Ant 288b Report: Misc. Outer Space Trivia

As you know we (ants) are interested in cosmology in general and outer space in particular. On August 3rd myself and 1,006 others from Pinky's various AntFarms™ visited a science museum & planetarium to learn more about space. We now return with some facts that may interest you, the reader of this blog.

• Galileo first sighted Jupiter's moons on January 7, 1610. At first he thought he was looking at some stars, but after observing their movements for a little while he figured out they were actually moons in orbit around Jupiter. Galileo used a telescope he made himself. We are in the process of making a telescope for ourselves.

• Have you ever wondered how large the moon is, relative to the size of the Earth? Imagine this: if the Earth were the size of an inflatable beach ball, the moon would be roughly the size of a grapefruit. Also, the spherical shape of a grapefruit makes it impossible for us to lift and/or transport.

• The Earth has two moons. Everyone knows the big one, but there is also a much smaller one named Cruithne. It is about 3 miles across and makes a weirdly-shaped orbit around the Earth that takes about 770 years to complete.

• As of this writing there are 240 known moons in our solar system. Maybe more by the time you read this.

• Even though light travels very fast, the universe is so big that the light you see from many of the stars in the sky have taken billions of years to reach your eyeball. So looking up into the night sky is also looking back into the farthest reaches of time - what we are seeing now is how these stars looked billions of years ago.

We hope you enjoy thinking about the above information.

Signing off,
Ant 288b

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Photo added Aug. 13

Boat People

Posted by Pinky.

Earlier today we received an e-mail from Deborah Kelly, an artist from Australia. One of the projects she works on (along with several others - an "art gang" if you will) really jumped out at me. Here's an image from that project:​

"In 1788 down Sydney Cove, The first boat people land, Said "sorry boys, our gain's your loss, We're gonna steal your land." (from the Boat People website)

Just change the details and suddenly it easily applies to the United States, don't you think?

The above image is an e-postcard - you can download it and send it around with all your e-mail. Go here to read about and see more pictures from this project!

Take care,
pinky

Q#2 for Daisy: Are Mexicans Native?

Posted by Pinky.

Here is Daisy's response to a second e-mail, also regarding the How To Solve Illegal Immigration video:

I just saw your video on illegal immigration and I found it very informative, interesting, and insightful. I just have a comment on something on it.

In it, you make a distinction between "Native Americans" and Mexicans. I don't know if you know enough of our history (Mexicans) but Mexicans for the most part ARE native peoples. About 30% of Mexicans in Mexico are pure indigenous and another 68% are mainly "mestizo" mostly Native-Mexican and Spaniard as compared to 1% of all "Americans" being pure (government recognized) indigenous. In Guatemala, native peoples are about 45% of the people. You can see these demographics in Wiki or the CIA factbook, among other places.

The brown race (not "red", known as "Native Americans") does not magically begin and end at the US/Mexico border. [...] When any discussion or reference is ever made of "Native Americans", it almost always refers to indigenous peoples of the U.S. or even Canada, but never Mexico. I am Chicano from East LA. My family has been in L.A. since 1920 on my mother’s side, and on my fathers just as long, but coming from Arizona. My family was Purepecha from Jalisco but you won't recognize that as well as Choctaw, Apache, Ute, etc. since again, the fallacy that Native peoples are solely from the U.S.

Many of the poorest of the poor from Mexico and Central America coming here are indigenous. They come from places like Puebla, Oaxaca, Yucatan, Chiapas, etc. and many speak mainly nahuatl and k'iche'. This big part of our history and identity not told or understood perpetuates the wrong belief that we are simply "aliens" as much as anyone else from anywhere in the world.

Thank you,
Randy

And here is Daisy's response:

Thank you, Randy, Your letter helps point out a problem in the video. I'd like to comment on this.

As an example, there is a part in the video during which I say:

"In the first group of course there are those people who are currently being labeled illegal immigrants. Most of them are recent immigrants, most notably from Mexico.

The second group are also immigrants, but they are immigrants who have been here longer, maybe a hundred years or maybe even going all the way back to the Mayflower or something like that.

And actually there's actually a third group, a forgotten group that's been made practically invisible over the past two hundred or so years, and that's the original Native inhabitants of these lands."

This way of explaining is actually potentially confusing because I am simultaneously using two separate, but overlapping, categorical systems: the so-called "legal resident vs. illegal immigrant" argument, and also the "native vs. settler" model. I chose to explain the situation in this way in an attempt to draw attention to the continued (imposed) invisibility of native people living within the territorial boundaries of the U.S., even as U.S. politicians and media commentators ask the question, "Who has a right to be here?" This can be confusing because the "legal resident vs. illegal immigrant" model is itself a settler construct, and, as you point out, does not take into consideration whether those 'immigrants' are native or not. In fact, we could say that the "legal resident vs. illegal immigrant" model is a favored way to frame the so-called 'immigration crisis' precisely because it conveniently leaves native people out of the equation. With native people out of the way, ruling class settlers are able to position themselves as legitimate owners and masters of this land; public outcries over how subsequent waves of 'illegals' are “ruining their country” is to be expected.

I decided to use the term 'illegal immigrants' in the video because this is a widely-used term at the moment here in the U.S. But in an attempt to keep things simple, the term itself manages to drag many other assumptions and problems into the discussion along with it. In hindsight, I probably should have, at the very least, noted that many of the so-called illegal immigrants from Mexico or elsewhere are also indigenous to their respective regions. This definitely complicates matters to a certain extent, but my failure to mention this created a lost opportunity - for example, an opportunity to raise many (generally) unconsidered implications regarding indigenous peoples' rights vis-à-vis certain settler constructs (in this case, 'national borders', citizenship, etc.).

