fredag den 31. december 2010

Jeremy Rifkin - The Empathic Civilisation

Robert Anton Wilson: Maybe Logic

hermed et link til en dokumentarfilm om den amerikanske forfatter Robert Anton Wilson. Hvis man ikke allerede kender til ham og hans arbejde er denne film et godt sted at starte.

More on Wikileaks.

Glenn Greenwald: What WikiLeaks revealed to the world in 2010

The generally interesting blogger Glenn Greenwalds round-up of the most important stories that were revealed by wikileaks in 2010.

Glenn Greenwald debates WikiLeaks with Frances Townsend on CNN



Julian Assange interviewed on Al-Jazeera.

Top officials in several Arab countries have close links with the CIA, and many officials keep visiting US embassies in their respective countries voluntarily to establish links with this key US intelligence agency, says Julian Assange, founder of the whistle-blowing website, WikiLeaks.

WikiLeaks founder Assange told Al Jazeera network that he is prepared to release all the explosive information in his possession to the public after "he has been done away with. "These officials are spies for the US in their countries," Assange told Al Jazeera Arabic channel in an interview yesterday.

The interviewer, Ahmed Mansour, said at the start of the interview which was a continuation of last week's interface, that Assange had even shown him the files that contained the names of some top Arab officials with alleged links with the CIA.

Assange or Mansour, however, didn't disclose the names of these officials. The WikiLeaks founder said he feared he could be killed but added that there were 2,000 websites that were ready to publish the remaining files that are in possession of WikiLeaks after "he has been done away with"."

tirsdag den 28. december 2010

R og SF vil forbyde Hizb-ut-Tahrir for opfordring til modstandskamp i Afghanistan.

I et telegram fra Ritzau kan man læse, at den islamistiske og sektlignende gruppering Hizb-ut-Tahrir for nylig indkaldte til et debatmøde hvor man ønsker at “sætte fokus på pligten til væbnet modstand for muslimerne i Afghanistan og omegn. Vi anser denne modstand som fuldt ud legitim. I den sammenhæng vil myndighedernes forsøg på at kriminalisere eller intimidere enhver krigsmodstander også blive belyst”.

De Radikales retspolitiske ordfører, Lone Dybkjær, mener at dette debatmøde har en skjult dagsorden, idet opfordringen til væbnet opgør i Afghanistan iflg. Dybkjær er ensbetydende med opfordring til væbnet kamp i Danmark, hvilket hun mener er "groft, dybt ubehageligt - og dybt skadeligt". Hvor hun får denne besynderlige logik fra nævnes ikke.

SF’s retspolitiske ordfører, Karina Lorentzen, mener at "det er udtryk for en syg og antidemokratisk tankegang, når en organisation som Hizb ut-Tahrir opfordrer til væbnet modstand." og ønsker derfor at politiet ser nærmere på sagen for at se om der er tale om opfordring til vold, hvilket ville kunne ulovliggøre organisationen hvis en domstol dømmer dette.

Men hvad er egentlige problemet her? Afghanistan er blevet sønderbombet gennem de sidste ni år af udefrakommende magter som ikke har bragt noget godt med sig for den menige afghaner, men som til gengæld har indført et bundkorrupt marionetstyre bestående af heroinbaroner og krigsherrer. Skal det forstås sådan, at Danmark gerne må begå voldshandlinger i en krig som kun har haft negative konsekvenser for mange afghanere, og vover nogen at tale den voldsramte parts sag, ved at opfordre til modstandskamp, i et land hvor vi intet som helst har at gøre, skal de have lukket munden dvs. forbydes under henvisning til at de opfordrer til vold?

Jeg er personligt ikke på nogen som helst måde tilhænger af Hizb-ut-Tahrir, men det her lugter langt væk af hykleri. Hvis Hizb-ut-Tahrir kan lukkes på det grundlag, så skal man begynde at lukke en del organisationer i Danmark, herunder de fleste politiske partier i Folketinget, da de ikke alene har opfordret til vold men aktivt har støttet op om krigshandlinger enten i Afghanistan eller Irak eller begge steder. En ting er, at man ikke kan lide Hizb-ut-Tahrir, hvilket jeg heller ikke kan, noget helt andet er forsøge at forbyde dem fra at organisere sig. Det er da netop "udtryk for en syg og antidemokratisk tankegang".

mandag den 27. december 2010

Dagens Citat: Chris Hedges.

