(no subject)

Dee and I attended the anti-war rally in New Orleans on Saturday. I'll have pictures to post tomorrow.

alobar was there, along with several other people I know from First UU Church.

It went very smoothly, some might say perhaps too smoothly. We were originally going to stay in the neutral ground and on the sidewalk when marching from Congo Square to Jackson Square, but there were just too many people -- easily more than a thousand -- and the march spilled over into the street, blocking Rampart, Canal, and finally Decatur.

The police who were on hand apparently decided that the best and most efficient way to handle the situation was to block intersections for us and just let us move on.

(no subject)

Let there be no illusion about what is going on in current US foreign policy.

The plan to attack Iraq has its roots in the first Bush Administration. Dick Cheney, then Secretary of Defense, established a Defense Policy Guidance document early in 1992 that argued that the fall of the Soviet Union had provided a rare opportunity for the United States. Without a rival superpower, there was effectively no one to prevent the United States from asserting its military and economic global dominance. The only way to preserve this 'Pax Americana' was to re-orient the US military as a global 'constabulary' force capable of fighting multiple wars on numerous fronts simultaneously.

The hawks behind this strategy were defeated in the political arena within the first Bush Administration, and they had no voice within the Clinton Administration. They were not inactive, however; in 1997 a number of hawks and leaders of the "neoconservative" moment established a foundation, the Project for the New American Century, that was dedicated to putting this vision at the center of U.S. defense strategy.

Signatories to the PNAC's Statement of Principles in 1997 included Gary Bauer, Jeb Bush, Dick Cheney, Eliot Cohen, Steve Forbes, Dan Quayle, Donald Rumsfeld, and Paul Wolfowitz.

In September 2000 this project published a document called "Rebuilding America's Defenses" that re-iterated and updated the directives of the Defense Policy Guidance document.

The viewpoint of this document describes the primary threat to US interests in the absense of a global rival thus: "[S]tates seeking to establish regional hegemony continue to probe for the limits of the American security perimeter" (p. 5). China is listed as a potential global rival, and Iraq, Iran, and North Korea are listed as nations "rushing to develop ballistic missles and nuclear weapons as a deterrent to American intervention in regions they seek to dominate" (p. 4).

One has only to read the document to see that it has become the basis of American foreign policy. All of the recommendations therein are in the process of being implemented -- from exiting the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, to closer alliance with Eastern European nations, to development of a "missile shield" and the abolition of certain programs like the Crusader -- and strong focus on containing three nations in particular... Iraq, Iran, and North Korea.

It is clear that the hawks within the administration have completely sidetracked the "War on Terror" into pursuing wholesale their blueprint for global empire. Page 51 suggests that they were hoping for some "catastrophic and catalyzing event - like a new Pearl Harbor" to enable their plan to be more rapidly enacted.

(no subject)

Posted just now in dieretailgiants:

How McDonald's outlets keep the locals happy in hotbeds of anti-Americanism.

A couple of examples:

Yugoslavia 1998
Problem: Operating under NATO auspices, the U.S. military begins a bombing campaign against Belgrade.

McSpin: Franchise repositions McDonald's as a symbol of anti-NATO protest. Hands out free burgers at rallies and adds a Serbian nationalist cap to the Golden Arches icon under the slogan "McDonald's is yours."


Egypt 2001
Problem: Anti-American boycott sparked by U.S. support for Israel.

McSpin: Local outlets introduce the McFalafel, rolled out behind an ad jingle sung by Shabaan Abdel Rahim, best known for his chart-topping hit "I Hate Israel."