And the show goes on

On Friday, July 22 a man was shot five times in the head on the floor of an Underground train by the police in London. The killing of the man was the big news of the day. Finally - many commentators on different TV channels here in the UK were saying - finally we are seeing the result of serious investigative operations. On the BBC I heard an “expert” saying that the public wants to see results and the shooting of the man is the result the public wants to see. TV journalists, with their impeccable aplomb, speculated all day about the mysterious man who was killed. He was kept under strict surveillance by the police since the day before, they said, when he had escaped from one of the bombing sites. Press conferences after press conferences, Sir Ian Blair, the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, repeated how quick the investigation was proceeding.

Great! But the man was completely innocent. “Mr de Menezes had been followed from his home in south London to Stockwell station after coming under surveillance and was felt by police to be acting suspiciously. A chase ensued before he was finally stopped on a Northern line train. Despite an initial statement from the Metropolitan Police Commissioner, Sir Ian Blair, that the man was "directly linked" to the terrorists who had tried to kill Londoners on Thursday, the force last night admitted he was not connected in any way.” (The Independent)

According to a recent poll, “72% of people said they thought that Britain’s participation in the Iraq war had made us more vulnerable to terrorist attack.”

From a recent report from The Royal Institute of International Affairs: “The report claims that there is ‘no doubt’ that the invasion of Iraq has imposed particular difficulties for the UK and for the wider coalition against terrorism. According to the paper, the situation in Iraq has ‘given a boost to the Al-Qaeda network’s propaganda, recruitment and fundraising’, whilst providing an ideal targeting and training area for Al-Qaeda-linked terrorists.”

But Blair and his gang keep repeating that this is an attack on “civilization”, on “our values” and “our way of life”. They keep repeating that the invasion of Iraq has nothing to do with the London bombing. Newspapers and TV channels keep asking Why are we attacked? Why we? Why now? The answers go behind the fantasy, but the word “Iraq” is never mentioned. Intellectuals, journalists and experts echo the master “It’s an attack on Western civilization”.

And the show goes on. We keep taking the bus and the tube with the danger to explode because of some bombs (or to be shot by some very efficient police operations) while the main responsible for all this madness keep preaching and lying from 10 Downing Street.

On the same subject read also:
- London Blasts: Don't let them win By Gabriele Zamparini
- Truth Struggling By John Pilger

London Blasts: Don't let them win

By Gabriele Zamparini

London, the city where I live, has been attacked. Ordinary people are paying the price, once again. Killing innocent people is an infamous act, never legitimate. Never justified. Never. But if we want to understand what’s going on without hysteria, we must look at the full picture. Again, not to apologize. But to understand. And hopefully to do something to build a better world.

I was living in New York when the September 11th attacks happened. I saw the people of New York meeting spontaneously in the streets and the squares of Downtown Manhattan. Staying together. Talking and singing for peace. Not revenge. I witnessed how the power used those events for its own agenda. I remember the manipulation of the events by the media, that corporate media that was beating the drums for war. And I feared the rise of a totalitarian regime.

There are still many questions on what exactly happened that day. But since, Afghanistan has been bombed and innocent people there, people like you and me, are still dying because of our Governments’ actions. Iraq has been invaded and occupied. No connections whatsoever linked Iraq to the September 11th attacks. And none of the alleged reasons given by our ruthless leaders were true. More than 100,000 Iraqi innocent civilians have been murdered, most of them women and children. Many young boys and girls from the United States, the United Kingdom, from Italy and many other countries lost their lives. Young boys and girls who didn't even start their lives were sent to kill other people, people who did nothing to them or to their own country. They were sent far away from home, through a brain washing process that involves complicity and unity by all sides of the establishment.

And then the massive human rights violation at Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib…

All this and much more, we were told, was necessary to fight the “War on Terror”. But war IS terror.

All this and much more, we were told, was necessary to keep our cities safe. Then Madrid and now London.

All this and much more, we were told, was necessary to build democracy in Iraq. Yet, no Iraqi wants foreign occupation.

In this day of sorrow, our solidarity and our thoughts must go to the innocent victims of these cruel and infamous acts in London. But our love for these brothers and sisters must not be an empty and hypocritical gesture of circumstance or convenience.

This is a time for reason, honesty and open discussion. Those who target innocent civilians are infamous terrorists who deserve our contempt and must be held accountable. Always. Doesn’t matter if they terrorize innocent civilians with a bomb placed on a bus or with much more expensive and sophisticated weaponry paid for by our tax money. Let’s not let them win.

