Human Rights Update: Burma, the Congo & Tibet -- Just Another Day?

Image: Frida Kahlo, Love Embrace of the Universe




Human Rights Update: Burma, the Congo & Tibet -- Just Another Day?

By Richard Power

No, I am not going to write about Gaza. I refer you to Steve Clemons' Washington Note. Steve offers a sophisticated perspective on the conflict (as well as a range of vital geopolitical issues); his views, and those of his featured colleagues, are both pragmatic and compassionate. (Click here, and here, and here, for some examples.)

Of course, I want the Obama-Biden administration to prove Robert Fisk wrong on Israel/Palestine (click here), just as I want it to prove George Monbiot wrong on Climate Change (click here); although, I confess I am skeptical on both fronts.

But, no, I am not going to write about Gaza.

I am going to stay focused on those situations I have committed myself to; they are, for me, free of any ambiguity whatsoever: Burma, Congo, Tibet and Darfur.

The Burmese Thugocracy remains entrenched and unchallenged, in any meaningful way. The great nations have not made life uncomfortable for them. Nor have those corporate interests that influence the policies of the great nations. Nor has the UN.

In a recent editorial, the independent (and exiled) Burmese newspaper, Irrawaddy, mocked the ineffectual performance of UN Special Envoy Gambari:

The Nigerian diplomat must be insane to think that the corrupt generals who terrorized the whole nation can be bribed into compromise. ... The Burmese generals must be laughing at Gambari and his proposal. The country’s political prisoners, however, have nothing to laugh about. They will be asking whether a more effective and better informed UN special envoy cannot be appointed. Persuasion and bribes won’t move the captors of more than 2,000 innocent people. Irrawaddy, 12-29-08

Of course, Gambari has had no impact on business as usual:

The China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) has concluded a 30-year deal to buy natural gas from Burma, the Chinese Corp announced ... The signing guarantees that energy-hungry China can fill a portion of its energy demand for nature gas from Burma’s offshore Blocks A-1 and A-3 in the Bay of Bengal for at least 30 years. In the two offshore fields, South Korea’s Daewoo International Corp owns a 51 percent share; Myamar Oil & Gas Enterprise, 15 percent; India’s Oil & Natural Gas Corp, 17 percent; Gail, 8.5 percent; and Korea Gas, 8.5 percent. ... Irrawaddy, 12-26-08

But before you beat your chest about China, check your stock portfolio (or what is left of it) against the Burma Campaign/UK's "Dirty List" of corporations doing business with the Thugocracy.

Meanwhile, UN Goodwill Ambassador Mia Farrow continues posting from the outskirts of Hell:

The impact of the violence is evident everywhere and it cannot be overstated. No institutional structure is in place. All ordinary ways of life have been disrupted. ... Children live in terror of being raped or abducted -- the girls are used for sex, boys are forced to fight. Civilians are attacked, raped, tortured and murdered.
Although the United Nations has dispatched the largest peacekeeping operation in the world, it has been unable to protect the people of North Kivu. Last month, with peacekeepers less than a mile away, at least 150 people were massacred. Mia Farrow, CNN, 12-23-08

And in Tibet, documentation on the torture of dissidents has been released:

The UN Committee Against Torture has delivered a damning assessment of China’s record on torture. ... In one section titled “Widespread torture and ill-treatment and insufficient safeguards during detention” the Committee states it remains “deeply concerned” about widespread reports of the “use of torture and ill-treatment of suspects in police custody, especially to extract confessions….to be used in criminal proceedings”. In its own submission to the Committee (2) Free Tibet submitted evidence of government. Tibetan News and Culture, 12-5-08

When will human rights, along with sustainability, be recognized for what it truly is -- the secret ingredient without which no real security is achievable?

See also The Bush Legacy on Darfur: Joy to the World? Glories of His Righteousness? Wonders of His Love? He Rules the World?

For a Words of Power Archive of Human Rights Updates, click here.

For a Words of Power Archive of Crisis in Darfur Updates, click here.

Richard Power's Left-Handed Security: Overcoming Fear, Greed & Ignorance in This Era of Global Crisis is available now! Click here for more information.

Darfur, Steve Clemons, Mia Farrow, Burma, Congo, Tibet, Richard Power, Words of Power


Economic Insecurity & the Climate Crisis: There is a Magic Bullet, There is a Holy Grail

Celtic Triple Spiral/Triple Goddess Symbol


The financial services industry has claimed an ever-growing share of the nation’s income over the past generation, making the people who run the industry incredibly rich. Yet, at this point, it looks as if much of the industry has been destroying value, not creating it. And it’s not just a matter of money: the vast riches achieved by those who managed other people’s money have had a corrupting effect on our society as a whole. Paul Krugman, 12-19-08

The world must avoid backsliding in fighting global warming and work out a "Green New Deal" to fix its twin climate and economic crises, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said ... Coping with the financial crisis would need a "massive stimulus," he added. "A big part of that spending should be an investment -- an investment in a green future." Reuters, 12-11-08

After a year in which it nearly lost its compass, the campaign against climate change heads into 2009 needing top-level political commitment, creative thinking and a deep well of money. Next year holds a big dream: by its end, the world will have forged a treaty in Copenhagen to shrink global warming from mankind-threatening juggernaut to manageable problem. Agence France Press, 12-14-08

The United States faces the possibility of much more rapid climate change by the end of the century than previous studies have suggested, according to a new report led by the U.S. Geological Survey. Washington Post, 12-25-08

Economic Insecurity & the Climate Crisis: There is a Magic Bullet, There is a Holy Grail

By Richard Power

2008 was a do or die deadline for the USA; it chose life and reason over madness and death. 2009 is a do or die deadline for the nations of the world as a whole; will we collectively choose life and reason over madness and death?

For years, some of us have been insisting that the climate change resulting from global warming must be understand as perhaps our greatest national and global security threat.

For years, some of us have been pointing out that even if we had not been confronted with the challenge of climate change, we would have been confronted with a global sustainability crisis in regard to water, food, sanitation, energy, etc.

For years, some of us have also been warning of hell to pay for the reckless, selfish and short-sighted economic philosophy that has dominated our national psyche and plundered our national wealth over the last few decades.

Lo and behold, the clock has run out on the time left for coming to grips with the Climate Crisis just as the Financial and Economic Crisis gets under way.

Emerging from this perfect storm of crisis is a three-headed monster (climate change, the sustainability meltdown and the spectre of a second Great Depression); this hell spawn threatens to devour the future.

But there is a magic bullet that will slay this three-headed monster. There is a holy grail that will renew the land it is laying to waste. But the magic bullet is not any one technology (certainly not "clean coal"), nor is the holy grail any one plan (and certainly not one proposed by T. Boone Pickens).

No, this magic bullet, this holy grail, is hidden within the collective will, conscience and common sense of humanity; and it can only be revealed by a critical mass of leaders at all strata of society and all dimensions of endeavor.

Of course, humanity has not exercised its collective will, conscience or common sense in quite some time. As the people of Rwanda and Darfur can attest. Yes, in a romantic moment, in 2000, humanity resolved to achieve the UN Millennium Development Goals, but now in 2008, half-way to the deadline, humanity is on track to fail in that effort. Yes, in 2000, humanity also signed the Kyoto Accords, albeit with a trembling hand, but it has been backing away from the treaty ever since.

It is important to understand how different our economic and environmental circumstances would likely be today if the planet's greatest economic, technological and military power had been under different leadership over the last eight years. But it will not do us too much good here and now. The question of the moment? Does the incoming Obama-Biden administration really understand? Do Hillary Clinton and Larry Summers really understand? Do a sufficient number of US Senators from both sides of the aisle understand?

