5 March 2012
Update: It still makes fascinating reading all these years on; the machinations of people with immense power, able to shape events to their pleasing, and that of their class.
Compiled and Edited by William Bowles, December 22, 1988. This file is a compilation of texts that have either been uploaded to or posted on this system [New York On-Line] or Peacenet, which have been edited to remove duplication, and/or inaccuracies and irrelevancies.
15 February 2012
Prequel: I’m going to write a longer piece on this issue, not Ali per se but on the entire ‘orientalism’ approach that saturates all of us, left and right.
All quotes from, ‘Assad must go to save Syria from intervention’, RT 15 February 2012
Today, I see that the well known ‘revolutionary’ Tariq Ali is telling that:
“He [Assad] has to be pushed out,” Tariq Ali insists, for which “the Syrian people are doing their best”.
28 December 2011
My last piece clearly touched a nerve at least judging by the readership it’s gotten so I thought it worth exploring the issue a little further, especially in light of the comments I’ve read.
4 December 2011
”I had to leave my dog in Iran’ – UK ambassador, BBC News, 2 December 2011
If I remember correctly, my mother told me that it was the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War in 1936 that prompted her to join the British Communist Party. The parallels with Libya today are not lost on me. Spain was the place that Hitler used to perfect aerial bombardment with Guernica as our testament to that particular piece of barbarity, just as today the Empire uses entire countries as target practice and to try out new weapons systems on ‘them’.
30 October 2011
Although many on the established Left are claiming OWS as their own, latching on to the anti-capitalist theme that figures prominently, at least in some locations, it’s clear that the focus of the OWS ‘movement’ varies greatly from place to place. Thus where it all started, in downtown Manhattan, the focus is very much on capitalist criminals rather than criminal capitalism. But little or no mention of the dreaded word- socialism, ironically for fear of alienating even those who occupy, never mind what the rabid corporate/state media does with that which shall remain nameless.
19 June 2011 — Strategic Culture Foundation
I’m sure that somewhere, in a university or institute, researchers have produced an analysis that measures the rise in the number of armed conflicts as a ratio of the increase in economic instability as capitalism goes into one of its periodic meltdowns. Meltdowns that almost invariably end in large-scale war/s as a means of consuming surplus capital, taking out competitors, getting rid of surplus labour, grabbing new markets, extending the sphere of empire… yada, yada, yada…
28 July 2009
Okay, the battle on the ‘left’ concerning who to support in Iran appears to come down to the following:
On the one hand we appear to have those who say that the mass demonstrations are solely the result of the West’s attempts to undermine and overthrow the existing regime, utilizing a ‘colour revolution’ similar to those used in the Ukraine and Georgia. And there can be no doubt that Western intelligence agencies are up to their necks in destabilization strategies (see below). If this is indeed true the question to ask is: Have Western agencies fomented or exploited the opposition and to what degree has it been a success as measured by the mass demonstrations and by elements of the Left supporting the demonstrations?
27 July 2009
I have been reading, with much despair and a deal of consternation, the torrent of ‘analysis’ coming out of ‘left’ field about which, if any, side to support in the ongoing struggles in Iran and, at the end of the day, a good deal more is revealed about the ‘left’ in the West than the situation in Iran.
4 September 2008
I love it! I just came across an article, “Did We Just Invade Pakistan?” but you’ll search in vain for any headline in the mainstream media that even comes close to calling it a US invasion of Pakistan.
26 July 2008
The US government is talking with Iran, so what’s the catch? The simple answer is the November election. The move is clearly aimed at associating McCain/Republican Party with a new, kinder, softer Bush cabal although the Washington Post sees it somewhat differently. In an unabashed paean to Obama it says: Continue reading
Investigating Imperialism 