It's my opinion that if enough people begin to challenge the legitimacy of oppressive settler constructs (for example, settler states [The United States of America, Canada, New Zealand, etc.], settler concepts [illegal immigration, the justice system, the Constitution, blood quantum, etc.], and so on), the conceptual and political terrain can be transformed and we will all be better positioned to turn our attention to righting the historical wrongs which we are now living and perpetuating. This is, as I understand it, one of the long-term objectives of The Pinky Show project.

~Daisy

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Thank you Daisy, for replying to Randy. And yes, this is one of our long-term objectives. Looooooong term! I won’t live long enough to see it realized, but I know that all play and no work guarantees that absolutely nothing happens.

By the way, we have not forgotten about the episodes about colonialism, settler colonialism, nation states, and all that other stuff. I know it's been a long time since I mentioned that we are working on them but alas, we're still working on them. Some subjects are just very challenging to research and clearly present in a short-form cat video format (to me, anyway)! So although Bunny and I are constantly working and re-working these scripts we're not going to release them until we're as happy as we can be with them, even if we know that 5 minutes after we publish them to the internet we'll be unhappy with them and want to change them some more! We are being extra careful with these episodes because we think that they really do have the power to radically transform the way a viewer thinks about history and society. Once the perspective shifts, everything looks different.

But at any rate please stay tuned. We've been doing a lot of research/writing the past few months, but in August-October we'll be right back in the production phase of things, so we'll have more episodes rolling out as we finish them off. Please take care. ~pinky

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Posted by Bunny.: This Q & A highlights something we're always struggling with here at The Pinky Show. In an attempt to make things as simple and widely accessible as possible, we often find ourselves leaving out huge amounts of extremely important information, ideas, and perspectives. Personally I see this as a form of intellectual violence. The only way we can justify it (barely) is to say that our mini-presentations are meant to instigate more curiosity, questioning, and dialogue. Anyone who thinks The Pinky Show is a good one-stop source for any final word on complex issues is not going to end up very smart. When more people become comfortable with the idea that anyone can do research - research of ALL kinds - into complicated matters, then hopefully The Pinky Show will become obsolete.

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Posted by Pinky: Thanks for bringing that up, Bunny. You could say the same thing about schools.

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Posted by Bunny: Yup.

Q#1 for Daisy: Slaves as Settlers?

Posted by Pinky.

Here is an e-mailed question we received yesterday that I forwarded to Daisy:

Hi - I very much liked your [How To Solve Illegal Immigration video], but I must point out that to me the two categories of settlers and indigenous peoples doesn't seem to apply to the predecessors of African Americans who were, literally, dragged here kicking and screaming... Have I missed something? (from Maryellen)

Daisy's response:​

There's no doubt that slaves from Africa were oppressed, murdered, and then some. But within the framework of settler colonialism, slaves brought from Africa are settlers. They certainly are not native. There are numerous examples of native peoples enslaved by settlers but I don't think that's what the e-mail is inquiring about. Practically all of Africa was colonized by European states - therefore (most) Africans in Africa were colonized. However African slaves brought to the Americas were not colonized; they were enslaved - which is also despicable but basically a different form of violence. So both groups - native peoples and slaves - were/are victims within the centuries-long historical trajectory of Euro-American Imperialism, but they're still different classes within the settler/native paradigm.

People get confused because they want to mix the native/settler dichotomy with other dichotomies - oppressed vs. oppressor, good vs. evil, etc., but this results in a faulty analysis. One can also make distinctions between different motivations or circumstances for settler mobility - for example, settlers who arrived in the New World seeking gold and other kinds of fortunes, settlers fleeing oppression elsewhere, settlers enslaved and brought kicking and screaming. It would be wrong to say that there aren't enormous differences regarding how and why these different groups of of non-indigenous people came (or who were unwillingly brought) to the "New World" from elsewhere. But these differences do not negate one's status as a settler within the settler colonialism paradigm. Just one example: historically speaking, the ruling class in the U.S. has treated black people as a threat and has responded with a thousand different mechanisms of oppression. But the perceived threat of black ascendancy to political and economic power is not based on African Americans' reclaiming of native land. This in itself is an important difference; please consider the implications.

The presence of slave labor almost guarantees the rapid economic development of settler states, which obviously benefits from the exploitation of that labor. And because this exploitation takes place on native land, this in turn generally accelerates the displacement, removal, assimilation, killing, etc. of native peoples living within the territorial boundaries of the newly formulated settler state. This is not to say that slaves from Africa were happy to participate in the genocide against Native Americans; you could say their status as settlers was forced upon them.

~Daisy

U.S. Strategy in Vietnam (continued)

Posted by Bunny.

Just received an interesting reply to my reply to Darren (July 23 entry). Here it is:

Bunny, Thanks for the reply....

I respect that your report was based on the enormous body of first hand documentation on the Vietnam War. It is disturbing how much information is available to the public but ignored in favor of convenient myths....

However, analysis of US foreign policy provides numerous case studies which support the idea that a campaign of brutal violence and destruction will promote cooperation out of necessity (beginning with Germany / Japan during WWII....and yes, I understand there is a huge difference between WWII and the Vietnam War).

Whether we supported a government friendly to US interests (El Salvador), a government installed by the US (Vietnam, Iran) or we simply destroy everything (Japan), the goal of submission seems secondary to creating an environment of pathetic desperation (West Bank and Gaza haven't submitted, but they are pathetically desperate).

I asked Noam Chomsky about this, and he agrees that, "In general US policy towards the third world — the former colonies - was to ensure that their markets and resources would be open to exploitation by Western, primarily US, concentrated capital. There's plenty of evidence on this, and it goes right to the present..." (Chomsky).

Domination and occupation are two different things- a country can be dominated without occupation, although an occupation cannot succeed without domination. The US failed to occupy Vietnam (literally or through a puppet govt), but we were able to dominate the country and eventually gain access to labor and markets.

Two main elements of colonialism are exploitation and pacification. The goal of colonialism is to exploit- generally, to the highest degree possible. Pacification is the method of control- to prevent the colony from using resources, labor, and markets for its own interests (occupation through domination).