The USA desperately needs the trillion-dollar stimulus package that the Obama team is reported to be developing. But that stimulus needs to not only re-build the deteriorating infrastructure of the USA, it also needs to turn it green at the same time. Is there sufficient political courage to get this done? Is there sufficient political courage to even propose it?

And even if the answer to those questions is a surprising yes, what about the other great nations? The EU? Yes. But what about the Russians, the Chinese and the Indians? If the G-8 talks out of both sides of its mouth, why should the G-20 listen?

2007 Nobel Peace Prize winner Al Gore and Sir Nicholas Stern, the former Chief Economist and Senior Vice-President of the World Bank, are two of thosespeaking out with the authority of their vision. They are articulating how to weather the perfect storm and slay the three-headed monster.

In a recent blog post, Gore had both encouraging comment on Obama's energy/environment team of Carol Browner (Assistant to the President on Climate Change and Energy), Nobel prize winning physicist Steven Chu (Secretary of Energy) and Lisa Jackson (EPA Director)and an admonishment to the rest of us: Barack Obama has selected an exceptional team to lead the fight against the climate crisis ... While this is an amazing group of public servants, we must recognize that there is still a very difficult challenge awaiting us before we can pass new laws that truly solve the climate crisis. Public support for doing the right thing is more crucial now than it ever has been. Al Gore, 12-19-08

In a recent interview with Le Monde (translated by Leslie Thatcher of Truthout), Lord Stern talked about the synergies available in coming to grips with both the climate crisis and the economic crisis at once.

Here are a few excerpts from Lord's Stern responses to Le Monde's questions (but I urge you to click on the link and read the whole of it):

The economic crisis will cause a 4-5 percent global GDP reduction for two or three years, while, if we don't act today, the planetary crisis - I use this term rather than "environmental crisis" which I consider too limited - will have still more serious effects over time scales from fifty to a hundred years. Not only in terms of destruction of value, but also in terms of the natural catastrophes, human migrations, and conflicts between communities it will engender. ... these two crises, economic and planetary, have one thing in common: they're the consequence of a system that does not evaluate the risks that its operation generates, that does not take into account the fact that it may end up destroying more than the immediate profit it procures and that, finally, underestimates actors' interdependence. ...
The instruments of political economy that must be implemented have to be in proportion to the seriousness of the crisis: extremely powerful. ...
At issue is a major political choice we must make right now, taking advantage of the opportunity offered by implementation of the rescue plans and recovery policies announced these last few weeks, and also those still to come.
For example, why not direct the aid offered to the automobile industry and all public assistance in general towards research and development of an economic model and technologies that act in concert with the fight against global warming.
Why not guarantee first those bank loans towards investments in clean technology and renewable energy? Why not change the tax code to reduce the relative price of those technologies and those energies?
All those initiatives are recovery measures. Today, we have the possibility to create a technology shock equivalent to the one industry experienced with the appearance of railroads or electricity, the source of long phases of economic growth. Le Monde Interview w/ Sir Nicholas Stern, Translated by Leslie Thatcher, Truthout, 12-13-08

Let us hoped the messages of Gore and Stern are echoed in the streets and on the air waves, let us hope they are heeded in the corridors of power.

You and I must be in the vanguard -- in words, thoughts, prayers, and especially deeds. Please go into this Julian calendar New Year with open eyes, a simple message and a strong voice.

If you have not already joined the Alliance for Climate Protection, Al Gore and I urge you to do so. Click here.

For an archive of Words of Power posts on Economic Insecurity, click here.

For the Words of Power Climate Crisis Updates Archive, click here.

Click here for access to great promotional tools available on The Eleventh Hour action page.

To sign the Live Earth Pledge, click here.

For analysis of the US mainstream news media's failure to treat global warming and climate change with accuracy or appropriae urgency, click here for Media Matters' compilation of "Myths and Falsehoods about Global Warming".

Want to participate in the effort to mitigate the impact of global warming? Download "Ten Things You Can Do"

Want to join over one million people on the Stop Global Warming Virtual March, and become part of the movement to demand our leaders freeze and reduce carbon dioxide emissions now? Click here.

Center for American Progress Action Fund's Mic Check Radio has released a witty and compelling compilation on the Top 100 Effects of Global Warming, organized into sections like "Global Warming Wrecks All the Fun" (e.g., "Goodbye to Pinot Noir," "Goodbye to Baseball," "Goodbye to Salmon Dinners," "Goodbye to Ski Vacations," etc.), "Global Warming Kills the Animals" (e.g., "Death March of the Penguins," "Dying Grey Whales," "Farewell to Frogs," etc.) and yes, "Global Warming Threatens Our National Security" (e.g., "Famine," "Drought," "Large-Scale Migrations," "The World's Checkbook," etc.) I urge you to utilize Top 100 Effects of Global Warming in your dialogues with friends, family and colleagues.

Richard Power's Left-Handed Security: Overcoming Fear, Greed & Ignorance in This Era of Global Crisis is available now! Click here for more information.

Nicholas Stern, Global Warming, Energy Security, Environmental Security, Alternate Energy, Sustainability, Green Power, Renewable Resources, Climate Change, Human Rights, Al Gore, An Inconvenient Truth,Laurie David, Stop Global Warming!, The Eleventh Hour, Organic Gardening, Richard Power, Words of Power

Hard Rain Late Night: Sinead O'Connor -- Fire On Babylon

Hard Rain Late Night: Sinead O'Connor -- Fire On Babylon



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Sinead O'Connor, Late Night, Music, Richard Power, Words of Power

Stepping Back Thru the Looking Glass: The UAW, Caroline Kennedy, Mike Connell, Rick Warren & Our Future

Diego Rivera's Detroit Murals (Detroit Institute of Art)


In short:
-Not medical
-Not weather
-Not running out of gas ... Larisa Alexandrovna on the Death of Mike Connell, 12-12-08

The fact is that Caroline Kennedy has a first rate mind and class. She would bring both to the Senate. She's dedicated to education, a real New Yorker, and a woman who has raised her family, hoping now to give back to her country in a manner that is mutually beneficial to all, including New York state. Taylor Marsh, 12-6-08

Stepping Back Thru the Looking Glass: The UAW, Caroline Kennedy, Mike Connell, Rick Warren & Our Future

By Richard Power

Perhaps you noticed (and wondered) why I have allowed several important stories -- e.g., the US auto industry crisis,the struggle over the NY Senate seat, the Obama invitation to Rick Warren to perform the inaugural invocation, and the death of Mike Connell -- to develop without offering any analysis.

After the Obama-Biden victory in the November election, I promised myself I would take a couple of steps back from US domestic politics, while following the heat and the action via those established bastions of the alternative media in whom I have great confidence (e.g., Buzzflash, Democracy Now!, Thom Hartmann Show, Crooks and Liars, Think Progress, Raw Story, etc.)

But since we are on the topic of those issues Words of Power has not weighed in on over the last several weeks, indulge me for a few moments:

On the US auto industry crisis: When you consider how easily the political establishment got out your checkbook to reward the recklessness of those who got us all into these dire financial straits, and then how stubbornly that same political establishment refused to write a check for the US auto industry, which had been brought to its knees because of that very recklessness, there are two conclusions to be drawn, 1) the political establishment and the mainstream news media are either in denial about the scope of the dangers ahead, or have suffered debilitating loss of mental faculties after decades of Greenspanitis and the cult of Milton Friedman and 2) much of the skewering of the US auto industry on the air waves and on the floor of the US Senate was simply a bold, naked and desperate attempt to break the back of the United Autoworkers Union (UAW) and by extension break the backs of organized Labor as a whole. This viciousness must not be allowed to succeed.

