The Real America

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PASADENA CA - On Thursdays since, June 25, 2009, a group of protesters gathered at the intersection of Orange and Hill Avenues to hold a protest vigil, shown in this film, and which continues there weekly. Drive by and honk if you care to.

So why after 60 years of Republican blocked attempts at nationalized health care are we finally seeing some movement? It looks like things are so bad that the insurance companies aren't even making out. If things get bad enough for people and people can’t afford to pay their bills, guess who gets screwed? The insurance companies who charged the outrageous premiums to begin with. Once again we see the authoritarian right digging their own grave. Keep up the good work guys. With any luck your kind will soon be extinct. Bailouts can't go on forever. At some point these greedy corporations will die if we refuse their services, whether out of necessity or not. The people have the power and always have. It's ultimately about cutting off the money. Now if only we could do this to Wall Street and The Pentagram.

“Health care reform is no longer just a moral imperative, it is a fiscal imperative. If we want to create jobs and rebuild our economy, then we must address the crushing cost of health care this year, in this Administration.” - President Barack Obama, White House Forum on Health Reform, 3/5/09

The following excerpts are from HeathReform.gov:

“With All These People Losing Jobs, A Lot Will Lose Their Health Insurance”
The Wall Street Journal, Thursday, April 23, 2009 - President Obama has said that health reform “cannot wait, must not wait, and will not wait another year.” Today the Wall Street Journal cited evidence that illustrates why so many Americans cannot afford to wait another year for health reform. Layoffs are causing thousands of Americans to lose their health care coverage, and as was reported today, insurance companies are seeing their profits shrink as they lose members.

Insured, but Bankrupted by Health Crises
New York Times, 7/1/09 - It is commonly cited that nearly 50 million Americans go each year without health insurance. What is perhaps less apparent is that millions more are severely under-insured. The unfortunate reality is that even those with insurance are too often brought to financial ruin because of medical expenses.

Medical Bankruptcy
South Florida Sun-Sentinel, 6/23/09 - Americans across the country are struggling to keep up with rising costs of medical bills, high deductibles, increasing premiums, and the escalating costs of prescription drugs. For some Americans health care costs result in medical bankruptcy. According to a new Harvard University study, 62% of bankruptcies in 2007 were caused by medical-related debt.

Iranian Protests in U.S. Streets may Save them from Dehumanized War, unlike the Iraqi and Afghan Victims of U.S. Occupation

Iranians have been holding a protest vigil since the Iran election in front of the federal building at Westwood and Veteran Avenues in West Los Angeles. On Sunday, June 28, 2009, about 5,000 of them took to the streets there in the march depicted in this film. Many would not be interviewed on camera, probably in fear of reprisals against their families in Iran by the Iranian government, as some told us. Of those who spoke on camera, they explained how their presence was only to show solidarity with those in Iran. They feel frustrated that they cannot do something more to stop the Iranian government. Some want the U.S. and the U.N. to impose sanctions on Iran, specifically to companies like Nokia that do business with the Iranian government in providing surveillance technology used wrongfully against the Iranian people, to deny them basic freedoms.

However, sanctions on Iran from the U.S. in the past have hurt the Iranian people as much, if not more than it hurt the Iranian government. Is it possible for the U.S. or the U.N. to have the acuity to distinguish between the Iranian people and the Iranian government; to impose selective and targeted sanctions on companies like Nokia, or at least the offending technologies they sell? If so they would then target the Iranian government's anti-democratic behavior without hurting the Iranian people, unlike what the U.S. did to Iraq after the Gulf War in obtuse sanctions that effectively broke down their infrastructure, and took away basic human needs like water and electricity from all the Iraqi people.

One good thing that these marches do is to show the world and the Iranian government the faces of Iranians, which makes it impossible for the U.S. and other governments, to dehumanize the Iranian people in order to wage war, as the U.S. has done in Iraq and Afghanistan. Iraq War veterans have testified to this fact in the Winter Soldier testimonies on U.S. military racism (http://ivaw.org/wintersoldier), citing how their superiors demean Iraqis, and now Afghans, by routinely referring to them as "hodgie", a slag term for Hajji.

It is a well known fact among scholars (like Dr. Haig Bosmajian, University of Washington in Seattle) that the U.S. military has, as a matter of policy, demeaned the people of entire countries that we have gone to war with, ever since the Korean War when they referred to Koreans as "gooks", which carried over to the Vietnam War. It is no stretch to call our military racist. But this was also found during WWII when they called the Germans "krauts". The Germans are especially infamous for their pro-war dehumanization campaign of the Jewish people in calling them "rats". The purpose of this as government policy is to make it easier for people and troops to accept war, especially the killing and genocide of innocent people.