Massive destruction- (natural, man made, economic or literal) can pacify a civilian population (domination without occupation). It may or may not achieve access to resources, labor or markets.... but if a country is in ruins, its rejection of predatory capitalism is usually destined to multiply suffering (North Korea...).

A united, communist Vietnam destroyed by the Vietnam War would not serve as a model for a popular communist movement in other third-world countries- no country wants to adopt a form of government that will instigate the US. At the very least, the Vietnam War persuaded other nations that communism (or socialism, which the US tried to equate with communism) wasn't a wise decision. In the best case scenario (for US policy makers) neo-colonialism takes hold very strongly- like in Latin America, SE Asia, or more recently, Iraq.

If you wanted to do an analysis of the Vietnam War's success/failure, it could be broken down this way:

objective- prevent the spread of communism SUCCESS
objective- To occupy Vietnam or install a government FAILURE
objective- To dominate Vietnam SUCCESS

Bunny: "When I said "the strategy failed" I was referring to the U.S. leadership's inability to get the Vietnamese - both in the South and in the North - to capitulate to foreign domination."

Once again, a country can be dominated without being occupied. We were unable to occupy Vietnam, but able to dominate them. In reality, it isn't even necessary to fight, let alone occupy- it is possible to get others to fight for you (El Salvador fought itself, we provided weapons and training) and it isn't even necessary to fight at all (sanctions, natural disasters, famine).

As Kim pointed out- "the main point is the US wanted to control Vietnam." To a certain degree, we did / do. Of course, to a certain degree, we didn't / don't, but this is assumed, since historically we lost. I think this is relevant to the Iraq War, since the objective of the War has changed from securing WMDs, to removing a brutal dictator, to bringing democracy to the region. The lack of a clear objective implies the intention of domination in Iraq as well.

Sorry for the lengthy reply....

-Darren

And here is my reply to the above:

Hi Darren,

Thank you for your reply. No need to apologize for its length - 95% of the e-mails we receive are brief and stupid, so I view your e-mail as a very good thing.

I agree with many of your points. I don't have any qualms with your assertion that the U.S. has found various ways to successfully infiltrate and control certain aspects of Vietnam's economy. But I think you are attempting to clarify something I wasn't talking about. My original point was only that in '75, the U.S. leadership did not order an evacuation of Saigon with a knowing smirk - saying "Ah, this is all going according to plan...!" I was not trying to access what we now know would come later. The U.S. evacuation from Vietnam is evidence of a failed military and political policy. I think it's extremely important to acknowledge that regardless of the current economic and political relationships that exist between the U.S. and Vietnam today, the Nationalists' ejection of U.S. forces from Vietnamese soil in 1975 was a powerful statement which holds many important historical lessons. It's too easy to say, "The strategy worked perfectly." This was a Third World nation throwing a military superpower off their land. Obviously the meaning or symbolism of this event cannot be the same for Americans (or other First Worlders) and for people of the colonies. Now, when you say that the domination did not end with the physical expulsion of U.S. forces, I agree with you. But I think this is a different (though historically linked) lesson that must also be studied.

At any rate, I'll post your reply in the blog. It makes many good points and it's good to have some back and forth. Hopefully a few people will feel intrigued enough to do some research of their own. That's the main thing.

Thanks,
Bunny

By the way, I also received a pissy e-mail today asking why I'm blogging so much instead of Pinky. The short answer is Pinky's real busy with episode research and writing and that takes priority over blogging. So in the meantime I do more blogging. I always try to put a little note like “Posted by Bunny” the beginning of every entry so if you see my name and don't like my entries, skip it. ~B.

Bunny Mailbag: U.S. Strategy in Vietnam.

Posted by Bunny.

We got an interesting e-mail the other day from a guy named Darren:

Pinky (and friends),

I love your show... I recently watched the movie about the American War, and I was thoroughly impressed (as usual).... However, I disagree with one of Bunny's conclusions....It is a very important point that is not in history books....

Bunny asks why the US "Chose to devastate Vietnam to such an extreme" driving them "to the brink of annihilation". Bunny then says the Vietnam War "was that way by design". All of this is correct. But Bunny says that "the strategy failed". However, it worked perfectly.

We bombed Vietnam to the brink of annihilation - it will take a hundred years for Vietnam to recover fully. Now, there are American sweatshops in Vietnam - we have access to the Vietnamese market, just as we wanted. And we guaranteed the failure of Communism as a political model for the region - which secured other Asian markets for the US.

The US involved Latin American coups / wars of the last 60 years or so also demonstrate this principal - we either secure Latin American markets, or open them to the US with ultra violence and destruction - which guarantee open markets out of simple desperation.

Best wishes,
Darren

My reply:

Hi Darren,

Actually, in my report, when I said "the strategy failed" I was referring to the U.S. leadership's inability to get the Vietnamese - both in the South and in the North - to capitulate to foreign domination. Since it was the U.S. that eventually had to evacuate Vietnam in 1975, I still stand by this statement.

On the other hand your comments suggest an interesting possibility - that U.S. leaders somehow had a decades-long strategy that linked total social, economic, environmental, etc. destruction of their country to eventually enable the U.S. to re-enter Vietnam as master to Vietnamese labor and markets. This would seem plausible to me, except that in my review of Vietnam War-era governmental documents I haven't been able to find a paper trail that clearly demonstrates this kind of long-term vision on the part of the U.S. leadership. I'm not saying I'm willing to completely rule this kind of logic out; I just don't have the documentary evidence here in front of me to say, "A-ha! Here it is, directly from the mouth of McNamara..." (or Johnson, or Kissinger, or Nixon, or whomever). If you could point me in the right direction with a list of citations that illustrate your point I would appreciate it.

