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Archive | November 1st, 2018
US VP Pence's Accusations of Venezuelan Financing of Migrant Caravan Disproved
Posted on 01 November 2018. Tags: Venezuela: Migrant Caravan
On-the-ground journalists have classed the accusations as "completely ridiculous" and a lie, showing that the migrants "don't have a dollar to even pay for a bottle of water."
The migrants have marched through Guatemala and are now in Mexico. (Reuters/EP)
Merida, October 24, 2018 (venezuelanalysis.com) – Journalists have joined Venezuela officials in ridiculing allegations made on Tuesday by US Vice President Mike Pence that Venezuela is financing the migrant caravan traversing Central America en route to the Mexican-US border.
Pence, in an interview with the Washington Post, claimed that US-allied Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernandez had told him that the 7000-strong migrant march is "organized by leftist groups in Honduras, financed by Venezuela, and sent north to challenge our sovereignty and challenge our border."
✔@postlive
.@costareports asks @VP Mike Pence about @realDonaldTrump's claim that unknown Middle Easterners had infiltrated the migrant caravan heading to the U.S. border. "It's inconceivable that there are not people of Middle Eastern descent," Pence said.
2:42 PM – Oct 23, 2018
His accusations were backed up by outgoing US Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley, who claimed that "Honduran politicians allied with Venezuelan & Cuban socialist dictators are encouraging the caravan to undermine US-friendly gov't of Hernandez."
Neither Pence nor Haley provided any evidence for their claims. Pence also echoed US President Trump's remarks that there are Middle Eastern "terrorists" within the mass of migrants.
Trump has vowed to "do whatever we have to," including using the US military, to stop the migrants from "violating" US territory. He has also recently cut billions of dollars of funding to Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador to punish them for failing to detain the march.
Speaking on the ground from the march, which currently finds itself en route to Mapastepec, Mexico, after a day's rest in Huixtla close to the Mexican-Guatemalan border, Mexican journalist Jorge Ramos resolutely disproved Pence's accusations. Ramos pointed out that the awful material conditions of the migrants prove that no external financing, let alone government backing, exists.
"It is ridiculous, completely ridiculous. I have spent the last 48 hours with these immigrants and they don't have a single dollar. If they are being financed, I don't see it, because they have nothing. There is no financing, and it's not from Nicolas Maduro. The explanation is very simple; they are here due to violence and extreme poverty," he reported.
"[Pence] is lying. There is no proof. (…) Here people don't have a dollar to even pay for a bottle of water. This is a lie which the White House is saying maybe for political motives, but the reality here is not that [of external government backed financing]," he went on to claim.
Ramos also stated that he saw no-one from the Middle East, challenging Trump to "speak the truth and not create fear."
Testimony from the immigrants confirmed that motives behind the 3500km-long procession include the search for a better quality of life and employment, as well as fleeing violence, crime, and extreme poverty. No interviewed migrants mentioned political motives or any connection to Venezuela.
Likewise, the man accused by the Honduran government of organising the march, Bartolo Fuentes, a leftist journalist and migrant rights activist from the Central American country, has since clarified that the procession was self-organised through social media.
He also stated that the impoverished Hondurans wanted to leave en masse to protect themselves from organised crime and that there were no political motives behind the procession. Fuentes additionally accused the Honduran and US governments of inventing "fictitious excuses" to shift the blame from the poverty which their policies have created in the region.
Venezuelan authorities have also responded to the accusations, with National Constituent Assembly (ANC) President Diosdado Cabello stating, "Imperialist cynicism has no limits and their lackeys repeat [their accusations] like parrots. They are blaming us for everything."
Diosdado Cabello R@dcabellor
Como una profecía autocumplida, resulta ahora q nuestro país es quien financia la "caravana" centroamericana que va rumbo a EE.UU., el cinismo imperial no tiene límites y sus lacayos repiten como loros. Nos culpan de todo porque no nos rendimos. Nosotros Venceremos!!
11:52 PM – Oct 23, 2018
He also went on to criticise the visit of Hollywood superstar Angelina Jolie to Peru, allegedly to inspect the conditions of the Venezuelan immigrants there, claiming that the move was concocted to distract attention away from the Honduran Caravan. Jolie's visit was sponsored by the United Nations and NATO.
"Lights, camera, action: Angelina Jolie appears to give all of her 'love' to the caravan of Venezuelans in Peru, sorry, the Venezuelan diaspora. Such opportune news for the right wing press which don't talk about the Central American migrants and the 'love' which they will receive when they get to the US," Cabello added.
Whilst President Maduro is yet to respond to Pence's accusations, he has previously called on the US government to open their border and "respect" the migrants.
Speaking Saturday, he also expressed his "pain" at what is happening, assigning blame to "capitalism" for creating the conditions which force citizens to migrate in such large numbers.
ANC Vice President, Tania Diaz, also showed solidarity with the migrants Wednesday, pointing out the hypocrisy between the media coverage of the migrant caravan and the Venezuelan migratory situation. Caracas has repeatedly claimed that a narrative of migratory humanitarian crisis is being used to justify a foreign intervention in the country.
"In Central America they don't say 'humanitarian crisis, massive exodus, catastrophe, diaspora'. There, it is a 'caravan', as if it were a party, and they are thousands which are fleeing poverty, violence, a lack of opportunities, hope, and the US government is closing the door to them."
Path from San Pedro Sula, in Honduras, to the US-Mexican border. (Archive)
The migrant procession began in San Pedro Sula, Honduras October 13 with around 1000 people. It has since swelled to over 7,125 according to UN data. They are currently 2,734 kilometres short of El Paso, their final destination (on the US-Mexico border), which is approximately 555 walking hours away. It is unclear when the caravan is expected to arrive, and whether Mexican and US authorities will allow them to achieve their objective. Mexico is due to see a change in president this December 1, with the leftist Lopez Obrador taking over from US-backed Pena Nieto.
Since leaving Honduras, the migrants have crossed Guatemala, attracting interest from those in similar conditions who have joined the march. After a brief standoff with Mexican police on the Mexico-Guatemala border, they managed to cross into Mexico. A second, 1000-strong Caravan set off from Guatemala Tuesday, looking to join the first en route in Mexico.
Honduras has been one of the staunchest US allies in Latin America since 2009, when a US-instigated coup ousted then-president Manuel Zelaya. The country since has also been marred by violence and instability, as well as seeing a dive into poverty, with social leaders being targeted in political assassinations.
caravana_0.jpg
Marchers carry crosses, flags, and banners. (Archive)
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Ditching the Dollar: Venezuela Moves to Euros in International Trade
Posted on 01 November 2018. Tags: Venezuela: International Trade
Venezuela's vice president for the economy announced on Wednesday that the country will stop using the dollar for international transactions in favor of the Euro.
By Loud & Clear – Radio Sputnik
The news follows Venezuela's turn toward cryptocurrency with the creation of the Petro in an effort to reduce its exposure to transactions conducted with dollars.
"Since the government launched its first cryptocurrency, the Petro, there's been an increased amount of interest in Venezuelan society as to cryptocurrencies' use and the way that they can be used by general, average citizens to generate income. So your average young Venezuelan is now really interested in bitcoins and a whole range of other cryptocurrencies, partly because they allow them to trade on the international scene," Paul Dobson, a journalist for Venezuela Analysis who is based in Merida, Venezuela, told Radio Sputnik's Loud & Clear.
When it comes to the euro, Dobson cautioned that the government's statements "have to be considered a little bit more in terms of a show of intent rather than a concrete change."
"It definitely shows that the government is looking to move away from dollar dependency, and in some ways it aligns them closer with efforts made by other countries in the last couple of months," he told Loud & Clear hosts John Kiriakou and Brian Becker.
Last week, Sputnik News reported that China sold off $3 billion in US dollar bonds. In recent months, Russia, China, Japan, Turkey, Iran and Iraq have all ditched the dollar in bilateral trade with each other. Meanwhile, the European Union scrapped its use of the dollar when trading with Iran in order to circumvent US sanctions.
While Venezuela's move won't have a "massive impact on the economy," Dobson said, it is part of a larger trend of countries dropping the dollar in response to US President Donald Trump's hawkish economic policies.
For the Venezuelan economy to drastically change, there needs to be a "shift in how these oil contracts are drawn up and agreed upon," Dobson said. "The international oil trade provides the vast majority of Venezuela's foreign currency."
"There are indicators that show that Venezuela is successfully moving away from an oil-dependent economy," he added, citing a report from New York brokerage firm Torino Capital in September that said Venezuela's non-oil exports are at an all-time high.
"The US hegemony of [the dollar] will only be seriously challenged when these sorts of international alliances reach a turning point, when they reach a certain accumulation of strength."
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What is the Impact of US Sanctions on Venezuela?
Posted on 01 November 2018. Tags: US Sanctions on Venezuela
What do people on the streets of London and Caracas think about US sanctions and Venezuela's economic problems? A Simple Question takes a look.
By A Simple Question – Press TV
Venezuelan President Maduro says US-backed enemies of his country have launched an economic war on him. He also claims opposition leaders worked together in an effort to assassinate him and that they tried to overthrow him through violent street demonstrations.
Despite pointing the finger of blame at US President Donald Trump, he still claimed he hoped to meet with Trump face to face. But in 2017 the White House responded to a similar request by saying such a meeting would only take place if the country returned to democracy. Diplomatic relations between Venezuela and the United States have been tense since the now dead socialist President Hugo Chavez came to power in 1999.
Both Chavez and Maduro, his successor, have accused Washington of assassination attempts against them. Meanwhile, Trump has imposed financial sanctions on Venezuela and its state oil company. He has even imposed sanctions on President Maduro's wife and several of his top allies to further increase pressure on the government.
Venezuela also accuses the United States of encouraging its emigration crisis to embarrass Caracas, which has the world's largest proven oil reserves but is in full economic collapse. Pro-government supporters of President Maduro have taken to the streets to protect against American interference after reports that US officials met secretly with Venezuelan military officers to discuss plans to oust Maduro.
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A Humanitarian Crisis in Venezuela? A Case Study into NGO Mercy Corps
Posted on 01 November 2018. Tags: Venezuela: A Humanitarian Crisis
Does an NGO whose CEO is a member of Washington's top foreign policy think tank really have Venezuelans' best interests at heart, Nina Cross asks.
