Radical media, politics and culture.

"The Progressive War"

Salim Muwakkil, In These Times, May 9, 2003

The pro-war progressives want to claim the tradition of the anti-Stalinist left of Cold War lore, but that analogy is faulty.


Among the many effects of the terrorism attacks of September 11, 2001, was the ideological shift they provoked among those on the left. Many left-leaning commentators were so disconcerted by some of their fellow travelers' responses to the attacks, they jumped straight into bed with the neocon war party.

Anonymous Comrade submits:

"Policy Through Rose-Colored Pilot's Glasses"

John Chuckman

Everyone, not attached by threadbare ideology or plain old war profiteering to President Bush's War on Terror, knows that even on its own terms, it can only fail miserably in a great waste of lives and substance. You cannot fight a war against religious faith and opposition to injustice unless you are prepared to be as utterly ruthless as Stalin, and even then, when you lie pickled in your tomb, the roots you missed destroying will grow hardy new plants, as they have in contemporary Russia. But I would never have expected stark evidence for failure to come so quickly.

hydrarchist submits: The following article is reprinted from May's Black Commentator


"Treat Corporate Media Like the Enemy,

& No Free Pass for Black Radio"


On June 2, transnational corporations claiming to be
American citizens are likely to win permission to complete
their conquest and consolidation of U.S. mass media, both
broadcast and print. Their servant is Colin Powell's son,
Michael, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission
and the most anti-public overseer of the public airwaves
since passage of the Federal Communications Act of 1934.

Marko writes:

"Anarchism and Human Survival:
Bertrand Russell's Problem"




Bertrand Russell throughout his long career as a public intellectual and political activist had reason to reflect on the follies of humanity and the real threats to human survival, threats which are self induced. Much speculation and movie making is devoted toward such survival threatening events as asteroid strikes and mantle head plumes. What is totally ignored is the threat to human survival posed by our own institutions. We can notch another one for the propaganda model; it is to be expected that our pathological institutions would not dwell on their inherent pathology. We can expect nothing less of the corporate media.

jim submits:

"What Does the Felling of the Monument Mean?"

Jürgen Habermas

Let us not close our eyes before this revolution in world affairs: the
normative authority of America lies shattered

1 The whole world watched that scene on the 9th of April in Baghdad,
followed the American soldiers placing the noose around the neck of
the dictator, watched the tyrant being felled from his pedestal in a
most symbolic act, before a jubilant crowd. First the apparently
immutable monument wobbles, then it falls. Before it crashes
liberatingly to the ground, gravity has to overcome the grotesquely
unnatural horizontal position in which the massive figure, gently
see-sawing up and down, is poised for one last disturbing second.

jim submits:

"Music From the Left"

R. G. Davis

In Noise: The Political Economy of Music, Jacques Attali argues that musical innovations prefigure social developments. For those of us interested in effecting changes in society he offers this thought: "Any theory of power today must include a theory of the localization of noise and its endowment with form" (1985, xi).


The form of most folk and almost all jazz/pop music does not (cannot) even reflect industrial social relations as we know them, much less make a comment on them. Classical music, or music organized by a trained composer, art music, is more likely to produce an instructional metaphor (and form) with which to examine the foundations of corporate society. I think that the structure/form of a musical composition, no matter what the lyrics, influences the listener's thoughts about the world. The structure contains a view of the world which the listener reiterates in his/her personal musical repetition. The structure then becomes a metaphor for a view of the world.

Full story continues at Davis

Anarchists and Palestine: Class Struggle or Popular Front?


  By Ryan Chiang McCarthy


   


  As the imperialist "war on terror" gains momentum, the conflict in Palestine is plunged continually into the center of world attention, conveyed so as to force us all to take positions along pre-defined lines- are you pro-Israel or pro-Palestinian? All states have joined the drive to polarize the world behind these fronts. For anarchists, it is vital not to compromise a class perspective, rejecting the programs of both Palestinian nationalism and Israeli genocide. In the US, where Israel must look for its lifeblood of weaponry and international clout, anarchists have a great responsibility to the proletariat of Israel and Palestine. Unfortunately, many US anarchists have chosen the way of the popular front.

Jim - TACT1 writes: "



HUB - a discussion document

social - political - collective

www.hub.org.uk



Introduction



There has been a lot of discussion recently around the idea of some kind of co-ordination mechanism for the extra-parliamentary opposition movements - the Anarchists, anti-Capitalists, progressive non-Party organisations and the grassroots Left (amongst others). We think this is a very interesting discussion, but what is vital is that it moves from being a discussion into a real network for real change: the fine words must be followed by action.

"Angered by Snubbing, Libya, China and Syria Form 'Axis of Just as Evil':

Cuba, Sudan, Serbia Form 'Axis of Somewhat Evil';
Other Nations Start Own Clubs"

Andrew Marlatt, SatireWire

Beijing (SatireWire.com) -- Bitter after being snubbed for membership in the "Axis of Evil," Libya, China, and Syria today announced they had formed the "Axis of Just as Evil," which they said would be way eviler than that stupid Iran-Iraq-North Korea axis President Bush warned of his State of the Union address.

Axis of Evil members, however, immediately dismissed the new axis as having, for starters, a really dumb name. "Right. They are Just as Evil... in their dreams!" declared North Korean leader Kim Jong-il. "Everybody knows we're the best evils... best at being evil... we're the best."

Biotic Baking Brigade writes:

"Sweet Disobedience"

Biotic Baking Brigade, Ricotta Division

On May 4, 2003 Luca Casarini, leader of the Disobbedienti, an important component of the Italian anti-capitalist movement, was pied in New York City. With this gentle breach of etiquette, Casarini received his just desserts for the mischief he has caused to the Italian movement.

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