Friday, December 25, 2009

Potpourri


New World Notes News
Vol. 2 No. 51 -- December 26, 2009

This Week in New World Notes, radio program #95, Dec. 29:

Potpourri


In a nutshell

I tried to make a hodgepodge of interesting unrelated items, but everything came out interconnected anyway! Features Brit journalist Johann Hari's expose' of Israel's secret weapon against Palestine--tons of untreated Settler sewage. The US's bloody foreign policy since--I dunno--1898? 1756? Glen Ford on Obama, "The Banksters," & dancin' to "The Monster Crash." As Zola wrote, I accuse! Happy New Year!

Discharge of sewage from Israeli settlement of Beitar
Illit pours down onto Palestinian fields, destroying
crops and poisoning drinking water.

This week's music

Notes & Credits

Correction: Last week I mistakenly said that the music in our Christmas show (#94) was performed by 3 Jews and a gay Gentile. In fact, the music was performed by 2 Jews, a gay Gentile, and a Swedish Baptist (Stan Freberg). Could I make this stuff up?

For more by Glen Ford & other good commentary, see http://www.blackagendareport.com/

Johann Hari, "Israel is Suppressing a Secret It Must Face," originally in The Independent (London), April 28, 2008. I condensed & edited the U.S. version, from Common Dreams. Full text here: http://www.commondreams.org/archive/2008/04/28/8582

Johann Hari

Free subscription to weekly New World Notes email newsletter upon request. (Subscribers list is totally confidential.)

Thanks to David Schonfeld for rounding up this week's 2nd song & permission to broadcast it.

New World Notes is produced under the auspices (Latin for "spreading chestnut tree") of WWUH-FM, a community service of the University of Hartford. Feedback to kdowst at hotmail period com.

Coming soon -- Tuesday debut dates on WWUH shown:

  • January 5 -- Varieties of Sexual Experience, OR: Goldberg's Other Variations
  • January 12 -- The Kids Are All Right -- Including teenaged Presidential Scholars who stood up to Bush on torture . . . and young protestors in Copenhagen who combined sanity & street theatre. Gen-X slackers are dead. Long live the kids!

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Saturday, December 19, 2009

Christmas Special 2009


New World Notes News
Vol. 2 No. 50 -- December 19, 2009

This Week in New World Notes, radio program #94, Dec. 22:

Stan Freberg

Christmas Special 2009


Brevity is The Soul of Wit Department:

Somebody famous was born on Christmas--I forget who. John Lennon? In celebration thereof, we present 3 seasonal songs, performed by 3 Jews (Simon, Garfunkel, & Stan Freberg) and 1 "out" homosexual Gentile (Elton John). Less humorously, we also commemorate 2 unhappy anniversaries: the sack of Fallujah (2004) and the sack of Gaza (begun Dec. 27, 2008). "War is over, if you want it." Happy Christmas!

Credits

New World Notes is produced under the auspices (Latin for "unisex bathroom") of WWUH-FM, a community service of the University of Hartford. Feedback to kdowst at hotmail period com.

Notes

This week's holiday music (all Oldies):

  • Simon & Garfunkel, Silent Night / 6 o'Clock News
  • Stan Freberg, Green Chri$tma$
  • Elton John, Where To Now, Saint Peter?

http://www.annefeeney.com/

Coming soon -- Tuesday debut dates on WWUH shown:

  • December 29 -- Potpourri . . . including Israel's secret weapon in Palestine . . . U.S.'s bloody foreign policy since 1898 (if not 1756) . . . and Obama, "the Banksters," & dancin' to The Monster Crash. Happy New Year!
  • January 5 -- Varieties of Sexual Experience, OR: Goldberg's Other Variations

Broadcast schedule: Scroll down to previous entry.

Sir Elton John

A Christmas Carol

Where to now, Saint Peter,
If it's true I'm in your hand?
I may not be a Christian,
But I've done all one man can.
I understand I'm on the road
Where all that was is gone.
So where to now, Saint Peter?
Show me which road I'm on . . . .


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Saturday, December 12, 2009

Afghanistan: Won't Get Fooled Again!


New World Notes News
Vol. 2 No. 49 -- December 13, 2009

Note: Entries in this blog are not transcripts of the radio
program. Rather, they are informal essays concerning the
program installment and its subject.

This Week in New World Notes, radio program #93, December 15:

Afghanistan:
Won't Get Fooled Again!

Executive summary

Three fine minds (& my own) cut through the BS about why "we" are rampaging across Afghanistan. Hartford activist Steve Fournier questions why Hillary Clinton calls Afghan suicide bombers "cowards" while the U.S. is bombarding wedding parties with aerial drones controlled from Nevada. Political scientist David Model (read aloud by me) lucidly explains the real reason for this war. Last, in a rousing speech, Afghan activist and ousted MP Malalai Joya--a young woman--brilliantly denounces the cruelty and hypocrisy of Bush, Obama, Karzai, the warlords, NATO, and the Taliban.

What is past is prologue

In 1964, when President L.B. Johnson ordered a large increase in U.S. military personnel in Vietnam, few Americans alive knew anything about the war's most obvious ancestor: the U.S.'s Philippine War of (circa) 1898-1905. The "large increase" in troops was called an "escalation" back in the 1960s, not a "surge." Political/military "Newspeak" was in full flower back then . . . but still less resplendent than it is today!

After the Philippines adventure, the powers-that-be waited 60 years (overlooking Korea) before serving up more of the same in Vietnam.

In 2003, so eager were the P-T-B to control the oil of the Middle East, that they launched the Iraq bloodbath/quagmire only 30 years--just one generation--after the end of its Vietnam predecessor.

