China Veiling Light

Would you like to ensure that your blog or internet site or newspaper or book, etc. is made inaccessible for over one billion people? Then simply point out how little respect for human rights, freedom of speech, protection of minorities, the right freely to demonstrate, and especially the chance to criticize the government exists in the so-called People's Republic of China, a country of unbridled capitalism for the few, immense poverty for the masses, freedom for none, privilege for cronies, and exclusive power in the hands of what claims to be a communist party allowing no political competition. The Olympic games there will provide the ultimate proof of the games' commercial philosophy while disregarding any claim to promoting the fellowship of mankind.

Reporters sans frontières - China

Forty per cent of the 163 China-based foreign journalists polled by the Foreign Correspondents Club of China (FCCC) in 2007 said they had experienced some form of interference by the authorities since 1 January. A total of 157 incidents (arrests, surveillance, intimidation of sources, violence or threats) were reported to the FCCC. Asked if China had kept the promise made in 2001 by Wang Wei of the Beijing Organising Committee for the Games to give the foreign media complete freedom to work, 67 per cent said No. Only 8.6 per cent said Yes.

And this doesn't even begin to explore China's denial of rights to its own citizens, as the following excerpt from an article from today's newspaper, with link to the full story, reveals !

Berliner Zeitung

Chinas Polizei trainiert für Olympia
Bernhard Bartsch

Knapp ein Jahr vor den Olympischen Spielen und kurz vor dem am 15. Oktober beginnenden Parteikongress verschärft Chinas Regierung die Repressionen gegen Regimekritiker. In den vergangenen Wochen wurden zahlreiche prominente Aktivisten festgenommen, meist ohne Haftbefehl.
Berliner Zeitung, 04.10.2007

Playpen Power Russian Style !

The Russian playpen's putative potentate finds a way to make the American bushbaby playpen extremely envious...

Putin's Plan to Stay in Power - TIME

It has long been assumed that President Vladimir Putin, whose term of office expires next March, would prefer to remain in power. But how he might try to do so while operating within the terms of Russia's constitution has been a source of endless speculation. On Monday, Putin provided what may be the answer, when he announced that he would head the list of the ruling United Russia (UR) party in December's election to the Duma, the lower house of Russia's parliament. While it may sound like a step down for an executive president to run for a seat in a legislature that has largely served as a rubber stamp to his policies, the move suggests that Putin may opt to reorganize the Russian power structure — if he can't hold on to the seat of power, he could always shift power to a seat he can hold.

Vladimir Poutine se voit en premier ministre de la Russie
LEMONDE.FR 01.10.07

©

The New York Times

Putin Says He Will Run for Parliament
By C. J. CHIVERS
Published: October 2, 2007

The suggestion seemed to confirm that President Vladimir V. Putin plans to hold on to the power he has accrued.

That's the way to do it, playpenalers ! Constitutional change for the fable of stable power as those power mongers keep on keeping on despite those who demand accountability and rights and justice!

Άλήθεια

Άλήθεια:

„Das Hereinblicken des Seins in das von ihm selbst und als es selbst gelichtete Offene, offen für das Unverborgene alles Erscheinens.“

…

„Sein, das selbst west als das Freie, in dessen Lichtung das Seiende den Eingang zur Unverborgenheit und aus dieser den Aufgang zum Erscheinen und mit diesem den Fug der Anwesung findet.“

MH: GA Bd.54, S.240

Being peers into the illuminated openness that it itself illuminated and is, open for the unconcealed of all appearing.

...

Being that itself essentially sways as the Free, in whose illumination beings find access to unconcealment and, from that, ascent to appearance and, from this, the joint of swaying temporal existence.

Playpen Seeking New Rattle: Iran

Annals of National Security: Shifting Targets: Reporting & Essays: The New Yorker:
Shifting Targets
The Administration’s plan for Iran.
by Seymour M. Hersh
October 8, 2007 issue of The New Yorker

"In a series of public statements in recent months, President Bush and members of his Administration have redefined the war in Iraq, to an increasing degree, as a strategic battle between the United States and Iran. “Shia extremists, backed by Iran, are training Iraqis to carry out attacks on our forces and the Iraqi people,” Bush told the national convention of the American Legion in August. “The attacks on our bases and our troops by Iranian-supplied munitions have increased. . . . The Iranian regime must halt these actions. And, until it does, I will take actions necessary to protect our troops.” He then concluded, to applause, “I have authorized our military commanders in Iraq to confront Tehran’s murderous activities.”

