“But we beseech you, brethren, to respect those who labor among you and are over you in the Lord and admonish you, and to esteem them very highly in love because of their work.”

(St. Paul, 1 Thess. 5:12-13) 

From the Catholic League:

Catholic League president Bill Donohue comments on the way MSNBC host Chris Matthews handled his interview with Providence Bishop Thomas Tobin last night on “Hardball”:

We were deluged with phone calls, faxes and e-mails after what happened yesterday on “Hardball.” After watching the first portion of the interview between Chris Matthews and Bishop Tobin, I wondered what all the fuss was all about: Chris was just being his usual aggressive self. But it didn’t take long before Matthews literally spun out of control.

Matthews proceeded with an extended and quite insulting lecture. He had absolutely no interest in a discussion on the question of the morality and legality of abortion—all he wanted to do was to make the bishop sit there and listen to his rant. Indeed, his tirade was simply over-the-top.

No non-Catholic would ever treat a bishop this way. But too many liberal Catholics, especially Irish Catholics, think they are exempt from the same standards of civility that apply to others. They are flatly wrong.

I was on MSNBC twice yesterday on this same subject and was treated with respect both times. Ed Schultz, who can be quite tough, was totally respectful, and I’m a lay person. Chris could learn a thing or two from Ed, who not only does not insult his guests, he actually gives them a chance to respond.

Contact executive producer John Reiss: hardball@msnbc.com

END OF POST

Source : http://freeaafia.org/

I have decided, at long last, to put down my own thoughts on the recent heavy trend of gamers threatening to boycott games if certain things are not done. Specifically this is about my personal experiences going up against the Left 4 Dead 2 boycott, but also from talking to people who have complained about what Activision and Infinity Ward did with Modern Warfare 2 (but still play it anyway).

Our story begins in late May, after Left 4 Dead 2 is announced at E3. Personally I didn’t know what to think. It seemed odd that Valve would want to put out a sequel that fast, a sequel that they planned to release on time for once even. I did not however, expect the level of vitriol from certain people, one of whom was a mod that banned me from the forum he moderated rather that talk civil about it. His complaints were (as were later parroted by the boycott movement itself)

1. Valve had lied. They had promised x amount of weapons and y amount of campaigns and a working SDK for L4D1. They had not delivered, this meant they were liars
2. If they are putting all this stuff in a new game, they should be giving that new content away for free, like they did with Team Fortress 2.
3. It isn’t going to be different enough from the first to justify being new.

Those were the main points. The problem with both those points, in addition to them being wrong, was that they were formulated before any real information about Left 4 Dead 2 had surfaced other than “yeah we’re making it.” This is why I have a problem with E3, or more correctly the people who hang on every single word said at it. It leads to knee-jerk reactions like this. Course, people buy yearly released games and sequels all the time (hi there Madden series!), but apparently Valve doing this is somehow wrong and indecent and terrible and so on and so forth.

So a couple days go by and more information comes out. For one, Valve was not abandoning L4D1. In fact the SDK was coming out of beta next week and would be cross-compatible with L4D2 content. In addition they were already working on another DLC campaign (granted the full info about this didn’t hit until about a month or two later), and as for L4D2, why couldn’t it be a free DLC add-on? Well they (Valve) had considered that, and there were a couple reasons why it had to become a full game.

1. the AI director was being altered to work in different ways, and also work better
2. Level design was taking a drastic change and branching paths were being introduced, something that again was necessitating a change in the AI director
3. The game engine itself was changing a bit to allow the Infected to be dismembered differently, as well as new and more visceral damage effects, plus melee weapons.
4. All in all, with the new levels, weapons, characters, and so forth, they estimated it to be roughly twice the content of L4D1 and therefore they couldn’t feasibly see giving it away for free (also due to the changes being made to AI and the engine, they wouldn’t be able to, but I’ll get back to that).

Despite these rather obvious and good reasons as to why they couldn’t just make it a free release, people were not satisfied, again citing that Valve was only after their money. Yes Valve, a company that hasn’t really done anything along the lines of EA, Blizzard, or Activision (among others) and released something just to cash in or charge out the ass for things. As to the erupting forum debate, I was soon removed when I took my stand at how hilariously wrong the people planning on boycotting were. insults were exchanged, sexual orientations (mine) were called into question, and at the end I was sent away with some comment about how my comprehension levels were worse than that of a retarded chimpanzee. Which is funny seeing as how I was reading everything correctly and the moderator was too busy doing the digital equivalent of holding his hands over his ears and loudly shouting “LALALALALA I CAN’T HEARRRRR YOUUUU”

If he had listened, or maybe taken the time to think, he’d be able to see that L4D and Team Fortess 2 are two different things. TF2 has no real AI to deal with, and thus can be updated really quickly. Something like Left 4 Dead requires levels to be built with pathfinding routines scripted, AI director events scripted, other events, and so on and so forth. And the levels are much larger too. It’s not like you can just wave your hand and boom, there’s a level. Furthermore you cannot alter the code of a game engine as easily as people tried to believe, which again above all else meant that they had to make it a sequel.

So around this time I learned about the L4D2 Boycott Group on Steam. I read their manifesto, which later added such wonderful gems like “The fiddle music sucks and is not L4D enough”. Through it all I maintained that they were wrong and that by and large this group (which became almost 45,000) were not only going to not cause any real damage (being barely 3% of all L4D1 copies sold), but that their concerns were not legitimate and instead were by and large motivated by a sense that they were being betrayed and that Valve “owed them”. This was not a sentiment exclusive to me. Adam Sessler of G4 had a similar belief, pointing out that Valve was not in the habit of screwing people over and that consumers are not owed anything by a developer, and also calling the behavior of the boycotters “a little bit on the naive side [that only they should be considered] and slightly embarrassing. It’s really kind of juvenile and if I were the head of one of these companies sitting there and seeing that the original Left 4 Dead sold an obscene amount of copies last year and that this [the boycott] is only a small percentage of it, i would probably listen to those people [the boycotters] even less”. The boycotters countered back that they were being misrepresented and were not allowed a chance to speak their side of the argument. There was just one problem with that, they already were.

