And beside all the compelling political reasons why immigration is a human right, there are the cultural ones that make it so desirable. In a world chock full of global communication, we still don’t know much about each other or about our different cultures–especially the vibrancy of poetry & music & art.

Many first heard the Peruvian flute from immigrant musicians playing for change in subways or on street corners. Once you’ve heard it’s vibrant & sometimes haunting sounds, you will find it unforgettable. Why should the global predators be allowed to deny us these treasures? It’s for certain once we’ve heard their music, we’re less willing to take up arms against others or consider them barbarians.

Colonial powers have turned much of culture into propaganda, especially film. But this kind of culture doesn’t serve colonialism at all; it only serves human solidarity. We are meant to be brothers & sisters singing our own songs to each other–not shouting war chants.

This musician is in Q’ero, Peru.

(Photo by Kazuyoshi Nomachi)

Stranded by flooding in Cali, Colombia: undoubtedly what most concerns Colombian & US officials is how the massive flooding will affect drug production & trafficking this year. The CIA & Colombian businessmen rely on that filthy luchre for personal enrichment & to bankroll their nefarious operations. That’s not conspiracy theory but is very well-documented.

The reason for flooding in Colombia should come as no surprise since for decades Colombian rainforest has been stripped bare for cocaine, marijuana, & heroin production & deforestation is now accelerating for gold mining & to build palm oil, sugar cane, & biofuel plantations.

Deforestation disrupts the water cycle which trees play a vital role in maintaining. Trees draw water up through their roots to release into the atmosphere. A large part of the water that circulates within a rainforest ecosystem remains inside plants & trees. Trees also affect rainwater runoff & help soil absorb the excess water. So when forests are mowed down the climate gets drier, exposes soil to additional sun-baking, & eventually makes soil infertile by washing away vital nutrients in unimpeded rainwater. This process also leads to riverbank erosion which affects the levels of river beds.

It’s a slippery slope those drug peddlers & neoliberal predators are traveling since they’re pushing against the very laws of nature. At a certain point, even the most advanced Monsanto chemicals won’t be able to solve the problems of agribusiness created by their greed.

It’s long-since time we took back our planet from those so blinded by greed they are unable to steward the bounteous resources of Mother Earth meant for all of us to enjoy. And we ought to do it before there isn’t a patch of grass left to sit on or an acre left to plant food.

(Photo by Luis Robayo/AFP)

There were six funerals this week for three Palestinians killed by the Israeli military in the West Bank (in separate incidents) & three killed by an Israeli bombing in Gaza. Thousands attended the funeral of this 20-year-old student named Saji Darwish who was shot in the head by Israeli soldiers (on March 10th) near the West Bank city of Ramallah.

A spokesperson for the Palestinian Authority (PA)–engaged in US-brokered peace talks with Israel since August 2013–issued a statement warning that Israeli violence could “lead to the situation spiraling out of control” & constitute “a dangerous provocation that will torpedo what’s left of the peace process.”

The constant violence against Palestinians by the Israeli military in Gaza & the West Bank & the acceleration of Zionist settlements in the West Bank do more than constitute a “dangerous provocation”; they expose the peace negotiations as nothing more than a diplomatic sham–& a shameful one at that–& expose the PA for what it was set up to be by the Oslo Accords: a phony regime with little authority except to help Israel control Palestinian intifada.

Adding humiliation to ignominy, the PA statement went on to urge the US, UN, EU, & Russia to intervene in the situation. They aren’t involved enough with their bankrolling of Israel’s massive arsenals!?

Long live Palestinian intifada! No military aid to Israel! End the phony-assed peace talks! Support the Boycott, Divestment, & Sanctions movement against Israel!

(Photo by Altahrir from Alternative Information Center)

This is an article I wrote on child labor for Wisdom Blow ezine in January 2012. Child labor increases exponentially as capitalism continues its decline into barbarism. The manicured patricians who run multinational corporations exploiting children as miners, garment workers, farm workers, sex slaves have no scruples because racism is a fundamental component of child labor driven by the economic compulsion to drive down the power of adult labor. Child labor is an intolerable scourge for humanity & must be actively opposed.

There are many wrenching images of child laborers from around the world but this photo is of a child farm worker in the US. The US & European regimes flaunt superiority with their child labor laws, ignoring that most countries have legislation prohibiting or restricting it. Of course, nowhere are these laws allowed to impede profiteering, especially by US & European mining & agribusiness multinationals.

