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Tuesday February 19,
2008
The "blessings of liberty"
More
indication the US killed Bhutto? And what did Bush mean when he said
the US would "help" Cuba?
The New
York Times has a pretty good rundown and some photos of the
Pakistan election. It gives the results as follows:
The
nearly complete election tally Tuesday showed the Pakistan Peoples
Party [formerly led by Benazir Bhutto, now led by her husband,
Asif Ali Zardari] winning 80 of the 242 contested seats; the
Pakistan Muslim League-N with 66; and the pro-Musharraf party trailing
with 38.
The above may or
may
not be true and accurate. There were so many voting irregularities that
the most anyone is saying is that the results are more or less accurate
if not entirely fair.
The lie is found
in this statement:
...
the
United States, which has backed Mr. Musharraf to the hilt even as a
Taliban and Al Qaeda insurgency has grown in intensity, must seek new
partners in the campaign against Islamic militants in the country and
region.
The United States
need look no further than Musharraf as always, as can be seen on page
two of the NYT article:
Mr.
[Nawaz]
Sharif, who was ousted as Prime Minister in 1999 in a coup by Mr.
Musharraf, framed his campaign on a distinct anti-Musharraf platform, a
tactic that appears to have worked well and that brought his party an
unexpectedly strong windfall.
Mr. Zardari sounded more accommodating tones about Mr. Musharraf.
Analysts said it was possible that Mr. Zadari would even seek to form a
coalition with Mr. Musharraf’s party and leave Mr. Sharif 's party
outside the government.
So it's no
surprise that Musharraf is taking his loss of seats gracefully.
The US wouldn't
have
liked it had Bhutto lived to win the election because she openly stated
her dislike of Musharraf, and if she was expressing true sentiments
then her coalition would have been with Sharif and it would have been
Musharraf out in the cold.
Zardari, on the other hand, known in the past for being, shall we say,
willing to do what is expedient and profitable, will be more
accommodating, and very likely the fake "war on terror" will resume and
it will be business as usual in Pakistan.
I truly hope I am wrong.
See Also: The Bhutto Page
In Cuba, fears of a US invasion are heating up now that Castro
has stepped down from the presidency.
Castro:
"It would betray my conscience to occupy a responsibility that requires
mobility and the total commitment that I am not in the physical
condition to offer."
Bush: "The United States will help
the people of Cuba realize the blessings of liberty."
What in the world
gives
Bush the idea that a change of leadership in Cuba would automatically allow a US
intervention?
And why in the world does the International Herald Tribune
characterize Castro's stepping down as an "unexpected announcement"?
Why does the IHT say so naively that Castro's statement "raised the
possibility little would change"?
Shouldn't the word be "probability"? There may be some
differences of
approach, but the basic system will not change, nor will Cubans
suddenly love the US.
Do Cubans even want change? The Center for International Private
Enterprise reports that Cubans like things just the way
they are. Castro has been the most successful "communist" leader
the world has known, and Hugo Chavez is running a close second.
But the
US State Department actually has a "Cuban Transition Coordinator"
whose job appears to consist of taking advantage of a little window of
opportunity to stir up dissent in Cuba. He was asked this
question:
The
congressmen who visited Cuba last month, one of them was there, if I'm
not mistaken, Representative McGovern, and they basically have said
there is no indication that there will be a kind of massive uprising or
any changes in the political life of Cuba whatsoever. My understanding
is you don't agree with that, right?
And here's his
answer:
The
Congressman's entitled to his views, of course. What I'm saying is
there is a desire for change in Cuba and that our view is that most
Cubans want democratic change in their country.
Well what would
you expect him to say?
Intervention
in
Cuba is something that America's citizens should be up in arms about,
because it
spells more turmoil for them as well. But the problem for Americans is
that they can too easily be led to believe their government is doing a
good thing for Cubans. And that's because the word "communist"
has
been imbued by long years of cold war propaganda with the
same aura as the danger music in a horror film.
It's an illusion. In reality, there are many brands of "communism" but
at its root it's nothing but a non-capitalist system which is only as
good as its administrators - and this is true of any system - and it's
not the lack of "freedom" that US administration decries, it's the
rejection of capitalism.
I've said this many times, but when even respected media don't get it,
it needs to be said as often as possible: neither the US nor Canada is
a democracy; they are capitalist systems ruled callously from the top
down by banks and other corporations. Socialism is a bottom up
system
- and that's why Cuba has probably the best health care, for instance,
in the world. Just ask Michael Moore.
Everybody gripes at one time or another about their government, so
there are bound to be people in Cuba who want some changes, but as in
Iraq, if the people had wanted change badly enough they would have
fought for it. Lord knows they are willing to lay down their
lives now
to get rid of the invaders.
I personally could never lean so far left as to embrace
communism. But
neither do I fear it as the Americans have been conditioned to
do. So
what if there were Marxists helping people to form trade unions when
they badly needed protection from their employers? So what if
they were also strongly behind the Civil Rights Movement? So what if a
few pinkos were involved in getting women
the vote and such things as shelters to escape to from violent
spouses? So what if a few reds march in our
anti-war protests? So what if they run candidates in every
Canadian
election?
It can't be anywhere near as bad as having the whole earth ripped up by
the transnationals and the general population reduced to slavery for
the profit machines.
I'll tell you, though, I'll never understand how "Christian" countries
can support
the worst kind of capitalism when Jesus himself was a pinko.
Check out
the Acts of the Apostles if you don't think he taught communal living
and sharing of the wealth. In fact, the apostles went a little
overboard, a bit Stalinish in their punishments of people who didn't
fully comply with the rules - all with God's blessing of course.
I've added a Hands off Cuba!
link to the left side panel of my home page, just below Hands off
Venezuela!
- two places around the throats of which the neo-cons are drooling to
get their greedy mitts. The Cuba protest campaign is a British model,
but it seems a good one for
Canadians as well.
yayacanada
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