Various stories were cropping up about people coming into L4D games and griefing the hell out of them if people weren’t on board for the boycott. That doesn’t exactly sound like the actions of reasonable individuals to me, nor to many others. By the time Sessler had said his piece resentment was growing amongst the Steam community, angered that people would stoop to such a level to try and force Valve to give them something that they weren’t possibly going to get. Of course, the boycotters claimed they weren’t trying to get L4D2 for free, but that’s a load of bull. So was their claim that the boycott wasn’t about L4D2. But I digress. In response to the boycott group, groups began cropping up against the boycotters and overwhelmingly in favor of Left 4 Dead 2. I joined one of the larger ones, Left 4 Dead Enthusiasts, mostly so I could have an inside track of what was going on. It was here I began to hear a lot more about the greifing, as well as the fact that the boycott group was apparently sending out mass invites, which meant their numbers were artificially inflated on top of everything else. With all that dishonesty why should anybody give the boycotters a chance to say anything else besides their manifesto? Now I know that sounds unfair but lets be realistic here. If you are going to lead anything, you have to be responsible for your followers. The leaders of the Boycott did not do this, they deserved nothing in the first place and their inability to take the moral high ground (either through ignorance or just not caring in the slightest) meant that any chance for it would be slim. Valve of course, being Valve, saw things a bit differently, but I’ll get to that in a while.

Fast-forward to August. Valve announces bigger details on “Crash Course”, a DLC pack for Left 4 Dead. Yes that’s right, the first one. This put a major crimp in the boycotter’s attempts to claim Valve wasn’t going to support L4D1 anymore. Of course the boycotters somehow tried to spin it as Valve responding to pressure from them, this despite the fact that anybody with any sort of industry knowledge (or even the ability to use google to learn about such things) would find that for Crash Course to be ready by September when it came out, it was likely it had been started around or even before E3, and therefore was Valve’s plan all along. This of course, marked the point where the movement really began to lose ground, to the point that one of the boycott leaders, known as “Walking_Target” (an apt name if there ever was one) began going to whatever press he could trying to plead his case and a desire to be heard. I encountered him on the Escapist and I have to say I had no trouble telling him in no uncertain terms why he and the rest of his group were wrong and why, no matter what his original intentions were, they were gone because he had failed to keep the group on track and on the higher ground.

Then came September. By this point the Boycotters had been losing on every front, especially since preorders for L4D2 were far exceeding that of the first one. Valve decided to play its final trump card: invite the boycotters to their studios to see L4D2 for themselves. Now I am not a fan of the idea that people who throw tantrums should be rewarded, but I can’t argue with the result. After playing it the leaders (Walking_Target being one of them) returned to the group with the good news that more rational people had known for months. It was definetely a much different game and not a cheap cash-in. The boycotters were not pleased. They turned on their masters (what a shock) claiming Valve had paid them off. By October the group was effectively dead. It didn’t even last until the game shipped, something I had predicted would happen (And I’m not trying to stroke my own ego since I can only really predict one or two events a year. This year it was the PSPGo being a massive failure and the L4D2 Boycott failing as well). To further drive the point home, it was later revealed that people in the boycott group were preordering at a higher percentage than people who hadn’t been in the group. All thanks to Steam’s ability to track that sort of information. Despite my misgivings about it, Valve had killed the boycott movement with kindness.

Discontent slowly fell away, though some people foolishly held onto the belief that they’d made a difference. Well ok I guess that’s not necessarily false, because they did make a difference. They made the game even more popular and more successful. Probably not what they were going for. Having played L4D2 I can honestly say it was not a cheap cash-in. It is far more than the original was and Valve made the right decision. I enjoy the game just as much as I did the first and I do not feel like I didn’t get my money’s worth out of the first game. I cannot for the life of me understand people who complain this loudly and achieve so little in the process. But it wasn’t over yet.

While this movement quietly died out, another one was gaining steam. This one leveled against Activision and Infinity Ward. See people weren’t too happy about losing dedicated servers in Modern Warfare 2. They were even more annoyed when it was revealed they’d have to use Steam to play multiplayer, and that VAC was going to replace Punkbuster in terms of trying to stop cheaters. What nobody stopped to consider was that this was an experiment. One that obviously has not worked. But rather than think that way people have been complaining about how Steam is controlling too much of the market (I didn’t know 4% of all game sales was such a big deal), and that other companies will follow this trend. The latter argument gained creedence when John Carmack announced that his new game Rage would also not use dedicated servers. Of course the thing about John Carmack is that he is a goddamn genius so maybe he does have a reason for what he’s doing. But looking at forums shows people more of the belief that Carmack is a dinosaur who hasn’t made anything good in over a decade. Nevermind the fact that Doom 3 was actually a pretty good game and if people would stop blindly parroting a certain fast-talking critic they’d probably remember that.

