Suffer The Children....Shame on Adults

"Something's happening here.
What it is ain't exactly clear.
There's a man with a gun over there.
Telling me I got to beware." -Buffalo Springfield

What it is ain't exactly clear but what is clear are the lies and hypocrisy of adults professing to give a damn about the children of this world. From abusive parents, neglectful schools, uncaring social services, eager recruiters for war, Congressmen/women more worried about large stakes contributions to the Pope it is clear children have little importance other than using them as public relations tools.
We can make believe we care about children but why do we continue to allow them to be victims of killers with guns? Why have we failed time and again to implement even the most reasonable and less intrusive forms of gun controls that pale in comparison to the controls in the rest of the world? Why do we continue to allow old men and women to take us to war and sacrifice our youth to failed policies and immoral goals of our wars? Why do we allow children in far away places to be enslaved in sweat shops so we here in America can wear stylish clothing?
We know the sacrificial offerings of children adults implement but turn our eyes away in guilt and shame. Or apathy and the desire not to know about what we do to our children of this world. Since my time in Vietnam I've witnessed the sacrifice of children to the sins of adults. I personally saw death by bombs, death by napalm, death by mortars and artillery, death by gunfire and death by chemicals in a war lacking moral reason.
Since my personal witness I've viewed thousands of photos and videos of the casualties of wars that inevitably include a huge number of children's bodies mutilated by adult implements of death. After so many dead bodies it numbs the mind to the real stories of each individual child killed. The question "Why?" continually runs through my head. Why do we allow this to happen?
The classic adult response to the carnage of children occurred just recently when the families of children killed in the Newtown grade school went to Congress to plead for gun control. They were handing out photos of their beloved children to remind Congress of the moral mandate to do something to control the sale of high powered guns to anybody who wants them. A female Congress person quickly passed the group with the statement, "I'm good" as she refused to take the photos of the dead children the parents were handing out as a reminder of our failure to protect all children.
"I'm good"? How can she be good with the daily carnage of kids from the shores of America to the shores of Africa and Asia? But she represents a culture that's ok with daily violence against children and one that encourages our young to be violent. She represents a culture where those that can afford a good education live in gated communities, go to sheltered schools and have little interaction with those living in stark poverty. The poor get the worst school buildings, largest classes and most out of date learning materials. They're graded by inane political tests meant to "measure" teacher efficiency. They only measure the obvious. If you're poor, hungry and living in gang afflicted neighborhoods learning doesn't occur easily. To add insult to injury the rich school districts doing well in the proficiency tests get rewarded with extra tax dollars while the poor districts get punished.
In war torn nations, ripped apart by sectarian strife, 15th Century type culture keeps young girls and women from going to school. India has daily stories of young women raped by gangs of adult men who seldom face prosecution for their crimes. In fact, the families of the victims are more often ostracized than the predators. One of the latest rapes involved a five year old girl. The response from authorities remains unconcerned.
In Pakistan, China, Bangladesh, Vietnam and numerous other nations the American need for consumer goods leads to child slave labor. The esteemed Apple computer company has most of it's computer hardware put together in such sweat shops. The Jordanesque Nike athletic shoe company has long used the slave labor in nations outside the U.S., the largest buyer of their expensive shoes.
Even in the religious community we find the hypocrisy of concern for the child. The Roman Catholic Church has become notorious for its constant refrain of the intrinsic evil of abortion but continues to back peddle and evade responsibility for pedophiles posing as priests. The new pope, Francis, recently reaffirmed the Church's position against American nuns who he feels put too much emphasis on social justice issues and not enough on the abortion issue. Maybe the good sisters have a clue about the one out of every five children being malnourished and want to do something about it? Maybe they see poor children in every city they serve living without homes, adequate clothing and going to over populated classes?
If the Catholic Church is righteous why haven't they looked at the fact this planet can no longer sustain population growth at the rate it's going right now. The Church's response to this has been loud opposition to all forms of contraception leading poor families to have more children than they can sustain. Leading to hunger and starvation. But at least they didn't prevent child bearing or commit abortion.
The Church also shows its social consciousness by not allowing its relief workers to distribute condoms in HIV ravaged nations. Children born with AIDS seems more important than protection against the HIV virus.
The truth about the Church remains the ugly misogyny it practices in most everything it does. Its obsession with controlling the sex lives of the people, especially women, has reached obscene levels. Its total wealth, hidden around the world and in the Vatican itself, belies the piety and righteousness the Church claims to have . How many children the Church claims to love could the Church feed, clothe and house if it only followed the teachings of Christ? It's clear the Church loves power much more than children or social justice. It's clear the issue of abortion is one way of exerting power over women who still remain faithful to a failed institution.
But, we should not just point fingers at the Catholic Church. We need only look around the world at most of the alleged followers of Christ and other prophets to see their wealth. Huge shrines in forms of cathedrals and mosques rise up in the skies while on the ground millions starve. Money, money, money seems to be the first tenet of the religious communities. Their NGOs coerce and ignore cultures impoverished by violence, drought and the rape of natural resources unless "their way" is followed. Too often the alleged charity work being done has hidden agendas. Too often there are strings attached. The overall results continue to affect the children of the world most.
It's a damn lie the adults of this world care about children. We need only look at the conditions of children around the world to affirm this dirty little secret. The care for children professed by far too many is simply lip service. Ask the people of Haiti. Ask the continent of Africa. Ask the parents in our nation's poor urban areas.

