Current Events

Re: Who are the Libyan rebels?

Ricky James Moore II — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 22:46:40 GMT

Marko:

I think the media overexagerates the extent to which Africans and the middle-easterners (the average person) hate the West or westerners personally.

People in the rest of the world are extremely good at being aware that there is a distinction between peoples and governments. Much more so than Americans or Europeans.

Re: Who are the Libyan rebels?

Hard Rain — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 21:24:51 GMT

I really enjoyed these two clips. Knowledgeable guests absolutely pummelling the neocon shills for the regime:

Michael Scheuer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=A-bez9O-xmk

Jeremy Scahill: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=dXDZ2AogetA

Re: Who are the Libyan rebels?

Bohemian — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 19:33:48 GMT

To answer the OP, it's definately CIA and other western agent provocateurs. The term Al-Qaeda is just a euphemism.

The civil unrest is genuine no doubt. However, the actual rebellion is Western instigated. The same CIA assets from the 1980s are back at the helm, a new central bank is trading oil, oil trade agreements are being made, oil companies are currently holding Libyan nationalization at bay, etc.

You put the pieces together.

Re: Who are the Libyan rebels?

Marko — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 16:29:32 GMT

I think the media overexagerates the extent to which Africans and the middle-easterners (the average person) hate the West or westerners personally.

People in the rest of the world are extremely good at being aware that there is a distinction between peoples and governments. Much more so than Americans or Europeans.

Re: Who are the Libyan rebels?

John Ess — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 22:05:30 GMT

I think the media overexagerates the extent to which Africans and the middle-easterners (the average person) hate the West or westerners personally.

Really there are a few countries that get money to except our will, by no means all of them the same that are revolting. It is not their friendship. And that pseudo-friendship, given that is extended cultures as different as Egypt and Saudi Arabia, has little correlation to them being in conformity to American freedoms or ideals. But that is another matter entirely.

I have never met anyone in the Arab world who treated me unkindly. Europeans are more likely to be jerks to me. Or other Americans. Even when I discuss Israel, fewer people are willing to connect it to American ideology at work. Even people who are anti-semitic tend to think the Americans (white or black or whatever) are merely controlled by the Jews to our detriment.

There are two mythologies; both of which rely on hate towards the US. The left needs hate because it is the third world's supposed hatred towards Americanism, which is a projection of their own hatred of it. (And as even Marxists like Zizek will say is a 'vulgar reductionism' to everything being about America and not anything else; which ironically pairs with hatred of secularism and constitutional freedoms). The right needs hatred because they need to assert exceptionalism and the need to bomb, plus it looks like jealousy of our awesomeness. Part of it also ignores the issue of Israel. And makes it seem more personal. We don't any aggression in the word. People just hate us.

At the same time, it is vain to think everything is about the USA. As if everyone is trying to save Western civilization for amurrrca or destroy it. As if that is the only goal one wakes up to. Their decision to do one or the other. Most people have ideology more local; whether it is naive or more farsighted. All we know now is that the Arab league and other old school bodies are going to be toast. And their time just ran out. We are going to see a different future. Probably one of more technology and greater sanity, and less physical force. It is not always utopia. But every civilization has to switch from the physical state to the ideological state. From the bludgeon to the school desk.

People should put it out of their minds that it is about conforming to or fighting the US one way or another. This is basically a media frame that looks good next to stock prices and other things that OPEC 'controls' through coughing or looking at the US the wrong way. After all, it's not all about us.

Re: Who are the Libyan rebels?

