Texas Longhorns with newborn calf in Bluebonnets

Texas Longhorns with newborn calf in Bluebonnets

Please note I have a new phone number...

512-517-2708

Alan Maki

Alan Maki
Doing research at the LBJ Library in Austin, Texas

It's time to claim our Peace Dividend

It's time to claim our Peace Dividend

We need to beat swords into plowshares.

We need to beat swords into plowshares.

A program for real change...

http://peaceandsocialjustice.blogspot.com/2013/03/a-progressive-program-for-real-change.html


What we need is a "21st Century Full Employment Act for Peace and Prosperity" which would make it a mandatory requirement that the president and Congress attain and maintain full employment.


"Voting is easy and marginally useful, but it is a poor substitute for democracy, which requires direct action by concerned citizens"

- Ben Franklin

Let's talk...

Let's talk...

Saturday, August 17, 2013

Commemorating the 1963 March on Washington.

We can expect Obama, in his speech on August 28 commemorating the March on Washington, to take Martin Luther King, Jr. out of context.

And we can even expect those Obama supporters organizing the March on Washington on August 24 commemorating the 1963 March Washington to not only take King out of context but intentionally omit the links King drew between war, unemployment and poverty and the need for peace if we are going to have the resources to create real living wage jobs and full employment which would put an end to poverty.

Here is one of Kings most most important (and intentionally) overlooked speeches and we probably won't be hearing this kind of talk from speakers on August 24 or most certainly from Obama on August 28.

I would urge you to take the time to read this entire speech, the comments and King's response... and then share this far and wide in order to counter the misinformation we will be getting about King in the days ahead.

It is bad enough those in power take King out of context; we should be careful that we don't do the same thing.

This is a speech by King in which he declares:

"Now I wanted to say something about the fact that we have lived over these last two or three summers with agony and we have seen our cities going up in flames. And I would be the first to say that I am still committed to militant, powerful, massive, non­-violence as the most potent weapon in grappling with the problem from a direct action point of view. I'm absolutely convinced that a riot merely intensifies the fears of the white community while relieving the guilt. And I feel that we must always work with an effective, powerful weapon and method that brings about tangible results. But it is not enough for me to stand before you tonight and condemn riots. It would be morally irresponsible for me to do that without, at the same time, condemning the contingent, intolerable conditions that exist in our society. These conditions are the things that cause individuals to feel that they have no other alternative than to engage in violent rebellions to get attention. And I must say tonight that a riot is the language of the unheard. And what is it America has failed to hear? It has failed to hear that the plight of the negro poor has worsened over the last twelve or fifteen years. It has failed to hear that the promises of freedom and justice have not been met. And it has failed to hear that large segments of white society are more concerned about tranquility and the status quo than about justice and humanity."

http://www.gphistorical.org/mlk/mlkspeech/index.htm

In response to a comment from the audience, King said:

"...But I don't have time to go into the history and the development of the war in Viet Nam. I happen to be a pacifist but if I had had to make a decision about fighting a war against Hitler, I may have temporarily given up my pacifism and taken up arms..."
 





John Kerry hammers democracy and takes a poke at "We The People" who are thoroughly fed up.

John Kerry hammers democracy and takes a poke at "We The People" who are thoroughly fed up.

Speaking to State Department personnel at the U.S. Embassy in Brasilia, Brazil, on Tuesday, Secretary of State John Kerry said that "this little thing called the Internet makes it much harder to govern."

What is interesting is that most of the media has not even so much as questioned Kerry or insisted he go into more detail about this remark which is a direct attack on democracy.

Obviously, Kerry and Obama and the Democrats and the Republicans are arrogantly insisting that they have the right to run the government according to Wall Street's dictate without any input into the decision-making process from "we the people."

If we look at how the Democrats and Republicans run their own political parties we get a clue about how they want to run the government--- by manipulation and scheming in order to control people and movements completely free from any form of real citizen participation, transparency and oversight and without any consideration for democracy, the United States Constitution and Bill of Rights or the United Nations' Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

It is the epitome of hypocrisy that we have the United States Secretary of State, John Kerry, trotting the globe "on our dime" lamenting efforts of citizens to participate in their governments as all these other Wall Street bribed politicians, the mainstream corporate controlled media and the over-paid capitalist Sooth-sayers/pundits along with the muddle-headed middle class "intellectual" supporters of Obama all boasting to the world that the United States is the world's greatest bastion of democracy.

Talk about "irony."

We are getting a good strong dose of what Obama meant when he wrote this article about "Renewing American Leadership" back in 2007 for Foreign Affairs Magazine:

http://wallstreetsfriend.blogspot.com/2011/04/renewing-american-leadership-by-barack.html

Wall Street insists on its "right" to dictate without interference from the working class based upon its greedy appetite for profits obtained through exploitation, rape and robbery.

If people object and protest against this Wall Street dictate here at home or abroad, in the eyes of these Wall Street vultures like John Kerry, the people--- we the people--- become difficult to control.

We must exercise all of our rights using protests in the streets backed up at the ballot box.

We need to use the Internet to organize a political party of "We The People" fed up with wars, unemployment, poverty, lack of access to health care, racism and inequality along with the destruction of our living environment.

Barack Obama and John Kerry have apparently become concerned that "We The People" may decide to use the Internet in exercising our right to revolution.

Instead of welcoming the Internet as a harbinger of direct citizen participation in the decision-making process of a working democracy, John Kerry laments citizens having the knowledge required to participate in their own governments--- come on, really; is this kind of representative of the United States of America we want traipsing the globe "on our dime?" Let Wall Street pay the tab for its own propagandists.