Do you remember a few years ago the US Government threatened Microsoft under antitrust laws?
Funny how that interest sort of faded. But only for a while. Like they were regrouping somewhere in the cellars of the Pentagon or the NSA or the White House. Down there in the dark among the lizards.
Then the Government came charging back with a fury and threatened to dismantle Microsoft into three separate companies. They feared Microsoft had way too much power because of their monopolistic position in the computer market? That is bad, they said.
But wait, someone might have exclaimed, wouldn't a monopoly be a GOOD thing if a government could use it to control people and identify where they were and what they were saying and doing and thinking? And the road was headed to everyone owning a computer? And wouldn’t those puters most likely have the Windows Operating System? Isn't Windows on 98% of all computers with XP, Vista or now Windows 7 OS?
Have you noticed that when you go to a website, and then delete or clear all your cookies, and then go back to that website some time later, they seem to know who you are?
Didn't Microsoft put a unique number into your operating system under the hype that it was a good thing to control piracy of their software? Then under waves of protest from the public they said they wouldn't TURN ON that unique identifying number? Or at least YOU could turn it off? And doesn't your hard drive have a unique number too? Did you know that even your CD burner imprints a unique number onto every CD you burn identifying the actual burner? And your digital camera does the same thing. Even if you steal it from the web, someone can find out who TOOK that picture. And when and where?
Didn't the FBI come out with a sneaky computer spy system called Carnivore a few years ago, that could read the contents of any computer it wanted through your server? Then they changed the name because it seemed too ominous and scary and 1984ish? Funny how the past can scare us.
Carnivore could see every single email you sent to whomever and every word you typed into your hard drive or internet browser? Mostly Microsoft’s Internet Explorer of course.
Including every password and user name you ever used in a chat room or discussion forum? And didn't all this happen at about the same time as Microsoft introduced Windows XP? And didn't the US hold these server companies hostage by threatening to shut them down unless they installed Carnivore into their systems without telling anyone? Without telling their customers? You.
Sorry for all these rhetorical questions, but ….
Doesn't Homeland Security and the Patriot Act give the government pitbulls the power to do anything they want without telling anyone about what they are doing? To fight terrorism they say? Hmm.
Isn't Microsoft starting to add things now to updates of its software without making it clear to technical people exactly what those updates are or what they are supposed to do? In Windows Media player some technicians have compared the guts of Media Player 9.0 with Media Player 10.0 and can't find the differences? So why the update?
Would the US government and Bill Gates have made a secret deal somewhere in the shadowy bowels of the Pentagon with all those Gila Monsters to allow Microsoft to continue as one company, so long as the Justice department had access to the Windows Operating System? Wouldn’t proud papa Bill Gates have done anything to avoid the Sophie’s choice decision about his company? His precious family. His birth child.
After all, we all know that starting a company becomes your googly baby, your loving family and you nurture it along the way until it becomes something to be proud of like your son growing up to be famous? And wouldn’t any worried parent have done what he had to do to keep it all together? Bill Gates being no exception?
I don't know ... wouldn’t he?
Er ... would the US government be that sneaky as to threaten Bill Gates into a deal that allowed them to monitor the masses through the most used computer system in the world? Oops, sorry for yet another rhetorical question, but I was there in the sixties.
I have not lost faith. I still believe in the sneakiness of certain humans who want their way. And I understand the vulnerability of parents who fear for their children. And I still know that stealthy power-mongering forces attempt to run the world from the dark side.
They say that when a venomous Gila Monster bites you, he doesn’t let go until sunset. I may even start believing in reptilian shape-shifters.
As the poetic prophet Bob Dylan once said, ‘It ain’t dark yet, but it’s gettin’ there.’
Monday, March 15, 2010
Saturday, March 13, 2010
Social sites
I wonder how many of you belong to Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Digg, etc? If you are already a member it is probably too late for you. If you have not signed up yet, you need to consider the future for your ilk and offspring.
