EMAIL SIGN UP!
Most Popular This Week
Popular content
Today's Top News
'The War You Don't See': A Film You Won't See
An Open Letter to Noam Chomsky and the General Public
Dear Noam,
I am writing to you and a number of other friends mostly in the US to alert you to the extraordinary banning of my film on war and media, 'The War You Don't See', and the abrupt cancellation of a major event at the Lannan Foundation in Santa Fe in which David Barsamian and I were to discuss free speech, US foreign policy and censorship in the media. 
Lannan invited me and David over a year ago and welcomed my proposal that they also host the US premiere of 'The War You Don't See', in which US and British broadcasters describe the often hidden part played by the media in the promotion of war, notably in Iraq and Afghanistan. The film has been widely acclaimed in the UK and Australia; the trailer and reviews are on my website www.johnpilger.com
The banning and cancellation, which have shocked David and me, are on the personal orders of Patrick Lannan, whose wealth funds the Lannan Foundation as a liberal center of discussion of politics and the arts. Some of you will have been there and will know the Lannan Foundation as a valuable supporter of liberal causes. Indeed, I was invited in 2002 to present a Lannan award to the broadcaster Amy Goodman.
What is deeply disturbing about the ban is that it happened so suddenly and inexplicably: 48 hours before David Barsamian and I were both due to depart for Santa Fe I received a brief email with a 'sorry for the inconvenience' from a Lannan official who had been telling me just a few days earlier what a 'great honor' it was to have the US premiere of my film at Lannan, with myself in attendance.
I urge you to visit the Lannan website www.lannan.org. Good people like Michael Ratner, Jeremy Scahill and Glenn Greenwald are shown as participants in discussion about freedom of speech. I am there, too, but my name is the only one with a line through it and the word, 'Cancelled'.
Neither David Barsamian nor I have been given a word of explanation. All my messages to Lannan have gone unanswered; my calls are not returned; my flights were cancelled summarily. At the urging of the New Mexican newspaper, Patrick Lannan has issued a one-sentence statement offering his regrets to the Lannan-supporting 'community' in Santa Fe. Again, he gives no reason for the ban. I have spoken to the manager of the Santa Fe cinema where 'The War You Don't See' was to be screened. He received a late-night call. Again, no reason for the ban was forthcoming, giving him barely time to cancel advertising in The New Mexican, which was forced to drop a major feature.
There is a compelling symbol of our extraordinary times in all of this. A rich and powerful individual and organization, espousing freedom of speech, has moved ruthlessly and unaccountably to crush it.
With warm regards
John Pilger
Comments
Note: Disqus 2012 is best viewed on an up to date browser. Click here for information. Instructions for how to sign up to comment can be viewed here. Our Comment Policy can be viewed here. Please follow the guidelines. Note to Readers: Spam Filter May Capture Legitimate Comments...
83 Comments so far
Show AllI was disappointed also, but I think one should wait to hear the reasons Lannan gives. It's a free country; it's his dime.
Why not show the film at The Screen anyway, and let the tickets pay for it?
Nice soft-peddle, Bushrod. It may be his dime, but it's our democracy.
Absent any explanation from J. Patrick Lannan for canceling an event a year in the making, we can only assume that he's a garden-variety censor, another wealthy man who used his personal axe to damage the larger community. Where have we seen that before?
The great good that comes out of this act of censorship is it will heighten interest in the film. John Pilger has taken on better than Lannan and done just fine, but the betrayal must smart. Chin up, John, this fight isn't over.
Bushrod, are you kidding?
"...but I think one should wait to hear the reasons Lannan gives. It's a free country; it's his dime."
Mason C nailed you, buddy! It IS our Democracy. But, for how much longer I'm not sure... Freedom is an idea, it exists no matter how little of it can be experienced. If the exercise it takes to keep naivete at bay and vigilance to the fore doesn't soon get a broader workout then all our backsides will be goose-stepped after Nov of 2012.
The problem at Lannan, as I see it, is a stock-in-trade classic example played out before our very eyes of what Chris Hedges so adroitly describes in his The Death of the Liberal Class.
See the full event in three indispensable parts here, without delay, from his book release lecture last October in Troy, NY:
Intro - http://www.youtube.com/embed/Igjh39lrzKs
Lecture - http://www.youtube.com/embed/bYCvSntOI5s
Q & A - http://www.youtube.com/embed/XfPDp0jCT_U
"one should wait to hear the reasons Lannan gives"
Non have been forthcoming. How long will it take for Lannan to perfect his justification lies?
