Voice from the Commonwealth Commentary, World Views and Occasional Rants from a small 'l' libertarian in Massachussetts
"If ye love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest for freedom, go home and leave us in peace. We seek not your council nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen." - Samuel Adams
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Praise for Voice
"A smart fellow...I do like, recommend and learn from Barbera's blog." -Roger L. Simon
"Your blog is bullshit"- anonymous angry French reader.
Pat Sajak (yes that Pat Sajak) gavce a speech a few months ago that was overlooked but is spectacular. The title alone makes it good. The Disconnect Between Hollywood and America
Here in this quiet, peaceful corner of Michigan, you might not have a sense of your importance in the world. I come from a community that has the opposite problem. Because it is so big and so powerful, so great and so well-known, it has an exaggerated view of its significance. That community is Hollywood.
You see, one of the dangers of my business is that it has the potential to fill you with a distorted view of life and of your importance in it. And it's understandable in a way. If you are part of a successful enterprise, people treat you very well. They send limos for you. They tiptoe around you. They pretend that the most outlandish or inane things you might say are important and quotable. Drugs? Adultery? Alcoholism? Deviant behavior? Don't worry. You go on Oprah-you cry-people call you heroic for being so open-and your career soars to new heights.
You're treated importantly, so you must be important. Suddenly your views are not just your own private opinions; they become part of the public record. They quote you on Entertainment Tonight and in People magazine. You can endorse a candidate, fight for a cause, call people names -- it's pretty heady stuff. The world waits breathlessly for your next pronouncement
This is great...
Filmmaker Rob Reiner -- a cofounder of Castle Rock Entertainment -- is reportedly upset by what he sees in many films these days, and he plans to do something about it. In fact, he's so upset about this thing, anyone who wants to depict it in a Castle Rock film must meet with Reiner first in order to justify its inclusion.
So what's got Rob so upset? Gratuitous violence? Casual sex? Disrespect toward Christianity? Bias against Big Business? Is that what he wants to cut down or eliminate? No, of course not. That would be censorship. He wants to get rid of smoking. There's too much smoking in movies.
To quote Mr. Reiner, "Movies are basically advertising cigarettes to kids." No knock on Rob. In fact, I agree with him. But why is smoking open to censorship and not these other issues? And what happened to Hollywood's argument that movies and TV shows don't cause bad behavior, they just reflect it? Or is it merely a health issue? But surely, health is involved when it comes to violence and casual sex. The answer is, there is no answer. It's just Hollywood being Hollywood. It's monumental hypocrisy. Kids can't pick up bad habits from what they watch... oh, except for smoking.
You see, if you complain about what you see as excesses on the screen, you are a book-burning prude who wants to tell everyone else how to live. You are a censor. You have no right. That is a right saved for the wise. They know better. They are important.
It's the same kind of nonsense that brings celebrities to "Save the Earth" benefits in eight-mile-per-gallon limos. Or that allows them to make a public service announcement urging recycling -- filmed at their 20,000 square foot homes. They can lecture to you and you should listen, even if they don't, because... well, because they're celebrities. They're from Hollywood, for goodness sake-and you live in Michigan!
I have to start watching Wheel of Fortune more....
And, perhaps worst of all, it's the phenomenon that allows movie studios and television networks to program with an utter disregard for your kids and your communities. It's not that they're evil people. They have kids and they care about them. But they see no connection between what they do and the results of what they do. And, besides, you're not really families and communities. You're ratings, demographics and sales.
You see, they are -- for the most part -- clueless. Clueless about this country and its people. Clueless about you. And they are afraid. They are afraid of the new technologies-afraid of the dwindling numbers of viewers or readers or listeners... afraid for their very existence. So, don't you see, they have to do what it takes to survive. They must survive. They are important. Who do you people out here -- the ones they fly over on their way to the other Coast for meetings -- who do you think you are?
