May 2007 Issue

As I write this, Congress is debating timetables for withdrawal from Iraq. In response to the Bush Administration's "surge" of troops, and the Republicans' refusal to limit our occupation, the Democrats are behaving with their customary timidity, proposing withdrawal, but only after a year, or eighteen months. And it seems they expect the anti-war movement to support them.

That was suggested in a recent message from MoveOn, which polled its members on the Democrat proposal, saying that progressives in Congress, "like many of us, don't think the bill goes far enough, but see it as the first concrete step to ending the war."

Ironically, and shockingly, the same bill appropriates $124 billion in more funds to carry the war. It's as if, before the Civil War, abolitionists agreed to postpone the emancipation of the slaves for a year, or two years, or five years, and coupled this with an appropriation of funds to enforce the Fugitive Slave Act.

When a social movement adopts the compromises of legislators, it has forgotten its role, which is to push and challenge the politicians, not to fall in meekly behind them.

We who protest the war are not politicians. We are citizens. Whatever politicians may do, let them first feel the full force of citizens who speak for what is right, not for what is winnable, in a shamefully timorous Congress.

Timetables for withdrawal are not only morally reprehensible in the case of a brutal occupation (would you give a thug who invaded your house, smashed everything in sight, and terrorized your children a timetable for withdrawal?) but logically nonsensical. If our troops are preventing civil war, helping people, controlling violence, then why withdraw at all? If they are in fact doing the opposite - provoking civil war, hurting people, perpetuating violence - they should withdraw as quickly as ships and planes can carry them home.

It is four years since the United States invaded Iraq with a ferocious bombardment, with "shock and awe." That is enough time to decide if the presence of our troops is making the lives of the Iraqis better or worse. The evidence is overwhelming. Since the invasion, hundreds of thousands of Iraqis have died, and, according to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, about two million Iraqis have left the country, and an almost equal number are internal refugees, forced out of their homes, seeking shelter elsewhere in the country.

Yes, Saddam Hussein was a brutal tyrant. But his capture and death have not made the lives of Iraqis better, as the U.S. occupation has created chaos: no clean water, rising rates of hunger, 50 percent unemployment, shortages of food, electricity, and fuel, a rise in child malnutrition and infant deaths. Has the U.S. presence diminished violence? On the contrary, by January 2007 the number of insurgent attacks has increased dramatically to 180 a day.

The response of the Bush Administration to four years of failure is to send more troops. To add more troops matches the definition of fanaticism: If you find you're going in the wrong direction, redouble your speed. It reminds me of the physician in Europe in the early nineteenth century who decided that bloodletting would cure pneumonia. When that didn't work, he concluded that not enough blood had been let.

The Congressional Democrats' proposal is to give more funds to the war, and to set a timetable that will let the bloodletting go on for another year or more. It is necessary, they say, to compromise, and some anti-war people have been willing to go along. However, it is one thing to compromise when you are immediately given part of what you are demanding, if that can then be a springboard for getting more in the future. That is the situation described in the recent movie The Wind That Shakes The Barley, in which the Irish rebels against British rule are given a compromise solution - to have part of Ireland free, as the Irish Free State. In the movie, Irish brother fights against brother over whether to accept this compromise. But at least the acceptance of that compromise, however short of justice, created the Irish Free State. The withdrawal timetable proposed by the Democrats gets nothing tangible, only a promise, and leaves the fulfillment of that promise in the hands of the Bush Administration.

There have been similar dilemmas for the labor movement. Indeed, it is a common occurrence that unions, fighting for a new contract, must decide if they will accept an offer that gives them only part of what they have demanded. It's always a difficult decision, but in almost all cases, whether the compromise can be considered a victory or a defeat, the workers have been given some thing palpable, improving their condition to some degree. If they were offered only a promise of something in the future, while continuing an unbearable situation in the present, it would not be considered a compromise, but a sellout. A union leader who said, "Take this, it's the best we can get" (which is what the MoveOn people are saying about the Democrats' resolution) would be hooted off the platform.