See also: Iran Was an Easier Enemy Before We Saw Their Faces by David Bromwich, Huffington Post, June 24, 2009 12:32 PM

Visit the Stop War Project

The U.S. Flag does not Stand for Freedom

Welcome to the United Socialist Corporate Welfare States of America. This year Americans will not be celebrating their faux independence with fireworks. Most states, cities and towns don't have the budget to fund fireworks. Our taxes are going to Wall Street to fund corporate legalized crime. We are sending 30,000 more troops into Afghanistan at a cost to taxpayers of $750,000 for each troop per year. Afghanistan is a much more expensive war because of the rough unpaved terrain. This July 4th we have had the news of unemployment averaging at 10% and as high as 16% in some states. People are losing homes and jobs. The future does not look bright. There is no upturn in sight. Things are going to get worse before they get better, if they ever do get any better. Our government funds Wall Street bankers to boost the economy but people don't have any money to buy anything. Even if Wall Street starts lending money, the people won't be able to pay it back, let alone qualify for it. This is little more than the new millennium prohibition era with thugs taking our money through the U.S. treasury.

Why celebrate independence anyway? What are we independent from? The British? How about our own government? Our taxes fund all these things without our consent. They are dictated to us. We've had nationwide "tea parties" in protest of the Wall Street bailouts. We are in a war in Afghanistan with no exit strategy. We don't know who we're fighting. We are incapable of distinguishing civilians from Taliban and so we just bomb and raid civilian homes. We occupy Afghanistan just as we occupied Iraq and just as the British attempted to occupy the U.S., the independence from which we celebrate this holiday. Anyone who celebrates this independence day is a bigot and a hypocrite. We are not independent. Our flag does not deserve our honor and respect on this day in 2009 when our troops fight and die in vain for no known cause. Our bombing and killing of civilians motivates surviving young men to join the insurgency against the U.S. and fight back. Our war is a liability to our freedom. Our troops do not protect our freedoms they endanger them. July 4th is a sham.Our flag does not stand for freedom today. It stands for corruption, deceit, and dictatorship.

We are Already at War with Iran

It's quite apparent that Republicans and the authoritarian right are hell bent on doing something to support the recent uprising in Iran. But what is it they ultimately want?

War.

McCain stated plainly during his campaign that he wanted to go to war with Iran. Bush had the same sentiment. McCain's rhetoric is that he wants the President to stand up against the Iranian supressive government with a statement of support. The President has done that. Yet McCain is still whining.

There are protesters in the streets of the U.S. crying for freedom for Iranians. What do they want? What do they think we can do? Meanwhile, there are reports that the CIA seeded the Iranian uprising. Whether this is true or not, it's not a stretch to believe that right wing sympathizers, even outside the CIA, and possibly backed by right wing money, would be promoting these uprisings and rallies.

The right wants war with Iran and they will stop at nothing to get it. They want total control of the Middle East. This has been their goal for years. They want Afghanistan and they want Iraq. It has nothing to do with terrorists or suppressive governments. It has to do with oil and war profiteering. They want control of Middle Eastern oil and they want perpetual war.

Are we to now go into Iran with troops and bomb them too? Are we to start killing innocent Iranians who happen to be in the way, like we did in Iraq and Afghanistan? America's military solutions always involve the deaths of thousands to millions of innocent people. Our military has a racist policy. We dehumanize entire countries to justify killing innocent civilians in the name of our wars. Our moronic military, despite it's having cutting edge technology and (not so) smart bombs, has plainly stated that they can't distinguish between the bad guys and the civilians. So they just bomb everyone. Iran is next in the list.

Meanwhile unemployment continues to rise in the U.S. Our econmy continues it's downward spiral, though perhaps at a slowing pace, but downward still. Can we aford another war, while we mantain troops in Iraq and a war in Afghanistan?

Update 6-28-2009: I talked to some of the Iranians protesting in L.A. 5,000 of them marched on the Federal building in Westwood. They all say they don't want war. But most of those I talked to were not aware of the U.S. actions on the Iran border. The last thing any of them want is a U.S. war on Iran, which would bring down the killing of innocent Iranians, because that's what Americans do. They want peaceful sanctions and for the U.N. and the U.S. to not recognize the Iranian oppressive theocratic government. They believe that the U.S. cannot go to war there, because of our stretched economy in two other wars. Yet our support of Kurds on the Iran border suggests otherwise. Are they naive to think right wing warmongers won't use this uprising as an eventual excuse for war?

