Of An Old Tired Man

I was just sitting listening to the music in the furtherleft chat room, when Sept.11, 2001, crossed my mind..... I know it is an old worn out subject by now, but occasionally my minds wonders back to that day, as it events were one of the most traumatic and influential things in my life.

Like most in the USA, my original reaction was anger, anger at the deaths of 3,000 people, angry that the sanctuary we call our homeland was violated,anger mostly because no other emotion seemed to fit.

After the initial shock and anger, the next things that came to mind was the question,WHY? Why would anyone want to do this to us, to My Country, to 3,000 innocent people.

You see up to this time, after a brief period of activism in the 1960's and seventies, I like a lot Americans,was living an almost contented, middle class, scrambling up the ladder, type of life. That life was on hold on that day because of a recent fall and back injury, so I had plenty of time to think and reflect.

There comes a time in a person's life when all he/she has learned and experienced seems of no avail in providing answers, or even the right questions.

The days following 9/11 was that time for me.

At such a time, the seekers of truth of the WHY, will climb their "spiritual"mountain to seek truth from his/her old man at the top.

I never did find the old man at the top, but I did ascend the mountain, and from the top of that spiritual mountain all you can see is the truth. At the top of that mountain the truth is all there is, you are above the clouds of illusion, the smog of subterfuge. All there is the truth.

The truth is like the ex lover we all have had. We wish we could see him/her again, but hope like hell we never do.

The truth that day has changed my life. The truth showed me that day, that America(USA), was not what is was pretending to be(really something I knew all along, but did not want to admit).

In the view of truth from that clear mountaintop, I could see all the bombs that have been, and will be dropped by the USA, for no other reason, but that we can.

I saw the the blacks of the past hanging from sycamore trees.

I saw 1,000's of Native Americans, who's life and land has been stolen from them, and although they are allowed to live, they are reduced to to living a life of alcoholism and violence, and poverty on reservations, a once proud people now just wards of a foreign power, of the invaders.

I saw the millions of starving people in third world countries, who barely etched out a living working at starvation wages, so the USA could continue to live in luxury.

And finally I saw hundreds of millions of Muslims, who should be living the richest lives on earth, living as slaves to USA and Israeli puppet governments and leaders.

I saw the children who died while still at an age they should be playing games with friends, burning with napalm, the women who all they wanted was to love and raise their family, treated as whores by USA soldiers and big businessmen.

And Last of all I saw the fathers. I saw the anger in their eyes, the hate in their hearts, the determination that this is enough, we will take it no more.

Now I understood where the planes came from and why, and although my heart still mourns for the lives lost on 9/11/2001. I see now these planes came from the hate and determination in those fathers eyes.

Would I have done less, I hope not!

Afghans Describe

"Tractor Trailers Full of Pieces of Human Bodies"

By Jeremy Scahill

May 09, 2009 -- As rage spreads in Afghanistan after US bombing that killed up to 160 people, unnamed Pentagon officials are spinning another cover-up. Defiant Obama moves ahead with troop increase.

As President Barack Obama prepares to send some 21,000 more US troops into Afghanistan, anger is rising in the western province of Farah, the scene of a US bombing massacre that may have killed as many as 160 Afghans, including 13 members of one family. At least six houses were bombed and among the dead and wounded are women and children. As of this writing reports indicate some people remain buried in rubble. The US airstrikes happened on Monday and Tuesday. Just hours after Obama met with US-backed president Hamid Karzai Wednesday, hundreds of Afghans--perhaps as many as 2,000-- poured into the streets of the provincial capital, chanting "Death to America." The protesters demanded a US withdrawal from Afghanistan.

In Washington, Karzai said he and the US occupation forces should operate from a "higher platform of morality," saying, "We must be conducting this war as better human beings," and recognize that "force won't buy you obedience." And yet, his security forces opened fire on the demonstrators, reportedly wounding five people.

According to The New York Times:

In a phone call played on a loudspeaker on Wednesday to outraged members of the Afghan Parliament, the governor of Farah Province, Rohul Amin, said that as many as 160 civilians had been killed, according to a legislator, Mohammad Naim Farahi. Afghan lawmakers immediately called for an agreement regulating foreign military operations in the country.

"The governor said that the villagers have brought two tractor trailers full of pieces of human bodies to his office to prove the casualties that had occurred," Mr. Farahi said. "Everyone at the governor's office was crying, watching that shocking scene."

Mr. Farahi said he had talked to someone he knew personally who had counted 113 bodies being buried, including those of many women and children. Later, more bodies were pulled from the rubble and some victims who had been taken to the hospital died, he said.

The US airstrikes hit villages in two areas of Farah province on Monday night and Tuesday. The extent of the deaths only came to public light because local people brought 20-30 corpses to the provincial capital. If the estimates of 160 dead are confirmed, it would reportedly be the single largest number of deaths caused by a US bombing since the overthrow of the Taliban in 2001. While Secretary of State Hillary Clinton initially "apologized" Wednesday for the civilian deaths and Obama reportedly conveyed similar sentiments to Karzai when they met in person, later in the day Clinton's spokesperson, Robert Wood, framed her apology as being based on preliminary information and, according to AP, said they "were offered as a gesture, before all the facts of the incident are known." By day's end, the Pentagon was seeking to blame the Taliban for "staging" the massacre to blame it on the US. Last night, NBC News's Pentagon correspondent Jim Miklaszewski said military sources told him Taliban fighters used grenades to kill three families to "stage" a massacre and then blame it on the US.

The senior US military and NATO commander in Afghanistan, Gen. David McKiernan, spoke in general terms: "We have some other information that leads us to distinctly different conclusions about the cause of the civilian casualties," he said. McKiernan left the specific details of the spin to unnamed officials.

According to The Washington Post, "A U.S. defense official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, said that 'the Taliban went to a concerted effort to make it look like the U.S. airstrikes caused this. The official did not offer evidence to support the claim, and could not say what had caused the deaths." Meanwhile, according to the Associated Press, a senior Defense official who did not want to be identified "said late Wednesday that Marine special operations forces believe the Afghan civilians were killed by grenades hurled by Taliban militants, who then loaded some of the bodies into a vehicle and drove them around the village, claiming the dead were victims of an American airstrike. A second U.S. official said a senior Taliban commander is believed to have ordered the grenade attack."

As the AP reported, "it would be the first time the Taliban has used grenades in this way."

While the Pentagon spins its story, the International Committee of the Red Cross has stated bluntly that US airstrikes hit civilian houses and revealed that an ICRC counterpart in the Red Crescent was among the dead. "We know that those killed included an Afghan Red Crescent volunteer and 13 members of his family who had been sheltering from fighting in a house that was bombed in an air strike," said the ICRC's head of delegation in Kabul, Reto Stocker. "We are deeply concerned by these events. Tribal elders in the villages called the ICRC during the fighting to report civilian casualties and ask for help. As soon as we heard of the attacks we contacted all sides to warn them that there were civilians and injured people in the area."

Read the entire ICRC statement here.