I think the U.S. - at least for a while - really did believe that Vietnam could be brought under U.S. control through a combination of traditional military force ("if only we could bomb them hard enough...") and ideological coercion ("winning hearts and minds", etc.). It's easy to find documents that show how many brilliant (and I'm not being sarcastic here) policy makers and war planners at the State Department and Pentagon mistakenly believed this, especially during the earlier phases of the war. But by 1968, long before the U.S. would be physically ejected from Saigon (1975), many of these same planners were already reaching into their bag of tricks for new tools (especially triangular diplomacy with China and the Soviet Union, and much later, devastating trade embargoes) in search of ways to salvage the U.S.'s damaged reputation and political standing among other nations, economy, national culture, etc. So while I agree with you that the U.S. corporate elite currently enjoys very lucrative access to Vietnamese labor and markets, I don't think this is because of visionary planning. Rather I think it just proves that the U.S. wields an impressive diversity of coercive tools, and is capable of successfully changing to new strategies when others fail.

Bunny

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Posted by Kim: I think it's good to point out though that Darren and Bunny are in agreement that the main point is the US wanted to control Vietnam. "If at first you don't succeed, try, try again!" ]

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Posted by Bunny: Yeah that's true but I just wanted to be clear that I like to start with documentary evidence and then proceed with an analysis from there. If Darren can provide some documentation that would point me towards other conclusions then of course I’m more than willing to change my thinking. There's no reason why we can't release The American War: The U.S. in Vietnam, Version 2.0 ]

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Posted by Pinky: Thanks Bunny. Darren’s e-mail is interesting. And yes, it would be great to re-do that episode; it's one of my favorite ones we've done so far. But I think it would be easier to watch if we added more moving pictures and other stuff.

PS Art On Its Way To Virginia

Posted by Bunny.

Yesterday morning we shipped our Pinky Show stuff to Arlington for the Picturing Politics 2008 exhibition. I couldn't believe how expensive it was to ship - I think it was about $160 - more if you include the ridiculous amount of bubblewrap and coroplast Pinky used to wrap everything up. (Can you say "anal retentive"?)

View fullsize

​Dear Washington, D.C.,

To your eventual dissolution as a perpetrator of global violence.​

Sincerely,​

pinky & Bunny
July 2008

Anyway, if any of you live near Washington D.C., please go see the show (August 15-September 27). And if you could take a picture of our work in the show, that'd be great because we can't afford to actually travel to Arlington to see the show ourselves. If we get any good pictures of our work installed in the AAC galleries I'd like to include it in the On Native Land entry in our Commons Gallery.

By the way, in response to questions about the art pieces (For example, "But what does it mean???", etc.), Pinky has expanded the explanatory notes that appear as mouse-overs in the gallery. You have to put your cursor over the picture in order to have the notes pop up. ~B.

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Posted by Kim: Lost in all this is Bunny forgot to mention that the art work came out really beautiful! Just wanted to say that! ^_^ ]​

Good Quote: Helen Keller

Posted by Bunny.

I came across this quote by Helen Keller today: "I don't give a damn about semi-radicals."

Think about it.

An Iraq-Monsanto Connection

Posted by Bunny.

Thank you Phiya for sending us this important report by F. William Engdahl called Iraq and Washington's 'seeds of democracy'. An excerpt:

"In May 2003 Paul Bremer III, was put in charge with the imposing title, Administrator, of a newly created Coalition Provisional Authority or CPA... As head of the CPA, Bremer moved swiftly to draft a series of laws to govern Iraq... One of the Orders mandates that no elected Iraqi government will have the power to alter the US-imposed laws. The new laws, or Orders, as they were called, would insure that the economy of Iraq would be remade along lines of a US-mandated 'free-market' economic mode... This ensured unrestricted foreign business activities in the country. Investors could also take 100 percent of the profits they made in Iraq out of the country. They would not be required to reinvest and they would not be taxed...

Buried deep among the Bremer laws was Order 81, 'Patent, Industrial Design, Undisclosed Information, Integrated Circuits and Plant Variety Law'. At the heart of Order 81 was the Plant Variety Protection (PVP) provision. Order 81, states: 'Farmers shall be prohibited from re-using seeds of protected varieties or any variety mentioned in items 1 and 2 of paragraph (C) of Article 14 of this Chapter.'

In plain English, this gives holders of patents on certain plant varieties, i.e. large foreign multinationals, absolute rights for 20 years over use of their seeds in Iraqi agriculture. The protected plant varieties are Genetically Modified or Gene Manipulated (GM) plants, and an Iraqi farmer who chose to plant such seeds must sign an agreement with the seed company holding the patent that he would pay a 'technology fee' and an annual license fee for planting the patented seeds.

Any Iraqi farmer seeking to take a portion of those patented seeds to replant in following harvest years would be subject to heavy fines from the seed supplier. Iraqi farmers would become vassals, not of Saddam Hussein, but of multinational GM seed giants.

Iraq is part of Mesopotamia, the cradle of civilization, where the fertile valley between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers created ideal conditions for crop cultivation. Iraqi farmers have existed since approximately 8,000 B.C. and had developed the rich seed variety for almost every variety of wheat used in the world today. They did this through a system of saving a share of seeds and replanting, developing new naturally resistant hybrid varieties through the new plantings.

For years, the Iraqis had held samples of such precious natural seed varieties in a national seed bank, located, ironically, in Abu Ghraib, the city made infamous as a US military torture prison site in 2004. Following the US occupation and various bombing campaigns, the historic and invaluable seed bank in Abu Ghraib vanished, a possible further casualty of the Iraq war...

Order 81 on Intellectual Property Rights, was not negotiated between a sovereign government and the WTO, or another government. It was imposed on Iraq without debate, from Washington. According to informed Washington reports, the specific details of Order 81 on plants were written for the US Government by Monsanto Corporation, the world's leading purveyor of GMO seeds and crops..."

Please read the whole report here.

