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I thought I would weigh in on some of the critical issues we’re now facing, setting aside for a minute Part 2 of my prison series relating to slave labor and the prison industrial complex.

Bush has just given his speech outlining his plans to escalate the war in Iraq by sending another 20,000 troops into this war torn nation. This can only mean more death, destruction, carnage and, more than likely, a widening of the conflict to a regional war.

Meanwhile, the colonial wars in Afghanistan, Palestine, Somalia and Haiti continue to grow hotter and more dangerously disastrous for the peoples of those nations.

Once again, the U.S. is backing up an unpopular military regime, Ethiopia, violating international laws with its bombing strikes in Somalia and its proxy invasion using Ethiopian troops despised by most Somalis. It’s no matter that the Union of Islamic Courts might not practice a religion to our liking; they had brought at least six months of peace and stability to a country plagued with lawlessness and violence since 1991 and had the popular support of a majority of Somalis. The U.S. is now backing the very war lords they fought over a decade ago and labeled terrorists.

Of course, we all know that if Somalia were not of strategic importance militarily as well as possessing oil resources, the U.S. wouldn’t be there.

The Palestinian crisis continues to worsen as the U.S. and Israel continue to deprive the Palestinians of their rights to self-determination and independence, continue their land grabs and attacks upon civilians including children, using some of the most brutal and repressive tactics ever.

In Haiti, the U.S. has deployed its U.N. forces to continue the occupation of this tiny Black nation – terrorizing the supporters of deposed President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, who comprise the overwhelming majority of Haitians. These U.N. terrorists have been murdering unarmed civilians and raping women and girls, a weapon of war that is more and more common throughout the world.

We have a new Democratic-controlled Congress that is still doing absolutely nothing to bring these opportunistic and catastrophic wars to a halt. They can fund the Iraq war to the tune of about $130 million a day, a total of some $500 billion to date, but can’t find any money to reconstruct New Orleans or provide decent housing, education, heath care, healthy food etc. to their own people.

They talk about “the troops” like their choir boys (and girls).

Did we describe Hitler’s troops with the same supportive kindness? What the hell do we think these guys are doing over there?! How many Iraqis have been killed, maimed, displaced? A Lancet report gave a civilian count of more than 650,000 a while ago – and counting – not to mention millions of refugees.

We have a so-called progressive movement that thinks all we have to do is impeach Bush and that will solve the problems created by this fascist system of capitalism/imperialism. Yeah right. Get rid of Bush so we can have Dick Cheney as our president?!? and the same stupid Congress?

If I’m not mistaken, I recall a reporter recently noting that this Congress voted itself eight raises in recent years. And I think that brings their salaries (not mentioning perks!) to over $185,000 per year or something like that. So where do they get the nerve, the Chutzpah, to pass a long overdue minimum wage that is a measly $7.50 hour. I would just love to make each and every one of those sobs live on such an income – working a 40-hour week – for at least six months. First of all, they probably couldn’t handle working 40 hours a week. Every time you look up, these creeps are off on some vacation.

The environment is heating up and getting more polluted. We’ve just learned that 2006 was the warmest year on record, and it’s threatening to get a lot warmer. And we’re already seeing the effects of global warming in all these changing and weird weather patterns (71 degrees in January in New York, 20 degrees in California), polar bears threatened with extinction, glaciers and ice caps melting etc.

We hardly have any human or civil rights left. They’ve tampered with the voting machines, systematically disenfranchised people, legitimized torture, wiretapping and other forms of surveillance, dissolved habeas, consolidated and controlled public airwaves (media), escalated the war on the poor with their draconian sentencing laws and bullshit drug wars, making the U.S. the world’s greatest incarcerator with 13.5 million people trafficked through the penal system annually.

Homelessness continues to claim the lives of thousands of people every year, deaths that are rarely even reported. Yet Gov. Schwarzenazi is threatening to snatch the safety net from mothers with children who don’t meet their “work requirements” (parenting is not work, you know). Cutting off the incomes of parents with children will put many more children and families out on the street. Meanwhile, more cuts are being made to HUD or subsidized housing in the face of a dearth of affordable units nationwide.

As for health care, the S.F. Chronicle reported the governor just spent $55,000 for the medical costs of his broken leg, and the treatments are not completed to date. So what do the rest of us do when we suffer injuries or need health care – those who have no insurance? There is really only one solution to this abominable medicine-for-profit system that treats health care as a privilege and not a right, and it’s called universal health care or single-payer health care.

As for jobs, our jobs are being outsourced to the cheapest labor markets in an increasingly global economy – and to prison labor for made-in-USA labels. More on that later.

Repression for decades now has displaced our real revolutionary leadership, most of whom are either locked up or in exile.

We have to do better. We will have to find the courage to take a real stand in total opposition to the status quo – before it’s too late.

Power to the people! Dare to struggle; dare to win! Venceremos.

Email Kiilu Nyasha, Black Panther veteran and revolutionary journalist, at HYPERLINK "mailto: This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it " This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it .

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