"Orwell warned of a world where books were banned. Huxley warned of a world where no one wanted to read books. Orwell warned of a state of permanent war and fear. Huxley warned of a culture diverted by mindless pleasure. Orwell warned of a state where every conversation and thought was monitored and dissent was brutally punished. Huxley warned of a state where a population, preoccupied by trivia and gossip, no longer cared about truth or information. Orwell saw us frightened into submission. Huxley saw us seduced into submission. But Huxley, we are discovering, was merely the prelude to Orwell. Huxley understood the process by which we would be complicit in our own enslavement. Orwell understood the enslavement. Now that the corporate coup is over, we stand naked and defenseless."

Kilde.

lørdag den 25. december 2010

Afghans for Peace.

Dagens citat: Glenn Greenwald.

"One of the hallmarks of an authoritarian government is its fixation on hiding everything it does behind a wall of secrecy while simultaneously monitoring, invading and collecting files on everything its citizenry does."

mandag den 20. december 2010

Mediekritik.

I en meget anbefalelsesværdig kronik i Information kaster forfatteren Carsten Jensen sig i ud i en sønderlemmende kritik af danske journalister, som han kritiserer for at være blevet magthavernes villige idioter, da de ofte ikke opfylder deres kritiske samfundsfunktion i noget nær ønskværdig grad. Et samfund med en svag såkaldt fjerde statsmagt er et samfund hvor magtmisbrug og manipulation af befolkningen har alt for gode vilkår. Som Carsten Jensen formulerer det:

"Politikere bør være bange for journalister. De skal ikke tænke på dem som nyttige idioter. De skal få tynd mave, bare de ser en journalist for sig. Men danske aviser repræsenterer i disse år ikke andet end den institutionaliserede magtesløshed."

For magthaverne er ikke bange for journalisterne. Det forholder sig snarere omvendt. Dette blev på pinlig vis illustreret, da man i et klip igår aftes kunne se hvordan sundhedsminister Bertel Haarder gik amok på en journalist som tillod sig at stille kritiske spørgsmål som Bertel Haarder ikke på forhånd var blevet briefet om ville finde sted, som om dette var en legitim kritik af journalisten. Det er det imidlertid ikke. Det er til gengæld et udtryk for mediernes sørgelige tilstand i dagens Danmark, at man for at kunne interviewe en minister først er nødsaget til at briefe vedkommendes spindoktor så ministeren har mulighed for på forhånd at lægge en strategi for hvordan han eller hun vil håndtere medierne. Det er ikke i demokratiets interesse, at en minister gives forberedelsestid i samråd med sin spindoktor, så han eller hun kan glide af på kritiske spørgsmål ved at svare uden om, eller simpelthen nægte at svare på spørgsmål som han eller hun ikke har haft tid til forudgående at forberede sig på. Hvordan skulle det nogensinde kunne blive det?

I en udgave af spindoktorprogrammet "Mogensen og Christiansen", gjorde Michael Christiansen, Anders Fogh Rasmussens tidligere spindoktor, nærmest pralende seerne opmærksomme på hvordan han havde instrueret statsministeren i at omgås journalister på sit ugentlige pressemøde, så han lettest kunne snige sig udenom for mange kritiske spørgsmål. Var dette sket i et blogindlæg kunne man måske slå ud med armene og tænke, at nå ja sådan tænker en spindoktor vel, men det skete på en tv-kanal som delvis er betalt af borgerne for at dække den politiske virkelighed kritisk, og han blev ikke mødt af nogen kritik, for der findes ingen journalist i programmet til at stille sig kritisk overfor denne pressehåndtering. Det er bare the name of the game og det er måske blevet et spil, for alt for ofte synes det som om, at journalisterne som dækker den politiske virkelighed på Borgen er så indfedtede i denne lille lukkede verden, at journalistik forvandles til mikrofonholderi og ukritisk videreformidling af spindoktorernes kyniske indstilling til hvad et velfungerende demokrati egentlig vil sige. Carsten Jensen spørger med rette journalisterne om borgerne og demokratiet er tjente med den danske journaliststand som den ser ud idag.