Loved yer post about the Chomsky - Kingsolver political prisoners vs. the real thing. Let Noam try, instead of having to suffer the privations of a high-paying tenureship under the ruthless Bush regime, a regimine of 'special labor' camps, a la Stalinism - where he would end up, if he were lucky, regardless of his eternal fawning towards the left. As you know from reading, no amount of brownnosing could save anyone under Uncle Joe. My favorite story from one of the bios of Iosif Dzhugashvili (by Edvard Radzinsky, and its a great one) is where he asks a general as he leaves Stalin's office, "You have a sidearm, don't you General?" "Of course, Comrade Stalin." "But yopu wouldn't use it on yourself, would you?" "Of course not, Camrade Stalin." "Very good." Imagine how it felt to leave like that. He wasn't arrested for one and a half years. Then of course shot. No pressure.
While we are on Stalinism and true police state murder let us not forget the gulags of North Korea.
"While I was there, three women delivered babies on the cement floor without blankets," Ms Soon told a Senate judiciary sub-committee chaired by the Democrat Edward Kennedy. "It was horrible to watch the prison doctor kicking the pregnant women with his boots. When a baby was born, the doctor shouted, 'Kill it quickly. How can a criminal expect to have a baby? Kill it.'
"The women covered their faces with their hands and wept. Even though the deliveries were forced by injection, the babies were still alive when born. The prisoner-nurses, with trembling hands, squeezed the babies' necks to kill them," Ms Soon said.
Ms Soon, who was first arrested in 1984, said she was tortured in pre-trial interrogation before being sentenced to a 13-year jail term for crimes against the state.
This is the government we should encourage with a 'Sunshine Policy'?
"There are 20 such cells for female prisoners and 58 cells for male prisoners. They are usually detained for seven to 10 days as punishment for certain offences, such as leaving an oily mark on clothes, failing to memorise the president's New Year message or repeated failure to meet work quotas.
"When the prisoners are released from the cells, their legs are badly bent, with frostbite in the winter, and so they can hardly walk. Many victims are permanently crippled from the lack of adequate exercise and eventually died as a result of the work resumed immediately after the release _
"In November 1989, I was detained in the punishment cell for a week for attempting to cover up a faulty piece of shirt made by a 20-year-old girl. The young girl was sent to the torture chamber and never seen again. Among other things, the freezing cold wind from the toilet hole made the experience extremely painful
The American media and university elites could spend more time educating their students what true dictatorship is but it would take time away from pointing out the evils of America.
This is straight out of an alternate universe. The Saudi Foreign minister says that Sharon has to go. For who, Barak or Rabin? Arafat had his chance with them, along with three decades worth of other prime ministers. He has fomented hatred and violence against them all. The Israeli people fairly and openly chose Sharon in response to the violence begun by Arafat's call for a second Intifada. If al-Faisal has a problem with that maybe he should consider the constant stream of threats, lies, hatred and support for the massacre of Israelis and Jews worldwide from Arafat, the Palestinians and the rest of the Arab world.
''It must change by the Israelis themselves, those who want peace ... If the Israelis can stand firm for this peace, then they will achieve the security they need." ''If they leave it to Sharon, he will lead the Middle East only to tragedy and conflict,'' the minister added. ''He is a man who thinks still on the lines of Fortress Israel, that the only good Arab is a dead Arab, that Israel is facing enemies on all sides of its borders.
How he can with a straight face talk about a change in leadership among the Israelis is beyond me. When was the last time an Arab government changed hands in a democratic and honest non-violent manner? What does he know of democracy that he can try to preach it to the Israelis? That the reporters could contain their laughter in the presence of such laughable words is amazing. But then, most present probably agreed with him.
''He is a man of the 50s and 60s. Unfortunately he is determining the fate of the Israelis in the new decade.''
And, in what decade (or century, for that matter) is the Saudi leadership living?
''(He[Sharon] thinks) that an Arab when he says peace he means peace that will finally end in driving all Israelis into the sea, that the only security for Israel is to rely on its arms and the relationship with the United States,'' he said. ... Prince Saud...said that all Palestinian factions, including the radicals Islamists in Hamas and Islamic Jihad, were working on a cease-fire in their conflict with Israelis. ''They are all working on a paper that has all the conditions that they will subscribe to for stopping the fighting,'' he said, without much elaboration.