The Only Thing to Fear is Fear Itself...Not Anymore

When did it become ok to shut down an  entire metropolitan area of a U.S. city to hunt a murder suspect? Are Americans now supposed to fear for our lives everytime a murder takes place. Even one as widely publicized as the Boston bombings?
Descriptions came from citizens in Boston metro of military style occupation of their neighborhoods. There was even mention of tanks being used. Seriously? In a nation that just days ago allowed its Congress to shoot down the benign background check law we're supposed to quiver in fear whenever a murder occurs? This nation that relishes the violence of gunplay and shoot-outs wants the citizens to stay indoors, don't let anybody but an uniformed officer enter, close your blinds, hide, live in fear?
The "Prince" has won. Or rather princes. We're all supposed to suspend life because two idiot terrorists chose to murder at one of the iconic sporting events, the Boston Marathon. So, the terrorists have won the infamy they sought for themselves and whatever cause they claim to represent. They win, we lose. Big governmental surveilance and policing wins. If we thought we lived in a police state before we've not seen anything yet.
Which makes me wonder, where's all the policing and surveilance been in the neighborhoods of Chicago and others that have daily body counts? The neighborhoods of color should be so lucky as having the security shown in the pursuit of two murderous fanatics. Wouldn't it be nice if parents in these neighborhoods could feel their children are safe?
And it astonishes me the mass media has been allowed to perpetrate the scare tactics, false rumors and just plain awful journalism. Almost like they've become complicit in keeping the citizenry terrified for the militaristic police forces and federal agencies. We witnessed an alleged expert in criminal behaviors come on the air spouting his "sources" told him the bombers were men with brown skin, the code for Arabic terrorists. Turns out the bombers were as lily white as the racist commentator. But now there is said to be Islamic connections. There's supposed to be more than one bomb in the city. Does this make them different from Timothy McVeigh?
So all sporting events, all train traffic and even all air travel is shut down. We're supposed to believe the two are so sophisticated in their criminal activity they have to shut the city down. So why were they so easily spotted on video? Why has every action they've taken seemed more like hate filled amateurs violently acting out than a terrorist cell planning on the destruction of the entire city of Boston?
In the past Americans were told not to allow fear to overcome us. Told the criminals win if we allow them to keep us from carrying on our daily lives. Now every time there's a threat we're supposed to hide in fear and trust our militarized police forces will protect us. And pray their stray shots during fire fights don't kill one of us. Or their high speed chases don't run us over.
Living in fear is living only a part of life. The world is dangerous and there are numerous predators lurking in all parts of our world. I witnessed Vietnamese villagers carry on living their daily lives in spite of American and Viet Cong/North Vietnamese troops constantly intruding on their safety. They kept living their lives in spite of daily bombings. The same was witnessed by troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. Fear is crippling and leads to dependency on "others" to protect us. Especially those who wield far too much power over us already.
I don't give a damn about the two killer brothers responsible for their heinous acts of terror on children and innocents. I don't give a damn about their motivations. They won't get any of my sympathy. No, instead, it angers me that a nation would allow two killers with hate in their heart to cripple a major metropolitan area the way these two were allowed to do.
It angers me they've given the para-military police and federal agencies constantly wanting to usurp our rights more opportunity to do just that. And it gives me a strange feeling when I watch a largely white neighborhood told to stay out of their streets for the entire day cheering the hundreds of heavily armed police, federal agents and others to take down one single person once they finally do. I thought of the word "lemmings" as I watched that scene.
It angers me that the same strength of force can't be brought to the poor neighborhoods of gang and drug activity to bring justice to the moms and dads who stare helplessly when their children are shot down by stray gunfire of the gangsters. It angers me that we should applaud the forces of police power but do nothing to condemn the politicians that leave us all vunerable to the gunfire of fanatics and criminals because they fear the power of the death dealers like the NRA. It angers me to see Obama talk about the grief of the dead from such crimes as these but how little he says about the dead of the neighborhoods of color living through decades of war brought to them by gangsters armed by the death dealers associated with the NRA.
Our fears are only increased by what we perceive as terrorism but we hardly blink at the larger causes of death brought on by our own neglect of those less "worthy" of our attention. We hardly blink at the stripping of our basic rights as citizens every time there's one of these highly publicized crimes. There should be terror in our minds at this prospect of constantly living in fear of gangsters, terrorists and politicians more than willing to take our rights.
There will be no freedom when we allow this fear to rule us.

