By Nicholas Menapace
It’s a sad time for America now, the economy is poor and everyone is suffering. The unemployment rate is at 5.1% and likely to go up; people are losing their homes and gas prices are soaring at over $100 a barrel. The average American is suffering economically and companies have told their employees that they will stop all employee raises. You might be thinking, “Oh well, those companies are struggling to and they just can’t afford it”, but if that is so, why is American Airlines, who supposedly needs to cut wages and increase flight costs, paying their CEO not just his normal over a half a million-dollar salary, but also $6.6 million in a 2007 bonus. In fact American Airlines gave $250 million in stock bonuses to its executives and managers at the same time as it said it needed to halt pay raises for its employees. This is not unique to the American corporate world; the average CEO makes over 500 times what its average employee makes. In contrast, in places like Japan a CEO makes about seventeen times what an employee makes.
Why do Americans defend this system, all it has done is kept these CEO’s and corporate executives rich and actually keeps making them richer even when their companies fail. Our system has been rather quickly destroying the middle class, yet we sit here and let these Robber Barons screw Americans over by simply moving their jobs oversees and then promptly screwing over the workers in those countries by paying them almost nothing. On top of that many of these companies essentially do not have to pay taxes and many times the government actually gives direct money to these companies such as in 2001 when George W. Bush gave $15 billion dollars of tax payer money to the airline industry. Since the 1980’s its been free game on screwing over the worker since the great Ronald Reagan gave the go ahead for companies bust unions, ignore labor laws, and at the same time bring in government aid. Why is this okay with the American public that the top 1% of Americans own 60% of the wealth yet most Americans would tell you we don’t have a class system. Are we really indoctrinated enough that we don’t see ourselves being screwed over?
Sunday, April 13, 2008
Working People Get No Meaningful Vote in 2008 Presidential Election
By Michael Hoffman
All three major candidates for the presidency have claimed to be the candidate of the common man, the hard working Americans who are struggling to get by. They say that they are “one of us” and that they will be the agent of “change.” But no matter which one of the three wins the White House in November, no real change will be forthcoming. Why not? Because in today’s political world both major parties are ruled by corporate interests and these three candidates are no different.
Let’s start with Hillary Clinton. She’s been posing as a friend of the common man and had been endorsed by many unions. But it is hard to see how she would help the workers when one looks at her history. From 1986 through 1992, while Bill Clinton was governor of Arkansas, Hillary was on the board of none other than Wal-Mart. While Senator Clinton was a member of the board, Wal-Mart went about its business of wiping out small town businesses and profiting off the sweat and blood of sweatshop workers. Also, according to abc News, Hillary stayed silent while Wal-Mart board members went on their anti-union rampages, although she did push for environmentally friendly policies and better treatment for female workers. The Clintons were also friends with Wal-Mart founder Sam Walton, the man who personally told loaders at an Arkansas distribution center that he would fire them all and shut the center down if the voted to join a union. And let’s not forget that it was Bill Clinton who signed NAFTA into law, leading to the disappearance of American jobs.
On the Republican side, John McCain has presented himself as a maverick, as someone who does not bow down to special-interest groups. However, according to the Washington watchdog group Center for Public Integrity, between 1997 and 2006, McCain has taken $2.6 million from Political Action Committees (PACs). McCain has taken money from such corporate donors as Verizon and AT+T, the company that has been helping the NSA spy on American citizens.
Corporate donors have even tainted the candidacy of Barack Obama, a man so charming and full of hope that even I like him. Unfortunately, he too has been bit by the corporate bug. According to the Chicago Tribune, about three-fourths of Obama’s campaign cash has come from corporate donors. Also, he has received money from Exelon Corporation, the country’s largest nuclear plant operator. One of Obama’s largest donors is Exelon chairman John W. Rowe, who is also one of the board of the neo-con American Enterprise Institute.
The only way to escape this corporate trap is by voting for a third party. You could do what I have done in the past and vote for the Green Party, a party that actually cares about the future of America and its citizens. Some of its core values are grassroots democracy, social justice and environmental responsibility. If you like the latter two of these but would rather see capitalism done away with all together, you could vote for either the Socialist Party USA or the Socialist Workers Party. Or, if you love civil liberties and also the free market you could vote for the Libertarian Party, which competes with the Green Party for dominance as the biggest third party in the country. If you would like to abolish the income tax and also see the constitution become based on the Bible (a fundamentalist reading of the Bible), you could vote for the Constitution Party, although in Connecticut this party is known as the Concerned Citizens Party. Finally if you really hate alcohol, you could vote for the Prohibition Party, which wants to make alcohol illegal. Believe it or not, this party has been around since 1869 and has run a presidential candidate in every election cycle since 1872.
So, the good news is you have options. The bad news is that if you do vote for a third candidate, there is virtually no chance that they can become president. The Commission on Presidential Debates makes sure that only Republicans and Democrats can take part in debates (unless it’s a pro-corporate billionaire like Ross Perot). Also, since the corporations and special-interest groups give their money to the two major parties, who keep them rich, third parties get no money and no attention from the corporate media. Therefore, voting for a third party is rendered virtually meaningless, while voting for one of the corporate parties will not help either. The only way we can give our votes meaning is by getting rid of the two party system and by voting for third party candidates for town and state offices and for Congress which actually have an outside chance of winning. Getting third party candidates into Congress is a good way to get the ball rolling on ending the two party system and bringing real democracy to the United States.