(I recognize that "end" is a debatable term, as Vietnamese people are still being born deformed and dying young from the gazillion gallons of toxic defoliants the Americans sprayed on their country. To say nothing of the descendents of the GIs who did the spraying.)

In 2003, millions of American citizens retained vivid memories of the horrors of Vietnam. So launching the equally-unnecessary Iraq bloodbath/quagmire was a gamble. Which, however, has succeeded to the satisfaction of the powers-that-be.

Hartford activist/lawyer/Green politician Steve Fournier

I have certain doubts about the Nobel Peace Prize, but President Obama certainly deserves this decade's Chutzpah Up the Wazoo Award for starting yet another Philippines/Vietnam/Iraq combination bloodbath/debacle only six years after the launch of the last one--and before that one has come close to ending!

If you liked our little Iraq adventure, you're gonna really like the Great Afghanistan Escalation. And you'll simply love the Af-Pak Donnybrook! Coming soon to a theater-of-war near you!

Department of Adolescent Humor:

I said that David Model reveals the main reason that "we" are bombarding babies in Afghanistan. I don't want to tease the reader, but I don't want to spoil the suspense, either. So I'll just give a hint about the actual main reason: Afghanistan is Trouble with a capital T, which rhymes with P, which stands for . . . . No, not Pool, you knucklehead!

I'll give you another hint.

Three teenaged guys (circa 1965) were chatting about who was the sexiest woman in the world. One (let's call him Tinker) opines, "Marilyn Monroe, without a doubt!" Evans rebuts, "Nah, don't be a jerk: it's Brigitte Bardot!" Chance pipes up, "You guys are both full of [solid waste]. It's a well-known fact that the sexiest woman in the world is Marilyn Pippilini!"

Tinker and Evans are nonplussed. They exclaim in unison, "What?! Who the [heck] is Marilyn Pippilini?! "

Chance pulls out his wallet. Next to the rolled condom is a clipped newspaper headine. He shows it to Tinker and Evans. It reads,

Three Hunded Men Lay
Maryland Pipeline

This is one of two jokes from my adolescent years (circa 1965) that I still remember. The other doesn't bear repeating. All those dozens of Elephant Jokes . . . gone!

Recent offering by David Model

Notes and links

Steve Fournier's jeremiad recorded exclusively for New World Notes. See Steve's "Curent Invective" at http://www.currentinvective.com/ .

David Model's essay, "NATO's Chimerical Enemy in Afghanistan," from CounterPunch, condensed & edited for radio by K.D. Here's the original: http://www.counterpunch.org/model11132009.html.

Malalai Joya's speech in Vancouver on November 14, 2009, was recorded for CFRO by Alex Smith--http://www.ecoshock.org/. See also http://www.stopwar.ca/. About half of Joya's speech is reproduced in this installment of NWN. For the whole shebang and/or Q&A, see here: http://www.radio4all.net/index.php/program/37338.

Malalai Joya's recent book is Raising My Voice. Jonathan Steele's interesting review of it in The Guardian is here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2009/aug/15/afghan-activist-malalai-joya

New World Notes is produced under the auspices (Latin for "oppressive yoke") of WWUH-FM, a community service of the that beacon of light in darkest Connecticut, the University of Hartford.

Malalai Joya


Coming soon -- Tuesday debut dates on WWUH shown:

  • December 22 -- Christmas Special ... including reflections on the sack of Fallujah (5th anniversary) and the sack of Gaza (1st anniversary)
  • December 29 -- Potpourri . . . including Israel's secret weapon in Palestine . . . the U.S.'s bloody foreign policy since 1898 (if not 1756) . . . and Obama, "the Banksters," & dancin' to The Monster Crash. Happy New Year!

Catch New World Notes (all times Eastern):


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Saturday, December 5, 2009

Michael Parenti on "Political Liberties and Economic Democracy"


Bread line, Louisville, Kentucky, 1937. Photo by Margaret
Bourke-White. All Graphics: click to enlarge.


New World Notes News
Vol. 2 No. 48 -- December 8, 2009

This week in New World Notes, radio program #92, Tuesday, December 8:

Michael Parenti on
"Political Liberties and
Economic Democracy"

Workers' Summary

The best parts of Parenti's lecture and Q&A at the University of Hartford on November 4 are here. Parenti argues that improvements in public policy--and in living conditions for the non-rich--resulted from struggle from "below," not from the goodness of the governing elites' hearts. Average citizens fought for greater political liberties as tools to compel concrete improvements in their lives.

This program includes fine parts on airport security, Saddam Hussein, the Maine anti-gay-marriage referendum, and Parenti's forthcoming book on organized religion, God and His Demons.

Egypt, 21st Century

Notes

www.michaelparenti.org

The first 20 or so minutes of Parenti's lecture--on the dislike of democracy by the Framers of our Constitution--with parallels drawn to the Classical world--are not included in this installment of NWN. This omitted segment is intellectually substantial and well worth hearing when you're in the mood for some serious history & political science. Some later parts are snipped as well. I've made a complete, uncut, unedited recording of the entire presentation and Q&A (1h, 12m) available for anyone who cares to hear same. The introduction is by University of Hartford President Walter Harrison.

Recorded live by moi.

Free subscription to weekly New World Notes email newsletter upon request. (Subscribers list is totally confidential.) The newsletter essentially duplicates the weekly blog entry--but some people like the weekly reminder.

Dr. Michael Parenti (plaid shirt)

Coming Soon -- Tuesday debut dates on WWUH shown:

  • December 15 -- Afghanistan: Won't Get Fooled Again!
  • December 22 -- Christmas Special ... including reflections on the sack of Fallujah (5th anniversary) and the sack of Gaza (1st anniversary)

Catch New World Notes (all times Eastern):

"Freedom of Speech" by Norman Rockwell. No comment.



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