One thing they seem to have done is to get their faces out in the streets, and the media, and put themselves in the minds of the American people as humans, which will make it much harder for our military to dehumanize them. So perhaps their uprising is stopping a war with Iran in it's tracks.

Links:

The U.S. has been secretly at war with Iran as far back as 2005
Bush setting America up for war with Iran 9/16/2007

What do the CIA, John McCain, the Iran Uprising, the Afghanistan War, and your Lockheed-Martin Stocks have in Common?

For years right wing extremists have been bucking to have a confrontation with Iran. Had McCain won the election we'd likely be at war with them now, or at least making a military stand. It's no surprise he now calls on Obama to publicly give America's official support to the uprising in Iran. But as Obama has explained, doing so would exacerbate the problem and motivate the Iranian government to cite America as the force behind the uprising.

Interestingly, it may well be a fact that America is the force behind the uprising. Maybe not Obama. But America is a complicated place these days. We "elected" a president twice under highly questionable circumstances, a corrupt Supreme Court, corrupt election officials, a governor of Florida who used his authority in miscounting votes to see that his brother was elected, and hacked election machines in at least two recent presidential elections. We committed an illegal international act in a preemptive war, a racist genocidal war with a military that dehumanizes all Muslims, disdainfully calling them "Hajjis" as a matter of policy to better help our troops deal with killing innocent people. These are facts reported by veterans in the Winter Soldier testimonies.

Then there's America's example of free enterprise, or as it's better known, the socialist corporate welfare state. In America the biggest banks and auto companies are goverment owned, at least in part. Government officials are bought and paid for by corporations like the military industrial complex, which could sure use another war in Iran. Bush and Cheney immediately upon taking office in 2000 changed laws so that the monopolistic energy industry, with Enron as it's poster boy, was given great tax breaks (Worse Than Watergate, John Dean, Warner Books 2005, p75-76)

So now McCain and others cry to Obama to stand up to Iran and tell them how to run a "democratic" election? What a comedian. We've got some cleaning up to do before we can go around telling people how to be a democracy.

But how is America behind the uprising? With all the right wing sentiment and misplaced power, likely in places like the military, Wall Street, corporate America, and the CIA (who have fronted for the corrupt Bush and Cheney regime) it's not much of stretch to consider that the Iran uprising was indeed orchestrated by these underground right wing U.S. powers. Pakistan Daily reports in two separate articles, and you won't find this in the U.S. corporate media:

CIA has Distributed 400 Million Dollars Inside Iran to Evoke a Revolution.

Former Pakistani Army General Mirza Aslam Beig claims the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) has distributed 400 million dollars inside Iran to evoke a revolution. In a phone interview with the Pashto Radio on Monday, General Beig said that there is undisputed intelligence proving the US interference in Iran. "The documents prove that the CIA spent 400 million dollars inside Iran to prop up a colorful-hollow revolution following the election," he added.

Pakistan's former army chief of joint staff went on to say that the US wanted to disturb the situation in Iran and bring to power a pro-US government. He congratulated President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on his reelection for the second term in office, noting that Pakistan relationship with Iran has improved during his 4-year presidency.

"Ahmadinejad's re-election is a decisive point in regional policy and if Pakistan and Afghanistan unite with Iran, the US has to leave the area, especially the occupied Afghanistan," Beig added.

So then Ahmadinejad's re-election is a threat to America's war machine?You mean they might stop us from bombing Afghanistan? The CIA will have none of that.

US Official: The CIA bribed Iranian government officials, businessmen, and reporters, and paid Iranians to demonstrate in the streets

Stephen Kinzer’s book, All the Shah’s Men: An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror, tells the story of the overthrow of Iran’s democratically-elected leader, Mohammed Mosaddeq, by the CIA and the British MI6 in 1953. The CIA bribed Iranian government officials, businessmen, and reporters, and paid Iranians to demonstrate in the streets.

The 1953 street demonstrations, together with the Cold War claim that the US had to grab Iran before the Soviets did, served as the US government’s justification for overthrowing Iranian democracy. What the Iranian people wanted was not important.

Today, the street demonstrations in Tehran show signs of orchestration. The protesters, primarily young people, especially young women opposed to the dress codes, carry signs written in English: "Where is My Vote?" The signs are intended for the western media—not for the Iranian government.

More evidence of orchestration is provided by the protesters’ chant, "death to the dictator, death to Ahmadinejad." Every Iranian knows that the president of Iran is a public figure with limited powers. His main role is to take the heat from the governing grand Ayatollah. No Iranian, and no informed Westerner, could possibly believe that Ahmadinejad is a dictator. Even Ahmadinejad’s superior, Khamenei, is not a dictator, as he is appointed by a government body that can remove him....