To the extent that someone's dime decides what information people get, the country is not free. While I do not say that this power of $$ is a problem with Lannan per se or the convenience of allowing Lannan to direct its funds, I see no reason Lannan should be free from criticism.
If Lannan wishes to air its opinion, or discuss managerial motives, it has the resources to do so. Apparently someone does not wish to do so at this time.
Showing the film elsewhere sounds like a great idea, but it is not likely one Pilger has not thought of, is it?
Only a fool would claim that this is a free country. However, having just seen the film in its entirety at: viddler.com/explore/Irishstorm/videos/7/ I can see why Neoliberals such as Lannan might have problems with it. Among other things, it dares to criticize Israel for intimidating the media if they publish any story that the Right Wing Israelis do not like. As we have seen in the despicable display recently in Congress as our "representatives" groveled at the feet of Netanyahu, the MSM is only too eager to debase themselves at the behest of Israel. Pilger's film has one major flaw: it dares to tell the Truth.
As of 18 June 2011 vidder claims the file never exited!
Please offer an alternative source !
First I tried the direct link. "Deleted or never existed"
Then I initilized an account on vidder and asked again.."Deleted or never existed"
Author search. empty.
Title search empty.
Single word searches never go anywher.
Censored or hoax
If the film had ever been there long enough to be part of a directory I should have found something.
I would like to find the video for my own edification. Everybody nees a few good Right Wing bait lockers.
Needless to say: John Pilger is not a usr of vidder and his title is not there.
Censorship to the tune of deleting a file and the uesr account at vidder of the author
Any information considered vital, and important enough to show to as many as possible, should never be a prisoner of monetary control. IOW: it should be free, and distributed freely. I've always been suspect of progressive documentaries that limit themselves to the monied bourgeoisie. Profiteering through the suffering of others!
For now, however, one can always download these films at no cost, via torrent:
http://btjunkie.org//search?q=the+war+you+don%27t+see
I recommend uTorrent, and downloading via public wifi, to protect your privacy. Or using a reliable VPN from home.
Can't stream this video in Canada, are we being censored by someone.
If you have to ask...
This type of censorship is creeping up everywhere. It's hidden in plain sight, witnessed in the way NO major Left wing/progressive will speak openly about the truth of 911, to the more severe forms of brutal suppression and retaliation against "the messenger," as seen in the fates of Bradley Manning, Julian Assange, and a growing list of others.
For some time corporations have used slap-suits to shut up or shut down their detractors. Now, given their profit margins, it's a reliable strategy to just hire a PR firm to begin a series of character assaults aimed at both dangerous rival principles, along with those in the know. When these attempts fail, the next line of defense is to silence those who might have a compelling message to share.
Control of media is taking place. On one of yesterday's threads, the usual fools FOR the status quo showed up to try to present the "equivalent" case that there are so many channels, so much bandwidth, certainly Progressive voices could get their act together to utilize them! Such a free-market approach purposely covers up the very nature of the communications cover-up under way. Big money has captured media, and big money is tied to corporate profits. Therefore any messages antithetical to that dominant drive will not be tolerated. Tragically, since war is arguably The Chief Amerikan expert/product, no voices in opposition to Amerika's wars of empire/resource acquisition will be seen or tolerated in the MSM. But that's not all folks...
This site has its embeds in position to constantly post messages that undermine the truth at play in all of these places:
1. The Truth about Nuclear power
2. The Truth about the costs of war
3. The Truth about the complicity between both parties in maintaining a pro-corporate agenda
4. The Truth that civil liberties are being dangerously decimated
5 The Truth about the unitary exec continues to arrogate to itself all those rights NOT found in The Constitution, Bill of Rights, etc. such as the License To Kill!
6. The Truth about the state of nature (imploding everywhere in fits of ecological collapse)
7. The Truth about our economy: a shell game designed by the casino owners still playing deceptive odds on Wall Street with the public's money, its favored bargaining chips.
8. The Truth about public education being turned into training grounds for the next battery of troops
9. The Truth that there is no longer any democracy at work, it's just a facade to hide the fascism underneath
10. The Truth about the filth in our water supply, the contaminants in our air, soil, and foostuffs (as regulatory agencies are defanged!)
Etc.
Those thinkers capable of making people see beyond official storylines are being banned, blocked, barked at, when not virtually bludgeoned.