On the US Senate seat in New York: There are many qualified and worthy candidates for the seat that Hillary Clinton is leaving to become Obama's Secretary of State. So what? I raised myself on the streets of NYC, and I am unabashedly behind the drive to give it to Caroline Kennedy. It would be both a powerful symbolic move at a critical moment and a refreshingly intimate and personal move. Caroline is a different kind of person than the career politicians that largely populate the US Senate. She has made different life choices, and she has accumulated a different life experience. If she makes it to the floor of the US Senate, she will surprise and delight the electorate. Furthermore, on a pragmatic level, the person appointed to that seat will have to face TWO elections in four years. What is most disturbing is the mean-spirited and (as usual with Democrats) self-destructive nature of the attacks against her, in particular from Bill Press on his radio show.

On Rick Warren: The Sermon on the Mount is one of the most extraordinary statements in all of human history, and it is well past time that those who are given the bully pulpit in its name are something more than bullies. We will not know for awhile if this was another brilliant political and psychological move by Obama, or his first really unfortunate blunder in the aftermath of the election. But for now and from here, I concur with Rachel Maddow, it seems to be a "lose, lose proposition" that hints disturbingly at arrogance borne of an incredible hitting-streak.

On the Death of Mike Connell: In the course of the 2008 election cycle, there were two critically important developments in Election Security. It is vital that both are understood. The first critically important development is that at a press conference over the summer, the revelations of Republican information security operative turned whistleblower, William Spoonamore, took us beyond "what if" and "it seems like" and into naming companies and individuals and posting charts of not only what could happen but how it happened and where. The second critically important development was that the progressive movement together with people of good will and reasonableness from both the savaged center and the embarrassed right took back the electoral process (at least for one cycle) and proved an assumption we clung to through the last eight years, i.e., IF the turn-out was big enough and IF the margin of victory was wide enough, the will of the electorate could not be canceled out. Or was it just that the heat was on, and those who dared before did not dare this time? We may never know. Either way there was an historic and desperately necessary victory. So this is a critical juncture -- the movement to restore the integrity and sanctity of your vote must not be abandoned or relegated to obscurity. The great danger incorporated into the process through electronic voting, caging, and other unsafe and unsavory elements, is still with us. Now Connell, named by Spoonamore, is dead. It is important that you understand that protection and immunity had been requested for him from federal and state law enforcement prior to the crash of his small plane. It had not been granted, and he was left vulnerable. You can follow this story closely via those Heroes of the Evolution, Brad Friedman, Mark Crispin Miller and Larisa Alexandrovna, and elsewhere in the alternative media. It is as big as the Don Siegelman story and it must not be allowed to die.
(Click here to watch Amy Goodman's interview with Mark Crispin Miller on Connell's death.)

Restoring the republic was one of the core issues which motivated the founding of Words of Power. Although this struggle is far from over, the course of the future is, for the present, in the hands of sane men and women (i.e., the incoming Obama-Biden administration and a Democratic majorities in both the Senate and the House of Representatives.

I choose the word "sane" because you and I know that the leadership is not nearly progressive enough, but they are, however, sane and responsible, and after the last eight years, I am grateful for "sane" and "responsible."

We will have to monitor the course of events closely and raise bloody hell if it gets off-track or if the pace is too incremental. Given our dire environmental and economic circumstances, "too incremental" is a synonym for national suicide.

Words of Power will be re-focusing on its other core issues, i.e., the Climate and Sustainability Crisis, Human Rights (in particular, Darfur, Burma and the Congo, as well as the empowerment of women and the rescue of child soldiers globally) and Economic Security.

As profound and desperate the victory in November 2008 was, we have several more life or death deadlines rapidly approaching: the nations of the world must act on the Climate Crisis collectively, sweepingly and without delay, in 2009, they must also achieve the UN Millennium Development Goals by 2015; meanwhile, every dawn that breaks is another deadline for the wretched of the earth in Darfur, Burma, the Congo and other hell holes of the world's moral failure; and all of this world of woe is grinding on against the backdrop of a Global Financial and Economic Meltdown that threatens to bottom out in a second Great Depression.

For a Words of Power Archive of posts on the Crisis in Darfur, click here.

For the Words of Power Climate Crisis Updates Archive, click here.

For an archive of Words of Power posts on Economic Insecurity, click here.

For an archive of Words of Power posts on UN Millennium Development Goals, click here.

For a directory of Words of Power Human Rights Updates, click here.

Richard Power's Left-Handed Security: Overcoming Fear, Greed & Ignorance in This Era of Global Crisis is available now! Click here for more information.

Darfur, Caroline Kennedy, UAW, UN, Genocide, Rick Warren,Mike Connell, Climate Change, Richard Power, Words of Power

The Bush Legacy on Darfur: Joy to the World? Glories of His Righteousness? Wonders of His Love? He Rules the World?

For More Compelling Photos from Mia Farrow's Journeys, click here.

The Bush Legacy on Darfur: Joy to the World? Glories of His Righteousness? Wonders of His Love? He Rules the World?

By Richard Power

As I moved through the streets of the city today, amidst hard-working people hurrying every which way to meet the material and emotional needs of their loved ones, trying as best they could, in an anxious atmosphere, to celebrate the mysteries of love, I could not stop thinking about an op-ed piece I read late last night: Five Steps to End Genocide in Darfur

Reps. Barbara Lee (D-CA)and Stenny Hoyer (D-MD) shared the byline.

There is nothing in it that you and I do not already know. And that is why it is so disturbing to read.

It suggests nothing impractical or unrealistic.

There is nothing suggested in the Lee-Hoyer op-ed that could not have been done at any point over the last few years, IF the Bush-Cheney regime had not been disingenuous in its policies regarding Darfur and its participation in the deliberations of the UN Security Council.

China would not have blown off the consensus of the world community if that consensus had been marshaled in the name of the people of Darfur during the years leading up to the Beijing Olympics; and it could have been marshaled by the USA.

And what will happen in the coming months?

Susan Rice, the woman Barack Obama has chosen to be his Ambassador to the UN understands both what must be done in Darfur and what must be done to strengthen the UN for the Herculean tasks that lie ahead. But Rice and her colleagues not only have to deal with the costly and intractable problems of Iraq and Afghanistan, and all that those foolish military adventures have done to us, they must also deal with a dire economic crisis that threatens to bottom out into a second Great Depression.

In contemplating the Bush legacy project, the list of abominations that vie for the label of "vilest" is long, but the deceit on Darfur definitely ranks in the top five.

Here is a distillation of the Lee-Hoyer piece, with a link to the full text:

First, we must reinvigorate the peace process. Darfur needs a comprehensive political solution. ...
Second, it is essential to ensure continued humanitarian access. Humanitarian conditions in Darfur continue to erode: There are increasing food shortages and violence in Darfur's Internally Displaced Persons camps, and murder, theft, and vehicle hijacking is on the rise. ...
Third, we must help the peacekeepers do their jobs. In 2007, the U.N. Security Council established a hybrid African Union/United Nations peacekeeping force for Darfur, yet less than half of the 26,000-strong force is in place. ...
Fourth, the Obama administration should engage the international community on Darfur. Next to the United States, no country has greater power to stop the genocide than China, whose $8 billion investment in Sudan's oil industry gives it both an economic interest in stability and the leverage to bring it about. ...
Fifth, the civil war between Sudan's North and South must not be allowed to flare again into violence. Five Steps to End Genocide in Darfur, San Francisco Chronicle, 12-23-08

I encourage you to follow events in Darfur on Mia Farrow's site, it is the real-time journal of a humanitarian at work; the content is compelling, insightful and fiercely independent.

