A Twitter clash has broken out between people favoring #BlackLivesMatter or #AllLivesMatter, both protesting U.S. police violence against Americans but failing to take into account the hundreds of thousands of lives lost to the U.S. military as self-appointed global policeman, says Sam Husseini.
By Sam Husseini
The last several months have seen a debate, at times heated, between the #BlackLivesMatter movement and those who respond with #AllLivesMatter. I think a lot of people — perhaps not all — who are using both tags are missing a larger point and opening themselves up to ultimately devaluing a lot of lives.
People use #BlackLivesMatter to denote that given our criminal “justice” system, African-Americans are frequently targeted, endangered and at times killed largely because they are black. And that’s totally true and needed saying a long time ago.
Afghan children await school supplies from Allied forces at Sozo School in Kabul. (French navy photo by Master Petty Officer Valverde)
People saying #AllLivesMatter presume to appeal to universal values, perhaps also noting that poor whites and others have particular vulnerabilities to police abuse as well. And the last part is certainly true. But it is odd to see an appeal to universal values that seems to broaden the point to include a relatively privileged group.
They crit each other: “The Defacement of Sandra Bland Mural Proves #AllLivesMatter Is Destructive” (“#AllLivesMatter is a mantra of white supremacy that ignores history…” and “#BlackLivesMatter Should Move Towards #AllLivesMatter” (“Twice as many Whites are killed than Blacks by cops, which means they are killed at about a third of the rate as Blacks.”)
But both sides limit who they mean by “lives.” They effectively exclude the victims of the U.S.’s highest officials. When most people use #BlackLivesMatter, they seem to be saying that all black U.S. lives matter when taken unlawfully by the government. And when most people who use #AllLivesMatter use it, they seem to be saying all U.S. lives matter when taken at the hands of police authorities — not just black U.S. lives. But the formulation effectively excludes the lives of millions of people who U.S. officials have deemed expendable for reasons of state.
Charles Blow of the New York Times, for example, at one level makes a legitimate point: “#AllLivesMatter may be your personal position, but until that is this COUNTRY’S position it is right to specify the lives it values less…” But aren’t some of the lives that this country values less the lives our government and military has taken in Iraq and Afghanistan the last 15 years?
Blow also tweeted: “I will not be an accessory to my own oppression. #BlackLivesMatter” But nor should one be an accessory to the oppression of others.
What should be a glaring blind spot has at time reached absurd proportions. Hillary Clinton saying “all lives matter” at a predominantly black church was deemed a “misstep” by NPR, but why not examine if it makes any sense coming from her?
While a U.S. senator, Clinton voted for authorizing President George W. Bush to invade Iraq, resulting in hundreds of thousands killed and millions displaced. While Secretary of State, Clinton helped preside over the U.S. massive nuclear weapons arsenal, which threatens the entire planet, the drone assassination program which has killed thousands, and the NATO bombing of Libya, boasting afterward of Muammar Gaddafi’s brutal murder: “We came, we saw, he died.” That doesn’t exactly square with a position of “all lives matter.”
As it is, #BlackLivesMatter fails to genuinely uplift the lives of the most discarded by remaining within a national confine. And #AllLivesMatter isn’t being universal at all — in its current form, it’s being outright nationalistic and parochial.
Many now know the names of Sandra Bland and of Samuel DuBose and other African-Americans whose lives were devalued by law enforcement officials, we know their names and we know some of their stories. But the U.S. government has been bombing and attacking several countries in the Mideast and parts of Africa for years now, including. Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Somalia, Pakistan, Yemen, Libya. How many names do you know of the victims of U.S. foreign policy?
We know the names of the victims of the so-called Islamic State, people like Steven Sotloff. We know the names of victims of the Taliban, like Malala Yousafzai, who recovered from their attack on her. But the U.S. government has killed thousands of people in Iraq and Afghanistan, but we don’t know the names, we don’t listen to their stories.
Virtually the only time we meaningfully perceive the violence of U.S. foreign policy — in media or anywhere really — is when U.S. soldiers are hurt or killed. Otherwise, the violence is accepted as normal, as Cincinnati prosecutor Joe Deters said in relation to the police slaying of Samuel DuBose: “This doesn’t happen in the United States — okay. This might happen in Afghanistan or somewhere. This just does not happen in the United States.”
Have you thought of a civilian victim of U.S. policy who you could name? You probably came up with Anwar al-Awlaki. But the reason you know his name is he was a U.S. citizen, proving the point that often that is what bestows value upon a human life. A study by Physicians for Social Responsibility earlier this year found: “The number of Iraqis killed during and since the 2003 U.S. invasion have been assessed at one million, which represents 5 percent of the total population of Iraq. This does not include deaths among the three million refugees subjected to privations.”
But that’s a non-story. We’ve ended up in a sense embracing Stalin’s aphorism: “The death of one man is a tragedy, the death of millions is a statistic.” A year ago, the U.S. government backed the latest of Israel’s regular brutal bombing of Gaza, in which Israel killed over 1,000 Palestinians, hundreds of them children. For several months now, U.S. ally Saudi Arabia has been bombing Yemen to minimal attention and virtually no protest. President Barack Obama just visited Ethiopia and Kenya — with barely any criticism of how those nations have carved up Somalia, perpetuating killing there.