"Er demokratiet godt tjent med jer? Ja, hvis demokrati handlede om datomærkning af fødevarer, og demokratiet bestod af konsumenter og ikke af borgere. Ja, hvis demokrati kun handlede om at give point til de politiske partiers taktiske positioneringer og bedømme det sprog, de vælger, når de skal sælge sig selv. Ja, hvis virkeligheden ikke fandtes, og alt var spindoktor-retorik, og der ikke var en verden hinsides beslutningstagernes horisont. Ja, hvis demokrati var en tilskuersport og Christiansborg et stadion. Ja, hvis loven i et demokrati kun skal overholdes af folket, men ikke af de folkevalgte ministre. Ja, hvis borgerne i et demokrati ikke har brug for informationer, der gør dem i stand til at tage kritisk stilling til de beslutninger, der tages på deres vegne og i deres navn. Ja, hvis demokrati ikke også vedrører fremtiden, krige på fjerne steder og i det hele taget en stor verden hinsides vore egne grænser.

Lad mig gentage mit spørgsmål: Er demokratiet godt tjent med de medier, vi har i dag? Er det danske folk? Er den trykte presses dramatiske og konstant faldende oplagstal en knusende dom over jeres selvpåførte irrelevans, eller skal vi forstå det som et tegn på en stigende overfladiskhed blandt læserne i en medie- og indtryksbombarderet tid? Er det sådan, at folk ikke gider læse om væsentlige emner, eller er det sådan, at det i hvert fald ikke er i aviserne, de finder dem, og at de derfor opsiger deres abonnement?"

I stedet for at sætte vores lid til, at det nok altsammen ordner sig og der nok bare er tale om passerende tendens, burde vi måske som borgere insistere på en kritisk medievirkelighed, uden uskadelige mikrofonholdere, men som gør en dyd ud af at dække de demokratiske processer på en sådan måde, at politikerne ryster af skræk når de ser en journalist. Jeg kan derfor anbefale folk at støtte op om Jeppe Kabells forslag om en ny form for kritisk offentlighed. Kabell beskriver hvordan dette kunne foregå i sit meget anbefalelsværdige blogindlæg "Sådan kan vi redde journalistikken, genoplive demokratiet og afskaffe mediecirkuset." Der er også andre bemærkelsesværdige initiativer i gang udenfor den etablerede medievirkelighed. Et sådant er medieoplysning.dk hvor jeg selv har bidraget.

Slavoj Žižek on Riz Khan - Living in the end of times.

Dagens citat: David Graeber om institutionaliseret håbløshed.

"Hopelessness isn't natural. It needs to be produced. If we really want to understand this situation, we have to begin by understanding that the last thirty years have seen the construction of a vast bureaucratic apparatus for the creation and maintenance of hopelessness, a kind of giant machine that is designed, first and foremost, to destroy any sense of possible alternative futures. At root is a veritable obsession on the part of the rulers of the world with ensuring that social movements cannot be seen to grow, to flourish, to propose alternatives; that those who challenge existing power arrangements can never, under any circumstances, be perceived to win. To do so requires creating a vast apparatus of armies, prisons, police, various forms of private security firms and police and military intelligence apparatus, propaganda engines of every conceivable variety, most of which do not attack alternatives directly so much as they create a pervasive climate of fear, jingoistic conformity, and simple despair that renders any thought of changing the world seem an idle fantasy.Maintaining this apparatus seems even more important, to exponents of the "free market," even than maintaining any sort of viable market economy. How else can one explain, for instance, what happened in the former Soviet Union, where one would have imagined the end of the Cold War would have led to the dismantling of the army and KGB and rebuilding the factories, but in fact what happened was precisely the other way around? This is just one extreme example of what has been happening everywhere. Economically, this apparatus is pure dead weight; all the guns, surveillance cameras, and propaganda engines are extraordinarily expensive and really produce nothing, and as a result, it's dragging the entire capitalist system down with it, and possibly, the earth itself."

David Graeber - Hope in Common.

onsdag den 15. december 2010

Bernie Sanders!

Bernie Sanders, den eneste demokratisk socialistiske senator i USA, holdt forleden en otte en halv time lang tale om den amerikanske stats oligarkiske orden i Senatet, Han er uafhængig af de store partier og siger tingene uden omsvøb. Her er et kort uddrag hvor han i skarpe vendinger kritiserer Obamas nye lovforslag om skattenedsættelser til den rige elite.

