The Op/Ed opinion section
The two major wars being fought in the world make it clear that no matter what kind of rules governing warfare are in place, there is no way to enforce them. Russia, Ukraine, Israel and Hamas are running roughshod over civilian populations, defying basic humanitarian principles while the rest of the world can only use words to slow them down.
Global corporate capitalism led by the hegemonic state, the United States, is a fundamentally immoral and irrational system. In capitalism, both states and corporations are designed to maximize short-term power and profits for the super-wealthy corporate elite. [1]
For two and a half months, Israeli military forces, with the full backing of the US government, have dropped more than 40,000 tons of explosives—the equivalent of more than two nuclear bombs—on Gaza destroying residential buildings, hospitals, schools and refugee camps and deliberately targeting hundreds of medical workers, journalists, teachers and other civilians for assassination. [2]
Questioned at a Congressional hearing, the President of the University of Pennsylvania will not say that calling for the genocide of Jews violates the University’s anti-bullying or harassment Code of Conduct. She says it is “context-dependent,” and only violates University’s rules “if the speech turns into conduct.”
The presidents of Harvard and MIT gave similar testimony.
“Freedom! Justice!” Demand of Generations of Palestinians
Will Not Be Denied All That Much Longer
Israelis are very proud of their Biblical God given cry and order, ‘Let My People Go,’ but never seem to accept, nor hear, nor acknowledge, that ‘Let Us Have Our Freedom’ be the imagined cry of generations of captive Palestinians suffering Israel’s merciless, and very often deadly, illegal military occupation.
Israel maintains an illegal air, sea and land blockade on Gaza, not allowing anyone, including children, to escape being bombed to death.
The US government, providing Israel with warplanes, missiles, weapons, ammunition and political and diplomatic backing, is complicit in this ongoing genocide of bombing to death thousands of militarily confined civilians, mostly women and children .
UN Told Israelis Give The Land & Homes Back and Compensate Palestinians! Resolution #194 12/11/1948!
On May 14, 1948, the Provisional Government of Israel had proclaimed a new State of Israel comprising 77% of the land in Palestine.
On December 11, 1948, exactly one week after Albert Einstein condemned the macabre Israeli massacre at the Arab village of Deir Yassin and warned against supporting Fascism in Israel in a letter to the New York Times signed by other prominent Jews, [1] the United Nations General Assembly adopted resolution #194, resolving that:
When Trump ran for President the first time it seemed like a bad joke when he was elected. Then the nightmare began. America became a country with a mentally ill fool for a leader. He trashed the economy and ruined any semblance of good relations we had with other countries around the world.
Despite the fact that he is facing 91 legal charges against him he is more emboldened than ever to assume the presidency and transform it into a military dictatorship. Snubbing all of the Republican debates is a very bad signal. It means that he is convinced he is the only one who can win the election and it also makes it clear that he will make up his own rules as the election season moves ahead.
Trump and his team of maniacs are already mapping out plans for when he wins the election. He is talking about clamping down on immigration and turning anyone who wants to enter this country into a criminal.
Years ago, Noam Chomsky suggested such a book be written.. Former US Attorney General Ramsey Clark, who would have written a foreword, expected it to be sent to key historians to knock America off it’s false pedestal of having protected the world from Hitler, who America”s greatest corporations had empowered with massive investments in, and joint venturing with his poor and disarmed Nazi Germany bringing it up to world’s #1 military in only six years.
With so much trouble in the world, in so many realms, I can’t help but ask myself, what is my responsibility? Where to begin? Problems seem innumerable. Where is the onus?
Yet today, for some reason, I looked at that word, onus, and couldn’t stop seeing it as comprised of its parts; on us. The burden is… on us. Is that etymology on purpose? An answer to the elusive question hidden in plain sight?
Einstein Cited Equally Horrific Terrorist Massacre of Arabs + USA Origen of Killing in Palestine
Excerpt of a Letter to the New York Times, December 4, 1948, from Albert Einstein and other prominent Jews.
“Attack on Arab Village
For most of my life I have tried to keep an open mind about the perpetual conflict between Israelis and Palestinians. When there is a near-constant state of war both sides do things that oppress innocent people and make life difficult.
As a full-of-myself 20 year old I thought I had all the answers. It seemed black and white to me when I was in Israel in 1970. The Israelis had all the power and they were suppressing the Arab population. When I met my father’s cousins who had walked from Russia to Palestine in 1920 to escape the brutality of the Czar’s pogroms against Jews I told them I thought Israel was treating Arabs the same way that the Jews had been treated by the Nazis. They were outraged and didn’t speak to me for a few days. They decided to chalk up my remarks to youthful arrogance and innocence.
Over the past 54 years I have come to understand that this conflict is always in the grey area and I have tried to be sympathetic to both sides. But everything changed last week when Hamas attacked Israel.