By the way, according to a scientific study we read in the journal Science last year, all "domestic cats" (hate that term) alive today are supposedly descended from ancient ancestors who roamed the area that now includes Iraq. So all you apathetic cats out there, why not put those stupid TV remote controls down and do something about the exploitation of your ancestors' home town.

~Bunny.​

Must-See Film: The W0r1d Acc0rd1ng t0 M0nS@nt0

Posted by Pinky.

Why is my title all weird-looking? Well, because every time this video has been posted somewhere on the internet, it's been pulled down very quickly. Hopefully using this top-secret, un-Google-able spelling tactic will help it stay under the radar a bit longer!

This eye-opening documentary was produced for French television by Marie-Monique Robin. It hasn't been shown to the American public yet (will it ever?) - which is too bad, because this documentary will blow your mind. Try to watch it as soon as possible (now is a good time!), as no one knows how long the video will be online before it's pulled again. The Hemowai Bros. are fighting corporate America and risking lawsuit in order to try to get everyone this information.

If you drag your feet and the video (below) is no longer available, please consider ordering the DVD from the filmmaker and hold screenings for your friends. Spread the word - M0ns@nt0 must be stopped, and can be stopped, but it will take the efforts of lots of ordinary citizens to do it. The future of the planet is in your hands!​

If the above video doesn't work, you can try going here.

Thanks,
pinky

Article: Iran: All Out War or "Economic Conquest"?

Posted by Pinky.

Every weekend we (Bunny, Kim, Mimi, and I) try to make it a point to have a 'articles' meeting. We sit around and exchange copies of the most important or interesting articles we've encountered during the week. At today's meeting one of the articles Mimi presented was especially helpful in allowing me to get a clearer picture of what's really going on behind the U.S.'s incessant calls for sanctions and military strikes against Iran. It's written by Michel Chossudovsky and is called Iran: War or Privatization: All Out War or "Economic Conquest"?

Like everybody else, I like articles that provides new information. But I especially like articles that answers a question that I've been confused about for a while. And even better than those kinds of articles are the articles that asks a question that I hadn't thought of asking, then gives me a moment to realize that I don't know the answer to this new question, and then finally answers the question for me! Awesome! Well this article is exactly like this.

Here's a few excerpts from the article:

"Tehran is to allow foreign investors, in what might be interpreted as an overture to the West, to acquire full ownership of Iran's State enterprises in the context of a far-reaching "free market" style privatization program...

It is important to carefully analyze this decision. The timing of the announcement by Iran's Privatization Organization (IPO) coincides with mounting US-Israeli threats to wage an all out war against Iran...

...Is this decision by Tehran to implement a far-reaching privatization program, in any way connected with continuous US saber rattling and diplomatic arm twisting?

At first sight it appears that Tehran is caving into Washington's demands so as to avoid an all war.
Iran's assets would be handed over on a silver platter to Western foreign investors, without the need for America to conquer new economic frontiers through military means?

But there is more than meets the eye.

Washington has no interest in the imposition of a privatization program on Iran, as an "alternative" to an all out war. In fact quite the opposite. There are indications that the Bush adminstration's main objective is to stall the privatization program...

...Now why on earth would the Bush administration be opposed to the adoption of a neoliberal-style divestment program, which would strip the Islamic Republic of some of its most profitable assets?

If "economic conquest" is the ultimate objective of a profit driven military agenda, what then is the purpose of bombing Iran, when Iran actually accepts to hand over its assets at rock-bottom prices to foreign investors, in much the same way as in other compliant developing countries including Indonesia, the Philippines, Brazil, etc?"

Do you know the answer to this? If not, please go read the article! The article is kind of like the Raed Jarrar talk, in that after reading it you be more able to decode the illogical "news" we are constantly getting pounded with here in the U.S. Since our so-called leaders seem to be in near-universal agreement over how important it is for us to destroy Iran, it seems that resistance to this kind of predatory thinking will have to come from a well-informed citizenry.

Read Michel Choussudovsky's article here.

Thank you,
pinky

Bunny Mailbag: Priorities; LHC Thing.

Posted by Bunny.

This e-mail from today, July 6 is in response to our recently posting a 1 hour 10 min episode:

Hi Pinky,
I'm really glad you posted a video about the occupation in Iraq. I agree and a lot of other voters agree that this is the number 1 issue on our minds. However I notice your videos are getting way too longer tho. Over an hour is a huge time commitment in today's world. I'm sure you would be able to influence more people, especially busy people like me if you'd stick to your shorter lengths. Busy people tend to be highly educated with jobs and other commitments. Personally I can do 20 minutes tops and 5 is even better. I totally support you guys but I think your going in the wrong direction with the timing.
David

My reply:

Hello David. We realize many people have attention-span and commitment problems when it comes to certain kinds of activities: self-education, cleaning up the environment, stopping bombs from falling on children, etc. Our assumption is that your 'lack of time' is simply a reflection of your priorities, and we don't think it makes sense for us to get involved with such matters. For example, no one would appreciate it if we advised them to free up an hour in their busy schedule by not watching American Idol, skipping a few meals (or trips to the bathroom for that matter), or simply waking up ten minutes earlier every day for a week. That would be pointless and annoying. So our policy is to not care about whether or not you have time to watch our episodes. Thanks. Bunny

E-mail number two, from Gigi:

Scientists call it an atom smasher. I was wandering if you guys heard of it. It's also called LHC. The main purpose with this LHC is to find dark matter. (or find out more about dark matter.) They're spending over millions of dollars to make this work. It was suppose to be launched in 2012 but it is now announced to be launched this year. (2008 Early August) Many scientist fear it will create a black hole and destroy the earth. Sounds like a sci fi movie doesn't it? I was wandering if you guys can look more into it. In my personal opinion, it doesn't sound like it's worth it. What do you guys think? - Gigi

And here is my reply to Gigi:

Dear Gigi, I have not heard about the LHC ("Large Hadron Collider", I looked it up) before receiving your e-mail. I am interested in anything that has the ability to make black holes, even if they are micro black holes. And of course any machine that can possibly crush the entire planet into nothingness is an attention catcher. To be practical though, our (cats) backgrounds in particle physics is fairly limited and we're probably not the best group to be asking about the safety of this project. For example, the European Organization for Nuclear Research has assured the public via its website that although the LHC will be able to produce "an energy that no other particle accelerators have reached before", higher energy levels are routinely produced in nature during cosmic-ray collisions. Do I know what cosmic-ray collisions are? No. Should I concerned? I have no idea. Thanks for the e-mail though, I will be thinking of you when I read in the headlines that Switzerland has disappeared into a black hole. Thanks, Bunny

End of Bunny Mailbag for today.