There Is No Justice with American Exceptionalism

How does anyone justify killing an eight year old child? Or a 29 year old woman loved by many? Or a college exchange student from China? Or the maiming and wounding of nearly 150 humans?
The bombing at the Boston Marathon on April 15, 13 is one more atrocity committed by criminals with hate in their hearts. No  cause justifies these type of actions. And the President is right to demand justice for the victims and survivors of the bombings. We need to capture the criminals responsible and bring them to justice.
On the same day there were 55 humans killed by bombs in Baghdad. A day before there were numerous dead from a bomb in Mogadishu, Somalia. The victims and survivors of these bombings also deserve justice.
And if we truly want justice in this world shouldn't we seek justice for the children killed in Baghdad, Fallujah, Basra, and uncounted villages throughout Iraq from the years 2003 to the present day? Or the innocent humans killed in Afghanistan from the year 2001 to present day? Or the innocents killed by drones for years in both countries and other nations we have allowed deadly drones to search out targets?
Where is the justice for the dead children of Palestine killed by a Zionist government armed by American weapons cheaply priced? Or the dead children of Israel killed in reprisal attacks? Where is the justice for idealistic young people like Rachel Corrie, ran over by an Israeli Caterpillar as she attempted to stand up for justice?
Where is the justice for the children of Sudan, Kenya, Uganda and all the many African nations under the spell of tribal genocide? Many killed by criminals securing weapons sold by American arms manufacturers.Where is the justice for children killed in Serbia, Estonia and all the other divided nations of the former Yugoslavia? Or the children of Vietnam still suffering the effects of American Agent Orange dropped in the 60s and 70s?
Since September 11, 2001 the millions of humans killed as a result of American wars seem exceedingly more than enough retribution for American lives lost in the terrorist attack of that day. We Americans fail to see the dead of other nations killed in our name for no good reason. We demand justice when it's our citizens, our brothers and sisters killed. We think an American life to be exceptionally more important than any other life.
The American people are mostly good people. They have the same desires of peace and security for their families as most people in the world have. Unfortunately, American exceptionalism blinds us to the true suffering of most humans outside our borders. Especially "third world nations". Nations populated by people of color in the majority.
The tragedy of Boston scars us all but pales in comparison to the tragedy of bombs falling on populated neighborhoods of Baghdad and Fallujah. The Aurora theatre massacre, the Newtown massacre and all the repeated atrocities over the past 20-30 years in this nation are nowhere close to the ongoing tragedies of nations most Americans can't find on a world map. Americans are so prone to PTSD because our traumatic events happen so infrequently compared to the majority of the world. Haitians live in a constant state of trauma. The "lost boys" of the Sudan had culture shock when they migrated to the U.S. because they didn't face daily trauma.
These thoughts don't mean to diminish the loss of American lives to criminal acts such as Boston or Aurora. But American exceptionalism has blinded us to the larger perspective of the world's suffering. We've been blinded to how much of the suffering our own governmental policies cause. Perpetual wars for phony justice are sold to us like car commercials. Only our troops matter. The collateral damage of our wars is hidden from us by the media that seems to be at the beck and call of the government.
To bring justice to our dead children we must bring justice for all dead children killed by the violence of wars, greed and power. We can't allow borders or national flags to prevent us from being citizens of the world first. Christ and all other prophets didn't see borders and national flags as barriers to justice for all. We simply need to follow their teachings for the justice we seek.