For a Words of Power Archive of posts on the Crisis in Darfur, click here.

Here are other sites of importance:

Dream for Darfur

Enough: The Project to End Genocide and Mass Atrocities

Genocide Intervention Network

Divest for Darfur.

Save Darfur!

Richard Power's Left-Handed Security: Overcoming Fear, Greed & Ignorance in This Era of Global Crisis is available now! Click here for more information.

Darfur, Divestment, Enough, UN, Genocide, Mia Farrow, Dream for Darfur, Sudan, Investors Against Genocide, Richard Power, Words of Power

Hard Rain Late Night: Chloe Goodchild -- Om Tara Tutare Ture Soham

Hard Rain Late Night: Chloe Goodchild -- Om Tara Tutare Ture Soham



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Chloe Goodchild,You Tube, Late Night, Music, Richard Power, Words of Power

No more than a strand in the infinite web of life, interconnected w/ every other strand; no less than an agent of change that can effect the whole

Image: Winter Solstice (Mother Jones)


In 1925, Mahatma Gandhi remarked that "Sanitation is more important than political independence." More than 80 years later, access to basic sanitation remains out of reach for 546 million people in sub-Saharan Africa. Inter Press Service, 12-19-08

In a statement the Bank of Japan painted a grim picture of the economy and echoed sentiments that led to the government's prediction of zero growth in real terms for seven years. Agence France Press, 12-19-08

Catastrophes killed more than 238,000 people this year ... the total cost to society was 225 billion dollars (182 billion euros)... The worst year of natural and man-made catastrophes was 2005, with 374,042 people killed and 107 billion dollars in insured losses. Agence France Press, 12-18-08

Hurricanes and earthquakes win more headlines but heatwaves claim most lives, according to a survey of mortality from natural threats in the United States. Agence France Press, 12-17-08

No more than a strand in the infinite web of life, interconnected w/ every other strand; no less than an agent of change that can effect the whole

By Richard Power

This is a Solstice message. In the Northern Hemisphere, it is the Winter Solstice; in the Southern Hemisphere, it is the Summer Solstice. Either way, it is a profound turning of the wheel, a juncture of great power and great promise.

The reality of this world is more like a wild dance around a great bonfire than some ancient edifice stumbled upon in the wilderness. The truth of our circumstances is fluid, not solid. You must enter in that wild dance, and feel the rhythm from inside of the circle, you cannot simply sandblast away the sediment of centuries to reveal its stony edifice. The message of our time is only partially revealed in the symphonic silence of the mountains; to grok the whole of it, you must also hear the part that is whispered, wept and wailed in the villages far below.

Reality is fractal, truth is ever evolving. The time for contemplation is past, this is the time for compassionate action. It is a common humanity that must guide us, a shared vision of the oneness. If you know that you are no more are than a single strand in the infinite web of life interconnected with every other strand, and therefore no less than an agent of change that can effect the whole, then you carry this vision inside of you, and you are moving in the exultant heat of that wild dance.

Wherever you live, it is up to you to bring this vision into the public discourse.

Maybe you live in the USA, which has just pulled back from the brink of the abyss, or in the EU, which has been waiting for its significant other to pull itself back from the brink of the abyss.

Maybe you live in India or Brazil or any of the other G-20 nations, where you have been waiting for the USA and the EU to wake up to the new geopolitical order that is growing up through the cracks and fissures in the old geopolitical order.

Maybe you live in a forsaken and failed nation, where you have been waiting for the great nations, the once and future great nations and the would-be great nations to wake up to the simple truth that the wretchedness of your plight is not as far from their current circumstances as they pretend.

Maybe you live in some place in between one and another of these groupings.

But wherever you live, you can be assured of one painful fact -- it is unlikely that the political establishment, or the mainstream media, or the business community or the religious leadership is really ready to meet the challenges of what the present and future dangers demand of us all.

You must lead them. Of course, they will pretend as they always do that they are leading you, but in reality as it has always been at the watershed moments of human history, it is you who will lead them to the barricades.

Over the last couple of years, I have written of the great and pressing deadlines that we face collectively. One of them has been met. The USA has chosen reason over madness. As vital as that victory of delusion was it was only the beginning.

In 2009, the planet as a whole must meet the deadline of going green, not symbolically or cosmetically, but swiftly and substantially. And it is not really a question of whether or not this can be achieved in the current global financial meltdown and resultant economic crisis; in reality, there is no way out of our dire financial and economic straits other than going green swiftly and substantially.

Another deadline we cannot afford to fail in meeting is achieving the UN Millennium Development Goals by 2015. If our species does not accomplish these tasks, the sustainability and human rights problems that the MDG aim at mitigating will overwhelm us even if the climate crisis does not.

Meanwhile, there are deadlines that we have already missed. They linger, festering on the ground in the world's remote regions, as well as inside of our own troubled psyches. For example, every day that something sweeping and awe-inspiring is not done to stop the slow-motion genocide in Darfur, we are all diminished and further demoralized, whether we acknowledge it or not. Nor can the gang rape of the Congo, the brutalization of Burma, or the systematic cultural dismemberment of Tibet simply be ineffectually fretted over any longer. Concerted, compassionate action must be taken.

You must force all of this to happen. How? By showing your political establishment, mainstream media, business community and spiritual leadership that you understand the reality of the world, and the truth of our circumstances, better than they do, and that they cannot avoid embracing your vision of oneness, collective responsibility, sustainability and compassionate action.

Here are excerpts from four stories that underscore the urgent need for a new vision and a new way, with links to the full texts:

In 1925, Mahatma Gandhi remarked that "Sanitation is more important than political independence." More than 80 years later, access to basic sanitation remains out of reach for 546 million people in sub-Saharan Africa.
In East Africa, not one country is on track to meet Millennium Development Goal Seven, which aims to reduce by half the number of people without access to clean drinking water and decent sanitation by 2015.
Despite governments in the region being signatories to several declarations on improving sanitation, many East African households still lack access to flush toilets or pit latrines. Open defecation is widespread, and 'flying toilets', where people defecate in plastic bags and throw them away at night are the rule rather than the exception in many informal settlements. Inter Press Service, 12-19-08

Evidence of global downturn deepened on Friday as oil prices plunged again, Japan slashed interest rates to near zero to stave off recession and a top banking association warned the world economy will contract in 2009. ... Mature economies -- including the United States, the 15-nation eurozone and Japan -- that are now in recession were forecast to contract a hefty 1.4 percent amid the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression. ... In a statement the Bank of Japan painted a grim picture of the economy and echoed sentiments that led to the government's prediction of zero growth in real terms for seven years. ... "Under these circumstances, economic conditions have been deteriorating and are likely to increase in severity in the immediate future," it said. Agence France Press, 12-19-08

Catastrophes killed more than 238,000 people this year, with cyclone Nargis which swept through Myanmar accounting for more than half the deaths, a study by reinsurer Swiss Re showed on Thursday.
"While the total cost to society was 225 billion dollars (182 billion euros), 50 billion dollars was covered by property insurance, making 2008 the second costliest year ever in terms of insured losses," the world's biggest reinsurer said.
The worst year of natural and man-made catastrophes was 2005, with 374,042 people killed and 107 billion dollars in insured losses. Agence France Press, 12-18-08

Hurricanes and earthquakes win more headlines but heatwaves claim most lives, according to a survey of mortality from natural threats in the United States ... The study is published by an open-access British review, the International Journal of Health Geographics. ... Heat and drought accounted for 19.6 percent of total deaths. This was followed by severe summer weather, where hail, lightning and thunderstorms, accounted for 18.8 percent of deaths; and by severe winter weather, where snow and ice were to blame for 18.1 percent of fatalities. Earthquakes, wildfires and hurricanes were responsible for less than five percent of all deaths from natural hazards combined. Agence France Press, 12-17-08

For the Words of Power Climate Crisis Updates Archive, click here.

