Oh, I cried at Sabra and Shatila,
The tears ran down my spine,
And I cried when Rabin was gunned down,
As though I’d lost a father of mine.
But I don’t sympathise with Zoabi,
Her antics just cross every line.
So love me, love me, love me, I’m a liberal.
I love Ray Hanania and J-Street,
Their message of peace speaks to me,
I curse Lieberman and Netanyahu,
For their counterproductivity.
But don’t talk to me ’bout apartheid,
It’s so complicated, you see.
So love me, love me, love me, I’m a liberal.
I remember the spirit of Oslo,
My faith in the process restored.
I had hoped that the Palestinians,
Would renounce all that I had deplored.
But no, they crap on ’bout “oppression” –
It’s not about whose ox was gored!
So love me, love me, love me, I’m a liberal.
I cheered for Obama in Cairo,
I know that he’ll soon turn the tide;
His call for a two-state solution,
Just makes my eyes well up with pride.
He knows that we must change the discourse,
There’s just too much hate on both sides.
So love me, love me, love me, I’m a liberal.
The ideological settlers –
It seems nothing will give them pause.
I can’t understand how their minds work:
They need to read Grossman and Oz.
But until the Pallies find Gandhi,
You won’t find me joining their cause,
So love me, love me, love me, I’m a liberal.
These boycotts, divestments, and sanctions,
Do not help the cause of peace.
Can’t you see that the two warring factions
Need dialogue and not thought police.
By the way, did you know that Barghouti,
Goes to uni in Tel Aviv?
So love me, love me, love me, I’m a liberal.
There was a time I thought quite diff’rent,
I freely admit it, you see.
I bought a book by Lenni Brenner,
And once I defended Chomsky!
But now I’m much older and wiser,
And I hope, one day, you, too, will be-
So love me, love me, love me, I’m a liberal.
Adapted from Phil Ochs, Love me I’m a Liberal by Elise Hendrick and republished from her blog.
Elise Hendrick [@translator_eli] takes a satirical look at the duplicitous efforts of mainstream privileged white media to promote bigotry and Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s islamophobic, faux-feminist views.
In Australia, neoliberalism is understood largely as an economic model, characterised by the sweeping privatisations that Carr championed in NSW. But, actually, it’s more than that. Neoliberalism differs from a classical free market orientation precisely because it extends beyond the economy to embrace the entire social world, which it then recasts on market lines. The neoliberal project doesn’t just assign to the market those roles previously understood as quintessentially responsibilities of government (such as, say, the provision of utilities); rather, it recasts governance itself as an entrepreneurial project, with productivity and profit increasingly normalised as the criteria to judge success and failure.
In other words, neoliberalism effects a thoroughgoing depoliticisation. Most obviously, this manifests itself in a belief, now shared by almost all mainstream politicians, that government should not intervene in the market. This conviction – a consensus about the role of politicians as simply economic caretakers – already renders out of bounds most of the policies that previous generations of social democrats would have taken for granted.
More importantly, neoliberalism also recasts governance and the democratic process in market terms. The resulting political culture casts citizens as autonomous economic agents, relating to each other and to the state as individual entrepreneurs. The politician no longer appeals to party members, unionists, religious believers or specific communities; instead, he or she addresses individual consumers, touting for their business in much the same way as any other corporation.
In the neoliberal polity, it makes no more sense for citizens to rally than in does for, say, users of Apple computers to hold a march. In both cases, their role is simply to consume, with the ballot box understood as an extension of the cash register. If the latest iPhone is a dud, buy an Android; if the Labor Party’s been in power too long, vote Liberal.
Because democracy is understood as a market, rallies, protests, demonstrations and strikes seem, to the neoliberal, not as expressions of the popular will but as outrageous assaults on the democratic system.
To be clear, we’re not seeing the end of the right to protest, so much as its hollowing out. In the neoliberal era, tightly-controlled top-down events are still considered legitimate – witness the staged spectacles at the recent Republican and Democratic conventions in the US.