All three major candidates for the presidency have claimed to be the candidate of the common man, the hard working Americans who are struggling to get by. They say that they are “one of us” and that they will be the agent of “change.” But no matter which one of the three wins the White House in November, no real change will be forthcoming. Why not? Because in today’s political world both major parties are ruled by corporate interests and these three candidates are no different.
Let’s start with Hillary Clinton. She’s been posing as a friend of the common man and had been endorsed by many unions. But it is hard to see how she would help the workers when one looks at her history. From 1986 through 1992, while Bill Clinton was governor of Arkansas, Hillary was on the board of none other than Wal-Mart. While Senator Clinton was a member of the board, Wal-Mart went about its business of wiping out small town businesses and profiting off the sweat and blood of sweatshop workers. Also, according to abc News, Hillary stayed silent while Wal-Mart board members went on their anti-union rampages, although she did push for environmentally friendly policies and better treatment for female workers. The Clintons were also friends with Wal-Mart founder Sam Walton, the man who personally told loaders at an Arkansas distribution center that he would fire them all and shut the center down if the voted to join a union. And let’s not forget that it was Bill Clinton who signed NAFTA into law, leading to the disappearance of American jobs.
On the Republican side, John McCain has presented himself as a maverick, as someone who does not bow down to special-interest groups. However, according to the Washington watchdog group Center for Public Integrity, between 1997 and 2006, McCain has taken $2.6 million from Political Action Committees (PACs). McCain has taken money from such corporate donors as Verizon and AT+T, the company that has been helping the NSA spy on American citizens.
Corporate donors have even tainted the candidacy of Barack Obama, a man so charming and full of hope that even I like him. Unfortunately, he too has been bit by the corporate bug. According to the Chicago Tribune, about three-fourths of Obama’s campaign cash has come from corporate donors. Also, he has received money from Exelon Corporation, the country’s largest nuclear plant operator. One of Obama’s largest donors is Exelon chairman John W. Rowe, who is also one of the board of the neo-con American Enterprise Institute.
The only way to escape this corporate trap is by voting for a third party. You could do what I have done in the past and vote for the Green Party, a party that actually cares about the future of America and its citizens. Some of its core values are grassroots democracy, social justice and environmental responsibility. If you like the latter two of these but would rather see capitalism done away with all together, you could vote for either the Socialist Party USA or the Socialist Workers Party. Or, if you love civil liberties and also the free market you could vote for the Libertarian Party, which competes with the Green Party for dominance as the biggest third party in the country. If you would like to abolish the income tax and also see the constitution become based on the Bible (a fundamentalist reading of the Bible), you could vote for the Constitution Party, although in Connecticut this party is known as the Concerned Citizens Party. Finally if you really hate alcohol, you could vote for the Prohibition Party, which wants to make alcohol illegal. Believe it or not, this party has been around since 1869 and has run a presidential candidate in every election cycle since 1872.
So, the good news is you have options. The bad news is that if you do vote for a third candidate, there is virtually no chance that they can become president. The Commission on Presidential Debates makes sure that only Republicans and Democrats can take part in debates (unless it’s a pro-corporate billionaire like Ross Perot). Also, since the corporations and special-interest groups give their money to the two major parties, who keep them rich, third parties get no money and no attention from the corporate media. Therefore, voting for a third party is rendered virtually meaningless, while voting for one of the corporate parties will not help either. The only way we can give our votes meaning is by getting rid of the two party system and by voting for third party candidates for town and state offices and for Congress which actually have an outside chance of winning. Getting third party candidates into Congress is a good way to get the ball rolling on ending the two party system and bringing real democracy to the United States.
Thursday, April 3, 2008
Why You Should Be as Pissed Off as I Am: The assault on feminism in the United States
By Kari Sledzik
This recent fall, I took a stab at journalism for my first time. I enrolled in a journalism course, and I also attempted to write for the infamous Recorder. The Recorder attempt was, for lack of a better term, a complete disaster. In the matter of only a few weeks, it became abundantly clear that the Recorder would only support free speech for the people who sat at the cool kids’ table, and my articles were consistently subjected to censorship or outright rejection.
The journalism course was a little less frustrating. I mean, my articles were read, critiqued, and ultimately respected. Fine. I stopped writing for the Recorder basically as soon as I became recognized as a staff writer, but I couldn’t quit the journalism course without having to go back and re-take it anyway. I was never really experienced in journalism, so I did end up learning a thing or two.
One assignment was particularly poignant to me. The assignment was simple – think of a question, and write a short article incorporating about five people’s responses to said question. My question was rather straightforward – “what is a feminist?”
I’d be lying if I said that the assessments of women in the United States I subsequently received were really surprising. One woman said that feminism is totally outdated, and that no woman – even Hillary Clinton herself – still considers herself a feminist. Being that I was just the reporter and recording the response, I deemed it inappropriate to tell her she was sitting across from a feminist, who was dating a feminist, who knew many feminists, and, well, you get the point. Although I did get some educated and what I would consider to be accurate portrayals of feminists in my interviews, an overarching concept of feminists as lesbians and man-haters, and exclusively women for that mater, was definitely there. And it pissed me off.
Maybe it’s not fair to be pissed off at the people I was talking to. When you live in a society that attacks women consistently through institutional, interpersonal, religious, and countless other ways, how can we expect them to react any differently? Our government, media, schools, private companies, and essentially all elements of our society are slighted against women. All of these institutions teach us, from birth, that men are fundamentally more perfect than women, and therefore have to make all of the decisions that affect our lives.