It's interesting how transparent and open to the media this Iranian uprising is. It seems like a well coordinated media campaign, complete with an official color (green), and the latest Web 2.0 social network technology. The Huffington Post is live blogging the Tweets and videos. Twitter is inundated with second by second accounts of the happenings in Iran. They even have little green overlays for Twitterers to place on their icons, in a showing of "solidarity". The BBC and CCN have almost complete access, compared to the Iraq War. But is this solidarity and access contrived and seeded by the CIA?

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are quite the opposite in transparency. No moment by moment updates on Twitter. No green overlays. No inundations of on the spot photographs, and videos of people dying in the streets of Baghdad. The BBC doesn't find a way to break through the censorship in Iraq or Afghanistan with their news satellites. Yet 1.5 million innocent Iraqis are known to have been killed since America's occupation. Iraq War veterans say that most of those deaths are due to our bombs and bullets. The U.S. notoriously censors every bit of media of these wars. No pictures, no video. Only a very few officially Pentagon approved pictures and videos get through. It's all way too curious how easily we see everything that's going on in Iran, but absolutely nothing of Iraq or Afghanistan. Meanwhile, the Congress this week, passed 106 billion more dollars in war funding. Is this all coincidence? There's a saying in the law enforcement community, "There are no coincidences".

From the CIA's book review of All the Shaw's Men ( New York: John Wiley and Sons, 2003. 258 pages):

All the Shah's Men: An American Coup and the Roots of Middle East Terror

At an NSC meeting in early 1953, President Dwight Eisenhower said "it was a matter of great distress to him that we seemed unable to get some of these down-trodden countries to like us instead of hating us."1 The problem has likewise distressed all administrations since, and is emerging as the core conundrum of American policy in Iraq. In All the Shah's Men, Stephen Kinzer of the New York Times suggests that the explanation may lie next door in Iran, where the CIA carried out its first successful regime-change operation over half a century ago...

....The CIA's covert intervention—codenamed TPAJAX—preserved the Shah's power and protected Western control of a hugely lucrative oil infrastructure. It also transformed a turbulent constitutional monarchy into an absolutist kingship and induced a succession of unintended consequences at least as far ahead as the Islamic revolution of 1979—and, Kinzer argues in his breezily written, well-researched popular history, perhaps to today....

For most of us, these facts only come to light and are admitted to, years after the fact. It seems then, more likely than not, that the CIA is now behind the uprising in Iran. The CIA is defending it's setting up the Shaw for Nixon in this book review on it's website. But the fact that the CIA has to have a review of this particular book indicates they are concerned about their image.

This recent Iranian uprising is a little too convenient for Republicans and right wingers looking for a new emergency situation that will give them the right to exercise their military industrial complex to secure and control Mid-Eastern oil, and boost Shell, Exxon, General Dynamics, Lockheed-Martin and KBR to boot. That's been their plan all along, and Obama is messing it up.

Anyone who accuses Republicans and the CIA of such things could easily be labeled as, now famously, a conspiracy theorist (as if that were a lunacy, considering co-conspirators Bush and Cheney), or anti-American, anti-democracy, and siding with "the enemy", that is, if you're one of those authoritarian half-wits who can't think for themselves. Thinking people, like President Obama, know that getting into this mess is the worse thing Americans could do, unless of course we want to have another war, or maybe want to protect our investments in Lockheed-Martin.

References include Worse that Watergate, John Dean; Conservatives Without Conscience, John Dean; and The Three Trillion Dollar War, Joseph Stiglitz and Linda Blimes; and ReThink Afghanistan, among others.

You can Stop War

It seems like a lost cause. A recent Gallop poll shows a large increase in anti-war sentiment. CNN reports two thirds of Americans oppose the war in Afghanistan. Yet there is no end in sight to the Afghanistan war. It is being compared to Vietnam by some very prominent people like Ron Paul and Andrew Bacevich, as well as many not so prominent people, like most veterans.^{Some film clips provided by: ReThink Afghanistan, Sir! No Sir!; Some photos by: AfterDowningStreet.org, Chris-Floyd.com, and RAWA.org
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The Vietnam War Reincarnated

This is another Vietnam. We can win nothing. It will cost immensely in lives and money, and the return will be less than nothing (ref. The Three Trillion Dollar War by Joseph Stiglitz - read it). We will be left with tens of thousands of veterans facing lifetimes of disability, poor health, lost limbs and suffering families. These wars are simply made to profit the corporations who benefit from them, as usual. The Iraq war too continues will no commitment to get out of there, despite the fact that our presence there is an illegal racist genocide. But there are things you can do to stop these wars.