Child labor exists in every country, even if only in illegal sweatshops with trafficked labor, but also in legalized (though still barbaric) forms. In 2012, the Obama regime, in service to agribusiness, defeated safety legislation for child farm workers & made it illegal to ever again attempt to even monitor child labor practices on farms. This excludes from protection an estimated 800,000 (mostly Mexican) children working with pesticides, dangerous tools, in extremely dangerous conditions, & with livestock. A little investigation would likely turn up similar escape clauses in European countries.

The fundamental purpose of employing children is to eviscerate the economic & political power of adult labor & reduce working people to the status of chattel. Many argue child labor cannot be outlawed because it is necessary to family survival. Such hooey is based on a narrow understanding of the problem & the solutions. What about the survival of the children?

This post is a tribute to child workers & a pledge to do our utmost to advocate for them to get them back to the schools & playgrounds where they belong.

(Photo of child farm worker in US by unidentified photographer)

http://www.wisdomblow.com/?p=2895

If an establishment human rights group like Amnesty International (AI)–the winner of their Nobel Peace Prize, no less–issued an investigative report on Palestinian terrorism toward Israel, the entire media would be burning up the wires with photos, denunciations, & on-the-spot investigations showcasing heart-wrenching stories of civilian trauma at the hands of the Arab barbarians. They would be burning up the wires because such a fictitious report would document pro-Israel propaganda that is a staple of media reporting.

This bias explains why most media is entirely mute on the most recent AI report (issued Feb 27th) entitled “Trigger-happy: Israel’s use of excessive force in the West Bank.” The investigation details the extreme violence of the past three years by the Israeli military toward Palestinians, called a callous & reckless disregard for human life but more appropriately called ethnic cleansing. It includes not just massive incarceration, including hundreds of children, but the murder of dozens of Palestinians (also including children) & the injuries of thousands (again including hundreds of children) mostly for stone throwing. The weapons employed by Israel include live ammunition, rubber-coated metal bullets, tear gas, stun grenades, water cannons, chemical & malodorous skunk bombs. Hundreds of injuries are caused by shrapnel.

The AI report focuses only on the West Bank & does not include the adjacent Gaza Strip although AI has previously issued reports denouncing the Israeli blockade of Gaza. The NY Times buried mention of the West Bank report in an article on page nine; the Washington Post, so Johnny-on-the-spot in denunciations of Palestinian terrorism (that is, self-defense), doesn’t appear to have reported the story at all. The LA Times, Reuters, & the UK Guardian did report the story which gives irrefutable evidence of Israeli war & human rights crimes.

After describing the crimes & charges in the AI report, Reuters inexplicably refers to the conflict as “a low-intensity confrontation.” Well that sure as hell would depend on whether you’re Palestinian or Israeli, wouldn’t it!? If you’re on the receiving end of rocks, it’s pretty damn low-intensity; if you’re on the receiving end of live ammunition & ethnic cleansing, it doesn’t get more high-intensity than that.

Israel’s Foreign Ministry responded with the usual defense, saying the AI report “smacks of bias, discrimination, & racism” & accusing Amnesty of wanting to deprive Israel of the right to self defense. Nice try Israel, but your military is an occupying army protecting thousands of Zionist settlers from around the world moving in & expropriating Palestinian lands! The guilt-baiting is supposed to bring anti-Zionism to its knees but ethnic cleansing speaks louder than tedious accusations.

Amnesty calls on the US, the European Union, & other countries to stop delivering munitions, weapons, & other military equipment including crowd control weapons & devices, & training to the Israeli military. It would have been good if AI had stopped there instead of adding that such deliveries should only be resumed when Israel can ensure their arsenal will not be used to violate international humanitarian law & international human rights law. Israel has no rights whatsoever to be in the West Bank or to continue moving in settlers to violently expropriate Palestinian lands. It would be more consistent with the findings of the report to demand Israel get the hell out of the West Bank but you can only ask so much of an establishment human rights group. The recent exposé, even with its limitations, serves justice well.

This photo is of a Palestinian protestor caught in a tear gas barrage by Israeli soldiers in the Jalazoun refugee camp near the West Bank city of Ramallah (Jan 31st 2014). Does this look like a “low-intensity confrontation” to you?