When women pose a threat, it becomes the men’s job to remind us how the world works. This is when they get the promotion you were more qualified for, give you a good slap in the face when you argue, close your neighborhood sexual health clinic, or flat out rape you. And it’s when this becomes your fault. You talked back, you dressed too provocatively, you’re a bitch. Is it any surprise that women have this perception and shy away from feminism? Is it any surprise that these institutions paint feminism this way? They have a lot at stake, and they could lose it all if the playing field were actually even remotely equal.
Immediately, people point to Roe v. Wade, the Equal Rights Amendment, and female suffrage, which suggest that we have made significant leaps and bounds towards equality. Never mind that Roe v. Wade is in the most precarious situation that it has ever been in. Never mind that it took congress over 50 years to approve the three sentences known as the Equal Rights Amendment, but it never in fact passed state ratification, even after Congress passed a two-year extension on its ratification. Never mind that female suffrage took until the 1920s, only about 150 years after white males of privilege allowed themselves to exclusively control the fledgling government.
The well-known wing of the feminist movement made demands for white, bourgeois women. You know, Gloria Steinem would get up and wax poetic about how oppressed middle class women were. Don’t get me wrong. All women’s rights are equally important. But were most women really thinking of being able to get out of the house instead of baking cookies and reading magazines, or were more concerned that their hours at their only low-paying job were cut to 30 per week and she would consequently be denied maternity leave for the baby expected to arrive in less than a month? More importantly, did you hear about any of the feminists in the movement that were concerned about the latter? Well, they were there, standing somewhere in the shadow of middle class feminism. It’s no accident that a movement to empower second-class citizens created more of them.
So here are the lessons that Gloria Steinem chose not to teach you. Embedded in our institutions, within those endless layers of bureaucracy, are several absurd reasons that women cannot succeed. They get diseases once a month. If they get pregnant, you have to pay them to be out for a few months to take care of herself and the baby. They’re too weak and sensitive – having leadership and decision-making positions would be damaging for them and the institution. If she gets the job, the man who is more powerful and competent would not. If she reports that he raped her, it would be so damaging to his career and livelihood, which is much more important than her physical and mental health. So men have to stick together and make sure that society is organized so they can keep their power. It’s not a conspiracy, folks. It’s reality. All institutions benefit from sexual discrimination. It drives down wages for everyone, male and female alike.
Have we determined that men were right all along? We’re too quick to say “well, it’s not as bad as it was.” Wake up. It is that bad. It is that unequal. Call the police next time you encounter a domestic dispute. Time how long it takes them to get there, and take note of what they actually do. Hell, report it at CCSU. You will be politely escorted to each facet of judicial bureaucracy, and maybe if they like you the report will reflect what you said or even be filed at all. And when hell freezes over, they’ll investigate it properly.
Aren’t these pretty serious issues? Aren’t they current? How does any of this indicate equal and fair opportunities for women? The truth is that feminism is in serious trouble. Women haven’t moved forward and continue to face discrimination, harassment, and a consistent lack of support from their government. It’s not just a Central thing or a Wal-Mart thing or an office thing. If anything, Central is a microcosm of some of these serious issues that nobody in society seems ready to deal with. That’s why I’m pissed off, and why you should be too.
This recent fall, I took a stab at journalism for my first time. I enrolled in a journalism course, and I also attempted to write for the infamous Recorder. The Recorder attempt was, for lack of a better term, a complete disaster. In the matter of only a few weeks, it became abundantly clear that the Recorder would only support free speech for the people who sat at the cool kids’ table, and my articles were consistently subjected to censorship or outright rejection.
The journalism course was a little less frustrating. I mean, my articles were read, critiqued, and ultimately respected. Fine. I stopped writing for the Recorder basically as soon as I became recognized as a staff writer, but I couldn’t quit the journalism course without having to go back and re-take it anyway. I was never really experienced in journalism, so I did end up learning a thing or two.
One assignment was particularly poignant to me. The assignment was simple – think of a question, and write a short article incorporating about five people’s responses to said question. My question was rather straightforward – “what is a feminist?”
I’d be lying if I said that the assessments of women in the United States I subsequently received were really surprising. One woman said that feminism is totally outdated, and that no woman – even Hillary Clinton herself – still considers herself a feminist. Being that I was just the reporter and recording the response, I deemed it inappropriate to tell her she was sitting across from a feminist, who was dating a feminist, who knew many feminists, and, well, you get the point. Although I did get some educated and what I would consider to be accurate portrayals of feminists in my interviews, an overarching concept of feminists as lesbians and man-haters, and exclusively women for that mater, was definitely there. And it pissed me off.
Maybe it’s not fair to be pissed off at the people I was talking to. When you live in a society that attacks women consistently through institutional, interpersonal, religious, and countless other ways, how can we expect them to react any differently? Our government, media, schools, private companies, and essentially all elements of our society are slighted against women. All of these institutions teach us, from birth, that men are fundamentally more perfect than women, and therefore have to make all of the decisions that affect our lives.
When women pose a threat, it becomes the men’s job to remind us how the world works. This is when they get the promotion you were more qualified for, give you a good slap in the face when you argue, close your neighborhood sexual health clinic, or flat out rape you. And it’s when this becomes your fault. You talked back, you dressed too provocatively, you’re a bitch. Is it any surprise that women have this perception and shy away from feminism? Is it any surprise that these institutions paint feminism this way? They have a lot at stake, and they could lose it all if the playing field were actually even remotely equal.
Immediately, people point to Roe v. Wade, the Equal Rights Amendment, and female suffrage, which suggest that we have made significant leaps and bounds towards equality. Never mind that Roe v. Wade is in the most precarious situation that it has ever been in. Never mind that it took congress over 50 years to approve the three sentences known as the Equal Rights Amendment, but it never in fact passed state ratification, even after Congress passed a two-year extension on its ratification. Never mind that female suffrage took until the 1920s, only about 150 years after white males of privilege allowed themselves to exclusively control the fledgling government.
