Meditations on nationhood in
Barcelona.
a. 
b. 
a. El Mundo
daily: Artur Mas, the Catalan civilian leader, surrounded by leaders of the
Spanish “Military Association”, the power base of Franco´s fascist regime, who
staunchly and openly oppose the drive for Catalan independence, during the
official mas for La Merce' last Sunday. b. The copy on the Spanish poster for
Brad Pitt’s Killing Them Softly, is “the US is not a nation, it’s a business.”
Barcelona, September 26 – the
peaceful dialogue on Catalonian independence continues:
- The headline of the conservative El Pais,
paper edition, in Barcelona, like all local papers, is “Mas propone consultar al “pueblo de Cataluña”
la creación de un Estado” – Mas proposes consulting the “People of
Catalonia” on creation of a state. The local El Mundo
edition carries a similar headline. In contrast, the headline of the
Spanish online national edition of El Pais is, “La vicepresidenta, ante el desafío de Mas: ‘La respuesta
será firme y serena’ ” – The Vice President, in opposition to Mas’s
challenge, ‘The response is firm and serious’ “.
- El Mundo, local paper edition, also carries on its front page a photo
of Artur Mas, the civilian leader of Catalonia, and the leader of the
Spanish Associacion de Militares in an unfriendly pose, seated side by
side in the front row of the official central mass for La Merce last
Sunday. The caption of the photo refers to Mas as the leader of
the Catalan independence drive and the generals, as the leaders of the
“Old Tradition.”
- The local paper edition of the left-wing La Vanguardia carries a very
large photo of the same occasion on its front page (not to be found in the
online national edition). However, the photo provides a
different perspective of the same scene in the official La Merce
mass. Here, Artur Mas is seen seated surrounded by five
representatives of the Associacion de Militares, almost under siege. The
caption's headline is “Entre militares” - Among the military - and it
explains that Artur Mas and the leadership of the Associacion de Militares
were seated that way in accordance with protocol, and that the scene
“invoked moments of the tyranny”.
In short – the Catalan People
are peacefully but firmly asserting their nationhood, in the face of repeated
threats of violent oppression by the Spanish fascist “Military Association”,
which still holds a formal, central place in the political structure of Spain.
In the meanwhile in Brussels,
the Catalan papers report that negotiations continue between the Spanish
government and the bankers, regarding the bailout package, which Catalonia has
already rejected. And in the neighboring Portugal, large demonstrations against
“Austerity”, imposed by the bankers, continue.
For leisure, I was reading John
le Carré's The Constant Gardner, which focuses on abuse of the People of
Africa by multinational pharmaceutical corporations and the complicity of the
British Foreign Office. In one scene, a finely bred, Eton/Oxford
grad, junior Foreign Office consul is lecturing in Oxford on UK foreign policy
vis a vis the Third World nations. During questions and answers at
the end of the lecture, the focus is on the morality of such policies. Finally,
the lecturer states that a government of a legitimate nation is characterized
by establishing some basic guarantees to the People, among them, some minimal
level of the rule of law, and also shows genuine concern for the peace and
welfare of the People. If such characteristics are missing, he concludes, the
People should be regarded as “Failed-Nation”, or “Un-Nation”. At the
same time, he consents that today the Foreign Office makes no such distinction
in dealing with various regimes.
On the same subject, the
streets of Barcelona are decorated now with posters of the recently released
Spanish version of Brad Pitt's movie with the copy, “ 'America, no es un pais,
es un negocio', Jackie Cogan” - the US is not a nation, it is a business.
For those, not given to high
fullutent abstractions of nationhood, economics, and foreign policy, the
question can be boiled down to this: Is there a moral distinction between a
wealthy patron hiring the services of a prostitute, and the same patron hiring
the services of a pimp, to violently coerce a woman into prostitution?
The moral dilemma regarding
pimped prostitution is equally applicable today to the United States, and the
relationship between banks, government, and the People in view of the
“Foreclosure Crisis”, the “Bailouts”, the unprecedented corruption of the state
and US courts, the enormous Gulag that is in place, and the oppression of the
People at large and truthers in particular through police, prosecutorial, and
judicial misconduct.
LINKS:
[1] Mas propone consultar al “pueblo de Cataluña” la
creación de un Estado
[2] La vicepresidenta, ante el desafío de Mas: “La
respuesta será firme y serena”
____________
Joseph Zernik, PhD
Human Rights Alert (NGO)
The 2010 submission of
Human Rights Alert to the Human Rights Council (HRC) of the United Nations for
the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) of Human Rights in the United States was
reviewed and incorporated in the official HRC Professional Staff Report with a
note referring to “corruption of the courts and the legal profession and
discrimination by law enforcement in California.”
The 2012 submission of Human Rights Alert to the HRC
for the UPR of the State of Israel is titled "integrity, or lack thereof,
of the electronic record systems of the courts of the State of Israel'. It is
scheduled for review in January 2013.
____________________________
Boycott the US presidential
vote! It only legitimizes the illegitimate...
12-04-15 2012 Presidential
election votes will be counted in Spain
http://www.scribd.com/doc/89464081/
Occupy!
11-12-10 Where should
Occupy go next? Civil Disobedience in the footsteps of Thoreau and Gandhi!
http :// www.scribd.com/doc/75348301/
12-06-08 Courts and Judges
as racketeering enterprises under RICO (the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt
Organizations Act) - key element in the current financial crisis
http://www.scribd.com/doc/96504009/
Secede! The US in its
current form is simply unmanageable...
12-01-01 Secession - A
Smart Business Move!
http://www.scribd.com/doc/76877453/
Get Up, stand up, stand up
for your rights!
_____________________________
Take away justice, then, and what are
governments but great bandit
bands?
Saint Augustine, Civitas Dei (City of God,4.4)
_____________________________
