How does a revolt come about and what does it leave behind? What impact does it have on those who participate in it and those who simply watch it? Is the Greek revolt of December 2008 confined to the shores of the Mediterranean, or are there lessons we can bring to bear on social action around the globe? Revolt and Crisis in Greece: Between a Present Yet to Pass and a Future Still to Come is a collective attempt to grapple with these questions.
Thursday, May 31, 2012
Revolt and Crisis in Greece
Former Security Official Unveils Mossad's Role in Assassination of Iraqi Elites
Former Iraqi National Security Advisor Moafaq al-Rubaie said that the Israeli spy agency, Mossad, has infiltrated its agents into Iraq under different guises and assassinated the country's elites.
"The assassination of Iraqi scientists and pilots was neither accidental nor a natural result of insecurity and instability in the country, rather it was a well-planned move led from behind the stage by some spy agencies, which want to destroy Iraq and keep it backward," Rubaie said.
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The Aesthetics of Transhumanism
Natasha Vita-More, Hplusmagazine
The current socio-political discussion on transhumanism concerns human use of NBIC [1] technologies and sciences to enhance human biology and to radically extend human life. I address this concern by bringing art and design into the discussion.
Artists and designers have been altering the human form — perceptually, conceptually and in actuality — from existing states to envisioned, preferred states. The perception of an ideal human is evident in the construction of statuesque sculptures. The conception of an enhanced human is evident in imagined mechanism in providing electronic senses and robotic extensions. The central issue now is that both the opponent and the advocate of transhumanism realize that the actuality of altering the human form is practicable, that duplicating the mind is probable, and that extending life is feasible.
More...
See also:
“Transhumanism” by Julian Huxley (1957)
UNICEF: US Among Highest Child Poverty Rates in Developed Countries
A new report released this week by the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) reveals alarming child poverty rates within affluent, or 'developed', nations. The US ranks second highest among all measured countries, with 23.1 per cent of children living in poverty, just under Romania's 25.6 per cent.
The report Report Card 10 shows roughly 13 million children in the European Union (plus Norway and Iceland) lack basic items necessary for their development. 30 million children – across 35 countries with developed economies – live in poverty.
Monkey Muggers in India
Gangs of rhesus macaque monkeys run riot in the Indian city of Jaipur. [BBC]
See also:
Indians Feed the Monkeys, Which Bite the Hand
As urbanization has steadily encroached on their habitat, monkeys have become the scourge of New Delhi. The solution for now: a bigger monkey.
Violent anti-science anarchists vow to strike again
From New Scientist:
It's like something out of Kafka. Anti-science anarchists in Italy appear to be ramping up their violent and frankly surreal campaign. Having claimed responsibility for shooting the boss of a nuclear engineering company in Genoa, the group has vowed to target Finmeccanica, the Italian aerospace and defence giant.
In a diatribe sent on 11 May to Corriere della Sera newspaper on 11 May, the Olga Cell of the Informal Anarchist Federation International Revolutionary Front said it shot Roberto Adinolfi, head of Ansaldo Nucleare, in the leg four days earlier. "With this action of ours, we return to you a tiny part of the suffering that you, man of science, are pouring into this world," the statement said. It also pledged a "campaign of struggle against Finmeccanica, the murderous octopus". Ansaldo is one of Finmeccanica's many offshoots.
The cell has previously targeted nanotechnology researchers, and in 2010 it tried to bomb an IBM lab in Zurich, Switzerland. The attempt resulted in three conspirators being caught and jailed.
Anarchism in the Chinese Revolution
A talk on the Chinese revolution with a particular focus on anarchism. Also looks at the Long March and the peasant insurrections as well as the role of Mao and the Russian communist party. Recorded at a Dublin WSM meeting, August 2008
Scientists late to recognize human and giant mammal coexistence
According to Pravda:
Giant mammals roamed North America during the Ice Age, but were humans among them? A site in Vero Beach on Florida's East coast contains mammoth, mastodon, giant ground sloth-and human fossils. The problem is that humans were not yet supposed to have been there, according to the standard story told to generations of archaeologists.
[ ... ]
Supposedly, the earliest Americans were the Clovis peoples, who left tool caches in New Mexico caves that researchers discovered in the early and middle 20th century. However, all this new evidence of pre-Clovis peoples is finally forcing a broad scale revision of history.
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Stefano Benni: The Story of First-Aid and Beauty Case
"The Story of First-Aid and Beauty Case" is highly reminiscent of cartoons; special effects and grotesques of personae chase each other from beginning to end, and the grand finale, with the whole town taking part in a merry-go-round of traffic violations, is full of hilarious exaggerations. Yet, the story is not merely a divertissement. Typical motifs of Italian comedies (and, to some extent, of Italian culture in general), like the jocular disrespect for authorities, the almost innate solidarity among the lower classes, and of course a beauty that turns every head and pierces every heart, are in action in this hyperbolic depiction of small-town life.
See also:
Misterioso - A Journey Into The Silence Of Thelonius Monk
2007 Edition of the acclaimed work written by Stefano Benni, adapted and directed by Filomena Campus.
The Genesis of Imperialism
From J. T. Walton Newbold's Egypt & the Entente:
If one was endeavouring to put one’s finger upon the specific causes which led to the breakaway from the Liberal Party of that considerable fraction of monied magnates and industrialists who formed the backbone of Liberal Unionism one would have to ignore, in large measure, the generally accepted explanation that it was occasioned by Gladstone’s Irish policy and look very much further back than 1885.
The really critical year was not 1885. It was 1875. That was the year in which the approaching collapse of Egyptian finance became obvious; when the British Government, acting through the Rothschilds, acquired the Khedive Ismail’s holding of Suez Canal shares; when the Ottoman Government defaulted upon its loans. That was the year when the British Government, under pressure of the creditors, had to intervene and exercise diplomatic influence on their behalf both in Cairo and in Constantinople, but particularly in Cairo.
The diversion of shipping from the Cape route, where Britain’s power was established, to the Suez Canal route required that British influence should become paramount between Port Said and the mouth of the Red Sea.
[ ... ]
Three Men of Mystery
French capital—that of Baron Hausmann and the Société Générale de Paris—was placed at the service of the Khedive Ismail for the building of the railway across the Isthmus of Suez. French capital was also the main fund upon which the notorious Baron de Hirsch drew for his unscrupulous project of a railway to join up Vienna with Constantinople and Salonica. This Baron de Hirsch deserves more than a mere passing commentary. He was the first of three adventurers whose romantic careers have added new tales to the myths and legends of the East. He was the first of three characters, of three personalities, who, in their days and generations, were on all men’s lips. First was Baron de Hirsch. Second was Sir Ernest Cassel. Third was, and is, Sir Basil Zaharoff.