It may be possible to honor the noblest possible intent in #BlackLivesMatter: That we should rush to aid those lives that are disregarded by many. Likewise for #AllLivesMatter: We should be universal and apply the principle of veneration of the value of life truly to all. Both impulses in their best form would argue to seriously scrutinize the U.S. government’s role as global rogue cop — a “cop” more dangerous than the most violent, racist police operating in the U.S. today.
Sam Husseini is communications director for the Institute for Public Accuracy. Follow him on twitter: @samhusseini.
How, Why White Lives Matter ( Prosper & Thrive in America )
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The American Industrial Revolution and the Building of American Wealth
How Andrew Carnegie got fabulously rich off the backs of Black prison labor. (1900-1940)
In the introduction to Slavery by Another Name, Blackmon describes his experience as a reporter for the Wall Street Journal “asking a provocative question: What would be revealed if American corporations were examined through the same sharp lens of historical confrontation as the one then being trained on German corporations that relied on Jewish slave labor during World War II and the Swiss banks that robbed victims of the Holocaust of their fortunes?” His story describing corporate use of black forced labor in the post-Civil War South generated more response than any other piece he had written, and inspired him to pursue a book-length study of the subject.
Blackmon structures his narrative around a young African American man named Green Cottenham; though the records of Cottenham’s life are incomplete, Blackmon states that “the absence of his voice rests at the center of this book.” Cottenham, who was born in the 1880s to two former slaves, was arrested in 1908 for vagrancy, a common pretext to detain blacks without a white patron. The state of Alabama rented him to a coal mine owned by U.S. Steel Corporation, where he died.
As context for Cottenham’s story, Slavery by Another Name also details the beginnings of “industrial slavery”, in which convict laborers were put to work in factories or mines rather than cotton fields. Though slaves were formally emancipated by the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution following the Civil War, Southern states subsequently passed Black Codes, ” an array of interlocking laws essentially intended to criminalize black life”, to restrict the economic independence of blacks and provide pretexts for jail terms. These convicts were then rented to plantations, lumber camps, and mines to be used for forced labor. Though federal prosecutors such as Eugene Reese attempted to prosecute responsible parties in the early 1900s under federal laws against debt peonage, the efforts received little support locally or nationally. The system finally comes to an end only with the advent of World War II, approximately four decades.
In the book’s epilogue, Blackmon argues for the importance of acknowledging this history of forced labor: “the evidence moldering in county courthouses and the National Archives compels us to confront this extinguished past, to recognize the terrible contours of the record, to teach our children the truth of a terror that pervaded much of American life.
How/Why White Lives Matter
Example #1
How the GI Bill Left Out African Americans
David Callahan
November 11, 2013
Veterans Day is always an occasion among progressives to talk up the GI Bill. And, indeed, that 1944 legislation was truly remarkable, helping millions of returning veterans go to college and buy homes in the great postwar suburban land rush.
Unfortunately, we often forget the darker side of this story — which is how African-American veterans were denied many of the benefits of the GI Bill.
Why is this part of the story important to remember? Because it helps explain the ongoing challenges of African-Americans to build wealth and achieve intergenerational mobility.
There are lots of reasons that whites have so much more wealth than nonwhites. How the GI Bill played out is one of those reasons. Whites were able to use the government guaranteed housing loans that were a pillar of the bill to buy homes in the fast growing suburbs. Those homes subsequently rose greatly in value in coming decades, creating vast new household wealth for whites during the postwar era.
But black veterans weren’t able to make use of the housing provisions of the GI Bill for the most part. Banks generally wouldn’t make loans for mortgages in black neighborhoods, and African-Americans were excluded from the suburbs by a combination of deed covenants and racism.
In short, the GI Bill helped fostered a long-term boom in white wealth but did almost nothing to help blacks to build wealth. We are still living with the effects of that exclusion today — and will be for a long time to come.
How/Why White Lives Matter
Example #1
How the GI Bill Left Out African Americans
David Callahan
November 11, 2013
Veterans Day is always an occasion among progressives to talk up the GI Bill. And, indeed, that 1944 legislation was truly remarkable, helping millions of returning veterans go to college and buy homes in the great postwar suburban land rush.
Unfortunately, we often forget the darker side of this story — which is how African-American veterans were denied many of the benefits of the GI Bill.
Why is this part of the story important to remember? Because it helps explain the ongoing challenges of African-Americans to build wealth and achieve intergenerational mobility.
There are lots of reasons that whites have so much more wealth than nonwhites. How the GI Bill played out is one of those reasons. Whites were able to use the government guaranteed housing loans that were a pillar of the bill to buy homes in the fast growing suburbs. Those homes subsequently rose greatly in value in coming decades, creating vast new household wealth for whites during the postwar era.
But black veterans weren’t able to make use of the housing provisions of the GI Bill for the most part. Banks generally wouldn’t make loans for mortgages in black neighborhoods, and African-Americans were excluded from the suburbs by a combination of deed covenants and racism.
In short, the GI Bill helped fostered a long-term boom in white wealth but did almost nothing to help blacks to build wealth. We are still living with the effects of that exclusion today — and will be for a long time to come.
