Friday, August 30, 2013

Kelly McParland resurrects a classic racist smear divorced from history and reality

"If the U.S. does go ahead with plans to intervene, it will be doing so despite overwhelming public weariness across the western world with problems in the Middle East and Arab countries, with limited support from other western governments, and with no real appetite from Americans themselves. The experiences of Iraq and Afghanistan, the ongoing crisis in Egypt, the apparent lack of any progress in a region addicted to violence, have all been effective in diluting the West’s innate sympathy for the people of the region.  How often can you try to help people who don’t seem to want it and respond largely with anger and even more violence?"
Ahistorical, racist nonsense that deliberately ignores how often the West has intentionally stamped out any stirrings of real democracy in the region.

The end of Inevitability?

We all know that helpless frustrating feeling.

We are allowed to debate all we want, the majority can express their view clearly and unambiguously objecting in the streets and the ballot box.

The the elites will do what they want anyway.  'Austerity economics are inevitable and unavoidable', throwing ourselves into the latest military quagmire is the only real option, the drug war will continue no matter how much the majority object. Lie back and enjoy it or shake your adorable little fists either way the 'grown ups' will make the real decisions.

But suddenly that aura of inevitability is wavering.  The UK parliament stuns observers by actually reflecting the will of the British people and deciding NOT to blindly sign on to raining death down on the Syrian people to object to the Syrian government possibly having rained death down on the Syrian people.  Harper and Mckay go back to the old filthy propaganda well to try to smear Trudeau as promoting drug use to children (won't SOMEONE think of the children?) but despite their smears the Liberal's popularity actually jumps as Canadians go, 'Yeah? So he's admitting publicly to what a huge percentage of Canadians do or have done privately? Good for him.'  In the US the drug war shows every sign of beginning to officially wind down as Obama's Justice Department signals it will not sabotage the will of individual states to stop treating Marijuana like Satan's leafy friend.

The discredited orthodoxy of austerity still dominates the discourse of mainstream politics worldwide, despite the will of the public but even there cracks are beginning to appear.

Could we finally be getting past the stale argument that there is no choice but what the elites tell us so we should just be grown ups and accept it?

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