Baron de Hirsch, the herald of that great army of railway promoters, public works contractors, and shad financiers who have, at one time or another, plied their peculiar callings at Constantinople, was associated with the same financial house as Sir Ernest Cassel. Sir Ernest Cassel was associated in his manipulations at Constantinople with the same firm of armament contractors and financiers as Sir Basil Zaharoff.
There is visible a definite connection between the three “mystery” men. There has been behind each, in his time, the same lurking presence. It has been disguised with consummate skill. But conceal their tracks as they may, the most cautious of capitalists cannot mask their identity for all time from those of us who search for them with the applied science of the materialist conception of history. 
~ ~ ~
For more on Sir Basil Zaharoff see
The Merchant of Death: Basil Zaharoff
6 Supervillains From History That Make The Joker Look Subtle
Tuesday, May 29, 2012
WAKE UP by David Bradbury
Uranium mining is set to expand in Australia unless we actively oppose it.
Professor’s Work Shows People Power Trumps Violence
By Jenny Gustafsson School of Authentic Journalism
Together with Maria J. Stephan, Chenoweth started researching civic resistance movements between 1900 and 2006, comparing them to their violent counterparts. A book, called Why Civil Resistance Works, based on that research came out in August 2011 and presents the findings — quite groundbreaking ones — that nonviolent tactics are twice as effective as violent ones.
For someone who spent her whole academic career studying the logic of violence, working with this research meant questioning many old-established assumptions.
“In the beginning, I was very skeptical,” Chenoweth says. “Now, it has totally changed how I look at my field. I realize that many of those who are committed to violence are doing so for the wrong reasons. They think that it works.”
[ ... ]
“Participation. That’s the single most important element for any successful campaign,” Chenoweth says. “For a movement to succeed, mass mobilization is required. And nonviolent movements have fewer obstacles for people to get involved. Violent campaigns are neither large enough nor diverse enough.”
'Americans don't share global domination policies of their leaders'
RT talks to Peter Dale Scott - former diplomat, poet and prominent anti-war advocate. He says that the US corporate superstructure conglomerate - including financial interests, the defense industry, oil companies and the media - brazenly manipulate American society.
Transcript: https://rt.com/news/america-corporate-conglomerate-scott-751/
Save us from the saviours - Slavoj Žižek on Europe and the Greeks
Here is the paradox that sustains the ‘free vote’ in democratic societies: one is free to choose on condition that one makes the right choice. This is why, when the wrong choice is made (as it was when Ireland rejected the EU constitution), the choice is treated as a mistake, and the establishment immediately demands that the ‘democratic’ process be repeated in order that the mistake may be corrected. When George Papandreou, then Greek prime minister, proposed a referendum on the eurozone bailout deal at the end of last year, the referendum itself was rejected as a false choice.
There are two main stories about the Greek crisis in the media: the German-European story (the Greeks are irresponsible, lazy, free-spending, tax-dodging etc, and have to be brought under control and taught financial discipline) and the Greek story (our national sovereignty is threatened by the neoliberal technocracy imposed by Brussels). When it became impossible to ignore the plight of the Greek people, a third story emerged: the Greeks are now presented as humanitarian victims in need of help, as if a war or natural catastrophe had hit the country. While all three stories are false, the third is arguably the most disgusting. The Greeks are not passive victims: they are at war with the European economic establishment, and what they need is solidarity in their struggle, because it is our struggle too.
~ ~ ~
See also:
Greek Misery: Looted, suicidal, desperate
Facebook fury has forced the head of the International Monetary Fund to express sympathy with Greece's financial struggle. Christine Lagarde caused outrage by saying she had more sympathy for poor African children than Greeks suffering economic problems. She suggested that the Greek culture of tax evasion was the main cause of their hardship, prompting tens of thousands of furious messages on her page. For more on the story RT talks to George Katroungalos, attorney and professor of international law.
For Europe’s sake Greece must renege on its bailout commitments – Varoufakis' op-ed in Le Monde
Conventional wisdom has it that, if Greece wants to stay in the Eurozone, it must abide by the terms and conditions of its ‘bailout’ deal.
It is my considered opinion that the conventional wisdom is, once more, profoundly wrong. That Greece’s only realistic chance of staying in the Eurozone is to challenge the terms of its ‘bailout’ agreement. Moreover, I shall be arguing that such a challenge would be a great gift to Europe. Indeed, it may prove a prerequisite for the Eurozone’s survival.
US planned nerve gas attack on Australian troops
The United States planned to gas Australian troops in experiments with two of the most lethal nerve gases ever devised, newly declassified files have revealed.
Previously top secret documents have shown that even as the world was outlawing chemical weapons at the height of the Cold War, Washington sought Canberra's permission to test sarin and VX gas on diggers in remote Queensland.
The documents, shown on Channel Nine's Sunday programme yesterday, indicate that US military scientists wanted to bomb and spray 200 "mainly Australian" troops with the deadly nerve agents in the 1960s.
Shaken by the request, the plan was rejected by Liberal Prime Minister Harold Holt, despite Canberra's deep concern to keep the US engaged in the western Pacific.
Government Orders YouTube To Censor Protest Videos
In a frightening example of how the state is tightening its grip around the free Internet, it has emerged that You Tube is complying with thousands of requests from governments to censor and remove videos that show protests and other examples of citizens simply asserting their rights, while also deleting search terms by government mandate.
The latest example is You Tube’s compliance with a request from the British government to censor footage of the British Constitution Group Lawful Rebellion protest, during which they attempted to civilly arrest Judge Michael Peake at Birkenhead county court.
Peake was ruling on a case involving Roger Hayes, former member of UKIP, who has refused to pay council tax, both as a protest against the government’s treasonous activities in sacrificing Britain to globalist interests and as a result of Hayes clearly proving that council tax is illegal.
Hayes has embarked on an effort to legally prove that the enforced collection of council tax by government is unlawful because no contract has been agreed between the individual and the state. His argument is based on the sound legal principle that just like the council, Hayes can represent himself as a third party in court and that “Roger Hayes” is a corporation and must be treated as one in the eyes of the law.
The British government doesn’t want this kind of information going viral in the public domain because it is scared stiff of a repeat of the infamous poll tax riots of 1990, a massive tax revolt in the UK that forced the Thatcher government to scrap the poll tax altogether because of mass civil disobedience and refusal to pay.
