This is shaping up to be the election year Republicans sound like Democrats and vice versa.
A year when Republicans say things like this:
“The elite class in America is becoming a ruling class, and they’ve made enough money by hiring cheap illegal labor that they think they also have some kind of a right to cheap service to manicure their lawns and their nails,” said King. “And so this new ruling class of America is expanding the service class in America at the expense of the middle class.”
And traditionally Democrat-supporting laborists, in the face of mass arrests of illegal immigrants, declare that unions will not endorse a May 1 boycott because it would be illegal.
Then there’s Bush asking for a probe into gas price fixing as the mannequin Kerry calls for a permanent presence in Iraq. God, G-d, Allah, and whatever deity those crazy, tax dodging polygamists in Utah worship, save me from yet another year of Kerry speeches. I pray to be spared that stiff’s glorification of the Empire’s army. What part of “all volunteer” and conscientious objection do liberals and the antiwar movement not get?
But liberals have never been accused of belaboring the long thought. As “progressive Christians” ramp-up for a nationwide debate on Darfur, how many participants will mention that in supporting death to the government in Sudan (aka Somalia II) they are calling for the imposition of a regime just as heinous? Why is it that when so-called Christians force children to fight, their religious affiliation exonerates them from war tribunals?
Whilst on the subject of progressive Christians, I will no longer support your “save women’s choice” bullshit. I’ve done it for years, even though it’s turned my stomach. I continued to do so in the face of antiwar marches turning out numbers around half a million when your march on Washington turned out at least a million. I will continue to support the argument that when a woman’s life is threatened, or tests conclude fetuses are non-viable, or in cases of rape, that abortion should be an option decided by the woman and their doctor. But abortion by choice is off my activist list. Take the pill. Get thee an IUD. Carry a freaking condom in your pocket, fer fuck’s sake.
Whilst on the subject of fuck you, fuck you Osama. I don’t know who or what enables you to send out a message whenever the spirit moves you in a time my government taps the phone of anyone they choose and kidnaps people off foreign streets to be tortured, but shut the fuck up, murderer. Palestinians have suffered enough at the hands of two-faced, double dealing Saudis and the genocidal monsters in Zionist Israel. An endorsement from you is a call for their death machines to make them a sacrificial lamb of your cause. Hamas should disavow you and Islamic Jihad. If it’s not infiltrated with Mossad agents, it may as well be. Their attack on Israeli civilians brought a smile to Ehud Olmert’s face. A smile. [ 17 April ]
Challenging Empire
How People, Governments, and the UN Defy US Power
Phyllis Bennis
pp. 95, 96
Protocol I of the 4th Geneva Conventions (Protection of Victims of International Armed Conflicts) governs the conduct of war. In describing obligations of combatants, Article 57(2), the Protocol says:
(a) those who plan or decide upon an attack shall: (i) do everything feasible to verify that the objectives to be attacked are neither civilians nor civilian objects and are not subject to special protection but are military objectives…; (ii) take all feasible precautions in the choice of means and methods of attack with a view to avoiding, and in any event to minimising, incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians and damage to civilian objects; (iii) refrain from deciding to launch any attack which may be expected to cause incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians, damage to civilian objects, or a combination thereof, which would be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated;
(b) an attack shall be cancelled or suspended if it becomes apparent that the objective is not a military one or is subject to special protection or that the attack may be expected to cause incidental loss of civilian life, injury to civilians, damage to civilian objects, or a combination thereof, which would be excessive in relation to the concrete and direct military advantage anticipated;
(c) effective advance warning shall be given of attacks which may affect the civilian population, unless circumstances do not permit.
pp. 96, 97
The US (along with Turkey, Afghanistan under the Taliban, Iraq under Saddam Hussein, and a few other countries) has refused to ratify Protocol I, precisely because it would require that the militants the Bush administration calls “unlawful combatants” would have to be accorded the privileges of any prisoners of war. The Protocol was drafted specifically to include the obligations of anti-colonial and anti-occupation resistance fighters. Article 2 (4) of the Protocol extends its authority to
“include armed conflicts which peoples are fighting against colonial domination and alien occupation and against racist regimes in the exercise of their right to self-determination, as enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations and the Declaration on Principles of International Law concerning Friendly Relations and Co-operation among States in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations.”
Hamas may not be able to take stones from Palestinian children’s hands, but it should not make excuses when they go into Israel and kill civilians, especially when there is a steady supply of legitimate targets. Palestinians should decide whether or not to engage in an armed struggle, and if so, make a committment not to descend to the depths of inhumanity and illegality of the Israelis. When they send those tanks into the Occupied Territories, where is the army standing between them and civilians? Why is there no military presence at the checkpoints on Palestinian land? Why are old men facing maniacal settlers alone?
God, G-d, Allah, and whatever other entity is available, when this looks good to someone committed to non-violent direct action, you know the shit is going to hit the fan. Spare mercy for the innocents, eh, not that you have so far.
Protestors clash with riot police during a demonstration against the visit of U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in Athens, Greece, on Tuesday.