No military aid to Israel! Support Palestinian justice by supporting the Boycott, Divestment, & Sanctions campaign!

This is a copy of the AI report: http://www.amnesty.org/en/library/asset/MDE15/002/2014/en/349188ef-e14a-418f-ac20-6c9e5c8d9f88/mde150022014en.pd

(Photo by Mohamad Torokman/Reuters)

God hath no fury like neoliberal plunder in taking out this planet. That flood story in Genesis is beginning to look something like a prophecy & we should maybe pull out the Old Testament to take some tips from Noah. It’s probably time to start building arks–before the logging companies finish off every last forest.

This fellow is battling floodwaters from the Acre River in the northern Bolivia/eastern Peru region at the edge of the Andes. The area shows considerable evidence of climate change on forests & on bird migration & is being studied by groups of scientists. Actually most of the forests have been long-since chopped down for export.

We’re sending out a red alert to find out if any part of the planet still has dry ground or high ground where we can paddle our canoe since there are no forests left here either. England has been submerged for weeks & word is Betty Windsor has nearly completed construction of the family ark so they can make their getaway. Without hiring a crew they aren’t going nowhere; there isn’t one among them who knows how to do a damn thing.

We’re not sorry to see the parliament go down but brothers & sisters in England, we’ll sure miss you. You’ve all been such a pleasure to know; your labor history so valuable; your left a cornucopia of cautionary tales. Let us know if you find high ground.

(Photo by Odair Leal/Reuters)

And when all is said & done, after the last tweet & range of views on Islam, religious fundamentalism, the burqa, & the Taliban have been exorcised & the adrenalin has settled, there are these little Afghan girls made homeless by the US-NATO war.

Few reliable figures exist for the number of Afghan children orphaned by the war through loss or separation from parents. Nearly a decade ago, it was estimated at two million. That is, one out of seven children growing up on the streets scrounging to survive or in an orphanage. We don’t know if these little girls are orphaned; we do know they lost their home to bombing & live in makeshift refugee housing.

So it really doesn’t matter what we think of the burqa; what matters is what we do about the US-NATO bombing.

US-NATO out of Afghanistan! US out of Iraq!

(Photo by Massoud Hossaini/AP; Hossaini is an Afghan photojournalist who has long documented the story of Afghan’s orphaned children.)

Has Richard Dawkins been running off at the mouth against Islam again? I keep seeing posts about his latest vituperation calling Islam loathsome but can’t find if it’s in a recent speech or from his nonstop twitter manifesto on the subject. He’s simply cornucopian when it comes to denunciations of religion but atheists ought to think twice before letting him take the lead. He appears to think inflammatory insults are the way to bring down what he calls “The God Delusion”: he’s declared religious training worse than child sexual assault & compared the burqa to a garbage bag.

In a statement that cannot be given any credulity he says he feels “visceral revulsion at the burqa because for me it is a symbol of the oppression of women.” He stops short of calling for legal bans on the burqa because of the “implications for individual liberty & freedom of choice.” He doesn’t mention the elementary democratic principle of freedom of religion.

All that might be tolerable malice if it didn’t stoke social hatred, inspire white supremacists, & glorify Islamophobia as a political weapon to justify wars in several countries. Here our man has crossed the line to stand with tyranny while millions of Muslims, including millions in burqas, astonished the world by defying mightily armed dictators backed by US military largesse.

No one who has read Dawkins’ unreadable screed titled “The Selfish Gene” is surprised at his approach to religion. We do however marvel he would claim religion is nothing but unsubstantiated assertions since you don’t get more unsubstantiated than evo psycho thought. In fact, you don’t get more psycho or more misogynist or more racist. Many geneticists & others like Stephen J. Gould, Ruth Hubbard, Richard Lewontin, Evelyn Fox Keller have eviscerated any scientific bases to evo psycho derangement & exposed its political motivations. It continues to set back the study of evolution & turns it into a mockery of science.

Dawkins stands as a warning to us all: choose your gurus wisely; your evangelists even more so. When our man has gotten off his bumptious ass & done more than tweet degradations & if he ever makes even a teensy-weensy contribution to social transformation, then he can blither on without the impediment of our disdain. Until then, suck it Richy!

(Photo of Dawkins’ smug mug by Kelly Barnes from Adelaide Now)