U.S. Is A More Peaceful Place Than Angola And Bangladesh... Barely
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Today's the day we can send a message
to Washington that we want jobs, not war.
First off, today being the day of the California primary-- which features one race pitting a rabid warmonger, Jane Harman, against a pro-peace progressive, Marcy Winograd (CA-36)-- let's start this discussion with a one-minute video Brave New Films released yesterday:
OK, now let's think globally. This morning the Institute for Economics and Peace released the 2010 Global Peace Index, which, I'm assuming, will be available online later today. I'm working from a summary of an advance .pdf file they provided me with last night. "The results," it begins, "... suggest that the world has become slightly less peaceful in the past year. The GPI, which gauges ongoing domestic and international conflict, safety and security in society and militarization in 149 countries, registered overall increases in several indicators, including the likelihood of violent demonstrations and perceptions of criminality."
They trace some of this increase to the global economic turndown-- something we follow here at DWT and view as the successful class warfare conducted by the very wealthy parasites against society in general across the entire world. New Zealand, Iceland and Japan are ranked as the most at peace countries in the world, although if only Japan had a Second Amendment and a well-armed population I'm sure they would be as peaceful as the U.S. Oops... the U.S. ranked #85, just below totalitarian China and civil-war-plagued Bolivia, Macedonia and Nepal. But our bastion of "We're #1-ness" did come out ahead of Iran, Mexico, Yemen, Haiti, Syria, Algeria, Thailand, Turkey, Myanmar, Zimbabwe, Nigeria, North Korea, Israel, Pakistan, Sudan, Afghanistan, Somalia, Iraq... you know, the countries that have been in the news lately regarding difficulties.
Will our country ever be more at peace within itself and more of a force for peace in the rest of the world? Well... ever is a very long time, but the Change Obama seems to have been talking about when he ran for president didn't include either the intention or the will to change much of the Bush-Cheney policies encompassed in brutal class war at home and aggressive international superpower arrogance abroad. Here's some of the latter, which I especially hope our friends in CA-36 will think about when they go to vote today:
UPDATE: 2010 Global Peace Index Report Is Now Live
And available here... and beautifully laid out, with little flags and charts and graphs and bars.
Labels: Global Peace Index, Marcy Winograd
posted by DownWithTyranny @ 6:00 AM
4 comments
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4 Comments:
I agree with you, but good luck with that. I was watching closely during the 1960's (and ever since). Americans do not vote against war. Ever.
Some do, obviously. But never enough to make a difference, and it's usually not even close. Remember Nixon vs. McGovern? Americans love war.
If Winograd wanted to win, she should have played down the anti-war message and gone after Harman on other fronts. It's not like there's a shortage of opportunities.
I absolutely can't stand Harman. She represents everything that's wrong with the US today. But if I were a betting man, that's where I'd put my money.
I wish it weren't so.
Progressives took it in the ass again yesterday. Harman wins, Lincoln wins, all the scummiest win. It happens every damned time.
I told you so, but believe me it gives me no pleasure. I would much rather have been wrong.
The stupidity of the American voter has astonished me time and again for decades. GB Shaw was right when he said that democracy ensures that we will get the government we deserve.
I know that *I* don't deserve it, but I'm getting it anyway, time after time. Nixon, Reagan, Bush, and Bush. That's the kind of trash that keeps getting foisted on me.
This sucks.
Perhaps H.L Mencken had it better:
"Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want and deserve to get it good and hard."
59% to 41% - the ratio of pro-war voters to anti-war voters has always been just about like that, ever since I started paying attention in the mid-1960's.
There are a lot of reasons for it (mostly bad ones), but the plain fact is, you can't get elected in America by campaigning against war.
Winograd should have known better. I mean no offense to her, but this one issue shows that she doesn't know what she needs to know to have this job. If shows naivete.
Blue America better wake up! If you don't want to waste more good money on bad campaigns in the future, take a lesson!!!
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