Carnival.

Getty Image, taken from BBC News site.

       The closer it gets the more I despair, I am of course referring to Cop-26, or as I prefer to call it, Cop-out-26 Carnival. It is a carnival, a gigantic show, an illusion, those who think that something great will come out of this extravaganza are naive in the extreme and sadly missing the facts. As I stated in a previous blog, the largest oil and gas producing companies have plans to increase production, not to reduce production. Now the BBC has released leak documents that show that governments and large corporations are lobbying the UN to play down the need to move rapidly away from fossil fuels. Another stated strategy for tackling this climate disaster is for richer countries to pay more to poorer countries to help them develop green policies. The leaked documents also show that rich countries are now questioning that strategy.

       We are being told by the Mafia in the Kremlin in George Square that it will show case Glasgow. What will happen is we will have a massive lockdown in Glasgow, where the citizens will be restricted and banned from large swaths of their city and their daily lives disrupted. So it will be a case of showcasing our city without the people of the city. The media will have a frenzy of a party chasing after That massive entourage of the rich and powerful and their army of security, who are jetting across the planet to grab a spot of publicity at the carnival. They will spout sounds that they think the people will like to hear, and spout them without a shred of belief in what they are saying. They will do their best to grab centre stage and create the illusion that they are the greenest government on the planet. Then they will all go back to their opulent lives of greed and exploitation, and carry on as if nothing had happened.
        The planet is not going to be saved by the rich and powerful, who are doing very well from its destruction. They are not going to listen to your appeals for change, if it means jeopardising their wealth and privileges, they are not going to be moved by your petitions if it means curtailing their opulent lifestyles, and they are quite happy to let your march from A to B, as long as you do it to the their prescribed formula.
       It will take massive direct action by the people, an eruption of righteous anger right across the planet, the like of which we have never seen before. The price of quiet appealing and protest marches is the extinction of our species along with millions of others. There is not enough time to pontificate with the destroyers, the plunderers, the exploiters, the minutes are being counted down, your children and grand children are the ones we sacrifice if we continue our appealing to the powers that be.

Visit ann arky's home at https://spiritofrevolt.info   

Israeli Zionists Poison Human Dignity.

       What has to happen in Gaza for the world to take the perpetrators of this genocide to task? How much deeper in despair, misery and deprivation do the people of Gaza have to sink before the world deal firmly and justly with the engineers of this human tragedy? We all know the gang responsible for this crime against humanity, it is blindingly obvious, it is that festering cancer, the Israeli Zionist apartheid regime with its blind irrational and brutal policies based on the belief that an invisible man in the sky gave them this land around 2,000 years ago, and the world accepts this. The answer to these questions is of course, the world will not address this brutal savagery based on idiotic blind faith and greed for profit. As long as capitalism can extract profit from this swamp of misery built on religious bigotry, the Palestinian blood will flow. The only real long term and permanent answer is to demolish the capitalist system that works hand in glove with the rancid poison that is being inflicted on the Palestinian people. That of course does not mean we ignore the present, we must shout louder, act more forcibly, and continue to highlight this avoidable gushing bleeding wound, that is a deliberate and avoidable travesty of human dignity.

The following from the Independent:

        The UN estimates that an extra $20m is needed to plug an otherwise imminent health crisis.
         “The worst-case scenario is we would not able to continue to feed half the population of Gaza,” Elizabeth Campbell, director of UNRWA’s Washington DC office told The Independent.
        “We will have to close schools, people would have no access to our health care systems. We will have to cut jobs.”
          After the Palestinian Authority, UNRWA is the largest employer of people in Gaza.
          Ms Campbell warned that a destabilised Gaza would also pose a direct threat to Israel.
       “You will have a major humanitarian catastrophe which would easily spread across territories,” she said.
        “We are deeply concerned about the security implications.”
     Her warnings were echoed by Jamie McGoldrick, the UN humanitarian coordinator for occupied Palestinian territory, who said on Wednesday that without immediate funding as many as 1,700 people in Gaza could lose their limbs over the next two years.
       Some 29,000 people in the enclave have been wounded by Israeli fire at protests and clashes near to the border fences over the past year.
        At least 7,000 have suffered gunshot wounds, mostly to their lower limbs. Hundreds of those are in need of urgent limb-saving treatment provided by the UN.