Mercy Corps staff with Venezuelans on the Colombian border. (@MercyCorpsCo / Twitter)
By Nina Cross
Following a sharp increase in Venezuelan migration since 2015, the corporate mainstream media, alongside the governments of the US, EU and Colombia, is aggressively pushing the narrative of a "humanitarian crisis," at the same time that Western NGOs flock to set up shop along the Colombian border.
But what if NGOs are being used to influence how the movement of people from Venezuela into Colombia is being shaped and reported, and what's more, if they are directly benefiting from this situation? To explore the idea, we focus on one such NGO, US-based Mercy Corps, which recently announced an expansion of its operations on the Colombo-Venezuelan border.
Mercy Corps's budget for global operations, of the order of US $500 million (according to its 2017 annual report), includes funding from US and EU government agencies. Its financiers have included the UK's International Department of Development, which has regularly sent aid via Mercy Corps to rebel-held areas in Syria. Other funders include the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Clinton Foundation.
In March 2018, Mercy Corps carried out a "rapid needs assessment" (RNA) of Venezuelan migrants arriving at two main points along the Colombian border. The information gathered was used to "demonstrate" the dangers involved during and after crossings from Venezuela, and the reasons for leaving the country. It is in response to this second question that the people interviewed by Mercy Corps all say the same thing: they are migrating due to an economic crisis in Venezuela, which is linked to hyperinflation.
Independent UN experts, as well as other commentators, have shown on many occasions that the causes of this economic crisis have been significantly exacerbated by the economic sanctions imposed for years upon Venezuela by the US, as well as clarifying that the crisis in Venezuela is economic, not humanitarian. Even US State Secretary Mike Pompeo recently admitted that the sanctions "sometimes have an adverse impact on the people of Venezuela."
However, Mercy Corps is not concerned with narratives that expose US and EU complicity, and as such, its recommendations fail to include the most obvious point: end the sanctions and stop the hostility towards Venezuela as they are inflicting hardship on its population.
Instead, Mercy Corps' RNA identified 3 basic needs to be met by the Colombian government: a path to legal entry into Colombia that did not involve passports, the legal right to work in Colombia with the same wages and protections as Colombians and access to shelter, food and water. It is on this third point which Mercy Corps looks to fish for substantial (tax-free) donations and financing from the Global North.
In April, the Colombian government agreed that migrants could register, without passports, at any of the 500-plus checkpoints it would set up along the border over a two month period, to end in June. The reason given was to see how many Venezuelans were entering Colombia. The checkpoints were spread along the 1,500 mile border. Any information supplied by migrants at the checkpoints would be retained by NGOs, not passed to government departments.
By August, the Colombian government agreed that nearly half a million Venezuelans could remain in Colombia for up to two years, look for employment and have access to basic services. The reason given for this change was to accommodate humanitarian needs.
This shift in policy was a reversal of the government's ruling in February, when up to 3,000 Colombian soldiers were stationed along the border to check for passports. This tightening of rules was referred to as a "diplomatic closure" and the government claimed in a short time the number of migrants fell by 30%.
Yet within a few weeks Bogota U-turned its policy to allow the unhindered movement of Venezuelans, and NGOs such as Mercy Corps were conscripted to enable the process. The new policy of the Colombian government met exactly the needs identified by Mercy Corps, suggesting that the campaign for this migration was an international, organised effort.
In October of this year, Mercy Corps announced they are expanding their services on the border, including providing migrants with a debit card to purchase products. Yet, one out of every three Venezuelans attended by Mercy Corps did not see any improvements to their diet in the two weeks since arriving to Colombia, and 12 percent reported that it had worsened.
Since the Colombian government changed its policy, the number of people leaving Venezuela has increased, according to the Migration Policy Institute, an organisation affiliated to the EU.
As the exodus expands, the humanitarian needs of migrants grow more urgent.
Humanitarian crisis? Mercy Corps as a propaganda tool
The situation of Venezuelan migrants is now being called a "regional humanitarian crisis," creating a picture of unimaginable catastrophe that needs external intervention.
This escalating crisis narrative of an expanding exodus is placing Venezuela under intense scrutiny. While punishing Venezuela with sanctions from the front, and promoting a migration crisis from behind, the EU and US, with the cooperation of Colombia, are attempting to box Venezuela into a more isolated and vulnerable position.
Colombia has enjoyed close ties with the EU, and soon after changing its policy on Venezuelan passports, it became a NATO partner, further cementing its EU and US dealings. This ballistic development means that the consequences of border conflict, fuelled by a recent movement of 5,000 extra troops to the Catatumbo border region, should be taken very seriously.
Meanwhile, Mercy Corps has consistently driven a narrative of a full-blown humanitarian crisis and rampant violence under President Maduro, including unfounded allegations of repression and torture. For instance, the NGO has made the unsubstantiated, hyperbolic claim on their website that "newborns in Syria have a better chance of survival than those born in Venezuela today," wich clearly looks to stoke the fire.
Harnessing its "independent charity voice," Mercy Corps is playing its part as a propaganda tool in vilifying the Venezuelan government, enabling its US and EU funders to continue their sanctions, which only worsen the economic hardship of average Venezuelans, the root cause for leaving their country, as explained in Mercy Corps' own needs assessment. And whilst all this goes on, Mercy Corps gleefully rakes in ever greater funding so as to "attend" to the "humanitarian crisis" they, together with the mainstream media, have played a key role in manufacturing.
Political interference and profit from Mercy Corps
However, beyond playing a role in the international media war, Mercy Corps is intimately linked to the Washington policy-making establishment that has formulated the US policy of illegal, unilateral sanctions.
Mercy Corps is connected to the influential US Council on Foreign Relations(CFR) through its CEO Neal Keny-Guyer, who declared earnings of $460,000just for his Mercy Corps role in 2017. Apart from being a member of the CFR, he also serves as chairman for Interaction, the US' largest alliance of NGOs and sitting on the World Economic Forum's Global Agenda Council on Fragility, Violence and Conflict. The CFR, a virtual who's who of America's wealthiest and most powerful people, claims it "helps policymakers" on "international peace and stability," whilst actually pushing Washington's neoliberal agenda and interests around the world.
The president of the CFR is Richard Haass, Middle East advisor under George Bush, and advisor to Colin Powell under George W. Bush. On his 2016 election win, Donald Trump publicly considered Haass as an advisor.
The CFR president recently displayed his frustration that US-backed military coups and UN- sanctioned military intervention in Venezuela, all of which would create a further migratory exodus, were taken off the table, despite ongoing rumours from the White House, Bogota, and even Brasilia, that they may be be possible.
✔@RichardHaass
For those here and the region who will be quick to criticize the administration for this, i ask what is your policy other than watching Venezuela become a failed state that is starving and crushing its people and creating hundreds of thousands of refugees? https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/08/world/americas/donald-trump-venezuela-military-coup.html?smprod=nytcore-ipad&smid=nytcore-ipad-share …
1:34 PM – Sep 8, 2018
Trump Administration Discussed Coup Plans With Rebel Venezuelan Officers
Venezuelan military officers seeking to overthrow President Nicolás Maduro sought help from the Trump administration, which met with them several times.
Venezuela's future is bleak. Sanctions and refugee support will not alter things. R2P is essentially dead. Local govts need the capacity to deal w internal and regional security challenges. Existing regional bodies are inadequate. my latest from @ProSyn https://bit.ly/2OT8wPN
What the Crisis in Venezuela Reveals | by Richard N. Haass
With inflation skyrocketing, infrastructure crumbling, crime running rampant, and hunger spreading, Venezuela's situation is bleak, and shows no signs of improving. The question for the rest of the…
project-syndicate.org
In February the CFR made a Preventive Action Plan which recommended more economic sanctions for Venezuela, and in May more US sanctions were imposed.
Whilst sanctions have helped create the conditions which drive people out of Venezuela, US government aid has flowed to NGOs in Colombia, to which Mercy Corps has taken its chunk.
Mercy Corps' 2017 financial statement shows that the organization benefited from US $464,452,000 in governmental grants and private backing alone, only spending $139,876,000 in humanitarian relief and $46,699,000 in humanitarian recovery. Of this humanitarian relief, the vast majority was spent on the mysteriously entitled "subgrant" category, and only $21,753,000 on actual materials and supplies for migrants.
Aid and NGOs: Assets of US policymakers
The CFR also included an aid plan for Venezuela which called for State Department funding for the Bureau of Population, Refugee and Migration (PRM), an organisation which finances Mercy Corps.
In August, the US announced an aid plan at the United Nations Assembly General (UNGA), matching the plan set out by the CFR.
Additionally, in an April article the CFR also suggests "…bypassing the government, if enough aid is provided by the United States, the Lima Group, and the EU to enable people to bring some back into Venezuela."
The CFR continues: "While not the ideal means to provide humanitarian aid inside Venezuela, smuggling is a well-established activity and effectively closing the border to the influx of such aid would significantly add to the discredit of the Maduro government."
Indeed, the CFR is explicitly advocating illegal smuggling as a means of destabilizing the elected government in Caracas. Meanwhile, smuggling is a problem for Venezuela, but not in the terms described by the CFR. On the contrary, Venezuela has suffered from extensive smuggling of subsidized goods and fuel into Colombia, exasperating shortages and as such generating more inflation.
Mercy Corps: A toy in the US imperialist toolbox
This game played by think-tanks and policymakers reveals Washington's glaring double-standards vis-a-vis Venezuela. While they help to create and exploit the need for basic foods and medicines in another hemisphere, roughly 45,000 of their own people die each year through lack of health care. Around 30 million Americans have no medical cover at all, roughly the population of Venezuela, which has health care written into its constitution.
Every year a further 2 million Americans travel out of the US for treatment they cannot afford at home. Some will die if they do not find treatment abroad, but instead of being a crisis, this is termed 'medical tourism.'
At the same time, the US is deporting tens of thousands of Hondurans, while more attempt to cross the border into the US every day, a legacy of Hillary Clinton's 2009 adventurism.
