Torture has been privatized now, so you have obviously the whole scandal in America about the abuse of prisoners and the fact that, army people might be made to pay a price, but who are the privatized torturers accountable too?
quote by Arundhati Roy
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Youre Not An Army
We can drag you out of bed in the middle of the night
Drive tanks along your street looking for a flight
We can put you in a cell an dash away the key
Make you stand against the wall torture chamber stylee
The reason is simple, it's obvious to see
We can shoot at you but you can't kill we
Don't you see, don't you see, your not an army
The reason is simple, it's obvious to see
Right is on your side but the media's with we
Don't you see, don't you see, your not an army
The thing you must remember since these troubles first began
Were supported by a tax paying population
And if the rest of this world is against we
It's a fact that the people of this country won't see
They can give you a trial by military
But you won't be sentenced politically
You'll be beat by other prisoners for political views
But you just another killer when we read it in the news
song performed by by Ub40
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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To call something an 'enhanced interrogation technique' doesn't alter the fact that we thought it was torture when the Japanese used it on American prisoners, we thought it was torture when the North Koreans used it, we thought it was torture when the Soviets used it. You know, it's almost the moral equivalent of saying that rape is an enhanced seduction technique.
quote by Ted Koppel
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Funding privatized accounts with Social Security dollars would not only make the program's long term problems worse, but many believe it represents a first step toward undermining the program's fundamental goals.
quote by Patty Murray
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The president and Republicans in Congress have repeatedly promised to revisit Social Security privatization after November. But Americans have already said, loud and clear, that they don't want Social Security to be privatized or dismantled.
quote by Jim Clyburn
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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A Poem also About Duplicity
It would be unfortunate if the idea of multiple selves
obscured the fact the self is still
responsible for the terror it makes in the mind.
It would be a mistake if the multiple meanings
of words like torture disguised the fact
we are torturers, with lessened concern about it.
It would be tragic if the loss of multiple relationships
to the unconscious
obviated the possibility
of minding a more responsible life.
I say this as someone who minds
what insanity means, not what we are coming to think.
Imagination means so much;
so much depends on what's under.
poem by Forrest Hamer
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Bird With Two Right Wings
And now our government
a bird with two right wings
flies on from zone to zone
while we go on having our little fun & games
at each election
as if it really mattered who the pilot is
of Air Force One
(They're interchangeable, stupid!)
While this bird with two right wings
flies right on with its corporate flight crew
And this year its the Great Movie Cowboy in the cockpit
And next year its the great Bush pilot
And now its the Chameleon Kid
and he keeps changing the logo on his captains cap
and now its a donkey and now an elephant
and now some kind of donkephant
And now we recognize two of the crew
who took out a contract on America
and one is a certain gringo wretch
who's busy monkeywrenching
crucial parts of the engine
and its life-support systems
and they got a big fat hose
to siphon off the fuel to privatized tanks
And all the while we just sit there
in the passenger seats
without parachutes
listening to all the news that's fit to air
over the one-way PA system
about how the contract on America
is really good for us etcetera
As all the while the plane lumbers on
into its postmodern
manifest destiny
poem by Lawrence Ferlinghetti
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There Is Nothing Wrong With Power
'Tis sad to think that many with power abuse it those with power who abuse it weak not strong
There is nothing wrong with having power in the first place it is the abuse of it that is all wrong
For the abuse of power leads to serious crimes against the powerless though power in good hands it is quite okay
And good people with power never do abuse it they use it in the most constructive way
Some people with power are quite benign people and philanthropic one of them can say
But those who abuse their power to the law may never answer though to karma there's a price they have to pay
The abuse of power leads to dictatorial regimes that leads to serious crimes against humanity
In the despicable crimes against women and children the wrongs of power gone wrong for all to see
The people who abuse their power should never have it though to their power they desperately do cling
Power in the right hands an adavantage to others and power in the wrong hands is a dangerous thing
There is nothing wrong with power from once 'tis used well but some with power they do abuse their rule
And some with power they can become quite nasty and derive pleasure out of being cruel
But power in the right hands can be a blessing and kind people with power their praise we ought sing
Since they have the gift of empathy within them and happiness to others they do bring.
poem by Francis Duggan
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The healthy man does not torture others - generally it is the tortured who turn into torturers.