While the recent earthquake shook the bones of Christchurch in New Zealand, an earthquake of another kind rippled briefly through the Australian landscape. I want to make sure it is not ignored. The results of the 12 year nationwide Challenging Racism survey from the University of Western Sydney shocked me to the bone. Download the national results here, state comparisons here, and click on the map here to find out further information about racism in your region, which is where you are able to compare the different groups who are the main targets of racists with the state and national averages.
The results for Wide Bay-Burnett (my area in Queensland) confirm decades of personal observation, demonstrating the existence of significantly more racism than the state or national averages with US racial target of choice, Muslims at the top of the polls, a trend which is consistent from region to state to nation. Queenslanders are more prejudiced toward Aboriginal folks than Asians, a trend which is reversed in my region by a whisker. There are more equal opportunity haters in my neck of the woods it seems as there’s a scant couple of percent between the antipathy toward Indigenous folks, Asians and Jews.
% of Wide Bay respondents
Total QLD survey %
Total Australia survey %
Anti-Asian
36.4
27.9
23.8
Anti-Indigenous
35.8
29.0
27.9
Anti-Italian
17.0
12.7
11.0
Anti-British
8.5
7.5
7.8
Anti-Muslim
57.0
50.1
48.6
Anti-Semitic (Jewish)
33.9
23.5
23.3
Anti-Christian
14.5
9.0
9.7
Anti-Black African
–
–
27.0*
* Note: Responses for ACT, SA, Perth, NT and TAS only.
However, it doesn’t matter which shade of bigotry folks project, their carbon footprint is more related with their faith and participation or lack thereof in the modern idolatry of consumerism and its theoretical underpinnings in economic irrationalism.
Concerned about the carbon tax and its effect on your much abused budget? Are you not incensed you have voluntarily adopted a simpler less consumerist lifestyle for years and you will now be punished further by price rises because of the irresponsible behaviour of the rest of the wretches with whom you share these colonial shores? Gillard’s vaunted “educative” spanking effect from the carbon tax on consumer habits may be short-lived and very quickly, the population will resume its profligate ways, as with the GST, another notable government tax grab. We need a broader vision, with a widet more-effective brush, and not the the faux “Billy Tea Party” offered by Cory Bernardi, one must quickly add.
Here’s an idea to substitute for the carbon tax which would have a multiplier effect elsewhere, by encouraging holiday makers to less polluting relaxation.
End the cruise ship industry now – it is an anachronism which mainly benefits a tiny fraction of the population, the ruling elite. If Australia closed down all cruise ship industries, a good proportion of our carbon tax would be paid in advance. Noone would be screaming except rich boaties, cruise ship companies,.gluttonous tourists and their class allies, the politicians whom they pamper with campaign donations and dinners at yacht. Who *really needs* to go on a cruise ffs … end the cruise shipping industry now, do the planet and everyone but the rich and/or stupid and their enablers a favour. For those who simply must have a ‘cruise’, the ships can be permanently based ashore where waste can be disposed of properly and fuel impact removed. My favourite whiners against my stellar idea thus far are self-labelled greenies who have taken Alaskan cruises so they can say they’ve seen the result of the Exxxon Valdez oil spill disaster. These folks must do better. There’s plenty of room for productive extension also, by cutting back on defence force ship size and number, and on commercial shipping generally. At the very least, tightening of pollution regulations across the oceans would contribute greatly to the reduction of the human carbon AND pollution footprints.
For more positive climate change impact, consider this simple two pronged approach: (1) Lower the population by removing incentives for breeding by ensuring adequate pensions and care for aged folks, and (2) Educate women since educated women choose to breed less overall, “except for women who pursue the most advanced degrees. . Women with professional degrees and Ph.D.’s are slightly more likely to have had children than their counterparts with just master’s or bachelor’s degrees”.
Now, for some other climate saving ideas which anyone except the completely decrepit, lazy or unimaginative middle class twit can implement:
Climate savers #1 : Instead of *driving* to gym or sports club in your big shiny 4WD, walk or take a train; form a neighbourhood walking group
Climate savers #2 : Eat less, you corpulent middle class wankers
Climate savers #3: Don’t overbreed, it only viralises your existent pollution and ignorant consumerist mindset
Climate savers #4: If you really must breed, instead of buying little Georgina a puppy or the latest Nintendo, buy her a pet rock.