>>>Mark It is nothing but ego or bigotry or power between humans that gives us the illusion that one life matters more than another.<<<
The MILLIONS Red Black Brown or Tawny skinned humans murdered, mutilated and dominated by Europeans for hundreds of years past, present and future are no "illusion", Mark.
(For a clue, do a google search for Kissinger's NSSM200.)
Mortimer, I wonder if we are having a problem in perception and understanding each other?
The illusion of which I’ve been referring to all along would be the illusion the perpetrators have — that their lives were and are somehow more important than all of those “MILLIONS Red Black Brown or Tawny skinned humans murdered, mutilated and dominated” — while quite literally Europeans have been playing God to the greatest degree they are capable by deciding who lives and dies — as though their lives matter more — as we are still seeing today with technologically advanced weapons in the hands of primitively tribalistic humans (Europeans).
My point has been stated all along — their lives do not matter more than any others and may prove to be an overall negative as explained in my previous comment.
By the tone of your comments I don’t believe you have been comprehending my intended meanings throughout this conversation starting with your first response to my initial comment.
Thanks, Mark. I am grateful and very appreciative of your taking time for this clarification. I’m glad we’ll no longer be banging heads.
I extend a poetical right hand of friendship to you, plus a high-5 and a fist bump.
Peace, with apologies…
Thumbs up on all of that even — though we likely would have differing views on a number of issues… Arguing on these boards is largely an exercise in logic and understanding for myself.
When looking from a historical perspective of what so and so or so and so did in the past, any human could rationalize any atrocity based on the reasoning that it happened before. I see a lot of people on message boards trying to justify one form of bigoted supremacy or another based on something in the past or made up BS. Be it American exceptionalism, Zionism or any other bigoted ideology — it generally comes down to someone trying to “justify”, through absolute BS, taking something someone else has including peoples lives for no valid moral or legal reason.
There is and always has been a great deal of human psychology playing into all of this with the motives of those imposing, deceivers, denyers, the sentimentally or religiously biased, with all the sycophants and sell-outs and anyone else who caters to and perceives to gain from the status quo or it’s continuation — all playing a part in creating the present reality. In spite of all the BS there is truth in all matters even if we don’t accept it or know what it is.
As we know, with the laws currently in place, corruption is systemically built right into our US political reality — the vast majority does have a price for which they’ll sell out moral and legal principle. It could be we’re all destined because our human nature and instincts control us much more than what’s left of our compromised intellects due to our human nature, instinct and psychological factors.
Today’s “Globalization†actually began in the 16th century with the formation of the British East India Company.
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Based in London, the East India Company presided over the creation of the British Raj. In 1717 the company received a royal dictate from the Moghul Emperor exempting the company from the payment of custom duties in Bengal, giving it a decided commercial advantage in the Indian trade. A decisive victory by Sir Robert Clive at the Battle of Plassey in 1757 established the British East India Company as a military as well as a commercial power. By 1760 the French were driven out of India, with the exception of a few trading posts on the coast, such as Pondicherry.
The company also had interests along the routes to India from Great Britain. As early as 1620 the company attempted to lay claim to the Table Mountain region in South Africa and later it occupied and ruled St. Helena. The company also established Hong Kong and Singapore, employed Captain William Kidd (1645–1701) to combat piracy, and cultivated the production of tea in India.
Another notable event in the company’s history is that it >>>> made the fortune of Elihu Yale (1649–1721), the benefactor of what became Yale University. Its products were the basis of the Boston Tea Party in Colonial America.<<<<
Its shipyards provided the model for St. Petersburg, elements of its administration survive in the Indian bureaucracy, and its corporate structure was the most successful early example of a joint stock company.
However, the demands of company officers on the treasury of Bengal contributed tragically to the province's incapacity in the face of a famine which killed millions in 1770–1773.
(Otherwise known as the Bengali Holocaust)
a famine which killed millions in 1770–1773.
(Otherwise known as the Bengali Holocaust)
…do ‘All’ lives REALLY matter, Mark???
The Bengal Famine: How the British engineered the worst genocide in human history for profit
Rakhi Chakraborty
“I hate Indians. They are a beastly people with a beastly religion. The famine was their own fault for breeding like rabbits.†-Winston Churchill
The British had a ruthless economic agenda when it came to operating in India and that did not include empathy for native citizens. Under the British Raj, India suffered countless famines. But the worst hit was Bengal. The first of these was in 1770, followed by severe ones in 1783, 1866, 1873, 1892, 1897 and lastly 1943-44. Previously, when famines had hit the country, indigenous rulers were quick with useful responses to avert major disasters. After the advent of the British, most of the famines were a consequence of monsoonal delays along with the exploitation of the country’s natural resources by the British for their own financial gain. Yet they did little to acknowledge the havoc these actions wrought. If anything, they were irritated at the inconveniences in taxing the famines brought about.