The goons are making it clear where the allowable boundaries of discourse exist. Cross the line at one's peril...
Siouxrose,
Well said.
Some say it's just the repugs doing scorched earth policies (like Cheney did by seeding federal bureaurocracies before Obama came in - not that Obama is any different) in anticipation of massive democratic takeover of the house in 2012 but I think they are just tightening the noose because the American public is getting uppity.
Excellent post, Souixrose.
The other side of the American forced censorship lobotomy of which you speak is the willingness of far to many tens of millions of Americans to bask in ultra-materialist, infotainment distracted ignorance as a false form of psychological self-protection (false because it only delays and worsens the inevitable harsh reality that is slowly, inexorably crashing in).
These types of Americans want their gasoline, beer, Doritos, cigarettes and wide-screen TV consumerist baby burp existence to last as long as it can without them having to think or get off their ass to do anything more than serve themselves and peer down the dim tunnel-vision of their pre-packaged McLives.
Given the truly frightening and rapidly deteriorating state of national and global affairs I have never seen a more obscene disparity between our increasingly grim corporatist, militarist realities and the expanding amoral and immoral delusions held in common so willingly by so many Americans. Most of them don't know or respect the Bill of Rights so they don't care that they've already lost most of those rights. They don't give a shit about the environment and only care that gas doesn't go over $4 a gallon--wars or no wars. They could care less about the innocent people our nation kills, maims or turns into refugees from its illegal wars, covert and overt insurgencies, extra-Constitutional attacks on Libya, drone campaigns from Pakistan to Yemen, etc. So long as they can zoom around in their SUVs and big trucks, have their drinks and snacks and hit the remote on that 50 inch TV for the Superbowl, Amurkan False Idol, or So Tom Delay Can Dance they could give a shit about anything else besides sex and their own death from obesity and heart disease.
WELL-freaking said, Metal. I have argued this same point myself again and again, but I am usually rebutted with "it isn't Americans' fault, it is the MSM. They are only victims of all the corporate brainwashing and lack of information."
While it is true that the truth, and progressive viewpoints, are carefully eliminated from the MSM - and only bread and circuses and government-approved, pro-corporate propaganda and talking points are parroted back - this is NO excuse for the electorate to not be informed. Democracy is a participatory form of government - you don't want to lose it, you need to stay informed and seek the truth out no matter how much effort it might take. I've said it before: Americans are too lazy and apathetic, and blaming this fact on the media or the fluff that is fed into their living rooms is a total cop-out.
Capitalism itself is nothing more than self-perpetuating, mass insanity.
While I think your plaint has a bit of blame the victim and a disconnect from the realities of most people's lives, it is very well written. "..pre-packaged McLives.." WOW!
Right on target, Souixrose.
Siouxrose, I fully agree with you, of course, regarding the censorship on many issues, including the 10 that you note.
However, the greatest censorship of all is, as you note of the empire's media control, the censorship and the distortion caused by a massive facade of propaganda regarding the seminal issue behind all other issues; the causal cancerous issue of the increasingly violent 'global EMPIRE', which is the singular driving force behind all other issues.
As I noted recently in a CD news story on the deceitful and 'Vichy' facade of MoveOn's actions:
" 'In the case of an ailing social order, the absence of an adequate diagnosis is a crucial, perhaps decisive, part of the disease', Zygmunt Bauman, as quoted by Morris Berman in ""Dark Ages America; The Final Phase of Empire".
Bauman's most insightful analysis points out that the disguise of a social/economic/political dysfunctional system, such that a real diagnosis of the hidden pathology of Empire is, like the camouflage of a predator or the hidden nature of a cancer, the seminal weapon that such a predator employs to infect, attack, and destroy a society or a country."
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2011/06/08-8
The key point here, Siouxrose, is that the disguise is the most deadly weapon of Empire. As Bauman tellingly notes, "the absence of an adequate diagnosis is a crucial, perhaps decisive, part of the disease" -- and the absence of a correct diagnosis is directly caused by the disguise, camouflage, deceit, propaganda, and 'Vichy' facade of the Empire disease or pathology itself, just as cancer hides itself from diagnosis until it is often too late to treat.
In the particular case here, of Pilger's planned presentation, is that his presentation would have shined truth too clearly on some aspect of the global Empire's modus operandi -- probably in disguising how the overt violence of war is presented as a humanitarian or democracy development project (like Bush's cynical oxymoron as a "democracy project" or "freedom agenda").