[...]

“A lot depends on how stupid the Iranians will be,” Brzezinski told me. “Will they cool off Ahmadinejad and tone down their language?” The Bush Administration, by charging that Iran was interfering in Iraq, was aiming “to paint it as ‘We’re responding to what is an intolerable situation,’ ” Brzezinski said. “This time, unlike the attack in Iraq, we’re going to play the victim. The name of our game seems to be to get the Iranians to overplay their hand.”

[...]

Another recent incident, in Afghanistan, reflects the tension over intelligence. In July, the London Telegraph reported that what appeared to be an SA-7 shoulder-launched missile was fired at an American C-130 Hercules aircraft. The missile missed its mark. Months earlier, British commandos had intercepted a few truckloads of weapons, including one containing a working SA-7 missile, coming across the Iranian border. But there was no way of determining whether the missile fired at the C-130 had come from Iran—especially since SA-7s are available through black-market arms dealers.

Vincent Cannistraro, a retired C.I.A. officer who has worked closely with his counterparts in Britain, added to the story: “The Brits told me that they were afraid at first to tell us about the incident—in fear that Cheney would use it as a reason to attack Iran.” The intelligence subsequently was forwarded, he said.
The retired four-star general confirmed that British intelligence “was worried” about passing the information along. “The Brits don’t trust the Iranians,” the retired general said, “but they also don’t trust Bush and Cheney.” ♦"

A Playpen for Ahmadinejad

No wonder he thinks the fact of the Shoa is a theory needing more research ! He also believes there are no homosexuals in Iran and that women have equal rights when there are some responsibilities they are "relieved" from, since men only must take care of them out of respect for the gender "god made kindly and beautiful". He is likewise unable to answer a yes-no question, or indeed any at all on the question of Israel's existence, instead resorting to a reference to the necessity for a referendum about the state in Palestine (which is probably an indication that Israel is for him not a state at all).

But hooray for my alma mater Columbia University for having him speak and posing him the rough questions. Hooray for the clear introductory remarks of Columbia's president Bollinger. Just letting the man speak and hearing him dodge questions makes clear what is going on. It also points up the stupidity of the playpen and its bushbaby for not being able to deal with this character in diplomatic fora!

The New York Times

Ahmadinejad, at Columbia, Parries and Puzzles
By HELENE COOPER
Published: September 25, 2007

In a hostile environment at Columbia University, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran meandered from science and religion to politics. [...]

He said that there were no homosexuals in Iran — not one — and that the Nazi slaughter of six million Jews should not be treated as fact, but theory, and therefore open to debate and more research.

The New York Post
Ahmadinejad Questions 9/11, Holocaust
By NAHAL TOOSI Associated Press Writer

NEW YORK (AP) -- Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad defended Holocaust revisionists and raised questions about who carried out the Sept. 11 attacks in a tense showdown Monday at Columbia University, where the school's head introduced the hard-line leader by calling him a "petty and cruel dictator." [...]

He provoked derisive laughter by responding to a question about Iran's execution of homosexuals by saying: "In Iran we don't have homosexuals like in your country ... I don't know who's told you that we have this."

La présence d'Ahmadinejad à l'Université de Columbia crée une polémique
LEMONDE.FR 24.09.07

©

The Guardian
As protesters jeer, Ahmadinejad denies Iran wants nuclear weapons
· President claims country has no gay population
· Bad-tempered exchanges as leader visits US college
Julian Borger in New York and Ewen MacAskill in Washington
Tuesday September 25, 2007
"Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran's president, told Americans yesterday his country had no nuclear weapons programme, but then called his own credibility into question by insisting it had no gay people either."