The first of these famines was in 1770 and was ghastly brutal. The first signs indicating the coming of such a huge famine manifested in 1769 and the famine itself went on till 1773. It killed approximately 10 million people, millions more than the Jews incarcerated during the Second World War. It wiped out one third the population of Bengal. John Fiske, in his book “The Unseen Worldâ€, wrote that the famine of 1770 in Bengal was far deadlier than the Black Plague that terrorized Europe in the fourteenth century. Under the Mughal rule, peasants were required to pay a tribute of 10-15 per cent of their cash harvest. This ensured a comfortable treasury for the rulers and a wide net of safety for the peasants in case the weather did not hold for future harvests. In 1765 the Treaty of Allahabad was signed and East India Company took over the task of collecting the tributes from the then Mughal emperor Shah Alam II. Overnight the tributes, the British insisted on calling them tributes and not taxes for reasons of suppressing rebellion, increased to 50 percent. The peasants were not even aware that the money had changed hands. They paid, still believing that it went to the Emperor.
Partial failure of crop was quite a regular occurrence in the Indian peasant’s life. That is why the surplus stock, which remained after paying the tributes, was so important to their livelihood. But with the increased taxation, this surplus deteriorated rapidly. When partial failure of crops came in 1768, this safety net was no longer in place. The rains of 1769 were dismal and herein the first signs of the terrible draught began to appear. The famine occurred mainly in the modern states of West Bengal and Bihar but also hit Orissa, Jharkhand and Bangladesh. Bengal was, of course, the worst hit. Among the worst affected areas were Birbum and Murshidabad in Bengal. Thousands depopulated the area in hopes of finding sustenance elsewhere, only to die of starvation later on. Those who stayed on perished nonetheless. Huge acres of farmland were abandoned. Wilderness started to thrive here, resulting in deep and inhabitable jungle areas. Tirhut, Champaran and Bettiah in Bihar were similarly affected in Bihar.
Prior to this, whenever the possibility of a famine had emerged, the Indian rulers would waive their taxes and see compensatory measures, such as irrigation, instituted to provide as much relief as possible to the stricken farmers. The colonial rulers continued to ignore any warnings that came their way regarding the famine, although starvation had set in from early 1770. Then the deaths started in 1771. That year, the company raised the land tax to 60 per cent in order to recompense themselves for the lost lives of so many peasants. Fewer peasants resulted in less crops that in turn meant less revenue. Hence the ones who did not yet succumb to the famine had to pay double the tax so as to ensure that the British treasury did not suffer any losses during this travesty.
After taking over from the Mughal rulers, the British had issued widespread orders for cash crops to be cultivated. These were intended to be exported. Thus farmers who were used to growing paddy and vegetables were now being forced to cultivate indigo, poppy and other such items that yielded a high market value for them but could be of no relief to a population starved of food. There was no backup of edible crops in case of a famine. The natural causes that had contributed to the draught were commonplace. It was the single minded motive for profit that wrought about the devastating consequences. No relief measure was provided for those affected. Rather, as mentioned above, taxation was increased to make up for any shortfall in revenue. What is more ironic is that the East India Company generated a profited higher in 1771 than they did in 1768.
Yes, Mortimer, one life matters as much as another — unless I’m missing something?
Maybe you could explain to me how it would be otherwise?
Mortimer I am totally enjoying the history here that you are providing. Read this link to a great article for thoughts about what is really driving the jihadist in the Middle East ….
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2015/07/tomi-lahren-its-not-the-muslims-stupid.html
Terrorism expert Brigitte Gabriel, the CEO of ACT! for America responded- The peaceful majority were irrelevant. I’m glad you’re here, but where are the others speaking out? As an American citizen, you sat in this room
>>>>and instead of standing up and [asking] something about our four Americans
that died<<<< [in Benghazi]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
John McCain’s history and heroism are under fire today for good reason. In 2011 he met with and gained support for Al Qaeda Libya. “McCain called on all nations, especially the U.S., to recognize the National Transitional Council in Benghazi. He said some of the Gadhafi regime’s frozen assets should be redirected to the rebels and the U.S. should facilitate the delivery of weapons to rebel fighters.â€
This group became the core group for what would become ISIL. John McCain’s support for terrorists never wavered until it became a hot potato in an election cycle. In Syria, McCain once again openly demanded the US arm the terrorists. As late as January 2015, John McCain was illegally visiting his ISIL friends in Syria.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Joe, I cut these paragraphs out of the piece as illustrative of the persuasive power of the ideological expression, "American Exceptionalism."
Libya is prime example of how easily International Law can be broken At Will by any European so-called coalition without a whimper of outcry from the weaker world-at-large. As with Iraq and Syria, Libya was a secular nation. Saddam, Assad and Qaddafi had absolutely no use for militant Islamists. Each ruled modern countries with well educated populations, strong medical institutions, proper housing and all accoutrements for safe living.
All of that has been wreaked by European aggression, by reason of the accusation that the leaders of these nations were "Brutal Dictators" killing their own people…
With regard to Qaddafi, he was accused of mounting an horrific "attack upon Libyans" that required an "Humanitarian Intervention." It was Total Bullspit. As Qaddafi yelled, it was his government that was under attack by jihadist rebels. Imagine that!! Jihadist rebels whom We had armed! Rebels whom We assisted by months and months of continuous bombings. Libya, like Syria and Iraq is completely destroyed.
Future contracts for US & European construction firms are or will be doled out to "rebuild" the former middle east and the objective to OPEN NEW MARKETS will've been achieved after many, many innocent lives that don't matter have been sacrificed to the god of greed & unrestrainable Power.