Dream On!
Clouds hang low today covering the ridge,
if I drive up there on my bike I can hide in
a steel blue cloud and people will say:
where is he? Him! He is trying to find
the milky way where postmen wear red
uniforms and say good morning sir before
handing you the gas bill.
Sigh, here back on earth the post has been
privatized low status, casual work, they
wear jeans and anorak and have no time for
a chat, their route is long and a man with
a timepiece follows them around.
When coming down from the ridge I will not
carry tablets, stay silent drive home and
make a cup of coffee.
poem by Oskar Hansen
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Ex Post Facto
i. Prologue Ex
This forever war is flowing somewhere…
A ballad of the blues over sanguine seas.
The baghdad blues:
a man in a corner does not move.
His wife and children, strewn: lost love-letters of blood.
Beneath the veil of a willowy dream,
as if the world shall absolve you with buttery palms.
God is watching you, sad soldier,
dragging the landing gear of prosthetics.
ii. Post En Medias Res
In this land of no escape,
Take me to Walter Reed,
The privatized foothold of rats,
Birthing future breeders
Of post traumatic stress,
Oil oligarchy disorder.
To spend limbless days,
basking in the sun’s rays, enlivened
with particles of biochemical warfare.
iii Facto Epilogue
I hear America crying:
politicians as war heroes,
priests as common criminals,
bards at the podium.
And where are the philosophers?
Destined to the peeling wail
of a teetering helicopter,
Small mosquito in the eye of God?
Listen, America, dry your tears,
don’t bask in the permanent grandeur
of abandoned radio halls
As we walk on water like Jesus,
Apprenticed for Armageddon.
poem by Marina Gipps
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America
(Francis Scott Key)
Oh, say, can you see
By the dawn's early light
What so proudly we hailed
At the twilight's last gleaming
Whose broad stripes and bright stars
Through the perilous fight
O'er the ramparts we watched were so
Gallantly streaming?
America, America, America
America, America, America
And the rocket's red glare
The bombs bursting in air
Gave proof through the night
That our flag was still there
Oh, say, does that star
Spangled banner yet wave
Over the land of the free
And the home of the brave!
America, America, America
America, America, America
America, America, America
America, America, America
America, America, America
America, America
ooohhh
song performed by by Lou Reed
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Heaven For Some
It's said, by those who have been there and back,
that hell can at times be a boring place, pink
lightening and women that endlessly try a new
frocks on. Here are pools of banal sin, rivers
of pornography and small time crooks trying
to sell you fake religious icons, but not one evil
dictator around repenting his murderous ways,
or a capitalist swine now regretting cheating
workers of their pension rights. Where do they
go? Are they pardoned and sent to a privatized
heaven where they play high stake poker with
senior seraphs? I'd like to know before I rob
a bank. I'm fed up with stealing children's toys.
poem by Oskar Hansen
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Why America
America, America you don't know me,
But dear America I know you.
I see you in the faces of young people,
I watch you sleep in your crib at night.
I hear your voice in the crowded streets,
I taste your soul in the resturants at dinner time.
Why America have you forgotten about us?
You got too big and you left us behind.
Not thinking about the little man,
We were just a waste of your time.
Dear America turn back and look at what you are,
The wind in our hair, the dirt in our pots,
The rain on our cheeks, the oil in our homes.
America why would you allow yourself to forget?
We made you what you are today.
We the little man dug into your land to find oil.
We turned over your soil to feed the pig you are now.
We America are who you should thank
We, America are the working class people.
Without us there is no you.
Without the work we do there is no product,
Without the product there is no profit.
We, America fuel you, yet you leave us behind.
It's okay though, all is forgiven.
WE FORGIVE YOU! !
poem by Racquel Davis
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The photographs of Iraqi prisoners being subjected to degrading and humiliating treatment by their captors, and the reports of acts of sexual abuse, physical abuse, and other acts of maltreatment shock the conscience.
God Has Blessed America
God has blessed America
with the ability to choose.