The day that these groups, and the PA for that matter, remove the part in their charters that call for the extirpation of Israel and stop open calling for this on TV and in print and stop teaching it to their children, al-Faisal can say that Sharon is deluded in beleiving that the Arab world wants Israel and the Jews completely destoyed. Until then the truth is that this is precisely their goal and they admit it openly everywhere you look and listen.
Even the Guardian can't bring itself to support Saudi show trials against Britons that the Sauds claim are responsible for the anti-Western bombings in Riyhad. There is no evidence, just a 'confession' by a Belgian arrested in the course of the 'investigation'. It will be interesting to see how Blair plays this. It will be interesing to see how Bush plays this, too.
Nice to know the Governer of Maryland, apparently, considers 'diversity' more important that professional qualifications when appointing judges. Here he pats himself on the back as he appoints an Asian-American and openly lesbian. The writer digs up the info that the Governer decided was merely incidental to their appropriateness and they both sound more than qualified but it is just the idea of making this kind of statement: "The strength of Maryland is its diversity, and with these two appointments we are celebrating that diversity and breaking down barriers," Glendening said in a prepared statement. "I am confident Ms. Hong and Ms. Weinstein will make Maryland a more fair, just and inclusive (place) to live."
Why is up to a judge to make a place more inclusive?
He also claims to be breaking down barriers. The only barrier should be and Constitutionally is lack of qualifications.
The foam bomb, for example, would allow US forces to isolate production sites in urban areas without using high explosives, which carry the risk of releasing chemical or biological agents into the atmosphere, threatening soldiers and civilians.
The Saudi Ambassador to the UK fulfilling his truth quota for the year writes a short letter to the Independent dismissing Bin Laden. This coming from the same person who writes glowingly of homicide bombers.
I wonder if he realizes how truthful he is being when he says: I must start by frankly admitting that Saudi Arabia has always been an efficient factory for the production of myths.
Listening to him, in some of his rambling interviews, I had the impression of a madman who thought he had defeated one superpower and was about to defeat the remaining superpower. I am not a psychologist, but both his words and actions reveal a man with dangerous illusions of grandeur. He is not interested in redressing Palestinian injustices or in getting the Americans out of the Gulf, although he finds it convenient to mention those two issues. What he wants is the destruction of America itself. I refuse to dignify his actions with any justification; he kills because he enjoys killing.
He's wrong of course. He is exactly the person who needs to respond to Bin Laden and tell the world (especially the Muslim world) that al Qaeda and those who spread similar philosophies are wrong and should be denounced.
Of course he didn't forget to add a bit of anti-Zionism to the mix.
To compare him with Yasser Arafat is an act of folly only Ariel Sharon can muster.
Jimmy Carter's toadying to Castro really makes me sick.The moreso noe that I have begun a deeper reading into the Soviet Union and the truly unfree (not just in the minds of people like Chomsky and Kingslover) police state of Lenin, Trotsky and Stalin. People like Castro and Mugabe considerthe rhetoric and methods of these beasts to be his ideal and the people of Cuba suffer as a result.
Here is an article that has the testimony of a real political prisoner (as opposed to a cop killer like Mumia Abu Jamal).
There was no bed, no blanket, no bathroom facilities. Only a cell and Eriberto Mederos, a politicized nurse working for Fidel Castro's communist regime who violently subdued prisoners with the help of two assistants before dispensing his own brand of treatment: electroshock therapy.
Where was Amnesty international, where was the UN, where were the newspapers and movie makers to apprise us of this? Where are they now as still more suffer similar fates even today? How Jimmy Carter and those like him can critisize the justice of America and turn around nd heap praise on torturers and murderers is beyond me. It cheapens everything they do and say and hurts any real causes they may take up.
Again we see it is the French elite and government that hate America while the people of France have not forgotten. A museum exhibit is opening in honor of an American pilot shot down 56 years ago and whose remains were found last year.
Staying in the Soviet theme I have been running for the past couple of days. Remains of 190 people, including more then 70 children, were found at a monastery in the Ukraine that was used by the NKVD.