More...
Going nuclear-free: Germany smashes solar power world record
Germany’s solar power plants produced a record 22 gigawatts of energy on Friday, equivalent to the output of 20 nuclear plants. The country is already a world-leader in solar power and hopes to be free of nuclear energy by 2022.
The director of the Institute of the Renewable Energy Industry (IWR) in Muenster, northeast Germany, said the solar power delivered to the national grid on Saturday met 50 per cent of the nation’s energy quota.
"Never before anywhere has a country produced as much photovoltaic electricity. Germany came close to the 20 gigawatt (GW) mark a few times in recent weeks. But this was the first time we made it over," Norbert Allnoch told Reuters news agency.
The German government decided to turn its back on nuclear energy last year after the Fukushima disaster and plans to be nuclear-free by 2022. Critics have rounded on the initiative, skeptical that renewable sources can meet the nation’s growing energy needs.
One kidney illegally traded every hour worldwide, WHO reveals
The illegal trade in kidneys has become so rampant that more than one of the organs is traded every hour, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).
Every year, some 10,000 illegal kidney operations take place -- about 75 percent of the black market of all organs traded worldwide -- the Guardian reported Sunday, citing Dr. Luc Noel, a WHO official who monitors trends in human organ transplants.
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1932, A True History of the United States
"...while a nation goes speculation crazy the people neglect to think of fundamental principles."
These were the words of Franklin Roosevelt in the months leading into the Democratic National Convention of 1932. Roosevelt knew that the fight for the United States Presidency was not simply a game of political machines and punditry, but that this coming fight demanded a leader who understood the historic enemy of the United States and the founding principles of the nation.
US behind Russia plane crash: Russian military intelligence org.
Russia’s military intelligence organization (GRU) believes that Washington was behind the crash of a Russian Sukhoi Superjet 100 plane in Indonesia earlier in May, which killed 45 passengers onboard.
“We know that they have special equipment that can cut communications between an aircraft and the ground or interfere with the parameters on board,” Christian Science Monitor quoted a GRU general as saying, without mentioning his name.
The Superjet, which was crucial to Russia's hopes of becoming a major player in the modern aviation market, took off from an airport in the capital Jakarta on May 9 on a demonstration flight, but it lost radio contact and vanished from radar screens 50 minutes later.
More...
Sunday, May 27, 2012
The CIA In Australia: America's Foreign Watergate
by Wakeupmag.co.uk
"The CIA's aim in Australia was to get rid of a government they did not like and that was not co-operative… it's a Chile, but in a much more sophisticated and subtle form." - VICTOR MARCHETTI, ex-CIA officer, 1980
"There is profoundly increasing evidence that foreign espionage and intelligence activities are being practised in Australia on a wide scale… I believe the evidence is so grave and so alarming in its implications that it demands the fullest explanation. The deception over the CIA and the activities of foreign installations on our soil… are an onslaught on Australia's sovereignty." - GOUGH WHITLAM to the Australian Parliament, 1977
On December 2nd 1972, Australia's first Labor Government for twenty-three years was elected. The new Prime Minister, Edward Gough Whitlam, quickly set about a series of historic legislations: wages, pensions and unemployment benefits were increased; equal pay for women was introduced; a free national health service was established; spending on education was doubled; university and college fees were abolished; and legal aid became a universal right.
The Federal Government assumed responsibility for Aboriginal health, education and welfare, and the first land rights legislation for Aborigines was drafted. Cultural initiatives for women, Aborigines and immigrants were set up. Imperial honours such as knighthoods and MBEs were scrapped. The "Commonwealth Government" was renamed the Australian Government and an Australian anthem replaced "God Save the Queen."
Conscription was ended. Australian troops were withdrawn from the Vietnam War and men imprisoned for draft evasion were released. Australian ministers publicly condemned the American conduct of the Vietnam War. The U.S. bombing of Hanoi during Christmas 1972 was denounced as the work of "maniacs" and "mass murderers". Deputy Prime Minister, Dr Jim Cairns, called for public rallies to condemn the bombing and for boycotts on American goods. In response, Australian dockers refused to unload American ships. Whitlam himself warned the Nixon administration that he might draw Indonesia and Japan into protests against the bombing.
The Australian Government also pressed for support for the Indian Ocean Zone of Peace, which was opposed by the US, and spoke up in the United Nations for Palestinian rights. The French were condemned for testing nuclear weapons in the South Pacific, and refugees fleeing the CIA-backed coup in Chile were welcomed into Australia (an irony in the light of Washington's retaliation against Whitlam).
"We were told that the Australians might as well be regarded as North Vietnamese collaborators." - FRANK SNEPP, CIA officer stationed in Saigon at the time of the Agency's covert activities against the Whitlam government.
The CIA's alarm over the Australian Government rose to a fury when, in the early hours of March 16th 1973, the Attorney General, Lionel Murphy, led a raid on the Melbourne offices of the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO). Murphy and Whitlam were concerned about ASIO's involvement with local fascist Croatian groups that had carried out terrorist acts in Australia and against Yugoslav diplomats abroad.
Set up under the auspices of the UKUSA Treaty in 1949, ASIO had distinguished itself by not uncovering a single spy or traitor (this is still the case), yet it had become almost as powerful in Australia as the CIA itself. ASIO had a secret pact of loyalty to the CIA and helped to set up and maintain secret police organisations that kept files on all Australian Labor Party members, prominent politicians, government officials, union leaders, members of the Council of Civil Liberties and anyone considered the slightest left-of centre. Even prayer meetings for peace were watched and recorded.
According to a top-secret report to a Royal Commission into Australia's secret services led by Mr Justice Hope, for decades members of ASIO handed over to the CIA slanderous information against Australian politicians and senior officials who they regarded unfavourably. This material ranged from accusations of subversive tendencies to concern about their personal lives, and allowed the CIA to work against these people in ways that ranged from blackmail to efforts to block their careers.
More...
How to start a revolution: Learn from Iceland!
The people of Iceland forced their corrupt government to resign.
A public assembly was created to rewrite the constitution.
The banks were nationalized, it was decided not to pay the debt that PRIVATE banks created.
All of this in a peaceful way...
What would happen if the rest of the world took this as an example?
Amnesty Report Slams UN as Failure in the Wake of Global Uprisings
In its 50th global human rights report, rights group Amnesty International slammed the UN Security Council as a failure and "unfit for its purpose" in the wake of global uprisings.