Why?

These wars persist because most people are not aware of the reality of what is going on. Most people believe the political rhetoric and corporate media propaganda that these wars are protecting America from terrorists like the ones who committed the 9-11 attacks. The facts are that these wars endanger our freedom more and more with every day. They continually commit genocide against innocent people in Iraq and Afghanistan. This motivates more and more people to join anti-American insurgencies. There are now more terrorists than ever. The military plays the facts down. They censor all media reports and photographs. Only a very few get through. The media reports that do get through are watered down. If you want to know the truth of what is going on, listen to the veterans who have been there and who have experienced the horror.

You can Stop War

You can stop war by listening to veterans. Post links to their websites and videos on your websites, and on your social networks like Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Digg, NewsTrust. If you aren't familiar with these web services and social networks, go to their websites and sign up. Usually all you need is a username, password and email address. once you have accounts on these sites, post links to any stories you find, any video clips of veterans speaking out, any pictures of the truth about what goes on in these wars.

Join my project, The Stop War Project, a Ning network. Post pictures you copy from other websites or that you have. Blog, on this or any other network. Tell the world your opinions. Post videos from YouTube or anywhere else you find them. Let your friends know. All of these social networks have a feature to let you add friends. all you need is their email address, or if they are already on those networks just invite them to the cause. Use those features to invite all your friends, relatives and contacts to join up, or at least read about the truth. Visit the many veterans against war websites. You will be amazed at how many veterans and honorable military organizations opposed these lawless genocidal wars.

If you have any problems with any of this, we are here to help. Post a comment here or let us know. We'll put up a tutorial or respond with detailed information. You can also find help on the web. All of these websites have extensive help documentation and even help lines.

If we must live with these wars then we should face up to what we are paying for. Americans should admit their country is a racist genocidal warmongering nation. Write your Congressman and tell them what you think. Many of these veteran and anti-war organizations have mailing lists and will keep you informed of opportunities to write your Congressman or to participate in other ant-war activities. Join them.

A Racist America

Do you think America is not racist? Do the police in our cities drop bombs on neighborhoods where there are gangs, who commit domestic terrorism by killing people in the streets? Do we wipe out entire neighborhoods of innocent people just to get to a few terrorists? No. So why do we do that in other countries? Ask a veteran. They don't understand it either.

I think the reason is because they are not Americans. They are not white. They are not Christians, and we are a racist nation. So our leaders have no problem with racist preemptive genocide.

If you disagree, then get into the fray. Make your arguments. Compare what you have to say with what veterans who have been there say. Read the books and watch the movies that reveal the truth. Link to them on your social networks and pass them on to al your friends. This is what you can do to stop war.

Social Web Networks and Services:

Facebook - Network with family, friends, acquaintances. Join or create groups. Post links, pictures, and video. Link up with other networks.

Twitter - Post 140 character messages with a link. Follow others Twitterers.

MySpace- Network with family, friends, acquaintances. Join or create groups. Post blogs, links, pictures,music, and video.

Digg - Post links to news items on the web. Vote and comment on other Digg posts.

NewsTrust - Submit your review of news stories on the web. Review other posted stories. Review other reviews.

Delicious - Post bookmarks to favorite web links and news items. Make feeds of your links based on keywords you assign.

Flickr -post pictures. Join groups. Make contacts. Look at pictures. Make photo albums like mine.

Blogger - Create you own blog website for free. Includes free hosting and many gadgets and widgets, like feeds, blog editor, layout, and themes.

Wordpress - Create you own blog website for free. Does not include hosting but is easy to setup on your website. Includes many gadgets and widgets, like feeds, blog editor, layout, and themes.
Ning - Create your own free social network, with picture albums, video, music, and many gadgets.

Anti-War Veterans' Groups:

IVAW (Iraq Veterans Against the War)

VVAW (Vietnam Veterans Against the War)

VAIW (Veterans Against the Iraq War)

West Point Graduates Against the War

Veterans For Peace

Operation Homefront

Veterans For America

Center On Conscience And War

The Central Committee For Conscientious Objectors

Follow the Stop War Project on Social Networks

On Facebook join The Stop War Project

On Twitter follow StopWarProject

On Ning join The Stop War Project

Many of the organizations listed also have groups on Facebook, MySpace and Twitter

Books

The Three Trillion Dollar War by Joseph Stiglitz and Linda Bilmes

The War Within by Bob Woodward

Conservatives Without Conscience by John Dean

Worse than Watergate by John Dean

The 25 Year War: America’s Military Role in Vietnam by General Bruce Palmer, Jr.

