Tag Archives: Barack Obama

10 Years of Gitmo

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Today is the 10 year anniversary of the opening of the Bush/Obama Guantanamo Bay prison, or Gitmo as it is called…

10 Years of Gitmo – really gives me that warm and fuzzy patriotic feeling… and just think, with the NDAA just being signed, it’s now part of American tradition.

I mean, not like it’s affected any of us… right?

Today in the Huffington Post:

Guantanamo Bay 10th Anniversary: Obama’s Detention Law Could Fill Prison Obama Tried To Close

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama failed two years ago to close the infamous Guantanamo Bay prison, and with Wednesday marking the 10th anniversary of its creation, debate is raging over whether a law he signed will ensure it will stay open for decades to come, jailing even United States citizens.

Tucked into the National Defense Authorization Act of 2012, which Obama signed on New Year’s Eve, are provisions that appear to allow indefinite military detention of American terrorism suspects, and to require it of suspected foreign enemies.

The Obama administration insists the law merely codifies existing standards, but its strong supporters and vehement opponents are sure it does much more, legally enshrining for the first time in 60 years the authority to hold citizens without trial…

READ MORE: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/11/guantanamo-bay-10th-anniversary-indefinite-detention-american-citizens_n_1197547.html

and then I thought about…

“First they came for the communists,
and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a communist.
Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a Jew.
Then they came for me
and there was no one left to speak out for me.”

source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_they_came%E2%80%A6

Thugs On The Road Ahead: The Shock Doctrine

It no real secret where we’re headed. It’s been done over and over in other countries, just now it’s happening here.

If you don’t know what I mean, and would like to find out – watch the movie The Shock Doctrine. Naomi Klein explains it very well.

Here’s the trailer:

Also – here’s a link to Naomi Klein’s website – The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism: http://www.naomiklein.org/shock-doctrine

Nation On A Slippery Slope

High unemployment, social discontent, extremely low approval ratings for the current government, widening income gap between the 1% and the 99%, heated talk of war with Iran in the air – just to name a few critical factors.

Historically speaking – we are a nation on a very slippery slope at this moment.

Of course, everything could change tomorrow. Let’s hope so… oops – we tried the “hope” thing already.

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Change Has Come – Parts I, II and III

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ufoverdrive-change-has-come

 

Listen to This Sound Collage…

Get the Flash Player to see the wordTube Media Player.

Part I – If You Didn’t Care - 0:00 – 1:22
Part II – On This Day – 1:22 – 6:41
Part III – Our Most Desperate Hour – 6:41 – 10:22

Total Length: 10:22

From an album in progress called: Weapons of Mass Communication

FREE Download at the bottom of this posting!

About This Sound Collage

When I started working on this collage I chose to use pre-recorded music (instead of creating new music) because it made it a bit more like doing a radio show, and by using music that has a popular familiarity it allows me, as an artist, to make use of the mental baggage that comes along with it.

Every listener will already have memories, ideas and thoughts associated with the music pieces before they even hear this collage, and while they listen, their brain will pull from those memories and that will help emotionally color the way they hear this piece.

For myself, Pink Floyd has huge baggage. I won’t even begin to explain all the different ways Pink Floyd and their music have influenced my life and the way I hear sound and the spaces between moments of sound.

This collage starts with Pig On The Wings, Part I from Pink Floyd’s 1977 album Animals, an album I’ve been listening to a lot lately…

Lyrics

If you didn’t care what happened to me,
And I didn’t care for you,
We would zig zag our way through the boredom and pain
Occasionally glancing up through the rain.
Wondering which of the buggars to blame
And watching for pigs on the wing.