Sugata Mitra: The child-driven education

torsdag den 9. december 2010

Jeremy Scahills Vidnesbyrd foran Kongressen

Den undersøgende journalist Jeremy Schahill, bedst kendt for sin dækning af Blackwater/Xe, gav forleden sit vidnesbyrd for Kongressen og talte blandt andet ved denne lejlighed om USAs hemmelige krigsførelse i Pakistan, Yemen og Somalia. Dette er hele hans vidneudsagn.


"My name is Jeremy Scahill. I am the National Security correspondent for The Nation magazine. I recently returned from a two-week unembedded reporting trip to Afghanistan. I would like to thank the Chairman and the Committee for inviting me to participate in this important hearing. As we sit here today in Washington, across the globe the United States is engaged in multiple wars. Some, like those in Afghanistan and Iraq, are well known to the US public and to the Congress.

They are covered in the media and are subject to Congressional review. Despite the perception that we know what is happening in Afghanistan, what is rarely discussed in any depth in Congress or the media is the vast number of innocent Afghan civilians that are being killed on a regular basis in US night raids and the heavy bombing that has been reinstated by General David Petraeus. I saw the impact of these civilian deaths first-hand and I can say that in some cases our own actions are helping to increase the strength and expand the size of the Taliban and the broader insurgency in Afghanistan.

As the war rages on in Afghanistan and--despite spin to the contrary--in Iraq as well, US Special Operations Forces and the Central Intelligence Agency are engaged in parallel, covert, shadow wars that are waged in near total darkness and largely away from effective or meaningful Congressional oversight or journalistic scrutiny. The actions and consequences of these wars is seldom discussed in public or investigated by the Congress.

The current US strategy can be summed up as follows: We are trying to kill our way to peace. And the killing fields are growing in number.

Among the sober question that must be addressed by the Congress: What impact are these clandestine operations having on US national security? Are they making us more safe or less? When US forces kill innocent civilians in "counterterrorism" operations, are we inspiring a new generation of insurgents to rise against our country? And, what is the oversight role of the US Congress in the shadow wars that have spanned the Bush and Obama Administrations?

The most visible among these shadow wars is in Pakistan where the United States regularly bombs the country using weaponized drones. As we now know from diplomatic cables made public by Wikileaks, Pakistan's Prime Minister told a senior US official in Islamabad, "I don't care if [the US bombs Pakistan] as long as they get the right people. We'll protest in the National Assembly and then ignore it."

At the same time, US Special Operations Forces are engaged in covert, offensive actions in Pakistan, including hunting down so-called high value targets, doing reconnaissance for drone strikes and conducting raids with Pakistani forces in north and south Waziristan. These raids are carried out in secret and denied by Pentagon spokespeople in public. Leaked US diplomatic cables have now confirmed that the sustained denials by US officials for more than a year are false. According to an October 9, 2009 cable classified by Anne Patterson, then the US ambassador to Pakistan, offensive operations have been conducted by US Special Operations Forces and coordinated with the US Office of the Defense Representative in Pakistan. A US Special Operations source told me that the US forces described in the cable as "SOC(FWD)-PAK" were "forward operating troops" from the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), the most elite force within the US military made up of Navy SEALs, Delta Force and Army Rangers. This despite senior Pentagon and State Department officials, including by Ambassador Richard Holbrooke and Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell, publicly claiming there are no US troops in Pakistan or that the only role of US troops is to train the Pakistani military. Those statements are demonstrably false.

In the fall of 2008, the US Special Operations Command asked top US diplomats in Pakistan and Afghanistan for detailed information on refugee camps along the Afghanistan Pakistan border and a list of humanitarian aid organizations working in those camps. On October 6, Ambassador Patterson, sent a cable marked "Confidential" to senior US defense and intelligence officials saying that some of the requests, which came in the form of emails, "suggested that agencies intend to use the data for targeting purposes." Other requests, according to the cable, "indicate it would be used for "NO STRIKE" purposes." The cable, which was issued jointly by the US embassies in Kabul and Islamabad, declared: "We are concerned about providing information gained from humanitarian organizations to military personnel, especially for reasons that remain unclear. Particularly worrisome, this does not seem to us a very efficient way to gather accurate information." What this cable says in plain terms is that at least one person within the US Special Operations Command actually asked US diplomats in Kabul and/or Islamabad point-blank for information on refugee camps to be used in a targeted killing or capture operation.