The well-known wing of the feminist movement made demands for white, bourgeois women. You know, Gloria Steinem would get up and wax poetic about how oppressed middle class women were. Don’t get me wrong. All women’s rights are equally important. But were most women really thinking of being able to get out of the house instead of baking cookies and reading magazines, or were more concerned that their hours at their only low-paying job were cut to 30 per week and she would consequently be denied maternity leave for the baby expected to arrive in less than a month? More importantly, did you hear about any of the feminists in the movement that were concerned about the latter? Well, they were there, standing somewhere in the shadow of middle class feminism. It’s no accident that a movement to empower second-class citizens created more of them.
So here are the lessons that Gloria Steinem chose not to teach you. Embedded in our institutions, within those endless layers of bureaucracy, are several absurd reasons that women cannot succeed. They get diseases once a month. If they get pregnant, you have to pay them to be out for a few months to take care of herself and the baby. They’re too weak and sensitive – having leadership and decision-making positions would be damaging for them and the institution. If she gets the job, the man who is more powerful and competent would not. If she reports that he raped her, it would be so damaging to his career and livelihood, which is much more important than her physical and mental health. So men have to stick together and make sure that society is organized so they can keep their power. It’s not a conspiracy, folks. It’s reality. All institutions benefit from sexual discrimination. It drives down wages for everyone, male and female alike.
Have we determined that men were right all along? We’re too quick to say “well, it’s not as bad as it was.” Wake up. It is that bad. It is that unequal. Call the police next time you encounter a domestic dispute. Time how long it takes them to get there, and take note of what they actually do. Hell, report it at CCSU. You will be politely escorted to each facet of judicial bureaucracy, and maybe if they like you the report will reflect what you said or even be filed at all. And when hell freezes over, they’ll investigate it properly.
Aren’t these pretty serious issues? Aren’t they current? How does any of this indicate equal and fair opportunities for women? The truth is that feminism is in serious trouble. Women haven’t moved forward and continue to face discrimination, harassment, and a consistent lack of support from their government. It’s not just a Central thing or a Wal-Mart thing or an office thing. If anything, Central is a microcosm of some of these serious issues that nobody in society seems ready to deal with. That’s why I’m pissed off, and why you should be too.
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
UnitedStates vs. us: Terrorism and the Definition of Evil
By Wesley Strong
On Tuesday March 4th, Professor Yonah Alexander and Spanish Ambassador Javier Ruperez visited CCSU as part of the Middle East Lecture Series run by CCSU History Professor Norton Mezvinsky. Yonah Alexander is the director of Terrorism Studies at the Potomac University and is a world renowned expert on terrorism. Javier Ruperez is considered to be one of the best experts on terrorism as a former head of the UN Anti-Terrorism Unit. Presenting viewpoints that were “middle of the road”, Alexander and Ruperez demonstrated their expertise in the field by agreeing with and supporting the UN definition of terrorism. Both speakers stated openly that it was not important to consider the root causes argument, an argument that there are specific reasons for an individual’s participation in “terrorist groups”.
The positions of both speakers are the official positions of the UN and most of he westernized world in regards to terrorism in all of its forms. In a PowerPoint presentation that looked like it belonged on a conspiracist webpage, Dr. Alexander speedily attempted to demonstrate why the audience should believe his point of view while conveniently skipping over the more text-intensive slides. The speakers were challenged on the root causes argument, though they waivered little as they retreated into the UN position which disregards the root causes argument entirely without providing an reasoning to do so. The speakers were addressed in regards to State Terrorism to which they adamantly responded saying that there is no such thing as State Terrorism. The Speakers stated that since governments are governed by international law that they are accountable for their actions. This means that when the US bombs civilian housing as we have many times, it is an act of war while if anyone else commits those acts they are terrorists. State actors cannot be terrorists by this definition, even if they commit the same acts as those they classify as terrorist.
Based from the fact that there is no universal definition of who a terrorist is, as it is more defined as a level of power rather than by actual acts, the argument can be made that terrorism in and of itself is simply another threat to western or capitalist hegemony that in order to be conquered must be labeled as terrorism. In the United States the definition of terrorism has certain consequences. We are bombarded by images of the “Arab terrorist", much like we have been bombarded by images of the “black rapist” for years. This has a multiplying effect of diluting the perception of reality in which we perceive Arabs as terrorists. This has lead to many court cases over that fact where Imams were detained and not allowed to fly in the United States as they were considered threats. This was because Imams are required to wear a traditional garb and stick out as a “stereotypical Arab or terrorist”. The question of course is who the real evil is. As the US continues a foreign policy that includes an utter disregard for Sudan, while further occupying Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as unrelenting support for Israel - a state that has one of the worst human rights records, there is little question over who is the victim and who is the perpetrator. The classification of terrorist only became a popular classification after the fall of the Soviet Union, when using the classification of communist or socialist would no longer be applicable. In fact, the US government has recently passed a bill in the House of Representatives that equates violence from political organizations with violence from radical religious organizations – HR1955/S1959. The house version of the bill, HR1955, passed with an overwhelming bipartisan majority of 404 in favor, 6 against, with 22 missing. The bill defines Homegrown Terrorism as any group that attempts to use force or violence to change the minds of America. Force is defined as intellectual power or vigor, or a logical argument as well as the use of influential action to forward social goals.
