Tori Amos: "American Doll Posse"

American Doll Posse is a record that wants to know why we are at war, and what we are going to do to clean up our mess. Amos has always questioned the patriarchal authority, but this time she actually begins a record with a song called “Yo, George”, a finger-pointing 90-second interlude obviously directed at our commander-in-chief.

Unleashing her inner Rosie O’Donnell, a disillusioned Amos lashes out, “Is this just the madness of King George/Yo George/Well, you have the whole nation on all fours?” Ouch!

Amos sheds tears over the buckets of blood spilled on foreign soil on the anti-Iraqi war opus “Dark Side of the Sun.”

Snarly guitars accent her harsh sentiment in the biting lines, “So how many young men have to lay down/Their life and their love of their woman/For some sick promise of a heaven/Lies go back now to the garden/Even the four horsemen say all bets are off.”   more »

Almost unnoticed, the war in Iraq entered a new phase last week. Laconic statements from the White House and the Pentagon confirmed what had long been suspected - the US is planning a long-term military presence in Iraq.

This is a geopolitical development of the first importance.

In spite of current difficulties - May was the most lethal month for American soldiers since 2004, with 119 killed - the United States firmly intends to maintain control of Iraq and its vast oil reserves. Iraq's neighbours, and energy-hungry states and oil companies, will take note.

On a visit to Honolulu on May 31, Robert Gates, the defence secretary, said that the United States was looking for a "long and enduring presence", under an arrangement with the Iraq government.   more »

This strategy of repeating a “big lie” often enough to make it sound true was famously described in the writings of Nazi propagandist Joseph Goebbels during World War II.

However, given the relatively free U.S. press, many Americans felt they were protected from “big lie” techniques, counting on journalists to call lying politicians to account.

But that clearly is no longer the case – and hasn’t been for some time. Facing career pressure from well-organized right-wing attack groups, American journalists act more like triangulating politicians, fearful of accusations of “liberal bias” or unpatriotic behavior or softness on terrorism.

To have challenged George W. Bush in July 2003 – when he was near the height of his popularity and to do so in a way that might be interpreted as defending Saddam Hussein – would have looked like career suicide to many American reporters.

So, discretion – or in this case the acceptance of a lie as truth – was the better part of valor.   more »

Immigration has been a contentious issue throughout US history, from 1798 when the president was given the power, under the Alien Act, to expel "dangerous" foreigners, after the anti-Irish, anti-Catholic riots of the 19th century. But nothing on the scale of the present crisis.

Unlike in Britain, where illegal immigrants are usually taken to detention centres, there is an uneasy compromise in the US. With the economy dependent on illegal immigrants, the authorities only occasionally take action.

The problem for the illegal immigrants is that they are open to potential exploitation by unscrupulous employers. Reflecting the tension in the US, opponents of immigration from Latin America have taken to wearing T-shirts saying "Only speak English to me".   more »

Every year since 1975 the heads of the same states (with the more recent addition of Russia) meet to discuss ways to further their control over the rest of the world, including their own citizens, a fact which has become even more apparent at this year’s lockdown-style get-together.

In short, the G8 is and remains a meeting free from any sort of consultation with either the heads of those states who will be greatly affected by the decisions made (read African and developing nations), or the citizens the G8 leaders claim to represent.

It can also be viewed as a sort of party under Apartheid– the tiny number of “haves” sit in luxury behind a €12million fence and a police-enforced “protester free zone” 5 km outside the barbed-wire.

The great masses wishing for change or to at least have some sort of inclusion in the decision-making process, sleep in tents and are bullied by armed men in Darth Vader costumes.   more »