What is clear is that US officials have consistently misled the American and Pakistani people on the extent of US military operations inside Pakistan. The reality is that US soldiers are fighting and dying in Pakistan despite the absence of a declaration of war. It is imperative that Congress investigates this shadow war to examine its legality, but also its impact on Pakistan's stability and US national security. If Congress is kept in the dark about these operations, how can it expect to effectively and honestly debate US policy in Pakistan?

One of the most off-the-radar wars the US is currently waging is in the areas around the Horn of Africa and the Gulf of Aden, where US forces are increasingly militarily engaging forces from Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). While the stated US position is that the US military role in this region is limited to training and weapons support, we now know that on multiple occasions the US has launched cruise missiles carrying cluster bombs at villages in Yemen, killing scores of people. According to the Yemeni parliament, women and children have been among those killed by American bombs. One of these strikes was reportedly aimed at killing a US citizen, Anwar al Awlaki, who has been placed on a targeted assassination list by the CIA and the Joint Special Operations Command. Special Operations sources have told me that elite forces from the US Joint Special Operations Command have also engaged in unilateral direct actions--lethal operations--inside Yemen. As in the case of US drone strikes in Pakistan, the Yemeni authorities are colluding with American officials to mask the level of US involvement.

We now know that on September 6, 2009, President Obama's Deputy National Security Advisor, John Brennan, met with Yemen's president, Ali Abdullah Saleh, to discuss the rising influence of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP). According to one cable, "President Saleh pledged unfettered access to Yemen's national territory for U.S. counterterrorism operations... Saleh insisted that Yemen's national territory is available for unilateral [counterterrorism] operations by the U.S." As with the presence of US forces in Pakistan, publicly, the Obama administration insists that its role in Yemen is limited to training and equipping the country's military forces. In secret, however, US Special Operations Forces have been conducting offensive operations in Yemen, including airstrikes, and conspiring with Yemen's president and other leaders to cover-up the US role.

On December 17, 2009, an alleged al-Qaeda training camp in Abyan, Yemen was hit by a cruise missile killing 41 people. According to an investigation by the Yemeni parliament, 14 women and 21 children were among the dead, along with 14 alleged al-Qaeda fighters. A week later another airstrike hit a separate village in Yemen.

Amnesty International released photographs from one of the strikes revealing remnants of US cluster munitions and the Tomahawk cruise missiles used to deliver them. At the time, the Pentagon refused to comment, directing all inquiries to Yemen's government, which released a statement on December 24 taking credit for both airstrikes, saying in a press release, "Yemeni fighter jets launched an aerial assault" and "carried out simultaneous raids killing and detaining militants."

US diplomatic cables now reveal that both strikes were conducted by the US military. In a meeting with General Petraeus in early January 2010 President Saleh reportedly told Petraeus: "We'll continue saying the bombs are ours, not yours." Yemen's Deputy Prime Minister Alimi then boasted that he had just "lied" by telling the Yemeni Parliament "that the bombs... were American-made but deployed by" Yemen. In that meeting, Petraeus and Saleh also discussed the US using "aircraft-deployed precision-guided bombs" with Saleh saying his government would continue to publicly take responsibility for US military attacks. It is clear that we have only seen the beginning of the shadow US war in Yemen and Congress must demand accountability and examine the full extent of the lethal actions currently underway in Yemen.

US forces have also struck multiple times in Somalia and have used the Ethiopian Army as a proxy force to cover the role of US Special Operations troops in a shadow war against al Shabaab and other militant groups. In the years leading up to the December 2006 Ethiopian invasion of Somalia, the Pentagon trained Ethiopian forces-including the notorious Agazi special forces unit. The US role continued well into the Ethiopian offensive. A series of at least six US Special Operation incursions into Somalia followed the invasion, beginning with two AC-130 attacks in southern Somalia in early 2007 and another attack from a US warship in mid-2007. In the spring of 2008, five Tomahawk cruise missiles were fired from an unidentified US naval vessel at a target in southern Somalia, followed by a second strike in central Somalia that killed alleged al Qaeda commander Aden Hashi Ayro. The most recent operation we know of occurred under President Obama's command in September 2009, when at least two US helicopters-reported to have been AH-6 Little Bird attack helicopters-tracked and killed an alleged senior al-Qaeda leader in the al Shabaab-controlled southern region. A diplomatic cable released by Wikileaks reveals that a foreign official praised the US for the Somalia operation, saying "The Somalia job was fantastic." But the reality is that the invasion of Somalia was a disaster and actually increased support for Islamic radical movements.