The 'Good Samaritan' Connection

WORLD BANK - Working for a World Free of poverty.

INTERNATIONAL MONETARY FUND - The IMF is an organization of 184 countries, working to foster global monetary cooperation, secure financial stability, facilitate international trade, promote high employment and sustainable economic growth, and reduce poverty.

WORLD TRADE ORGANIZATION - The World Trade Organization (WTO) is the only global international organization dealing with the rules of trade between nations. At its heart are the WTO agreements, negotiated and signed by the bulk of the world’s trading nations and ratified in their parliaments. The goal is to help producers of goods and services, exporters, and importers conduct their business.

WORLD ECONOMIC FORUM - The World Economic Forum is an independent international organization committed to improving the state of the world by engaging leaders in partnerships to shape global, regional and industry agendas. Incorporated as a foundation in 1971, and based in Geneva, Switzerland, the World Economic Forum is impartial and not-for-profit; it is tied to no political, partisan or national interests.

G8 Gleneagles - " I really want to focus on the challenges of Africa and climate change during our Presidency. Africa is a wonderful, diverse continent with an extraordinary, energetic and resilient people. But it is also plagued with problems so serious that no continent could tackle them on its own." (from 'Welcome from the Prime Minister, the Rt Hon Tony Blair')

Who's winning in Iraq?

Someone has already won in Iraq.

Coca-Cola Company's Turkish partner said it had set up a new bottler for Iraq that will see the soft-drink giant's first permament presence there in more than 20 years. (Read more)

Nobel Peace Prize for Sir Geldof? Why Not?

Live8 organiser Bob Geldof has been nominated for the 2006 Nobel Peace Prize. BBC News

Why not?

Sir Bob Geldof has warned an unnamed American musician not to criticise US President George W Bush during the American Live 8 concert next month. (...) The mystery singer, who is anxious not to be named, was told by an angry Geldof, "Please remember, absolutely no ranting and raving about Bush or Blair and the Iraq war." UK & Ireland Yahoo News

[Sir Geldof said that Bush] "has actually done more than any American President for Africa." Chicago Tribune

[Geldof] condemned the protesters who were involved in battles with police on Monday as "a bunch of losers". (...) Geldof said he believed the Live 8 concerts had made a difference. "Look at George Bush's reaction where he said he watched the concert all day and it was a great piece of mass advocacy," he said. "After the concert he began talking about trade. He started talking in very different language." (...) BBC News

So, after Henry Kissinger and Jimmy Carter, why not Sir Bob Geldof?

John Pilger: FROM IRAQ TO THE G8

Over the past two weeks, the contrast between two related "global" events has been salutary. The first was the World Tribunal on Iraq held in Istanbul; the second the G8 meeting in Scotland and the Make Poverty History campaign. Reading the papers and watching television in Britain, you would know nothing about the Istanbul meetings, which produced the most searing evidence to date of the greatest political scandal of modern times: the attack on a defenceless Iraq by America and Britain.

Read "FROM IRAQ TO THE G8: THE POLITE CRUSHING OF DISSENT AND TRUTH" by John Pilger

World Tribunal? What World Tribunal?

Media Lens has detected a recent shift in media reporting. It is hard to quantify, but there is a palpable uneasiness amongst media professionals at the increasing rise of the 'blogosphere' and internet-based 'alternative' media sites. Joe and Jo Public are increasingly aware that the news and commentary distributed by the BBC, ITN, Channel 4 news and the liberal broadsheets, are protecting major war criminals in London and Washington.

THE MYSTERIOUS CASE OF THE VANISHING WORLD TRIBUNAL ON IRAQ
MEDIALENS

A Fascist Fart

Marcello PERA, President of the Italian Senate and second authority of the Italian Republic, during a meeting in Spain with the former premier Aznar, made the following comment about the new Spanish law legalizing gay marriage:

“One thing is clear: it’s false that [the new law] is about civil rights or measures against discriminations or extension of equality. Instead it’s about the triumph of that laicism that claims to transform desires – and sometimes even whims – into human rights.”

Mr PERA, a philosopher of liberalism (really this word can mean anything!), is a prominent figure of the Berlusconi’s party “Forza Italia” and is a very close friend of Joseph Ratzinger, now Pope Benedict XVI. Pera and Ratzinger wrote together a book, whose title is “SENZA RADICI. Europa, Relativismo, Cristianesimo, Islam” (WITHOUT ROOTS. Europe, Relativism, Christianity, Islam). I didn’t (and of course I won’t) read it. But the two men have the same opinions on divorce, abortion, homosexuality, scientific research and God only knows what else.