Ms. Clinton bears some responsibility for arming rebels in Benghazi and, by extension, bears some responsibility. the" terrorism expert" Brigitte Gabriel, was, presumably "out of the loop" and her outburst was a clear expression of "American Exceptionalism."
What can be said of Arming our so-called enemies and having sects within nations kill each other as we Arm both sides? I'd say it's the devious old rule of Divide and Conquer.
There's a huge hierarchical dividing line that separates Lives That Matter. It's been established for centuries. We all know who sits at the top of that hierarchy.
Some of us just don't want to admit it…
Yes, the ones who decide some lives don’t matter, go to extreme lengths to mask that belief — they are public liars and hypocrites — and it’s easily seen through by any objective viewer while it’s also resented by many.
From a philosophical or practical matter, I believe it would be impossible for anyone to make the case, at this time in history, that one human life matters more than another — unless of course they want to play God arbitrarily making those decisions.
Anonymous or Mortimer, thanks for the information. To support what you said about John McCain here is a link to a great article by Tony Cartalucci from 2011….
http://landdestroyer.blogspot.com/2012/03/john-mccain-founding-father-of.html
I could be totally off base here, but I do believe that all the chaos you see in Syria/Iraq is being done by donor made mercenaries. The U.S. to me shows its hand in this, when our President issues aid and arms to the ‘moderate rebels’. Even Obama has admitted there are no moderate rebels, so what are we talking about here. Is this the dirty little secret being screamed out loud? Is this another one of those times when the truth is hiding in plain site? Could the brilliant strategy be to wear Assad down with chaos? America always seems to reach first for the hammer, even when it’s not a nail. If it’s not a battle then it should be a war. I swear this is all we got. Isn’t it great that we are the most powerful military on earth? I only hope that the blowback will be aimed at the truly guilty ones one day, and not upon future generations of good young Americans.
You seem to be getting off the subject with some sort of disconnect here, but:
I get the impression you are trying to rationalize, if not justify, genocide and war along with everything that comes with it?
If so, would this be based on race or religious bigotry or just a general philosophy that might equals right and trumps all in your view?
With todays weapons and technology in the hands of primitive tribalistic European descendants, if they can’t get a grip on themselves, none of us will be arguing about what’s what for too much longer…
I’m not convinced that, “Today’s “Globalization†actually began in the 16th century with the formation of the British East India Company.”
In the context you framed it, man reaching out beyond his home range certainly would have taken place thousands of years prior to the East India Company. Exploration would have taken place for any number of reasons such as:
The necessity dictated by population growth requiring more food than what was available in the home range.
Drought and famine.
Tribal politics.
Clan wars.
General curiosity to see what else was out there, looking for a more fertile area where life would have been easier.
I’m also skeptical of the idea man needed to know the world was not flat prior to exploration for the same reasons listed above — as well as other possibilities. Undoubtedly throughout our existence humans have convinced themselves of all manner of things that simply weren’t true — like the world being flat. The desire and willingness to explore, seeking rich fertile and life filled places to live, would have been a compulsion for some individuals so inclined from at least the time humans were comfortable walking on two legs. The concept of controlling as much of the known universe and resources as possible, for one’s personal benefit, certainly preceded the East India Cpmpany.
Globalization is a combination of many factors including social and political, human nature and instinct, as well as megalomania and primitive tribalism — and all of those factors mentioned contain a varying amount of greed or lack thereof, depending on any individual and any relevant characteristics of the collective group.
Is globalization a human choice, an out of control addiction to power and greed, or is it destiny determined by a combination of all factors that drive humans to make choices that are predetermined because of their composite make up?
So many concepts and notions we’ve convinced ourselves of — simply are not true. Our biggest problem is determining what truth is and agreeing on what actions to take — often creating conflict — while for some, might is right and that’s all they need or want to know.
>>>Mark, the below report reveals the harsh reality of globalization-in-action.
The Masters of the Universe will maintain their Power & Control.<<<
Gaddafi Planned Gold Dinar, Now Under Attack
By Anthony Wile – May 05, 2011
Plans for attacking Muammar Gaddafi apparently go back some 20 years, and even US President Ronald Reagan tried to kill him, deeming him a threat to America power.
The latest attacks are in keeping with the larger wave of aggression initiated by the Anglo-American power elite that is on to the next stage of its implementation of the "new world order."
This power elite, based mostly in the one-square mile City of London, is said to seek world domination if it can get it – and sooner rather than later in the face of a growing Internet Reformation.
But there may be another reason for the Libyan attacks that explain their timing. According to a Russia Today news story, for which I was interviewed, Gaddafi was planning to introduce a gold dinar – "a single African currency made from gold, a true sharing of the wealth."
The idea, according to Gaddafi, was that African and Muslim nations would join together to create this new currency and would use it to purchase oil and other resources in exclusion of the dollar and other currencies. RT calls it "an idea that would shift the economic balance of the world."
It was not a democratic perspective in the sense that a country's wealth would revolve around gold and its population. But that's how modern money works. The current dollar reserve system benefits the US. In Gaddafi's case, as he held some 144 tons of gold against a fairly small population, a gold dinar would prove a most powerful currency.
