With high unemployment, massive poverty, inequality, and a weak economic recovery, the economy is obviously the number-one issue in public consciousness. President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney continue to trade barbs on the presidential campaign trail. Romney accuses Obama of being “anti-business”, while Obama criticizes Romney’s record with Bain Capital, Romney’s private equity firm that was involved in outsourcing American jobs overseas. Amidst this cacophony of superficial babble and quacking from two politicians backed by multinational corporations and Wall Street, one fact is conveniently left out of the discussion — the $1 trillion national security budget.
Tag Archives: militarism
The $1 trillion national security budget
Posted by Adam Hudson on July 29, 2012 in Economy, Empire/Hegemony, Inequality, International Relations, Irregular warfare & covert operations, Military-industrial complex, war economy, & war profiteering, Poverty, War & Peace
Tags: $1 trillion, 2011 debt deal, 2012 presidential election, anti-war, Barack Obama, CIA, drones, economic injustice, economic justice, empire, global economic crisis, imperialism, militarism, military-industrial complex, Mitt Romney, national security, national security budget, unemployment, War
Kony 2012 — propaganda for U.S. militarism in Africa
Within a matter of days, the film “Kony 2012”, put out by the NGO Invisible Children (IC), went viral. In the beginning, the film highlights the brutality of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), a Christian militia group in Uganda led by a man named Joseph Kony. The LRA is known for committing massive human rights violations, such as using child soldiers, murder, mutilation, abduction, and sexual enslavement of women and children. Most of the film, though, focuses on IC’s efforts to bring Kony to justice and encourages viewers to take part in the campaign. What IC explicitly advocates is U.S. military intervention in Uganda to apprehend Joseph Kony.
I could not help but cringe as I watched this film. For one, it reeked of a disturbing white savior undertone. Ugandans were not portrayed as agents of their own liberation. Rather, they (particularly the young boy Jacob) were portrayed as helpless victims in need of Western do-gooders to save them with charity rather than solidarity and empowerment. As an African-American, I could not help but be offended by this. Many Read the rest of this entry »
Posted by Adam Hudson on March 26, 2012 in Activism & Social Change, Africa, African/African-American history/politics/issues, Empire/Hegemony, International Relations, Military-industrial complex, war economy, & war profiteering, War & Peace
Tags: Africa, AFRICOM, Barack Obama, Congo, Democratic Republic of Congo, DRC, imperialism, Invisible Children, Kony, Kony 2012, militarism, Obama, Rwanda, Uganda