Having talked to one of my friends about this, his main concerns was Steam becoming a monopoly (which is impossible given how little of the market it controls in addition to the fact it’s not trying to push anybody out) and that Steam will become mandatory for PC gaming online. Again I think he’s a bit presumptuous, and not just because he’s playing Modern Warfare 2 despite saying he wouldn’t (in fairness, it was a birthday gift. In a counterpoint he could’ve gotten it exchanged because I believe he received a disk-in-hand copy.) And this is the problem. Too many gamers these days do not stop and think for just a second. Steam doesn’t control a huge chunk of the entire games market, and even with 70% of that 5%, other content download services still prosper (like Direct 2 Drive). Steam’s not a monopoly. They are competing with other companies and services, you know, the way capitalism is supposed to work. But rather than look things up, rather than think, gamers are more content to just say the first thing that comes to mind without considering that it might just sound really dumb a little while later. As somebody who has trouble thinking before speaking, I know what they’re going through, but the thing is I’m trying to learn from that, while they are content to make the same mistakes again and again. We cannot do boycotting the way the MW2 boycotters and the L4D2 boycotters did. For one it was unpleasant, and for another both groups had people buying the game anyway which just proves they were all bark and no bite. I think that there is a place for activism in gaming, and companies do listen to the concerns of people, but most of the time they seem to listen to people who deliver their arguments in a decent manner, instead of pretending they somehow hold the very survival of the company in their hands and won’t buy something unless it’s tailored to their specific needs. This has to change. We are not owed anything by any company. Warren Spector did not owe us for cutting out a lot of content in Deus Ex (Texas, Space, the Moon, etc.). Valve does not owe us for having to cut out content in L4D. Nobody owes us anything unless they specifically say it. A game design document is not a promise. Gamers need to learn that life, and especially the video game industry, does not deal in absolutes.

Diablo III won’t be coming out for at least another year. Now, I’m sad that this game of biblical proportions won’t be out in 2010(or possibly 2011), but nothing warms my sick, dark heart quite like the tears of fanboys everywhere.

Why does it warm my heart so? Fanboys of anything are borderline-bipolar when it comes to the things they love. They will defend their favorite products and companies from negative thoughts thrown from reviewers or friends as though they were defending their children from pedophiles. But, if the creator or developer of said products changes something about those products, the fanboys will turn on the developers so fast, unleashing a steaming vitriol in the form of a boycott or an angry email. So, it’s because of this hypocrisy they display that I revel in their despair.

Couple quick things: This game may very well ruin my life when it comes out. Finally, a giant cactuar for your viewing pleasure/horror. Enjoy.

Semper Shut Up,

The DevilGeek

The Electronic Intifada, November 10, 2009

Israeli Jews and the one-state solution

Anyone who rejects the two-state solution, won’t bring a one-state solution. They will instead bring one war, not one state. A bloody war with no end. — Israeli President Shimon Peres, 7 November 2009.

One of the most commonly voiced objections to a one-state solution for Palestine/Israel stems from the accurate observation that the vast majority of Israeli Jews reject it, and fear being “swamped” by a Palestinian majority. Across the political spectrum, Israeli Jews insist on maintaining a separate Jewish-majority state.

But with the total collapse of the Obama Administration’s peace efforts, and relentless Israeli colonization of the occupied West Bank, the reality is dawning rapidly that the two-state solution is no more than a slogan that has no chance of being implemented or altering the reality of a de facto binational state in Palestine/Israel.

This places an obligation on all who care about the future of Palestine/Israel to seriously consider the democratic alternatives. I have long argued that the systems in post-apartheid South Africa (a unitary democratic state), and Northern Ireland (consociational democracy) — offer hopeful, real-life models.

But does solid Israeli Jewish opposition to a one-state solution mean that a peaceful one-state outcome is so unlikely that Palestinians should not pursue it, and should instead focus only on “pragmatic” solutions that would be less fiercely resisted by Israeli Jews?

The experience in South Africa suggests otherwise. In 1994, white-minority rule — apartheid — came to a peaceful, negotiated end, and was replaced (after a transitional period of power-sharing) with a unitary democratic state with a one person, one vote system. Before this happened, how likely did this outcome look? Was there any significant constituency of whites prepared to contemplate it, and what if the African National Congress (ANC) had only advanced political solutions that whites told pollsters they would accept?

Until close to the end of apartheid, the vast majority of whites, including many of the system’s liberal critics, completely rejected a one person, one vote system, predicting that any attempt to impose it would lead to a bloodbath. As late as 1989, F.W. de Klerk, South Africa’s last apartheid president, described a one person, one vote system as the “death knell” for South Africa.

A 1988 study by political scientist Pierre Hugo documented the widespread fears among South African whites that a transition to majority rule would entail not only a loss of political power and socioeconomic status, but engendered “physical dread” and fear of “violence, total collapse, expulsion and flight.” Successive surveys showed that four out of five whites thought that majority rule would threaten their “physical safety.” Such fears were frequently heightened by common racist tropes of inherently savage and violent Africans, but the departure of more than a million white colons from Algeria and the airlifting of 300,000 whites from Angola during decolonization set terrifying precedents (“Towards darkness and death: racial demonology in South Africa,” The Journal of Modern African Studies, 26(4), 1988).

Throughout the 1980s, polls showed that even as whites increasingly understood that apartheid could not last, only a small minority ever supported majority rule and a one person, one vote system. In a March 1986 survey, for example, 47 percent of whites said they would favor some form of “mixed-race” government, but 83 percent said they would opt for continued white domination of the government if they had the choice (Peter Goodspeed, “Afrikaners cling to their all-white dream,” The Toronto Star, 5 October 1986).

A 1990 nationwide survey of Afrikaner whites (native speakers of Afrikaans, as opposed to English, and who traditionally formed the backbone of the apartheid state), found just 2.2 percent were willing to accept a “universal franchise with majority rule” (Kate Manzo and Pat McGowan, “Afrikaner fears and the politics of despair: Understanding change in South Africa,” International Studies Quarterly, 36, 1992).

Perhaps an enlightened white elite was able to lead the white masses to higher ground? This was not the case either. A 1988 academic survey of more than 400 white politicians, business and media leaders, top civil servants, academics and clergy found that just 4.8 percent were prepared to accept a unitary state with a universal voting franchise and two-thirds considered such an outcome “unacceptable.” According to Manzo and McGowan, white elites reflected the sentiments and biases of the rest of the society and overwhelmingly considered whites inherently more civilized and culturally superior to black Africans. Just more than half of prominent whites were prepared to accept “a federal state in which power is shared between white and non-white groups and areas so that no one group dominates.”