This is the beginning of a slippery slope back into McCarthyism and the Racism of the Jim Crow years. As our state continues to support Racist actions and depicts the Arab world as terrorists and people out to kill Americans – much like their depiction of communists under the USSR – there is little recognition from the people to that end of the similarities between the classifications of groups of people to be considered not “American”. In order to maintain its hegemonic and ideological rule in the world, the United States needs to continue to create evil. The nations of the Middle East have not been killing themselves for centuries and in fact were one of the most advanced civilizations prior to the involvement of the West in their affairs. This is not to say that they were perfect, but there certainly were no suicide bombings, Improvised Explosive Devises (IEDs), or any other commonality of violence at the time. You could even make the point that terrorism is a violent response to oppression brought on by the west in the form of occupation, genocide, and racism. When poor people have no means through which their voice can be heard and listened to, what else can they do but resist? This does not mean that the ends justify the means, but we certainly need to be clear about why terrorism exists.
So the next time that you see a news report of terrorists bombing a bar, remember that the US has continually bombed schools, orphanages, hospitals, mosques, union offices that they said they weren’t going to touch, and media headquarters of non-US media companies that criticize the US and Western hegemony. Remember that the resistance against Apartheid in South Africa was called a terrorist resistance because they bombed several bars that had a high population of state and military employees. Remember that the Sons of Liberty committed what in modern times would be called terrorist acts by tarring and feathering tax collectors, not to mention the Boston Tea Party. The question is what terrorism is and what resistance is. The US and the West strive to continually blur the line so that groups that are trying to build a better world are equated with Al-Qaida. Talk about slippery slopes.
a Video about HR1955
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9wJsovPRTEM
HR1955 GovTrack General link - It was not working when this article was poster
www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h110-1955
HR1955 GovTrack Full Bill Text link
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=h110-1955
On Tuesday March 4th, Professor Yonah Alexander and Spanish Ambassador Javier Ruperez visited CCSU as part of the Middle East Lecture Series run by CCSU History Professor Norton Mezvinsky. Yonah Alexander is the director of Terrorism Studies at the Potomac University and is a world renowned expert on terrorism. Javier Ruperez is considered to be one of the best experts on terrorism as a former head of the UN Anti-Terrorism Unit. Presenting viewpoints that were “middle of the road”, Alexander and Ruperez demonstrated their expertise in the field by agreeing with and supporting the UN definition of terrorism. Both speakers stated openly that it was not important to consider the root causes argument, an argument that there are specific reasons for an individual’s participation in “terrorist groups”.
The positions of both speakers are the official positions of the UN and most of he westernized world in regards to terrorism in all of its forms. In a PowerPoint presentation that looked like it belonged on a conspiracist webpage, Dr. Alexander speedily attempted to demonstrate why the audience should believe his point of view while conveniently skipping over the more text-intensive slides. The speakers were challenged on the root causes argument, though they waivered little as they retreated into the UN position which disregards the root causes argument entirely without providing an reasoning to do so. The speakers were addressed in regards to State Terrorism to which they adamantly responded saying that there is no such thing as State Terrorism. The Speakers stated that since governments are governed by international law that they are accountable for their actions. This means that when the US bombs civilian housing as we have many times, it is an act of war while if anyone else commits those acts they are terrorists. State actors cannot be terrorists by this definition, even if they commit the same acts as those they classify as terrorist.
Based from the fact that there is no universal definition of who a terrorist is, as it is more defined as a level of power rather than by actual acts, the argument can be made that terrorism in and of itself is simply another threat to western or capitalist hegemony that in order to be conquered must be labeled as terrorism. In the United States the definition of terrorism has certain consequences. We are bombarded by images of the “Arab terrorist", much like we have been bombarded by images of the “black rapist” for years. This has a multiplying effect of diluting the perception of reality in which we perceive Arabs as terrorists. This has lead to many court cases over that fact where Imams were detained and not allowed to fly in the United States as they were considered threats. This was because Imams are required to wear a traditional garb and stick out as a “stereotypical Arab or terrorist”. The question of course is who the real evil is. As the US continues a foreign policy that includes an utter disregard for Sudan, while further occupying Iraq and Afghanistan, as well as unrelenting support for Israel - a state that has one of the worst human rights records, there is little question over who is the victim and who is the perpetrator. The classification of terrorist only became a popular classification after the fall of the Soviet Union, when using the classification of communist or socialist would no longer be applicable. In fact, the US government has recently passed a bill in the House of Representatives that equates violence from political organizations with violence from radical religious organizations – HR1955/S1959. The house version of the bill, HR1955, passed with an overwhelming bipartisan majority of 404 in favor, 6 against, with 22 missing. The bill defines Homegrown Terrorism as any group that attempts to use force or violence to change the minds of America. Force is defined as intellectual power or vigor, or a logical argument as well as the use of influential action to forward social goals.
This is the beginning of a slippery slope back into McCarthyism and the Racism of the Jim Crow years. As our state continues to support Racist actions and depicts the Arab world as terrorists and people out to kill Americans – much like their depiction of communists under the USSR – there is little recognition from the people to that end of the similarities between the classifications of groups of people to be considered not “American”. In order to maintain its hegemonic and ideological rule in the world, the United States needs to continue to create evil. The nations of the Middle East have not been killing themselves for centuries and in fact were one of the most advanced civilizations prior to the involvement of the West in their affairs. This is not to say that they were perfect, but there certainly were no suicide bombings, Improvised Explosive Devises (IEDs), or any other commonality of violence at the time. You could even make the point that terrorism is a violent response to oppression brought on by the west in the form of occupation, genocide, and racism. When poor people have no means through which their voice can be heard and listened to, what else can they do but resist? This does not mean that the ends justify the means, but we certainly need to be clear about why terrorism exists.
