Surviving Capitalism (Not) : ALBA countries join chorus condemning "Contras" interference in Syria

We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Wednesday, February 8, 2012

ALBA countries join chorus condemning "Contras" interference in Syria

Click here to access article from Voltaire Network.

The ALBA countries (Antigua and Barbuda, Bolivia, Cuba, Dominica, Ecuador, Nicaragua, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and Venezuela.) have had first hand experience with the destabilization actions of the Empire and fully understand what is now occurring in Syria.

While the cynicism underpinning the destabilization strategy underway may leave many Europeans incredulous, the same does not apply in the case of Latin America. There, the role of the "Contras" is still fresh people’s minds, and the parallel with the Syrian situation is made immediately.

In 1983 on a trip to Nicaragua I personally witnessed the destruction of Nicaraguan clinics and schools by US sponsored Contras based in Honduras. Because US activists in 1983 were able to put enough pressure on members of Congress to cut off funding for these operations under the Boland Amendment, the military-financial-industrial secret government (the government of, by, and for the One Percent) proceeded to fund their surrogate army called the Contras by collaborating with drug traffickers to import drugs to US inner cities in exchange for a cut of the profits to fund the Contras (read the book entitled, Dark Alliance: The CIA, the Contras, and the Crack Cocaine Explosion, by the journalist Gary Webb) and by illegally selling weapons to Iran.

For his outstanding work in exposing the secret drug operations of the US, Webb and the San Jose Mercury were attacked by the leading press agencies consisting of the Washington Post followed soon by the NY Times and then all other major media. Since then most of the facts he exposed have been found to be true and even admitted to by the CIA. However, his career was ruined, and he eventually committed suicide. (Read Kill the Messenger by Nick Schou.) This was a lesson not lost on many journalists and editors in the media: do not mess with the real government of the US!

This action was no isolated incident, only one of the most dramatic examples of retribution against journalists for telling the truth and revealing the crimes of the real government. Other casualties in this war on truth among journalists and writers include Ray Bonner, Octavia Nasr, Helen Thomas, Eason Jordan, Peter Arnett, Phil Donahue, Ashleigh Banfield, Bill Maher, Ward Churchill, and Van Jones.