During the 1980s, the white electorate in South Africa moved to the right, as Israel’s Jewish electorate is doing today. Support seeped from the National Party, which had established formal apartheid in 1948, to the even more extreme Conservative Party. Yet, “on the issue of majority rule,” Hugo observed, “supporters of the National Party and the Conservative Party, as well as most white voters to the ‘left’ of these organizations, ha[d] little quarrel with each other.”

The vast majority of whites, wracked with existential fears, were simply unable to contemplate relinquishing effective control, or at least a veto, over political decision-making in South Africa.

Yet, the African National Congress insisted firmly on a one person, one vote system with no white veto. As the township protests and strikes and international pressure mounted, The Economist observed in an extensive 1986 survey of South Africa published on 1 February of that year, that many “enlightened” whites “still fondly argue that a dramatic improvement in the quality of black life may take the revolutionary sting out of the black townships — and persuade ‘responsible’ blacks, led by the emergent black middle class, to accept some power-sharing formula.”

Schemes to stabilize the apartheid system abounded, and bear a strong resemblance to the current Israeli government’s vision of “economic peace” in which a collaborationist Palestinian Authority leadership would manage a still-subjugated Palestinian population anesthetized by consumer goods and shopping malls.

Because of the staunch opposition of whites to a unitary democratic state, the ANC heard no shortage of advice from western liberals that it should seek a “realistic” political accommodation with the apartheid regime, and that no amount of pressure could force whites to succumb to the ANC’s political demands. The ANC was warned that insistence on majority rule would force Afrikaners into the “laager” — they would retreat into a militarized garrison state and siege economy, preferring death before surrender.

Even the late Helen Suzman, one of apartheid’s fiercest liberal critics, predicted in 1987, as quoted by Hugo, “The Zimbabwe conflict took 15 years … and cost 20,000 lives and I can assure you that the South African transfer of power will take a good deal more than that, both in time and I am afraid lives.”

But as The Economist observed, the view that whites would prefer “collective suicide” was something of a caricature. The vast majority of Afrikaners were “no longer bible-thumping boers.” They were “part of a spoilt, affluent suburban society, whose economic pain threshold may prove to be rather low.”

The Economist concluded that if whites would only come so far voluntarily, then it was perfectly reasonable for the anti-apartheid movement to bring them the rest of the way through “coercion” in the form of sanctions and other forms of pressure. “The quicker the white tribe submits,” the magazine wrote, “the better its chance of a bearable future in a black-ruled South Africa.”

Ultimately, as we now know, the combination of internal resistance and international isolation did force whites to abandon political apartheid and accept majority rule. However, it is important to note that the combined strength of the anti-apartheid movement never seriously threatened the physical integrity of the white regime.

Even after the massive township uprisings of 1985-86, the South African regime was secure. “So far there is no real physical threat to white power,” The Economist noted, “so far there is little threat to white lives. … The white state is mighty, and well-equipped. It has the capacity to repress the township revolts far more bloodily. The blacks have virtually no urban or rural guerrilla capacity, practically no guns, few safe havens within South Africa or without.”

This balance never changed, and a similar equation could be written today about the relative power of a massively-armed — and much more ruthless — Israeli state, and lightly armed Palestinian resistance factions.

What did change for South Africa, and what all the weapons in the world were not able to prevent, was the complete loss of legitimacy of the apartheid regime and its practices. Once this legitimacy was gone, whites lost the will to maintain a system that relied on repression and violence and rendered them international pariahs; they negotiated a way out and lived to tell the tale. It all happened much more quickly and with considerably less violence than even the most optimistic predictions of the time. But this outcome could not have been predicted based on what whites said they were willing to accept, and it would not have occurred had the ANC been guided by opinion polls rather than the democratic principles of the Freedom Charter.

Zionism — as many Israelis openly worry — is suffering a similar, terminal loss of legitimacy as Israel is ever more isolated as a result of its actions. Israel’s self-image as a liberal “Jewish and democratic state” is proving impossible to maintain against the reality of a militarized, ultra-nationalist Jewish sectarian settler-colony that must carry out frequent and escalating massacres of “enemy” civilians (Lebanon and Gaza 2006, Gaza 2009) in a losing effort to check the resistance of the region’s indigenous people. Zionism cannot bomb, kidnap, assassinate, expel, demolish, settle and lie its way to legitimacy and acceptance.

Already difficult to disguise, the loss of legitimacy becomes impossible to conceal once Palestinians are a demographic majority ruled by a Jewish minority. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s demand that Palestinians recognize Israel’s “right to exist as a Jewish state” is in effect an acknowledgement of failure: without Palestinian consent, something which is unlikely ever to be granted, the Zionist project of a Jewish ethnocracy in Palestine has grim long-term prospects.

Similarly, South African whites typically attempted to justify their opposition to democracy, not in terms of a desire to preserve their privilege and power, but using liberal arguments about protecting distinctive cultural differences. Hendrik Verwoerd Jr., the son of assassinated Prime Minister Hendrik Verwoerd, apartheid’s founder, expressed the problem in these terms in 1986, as reported by The Toronto Star, stating that, “These two people, the Afrikaner and the black, are not capable of becoming one nation. Our differences are unique, cultural and deep. The only way a man can be happy, can live in peace, is really when he is among his own people, when he shares cultural values.”

The younger Verwoerd was on the far-right of South African politics, leading a quixotic effort to carve out a whites-only homeland in the heart of South Africa. But his reasoning sounds remarkably similar to liberal Zionist defenses of the “two-state solution” today. The Economist clarified the use of such language at the time, stating that “One of the weirder products of apartheid is the crippling of language in a maw of hypocrisy, euphemism and sociologese. You talk about the Afrikaner ‘right to self-determination’ — meaning power over everybody else.”