When I was interviewed by RT, I said the following: "If Gaddafi had an intent to try to re-price his oil or whatever else the country was selling on the global market and accept something else as a currency or maybe launch a gold dinar currency, any move such as that would certainly not be welcomed by the power elite today, who are responsible for controlling the world's central banks. … So yes, that would certainly be something that would cause his immediate dismissal and the need for other reasons to be brought forward from moving him from power."
There are many who believe Iraq's Saddam Hussein's overthrow by the US was sealed when he announced Iraqi oil would be traded in euros, not dollars. Sanctions and then a US invasion followed. Coincidence? Hussein's idea would have strengthened the euro, but Gaddafi's idea would have strengthened all of Africa in the opinion of hard-money economists. Gold is the ultimate honest money and the peg against which all other fiat currencies are ultimately devalued.
Pricing oil in something other than the dollar would attack the basis of US power in the world. The dollar is the reserve currency based on a deal made with the Saudis back in 1971 in which the Saudis as the world's largest oil producer agreed to accept only dollars for oil. RT concludes: "A change in this policy its NATO allies literally could not afford to let that happen."
The central banking Ponzi scheme requires an ever-increasing base of demand and the immediate silencing of those who would threaten its existence. Perhaps that is what the hurry is in removing Gaddafi in particular and those who might have been sympathetic to his monetary idea.
– See more at: http://thedailybell.com/editorials/2228/Anthony-Wile-Gaddafi-Planned-Gold-Dinar-Now-Under-Attack/#sthash.hEItvfNa.dpuf
Globalization will be defeated one way or another, possibly by the globalists most prominent and driving characteristic of personal greed — leading to their own, and our, demise.
The fact that there are power and wealth brokers in the world does not make their life more valuable than the poorest peasant or slave — it only means they are currently in power and have more power — their true value may actually prove to be a negative value considering the damage and destruction they cause to other individuals, civilizations and the environment in total — where the peasant will prove to be nearly neutral with their impact when all is said and done.
And who is to say the illegal wars, whether promoted or simply allowed by the collective cabal, has not killed the individual who would have solved our energy problem or been the genius behind any scientific discovery or the most profound teacher of humanity that anyone could imagine.
Now back to question posed in the article: if you can, please explain who’s life matters more and why you’ve made that determination.
If mans life in the universe is ultimately insignificant then all human lives are equally as insignificant.
It is nothing but ego or bigotry or power between humans that gives us the illusion that one life matters more than another.
Shall we recommence with playing God?
America’s domestic policies have always devalued some lives while simultaneously and artificially overvaluing others — this is automatically two sides of the same coin.
America has blatantly placed an inordinately low value on the lives of Mid-Easterners since 9/11. This devaluation is even more pronounced because our leaders and media misrepresent the truth and tell outright lies to garner the publics backing for these illegal wars and carnage — while artificially demonizing Islam — those lies made the recent US invasions illegal domestically and according to international law as well.
Mr. Husseini is absolutely correct to state that devaluing any life devalues all of our lives — how we don’t know this instinctively is a valid question and an indication of just how far we’ve strayed into the wilderness with no respect for any life — not even our own — as we flirt with nuclear exchange over lies our neocon politicians and mass murdering media have been passing off as factual analysis concerning the Ukraine and Russia — lies intended to warrant yet more illegal and unjustifiable military actions on our part, while Russia has not so much as blinked due to our chicanery.
Consume just a little more propaganda and we all just might go to the grave having believed as individuals, several lifetimes worth of American lies.
Mark, there is ONE Dominant and Domineering Culture in the world. It’s the ONE culture that Colonized the Entire Planet after Magellan’s circumnavigation of the globe — after they discovered the earth wasn’t flat.
That revelation opened the door to European exploration which led to exploitation and domination of lands and peoples. The wealth of Europe was built through the expropriation of lands, natural resources and Human Beings.
Today’s “Globalization” actually began in the 16th century with the formation of the British East India Company.
When Cecil Rhodes declared that ‘THE SUN NEVER SETS ON THE BRITISH EMPIRE’, he didn’t spout empty words. The Brits colonized more than their fair share of people groups – along with the French, Spanish, Dutch, Portuguese, Germans and Russians.
European Dominion was established and maintained By Brutal Force and Uncivilized Murder which has never been abated. This, the 21st century remains Contaminated with Europeans Fighting and Bombing, developing and selling evermore despicable WMD’s for the very same nefarious reason, to dominate and control other peoples.
Are they a ‘superior race’? Or just more innately Martian in character?
Mortimer,
As I read the article it referred to American viewpoints and that was my perspective in commenting.
However, I would agree that Europeans in general have been the champion marauding and colonizing brutes over recent centuries.
To call them superior depends specifically on what aspect of superiority you refer to.
Are they superior war mongers killing more people who had done them no harm in order to dispossess them of whatever the Europeans wanted?
Are they superior con men getting people to trust them before they kill, rob and royally screw them?
Are they superior in arrogance, not recognizing other peoples rights to life and property?
Are they, with their weapons, industrial technology and lies, a superior threat to all life on this planet?