Perhaps, the global Empire realizes, as they should, that while such BS from a BSer like Bush is expected by the brainwashed public, that the same idiot-minded excuse will not be accepted by the public from the smoother talking and supposedly liberal current faux-Emperor/president, Obama.
Perhaps, Pilger's presentation, in some other regard, looked like it would puncture the 'two-party democracy' disguise of the global Empire, which controls our former country and others, and the more overt order was issued to 'kill it' -- rather than run the greater risk of killing Pilger himself.
In either case, this clearly points to the near certainty that the Empire is "taking off the gloves" -- as would be expected if Obama's smoother BS and PR is no longer adjudged by the Empire as "doing the trick" of keeping the people sufficiently 'stuck on stupid' and 'passively peaceful'.
The only real solution, of course, is to rip off the facade of faux-democracy in the US, which the global Empire has been successfully hiding behind for the past four or five decades, and which the Empire has had to employ increasingly violent measures "abroad and at home" [Arendt] to maintain.
We, the good, honest, average, middle/working-class people of the former US and all such world citizens have to 'cut-through' and 'rip-off' this ubiquitous and sophisticated disguise, facade, cover, charade, and camouflage of propaganda that the global Empire employs to maintain, as Bauman understands, "the absence of an adequate diagnosis" of Empire possible, and thus prevents all of us from seeing the full horror of this hidden causal cancer of Empire.
I strongly believe that the brilliant and insightful work of George Lakoff in linguistics and cognitive science of language and imagery can be very helpful in this project of truth.
For example, if Lakoff's thought-experiments with his Berkeley students and resulting book, "Don't Think About an Elephant" were to be combined to expose the hidden global Empire, such as an article or book, "Don't Think About Hiding the Elephant of Global Empire", then more people's minds could be triggered to combine the inescapable image of an elephant with the difficult and visual memory proposition of hiding an 'elephant of global Empire' and this should create highly intense and memorable linked images of trying to hide an elephant, perhaps a stylized India elephant from the British Empire Raj era, and perhaps with a banner of "Global Empire", in a cartoon of trying to hide the elephant of empire in the Oval Office of the White House, Pentagon, Citibank headquarters, or other supposedly symbolic/patriotic images of American power.
The purpose, of course, of creatively, humorously, and most important 'memorably' linking the image of a British Empire elephant of Empire with silly attempts to 'hide it' in memorable/patriotic images of American power, is to create an involuntary “analogy-thinking queue” that people can not forget --- and actually tend to keep thinking about, just as Lakoff's students at Berkeley could not stop thinking about the elephant once he had 'seeded' the word and image in their minds.
Anyway, the details of how best to scientifically create such word, image, and concept memorable linkages in order to cause people's minds to focus on the hidden reality of the global Empire that has taken over our country, and which is the penultimate problem for ourselves, our children, and the world are issues far above my pay-grade. But perhaps, Pilger was getting too close to revealing this truth, and hopefully Chomsky, or his former student, Lakoff, can do a much more effective job than I have outlined here, Siouxrose.
Thanks for making me think,
Alan MacDonald
Sanford, Maine
Liberty & democracy over violent empire –
New America People's Party 2012
Pilger's film is apparently just too truthful for the "liberal class," who have yet again thrown their support to humanitarian imperialism in Libya. And with the Obama administration poised to announce that U.S. troops will be staying in Iraq indefinitely -- whatever the previous agreement -- Pilger's dredging up of the myriad lies surrounding the Iraq invasion is too embarrassing...
The Lannan Foundation should be denounced and boycotted like the plague by all past and upcoming participants. Now it is clear: Any artist or intellectual who takes part in this program is little more than a fascist tool...
That's "neo-liberal class"
Please don't confuse people by mixing up the already severely degraded political term "liberal" with the economic term "neo-liberal" which has to do with Milton Friedman's failed theory of economic neo-liberalism. The Democratic Party's leadership, the Republican Party and the so-called Tea Party are all neo-liberal with respect to their economic policies.
They all support deregulation of corporations--including resource extractors, mercenary armies, private prisons, banks, credit card companies and "investment instruments" like derivatives; shifting the tax burden (even during wartime) away from the super-rich, large Wall Street speculators and the rentier class and onto labor and domestic industry; corporatist collectivization of domestic agriculture and (forced in many cases) privatization of foreign arable land, "free trade" offshoring of domestic manufacturing and manufacturing support jobs, and they all ignore pillaging and degradation of the environment as an "externalized" cost of doing business and whoring after political campaign money from the worst corporate actors on the planet.
metal, well said yourself!