The Times, meanwhile, interviewed local people who contradict the unnamed US Defense officials' version of events:

Villagers reached by telephone said many were killed by aerial bombing. Muhammad Jan, a farmer, said fighting had broken out in his village, Shiwan, and another, Granai, in the Bala Baluk district. An hour after it stopped, the planes came, he said.

In Granai, he said, women and children had sought shelter in orchards and houses. "Six houses were bombed and destroyed completely, and people in the houses still remain under the rubble," he said, "and now I am working with other villagers trying to excavate the dead bodies."

He said that villagers, crazed with grief, were collecting mangled bodies in blankets and shawls and piling them on three tractors. People were still missing, he said.

Mr. Agha, who lives in Granai, said the bombing started at 5 p.m. on Monday and lasted until late into the night. "People were rushing to go to their relatives' houses, where they believed they would be safe, but they were hit on the way," he said.

In her earlier statement regarding the bombing, Clinton told Hamid Karzai "there will be a joint investigation by your government and ours."

But before that investigation began, the Pentagon was already using its unnamed officials to blame the Taliban. It also bears remembering that the US track record of thoroughly "investigating" US massacres is pathetic. The UN said there was convincing evidence that last year's US attack on the village of Azizabad in western Afghanistan killed 90 civilians, but the military only acknowledged 30 civilian deaths.

Standing between Hamid Karzai and Pakistani president Asif Ali Zardari on Wednesday, Obama said the US would "make every effort" to avoid civilian deaths in both countries (which are regularly bombed by the US). But as he was making those remarks, Defense Secretary Robert Gates was arriving in Kabul on Wednesday "to make sure that preparations were moving forward for the troop increase and that soldiers and Marines were getting the equipment they needed."

May 09, 2009 --- I have learned over the past decade if I want to know what's really going on in the United States, I have to cruise through the foreign media to see what's creating a furor or causing a stink. So, while searching for the status of Spain's on-again, off-again criminal proceedings against six Bush Administration war criminals, this headline in Der Spiegel caught my eye -- "Frankenfood Ban is Neither Populism nor Panic-Mongering."

"For some time, the likes of Monsanto have had their white-smocked engineers tinkering merrily and dangerously with the very DNA of food, genetically modifying the natural composition of things like potatoes so they contain a pesticide in every one of their cells, or altering rice so it contains a diarrhea drug in every bite. This is no mere lab experiment, for unbeknownst to the vast majority of Americans, Monsanto and a handful of other global biotech giants have quietly spread the seeds of these genetically altered Frankenfoods to so many farms over the past decade that about a third of the foods on U.S. supermarket shelves now contain organisms with tampered DNA -- everything from baby food and milk to products made with soybean and corn. Thanks to well-placed campaign donations and powerhouse lobbying, this infiltration of our food supply has been done with practically no consumer awareness, since both Bill Clinton's and George W's administrations have let these foodstuffs be sold in America without so much as a label on them to tell us that we're buying something that our families might prefer to avoid."

(...) Monsanto has long been wired into Washington. Michael R. Taylor was a staff attorney and executive assistant to the F.D.A. commissioner before joining a law firm in Washington in 1981, where he worked to secure F.D.A. approval of Monsanto’s artificial growth hormone before returning to the F.D.A. as deputy commissioner in 1991. Dr. Michael A. Friedman, formerly the F.D.A.’s deputy commissioner for operations, joined Monsanto in 1999 as a senior vice president. Linda J. Fisher was an assistant administrator at the E.P.A. when she left the agency in 1993. She became a vice president of Monsanto, from 1995 to 2000, only to return to the E.P.A. as deputy administrator the next year. William D. Ruckelshaus, former E.P.A. administrator, and Mickey Kantor, former U.S. trade representative, each served on Monsanto’s board after leaving government. Supreme Court justice Clarence Thomas was an attorney in Monsanto’s corporate-law department in the 1970s. He wrote the Supreme Court opinion in a crucial G.M.-seed patent-rights case in 2001 that benefited Monsanto and all G.M.-seed companies. Donald Rumsfeld never served on the board or held any office at Monsanto, but Monsanto must occupy a soft spot in the heart of the former defense secretary. Rumsfeld was chairman and C.E.O. of the pharmaceutical maker G. D. Searle & Co. when Monsanto acquired Searle in 1985, after Searle had experienced difficulty in finding a buyer. Rumsfeld’s stock and options in Searle were valued at $12 million at the time of the sale.

Monsanto goes after farmers, farmers’ co-ops, seed dealers -- anyone it suspects may have infringed its patents of genetically modified seeds. As interviews and reams of court documents reveal, Monsanto relies on a shadowy army of private investigators and agents in the American heartland to strike fear into farm country. They fan out into fields and farm towns, where they secretly videotape and photograph farmers, store owners, and co-ops; infiltrate community meetings; and gather information from informants about farming activities. Farmers say that some Monsanto agents pretend to be surveyors. Others confront farmers on their land and try to pressure them to sign papers giving Monsanto access to their private records.

Like it or not, they're advancing their agenda, and a 2004 Rockefeller Foundation report shows it. GM crop production achieved nine consecutive double digit year increases since 1996. More than eight million farmers in 17 countries now plant them, over 90% in developing nations. Far and away, the US is the world's leader "with aggressive Government promotion, absence of labeling, and the domination of US farm production." Here, "genetically engineered crops (have) essentially taken over the American food chain." In 2004, over 85% of soybeans were genetically modified, 45% of corn, and since animal feed is mainly from these crops "the entire meat production of the nation (and exports) has been fed on genetically modified animal feed." What animals eat, so do humans.

Several EU countries, including France, Germany, Austria and Denmark, even ban some EU-approved biotech products to further cloud the outlook. Polls show why, with European public opinion strongly opposed to GMO foods and ingredients, with hostility levels in France as high as 89% and 79% wanting governments to ban them. This shows European consumers are far ahead of Americans and much better protected (so far) by their overall exclusion as well as having labeling requirements for those allowed to be sold. That provision is crucial as it empowers consumers to use or avoid eating these foods. If enough people abstain, food outlets won't carry them.

By Kristin Bricker   May 7, 2009

Yesterday, 72 Mexican civil society organizations and a Brigadier General of the Mexican Army sent the following letter to US Congress demanding that all military aid to Mexico be immediately halted. The letter comes as the US House of Representative is considering more than doubling 2009 funding for the war on drugs in Mexico.

Human rights organizations from Mexico City and 21 of Mexico’s 31 states signed the letter.

The signatories express their serious concern that Mexican President Felipe Calderon seeks to further militarize Mexican society. They write, “President Felipe Calderón has introduced a package of proposed legislative reforms to our Congress which contemplate declaring states of emergency that would justify the takeover and control of the Mexican Army over civilian institutions…”

The signatories tell Congress, “The number of complaints for human rights violations committed by members of the armed forces registered by the National Human Rights Commission has increased six-fold during the last two years, reaching 1,230 in 2008.” They note that human rights crimes committed by soldiers are almost never punished: “There is an almost complete absence of transparency in cases of human rights violations committed by soldiers, due to the use of military jurisdiction to investigate and prosecute members of the armed forces responsible for such actions… To date we have no knowledge of any conviction or sentence in a case of human rights violations committed by the armed forces during the current presidential administration.”