...and there are more. Post your suggestions.

Films, Web Series, Media

Rethink Afghanistan - Documentary film and website

Winter Soldier - Veterans' testimonials to the truth about war

Sir! No Sir! - A documentary about the suppressed Vietnam War documentary film, FTA, about Jane Fonda and Donald Sutherland's anti-war tour among the troops.

FTA (a.k.a Free the Army, a.k.a Fuck the Army) - A documentary of Jane Fonda and Donald Sutherland's anti-war tour among the troops.

Standard Operating Procedure - Errol Morris examines the incidents of abuse and torture of suspected terrorists at the hands of U.S. forces at the Abu Ghraib prison.

Obama may be Cute and Cuddly, but he’s not Housebroken

I had kittens when I was young. When you first get a kitten they are so cute and cuddly. But they pee and crap all over the place until you house train them. How do you do that? There is one very fast and fool proof way. Rub their noses in their crap. All it takes is once and they never crap on that place again. Rub their noses in it and then put them outside in the dirt. They make the connection.

Our country and our leaders need to have their noses rubbed in the crap they do. They need to take a good long look at the death, pain, suffering and destruction these wars are. Look at the lost limbs, the dead infants and toddlers, the devastated families, the broken bodies of our GIs, their broken families, their lost wages of never being able to work again. Take a good long hard look at those pictures, show them to the American people and then once again. tell us why these wars are so necessary. Tell us why wars that proliferate terrorism, instead of quelling it, are necessary. These wars are a liability to freedom. They motivate families of the innocent victims of our racist military to become terrorists against the U.S. military. If the U.S. were occupied and our families killed, we would do the very same. Our troops don't protect our freedom. They endanger it.

The President has stated he will not release photos of torture carried out by the U.S. The argument is that this release would endanger the lives of Americans. Meanwhile, it's obvious the photos would implicate the U.S. and the Obama administration, even though the torture was carried out in the previous administration. The wars continue. GITMO is scheduled to close, but it's still open. Renegade marines loyal to Rumsfeld continue to carry out atrocities against Afghan civilians. Bush is gone but his policies still linger like the stench of a week old litter box.

AP photographers, Eddie Adams' photograph of Nguyễn Ngọc Loan executing Nguyễn Văn Lém on February 1, 1968 and Nick Ut's photo of a naked 9 year old who's clothes were burned off by napalm, taken June 8, 1972

The problem here is that the truth is censored. This is the policy of the U.S. military and it is how they get away with the war crimes they commit. If people saw what goes on in war, as they did in Vietnam, these wars would be stopped. There are two photographs that are purported to have stopped the Vietnam war, one by Eddie Adams of a Vietnam officer executing an alleged Vietcong officer. The other is by Nick Ut of a naked 9-year-old girl running toward the camera to flee a South Vietnamese napalm attack . During that war the American public saw weekly graphic photos in Life magazine of U.S. servicemen with their guts blown out, or their arms and legs shot off. The nightly news reported the body count. We see very little of this today.

The war in Afghanistan is very much like the war in Vietnam. As Ret. Col. Andrew Bacevich testified to Congress, when he quoted The 25 Year War, a book by Gen. Bruce Palmer written in 1984,

"With respect to Vietnam, our leaders should have known that the American people would not stand still for a protracted war, of an indeterminate nature, and with no foreseeable end to the U.S. commitment."

Bacevich continued,

Today exactly 25 years later, we once again find ourselves mired in a protracted war of an indeterminate nature, with no foreseeable end to the U.S. commitment. Just as in the 1960s we possessed neither the wisdom nor the means needed to determine the fate of Southeast Asia, so today, we posses neither the wisdom, nor the means, necessary to determine the fate of the greater middle east.

The horrors of war, if revealed, and when they were revealed in the past, make us realize how wrong these wars are, and allow no refuge from the truth by our warmongering military complex.

There are pictures of war, of the civilian atrocities, injuries and deaths, along with the same pain and suffering our troops endure in these wars, for which they even admit they know not why they are there. Many such pictures are censored by the military. But some get through. What we are seeing with the administration's censorship of the torture is more of the same. They censor these photos for political self survival and to keep these wars going. They know if these photos get out the people will not stand for these wars to continue. The rhetoric about such photos endangering lives may hold some truth. But a long protracted war will certainly bring on much more death, pain, and suffering and outlandish war expense. If the release of these pictures stops the wars sooner, an obvious likely result, then their release will save hundreds of thousands, maybe millions of lives, including thousands of U.S. GIs and the devastations to their families.