You might get a kick out of Paul Krugman's column Friday, relevant to your accurate description of the many of the beneficiaries of this screwed up system being "super-rich, large Wall Street speculators and the rentier class".
Looks like Krugman agrees with you as his column is titled, "Rule by Rentiers"
Bravo, metal.
Best,
Alan MacDonald
Sanford, Maine
Liberty & democracy
over
violent
empire
New America People's Party 2012
Perhaps a short subject entitled "The Pilger You Don't See" can be produced and added to the bill at the rescheduled U.S. premiere of "The War You Don't See".
Personally, I think it's asking too much not to draw a negative inference from the abrupt and literally inexplicable manner in which the presentation was unilaterally canceled.
Off the top of my head, I can't think of a circumstance that would cause the sponsor and host to pull the plug without even a vague explanation, e.g. an unexpected personal emergency or crisis, a logistical snafu, etc.
Perhaps by Monday, "Democracy Now" will know more about the mystery; I'm expect that they'll at least report it.
You can watch it here:
"The War You Don't See"
http://www.viddler.com/explore/Irishstorm/videos/7/
Pilger's film should be released at independent theaters throughout this country. I know that there certainly are theaters here in the Pacific Northwest that would present this film. It sounds from the description of this documentary that many people would want to see how the media was complicit in going along with promoting and advocating these wars that have unjustifiably killed so many people in the Middle East.
It is also surprising, after looking at Pilger's web site, that, unless I missed it, this film is not available for purchase as a DVD.
EDIT:
It turns out that I was wrong. This film is available on DVD but one would need to have a region-free DVD player in order to play it here in the United States.
Someone with a region-free DVD or someone in the UK or Oz where I presume it can be played, need to rip it and get it uploaded into the bit-torrent-sphere. The best site to put the .torrent file is for this is "onebigtorrent.org" - a great source for the latest left-socialist or anarchist stuff.
Have a group project it on large screens/walls outside the foundation. (Drive-in style)
What a fantastic event, if the speakers remaining on the program convened everybody on the parking lot to watch the film and discuss (and with John Pilger of course!). I can't see Jeremy Scahill and Glenn Greenwald supporting the Lannan Foundation after their censor action. Expose the Lannan Foundation! Force them to say who/what got up their ass. They should proceed as if to speak as planned, but then move all proceedings outside to convene with Pilger and a film projection crew. Bring a small sound system and some lighting to facilitate a discussion circle. If the Lannan Foundation was forced, they can don ski masks to hide their cowardly faces and help run the re-formatted event on the parking lot. They can have some "anonymous" donor spring for refreshments.
Maybe there is enough interest from those who could not afford the event to multiply the attendance many-fold on the grounds outside.
The Yes Men could probably transform the sabotaged event into something even more effective.
If you try to visit the Lannan website you have to register first. Another way of barring people from any info. or comments. It's getting clearer and clearer what kind of world we are moving into.
Thanks to C.D. for posting the letter.
"If you try to visit the Lannan website you have to register first."
____________________
FYI, this isn't the case.
For some reason, the link embedded in the article-- "I urge you to visit the Lannan website www.lannan.org."-- actually goes to "https://webmail.west.cox.net/do/redirect?url=http%253A%252F%252Fwww.lannan.org%252F".
That's the "registration" page; I went there too first.
But if you go to the following links-- copy/paste them and see-- you'll get to the site and the information Pilger references without having to register:
http://www.lannan.org/
http://www.lannan.org/lf/rc/current-season/
_____________________
I don't know why the link in the article is set up that way; perhaps it's simply an error, and a CD editor/admin can fix it.
Please correct the link to the lannan foundation--the current link goes to COX. If you add the http:// it does go to the lannan foundation
http://www.lannan.org
Hit "contact" at the top and send them an email... http://www.lannan.org/lf/contact/
There's a little information about the content of the film at The People's Voice.org - but the videos there have been blacked out due to copyright.
http://www.thepeoplesvoice.org/TPV3/Voices.php/2010/12/19/john-pilger-s-the-war-you-don-t-see-an-i
Dandelion Salad has videos of the film (so far)
http://dandelionsalad.wordpress.com/2010/12/20/john-pilger-the-war-you-dont-see-must-see/
I just emailed this to Mr. Lannan:
Mr. Lannan:
I had never heard of your organization before I read John Pilger's letter that was printed on Common Dreams today regarding your sudden cancellation of his and David Barsamian's invitations to speak at your upcoming event in Santa Fe, and the cancellation of the showing of Pilger's documentary, The War You Don't See.