I am reminded of the situation at the 1964 Democratic National Convention in Atlantic City, when the black delegation from Mississippi asked to be seated, to represent the 40 percent black population of that state. They were offered a "compromise" - two nonvoting seats. "This is the best we can get," some black leaders said. The Mississippians, led by Fannie Lou Hamer and Bob Moses, turned it down, and thus held on to their fighting spirit, which later brought them what they had asked for. That mantra - "the best we can get" - is a recipe for corruption.

It is not easy, in the corrupting atmosphere of Washington, D.C., to hold on firmly to the truth, to resist the temptation of capitulation that presents itself as compromise. A few manage to do so. I think of Barbara Lee, the one person in the House of Representatives who, in the hysterical atmosphere of the days following 9/11, voted against the resolution authorizing Bush to invade Afghanistan. Today, she is one of the few who refuse to fund the Iraq War, insist on a prompt end to the war, reject the dishonesty of a false compromise.

Except for the rare few, like Barbara Lee, Maxine Waters, Lynn Woolsey, and John Lewis, our representatives are politicians, and will surrender their integrity, claiming to be "realistic."

We are not politicians, but citizens. We have no office to hold on to, only our consciences, which insist on telling the truth. That, history suggests, is the most realistic thing a citizen can do.

Much better, because after all, 19 out of 20 people on this planet are not american.

Mind you, christians and jews aren't supposed to kill either.

Why call yourselves buddhists or christians if you don't believe the fundamentals of your faith?

I know that all men are equally men. There are no sub-human humans. I believe in our natural abundance and the capitalist technique being used socially to create an egalitarian classless society. So I believe, have seen already in the abundant society I live in now, hope for a socialist future. But you religionists only believe in what is convenient.

According to any religion whatsoever, you should not have attacked Iraq. Should not be killing or causing there to be killing through incompetent alliances and interference. And yet according to all american versions of religion, whatever america does is right.
How does america differ from Nazi germany?
It has the concentration camps in eastern europe, cuba and north africa to which "detainees" (POW's and innocents) are taken for torture; people are killed by the hundred thousand each year all around the world every year through american policies, american armies.
Sorry, but I can't stomach the sentimental rose-tinted glasses through which "we" the american heroes of the world do "what is best at heart" for the lesser nations (subhumans?) of the world who can't take care of themselves.

"remove the beam from thine own eye first"
"don't complain about the snow on your neighbour's roof when your own doorstep is unclean"
In my case, I know what britain is there for, so I can quite happily share with you what you too are there for: resources, markets, slave labour.

Howard zinn says "are we politicians or citizens"? (binaries, anyone?)
I say - neither, I'm mankind!

Last Edited on 21-Apr-2007 2:53 AM

Why call yourselves buddhists or christians if you don't believe the fundamentals of your faith?

These countries are all dictatorships.

So what can we learn from buddhism that we don't get from christianity (scoff), Islam (snort!) and Communism (wuh?)

Peace?

Your religion is hogwash, they all are. Sorry to 'prejudge' you, but that's what religion is all about, providing coloured glasses through which to interpret everything, namely

HOLY - NOT HOLY (EVIL)

By the way it's illegal to say what I've just said in this country. "inciting religious hatred"

Last Edited on 26-Apr-2007 8:57 AM

You support the war by procrastinating over whether the occupation should continue. Should it continue? No.

A religionist is a nutter who believes in invisible things, and that reality is unreal - eg that this world is an inferior copy or shadow of some perfect "other" "unseeable" world;

for example, a buddhist

Last Edited on 27-Apr-2007 8:58 AM

Look, I'm an atheist too, but a fundamentalist is fundamentalist... religous or not. Oh wait! We've already had this debate!!! (Ten times...)

Last Edited on 6-May-2007 6:06 PM

In the past week, the catholic church has taken steps to turn the pro-nazi pope of WW2 into a saint - 15 bishops and 15 cardinals have voted this way already.

Just this week the catholic and protestant sections of Ulster (northern ireland) have finally agreed to share homerule power in said country. "Reverend" Ian paisley held out for the past eight or so years, because he says "home rule is rome rule".