Given the sharp increase in human rights abuses and the blanket impunity the military enjoys, the signatories write: “We respectfully request that the U.S. Congress and Department of State, in both the Merida Initiative as in other programs to support public security in Mexico, does not allocate funds or direct programs to the armed forces…. In particular, we urge the United States to consider ways to support a holistic response to security problems; based on tackling the root causes of violence and ensuring the full respect of human rights; not on the logic of combat.”

The letter marks a sharp divergence from an NGO letter drafted by Amnesty International and signed by many of the same signatories in May 2008. That letter, while expressing “profound concern over the human rights violations that have occurred in the last several months by the Mexican military and police within the context of the federal government’s fight against drug-trafficking and organized crime,” did not take a clear stance against the Merida Initiative and other US military aid to Mexico. On the contrary, it said, “We consider US cooperation on security matters to be appropriate and timely…”

The letter merely requested that human rights provisions be included in the Merida Initiative. Said human rights conditions apply to less than 15% of the total Merida Initiative package, and US Congress is currently considering doubling drug war aid to Mexico in 2009 even though the human rights conditions have not been met.

Amnesty International’s Mexico office told Narco News that they did not sign the following letter because they are still waiting for the Mexican government to comply with the human rights conditions they supported in last year’s letter.

With today’s statement, Mexican civil society and human rights organizations—based on their own lived experience with the consequences of Plan Mexico—have broken from the path of compromise urged on them last year by Amnesty, an organization that remains with a strategy now widely rejected South of the Border.

May 6, 2009

To: The Honorable Congress of the United States of America, United States House of Representatives, Committee on Appropriations, United States Senate.

The signatory organizations listed below address you, honorable representatives of the Congress of the United States of America, following President Barack Obama’s visit to Mexico on April 16 and 17, as well as the visits by high level public officials from the Obama administration in previous weeks; all of which represent a significant step forward in relations between our countries. In particular, in this letter we outline our concrete concerns regarding military assistance from the United States to Mexico.

We have closely monitored the impact of public security policies implemented by the current presidential administrations in both Mexico and the United States as well as bilateral assistance in this area. In this respect we make special mention of recent statements, such as those made by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, in which high level officials of the President Obama administration have recognized the United States’ responsibility in the problem of drug trafficking- related violence in Mexico owing to factors such as the high demand for drugs in the United States.

Furthermore, we welcome recent comments by theSecretary for Homeland Security, Janet Napolitano, which affirm that strengthening civil institutions, not increasing militarization, is the answer to combating high levels of violence along the United States-Mexico border. We hope that this perspective is shared by the U.S. Congress when determining how to allocate funds for public security and to support Mexico.

We wish to emphasize the current reality in Mexico where President Felipe Calderón has introduced a package of proposed legislative reforms to our Congress which contemplate declaring states of emergency that would justify the takeover and control of the Mexican Army over civilian institutions when these are considered inadequate or inefficient and when such a measure is considered strategic for national security. These proposed reforms are concerning because of the abuses that can arise from the militarization of public security.

Taking this into account, we express our serious concerns and reservations regarding the military aid provided by the United States to Mexico. Instead, we urge for an approach that is more comprehensive and respectful of the human and civil rights of the Mexican population.

We take this opportunity to highlight the following points:

• Through the Merida Initiative, the U.S. Congress has approved the expenditure of 700 million dollars directed to Mexico during its first two years. The package includes a significant portion of foreign military financing; especially in the first year of funding.

• In 2008, the United States Department of Defense stated that it had designated almost 13 million dollars in assistance to Mexico under Section 1206 to strengthen the capacity of Mexican armed forces to carry out anti-terrorist operations.

• Recent statements by the Obama Administration and congressional leaders indicate that Congress will soon be contemplating sizeable increases in funding for “the war against drugs” in Mexico as part of the FY09 Appropriations Supplemental Request, including $350 million dollars for the Department of Defense for anti-drug operations and other security-related activities on the United States-Mexico border and over $400 million dollars in assistance for counternarcotics efforts in Mexico that will be channeled through the Department of State. We are concerned about the lack of clear information on the specific designation of these funds and the possibility that they will be utilized to support further military assistance inside Mexico or militarization of the border region.

• Funding for the Merida Initiative in the 2010 budget will soon be under discussion. In light of the previous points, it is critical to contextualize the problems implicit in foreign military funding in the current circumstances in Mexico:

• The deployment of the Mexican Army to carry out public security tasks that legally correspond to the civilian police has brought with it a significant increase in human rights violations in the last two years, including extrajudicial executions, torture, arbitrary detentions and rape. In fact, the number of complaints for human rights violations committed by members of the armed forces registered by the National Human Rights Commission has increased six-fold during the last two years, reaching 1,230 in 20081.

• This situation owes itself in large part to considerations such as:

o The Army is not trained to carry out tasks that legally correspond to civilian institutions. On the contrary, the mentality of the armed forces is to confront an enemy force and not to protect the rights of the civilian population in the context of normal policing tasks.

o There is an almost complete absence of transparency in cases of human rights violations committed by soldiers, due to the use of military jurisdiction to investigate and prosecute members of the armed forces responsible for such actions.

According to information obtained through freedom of information mechanisms, in the first two years of the presidential term of Felipe Calderón, military authorities opened 170 investigations under military jurisdiction in which the victims were civilians; in this same period only 10 of these investigations resulted in indictments. To date we have no knowledge of any conviction or sentence in a case of human rights violations committed by the armed forces during the current presidential administration.

The involvement of the armed forces in policing tasks is not an effective response to combat drug trafficking and violence associated with organized crime. Military presence can at times result in an increase in the number of arrests; however, as an overall strategy it has not proven to be effective as it fails to address the factors that cause and perpetuate violence. An approach that takes the social factors that contribute to crime into account is urgently needed; instead of attacking crime with short-term approaches that respond only to situational contingencies.

We respectfully request that the U.S. Congress and Department of State, in both the Merida Initiative as in other programs to support public security in Mexico, does not allocate funds or direct programs to the armed forces. We believe that a change of paradigm is needed in order to combat the factors that cause drug trafficking and violence; instead of only combating their symptoms.

Any response to violence caused by drug trafficking must include measures to:

• Improve the access to drug treatment in the United States and implement other measures to reduce the demand for drugs in both countries.

• Reduce the flow of arms from the United States to Mexico.

• In terms of the possibility of providing funds to Mexico to improve the public security situation, any funding considered should take into account:

o Programs that address the root causes of insecurity such as poverty, inequality and the lack of access to educational and employment opportunities that allow the population to live a life of dignity.

o The strengthening of civil institutions, with civil and not military control; including the positive aspects of the judicial reform in Mexico such as the implementation of oral trials and an adversarial justice system.