These ongoing shadow wars confirm an open secret that few in Congress are willing to discuss publicly--particularly Democrats: When it comes to US counterterrorism policy, there has been almost no substantive change from the Bush to the Obama administration. In fact, my sources within the CIA and the Special Operations community tell me that if there is any change it is that President Obama is hitting harder and in more countries that President Bush. The Obama administration is expanding covert actions of the military and the number of countries where US Special Forces are operating. The administration has taken the Bush era doctrine that the "world is a battlefield" and run with it and widened its scope. Under the Bush administration, US Special Forces were operating in 60 countries. Under President Obama, they are now in 75 nations.

The Obama administration's expansion of Special Forces activities globally stems from a classified order dating back to the Bush administration. Originally signed in early 2004 by then-Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, it is known as the "AQN ExOrd," or Al Qaeda Network Execute Order. The AQN ExOrd was intended to cut through bureaucratic and legal processes, allowing US Special Forces to move into "denied" areas or countries beyond the official battle zones of Iraq and Afghanistan.

As a Special Operations veteran told me, "The ExOrd spells out that we reserve the right to unilaterally act against al Qaeda and its affiliates anywhere in the world that they operate." The current mindset in the White House, he told me, is that "the Pentagon is already empowered to do these things, so let the Joint Special Operations Command off the leash. And that's what this White House has done." He added: "JSOC has been more empowered more under this administration than any other in recent history. No question." "The Obama administration took the [Bush-era] order and went above and beyond," he said. "The world is the battlefield, we've returned to that."

While some of the Special Forces missions are centered around training of militaries in allied nations, that line is often blurred. In some cases, "training" is used as a cover for unilateral, direct action. As a former special ops guy told me: "It's often done under the auspices of training so that they can go anywhere. It's brilliant. It is essentially what we did in the 60s. Remember the 'training mission' in Vietnam? That's how it morphs."

As I just returned from Afghanistan, I would like to share with this committee part of my investigation into deadly US night raids in Afghanistan where innocent civilians were killed. These operations, carried out by the same Special Ops teams that operate in Yemen, Pakistan and Somalia, are part of what is effectively a shadow war within the more publicly visible war in Afghanistan. In one incident in February of this year, US Special Operations Forces raided a civilian compound in the Gardez District of Paktia province. They killed two pregnant women, a teenage girl and two men. US forces tried to cover up their responsibility for the killings and blamed the Taliban and said the women were killed in an honor killing. That was a blatant lie and eventually the US was forced to take responsibility, admitting the raid was conducted by operators from the Joint Special Operations Command.

I went to visit with that family in their home. They were pro-American and anti-Taliban before this raid. In fact, the night US forces stormed their compound, they thought it was a Taliban attack. The two men who were killed were actively working with US forces. One of them was a top police commander trained by the US, the other was a local prosecutor in the Karzai government. One man, who saw his pregnant wife gunned down by US forces, was hooded and handcuffed and taken prisoner for days by American forces. When he was released, he told me, he wanted to become a suicide bomber and blow himself up among Americans. The same was true of a similar raid on the Kashkaki family in Nangarhar province in May 2010 where eight civilians were gunned down by US forces. Local police officials told me the family had no connection to the Taliban. That family is left asking why they should support the US presence in their country after watching their loved ones shot dead before their eyes by a military that claims to be there to liberate them and free their country. The perception I heard expressed widely in Afghanistan was that the US is killing with impunity and strengthening the Taliban in the process.

Former senior State Department official in Afghanistan, Matthew Hoh, recently told me that the night raids are "a really risky, really violent operation," saying that when Special Operations Forces conduct them, "We might get that one guy we're looking for or we might kill a bunch of innocent people and now make ten more Taliban out of them." I told both of the families targeted in the raids I described that I would bring their cases before the US Congress and ask that they be investigated and that those responsible be held accountable for these extrajudicial killings. On behalf of those families, I humbly ask this committee to consider this request.

