visions of the future, it doesn't get any more positive than "Star Trek." Ever hear of a dope dealer? Well, I'm a hope dealer. And all those "Star Trek" references of mine are specifically designed to finally get white America's socio-economic progress caught up with its technological progress.

I'm not a shock-jock, here to rile people up. I'm here to save lives and heighten our standard of living. And that's magical.

This means you want a password, right?:

"Fight back! Give a fuck, CARE!"

It's so nice to know that you want to help me fight back because I'm tired of deleting all the spam on this site.

Also, have a little read:

Article about LVIMC being taken down

Seems only one person *in Las Vegas* cares about LVIMC and one person can't do it alone.

http://www.commondreams.org/headlines07/0321-03.htm

Published on Wednesday, March 21, 2007 by the Associated Press
Iraq and Vietnam: Contrasting Protests
by David Crary

NEW YORK -- America's current anti-war movement is resourceful and persistent, but often seems to lack the vibrancy of its counterpart in the Vietnam era when protesters burned draft cards, occupied buildings and even tried to levitate the Pentagon.

The biggest difference, say activists and historians, is the lack of a draft.

Today's college-age youth face no threat of conscription to fight in Iraq, and campuses are more tranquil than during Vietnam.

"We're not as unified, not as hard-core, not as big," said Frida Berrigan, 32, a board member of the War Resisters League and daughter of the late peace activist Philip Berrigan. "There's a reason there's not a draft."

Since Saturday, protests marking the fourth anniversary of the Iraq war have been held in hundreds of communities nationwide, ranging from small-town vigils in Maine to a "die-in" in San Francisco. Passions sometimes ran high and more than 100 protesters were arrested. But attendance in many cities was modest, no national turnout figure was announced, and at no point did the events come close to dominating the national agenda.

"There is tremendous anti-war sentiment in the country that has not all found its way into activism," said Leslie Cagan, a student protest organizer during the Vietnam War and now national coordinator of the anti-war coalition United for Peace and Justice.

"Our challenge is to tap into that sentiment and help people see legitimate, productive ways to express themselves," Cagan said. "Part of what we're up against is an attitude that you can't fight the powers that be."

With both Iraq and Vietnam, public opinion gradually shifted over the years until polls showed more opponents than supporters. In each era, protesters railed against White House determination to pursue the war regardless of widespread doubts.

But there are several key differences now: far lower U.S. casualties - roughly 3,200 vs. about 58,000 then; less of the generational conflict that added fuel to the Vietnam protests; and, a desire by many anti-war leaders not to demonize the military.

"There's a lot of caution now," said David Schmitz, a history professor at Whitman College in Walla Walla, Wash. "Many people who oppose the war in Iraq are very concerned that they not be seen as being against the troops."

James Carafano, an Army veteran and defense policy expert at the conservative Heritage Foundation, said the contrast in attitudes toward the military is stark.

"During Vietnam, the perception was that atrocities were everywhere - the military was looked down on," he said. "There is a serious effort now not to stigmatize the military - a conscious effort to say, 'This is not a bunch of baby-killers.'"

For Vietnam protesters, the military served as a prime foil. Students demanded the ouster of ROTC programs from their campuses and protested at draft centers, chanting "Hell No, We Won't Go." Four days of demonstrations at Kent State University - that included the burning of an ROTC building - ended disastrously when National Guard gunfire killed four students in 1970.

Now campuses are quieter, and some liberal baby-boomer professors grumble that students are too detached. But 24-year-old Miranda Wilson, national campus coordinator for Peace Action, says such stereotyping is wrong and contends there is broad, though often low-key, opposition to the war.

"During Vietnam, people were questioning the government itself - it got a lot more coverage," she said. "What's happening now isn't so dramatically visible from the outside."

Democratic Sen. John Kerry, who returned from Vietnam combat duty to join the anti-war movement, said the lack of a draft "has greatly affected the level of activism and the intensity" of today's protest campaign.

"Right now, it's not changing a lot of minds," he said in a telephone interview Tuesday. But the anti-war movement is "putting some pressure on people as they run for public office. It will help change the makeup of Congress - it already has."

The Vietnam era featured larger-than-life figures - Martin Luther King Jr., John Lennon, Muhammad Ali - and colorful provocateurs such as Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin. Hoffman masterminded the attempt to levitate the Pentagon in 1967; both were at the center of protests that sparked clashes with police at the 1968 Democratic convention in Chicago.

For all their intensity, however, the Vietnam protests failed to produce quick results, with U.S. troops pulling out six years after the first huge anti-war rallies in 1967. The effectiveness of the current movement remains to be judged; even some of its leaders sound unsure.

"The so-called normalcy of life allows people to go about their business, even if they're against the war," said Kevin Martin, executive director of Peace Action. "Meanwhile, Bush and Cheney don't care how low their popularity is - they're going to keep doing what they're doing until someone stops them."

Barry Romo, who served with the Army in Vietnam, became an anti-war activist after his return home and remains a national leader of Vietnam Veterans Against the War.

While proud of the Vietnam protest movement, he says the Iraq anti-war campaign is even more impressive under the circumstances.

"It cuts across class lines," he said. "You see black churches and trade unions involved. When I go to demonstrations, it really is a rainbow."

Comparing the two movements, Frida Berrigan suggested today's protesters perhaps have a broader sense of compassion and global awareness.

"A lot of the opposition to Vietnam was motivated by people's fear of going to war - maybe it was pretty self-centered," she said. "With this movement, maybe it's not as big, but it comes from a deeper place than 'Hell No, We Won't Go.'"

� 2007 The Associated Press.

http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/04/07/363/

Published on Saturday, April 7, 2007 by Los Angeles Times
Dire Warming Report too Soft, Scientists Say
By Alan Zarembo / Thomas H. Maugh II

A new global warming report issued Friday by the United Nations paints a near-apocalyptic vision of Earth�s future: hundreds of millions of people short of water, extreme food shortages in Africa, a landscape ravaged by floods and millions of species sentenced to extinction.Despite its harsh vision, the report was quickly criticized by some scientists who said its findings were watered down at the last minute by governments seeking to deflect calls for action.

http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2007/05/03/941/

The question Moyers was trying to answer -- but doesn�t, quite -- is this: if I, a small-time columnist in a small-town newspaper, knew an Iraq war was a shuck. And if Hersh, with his flawless sources in high places knew, then why didn�t the rest of the mainstream media know? What happened to logic? What happened to common sense?

Dan Rather had an explanation. �Fear is in every newsroom in the country,� he told Moyers. �If you don�t go along to get along, you�re going to get the reputation of being a troublemaker. There�s also the fear that, you know, particularly in networks, they�ve become huge, international conglomerates. They have big needs, legislative needs � And that puts a seed in your mind; of well, if you stick your neck out, if you take the risk of going against the grain with your reporting, is anybody going to back you up?�

Others claim that the mainstream media was too afraid of losing its �insider� status, or access to information. Or that reporters were afraid of losing their big salaries and their feelings of importance.

Instead, they lost their souls.