Right now there are probably millions of people in North America who are basically unaccounted for. Illegal immigrants of course, but many more who might have been here for years and never bothered to sign up for anything. Farmers, hunters living in the bush, hermits, the homeless, drifters, hoboes riding the rails, hidden in boxcars from the prying eyes of the rulesmakers, people who just disappeared. However these seem to be mostly older folk who have somehow been excluded from society and just became loners. But they'll die off soon, they're not the targets.
Today's youth are up to their pierced ears in the computer generation. And you KNOW you have an ISP number that identifies some things about you. And the hard drive within your computer has a unique ID number too.
Of course everyone is into the computer age. Including people who just might, sometime, want to know what you are doing out there in broad band land. Like what are you texting from your cellphone, sending on your Blackberry or commenting from your iPod? And to who? The governments in North America at least, and one suspects Britain and Euro countries are the same, have wonderful computers that can keep track of BILLIONS of facts and figures easily. Billions of course, meaning every single person on Earth. Many billions also meaning all those people AND every other single person that THEY know or have known. Six degrees of separation compressed into one nanosecond flash. More like six bytes now.
If you have signed up for facebook, for instance, you've already told someone everything about yourself. Including DOB, date of birth, which is used mainly for all police identification, and you even gave them your mother's maiden name! Your long dead dog who got run over when you were six, where you lived before now and before that. Where your Grandpaw came from. What you ate for breakfast, your fave foods, stores, cars, people, books, art. Your user name. Tatoos too, proud of that high flying trapezium? Almost as good as DNA for identifying you.
Sheeez it is endless.
But it is so much fun for the youth of today. Tweat your daily activities. Twitter your plans. Bleat your intentions, Blab your past. Write on your Wall. Message me, message all.
Not unlike those scribbles on washroom walls that used to say, 'for a good time call Gloria at 555-IM1-RU12'. And you wrote it down on a square of toilet paper. Today that square could hold your family history with a millennium to go.
And once you've entered all your pertinent info. You'll be into the broad band of fun fun fun and have .... ahem .... 'friends'. They promise.
Have you noticed how many governments are now embracing the internet? They are beginning to love it. The CIA, NSA, FBI, CSIS, MI5-6 and maybe even the KGB don't even have to go looking for you anymore in order to find out things about you. And if you suspect stuff like I do, then you KNOW that a windfall of information is there for the taking. Electronic surveillance with little effort. They simply set up their own social site, promote the hell out of it and have those millions of clickers come to simply donate the information needed to keep track of you.
Click to add a friend. Click to add government watchers.
But would government do such a thing? They monitored international telegrams before WWII. David Sarnoff, the head of Radio Corporation of America gave copies of Japanese RCA telegrams to Naval Intelligence. The CIA had its own airline in the sixties, Air America used for whatever nefarious purposes. They probably used taxpayer's cash to finance propaganda movies like United 93 and write totally fictitious dialogue to make themselves heroes. Google Gulf of Tonkin and see what you get. And using their own form of Google in their own computers will bring results on you too.
Click - add keywords - click - search database - click -refine search - click - area - click - click click .......
Oh, so THAT's who you know. Is it the same person who knew your mother in Mississippi? And the same guy who likes Mustang cars and casaba melon and wears orange and was in Texas when .... ? Aha, got it! You must be Freddie Zimmerman. Didn't you have trouble with porn once? We'll check your library card to see what books you took out. Your gas card to see where you went. Credit card to see what you bought.
You get the disquieting idea.
So maybe you can lie about the whole thing when you sign up? Don't tell your Internet Service Provider where you live. And not be in the system. Hmm, already suspicious activity. Not likely to be connected at all. So the ISP number betrays you. That sneaky little hard drive number defines it closer. I even had to supply my modem serial number for tech support from my new cable internet provider. You know of course, that literally everything you do goes through your modem. And consequently your emails and chat room conversations can be monitored and recorded. And you once had that argument on a forum about gun control and the NWO. Remember? At the risk of breaking the laws of the Patriot Act, your ISP MUST provide information to Homeland Security and cannot even tell YOU that you are being watched.