And we lean to our own understanding;
not asking him what to do.
God has blessed America
with landscape’s that will take your breath away.
And we dig-up and cut-down,
and litter everyday.
When God made the earth
He said, “It is good.”
And we’re not taking care of it;
like we know we really should.
God has blessed America
more than we deserve;
With his love and compassion,
His mercies new each day.
God has blessed America
With the babies that he give;
and we abuse and neglect them,
and kill them daily still.
God has Blessed America
Oh how he blessed us so.
We have freedom in our country;
More than other countries will know.
God has blessed America
with oceans blue as the sky;
and we pollute them, killing sea life,
not caring that they die.
God has blessed America
we have freedom of speech;
and we destroy; killing spirits
with the poison that we speak.
God has blessed America
The land we say we love;
But we continue to destroy it,
The land we’re unworthy of.
Copyright © 2010 by-Phyllis Strong
poem by Phyllis Strong
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Atomic Insanity Bomb
America, we're drained of enthusiasm for you
America, why this meaningless war?
America, you are no longer beautiful
America, when will you see the light?
When will you call peace and dance and sing
When will you look in the mirror
and see the menace you have become?
When will you read the philosophies of God
that say Thou Shalt Not Kill?
America, when will you open your eyes?
America, why do you dye the shores red?
Why are the guns loaded with skulls?
Why do you leave your brothers behind
To charge bull-like at a cloth too large for you?
America, why are you putting a gun to your head?
America, stop killing me I'm not
Innocent, not Guilty
AMERICA STOP PUSHING!
America don't liberate me I'm already independent.
America I refuse to give up my rights
I refuse to give up others' rights
America don't reject your own
America the HATE is growing
They're rising up growing
America, let the prisoners go
The scholars of war in peace in hate in freedom
The Ginsbergs and Kerouacs and Dickesons and Whitmans
Of generations past
Free the ones whose philosophies peace it together
America your war is at home
America what is your motto?
Mission is not accomplished
It has just started.
America you have life to give,
not take away.
America, you deserve this war
America, my love for you is gone
America, monster, stop your screaming slashing rage
Look into your past
America LEARN from your mistakes
America, make it continue
AMERICA MAKE IT STOP
poem by Lex Newman
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You Picked the Right Day for Torture
You picked the right day for torture.
It was too quiet and serene,
To be left untampered.
You wanted your presence felt...
And it was.
You picked the right day for torture
With or without a diet regimen
Or implementation of facts.
What you do behind one's back...
Is left to your interpretation.
Your rules and dispositions are taught!
Although not followed,
And neither held in high esteem.
You picked the right day for torture...
Perhaps now you can see in bright daylight,
The victims you continue to abuse
Are of your own kind.
And of them none can say you frighten.
Yet all have been too quick to say you are crazed!
And today you are here believing you will be praised,
And honored?
You picked the right day for torture!
And how much of it you take...
Will not leave a witness to feel remorse,
Or show heartbreak!
They have come to watch you exploit,
Your own pain!
You have picked the right day for torture!
Everyone came to give you the limelight,
And the fame you claim!
poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
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Oil & Democracy
Democracy and Oil
When rebels wave the magic banner of democracy,
the west acts blindly like a troll caught in daylight.
They run around and holler democracy and fig leaf,
Norway drops bomb for the sake of peace. History
for those who care to read, it is hundred years ago
that Italian air-force dropped bombs over Libya.
Small, small bombs, yet big enough to kill women
and children on the ground. Gaddafi, a low hanging
fruit must go; Oil must be democratically privatized-
given to the big oil companies- And that what this
war is all about...sole western access to energy.
poem by Oskar Hansen
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Egyptian Army
Egyptian Army will
serve the Egyptian nation.
Mubarak is not now
leader of Egyptian nation.
Will the Egyptian Army
serve will of Egyptian people?
Dictatorship torture poverty
serves not Egyptian people.
poem by Terence George Craddock
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And they've got to be held accountable; our broadcasting system has to be made accountable; and unless it is, it's going to be very hard to change anything else for the better in this country.
quote by Robert McChesney
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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