Zionism’s claim for “Jewish self-determination” amidst an intermixed population, is in effect a demand to preserve and legitimize a status quo in which Israeli Jews exercise power in perpetuity. But there’s little reason to expect that Israeli Jews would abandon this quest voluntarily any more than South African whites did. As in South Africa, coercion is necessary — and the growing boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) movement is one of the most powerful, nonviolent, legitimate and proven tools of coercion that Palestinians possess. Israel’s vulnerabilities may be different from those of apartheid South Africa, but Israel is not invulnerable to pressure.

Coercion is not enough, however; as I have long argued, and sought to do, Palestinians must also put forward a positive vision. Neither can Palestinians advocating a one-state solution simply disregard the views of Israeli Jews. We must recognize that the opposition of Israeli Jews to any solution that threatens their power and privilege stems from at least two sources. One is irrational, racist fears of black and brown hordes (in this case, Arab Muslims) stoked by decades of colonial, racist demonization. The other source — certainly heightened by the former — are normal human concerns about personal and family dislocation, loss of socioeconomic status and community security: change is scary.

But change will come. Without indulging Israeli racism or preserving undue privilege, the legitimate concerns of ordinary Israeli Jews can be addressed directly in any negotiated transition to ensure that the shift to democracy is orderly, and essential redistributive policies are carried out fairly. Inevitably, decolonization will cause some pain as Israeli Jews lose power and privilege, but there are few reasons to believe it cannot be a well-managed process, or that the vast majority of Israeli Jews, like white South Africans, would not be prepared to make the adjustment for the sake of a normality and legitimacy they cannot have any other way.

This is where the wealth of research and real-life experience about the successes, failures, difficulties and opportunities of managing such transitions at the level of national and local politics, neighborhoods, schools and universities, workplaces, state institutions and policing, emerging from South Africa and Northern Ireland, will be of enormous value.

Every situation has unique features, and although there are patterns in history, it never repeats itself exactly. But what we can conclude from studying the pasts and presents of others is that Palestinians and Israelis are no less capable of writing themselves a post-colonial future that gives everyone a chance at a life worth living in a single, democratic state.

Co-founder of The Electronic Intifada, Ali Abunimah is author of One Country: A Bold Proposal to End the Israeli-Palestinian Impasse.

Jewish Voice for Peace comments:

Ali Abunimah is a prominent defender of a single democratic state in Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories. In this article he makes the now quite common – though also controversial – comparison with Apartheid South Africa. Usually the question this comparison raises is whether Israeli treatment of Palestinians is really analogous to or as bad as the Apartheid regime’s treatment of its black majority, and the comparison is often used to support the use of tactics of resistance like BDS (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions) modeled on the anti-Apartheid campaigns of the 1980s.  But Abunimah instead hones narrowly in on the hostility of the white minority in South Africa to a multi-racial democratic state, a hostility that persisted until surprisingly shortly before change was initiated. It is this that he compares, in a wealth of detail, with Jewish Israeli fears of a single state solution. If change could occur in South Africa in spite of such widespread rejection in the white community, why, Abuminah argues, should change not occur in Israel despite the fears of the Jewish community? It won’t happen, he recognizes without outside pressure (and he supports BDS); but current Jewish Israeli rejection need not make it impossible.

This is surely true, but ‘not necessarily impossible’ is very far from showing that a one-state solution ought to be the aspiration of activist movements, Palestinian, Jewish or otherwise. As his banner quotation from Shimon Peres – a barely veiled threat – makes clear, it remains quite possible that a one-state ‘solution’ will involve no diminution of violence towards or oppression of Palestinians. One state is, after all, what there is now. What might make it important to explore a one state possibility is the fact, clearly motivating Abunimah, that two viable states are now impossible. Certainly he is correct to say that there is presently no political will in the Israeli or US administrations to move in the direction of a viable Palestinian state and reasonable opinions can differ on whether the current ‘facts on the ground’ make it impossible to eke out such a state. But it is also surely true that activist pressure can be brought to bear both on that political
will and even on the facts on the ground and this pressure has a natural point of application in the official commitment of Israel, the US, the PA (and even Hamas) to two states. If change is possible, as Abunimah argues, on the one state solution, then it is certainly possible for two states. But if two states can be achieved, then this removes a big chunk of the motivation for directing one’s energies to one state. Indeed, aiming for two viable states in the medium term is not inconsistent with seeking to build consensus, along the lines Abunimah suggests, for single state in the long term.

The question is by no means an obvious one to resolve, but it is important to consider where activist energies are most likely to have an effect, and avoid directions that absorb energy with little hope of result. Indeed some commentators have suggested that the one state solution has become increasingly acceptable in the mainstream US  media precisely because it is so unlikely to come about that it represents – from the point of view of the status quo – a harmless safety valve through which to discharge otherwise potentially dangerous activist pressure.

Alistair Welchman

It seems that Pakistan Feudal Party (also known as PPP) government in full swing

to confront independent media using all their internal resources and their external

links to put curbs on genuine journalism and news analysis.

It reminds us of Musharraf’s emergency days when similar was done to stop the voices against their mistakes and crimes.

Recent victim of this PPP government’s feudal martial law is “Meray Mutabiq” of Dr. Shahid Masood which has been banned by the Dubai government to go on air from Dubai.

Recently government, agencies, government sponsored media and journalists have started a massive campaign against independent media and the elements and methods used were pretty much same as of Musharraf times even the allegations are similar like being paid by opposition or serving the foreign agenda (We all know our governments have been serving the foreign agenda not the independent media).

We condemn this action of Pakistan and UAE governments and show our full solidarity with independent media.