In my region in Italy, PERA means FART. I know, put like that it’s too cheesy. So, let’s ask help to Dante.

“Ed elli avea del cul fatto trombetta” (And he had made a trumpet of his rump. ) (Inferno, XXI.139)

Well, it’s summer, time of trips and holidays. I would propose to those willing to go to Italy: don’t go. The air there really stinks these days! Go instead to Spain, to get a much cleaner and fresher breath:

"We are not legislating, honorable members, for people far away and not known by us. We are enlarging the opportunity for happiness to our neighbors, our co-workers, our friends and, our families: at the same time we are making a more decent society, because a decent society is one that does not humiliate its members." (from Spanish Premier Zapatero's remarkable gay marriage speech)

War on Drugs

The profit margins for major traffickers of heroin into Britain are so high they outstrip luxury goods companies such as Louis Vuitton and Gucci, according to a study that Downing Street is refusing to publish under freedom of information legislation. Only the first half of the strategy unit study led by the former director general of the BBC, Lord Birt, was released last Friday. The other half was withheld but has been leaked to the Guardian.

Revealed: how drugs war failed. Low seizure rates give traffickers vast profits from £4bn a year business, says report ministers refuse to publish. By Alan Travis, The Guardian

IPS Analysis: it has to be read to be believed!!!

I'm a regular reader of IPS (Inter Press Service News Agency) and I think it is a great source of valuable real news one can’t find easily in other outlets. For this reason I was even more surprised to read Live 8 Emotion Imperfect but an Impetus. Analysis by Sanjay Suri. The last paragraph is a real masterpiece of "analysis":

But there is no doubt the concerts placed Africa a little more on the minds of hundreds of millions, if not a billion or two people. And there can be no doubt that that is immeasurably better than doing nothing.

Click here to read more comments (and real analysis!) on Live 8

Freedom of the Press

George Orwell wrote:

"Freedom of the Press, if it means anything at all, means the freedom to criticize and oppose."

Obviously at 10 Downing Street, they must know Orwell very well!

Spinwatch refused a G8 press pass by the Police
Spinwatch Co-editor David Miller has been refused a press pass to cover the G8 summit at Gleneagles. According to Sean McCulloch of the vetting unit at Tayside police this has not been an isolated occurrence. Several journalists have been refused passes. Indeed it transpires that several letters announcing arrangments for picking up press passes have been sent to journalists, according to Sean McCulloch. They have subsequently had their passes rescinded on the orders of the police/intelligence agencies. The denial of press passes to journalists is an attempt to ensure that coverage of the G8 summit is managed to give a favourable glow to the G8 summit process. There is a clear strategy by the UK government to avaoid any circumstances in which debate on their record can take place. Spinwatch has asked the National Union of Journalists to intervene on our behalf. More on this process later...

Viva Zapatero

"We are not legislating, honorable members, for people far away and not known by us. We are enlarging the opportunity for happiness to our neighbors, our co-workers, our friends and, our families: at the same time we are making a more decent society, because a decent society is one that does not humiliate its members."

SPANISH PREMIER ZAPATERO'S REMARKABLE GAY MARRIAGE SPEECH
(Read it on DIRELAND)

Enemy Combatants All

Civil Society Moves to Center Stage
The World Tribunal of Iraq was a striking display of how global civil society is supplanting governments and the corporate media as the source of truth, justice, and direction as the latter institutions get universally discredited, and how well it is performing that role. The Istanbul session was the final act of a two-year process of about 20 hearings held in different parts of the world, including London, Mumbai, Copenhagen, Brussels, New York, Japan, Stockholm, South Korea, Rome, Frankfurt, Spain, Tunis, and Geneva. It was a nearly flawless performance of a symphony of sorrow, outrage, and condemnation organized by Turkish peace activists and performed by over a hundred people drawn from all over the world and from all walks of life, with a Jury of Conscience made up of citizens of 10 countries and a Panel of Advocates with 54 members. It united senior leaders of the transborder people's movement like international lawyer and university professor Richard Falk, head of the panel of advocates, and human rights activist Chandra Muzzafar, with nineties activists like celebrated novelist Arundathi Roy, and members of an even younger generation like Herbert Docena, who presented a universally applauded portrait of the economic colonization of Iraq, Dahr Jamail, who has become one of the most trusted sources of information on the war, and Iraqi activist Rana Mustafa, who risked life and limb along with photojournalist Mark Miller to make sure the world would have a film record of the destruction of Fallujah.