Just yesterday an irish girl won her right to come to england for an abortion of a foetus that is predicted to be so disabled that it will only live a few days. In ireland, the roman catholic laws forbid her an abortion on any grounds but rape. And even then, she must first prove the rape!

All over the world this week priests of all religions will be telling their Forrestt Gumps who to vote for, will be fiddling with children and unmarried mothers in their care, will be inciting people to murder anyone who does not love God, and show that love by giving money to the priests.

I'm not the extremist here.

As malcolm X said: "I don't believe in violence, they do".
Getting rid of priests and religion is about self defence.

so they killed him!

"The networks at work, keepin' people calm
Ya know they murdered X
And tried to blame it on Islam
He turned the power to the have-nots
And then came the shot"

Wore off on me

Now I know

They must be deprogrammed

Just like the weirdo paedo christians

and the hopelessly sad introverted buddhists

I agree that formal religion is used as a framework for indoctrination -- but any ideology (religious, secular, political, theoretical) can inculcate, and is generally designed to do so.

Therefore, being secular or atheist or religious is not what makes you a good or bad critical thinker. It is being able to see multiple perspectives, look at contexts, and developing the ability to hold two or more opposing thoughts in your mind at the same time.

Last Edited on 17-May-2007 11:20 PM

to be a catholic you must believe that 3 times one equals one. (the trinty). You must believe that God has a mother, a jew called mariah! You must believe, since the 19th century that the pope is infalible.
Now then.
If the pope says that aids is sent by the devil, that life begins when a sperm meets an egg (instantly, no development of non-life into life, apparently!) and that liberals are communists in mufti, then where's the good in that?

All the problems of america can be put down to brainwashing by priests and those the priests give their backing to.
No?

Doubt is the key to critical thinking. Actually, all THINKING is critical thinking, because all thought begins with a negative state of having a problem, and thinking begins to solve that problem.
"necessity is the mother of invention".

If you go round thinking that all things are "Inshallah" in gods hands, that all happens for a reason, then you'll end up content with living like a animal, like the talibanis and the average fatso from texas. Know nothin', do nothin', think nothin' animals.

So whilst "wisdom begins with the fear of the lord"
"reason begins with the rejection of faith".

Last Edited on 21-May-2007 4:37 AM

Otherwise, I agree with your point half-way. You have to understand that some religious people don't accept doctrine and mandated behavior unquestioningly or literally, but see it as one of many interactive elements to make sense of in the world.

Similarly, some atheists don't think deeply, some Marxists, some Green Party people. Every ideology has a party-line. So no one label determines if you think deeply and critically (or as Freire says "problem-pose")past what you have been taught.

Also, DOUBT and skepticism does usually does not lead to action. Often it leads to apathy. And I am NOT talking about you. Though I am sure you have encountered this.

Secular fundamentalism is absolutely no different than any other kind. They all operate under "I'm definitely right, and you are definitely wrong"

I would say that ME is more of a fundamentalist than any catholic I know.

Doubt leads to apathy, thats why the american army is so "active" in the world, because its soldiers are too badly educated to know right from wrong, and will do anything with no fear (doubt) that they might be wrong.

You don't know many catholics then do you, Jo.
I went to a catholic highschool, so I know a few. A few hundred! and are you kidding or what? Because, to be a catholic, the church INSISTS that you believe certain things.
Then is no "degree of belief" in the catholic church. It's called "dogma", "orthodoxy" (right-thinking).
Why just make stuff up to win an argument? It's dishonest, but you only fool yourself!

Caluje,
me.

If thinking is not directed towards solving a problem or improving a person's world, then its just descriptive.
This has a value, Like, say, poetry.
Anything else must be abstract speculation, and dare I say it, worthless.
Maybe we've got different ideas of 'critical'.
I just mean evaluative good or bad. like a food 'critic' may say a good thing as well as a bad.

If it means jst being negative, then well... everything ends up not good enough and the solution is total annihilation