Oh yes, you are THAT guy or girl? The one who keeps asking for friends from British Columbia who went to school in East Vancouver in 1982.
We might need to watch you, 82 was a convulsive year. We might want to eliminate all 1982 people someday. The planets align people's genes in a certain way at certain times and they're all threats.
Yes, those old drifters in and out of reality are harmless. Huddled at the back of the boxcar amid the cowchips. Barely seen through the slats. They've learned how to be invisible. Forgotten. But the young who sign up for fun and good times are the ones at risk. And their children. And in their future, a genome lottery might determine whether your family line even continues in humanity.
And I have not even mentioned RFID chips. Or the fact that Google Earth now has a street view of every street in North America and almost everywhere else! But that's a whole 'nuther subject.
Your friends are close .... but your enemies may be closer.
Try not to let it get under your skin.
Right now there are probably millions of people in North America who are basically unaccounted for. Illegal immigrants of course, but many more who might have been here for years and never bothered to sign up for anything. Farmers, hunters living in the bush, hermits, the homeless, drifters, hoboes riding the rails, hidden in boxcars from the prying eyes of the rulesmakers, people who just disappeared. However these seem to be mostly older folk who have somehow been excluded from society and just became loners. But they'll die off soon, they're not the targets.
Today's youth are up to their pierced ears in the computer generation. And you KNOW you have an ISP number that identifies some things about you. And the hard drive within your computer has a unique ID number too.
Of course everyone is into the computer age. Including people who just might, sometime, want to know what you are doing out there in broad band land. Like what are you texting from your cellphone, sending on your Blackberry or commenting from your iPod? And to who? The governments in North America at least, and one suspects Britain and Euro countries are the same, have wonderful computers that can keep track of BILLIONS of facts and figures easily. Billions of course, meaning every single person on Earth. Many billions also meaning all those people AND every other single person that THEY know or have known. Six degrees of separation compressed into one nanosecond flash. More like six bytes now.
If you have signed up for facebook, for instance, you've already told someone everything about yourself. Including DOB, date of birth, which is used mainly for all police identification, and you even gave them your mother's maiden name! Your long dead dog who got run over when you were six, where you lived before now and before that. Where your Grandpaw came from. What you ate for breakfast, your fave foods, stores, cars, people, books, art. Your user name. Tatoos too, proud of that high flying trapezium? Almost as good as DNA for identifying you.
Sheeez it is endless.
But it is so much fun for the youth of today. Tweat your daily activities. Twitter your plans. Bleat your intentions, Blab your past. Write on your Wall. Message me, message all.
Not unlike those scribbles on washroom walls that used to say, 'for a good time call Gloria at 555-IM1-RU12'. And you wrote it down on a square of toilet paper. Today that square could hold your family history with a millennium to go.
And once you've entered all your pertinent info. You'll be into the broad band of fun fun fun and have .... ahem .... 'friends'. They promise.
Have you noticed how many governments are now embracing the internet? They are beginning to love it. The CIA, NSA, FBI, CSIS, MI5-6 and maybe even the KGB don't even have to go looking for you anymore in order to find out things about you. And if you suspect stuff like I do, then you KNOW that a windfall of information is there for the taking. Electronic surveillance with little effort. They simply set up their own social site, promote the hell out of it and have those millions of clickers come to simply donate the information needed to keep track of you.
Click to add a friend. Click to add government watchers.
But would government do such a thing? They monitored international telegrams before WWII. David Sarnoff, the head of Radio Corporation of America gave copies of Japanese RCA telegrams to Naval Intelligence. The CIA had its own airline in the sixties, Air America used for whatever nefarious purposes. They probably used taxpayer's cash to finance propaganda movies like United 93 and write totally fictitious dialogue to make themselves heroes. Google Gulf of Tonkin and see what you get. And using their own form of Google in their own computers will bring results on you too.