Climate savers #5: Instead of burning fossil fuels, burn politicians in a non-polluting furnace. Or use as mulch for your garden.
Climate savers #6: If there are no politicians left to feed the non-polluting furnace, throw in the farting cows. Consider drilling down the pollutant gas-producing food chain.
Climate savers #7: Surprise the husband and kids! experience the unexpected and stay HOME for the holidays. Talking with each other makes a novel, relaxing change so for added benefit, send your iPads, iPods and iPhones television, computers, wiis and xboxes on a holiday to a friend’s shed and/or for a jaunt through Australia Post snail mail so you are not tempted.
Climate savers #8: Instead of planning your next boastful debt to be for a below ground pool, plant a rainforest in your backyard.
Climate savers #9: Learn from 40,000 years of indigenous habitation of Australia – your white colonial consumerism and capitalism are unsustainable, planet and people unfriendly. Contrary to questionable popular beliefs, humans are more likely to survive as a species if they cooperate and live within the garden in balance rather than attempting to dominate and subdue it for the benefit of an insatiable ruling elite. Don’t vote against your own interests. The elite are relying on the fact that you have done this in the past.
Climate savers #10: Economic rationalism is irrational. Never trust a smiling politician or any other member of the ruling elite and if they are telling you to do something it is quite often something which they will not do themselves. Insist any politician or pundit who asks you to change your habits by going without something, practise what they preach and demonstrate how to do it themselves first. You might also remind them that carrots taste much better than sticks and are healthier for you and the planet too.
A US scientific study is pointing the finger at the global shipping industry as a major contributor to climate change.
The study has found that the one hundred thousand commercial ships which travel the world’s oceans emit almost half as much particle pollution as the world’s 600 million cars.
The findings have been published in the Journal of Geophysical Research.
And the lead author is calling for an improvement in the quality of shipping fuels.
In the past, ships running under flags of convenience have been exposed in reports like the Ships of Shame inquiry as being unsafe for crews and polluting the ocean.
Now scientists have put a figure on exactly how much air pollution is emitted by the world’s shipping fleet.
US-based scientist Daniel Lack, who works for a US government agency called the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, has found every year commercial ships emit 1 million kilograms of particle pollution into the air.
The cruise ship industry is largely a North American phenomenon, and more than 80 percent of the approximately seven million passengers traveling are North Americans. The cruise ship market has expanded slightly in the Mediterranean and very slightly in the Far East. In Europe there are a large number of smaller passenger vessel services operating in the domestic or car ferry markets, but these vessels tend to provide transportation rather than entertainment and tourism.
Given their lucrative ties to the United States market, it is hardly surprising that the major cruise lines all maintain their principal offices in the United States. For example, Norwegian Cruise Line Ltd. has its corporate headquarters in Miami and employs approximately 1200 personnel throughout the United States. Carnival Corporation, the largest cruise line company in the world, has several offices in the US, as well as personnel and properties scattered throughout the country. Carnival owns twelve cruise brands, including Carnival Cruise Lines, Holland America Line, Princess Cruises, and Windstar Cruises, all of which operate in North America. Royal Caribbean has its principal executive office in Miami.
The cruise line industry will exhibit strong growth throughout the next two decades. The average annual growth of the industry has been almost eight percent since 1980, and with the world fleet of 230 cruise ships operating at 90 percent capacity, there are no signs of this growth slowing. North America is the largest market, and surveys indicate that 56 percent of Americans want to take cruises, while only 11 percent have done so. The number of cruise line passengers worldwide is projected to triple to 15 million by 2020, according to one industry expert.
Experiencing the stupidity of high density high consumption human living on the high seas – New York on the waves!
