Linux Beach

No Blood For Water

Israel's War against Lebanon is a war for water. They are attempting extend their lines to the Litani River in Southern Lebanon so that they can divert its waters to Israel. They have planned on this for decades. This war is not about self-defense or kidnapped soldiers or any of that crap. It is an old fashion imperialist war for natural resources.

Everyone knows the Iraq War is about Oil. That the war against Lebanon is about Water has slipped completely beneath the radar in America. This needs to change.

See this 1997 report on Israel, Lebanon and the Litani this more details and background:

1. Abstract
In the Middle East, the supply of water is much less than its demand, thereby
resulting in conflict over it. This is true for Israel and Lebanon, where there have
been struggles, although not always armed, for the waters of the Litani River. At
this point, Israel occupies southern Lebanon. Part of the Litani is located in this
region. There are conflicting reports and conclusions over whether or not Israel
is using the Litani. There is also a verbal struggle over which country needs the
Litani more, could make best use of it, and who, therefore, should develop their
use of the Litani. Although there is not an armed struggle over it now, it has been
involved in armed struggles in the past (in the 1967 war, and in 1982) and it is
conceivable that in the future the struggles over it may become armed.

Read the complete report. It is very illuminating.
The Inventory of Conflict & Environment (ICE) Nov. 1997

How Many Innocent People Do We Get To Kill?

George Bush started the War in Iraq seven hours before his own deadline. Saddam Hussein, who was paranoid and thought someone was trying to kill him, liked to move around a lot. George Bush had “intelligence” that Hussein was going to be staying with a certain Baghdad family the night before the War. So he ordered the house bombed, seven hours before his own deadline for Hussein to get out of Dodge.

More on Open Source, Google and Freedom on the Internet

As I have said in earlier communications, Google is a product of the Open Source community and it has proved to be an important tool for progressive causes. I've already given the examples of their "WMD" "Not Found" joke and China Proxy that created a way for the Chinese people to cir*****vent their government's blockage of Google. But their most important contribution has obviously been to provide the world with a very efficient and through search engine that operates without political bias or censorship. Recently they added the technology to translate pages written in Arabic. I believe this will prove to be a very useful feature for a world whose people very badly need to communicate better. Also the whole problem of the U.S. government demanding search engine info only saw light of day because Google refused to go along. Microsoft and Yahoo bent over without so much as a whimper and if Google had done the same thing no one outside of these companies and the government would have been the wiser.

If Google has one black mark in my eyes, ...

Memorial Day at Arlington West

We had a great Memorial Day weekend at Arlington West, Santa Monica. This project by Veterans for Peace, Los Angeles, put out over 2400 crosses in the sands next to Santa Monica Pier. We also put up a wall with names of all these dead Americans and ten flag draped coffins for the soldiers killed that week and signs pointing out all the Iraqi dead. Every Sunday morning we put up this memorial and then take it down at sunset. This weekend we had it up for three days.

Two evenings we lite each cross with a candle, showed videos and slideshows on a large outdoor screen. On Memorial Day we marched with flag draped coffins through the 3rd Sreet Promenade in Santa Monica and at the memorial we read the names of the fallen. Among the notibles that participated were Ron Kovic, Gore Vidal and Congresswomen Maxine Walters. You can see some pictures from the event here and see Real Media video of some of the local nes coverage here. This picure by Stephano for the Associated Press was picked up by the Washington Post.

Looking Forward to Judgement Day

I have been looking forward to Judgment Day for a long time now. You see, I'm of the opinion that God has a lot to answer for.

Letter to the [sic] Preditor: Dear L.A. Times

On Tuesday you said of the fighting between Iraqi police and British troops in Basra:

“The clashes, which involved members of cleric Muqtada Sadr's Al Mahl militia, apparently began when British commandos fired on Iraqi police, who took them into custody.” L.A. Times 9/20/05 p. A3

Camp Casey III - Covington, LA

While Cindy Sheehan leads a bus tour across the country, many of the people who created Camp Casey 1 & 2 near President Bush's ranch near Crawford, TX. have established Camp Casey III just north of Lake Pontchartrain in Covington, LA and are doing Katrina hurricane relief work. About 150 volunteers are working out of Camp Casey III and hundreds of thousands of dollars have been raised to support this effort that grew organically out of Cindy's vigil in Crawford. As Cindy Sheehan wrote "Camp Casey III in Covington, LA, is really hopping. Members of our Camp Casey group took 10,000 pounds of supplies to Covington..." This is how it happened.

When the volunteers took down Camp Casey I & II on the last day of August they found that they were left with large quantities of bottled water, food and medical supplies. Cindy Sheehan's legal counsel in Crawford, Buddy and Annie Spell from the Louisiana Activist Network and some members from Veterans For Peace Chapter 116, Mendocino County. CA took the VFP "White Rose" bus loaded with supplies and headed for the Katrina disaster area. Even before they reached Covington they were joined by other Camp Casey alumni, such as Alberto Marino from Austin and Alex and Ella of Minnesota.

Help Needed In New Camp Casey In Covington, La

This report came through the new Yahoo group for Camp Casey Alumni . It pretty much speaks for itself.

Where did the food go? What about the Medical supplies? How about all the water that was never sucked up in the 109 degree heat of Camp Casey? It got loaded up by the team and members of the Veterans For Peace Chapter 116, Mendocino County, www.vfproadtrips.org and hauled out with Annie and Buddy Spell of the Louisiana Activist Network, Commanding the way to as close as Camp Casey could get to the catastrophe in Louisiana. Alberto signed on the tour in Austin and we we were joined by Alex and Ella of Minnesota who spent a lot of time at Camp Casey the past month.

We are here, CAMP CASEY is alive, the food is cooking, and we are handing out supplies to the citizens of the community. We need help. Louisiana Activist Network and the VFP Chapter 116 are the only ones here in Covington.

Bring the Louisiana National Guard Home Now!

There are at least 400 members of 141st Field Artillery and 3,000 members of the 256th Infantry Brigade of the Louisiana National Guard together with their high water equipment in Iraq. I donâ��t claim that this is a complete list, just what I know now.

First They Ignore You

As the original Camp Casey 1 and her even bigger better and closer to the Bush ranch sister Camp Casey 2 enter their last days I hope all of those who participated and supported this effort will take a few minutes to savoir our victory. And then move on to build the September 24th into the biggest anti-war protest this country has ever seen.