Reasons to protest Bush Visit
enough is enough | 17.11.2003 14:43 | Anti-militarism | Globalisation | London
Bush is using military power to secure the dominance of a neo-liberal economic world order.
In the face of the largest political demonstrations in world history, the leaders of the "coalition of the willing" - Bush, Blair and the Australian Howard - unleashed devastation and misery on the people of Iraq.
Everyone who opposes the US administration's aggressive foreign policy agenda and contempt for democracy should come out and tell Bush in person.
The Bush visit is a chance to embarrass Blair and Bush by demonstrating that despite his attempts to ignore enormous anti-war sentiment, opposition to war in Iraq and to "globalisation at gunpoint" has not gone away.
Protesters are mobilising around growing opposition to the occupation of Iraq and expect that many people will also join in protest given the US government's support for global trade regulations which privilege rich countries over poor, their refusal to sign the Kyoto Protocol and the Nuclear non-Proliferation Treaty, their support for compliant dictatorships such as Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, and their continued backing for Israel's war on Palestine.
KYOTO CLIMATE KILLER
The US is now the greatest obstruction to the World Battle against Climate Change.
Climate Change urgently requires globally coordinated action to effectively bring it under control : so far the United states of America, the most powerful nation in the world, has proved the greatest force acting against any such globally coordinated action.
The only attempt so far made to achieve the globally coordinated action urgently needed to fight climate change has been the Kyoto Treaty, which took many years of hard work and complicated negotiations to achieve. In March 2001 the then new Republican President of the US, George W Bush, dumped the Kyoto treaty in an act of arrogant and high-handed irresponsibility that shocked the world .
Though the Kyoto treaty is nothing like as strong as it needs to be it makes some kind of a start to putting the brakes on the slide towards catastrophe, and embodies the principle that there must be mandatory limits to the greenhouse gas emissions of all the nations round the world. The rest of the world agreed to the Kyoto Treaty in Bonn, in July 2001, in defiance of the US, but the action of the US strengthened the hand of those who wanted to weaken the treaty and thereby caused it to be (even) weaker than it would otherwise have been.
WHERE ARE THE WEAPONS?
The leaders of the "coalition of the killing" are coming under continued pressure as the truth slowly but surely comes out about their lies regarding Iraq and WMD.
Despite a long and fruitless search for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, the US maintains that they are keeping us safe from "rogue states" and "terrorists".
The US, however, with an annual military budget of almost half a trillion US dollars has more weapons of mass destruction than any other nation and are prepared to use them. We know where the weapons are - and we know where the real threat lies...
WEAPONS IN SPACE
Missile defence is about control. Control of warfare, control in peace, control of space. Its aim, and the wider aim of space dominance, is "full spectrum dominance" - a US military term meaning dominance of the land, sea, air, space and information. The system threatens to provoke international instability, arms proliferation, a space arms race and will fuel the ideology of first strikes. The system is a threat to peace and security, not a path to it.
Missile Defence systems are under development in the US, Japan, Israel, Germany and elsewhere. The UK, with two US air force bases in Yorkshire vital to the system, is key to US plans for a vast, global missile defence system.
Should the plan go ahead Americans will spend hundreds of billions of tax dollars for a technically flawed scheme that offers only the illusion of protection. There will also be increased nuclear dangers in a world where there are far more nuclear weapons as countries such as China bolster their nuclear arsenals to overcome Star Wars. Star Wars sole beneficiaries will be U.S. defence contractors, poised to earn billions with an expensive and faulty solution to a non-existent threat.
CORPORATE CRIMINAL
In the face of a number of high profile corporate collapses, Dubya would like us to think that he is getting tough on corporate crime. But of course, he is one of those criminals.
Enron recently filed what was at the time, the largest bankruptcy in US history (since then, WorldCom has that distinction). Enron executives helped shape White House energy policy - a fact that Bush and vice president Dick Cheney diligently tried to keep secret.
Enron was Bush's and the Republican Party's largest campaign contributer. Over 50 high-level officials in the Bush Administration, including the White House, the Departments of the Treasury, Commerce, and State, the U.S. Trade Representative's office and EPA, had ties to Enron. In fact, Bush is so tight with former CEO, Kenneth Lay, that he calls him, affectionately, "Kenny Boy".
