Saturday, 6 January 2018

Heroes

Heroes

No. 5: MOANA COLE
https://www.kiwiblog.co.nz/2017/12/general_debate_27_december_2017.html/comment-page-1#comment-2106735
Early in the morning on New Year’s Day 1991 four Catholic peace activists (Moana Cole from New Zealand, Ciaron O’Reilly from Australia, Susan Frankel and Bill Streit from Washington, D.C.) calling themselves the ANZUS Peace Force Plowshares, entered the Griffiss Air Force Base in New York, USA.
After cutting through several fences, Bill and Sue entered a deadly force area, where soldiers are authorised to shoot to kill. They hammered and poured blood on a KC-135 (a refueling plane for B-52’s) and then proceeded to hammer and pour blood on the engine of a nearby cruise missile armed B-52 bomber that could be used in the Middle East. They presented their action statement and an indictment to base security who encircled them moments later.
Simultaneously, Moana and Ciaron entered the base at the opposite end of the runway, and made a sign of the cross with blood on the runway, spray-painting “Love Your Enemies – Jesus Christ”, “No More Bombing of Children in Hiroshima, Vietnam, Iraq, or Anywhere!” and “Isaiah Strikes Again”. For approximately one hour they hammered upon the runway chipping at two sections, one being nearly five feet in diameter, before they were detained.
The group declared that they had came together from three different countries to reclaim the acronym from the ANZUS Treaty and create a “new pact for peace, which is the way of the Lord.” They also asserted they were acting to prevent war in the Persian Gulf and called upon people to nonviolently resist war and oppression. In their indictment they cited the U.S. government for war crimes and violations of international law.
…..
All four were indicted on 9 January 1991 on federal charges of conspiracy and property destruction and faced a maximum sentence of 15 years in prison. After being held in jail for two months, they accepted pre-trial release on March 6th. They went to trial in Federal Court in Syracuse in May and were convicted by a jury. On August 20th, they were sentenced to twelve months in prison and ordered to pay $1800 in restitution. After serving 10 months Bill and Sue were released from prison in mid-June 1992. Moana and Ciaron were released in late June on bail pending a deportation hearing.
In October 1992, Moana returned to New Zealand following her court-ordered voluntary deportation. Moana currently lives in Christchurch and has been completing a Masters Degree in Law focusing on the legality of the US-led occupation of Afghanistan.
https://lestweforget.org.nz/profiles/moana-cole/
“Heroes” is a series devoted to those courageous and brilliant people who show us that, in a world seemingly run by flag-fetishists, cowards, conformists, crooks, abusers, scoundrels, embedded churnalists, yes-men, mass murderers and liars, there are still reasons for hope.
No. 1 Edward Snowden, No. 2 Gideon Levy, No. 3 Colin Kaepernick, No. 4 Allan Nairn