Photos of Iraq and Afghanistan Wars on The Stop War Project Network

Iraq is an illegal preemptive racist genocide. It started that way, and it continues that way. The fact that we plan to exit Iraq in another year or so does not make it any less illegal. As long as Americans are there, they are engaged in an illegal preemptive occupation, forsaking the lives of innocent civilians as a matter of policy. Afghanistan has the very same policies. We are there under the pretense of fighting the terrorists who committed 9-11. Those terrorists, Al Qaeda, are not in Afghanistan. They are in Pakistan. So why are we dropping bombs on Afghanistan?

We would never stand for our police to drop bombs on neighborhoods in the U.S. just to make sure they kill some gang bangers, forsaking the lives of the innocent. Yet we allow our military to do this very thing day after day as a matter of policy. Why? Because the victims are not Americans. They are Muslims, Iraqis, and Afghans. No matter that they include innocent men, women, children, and infants. We don't care because they are not Americans. That is a racist policy. That makes America a racist nation. If you can live with this, then you are racist.

Why have a bank? Vote with your feet. Walk out.

If you're like me you don't hold onto money long enough to warrant keeping a bank account with the liability of bouncing checks when it nears bottom. So don't have one. Use money orders. Why direct deposit all your cash into some crooks' bank? It's your money. Put in in your wallet, or your safe. By the time I pay my bills all I have left is spending cash for food anyway.

If you must have a bank account, just put enough in to cover the bills you must pay by check or your bank card. Why bother going to a money machine every time you need your own cash? Why pay all the associated fees? Banks have a great racket. They hold all your money, fee you when ever they feel like it, post your checks when ever they feel like, and share all your transactions with any government agency or lawyer who comes down the pike.

We have the power to stop banks in their tracks. Vote with your feet. Walk out of your bank.

It's been suggested that credit unions are a great alternative to banks. I don't think people should blindly follow any one strategy or part of the industry. One credit union may be good. Another may be bad. Generally they sound good, but they all still charge the same interest and fees as banks.

Why should people be responsible for propping up an economy based on credit, which profits the bankers, including credit unions? People should learn to live within their means, not on credit. This is the root of the problem. This is what the Japanese discovered when they went through this. They now live more within their means.

The further contraction of the economy without banks that some fear is merely a contraction of credit. People still have the ability to make a living and profit. In fact, without the incredible interest they now pay, up to around 30% on a typical credit card for example, they will have more money and the 'no bank, no credit' strategy will improve their cash position.

The only thing banks are good for is credit, and right now that is even questionable. The root of our problem is credit. It's time to think outside of the vicious credit cycle box. If banks want to attract customers they should compete for the business, reduce their interest rates, cut out all the fees and overdraft penalties that multiply when they hit. That's how a free market will work. Credit unions have those fees and interest charges too. Until they come up with a better alternative, I say walk out on them. Make them earn our trust and our business.

Who Needs Hollwood? Not these guys.

There's a new movement in filmmaking. It's what you might call a "who need's Hollywood?", DIY approach. A number of new filmmakers have had some awesome success with this. The thing is there is no one way for everybody. Each filmmaker seems to find their own road. But there are some commonalities, like social networking, self-distribution, and audience interaction, and always hard work.

Arin Crumley and Susan Buice successfully produced, directed and distributed their feature film, Four Eyed Monsters, through the internet and a lot of Google time. One thing about this is that technology moves so fast, and things are ever changing, so that what worked for them is already outdated. But their independent spirit in going down their own road, even paving their way through a wilderness, was the thing we can all take away from their experience and apply to ourselves. By the way, Four Eyed monsters garnered two Independent Spirit Award nominations.

The road they took started with vlogs on YouTube. I think they planned this as part of their strategy in marketing their film. Their vlogs were about the behind the scenes "making of" stuff that you might find in typical DVD extras. But there is nothing typical about these guys. The film itself was kind of a similar docudrama of their relationship, much of it in a vlog fourth wall style. That sounds a bit repugnant on paper. But the film is really beautiful. Check out the trailer to get a feel for it.  So while the film was about their relationship's birth, life and death, as the tagline reads, the vlogs were about that too, along with the making of the film and with more reality.

The interesting this is that their "making of" experience is like none you've ever seen, or maybe never will. They forged their way to gather a YouTube and social network audience, which they translated into theatrical sales, by capturing emails and zip codes and persuading  theaters across the country to show their film during four Thursdays September in 2005, I think it was. That itself is quite an accomplishment. But it doesn't end there. in fact it still hasn't ended.