ABC's (Appeasement Broadcasting Central?) spin keeps on rolling. Telling us how homesick and dejected the Palestinian terrorists who stormed and occupied the Church of the Nativity are.
Maybe they should also give us a story about the continuing sadness and trauma suffered by the families of those murdered by Ibrahim Abayat.
Some British politicians showing some backbone. 453 members of both Houses of Parliament have backed an intitiative to keep a firm policy against the theocracy in Iran and to support the National Council of Resistance of Iran.
“So long as the mullahs are in power, terrorism under the guise of Islam will continue. The right of the Iranian people to oppose those who terrorise them must be respected. In 1979 the mullahs revived terrorism, this time under the guise of Islam and in the name of God. Over 90% of terrorist acts committed in the past 23 years have been carried out directly by the clerical regime or its surrogates.”
There are a few soft voices in Arabia that are questioning the policy of preaching hatred.
"We have to confront a lot of things that we thought were normal," said Khaled M. Batarfi, the managing editor of Al Madina, a daily newspaper pushing the limits of what can be published. "We have to examine the opinions that resulted in these bad actions and see if they are wrong, or people just took them out of context." "Before Sept. 11, it was just an opinion, `I think we should hate the others,´ " he said. "After Sept. 11, we found out ourselves that some of those thoughts brought actions that hurt us, that put all Muslims on trial."
. "Wahhabism looks at every situation as black and white, there is no `in between,´ no gray area," said Mr. Awaji, who now works as a lawyer. "We have to be more open and more tolerant inside our sects. If we solve that within our sect, then we can be more tolerant than others." Mr. Awaji was among some 160 scholars and intellectuals who signed a manifesto this spring suggesting more dialogue with the West.
Update: You'll have to forgive me. Being away has put my daily reading behind quite a bit. I didn't read Jonah's take on this. Schooled in Archaeology and Middle Eastern Studies in college has given me a longer and more incrememntalist view of change. I don't expect the Wahabim to wake up tomorrow and say well we should start loving America and give up this dreadful anti-Semitism. It took two atomic bombs and millions of dead in Europe to to remove similar (and Europe's conversion lately is debatable) visions of pan-global domination.
While war may come to certain Arab (cough...Iraq....cough) countries we can no longer count on the kind of overwhelming defeat that we have seen in the past. And while that is a good thing, nobody (save certain extremists) wants to see millions dead and nuclear craters where once cities stood, we have yet to find a viable alternative. In the search for a third way (not appeasement and not all out war) we have gotten the gulags of the USSR, the killing fields of Cambodia, Rwanda, Bosnia ad infinitum.
So in the meantime we look for changes. It took Rosa Parks to coalesce the Civil Rights movement. It took the a series of relatively small events to lead up to the explosion of the American Revolution (Boston Tea Party, Stamp Act, Boston Massacre). The Reformation started with Martin Luther nailing up the 95 Points. Similarly, I think we need to see the followers of Islam question, publicly, the more extreme teachings that are tolerated. Mr. Batarfi may be saying that he thinks this path has led to their being put on trial and Jonah interprets this to mean that he has no problem with the hatred it is just the consequences he dislikes. Well this may be true but it creates the opening for someone to step in and take him to task for supporting that hatred. It will take a series of such questions before there can be change.
That is why I find these things encouraging. Will this man's words change Islam overnight? No, but there needs to be debate. Those who say things like terrorism is good and suicide bombers are martys and heroes need to be debated. All Muslims need to see the weakness and untruth in this support. The media has to stop giving these people (and their apologists) the proponderance of coverage. Start putting reformers on with these people to debate. Everyone says we have not seen voices from the Muslim community denouncing Bin Laden and Terrorism. And it is true. Not because they are not there and haven't been talking. It is because they are rational and eloquent speakers that get their words buried deep in stories and papers they don't make the front page. CIAR and others like them are the ones that the media turn to.
Jim Muir of the BBC has a good analysis of the situation in Kurdish held Northern Iraq. And the possibility of their supporting the ousting of Hussein. Of course they want it and with the right assurances they seem to be willing to participate but right now find themselves in the dubious position of being within a couple of hours of over 200,000 Iraqi troops (not to mention WMD's).