From your website it appears that your foundation has done a lot of great work in the past, and this event at which major liberal speakers were to discuss free speech, US foreign policy and censorship in the media sounds wonderful. Therefore it is a real shame that apparently without any explanation and literally at the last minute you have acted contrary to your stated ideals. I can only assume that this shocking curtailment of the public's right to know--to see all sides of an issue and come to our own conclusions--is the result of heavy pressure applied to you from someone(s) outside of your organization.
I am a strong advocate for free speech and the public's right to know. I sincerely hope that you will reconsider your cancellation of the film and immediately reinstate the invitations to both Mr. Pilger and Mr. Barsamian with new plane tickets and your heart-felt apology. Otherwise your event has been turned into a sham and should renamed: This Forum Has Been Censored: We Won't Allow You to See All of The Information Either.
Sincerely,
I created this petition as well. http://tinyurl.com/3cjysla
Please offer any suggestions before I try to promote it more widely. Thank you.
Done and done. Also forwarded
Damn the ban, stream the film on the web, John.
Well, John, both of your links even the one to your website goes to a cox webmail program so have you been hacked?
This makes no sense unless they are sabotaging all your work now.
There was a movie or story on the Hollywood War Machine also but the War Machine is embedded in the lives of everyone these days, not just media.
Jim G.
I am not sure about a film but there is a terrific book which I have which bears that title and that would be The Hollywood War Machine: U.S. Militarism and Popular Culture by Carl Boggs and Tom Pollard which describes the pernicious influence that Hollywood has had throughout the years in influencing American thought and opinion concerning American militarism.
For those who are interested there is a much lauded British anti-war film tonight on TCM called King and Country [1964] which takes place during World War I and is about a British officer [played by Dirk Bogarde] who defends a British private [played by Tom Courtenay] who is accused of desertion.
Ben Hecht's book "Perfidy" was intentionally kept out of print while under copyright to appease Zionists with whom Hect had come to a parting of the ways. Censorship works in any number of ways.
I'm getting paranoid. Why is Robert Reich's article posted on Commondreams yesterday (June 10, 2011) no loner available. I thought it was a very powerful essay on the economics of supply and demand. .
The Reich article is still available. See:
http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2011/06/10-7
For some reason, they pulled it off the front page and buried it in the "Headlines - June, 2011" archive page.
If you're only just now getting paranoid, you haven't been paying close enough attention.
I just finished watching all the video I could find, parts 1-3 and 5-7 as it was cut up on Youtube. Unless something very interesting is in the middle that I couldn't access, I wonder why the censorship, as there was nothing in there that I consider particularly new information. A good documentary, yes, but nothing particularly surprising, nothing someone used to reading progressive sites isn't already aware of.
That's what is starting to creep me out--the censorship and attacks are coming down for less and less reason. I'm glad the case against Thomas Drake fell apart, but the fact that the man was indicted at all is worrisome. My experience in the colleges I work at is increasingly creepy, what with students openly extolling people killing for fun, and nobody thinks--not the administration, for sure--that this is a problem. Yes, I'm increasingly paranoid.
I just finished watching the film. It is very good. Pilger
tells the truth.
I have attended many Lannan events here in Santa Fe (they are very affordable) and am disturbed that without a real explanation, Patrick Lannan, simply cancelled this important event. I imagine that he received some sort of "official threat" that made him back down; perhaps we will find out eventually. Things get crazier and crazier everyday here in the land of make-believe democracy and the formerly free. Better watch your ass !
Very disturbing.
Well here is one more skirmish in that unseen war raging around the world right now. What catches my notice is how sloppily "in your face" was the execution of this act. To me, it smells of "desperation" of the common enemy-to-humanity; that they are getting so panic-ed, with imminent "melt-down" rushing towards their "beloved" empire. They haven't faced such an onslaught in many centuries. This one will be thorough-going, perhaps permanent. Their empire will not live to see 2012. Neither will they, if they don't let it go (but they might be like Ahab, chasing his "Moby Dick" to perdition).
Inb, great observation on your part indeed:
"Their empire will not live to see 2012."
Best,
Alan
Liberty & democracy
over
violent
empire
New America People's Party 2012