~B.

New Episode; 4th of July Message from Bunny & President Bush

Posted by Bunny.

Here in the United States, July 4 is also known as "Independence Day". As President Bush spoke today in a Fourth of July speech to the nation from Monticello, Virginia:

"You represent many different ethnicities and races and religions. But you all have one thing in common - and that is a shared love of freedom. This love of liberty is what binds our nation together, and this is the love that makes us all Americans."

My theory is that there are other people around the world, who are not Americans, who also love things like liberty and freedom. So I think it'd be terrific if all the freedom-loving Americans President Bush is talking to would stand up and commit themselves to stopping their own country from denying freedom and self-determination to people elsewhere. Seriously, you can't have democracy and occupation at the same time.

To acknowledge the concept of independence, today we release a new episode - Iraq Under Occupation: Raed Jarrar decodes the misinformation. I admit it's a little long (~ 1 hr 10 min), but I hope everyone who is not already familiar with Raed Jarrar or his work will take the time to watch it. It is crucial that every American understand the implications of what he is saying.

Watch the video here.

~B.

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Posted by Kim: Please be careful of hot dogs and soda, they are tasty but also really not healthy.

Unpopular? Suppress Them With Violence.

Posted by Bunny.

Remember the last time you woke up in the morning and thought to yourself, "Gee, I really feel like overthrowing a poor, relatively defenseless country's government today..."? Happens all the time right?

While these kinds of thoughts may be fairly common, of course you don't follow through and actually do these kinds of things. And why not? Well, for starters, you probably don't own an aircraft carrier, or even a few helicopters. And more importantly, everybody knows that taking over somebody else's country is more complicated than just rolling into their capital with a few tanks. The bigger problem is always 'The Population'. How will you keep them under your thumb? Because post-coup d'etat, typically the people of your target country are going to be very edgy-cranky. Nobody enjoys having their sovereignty pissed on.

Thankfully, the U.S. government has written a very useful guide to help you deal with exactly these kinds of inconveniences. WikiLeaks has released a U.S. military counterinsurgency manual to the public: US Army Field Manual FM 31-20-3, Foreign Internal Defense Tactics Techniques and Procedures for Special Forces (2004 edition). Here is the summary from the WikiLeaks website:

This sensitive US military counterinsurgency manual could be critically described as "What we learned about running death squads and propping up corrupt governments in Latin America and how to apply it to other places"...

The document, which is official US Special Forces policy, directly advocates training paramilitaries, pervasive surveillance, censorship, press control, restrictions on labor unions & political parties, suspending habeas corpus, warrantless searches, detainment without charge, bribery, employing terrorists, false flag operations, concealing human rights abuses from journalists, and extensive use of "psychological operations" (propaganda) to make these and other "population & resource control" measures palatable.

Interested?

[ Download the whole manual here ] (PDF file, 219 pages, 1.2 MB)

Now that's what I call some Useful Information!

Now drop that ridiculous scrapbook shit (scrapbooking is not a real hobby) and go take over a country or something.

~Bunny.

Third World, Underdeveloped, or...?

Posted by Pinky.

Tonight we received a thoughtful e-mail I'd like to share with you.

Dear Pinky Show,

I want to first commend your production. I think what you guys are doing is revolutionary. I can tell the Pinky Show will be huge in the near future.

However, I just wanted to make one small request. I feel that "3rd world" is a very derogatory term for underdeveloped countries. During my years at GSU, which is one of the most diverse universities in America (over 100 different countries from all over the world give or take), I've learned that these terms — 1st, 2nd, and 3rd world — psychologically changes the actual perception of political and financial status of a country. It doesn't portray that the country is simply not as industrialized or technologically equipped to handle present day fast-paced society. It portrays that the country is of a different origin, as if it doesn't belong. It's hierarchical. According to my anthropology professor (unnamed for privacy purposes) who is an expert in his field, these terms were created to clearly exhibit the country into an impenetrable negative connotation. Example: Africa 's countries are considered 3rd world but we forget that Africa contains Dubai City, one of the richest cities. How can it be 3rd world if it has such a place as Dubai? However, one cannot debate the fact Africa itself is underdeveloped, always in constant turmoil. Not to mention many don't even use the terms 2nd or 1st world for any other country, let alone know what a 2nd world country is. Yet, why do we still continue using 3rd world??

Do you understand what I'm trying to convey? I know I may not be explaining it as well as my professor but I know my email is quite long already. Therefore, I shall conclude that we should strike out these derogatory and demeaning hierarchical labeling and merely describe a country as underdeveloped or not as developed as so and so.

Thank you for you time and consideration.

Lisa
Georgia State University

I really like it that people are willing to sit down and write these kinds of e-mails to us. We learn a lot by reading them. In this case we (Bunny, Daisy, and I) have talked about "Third World" vs. "underdeveloped" vs. X, Y, and Z, but maybe it is time to revisit the question. For the time being though, I thought it might be good if I wrote a quick reply to Lisa's e-mail.

Hi Lisa. I agree with you that the term "Third World" is derogatory. I think the term is unpleasant because it will always be tied to a world view in which some people and places are considered worthy of subjugation and exploitation by other people and places. That kind of logic is hurtful at its core. I do agree with you that how we use language is always a political act, and I would like to use a term that doesn't encourage people to think of places like Nicaragua, Haiti, or Cameroon as backwards, inferior, or lesser.