Enemy Combatants All
The Jury of Conscience's conclusions and recommendations are likely to have a powerful moral influence on the course of events, especially its call on US and Coalition soldiers to exercise their right to conscientious objection and on communities throughout the world to provide haven for those who heed this call. On the last day of the tribunal, jury leader Arundathi Roy observed that her thoughts and actions would categorize her as an “enemy combatant” in the US government's view. As I joined the thunderous applause for the jury's decisions, I thought, yes, why not, we are all enemy combatants now, and proud of it.

The Perfect Storm: the World Tribunal
by Walden Bello (Executive director of Focus on the Global South and professor of sociology at the University of the Philippines)

The Abominable Live 8

I felt dizzy when I read about Bono and World Bank President Paul Wolfowitz talking about poverty in Africa. But the worst had still to happen.

I wanted to laugh – but I couldn’t – when I heard George W. Bush talking about the great generosity of US Government to help the developing countries. But the worst had still to happen.

I felt sick when I saw Tony Blair and Sir Bob Geldof flirting and preaching on TV about Make Poverty History. But the worst had still to happen.

I thought of Afghanistan and Iraq when I heard UN Secretary General Kofi Annan saying: "On behalf of the poor, the voiceless and the weak I say thank you." But the worst had still to happen.

Then I saw Bill Gates on the stage of Live 8 in London, calling for generosity. But even that wasn’t the worst.

The worst would be let these clowns blind us on the real causes of the problem, in Africa as anywhere else. The worst would be falling in this propaganda trap orchestrated by war criminals and their friends. The worst would be let them win.

This morning I read an open letter by Sir Bob Geldof to the leaders of the G8. Toward the end, he writes: “Today there will be noise and music and joy, the joy of exuberant possibility. On Friday there will be a great silence as the world awaits your verdict.”

Let’s not be silent, neither on Friday, nor on Saturday or on any other day. Let’s not be silent against this clan of gangsters who arrogate to themselves the right to decide the life and death of millions of people and our very survival on this planet.

To keep my sanity I collected a few articles about all this. Take a look!

"I will be going up to Edinburgh not to march in favour of the G8, but to protest against it. And to protest against Geldof and Bono as well."

Monbiot to march against Live 8 and MPH (Make Poverty History). By Stuart Hodkinson. Red Pepper

“This initiative is driven out of northern countries, the African leg of Live8 was just tagged on the end so it's not geared to African audiences. This is where Africans and genuine friends of Africa . . . who are forced to live with this patronising mega focus are caught up with frustrating ambiguities,” wrote Abdul-Raheem Tajudeen, a commentator in Tanzania's Guardian newspaper. “How can you say that this focus on Africa is bad when the complaint before is that there is not enough attention to the challenges of the continent? Yet something inside you tells you that this interest is just the fashion of the moment and after it all, the public can actually return to their ignorant ways having done their bit for Africa.” In Kenya, Solomon Mbicha, a 31-year-old architect, takes an even more cynical view. “This is all done for publicity and economic gain. They do not really care for the people affected, the so-called people they are supposed to help,” he says. “Africa's problems can only be solved by Africans, not by external forces.”

Bob who? Live8 fails to resonate in Africa. By Andrew England in Dar es Salaam. Financial Times

Money from Live Aid saved lives but, as aid expert David Rieff recently argued, it may also have led to the loss of just as many lives. There was no sea change in attitudes. That wave of compassion did not stop millions voting for right wingers like Thatcher, Bush and Kohl in subsequent elections. Today, Africa is, if anything, worse off. (...) Geldof's un-punkishly conciliatory stance to these people creates the illusion that, as with the tsunami, "no one is to blame".

Why I won't be watching Live 8. By David Stubbs. Reviews editor of The Wire music magazine. BBC News

The former Genesis singer, who has been a leading proponent of world music, said he had failed to persuade Bob Geldof, the organiser of Live8, of his case. Speaking at a press conference in London, Gabriel said: "I do think it would be better to have a larger African presence in Hyde Park. Bob made the point that in places like China, if there's an act that comes on TV that they don't know, whether from Africa or Germany, they may well switch off. He wants to keep people watching. I don't agree that's the right criteria, but there it is."