Source Material

Part I – If You Didn’t Care

Background Music Piece – Pigs On The Wings – Part I – from Animals by Pink Floyd – Effects added

Sound Clips:

  • Howard Beale from Network, the 1976 film that won four Oscars and was nominated for Best Picture
  • Several Morpheus quotes from The Matrix, the 1999 film which also won four Oscars

Part II – On This Day

Background Music Piece – Downpressor Man – Bob Marley and The Wailers – Trenchtown Box Set – Sampled and looped

Sound Clips:

  • Leonard Cohen spoken word introduction to his song Democracy from a live recording made in Switzerland in 1993 (I’m not sure how you can find this recording but here’s a link to his album The Future which this song came from)
  • Johnny Cash reading The New Testament, quotes taken from The Book of Revelations, Chapter 10
  • Several quotes from Network

Part III – Our Most Desperate Hour

Background Music Piece – Shine On You Crazy Diamond – Part I from Wish You Were Here by Pink Floyd, re-mixed by The Orb

Sound Clips:

Notes on Links: I’ve added links to some of my source material so you can get your own copy.

The Johnny Cash CD set of him reading the New Testament is great, and the link goes to amazon.com – Thank you Christi and Louie for giving me the set as a gift!

I would also recommend the Bob Marley 4 CD Trenchtown Box Set – 80 classic Bob Marley and The Wailers songs from the early days (1969-1972) with that old school reggae feel and sound but this particular 4 CD set was a bootleg and unfortunately the Marley family received nothing for it – just a word of caution and respect.

And if Pink Floyd’s albums Animals and Wish You Were Here are not in your CD collection, I’ve just got to ask, why not?

Commentary

Our Most Desperate Hour – or – I Don’t Have To Tell You Things Are Bad…

This sound collage reflects on the moment we are living in right now, in March 2010.

We live in a time with a lot of anger, disillusionment, discontent, with hopes deferred, and a growing disconnect between the top and bottom of society with a quickly evaporating middle… troubles, hatreds, run-away emotions and raw Americanism is simmering under the surface of everyday life, and being heated up more and more by AM radio and TV talking heads.

Every day our eyes and our ears are owned by the visuals and sounds of mass media advertising, programming and culture – with information overload until it all becomes a blur that wears you down, wears down your hopes and dreams, wears down your resistance to do anything more that just sit back and watch the show.

Meanwhile people move from sofa to bed to work to sofa to bed with more and more impotent rage running through their brain because they know this is wrong – very wrong. And it is true – this is very wrong.

But you can’t just sit and passively think about how wrong it is, how stupid Congress or The President is, how ripped off you’ve been… how dissed, pissed and dismissed you’ve been.

You can’t just sit around and hurt about your lost job or career, lost life savings, lost opportunities, lost elections…

But we do – and that just makes the whole pot simmer even more…

And – what makes it all worse is that we voted for change in November 2008. We were promised change, invited to invest our hope in this change and like the bank’s taxpayer financed bail-out, we seem to be on the losing end of our investment in hope.

All of this has lead to the questions which are the starting point for this piece – what happened to the change we were promised? Did our vote even matter?

On This Day

I remember the feeling of that night in November 2008 when Obama won the election, it was like something I had never felt before – like something in the cosmos went “snap” and the vibration of that snap went zooming around the globe.

It felt like it wasn’t just a person we were voting for, but for an idea and a dream, for change. And the whole world was watching, holding their breathe, hoping… and then cheering along with all of us as every TV news show announced with near synchronized timing the election results just moments before 8:00 pm our time on the west coast.

There was something too powerful in that moment for that change to just fade away.

Change?

Yeah, I can feel that something is going to change…

I felt the voice of the people that night when they said they had hope, when they voted in the secret ballots of their hearts for change…

If the politicians they voted for don’t bring the change, then it will come from somewhere. That’s just the way things go, and right now that’s where we are.

Change has come, and it’s boiling under the surface and it seems to be looking for someone to blame.

Change is inevitable. But how will we change, how much mercy and how much judgment will we have on those that brought us to this point – those things are being weighed in the hearts of very many people at this very time.

Mercy or Judgment. Care or Blame. Your decisions are being recorded in heaven’s unchangeable heart.

FREE Download!