For an archive of Words of Power posts on Economic Insecurity, click here.

For an archive of Words of Power posts on UN Millennium Development Goals, click here.

For a directory of Words of Power Human Rights Updates, click here.

For a Words of Power Archive of posts on the Crisis in Darfur, click here.

Richard Power's Left-Handed Security: Overcoming Fear, Greed & Ignorance in This Era of Global Crisis is available now! Click here for more information.

Darfur, Global Warming, UN Millennium Development Goals, Natural Disasters, Richard Power, Words of Power


Past is Prologue: Santayana, History, the Global Economy, the "War on Terrorism" & the Damned -- Where Do You Stand?

Disintegration of the Persistence of Memory, Salvador Dali


There will come a moment when the most urgent threats posed by the credit crisis have eased and the larger task before us will be to chart a direction for the economic steps ahead. This will be a dangerous moment. Joseph Stiglitz, Vanity Fair, 12-10-08

What we're experiencing now is blowback, the cumulative result of decades of quick fixes and dirty deeds. The carpet's squelching under our feet. Arundhati Roi, 12-12-08

Obviously, the news media should aggressively investigate and report on actual involvement in actual wrongdoing by public figures. There was far too little of that reporting during the Bush administration. (Remember when the media refused to report on the Downing Street Memo? Good times.) Media Matters, 12-12-08

Past is Prologue: Santayana, History, the Global Economy, the "War on Terrorism" & the Damned -- Where Do You Stand?
By Richard Power

This is could well be the last time I post on the Bush-Cheney regime. It has been a long and difficult eight years. Many among us have suffered personally and professionally for daring to stand up both for our country and our common humanity.

Perhaps the biggest frame of all for any meaningful retrospective on the Bush-Cheney regime, and its enablers in the political establishment and mainstream news media, is the frequently cited utterance of the philosopher George Santayana: "Progress, far from consisting in change, depends on retentiveness. ... Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."

Of course, this statement is typically referenced to rouse the ire of the civilized world against the crime of genocide; and tragically, time after time since the Holocaust, Santayana's admonishment has been made poignantly relevant again, as one genocide after another has been allowed to proceed.

In addition, a bitter and tainted irony had come to envelope the oft-paraphrased remark ever since it was emblazoned on a banner hanging over Jim Jones' throne in Guyana, providing a backdrop for the swollen, stinking corpses of hundreds of lost souls who had been trapped in his madness and coerced into swallowing the Kool-Aid.

But after the last eight years, the bitter irony enveloping Santayana's warning should leave an even stronger taste in your mouth.

Not just because the genocide in Darfur has unfolded before the diverted eyes of the "civilized world" for these last few years.

But also because the Bush-Cheney regime contemptuously dismissed the lessons of Vietnam in the invasion and occupation of Iraq. Indeed, Colin Powell, the Bush-Cheney regime's own Secretary of State, had articulated the very lessons that were flushed down the toilet in the rush to that foolish military adventure. (To refresh your own memory about the "Powell Doctrine," click here.)

And because, in addition, the Bush-Cheney regime also contemptuously dismissed the lessons of Watergate, COINTELPRO, etc., enshrined, as they were, in the Church Committee's heroic efforts to reaffirm the sanctity of the Bill of Rights. (To refresh your own memory about the the Church Committee, click here.)

Not to mention the Geneva Accords, which are not at all ambiguous about the nature of torture or the banning of it, and the UN Charter, which does not allow a nation to launch unilateral and preemptive war.

Well, as it were not humbling enough to acknowledge that the lessons of Vietnam and Watergate had been dismissed and indeed mocked by Kool-Aid dispensers in high places, now we must also acknowledge that an even older, bigger and more foundational lesson has also been dismissed and mocked by those same Kool-Aid dispensers and their fellow-travelers, i.e., the lesson of the Great Depression and what Herbert Hoover and the philosophy he symbolizes did to precipitate it.

Remember, past is prologue. If you want to take away a lesson from this catastrophe, I suggest this one is fool-proof: Never allow anyone to take the highest office in the land if someone else won the election; never allow what happened in Florida in 2000 or Ohio in 2004 to happen again.

In the spirit of Santayana, as we close out this grim and embarrassing episode in US history, and hopefully move forward together as a nation -- left, right and center -- to heal and restore our traditions, I offer some insights of importance to those of you who wish to remember --

First, in Vanity Fair, Nobel prize winning economist Joseph Stiglitz provides a five point analysis of how we arrive at the threshold of a second Great Depression:

No. 1: Firing the Chairman: In 1987 the Reagan administration decided to remove Paul Volcker as chairman of the Federal Reserve Board and appoint Alan Greenspan in his place.
No. 2: Tearing Down the Walls: The deregulation philosophy would pay unwelcome dividends for years to come. In November 1999, Congress repealed the Glass-Steagall Act-the culmination of a $300 million lobbying effort by the banking and financial-services industries, and spearheaded in Congress by Senator Phil Gramm.
No. 3: Applying the Leeches: Then along came the Bush tax cuts, enacted first on June 7, 2001, with a follow-on installment two years later.
No. 4: Faking the Numbers: ... Unfortunately, in the negotiations over what became Sarbanes-Oxley a decision was made not to deal with what many, including the respected former head of the S.E.C. Arthur Levitt, believed to be a fundamental underlying problem: stock options.
No. 5: Letting It Bleed: The final turning point came with the passage of a bailout package on October 3, 2008-that is, with the administration's response to the crisis itself. We will be feeling the consequences for years to come. Joseph Stiglitz, Capitalist Fools, Vanity Fair, 12-10-08

Second, the brilliant and beautiful Indian writer-activist Arundhati Roy, reflects on the "war on terror" in the wake of the slaughter in Mumbai:

There are those who point out that US strategy has been successful inasmuch as the United States has not suffered a major attack on its home ground since 9/11. However, some would say that what America is suffering now is far worse. If the idea behind the 9/11 terror attacks was to goad America into showing its true colors, what greater success could the terrorists have asked for? The US army is bogged down in two unwinnable wars, which have made the United States the most hated country in the world. Those wars have contributed greatly to the unraveling of the American economy and who knows, perhaps eventually the American empire. (Could it be that battered, bombed Afghanistan, the graveyard of the Soviet Union, will be the undoing of this one too?) Hundreds of thousands people including thousands of American soldiers have lost their lives in Iraq and Afghanistan. The frequency of terrorist strikes on U.S allies/agents (including India) and U.S interests in the rest of the world has increased dramatically since 9/11. George Bush, the man who led the US response to 9/11 is a despised figure not just internationally, but also by his own people. Who can possibly claim that the United States is winning the war on terror? Arundhati Roi, Guardian, 12-12-08

Third, David Brock's Media Matters delivers the discouraging message that for the US mainstream news media, it is business as usual, and that seemingly nothing has been learned in that concentration of opinion-shaping power:

Perhaps the most striking aspect of the media's attempts to link Obama to the Blagojevich scandal has been the volume of news reports that are purely speculative -- and not only speculative, but vaguely speculative. That is, they don't even consist of conjecture about specific potential wrong doing. They simply consist of completely baseless speculation that Obama might in some way become caught up in the investigation at some point in the future, for some reason. It's little more than, "Maybe Obama will be involved." Well, sure. And maybe he'll play shortstop for the Washington Nationals next year. Media Matters, 12-12-08

For an archive of Words of Power posts on Economic Insecurity, click here.