Pedaling for Rights

Well, we made the Kreisfahrt bike demo this year, helping to snarl traffic throughout the inner city by passing nearly all major thoroughfares and shopping avenues, reminding car drivers of the idiocy of attempting to reach such places by individual automobile in the first place. Today they surely learned. And we had ideal weather for the whole thing: sun and 22°. A few photos:

On the way back home, we cycled past the corner where the demo against too much surveillance in Germany was headed shortly after its beginning. As indicated by the absurdly militant equipment and exaggerated numbers of the police there, the government evidenty fears this group a lot. The clowns were good, and even the yuppiest of the German political parties took part in it. And all they want is to be able to read a book or send an email without having the government know the contents. (This concern is, of course, though it shouldn't be, completely foreign to Americans living in the playpen of the bushbaby, even though a revolution or war of independence was conducted there for such reasons.) And two photos:

Das Wort

Im Griechentum ist ... das Wort ... dasjenige, worin das Sein sich dem Menschen zuweist, damit er es als das ihm Zugewiesene in seinem eigenen Wesen bewahre und aus solcher Bewahrung seinerseits erst sein eigenes Wesen als Mensch finde und behalte.
[MH, GA Bd.54, §5, S.115]

For the Greeks, the Word is that in which Being allocates itself to Man for him to preserve it in its own Essence as what was allocated to him and, from this preservation, on the other hand, finally to find and maintain his own Essence as Man.

American Tourist Abroad

On her last day there, she's stealing peas from a very nice, somewhat perplexed Berliner, even though she claims not to like them!

Degenerate Art is the best !

Here's to degenerate art!

And here's a call for caricatures of the reactionary catholic fundamentalist german cardinal Meisner for condemning any art not conforming to his notion of godly culture AND the new stained glass window done by the esteemed artist Richter, saying it was more suitable for a mosque or a synagoge because it was abstract rather than figurative. The fact that he used the same term for condemning art he doesn't like - degenerate art - entartete Kunst - that the Nazis used when they were burning books and deporting and gasing artists, only adds more evidence for this so-called man of god being a dangerous fundamentalist. Why is no one shadowing him and monitoring his email and tapping his phone?

Meisners Bild vom Menschen
Unter Kardinal Meisners verblasenem Satz von der "entarteten Kunst" kann sich jeder etwas anderes vorstellen, eindeutig sind bloß die Assoziationen, die das Vokabular erweckt - es verweist auf den nationalsozialistischen und klerikalfaschistischen Feldzug gegen die Moderne zwischen 1933 und den fünfziger ahren.
Ein Kommentar von Gustav Seibt
Süddeutsche Zeitung 15.09.2007

We Need Many, Many MORE CARICATURES !

Read Voltaire's play, look at the earlier caricatures, enjoy satire, think, go to political spoofs and consider whether thought without irony, irreverence, and nastiness is possible at all. NO RELIGION OR POLITICAL IDEOLOGY has the RIGHT to tell me or you that you don't have the RIGHT to READ or SAY or LOOK AT whatever you want to!

FAZ.NET - Mohammed-Zeichner: Al Qaida setzt Kopfgeld auf schwedischen Karikaturisten aus

15. September 2007 Eine irakische Gruppe des Terrornetzes Al Qaida hat zum Mord an einem schwedischen Karikaturisten aufgerufen, der den Propheten Mohammed als Hund dargestellt hatte. In einer im Internet erschienenen Videobotschaft setzte die Gruppe „Islamischer Staat im Irak“ am Samstag ein Kopfgeld von 100.000 Dollar - etwa 73.000 Euro - aus. „Von heute an rufen wir alle auf, das Blut des Karikaturisten zu vergießen, der es gewagt hat, den Propheten zu entwürdigen“, hieß es in der Botschaft. „Wir erhöhen die Belohnung auf 150.000 Dollar, wenn er geschlachtet wird wie ein Lamm“, drohten die Extremisten.

Qaeda calls for killing of Swedish cartoonist - The Boston Globe - Sept. 16, 2007
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates - The head of an Al Qaeda-led group in Iraq has offered a $100,000 bounty for someone to kill a Swedish cartoonist for his drawing of Islam's Prophet Mohammed, and has threatened to attack major Swedish companies.
Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, leader of the self-styled Islamic State in Iraq, also offered $50,000 to anyone who kills Ulf Johansson, the editor of the newspaper that published the drawing by Lars Vilks. Sweden's Nerikes Allehanda daily newspaper published the drawing, part of a series that art galleries in Sweden had declined to display, last month. The cartoon showed the Prophet Mohammed with a dog's body.

