Guest blogged by Fin
I (like you, I’m sure) was thrilled and energized by the President’s call to increase Freedom and Liberty across the globe. To that end, in today’s L.A. Times comes an article that I’m sure will make our Dear Leader’s heart leap. One in which a repressed group of people are finally being given the opportunity to cross over into the promised land of freedom. The money quote:
In the Islamic Republic of Iran… hundreds of people are having their gender changed legally, bolstered by the blessings of members of the ruling Shiite clergy.
Let’s take a moment and think about this. How monumental that one of the original members of the Axis of Evil (back before it was trendy) has chosen to give liberty to a discriminated against group. (Now, for the sake of full disclosure, the excised text in the above quote did say “gay male sex still carries the death penalty and lesbians are lashed”, but still this is a clear beacon of freedom for thousand of men and women yearning to be free of…well, being lashed and killed.)
What’s that, you say, Mr. President? You didn’t mean that kind of freedom? Oh, I see. I missed the fine print at the bottom of your speech. Funny, the list of unapproved freedoms listed is a lot longer than that other one. A few samples…
Freedom of Love? UNAPPROVED (if exercised call for hellfire and amend the Constitution)
Freedom of Speech? UNAPPROVED (if exercised, question patriotism and call traitors.)
Freedom of assembly? UNAPPROVED (if exercised, see Freedom of Speech above (plus lots of pepper spray and mass arrests. See RNC convention for further strategies.)
Freedom from torture? UNAPPROVED (if argued, claim the rules don’t apply and quickly imprison in dark, dank hole for all eternity. If successfully subverted, promote subverter to Attorney General. If hypocrisy of saying we’re better than them while acting like them is pointed out, pretend you don’t speak English. For examples, see Daily White House Press Briefings.)
Freedom to Vote? UNAPPROVED (if attempted to exercise, rig machines, manipulate distribution, and intimidate voters. For examples, see Ohio, Florida, New Mexico, and Pennsylvania. If irregularities are brought to light, shovel scorn and spite on all who question. Under no circumstances amend constitution to guarantee right to vote.)
Your turn…
Aw, man, Fin! You’ve ruined all my plans! Now I can’t decide whether to go to Holland and get Married, or go to Iran and get Transgendered, or go to Washington and get Pepper-Sprayed! That’s what happens when Freedom goes on the March: you get Too Many Choices!! 😉
Great piece. Nice to have you around!
Gol darn!
I might go to the new democratic republic of Afghanistan where a woman can get still arrested for walking down the street unaccompanied by a man. She also has to ask permission from hubbie or father to exercise her new freedom to VOTE! I imagine she has to vote for their pick. Oh, what the Hell! A vote is a vote.
LOL…I remember reading a story where people who didn’t vote for Karzai in the Afghan election were publicly threatened with having their homes burned to the ground. With American bribed War Lords controlling most of the country, and the people serving those Lords told, threatened, or bribed on how to vote…I’m sure glad freedom and democracy was so transparent and legitimate that an American oil and gas consultant named Harmid Karzai won. Gee! How did that happen?
That’s right Georgie Boy, give ’em a little freedom, just as long as you and your corporate royalty control the government as another corrupt state, just like a chip off the ol’ block! And who’s your DADDY?
So Iran kills and lashes gays and lesbians. I’m sure Rick Santorum and his Christian Dominion buddies are envious of that one. You’re only "evil" if you oppose or threaten the corporate world domination agenda. Otherwise, if you torture, corrupt, or suppress…that’s just AOK by Bush & Company! Just as long as you do so on behalf of corporate America and not against it!
Like I say…Viva la Revolucion!
Just saw a replay of the Jon Stewart show and got a pick up of the pResidential SOTI speech-
(SOTI=State Of The Inauguration). I missed its live presentation (but I really did not miss it), and I now got a rather complete rendition of the most important parts–shown by Stewart in about 30 seconds.
In short Bush saying, convincingly: Freedom Freedom Liberty Freedom Liberty
Freedom Freedom Freedom Liberty Freedom and more of those.
I think we need a massive turnout Freedom March to give us Freedom from Freedom.
Love it, Fin!
You’re great company and exhibit just the right degree of outrage. Hope you post again soon. 🙂
Cole – FREEDOM FROM ASTERISK FREEDOM!!
This would be an excellent bumper sticker or a life vow to live by. LIBERATION FROM ASTERISK LIBERTY would be another. Ah, the anger is here! We’ve said we’re angry and about what. NOW we must change things so we don’t die angry, distraught and disillusioned.
A Georgist economist, (Henry, not Bush, the Left Libertarian, sensible ones) asks: What Do You Know About Freedom?
The exceptions to rules are not indicators of the rules. Outside these sex change clinics a woman may be being stoned to death for adultery in Iran today.
