Showing posts with label war. Show all posts
Showing posts with label war. Show all posts

Wednesday, October 3, 2007

Who Hates Whom

It's an interesting primer on current ethnic/sectarian conflicts, AND it contains a grammar lesson in its title! What's not to like?

And he's putting up bonus chapters for conflicts that couldn't make the book due to space considerations. Here's the first one, on Senegal. Funny/sad quote to end it:
Finally, Dakar residents also harbor a much more recent resentment -- toward George W. Bush, who made a televised speech from Gorée Island in 2003.

Other high-profile figures ranging from the Pope to President Clinton to Nelson Mandela have made similar stops with minimal incident. However, according to Reuters (in a widely-published article no longer on their own site), before Bush’s arrival, Senegal’s national capital was shut down, over 1000 residents were taken off the streets, and the roads in and out of the capital were closed. (More from a local witness here.) Then, on the morning of Bush’s speech, the residents of Gorée Island itself were rounded up and herded onto a soccer field, out of sight of the cameras, where they were forcibly held for six hours until the event was finished.

The US president then spoke of his deep belief in liberty and equality, with no hint of irony.

The Senegalese president was instructed not to speak.

Friday, April 27, 2007

Buying the War

Bill Moyers documentary on the press in the runup to the Iraq War. (90 min) How did they get it so wrong? How did the press come to be a simple relay for administration talking points, rather than a source for analysis and evaluation?

http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/btw/watch.html

AP picture "shows" soldier flipping bird

The latest in the wingnut/moonbat photoshop wars. Contrast with Soviet and other historical modifying of photography. Now people are more sophisticated, both in the techniques to edit photos or to detect the modification. But it's still just as effective if people only get the first photo and never see the debunking.

http://confederateyankee.mu.nu/archives/223905.php