Al-Qaida setzt Kopfgeld auf Karikaturisten aus - Spiegel Online 15.09.2007

Zwei Schweden fürchten um ihr Leben: Iraks Al-Qaida-Chef will demjenigen, der den Karikaturisten Lars Vilks oder den Chefredakteur Ulf Johansson tötet, ein Kopfgeld zahlen. Vilks hatte den Propheten Mohammed als Hund dargestellt, Johanssons Zeitung die Zeichnung abgedruckt.
Hamburg - Die Terrororganisation al-Qaida im Irak hat ein Kopfgeld auf den schwedischen Karikaturisten Lars Vilks sowie Ulf Johansson, Chefredakteur der Zeitung "Nerikes Allehanda", ausgesetzt. Diese hatte im August eine Zeichnung von Vilks abgedruckt, die Mohammed als riesiges Hundedenkmal in der Mitte eines Kreisverkehrs zeigt. Das Blatt illustrierte damit einen Leitartikel über Meinungsfreiheit.

On the way to the airport to fetch her husband...

... my sis saw a palace, had to pull me out from under a tree, and smiled for the birdy!

Wonderful lit fest discoveries

Here to Dutch illustrator Sieb Posthuma and one example of his work, an enormous theater decoration for a Diaghilev festival, from that linked website:

And the Russian illustrator Vladimir Radunsky, charming, witty, intelligent, Dadaist:

Depressing to Find Auntie Times Right Again

It really does get to me, so often finding that The New York Times has understood something, but this is again the case after the bushbaby's most recent proof that he and his playpen will never understand anything, nothing, nuttin at all!

NYT Editorial
No Exit, No Strategy
Published: September 14, 2007
Last night’s speech could have been given any day in the last four years — and was delivered a half-dozen times already. Despite Mr. Bush’s claim that he was offering a way for all Americans to “come together” on Iraq, he offered the same divisive policies — repackaged this time with the Orwellian slogan “return on success.” [...]

Once again, it is clear that President Bush refuses to recognize the truth of his failure in Iraq and envisions a military commitment that has no end.

Doing the tourist thing

Taking Terri to Berlin gardens you end up traveling the world without leaving the city.

(Drooling yet, Jenn? Cause actually, this is me in a photo by Terri in a pasha's garden in Morocco.)

Literary Privilege

For the internationales literaturfestival berlin yesterday evening, I had the great privilege of interpreting for (among others) Anne Waldman as she explained and spoke about her choices for this year's Berliner Anthologie published for and with the literature festival. Her own piece, without, which you can listen to under this link, first title, was a refreshing reminder of the need for incantatory exorcising poetry to drive back the spirits of war. Also, she chose and read Allen Ginsberg's great Pentagon exorcism poem from the days of the movement against the Vietnam War.

Terri & Jeff, visiting, did NOT come along, Jeff being on another wavelength, but Terri, who actually was planned and should have come and would have liked it, was, at time to head over there, suddenly afflicted by fatiguing jet lag and decided to remain home with Detlef & her husband to play Kulturbanausen and go for a Döner for supper (trotz Fleischskandalen).

The next event of the festival will not be avoidable for her.

Check out Anne Waldman and learn to bang the poetic drums of resistance.

Justice Patriotic : PATRIOT ACT unconstitutional

In the case Doe v. Gonzales originally filed in April 2004, a federal court yesterday struck down the National Security Letter (NSL) provision of the amended version of the so-called Patriot Act. It has allowed the FBI to present NSLs to obtain private information about people in the US without court review or approval, while forbidding those who get NSLs from telling anyone about them. This prohibition power, said the court, is unconstitutional since it hinders courts in meaningful judicial review of same, in violation of the First Amendment and the principle of separation of powers.
U.S. District Court Judge Victor Marrero wrote, "In light of the seriousness of the potential intrusion into the individual's personal affairs and the significant possibility of a chilling effect on speech and association - particularly of expression that is critical of the government or its policies - a compelling need exists to ensure that the use of NSLs is subject to the safeguards of public accountability, checks and balances, and separation of powers that our Constitution prescribes."