For an archive of Words of Power posts on 9/11 and Terrorism, click here.

For Words of Power's archive of posts on Corporate News Media Complicity, Power of Alternative Media, Propaganda & Freedom, click here.

For a Words of Power Archive of posts on the Crisis in Darfur, click here.

Richard Power's Left-Handed Security: Overcoming Fear, Greed & Ignorance in This Era of Global Crisis is available now! Click here for more information.

Joseph Stiglitz, Arundhati Roi, Media Matters, George Santayana, Richard Power, Words of Power


Hard Rain Late Night: Sade -- By Your Side

Hard Rain Late Night: Sade -- By Your Side



Click here for Hard Rain Late Night Music Video -- Archive

Sade,You Tube, Late Night, Music, Richard Power, Words of Power

Food & Financial Sustainability Meltdown: Do You Really Think There are Even 6 Degrees of Separation Between You & People in Burma, Darfur or Congo?

Our Lady of Guadalupe

Planetary Food & Financial Sustainability Meltdown: Do You Really Think There are Even Six Degrees of Separation Between You & the People of Burma, or Darfur or Congo?

By Richard Power

For years now, tracking those stories I felt cried out for attention from the intersection of security, sustainability and spirituality, I have been posting Darfur Crisis Updates, Burma Crisis Updates, Congo Crisis Updates, as well as Climate Crisis Updates, Sustainability Updates, Food Security Updates and Economic Insecurity Updates, etc.

But tonight, on the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, under the biggest Full Moon seen in 15 years (in the Northern Hemisphere), I will post just this single Global Crisis Update on the Food and Financial Sustainability Meltdown. Because, after all, it is all interconnected, it is all a oneness.

In the 21st Century, economic security cannot be achieved without energy security and environmental security. In the 21st Century, the loss of human rights in one nation diminishes human rights in every nation. The horror that seems to be occurring far away is much closer than you think, and it is moving your way. If you turn your back on your neighbor in need, who will be there for you?

The so-called "Six Degrees of Separation" have collapsed into three, two, one ...

Here are six stories that erase those six degrees of separation -- three on the world food security crisis, and one on 30 additions to the "Dirty List" of corporations enabling the Thugocracy in Burma, along with an extraordinary post from humanitarian activist Mia Farrow now on the ground in the Congo, and an excerpt on Darfur from "Scream Bloody Murder," Christian Amanpour's powerful documentary on the collective failure of the great nations to stop the genocides that have occurred on our watch:

Nicholas D. Kristof on the need for a Secretary of Food:

"A Department of Agriculture made sense 100 years ago when 35 percent of Americans engaged in farming. But today, fewer than 2 percent are farmers. In contrast, 100 percent of Americans eat." New York Times, 12-11-08

US Conference of Mayors on homelessness and hunger in the USA:

Out of 25 cities across the United States surveyed by the US Conference of Mayors, 83 percent said homelessness in general had increased over the past year while 16 cities, or nearly two-thirds of those polled, cited a rise in the number of families who had been forced out of their homes. Agence France Press, 12-12-08

UN Food and Agriculture Organisation on global hunger:

The Rome-based organisation said that a preliminary estimate showed the number of undernourished people rose this year by 40m to about 963m people, after rising 75m in 2007. Before the food crisis, there were about 848m chronically hungry people in 2003-05 Financial Times, 12-9-08

30 More Companies on the Burma Campaign UK's Dirty List:

30 new companies have been added to the “Dirty List” published today by the Burma Campaign UK. A total of 170 companies feature on the new list. The ‘Dirty List’ exposes companies that are directly or indirectly helping to finance Burma’s brutal military dictatorship. The Burma Campaign UK, 12-11-08 [To read the list, click here.]

Mia Farrow on the ground in the Congo:

People here are tense, even here in Goma, as the fighting -- between Nkunda's rebel ground and Congolese government forces -- took place at the very edge of the city. Outside the city people told me they are terrified-loved ones disappear in the night. They awaken to the sound of gunfire. (The children are to afraid even to go to school as they fear they will be abducted by rebel militia or raped). This is a failed state if ever there was one-a lawless place torn apart by violence. At the gates of UN peacekeepers' barracks, thousands of people are clustered in a makeshift camp. Although the peacekeeping operation (MONUC) has not provided adequate security, their presence is all there is for this traumatized population. Outside the gates I saw children literally starving to death. Mia Farrow, 12-11-08

Excerpt from Christian Amanpour's "Scream Bloody Murder":

AMANPOUR (voice-over): Sixty years ago when Raphael Lemkin helped to write the Genocide Convention, he did not have the Internet.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: In Darfur, we have the power to save lives.
AMANPOUR: Or its ability to mobilize so many.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Not on our watch.
AMANPOUR: To speak out so strongly.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: One more time.
AMANPOUR: Now, genocide has its own grassroots movement. Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel says it has put genocide on the political agenda.
ELIE WIESEL, HOLOCAUST SURVIVOR: No other tragedy since 1945 has caught the imagination of so many people as Darfur has.
AMANPOUR: Eric Reeves is one of the fathers of the movement. A professor of English at Smith College, Reeves is a self-made expert on Sudan. He runs a one-man war room. Even while fighting his own five- year battle against leukemia.
ERIC REEVES, PROFESSOR: People like me, Khartoum, I've definitely gotten under their skin.
AMANPOUR: Reeves was one of the first activists to call Darfur genocide, early in 2004.
REEVES: I thought that I was creating a moment in which a debate would take place, a debate about what to do. What will we do?
AMANPOUR (on camera): When the answer came, it was a sobering reminder that the U.N. is powerless to force its members to act, even in the face of mass murder. So after four years of U.N. resolutions, there is still no end to this crisis.
REEVES: There was no lack of information. There was no lack of understanding. There was a lack of will to stop genocide. Year after year after year.
AMANPOUR: In 2004, Darfur was finally on the agenda. A Security Council resolution demanded that Sudan disarm the militias attacking the villages. But it issued no ultimatum to back up that demand, not even a trade embargo if Sudan refused.
The main spoiler was China, one of five countries on the Security Council with veto power. China has major construction contracts in Sudan. It buys oil from Sudan, and it sells Sudan its weapons.
REEVES: And at every point China has said no sanctions against Khartoum. None.
AMANPOUR: Sudan said sanctions were unnecessary, because it would punish anyone who committed crimes against civilians. But after two more years of death and destruction, the Security Council voted in 2006 for a peacekeeping force. This time, China went along, as long as the U.N. invited Sudan's consent.
REEVES: That was the phrase that China purchased with its threat of a veto. That invitation was declined.
AMANPOUR: Outraged, Reeves and other activists, including actress Mia Farrow, began putting the squeeze on China. By calling the Beijing Olympics...
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The genocide Olympics.
REEVES: I said, this is the phrase that will hurt China. This is the phrase that will get to China. ...
AMANPOUR: Twenty-six thousand soldiers and police. But after all that, a year into the mission, the force is less than half strength. And Darfur has descended into near anarchy. Bandits routinely hijack U.N. food convoys. U.N. patrols are ambushed. Peacekeepers are stripped of their weapons and even killed.
Despite all this, Eric Reeves believes the unprecedented grass roots protests have not been in vain.
REEVES: Without the outrage by American advocacy, we'd be looking at hundreds of thousands of additional deaths.
AMANPOUR: The prosecutor at the International Criminal Court has charged Sudan's president with genocide. This was the president's defiant response. Why, fourteen years after Rwanda, 60 years after the Genocide Convention, has the world's response in Darfur been so little, so late?
REEVES: That's the question I didn't ask myself forcefully enough, and I can only plead foolishness. CNN,12-4-08

Richard Power's Left-Handed Security: Overcoming Fear, Greed & Ignorance in This Era of Global Crisis is available now! Click here for more information.