The corporate carve-up of Iraq continues Dubya's "good work", with the value of contracts awarded to Halliburton - formerly run by Cheney - currenlty amounting to $US2 billion.
Halliburton began work in Iraq with a $US37.5 million no-bid contract in February to put out oil fires. That deal, expanded to include pumping oil, is now worth about $US948 million. But the oil contract alone, awarded by the Army Corps of Engineers to Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg, Brown & Root, is potentially worth up to $US7 billion, the military have said.
The contracting was done behind closed doors which circumvented traditional bidding procedures. Cheney, while insisting he has no financial interest in his former company, has received hundreds of thousands of dollars from Halliburton since taking office.
THE TEXECUTIONER
George Bush could reasonably be described as America's Biggest Serial Killer with 155 homicides and hundreds more attempts (some scheduled dates got last minute stays). Dubya is responsible for more state executions than any other elected official in recorded American history.
Under then-Governor George W. Bush, Texas ranked first in executions and dead last in social services. Bush opposed legislation banning the execution of people with IQs under 65 and legislation providing funding for the basic legal defense of indigent people. Instead Bush signed off on 155 executions, in what has been described as an "assembly-line" death penalty process. In a 1998 report, Amnesty International stated that "at every step in the death penalty process in Texas, a litany of grossly inadequate legal procedures fail to meet recognized minimum international standards for the protection of human rights."
US SPENDING ON IRAQ INVASION
http://costofwar.com/
Warmongers like Bush always seem to be able to find funding for the military at the expense of the real needs of people and the environment. The billions that Dubya is prepared to put up for occupying Iraq could be spent assisting in debt relief for developing countries, for example, helping to alleviate the desperate conditions which create poverty and social instability.
And all this fails, of course, to take into account the tremendous human cost in Iraq...
AND NOT TO MENTION A WHOLE BAG OF OTHER REASONS FROM SPONSORING COUP ATTEMPTS TO THE FTAA TO GM CROPS...
In the face of the largest political demonstrations in world history, the leaders of the "coalition of the willing" - Bush, Blair and the Australian Howard - unleashed devastation and misery on the people of Iraq.
Everyone who opposes the US administration's aggressive foreign policy agenda and contempt for democracy should come out and tell Bush in person.
The Bush visit is a chance to embarrass Blair and Bush by demonstrating that despite his attempts to ignore enormous anti-war sentiment, opposition to war in Iraq and to "globalisation at gunpoint" has not gone away.
Protesters are mobilising around growing opposition to the occupation of Iraq and expect that many people will also join in protest given the US government's support for global trade regulations which privilege rich countries over poor, their refusal to sign the Kyoto Protocol and the Nuclear non-Proliferation Treaty, their support for compliant dictatorships such as Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, and their continued backing for Israel's war on Palestine.
KYOTO CLIMATE KILLER
The US is now the greatest obstruction to the World Battle against Climate Change.
Climate Change urgently requires globally coordinated action to effectively bring it under control : so far the United states of America, the most powerful nation in the world, has proved the greatest force acting against any such globally coordinated action.
The only attempt so far made to achieve the globally coordinated action urgently needed to fight climate change has been the Kyoto Treaty, which took many years of hard work and complicated negotiations to achieve. In March 2001 the then new Republican President of the US, George W Bush, dumped the Kyoto treaty in an act of arrogant and high-handed irresponsibility that shocked the world .
Though the Kyoto treaty is nothing like as strong as it needs to be it makes some kind of a start to putting the brakes on the slide towards catastrophe, and embodies the principle that there must be mandatory limits to the greenhouse gas emissions of all the nations round the world. The rest of the world agreed to the Kyoto Treaty in Bonn, in July 2001, in defiance of the US, but the action of the US strengthened the hand of those who wanted to weaken the treaty and thereby caused it to be (even) weaker than it would otherwise have been.
WHERE ARE THE WEAPONS?