Click - add keywords - click - search database - click -refine search - click - area - click - click click .......
Oh, so THAT's who you know. Is it the same person who knew your mother in Mississippi? And the same guy who likes Mustang cars and casaba melon and wears orange and was in Texas when .... ? Aha, got it! You must be Freddie Zimmerman. Didn't you have trouble with porn once? We'll check your library card to see what books you took out. Your gas card to see where you went. Credit card to see what you bought.
You get the disquieting idea.
So maybe you can lie about the whole thing when you sign up? Don't tell your Internet Service Provider where you live. And not be in the system. Hmm, already suspicious activity. Not likely to be connected at all. So the ISP number betrays you. That sneaky little hard drive number defines it closer. I even had to supply my modem serial number for tech support from my new cable internet provider. You know of course, that literally everything you do goes through your modem. And consequently your emails and chat room conversations can be monitored and recorded. And you once had that argument on a forum about gun control and the NWO. Remember? At the risk of breaking the laws of the Patriot Act, your ISP MUST provide information to Homeland Security and cannot even tell YOU that you are being watched.
Oh yes, you are THAT guy or girl? The one who keeps asking for friends from British Columbia who went to school in East Vancouver in 1982.
We might need to watch you, 82 was a convulsive year. We might want to eliminate all 1982 people someday. The planets align people's genes in a certain way at certain times and they're all threats.
Yes, those old drifters in and out of reality are harmless. Huddled at the back of the boxcar amid the cowchips. Barely seen through the slats. They've learned how to be invisible. Forgotten. But the young who sign up for fun and good times are the ones at risk. And their children. And in their future, a genome lottery might determine whether your family line even continues in humanity.
And I have not even mentioned RFID chips. Or the fact that Google Earth now has a street view of every street in North America and almost everywhere else! But that's a whole 'nuther subject.
Your friends are close .... but your enemies may be closer.
Try not to let it get under your skin.
Sunday, March 7, 2010
Conspiracy theory ... 2 - Dag Hammarskjold
Sweden's Dag Hjalmar Agne Carl Hammarskjöld was Secretary-General of the United Nations from 10 April 1953 until 18 September 1961 when he met his death in a plane accident while on a peace mission in the Congo.
An accident.
In 1960, when President Joseph Kasa-Vubu and Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba of the Republic of the Congo sent a cable on 12 July asking 'urgent dispatch' of United Nations military assistance to the Congo, Secretary-General Hammarskjöld addressed the Security Council at a night meeting on 13 July and asked the Council to act 'with utmost speed' on the request. Following Security Council actions the United Nations Force in the Congo was established and the Secretary-General himself made four trips to the Congo in connection with the United Nations operations there. The first two trips were made in July and August 1960 and January 1961. The fourth began on 12 September 1961 and terminated with the fatal plane accident.
Natural resources of the Congo: petroleum, timber, potash, lead, zinc, uranium, copper, phosphates, natural gas, hydropower.
Patrice Lumumba helped found the Mouvement National Congolais (MNC) in 1958. Lumumba and the MNC formed the first government on June 23, 1960, with Lumumba as Prime Minister.
Upon independence in 1960, the former French region of Middle Congo became the Republic of the Congo and began a flirtation with Marxism.
Hammarskjöld’s most dangerous problem of the newly liberated Congo arose in July, 1960, when the new government, faced with mutiny in its army, secession of its province of Katanga, under Moise Tshombe, and intervention of Belgian troops, asked the United Nations for help. The UN responded by sending a peace-keeping force, with Hammarskjöld in charge of operations.
Despite the arrival of UN troops, unrest continued as the USA had interest to see the Belgians remain in the country. And Patrice Lamumba sought Soviet aid. But in September Lumumba was dismissed from the government by Kasavubu, an act of dubious legality. On September 14 a coup d'état headed by Colonel Joseph Mobutu (later Mobutu Sese Seko) and supported by Kasavubu gained power. Lumumba was captured in Port Francqui on December 1, 1960 by troops of Mobutu, arrested and flown to Leopoldville in handcuffs. Mobutu said Lumumba would be tried for inciting the army to rebellion and other crimes.