We expect the genuine journalists and analysts to continue their role which they have played against dictatorship, against emergency,against innocent killings and illegal abductions, against imperialist takeover of our country ,against NRO and corruption and the role to restore the independent judiciary of Pakistan.

————————————————————————————————————————

Geo’s program ‘Meray Mutabiq’ banned from Dubai

Source: http://www.thenews.com.pk/updates.asp?id=92070

KARACHI: A ban has been imposed on airing of Geo News’ program ‘Meray Mutabiq’ from Dubai.

According to sources, the high government officials of Pakistan exerting pressure on the Dubai government had the airing of the program stopped.

Geo’s administration has said that this step of the government is tantamount to targeting the freedom of expression.

It may be mentioned here that the senior analyst Dr. Shahid Masood was the anchor of ‘Meray Mutabiq’.

Why do we accept the broadcast of this sort of pornography on a program that we know is targeted at young people?

Well before Adam Lambert stole the AMAs and took homoeroticism to a new level, J. Lo had her own highly anticipated AMA performance.

He stole the show with homoeroticism? This is commendable?

Lopez performed her new single “Louboutins” on stage, complete with walking on the backs of her backup dancers. They had formed a stair-step formation, but something went wrong when Lopez leaped off the highest “step.”

Adam Lambert’s raunchy performance is no different then when Madonna, Christina Aguilera and Britney shared a same sex French kiss at the VMAs back in 2003. So why is this Adam Lambert AMA performance causing such a stir?

Is there a difference between Madonna’s slap in the face to civilized society or Adam Lambert’s? Maybe, but who cares. It’s time for civilized folks to fight back against the conscious desire of Hollywood, one of the partners of the Democratic Party, to dismantle the culture.

While both Lambert and Lopez had slips in their acts last night, one is left wishing they’d suffered concussion causing falls instead of simple glitches. They deserve the embarrassment.

Nevertheless, it is the corporate adults who sign off on this stuff who deserve the biggest humiliation. Nobody watching the next freak show Hollywood puts out would be a good start.

In the meantime, it is America that is demeaned, it is our country that is slip slidin’ away.

“If it’s gonna be edited (for West Coast rebroadcast – it was), then in a way that’s discrimination. I don’t mean to get political, but Madonna, Britney and Christina weren’t edited,” Lambert said. “It’s a shame. Female entertainers have been risqué for years. Honestly, there’s a huge double standard.”

Some indignation and outrage would be nice.

Black Friday is coming.

All week my plan was to write about the International Buy Nothing Day: A 24 hour moratorium on consumer spending.

It’s called Black Friday, because it is the day stores move from red to black in their sales margin.  The time between Thanksgiving and Christmas is the highest spending month in the entire year.

Fueled by a culture of over-consumption millions of Americans will participate.  Although I am encouraging you to do something different, I do think this idea is worth a laugh, which I found on the Buy Nothing Day website.

Whirl–mart

This activity has the advantage of being most likely to piss off security personnel. You and nine of your closest friends silently drive your shopping carts around in a long, inexplicable conga line without ever actually buying anything.

(Anyway, it made me laugh out loud.  I would never be able to do it, but I can see my daughter Molly and nine of her friends involved in this kind of social protest.  Oh yeah!)

I found a better idea for those of us who are slightly middle aged and have $50-100 we plan to spend over the weekend of Black Friday. Well, I wish I had thought of it, really do.  But I console myself that there’s no new idea under the sun, even if you copyright it like this woman did.  I can sure support it, because it makes so much sense.  It is called the 3/50 Project.  But I explain it all here:

Spend at least $50 in three local businesses to show your support of local, independent businesses.

Ask yourself what local, independently owned businesses would you really miss if they disappeared?

Get into those stores and buy something.

For every $100 you spend locally, $68 stays in the local community.  If you shop or eat at national chains, only $43 stays in your community.  If you shop on-line nothing stays local, did you hear that? Nothing.

So I’m thinking  about that this week.

• Frugal Muse is a local bookstore alternative.  Did you know if they don’t have the book you’re looking for, they’ll order it and give you 20% off. It’s so easy to just pop over to Amazon and 1-click.  But just think the difference it would make to call up Frugal Muse and place an order?  Remember, if you purchase on-line NOTHING stays local with your purchase.

Ask yourself where you shop often and could you make some changes to support local businesses not chains?

• I give lots of money to Walgreens. (Yuck!)  One thing I want to do is research local pharmacies and find one to that I can put my dollars into a local business.  Why not.  I fill prescriptions every month.  I want as much of my money to stay local.

• Ancora Coffee. Is the best coffee around in my opinion.  Can be purchased at local grocery stores like Sentry.  Ancora Coffee can also be purchased in local coffee shops, though I’m not sure which ones.  I bet I could find out! Friday, rather than get revved at Starbucks (I love me some Starbucks) try a local place like EVP.  No there’s no drive-thru, but that’s okay.
• Speaking of Sentry Foods, they have a local campaign telling you everything in their store made within 100 miles of their store.  You can walk through the store and make decisions about purchasing based on local businesses you want to support.  I think that’s awesome.  Of course Woodman’s is local and owned by the people.  And cheap, nice and cheap.
• The Camera Company.  Rather than make my purchases online, which I like to for ease of shopping in my pajamas, pop down there or get on their website.

Ask yourself where you eat out?

Rather than choosing a chain, consider one of the amazing local cuisines.  There are so many.  What are your favorite local eateries?  I’d like to know!! I’ll make a list and post it later.

• Himal Chuli is an all time favorite.
• And a recent find,  The Weary Traveler.
• so many great local places.  What would you put on this list?

Almost $70 of every $100 spent is a pretty daunting number!

Shopping local, independent shops might take a little research.  But think how good you you feel!!!  Rather than suck up to the giant conglomerates you’ll drink from the fountain of pure and  local.

