The week in review August 28-September 3
The story of the week is, of course, the devastation wrought by hurricane Katrina ... and our government ... on the residents of the Gulf Coast, particularly New Orleans. Throughout the week, the usually heavily censored news media has sent a stream of reports out of the disaster zone that revealed to the entire world the tragedy of the welfare state, the mean spiritedness of the 'warfare state', and the generalized incompetence of the government on every level to deal with disaster. As politicians threw blame at each other and everything else they could think of, people died, waiting for help that never came, while military and police efforts were aimed at preventing evacuees from leaving, preventing private rescue from entering stricken areas until it was "safe to be deployed", and 'protecting property' from 'looters', and America was treated to a series scenes that we usually see only in one of the far off countries we are equally adeptly 'rescuing'. As the week ended, 'Troops begin combat operations in New Orleans' to 'fight the insurgency in the city', while more sane Americans, acting on their own initiative, set up emergency responses such as the wonderful 'Homes for Katrina victims', and started political responses such as 'Bring the troops home from Iraq' (as one of the problems appeared to be that 'The National Guard belongs in New Orleans and Biloxi. Not Baghdad.')
The mainstream media, as of Friday, appears to have settled back into its usual 'report as ordered' mode, .... as the victims are herded across the country and deposited into various other gov't camps, and the talking heads and their tame experts start lecturing on how to 'rebuild' New Orleans, and the politicians settle on what to do (my guess is, they'll decide FEMA doesn't have a big enough budget, and pour $$$ into FEMA, which will go to some idiotic plan like building a levee along the entire Gulf Coast) it will be up to US to make sure the important message of Katrina, that the gov't was the problem in the first place and made matters even worse stays alive, and spreads .....
Katrina and Cindy may yet bring Bush down. While the 'homeland' reeled from the devastation of Katrina, the anti-war movement, 'sparked' by the persistence of Cindy Sheehen, continues to gain steam, as 'Mainstream America stirs' and 'Camp Casey goes to Washington. ' Though most libertarians support the remarkable activism of Sheehan, some don't ... read Nathan Barton's 'Why one libertarian doesn't support Cindy Sheehan' (and my response). Also, the establishment 'liberals' are just as scared of Sheehan's activism as the conservatives ... 'War liberals and Cindy Sheehan' explains pretty clearly how the 'War Party' is made up of the left as well as the right .... you reckon the reality of the BOYN (Boot on your Neck) Party is finally seeping out into the mainstream? We can hope ....
In other news, a recent poll shows that 'Info shrinks Patriot Act support ' ('Fewer than half of Americans know the purpose of the Patriot Act, and the more they know about it the less they like it, according to a poll released Monday.') This is good news for all those who wonder if efforts to get info out to the 'masses' has ANY effect ... it does, of course. Educate, agitate, organize.
Til next week
For freedom!
Mary Lou
Note: The RRND news feed IS up and running again.... unfortunately,the LAND page template is not ready yet (it will be soon, I'm told) ... meanwhile, keep checking here for daily updates.When we can move back over to the Liberty Action News site, I'll post an announcement here.
The story of the week is, of course, the devastation wrought by hurricane Katrina ... and our government ... on the residents of the Gulf Coast, particularly New Orleans. Throughout the week, the usually heavily censored news media has sent a stream of reports out of the disaster zone that revealed to the entire world the tragedy of the welfare state, the mean spiritedness of the 'warfare state', and the generalized incompetence of the government on every level to deal with disaster. As politicians threw blame at each other and everything else they could think of, people died, waiting for help that never came, while military and police efforts were aimed at preventing evacuees from leaving, preventing private rescue from entering stricken areas until it was "safe to be deployed", and 'protecting property' from 'looters', and America was treated to a series scenes that we usually see only in one of the far off countries we are equally adeptly 'rescuing'. As the week ended, 'Troops begin combat operations in New Orleans' to 'fight the insurgency in the city', while more sane Americans, acting on their own initiative, set up emergency responses such as the wonderful 'Homes for Katrina victims', and started political responses such as 'Bring the troops home from Iraq' (as one of the problems appeared to be that 'The National Guard belongs in New Orleans and Biloxi. Not Baghdad.')
The mainstream media, as of Friday, appears to have settled back into its usual 'report as ordered' mode, .... as the victims are herded across the country and deposited into various other gov't camps, and the talking heads and their tame experts start lecturing on how to 'rebuild' New Orleans, and the politicians settle on what to do (my guess is, they'll decide FEMA doesn't have a big enough budget, and pour $$$ into FEMA, which will go to some idiotic plan like building a levee along the entire Gulf Coast) it will be up to US to make sure the important message of Katrina, that the gov't was the problem in the first place and made matters even worse stays alive, and spreads .....
Katrina and Cindy may yet bring Bush down. While the 'homeland' reeled from the devastation of Katrina, the anti-war movement, 'sparked' by the persistence of Cindy Sheehen, continues to gain steam, as 'Mainstream America stirs' and 'Camp Casey goes to Washington. ' Though most libertarians support the remarkable activism of Sheehan, some don't ... read Nathan Barton's 'Why one libertarian doesn't support Cindy Sheehan' (and my response). Also, the establishment 'liberals' are just as scared of Sheehan's activism as the conservatives ... 'War liberals and Cindy Sheehan' explains pretty clearly how the 'War Party' is made up of the left as well as the right .... you reckon the reality of the BOYN (Boot on your Neck) Party is finally seeping out into the mainstream? We can hope ....
In other news, a recent poll shows that 'Info shrinks Patriot Act support ' ('Fewer than half of Americans know the purpose of the Patriot Act, and the more they know about it the less they like it, according to a poll released Monday.') This is good news for all those who wonder if efforts to get info out to the 'masses' has ANY effect ... it does, of course. Educate, agitate, organize.
Til next week
For freedom!
Mary Lou
Note: The RRND news feed IS up and running again.... unfortunately,the LAND page template is not ready yet (it will be soon, I'm told) ... meanwhile, keep checking here for daily updates.When we can move back over to the Liberty Action News site, I'll post an announcement here.
posted by Mary Lou at
3:51 PM
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