This tolerance of sex change operations seems more a reaction to what westerners would call oppression (homosexual activities are handled much like adultery) than proof of the great sexual freedoms extant in Iran today.
In the western world you can have a team of doctors in a hospital room working feverisly to save the life of a newborn infant that weighs only 10 ounces and in another hospital room another team of doctors doing a partial birth abortion.
I try to be careful not to be like the blind men around the elephant, who grasping to one little section of the elephant, exclaim that it is a tree, a giant leaf, a large snake, or a host of other things.
To invade or not invade a nation must not be based upon the moral appearances of that nation, but rather on the morals of the would be invader. It is not politically moral to invade a nation without the utmost reason. Lies will not suffice.
And if Iran suppressed sexual freedom to the extent they allowed no adultery, no homosexuality, and no porn, that would be no reason to invade them. If the people want those freedoms they have a responsibility to secure them. If we want a constitutional right to vote for president we must secure those freedoms ourselves rather than hope that someone invades us and brings us freedom.
Our world, until the last few years, was more of the opinion that national invasions must be the great exception rather than the great rule.
In our country there are great variations in voting: in some states felons can vote even while in prison, in other states they cannot ever vote again.
Until a short while ago (Lawrence v Texas, U.S. Supreme Court, 2003), homosexual behavior by consenting adults in private bedrooms was a crime in some states but not a crime in others.
What I am saying is that it is not persuasive to argue against invading Iran based upon a few hundred transexual operations. Nor is it an argument for invading it. It is not an issue.
The invasion in that area is about oil. And the argument must match the reasoning.
A better argument is that invading Iraq and Iran violates the rules of the holy grail we call capitalism.
If capitalism is a true religion to the neo-cons they should be able to prosper and succeed by merely practicing its dictates.
We should not have to invade countries and take their oil outside the dictates of civilized capitalism. If capitalism is valid it will take care of us economically if we practice it.
The argument that capitalism is no better than communist dictatorial regimes if it practices raw military "me like, me take" in place of capitalism would be more persuasive to those neo-cons in congress who make these decisions to support the admin.
To the extent that this blog-issue advocates a platform that the Iranian mullahs practice democracy or freedom because they allow a few hundred folk to get transexual operations = I respectfully dissent.
Even the current admin allows that (the head of the RNC is gay), and I do not take that standing alone as an endorsement of freedom.
Freedom can only be measured by what is available to and promoted for ALL.
By that standard neither the US nor Iran promote the larger concept of freedom.
Here we cannot vote for president based as a constitutional right, and in Iran there are fewer freedoms than here.
But when the only nation to have used nuclear weapons (US) to kill hundreds of thousands of civilian men, women, and children threatens Iran with a military attack for allegedly seeking nuclear weapons is major league hypocrisy.
Its about the oil … and the failure of neo-cons to follow the "capitalist religion".
To Cole: The answer to your quandry is in your question. The "freedom" is in the people of Iraq who willingly turn themselves into WMDs to rid themselves of those who invaded their country, on the false pretext of searching for WMDs that weren’t there before, but are now. Those people never had the freedom , or desire, to do this to Saddam. They found the will, the freedom and the desire to do it to us. Confusing, isn’t it? But we found the WMDs and the Iraqis do have the freedom to fight their oppressors. God truly does move in mysterious ways.
"ATTN Jimmo" is another matter. It’s an inside joke that’s on the outside now. Be thankful.
Yo Dredd! Nice piece of work – thanks for the food for thought (The nice thing is you can eat all you want and never have to put your brain on a diet.)
Hey, there is this nation that is torturing its people regularly. It is even said that the leader of the country walked up, pulled out his pistol. and shot a detainee in the head.
Come on neo-cons, invade them and bring demockracy to them. They need our compasionate conservative ideals and our exquistite voting machines.
Pardon my return but I have to admit I have been
flumoxed because I do not know What the Hell ATTN Jimmo means.
Now thanx to gWb I no longer know the meaning of Freedom, I looked and looked but cannot find it anywhere. And Liberty, hah I do not even know where to start looking.
Maybe they now resides in the WMD box safely hidden away. Far far away in the vicinity of the Holy Land.
Will we be so fortunate to ever see them in our land again?
You’d think the sucker was doing life in the Pen as obsessed as he is with freedom…. He said it 42 times in 21 minutes.
And while this was going on, a guy in the crowd booed him and got arrested.
The thing I really hate about this shitass is how he is ruining some of my favorite words. I wish he’d shut the fuck up, leave us be, and let us be free.
Oh, and in Afghanistan they were free to vote with disappearing ink.
LGM #11
I had questions and the answers seemed to elude me-first "What the Hell does ATTN J mean"?
Second, the mysterious loss of Freedom and Liberty which were sinisterly coopted by gWb in his SOTI speech.