1. Choose three local independent shops and/or restaurants.
2. Spend at least $50 (or more) and rest in the knowledge that almost 70% of each dollar you spend will go back into your community.

What are the top things you spend money on?  CDs?  Books.  Medication.  Food.  Gas.  Guitars (okay that’s just Tom.)

If we make smart local choices this about the different we’ll make in our local economy.  It may not always be the cheapest choice, but in the long run it may just be the tipping point to keep our local economy alive.

I chose Black Friday for this wonderful investment, but it could be any day in the shopping season.

Please let me know the three businesses you choose!!!

Yeah, boycott big chains this Friday!!!!!!!!!!

P.S.  Last year I wrote about spending $100 locally. (So okay, maybe I did have this idea first.) But seriously, it’s pretty good.  Read it.

P.P.S.  Obviously, this is geared toward Madison, but the same applies to any local economy.  Just do it!  Let me know your three choices whether you are here locally in Madison or elsewhere!

This is really amazing no fair trial, no justice, baseless allegations on an innocent mother of 3 children two of which are still missing (if alive) and still they call their selves civilized fighting a so-called war against terror. The imperialists are real terrorists and hypocrites ruling the world with their power,brutal killings,economic exploitation and lies.

They Zionists/Neo-Cons don’t consider others as human beings , they are real fascists and modern face of Nazism.

Can Aafia get the share of civilization and system of justice she deserves? Is there any conscience left in our government which is busy in licking feet of their imperialist masters? Is there any Kerry-Lugar bill for Aafia? Is there any humanity left for an innocent lady who has suffered a lot for being a muslim women who loves her religion?

————————————————————————————————————————

Source: http://www.nation.com.pk/pakistan-news-newspaper-daily-english-online/Politics/21-Nov-2009/Dr-Aafia-to-boycott-trial

Dr Aafia to boycott trial

The Nation
NEW YORK – While a defiant Aafia Siddiqui declared that she would boycott her trial in January, a federal judge Thursday rejected her lawyers’ plea that she could not be tried in the United States as they pointed out that the Pakistani neuroscientist’s alleged crime took place outside the country. Ms Siddiqui, who was brought to New York in August 2008 from Afghanistan where prosecutors say she allegedly fired at US interrogators. No American was hit but she was shot in the abdomen and was charged with attempted murder and assault.
In a pre-trial hearing on Thursday, her lawyers, led by Charles Swift, argued that Dr Siddiqui could only be tried on terrorism charges in the US, and not on murder charges. In this regard, he quoted various international regulations.
But US District Judge Richard Berman ruled out the motion, saying that the US courts have jurisdiction if American citizens were subjected to attacks abroad, citing some precedents.
But Ms Siddiqui, who is languishing in a maximum security jail, interrupted her lawyers in US District Court in Manhattan to announce that she did not plan to participate in her trial, scheduled for Jan 19.
“I am boycotting this trial,” she declared. “I am innocent of all the charges and I can prove it, but I will not do it in this court.”
Since the very beginning, Ms Siddiqui has said that she has no confidence in the American judicial system or the lawyers appointed for her by the court – even those retained by the government of Pakistan – and that she wants to make peace and knows how to do it.
She has vigorously protested against what she called humiliating strip searches before she is brought to the court.
Judge Berman said that her trial would proceed after her lawyers and prosecutors visit Afghanistan to interview eyewitnesses to finalise their case.
Lawyers for Ms Siddiqui tried to convince the court that she was mentally incompetent to stand trial, citing in part her refusal to cooperate with lawyers and the reports of a psychologist who said she suffers from delusional disorder and depression.
Judge Berman rejected that argument after prosecutors pointed to psychological reports that concluded she was faking mental illness.
Berman on Thursday rejected defence arguments aimed at tossing out charges against Ms Siddiqui that carry a potential minimum prison sentence of 30 years and a maximum penalty of life in prison.
Before he ruled on the request, Dr Siddiqui said visits by her lawyers were “torture for me” and it was a waste of money for lawyers to go to Afghanistan to interview witnesses because she was not participating in the trial.
“I’m not dealing with them anymore,” Dr Siddiqui said of her lawyers. “They’re just people coming to my door and talking, talking, talking.”
During a break, Dr Siddiqui was led out of the courtroom by US marshals when she would not stop talking loudly. “Take me out,” she said. “I’m not coming back.”
She was not present when the judge made his decision.

OK, how pissed are the Irish about being ousted from the World Cup? I’ll tell you how pissed. The Irish are so pissed they have stopped using Henry vacuum cleaners because the name “Henry” reminds them of that bastard who hand balled his way into history. Despite Thierry Henry having absolutely no connection what so ever with the vacuum cleaner company it hasn’t stopped people defacing them and scratching out the name “Henry”. Oh and Gillette, don’t think you are getting out of this so lightly, there are calls to boycott your shaving products because the “Hand of Frog” endorses them!

Come to think of IT…

Not too shocking video report of a website selling ebay and paypal accounts.

This is not the first time things such as this have been found.  I also found one which sells “free stolen paypal accounts”

So let this serve as a lesson;

No matter what the feedback, no matter how long a seller or buyer has been registered, no matter the paypal protection banner…

None of that means a single thing. The entire ebay paypal universe is supersaturated with fraud.

From the very top of the executive level to the bottom fences, thieves and flunkies whom stock the site with their wares.

Everything that can be gamed, is being gamed.

Is Troydes Selling eBay & PayPal Accounts Legal?

This video is from the ebaydirtylaundry channel on youtube. Please go there. rate, comment, subscribe.

This channel appears to be operated by Doc of ebaymotorssuck.com -  a great consumer advocate who has educated and  saved would-be scam victims untold amounts of money and undue grief, as well as having exposed and documented a great deal of fraud on ebay, ebaymotors, and paypal.

Truly, no one else out there even comes close to Doc’s level.

