Topic: War

On September 11, six years later: Mourn, honor, and move on …

By Christine Anne Piesyk | September 11, 2007 |

“Mourn as you must, but honor me most by continuing to live and be the best that you can be.”

In December, 2001, I reluctantly went to Ground Zero, to the pile of debris, the hole in the ground, the shattered remnants of buildings that had been the World Trade Center complex in downtown Manhattan. As so many others had already done, I inhaled the dusty air, some of which may have been human once.

I stood on the gallery of a church, leaning against one of its columns, staring aghast at the immensity of the devastation. Rubble. Piles of rubble. Behind makeshift fences and barriers. Designed to keep out a steady stream of the curious and the mournful.

I looked skyward, from ground level up to the top of a faceless building, exterior walls gone, the world privy to the angle of every desk and chair and file cabinet in the now wall-less, fully ventilated window offices. Huge loosely hung sheets of black tarp fell a hundred stories from roofline to sidewalk, and running high across the that roofline, touching the clear blue sky above, was a multi-story American flag.

I remembered so many times before,walking across the plaza, riding the elevator to Windows on the World, dining with my mother as the panorama of the Big Apple glittered around us. Seemed like yesterday. «Read the rest of this article»

Sections: Opinion, Politics | 1 Comment »

The Other side of the surge

By Bill Larson | June 14, 2007 |

This is the surge the other way; the hemorrhaging of a dying nation. A humanitarian disaster unfolding the UN says; nearly four million Iraqis displaced now by sectarian cleansing, kidnap and carnage; two million have fled altogether, half of them here in Syria; bus load after bus load arriving in Damascus, a hundred thousand more every month.

«Read the rest of this article»

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A soldier in Iraq asks in despair: Why are we here?

May 29, 2007 |

After watching his roommate fatally wounded in a roadside bombing, an Army Specialist wonders why the lives of good men are being lost when the Iraqis pose no threat to us and don’t want us there.

BAGHDAD, May 12 — My name is Donald Hudson Jr. I have been serving our country’s military actively for the last three years. I am currently deployed to Baghdad on Forward Operating Base Loyalty, where I have been for the last four and a half months.

I came here as part of the first wave of this so called “troop surge”, but so far it has effectively done nothing to quell insurgent violence. I have seen the rise in violence between the Sunni and Shiite. This country is in the middle of a civil war that has been on going since the seventh century.

Why are we here when this country still to date does not want us here? Why does our president’s personal agenda consume him so much, that he can not pay attention to what is really going on here? «Read the rest of this article»

Sections: Issues, Opinion, Politics | 17 Comments

Hope

By Bill Larson | May 7, 2007 |

This short animated film is a story of native American prophecy. It is the story of mankind, heading down the wrong path, with the hope we will one day find the path of peace and love.

“Hope” is a unique and powerful film with a message of peace for the future. Combining animation, archival footage and live action, in a multi-layered non-linear story, the film brings the viewer on a fascinating journey through human existence. ‘Hope’ is shaped around the knowledge and ideas of Willy Whitefeather, a man in his sixties of Cherokee ancestry, a storyteller, healer, survivalist and an individual of wisdom and heart.

«Read the rest of this article»

Sections: Arts and Leisure, Issues | No Comments

Updated: Must watch TV: Bill Moyers Journal: Buying the War

By Bill Larson | April 24, 2007 |

If you missed seeing it, or if you wish to forward it to your email lists, You can watch Bill Moyer’s Journal:  Buying the war online.

How the administration marketed the war to the American people has been well covered, but critical questions remain: How and why did the press buy it, and what does it say about the role of journalists in helping the public sort out fact from propaganda?

Set your PVR’s and stock up on popcorn, because this is really gonna be can’t miss TV.

David Swanson, who saw an advance copy of the program, writes, “Spending that 90 minutes on this will actually save you time, because you’ll never watch television news again-not even on PBS, which comes in for its share of criticism.”

«Read the rest of this article»

Sections: Arts and Leisure | 1 Comment »

Targeting Iran

By Bill Larson | April 2, 2007 |

Remember when we reported on the US invasion of Iran? The article that we wrote about the entry of U.S. troops into an Iranian consulate in Irbil, Iraq, on January 11th. Well, the UK news site The Independent is reporting that our troops missed their real targets, the deputy head of the Iranian national security council, Mohammed Jafari, and General Minojahar Frouzanda, the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Chief of Intelligence.

This is as Independent’s author Patrick Cockburn aptly describes it “…as if Iran had tried to kidnap the heads of the CIA and MI6 while they were on an official visit to a country neighboring Iran, such as Pakistan or Afghanistan.”

The attempted provocation of the Iranian government did not stop with that attack. On the fourth of February, Iraqi commandos likely under U.S. Command seized an Iranian diplomat Jalal Sharafi, who was the second secretary of the Iranian Embassy in Baghdad. «Read the rest of this article»

Sections: Issues, Politics | No Comments

Political music videos

By Bill Larson | March 30, 2007 |

Here’s a collection of protest music as a continuation of our Dear Mr. President article from the other day. Each of the videos below pose questions which deserve answers, but will likely never receive one from this administration. Oh well, I guess we can look forward to the next one in 2008.

Eve of Destruction

Barry McGuire’s classic anti-war song, Eve of Destruction. «Read the rest of this article»

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Video: The fifth estate: The Lies That Led To War

By Bill Larson | March 24, 2007 |

The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s program, The fifth estate took a look at the lies and manipulations which lead to the invasion of Iraq and the failure of the media to question the lies which they were being fed by this administration. They point out the many simularities between what we heard then about Iraq and what we are hearing from the administration about Iran. This program first aired on March 7th 2007.

Since the US-led invasion four years ago, the fifth estate has covered Iraq and the war on terror from virtually every angle–the military, media, intelligence, politics–revealing aspects of the story that you didn’t find anywhere else. Now, as the White House warns about the latest threat in the region, this time from Iran, it’s worthwhile looking back to examine the deception, suspect intelligence, even lies, that convinced the world of the rightness of targeting Saddam Hussein. «Read the rest of this article»

Sections: Arts and Leisure, Issues, Politics | No Comments