United Nations Secretary General Dag Hammarskjöld made an appeal to Kasavubu asking that Lumumba be treated according to due process of law. The USSR denounced Hammarskjöld and the Western Powers as responsible for Lumumba's arrest and demanded his release.
When the situation deteriorated during the year that followed, Hammarskjöld had to deal with almost insuperable difficulties in the Congo and with criticism in the UN. The last crisis for him came in September, 1961, when, arriving in Leopoldville to discuss details of UN aid with the Congolese government, he learned that fighting had erupted between Katanga troops and the noncombatant forces of the UN.
Sometime in the night of September 17-18, Dag Hammarskjöld and fifteen others perished when their plane crashed close to Ndola airport, near the border between Katanga and North Rhodesia. The details of that crash are still unknown.
A plane crash was an easy thing to engineer and accomplish in those days of naivity among Western nations. The Soviet bloc was after uranium. The USA was trying to keep them away from a source of supply. Hammarskjöld was working toward a democratic republic for the Congo and became a stumbling block for Soviet domination of the resource rich region, especially that all important uranium.
The quarter century of experimentation with Marxism was abandoned in 1990 and a democratically elected government was installed in 1992. The Republic of Congo is one of Africa's largest petroleum producers with significant potential for offshore development.
In July 2002, documents released by the United States government revealed that the CIA had played a role in Lumumba's assassination, aiding his opponents with money and political support, and – in the case of Mobutu – with weapons and military training. Did the USA actually supply Katanga troops with weapons with which to fight against the UN peace keeping forces?
The former USSR has never released any documents saying they or the KGB engineered Dag Hammarskjöld’s plane crash. Perhaps they’re buried somewhere within the permafrost depths of the Kremlin or Patrice Lumumba University in Moscow?
The Cold War was not always cold.
An accident.
In 1960, when President Joseph Kasa-Vubu and Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba of the Republic of the Congo sent a cable on 12 July asking 'urgent dispatch' of United Nations military assistance to the Congo, Secretary-General Hammarskjöld addressed the Security Council at a night meeting on 13 July and asked the Council to act 'with utmost speed' on the request. Following Security Council actions the United Nations Force in the Congo was established and the Secretary-General himself made four trips to the Congo in connection with the United Nations operations there. The first two trips were made in July and August 1960 and January 1961. The fourth began on 12 September 1961 and terminated with the fatal plane accident.
Natural resources of the Congo: petroleum, timber, potash, lead, zinc, uranium, copper, phosphates, natural gas, hydropower.
Patrice Lumumba helped found the Mouvement National Congolais (MNC) in 1958. Lumumba and the MNC formed the first government on June 23, 1960, with Lumumba as Prime Minister.
Upon independence in 1960, the former French region of Middle Congo became the Republic of the Congo and began a flirtation with Marxism.
Hammarskjöld’s most dangerous problem of the newly liberated Congo arose in July, 1960, when the new government, faced with mutiny in its army, secession of its province of Katanga, under Moise Tshombe, and intervention of Belgian troops, asked the United Nations for help. The UN responded by sending a peace-keeping force, with Hammarskjöld in charge of operations.
Despite the arrival of UN troops, unrest continued as the USA had interest to see the Belgians remain in the country. And Patrice Lamumba sought Soviet aid. But in September Lumumba was dismissed from the government by Kasavubu, an act of dubious legality. On September 14 a coup d'état headed by Colonel Joseph Mobutu (later Mobutu Sese Seko) and supported by Kasavubu gained power. Lumumba was captured in Port Francqui on December 1, 1960 by troops of Mobutu, arrested and flown to Leopoldville in handcuffs. Mobutu said Lumumba would be tried for inciting the army to rebellion and other crimes.