In the backdrop of courageous protesters worldwide, the group says that the UN Security Council is "tired, out of step and increasingly unfit for purpose." Salil Shetty, Amnesty International Secretary General, said, “Failed leadership has gone global in the last year, with politicians responding to protests with brutality or indifference."“In the last year it has all too often become clear that opportunistic alliances and financial interests have trumped human rights as global powers jockey for influence in the Middle East and North Africa,” added Shetty. “The language of human rights is adopted when it serves political or corporate agendas, and shelved when inconvenient or standing in the way of profit.”
Land grabbers: Africa's hidden revolution
Vast swaths of Africa are being bought up by oligarchs, sheikhs and agribusiness corporations. But, as this extract from The Land Grabbers explains, centuries of history are being destroyed...
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Projected PIIGS Pillage: 3233.5 Tons Of Gold To Be Confiscated By Insolvent European Banks
While hardly discussed broadly in the mainstream media, the top news of the past 24 hours without doubt is that in addition to losing its fiscal sovereignty, and numerous other things, the Greek population is about to lose its gold in a perfectly legitimate fashion, following amendments to the country’s constitution by unelected banker technocrats, who will make it legal for Greek creditors – read insolvent European banks – to plunder the Greek gold which at last check amounts to 111.6 tonnes according to the WGC. And so we come full circle to what the ultimate goal of banker intervention in the European periphery is – nothing short of full gold confiscation. So just how much gold will be pillaged by the banker oligarchy (it is amusing how many websites believe said gold is sacrosanct by regional national banks, and thus the EUR is such a stronger currency as it has all this ‘gold backing’ – hint: it doesn’t, as all the gold is about to be transferred to non-extradition countries)? As the World Gold Council shows in its latest update, between all the PIIGS, who will with 100% certainty suffer the same fate as Greece (which has shown that unlike during World War 2, it is perfectly willing to turn over and do nothing) there is 3234 tonnes of gold to be plundered.
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Saturday, May 26, 2012
Documentary: The Power Principle
http://metanoia-films.org/
This documentary is about the foreign policy of the United States. It demonstrates the importance of the political economy, the Mafia principle, propaganda, ideology, violence and force.
It documents and explains how the policy is based on the interest of major corporations and a tiny elite to increase profits and the United States governments own interests in maintaining and expanding it's imperialistic influence.
Inside the United States this has been made possible with a propaganda of fear for the horrible enemies like the Soviet Union, Communists and so on and a love for "free markets", "democracy", "freedom" and so on. Externally (and increasingly internally) this has caused massive poverty and suffering, genocide, war, coups, crushed unions and popular movements and environmental destruction.
The Power Principle - I: Empire, Metanoia-films (Noam Chomsky et al.)
The Power Principle - II: Propaganda
The Power Principle - III Apocalypse
Quebec's 'truncheon law' rebounds as student strike spreads
Martin Lukacs reports for the Guardian:
At a tiny church tucked away in a working-class neighbourhood in Montreal's east end, Quebec's new outlaws gathered on Sunday for a day of deliberations. Aged mostly between 18 and 22, their membership in a progressive student union has made them a target of government scorn and scrutiny. And they have been branded a menace to society because of their weapons: ideas of social justice and equal opportunity in education, alongside the ability to persuade hundreds of thousands to join them in the streets.
Under a draconian law passed by the Quebec government on Friday, their very meeting could be considered a criminal act. Law 78 – unprecedented in recent Canadian history – is the latest, most desperate manoeuvre of a provincial government that is afraid it has lost control over a conflict that began as a student strike against tuition hikes but has since spread into a protest movement with wide-ranging social and environmental demands.
Labelled a "truncheon law" by its critics, it imposes severe restrictions on the right to protest. Any group of 50 or more protesters must submit plans to police eight hours ahead of time; they can be denied the right to proceed. Picket lines at universities and colleges are forbidden, and illegal protests are punishable by fines from $5,000 to $125,000 for individuals and unions – as well as by the seizure of union dues and the dissolution of their associations.
In other words, the government has decided to smash the student movement by force.
Documentary: Rise Like Lions - Occupy Wall Street and the Seeds of Revolution
http://metanoia-films.org/rise-like-lions/
"Scott Noble's film Rise Like Lions takes the people, actions, and words from the camps and streets of Occupy Wall Street and provides a radical, compelling and inspiring account of what the movement is about. Watch it. Share it. Do it!" -Ron Jacobs, Journalist, Author The Co-Conspirator's Tale
Thursday, May 24, 2012
Documentary: The Fuck-It Point
When you have had enough. When you decide to take matter into your own hands and don’t care what’s going to happen to you. When you know that from now on you will resist with whatever tactic you think is most effective. More...
Accidentally Released - and Incredibly Embarrassing - Documents Show How Goldman et al Engaged in 'Naked Short Selling'
From Matt Taibi, Rolling Stone:
Last week, in response to an Overstock.com motion to unseal certain documents, the banks’ lawyers, apparently accidentally, filed an unredacted version of Overstock’s motion as an exhibit in their declaration of opposition to that motion. In doing so, they inadvertently entered into the public record a sort of greatest-hits selection of the very material they’ve been fighting for years to keep sealed.
British Man Arrested for Possessing Roasted Fetuses in Thailand
Police in Bangkok, Thailand have arrested 28 year-old Chow Hok Kuen, a Hong Kong-born British citizen, after finding a small collection of dead, roasted babies in his hotel room. The six fetuses, which were wrapped in gold leaf and tucked away inside a travel bags, had decayed past the point of recognition.
More...
See also:
Briton arrested in Thailand after being found with six roasted human foetuses
Catholic Priest Says A Schoolgirl Who Went Missing In 1983 Was Kidnapped For Vatican Sex Parties
The Catholic Church's leading exorcist priest asserts that a Vatican employee's daughter thought to be buried in a mob boss's tomb was kidnapped for Vatican sex parties, reports Nick Pisa of the Daily Mail.
[ ... ]
Father Amorth, 85, noted that an archivist at the Vatican previously admitted to recruiting girls for parties and told La Stampa newspaper the he believes that Orlandi "ended up in this circle" and that the "case of sexual exploitation" led to her murder followed by "the hiding of her body," according to the Daily Mail.
Wednesday, May 23, 2012
Egypt: The Story Of The Revolution
Film: The Story of the Revolution, 11 minutes
Directed by: Nagi Ismaiel
Poetry: Ahmed Haddad
Through the poem by Ahmed Haddad on the events of the Egyptian Revolution in 18 Days.
With the vision of the importance of work for the future, the director , with the assistance of the 25 artists who participated in the Egyptian revolution, draws a visual image of the poem in the form of a simple and inspiring film.