Amadeus — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 20:42:00 GMT

Unfortonatley I find the links you sent (most of which I have already read) to be very slective in it's information, as most political peices are. There are major truths in the articles you sent, in that this "al queda" serves the interest of the Oil companies and the Military Industrial complex and the Isreali/American "interest". This does not mean they aren't a real entitiy, and this also doesn't mean that Media has told many lies about the Al Queda and their capabilities, which purley serve to create fear in the public so they can have their freedoms stripped and such. Again, I find these conspiracy theories to be as selective with their information as much as a neo-conservative will cherry pick parts of an intelligence report. There's always a conflict if information regarding these conspiracy theories.I find it pretty obvious that most of these conspiracy theories are as likey to be as wrong as they can be right. Government isn't as smart as you think, and then again not as stupid as most of us think.

I already know what you're thinking, that I've really presented really no argument or actual facts or statistics. But I already know it won't matter if I send you some alternate sources. I hope you don't think it's a cop out by saying that

Re: Who are the Libyan rebels?

No2statism — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 20:12:40 GMT

Al-qaida is a myth. It was created by the CIA.

Re: Who are the Libyan rebels?

Ricky James Moore II — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 20:10:45 GMT

The Power of Nightmares, an excellent documentary on the NeoCons and their lies.

No such organization has ever existed. It's a fantasy that serves the interests of the American bureaucracy and radical Islamists.

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=7787

http://www.propagandamatrix.com/articles/march2005/210305alqaedamyth.htm

http://www.twf.org/News/Y2003/0622-Qaeda.html

Re: Who are the Libyan rebels?

Amadeus — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 19:47:31 GMT

Rofl Al Quaeda is not a myth.

Re: Who are the Libyan rebels?

Ricky James Moore II — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 19:27:42 GMT

al-Qaeda is a myth.

Re: Who are the Libyan rebels?

Marko — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 18:57:01 GMT

Who Are the Rebels?

by Jon Lee Anderson, BENGHAZI, LIBYA

Three of the world’s great armies have suddenly conspired to support a group of people in the coastal cities and towns of Libya, known, vaguely, as “the rebels.” Last month, Muammar Qaddafi, who combines a phantasmagorical sense of reality with an unbounded capacity for terror, appeared on television to say that the rebels were nothing more than Al Qaeda extremists, addled by hallucinogens slipped into their milk and Nescafé. President Obama, who is torn between the imperatives of rescuing Libyan innocents from slaughter and not falling into yet another prolonged war, described the same rebels rather differently: “people who are seeking a better way of life.”

During weeks of reporting in Benghazi and along the chaotic, shifting front line, I’ve spent a great deal of time with these volunteers. The hard core of the fighters has been the shabab—the young people whose protests in mid-February sparked the uprising. They range from street toughs to university students (many in computer science, engineering, or medicine), and have been joined by unemployed hipsters and middle-aged mechanics, merchants, and storekeepers. There is a contingent of workers for foreign companies: oil and maritime engineers, construction supervisors, translators. There are former soldiers, their gunstocks painted red, green, and black—the suddenly ubiquitous colors of the pre-Qaddafi Libyan flag.

Re: Who are the Libyan rebels?

Marko — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 14:55:29 GMT

No mention of imprisoning and beating up black Africans as suspected Gaddafi mercenaries?

You suggesting they should put that in their constitution??

Well it certainly looks like one of their revolutionary principles.

Re: Who are the Libyan rebels?

Paul — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 14:25:24 GMT

No mention of imprisoning and beating up black Africans as suspected Gaddafi mercenaries?

You suggesting they should put that in their constitution??

Re: Who are the Libyan rebels?

Phaedros — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 14:09:04 GMT

Yea, we can hope that a grand revolution will take place and the perfect democracy will be set up, but then there's reality.

Re: Who are the Libyan rebels?

Marko — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 14:04:00 GMT

Have you seen the transitional national council's "vision for the future" document? Ermm...here. "Denunciation of intolerance and violence", "democracy" with "equality for women" (and freedom of religion isn't mentioned here, but has been elsewhere), "recognition of the independence of sovereignty of other nations", etc. Al Qaeda wrote that, you think?

No mention of imprisoning and beating up black Africans as suspected Gaddafi mercenaries?