The full text of the court order is in this link.

Justice is the only method to combat the enemies of human and civil rights and democracy. This decision is a true tribute to those who have died at hands of terrorists and a true slap in the face for those terrorists and all those who, like them, seek to limit our right to think and speak and live freely.

My favorite person's birthday !

You are my sunshine, my only sunshine, you make me happy, when skies are gray, and you sure know, dear, how much I love you. So lets make some sunshine today!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

Detlef

ALLES GUTE ZUM GEBURTSTAG

BONNE ANNIVERSAIRE

Try to remember what started it all...

... the firey destruction of the WTC by fundamentalists unswayable in their blind convictions of being right while everyone else is wrong.

This is a characteristic they share with the bushbaby and his playpen, along with both groups' distrust of human rights, people who are different, free thought, passion, justice, etc.

As September 11 again nears, six years after those events, it is time to recall what was and is at risk:

• civilized enlightenment with humans doing what makes them human : thinking

and what the threat is:

• blindly believing religious fundamentalists afraid of thought and free people and prepared to do anything to stamp them out.

Fly the flag of enlightenment on September 11 !

And here's is an accurate assessment of the current dilemma from -
The New York Times
Editorial
Another Iraq Photo Op
Published: September 5, 2007
As Americans and Iraqis continue to die, President Bush stubbornly refuses to recognize that what both countries need is a responsible exit strategy for the United States.

And finally the title page of a government report with a link to the full document:

GAO
United States Government Accountability Office

Testimony

Before the Committee on Foreign Relations, U.S.Senate
SECURING, STABILIZING, AND REBUILDING IRAQ
Iraqi Government Has Not Met Most Legislative, Security, and Economic Benchmarks
Statement of David M. Walker Comptroller General of the United States

For Release on Delivery Expected at 2:00 p.m. EDT, Tuesday, September 4, 2007

Amazing concert & view

After the famous lunch that an American niece commented on before it was eaten and a sister reminded me of remembering the mention of in The Sound of Music, we went out to the street fair of the Berlin water company because SILLY was giving a free concert. And it was fantastic, a good ninety minutes of their fabulously powerful rock & sentiment songs. The attempt to make a video of a number (SILLY's official website has some samples) was stymied by the concrete canyon echoes from the walls of the modern administration buildings flanking the outdoor stage, so I've settled for posting this stunning photo of the old city hall at sunset as it looked behind and above the stage. It fitted the music just fine.

Für die verlorenen Kinder in den Straßen von Berlin.

Lunch is gonna be good...

Today, Edith is coming to visit and prepare us lunch as well. Ingredients are at the ready, and this is what we're having:

Jägerschnitzel a la DDR (mit Jagdwurst)

Zutaten
500 g Jagdwurst (möglichst großer Durchmesser!)
2-3 EL Mehl
2-3 Eier
3-4 EL Semmelbrösel
Bratfett, Pfeffer, Salz (optional Paprikapulver)

Info: Zu DDR-Zeiten oft so gegessen & auch selbamacht... Hintergrund der Falsifizierung' (Wurst statt echtes Schnitzel): Fleisch war knapp, Wurst war da schon eher zu bekommen (und billiger)... Wer diese Variante von Jägerschnitzel nicht kennt bzw. früher damit mal nicht so gute Erfahrung gemacht haben sollte, möge trotzdem mal den "Mut" haben, das selber auszuprobieren! Das Rezept ist mitnichten ein Kandidat für ein Gala-Diner, vor allem Kinder sind aber (ähnlich wie bei Fischstäbchen) dankbare Abnehmer ...

Zubereitung

Jagdwurst in 5..8 mm dicke Scheiben schneiden, pfeffern & salzen, panieren, (kross) braten, feddich!
'Standesgemäß' gehören eine einfache Tomatensauce (nur Tomate und Zwiebeln) und Makkaroni-Chips dazu! Jedwede andere Nudel/Pasta, aber auch Reis oder andere Beilagen passen aber auch...

Yes, ymm, and we're getting the version with tomato sauce !