http://bellaciao.org/en/spip.php?article22528

http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Asia/MakingSense_NKoreaCrisis.html

You do really do need to do some background research into the causes of the Korean War in the first place. i.e. America dictating to a sovereign country how they should govern themselves.

And of course, the reason the war stopped with the signing of an armistice was cos America was getting it’s ass kicked, just like it later got its ass kicked in Vietnam.

and

http://www.forum.copwatchers.org are now live

The Feb. 3 Doonesbury comic expressed my thoughts far more precisely than I could have written.

To quote:

“What are we like as a people?…Nine years ago we were attacked. 3,000 people died. In response, we started two long bloody wars and built a vast homeland security apparatus – all at a cost of trillions…During those same nine years, 270,000 Americans were killed by gunfire at home. Our response? We weakened our gun laws.”

I grew up in eastern Oregon and learned to use a gun for hunting game or for killing predators. A real sportsman/woman does not use a semi-automatic weapon. (my note: that last sentence sort of socks it to the NRA. PN) I do not believe the majority of Americans, nor Oregonians believe, we need semi-automatic weapons, a gun on every corner, or on every person walking down the street, and certainly not in our schools. Our children are far too precious to grow up in that kind of gun culture.

Roberta Hunter Parsons-Wachholz
Northwest Portland

Second Letter:

It’s so patently obvious that gun owners, gun dealers and gun manufacturers will do whatever they can to prevent any renewal of the assault weapons ban or any kind of legislation that might infringe on their precious right to own a firearm. The NRA’s recommendation that school teachers be armed is insulting to anyone with a modicum of intelligence. The Feb. 3 Doonesbury comic strip summed up the entire issue and the absurdity of the NRA’s position by pointing out that in the nine years since 9/11, when we were attacked and 3,000 people were killed, “we started two long bloody wars and built a vast homeland security apparatus – all at a cost of trillions…During those same nine years, 270,000 Americans were killed by gunfire at home.”

So how did we respond to those needless deaths? “We weakened our gun laws.” The last panel in the Doonesbury strip showed an alien saying, “Fail. Cannot comprehend.”

I’m not an alien, but I can’t comprehend it either.

Matthew Lubic
Talent (OR ?)

Editors Note: When I read both letters, I was struck by three important items:

1. Our response to the 911 Murders that was a case of overkill that also reduced our Civil Liberties to an extent that it impinges on the very fabric of our democracy. When you look at it in this manner, it would seem that it was the terrorists that won, not the people of the United States. Point number one is all in bold and is my emphasis, not that of the letter’s author.

2. I also grew-up around my Uncle Frank, an avid sportsman, and I too became the same. I do not need a semi-automatic weapon to hunt, although on a long-barrel .22 caliber rifle I find a semi-automatic quite effective for squirrel hunting. I don’t mind semi-automatic deer rifles either, or an automatic shotgun for Duck hunting, however fail to see the need for large capacity clips, and if a hunter needs more than seven shots (a reasonable limit the amount of rounds a clip can contain, that individual may need to return to the firing range and learn to become a crack-shot rather than firing so many rounds that he/she endangers other hunters who may be out in the wild.

3. I do believe that American’s should not be stripped of their rights to own a firearm, however, neither do I believe that we need high-capacity clips for the purpose of hunting or self-defense. High capacity clips are for the military and war – none of which apply to the average American.

Republi-crat demagogues, whether Romney or Obama, use China-bashing in the same
way America used Japan-bashing in the 1980s or anti-Latino immigrant vitriol
today: to divert blame from domestic economic problems away from America’s predatory capitalist system onto some foreign (preferably non-White) scapegoat.

America’s China Bashing: A Compendium of Junk Economics
http://michael-hudson.com/2010/09/americas-china-bashing-a-compendium-of-junk-economics/

American rulers pander to this kind of nationalist demagoguery because it works. Proud Americans love this kind of coded racist nationalism. It allows the flag-wavers to indulge in self-righteous chest beating in which the poor, innocent American Empire is supposedly threatened by evil-doers. LOL.

In the process, however, Americans stand reality on its head, as they studiously ignore how America is a victimizer, and not a victim.

Americans don’t have the honesty to face how their nation’s corporations are
massively exploiting workers in not only China but also India and elsewhere.

America cannot admit how their economy is fundamentally based upon exploiting the developing world in particular.

That’s what all this jingoistic whining about “outsourcing” or “foreigners stealing Amurican jobs” is designed to deny and cover up.

And that’s what “globalization” in general is really about: the imposition of
the USA’s Washington Consensus policy on foreign economies, and thus the
Americanization of the world.

Former NSA operative John Perkins even wrote a book about his personal experiences as an American “economic hitman” who job was to compel other nations to follow American economic dictates—or else.

Confessions of an Economic Hit Man: How the U.S. Uses Globalization to Cheat Poor Countries Out of Trillions
http://www.democracynow.org/2004/11/9/confessions_of_an_economic_hit_man

This doesn’t even begin to address another way that America rapes the world through what is euphemistically called the Dollar world reserve currency, which has allowed the USA to obtain the “greatest free lunch in history.”

Super Imperialism: The Economic Strategy of American Empire
http://michael-hudson.com/books/super-imperialism-the-economic-strategy-of-american-empire/

In 2011, Americans threw a minor fit when Russia President Vladimir
Putin called the United States a parasite on the global economy. What he was
talking about was this system of American Super Imperialism and the Dollar
reserve currency—and he was right in his characterization of the USA.

America: Host or Parasite?
http://michael-hudson.com/2007/03/america-host-or-parasite/

Given all these issues that you rarely hear about in the self-styled US free press or mainstream America in general, it’s long overdue that other nations start “getting tough” … with America!

Those are the facts that most Americans–including your article—refuse
to face.