So the next time that you see a news report of terrorists bombing a bar, remember that the US has continually bombed schools, orphanages, hospitals, mosques, union offices that they said they weren’t going to touch, and media headquarters of non-US media companies that criticize the US and Western hegemony. Remember that the resistance against Apartheid in South Africa was called a terrorist resistance because they bombed several bars that had a high population of state and military employees. Remember that the Sons of Liberty committed what in modern times would be called terrorist acts by tarring and feathering tax collectors, not to mention the Boston Tea Party. The question is what terrorism is and what resistance is. The US and the West strive to continually blur the line so that groups that are trying to build a better world are equated with Al-Qaida. Talk about slippery slopes.
a Video about HR1955
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9wJsovPRTEM
HR1955 GovTrack General link - It was not working when this article was poster
www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h110-1955
HR1955 GovTrack Full Bill Text link
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/billtext.xpd?bill=h110-1955
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
CCSU Administration Boasts "Diversity" accomplishments
On Wednesday March 26th, the CCSU Administration e-mailed an executive summary of all of it's "accomplishments" to the entire student body. Below is a link to access the file. The question is, has there really been any change on campus? Read through the summary and look around you and judge for yourself.
Diversity Executive Summary
Diversity Executive Summary
Monday, November 26, 2007
Saturday, November 17, 2007
Recruit This!
How the US Military is Trying to Recruit Your Children, and What You Can Do About it.
Mark T. Rutkowski
The War on Terror (or as it is now being called, the Long War) is into its sixth year with no sign of an end in sight. While Democrats continue to stall on Capitol Hill, more and more Americans die each week. To date over 3,200 Americans have been killed in combat and more than 24, 000 have been wounded. Meanwhile the military has experienced its lowest levels of enlistment since the Vietnam War.
In response to this massive personnel loss the Bush administration has stepped up its effort in military recruitment. Waivers have been given to criminal offenders while the standards for the Arm Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (ASVAB) have been lowered. The enlistment age has been raised twice: from 35 to 40 in 2005 and from 40 to 42 just last year. However the most effective element of this enlistment campaign has been the No Child Left Behind Act.
Signed into law in January 2002, No Child Left Behind narrows testing standards, increases state accountability and cuts federal funding to schools that are considered to be failing. In addition, section 9528 of the act requires that high schools turn over information of all students or risk losing federal funding. The legislation was co-authored by Department of Education Secretary Margaret Spellings, Texas lawyer Sandy Kress, and Spelling's Chief of Staff David L. Dunn. The act reads “…each local educational agency receiving assistance under this Act shall provide, on a request made by military recruiters or an institution of higher education, access to secondary school students names, addresses, and telephone listings.”
Additionally the Army’s Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps (JROTC) is used to give students an early lesson in military indoctrination. The Army defines JROTC as “a course of instruction taught for academic credit in high schools by retired officers and non-commissioned officers. In public schools, students select Junior ROTC as an elective course. In some private schools, such as military schools, enrollment in JROTC may be a mandatory part of the curriculum.” JROTC programs can be found in many inner city schools where the chances or recruiting students are very high. Such programs can cost school districts tens of thousands of dollars each year. Most JROTC graduates actually go on to be privates in the Army, not officers.
There are things people can do to curtail the military’s recruitment efforts. Parents have the right to opt their children out of section 9528 (links to the forms and additional information can be found at the end of this article). Letters must be submitted to both your high school district superintendent and the Pentagon. The first letter keeps the student’s information private from military recruiters while the second (supposedly) keeps his or her name out of the Pentagon’s JARMS database (the Joint Advertising Market Research and Studies database claims to be “the largest repository of 16-25 year old youth data in the country, containing roughly 30 million records.” Information private is purchased from school emergency cards, motor vehicle departments, college recruiters and even companies that sell class rings.) Parents should aware that unfortunately opting their children out of section 9528 means they may not receive valuable information from college recruiters. The War Resisters League has a counter-JROTC campaign known as Revolution Out Of Truth and Struggle (ROOTS) that seeks to dismantle current JROTC programs and prevent others from forming. Remember, no matter what a military recruiter may tell you, the ASVAB is completely voluntary.
Mark T. Rutkowski
The War on Terror (or as it is now being called, the Long War) is into its sixth year with no sign of an end in sight. While Democrats continue to stall on Capitol Hill, more and more Americans die each week. To date over 3,200 Americans have been killed in combat and more than 24, 000 have been wounded. Meanwhile the military has experienced its lowest levels of enlistment since the Vietnam War.
In response to this massive personnel loss the Bush administration has stepped up its effort in military recruitment. Waivers have been given to criminal offenders while the standards for the Arm Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (ASVAB) have been lowered. The enlistment age has been raised twice: from 35 to 40 in 2005 and from 40 to 42 just last year. However the most effective element of this enlistment campaign has been the No Child Left Behind Act.
Signed into law in January 2002, No Child Left Behind narrows testing standards, increases state accountability and cuts federal funding to schools that are considered to be failing. In addition, section 9528 of the act requires that high schools turn over information of all students or risk losing federal funding. The legislation was co-authored by Department of Education Secretary Margaret Spellings, Texas lawyer Sandy Kress, and Spelling's Chief of Staff David L. Dunn. The act reads “…each local educational agency receiving assistance under this Act shall provide, on a request made by military recruiters or an institution of higher education, access to secondary school students names, addresses, and telephone listings.”