United Nations Secretary General Dag Hammarskjöld made an appeal to Kasavubu asking that Lumumba be treated according to due process of law. The USSR denounced Hammarskjöld and the Western Powers as responsible for Lumumba's arrest and demanded his release.
When the situation deteriorated during the year that followed, Hammarskjöld had to deal with almost insuperable difficulties in the Congo and with criticism in the UN. The last crisis for him came in September, 1961, when, arriving in Leopoldville to discuss details of UN aid with the Congolese government, he learned that fighting had erupted between Katanga troops and the noncombatant forces of the UN.
Sometime in the night of September 17-18, Dag Hammarskjöld and fifteen others perished when their plane crashed close to Ndola airport, near the border between Katanga and North Rhodesia. The details of that crash are still unknown.
A plane crash was an easy thing to engineer and accomplish in those days of naivity among Western nations. The Soviet bloc was after uranium. The USA was trying to keep them away from a source of supply. Hammarskjöld was working toward a democratic republic for the Congo and became a stumbling block for Soviet domination of the resource rich region, especially that all important uranium.
The quarter century of experimentation with Marxism was abandoned in 1990 and a democratically elected government was installed in 1992. The Republic of Congo is one of Africa's largest petroleum producers with significant potential for offshore development.
In July 2002, documents released by the United States government revealed that the CIA had played a role in Lumumba's assassination, aiding his opponents with money and political support, and – in the case of Mobutu – with weapons and military training. Did the USA actually supply Katanga troops with weapons with which to fight against the UN peace keeping forces?
The former USSR has never released any documents saying they or the KGB engineered Dag Hammarskjöld’s plane crash. Perhaps they’re buried somewhere within the permafrost depths of the Kremlin or Patrice Lumumba University in Moscow?
The Cold War was not always cold.
Tuesday, March 2, 2010
Protest messengers
Many people are angry at the protesters who appeared on day one of the Olympic games up in Vancouver, and rightly so. A few protesters who could not organize enough to put out a cohesive effort and make a point, (whatever it was) was subject to an attention grabbing cadre of violent thugs. The police and public pushed back and the protesters were diminished and the point was lost. However the impression of violence remained.
As we all know deep down, walking the streets with signs, writing letters, shouting and screaming just doesn't work. The powers that be, meaning most corporations and banks, find that laughable and it has NO influence on their plans. The fact is that corporations are now basically running the world, including many governments. Scruffy characters walking the streets with signs just doesn't cut it. However, lobbyists in expensive suits with secret agendas is working.
So how does the messenger get the word out without being shot?
Perhaps it is all in who shoots first?
Years ago when the Front de Libération du Québec (FLQ) needed to assert itself they realized they needed drastic action. They kidnapped Pierre Laporte and murdered him, causing the October Crisis and attention on their cause. A clear and attention demanding message as to what it was.
The Squamish Five, basically environmental activists, began by engaging in vandalism, spurred by special environmental exemptions given to mining companies by government. This quickly became bombing attacks, to get the cognizance of the people. Concentration of the mind through ultra violence worked again.
There are many more instances since of taking extreme measures to make the point which some activists need to expose. They are labeled terrorists today. And that's what they are.
The roving tear-gas filled protests in Seattle at the WTO conference did eventually center the public's attention through the smoke on the ramifications of trade agreements that don't consider humans in the corporate mix. People did begin to ask, 'What are they protesting?' and the message seeped out.
So the protesters at the Vancouver Olympics breaking store windows was more of an act of disjointed hoodlumism than a real protest, but it did occupy the media for a few days. Any serious communication by the original paraders was missed, stolen by those few visuals of violence.
And it seems that as the weeks and months pass on, the corporations, governments, New World Order, and criminal organizations will take a little more power. And the populace will lose a few more freedoms.
In today's world, the event of note needs to be desperate and violent to capture attention. But is the action negated without a clear and simple understandable message which appeals to the people? Preaching anarchy for it's own sake doesn't work. And anyone who brings that message will be shot down before the purpose can be expressed. Shot down literally as in Kent State 1970.