When she launches in 2010, Allure of the Seas will share the title of the world’s largest and most revolutionary cruise ship with sister-ship Oasis of the Seas. An architectural marvel at sea, Allure of the Seas will span 16 decks, encompass 220,000 gross registered tons (GRT), carry 5,400 guests at double occupancy, and feature 2,700 staterooms. Allure of the Seas, and Oasis of the Seas, will be homeported at Port Everglades in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Allure of the Seas will tout the cruise line’s new neighborhood concept of seven distinct themed areas, which will offer guests of every age the widest array of onboard vacation experiences that cater to their personal styles, preferences or moods. Guests will enjoy lush and tropical grounds open to the sky in Central Park, located in the center of the ship and spanning more than the length of a football field. Central Park will be lined with boutiques and specialty restaurants, ranging from casual to fine dining, and introduce balcony staterooms rising five decks above the storefronts and overlooking the park – one of a few new categories of onboard accommodations made possible by the ship’s revolutionary design.
For a quick digression, here’s what happened when bigots took flight against Muslims in Orange County, California, recently.
A quarter of Australians describe their personal attitude towards Muslims as negative or very negative, according to a detailed national survey on social cohesion and immigration.
People who are most likely to be highly intolerant towards Muslims include those who are over 65, educated to year 11, work in trades and intended to vote Liberal/National or independent.
Why not call out Beyonce, Usher, Mariah Carey, and so many other artists, all of whom have performed in Israel, a state which practices a form of apartheid worse than anything the South African apartheid government had ever done? In 1973, the United Nations General Assembly defined the crime of Apartheid as “inhuman acts committed for the purpose of establishing and maintaining domination by one racial group of persons over any other racial group of persons and systematically oppressing them.” As Israel’s official policy privileges Jewish nationals over non-Jewish citizens, creating de facto and de jure discrimination against the indigenous Palestinian people, it is hard to dispute that this supposed “democracy” is in reality an apartheid state.
Jewish stabber not charged with murder. Other teens involved in murder of Arab man to stand trial for aggravated assault, obstruction of justice. Father of victim: ‘My son brutally murdered for speaking Arabic’
When urged at the start of January by Assange’s publisher to help him write his memoirs I said I was ready to assist, but only if I had strong editorial input and that no subject was off-limits. This, I was told, was not acceptable. Roughly at the same time our organisation started asking questions about Israel Shamir, a man accused of Holocaust denial and of being a close associate of Belarus’s autocratic leader Alexander Lukashenko. Index is one of the founders of the Belarus Committee. Despite repeated but polite requests to WikiLeaks, our team was stonewalled, so we went public with our concerns.
Assange’s reported conspiracy remarks to Private Eye magazine about me and senior figures in the Guardian do not help his cause. With so many genuine adversaries, why seek more? His approach has reinforced a view that whistleblowing is the preserve of irresponsible eccentrics – playing into the hands of malign forces in the US seeking to prosecute him for “terrorism” or under the espionage act.
Thanks in large part to WikiLeaks, no matter how hard the authorities try, it will be impossible in future to prevent conscientious whistleblowers from passing on material that seeks to cast a light on the actions of the powerful – information that might otherwise remain secret. Due to the published documents, people around the world – notably in the Middle East and north Africa – have a better sense of what others thought of their autocratic leaders. All this is the positive legacy. The rest is soap opera or, dare I say it, Tinseltown.
Whilst Ben Ali commiserates with 1.5 tons of gold and his new Saudi hosts on the loss of his holiday homes and yachts which he and his family pilfered, the Dark Prince of Ziostan seizes upon the tyrant’s ousting as yet another reason to delay the peace talks charade. ‘Talking of Peace Talks’ is a customary game played with international elites by the Ziostanian ruling class when they are not aggressing some neighbour or Palestinians unworthy of democracy, which is perceived as a risk by Ziostan’s elite to their ‘stability, security and peace’. It is a pleasant, hands-across-the-waters effusive pastime which obscures even more enjoyable activities like home demolitions, accelerated land theft throughout the West Bank, Occupied Jerusalem and the Negev, shooting motorists, or small boys and old men who stray too close to the Gaza apartheid fence when struggling to eke out a living collecting stones and pebbles to rebuild their famous landmark – the largest civilian prison on the planet. The main game though for Ziostan, its strategy, tactic and aim, is expansionism, the taking of territory which wondrously can be justified in retrospect or even in advance, for Ziostan’s constant demand for ‘stability, security and peace’ is paramount before the most rudimentary needs for survival of those they oppress.