Read the full article HERE: 

Visit ann arky's home at https://radicalglasgow.me.uk
 

The Legal Right To Armed Resistance.

 

     Do the Palestinian people have the right to defend themselves by armed struggle? Well according to the UN, as an occupied territory, they have that right legally. Israel as the occupier does not have that legal right and as an invader they are the illegal entity in this continuing bloodshed. 

     This from The Palestine Chronicle:

         When Israel says it has a “right to defend itself,” the correct response is to ask from what or whom?
      Not a single Israeli citizen or soldier has been harmed or killed by Palestinians since the protests began. In short, Israel is shooting and killing human beings who pose absolutely zero threat to either the state of Israel or its citizens.
       Moreover, never once have you ever heard an American journalist ask an Israeli war crimes apologist, “Well, don’t Palestinians have a right to defend themselves, too?”
       It’s such a self-evidently obvious and simple question, but no one dare asks it. I mean, why not?
       When Palestinians support non-violent forms of resistance, such as the boycott Israel movement, they’re smeared by Israel as “anti-Semites.” When they protest against their injustices angrily, they’re smeared as violent Arabs, and when they resort to violence, out of sheer desperation, they’re labeled “radical Islamic terrorists.”
         So, I’ll ask again. Do Palestinians have a right to defend themselves?
The answer to that question is a resounding yes.
         In fact, international law is unambiguous in its endorsement of “armed struggle” for peoples who seek self-determination under “colonial and foreign domination.”
          United Nations resolution 37/43, dated 3 December 1982, “reaffirms the legitimacy of the struggle of peoples for independence, territorial integrity, national unity and liberation from colonial and foreign domination and foreign occupation by all available means, including armed struggle.”
         Moreover, the resolution’s preamble makes clear that it refers not to a hypothetical in the abstract, but rather specifically to the rights of Palestinians, stating, “Considering that the denial of the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people to self-determination, sovereignty, independence and return to Palestine and the repeated acts of aggression by Israel against the peoples of the region constitute a serious threat to international peace and security.”
        Lynda Burstein Brayer is an Israeli-trained human rights lawyer, and she affirms the legal and moral right Palestinians have to armed struggle against Israel’s occupation, noting, “This document [UN resolution 37/43] legitimises all national liberation struggles, including, at this time in history, most particularly, the Palestinian people’s struggle for its own freedom. It is this right which legitimizes all Palestinian attempts to lift the yoke of Israeli oppression from Palestine, including all the actions taken by the Palestinians during Operation Cast Lead [Israel’s 2008/09 siege of Gaza].”
        Now we have completely flipped pro-Israel propaganda on its head.
Under international law, Israel’s occupation of the Palestinian territories is illegal, and Palestinians have a right to “armed struggle” against their illegal occupier – Israel – thus ipso facto Palestinians have a right to defend themselves against Israel, but Israel’s right to defend itself against Palestinian resistance is not guaranteed in the same manner.
        This reality should be chanted far and loud for it undercuts every Israeli attempt to couch its violence against the Palestinian people in claims of self-defense.

Read the full article HERE:

Visit ann arky's home at radicalglasgow.me.uk

Glasgow's Anti-fascist March.

    UN's anti-racism, anti-fascism day, March 22, saw many colourful marches, rallies and demonstrations, take place across the globe. Glasgow was no exception, with a noisy colourful march from George Square through the city centre and return to George Square for lots of music and some speeches. The Glasgow march was lead by wonderful inspiring drum band and was a sea of colour with banners from as far a field as Dumfries.

 

 

 

Visit ann arky's home at www.radicalglasgow.me.uk

Evictions To Help The Economy!!

      According to Sweet & Maxwell,(legal information providers), tenant evictions by landlords have risen to 36,177 for the year June 2012 to June 2013. This is the highest in 5 years, an increase of 9% on the previous year. We all accept that the governments “bedroom tax” has pushed already struggling tenants over the edge and must be blamed for most of this increase. Of course we should not forget the last few years of enforced austerity measures had already taken thousands to the brink of financial collapse and ever closer to that eviction. As Daniel Dover, co-author of Residential Possession Proceedings, has been quoted as saying, “Rising rents on residential property and falling real wages are trends that have been in place for a number of years, and have stretched the finances of an increasing number of tenants to breaking point.”