Yet, we are constantly told to believe that Washington cares about migrants and the well-being of Venezuelans.
While US policymakers play games around Venezuela, with toys from the imperialist toolbox, along with their EU friends, it is no wonder Maduro fears assassination.
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Venezuelan Opposition Celebrates Far-Right Bolsonaro Victory in Brazil, Calls for Intervention
Posted on 01 November 2018. Tags: Venezuelan Opposition
The result sparked deep concern among Chavista sectors fearing a possible military escalation from the ex-military man, whom they describe as a "neo-fascist."
President-elect Jair Bolsonaro (center to left) poses with military police in the Rio de Janeiro neighborhood of Cidade de Deus. Bolsonaro has pledged to give police free reign in Brazil's poorest areas in the name of fighting crime. (Facebook)
Merida, October 29, 2018 (venezuelanalysis.com) – Venezuela's opposition has welcomed the victory of ultra-right candidate Jair Bolsonaroin Brazil's presidential elections Sunday, calling on the new president-elect to intervene in Venezuela in line with their political goals.
Bolsonaro won the second round with 55 percent despite nearly 10 percent of ballots being marked null or void. Abstention was 22 percent, one point higher than the first round.
Following the controversial jailing and political barring of leftist frontrunner Lula da Silva on unfounded corruption charges, previously obscure nine-term congressman Bolsonaro soared to popularity in recent months, campaigning on an outsider platform of social conservatism, anti-corruption, and hardline anti-crime policies. Widely considered a "neo-fascist," the far-right former army captain has repeatedly expressed nostalgia for Brazil's military dictatorship, pledging to "cleanse" the country of leftists among numerous other inflammatory racist, sexist, and homophobic statements. His campaign team has also hinted at military action against Venezuela, raising concerns that Brazil could be used as a launchpad for a US-led strike on Caracas.
After the announcement of Sunday's results the ex-president of Venezuela's National Assembly and leader of the hard-right First Justice party, Julio Borges, took to Twitter to congratulate Bolsonaro, as well as to "invite him to work for the rescuing of democracy in Venezuela." Borges is currently a fugitive of the Venezuelan justice system in Colombia on charges of conspiracy and alleged masterminding of the August drone terrorist attack against President Maduro.
To the right of First Justice, the Popular Will party also welcomed Bolsonaro's victory, tweeting that they hope to "count on your struggle to rescue liberty and democracy in Venezuela."
"We hope that your government will contribute to promoting peace and liberty in all of the countries in the region and in rescuing democracy in Venezuela," declared Popular Will leading member Lilian Tintori.
✔@liliantintori
Felicitaciones al presidente electo de Brasil @jairbolsonaro. Le deseamos mucho éxito en su gestión. Esperamos que su gobierno contribuya a promover la paz y la libertad en todos los países de la región, y el rescate de la democracia en Venezuela.
1:10 AM – Oct 29, 2018
For his part, ex-Caracas Mayor Antonio Ledezma, another fugitive currently based in Spain, likewise praised Bolsonaro as "an ally to confront the government."
The opposition leaders' comments mirrored those of Organisation of American States Secretary General Luis Almagro, himself a vociferous opponent of Venezuela, who tweeted his support for Bolsonaro's "message of truth and peace."
"We congratulate President-elect Jair Bolsonaro and aplaude his message of truth and peace. Count on the commitment of the Secretary General of the OAS to work together for democracy, human rights, security and development in the region," he declared.
US President Donald Trump was also quick to place a congratulatory phone call to Bolsonaro, pledging joint military cooperation with Brasilia.
Following his electoral victory, Bolsonaro also reaffirmed his commitment to Washington and against Venezuela and Cuba, proclaiming, "We will stop praising murderous dictatorships, and we will stop scorning or even attacking important democracies like the USA, Israel and Italy."
Had a very good conversation with the newly elected President of Brazil, Jair Bolsonaro, who won his race by a substantial margin. We agreed that Brazil and the United States will work closely together on Trade, Military and everything else! Excellent call, wished him congrats!
For its part, the Venezuelan government issued a formal statementcongratulating Bolsonaro and calling on him to "retake diplomatic relations based on respect, harmony, progress, and regional integration for the wellbeing of our peoples." The Venezuelan-Brazilian border has turned increasingly hostile over recent months following increasing migratory traffic, xenophobic violence by Brazilian communities, and Brasilia'smilitarisation of the area.
Meanwhile, Venezuela leftist organizations expressed alarm at the election result, with many leaders and social movements wasting no time in evaluating its potential implications for the country.
One of Venezuela's leading campesino groups, the Bolivar-Zamora Revolutionary Current (CRBZ), issued a statement decrying the result as "a true right hook to progressive and transforming processes in our continent."
"[The outcome] obliges the Left to evaluate very seriously the causes and reasons… the ultra right was able to capitalise on the deep rejection of corruption [in Brazil] which has been embodied by a perverted political class… [with the previously ruling] Workers' Party converting itself into a symbol of this perversion,"the CRBZ continued.
International relations secretary of the Venezuelan Communist Party, Carolus Wimmer, similarly proposed that non-structural populist policies of the Workers' Party must be factored into explaining the result. "We must retake class-based struggle… the ascension of fascism in an emerging economy (…) marks the start of a deepening of the class struggle in our continent," he argued.
He also underlined the role of the United States in Bolsonaro's victory, recalling that Steve Bannon, ex-White House strategist, played "an important role in the campaigning and positioning of Bolsonaro as the leader of the discontent."
Venezuelan revolutionary intellectual Luis Britto Garcia expressed concernthat the election result will spell a heightened military threat against Venezuela, stressing "We can't carry on without border controls… This new context forces us to assume an extreme rethink of security and national defence… we must be conscious of the strategic doctrines which look to divide Venezuela."
Chavista economist and ex-Finance Minister Luis Salas, however, took a less pesimistic position, suggesting that "the Left in general and in Latin America in general tends to have a catastrophic and depressive reading of history (…) Bolsonaro's triumph is a step backwards, without a doubt, and there is great danger, but it is not the end of the world nor of history."
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Posted on 01 November 2018. Tags: Venezuela: US Sanctions
By A Simple Question
Venezuela Launches Media Response Plan to Fake News Attacks
Posted on 01 November 2018. Tags: Venezuela: Fake News Attacks
The 'Zero Tolerance Media Plan' is to be run by the Foreign Office and will look to offer responses to misleading and false international coverage of Venezuela.
Vice Minister for International Communication William Castillo announced the plan. (Archive)
Merida, October 31, 2018 (venezuelanalysis.com) – The Venezuelan government has announced the creation of a media based task force to address fake or misleading international news stories about the Caribbean nation.
The 'Zero Tolerance Media Plan' was announced by Vice Minister for International Communication William Castillo Monday, and will run through the Foreign Office and its network of embassies and consulates.
Castillo explained that the plan looks to offer responses to instances of fake news coverage "one by one."
"There have been attacks against the Venezuelan demonym, not just against the country, its political authorities, its government, or Chavismo any more, but now against the people, the average folk, our national identity," he explained.
Castillo used one example of a recent anonymous note in a Portuguese TV channel which claimed that Venezuelan mothers were giving away their children so as to be able to eat. "This is fake," he clarified.
Caracas has frequently denounced a media-based campaign to undermine its sovereignty, democratic credentials, and social advances in recent years. Venezuelan authorities claim that US-led media outlets, as well as important European outlets such as El Pais in Spain, look to damage the reputation of the nation and create spin which justifies coercive measures against the country, such as sanctions and an international intervention.
A recent example involves the so-called "humanitarian crisis" in Venezuela following increased migration levels.
"In Central America they don't say 'humanitarian crisis, massive exodus, catastrophe, diaspora'. There, it is a 'caravan', as if it were a party, and they are thousands which are fleeing poverty, violence, a lack of opportunities, hope, and the US government is closing the door to them," stated Vice President of the National Constituent Assembly Tania Diaz, drawing comparison with the 7000-strong migrant march which is en route to the Mexican-US border.
Further examples include the media coverage of the August 4 terrorist drone attack against President Nicolas Maduro, in which corporate media outlets used words such as "apparent" and "alleged" to sew doubt about the reality of the attack which targeted the President and injured seven soldiers.
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The Troika of Tyranny: The Imperialist Project in Latin America & Its Epigones
Posted on 01 November 2018. Tags: Venezuela: The Troika of Tyranny
Roger Harris looks at the context of the recent round of sanctions announces against Venezuela, Cuba, and Nicaragua.
John Bolton announced the new sanctions against Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua. (Alex Wong / GettyImages)
By Roger Harris – Popular Resistance
Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela are today threatened by US imperialism. The first salvo of the modern Age of Imperialism started back in 1898 when the US seized Cuba along with Puerto Rico and the Philippines in the Spanish-American War.
The Age of Imperialism, as Lenin observed, is characterized by the competition of the various imperial powers for dominance. That inter-imperialist rivalry led to World War I. Lenin called those putative socialists who supported their own national imperialist projects "social imperialists." Social imperialism is a tendency that is socialist in name and imperialist in deed. Imperialism and its social imperialist minions are still with us today.
US Emerges as the World's Hegemon
The United States emerged after World War II as the leading imperialist power. With the implosion of the Socialist Bloc around 1991, US hegemony became even more consolidated. Today the US is the undisputed world's hegemon.
Hegemony means to rule but even more so to dominate. As the world's hegemon, the US will not tolerate neutral parties, let alone hostile ones. As articulated in the Bush Doctrine, the US will try to asphyxiate any nascent counter-hegemonic project, no matter how insignificant.
In the Caribbean, for instance, the US snuffed out the leftist government of Grenada in 1983 in what was code named Operation Urgent Fury. Grenada has a population smaller than Vacaville, California.
The only powers that the world's hegemon will tolerate are junior partners such as Colombia in Latin America. The junior partner must accept a neoliberal economic regime designed to serve the interests of capital. Structural adjustment of the economy is demanded such that the neoliberal "reforms" become irreversible; so that you can't put the toothpaste back in the tube.
Colombia recently joined NATO, putting that junior partner's military under direct interaction with the Pentagon bypassing its civilian government. The US has seven military bases in Colombia in order to project – in the words of the US government – "full spectrum" military dominance in the Latin American theatre.