Additionally the Army’s Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps (JROTC) is used to give students an early lesson in military indoctrination. The Army defines JROTC as “a course of instruction taught for academic credit in high schools by retired officers and non-commissioned officers. In public schools, students select Junior ROTC as an elective course. In some private schools, such as military schools, enrollment in JROTC may be a mandatory part of the curriculum.” JROTC programs can be found in many inner city schools where the chances or recruiting students are very high. Such programs can cost school districts tens of thousands of dollars each year. Most JROTC graduates actually go on to be privates in the Army, not officers.
There are things people can do to curtail the military’s recruitment efforts. Parents have the right to opt their children out of section 9528 (links to the forms and additional information can be found at the end of this article). Letters must be submitted to both your high school district superintendent and the Pentagon. The first letter keeps the student’s information private from military recruiters while the second (supposedly) keeps his or her name out of the Pentagon’s JARMS database (the Joint Advertising Market Research and Studies database claims to be “the largest repository of 16-25 year old youth data in the country, containing roughly 30 million records.” Information private is purchased from school emergency cards, motor vehicle departments, college recruiters and even companies that sell class rings.) Parents should aware that unfortunately opting their children out of section 9528 means they may not receive valuable information from college recruiters. The War Resisters League has a counter-JROTC campaign known as Revolution Out Of Truth and Struggle (ROOTS) that seeks to dismantle current JROTC programs and prevent others from forming. Remember, no matter what a military recruiter may tell you, the ASVAB is completely voluntary.
The Legacy of U.S. Imperialism
Iraq, Afghanistan Wars Tied to Legacy of U.S. Imperialism
By Michael Hoffman
The people of Iraq and Afghanistan have suffered through repressive dictatorships and now wars that have killed many civilians as well as American troops. The real tragedy is this all may not have happened if it wasn’t for the United State’s imperialist aims.
The Iraqi people have gone through years and years of occupations. In 1258, the Mongols sacked Baghdad, murdering thousands. Later, the Iraqis became part of the Ottoman Empire.
After World War One, Ottoman rule ended but the Iraqi’s troubles were far from over. Great Britain, a country that never could keep its grubby paws off of other people’s possessions, was given a “mandate” over Iraq. In this case, the British wanted oil. They broke a promise to the Kurds to give them their own country because they would have had to give up Kurdish land with oil on it. They also set up puppet rulers and took away ownership of land from people whose ancestors had lived on it for centuries, giving it to landlords which effectively made the people serfs on their own land. Finally, a revolution in 1958 killed the puppet ruler and ended British rule.
Which takes us to the U.S.’s role. After a series of military rulers, the Baath party took over in 1963. A few years later, one of the Baath leaders, Saddam Hussein took total control and began a brutal dictatorship. The Bush administration justified the war in Iraq (after both Iraq’s harboring of weapons of mass destruction and Saddam’s support of Al-Qaeda were both exposed as lies) by saying that getting rid of Saddam would be beneficial to Iraqis. But that would go against the history of America’s dealings with Saddam. William Polk was responsible for planning American policy toward the Middle East during the Kennedy administration. In his book, Understanding Iraq Polk tells us that the CIA most likely helped with the coup that brought the Baath party into power and also helped to identify members of the former regime that were killed by the Baath. When Iraq went to war with Iran, the Reagan administration gave Saddam arms, money and food. Reagan also sent Donald Rumsfeld as a special envoy to visit Saddam and promise him that the U. S. would do whatever it took to ensure that Iraq did not lose the war. This was done by supplying or arranging for others to supply weapons, cluster bombs, components for nuclear weapons, and equipment to manufacture poison gas. U.S. and UN sanctions placed on Iraq after the Gulf War were also disastrous. Inflation destroyed the middle class. Malnutrition became widespread. Hospitals ran out of medicine and import mortality rates rose, all while Saddam was able to deflect these horrors onto the poor people of Iraq while he and his cronies continued to remain comfortably in power. Now the Iraqi people are in the middle of a new imperialist war which has led to a civil war which shows no sign of ending soon.
The people of Afghanistan are also no strangers to imperialism. In the 1980s they became the pawns of the cold war between the United States and the Soviet Union. While the Soviets invaded the country and supported a puppet government, the U.S. supported the rebel fighters known as the mujahidin or Muslim Holy Warriors. To do this the U.S. gave money to Pakistan whose ruler, General Zia, broke a promise to hold elections and was currently beginning a nuclear program. Zia gave money to the mujahidin and other Islamic radicals. After the Soviets left, the fundamentalist Muslims eventually took over, culminating in the repressive rule of Osama bin Laden’s patrons, the Taliban.
Without the role of imperialism, it is quite possible that the horrors of September 11th and the two destructive wars that followed could have been avoided and thousands upon thousands of lives could have been saved.
By Michael Hoffman
The people of Iraq and Afghanistan have suffered through repressive dictatorships and now wars that have killed many civilians as well as American troops. The real tragedy is this all may not have happened if it wasn’t for the United State’s imperialist aims.
The Iraqi people have gone through years and years of occupations. In 1258, the Mongols sacked Baghdad, murdering thousands. Later, the Iraqis became part of the Ottoman Empire.
After World War One, Ottoman rule ended but the Iraqi’s troubles were far from over. Great Britain, a country that never could keep its grubby paws off of other people’s possessions, was given a “mandate” over Iraq. In this case, the British wanted oil. They broke a promise to the Kurds to give them their own country because they would have had to give up Kurdish land with oil on it. They also set up puppet rulers and took away ownership of land from people whose ancestors had lived on it for centuries, giving it to landlords which effectively made the people serfs on their own land. Finally, a revolution in 1958 killed the puppet ruler and ended British rule.
