The Largest Minority

August 12th, 2008 by Manila Ryce

I made this for the Nader campaign, which means it’s the shit. I kid, I kid. But seriously, this video is awesome and I made it. Not being conceited, just honest. I’m too flawlessly humble to be conceited.

Join us in Denver for the “Open the Debates Super Rally” during the 2008 Democratic National Convention. Open the debates and take democracy back from the bipartisan, corporate tyranny of The Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD).

Help us challenge the CPD during the “Open the Debates Super Rally” on August 27th in Denver to end corporate control over our electoral process. Special guests TBA.

August 11th, 2008 by Manila Ryce

Google is scheduled to hold a debate independent of the corporate Commission on Presidential Debates (CPD). This is possibly our one and only chance to get Obama and McCain to debate Ralph Nader and any other third-party or independent candidate running for the presidency. We must pressure Google to lower their requirements to 5% before this opportunity is lost. While using exclusionary tactics to silence opposition, these two major parties seem to think that freedom, a term they both speak highly of, means having power for yourself at the expense of others.

In 1992, independent candidate Ross Perot, who was polling at 7-9 percent, was included in the debates at the request of George H.W. Bush, who made Perot’s inclusion a precondition for his own participation. Under current CPD requirements of 15 percent, Perot wouldn’t have been admitted today.

In 1996, Bob Dole proposed that if Perot were kept out of the debates he would allow the Clinton campaign to decide the terms of the event. Clinton agreed. George Stephanopolous, senior advisor to Clinton at the time, took pride in the undemocratic deal between the two candidates, explaining: “As long as we would agree to Perot not being in it, we could get everything else we wanted going in. We got our time frame, we got our length, we got our moderator.”

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August 10th, 2008 by Manila Ryce

An old classic from Rx2008.

August 9th, 2008 by Manila Ryce

August 8th, 2008 by Manila Ryce

18-year-old High school student Irving Gonzalez signed up for the Army’s Delayed Entry Program (DEP), a non-binding contract that left him free to change his mind before basic training. However, when Gonzalez decided he wanted to go to college rather than the Army, the recruiter, Sgt. Glenn Marquette, told Irving Gonzalez that he would be sent to jail if he didn’t join. DEP regulations state “under no circumstances will any (recruiter) threaten, coerce, manipulate, or intimidate (future soldiers), nor may they obstruct separation requests.” Democracy Now! plays the recording of their conversation, questions a spokesman for the US Military Recruiting Command, and talks with a Texas Congressman who is calling for an investigation.

This isn’t the first time teenagers have been intimidated into joining the military by recruiters from the Greenspoint Recruiting Station in Houston. Three years ago Sgt. Thomas Kelt left a message threatening a teenager with arrest if he did not keep an appointment. Rather than punishing Kelt, the Army promoted him to the role of station commander two months later to supervise and train other recruiters.

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August 7th, 2008 by Manila Ryce

August 5th, 2008 by Manila Ryce

The youth of America don’t need Hope. We need Rage.

This music video was directed in 2000 by Michael Moore when he had a bigger set of balls. It highlights the lack of choice Americans had between Gore and Bush (thank God all that’s changed). The video ends with a quote from Ralph Nader: “If you’re not turned on to politics, politics will turn on you.”

The song’s sequence of “Who controls the past now controls the future/Who controls the present now controls the past/Who controls the past now controls the future/Who controls the present now?” Is based on a series of thoughts by Winston, the main character in George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four, about the fact that the Big Brother controls the past and therefore controls the present and future. Others have interpreted these lyrics as a statement against revisionist history, and how the secrets that politicians keep from the public can greatly affect the future.

August 1st, 2008 by Manila Ryce

The sound quality sucks in this video so turn your speakers up.

Faiz Shakir of Think Progress interviews Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Seymour Hersh, who reveals that Vice President Cheney had planned to put US Navy Seals in Iranian PT boats in the Strait of Hormuz to provoke a war with other US vessels in a similar fashion to the Gulf of Tonkin Incident.

Hersh states: “There was a dozen ideas proffered about how to trigger a war. The one that interested me the most was why don’t we build — we in our shipyard — build four or five boats that look like Iranian PT boats. Put Navy seals on them with a lot of arms. And next time one of our boats goes to the Straits of Hormuz, start a shoot-up.”

Being the world’s only superpower comes with some perks - no one ever fucks with you - but that can also be a curse when maintaining your status depends on waging perpetual wars against indefensible nations. If you can’t get them to attack you, then you just have to attack yourself. US foreign policy is outright terrorism and “false flag operations” are a key part of that policy.

As if carrying out a “false flag operation” wasn’t easy enough, the planning, execution, and scapegoating is all funded by American taxpayers who then fit the bill for the upcoming war itself and volunteer themselves to be slaughtered in it as well.

h/t AlterNet