On the other hand, I would like to challenge the use of words like "underdeveloped." Personally I find this word equally offensive and maybe even more insidious. The logic of development begins with the assumption of absence. In the eyes of the developed, the underdeveloped have nothing of value - not even an understanding of their own situation. The remedy for this inferiority is often an infusion of outsider cash, contracts, and projects. All of these things come with many strings attached, although self-determination isn't one of them.

A lot of questions pop into mind when I start thinking about development: Is industrialization really progress? What are the unspoken assumptions and values of 'development'? Why is it that there always seems to be more development work going on in regions that promise future material benefits to the developers and aid-givers? What would happen if underdeveloped countries were able to participate in the global economy on their own terms, rather than terms set by the dominant players?

I also don't believe that a country can be "simply not as industrialized", or not "technologically equipped to handle present day fast-paced society". Underdeveloped countries are the way they are on purpose - I'm willing to bet that they'd probably all have radically different social and economic realities if there weren't certain powerful entities sitting (or is it shitting?) on them. So "development" is not a matter of random, historical happenstance. (I'm not saying this is what you meant, but I just wanted to point to the apparent lack of active, oppressive agents in your choice of wording...)

In some ways I prefer the more old-fashioned languages of description/oppression. They are so blatant. The new ways of speaking are so slippery by comparison - they're often successful in avoiding the unpleasant connotations, but in actuality they continue to refer to the same, sturdy systems of oppression. To me it seems like language is shifting quite rapidly toward fairness, but not surprisingly the more savage aspects of lived reality remain intact.

Actually, I can think of many examples in which the use of nicer, more enlightened language is actually instrumental in cultivating and maintaining inequity. For example, I think there must be several million people running around out there who would never allow themselves to condone the concept or practices of colonialism. Yet those same people are willing to uncritically accept globalization, including the most predatory aspects of it. Which reminds me of the old saying, "Old wine, new bottle."

That's all I wrote so far. I'll have to sit down with the others (Bunny, Mimi, Kim, Daisy, etc.) and ask them what they'd like to do with the term "Third World." Maybe we can come up with something better. In the past, when we've worked with people from "the Third World" (see? I have to put it in quotes now!) they've introduced us to a few possible replacement terms - Global South, The South, Two-thirds World, etc. But really there's no uncontested term that everyone seems to like. The only thing that we can all agree on is that things are not fair and we'll keep throwing stones at the machine until we can no longer throw stones.

~ pinky

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Posted by Bunny: Mmm, I bet this entry is going to generate a lot of upset replies: "Hey Pinky, Why do you hate poor people? Do you think not having drinking water or food to eat is cool?" Stuff like that…

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Posted by Pinky: If development was only about guaranteeing clean drinking water, adequate food, peace, and freedom for everybody, nobody would have a problem with it.

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Posted by Bunny: Not true. There are certain classes of people in this world that definitely profit from starvation & endless conflict.

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Posted by Kim: How about from now on we all agree to call third world countries "Awesome Number One" instead?

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Posted by Bunny: lol to Kim.

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Daisy: The term "development" generally passes uncontested because most people who use it don't see anything wrong with the dominant values it represents or the specific kind of development-work it enables. Obviously the word identifies a certain group of countries as needing to 'get developed'. This is called "Development as The Solution". Predictably, the nature of the so-called solution doesn't ever need to be interrogated. And why should it? Because doesn't development always come from the superior side of civilization? This is the arrogance and racism inherent to mainstream development-thinking. And should these assumptions ever be questioned, one can easily invoke the logic that development is the natural opposite to starvation, disease, and shorter life-expectancy. In this way anyone who questions development logically wishes a short, miserable life on the undeveloped.

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Posted by Pinky: I think Lisa raised something really good to talk about. Wouldn't it be nice if we could all sit down together and do something like a round table... Maybe we could invite her professor? We could add it to the Conversations area. What do you guys think?

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Posted by Bunny: Ummmm… do we not have enough projects underway already?

New Video: Global Mind Change Remix

Posted by Bunny.

Hi. We have a new video: see it here.

Pinky & I made this video for the launch of the new NEO.org website. It's a neat site based in Switzerland where you publicly state your intent to change the world for the better. The basic idea, as I understand it, is that you have to have right thought before you can have right action. Pinky and I have a couple of problems with the language of the declaration so we'll be writing an open letter to the authors of the Neo Declaration and the Neo community. But overall we think it's good and when I finish writing my declaration of intent I'll be posting it there. Pinky already did hers.

We have a bunch more videos almost done. Please stay tuned.

~B.

Tote Bags + Apologies On Their Way

Posted by Bunny.

The long lost shipment of Tote Bags from American Apparel FINALLY arrived yesterday afternoon *shakes clenched paw at American Apparel*, so the Pinky Show designs have been lovingly applied and the tote bags promptly shipped out this morning. My personal apologies to those of you who had to wait the extra weeks for your order to ship. For all the late orders we've included a small letter of apology plus secret mini-present on the side that I hope you will enjoy.​

Thank you again for your support of The Pinky Show. ~B.

Fire Extinguishers: Surprisingly Useful

Posted by Pinky.

Today I accidentally started an oven fire when I was trying to make frozen french fries (I like french fries). I was pre-heating the oven to 400°F when I went back to my computer for a few more minutes of script writing. Bad idea! I started smelling smoke a couple minutes later and when I went to go check what was going on the oven was already on fire. It's a good thing I had a fire extinguisher nearby. I shot the stove with it and the fire was out in 1 second. That's the first time in my life I've ever had a chance to use a fire extinguisher, and suddenly I have a new respect for them. Spending $10 for a small one is infinitely better than watching your whole trailer burn down to the ground!