Given the current considerations for the Merida Initiative 2010 budget and the possibility of more military financing to Mexico being channeled through the Department of Defense, we hope that the U.S. government takes into account the concerns and suggestions outlined in this letter in order to re-design assistance programs to Mexico. In particular, we urge the United States to consider ways to support a holistic response to security problems; based on tackling the root causes of violence and ensuring the full respect of human rights; not on the logic of combat.

since I can recall, I despised and felt hatred towards Americans'


Text of al-Jazeera interview with Osama bin Laden
Last Updated: 6:19PM BST 10 Oct 2001

This is a final interview the Saudi jihadist gave to the al-Jazeera Arab television channel in 1998. Although brief excerpts have been seen in the West, this is the first time the interview has been published at length

QUESTION: What is your history?

OSAMA BIN LADEN: I am Osama bin Mohammed bin Laden. I was born to Muslim parents in the Arabian peninsula in Riyadh, Malez neighbourhood, in 1377 Hijra [the Islamic year: AD 1957] and then by the grace of God we went to Medina six months after my birth, where I spent most of my life between Mecca, Jeddah and Medina.

My father, Sheikh Mohammed bin Awad bin Laden, was born in Hadramout [Yemen], from where he came to Hijaz to work for more than 70 years. God honoured him by granting him the tenders to build the mosques of the holy sites where the Kaaba is, and at the same time he also built the prophet's holy site.

When my father found out that the Jordanian government had submitted a tender to renovate the Dome [in Jerusalem], he gathered all the engineers and asked them to submit a tender for a cost price only, excluding profits. They told him they could guarantee him winning the bid even if they added on a percentage for profit, but he insisted that it be exclusive of any profit.

When they submitted their total figure to him, they were surprised that he (God rest his soul) had then gone ahead and reduced the total figure they had submitted for the project even further in an attempt to guarantee their company winning the renovation bid for the building of the holy site and the renovation of this particular one [the Dome of al-Aqsa mosque].

He won the bids and began the work. And on some days he was able to perform three of his daily prayers in three of the holiest sites.

I studied economics at Jeddah University and I began working in my father's company and on roads from an early age, even though my father passed away when I was 10. This is the brief history of Osama bin Laden.

Q: What do you seek?

OBL: What I seek is what is right for any living being. We demand that our land be liberated from enemies. That our lands be liberated from the Americans. These living beings have been given an inner sense that rejects any intrusions [of their lands] by outsiders.

Let us take an example of poultry. Let us look at a chicken, for example. If an armed person was to enter a chicken's home with the aim of inflicting harm to it, the chicken would automatically fight back.

Q: Do you think that the British-American attacks against Iraq will increase the popularity of uprising people against America, or will such attacks subdue them into desisting from any actions militarily or otherwise against the US and its interests?

OBL: Our enemies roam and meander in our seas and lands and skies, attack and assault without seeking permission from anyone, in particular on this occasion when America and Britain were unable to muster alliance in this blatant, disgraceful plot.

The present [Arab] regimes no longer have the power. Either they are collaborators or have lost the power to do anything against this contemptible occupation. So Muslims should emigrate somewhere where they can raise the symbol of Jihad and protect their religion and world, otherwise they will lose everything.

Are they incapable of appreciating the calamity that befell our brothers in Palestine and forgetting how the Palestinian people, once famous for their activity and agriculture and citrus and also for making of soap, have become a refugee people, turned into slaves of those colonialist Jews who dictate their movements? The situation is dangerous and if we do not move now when the ancient holy site of 1,200 million Muslims has been usurped, then when should people stir?

Those who believe that such attacks [against Iraq] will terrorise the Islamic movements are deluding themselves. We Muslims believe that our time of death is fixed. Our fortunes are in the hand of God. Since God created these spirits, granted people fortunes and exchanged them for heaven, why would they [Muslims] refrain from serving their religion?

Q: Following last year's attacks against Afghanistan, reports quoted you saying that you will retaliate. So far we have not seen any retaliation. Should there be further attacks against Afghanistan, will there be physical retaliation against the attackers and in what form will it come?

OBL: Our duty is to incite the jihad against America, Israel and their allies. We are following this route. Because of circumstances surrounding us, as well as our inability to move outside Afghanistan to take care of matters closely, we were unable to do so.

But, with the grace of God, we have established with a large number of our brothers in the International Islamic Front to confront Jews and the crusaders. We believe that the affairs of many of those are moving in the right direction and have the ability to move widely. We pray to God to grant them victory and revenge on the Jews and Americans.

Q: The US has warned its citizens and interests in the Gulf of the possibilities of attacks by your followers. How serious are these threats and do you target American citizens in general or mainly the American forces in the Gulf and other Islamic areas?

OBL: I heard this news [of the US warning] a few days ago, which filled my heart with joy. But how serious the threat is I cannot say. If I knew the person who made the threat I could respond, but unfortunately I have no idea who undertook this blessed effort and we pray to God to help them, let them be successful and grant them the body bags of the infidel Americans and others.

A target, if made available to Muslims by the grace of God, is every American man. He is an enemy of ours whether he fights us directly or merely pays his taxes.

You might have heard those who supported Clinton's attacks against Iraq formed three-quarters of the American population. A people that regards its president in high favour when he kills innocent people is a decadent people with no understanding of morality.

Q: The Pentagon has circulated news that you are suffering from muscular disease as a result of which you have a life expectancy of five to six years. How true is this report?

OBL: We are continuously thankful to God for I enjoy very excellent health. We here in the mountains endure severe cold weather, as well as extreme hot summers.

My favourite hobby is horse riding and I can still ride a horse non-stop for 70 kilometres [40 miles]. These are intentional rumours, perhaps aimed at disheartening some of our Muslim supporters and maybe even to calm the fear of Americans by suggesting that Osama is incapable of doing anything.

The truth is that this issue is not purely tied to Osama, for this is a nation of 1,200 million Muslims who will never allow the house of God to remain with these tainted arrogant Jews and Christians. We are confident in the knowledge that they will continue the jihad and unleash painful strikes against America and its allies.

Q: Last August 20 when the US air strikes were carried out against Afghanistan it was reported that you were attending a meeting which came under attack and that the air strike was timed to get you.

Were you attending this meeting, and is it true that you received a message from Pakistan asking you to leave that area immediately because of a possible strike? What is your relationship with Pakistan and do you think it will ever support the United States in its quest against you?

OBL: The intelligence that the Americans had was false. I was a few hundred kilometres away. As for the reports that we were pre-warned, I can say that thanks to God we have found a supportive people in Pakistan and one which has surpassed our expectations in the way it has supported us.

Q: Some newspapers say that you seek to acquire nuclear, chemical and biological weapons. How true are these reports?

OBL: We are seeking to drive them [the US] out of our Islamic nations and prevent them from dominating us. We believe that this right to defend oneself is the right of all human beings. At a time when Israel stocks hundreds of nuclear warheads and when the Western crusaders control a large percentage of this weapon, we do not consider this an accusation but a right and we reject anyone who accuses us of this.