Gulf News reports on the meeting this past weekend of Iraqi exiles.
"Let me tell you; first of all we made sure that the council represents all different sectarian factions and ranks in the army; second, the process of change will take place from inside where the Iraqi army will have a major role; three, we will not replace a dictator by another and we confirm that a democratic government takes control when the current regime is ousted; four, we welcome any support from our international friends."
Asia Times reports more on the letter by Ayatollah Taheri as he quit his position as Imam of Isfahan. While pointing out the pathetic response of the EU to the students protesting in Iran the article says that Bush's statement is late and needs to offer something more hopeful to the Iranians. An interesting possibility that the writer brings up is that there may need be no US military operation if there is a full scale revolution in Iran. I don't think US military action would be unnecessary but it the numbers involved may be reduced.
No less a figure than the Ayatollah Jalaluddin Taheri, the imam of the major city of Isfahan, its Friday prayers speaker for the past 30 years and the official representative of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, resigned his posts on July 9 and released a stinging five-page letter denouncing the Islamic Republic's regime of conservative clerics. "I am embarrassed and ashamed," he wrote. "You cannot blame [the United States and the Shah] for the failures and corruption of our country [which] have all resulted in our people turning away from Islam, rising unemployment, inflation, high cost of living and a satanic gap between the rich and the poor."
He describes the regime as a vast mafia that is responsible for "a failing foreign policy, corruption, bribery, brain drain and the harassment and jailing of journalists and writers". These people, he said, "are riding on a stupid camel of power onto the field of politics". And worst of all, this mafia gang funds and supports vigilante forces who "continuously sharpen their dinosaur fangs of violence, with the hope of marrying their ugly, oppressive, fear-evoking bride of violence to religion".
Comrade Bob is running out off allies fast. It look like all he has left is Castro and China. Libya is fed up with him. Not for his policies mind you, just that he can't pay them back.
This is a UN Press Release? The Palestinian Authority should take immediate and specific action to prevent terrorist acts against Israel, and its leadership must do more to de-legitimize terrorism among the public. The admonitions for Israel are even relatively fair.
I've noticed that I don't see any letters printed in the Washinton Post or NY Times that supports school vouchers. I don't know how this 100% can be when polls consistenetly show support to be near 80%. Couldn't be editorial bias on choosing the letters to print? Naaaahhhhh.
Good editorian in the Yemen Times called, appropriately enough, Trashcan of Civilizations. Unfortunately for the Middle East there needs to be actions to back up the words.
Even the intellectuals that Arafat and his supporters have spent years cultivating have begun to see the truth behind the hateful and racist anti-Semitic propaganda spreading among the militant factions of Palestinians.
Benny Morris the founder and most famous 'New Historian'
"I thought the Palestinians had changed their ideological course, but no. I thought something had changed in the Palestinian mentality."
...Hirsh Goodman. "I supported Oslo," he said. "I supported talking with Arafat. The greatest disappointment was to discover that despite everything I've believed, everything I've promulgated, that asshole never gave up terror."
"There is no flexibility on the issues of dignity and destiny and handling the vital interests of the country," Foreign Minister Naji Sabri said on Monday. "We will cut the head off anyone who raises a hand to our borders."
Where is Kofi's concern for the treatment of (potential) prisoners of war? When it comes to 'fighters' who by any defenition cannot be seen as anything but unlawful combatants, the UN and EU are very distaught over the treatment of Guantanamo prisoners. Iraq threatens to start beheading anyone who 'raises a hand toward' their border and silence ensues.
Still recovering from the trip so posting will probably commence tomorrow. My reading while in Florida was Martin Amis' "Koba the Drea : Laughter and the 20 Million". Anyone who thinks the Soviets were not so bad and that Castro, Mugabe and those like them are admirable should be required to read this book. I would require Solzhenitsyn but The Gulag Archipelego is a bit long (at 1800 pages). Amis does a fine job bringing together the writings of Solzhenitsyn and the other Soviet dissident writers and tying them in with his own thoughts, life and recollections.
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