It was a time of great and exalting excitement. The country was up in arms, the war was on..." The War Prayer, is a short story by Mark Twain about blind patriotic war and the God who is on both sides. Written around 1904, published after his death in 1923.
Part 1
Part 2
It was a time of great and exalting excitement. The country was up in arms, the war was on, in every breast burned the holy fire of patriotism; the drums were beating, the bands playing, the toy pistols popping, the Read more [...]
Posts tagged Politics
The War Prayer – Mark Twain
It was a time of great and exalting excitement. The country was up in arms, the war was on..." The War Prayer, is a short story by Mark Twain about blind patriotic war and the God who is on both sides. Written around 1904, published after his death in 1923.
Part 1
Part 2
It was a time of great and exalting excitement. The country was up in arms, the war was on, in every breast burned the holy fire of patriotism; the drums were beating, the bands playing, the toy pistols popping, the Read more [...]
Occupying DC
In DC on Tuesday 18th October, I had a chance to observe and talk directly with protestors, learning more about what they are really about. Camps and protests have been spreading throughout the city, I came across two of them. Each were occupied by a mixed age group, mainly students, retirees, and unemployed. Some had been there a couple of days, others a couple of weeks. Some supporters I met who have jobs join the protest even if just for an afternoon, to show their support.
At the first Occupy Read more [...]
“Shareholder Capitalism” VS “Socialised Capitalism”
Why did our political leaders bail out banks (who caused the GFC) rather than the public (who lost wealth and jobs as a result)? Why did governments spend trillions of dollars repairing a system that, in the well-known cycle of booms and busts, is destined to crash once again? Why are they bandaiding problems caught up in a powerbroker system that is visibly failing, rather than following the advice of economists like Joseph Stiglitz, who suggest seizing the opportunity for reform? Why do our political Read more [...]
“Occupy Sydney”
If you're not in Sydney (like me) or can't make it to protest, you can still spread the word about this peaceful protest to change the rules of our global capitalist game.
Stop banks and corporations:
- reducing humans to commodities
- controlling media
- funding both sides of wars
- destroying the environment
SATURDAY 15 OCTOBER 2:30pm
Reserve Bank of Australia
Martin Place and Macquarie Street
Sydney, Australia
Facebook event: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=122116297893189&ref=ts
Occupy Read more [...]
Carbon trading: the devil is in the details
Who benefits from carbon trading? Wall street??? De ja vu...
Annie Leonard, my favourite "make it simple and tie a bow around it" chick, reveals the "devils in the details":
Three problems:
1. Free permits to big polluters
2. Fake offsets
3. A massive distraction
It's like going on a diet to lose weight. We all know in the long term, diet's don't work!
If you wanna reduce carbon there's a very simple solution (which works for losing weight too): REDUCE YOUR CONSUMPTION.
We Read more [...]
Attempting Politics
Three years ago, before I went back to uni, I voted Liberal. Why? Three reasons: (1) Because my Dad voted Liberal. (2) I wasn't interested in Politics. (3) I didn't know the difference between Liberal and Labour (Australia's Right and Left). Not a good place for any voting citizen to be. And certainly not the best intellectual place for a person who has just enrolled in a Master of Arts. But that was why I was there. I felt an abyss of lacking knowledge and a desire to try to fill it.
I thought Read more [...]
Youtube & The Global Pyramid
I am assisting the teaching of a master's subject called The Political Economy of Conflict and Peace, at the University of Sydney this semester. My first presentation was yesterday and in the lead up to it I drowned myself in the political economic papers and books I wrote or read over the last couple of years. And searching YouTube for parts of documentaries that I have found useful in the past. This entry has become a bit of a dumping ground for me to refer and share again at later times... maybe Read more [...]
The gap between school and real-life
Does school prepare us for life in the real world? Is knowledge passed from academia to public spheres? Are we learning from the past, or do we continue to make the same mistakes? How well do we really understand ourselves and others in our geopolitical, social, and historical context?
It seems to me there are major gaps within our distribution of knowledge.
Today I want to focus on one of those gaps, the gap between life in school and life after school. Over the coming weeks I will look at Read more [...]
Brisbane’s Narrative Wreckage: Cataclysmic Interruptions and Redemptive Solutions
Content in living out your life: work, money, weekends, holidays, home, kids... and then something happens: a cataclysmic event changes everything.
Be it a sudden illness or a natural disaster like the flooding Brisbane is now facing, everything you know - everything you care about, everything you have dedicated your life to, everything you imagined for your future - can disappear in an instant.
As I write, Brisbane faces 12 people dead, 43 missing, 20,000 homes, and 3000 businesses under water. Read more [...]