We congratulated the Pakistani people when they achieved this nuclear weapon and we consider it the right of all Muslims to do so.

Q: Considering the charges by the American administration, which relate to terrorism, will you be willing to confront such allegations in another country and in a neutral court of justice?

OBL: There are two sides to this conflict. The international crusaders and the Jewish Zionist alliance headed by America, Britain and Israel. The second party is the Islamic world.

It is unacceptable in such a conflict whereby he aggresses and enters my innermost consecrated land and robs the Muslims' oil and then when faced with any resistance by the Muslims accuses them of being terrorists. This is either stupidity or assuming the others are stupid.

It is our legal duty to resist this occupation and to punish them with the same means they use against us.

Q: The Taliban said it would try you, should those governments accusing you present categorical evidence of your links to these charges. Do you expect a trial in accordance with laws used by Taliban and the Islamic Sharia?

OBL: We accept any court of justice that applies Islamic Sharia without being influenced by the infidels. We are willing and prepared, at any time, for any [Islamic] legal court of justice whereby the prosecutor and the accused can stand together. But if the prosecutor is the United States, then we too can become prosecutors and charge her with many things that it has committed in the land of Muslims.

But when the Americans, may Allah fight them, accused me they refused to agree to abide by our Sharia and said they were demanding one thing only and that is to hand over Osama bin Laden. They deal as if people are their slaves and sheep and with utmost arrogance. We pray to Allah to degrade them.

Q: You were accused of the attacks against the US embassies in Nairobi and Tanzania. What is your true stance with regards to these attacks?

OBL: Those who follow the international news would have worked out how much support there is in the Islamic world for attacks against Americans, even though people were saddened by the deaths of some innocent civilians of those countries. But it was clear that there was huge rejoicing and satisfaction in the Islamic world.

So I regard with honour those men who carried out bombing attacks in Riyadh, Khobar or East Africa. The same applies to the Palestinians, who are teaching the Jews great lessons.

Q: But the US says it has proof of your involvement in these attacks? In the investigation it is said that a person from your group has made confessions relating to your organisation and its links to bombings, including the World Trade Centre [in 1993]?

OBL: America's allegations are many, but they do not concern us much. Those people are resisting the international infidels who occupied their lands and what angers America most is when people it has abused resist its abuse.

Despite this I maintain that its allegations are false, unless it means that I am involved in inciting and goading them, which is very clear and to which I confess at all times. I was one of those who signed an edict calling for jihad and we have incited for several years now and, thank God, many brothers adhered to our calls.

Yes, they confessed during some interrogations that they were influenced by some of our statements that we made to people and in which we announced certain edicts about the obligation of Muslims to wage jihad against those occupying Americans.

What is wrong with resisting the aggressor. The North Koreans, the Vietnamese, they all resisted the Americans. This is a given right.

As I said in the past, we missed a great honour in that we were not involved in the killings of Americans in Riyadh. So these charges are false. If the charges against me are for incitement then they are true. It is I with other Muslim brothers who incite jihad.

Q: Mohammed Sadeq Howeida [one of those arrested in connection with the East African embassy bombings] claimed that he was trained in your camps and was personally acquainted to you. How true are his confessions?

OBL: In the training camps in Afghanistan more than 15,000 men were trained. As far as reports say I ordered him to carry out these attacks, I believe this is an erroneous American attempt against me. It has no evidence. Assuming that brother Howeida did say such things, it would have been under torture during which he was forced to make false confessions.

Q: After the air strikes against Afghanistan the US president called for an economic war against you. Will this cause you major discomfort?

OBL: War is war. You win some days, you lose others. America has created enormous pressures against our activities from an early date and this did affect us. Certain countries in which we have money and properties ordered us to cease aggression against America, but it is our obligation to goad the Umat [Muslim peoples] and thanks to God we continue.

Q: Last February you called a jihad against the crusaders and the Jews and, in particular, against the Americans. This call came at a time many of the movements who had walked the path of armed struggle started to cease such activities and to start participating in their countries' parliaments. Don't you think that by calling a jihad you are going against the trend?

OBL: Those Muslims who say that these are not times for jihad are gravely wrong.

Following the absence of jihad from our Umat for such a long time we acquired a generation of people seeking education who had not experienced the reality of jihad, and they have been influenced by the American culture and media invasion that stormed the Muslim countries. Without even participating in a military war we find this generation has already been psychologically beaten.

What is true is that God granted the chance of jihad in Afghanistan, Chechnya and Bosnia and we are assured that we can wage a jihad against the enemies of Islam, in particular against the greater external enemy - the crusader-Jewish alliance.

Those who carried out the jihad in Afghanistan did more than was expected of them because with very meagre capacities they destroyed the largest military force [the Soviet army] and in doing so removed from our minds this notion of stronger nations.

We believe that America is weaker than Russia and from what we have heard from our brothers who waged jihad in Somalia, they found to their greatest surprise the weakness, frailness and cowardliness of the American soldier. When only eight of them were killed they packed up in the darkness of night and escaped without looking back.

Q: A reward of $5 million has been placed for your arrest or information leading to your arrest by the Americans. Are you afraid of being sold by a treacherous party?

OBL: These men left the world and came to these mountains and land, leaving their families, fathers and mothers. They left their universities and came here under shelling, American missiles, and attacks.

Some were killed: six Arabs and one Turk. These men left the world and came for the jihad. America, however, which worships money, believes that people here are of this calibre.

I swear that we have not had the need to change a single man from his position even after these reports were made. We do not suspect our brothers and accept them for their goodness.

Q: What kind of relationship is there between you and the Taliban. Are you part of it or do you function independently but from Afghan territory?

OBL: I call on all Muslims outside Afghanistan to support this nation. With their thoughts, their donations and their support, for it represents the symbol of Islam.

Any aggression by America today against Afghanistan should not be seen as mere aggression against Afghanistan itself, but should be seen as an aggression against Afghanistan the carrier of the real and truest Islam in the Muslim world, the one waging Jihad in the name of the Islamic world.

Our relationship with the Taliban is very strong and it is an ideological relationship not based on mere political or financial relationships. Many nations have tried to pressure the Taliban and force them into things, but by the grace of God they have been unyielding in their beliefs.

Q: How true are reports that the Taliban will hand you over should there be damning evidence against you?

OBL: From what I have heard the Taliban denied such reports and said it was untrue, but only God knows the truth.

Q: The CIA says there was a relationship with you during the Afghan-Soviet war.

OBL: In answer to your previous question as to whether we are working here independently of the Afghans, the truth is that we do not operate here in an independent fashion. We are in a state that has a prince of believers and we are obliged under the Sharia to obey him.

We are committed to this nation and call upon the people's support and warn against America's propaganda, whereby it seeks to strike the Afghan state, but it seeks to do so under the pretext of hitting Osama bin Laden. This will not serve her at all.