I should mention that there is also an ebaymotorssucks channel on youtube as well. It’s been there quite some time, but now Doc is geared up with some new screenrecording sw. and is now taking consumer awareness education/infotainment/edutainment to Web 2.0.* in a major way.

One last thing I want to convey;

This is neither designed or intended to be advertising for the site selling the accounts. I urge and advise folks to NOT visit the site(s) and NOT to conduct business there.

If you must use ebay and paypal, register your own legit account(s) and follow the rules (which truthfully, I do NOT recommend either, all things given)

]]> http://boycottcomerica.wordpress.com/2009/11/23/workers-demand-severance-pay-picketing-scheduled-at-comerica-bank-on-11242009/ Mon, 23 Nov 2009 02:53:55 +0000 bankingwhistleblower http://boycottcomerica.wordpress.com/2009/11/23/workers-demand-severance-pay-picketing-scheduled-at-comerica-bank-on-11242009/ http://originalorganics.wordpress.com/2009/11/20/all-things-green-a-greener-christmas/ Fri, 20 Nov 2009 15:03:06 +0000 Paul Wagland http://originalorganics.wordpress.com/2009/11/20/all-things-green-a-greener-christmas/

It’s four in the morning, the end of November. Not a cheery time to be lying awake worrying, but this morning I had good cause – I’ve realised Christmas is coming. This year at least my worries take an unusual and original form. My girlfriend and I have decided to boycott the whole thing, which means no presents, no family, no fancy meal, and hopefully no stress – just the two of us and the dog in the camper van somewhere in a wood in Norfolk. So why am I worrying? Because I can’t help feeling guilty that we’re not ‘playing along’ with the rest of the world!

Why our festive boycott, you may well ask. Well, mainly, it’s not exactly green is it? All the unwanted gifts shoved to the back of the cupboard, the packaging and transport of said gifts, the tonnes of wasted food and (call me scrooge if you will) those eye-wrenching, kilowatt-burning neon displays with which some people choose to adorn their homes! What’s more, far from being a happy family occasion, Christmas has become a time of emotional and financial stress for many of us. I would never suggest that an all-out ban is a good idea for everyone – this has the potential to be a very happy and rewarding time of year, particularly for kids. That said I do wish the public at large would stop and think before indulging themselves (and their egos) on the few shopping days they have left.

Before we ‘went the whole hog’, our household experimented with the idea of a green Christmas and it worked pretty well. The idea was that every aspect of the season be considered from an environmental perspective – in particular we were careful about the type and number of presents we bought each other.

We went so far as to prescribe four options for our seasonal generosity, which I present here for your consideration!

Option one – give the gift of time. Whether it be a couple of day’s labour on dad’s allotment, or just taking auntie for a Christmas walk, people will appreciate this kind of thoughtful effort every bit as much as they would an expensively-wrapped (but still generic) gift.

Option two – give a zero-carbon gift. This takes a little imagination, but can either take the form of a ‘real’ item (a fruit tree for the garden, credits for music or film downloads rather than a CD or DVD) or can involve a trip or excursion – perhaps a ticket to the theatre, with train fare included.

Option three – give something they need. If one of your family members is starting a new course, buy them something from the reading list. If they’re a keen gardener, offer to pay for next year’s seed order, and so on. It doesn’t take a genius to point out it’s better to receive something you really need, rather than something you would never buy for yourself.

Option four – make people think. An environmentally conscious gift (such as a wormery!) might be just the nudge some people need to make a few eco-friendly changes to their lifestyle. If friends and family are already pretty good at being green, they will value the sentiment (and the gift) all the more highly.

Paul Wagland

They decide to cash in on this call to violence.  Can you say boycott?

http://gawker.com/5408677/cafepress-is-officially-cool-with-selling-t+shirts-urging-people-to-pray-for-obamas-death

From Honduras embassy blog

The following article from El Tiempo (translated into English) suggests that the coup regime is finalizing its strategy for “protecting” the November 29 election from “interference” by those who promise to boycott.  No doubt, the Michelettis will use election law, interpreted very broadly, in order to cover widespread state-sponsored repression.  

The massive plan to boycott will leave the Michelettis with an illegitimate election because of ridiculously low voter turnout, but  the US has the script prepared already for the State Department’s, Ian Kelly,to declare on November 30 that it was “a free and fair election with little or no irregularities reported.”  The Michelettis will ride this election wave out and cruise into shore fairly easily.

And, the Honduran shock troops will gleefully wreak havoc on the population as it begins to chip away at what is its longer-term problem:  a Resistance that won’t go away and, by its sheer numbers, poses a threat to the oligarchy well beyond the election.

ROBERTO MICHELETTI: “HUNDREDS OF FOREIGNERS COMING IN TO BOYCOTT ELECTIONS”
(translation from Honduran newspaper El Tiempo, Nov. 16, 2009)

De-facto interim “president” Roberto Micheletti said that hundreds of foreigners have been entering the country to boycott the elections scheduled for November 29th. “We have knowledge of this. Our military, supported by our allies and friends, have initiated an investigation that has secured information about people from Venezuela or Nicaragua coming here to try to cause trouble to the electoral process”, said Micheletti.

“There is a security plan to protect the population in general, for them to vote without fear, so that they can elect their new authorities”.

Micheletti recalled that the Electoral Law in its article 209 stated that, “Will be sanctioned with a penalty of four years in prison whoever, without legitimate authorization, seeks to impede other persons, through violence, the exercise of their electoral rights”.

A secondary law expresses that in addition to the electoral crimes that will be sanctioned with prison, will be also punished with prison time all persons who by any means impede access to the electoral locations that are needed for the functioning of the elections.

Calls to boycott the elections have been made by “sectors of society, as well as foreigners who have entered the country”, for example “the leaders of the group called Popular Resistance, which has its intent to prevent the election”.