"When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle." ~ 
Any world is an illusion, but within illusion, another world, a better world, seems possible. In the material world, the one we think is real, the divide between the 'left' and 'right' is an artificial one. This divide serves to keep us separate from each other and prevents us from seeing clearly that we in fact have shared interests and a common enemy. A better way to approach economy, politics, culture and society would be to take note of the ways in which our societies are divided horizontally: the interests of the few (the elite) and the many (ordinary people). The elite wants to oppress and exploit the rest of us. In a material sense, they are our enemy. They are working to establish a One World Company, aka a totalitarian New World Order. World government is the last thing ordinary people need. We need free and open communities with equal rights for everyone and a profound respect for the many differences between us. We want freedom rather than security. We want peace, not war. Above all else, we want truth, dignity and justice. ~ The Editor
XML FeedsAnother Evil Little War
Nebojsa Malic
Antiwar Forum
Kosovo Repeated
Twelve years ago, Bill Clinton launched an evil little war in the Balkans, attacking what was then Yugoslavia because he could. The best indicator of that were the ever-changing pretexts for the war, from imposing a "peace" ultimatum and "protecting refugees" (created by the bombing) to stopping a (fictitious) "genocide." Four years later, when Bush the Lesser invaded Iraq, his pretexts were less humanitarian, but no less fictitious. The pattern was obvious even then. Today, the Nobel Peace Prize stands worthless as the Empire engages in yet another evil little war, this time in North Africa. Imperial policy has come full circle, with Barack Obama managing to combine the Clinton restoration with the Bush continuity.
Shifting the Goalposts
Following the 1999 war, which ended with the NATO occupation of the Serbian province of Kosovo, the Empire hired an "independent commission" to whitewash the endeavor as "illegal but legitimate." In actuality, it was both illegal and illegitimate. The war clearly violated the UN Charter, the NATO charter and the U.S. Constitution. Empire’s principal claim to the war’s legitimacy — alleged Serb atrocities against Albanian rebels — was exposed as exaggerated propaganda relatively quickly. Adding insult to injury was the wholesale campaign of ethnic cleansing by the Albanians, which started the moment NATO troops arrived in the province and went on for years with absolute impunity.
Even today, however, criticism of the Kosovo War takes on a "yes, but" form, in which the principal points of NATO propaganda — Serb atrocities, the alleged ethnic cleansing plan, 10,000 dead Albanian civilians, etc. — are taken as unimpeachable facts rather than tailor-made fiction. All that remains of the argument against the war then is that it was "too expensive" and "took too long." So, if the Empire promises and delivers a faster and cheaper war, that would make it all right? - Except there is no such thing, of course.