In closing, the stated focus of this hearing is US national security policy and civil liberties. I believe strongly that the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have a direct impact on what happens here in the United States. The same is true for the covert, shadow wars from Pakistan to Somalia to Yemen and beyond. These wars help to shape our domestic policies as well as world opinion about our nation. It is essential for journalists and this Congress to fulfill their oversight functions and to shed light on actions--as unsavory or as difficult as they might be at times--so that US policy moving forward can truly be based on what is best for the people of this nation as well as the populations of the nations where the US is waging wars, whether declared or undeclared. I thank this body for the opportunity to testify today. I ask that my full, prepared remarks be entered into the official record. I am prepared to answer any questions you may have."

© 2010 The Nation

http://www.commondreams.org/headline/2010/12/09-7

onsdag den 8. december 2010

Om tvangsskoling.

Debatten om folkeskolen anerkender som regel implicit dens legtimitet. Fokus er som regel på hvordan man kan gøre det bedre vha. nye læringsstrategier som skal eksistere indenfor det eksisterende institutionelle rammeværk, men folkeskolen som institution kritiseres sjældent. Det mener jeg er særdeles problematisk, da jeg anser folkeskolens nuværende struktur for at være endda meget patologisk. Vi har derfor brug for en fundamental omtænkning af folkeskolen.

- Den første problemstilling knyttet til tvangsskoling er, at den alt for ofte skaber forvirring snarere end forståelse hos eleven. Sekvensen af timerne i løbet af en skoledag består af urelaterede emner og en undervisning som afbrydes når klokken ringer, uanset hvor godt man er i gang med noget. I stedet for at fokusere på dyb og kritisk forståelse af interrelateret stof, er fokus i skolesystemet som oftest snarere på indlæring af facts som der ofte ikke er nogen umiddelbar relation mellem. Kvalitetsindlæring er karakteristisk ved, at man går i dybden med et emne over lang tid, hvilket ikke er tilfældet i det meste skoling, hvor fragmentering og forvirring presses ned over børnene.

- Børnene er intellektuelt afhængige af underviserne. Af alle de utallige ting som er værd at lære (om) er det kun et fåtal man får lov at stifte bekendtskab med i skolen. Disse emner er fastsat af usynlige administratorer som åbenbart er så oplyste, at de ved præcis hvad der er værd at lære. Vores egen undervisningsminister er en af disse oplyste. 15 + 16 = 33.

“Gode elever” venter på at få at vide af læreren hvad de skal tage sig til, hvilket sender eleven det uheldige signal, at man må vente på at andre mennesker, bedre trænet og mere oplyste end en selv, skaber mening i ens liv. De “dårlige elever” bekæmper denne intellektuelle afhængighed, selvom de ikke har sproglig forståelse nok til at kunne sætte ord på denne modstand, men den slags findes der selvfølgelig midler imod. Med magt knækkes viljen hos de som gør modstand og dette sker som regel uden forældrenes skepsis. Eventuelt kan man diagnosticere dem som indlæringsbesværede og adfærdsvanskelige og medicinere dem. Det er vist ret populært.

- Børnene har intet privatliv i skolen og som udgangspunkt ingen rettigheder eller egentlig medbestemmelse. Man lærer om demokrati, men den eneste variant i skolen er som regel noget a la valget mellem om man vil i Zoologisk Have eller på museum. Alt det grundlæggende har børnene ingen indflydelse på.

- Børnene er konstant overvågede af påtvungne autoriteter i skolegården, i klasseværelset og i gymnastiksalen, hvilket selvfølgelig er glimrende hvis man ønsker at vænne børnene til et liv i et stadig mere omsiggribende overvågningssamfund, men opdragelse til demokratisk adfærd og værdsættelse af ens ukrænkelige rettigheder kan det næppe siges at være.

For mig at se kan ovenstående aldrig blive indgangen til kritisk fornuft og original selvstændig tænkning. Hvis barnet opnår dette er det på trods af folkeskolen, ikke på grund af den. I Folkeskolen lærer man snarere at vænne sig til at gøre ting man ikke kan lide, at adlyde påtvungne autoriteter og indfinde sig med tvang og straf.

“Education is what remains after one has forgotten everything he learned in school.” - Albert Einstein.

torsdag den 2. december 2010

Eisenhowers Advarsel mod Det Militær-Industrielle Kompleks.



"A vital element in keeping the peace is our military establishment. Our arms must be mighty, ready for instant action, so that no potential aggressor may be tempted to risk his own destruction...

This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence — economic, political, even spiritual — is felt in every city, every statehouse, every office of the federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society. In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals so that security and liberty may prosper together."