1. Never leave a stove unattended, not even for a little while.

2. Always have a fire extinguisher around.

When I saw the fire, which was actually pretty big by the time I saw it, I thought for a couple of seconds "Hmm... how do I put that out?" before remembering we bought a fire extinguisher a couple of years ago. I hope everybody reading this who don't already have a one around the house goes and buys one right away. If it's not roasting a marshmallow, fire is really scary!

I ended up making the french fries on the stove top (the burners still work), but it doesn't taste as good as baked.

GO BUY A FIRE EXTINGUISHER!

Your friend,
pinky

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Posted by Kim: Pinky, marshmallows are not vegetarian-friendly. They have gelatin in them, which usually comes from animal hides and hoofs-n-stuff.

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Posted by Bunny: That's not true - gelatin isn't made of hoofs. But still, you two should probably stay away from Jell-O if you want to avoid the boiled pig skin. Also true of Gummy Bears and many cheesecakes.

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Posted by Kim: NOOOOOO!!! NOT CHEESECAKES!!!

Bunny Mailbag: Events; Pinky's not gay; Animal Eating; etc.

Posted by Bunny.

In response to yesterday's diary entry, a reader wrote:

"Hi Bunny... I want to learn about those events or at list acknowledge them but it's really hard to find the things that you meant. Can you give the name of the events/wars that you listed - Hawaii (1893), Iran (1953), Guatemala (1954), Chile (1973), Mystic (1637), Sand Creek (1864), or Yucca Mountain). I will so appreciate it."

Fair enough. Here's a quickie list.

Hawaii, 1893: overthrow of Hawaiian government w/ direct support of U.S. military. Five years later the U.S. annexed Hawaii and over a 100 years later Native Hawaiians still don't have their land or sovereignty back.

Iran, 1953: "Regime change" as we like to call it. Mossadegh deposed via CIA covert ops (Operation Ajax) and the U.S.-friendly Shah installed.

Guatemala, 1954: President Arbenz overthrown via U.S.-orchestrated coup d'etat. Long line of U.S.-friendly dictators maintained afterwards.

Chile, 1973: President Allende overthrown via U.S.-assisted coup d'etat. U.S.-friendly dictator (Pinochet) assumes power.

Mystic, Connecticut, 1637: Massacre of Pequots.

Sand Creek, Colorado, 1864: Massacre of Cheyenne and Arapaho.

Yucca Mountain, Nevada: Massacre of Native Lands (i.e., the U.S. government is trying to put the largest nuclear waste dump ever designed into these mountains; read the Treaty of Ruby Valley (1863) - the Western Shoshone never ceded Newe Sogobia to the United States). I put this in the list because it is directly connected to 500 years of genocide, exploitation, and disrespect of Native peoples and lands.

This is only a tiny sampling, obviously there are many more.

If you want to learn more about the ideological foundations that tends to produce these kinds of occurrences, I recommend Facing West: The Metaphysics of Inidan-Hating & Empire Building by Richard Drinnon. Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States, 1492-Present is also a good place to start.

E-mail number two:

"Hi Pinky, I've been meaning to ask you and I don't mean to be too personal but are you by any chance a lesbian? I was wondering if that was the reason why you have made several references to gay rights on your website. Best, Dana"

I'm not Pinky but I'll answer anyway: We talk about gay rights sometimes because we don't like discrimination, not because of our own sexual orientations.

Next e-mail:

"Do you guys eat meat?"

Answer: Pinky is a vegetarian. A few months after Pinky decided to do that Kim also decided to become a vegetarian. When we’re not traveling I usually don't eat "meat" but if I'm hungry and some bird comes lazily walking by of course I'll have a go at it. Mimi eats whatever.

That's enough e-mails for today.

~Bunny.

Angry Internet Mob Defends Loose Change

Posted by Bunny.

As expected, we received several angry e-mails today from readers who didn't appreciate my post from yesterday. Apparently Pinky and I have an obligation to believe what they believe - that the U.S. government is responsible for plotting and carrying out the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks:

"I find it hard to believe that after considering the evidence you still aren't willing to conceed that the government may be responsible. What do you need besides a mountain of evidence? Did you even watch the whole film? In your so-called review you never list exactly what was wrong with the documentary. Do you think that just because a bunch of people organize themselves into a government then they are automatically incapable of conspiring against the American people? You pose as people suspicious of abuse of power but in the end you are just not ready to see the big picture. I dare you to post this in your sacred blog."

I think this one is fairly representative of the other e-mails we received today. I don't want to spend time crafting a carefully worded response to all of them so I'll just respond to the above one with a simple list of statements (sorry, it's just faster):

1. The evidence was weak. Should I be swayed by a mountain of weak evidence? You don't create a compelling argument by stringing together a long list of possibly-related (or not) documents, events, pictures, diagrams, video, thoughts, opinions, possibilities, and musings. That's not evidence. That's a collection of stuff.

2. Yes, I did watch the whole film. Which didn't help.

3. I didn't "review" Loose Change. I just wanted to point out that Pinky and I watched it and we thought it wasn't good. I only wanted to mention this because lots of people had e-mailed us "highly recommending" that we watch the film, presumably because they thought we'd enjoy it. Well we finally watched it and hey, I thought it was weak.

4. Do you really think that I think that governments are incapable of crimes? Are you stupid?

5. We are cats, not “people”.

6. I don't know exactly what "The Big Picture" (as you so neatly put it) really is, but I'm fairly certain that conspiracy theories isn't it. Why not study the history of Hawaii (1893), Iran (1953), Guatemala (1954), or Chile (1973)? Or for that matter Mystic (1637), Sand Creek (1864), or Yucca Mountain (right now)? These histories clearly have much to teach us about "abuse of power", and yet none of them fall into the category of "conspiracy theory".

I'm sure some who sent e-mails today will not be satisfied with the above, and that's fine. Not a big deal - we don’t have to agree on everything or even anything.

~B.