Would you like a MP3 copy of this sound collage to listen to on your iPod or other portable music device?

Download Instructions

Right click (with your right mouse button) here with your mouse, and choose “Save link to…” and then select where you want to download the MP3 file. Click enter and the download will begin.

Change Has Come – Parts I, II and III | Size: 14.25mb | Length: 10:22 | Bit Rate: 192 kbs (high quality)

Enjoy!

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STEW – Reheated

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2009-09-03-stew_reheated

Reheating The STEW

Barack Obama - 44th President

It’s been nearly ten months since the election of Barack Obama in November of 2008. At the time of the election I was writing a series of pieces comparing the election to the story of the twin brothers, Jacob and Esau, in the Hebrew and Christian Bibles – I called this series STEW.

Last Episode of the Story before the Election Break: Jacob Gets Everything

Like most everyone else who voted for Obama, I was in a state of amazement as I watched his acceptance speech on the night of the election (you can read about my reaction in my STEW election-break posting called “STEW: Part Three – Welcome to the WE generation” ) and ended up pausing the series while I worked on other things.

After a long break, we continue the story…

The story of these two brothers begins in The Book of Genesis, chapter 25, and today we pick up the story in verse 25 and continues until verse 34…

The Twins – Jacob and Esau

The Book of Genesis tells us about the Patriarchs of the Hebrews – the first three males of a divinely chosen people and a line of blessing that will culminate in God’s Eternal Kingdom with His Messiah on the Eternal Throne – and it starts with three generations of one human family; beginning with Abraham – the Father of Faith, his son, Isaac – The Child of Promise and then Jacob, who became Israel, the Father of the Twelve Tribes.

Now Jacob, the third of The Patriarchs, was born with a twin named Esau. [You can find the story in Genesis 25:21-28] and they wrestled violently in the womb causing their mother, Rebekah (played by Madonna in a previous episode) great distress and pain during her pregnancy.

When she inquired of The Lord why her pregnancy was going so bad The Lord told her:

“Two nations are in your womb;
And two people shall be separated from your body;
And one people shall be stronger than the other;
And the older shall serve the younger.”

When she gave birth, indeed she had twins – the first child to be born was Esau, who was already covered with red hair, followed by Jacob, holding onto the heel of his twin Esau.

It’s important to note that there is a tradition that believes that Esau was so restless in the womb that he was literally trying to fight his way out of Rebekah and if Jacob hadn’t held him back Esau would have killed his mother in an effort to be born early, and that is why the struggle in the womb and why Esau came out first with Jacob holding his heel.

This tradition could also explain why Jacob was his mother’s favorite son.

Esau grew up to be a hunter and outdoors-man, was a very hairy man and dreamed of moving to Alaska; while Jacob grew up a peaceful, smooth-skinned man and dreamed of going to Washington DC.

Now, in those days and according to their customs, the first-born male got the entire inheritance – everything – land, animals, money, servants… and in this family it also came with the Divine Blessing that Abraham had first received for El Shaddai, The Almighty God. In this case, that meant that Esau, by birthright, was entitled to the complete inheritance when Isaac died.

Jacob understood this very well, and Esau really couldn’t care less…

stew1

One day Esau (played by John McCain, poor, sold-out John McCain) came back from hunting and smelled something delicious cooking. Following his nose he found his brother Jacob cooking a pot of red lentil stew. “I’m starving, let me have a swallow of that red stuff…” he told his brother, and Jacob, not being in a giving mood, said, “Sell me your birthright first.”

Esau, letting his appetite overcome his good sense, figures that a birthright is worthless to a dead man, and agrees.

After making Esau swear an oath, Jacob served him some stew and bread, which Esau ate quickly and then went on his way.

Little did Esau know that El Shaddai, who watches over everyone, saw what Esau had done and heard the oath Esau made, and knew that Esau despised his birthright, and had also despised The Almighty God.