The leaders of the "coalition of the killing" are coming under continued pressure as the truth slowly but surely comes out about their lies regarding Iraq and WMD.
Despite a long and fruitless search for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, the US maintains that they are keeping us safe from "rogue states" and "terrorists".
The US, however, with an annual military budget of almost half a trillion US dollars has more weapons of mass destruction than any other nation and are prepared to use them. We know where the weapons are - and we know where the real threat lies...
WEAPONS IN SPACE
Missile defence is about control. Control of warfare, control in peace, control of space. Its aim, and the wider aim of space dominance, is "full spectrum dominance" - a US military term meaning dominance of the land, sea, air, space and information. The system threatens to provoke international instability, arms proliferation, a space arms race and will fuel the ideology of first strikes. The system is a threat to peace and security, not a path to it.
Missile Defence systems are under development in the US, Japan, Israel, Germany and elsewhere. The UK, with two US air force bases in Yorkshire vital to the system, is key to US plans for a vast, global missile defence system.
Should the plan go ahead Americans will spend hundreds of billions of tax dollars for a technically flawed scheme that offers only the illusion of protection. There will also be increased nuclear dangers in a world where there are far more nuclear weapons as countries such as China bolster their nuclear arsenals to overcome Star Wars. Star Wars sole beneficiaries will be U.S. defence contractors, poised to earn billions with an expensive and faulty solution to a non-existent threat.
CORPORATE CRIMINAL
In the face of a number of high profile corporate collapses, Dubya would like us to think that he is getting tough on corporate crime. But of course, he is one of those criminals.
Enron recently filed what was at the time, the largest bankruptcy in US history (since then, WorldCom has that distinction). Enron executives helped shape White House energy policy - a fact that Bush and vice president Dick Cheney diligently tried to keep secret.
Enron was Bush's and the Republican Party's largest campaign contributer. Over 50 high-level officials in the Bush Administration, including the White House, the Departments of the Treasury, Commerce, and State, the U.S. Trade Representative's office and EPA, had ties to Enron. In fact, Bush is so tight with former CEO, Kenneth Lay, that he calls him, affectionately, "Kenny Boy".
The corporate carve-up of Iraq continues Dubya's "good work", with the value of contracts awarded to Halliburton - formerly run by Cheney - currenlty amounting to $US2 billion.
Halliburton began work in Iraq with a $US37.5 million no-bid contract in February to put out oil fires. That deal, expanded to include pumping oil, is now worth about $US948 million. But the oil contract alone, awarded by the Army Corps of Engineers to Halliburton subsidiary Kellogg, Brown & Root, is potentially worth up to $US7 billion, the military have said.
The contracting was done behind closed doors which circumvented traditional bidding procedures. Cheney, while insisting he has no financial interest in his former company, has received hundreds of thousands of dollars from Halliburton since taking office.
THE TEXECUTIONER
George Bush could reasonably be described as America's Biggest Serial Killer with 155 homicides and hundreds more attempts (some scheduled dates got last minute stays). Dubya is responsible for more state executions than any other elected official in recorded American history.
Under then-Governor George W. Bush, Texas ranked first in executions and dead last in social services. Bush opposed legislation banning the execution of people with IQs under 65 and legislation providing funding for the basic legal defense of indigent people. Instead Bush signed off on 155 executions, in what has been described as an "assembly-line" death penalty process. In a 1998 report, Amnesty International stated that "at every step in the death penalty process in Texas, a litany of grossly inadequate legal procedures fail to meet recognized minimum international standards for the protection of human rights."
US SPENDING ON IRAQ INVASION
http://costofwar.com/ Warmongers like Bush always seem to be able to find funding for the military at the expense of the real needs of people and the environment. The billions that Dubya is prepared to put up for occupying Iraq could be spent assisting in debt relief for developing countries, for example, helping to alleviate the desperate conditions which create poverty and social instability.
And all this fails, of course, to take into account the tremendous human cost in Iraq...
AND NOT TO MENTION A WHOLE BAG OF OTHER REASONS FROM SPONSORING COUP ATTEMPTS TO THE FTAA TO GM CROPS...
enough is enough
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