Needless-to-say, no Colombian military bases are in the US. Nor does any other country have military bases on US soil. The world's hegemon has some 1000 foreign military bases. Even the most sycophantic of the US's junior partners, Great Britain, is militarily occupied by 10,000 US troops.
The US is clear on its enemies list. On November 1, US National Security Advisor John Bolton, speaking in Miami, labelled Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Cuba the "troika of tyranny." He described a "triangle of terror stretching from Havana to Caracas to Managua."
Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Cuba are targeted by US imperialism because they pose what might be called the "threat of a good example;" that is, an alternative to the neoliberal world order. These countries are suffering attacks from the imperialists because of the things they have done right, not for their flaws. They are attempting to make a more inclusive society for women people of color, and the poor; to have a state that, instead of serving the rich and powerful, has a special option for working people, because these are the people most in need of social assistance.
Sanctions: The Economic War against Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Cuba
The US imperialist rhetoric is backed with action. In 2015, US President Obama declared Venezuela an "extraordinary threat to US security" and imposed sanctions. These sanctions have been extended and deepened by the Trump administration. The US has likewise subjected Cuba to sanctions in a seamless bipartisan policy of both Republicans and Democrats for over half a century. Now the US is the process of imposing sanctions on Nicaragua.
Unilateral sanctions, such as those imposed by the US, are illegal under the charters of both the UN and the Organization of American States, because they are a form of collective punishment targeting the people.
The US sanctions are designed to make life so miserable for the masses of people that they will reject their democratically elected government. Yet in Venezuela, those most adversely affected by the sanctions are the most militantly in support of their President Nicolás Maduro. Consequently, the Trump administration is also floating the option of military intervention against Venezuela. The recently elected rightwing leaders Bolsonaro in Brazil and Duque in Colombia, representing the two powerful states on the western and southern borders of Venezuela, are colluding with the hegemon of the north.
The inside-the-beltway human rights organizations, such as Human Rights Watch, fail to condemn these illegal and immoral sanctions. They lament the human suffering caused by the sanctions, all the while supporting the imposition of the sanctions. Nor do they raise their voices against military intervention, perhaps the gravest of all crimes against humanity.
Liberal establishments such as the advocacy group Washington Office on Latin America (WOLA) try to distinguish themselves from hard-line imperialists by opposing a military invasion in Venezuela while calling for yet more effective and punishing sanctions. In effect, they play the role of the good cop, providing a liberal cover for interference in the internal affairs of Latin American nations.
These billionaire-funded NGOs have a revolving-door staffing arrangement with the US government. So it is not surprising that they will reflect Washington's foreign policies initiatives. But why do some organizations claiming to be leftist so unerringly echo the imperialists, taking such umbrage over Venezuela, Cuba, and Nicaragua while ignoring far greater problems in, say, Mexico, Colombia, and Honduras, which are US client states?
Most Progressive Country in Central America Targeted
Let's take Nicaragua. A year ago, the polling organization Latinobarómetro, found the approval rating of Nicaraguans for their democracy to be the highest in Central America and second highest in Latin America.
Daniel Ortega had won the Nicaraguan presidency in 2006 with a 38% plurality, in 2011 with 63%, and 72.5% in 2016. The Organization of American States officially observed and certified the vote. Polls indicated Ortega was perhaps the most popular head of state in the entire western hemisphere. As longtime Nicaraguan solidarity activist Chuck Kaufman noted, "Dictators don't win fair elections by growing margins."
Nicaragua is a member of the anti-imperialist Bolivarian Alliance for the Peoples of Our America with Cuba, Venezuela, Bolivia, and some Caribbean states. Speaking at the UN, the Nicaraguan foreign minister had the temerity to catalogue the many transgressions of what Martin Luther King called "the greatest purveyor of violence in the world" and express Nicaragua's opposition.
These are reasons enough for a progressive alternative such as Nicaragua to curry the enmity of the US. The enigma is why those claiming to be leftists would target a country that had:
– Second highest economic growth rates and the most stable economy in Central America.
– Only country in the region producing 90% of the food it consumes.
– Poverty and extreme poverty halved; country with the greatest reduction of extreme poverty.
– Reached the UN Millennium Development Goal of cutting malnutrition by half.
– Nicaraguans enjoyed free basic healthcare and education.
– Illiteracy had been virtually eliminated, down from 36% in 2006 when Ortega took office.
– Average economic growth of 5.2% for the past 5 years (IMF and the World Bank).
– Safest country in Central America (UN Development Program) with one of the lowest crime rates in Latin America.
– Highest level of gender equality in the Americas (World Economic Forum Global Gender Gap Report 2017).
– Did not contribute to the migrant exodus to the US, unlike neighboring Honduras, El Salvador, and Guatemala.
– Unlike its neighbors, kept out the drug cartels and pioneered community policing.
In April of this year, all of this was threatened. The US had poured millions of dollars into "democracy promotion" programs, a euphemism for regime change operations. Suddenly and unexpectedly, a cabal of the reactionary Catholic Church hierarchy, conservative business associations, remnants of the US-sponsored Contras, and students from private universities attempted a coup.
Former members of Ortega's Sandinista Party, who had long ago splintered off into political oblivion and drifted to the right, became effective propagandists for the opposition. Through inciting violence and the skillful use of disinformation in a concerted social media barrage, they attempted to achieve by extra-legal means what they could not achieve democratically. Imperialism with a Happy Face.
We who live in the "belly of the beast" are constantly bombarded by the corporate media, framing the issues (e.g., "humanitarian bombing). Some leftish groups and individuals pick up these signals, amplify, and rebroadcast them. While they may genuinely believe what they are promulgating, there are also rewards such as funding, media coverage, hobnobbing with prominent US politicians, and winning awards for abhorring the excesses of imperialism while accepting its premises.
Today's organizations that are socialist in name and imperialist in deed echo the imperial demand that the state leaders of the progressive movements in Latin America "must go" and legitimize the rationale that such leaders must be "dictators."
They try to differentiate their position from the imperialists by proffering a mythic movement, which will create a triumphant socialist alternative that fits their particular sect's line: Chavismo without Maduro in Venezuela, Sandinismo without Ortega in Nicaragua, and the Cuban Revolution without the Cuban Communist Party in Cuba.
The political reality in Latin America is that a right-wing offensive is attacking standing left- leaning governments. President George W. Bush was right: "Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists." There is no Utopian third way. Each of us has to determine who are the real terrorists, as the juggernaut of US imperialism rolls out a neoliberal world order.
Chaos: The New Imperialist Game Plan
For now, the coup in Nicaragua has been averted. Had it succeeded, chaos would have reigned. As even the most ardent apologists for the opposition admit, the only organized force in the opposition was the US-sponsored rightwing which would have instigated a reign of terror against the Sandinista base.
The US would prefer to install stable rightwing client states or even military dictatorships. But if neither can be achieved, chaos is the preferred alternative. Libya, where rival warlords contest for power and slaves are openly bartered on the street, is the model coming to Latin America.
Chaos is the new imperialist game plan, especially for Bolton's so-called troika of tyranny. The imperialists understand that the progressive social movements in Venezuela, Nicaragua, and Cuba are too popular and entrenched to be eradicated by a mere change of personnel in the presidential palace. Much more drastic means are envisioned; means that would make the bloody aftermath of the US-backed Pinochet coup in 1973 in Chile pale by comparison.
In Venezuela, for example, the opposition might well have won the May 2018 presidential election given the dire economic situation caused in large part by the US sanctions. The opposition split between a moderate wing that was willing to engage in electoral struggle and a hard-right wing that advocated a violent takeover and jailing the Chavistas.
When Venezuelan President Maduro rejected the US demand to call off the elections and resign, he was labelled a dictator by Washington. And when moderate Henri Falcon ran in the Venezuelan presidential race on a platform of a complete neoliberal transition, Washington, instead of rejoicing, threatened sanctions against him for running. The US belligerently floated a military option for Venezuela, stiffened the suffocating sanctions, and tipped the balance within the Venezuelan opposition to the radical right.
The US is not about to allow Venezuela a soft landing. Their intent is to exterminate the contagion of progressive social programs and international policy that has been the legacy of nearly two decades Chavismo. Likewise, for Cuba and Nicaragua. We should also add Bolivia in the crosshairs of the empire.
We've seen what Pax Americana has meant for the Middle East. The same imperial playbook is being implemented in Latin America. Solidarity with the progressive social movements and their governments in Latin America is needed, especially when their defeat would mean chaos.
Posted in VenezuelaComments Off on The Troika of Tyranny: The Imperialist Project in Latin America & Its Epigones
Naziyahu: Brutal Murder of Khashoggi by Saudis 'Horrendous,' But… 'Larger Problem Is Iran'
Posted on 01 November 2018. Tags: Brutal Murder of Khashoggi
Netanyahu: Brutal Murder of Khashoggi by Saudis 'Horrendous,' But… 'Larger Problem Is Iran'
The Israeli prime minister's first public comments on the killing come amid reports he urged the Trump administration to stand by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman
by: Jessica Corbett
While publicly condemning the murder of Jamal Khashoggi on Friday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu emphasized the importance of Saudi Arabia as a strategic regional partner and has reportedly has urged the Trump administration to maintain support for Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. (Photo: Wikimedia Commons)
As the global community continues to demand justice for murdered Washington Postcolumnist and Saudi Arabian dissident Jamal Khashoggi, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, in his first public comments, described Khashoggi's killing at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul last month as "horrendous" before immediately defending Saudi Arabia as strategically important to counter Iran.
"What happened in the Istanbul consulate was horrendous and it should be duly dealt with. Yet at the same time I say it, it is very important for the stability of the world, for the region and for the world, that Saudi Arabia remain stable," Netanyahu toldreporters after a diplomatic meeting in Varna, Bulgaria on Friday. "I think that a way must be found to achieve both goals. Because I think that the larger problem is Iran."