Revealed (at last): Live8's African artists. By Cahal Milmo. Belfast Telegraph

The Bob Geldof superstar concert series 'Live 8' correctly stood accused of being 'hideously white' (as Black Information Link put it), since only one band from Africa was scheduled amongst dozens at the five major performances. (A hastily arranged additional concert in Johannesburg may lead to a kind of outsourcing for black bands.) In any case, Sir Bob's mid-1980s Live Aid famine relief strategy is widely understood to have flopped because it ignored the countervailing roles of imperial power relations, capital accumulation, unreformable global institutions and venal local elites problems repeated and indeed amplified in Live 8. (,,,) Bono in particular has been obsequious. At the last New Labour party convention, Bono labeled Blair/Brown the 'Lennon and McCartney of poverty reduction'. According to Quarmby, 'some groups involved in Make Poverty History were horrified. John Hilary, director of campaigns and policy at War on Want, was in the audience. "When Bono said that, many NGO leaders who were there put their heads in their hands and groaned It's a killer blow for us. To see the smiles on the faces of Gordon Brown and Tony Blair! This is exactly what they want - they want people to believe that this is their crusade, without actually changing their policy."'

How Glo-Bono-Phonies and Trojan Horse NGOs Sabotage the Struggle Against Neoliberalism. By PATRICK BOND, DENNIS BRUTUS and VIRGINIA SETSHEDI. CounterPunch

The front page of the London Observer on 12 June announced, "55 billion Africa debt deal 'a victory for millions'." The "victory for millions" is a quotation of Bob Geldof, who said, "Tomorrow 280 million Africans will wake up for the first time in their lives without owing you or me a penny...". The nonsense of this would be breathtaking if the reader's breath had not already been extracted by the unrelenting sophistry of Geldof, Bono, Blair, the Observer et al.
Africa's imperial plunder and tragedy have been turned into a circus for the benefit of the so-called G8 leaders due in Scotland next month and those of us willing to be distracted by the barkers of the circus: the establishment media and its "celebrities". The illusion of an anti establishment crusade led by pop stars - a cultivated, controlling image of rebellion - serves to dilute a great political movement of anger. In summit after summit, not a single significant "promise" of the G8 has been kept, and the "victory for millions" is no different. It is a fraud - actually a setback to reducing poverty in Africa. Entirely conditional on vicious, discredited economic programmes imposed by the World Bank and the IMF, the "package" will ensure that the "chosen" countries slip deeper into poverty.

The G8 Summit: A Fraud and a Circus. By John Pilger. New Statesman

The spectacle of Bob Geldof and Bono bear-hugging G8 leaders in Genoa on Saturday was revolting. It was not just the manic presumption that they would have an iota of influence, or the phoniness and the crass attention-seeking of the exhibition that was stomach-churning. It was their giddy association with the rulers of the world and their eloquent dissociation from the tens of thousands who had gathered to protest against the unfairness and inequities of the new world order. The G8 represents the tyranny of the new world order against the interests of the world's poor. Self-chosen on the basis of their military might and capitalist credentials, the G8 seeks to further its hegemony of the world, amid a pretense of compassion for the developing world. (Geldof and Bono unwittingly - one assumes - helped further that pretense by the ghastly photo-opportunity in which they participated.) It represents the damaging consequences of globalization and the marginalization of the Third World.

Published on Wednesday, July 25, 2001 in The Irish Times. Geldof and Bono Out of Tune on G8. By Vincent Browne. Read the article on Common Dreams

(...) globalisation does not mean 'the impotence of the state', but the rejection by the state of its social functions in favour of repressive ones, irresponsibility on the part of governments, and the ending of democratic freedoms. (...) Democracy consists not only in the possibility of expressing different points of view (this possibility was manifested to some degree in the discussion in the castle), but also in everyone having this possibility. The problem lies not only in politics. At its heart is the indifference of the media, and above all of the television, to any attempt at 'dull' theorising, the rule of banality, and the refusal to listen to the opinions of people outside a narrow circle of 'newsmakers' (whether these are official or 'alternative' is ultimately unimportant).

The lessons of Prague, by BORIS KAGARLITSKY. Issue 89 of INTERNATIONAL SOCIALISM JOURNAL


On the same topic:
- Cosa Nostra
- Nothing About Us, Without Us
- Iraq, G8 and a Question for Bono & Sir Bob
- The battle to re-conquest Africa