Bilal Is Free!

I've just read the excellent piece of Llyd Wells titled, "A Tale Of Two Prisoners," and wanted to give you the heads' up that Bilal was freed on Wednesday [April 16], finally.

--Victor Caivano

L. W. replies: Bilal Hussein was released shortly after the article in question was submitted, and just prior to its publication. Sami al-Hajj, the Al-Jazeera cameraman detained at Guantanamo for over 6 years, has also subsequently been released (without charges, of course), as of May 1. As much as I would like to claim a rare victory for the ever-more-supine American fourth estate, my conscience won't let me. The release of these two men is no absolution of our treatment of them or of the hundreds (or more) like them" treatment of which I am ashamed and for which I beg pardon.

US Is The Problem

Tibet has been a part of China since ancient days. Historical records have shown that Tibet had been under the central government of China for more than 700 years since the Yuan Dynasty (1271-1368). Less than six decades ago, China emerged from a century of colonialist oppression and humiliation at the hands of the very same colonialists that are currently behind the anti-China campaign of disinformation.

Tibet became (de facto) independent in 1911 after the Manchu dynasty fell. But this independence was never accepted by either the Chinese governments that succeeded the Manchu, or by Britain, India, and the United States--the democracies with whom Tibet had the closest ties.

For political and economic self-interest, these democracies instead continued to accept Chinese suzerainty over Tibet. Consequently, when Mao Zedong sent his army to incorporate Tibet into the People's Republic of China in 1950, Britain, India, and the United States not only did not assist Tibet, but also blocked Tibet's appeal for help to the United Nations.

The international community now is being barraged with a deliberate and sustained campaign of disinformation about what is going on with Tibet as once again, Washington is providing financial, political, diplomatic, and propaganda support to a blatantly racist demonization effort, ostensibly due to "concerns" for "human rights."

It's outrageous that nobody is mentioning that a quarter of US territory was forcibly taken from Mexico merely a hundred years ago, and millions of Native Americans were genocided by European settlers before that.

We hear that Tibetans suffer cultural genocide, but we do not hear those terms applied to Spanish and French policies toward the Basque minority. We do not hear those terms applied to the US annexation of the Kingdom of Hawaii in 1898. Now, the very same colonialists (redneck cowboys) jump up and down and scream for Tibetans. How ridiculous!

And what about Palestinians? Anybody? --Tuan Zhang

G.P. replies: Now I've seen it all: a letter-writer accusing ETS! of hypocrisy when criticizing foreign human rights violations because, well, the US and its allies are nasty, too. If our letter-writer had ever actually read an issue of ETS!, as opposed to, say, firing off a letter to a random site his web crawler in Beijing stumbled upon, he'd know that few of our issues don't contain criticisms of US foreign policy. (And, yes, the Israelis, too--we made the comparison of Palestine with the Tibet situation in the same article he's ripping. Pity he didn't read that far.)

Why? We hate colonial empires. And the horrors of the 19th Century notwithstanding, China is one of the world's oldest empires, collecting tributes for innumerable centuries from Tibetans (as well as most of the rest of East and Southeast Asia). That's the "historical precedent" he's citing. That doesn't excuse China dominance and oppression of Tibet today--nor its many other dreadful practices, from its savage "justice" system to oppression of its own minority citizens (Uighurs and Mongolians included), to support for the fellow butchers in the Sudan and Burma, among other places, which were the article's main focus. Funny how he didn't mention any of that.

Blood looks pretty much the same whether it's being spilled on behalf of officials in Washington or in Beijing. Or Jerusalem or Moscow or London or Riyadh. Our response to it should be the same, too.

Hail The New State Religion

Recently I did a quick tally of the number of "enemy combatants" tortured to death by US forces in our various gulags/torture chambers across the globe. The acknowledged and undisputed number is over a hundred, but our hit parade by any reasonable estimate far exceeds this. We have murdered terrorist taxi drivers, terrorist college students, terrorist fathers, terrorist brothers, terrorist farmers. It's a mistake to minimize our considerable achievements here.

So here's the question of the day--perhaps the question of the new century. Why is there virtually no protest or outrage over the fact that we are routinely torturing and murdering prisoners? The answer can be found at the blood-stained altar of our new state religion "war on terror." Our old-time state religion "anti-communism" served the empire well for decades until the dissolution of the Soviet Union. The commandments and edicts of "anti-communism" allowed us to plunder, terrorize, start wars, overthrow governments, murder hundreds of thousands of people, and support tyrants and monsters the world over with righteous halo intact. Consider our deeply moral successes in Iran, El Salvador, Chile, Guatemala, Brazil, Nicaragua, and Haiti, just to list a few.

However our "war on terror" gospels present us with exciting new opportunities unheard of even at the height of our "anti-communism" crusades. The "war on terror" new testaments allow us to attach and destroy nations on any pretext, utterly shred and destroy any adherence or observance of international law, murder, torture, and terrorize entire populations and ethnic groups, and enact sweeping and hopelessly repressive legislation at home intent on muzzling any possible civil disobedience.

So let's open our hymnbooks and sing an ode to the glories of our new state religion"war on terror." Just think if we reach and maintain the right crescendo, we'll be able to drown out the tormented screams of our victims. Hallelujah. --Jim Sawyer

The Pundits Have Forgotten Their History

Those pundits who are questioning Barack Obama's electability (and Hillary Clinton's, for that matter) have forgotten their history.

On the seven occasions since the Civil War when a presidential election was held during a recession, the party of the incumbent president has always lost. What makes the chattering class think it is going to be any different this year?

According to The New York Times, "Allan J. Lichtman, a history professor at American University, wrote in his book, 'The 13 Keys to the Presidency,' that all seven times since the Civil War when the economy was in recession in the fall of a Presidential election year, someone from the opposition party was elected President. The years he listed were 1876, 1884, 1896, 1920, 1932, 1960, and 1980. ("Recession and Re-election Don't Mix," David Rosenbaum, The Times, October 9, 1991.)

George H.W. Bush lost to Clinton in 1992 because pockets of the 1991 recession were still spread all over the country, making the recovery almost imperceptible.

--Clive Leeman