As far as we are concerned, we are not intimidated by American missiles. But we warn them any strike against this people is an aggression against the Muslim nation.

Because of many circumstances in Afghanistan, the Taliban has a view that we should not conduct any moves from inside Afghanistan against any other state. This was a decision from the head of believers. But we do incite others and the issue does not end because of our restricted movement during these times.

Q: Going back to the previous question of you and the CIA and American support for the war against the Soviets . . .

OBL: This is misinformation by the Americans. Every Muslim the minute he can start differentiating, carries hate towards Americans, Jews and Christians, this is part of our ideology.

Ever since I can recall I felt at war with the Americans and had feelings of animosity and hate towards them. So what they say happened between them and myself is out of the question.

It is only because the Americans were occupying the region that they threatened to use military force should the Soviets conduct such an intervention. So the Americans would be lying if they claim they had supported us. We challenge them to provide evidence supporting such claims.

They were a burden on us and on the mujahideen in Afghanistan, for we were performing our obligations in protecting Islam in Afghanistan even though this obligation of ours was at times serving, though without our consent, interests of America.

When the interests of two sides coincide at times, this does not amount to co-operation. We regard them with animosity and there are statements going far back with us calling for a boycott of American products, and even the necessity to attack American forces and America's economy. This goes back for over 12 years now.

Q: Reports suggest that your followers and supporters are also active in some Arab states such as Yemen. How true are these reports?

OBL: Well . . . [he smiles] our connections are rife in the entire Muslim world, be it in Pakistan, Yemen or anywhere else. With Yemen we have strong relations which go back a long way, in particular since our origins and those of my father date back to Yemen.

Q: What are your end objectives and what message would you like to make to the Islamic world in general?

OBL: We believe very strongly and I say this despite the pressures imposed on us by the regimes and media. They want to skin us from our manhood. We believe that we are men, Muslim men, committed to defend the grandest house in the universe. The Holy Kaaba is an honour to die and defend. So this is our aim - to liberate the lands of Islam from the sinners.

America and some of its agents in the region bargained with me more than 10 times to keep quiet and silent this small tongue of mine. "Shut up" and we will return to you your money. They believe that people only live for worldly matters and they forgot that our lives are meaningless if we do not seek to please the good will and pleasure of Allah.

Finally, I advise all Muslims to adhere to the Koran. This is the way out from our present predicament. Our cure is the Koran. When one reads the Koran one wonders: Do they not read the Koran or do they actually read but not understand as they should?

USA KNOWINGLY LETS PHARMACEUTICAL COMPANY INFECT COUNTRIES WITH AIDS VIRUS

by Larken Rose

4/28/09

First, the good news: The pro-freedom “movement” is seeing a dramatic growth spurt. All sorts of people, from all walks of life, are coming to realize that our “protector” government is the main thing that we need to be protected from. In fact, by all appearances, the movement is growing by leaps and bounds, especially among the younger generations. However …

What I see in the movement, including what I saw at Saturday’s “End the Fed” event, leaves me with mixed emotions. In my brief comments there, I didn’t want to be too blatant, lest I offend both the organizers and the spectators of the event, but the truth is, most of what the “movement” is focusing on is pointless and doomed to fail. The problem is this: Most people have been trained to view obedience as a virtue and have been taught to take pride in the fact that they are “law-abiding taxpayers” who “play by the rules.” And this is just as true of most of the people in the “movement.” As a direct result, they are focusing all of their energies on electing this or that candidate, or on lobbying for or against this or that legislation. In short, they continue to focus on asking tyrants to please give us permission to be free. And the message that that sends to those in government, more than whatever the people are actually “demanding,” is this: “We agree that we cannot be free without your blessing!”

Throughout most of the world, throughout most of history, saying what you think has been “illegal”; having the means to defend yourself has been “illegal”; in fact, anything other than unquestioning obedience to authority has been “illegal.” The vast majority of oppression and tyranny in history was done “legally.” But what does that even mean? All it means is that, before stomping on the peasants, the tyrants would formally proclaim, “We have the right to do this to you.” Likewise, resisting tyrannical governments has always been “illegal.” In fact, how could it not be? What tyrant would be so stupid as to say, “It’s okay, you’re allowed to disobey me”? But as obvious as that is, most people are still so indoctrinated into the notion that obedience to authority is a moral imperative, that even most of those who claim to be freedom-fighters frequently end their “demands” with “as long as it’s not illegal.” In other words, they will do all manner of noble fighting for justice, as long as they have the tyrants’ permission to do so. Well, duh. What good has that ever accomplished?

Quite a few people have, in the past few years, complained that I have “gone too far” with the whole “anarchy thing.” You see, they want a solution “within the system,” a way to change “the law” to restore our freedoms. They fail to notice the obvious logical contradiction: If you need the permission of “law” to be free, then by definition, you’re not free. It’s classic slave mentality: If you’re waiting around for your master to tell you that you’re allowed to be free (and how likely is that to happen?) then you are accepting your enslavement as just and legitimate. As such, you don’t really believe in freedom; you just want a nicer master.

I can’t decide if it’s encouraging or depressing to watch a room full of people “demanding” that their masters pass a “law” to let the people be free. And, whether out of fear or retaliation, or out of existential fear of not being good, obedient subjects, those people constantly throw in the qualifiers, “not violently, of course,” or “not by doing anything illegal, of course.” Why not? Obtaining freedom from tyranny is always “illegal” and almost always requires either violence or the threat of violence. All so-called “law,” including the heinously oppressive kind, is backed by the threat of violence. Not surprisingly, just about the only time such “legal” injustice is defeated is when its intended victims use defensive force to stop it.

The truth is, most people who say they are pro-freedom are still nowhere near shaking themselves of the slave mindset. They still view “breaking the law” as the most unthinkable sin, even when they acknowledge that the law is oppressive. Need proof? Suppose there were a rash of armed carjackings in some town, and the townsfolk got together to decide what to do about it. How many speeches would end with this? “so we must put an end to this crime … without violence, of course.” I’m guessing no one would say that. Why not? Because they would view the carjackings as entirely evil, and would view the forcible resistance of them as inherently justified. So why don’t they say the same about “government” thefts, frauds, and oppressions?

Because the truth is, as much as they don’t like getting whipped by the master, deep down they still believe that the master has the right to whip them. Why else would they waste time continually asking the master to stop? Why else would they qualify all their “demands” for their master’s kindness with something along the lines of, “but of course I won’t disobey you or lift a hand against you”?

Obama's Violin
Populist rage and the uncertain containment of change
May 2009 By Paul Street
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As of this writing in late March, the Barack Obama administration and its allies in the Democratic-run Congress have been attempting to perform system-maintaining acts of co-optation and popular pacification that no Republican presidency or Congress could ever carry out. Lance Selfa reminds us in his recent book The Democrats: A Critical History (Haymarket, 2008) that corporate America would have no reason to embrace a two-party system if there were no significant differencesbetween the two competing "subdivisions" of what Ferdinand Lundberg once aptly called "the Property Party." The business elite profits from a narrow-spectrum system in which one business party is always waiting in the wings to capture and control popular anger and energy when the other business party falls out of favor.