Uncle Tom and the KKKongress

I hesitate using derogatory terms that are widely known as racist but dammit, Barack Obama is about as much an Uncle Tom as I've ever come across in my life. Just look at his record of kow-towing to the white dominated financial sector of this nation.Look at his proposed cuts in Medicare, Social Security and Medicaid. This is a President that has done just about everything the Klanish likes of Mitch McConnell and John Boehner could ask for. He's responsible for more violations of human rights than his hawkish predecessor, Dubya Bush. He's lied time and again on the campaign trail only to do exactly the opposite once elected. He first ran on the concept of "hope" and ended up making those who fervently supported him look like "dopes".
In my days of rage and activism I aligned myself with black brothers and sisters including members of the Panthers. I came to understand how harmful the term "uncle Tom" could be but also understood why some came to be called a "Tom". When you're doing the bidding of the white power structure at the  cost of communities of color and the poor and disabled in this society as a person of color, you are a "Tom". The term originates from the servile character in the rewrite of Harriet Beecher Stowe's book UNCLE TOM. In the book Tom was a hero saving other slaves from the oppression of slavery but once Hollywood got hold of the book it turned Tom into the servile character doing the bidding of his "master". A typical white revision of a black hero into the acceptable white version of a black man.
It's difficult to call Obama a Tom because the man has been the target of such racist hate. There have been ten times the number of threats against his life than any other President. No other President has faced the number of Senate filibusters as Obama's administration has. No other President has had judicial and other appointments refused as often as Obama has. From the beginning the hate mongers and racists such as McConnell and  Boenhner, Lindsay Graham, Michelle Bachman and so many others have publicly stated they intended on blocking anything Obama proposed that would make him look good and enhance his re-election. The only things that seems to be missing are the white hoods and burning crosses. The new Jim Crow is real and Obama has become the symbol of the reason why the racist white oppressors have come out of the wood work.
So what's Obama's response to the racists? He meekly offers compromises that throws the baby and all other weak members of the American society under the bus to appease them. He's become a well educated tool of the white masters. He's become the epitome of an Uncle Tom.
I have worked with the poor for over 25 years. They struggle to buy food, stay in livable housing and get the health care they need. Their entitlement is poverty under Medicaid or Medicare. These are not the people who are ripping the system off. We need only look to Wall Street and the banksters that caused the financial crash of 2008 to find the true entitlements. Too big to fail and free of prosecution these criminal with the complicit Congress and Presidency continue to practice the same toxic practices that led to the 2008 crash. They just moved from housing to other areas.
If we want to find the welfare queens/kings we need only look to the criminals in the medical field who work the Medicaid and Medicare systems to fraudulently take millions in fees for care not given. We need only look at the monstrous end of life industry that puts the elderly through tortuous procedures having no chance to enhance the quality of their lives but certainly enhance the banking accounts of the frauds who claim to be care-givers.
Who's to blame? We must look at the Congress and President in collusion with the Supreme Court allowing the corporate world free rein while continuing to oppress the poor and middle class. The Congress remains an exclusive white male club that only allows token representation of women (making up 51% of the population) and people of color. Looking at the hateful words and the faces of the weekly news shows on Sundays, we constantly see the ugliness of our Congress. Far too often we hear code words of racism. Far too often we hear lies and misrepresentations of why this nation is so much in debt. Far too often we don't hear anything about the spending on wars and the military. And far too often we see racist white men who could easily be mistaken for Grand Wizards of the KKK.
So it baffles me why the good 'ol boys hate OToma. He has given them 90% or better of what they and the corporate bosses want. It simply comes down to the color of his skin in the Presidency. It doesn't sit well with the racist base of the Congress and the corporate boards. Look at the CEOs of the largest corporations and there are very few people of color. Very few women.
The sad conclusion is Barack is an "uncle Tom" that has overlooked the racists and sold out people of color, the impoverished, liberals, progressives and activists hoping to bring true change. He's overlooked the Klanish types who somehow got leadership in Congress to be a token in a powerless Presidency. His theme of hope has turned into a sad discouraging hopelessness for those in need. He has betrayed those who are most in need of hopeful progress.