On 2/7/07, Doug Henwood <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
But most Americans are not poor, and a
discourse that focuses on material deprivation won't speak to three-
quarters of the population. They may feel insecure, anxious, and
alienated, but they will not recognize themselves in warmed-over
1930s rhetoric.
And then there's the inconvenient truth that a poverty-line income in
the U.S. is at the 98th percentile of the world income distribution.
Then, perhaps, the rest of the world might have to take matters into
their own hands, since the Americans are too rich and can't be
bothered.
<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/stan-goff/an-appeal-to-people-outsi_b_40598.html>
Stan Goff
02.06.2007
An Appeal to People Outside the United States to Break US Imperial
Power (37 comments)
NOTE: Please translate this into as many languages as possible, and
distribute as widely as possible.
This series of suggestions is written because my country is on a path
that will first destroy other societies -- upon which we depend -- and
the biospheric basis of life itself; and this means eventually our own
society.
Our society now -- an imperial society -- is deeply alienated,
desperately unhappy, and thoroughly indoctrinated into the acquisitive
individualism that creates that alienation and unhappiness. We
continue down this path because the weight of the system gives it such
enormous inertia. We need you to do these things, not just to ensure
your own futures... but for our own good.
The United States now exists as a parasite upon the rest of the world.
In this system, this political entity called the United States of
America is not only a parasite, but a parasite that is destroying its
own host. There is only one outcome in the end for such a
relationship; we will all perish together. With the help of the people
of the world -- and I will outline ten ways you can help us -- we can
all escape this fate. Each of us -- with the destruction of US
imperial power -- will be in a better position to work for a
sustainable and indpendent future for ourselves, our children, and our
grandchildren.
(1) If there is a US military base in your country, begin a concerted
campaign to get rid of it. These bases are exercises of imperial power
against your own sovereignty. They are creating base-economies of
crime, corruption, and prostitution. They are environmental disasters.
Wage a sharp political struggle to make them untenable.
(2) If there are US companies, be they factories, financial offices,
or retail outlets, in your country, organize sustained boycotts of
them.
(3) If you live in a country that owes an external debt to the US or
the US-controlled International Monetary Fund, begin a fight to either
default on that debt outright, or secure low-interest or no-interest
loans from other countries to pay down the principle. Your nations'
debt is your peoples' slavery.
(4) Boycott any American agricultural products being dumped on your
national markets; and wage a political fight to stop them coming in.
US industrial agricultural corporations are heavily-subsidized and
predatory monstrosities that destroy the environment and are used as a
weapon to destroy your local, traditional agriculture. Ending
agriculture for export and supporting your own subsistence and local
market agriculture is necessary to break your dependency upon and
subjugation to the United States. Fight for you nations' land; and do
not let it become an export platform for dollar-crops in the US
market.
(5) Boycott American cultural products. They are propaganda aimed at
turning your children into mindless consumers and your nations into
obedient colonies.
(6) Make these political issues at home. Fight politicians who are
called "pro-American," This means they are stooges for US-based
transnational corporations or for the US state.
(7) Fight to nationalize your most valuable natural resources; and
support politicians who will abrogate agreements that allow US finance
capital unlimited access to your national markets.
(8) Try to close down any projects that are run out of the US Embassy
by the US Agency for International Development (USAID). These projects
are designed to drain talented local people away from national
independence movements, and the USAID works closely with the Central
Intelligence Agency.
(9) Expose and resist any political activity by the National Endowment
for Democracy (NED), also operating in concert with the US Embassy.
This is a front organization for the purpose of engineering election
outcomes in your nation that are seen as favorable to US transnational
corporations and the US state.
(10) Mount massive political efforts directed at US Embassies
everywhere that oppose the US occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan, and
demand not only withdrawal, but that no US bases be left behind.
NOTE: I have not called for violence in any of these suggestions.
These are generic recommendations.
--
Yoshie
<http://montages.blogspot.com/>
<http://mrzine.org>
<http://monthlyreview.org/>