Tuesday, May 22, 2012
John Rees on democracy and the age of mass movements
From the Troubled Kashmir blog:
David Jamieson speaks to political commentator John Rees about mass movements, the modern world and the tasks of the left today.
John Rees is an activist, broadcaster and the author of numerous books including Imperialism and Resistance and the recently published Timelines: A Political History of the ModernWorld. He was a co-founder of the Stop the War Coalition (UK) and is vice-president of the International Campaign Against US Aggression founded in Cairo in 2002. He is a member of the editorial board of Counterfire.
DJ: What, in essence, is the age of mass movements?
JR: It is simply a description of the pattern of class struggle since the turning point of the anti-capitalist demonstrations on Seattle in 1999. Since then the pattern of mobilisation has involved mass street protest as a central feature of radical politics, most strikingly in response to the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, but not exclusively so. Similar mobilisations have repeatedly taken place over economic issues, originally in the anti-capitalist movement and more recently in response to the recession. Similar characteristics can be seen in the student movement that erupted in the UK in 2010.
Of course these have not been the only form of the class struggle. There have been strikes, though mainly in the west single day mass strikes dependent on calls from the trade union bureaucracy. Interestingly the key aspect of these strikes is not their economic impact since this is limited in any one day action, but their capacity to pull workers into mass demonstrations very like those of the mass movements themselves. There have also been less formal outbursts of anger, like the riots in the UK last year.
DJ: When, and under what circumstances, did this situation emerge?
JR: The key determinants of this phase of struggle are as follows:
Firstly, the anger generated over decades by the failure of neo-liberal economics as instituted since the late 1970s when the welfare state consensus of the long post war boom was abandoned by the political elites.
Secondly, the new phase of imperialist conflict opened by the end of the Cold War in 1989. This phase is characterised by the US’s strategic dilemma of trying to arrest its relative economic decline by using its overwhelming military superiority to overawe its competitors and secure its imperial control of resources and geo-political bases of operation, particularly in the Middle East.
Thirdly, the fissure this has produced between the ruling class and a majority of the people on a range of important political and economic issues. This was later described as a ‘democratic deficit’. The term should be seen as describing the declining popular faith in some of the main institutions of capitalist society: government, parliament, elections, corporations, the press, the police and so on.
Fourthly, there is weakness of the trade unions, the main reformist parties and the radical left. The unions have been weakened by structural changes in the economy, by successive attacks by the ruling class and the inability of the existing trade union leadership to deal with these attacks. The reformist parties have, at least at a leadership level, adopted neo-liberal economic and social policies and neo-conservative foreign policies that are indistinguishable from main stream conservatism. The radical left has been unable to fill the vacuum created by this crisis in the mainstream organisations of the labour movement.
Fifthly, this combination of factors – economic and imperial crisis, democratic deficit and weak union and reformist organisation – has produced the mass movement as the characteristic response of those that want to fight the system. Stronger unions might have produced a response that involved greater levels of industrial action. Stronger reformist parties might have produced left reformist currents of greater attractiveness. But in the absence of these alternatives many people take to the streets and create movements of protest based on this kind of action, or on forms of direct action.
ANONYMOUS - Monday Mail Mayhem
Greetings world,
We are Anonymous.
Today we are releasing 1.7GB of data that used to belong to the United States Bureau of Justice, until now.
Within the booty you may find lots of shiny things such as internal emails, and the entire database dump.
We Lulzed as they took the website down after being owned, clearly showing they were scared of what inevitably happened.
We do not stand for any government or parties, we stand for freedom of people, freedom of speech and freedom of information.
We are releasing data to spread information, to allow the people to be heard and to know the corruption in their government. We are releasing it to end the corruption that exists, and truly make those who are being oppressed free.
The price we pay very often is our own freedom. The price governments pay is the exposure of their corruption and the truth being revealed, for the truth will set us free in the end.
So once more we call on you. Hackers, activists, and freedom fighters; join us in our struggle against these corporate
Download:
https://thepiratebay.se/torrent/7287633/1.7GB_leaked_from_the_Bureau_of_Justice
Egypt-Israel peace treaty in doubt as election nears
The peace treaty signed more than 30 years ago between Egypt and Israel is in jeopardy, its life contingent on who wins the Egyptian presidential election on Wednesday, according to Kevin Connolly of the BBC.
Connolly argues that the deal was struck between leaderships, not peoples - and it is now deeply unpopular with the Egyptian street.
NATO vulture culture: Aliens in the windy city
The Russian Aurora has discharged a preemptive salvo against the Atlantic freedom vultures in America, which have camped out at sweet home Chicago.
No, it wasn’t another Bolshevik mutiny on the legendary cruiser in St. Petersburg; it was an audacious Russian think-tank, the Institute for Foreign Policy Research & Initiatives, www.invissin.ru that boarded the ritzy Marriott Aurora in Moscow to test-fire a new revolutionary manifesto – an international conference titled NATO: Myths and Reality, Lessons for Russia and the World.
To pierce through the conspiracy of Euro worriers’ groupthink, mainstream media gag order and smug complacency of illiterati, the Russian think-tank deployed a quartet of mind-explosive experts:
- Dr. Daniele Ganser, president of the Swiss Institute for Peace and Energy Research and author of NATO’s Secret Armies: Operation Gladio and Terrorism in Western Europe;
- Prof. Pino Arlacchi, European Parliament deputy from Italy and former executive director of UNODC;
- Alfred Ross, president of the Institute for Democracy Studies, New York and author of From Yalta to Libya, the US & NATO: A History of post-WW2 Aggression;
- Prof. Peter Dale Scott, University of California, Berkeley and author of Drugs, Oil and War: The United States in Afghanistan, Columbia and Indochina.
More...
The Pinkertons Head To Occupy Wall Street
Steve Horn reports:
On April 25, roughly a week before the Occupy movement’s May 1 general strike action, Bloomberg News reported that the big banks and other Wall Street firms had hired a private security firm named Securitas AB to track down activist “wolves” deemed a “business disruption” on Occupy’s May Day action, as well as during the upcoming NATO Summit protests in Chicago.
“The world’s biggest banks are working with one another and police to gather intelligence as protesters try to rejuvenate the Occupy Wall Street movement with May demonstrations,” explained Bloomberg. “Banks are preparing for Occupy demonstrations at the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s (NATO) Chicago summit on May 20 and 21 by sharing information from video surveillance, robots and officers in buildings.”