Earlier on Friday, Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz, a member of the prime minister's security cabinet, had said in a radio interview that Khashoggi's murder "was a despicable action. It's worthy of all reproach. This was a civilian, a journalist, not a terrorist," but also that "Arab states, including Saudi Arabia, are our allies in recent years against the spread of Iran and against the Iranian nuclear threat." Iran maintains that it is not trying to build nuclear weapons and international watchdogs have foundthe nation in compliance with the 2015 nuclear deal.
The Israelis' remarks followed a Washington Post report on Thursday that Netanyahu had privately urged the United States to maintain support for Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, or MbS. According to the Post, in recent days, autocraticEgyptian President Abdel Fatah al-Sissi and Netanyahu have "reached out to the Trump administration to express support for the crown prince, arguing that he is an important strategic partner in the region."
As details of the grisly killing have emerged, MbS has faced heightened scrutiny over suspicions that he was involved in a plot to assassinate Khashoggi. Saudi Arabia has changed its official story multiple times since the dissident entered the consulate on Oct. 2 and never reemerged. Initially, the kingdom said Khashoggi left the facility unharmed, before claiming he died in a "fistfight" gone wrong. The country's attorney general finally admitted last week that, as Turkish officials have alleged for weeks, the murder was premeditated.
While President Donald Trump has revoked visas or limited travel for 21 individuals accused of being involved with the murder, the president has accepted the crown prince's denials that he never had "any knowledge of what took place in their Turkish consulate." Trump also has resisted pressure from the public and politicians to cut off arms sales and military support for Saudi Arabia as it wages war on Yemen, where the Saudi and UAE-led coalition's bombing campaign has created the world's worst humanitarian crisis.
The Post also reported Thursday that the crown prince has spoken with Trump's son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner, arguably his top ally in the Trump administration, multiple times since Khashoggi was killed—including a call with Kushner and National Security Adviser John Bolton in which the MbS alleged that Khashoggi was "a dangerous Islamist" affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood.
Echoing Khashoggi's repeated denials over the years that he was affiliated with the Egypt-based organization, his family said in a statement: "Jamal Khashoggi was not a dangerous person in any way possible. To claim otherwise would be ridiculous."
Khashoggi's fiancée, Hatice Cengiz, on Friday requested that his remains be turned over for a proper burial. However, Turkish presidential adviser Yasin Aktay told the Hürriyet Daily News this week that he believes Khashoggi's body was cut up then dissolved in acid. "Now we see that they did not only dismember his body but also vaporized it," Aktay said. "The reason they dismembered Khashoggi's body was to dissolve his remains more easily."
Posted in USA, ZIO-NAZI, Saudi ArabiaComments Off on Naziyahu: Brutal Murder of Khashoggi by Saudis 'Horrendous,' But… 'Larger Problem Is Iran'
Murder of Saudi Journalist Builds Opposition to Yemen War
Posted on 01 November 2018. Tags: Yemen War
Mid-term elections could reverse Trump policies
by: Reese Erlich
The Arab Spring spread through Saudi Arabia and continued for years in the mostly Shia Muslim, eastern part of the country. When the current Crown Prince Muhammed bin Salman came to power, he escalated the war in Yemen and cracked down on dissent at home. (Photo by Reese Erlich)
The murder of dissident Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi has backfired on the Saudi royal family by focusing new attention on its vicious war on Yemen.
The last few weeks have seen startling new reports on civilian atrocities and growing support for a House of Representative resolution invoking the War Powers Act to stop the war. Rep. Ro Khanna (D-San Jose) now has 73 cosponsors for a resolution that would stop US participation in the Yemen slaughter.
The Khashoggi murder has fundamentally shifted opinions on Capitol Hill about US-Saudi relations, Rep. Khanna told me in a phone interview. He likened it to one partner in a marriage having an affair.
"The marriage may last but it will never be the same," he said. "It's opened people's eyes."
Murder expressly in the Orient
On October 2, the Saudi regime, headed by Mohammad bin Salman, murdered opposition journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Istanbul. Saudi officials had a premeditated plan to kill Khashoggi, dress a Saudi operative in his clothes and then have him walk around the city to leave the impression he was still alive.
In reality, Khashoggi was brutally murdered and dismembered with a bone saw, according to Turkish government sources. While tens of thousands of Yemenis have died as a result of the Saudi invasion of Yemen, it took the death of one man to focus world attention on Saudi atrocities.
Partially in response to the Khashoggi scandal, US Secretary of Defense James Mattis called for all sides in the Yemen War to begin UN-sponsored peace talks within 30 days. But Secretary of State Mike Pompeo demanded that the Houthi movement, which is fighting Saudi Arabia, begin the ceasefire first. Past United States calls for ceasefires and peace talks went nowhere because the Trump administration is determined not to disrupt relations with Saudi Arabia.
The Trump administration provides intelligence to the Saudi military fighting in Yemen and helps refuel its fighter jets. The United States currently has dozens of soldiers deployed in Yemen, ostensibly to combat terrorism. Earlier this year the New York Timesrevealed that about a dozen Green Beret commandos were stationed in Saudi Arabia along the Yemen border to train the Saudi military in interdicting Houthi missile attacks.
As I've reported previously, the Trump administration could end the war within days. US technicians fuel and maintain Saudi fighter planes manufactured by Boeing. Trump could order the technicians to stop work, as provided in the Boeing contract.
"If the United States stopped fueling the planes, the war would end," noted Khanna.
Who's fighting and why?
Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) invaded Yemen in 2015 claiming to support the legitimate government of Yemen's Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi. In reality, Hadi was installed by the United States after an Arab Spring uprising and today acts as a Saudi puppet. He lives in Saudi Arabia, not Yemen.
The Houthis, a conservative political Islamic movement, control the northern part of Yemen. Iran supports but does not control the Houthis. The Houthis havekilled civilians by firing artillery indiscriminately into Yemeni cities and launching rockets into southern Saudi Arabia, according to Human Rights Watch.
But the Saudi/UAE coalition is responsible for far more death and destruction. In an online interview from the Yemeni capital Sanaa, radio reporter Ali Shahari told me coalition planes have destroyed massive amounts of infrastructure and caused the deaths of tens of thousands. The two occupying powers have blocked access to the country's ports, which stops even humanitarian aid such as food and medicine.
"The people here are suffering from malnutrition due to the imposed blockade," Shahari said. "This is a catastrophe."
The United States, UK and France provide the deadly munitions responsible for civilian deaths. Lockheed-Martin sold the guided missiles to Saudi Arabia that caused the deaths of 40 children and 11 adults in the infamous August attack on a school bus.
Most of the mainstream media say some 10,000 Yemenis have died in the war, but that figure comes from a two-year-old UN estimate. The Armed Conflict Location and Event Data Project(ACLED), a research institution funded in part by the US State Department, indicates that from 2016 to the present, some 56,000 Yemeni civilians and combatants have died. The total since the beginning of the war will likely be 70-80,000, according to a ACLED spokesperson.
A new report by the World Peace Foundation shows that the Royal Saudi Air Force intentionally attacks food storage facilities. Report author and Tufts Professor Martha Mundy explained, "There is strong evidence that Coalition strategy has aimed to destroy food production and distribution in the areas under the control of Sanaa."
Bump from Trump
Obama and now Trump have supported the Yemen occupation to defend US so-called national interests, part of the larger fight against Iran. The United States accuses Iran of seeking to militarily dominate the region from Lebanon, through Syria, Iraq, Bahrain and Yemen.
My — how the kettle calls the pot black. The United States has dominated the Middle East in the post-World-War II era and seeks to maintain its power in an alliance with Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Israel. It has massive military bases in Bahrain and Qatar
The US Navy keeps the sea lanes open for US and allied oil corporations. And, by sheer coincidence, oil and munitions companies make billions of dollars in profits.
Funny how "national interests" are of great interest to the rich but not to the nation.
The Saudis had predicted a quick victory in Yemen but are now bogged down in a never-ending war that costs at least $5-6 billion a month. Fallout from the Khashoggi murder has made the war even more problematic.
Neither Obama nor Trump ever formally declared war in Yemen, and the fighting there has nothing to do with combating terrorism. Even the Republican-dominated House in November 2017 voted by a whopping 366-30 margin to stop United States participation in the Yemen war. In March a similar measure failed in the Senate by a vote of only 55-44.
If the Democrats win the House, and particularly the Senate, they could put tremendous pressure on Trump to reverse his disastrous Mideast policies.
Rep. Khanna emphasized that his War Powers Act measure has significance beyond the Yemen war. "The bill is a reassertion of Congress's role in foreign policy," he said. "It's a reorientation of US policy away from interventionism."
Posted in Saudi Arabia, YemenComments Off on Murder of Saudi Journalist Builds Opposition to Yemen War


People ask a certain question so often at Reunions that my friend Mike Korn '00 had a T-shirt made to answer it. Now, when someone starts the inevitable "Which tent do you guys want to go to?" conversation, Mike simply points to his shirt, which reads: ANYWHERE BUT THE FIFTH.
Tent-hopping is one of the best aspects of Reunions. No matter when you graduated, you can enjoy the ambiance surrounding every era and age group. Like dancing to classic rock? Aim for the 30th or 35th. Quiet cocktails? Try the 60th. Cramped shoulder-to-shoulder shouting with tall youths who don't yet understand that the world is cruel and who spill beer on you and call you "bro" and try to hook up while wearing obnoxiously large sunglasses? That, of course, would be what Korn tries to avoid — the fifth.
To observe the disparity between two very different reunions, on Saturday night I stopped by both the fifth-reunion tent, in Pyne-1901 Courtyard, and the 50th-reunion tent, in Blair-Joline Courtyard.
So perhaps today's 20-somethings are no more boisterous than mid-century youth — and can look forward to a 50th reunion of a mellowness on par with the Class of 1962's.
Adam Ruben '01 is a writer, comedian, and molecular biologist in Washington, D.C. Learn more at adamruben.net.


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Mitsubishi Maidens enjoy sailing success despite the drag
A team of plucky girls from Mitsubishi Electric spent last weekend competing in the 25th anniversary Little Britain Challenge Cup in the waters around the Isle of Wight.
The Mitsubishi Maidens took part in the three-day event, which sees scores of amateur construction industry sailors take to the waters around Cowes. The Little Britain Challenge Cup is a huge fundraiser for a whole raft of charities and 68 corporate teams competed in this year's competition.