Now I am told my questions have become a quandry–well, talk about your mushrooming clouds!
I suspected they might have been transported across the sea. And I am to be conforted knowing that indeed they are in Iraq. Marching with Freedom loving Iraqi’s -a short march-to a point of veritable explosion of Freedom and body parts.
And this you call a mysterious Godly movement?!
Sorry, I would attribute it more to a mysterious bushmob bowel movement.
As for Saddam, all I truely know is that he is a ‘bad’ guy whose rule was initiated by bushmob-1, and warmly embraced by the mob who saw to it that he got a plentiful supply of biological/toxin ‘WMD'(s). And the go ahead to attack Kuwait.
And I truely know that by way of our Media whose truth telling ability has been severly discredited.
But thanks because I know know that I not only lost ‘Freedom’ and ‘Liberty’ but I also lost ‘Truth’.
I do hope that the WMD box is big enough to hold them all.
The first question: "what does atty j mean?’ shrinks away. Thanks God.
Re #10 Dredd my friend, you hit the nail right on the head. Is it just me, or do the rules of Capitalism only apply to little people? I mean, whenever one of the Mighty in the great US military-Industrial complex are in dire financial straits (like say oooooh, lemme think- Lockheed for instance), they get bailed out with your tax dollars, yet when a pig farmer in Iowa can’t compete with one of the agri-giants (because he has to comply with environmental regulations and they don’t), he can go screw himself?
I’m willing to believe that I’m being dense, but once again I just don’t get it.
Keep the faith!
czaragorn and da wookie,
I have read some ramblings by neo-cons who have this very mysto outlook on capitalism that really, really is a religion.
It has no demonstrable basis in fact as you have deduced and as I mentioned.
They have a blind faith in something that really, really is myth. Dickey boy Cheney even said recently "deficits don’t matter", which is just one strange article of faith.
They think spending our money is their God given right.
Viva the little folk who know better.
There are different views in the oligarchy as to how to keep the masses subjugated. The PNAC believes in chaos and crippling of the people. The situation in Iraq is the grand test of their strategy.
They have to be successful there in order to keep implementing this technique. I believe they have a lot to learn.
You all notice how Fallujah disapperaed from the radar…literally! The city made a prison camp is under media blackout! Why? You can guess, but that experiment in mass murder is not going very well and I’m sure they’re very busy cleaning up all the dead bodies from the rubble and burying them in mass graves to conceal the evidence…just like Saddam! So how many did Bush & Company really kill there?
1,500? 5,000? 10,000? 15,000? 25,000? etc?
Is it any wonder the press is silent? The Pentagon? The White House? Why turn Iraq over to a UN international peace keeping force that would prevent your military from committing mass murder, war crimes, and crimes against humanity? Too many witnesses…too many leaks…too much exposure for the dirty work they always knew they would do to make sure they protected their oil and gas investments! It is time to arrest the war criminals before they kill any more!
Viva la Revolucion!
Freebird
Freedom IS on the march!!
W. has exercised his freedom in naming leaders of Haiti , Afghanistan, Ukraine, and soon to be Iraq! I’m sure I am missing some. Good thing W. DOESN"T believe in nation building.
I am in the medical profession and would have been sued many times over if I had exercised one iota of the incompetence this gang has been a party to!
I don’t know what’s worse… the lies or the incompetence!!
W. will not last 4 years, the people have spoken and they didn’t re-elect him and their voices will be heard.
The only Freedom that could come to the U.S. right now would be if W. and his gang rode off into the sunset.
Freebird, I believe you’re right.
There has been some talk of the truth of the matter leaking out anyway. It’s like the truth is trapped in a pressure cooker and the escape valve is getting blocked.
Today in the Senate the words were LIES, LIES, LIES. Finally.
It’s true, Me. You can’t run a business like that. Unfortunately, it will be hard to find a horse for them to ride out on since they are going to kill all the wild ones on the prairies.
We’ll give’m a damn donkey!
Freebird #18
Your observation of the destruction and isolation of Falluja ties directly into the Guest Blog of Winter Patriot: Support our Troops and the D.O. J. action to have the court reverse the judgement in favor of P.O.W.s who were tortured, and thereby make torture of any troop, ours or the ‘enemies’ legitimate.
What happened in the now Falluja Ghetto is as much a War Crime as was the Nazi action in Poland where the Warsaw Ghetto was demolished and the population killed or deported to death camps, to be later killed.
How many of our countrymen/women can (will) claim ‘We did not know"?
Support our troops–Bah! Bring them all home now before they are killed or kill any more!
We are no longer innocent, like it or not WE are on the record of having ‘elected’ and inaugurated an administration that commits CRIMES of War and is proud of it.
I am on record as not being a bushit weenie …
I am on record as not being a bushit weenie …