Are they superior deceivers all the way around — with the elites deceiving the masses in their own countries in order to perpetrate mass murder, theft and destruction of foreign peoples and their civilizations?
Do they possess a superior type or amount of greed?
My point was that this “attitude” of superiority and double standards, not only makes them superior hypocrites but foments a self-feeding cycle of superior disregard for life itself.
Yes,obviously all lives do matter,but I think the all lives matter movement is diluting(probably to obscure our domestic disaster of racist hatred,which makes US a laughingstock of hypocrisy) the actual reality of black lives are taken with impunity in America,and historically.
A statistic to ponder; What is the rate for poor hispanics,who are on the same level of poverty?Are they subject to the same rate of death?
And that pos shillary even using that all lives matter,with her terrible sordid history of blood and war,and abandoning the poor of America to neocapitalism,is another blot on her resume of BS.
>>>>>> I do not admit for instance, that a great wrong has been done to the Red Indians of America or the black people of Australia. <<<<<<
ANTHRO 6 – An Introduction to California's Native People
The first 50 years of the American Period was a horrible time for the Native Californians, given the sheer magnitude of what happened during that half century: scalpings of men, women, &children; incarceration in jails with the only way out being enforced indenture to whites for unspecified lengths of time; the kidnapping &sale of Indian children; the massacres of entire Indian villages; the military roundup of Indians and their enforced exile on military reservations where even the most basic of living amenities were lacking; their complete legal disenfranchisement. The outcome of all this was that during the first two decades of the American occupation, the native population of California plummeted by 90 percent – in short, a California version of the WWII Holocaust.
Because of the oppressive, depressing, &horrifying nature of the American period I was tempted, while preparing this web page, to simply summarize what had happend to the Native People. I felt (as several of my students who proof-read the web document did) that human nature, being what it is, would cause people visiting the American Period page to block out the information with which they can't or don't want to deal. In one section the information is so damning towards the Americans that, as one of my students pointed out, many people just won't read it, or worse, they'll conclude that the views &information presented are too one-sided; thus, they may discount the information entirely. Surely, there must have been people speaking out on behalf of the Indians and against the genocide committed against them?
There were a few people who spoke out, who reacted against the savagery of the anglo-Americans in California. Unfortunately, such voices were"crying in the wilderness." They were pushed aside, their humanity negated by a system that promulgated the shibboleths of inevitable conflict, the greatest good for the greatest number, and the most important one, the destiny of the white man.
As I note below, the anglo-Americans believed they were the chosen civilizers of the earth. And contrary to popular myth, the men who ruthlessly destroyed the Native Californians were not the outcasts of society, the footloose riffraff of the United States. In fact, many of the whites often became California's leading citizens. For example, in northwestern California William Carson has been credited with creating hundreds of jobs on the Pacific Coast. Yet, this man participated in the Hayfork Massacre of 1852 where 152 Native Californians were slaughtered. John Carr, in his book Pioneer Days, describes the Massacre and states in the introduction: " It may help … to rescue and preserve some of the doings of the common people that founded and built up this great State of California" [emphasis added]. With the exception of Isaac Cox, author of the Annals of Trinity County, most white historians who discuss the Hayfork Massacre and the events leading up to it [the killing of the white John Anderson and the stealing of his cattle by the Indians], place the BLAME for the Massacre on the Indians, not on the whites. Even Cox, who states the Indians were justified in having a grudge against Anderson, justifies the massacre: "Be this true or not, the rascals had committed a glaring infraction into the peace and security of the county and to chastise them was proper and laudable."
Below I discuss the 1850 An Act for the Government and Protection of Indians, which established the means whereby Indians of all ages could be indentured or apprenticed to any white. Eleven years later an editorial in the Humboldt Times noted:
This law works beautifully. A few days ago V. E. Geiger, formerly Indian Agent, had some eighty Indians apprenticed to him and proposes to emigrate to Washoe with them as soon as he can cross the mountains. We hear of many others who are having them bound in numbers to suit. What a pity the provisions of this law are not extended to Greasers, Kanaks, and Asiatics. It would be so convenient, you know, to carry on a farm or mine when all the hard and dirty work is performed by apprentices
In 1860 the Los Angeles City Council approved an ordinance which read:
When the city has no work in which to employ the chain gang, the Recorder shall, by means of notices conspicuously posted, notify the public that such a number of prisoners will be auctioned off to the highest bidder for private service, and in that manner they shall be disposed of for a sum which shall not be less than the amount of their fine for double the time they were to serve at hard labor.
What's most telling about this slavery is that it involved Indians almost exclusively. At about this time, J. Ross Browne wrote about this ordinance and the Indians' condition in Los Angeles:
The inhabitants of Los Angeles are a moral and intelligent people and many of them disapprove of the custom of auctioning off prisoners on principle, and hope that it will be abolished as soon as the Indians are all killed off.
I hope you will take the time to read the following. It's time Americans faced up to the enormity of the California Holocaust.
The Early Years: Madness, Mayhem, and Massacres
In 1848, California became a part of the United States. Under the terms of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, California's native peoples were to become citizens of the U.S. with their liberty and property rights given full protection under U.S. laws. However, the govertment failed to live up to these terms and the native peoples suffered horrendously during the next several decades.