Amongst the chosen charities for 2012 are the Ellen MacArthur Cancer Trust, the Jubilee Sailing Trust, the Cirdan Sailing Trust and the Skandia Team GBR Paralympic Classes Squad.
"Once again, we couldn't quite make the podium in terms of sailing ability but I think we were recognised as the hardest socialisers and all the crew deserve a medal for their efforts both on and off the water," said Harriet Evans, Mitsubishi Electric's team leader and Corporate Sales Manager.
"Each year around half of our crew have never even sailed before they step on board, so I am proud of their bravery."
The Mitsubishi Maidens finished 11th in their class but enjoyed phenomenal success in Race Two, where their excellent teamwork saw them cross the line in 6thplace.
Mitsubishi Electric has taken part in the event for the past 5 years and traditionally enters the only all-female crew. This year though, the skipper had to drop out at the last moment to be replaced by a man. Owain Peters, suddenly had to become Zoe for the weekend, don a fetching blonde wig for the occasion, and also chat happily about lipstick and dance moves.
"We also use the weekend as a team building exercise so it was important that we found a way to overcome the fact that our skipper had to change at the last minute," explained Harriet.
The event also gives the team an opportunity to network with other companies working in the construction industry. The Mitsubishi Maidens this year were: Harriet Evans, Alex Black, Sarah Hayler, Penny Calvin-Thomas, Michelle Goodman, Megan Pugh, Hema Myanagr, Kerry Mooney, Helena Kadir, Natalie Pell, and guest sailor Abigail Matthews of structural engineers Momentum.
Over the event's history, Little Britain has donated in excess of £1m to sailing charities helping disadvantaged or disabled people experience the world of sailing. The 2011 regatta raised £40,000 alone and organisers are hoping that this year's event raises even more.
It's not too late to make a donation and further details on the event and the charities can be found on the official website: www.littlebritain.co.uk.
http://www.mitsubishielectric.co.uk
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November 1, 2012 Kirsty Hammond Company News, Heating & Ventilation

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


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Caroline Choi
Senior Vice President, Corporate Affairs
Edison International and Southern California Edison
Caroline Choi is senior vice president of Corporate Affairs at Southern California Edison (SCE), one of the nation's largest electric utilities, and its parent company, Edison International. Choi is responsible for overseeing Government Affairs, Public Affairs, Corporate Communications and Corporate Philanthropy on national, state and local levels.
Previously, Choi served as senior vice president of Regulatory Affairs at SCE. In that role, she was responsible for the company's regulatory strategy and policy at the national and state levels, including regulatory affairs, regulatory operations and environmental affairs.
Choi previously was vice president of Energy and Environmental Policy at SCE, where she oversaw the analysis of energy and environmental policies; development of a long-term environmental, energy and technology strategy for SCE; and management of regulatory efforts at the California Public Utilities Commission and other state energy and environmental agencies.
Before joining SCE in 2012, Choi was executive director of Environmental Services & Strategy at Progress Energy (now Duke Energy), where she was responsible for leading environmental permitting, compliance and policy. She served the company in various roles, including director, Energy Policy & Strategy, and manager, Federal Public Affairs.
Choi is active in national policy and community engagement, where she serves on the executive board of the Smart Electric Power Alliance, a nationwide organization that supports utilities in the implementation and deployment of clean energy and distributed resources. She also chairs the board of Veloz, a non-profit dedicated to accelerating the shift to electric transportation through public-private collaboration and public engagement. In addition, she serves on the boards of the Electric Transportation Community Development Corporation, Los Angeles Business Council and National Forest Foundation.
Choi holds a bachelor's degree in government from Dartmouth College.
Edison Energy and its subsidiaries are not the same company as Southern California Edison, the utility, and they are not regulated by the California Public Utilities Commission.


The Dakhuis (Roof House) is at the same time a shelter and an agora: a place where groups and individuals can come together for a common purpose: sharing with each other and learning from each other.
For the visitor of the Dakpark, the Dakhuis is a place to experience and participate in the coexistence of urban life and nature, a testing ground where a new kind of city is conceived and made. The Dakhuis is a common house, organized and arranged by residents. It is an experiment to redesign the city, based on the participation of its inhabitants. The Dakhuis strives to be a place that stimulates social interaction. It will be a place where residents and others can become actively involved in the design of their living environment.
The physical space of the Dakhuis is built on two levels: an airy, light and spacious glass house, set on top of a warm and cozy enclosed space, built of straw bales. The Dakhuis has the form of a crown, as a luminous symbol for the Dakpark community.
The building is designed to be used flexibly, in all seasons: in the summer the entire space is used, with the top floor functioning as a terrace that can open to the outside. In spring and autumn, the glass house is heated by the sun and can be used for all kinds of activities. In the winter, the user retreats to the ground floor, where the insulated spaces are heated by means of economical and sustainable pellet stoves. The outer wall built with straw bales provides extra comfort. The water from the roof is collected in large reservoirs for use in the garden.
Dakhuis was selected to participate in the second round of the competition 'Bijzonder buiten, zoekt innovatief binnen' to design a new community space for the Dakpark in Rotterdam.


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Little Mennonite Girl (1991)
Details of prints
and enlarged images
can be found in the
Catalogue of Prints.
Mauricio Lasansky (1914-2012) is remembered today as one of the fathers of 20th century American printmaking. During his lifetime he played a pivotal role in revitalizing graphic art mediums and establishing them as an important form of artistic expression on par with painting and sculpture.
As an artist Lasansky is best known for significantly expanding the possibilities of intaglio printmaking, a process in which an image is created on the surface of a metal plate using a range of techniques such as: etching, drypoint, aquatint, and engraving. Many of the prints in his oeuvre remain among the largest and most technically complex in existence.
Lasansky was also a teacher for most of his life - first in his native Argentina and later in Iowa where he lived for more than 65 years. At the University of Iowa in Iowa City, he developed a printmaking workshop that was ranked among the very best in the world. In 1966, Time magazine called Lasansky "the nation's most influential printmaker." During his tenure, he had the opportunity to disseminate his extensive knowledge of printmaking processes to generations of students, many of whom went on to become successful artists and professors themselves. Lasansky's legacy as an artist-educator figures prominently in what has become known as the post-World War II renaissance of American printmaking.
Lasansky is also known worldwide for works of art that examine the brutality of Nazi Germany. Best known are The Nazi Drawings, a powerful expression of the profound disgust and outrage Lasansky felt after viewing a US Military documentary showing the victims and aftermath of Nazi atrocities. Lasansky worked intensively for six years to create the series, which consists of thirty individual pieces and one triptych. The drawings were created with pencil, water- and turpentine-based washes, and collage on common commercial paper. Since their completion in the late 1960's, The Nazi Drawings have been exhibited in many prominent art museums, and have received widespread public attention. In 1967, The Nazi Drawings, along with shows by Louise Nevelson and Andrew Wyeth, were the first exhibits installed at the new Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City. The series will be featured at the Minnesota Institute of Art in late 2020.
A permanent display of Lasansky's art can be seen and collected at the Lasansky Corporation Gallery in downtown Iowa City. Please contact us about availability.
Remembering Phillip Lasansky his decades of dedication to art in the corridor
Louis Phillip Lasansky loved art, though it was in a different way than the rest of his family. Born in Iowa City on Dec. 10, 1954, Phillip passed away unexpectedly at the age of 65 last month, on Jan. 18. One of the six children of Emilia Lasansky and Mauricio Lieb Lasansky (renowned for the "Nazi Drawings" and his intaglio printmaking). Phillip was known across the Iowa art world for his constant involvement.
Phillip ran The Lasansky Corporation Gallery, which was largely dedicated to displaying the works of his father. He regularly allowed local students to tour and would speak on the history and work of his father and, occasionally, his younger brother artist Tom‡s Lasansky. Though not involved in the creation of his own art, Phillip was prolific in his love of artists and art history, having spent decades volunteering at the Cedar Rapids Art Museum where he served on the board and in various committees. Read More
More News . . .
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The Duroc sweet chorizo is processed by a family group in the Autonomous Community of La Rioja, from Duroc pigs race exclusively. It was decided to work with this type of pig for its renowned firmness of the meat, for the juicy flavor that accords every palate. The care of the feeding based on vegetable feed and the selection of these pigs follow canons control very restricted and steady.
From MyJamon we recommend to try this sweet chorizo cooked with wine, like croquettes, as a snack or as an appetizer with other Spanish sausages.
It could be an original present for a special dinner and ideal gift for any lover of Spanish gastronomy.


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Planned Parenthood's Abortion Mantra Leads to Infanticide
Opinion | Alan Sears | Feb 28, 2012 | 11:58AM | Washington, DC
Although popular opinion has been turning steadily against Planned Parenthood and their allies over the course of the last 20 years, the culture of death continues to seek and proselytize new adherents in pervasive and destructive ways. With their success, human life has been cheapened to such a degree that news stories about sex and death which our grandparents would have found heinous, don't even make us blink today.
For example, in April 2005, a 19-year-old teenager in Canada became pregnant. She hid the pregnancy from her parents and secretly gave birth to a son in her parents' basement. Immediately thereafter, she strangled the child to death so he wouldn't make any noise. She then went outside and threw the body over the fence, where it was later discovered.
In that same year, a 16-year-old Michigan boy repeatedly hit his pregnant 16-year-old girlfriend in the stomach with a small baseball bat in hopes of killing their baby: he succeeded. Eric Smith, the county prosecutor in the county where the crime happened, said, "The length at which these two 16-year-olds went to abort this unborn child is disturbing."
Of course, what's profoundly troubling is that representatives of the culture of death were more disturbed the abortion was done externally with a bat instead of internally via Planned Parenthood scalpels and vacuum devices. As Lori Lamerand, president and CEO at Planned Parenthood of Mid and South Michigan put it, "It's always tragic when people resort to such drastic measures, when there are appropriate, safe medical measures available."
