Mario Saenz: Caffeine-fueled philosopher and hellraiser » Current Events

Why I Was Glad

Lisa Goodlin — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 16:35:30 +0000

I’m glad that things are not as bad as I thought they were, that we’re not now rounding up everyone whose politics disagree with the current fashionable ideology. I’m glad that we still have free speech.

I Was Wrong

Lisa Goodlin — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 14:44:12 +0000

And I’m glad.

The Spy Next Door

Lisa Goodlin — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 16:20:09 +0000

It’s not surprising that the spy next door was just the guy next door. After all, serial killer John Wayne Gacy was said to have been a good neighbor. But I am concerned that Vicky Peláez and Juan Jose Lázaro may have been targeted because they are leftists. Perhaps they are indeed Russian spies, but could it be they are the dolphins who got caught in the tuna nets? Was it simply convenient to pick them up along with actual Russian spies? We may pride ourselves that our country is the symbol of freedom, but we often wish to silence those with whom we don’t agree or who challenge the status quo.

Since 2001, many innocent American Muslims have faced charges of everything from terrorism to money laundering because of rampant, irrational fear and bias. Is the government now turning its gaze to the left?

Boobquake

Lisa Goodlin — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 15:22:57 +0000

Yesterday was international Boobquake Day, a response to the Islamic cleric who said that inappropriate dress leads to promiscuity which leads to earthquakes! Hm, maybe “earthquakes” is a metaphor. Read about it here.

This idiocy reminds of Jerry Falwell speaking about 9/11:

” I really believe that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People For the American Way — all of them who have tried to secularize America — I point the finger in their face and say ‘you helped this happen.’”

Image: The Independent.

Government Persecution of Muslims

Lisa Goodlin — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 17:39:24 +0000

My friend Katherine Hughes is a civil liberties activist, and she called my attention to the case of Fahad Hashmi. His story is like something out of a book of fiction, and yet it is frighteningly true. He has been held for two years and will go to trial later this month. His crime? In 2004 he allowed an acquaintance to stay in his London apartment for about two weeks. During that time the acquaintance kept in Fahad’s apartment a suitcase with several raincoats, ponchos, and pairs of waterproof socks. The government alleges that later the acquaintance gave the rainwear to a high-ranking member of Al Qaeda. Thus, Fahad is guilty of material support of terrorism. Unbelievable.

Watch the 12 minute documentary on the case at the FreeFahad website.

Health Care Reform: Joy and Fear

Lisa Goodlin — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 01:59:58 +0000

I am glad that the health care reform push was successful. At the same time I’m dismayed by the protesters. There have been reports of racist and homophobic slurs being slung by the anti-reformers. Add to that the anti-woman, anti-compassion, anti-common-sense agenda of preventing “federally funded abortion,” and we have a very scary picture. The conservatives are so good at organizing that if there were a violent revolution competition, I think they would win.

All those who think we’re living in a post-racial, post-anti-gay, post-feminist society can wake up now.

Photo from the Huffington Post.

A Double Standard

Lisa Goodlin — Sat, 28 Nov 2009 18:31:10 +0000

My friend Katherine Hughes drew my attention to a news article. The headline reads, “FBI: Ex-doctor in Ohio admitted making pipe bombs.” Authorities found 35 pipe bombs and hundreds of rounds of ammunition in his apartment.

Katherine said she was reading through the brief article and couldn’t understand why it didn’t say anything about terrorism. Then it dawned on her. The man is not Muslim.

The Image of The Muslim and The Reality of White Neo-Fascism

Mario Saenz — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 02:55:50 +0000

The violent attack by a Muslim officer at Ft. Hood is a tragedy in an increasingly militarized state now magnified by anti-Muslim fanaticism. The call by the ultra-conservative “fringe” (now comfortably navigating, however, in the mid-stream of the Republican Party) to expel and ban all Muslims from the U.S. military is simply another step in what is by now the firmly established foreign and domestic “Orientalist” policy of the U.S. government.

The orientalist construction of the non-Western “Other” and the reciprocal construction of the West as the normative standard have a long imperial history. Edward Said’s analysis is still applicable. What is new is the troubling similarity to early 20th Century attacks on Jews throughout much of Europe.

The Muslim of the early 21st Century is becoming the Jew of 100 years ago. The attacks against Muslims take place in the context of militarism, nativism, corporativism, and the mainstreaming of an ultra-rightwing populism that brings together tea-baggers, white supremacists, and neo-Know Nothings like Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, Drudge, and Rush Limbaugh, with all sorts of opportunists within the political establishment. The mass element of the new right may express resentment towards a multicultural society; it also expresses the will of authoritarians without authority, totalitarians without totality, for a central authority that lashes out against all threats to their fascist aspirations, leashes in all resistance and brings the country back to the mythical unity of the past.

Militarism, nativism, hatred of foreigners, and the corporativist vertical alliance between big capital, and sectors of the middle class: These are together elements of fascist terror for which only one component seems to be lacking: political control of the machinery of government.

The Free Press–Capitalist Style

Mario Saenz — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 14:22:56 +0000

On Sunday, July 5, President Mel Zelaya attempted to fly back to Tegucigalpa, Honduras, after he was overthrown by proto-fascist forces and forcefully flown out of the country the week before. The army had blocked the tarmac with cars and trucks, making it impossible for President Zelaya to land. Army snipers, posted on the terraces of airport buildings, began shooting at the large crowd of pro-democracy demonstrators who were assembled at the airport to receive their president. Several people were killed and injured by the gunfire.

La Prensa, one of the pro-coup newspapers in Honduras (and only pro-coup papers are allowed to operate), was forced to report on the demonstration because of its magnitude. However, with Reaganesque and Stalinist flair it distorted the facts on the ground. Not only did it fail to report that the demonstration was peaceful; it also retouched pictures of killed demonstrators to show, I suppose, that Army bullets are peaceful. La Prensa’s own sanitized version of the picture at the top of this entry follows below.

Why are media in this country so circumspect about the brutal repression of pro-democracy demonstrators in Honduras? The obscene infotainment coverage of Michael Jackson’s death is simply an excuse not to think about the world when the oppressor is on the side of U.S. imperialist interests. If Neda had been Honduran, her blood would have been sanitized out of existence, and the U.S. media would have been as indifferent as it is in the case of Honduras and it would have implied with barely perceptible coverage, as it does in the case of Isis Obed Murillo, “Who cares, Screw her!”

Pro-Democracy Demonstrations, Capitalist Style

Mario Saenz — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 19:32:04 +0000

Noticiashonduras@gmail.com reports that Honduran capitalist corporations and the military dictatorship are forcing workers to don a white shirt to march in a demonstration in favor of the coup.

Also, the inhabitants of poor neighborhoods in Tegucigalpa are denouncing that the government is paying people the equivalent of US$ 5.00 plus a white shirt to march in the demonstration.

This is what people who believe in capitalism believe in when they are the power: 5 dollars = 1 vote and, if you don’t agree, we fire you … or at you.