I decided to start a list of things the Brattleboro Selectboard chose to overlook in making their EMS decision:
1. A petition of over 400 resident signatures
2. 70+ written pro-Rescue comments on the project web site
3. Public comments against municipal EMS at EMS meetings
What they said:
We’ll have an open and transparent public process. We want to have a great public process. We need to hear from the public. I’m not hearing enough from the public. We’ll give the public a chance to weigh in. This will be an open and transparent public process. Your comments are really important.
Then they said:
The website comments are self-selecting and biased. You’ve already spoken for three minutes! You need to wrap it up. So emotional. Those news articles don’t apply to us. No looking back. Look to the future, now! We know the majority of the public says they want Rescue but we’re voting against it. We have information the public doesn’t have.
Remember the quote attributed to Yogi Berra: “It ain’t over ‘til it’s over.” Now, consider the Starship’s lyrics, “It’s not over ’til it’s over; It’s not over ’til we get it right.”
Please review the following articles in September 27, 2023 edition of the Commons:
A squandered opportunity by William E. Kraham
Use of ARPA funds can only be seen as evidence of its bad faith by F. David Levenbach
Brattleboro town department heads ‘blindsided’ by Barbara Mellish
Below is a brief Forbes piece discrediting Robert Kennedy, Jr. The key sentence is the following:
“This week he posted to his Instagram account a photo of Gates with the wild words ‘The digitalized economy? We get rid of cash and coins. We give you a chip. We put all your money in your chip. If you refuse a vaccine, we turn off the chip and you starve!’”
I knew Kennedy is untrustworthy when I fact-checked his video, “The Real Anthony Fauci” and discovered that at the very beginning of the video: Kennedy, setting the stage for what the video will prove, makes a serious, factually untrue statement, which he has never subsequently corrected. If you are going to expose the mainstream media and medical establishment for propagating false narratives; then you yourself, Kennedy, better be impeccably truthful.
In the September 11 edition of the Reformer Selectboard member Daniel Quipp is quoted as saying “a pretty clear vocal majority,” referring to those who “would like the board to contract with Rescue again.” Majority of what is not clear, so I checked with Daniel. He told me he meant the majority of those who have expressed their opinion on this matter to the board. When I checked the Town’s “Fire-EMS Transition Project” web page (9/12): a quick run-through of the feedback submitted by email does show an overwhelming majority of Rescue supportive comments. I counted 75 out of 77.
Here are some thoughts from a member of the minority expressing an opinion. I hope they resonate with the majority of citizens that have been silent on this matter.
I think defining what is a personal attack, and how it differs from a strong but fair statement is often not understood.
Today, on the Brattleboro Facebook Discussion page, Steve West accused me of having make a personal attack because I had written that a deceptive statement about the Rescue EMS response time was allowed to stand unchallenged by town department heads and the town manager at Tuesday’s EMS forum.
While trying to gather names in support of keeping Rescue, Inc. ,at the Senior Center, I was informed that this was not allowed. This was not a partition for any political party, it was a partition involving the health and welfare of the people of Brattleboro.
Let us go back just a bit. Originally the Town Representatives voted for monies to go to Rescue, Inc. not to be put in the Town Budget as an axillary line item. So they hire a Town Manager, who we find out later that had ties with Golden Cross. When this happened why did this not alert our Selectboard to question these ties. Instead of admitting that they dropped the ball they continue to try to ram this down the throats of the Brattleboro residences, even with the multitude of responses that we want Rescue, Inc .
Ever since the relationship between Rescue and Brattleboro was ruptured in 2022, the Town has been faced with the challenge of arranging for EMS services. While the explanations for the 2022 break have been vague and unconvincing, the plan is for the Selectboard to decide how to proceed at its 19 September meeting. There are three options. Details on the three are worked out in Town Manager Potter’s 1 September “Transition Update” memo and a 7 September “Supplemental” memo (hereafter first and second memos); both of them, and much more information, is posted at the dedicated Fire-EMS Transition section of the Town website. . It is important to note that Mr. Potter’s analysis of the three options are focused on the first year–FY25 impacts—on the General Fund. Longer-term financial impacts for a Town EMS are not estimated.
Although I have made a comment or two on ibrattleboro.com decrying the autocratic manner of selectboard members (we make the decisions, we don’t have to explain), I have been reluctant to speak out about the EMS controversy as I have not made a truly serious effort to become informed. After watching the September 12 EMS forum, I still do not feel capable of analysing which choice is better; but on a gut-feeling basis, I do not trust the Dog-And-Pony-Show put on by Town leadership. A “consensus” of 11 Town employees concerned with their jobs reciting matching opinions, is hardly a genuine consensus.
Still, I wondered what if they are right and EMS run by the fire department actually would be better?