The actions of the Canadian mother and the Michigan couple demand more than sorrow over how they killed their children. They demand sorrow over the fact that death was even viewed as solution by these young parents to begin with. Yet Planned Parenthood and its fellow travelers encourage our youth to view fetal death as a good "option" via web-based propaganda outlets like Teenwire.org and the texting campaign Planned Parenthood has undertaken to reach out to children as young as 14. Or, as one Planned Parenthood affiliate did, launching a "Tell a Friend" marketing program that offered free movie tickets and a chance to win an I-Pod as a reward for teenagers referring friends to Planned Parenthood for their "services."
At Planned Parenthood's Teenwire.org, the assumption is that young mothers will choose abortion. So, after a little lip service to those who "think [they] might continue the pregnancy," the tone on the site quickly switches to, "If you're considering abortion, you should make a decision as soon as possible. Abortion is very safe, but the risks increase the longer a pregnancy goes on."
In that one sentence, vulnerable, young women, desperate for truth and open to the power of suggestion, are essentially told carrying a live child is risky but "abortion is safe" without any caveats or stipulations. No mention is made of the ties between abortion and breast cancer or abortion and depression, nor is mention made of the lifelong torment of post-abortive women after it's way too late.
There is no excuse for taking a human life in cold blood, but there must be sympathy for teenagers in crisis who find themselves thoroughly seduced by the Planned Parenthood mantra—the mantra that the only value humans possess is the value other humans place on them, not the intrinsic value they have as a human person.
We must remain relentless in our fight against Planned Parenthood and its grand deception on the one hand, yet compassionate in outreach to those whom Planned Parenthood has misled on the other. The lives that need to be protected from these abortion profiteers are both inside and outside the womb.
LifeNews Note: Alan Sears is a former federal prosecutor who held various posts in the departments of Justice and Interior during the Reagan Administration. He is president and CEO of the Alliance Defense Fund (www.telladf.org), a legal alliance employing a unique combination of strategy, training, funding, and litigation to protect and preserve religious liberty, the sanctity of life, marriage, and the family.


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Tag Archives: inspiration
I was talking to a woman at a concert about the extraordinary American singer-songwriter, Neko Case. I said, her voice on record is my benchmark, the definition of bell-like precision with passion. The woman laughed and said, to her, Neko represents the ultimate raw, one-take beauty-in-imperfection voice. We laughed. Our visions of this artist, and her great gift to music, were so different.
This difference cuts to the very heart of why my second Wasp Summer record has taken 3 ½ years and counting. I've sat on the bass and drum tracks we recorded in February 2015, sporadically adding guitars, organs, sounds and harmonies, revising the production notes. Not including recovering from depression, breakups, financial issues and the dissolution of the band itself, the thing I have been stalling on was recording the vocals.
I have lived with this set of songs for so long. The oldest song, Lights On Eyes Open, dates to 2005, and the rest between 2010 and 2015. Perhaps surprisingly, they still thrill me. I feel I captured what I wanted to say on each track and that it's a cohesive album.
It's the responsibility of transmitting the soul of each song in the most direct, most emotionally available manner that has been the mental block for me. Unlike the ephemerality of live performance, the permanence of the album vocals became terrifying.
As I recorded at home, in my safest space, I loved the takes I got, but as I listened back, my fear kicked in. An unstoppable internal critic picked apart every phrase for pitching errors, inauthenticity, hollowness, inadequacy. The reference songs I used to guide the mood of each take (mainly Cocteau Twins, Pretenders, Motels, Fleetwood Mac, Mirah, Kate Bush, Linda Ronstadt, PJ Harvey, Triffids and Divinyls) became towering and inaccessible.
I tried editing together 'perfect' vocals from the various takes I recorded. Something I have tried twice before. The result is always the same, a dead-sounding vocal line. I rerecorded them over and over. I tried different microphones. I reminded myself to be kind. I left the songs alone for a year. Nothing made me comfortable with leaving these vocals to posterity. I stopped talking about the record. Despaired.
I feel ashamed of this fear and delay. I'm strong psychologically. I finish what I start. Don't I? This is my novel, my movie, my creative heart. I'm a trained singer. I've been doing this for 27 years. They're my damn songs. I don't know if this is common. I've hear about a million different approaches, including the singer of a famous German band who happily plays to 20,000 people a night but needs everyone to leave the studio when he records vocals.
My heart says be one-take Neko. My head says be bell-like, perfect Neko, and a relentless perfectionist, and when will you ever get there?
Earlier this year, a friend, and the engineer who recorded the original bass and drum tracks, asked me what was happening with the record. I told him I was stalled on the vocals, and couldn't get perspective on them. I said I needed to save some money, hire a nice mic or find a producer to help me get good takes and finish the record. I told him I wanted someone to tell me if it was good and honest, or if they thought I could dig a bit deeper. I just wanted some support. It's hard work finishing a record alone.
He offered a lifeline. I help him with vocals and backing vocals on his record in exchange for him recording mine and acting as producer, talking me through the rest of the recording. So far, we've done two songs, and I've revised the entire album, replacing or adding guitars, sounds and keys.
I'm still excited by the songs, and although the urge to pick apart my vocals is still there, I like the energy of the takes we've done. We've found the microphone combination I'll use for the whole record – a Neumann condenser and an AKG pencil mic. Check out those beauties!
We're going for no more than three takes of each track, and I'm hoping the relaxed and supportive atmosphere will still my devilish urge to rip my own singing to shreds.
I feel confident that I'll both actually finish this record this year and have the money to mix, master and release it. Finally. I'd really, really like to have my albums available on vinyl.
Would you buy vinyl through a pre-order campaign on bandcamp? Would you prefer a CD or download?
I'd really appreciate if readers who can support me could let me know which format they're likely to choose. It takes some logistical planning and timing to put an album release together and deliver by the due date.
Thanks for reading. I'd love to hear from you.
– Samantha, Berlin.
Tags: album, anxiety, Berlin, blog, Chris Lastelle, Cocteau Twins, fear, Fleetwood Mac, home recording, home studio, inspiration, Linda Ronstadt, microphones, Mirah, Mitropa, music, Neko Case, new album, new music, news, perfectionism, PJ Harvey, Pretenders, recording, The Divinyls, The Motels, The Triffids, vocals, Wasp Summer, work
Categories 2018, album, Influences, Mitropa, recording, songs, studio, Wasp Summer, writing
Inspired by that facebook game where you list 10 important albums, I realised that many of my favourite albums are not the ones that shaped my music or songwriting directly.
I want to explore the albums that changed how I thought about my practice as a singer and songwriter, and that are direct influences on Mitropa, the Wasp Summer album I'm currently making.
Number 3 must be Faith No More's eclectic hard rock masterpiece 'The Real Thing'.
1990, Year 10, and the final year of the acceptably ugly school uniform. Fashion inspirations: Stevie Nicks, Chrissy Amphlett, Wendy James, Permanent Vacation-era Steve Tyler checking out new band night at the Whisky a Go Go.
Faith No More's The Real Thing quite literally changed my life. Before this album came out, my two big musical loves were INXS and Guns 'n' Roses, who, around that time, inspired me to fashion a primitive vapouriser from a coke can and fill it with Mum's best Ceylon in order to experiment with the 'smoking tea' they spoke of in their cover of Aerosmith's mighty Mama Kin. No buzz. But I digress.
I think I may have Shane N. to thank for my first tape of this album. At least, I associate it with going Trick or Treating with him around Highland Park, a newish housing estate, and coming home to my Dad telling me he kept a little black book of all my misdemeanours and had spies all over Nerang who would tell him if I got up to mischief. Mum assures me that was just Dad's sense of humour.
The second single off this record, Epic, went round our school like a particularly explosive dose of salts. I have a vivid memory of discussing the video in awe with Brett N. one Monday morning outside the science block. We'd obviously all seen it on Rage over the weekend. They'd never play it on our local radio station. Until it spent 18 weeks on the charts, Australia giving them their first international #1.
But it wasn't Epic that really blew my mind. Like pop kids who discovered The Smiths or The Cure, this took all my love of hard rock and added weirdness, eclecticism and intelligence. I desperately wanted to be in a band, and eventually my mate Craig Rickard invited me to create 'Decadence', our glam-rock covers band.
I loved the pop-triple-punch opening of From Out of Nowhere, Epic and Falling To Pieces, but the later three song run of The Real Thing, Underwater Love and The Morning After, and especially the title track itself, changed for me what was possible with music. It gave me the idea that songs could have power, texture, mystery and space.
The music is precise, brutal and, yes, spacious. There are repeating lyrical threads through the album that are philosophical, questioning and complex, not merely hedonistic. There's also a huge whack of absurdist humour.
I had my first taste of cool as a school authority on this album. Two popular girls came around to ask if i could dub them copies. I had an old pink Sanyo deck that dubbed in real-time, and as we listened to the piano ending to Epic, they were visibly disturbed at the weirdly classical turn the album was taking. "What is this shit?" they asked. "It's excellent. Do you want it or not?"
Patton's vocals go from roaring and stentorian to seductive, almost pleading. I have never forgotten his harmony sixths, and the way he sings "you leave me writhing on the floor" definitely "makes me feeeeeeeeel this way"…
And they finished the album with the consumately creepy lounge-pervert swing ballad End of The World. It was my Enlightenment.
Check out my crucial album #1: Cocteau Twins 'Heaven or Las Vegas'
Check out my crucial album #2: Talk Talk's Laughing Stock
Tags: 1990, ABC, Aerosmith, Chrissy Amphlett, cool, crucial album, Divinyls, Faith No More, Guns 'n' Roses, harmonies, high school, inspiration, inspo, INXS, LA, Mike Patton, music, Nerang, Rage TV, The Real Thing, Wendy James
Categories 2018, Berlin, Best of, crucial albums, Influences, music, Wasp Summer
Number 2 must be Talk Talk's avant-jazz-rock masterpiece 'Laughing Stock'.
Talk Talk's final album Laughing Stock is an entirely appropriate album to come after the Cocteau Twins. Another record that nails the balance between melodic beauty and noise, sung in glossolalia and with the most amazing sense of space.
The track Ascension Day is actually super important to the writing that went towards the next Wasp Summer album, and I have Chris Chapple to thank for the introduction. I can still see the scene, bathed in beeswax-yellow light, in his old St. Kilda living room as The Mime Set gathered for a rehearsal/writing session for our second album.