Securitas AB is a Sweden-based firm with a subsidiary named Pinkerton Consulting and Investigations, which was once Pinkerton National Detective Agency — the famed strikebreakers and union-busters behind such historical labor events as the Haymarket Affair of 1886, the Homestead Strike of 1892 and the Great Railroad Strike of 1877.
Since its formation in 1852, Pinkerton has been one of the go-to bodyguards and detectives of the 1-percent. So, perhaps it is only appropriate that they have resurfaced in the attempt to co-opt and repress the Occupy movement.
Today, Pinkerton is a private sector espionage firm, with services including general surveillance, cybersurveillance, executive protection, event management, crisis management and undercover operations. Its modus operandi has stood the test of time: divide and conquer burgeoning democratic movements.
More...Hardens Your Arteries - Odds Are 6 in 10 You're Consuming This Poison Ingredient Daily
According to Dr. Mercola:
Reviewing the imaging data and cardiovascular history of patients who received whole-body sodium fluoride PET scans, the researchers found a significant correlation between a history of cardiovascular events and presence of fluoride uptake in coronary arteries.
[ ... ]
According to the featured study:
"Fluoride uptake in vascular walls was demonstrated in 361 sites of 54 (96%) patients, whereas calcification was observed in 317 sites of 49 (88%) patients. Significant correlation between fluoride uptake and calcification was observed in most of the arterial walls, except in those of the abdominal aorta. Fluoride uptake in coronary arteries was demonstrated in 28 (46%) patients and coronary calcifications were observed in 34 (56%) patients."
The amount deposited into your bones and teeth varies depending on your age. In children, more than 50 percent of an ingested dose of fluoride is deposited in bone, but in adults only about 10 percent is stored there. As the number of research studies into the toxic effects of fluoride has increased, there is now support for a rather long list of potential health problems related to fluoride accumulation in your body.
More...Monday, May 21, 2012
South Korea finds smuggled capsules contain human flesh
The Associated Press reports:
South Korea has seized thousands of smuggled drug capsules filled with powdered flesh from dead babies, which some people believe can cure disease, officials said Monday.
The capsules were made in northeastern China from babies whose bodies were chopped into small pieces and dried on stoves before being turned into powder, the Korea Customs Service said.
Customs officials refused to say where the dead babies came from or who made the capsules, citing possible diplomatic friction with Beijing. Chinese officials ordered an investigation into the production of drugs made from dead fetuses or newborns last year.
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South Korea Steps Up Fight Against Human Flesh Pills from China
...Demand for the pills has been driven by the belief that the fetus is a “tonic” for disease, the China Daily cited the documentary as saying. Consumption of human placentas is more common in China, where it is believed to help revive blood supply and circulation, according to the China Daily report. A report in the Global Times, a tabloid published by the official People’s Daily, said the human flesh pill were used to enhance sexual performance.
The Korean customs announcement comes less than a month after China’s drug regulators announced the suspension of sales of 13 drugs (11 Chinese traditional medicines and two antibiotics) after finding they were encased in gelatin capsules that contained excessive levels of chromium. According to China’s state broadcaster, CCTV, the toxic drug capsules were believed to originate from factories in China’s coastal Zhejiang province and had been made using scraps of leftover leather...
See also:
British royalty dined on human flesh (but don't worry it was 300 years ago)
It would appear the sci-fi classic Soylent Green was prophetic after all!
The Chain of Obedience
The death squads and concentration camps of history were never staffed by rebels and dissidents. They were were run by those who followed the rules.
Living in a Banksters’ Paradise – Part 1 of 2
Paul Adams, J.D. writes for Activist Post:
A more recent study found that Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase, Citigroup, Wells Fargo and HSBC now have the power of the Federal Reserve at their fingertips.
That makes sense because after years of making bad loans with artificially low interest rates and foreclosing on millions of American homes, the Fed bailed out the following banks with at least $16.9 trillion according to page 131 of the first GAO audit:
- Citigroup: $2.5 trillion ($2,500,000,000,000)
- Morgan Stanley: $2.04 trillion ($2,040,000,000,000)
- Merrill Lynch: $1.949 trillion ($1,949,000,000,000)
- Bank of America: $1.344 trillion ($1,344,000,000,000)
- Barclays PLC (United Kingdom): $868 billion ($868,000,000,000)
- Bear Sterns: $853 billion ($853,000,000,000)
- Goldman Sachs: $814 billion ($814,000,000,000)
- Royal Bank of Scotland (UK): $541 billion ($541,000,000,000)
- JP Morgan Chase: $391 billion ($391,000,000,000)
- Deutsche Bank (Germany): $354 billion ($354,000,000,000)
- UBS (Switzerland): $287 billion ($287,000,000,000)
- Credit Suisse (Switzerland): $262 billion ($262,000,000,000)
- Lehman Brothers: $183 billion ($183,000,000,000)
- Bank of Scotland (United Kingdom): $181 billion ($181,000,000,000)
- BNP Paribas (France): $175 billion ($175,000,000,000)
- and many more including banks in Belgium of all places
That’s right, largest banks, many of which appear to own shares in the private Federal Reserve, bailed themselves out in excess of the U.S. 2010 GDP ($14.59 Trillion - value of all goods and services produced in the U.S. for the year). Yes, even the fictional national debt of $15.7 trillion dollars could have been paid-off for less than the bankster stole.
More...
Spain's Indignados one year on ― more relevant than ever
The emergence of a new generation of neighbourhood activists under the 15-M banner has led to a revival of the neighborhood associations, created in the 1960s and 1970s struggle against the Franco dictatorship. With this has come generational cross-fertilisation.
Ishmael Reed quote from 'Mumbo Jumbo'
"If the British prose style is Churchillian, America is the tobacco auctioneer, the barker; Runyon, Lardner, W.W., the traveling salesman who can sell the world the Brooklyn Bridge every day, can put anything over on you and convince you that tomatoes grow at the South Pole."
~ Ishmael Reed (b. 1938), U.S. novelist, poet, essayist. Mumbo Jumbo, ch. 4, Atheneum (1972).
1939 World's Fair Meets the Swingin' Love Corpses
From the Wikipedia entry: "The 1939--40 New York World's Fair, which covered the 1,216 acres (4.92 km2) of Flushing Meadows-Corona Park (also the location of the 1964--1965 New York World's Fair), was the second largest American world's fair of all time, exceeded only by St. Louis's Louisiana Purchase Exposition of 1904. Many countries around the world participated in it, and over 44 million people attended its exhibits in two seasons. The NYWF of 1939--1940 was the first exposition to be based on the future, with an opening slogan of "Dawn of a New Day", and it allowed all visitors to take a look at "the world of tomorrow". According to the official New York World's Fair pamphlet" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1939_New_York_World's_Fair
With Dr. Philo Drummond - sax and vocals, Col. Sphinx Drummond trumpet and vocals, Bishop Ray Hay - guitars and vocals, Mojo Skippy Butcher - drums, Lafe Kowabunga - bass guitar.