It seems the message has to read like a movie script to work. What is wrong? Why is it wrong? And who is responsible for making it wrong. And most important, proof of what they have done to cause the problem. Michael Moore has the formula but then he is rich enough to produce it. And a solution must be offered.
It's not quite a plutocracy, not quite an oligarchy, and not quite anarchy, even though they the small group within a group display that graphic a on their black banner. It seems what they are really protesting is the corporate enslavement of the people.
And we know from decades long campaigns against cigarette companies, for instance, by governments and organized activists, that deflecting the terrifying consequence of corporate greed with huge money works, and protest through peaceful, legal means does not.
What we remember in the theater of the Olympic Games is that shocking image of black-clad masked thugs smashing chairs through windows. If there HAD been a true message there, we would now know it. Right or wrong. However uneasy the thought, we know that violence works, from the Mafia to the Hell's Angels to the suicide bombers in Iraq, we know.
So what is left for the messenger? Shoot first and answer questions later?
As we all know deep down, walking the streets with signs, writing letters, shouting and screaming just doesn't work. The powers that be, meaning most corporations and banks, find that laughable and it has NO influence on their plans. The fact is that corporations are now basically running the world, including many governments. Scruffy characters walking the streets with signs just doesn't cut it. However, lobbyists in expensive suits with secret agendas is working.
So how does the messenger get the word out without being shot?
Perhaps it is all in who shoots first?
Years ago when the Front de Libération du Québec (FLQ) needed to assert itself they realized they needed drastic action. They kidnapped Pierre Laporte and murdered him, causing the October Crisis and attention on their cause. A clear and attention demanding message as to what it was.
The Squamish Five, basically environmental activists, began by engaging in vandalism, spurred by special environmental exemptions given to mining companies by government. This quickly became bombing attacks, to get the cognizance of the people. Concentration of the mind through ultra violence worked again.
There are many more instances since of taking extreme measures to make the point which some activists need to expose. They are labeled terrorists today. And that's what they are.
The roving tear-gas filled protests in Seattle at the WTO conference did eventually center the public's attention through the smoke on the ramifications of trade agreements that don't consider humans in the corporate mix. People did begin to ask, 'What are they protesting?' and the message seeped out.
So the protesters at the Vancouver Olympics breaking store windows was more of an act of disjointed hoodlumism than a real protest, but it did occupy the media for a few days. Any serious communication by the original paraders was missed, stolen by those few visuals of violence.
And it seems that as the weeks and months pass on, the corporations, governments, New World Order, and criminal organizations will take a little more power. And the populace will lose a few more freedoms.
In today's world, the event of note needs to be desperate and violent to capture attention. But is the action negated without a clear and simple understandable message which appeals to the people? Preaching anarchy for it's own sake doesn't work. And anyone who brings that message will be shot down before the purpose can be expressed. Shot down literally as in Kent State 1970.
It seems the message has to read like a movie script to work. What is wrong? Why is it wrong? And who is responsible for making it wrong. And most important, proof of what they have done to cause the problem. Michael Moore has the formula but then he is rich enough to produce it. And a solution must be offered.
It's not quite a plutocracy, not quite an oligarchy, and not quite anarchy, even though they the small group within a group display that graphic a on their black banner. It seems what they are really protesting is the corporate enslavement of the people.
And we know from decades long campaigns against cigarette companies, for instance, by governments and organized activists, that deflecting the terrifying consequence of corporate greed with huge money works, and protest through peaceful, legal means does not.
What we remember in the theater of the Olympic Games is that shocking image of black-clad masked thugs smashing chairs through windows. If there HAD been a true message there, we would now know it. Right or wrong. However uneasy the thought, we know that violence works, from the Mafia to the Hell's Angels to the suicide bombers in Iraq, we know.
So what is left for the messenger? Shoot first and answer questions later?
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