Years between 1845 and 1855 brought a flood of Anglos into California. Lured by land and gold, hordes of newcomers poured into California, penetrating into the most remote valleys and mountains searching for gold, timber, &land, and overwhelming the native peoples. The resulting confrontation between the Anglos and Indians was ugly and brutal. Throughout the state the native peoples were the victims of an almost inconceivable tragedy brought on by disease, starvation, and outright genocidal campaigns against them. In a mere ten years, the Indian population of the central valley and adjacent hills and mountains plummeted from 150,000 to about 50,000.
Displaced from their ancestral homes, denied access to critical food and medicine resource procurement areas through such devices as fences and fictional property "rights" of whites, their fishing places choked with mining and logging debris, the native peoples starved to death by the hundreds. Animals were hunted or driven from their old territories; irrigation lowered water tables and native plants withered and died. The rich swamps, once prime resources of food and game, were drained to become farm land. Cattle and pigs ate the grasses and seeds and nuts, foods vital to the native peoples subsistence base.
Added to this was the wholesale slaughter of the native peoples across the state. Anglos, greedy for Indian land and resources, and infused with ideas of their own racial superiority, justified the murder of the native peoples by extolling the MANIFEST DESTINY of the white race. The anglo's institutionalized propaganda perpetuated the myth that the American settler was the chosen civilizer of the earth, attitudes fostered by the press and by the materialistic successes of the ranchers, businessmen, &industrialists. Many miners, settlers, and other anglos treated persons with any degree of native ancestry as slightly less than human. Indians were hunted, shot, and lynched so frequently that newspapers rarely bothered to record such EVERYDAY events.
All across California, groups of anglo males formed "volunteer armies" and would periodically swept down on peaceful Indian villages, indiscrimately killing women, men, and children. In 1853 in northern California a group of citizens from Crescent City formed one of these "companies" and dressed like soldiers they surrounded the Tolowa village of Yontoket. Here, at the center of the religious and political world of the Tolowa people, some 450 Tolowa had gathered to pray to a universal spirit for beauty and order &to thank God for life. Suddenly the anglos attacked – a Tolowa man tells the story, years later:
The whites attacked and the bullets were everywhere. Over four hundred and fifty of our people were murdered or lay dying on the ground. Then the whitemen built a huge fire and threw in our sacred ceremonial dresses, the regalia, and our feathers, and the flames grew higher. Then they threw in the babies, many of them were still alive. Some tied weights around the necks of the dead and threw them into the nearby water.
Two men escaped, they had been in the Sacred Sweathouse and crept down to the water's edge and hid under the Lily Pads, breathing through the reeds. The next morning they found the water red with blood of their people.
A hearty well done, Mortimer. What you have here is a history that must be told.
Come September
Arundhati Roy
Lensic Performing Arts Center
September 29, 2002
>>>EXCERPT<<<
How carelessly imperial power vivisected ancient civilizations. Palestine and Kashmir are imperial Britain’s fester- ing, blood-drenched gifts to the modem world. Both are fault lines in the raging international conflicts of today.
In 1937, Winston Churchill said of the Palestinians, I quote, “I do not agree that the dog in a manger has the final right to the manger even though he may have lain there for a very long time. I do not admit that right. I do not admit for instance, that a great wrong has been done to the Red Indians of America or the black people of Australia.
I do not admit that a wrong has been done to these people by the fact that a stronger race, a higher-grade race, a more worldly wise race to put it that way, has come in and taken their place.â€
That set the trend for the Israeli State’s attitude towards the Palestinians.
In 1969, Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir said, “Palestinians do not exist.â€
Her successor, Prime Minister Levi Eschol said, “What are Palestinians? When I came here (to Palestine), there were 250,000 non-Jews, mainly Arabs and Bedouins. It was a desert, more than underdeveloped. Nothing.â€
Prime Minister Menachem Begin called Palestinians “two-legged beasts.â€
Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir called them “grasshoppers†who could be crushed. This is the language of Heads of State, not the words of ordinary people.
FROM A DOVE TO AN AIRPLANE….
A teenage Palestinian who liked to express her feelings in art
left her former “home” when it was bombed and totally
destroyed by Israeli/American bombs. “I have no home” she
tolkd one advising her to go home. Later she volunteered to
help the injured. “I used to be able to draw a dove but now
I can only draw an airplane,” she told a writer from EI.
None of the US political candidates so filled with real or
faked sympathy for black lives in the US would dare to
express their concern for the thousands of Palestinian
lives who evidently do not “matter”, Nor do they notice
the crimes of aggression by Israeli/US forces,the war
crimes, the crimes against humanity, the murders and
rapes and massacres, the murders, the home dispossession
and destruction and on and on.
(Should such concerns be even indirectly alluded to
vast donations would disappear. So Palestinians continue
to be exterminated, terrorized.)
Their places of worship are also attacked, appropriated or
simply destroyed. Who can forget “The Dungeon” formerly
a mosque near Tel Aviv, now an S & M center in private
Jewish hands for the use of Jews.(See Max Blumenthal,
GOLIATH…)
Certainly Black Lives do Matter. So do Palestinian Lives.
—Peter Loeb, Boston, MA, USA
Thank you, Peter, for this thoughtful response.