chris hedges

This past Monday I received an email from Eileen of I-witness video. She was on Monday morning's Democracy Now! broadcast and was alerting people to this fact. I'll ignore the fact that she sent the email out at 1am and the episode aired at 8am and also the fact that I didn't check my email until 11am.

Fortunately David Rice, of DN!, and his awesome comrads down at DN! record each and every episode and get it up to Archive.org ASAP!!!.. Schweet, Thank you DemocracyNow! (now come up to MNN and help us out... please ;) )

Back to the point. Eileen was talking with Amy Goodman about the recent ruling the NYPD had violated a previous ruling that barred them from videotaping innocent civilians for no legitimate reasons. Their action were found to be illegal and a flagrant misuse of NYPD's anti-terrorism resources.

I've become very interested in these stories when I was videotaped by the NYPD in Feb of 2006. They didn't stop to talk to me, ask my name or say a single word to me. They pointed a camera with a super bright light in my face for about 10 seconds then simply drove off. As if I were some odd alien to be analyzed.

What was I doing at the time?? Riding my bike in a Critical Mass ride with about 20 other cyclists in 35 degree weather. I wasn't a threat to anyone.

This isn't the reason for my post though.

In order to get to the story about the NYPD's illegal actions (shocker!) I had to watch the first 30 minutes which was an interview with Chris Hedges. He is the author of "American Fascists: The Christian Right and the War On America".

Now I know that my viewpoints are going to tick off a few people, especially in my own family but....

I have to agree with Chris Hedges. The Christian right has waged a war on America and it isn't letting go. They will not be satisfied until we are a full christian country and we use our military strength to bring other countries to Christianity; of course they do under the guise of "Democracy".

He brings up the obvious Pat Robertson quotes about Hugo Chavez and also mentions his huge investments in blood diamonds. Regardless of where he invests I think the real question is "Why is he investing; period"?

Look religion is supposed to be about faith and a belief system. How does gobbs of money fall into that? The man is worth billions, how is this fulfilling God's mission? The money has to come from somewhere, it doesn't miraculously appear.

Back to the religious right. I'm just in awe at the boldness of their statements and how backward they are in their thinking.

Personally I relate this to this generation's battle.

In this country we have had to battle slavery, women's liberation, segregation, civil rights, and we are still continuing to battle racism. The big battle of today is fighting off this Christian right whom are attempting to force us back in time.

Now I am not stating that Christians, or any other religion, should not be allowed to practice or preach. They should definitely have that right and I fully support it. What I am saying is that they are going too far, they are reaching outside of the church and attempting/succeeding to make world changes.

The church is in no position to recommend who we should assasinate nor are they in a position to point fingers at gays/lesbians or us "dirty hippy liberals" for terrorist disasters. Of course the irony in the latter is that actions such as these bring about the terror reactions.

Now I must go pick up the book but first I have to get through the latest Noam Chomsky book I just got; failed states.