Part 1
Swingin' Love Corpses Tunes: Afternoon Jam, Reptilian Sister-In-Law, Transparent Dreams Of Nocturnal Atlantis, Occidental Rejections
Part 2
Swingin' Love Corpses Tunes: Blistering Corpses, The 22nd Time I took a Dump on this Trip
Part 8
Message to Anonymous Subgenius
Brothers and Sisters,
We must confront ourselves.
We know that all men and women are created good.
We must understand why you have gone bad. You can not play checkers with your life, jumpin' around like an 'ol whirl wind.
Wrapping your dishes and plates and then unpacking them and placing them back on the shelf.
This is not the way Jehova One has designed you to act.
Unless.. you are willing to admit, that you are a normal, a pink boy, a ninny, a twit.
Only then can you decide where your path shall lead you. We know in head, that we are all created good by Jehova One.
Some of you got such bad luck sometimes in your life, you couldn't hang yourself with your own neck tie.
This is when you should look to Bob.
When you look to Jehova One, and say "Bob, come into my life" and you shall see, one set of footprints in the sand.
And that is when you will know, that Bob has charged you $5.99 to carry you to the nearest taxi.
Praise Bob in his divine ways.
You got to know, that life is like a vanishing twin. A baby inside of a twin inside of a woman's belly.
That's how confusin' this wiggly world can be. You got to raise up above this wiggly world and grab the hand of Bob!
Praise him and all that flows through Bob!
~ ~ ~
See also:
Sweden's Royal Academy of Science highly critical of wind power
Thirteen of Sweden's most eminent scientists within climate and energy explain that the current Swedish wind power investment is a huge mistake that will cost the Swedish people billions of dollars without providing any benefits to the country. It is also stated that wind production is minuscule, but was it to increase significantly then it would entail additional costs to electricity consumers in the form of demands for increased network expansion and back up power generation. All in all this means that the expansion of wind power as a whole is negative for the electricity consumers and for Sweden's competitiveness. There are no environmental benefits either because wind power is not able to reduce carbon emissions.
Penn State Professor Says Global Warming Skeptics Are Guilty of a “Crimes Against Humanity”
Via Weasel Zippers:
“The findings are shocking," Dr. Alex Rogers, IPSO's scientific director, said in a statement released by the group. "This is a very serious situation demanding unequivocal action at every level. We are looking at consequences for humankind that will impact in our lifetime, and worse, our children's and generations beyond that."
More...michael of bernicia - Beating the Banksters!
michael of bernicia gives a presentation to a Freedom North West meeting on the 21st of March 2012.
Sunday, May 20, 2012
#blockupy update
Around 30,000 people from across Europe are protesting on the streets of Frankfurt/Main against austerity policies and capitalism right now. The rally is part of the days of action called blockupy.
Up to 8,000 police forces stationed. Riot police keeps provoking protesters by entering the rows, trying to split the rally and alone by its massive martial presence.
live updates via https://twitter.com/
#1world1struggle
Police called to three-year-old's birthday party because cake candles posed health and safety risk
Police were called to a three-year-old's birthday party because they lit the candles on his cake! Or that's what the family say.
[ ... ]
"In the end we went outside and lit the candles in the car park. Oscar and the other children started crying when the police turned up."
More...
Pentagon Moves to Combat the “Insider Threat”
From Steven Aftergood's Secrecy News:
The Department of Defense has issued a new Instruction defining its response to the “insider threat” from Department personnel who engage in unauthorized disclosures of information or other activities deemed harmful to national security.
The new Instruction assigns responsibilities and authorities for systematically detecting “anomalous” employee behavior that may be an indication of an insider threat.
Global Police State Already In Force?
M. J. Molyneaux reports:
In February 2010 the US Dept of Defence published FM 3-39.40 Internment and Resettlement Operations. (1) This restricted document (just come to light on the internet) was written for the U.S. Army Military Police on how to control and incarcerate so-called enemies including civilian populations. This is for use at home or abroad. The implications of this document and the training to implement those policies are far-reaching and alarming. It illustrates how the US military expect the world to be transformed into a global police state. Looks like it already has.
A review of the document shows that the aim is not obviously malicious, but an advanced plan to prevent chaos in a world reacting to escalating population growth and conflict over resources. The disturbing thing about this plan is not that the US wants tight control for maintaining law and order over civilians in situations of unrest, but that they anticipate that their own Military Police will be the ones to enforce the law!
[ ... ]
More...
News blackout and military censorship follow coup
Last week’s coup in Guinea-Bissau, in which Prime Minister Carlos Gomez Junior and Interim President Raimundo Pereira were arrested, has been followed by grave violations of the right to information, including threats to journalists, a news blackout and media censorship. We urge the new military government to restore the media’s right to report news freely.
“The 12 April military coup has led to serious restrictions on the freedom to report news and information, although this is vital at times of political unrest, Reporters Without Borders said. “A news blackout, in which all radio and TV stations were closed, has been followed by military control of media content. We hope that the return to political and institutional normality promised by the ruling junta will result in full restoration of media activity.”
At a meeting with media executives on 16 April, the military high command said they could resume operating as long as they did not mention that protests that have been taking place in the capital. The goal of “constructing peace and national unity” was cited as grounds for this restriction. Reporters Without Borders regards it as the introduction of military censorship.
The FBI took -- and mysteriously returned -- their server. Here's their story
Ever wonder what it's like to have FBI agents knock on your door? Or to have them walk into your business unannounced and walk away with your computer? Jamie McClelland and Alfredo Lopez can tell you.
Their recent run-in with the men in black – the result of a spate of email bomb threats to the University of Pittsburgh -- offers a rare glimpse into the collision between free speech rights and the benefits of anonymity on one side with the needs of law enforcement to act quickly in the face of real threats on the other.
Banking giant accused of laundering billions
A former employee of HSBC in New York has 1,000 pages of customer account records he claims are evidence of an international money-laundering scheme involving hundreds of billions of dollars by the global banking giant, which reportedly is under investigation by a U.S. Senate committee.