But the two parties are not simply interchangeable. It is the Democrats' job to define and embody the constricted left-most parameters of acceptable political debate. For the last century, it has been the Democratic Party's distinctive assignment to play "the role of shock absorber, trying to head off and co-opt restive [and potentially radical] segments of the electorate" by posing as "the party of the people"(Selfa). The Democrats performed this critical system-preserving, change-containing function in relation to the agrarian populist insurgency of the 1890s and the working-class rebellion of the 1930s and 1940s. They played much the same role in relation to the antiwar, civil rights, anti-poverty, ecology, and feminist movements during and since the 1960s and early 1970s. In every case, the movements that arose to challenge concentrated power and oppression and to reduce inequality were pacified, silenced, and ultimately shut down, their political energies sucked into the corporate and militaristic Democratic Party.

The standard historic pattern of Democratic Party co-optation and progressive surrender is currently trying to repeat itself amidst epic economic crisis and imperial disruption. Two and a half weeks after Obama's victory in the 2008 presidential election, David Rothkopf, a former Clinton administration official, commented on the president-elect's corporatist and militarist transition team and cabinet appointments with a musical analogy. Obama, Rothkopf told the New York Times, was following "the violin model: you hold power with the left hand and you play the music with the right."

The Obama administration's record so far is richly consistent with the violin analogy. Dominant, so-called "mainstream" media routinely portray Obama as a "bold" and even "radical" "departure from the past"—a person of what the leading communications authorities call "the left." This is offensive to people on the actual left. The supposed "peace candidate" intends to increase the United States' massive "defense" budget this and next year. Reading the fine print on Obama's Iraq plan, moreover, it is clear that he plans to sustain the illegal occupation of that country well past 2011 and very likely into the indefinite future.

To make matters dangerously worse, Obama is actively increasing the level of U.S. violence in Afghanistan and—most ominously—in nuclear Pakistan. The New York Times reports, with no hint of disapproval, that he is considering "expanding the American covert war in Pakistan," where every U.S. missile attack destabilizes the political situation a bit more. Obama and his so-called "national security" team are planning, the Times reports, to "widen the target area" of their already "extensive [CIA] missile strikes" on that country to include Baluchistan, "a sprawling province that is under the authority of the central government" (March 20, 2009).

Obama is continuing core Bush policies on Israel and Iran. He refuses to pay honest attention to the legitimate grievances of the Palestinian people about whose fate he stayed revealingly mute during the savage U.S.-Israel assault on the people of Gaza last December and January. He made no effort to resist the U.S. Israel lobby's torpedoing of Charles Freeman's nomination as chair of the National Intelligence Council. Freeman, a veteran national security operative, was brusquely dismissed because he dared to suggest that the Israeli apartheid and occupation state might bear some responsibility for violence and hatred in the Middle East.

Meanwhile, Obama dangerously and revealingly resists pressure to investigate and prosecute the monumental war and human rights crimes of the Bush administration. He quietly commits to the officially concealed trillion dollar annual Pentagon budget, a giant subsidy to high-tech industry that pays for more than 760 bases across more than 130 nations and accounts for nearly half the military spending on earth—all in the name of "defense." The leading Wall Street investment firm and bailout recipient Morgan Stanley reported the day after Obama's election victory that Obama "has been advised and agrees that there is no peace dividend."

I get email all the time from Americans claiming to be puzzled why I despise America. Let me spell it out more clearly.

1. On 2001-10-07 the USA attacked Afghanistan unprovoked. It is an international war crime to aid or abet such an aggressive war. Nearly all Americans support that illegal war.
2. On 2003-03-20 the USA attacked Iraq unprovoked. It is an international war crime to aid or abet such an aggressive war. Colin Powell presented counterfeit evidence of Iraq’s alleged nuclear weapons at the UN to justify the preemptive attack. Nearly all Americans supported that illegal war. They only had second thoughts when the costs in dollars and American lives mounted, not because they had an attack of conscience.
3. America routinely tortures detainees in Afghanistan and Iraq. This is illegal by the Geneva conventions. Only a handful of Americans made any protest.
4. Americans killed over hundred thousand civilians, mostly children. Targeting civilians is illegal by the Geneva conventions. Nearly all Americans excuse this behaviour.
5. The American soldiers in Afghanistan and Iraq are in no way defending the USA. They are fighting to control oil. The attraction of the war to soldiers is not the money or the travel, but the appeal of absolute power of life and death over others, the opportunity to maim, rape, kill and plunder without restraint. The soldiers are morally then the equivalent of Mafia hitmen. Nearly all Americans treat them as heroes, on the same plane as those who sacrificed their lives in WWII to protect the USA. This a blasphemy. Nearly all Americans support president Bush in thumbing his nose at the world court, and harbouring American war criminals safe from prosecution. America forces other countries to violate their treaty duty to prosecute war criminals on their soil.
6. Americans use banned weapons such as Napalm, white phosphorus, cluster bombs and depleted uranium to kill slowly and painfully.
7. The Bush administration gradually whittled away at constitutional right after constitutional right with a mere peep of protest. America is a nation of cowards. A people afraid to lift a finger to defend the constutition don’t deserve to have such an exemplary constitution.

I can’t understand how anyone could be proud to belong to a country that degenerate. It is like being proud of being a German in the time of Hitler.

My anger and contempt are based on the above seven recent behaviours of Americans.

Happy May Day Labor Day!

May 1st is a legal holiday here Mexico as in most countries of the world. Mexican workers are entitled to a day off work with full pay or double pay if they do work. The day is celebrated around the world as International Workers Day, except for the United States, where children are taught to dance around a flowered pole in welcome of Spring. This is especially curious since May Day honors events that happened in the the US. The designation of May 1 as Labor Day by nations other than the US came about from worldwide outrage over events that took place in Chicago. It is the story of Haymarket Square.

Of course, labor history is anathema to corporate America and is edited out of textbooks. (Except for examples of corruption). As Orwell pointed out in 1984: "Those who control the present, control the past, and those who control the past, control the future." We should take strength from the brave Americans who fought against the entrenched forces of the right.

All of the privileges workers enjoy today - a minimum wage, safety laws, and even an eight-hour workday -came about only with the sacrifice of the workers who came before them. Although governments prefer our collective amnesia, workers on May Day should remember the past and realize they too are part of an ongoing struggle to bring about an end to the exploitation of labor around the world. From the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, people in factories have worked very long shifts, lasting up to fourteen or more hours a day.

During the 1880s a new movement in the US calling for an eight-hour day inspired both labor unions and unorganized workers. At its 1884 convention, the Federation of Organized Trades and Labor Unions adopted a resolution stating that beginning May 1, 1886, "eight hours shall constitute a legal day's work" and workers would strike at companies that did not recognize the eight-hour day. By April 1886, a quarter of a million workers had committed themselves to go on strike as part of the May Day movement. This enabled thousands of workers to win shorter shifts. Most employers, however, refused to reduce working hours.

