Tuesday, March 22, 2011

America 'Trapped' by False Narratives

By Robert Parry
March 22, 2011

On a state visit to Chile on Monday, President Barack Obama deflected questions about U.S. support for the late Augusto Pinochet’s brutal dictatorship by warning against the risks of becoming “trapped by our history.” But a clear and present danger to the United States is that it is being trapped instead by false and misleading narratives.

Read on.

5 comments:

rosemerry said...

Obama also said there had been "difficult times" in the US/Chile relationship. Not reading history is a sure way to repeat the errors, and Obama is trying really hard to do that. I notice he is in Brazil arranging petrol deals, and in Chile with the rightwing leader, not in Venezuela, Bolivia or all the newly democratic leftist, independent countries.

Morton Kurzweil said...

When every president since Reagan 'looked forward', they faced backward , bent over, and looked between their legs.

Peter Loeb said...

CREATING "VIRTUE"

A child's birth is always depicted
as being surrounded with incred-
ible "virtue" (typically white).
Forgotten are the games of lust,
entrapment (by both M and F), economic costs. Forgotten
as well is the lust, the sweat
and screams of copulation...

We need to understand not only
the realities of history but
the realities of the present.

It is marvelous to go about the
world and preach about "atrocities"
and "protection of Lybians from
terror" (typically both resulting
from regimes the US has supported
for many decades).

"Liberty" and "democracy" are pretty much reserved for whites and others like "us". Others are always "evil"
forces of "chaos". Perhaps they
don't like to be bombed. They
may not be like the US free
marketeers. They may even have
other religious beliefs, invariably
denoted as nefarious in govern-
ment and media reports.

Why do the US and its NATO
followers want to destroy another
country to protect its dead
for their own good? How "virtuous"
we are in spreading this gospel!

And what about the Security Council
resolution of February 18?

All other 14 members condemned
the State of Israel. Only a single
nation vetoed and killed this
action. In this case,
the US did not feel that
Palestinians should be protected from terrorism, slaughter, ethnic
cleansing by the State of Israel.

So that reolution was killed by
the--- always innocent--- US veto.

And the US could make statement
after statement about its
innocence and virtue to the world.

And ethnic cleansing and occupation continues in Palestine.

The blockade of Palestine continues.

The building of settlements (for
Jews only)is encouraged and continues.

The subsidy of Israeli atrocities
and terrorism is facilitated by
the US Congress and the US
Legislature.

And now by the UN whose attempt at
justice was foiled by a US veto on February 18, 2011.

Are they forgetting the Holocaust?
Or are they just starting again.
Is the US saying that what is
past (the Holocaust) should be
forgotten?

Innocent births ARE to be celebrated. The sweat of their
creation, the grunts and groans
of human coupling are just...
well..the past. Right?

email: peterloeb@yahoo.com

Ethan Allen Speaks said...

President Obama's use of "False Narratives" to bolster his disingenuous appeal for regional partnership with what he termed "Latin America", a term that should, itself, give any informed listener pause, evoked a memory of Hugo Chavez's comment before the United Nations that there was a stench of sulphur in the air when then President Bush speaks.
This speech removes the last thread of belief, in this citizen's mind, that Obama is a honest proponent of Progressive or Liberal change and values; we can afford no further granting of any benefit of doubt. Rather unwittingly or not, he has become a tool of corporate "disaster capitalists" and empiricist practitioners of "manifest destiny". From his phony recollection of the events surrounding the Honduran coup to his deceptive account of the Colombian government's benevolence, he left no misinformation unmentioned; while in remarkable contrast there were multiple nuanced innuendos aimed at the burgeoning and successful social democracies of Bolivia, Venezuela, Argentina and others, referring to them
as "dictatorships" that betray the interests of the people that elected them.
If truly enlightened Progressives intend to retain credibility, let alone self respect, it is time to acknowledge that our HOPE for "Change" we can believe in has been hijacked by yet another silver-tongued closet Conservative.

Peter Loeb said...

HAVING CAKE AND EATING IT

Many thanks to Ethan Allen for his
remarks on President Obama and
his role ---not his clever
rhetoric.

Progressives still want so badly
to believe that the silver-tongued
conservative current chief
executive really wants all the
good things. Many will not and
cannot recognize our all-too-
recent failures.(I voted for
Obama twice in 08). Today I
recognize the validity of a
phrase by Robert Benchley, comic
writer of the 1940's:

"My Years in a Quandary and How
They Grew."

So many petitions to our dear
leader because he promised, he
promised...and we believed his
pandering to us.

We did not judge him "by the content of his character" but by his skin MLK Jr.)

"Dear President Obama: Remember
how you promised [this or that]..."

I must make a decision.

Will I vote for a President and
party who support the terror-
State of Israel in its occupation
of Palestine,Israel's slaughter, blockade, seige, settlements??

Will I vote for a President or party which continues to view
Hamas (not Israelis) as terrorists?

Will I vote for a President or
party which sides with the wealthy?
Again and again and again.

Will I continue to support a
President and party committed to
warmaking?

Will I continue to support a
President and party which on
February 18 vetoed a proposal
at the UN Security Council
condemning the State of Israel?
(All other members supported the
proposal;there were no abstentions.)

By so doing the US voted to
support Israeli's and support
their violence and to increase
violence in the conflict.

Do I really believe that if
this conservative-leaning President
and party are elected, these
things will be resolved?

I am told I am not being "real-
istic". Obama "must" do as he
is doing. And so forth. I no
longer accept that lame excuse.

As a supporter of the US civil
rights movement should I have
supported racist democrats only
because the others were "worse"?

I have grown up. My years in a
quandary are over. I can no
longer hide.

email:peterloeb@yahoo.com