Mia Farrow, Christian Amanpour, Eric Reeves, Burma, Darfur, Congo, Richard Power, Words of Power


Imagine Peace, Cultivate Happiness

Imagine Peace


Imagine Peace, Cultivate Happiness

By Richard Power

The IMAGINE PEACE TOWER in Reykjavik has gone dark again. Dedicated on October 9th 2007, Lennon’s 67th birthday, it is "an outdoor work of art conceived by Yoko Ono in memory of John Lennon" and "symbolizes Lennon’s and Ono’s struggle for world peace which began in the sixties."

Yoko Ono has it lit every year from October 9th (the anniversary of John Lennon's birth) to December 8th (the anniversary of his assassination) as a symbol, a beacon and a focus of prayer and wishes.

So now that the green-powered shaft of light has been turned off until next year, I exhort you to not only "Imagine Peace," but also to "Cultivate Happiness," particularly at this strange juncture of great political hope and great economic despair.

Today, you are the symbol, the beacon and the focus.

To overcome the challenges of achieving economic security, environmental security and energy security, we are going to need not only courage, compassion and clarity of mind, but also an indomitable inner happiness. It is not only attainable, it is actually our natural state, if we just allow ourselves to experience it in the space between our thoughts and graspings.

As fuel for the stoking of your internal hearth, I commend two recent news stories to you.

One, from the S.F. Chronicle, tells how the government of Bhutan has begun a global trend toward factoring happiness and well-being into our understanding of national strength and success. "The dogma of limitless productivity and growth in a finite world is unsustainable and unfair for future generations."

The other, from the L.A. Times, reports on the importance of "social networks" in the spreading of happiness and well-being. "A happy friend who lives within a half-mile makes you 42% more likely to be happy yourself."

Take a few moments to read these excerpts, and the articles they link to, and then factor their messages into your work.

In the thick of a global financial crisis, many economists have come to this Himalayan kingdom to study a unique economic policy called Gross National Happiness [GNH], based on Buddhist principles. ... "Happiness is very serious business," Bhutan Prime Minister Jigme Thinley said. "The dogma of limitless productivity and growth in a finite world is unsustainable and unfair for future generations." ...
"We can no longer approach the 21st century with the instruments of the 20th century," said Nicholas Rosellini, head of the U.N. mission in Bhutan.
Indeed, GNH guidelines are being adopted in Brazil, India and Haiti.
But the most extensive programs are occurring in Canada, Australia, the United States and France. The Canadian Index on Well-being, Measuring Australia's Well-being project and State of the USA are all trying to measure the well-being of its inhabitants.
Sabina Alkire, professor of economics at Oxford University, says such surveys are geared to measuring the quality of life irrespective of gross domestic product. "Happiness is a mysterious and profound thing, and any means of measuring it is imperfect," she said. "But it is much less imperfect than GDP." ...
For GNH to grow, government must concentrate on four key areas:
-- Promotion of equitable and sustainable socio-economic development
-- Preservation and promotion of cultural values
-- Conservation of the environment
-- Good government
In a bid to popularize the concept internationally, the Bhutanese government is devising a GNH index that is expected to be ready as early as the end of the year. Unlike the gross domestic product index, however, a GNH index measures the quality of life based on 72 standards. Don Duncan, S.F. Chronicle, 12-4-08



In a study published online today by the British Medical Journal, scientists from Harvard University and UC San Diego showed that happiness spreads readily through social networks of family members, friends and neighbors.
Knowing someone who is happy makes you 15.3% more likely to be happy yourself, the study found. A happy friend of a friend increases your odds of happiness by 9.8%, and even your neighbor's sister's friend can give you a 5.6% boost. ...
A happy friend who lives within a half-mile makes you 42% more likely to be happy yourself. If that same friend lives two miles away, his impact drops to 22%. Happy friends who are more distant have no discernible impact, according to the study.
Similarly, happy siblings make you 14% more likely to be happy yourself, but only if they live within one mile. Happy spouses provide an 8% boost -- if they live under the same roof. Next-door neighbors who are happy make you 34% more likely to be happy too, but no other neighbors have an effect, even if they live on the same block. ... Richard Suzman, director of behavioral and social research at the National Institute on Aging, said Fowler's and Christakis' work was persuasive enough to force policymakers to rethink the importance of social ties when contemplating happiness or obesity or smoking. "You can't just treat individuals; you have to treat networks or communities," he said. Karen Kaplan, LA Times, 12-5-08


Richard Power's Left-Handed Security: Overcoming Fear, Greed & Ignorance in This Era of Global Crisis is available now! Click here for more information.

Yoko Ono, John Lennon, Imagine Peace, Bhutan, Iceland, Reykjavik, Richard Power, Words of Power


Hard Rain Late Night: Natalie Merchant -- Kind and Generous

Hard Rain Late Night: Natalie Merchant -- Kind and Generous



Click here for Hard Rain Late Night Music Video -- Archive

Natalie Merchant,You Tube, Late Night, Music, Richard Power, Words of Power

The Congo Conflict is An Economic War, Rape is Being Used as a Weapon of Terror; Here is What Should Be Done & Why It Won't Be (At Least Not Soon)

Read Mission Song. John Le Carre's extraordinary thriller about the Congo. Click here for the Buzzflash review.

"Hundreds of women & children were raped yesterday, hundreds more today. This is an economic war that uses terror as its main weapon." Stephen Leahy, Inter Press Service, 12-4-08

"This is a resource war," says Muzong Kodi of Chatham House, another British think tank. "There won't be a long-term solution if the issue of illicit exploitation is not solved." Eastern Congo is a treasure house of natural resources, especially cassiterite, the ore from which tin is made, as well as gold, diamonds and coltan, an essential mobile-phone component. ... Rod Norland, Newsweek, 12-6-08

Oxfam is extremely disappointed by the unwillingness of European governments to provide a temporary peacekeeping mission to DRC. Member states must live up to their responsibility to protect civilians caught up in fighting and they must do it now. EU leaders have to face up to the stark choice before them. Failure to do so means armed men go on murdering, raping and looting indiscriminately and the enormous suffering in DRC continues.” said Elise Ford, head of Oxfam's EU office in Brussels. OXFAM, 12-3-08

Congo Crisis Update: The Congo Conflict is an Economic War, Rape is Being Used as a Weapon of Terror; Here is What Should Be Done & Why It Won't Be (At Least Not Soon)

By Richard Power

If you searched "Congo" on Goggle News this morning, you would come up with a few hundred headlines on progress concerning "peace negotiations." Nothing wrong with working to get people to the table, but the suffering of the Congo will not end without a sweeping, international commitment to a new approach.