      Campaign group False Economy, through a Freedom of Information request, received figures from 114 local authorities, indicating that because of the “bedroom tax”, a minimum of 50,000 are adversely affect and facing rent arrears problems. You can add to that number by approximately 30,000 tenants in housing association property.

      Recently a much smaller survey, found that one household in four, 25%, affected by the “bedroom tax” have found themselves facing rent arrears for the first time. According to the National Housing Federation, just over 50% of 63,578 tenants from 51 housing associations were unable to meet their rent payments in the first few months of the introduction of this tax. The worst affected area being Barrow in Cumbria, where more that 75% of all council tenants have fallen into rent arrears since the introduction of this brutal tax. Other areas are showing figures of around 50%. That is a lot of anxiety, stress and misery.

     We are not alone in seeing this tax on the poor as unfair, brutal and unacceptable, the United Nations’ special rapporteur on housing Raquel Rolnik has called for a rethink on the policy after finding the reform was causing “great stress and anxiety” to “very vulnerable” people.

      Will rent arrears, the ensuing poverty, and the actual and threatening evictions, be the spark that will light the fire? The fire is inevitable, as sparks are flying everywhere, ATOS, workfare, zero hours contracts, decimated social services, continuing austerity in the midst of arrogant wealth, and a government that is no more than a thin mask for blatant corporate greed.

Visit ann arky's home at www.radicalglasgow.me.uk

Water, A Right Or Just Another Marketable Commodity?

      Continuing with the plunder of the public purse, Greece is pushing ahead with the privatisation of water and sewage. Is water a necessity of life, or just a marketable commodity. In 2010 the UN registered water as a human right. Of course that will not deter the financial Mafia in conjunction with the corporate greed machine from demanding that their puppet governments get on and privatise water where ever possible.  What the parasitic corporate bosses think of water is explained in this extract from an article by Augustine Zenakos:

------“The idea that water is a human right comes from ‘extremist’ NGOs. Water is a food like any other, and must have a market value,” said the president of Nestlé in 2005. This is perhaps the only man who found it in him to label the UN, which registered water as a human right in 2010 by 122 votes in favor and 41 abstentions, “extremist” – though it has to be said that, interestingly, one of the countries that abstained was Greece.

Read the full article HERE:

ann arky's home.

I Am Israel.

Hi,

     just back from a few days away, spent a them in beautiful Perthshire and feeling great.

 

  Just to get started:

ann arky's home.

Bedroom-tax - Poll-tax!!

      We in the UK are heading for some real battles and should be preparing now. Come April there will be the implementation of the "bedroom tax"  on top of increasing food poverty and fuel poverty. This "bedroom tax" will put three options before all those in social housing, if they are deemed to have an extra bedroom. As an "under-occupier" you can pay extra, take in a lodger or get out, non-compliance will trigger eviction notices. This is probably the most vicious attack in decades on the ordinary people of this country. The legislation comes into force and they are well aware that there isn't enough right sized accommodation to fulfil that legislation, but that won't stop them going for evictions. Even if there were enough right-sized apartments for everybody, but there isn't, the monumental upheaval to people's lives, sick, disabled, elderly, young families, as they are shunted around to the satisfaction of some millionaire cabal's bullshit economics, is inhumane, unjust and downright vindictive. This is "poll-tax model two.
       While our millionaire parasites that lord it in those Westminster Houses of Hypocrisy and Corruption are spewing out crap about it all being necessary and "for our own good" a UN official, Mr De Schutter, the UN's Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, has stated that the explosion of people in the UK, depending on food handouts could represent a human rights abuse. He points to the dramatic rise in the number of food banks as evidence that governments had "failed in their responsibility not to leave the poorest behind". Here in the UK the number of food banks as exploded tenfold  since the start of the recession.
       This is the UK today, massive fuel poverty with energy prices still rising. Food poverty with food banks the only growth industry in town. A third of children living in poverty. Unacceptable unemployment among our young people. Being forced through "workfare", to work for free in some tax dodging corporate greed machine. Now the threat of evictions being heaped on the shoulders of the already struggling public.
        These are drastic times and drastic action by the organised public is the only answer. We may not yet be where the people of Greece are as far as deprivation is concerned, but we are moving inexorably in that direction, it is only a matter of time. It is inevitable, unless we the public, by mass organised resistance, come together and drive our society in a different direction. Another world is possible. 