John Cruz has delivered to WND customer account records he says he pulled from the HSBC computer system before he was fired. Cruz was terminated Feb. 17, 2010, after two years at HSBC for “poor performance,” but he contends he was let go because senior management didn’t want to him to pursue his personal investigation.
[ ... ]
“I was shocked to find accounts through which millions of dollars were being deposited and withdrawn without any apparent business activity being conducted,” he said. “Then when I went to visit the business, I found nothing – shell companies, vacant offices with no furniture, or no such business whatsoever at the address listed on the account records.”
Israeli Police Target Activists as Social Protests Restart
Last Summer's J14 movement against the high cost of living in Israel organized first major demo of the year, police targeted leaders.
Saturday, May 19, 2012
Analyst: Anti-NATO Protesters Help Raise Chicago’s Profile
As WBBM Newsradio’s John Cody reports, professor Ian Hurd says the only way Chicago raises its international profile is with big demonstrations, because otherwise there’s no news other than, “a successful meeting was held.”
More...
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See also:
NATO protesters occupy Chicago streets
Space Hijackers create Official Protesters programme for the London 2012 Olympics
Bespoke troublemakers, the Space Hijackers, have announced that they are the Official Protesters of the London 2012 Olympic Games. To this end, they've launched a site where you can register for tickets for the official protests. They have also outlined the top ten reasons why the Olympics are worth protesting against.
A spokesperson said "accept no imitation, we are the Official Protesters. We shall be taking steps to ensure no unauthorised protest occurs around the London 2012 Olympic Games".
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
U.S. Military Taught Officers: Use ‘Hiroshima’ Tactics for ‘Total War’ on Islam
By Noah Shachtman and Spencer Ackerman report for Wired's Danger Room:
The U.S. military taught its future leaders that a “total war” against the world’s 1.4 billion Muslims would be necessary to protect America from Islamic terrorists, according to documents obtained by Danger Room. Among the options considered for that conflict: using the lessons of “Hiroshima” to wipe out whole cities at once, targeting the “civilian population wherever necessary.”
The course, first reported by Danger Room last month and held at the Defense Department’s Joint Forces Staff College, has since been canceled by the Pentagon brass. It’s only now, however, that the details of the class have come to light. Danger Room received hundreds of pages of course material and reference documents from a source familiar with the contents of the class.
The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff recently ordered the entire U.S. military to scour its training material to make sure it doesn’t contain similarly hateful material, a process that is still ongoing. But the officer who delivered the lectures, Army Lt. Col. Matthew A. Dooley, still maintains his position at the Norfolk, Virginia college, pending an investigation. The commanders, lieutenant colonels, captains and colonels who sat in Dooley’s classroom, listening to the inflammatory material week after week, have now moved into higher-level assignments throughout the U.S. military.
For the better part of the last decade, a small cabal of self-anointed counterterrorism experts has been working its way through the U.S. military, intelligence and law enforcement communities, trying to convince whoever it could that America’s real terrorist enemy wasn’t al-Qaida — but the Islamic faith itself. In his course, Dooley brought in these anti-Muslim demagogues as guest lecturers. And he took their argument to its final, ugly conclusion.
[ ... ]
International laws protecting civilians in wartime are “no longer relevant,” Dooley continues. And that opens the possibility of applying “the historical precedents of Dresden, Tokyo, Hiroshima, Nagasaki” to Islam’s holiest cities, and bringing about “Mecca and Medina['s] destruction.”
New Mayan Calendars Discovered: World Isn't Ending After All
Archaeologists discovered another Mayan calendar in Guatemala showing the Earth's time will continue beyond December.
"It's like the odometer of a car, with the Maya calendar rolling over from the 120,000s to 130,000 ... The car gets a step closer to the junkyard as the numbers turn over; the Maya just start over."
See also:
New Mayan Discovery: The World Isn’t Ending!
The Mayans predicted that the world would end in 2012, right? Not according to the fascinating findings from a recent dig. Vivien Marx on why archaeologists are hopping with glee.
NEWS FLASH: Probably OK to plan for 2013 after all
Louisiana is the prison capital of the world, and its own sheriffs are the ones who profit
Ana Kasparian tells Cenk about the real (only) winners behind Louisana's unfortunate designation as the "prison capital of the world": the local sheriffs' departments, which run the jails.
McKenna: Eros and the Eschaton
Terence McKenna talks about the challenge we face, the archaic revival, the psychedelic mystery, culture and transformation from the question and answer session of his lecture entitled ‘Eros And The Eschaton’.
Transcript
John Steinbeck - Nobel Prize Speech
John Steinbeck's speech at the Nobel Banquet at the City Hall in Stockholm, December 10, 1962
"Literature was not promulgated by a pale and emasculated critical priesthood singing their litanies in empty churches - nor is it a game for the cloistered elect, the tinhorn mendicants of low calorie despair. Literature is as old as speech. It grew out of human need for it, and it has not changed except to become more needed."
"Socialism never took root in America because the poor see themselves not as an exploited proletariat but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires"
"Our species is the only creative species, and it has only one creative instrument, the individual mind and spirit of a man. Nothing was ever created by two men. There are no good collaborations, whether in art, in music, in poetry, in mathematics, in philosophy. Once the miracle of creation has taken place, the group can build and extend it, but the group never invents anything. The preciousness lies in the lonely mind of a man. And now the forces marshaled around the concept of the group have declared a war of extermination on that preciousness, the mind of man. By disparagement, by starvation, by repressions, forced direction, and the stunning blows of conditioning, the free, roving mind is being pursued, roped, blunted, drugged. It is a sad suicidal course our species seems to have taken. And this I believe: that the free, exploring mind of the individual human is the most valuable thing in all the world.
And this I would fight for: the freedom of the mind to take any direction it wishes, undirected. And this I must fight against: any idea, religion, or government which limits or destroys the individual. This is what I am and what I am about. I can understand why a system built on a pattern must try to destroy the free mind, for this is the one thing which can by inspection destroy such a system. Surely I can understand this, and I hate it and I will fight against it to preserve the one thing that separates us from the uncreative beasts. If the glory can be killed, we are lost." -East of Eden 1952
"I guess this is why I hate governments. It is always the rule, the fine print, carried out by the fine print men. There's nothing to fight, no wall to hammer with frustrated fists."-Travels with Charley, 1962
"What good's an opinion if you don't know?"-Travels with Charley
"Power does not corrupt. Fear corrupts... perhaps the fear of a loss of power."
"...there is a base theme. Try to understand men, if you understand each other you will be kind to each other. Knowing a man well never leads to hate and nearly always leads to love."
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