2012/05/29

Republican rhetoric over the top




Not all overheated political rhetoric is alike. Delusional right-wing crazy talk — the kind of ranting we’ve heard recently from washed-up rock star Ted Nugent and Tea Party-backed Rep. Allen West (R-Fla.) — is a special kind of poison that cannot be safely ignored.Let me be clear: I’m saying that the extreme language we hear from the far right is qualitatively different from the extreme language we hear from the far left — and far more damaging to the ties that bind us as a nation. Tut-tutting that both sides should tone it down is meaningless. For all intents and purposes, one side is the problem. (...)

By Published: April 20 Read the complete article

2012/03/11

How many Muslims has the U.S. killed in the past 30 years?


By Stephen M. Walt 

Tom Friedman had an especially fatuous column in Sunday's New York Times, which is saying something given his well-established capacity for smug self-assurance. According to Friedman, the big challenge we face in the Arab and Islamic world is "the Narrative" -- his patronizing term for Muslim views about America's supposedly negative role in the region. If Muslims weren't so irrational, he thinks, they would recognize that "U.S. foreign policy has been largely dedicated to rescuing Muslims or trying to help free them from tyranny." He concedes that we made a few mistakes here and there (such as at Abu Ghraib), but the real problem is all those anti-American fairy tales that Muslims tell each other to avoid taking responsibility for their own actions.
I heard a different take on this subject at a recent conference on U.S. relations with the Islamic world. In addition to hearing a diverse set of views from different Islamic countries, one of the other participants (a prominent English journalist) put it quite simply. "If the United States wants to improve its image in the Islamic world," he said, "it should stop killing Muslims."
Now I don't think the issue is quite that simple, but the comment got me thinking: How many Muslims has the United States killed in the past thirty years, and how many Americans have been killed by Muslims? Coming up with a precise answer to this question is probably impossible, but it is also not necessary, because the rough numbers are so clearly lopsided.
Here's my back-of-the-envelope analysis, based on estimates deliberately chosen to favor the United States. Specifically, I have taken the low estimates of Muslim fatalities, along with much more reliable figures for U.S. deaths. 

2012/02/11

The caging of America





Over all, there are now more people under “correctional supervision” in America—more than six million—than were in the Gulag Archipelago under Stalin at its height. That city of the confined and the controlled, Lockuptown, is now the second largest in the United States.  

Why do we lock up so many people? by  Read more 



2012/02/06

The Palestein case


 
 Read more
Did you know?

1 - THAT, when the Palestine Problem was created by Britain in 1917, more than 90% of the population of Palestine were Arabs, and that there were at that time no more than 56,000 Jews in Palestine?
 
2 - THAT, more than half of the Jews living in Palestine at that time were recent immigrants, who had come to Palestine in the preceding decades in order to escape persecution in Europe?... And that less than 5% of the population of Palestine were native Palestinian Jews?
 
3 - THAT, the Arabs of Palestine at that time owned 97.5% of the land, while Jews (native Palestinians and recent immigrants together) owned only 2.5% of the land?
 
4 - THAT, during the thirty years of British occupation and rule, the Zionists were able to purchase only 3.5% of the land of Palestine, in spite of the encouragement of the British Government?... And that much of this land was transferred to Zionist bodies by the British Government directly, and was not sold by Arab owners?
 
5 - THAT, therefore, when British passed the Palestine Problem to the United Nations in 1947, Zionists owned no more than 6% of the total land area of Palestine? ... Read more

2012/01/19

Is the American way of life preferred over all other cultures?


Although the American way of life may seem luxurious to many, it is not the same across the socioeconomic board. Many Americans live in poverty and do not have access to proper education, housing or food. We irresponsibly spend money on larger and larger houses and spend until we get into debt. Instead of growing our own food we also support exploitative business practices by supporting factory farming and the unsupervised labor of illegal immigrants. Our culture is not superior to other cultures at all because it encourages superficiality, waste and indulgence. Although it's true than many cultures are worse or the same, our culture is not better than the British, Australians or Germans, etc.

Hang Mike Pence