Saikou,
I had so little to say because I do not believe in the Bush/neoconservative
agenda. I think to any keen student of the relations between "The West" and
the rest of the world, it merely represents a recycling of the imperialist
pretense "The white man's burden". Even though to some there are benefits
that forces working to remove dictatorships can gain from The Bush Agenda,
it is not laudable because in essence it is undemocratic! Just the other day
I was going through my papers and I came across a poem I wrote in 1991 in
the aftermath of the death of ninety three Senegalese soldiers during The
First Gulf War. This was my reaction then and it basically remains so to
this day. I am convinced that in the majority of cases when a nation assists
another to attain national liberation or freedom from a dictatorship, there
are ulterior motives involved!

YOUR WARS NOT OURS: WASTING BILLIONS

Ninety three men of valour
Reputed best defenders of a nation
Selected from amongst the ranks
Of a national army
In a split second are gone

Science and technology have advanced
So that people can visit the moon
And put satellites in space
To do variable data collections
Making earth a single village

Defence budgets are the fattest
No doubt generals are flamboyant
Soldiers becoming most arrogant
For with their deadly machines poised
We are completely at their mercy

As for the people in the streets
Who pay all the taxes
That they are always devicing
To sponsor their fat budgets
No respite, no peace, no security!

You sent our grandfathers to Waterloo
Our fathers to Burma
And our brothers to the Gulf
To face destructive machines of war
For the expansion of your profit margins

You waste billions in wars
To defend some principles
Yet in chile, Ethiopia and The Sudan
Theres starvation of a generation
You cant spend billions to save lives

Have you not learnt your lessons
That your wars and bloodshed
Solve not your problems
But only sow seeds of hatred
Which germinate into revenge later

Omar Joof.



>From: samateh saikou <[log in to unmask]>
>Reply-To: The Gambia and related-issues mailing list
><[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Re: [>-<] Spinning Liberty
>Date: Sat, 22 Jan 2005 01:54:45 +0000
>
>Omar,
>But I agree with the many analysts who also argue that much of the speech
>is
>for internal consumption.With the economic difficulties America is
>experiencing,the failure(defeat) in Iraq,it should not be difficult to
>predict  what lies ahead for the American moral.The Neo conservative
>convinced  with the believed that the Moral of the American is of
>fundamental importance in sustaining the image America has and must
>continue
>to build for her self in the outside world.To burst that moral,Americans
>should be told that they are responsible for fighting the "evil" and
>"Spread
>democracy" to the outside world.This make religious fanatics,like Bush,a
>very useful "duff" for the noe -conservatives.
>
>For Freedom
>Saiks
>
>>From: "omar joof" <[log in to unmask]>
>>Reply-To: [log in to unmask]
>>To: [log in to unmask], [log in to unmask]
>>Subject: RE: [>-<] Spinning Liberty
>>Date: Fri, 21 Jan 2005 22:27:24 +0000
>>
>>[ This e-mail is posted to Gambia|Post e-Gathering by "omar joof"
>><[log in to unmask]> ]
>>
>>
>>Ebou,
>>I very ardently share your hopes in this regard!
>>Omar Joof.
>>
>>>From: Ebou Jallow <[log in to unmask]>
>>>Reply-To: [log in to unmask]
>>>To: [log in to unmask]
>>>Subject: [>-<] Spinning Liberty
>>>Date: Fri, 21 Jan 2005 11:06:45 -0800 (PST)
>>>
>>>
>>>I find myself  on line with the idea argued by Jurgen Habermas that
>>>modernity is an unfinished project and postmodernism is an offshoot if
>>>not
>>>a perversion of history after the Enlightenment.  This sensation dawned
>>>on
>>>me yesterday whilst listening to Pres. Bush’s inaugural address at the
>>>Mall.  Americans love to believe in a Heavenly Father who endows mankind
>>>with inalienable rights.  A commendable act of faith indeed but the
>>>foundation of that creed is misplaced.  America is born during the
>>>Enlightenment…an explosive epoch during the history of human that
>>>reverses
>>>the excesses of the religious clergy and reinstates humanism as
>>>understood
>>>from the ancient Greeks.
>>>
>>>The three spinning Goddesses of Fate, Moirae in white robes are ancient
>>>deities that even the Zeus feared.  I found myself entertaining the
>>>notion
>>>that even the White House is purposively painted white in sanctification
>>>of the Goddesses of Destiny.   Ever since the presidency of James Madison
>>>there has been a national feeling of a moral crusade towards liberty as
>>>John O’Sullivan in 1845, once wrote that "it was the nation's manifest
>>>destiny to overspread and to possess the whole of the continent which
>>>Providence has given us for the development of the great experiment of
>>>liberty and federated self-government entrusted to us."  The spinning of
>>>liberty has been the business of America as Americans understand
>>>themselves, and an ongoing project as President Bush eloquently
>>>demonstrated yesterday before the world:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>“All who live in tyranny and hopelessness can know the United States will
>>>not ignore your oppression or excuse your oppressors,” President George
>>>Walker Bush
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>President Bush’s new found crusade against tyranny and for a world wide
>>>experimental democracy is a reconciliation of noble American intentions
>>>and interests…a synthesis that has never been before in modern human
>>>history.  Lady Liberty is on the march again, and hopefully she shall
>>>tear
>>>down all the garrisons of oppression around the globe.   So the Yaya
>>>Jammehs of this world beware because Uncle Sam has had enough.  And for
>>>the oppressed Gambian people, America has made a pledge:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>"When you stand for your liberty, we will stand with you” Pres. Bush
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>Almost half a century ago President Woodrow Wilson helped end colonialism
>>>and European imperialism with his 14 point address at the League of
>>>Nations.  Let us also hope that President Bush’s second inaugural address
>>>shall motivate heroic spirits and freedom fighters to end autocracy,
>>>tyranny and all types of oppression.  President Bush has promised to spin
>>>the thread of liberty, and I pray it reaches all dark corners of the
>>>globe.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>Ebou Jallow
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>__________________________________________________
>>>Do You Yahoo!?
>>>Tired of spam?  Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
>>>http://mail.yahoo.com
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
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