By May 1 some 200,000 US workers were on strike. An additional 340,000 workers in the industrial cities of Boston, New York, Milwaukee, Chicago and Pittsburgh, turned out for local parades and rallies. One of the most militant campaigns occurred in Chicago. The syndicalist International Working People's Association — promoting equal rights and an end to racism and the class system — had successfully organized huge numbers of workers, building a movement that included African-Americans, immigrants, and women standing together with white men. Largely because of the organization’s efforts, 50,000 workers went on strike, with tens of thousands attending the city's May Day parade. The IWPA's successful broad-based appeal worried businesses and the government alike. This fear resulted in the expansion of both the police and the militias.

On May Day, Albert Parsons, along with Albert Spies, spoke to a huge crowd assembled as part of the May Day activities. Parsons was a member of both the Knights of Labor and the Chicago Central Labor Union, and Spies was the editor of the German workers' paper Die Arbeiter-Zeitung. Despite the city leaders' expectations of violence (which led to a heavy police presence), the rally ended without incident. Two days later, Spies spoke to a meeting of 6,000 workers. Among the workers were striking lumber workers and employees from the McCormick Harvester Works.

Cyrus McCormick, a determined union-buster had locked his workers out as a result of their strike of two and a half months. Nonstriking workers and replacement workers became the focus of heckling by other meeting participants, which created a chaotic atmosphere. Then, in a classic case of overreaction, police fired into the crowd and killed at least two men while wounding many more. Appalled by the police violence, Spies called for a massive rally the next day in Haymarket Square. Between 2,000 and 3,000 people attended the May 4 rally. Parsons gave an hour-long speech that was relatively tame. He specifically stated, "I am not here for the purpose of inciting anybody."

Chicago Mayor Harrison, who had attended most of the meeting, stopped by the police station on his way home. He reported to Police Captain Bonfield that "nothing looked likely to require police interference." Despite this advice the captain, who regularly employed Pinkerton detectives and supported "shoot to kill" policies when dealing with strikers, sent additional officers to the square. After hours of speeches, people had begun to leave, when Samuel Fielden, a Methodist preacher and the final speaker, took the podium. Concluding his speech, he encouraged workers to stand up to the law, which did not protect them, urging them to "kill it, stab it . . . to impede its progress."

The police considered this "inflammatory language" and 200 police officers ordered the remaining crowd to disperse immediately. As Fielden argued with the police of the peaceful intent of the meeting, someone threw a dynamite bomb at the police. One sergeant was killed immediately. The police then opened fire at the crowd. Estimates indicated that seven or eight civilians were killed. Several policemen and additional civilians died later. Following the event, hysteria swept the city.

Mayor Harrison declared martial law. Some believed the bomb had been thrown by an agent provocateur. Indeed, it served nicely as an excuse for the police to harass and attack scores of people. Hundreds were arrested. State Attorney for Cook County J. Grinnell announced in a public statement, "Make the raids first and look up the law afterwards." Labor unions were broken up. Picketing strikers were arrested and the police continued to beat labor supporters.

In conjunction with the bombing, the state arrested and indicted eight anarchists: Spies, Michael Schwab, Fielden, Parsons, Adolph Fischer, George Engel, Louis Lingg and Oscar Neebe. All were charged with conspiracy to murder, despite the fact that only three had been present at the Haymarket meeting. For their trial, a special bailiff was appointed to pick the jury. He stated, "These fellows are going to be hanged as certain as death." During the trial in June 1886, the state could not provide evidence that any of the men had knowledge of the bomb or that they had incited or participated in the violence.

But it wasn't the men so much as their ideas that were considered dangerous. As Grinnell stated in his summation: "Law is on trial. Anarchy is on trial. These men have been selected, picked out by the grand jury and indicted because they were leaders. They are no more guilty than the thousands who follow them. Gentlemen of the jury: convict these men, make examples of them, hang them and you save our institutions, our society."

As a result of the trial, all but one of the men received death sentences (Neebe received 15 years). Despite international outcry, Spies, Parsons, Fischer, and Engel were hanged on November 11, 1887; Lingg escaped by committing suicide. Hundreds of thousands of people lined the funeral procession for the executed men. Later, in 1893, when newly elected Governor Altgeld granted pardons to Neebe, Schwab, and Fielden, he admitted that the trial had been unfair and that the men had always been innocent of the crimes.

After Haymarket, workers all over the world pointed towards May 1 as their day. After 1886 rallies, strikes and other militant actions promoted the cause of the working class around the world. Unfortunately, a conservative element within U.S. organized labor, combined with the crushing government repression of left politics, allowed the significance of the day to become lost in the United States. As early as 1894, President Cleveland signed a bill naming not May 1 but the first Monday in September as "Labor Day." This creatively sidestepped the day with more historical significance. Adding further insult, President Eisenhower proclaimed May 1 as "Law Day" in 1958. In light of the history of May Day, it is ironic that the theme of the 2002 year's Law Day, sponsored by the American Bar Association, became "Celebrate Your Freedom." The focus being worded to "equal protection of the laws", though the effect was the opposite.

What happened at Haymarket must not be forgotten, lest it give reactionary forces the opportunity to revoke what the labor movement has gained. In 1886 the movement was strong and visible. It was the state that provoked crowds into violence in order to create an excuse to undermine the progress of the working class. Governments cannot be allowed to frighten workers back into silence. Instead, it behooves them to follow the examples set by Parsons, Spies, Fischer and Engel, and all the others who have died or been imprisoned by the state. The events of May Day 1886 remind us that workers will continue to be exploited until they stand up and oppose that exploitation. It is only with organization and the courage to speak out against injustice that there will be better working conditions, better pay, and better lives.

Now a George W Bush has once more further obscured the truth of history by newly changing the name and function of the real Labor Day to "Loyalty Day". Haymarket Square no longer exists. Its location was where the Kennedy Expressway now crosses Randolph Street. The statue which marked the point of Labor Day's inception has been moved to the Chicago Police Academy and can only be viewed with special permission. They can rename, they can distort, they can run, but they can't hide, for the world remembers.

I conversed with Manuel Paz in early morning of last May 1st as he prepared to open his taquería. Many local workers exchange stories there as they take their afternoon siesta with his tacos and ceviche tostadas. The old men of our small pueblo gather at Manuel's in the evenings to comment on events as they play dominoes. Manuel is thus regarded as the town's fountain of local thought and knowledge, for what is said in his taqueria and then repeated in one home, is soon known in others.

Manuel was well aware of the role of Chicago's Haymarket Square beginning of that day's world celebration of May Day, Law Day, and Loyalty Day, Labor Day, but there was one thing about it he did not know. He had a hard time believing me when I told him it is neither taught nor celebrated as such in the United States. That night, the people of our pueblo also pondered that.

This year they will join their nation and its workers both at home and abroad in purchasing nothing on May 1st that is either gringo made or sold.