Which takes us to the U.S.’s role. After a series of military rulers, the Baath party took over in 1963. A few years later, one of the Baath leaders, Saddam Hussein took total control and began a brutal dictatorship. The Bush administration justified the war in Iraq (after both Iraq’s harboring of weapons of mass destruction and Saddam’s support of Al-Qaeda were both exposed as lies) by saying that getting rid of Saddam would be beneficial to Iraqis. But that would go against the history of America’s dealings with Saddam. William Polk was responsible for planning American policy toward the Middle East during the Kennedy administration. In his book, Understanding Iraq Polk tells us that the CIA most likely helped with the coup that brought the Baath party into power and also helped to identify members of the former regime that were killed by the Baath. When Iraq went to war with Iran, the Reagan administration gave Saddam arms, money and food. Reagan also sent Donald Rumsfeld as a special envoy to visit Saddam and promise him that the U. S. would do whatever it took to ensure that Iraq did not lose the war. This was done by supplying or arranging for others to supply weapons, cluster bombs, components for nuclear weapons, and equipment to manufacture poison gas. U.S. and UN sanctions placed on Iraq after the Gulf War were also disastrous. Inflation destroyed the middle class. Malnutrition became widespread. Hospitals ran out of medicine and import mortality rates rose, all while Saddam was able to deflect these horrors onto the poor people of Iraq while he and his cronies continued to remain comfortably in power. Now the Iraqi people are in the middle of a new imperialist war which has led to a civil war which shows no sign of ending soon.
The people of Afghanistan are also no strangers to imperialism. In the 1980s they became the pawns of the cold war between the United States and the Soviet Union. While the Soviets invaded the country and supported a puppet government, the U.S. supported the rebel fighters known as the mujahidin or Muslim Holy Warriors. To do this the U.S. gave money to Pakistan whose ruler, General Zia, broke a promise to hold elections and was currently beginning a nuclear program. Zia gave money to the mujahidin and other Islamic radicals. After the Soviets left, the fundamentalist Muslims eventually took over, culminating in the repressive rule of Osama bin Laden’s patrons, the Taliban.
Without the role of imperialism, it is quite possible that the horrors of September 11th and the two destructive wars that followed could have been avoided and thousands upon thousands of lives could have been saved.
Thursday, October 25, 2007
National "Security"
The threat level in the airline sector is High or Orange. Read more
So here's an article that that was, for reasons unexplained, rejected by the Recorder. But we think it's pretty obvious why it didn't run.
-DA Editors
We need your personal records. This is for your protection.
by Kari Sledzik
George Orwell’s fictional 1984 depicted a society where the government had their hands on everything. There was no privacy. People didn’t have personal lives. The government told you when and how to do everything, and they watched your every move.
But this was a work of fiction, and this world is only a fantasy. No proudly democratic society would invade its’ citizens lives.
Right?
The Orwellian nature of our society is hardly news. People have been drawing startling parallels between American society and Orwell’s 1984. What the American Civil Liberties Union’s latest lawsuit found is just one more to add to the list.
The ACLU found documents revealing that the Department of Defense had secretly issued 455 national security letters after September 11. These national security letters are often used to investigate criminal cases, and they allow access to personal records, like financial and internet records. They must be reviewed and signed individually by a Federal Judge. The institutions are not permitted to tell the individual being investigated that the government has obtained access to these records.
According to the ACLU, the declassified documents indicate that the FBI and the Department of Defense worked together to overexert power granted under the Patriot Act. The individuals investigated included Pentagon employees, but ACLU staff attorney Melissa Goodman said that this raises the issue of spying on civilians as well. Retired Colonel Ann Wright brought this issue up in a forum in West Hartford recently. According to Wright, some officers have been signing these letters themselves without the signature of a Federal Court Judge.
So this is for our protection, right? We’re so protected here in America that we feel the need to spy on the people we hire to work within the government. Oh, and by the way, to all of you nutty dissenting individuals, the government will keep an eye on you too.
Government spying is nothing new in America. Since the Patriot Act went into effect, there’s not much people can do to argue that. At best, you hear the “if you’re innocent, you’ve got nothing to hide” argument, but that all but disputes the fact that the government can stick their hands into our business. But with 455 letters being issued so covertly and without the signature of a Federal Judge, it’s pretty hard to convince me that every single one indicated an imminent and serious threat to national security. If these investigations were truly valid and necessary, why bypass that requirement?
This is just another example of how the government has overextended the arm of the law to instill a climate of fear. We can feasibly be monitored at any time, and we know it. People who actively speak out against government actions could be incriminated for a fundamental right granted in the Constitution. And as I said, this is nothing new, but these national security letters indicate some issues that maybe we weren’t even aware of.
Should we be scared? Should we be concerned? Reason says yes, but the government tells us that this is merely a matter of national security. This is for our protection.
Saturday, October 13, 2007
Recorder doesn't run this comic, but it runs others.
Ignoring the diversity on this campus, President Miller has decided to push the job off onto students on how we should increase diversity awarness, understanding and acceptance. I don't know why the Recorder didn't run this comic that was submitted, but they certainly are attacking only those who aren't in power. Scared a bit of Pres. Miller? It is clearly humor and a parody of the Iranian President, certainly much more humorous than recent cartoons. Anyways, we can add this to our series of cartoons. Thanks, MTR!
-DA Editors
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By Lucy P.