To Be Continued…

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Vice Presidential Debate – John McCain, I’m insulted…

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People, I Just Got To Speak About Something

I am offended by John McCain and what he has done in his craven, last-gasp attempt at the presidency  – Injecting a not-ready-for-prime-time-way-right-wing governor of Alaska into this race in an attempt to use celebrity to make people look past the reality of what’s going on, and get himself elected. I used to like John McCain, and this, my friend, is no John McCain.

Flash Back A Couple of Months…

Anyone remember a couple of weeks before the Democrat convention when the McCain campaign was making a big issue about Barack Obama just being a “Celebrity” – while Barack was out on the campaign trail everyday, talking to people, talking to reporters, discussing issues and his plans… of course Barack is no “celebrity” (a large cultural insult from the Right against the celebrity culture they hate – and crave) – and now being a celebrity is wrong? I thought our nation was crazy about celebrities… but that all aside – it was a stupid campaign trick, but here’s the follow-up…

What Has Happened Since Then…

Barack Obama has a great convention, adds Joe Biden to his ticket and beefs up his foreign policy stand, heck, I even decided to vote for Obama instead of the usual Libertarian candidate (in case you don’t know, I come from a right-wing, Christian, libertarian background – I feel especially betrayed this year).

Then John McCain has his anointing party/right-wing freak show (Drill baby, drill???) and selects who(???) as his running mate. Sarah Palin. She’s so unknown you have to wonder why ol’ John choose her. I mean, if he wanted to “out-Hillary” Obama he could have choose a number of smart, experienced, Republican women for the ticket. But he didn’t. He choose someone only the small population of Alaska knew anything about so this campaign could write the script for her, this is the McCain movie – here’s your lines.

And then they (the McCain campaign) kept her away from everyone – like some celebrity – and only allowed her to appear at carefully controlled events and interviews – like a celebrity… and then I had to watch this debate tonight.

Beauty queen recites carefully-coached lines – not answering questions (is that a celebrity or just an old-school politician?), but instead – again – spouting carefully-coached line. It’s the Stepford-Vice-President. And then when she endorsed Dick Cheney’s view of the VP job and the expansion of executive power I think I heard all I need to know about her worldview… SCARY!

Meanwhile ol’ Joe is being Joe Biden, trying to explain very complex issues in the two minutes he has while trying not to make a big gaff, not look like a mean man beating up on the delicate flower, I mean, celebrity VP candidate. I sat there watching Sen. Biden, who I have often disagreed with, and thought, this man knows what he’s talking about. Nice choice Obama.

Bottom Line

Heart beat away: Just think it through… Joe Biden or Sarah “Oh golly” Palin. Folksy may work in Alaska, but I don’t want my VP talking folksy to world leaders in times of crisis – “Well golly Putin…”. She may be a great hockey mom or whatever, but there are a ton of those, and does that make them just as qualified to be VP? I’m not sold on Palin’s credentials, but Sen. Biden – we know he has the experience.

Right-Wing Idiots: Why do the Republicans keep giving us the useful idiots? Dan Quayle, George W. Bush, Sarah Palin. I mean the Democrats don’t do so hot either (what were they thinking with John Kerry, George Dukakis…), but this year they have it nailed. But these Republicans… (sorry, I just had to go off there.)

Killing Christianity in America: As a Christian this is the hardest part for me. We are watching some of the final nails in the coffin of Christianity as we know it in America. The evangelicals have sold out the Kingdom of God for a cheap bowl of political soup. Tax rules will be changed, this power grab will be slapped down by those that are much better at this game. And the cause of Christ? Yet another betrayal by those that should know better… Churches fighting the IRS by preaching politics from the pulpit, come on. That’s just like Jesus would have done, right? (render unto Cesar what belongs to Cesar) – not at all!

Please – do everything possible to help Barack get elected, because if I’ve seen our future leader debate Joe Biden tonight, people like me (you know, those artist types) will be be enjoying the pleasure of extraordinary rendition in the very near future. I wish I was just kidding.

Rant over.

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