It may have been the same night I cried behind the door as we ran an early version of Honey O, and Andrew gently asked if I wanted my lyrics to be that nakedly honest. Yes, I do. Always.
That's the thing about this album. It's achingly truthful. I can make out words here an there, but even through abstractly-sung text, the emotional through-line of this album is pure and true.
Even though the album was painstakingly assembled collage-style from over 7 months of improvised recordings, this album is honest and brutal and true.
Released on the Verve jazz label, it's more akin to jazz than the glossy, clever pop they made before, but also lays the foundation for post rock, a territory, along with dream pop, that I spent a good part of my 20s travelling.
To make music where "The record was "only complete" when the band's Mark Hollis felt each guest musician had "expressed their character and refined their contribution to the purest, most truthful essence," is the dream, isn't it?
Tags: album, cool, crucial album, dream pop, influential, inspiration, inspo, jazz, Laughing Stock, Mark Hollis, Mitropa, music, post-rock, rehearsal, St. Kilda, Talk Talk, The Mime Set, Verve Records, Wasp Summer
Categories 2018, album, Berlin, crucial albums, music, Wasp Summer, writing
Number 1 must be the Cocteau Twins masterpiece 'Heaven or Las Vegas'.
Oh, this album, beginning to end, blows my mind. In 1994, I escaped an increasingly dangerous relationship and was relieved to move into a sharehouse in Lismore with 4 other women, located above a veterinary surgery. Collectively and consciously, we explored ritual paganism, argued theology with the Mormons that came each week to save us, and smoked more weed than was strictly necessary. I saw some weird shit.
I started off living behind a makeshift curtain in the kitchen until a room became available. Then I moved into the least psychedelically-wallpapered of the rooms, affectionately known as the Triffid Room.
A lot of music that is important to me (Pink Floyd, PJ Harvey, the Clouds) came out of this room and this year, as did my first attempts at songwriting. Rachel the Cone Queen stole this record from her sister, but it lived for the entire year in my room where I attempted to rationalise its immense harmony while drifting off into its etheric spheres.
This album remains an act of divinity to me. The Cocteaus' perfect pop moment. The post-punk textures they had been developing all the way along, Liz Fraser's astonishing vocal style, the pulsing bass and drum machines, liquified into a weird, dreamy and pleasurable set of songs that blew open my expectations of what I could do, what the human voice could do, what guitars could sound like.
It was the precursor chemical to so much of the music that made my music sound the way it does. At least, most of what I did with The Mime Set and Wasp Summer was me aiming for this kind of freedom.
Upon reflection, Annie Lennox and Liz Fraser are largely responsible for the beautiful oddness of my sense of harmony.
Tags: Annie Lennox, Berlin, Cocteau Twins, cool, dream pop, Heaven or Las Vegas, indie rock, influences, inspiration, inspo, Lismore, Liz Fraser, Mitropa, music, Robin Guthrie, shoegaze, Simon Raymonde, songwriting, Wasp Summer, weed, wicca
Categories 2018, album, Berlin, Best of, crucial albums, Influences, music, Wasp Summer, writing
Apart from buying us drinks, music is the best way to know musicians, so here are some albums that are important to us as musicians and people.
To make it easy to share, we've posted these lists on YouTube and Spotify. If you'd prefer these lists in another format, or on another service, just leave us a message below, and we'll try to arrange it.
Simon and I each have a story about an album that was crucial to us starting our first bands.
Simon's Influences
I met a friend of mine and started a band because I was the only person in the area with a Black Flag LP. I can remember our first gig when we were just 15; the local gang grabbed the lead singer and told him 'If you guys suck, we're gunna punch the shit out of ya!' We knew three songs. We played them three times. Nobody seemed to mind. We didn't get beaten up. The kids at that party were throwing flagstones at the cops as we loaded out into my Mum's car. At the next gig, someone turned up the RHCP's 'BloodSugarSexMagic' record to try and drown us out. Then they started throwing stones at us.
The guitar player, Paul Dempsey, went on to found (successful Australian rock band) Something For Kate. People don't throw stones at him anymore. Except me. I chuck a good sized rock at that lanky motherfucker every chance I get. Just to remind him of his roots and that good rock and roll never comes easy.
Samantha's Influences
The albums that made me want to be in a band were Transvision Vamp's Pop Art and Faith No More's The Real Thing. At my school, there were two types of popular girl: surfer's girlfriends and rough netballers. Two of the latter knocked on my door one afternoon. I was worried. "We heard you got that Faith No More album." "Er… The Real Thing. Yes." I was confused.
"Make us a copy?" one said, handing me a blank cassette. Before this, being a music nerd had only won me insults and my circle of metalhead friends. I could do this and might not get beaten up either. I'd been into the band for a year, but then in mid-1990, 'Epic' was number 1 in Australia. As I only had a simple cassette deck, we listened to the whole album as I dubbed it, with me pointing out the cool bits. "What's this classical shit?" Weirdly, they'd never noticed the piano outro at the end of 'Epic'. They nearly left. "Nah," I corrected, "It's where the goldfish is dying at the end of the video." "Oh, alright," they said, and stayed patiently until their cassette was finished.
If you sign up for our newsletter, Simon and I will tell you about our first attempts at songwriting. Sign up for the newsletter here: http://eepurl.com/rO3db
Bis gleich,
Samantha and Simon
Wasp Summer
Tags: discover, find, influences, inspiration, musical influences, new music, playlist, playlists, Sam, Simon, Spotify, Wasp Summer, YouTube
Categories Influences, music, songs, Wasp Summer, writing
Chrissy Amphlett
Vale Chrissy Amphlett. I was 7, maybe 8, when I first saw you on the tele. I was pretty newly arrived in Australia and without any new heroes to help me through the bullying and difference of newly suburban Nerang, a highway town they'd started carving out of agistment acreage and farms in the 70's.
Classic Chrissy Amphlett by Tony Mott
I was sitting cross-legged on the floor like you would in the Pleasure and Pain video, engrossed in my essential weekly show Countdown. I'm pretty sure it was Boys In Town. I remember then putting Boys In Town on the jukebox at a pub near my school where my Dad was playing pool. At the time, I wasn't aware of the context but, as I grew into my body and my teens, that song became my Suburban Girl's Escape Manual, "I was just a red brassiere/to all the boys in town/put this bus in top gear/get me out of here…" Aussie girls were tough, sassy. I would be tough and sassy too.
I was in immediate thrall to your toughness, your wildness. You thrilled me. I was glued to the TV or the radio every time you were on. It took me a little more maturity to see your equal and brave vulnerability. You were so tough because you laid your whole self on the line – defiantly, provocatively – Are you man enough to handle me? Please be man enough to handle me.
You had the onstage stance of a school brawler: squared off, sharp elbows, crouching and ready – a female John Wayne cowboy in a sailor suit, flat shoes and suspenders. Rather than your spectacular writhing on the industrial grid flooring in Pleasure and Pain, I was struck by your quick, ugly, angular arm gestures and wide, confronting eyes. You, Chrissy, pointing and sarcastic, "Ha! Oh please don't ask me how I been getting on." It took me years to understand you were singing, "how I been getting off" – a world of difference. Your sarcastic 'Ha!" was also in Hey Little Boy, the last Divinyls song I really liked. "Ha! Well! I'm talking to YOU!"
Chrissy Amphlett at Australian Made by Bob King
In 1986, a bunch of cowboy promoters staged Australian Made, an all-Australian music festival I was too young to go to. But I wore out the video watching, well, Michael Hutchence – who wouldn't… and you, Chrissy. Breaking the fourth wall. Getting off the stage and wobbling precariously on the camera track behind the crowd barrier. Sitting open-legged on the lip of the stage. Yelling, "Where are all the boys?". Sitting next to Hutchence saying, "I just do my thing, Troy. Whatever happens, you know, the moment takes over." I wanted to be you so badly. I practiced being you with a broomstick mic stand and hairbrush microphone. I wasn't a tough girl, but I was a mouthy girl, a quietly provocative girl, a girl with a strutting walk – liquid on the inside and solid brass on the outside. I wanted to be you so badly, I got into singing.
Your gasping, sucking breathing in songs, your hiccuping yodels and growled, fried notes were so against the normal rules of recorded singing and so important to the intensity of your sound, and mine. I got into my first band at 15 and, with you as my patron saint, finally began to enjoy myself and confuse my fellow students at lunchtime gigs. Strangely, I don't remember us doing Divinyls songs. They were such a tight band with such classy, rippling lead lines, a killer pop singles band, that we couldn't touch those sounds, but I was never really looking at Mark McEntee.
Your conversational tone with the audience during Temperamental, your cowboy walk from the hips, your pointing and simply owning the stage as if this argument was in your comfortable kitchen at home. Your red hair. Your open mouth. I absorbed all of this from you.
I saw you once in the toilets at the Athanaeum Theatre in Melbourne during a Tex, Don and Charlie concert. I sat in the cubicle bracing myself to say hello, thank you for your inspiration. As I emerged, another woman beat me to it, catching her eyes in the mirror (she couldn't look directly) and offering you, "You inspired me and my girlfriends to be tough and strong. Thank you." She'd said what I would have said and you just kind of looked at her and drawled, "Yeeeaaaaahhhhhhhh." No big-sisterly smile and wink, nothing. I slunk out without a word, appalled but exhilarated to have been in your presence. Praise or bile, like Dean Martin, you seemed truly not to give a fuck.
I turn 38 next month, Chrissy. You were only 14 years older than me. I'm so happy you went peacefully in your sleep after your body was ravaged by both cancer and MS. In interviews, you seemed to take a lot of wisdom and strength even from two solid body blows like that – a brawler 'til the end. I've now strapped on an electric guitar and, vocally and musically, I'm aiming for the mix of cool, vulnerability, wry humour and balls that you taught me, Chrissy. You were my first musical hero. What you offered us shaped me on stage and helped give me a place and an identity as an immigrant to Australia. Thank you.
Tags: Australian, Chrissy Amphlett, heroine, inspiration, legend, pioneer, RIP, rock, vale
Categories Chrissy Amphlett, mayhem, music, musician, Obituary, thank you