No. 4: ALLAN NAIRN
His speciality being US-backed atrocities, Nairn has reported from the charnel houses of Haiti, El Salvador, Guatemala and Indonesia. He’s openly challenged Henry Kissinger; helped bring American proxies to trial; exposed the US-training of death squads in El Salvador and Haiti; and in Guatemala he filmed what later turned out to be the country’s current president casually talking about his role in the 1980s highland genocide. Often, the irony is that those he exposes can’t kill or torture Nairn because he’s a US citizen, which would put their American aid at risk. With the insurance that comes along with his blue passport, he’s goaded Washington-approved jackboots and the suits that approve them.
…
“In 1990 I went to then-occupied East Timor. Timor was actually the scene of the most intensive proportional genocide since the Nazis. A third of the Timorese population was killed, or died of hunger and disease. The military invaded Timor with a personal green-light from President Ford and Henry Kissinger. When I first went there in 1990 it was still under military occupation. That was actually the worst, most intense terror I have seen anywhere in the world. Guatemala in 1980 approaches it, but nothing close to what was going in Timor at the time.”
“Heroes” is a series devoted to those courageous and brilliant people who show us that, in a world seemingly run by flag-fetishists, cowards, conformists, crooks, abusers, scoundrels, embedded churnalists, mass murderers and liars, there are still reasons for optimism.
No. 1 Edward Snowden, No. 2 Gideon Levy, No. 3 Colin Kaepernick
Produced by Daisycutter Sports Inc.
9 December 2017 at 9:05 am
No. 3: COLIN KAEPERNICK
One of the fastest, cleverest, most exciting football players of his generation, Colin Kaepernick led San Francisco to the 2013 Super Bowl, the first time the 49ers had made it in twenty years.
But it’s as a moral leader that he has really made his mark. To register his disgust at police killings of black citizens and the war crimes of the United States overseas, Kaepernick refused to stand for the militarised national anthem ceremony before games. He has carried on the proud tradition of Jackie Robinson, Muhammad Ali, John Carlos, Tommie Smith, and countless other black athletes who have refused to be bullied into silence by politicians and their media accomplices.
To the fury of the flag-idolating right wing, Kaepernick’s leadership has inspired hundreds of athletes in many sports, from professional to high school level, to refuse to participate in state-sponsored obedience ceremonies before their games.
So influential, and so threatening, has Kaepernick’s moral stature become that he provoked the Groper-in-Chief to unleash a public tirade against him, hilariously urging NFL owners to “Get that son of a bitch off the field right now. Out. He’s fired. He’s fired!”
“He’s one of the brightest, most articulate and committed people that I have ever come across. I knew Muhammad Ali. I most certainly worked with Carlos and Smith. Bill Russell, Jim Brown, some of these people from the 1960s, Arthur Ashe—I put him in that class. And I’m pushing him. I hope that he’ll become a person of the year—all of the athletes collectively—and I personally am pushing him for a Nobel Peace Prize nomination, even if he doesn’t get it, because I think he’s going to have that impact as we look back 20 years from now, 30 years from now. And I think it should be recognized.”–Dr. Harry Edwards
https://www.democracynow.org/2017/9/25/dr_harry_edwards_nominate_football_player
“Heroes” is a series devoted to those courageous and brilliant people who show us that, in a world seemingly run by flag-fetishists, cowards, conformists, crooks, abusers, scoundrels, mass murderers and liars, there are still reasons for optimism.
No. 1 Edward Snowden, No. 2 Gideon Levy
Brigid2.1
9 December 2017 at 12:49 pm
It also seems “The Intercept has exclusive publishing rights and an exclusive hold on the content of the Snowden leaks, of which this newly released document is a part. Indeed, the Intercept was founded after the Snowden leaks were made public and its first hires were Glenn Greenwald and Lauren Poitras, the only journalists possessing the full Snowden cache. Those documents now belong to the Intercept’s founder — billionaire eBay founder, — and his for-profit media company, First Look Media.”
“His (Omidyar) investments with USAID have continued since the Intercept’s founding, helping fund the NGO’s more recent overseas programs aimed at “advancing U.S. national security interests” abroad.”
What do we do when we can’t even trust The Intercept?
Reply
  • Morrissey2.1.1
    9 December 2017 at 6:18 pm
    I think we can trust Glenn Greenwald and the rest of the brilliant and principled writers there. But, as with all owners of media outlets—like the Kochs, the Murdochs, the Russian, Australian and British governments—Omidyar needs to be scrutinized.
    Thanks for that, Brigid, it’s very interesting.
    1. 2 December 2017 at 9:12 am
      No. 2: GIDEON LEVY
      Gideon Levy is the most hated man in Israel – and perhaps the most heroic. This “good Tel Aviv boy” – a sober, serious child of the Jewish state – has been shot at repeatedly by the Israeli Defence Force, been threatened with being “beaten to a pulp” on the country’s streets, and faced demands from government ministers that he be tightly monitored as “a security risk.” This is because he has done something very simple, and something that almost no other Israeli has done. Nearly every week for three decades, he has travelled to the Occupied Territories and described what he sees, plainly and without propaganda. “My modest mission,” he says, “is to prevent a situation in which many Israelis will be able to say, ‘We didn’t know.’” And for that, many people want him silenced.
      http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/is-gideon-levy-the-most-hated-man-in-israel-or-just-the-most-heroic-2087909.html
      Gideon Levy is a Haaretz columnist and a member of the newspaper’s editorial board. Levy joined Haaretz in 1982, and spent four years as the newspaper’s deputy editor. He is the author of the weekly Twilight Zone feature, which covers the Israeli occupation in the West Bank and Gaza over the last 25 years, as well as the writer of political editorials for the newspaper.
      Levy was the recipient of the Euro-Med Journalist Prize for 2008; the Leipzig Freedom Prize in 2001; the Israeli Journalists’ Union Prize in 1997; and The Association of Human Rights in Israel Award for 1996.
      His new book, The Punishment of Gaza, has just been published by Verso Publishing House in London and New York.
      https://www.haaretz.com/misc/writers/gideon-levy-1.402
      “Heroes” is a series devoted to those courageous and brilliant people who show us that, in a world seemingly run by crooks, abusers, scoundrels, mass murderers and liars, there are still reasons for optimism.
      No. 1 Edward Snowden
    2. Morrissey6
      2 December 2017 at 9:23 am
      Here’s your chance to meet a real hero
    3. Gideon Levy will deliver a public lecture tomorrow (Sunday) at the Mt Eden War Memorial Hall, 487 Dominion Rd, Balmoral, Auckland
      Sunday 3 December 2017 3:00pm – 5:00pm
    4. 27 November 2017 at 9:32 am
      Heroes
      No. 1: EDWARD SNOWDEN
      “Snowden should, in my opinion, be welcomed home with honors for his service to his country, and for his courage and integrity in the manner in which he performed this service. Apart from exceptional circumstances, citizens have every right to know what their government is doing, in particular what it is doing to them – in the present case, as Snowden revealed to us, keeping citizens under extensive and deeply intrusive surveillance.”—NOAM CHOMSKY, September 2014
      “Heroes” is a series devoted to those courageous and brilliant people who show us that, in a world seemingly run by crooks, abusers, bullies, scoundrels, mass murderers and liars, there are still reasons for optimism.


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