Blogging the democratic revolution
Red Anti-semitism at work in Italy. From YNet News: Holocaust cartoon stirs row. An anti-Semitic caricature published by an Italian Communist Party’s newspaper depicted Israel’s security fence with welcome sign paraphrasing Auschwitz’s ‘Work Liberates’ . Yasha Reibman, spokesman of Milan’s Jewish community, told Yedioth Ahronoth that the cartoon publication was a very severe act and demanded that the newspaper editor be dismissed immediately in a bid to prove that the stances presented by the journal do not represent the stances of the party it represents. The problem is that it represents the stances of the party. Indeed: Italian Lower Chamber…
The United Nations was not intended to prevent genocide in Darfur. It was not to swap oil-for-food, depose of rogue regimes seeking weapons of mass destruction, or fight avian flu. It has never had the means or accountability mechanisms available to do so. It was created by the victor powers of World War II ???????? Russia, China, France, Britain, and the United States ???????? with the sole purpose of maintaining stability and collective security. Global order was at the top of the agenda. Human rights may have received its rhetorical due, but ???????never again??????? proved to be empty in substance.…
The Nepal of March, the one of April, and the one of May are unrecognizable parallels of a place trying to make incremental transformations in three months that took the Western world centuries. It is hard to forget that just over a year ago, the country’s King seized absolute power by disbanding the government and ordering the military to put down all opposition to his rule. In April. however, this absolute power proved not so, as people power shook the streets of Kathmandu for three weeks, forcing the King to reinstate parliament and resign to the margins. The political leaders…
President Bouteflika’s recent comments regarding the French colonization of Algeria have caused quite a stir. His fuss holds the potential to accomplish a great deed; placing such a burden on the world community’s conscience that they feel moved to take meaningful action in Darfur, or at least to make them seriously contemplate it. But it does not seem to be the case that Mr. Bouteflika, or any one else, is going to use this tremendous opportunity to do good. His comments have been a source of reflection for me over the past week or so. Firstly, I am inclined to…
It’s with great sorrow that I learn that the U.S. gov’t caved in to the Mullahs. SMCCDI, a secular , democratic and anti-islamist movement committed to regime change in Iran reports some worrying news. Many Iranian oppositionists had used to support President Bush and now the U.S. gov’t sells its soul to the Islamic regime and announces it won’t grant funds to the Iranian oppositions. If Bush’s popularity has reached a new low, it is not because of being a “warmongering” administration, as some naive pundits claim. No. It’s because it seems very weak in front of terrorists and the…
Defying Mubarak’s goons on May 11 Source: AP via Yahoo! News Hundreds more were arrested in Egypt Friday as a result of the massive pro-democracy protests in this pharaonic tyranny that is proving itself a petri dish for Islamofascists. The intent of the democracy protestors is to stop that from happening by stopping tyranny. These fearless unarmed Egyptians are not only fighting for democratic revolution, they are also fighting binladenite Islamofascism. Not with clubs, as the Mubarakites do, but with the inner fire of democracy, something that dries up Islamofascism like a desert wind. Sadly, the U.S. supports this wretched…
I was somewhere outside Yogyakarta on this day eight years ago, within sight of Mount Merapi volcano. One of the greatest democratic revolutions in history was about to erupt but I didn’t know it then. I was at a mysterious Javanese graveyard of tombs outside Yogyakarta, where old and young many of them in traditional Javanese dress of batiks in ancient cinnamon and indigo dyes, alongside boulevards of tombs and walls, a lot of dark palms shading it all, mysteriously gloomy, even as amid the equatorial sun its shade made it all refreshingly cool. The old women, like the men,…
Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez is nothing more than a brutal leftist thug with aspirations of being the next Simon Bolivar, the next Fidel Castro. He seeks to unite all the nations of Latin America under his wing, so that together, they may challenge the United States. He would lure them into his axis with the promise of U.S.-financed cheap oil, yet punish and intimidate any who don’t go along with his direction by cutting off that same oil. He’s telling all nations that it’s either him or the U.S., and the U.S. has nothing to offer them. Every last nation…
Egypt exploded into riots after police moved in and cracked down on peaceful protestors seeking to defend judges who were trying to defend rule of law. The targets of repression were treated barbarically by police, as the photos in the links below show. Egyptian bloggers who are seeing all of this firsthand suggest that this is a real fight for democracy in this country. Source: Sandmonkey Unrest in Egypt was based on the government’s thuggish sweep and crackdown on all sorts of democracy activists, often under the pretext of hunting terrorists. Since there really are terrorists in Egypt, it’s a…
A dozen of supporters of the Italy Cuba friendship (with Castro) association display a welcome banner as Venezuelan Dictator Hugo Chavez heads to the Vatican for talks with Pope Benedict XVI, in Rome, Thursday May 11, 2006 Why didn’t the Venezuelan freedom fighters in Italy demonstrate against Chavez? It was a good occasion to show Chavez and the Italian communists that most Venezuelans don’t buy the Chavista propaganda
Evo Morales’ nationalization of Bolivia’s energy resources seemed to be the act of a retrograde madman intent on repeating the mistakes of the 1960s. And largely, that’s what he is. He’s taking Bolivia right down the road to ruin, as if this poor country can afford any more of that. Nationalization has got to be the stupidest, insanest, most guaranteed-to-fail thing he can possibly do for, or rather, to, Bolivia. Yet there are many people … for now … who support him. It defies belief that in this day and age, anyone could possibly support the messes of the idiotic…
…reality to Evo Morales and Hugo Chavez. “If you do not have clear rules for the game, capital is not going to come. If there is no capital, there is no growth. If there is no growth, there is no employment. If there is no employment, there is no income. If there is no income, there is nothing to invest more in nutrition, health and education, which are the most powerful weapons for reducing poverty,” the Peruvian president said. What a beautiful grasp on how the world works! Why don’t honorable, intelligent, and yes, indigenous, Latin American leaders get more…
I had long explained the way Mr. Romano Prodi won the Italian election. The slim margin with which he won offers, according to numerous international and italian analysts (from both the left and the right) little chances that his government will last 5 years. In an open violation of the democratic debate with the now-opposition Berlusconi’s House of Freedom, the Left has elected 3 of their militants for the most important institutions: Franco Marini, ex-christian democrat, as President of the Senate; Fausto Bertinotti, leader of the Communist Refoundation Party, as president of the Chamber of Deputies. And, right yesterday, former…
President Lula da Silva of Brazil is not stupid. After a softie performance in the first week after Bolivia “nationalized” Brazil’s $1.6 billion in investments there, downplaying any opposition against the taking of it, or any animosity against Bolivian President Evo Morales, he unexpectedly came out and laid the blame for this mess right where it belonged: at Hugo Chavez of Venezuela. Lula is a gentle man, but in this case he came on uncharacteristically strong: He demanded that Chavez stop meddling in the Southern Cone, and warned the Venezuelan dictator that there would be consequences. Lula knew very well…
I chatted with Rob last night, he’s got one big thing he’s got to get out of the way, but he’ll be posting soon, probably later today or by tomorrow. Stay tuned!