It is two years since Ziostan declared its massacre of the people of Gaza over, and the hideous, illegal siege remains, with the full complicity of the global political community which has chosen shining, privileged, packaged ziocolony to rule over and occupy Palestinians. Ziostan commandeered more than 3 million dunam of cultivated fields and villages during and after their genocide and expulsion of Palestinians, the Nakba, in 1948. The inconvenience of the continued presence of suffering, protesting Palestinians as a distraction from fiercely marketed tactical Ziostanian victimhood is perceived as a small price to pay in order to usurp the balance of Palestinian land and resources which Ziostan covets. Those who resist Ziostanian power even in non-violent ways, including children, are often summarily jailed, labelled terrorists and tortured. There will be no need for two states if Ziostan can appropriate all Palestinian land without resistance or approbation from the international community. The ‘talk of peace talks’ charade provides window dressing for the international ruling class and ameloriates criticism within Ziostan itself. Failure of ‘peace talks’ is routinely blamed upon Palestinians unwilling to surrender one more dunam of their indigenous birthright and heritage or to forgo the right of return guaranteed by international law. Conscience is no impediment to the elite of Ziostan, for as with other elites, Ziostanians do not flinch from their righteous dispossession of those whom they perceive as lesser humans or not human at all.
The Dark Prince remains aloof from many of his own people as he is from Palestinians and transfixed by the hunt, does not understand the lessons presently before him. Yet neither he nor the rest of his ziofascist retinue or contrived brute force, theft and calumny can withstand the people’s search for real security and peace based soundly on justice and equal rights and backed with a growing solidarity movement focussed on boycotts, divestments and sanctions. Tinpot dictatorial sociopaths with Uzis, F15s, dungeons, pain, the whole banal sex and death repertoire have limited appeal – fascistic crises and spectacles lose their lustre after their twisted motivations are exposed.
Perhaps when Nutanyahoo is finally ousted by a united people hungry for real democracy, he too can apply to Saudia for a political sinecure or respite.
“We hope that the summit will adopt Egypt’s proposal which would be a message from the Arab to the Western and European world saying ‘Do not dare interfere in our affairs”, he was quoted as saying by the official MENA news agency.
MENA said he was responding to a question from one of its journalists who asked if the summit could adopt a common position concerning Western bids to interfere in Arab affairs.
On Thursday, Clinton urged Arab leaders to work with their peoples to implement reforms or see extremists fill the void, warning the “region’s foundations are sinking”.
The region’s peoples “have grown tired of corrupt institutions”, Clinton told Arab counterparts in Qatar attending the Forum for the Future, a 2004 US initiative aimed at promoting such partnerships.
“In too many places, in too many ways, the region’s foundations are sinking into the sand. The new and dynamic Middle East that I have seen needs firmer ground if it is to take root and grow everywhere,” she said.
Clinton said the region’s leaders “in partnership with their peoples” have the capacity to build a bold new future where entrepreneurship and political freedoms are encouraged.
“It’s time to see civil society not as a threat but as a partner,” she said.
“Those who cling to the status quo may be able to hold back the full impact of their countries’ problems for a little while but not forever.
“Others will fill the vacuum,” if leaders failed to offer a positive vision to give “young people meaningful ways to contribute”, Clinton warned.
Abul Gheit also dismissed the notion that people in the Arab world could be inspired by Tunisia, where violent protests forced president Zine Al Abidine Ben Ali to abandon his post.
“The talk about the spread of what happened in Tunisia to other countries is nonsense. Each society has its own circumstances,” Abul Gheit told reporters in Sharm El Sheikh.
“If the Tunisian people decide to take that approach, it’s their business.
“Egypt has said that the Tunisian people’s will is what counts,” said the foreign minister.
“Those who imagine things and seek to escalate the situation will not achieve their goals.
“The most important thing is the will of the Tunisian people. Nobody is resisting it,” Abul Gheit added..
It is most important for dictators to resist the will of the people – yet even Pharaohs may fall when the people no longer tolerate their cruelty and corruption.