They acquired support form a number of online web film distributor ventures, including YouTube, where they were the first online feature release, and Spout.com, who paid them a dollar for everyone who they referred to Spout, amounting to $35,000. Their vlogs were so popular that they included them as a series of episodes on the DVD, along with the film and a soundtrack CD. The DVD has sold around 1500 copies through their website, mainly. Now they are talking to DVD distributors and I think they are available at Borders and maybe on a cable movie channel in the future.

This is backwards from what the conventional Hollywood big business model professes. In that model, you never release to the DVD market and certainly not the internet, until you have exploited the theatrical market. Not these guys. They offered their film for free on YouTube, along with the vlog episodes, which built interest for the DVD and generated the theatrical and DVD markets.

I've heard filmmakers worry about exposing their film like this, as a quick way to kill all chances for conventional distribution. but what Arin is saying is that conventional distribution is a pipe dream. Susan calls it the prince with the glass slipper. This is so true, and so obvious, it's amazing filmmakers haven't seen this before. We are wasting our time submitting to festival after festival, where are chances are a few hundred out of 5000 to 6000 for the big festivals. Even if we have a good film, and even if it;s picked up by a festival, the chances of finding a distributor this way are so remote. There are usually one or two film at any festival, if that, that get a distribution deal. Then what? Our films are shelved. We don't have to accept this treatment.

Like Arin and Susan we have the greatest marketing tool at our fingertips, and it's free. The internet. Lance Weller and some others have a website, WorkBookProject.com, where these kinds of things are discussed openly. You'd be surprised at how many filmmakers are finding audiences this way.

Here are some websites to check out:

FourEyedMonsters.com
WorkBookProject.com
Spout.com
YouTube Screening Room
Blip.tv
IndieGoGo
BraveNewTheaters.com

At these sites you'll find a lot more links.

Check out my own venture at OutInTheStreetFilms.com, and my film project, Stop War.

The Stop War Project

The Stop War Project seeks to stop all war for all time through the power of communication. I believe the troubles in the world stem from a lack of communication. If we all were more informed of what was going on in the world this might be very different. I believe we could even stop war this way. The Iraq war has gone on for six years, costing thousands of American lives and over a million Iraqi lives, most of them innocent people, children and babies. Would the people in this country stand for such a policy if they were the victims? No. But a bigger question is, do most Americans even know what has been going on?

For six years we've been supposedly "fighting" terrorists by wage a preemptive war in Iraq. Meanwhile the real architect of that terrorism, Osama Bin Laden, is yet to be found. In fact he is supposedly in Afghanistan. We have been bombing innocent people in the wrong country. Why?

There is also evidence that Al Queada stemmed from a CIA organization (see The Three Trillion Dollar War by Joseph Stiglitz). We know that Bin Laden was a CIA operative who worked with George H.W. Bush. Amazingly we can't account for this one man's whereabouts after initially spending $1,000,000,000,000 (that's a trillion), 5000 American lives, 1.5 million Iraqi lives, 20,000+ innocent Afghan lives (God only knows the true numbers. We don't bother counting them. They're just Afghans.), in a supposed war to hunt him down.

Now if we're going to have a war we should at least be honest and upfront about it. If it's not Bin Laden then say so. If the cost is three to five trillion dollars as Joseph Stiglitz says, then fess up to it. Show us the American body count every week. Tell the American people the costs of these wars, the liabilities, the increased terrorism they proliferate and convince us it's worth it. No one can do this.

Iraq is a preemptive illegal racist American genocide and continues to be so. Is this America or a neo-Nazi state?

The more innocent people we kill, the more we motivate their survivors to become insurgents and terrorists and retaliate. What would you do if your town was bombed and your family killed. Would you sit back and take it? Our country was founded on the right to arms, to fight for and protect our freedom and our families. Yet we are oppressing another country, doing this very thing, and when they retaliate we call them terrorists, and retaliate with more bombs and guns, which keeps the cycle going and war profiteers profiting.

We are proliferating terrorism and endangering our freedom, not protecting it. And so our troops do not fight or die for freedom. They fight and die for Halliburton, Texaco, and Shell. They fight and die in vain. Many of them are vain. They are racist warmongers who live to fight and even die for the promise of glory, a false glory. But that's just my opinion. I respect your right to differ. Many troops fight and die with great honor, because they believe they do it for their country. But not all of them. Just look at the pictures and videos I have collected to see evidence of this. Even if they think they are fighting with honor, there's nothing honorable about preemptive racist genocidal war.

We need to get the word and the pictures out, to expose what's gong on. There are many veterans against war, who speak out and protest regularly. You can find them all over YouTube. You will also find racist troops who mock the Muslim culture, even to their faces, and show their strong prejudice and disrespect for theirs lives, for all life.

Join the Stop War Project Network.