Mercenaries 2: World in Flames??????? is an explosive open-world action game set in a massive, highly reactive, war-torn world. A power-hungry tyrant messes with Venezuela’s oil supply, sparking an invasion that turns the country into a warzone???????” With a hat tip to Venezuela Today this new video game, showing a major street in Caracas on fire, represents a significant cultural shift. Gone are the days when Venezuela was just an insignificant Latin American country, or a more ridiculed version of Mexico. It’s now the center of attention, the focus of evil in this world today. I am not a big…
6:00 a.m. Greenwich Main Time City: London Brrrrrrrrrrnnnnnnnnnnnnngggggggggggg!!!!!!!!!!! Brrrrrrrrrrnnnnnnnnggggggggg!!!!!!!!! Roy: Hullo, mate. William: Goddamn it, don’t you hello mate me, you oleaginous punk. This is Caracas calling. Roy: Wot’s up? William: You know what’s up, Swedish Wonder Kid. And boy you better have an explanation. R: Hunh? W: Haven’t you seen the London Times? We have a crisis. One week before Our Fearless Leader makes his grand debut in London? Do you see what’s in it? R: No, I only read my own Web site, the font of all truth. W: Cut the clowning, blobbo. You know very well what…
Every leftist and his chihuahua has seen fit to adapt the image of Che Guevara on his cheap mass-produced t-shirt. It’s an all-purpose “revolutionary” (and very fake revolutionary) insignia. Not only was Che Guevara a thief and a psychopathic killer, he was also a mercenary who took a special pleasure in ending the lives of very young victims. He killed people for no reason whatever, and then drew a draw out of his fancy cigarette-holder, emblem of the very rich. He was a foul foul creature, one of the worst who ever lived. And yet, in this Hollywood-tinged age, he…
Oh it’s a rocky road to socialism, the road to Chavismo. Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez has assured that, because the doggone donkey trail out of Caracas to the airport (the bridge to Socialism already collapsed) has been done in by a rockslide. So, the road to Socialism, the Sea of Happiness ever promised by Hugo Chavez like a shimmering ribbon, is now covered with a big mound of rainslicked mud. Note that unlike those hateful, capitalist private sector places, there is only one road to Socialism and it goes through Caracas. No road? No socialism. And no entry to Caracas.…
BBC News: Russian President Vladimir Putin has used a Victory Day parade to issue a warning to neo-Nazis and other nationalist extremists. He said they were “leading the world to a dead end” and would not be tolerated in Russia. His comments follow a series of attacks on foreigners – some of them fatal. Ä…Å By using a big, set-piece occasion to raise the issue, Mr Putin is stressing the moral urgency of Russia’s racist problem, says the BBC’s Russian affairs analyst Steven Eke. “Those who are again trying to raise the defeated flags of Nazism, who sow ethnic hatred,…
Cuba has secured a spot on the new United Nations human rights council, the board that replaced a previous one, which was intended to keep countries like Zimbabwe and Burma off these boards. Cuba is the biggest human rights violator in the hemisphere. It is one of the few tyrannies in the world that refuses its citizens the right to leave, effectively turning it into an island prison. It has one of the world’s highest suicide rates. Its locals without party connections get no health care, and in fact are denied education if their parents are dissidents. Its residents are…
Today signals the beginning of the end for Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez. His oil-fueled pork-barrel project to buy off the Americas and secure absolute power is now showing signs of fraying badly at the seams. It has to tatter, of course, and the reason is simple: Chavez’s Cuban socialism does not work. Three powerful news items around Hugo Chavez’s personal ATM machine — I mean, Venezuela’s oil production — tell the story, and these stories are starting to arrive fast and thick: 1. All new (corrected, thank you Nick) oil production from 32 operating contracts with foreign firms HAS COMPLETELY…
Iran’s leader, Mahmood Ahmadinejad, Monday sent a letter to President Bush in some sort of effort to communicate with him, and to halt potential action over Iran’s nuclear program. It has a weird bloggerly quality to it, mulling over events, ranting and raving here, whining about always being a victim there, and it’s sort of interesting to read. But the most interesting part (to me) is Ahmadinejad’s clear reference to Venezuela’s dictator, Hugo Chavez. It’s obvious he watches the Chavista soap opera going on in the Western hemisphere, and clearly has discussed the paranoias of Chavez. They fill his thoughts.…
A fearless Peruvian democracy revolutionary, Maria Elena Moyano, may finally see her killer brought to justice. An arrest was made of the Shining Path Marxist terrorist who most likely did it 14 unpunished years ago this afternoon in Peru. I wrote about her case about a year ago here. Source: Peru Hilfe Moyano was a Peruvian community leader in a poor slum who organized to get the poor included into the system too. Instead of out in guerrillaville. The Shining Path hated her intensely for it, threatened her, tried to kill her, and eventually killed her. There’s a big difference…
In a little-reported story last week, Mexico experienced some fearsome riots, with Sweetness & Light reporting that they were about opposition to a new Wal-Mart. In San Salvador Atenco, in central Mexico state, not far from the capital, over 200 people were arrested, protesting a new Wal-Mart about to go up. One 14-year-old was killed, and President Vicente Fox has said over the weekend that the government overreacted. Naturally, the Marxist Zapatistas showed up, led by blue-eyed, white-skinned, failed, wanna-be professor Subcommandante Marcos, who says he represents the Indigenous people. But his opportunism (and he’s all about opportunism!) doesn’t obscure…