Such a commitment must be predicated upon an unadulterated acknowledgment that this bloodshed is about profits from coltan and other vital resources. Such a commitment would also require a willingness to commit 100,000 well-equipped soldiers to a peace-keeping force, with a meaningful mandate and pragmatic rules of engagement. Such a commitment would also require the personal leadership of some individual of global statue to drive the process.

Tragically, the fabric of the world community is as weak today as the Congo is sick, and the likelihood of such a serious commitment being made is as remote as the Kivu region itself. Yes, this can be reversed. The world community could get healthy fast in the new year, but meanwhile, "hundreds of women & children were raped yesterday, hundreds more today." I do not know what to suggest you do, but give to those NGOs that are on the scene and alleviating suffering as best they can, e.g., OXFAM and the Irish Red Cross.

Here are excerpts from three insightful pieces on the real issues in the Congo crisis, one from Inter Press Service, one from Newsweek, and one from OXFAM:

International lust for the enormous mineral and resource riches of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) abetted by international indifference has turned much of country into a colossal "rape mine" where more than 300,000 women and girls have been brutalised, say activists.
"Rape is being used as a deliberate tool to control people and territory," said Eve Ensler, a celebrated U.S. playwright and founder of V-Day, a global movement in 120 countries to end violence against women and girls. ... Hundreds of women and children were raped yesterday, hundreds more today. This is an economic war that uses terror as its main weapon to ensure warlords and their bands control regions where international companies mine for valuable metals like tin, silver and coltan, or extract lumber and diamonds, Ensler said.
Coltan is a rare and extremely valuable metal used in cell phones, DVD players, computers, digital cameras, video games, vehicle air bags, and more. ...
"A friend mapped the locations of the mass rapes in the DRC and they correspond to coltan mining regions," she said.
This "blood coltan" -- akin to blood diamonds -- generates billions of dollars of sales every year for electronics manufacturers in rich countries and brings hundreds of millions of dollars to rebels and others who control the coltan-producing regions. Stephen Leahy, Inter Press Service, 12-4-08

Foreign troops have proved successful in ending certain African crises before (such as Sierra Leone's in 2002). But Congo's problems are more daunting. The country is vast—the capital, Kinshasa, is more than 1,600 kilometers from Goma—and the conflict is extremely complex, involving some 20 militias and ethnic (Hutu vs. Tutsi) hostilities. "You would need a minimum of 100,000 soldiers to have a credible peacekeeping force," says Chitiyo. "Nineteen or twenty thousand just doesn't cut it."
A better approach would recognize the sources of the conflict and address them. "This is a resource war," says Muzong Kodi of Chatham House, another British think tank. "There won't be a long-term solution if the issue of illicit exploitation is not solved." Eastern Congo is a treasure house of natural resources, especially cassiterite, the ore from which tin is made, as well as gold, diamonds and coltan, an essential mobile-phone component. ...
Effective action on the resource and the regional front will require some serious arm-twisting from the West. ... Many think it would also help to appoint an envoy with more gravitas and clout than Obasanjo; Chitiyo suggests someone like Kofi Annan or Pope Benedict (Roman Catholicism is strong in Africa's Great Lakes region). Rod Norland, Newsweek, 12-6-08

International agency Oxfam today accuses European member states of turning their backs on the suffering of the people in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). ... “Oxfam is extremely disappointed by the unwillingness of European governments to provide a temporary peacekeeping mission to DRC. Member states must live up to their responsibility to protect civilians caught up in fighting and they must do it now. EU leaders have to face up to the stark choice before them. Failure to do so means armed men go on murdering, raping and looting indiscriminately and the enormous suffering in DRC continues.” said Elise Ford, head of Oxfam's EU office in Brussels. ...
“France which currently holds the EU presidency has already shown strong political commitment by helping to persuade the UN Security Council to authorize MONUC to deploy more troops on the ground. But the people in North Kivu urgently need greater protection now and some EU member states are willing to provide it. French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner must now mobilize the political will that is so urgently needed and gain agreement for the swift deployment of a peacekeeping force,” said Nicolas Vercken, Oxfam conflict advocacy officer in Paris. OXFAM, 12-3-08

The Irish Red Cross is accepting donations for the people of the Democratic Republic of Congo online and via telephone (1850 50 70 70). Another worthy vehicle is OXFAM.

Richard Power's Left-Handed Security: Overcoming Fear, Greed & Ignorance in This Era of Global Crisis is available now! Click here for more information.

For a directory of Words of Power Human Rights Updates, click here.

Congo, Genocide, Irish Red Cross, Human Rights Watch, Richard Power, Words of Power

In An Era of Global Crisis, Nobel Peace Prize Winners, Yunus & Gore, Issue Calls for Honesty & Realistic Priorities

Image: Diego Rivera, Nude with Calla Lillies


In An Era of Global Crisis, Nobel Peace Prize Winners, Yunus & Gore, Issue Calls for Honesty & Realistic Priorities

By Richard Power

Since the November election in the USA, many of us have been simply grateful and relieved, but now it is time for brutal honesty, realistic priorities and urgent, meaningful action. And, hear me, as shrewd and responsible as the incoming Obama administration promises to be, it will have to be pushed and pushed hard on some very big issues. You must be hard and loud, you will be doing the new administration a favor. It must govern from the center, otherwise it will be under merciless attack from the beginning. What it needs is for the people of the nation and the world to push the center itself toward the progressive side of the spectrum.

Two recent Nobel Peace Prize laureates, economist Muhammad Yunus and statesmen/entrepreneur Al Gore have begun the heavy-lifting --

Yunus has spoken out on the global financial crisis and its proper context and its proper place in the top priorities of the human race:

The global financial crisis is distracting attention from other pressing issues such as high food and energy prices, and environmental damage, Nobel peace laureate Muhammad Yunus told AFP Wednesday.
The Bangladeshi economist warned that not addressing those other issues would lead to a "much bigger crisis ahead" that would have political and financial implications.
"What we see as a financial crisis is a part of many more crises, which are going on simultaneously in 2008," Yunus said in an interview while attending a summit of business leaders in London.
"You remember the food crisis? It's still on, it didn't disappear. Simply, this (financial crisis) became much more pressing and everybody is paying attention."
He continued: "Then we have the energy crisis, it's still there... And then the environmental crisis, we have not solved anything about the environmental crisis." Agence France Press, 12-3-08

Al Gore is leading push-back on the boondoggle of "clean coal":

Al Gore’s Alliance for Climate Protection, the League of Conservation Voters, National Wildlife Federation, Natural Resources Defense Council, and the Sierra Club launched the “Reality” Coalition, a national grassroots and advertising effort to tell a simple truth: there is no such thing as “clean coal.” The coalition is arguing that coal cannot be considered clean until its carbon dioxide emissions are captured and stored, and that until coal is truly clean, there should be no new coal-fired power plants built in America. Watch their new ad:
“The coal industry has spent hundreds of millions promoting ‘clean coal’ technology, but in reality, there is not a single large-scale demonstration project in the United States for capturing and safely burying all of coal’s CO2 emissions,” Gore said. “The industry must make good its promise if they truly want to do their part to solve the climate crisis. Until that happens, coal cannot be called ‘clean.’” Think Progress, 12-4-08

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Mohammed Yunus, Clean Coal,Global Warming, Energy Security, Environmental Security, Alternate Energy, Sustainability, Green Power, Renewable Resources, Climate Change, Economic Security, Al Gore, Food Security, Richard Power, Words of Power