POWER CUTS, a daily reality in Greece by docupraxi

ann arky's home.

JUST ANOTHER IMPERIALIST WAR.

    The recent conference Non-Aligned-Movement, held in Tehran may be seen as a counter movement to that other grouping of national states, the UN. However what it can't be seen as, is a move for democracy.  What we all know is that the UN is the implementer of the world's most powerful nation's corporate and imperialist wishes, and it will use what ever brutal force it needs to achieve those ends. The slaughter of thousands, the displacement of millions and the total destruction of a country's infra-structure, as in Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, etc. damage that will last at least a generation, is hardly putting the ordinary people first. The UN, like the corporate system that it supports, is mired in corruption, driven by greed and has no other purpose than to defend the hegemony of the world's most powerful corporate bodies, and the expansion of Western imperialism.

      The Non-Aligned-Movement, is no different in its form, its aims are to create an alternative power structure to the UN but not to bring freedom and democracy to the people of those countries, but to protect and increase the power of those institutions that control those countries. It is just another imperialist body gearing up to challenge for total control.

     Just as in the past the British Empire, the German Empire, the Spanish Empire and the French Empire, all squabbled and slaughtered to keep and gain the spoils of empire, so now we have moved on to the world more or less being dominated by one empire, the Western corporate imperialists. The Non-Aligned-Movement is at present, a junior player in another imperialist war. We can expect that war to become more brutal as the dominant sees the other as a threat.

      Is this the best that man can come up with, the slaughter of millions of ordinary people to protect the wealth of the few? That beast that some call the pinnacle of evolution has slaughtered more of its own kind than any other beast on earth. Surely we as thinking beings can come up with an alternative to follow -my-leader and start to destroy that which is destroying us, this corporate system of greed, driven by the few.

      Our imagination, compassion and experience can surely create a system of fairness that sees to the needs of all our people. We can create a better world built on co-operation, mutual aid and sustainability, but the old one has to come crumbling down and end up in the dustbin of history.

 

OUR FUTURE.

Once upon a time,

in our not so distant past

stood a beautiful, a unique world,

laden with promise,

a world where our future was open,

our potential vast.

Now, seduced by glinting tinsel of the mad

our reason quivers

on the edge of a dark abyss.

We have created a world

where wastelands abound

where we

the many, the marginalised, the ordinary,

struggle to survive in voracity that astounds

are seduced

to create wastelands in our minds,

slowly accepting chaos

in a world of insanity.

Here corporate monsters

of hypocrisy, contradictions,

sever the fragile cord

that unites being with being,

ann arky's home.

WHEN IS A BOOT NOT A BOOT???

       The UN No-fly Zone resolution 1973, specifically ruled out foreign military action on the ground in Libya. The enforcers of the No-fly Zone have always said that in this operation there would be no “boots on the ground”. Of course that doesn't include Special Forces who have been there more or less from the start, probably on a photo shot for some travel agency. Now the UK is sending in high ranking military officers. No doubt to comply with the UN resolution they, like the Special Forces, will go in barefoot. It is the usual creep process. If they can't get what they want with the rules then we can indulge in some euphemisms. First there will be advisers, then training and support, then there is humanitarian help, which will need military protection, and of course then comes the “Peacekeeping Force”.

        Is there anybody out there who believes that we are doing this for the good of the Libyan people? Today the “rebels” stated that there has been 10,000 killed and 50,000 wounded, (the figures can't be independently verified), the city of Tripoli has suffered over 200 strikes by weapons of mass destruction with fancy names like Pathfinder, etc. followed by claims that we killed no civilians. Think of all the money the arms industry will make replacing all those missiles at prices ranging from £500,000 to £800,000 a shot. Very smart missiles these, they don't explode if there are civilians in the area. The country has now been turned into another African nation where civil war rages. Our support has hurtled Libyan against Libyan in a bloody struggle that wont be healed for generations. The country's infrastructure is smashed, now there's an opportunity for Haliburton, what hope now for the Libyan people, with the West calling the shots, one thing for sure, they can say goodbye to their oil.

ann arky's home.