They destroyed everything.
Our homes
Our hospitals
Our place of prayer
Holy Places
They murdered our children
Our Children

My mother lies
In part, in parts
Most of her hot vapor sprayed
Against the wall
Updating paintings
Soaking into the soft cushions

I’m in a tent
On vacation
Plenty of food
Like “Victory”
It’s within reach
A few more meters
A few more deaths

You’re in a tent
You say to me
Rent-free
I should be happy
And quiet
For the privilege I endure

The results of this lack of engagement were devastating – for the entire world. The neo-conservative agenda went into full swing. As outlined in the document “Rebuilding America’s Defenses”, the Project for the New American Century articulated their intentions to undermine the US Constitution and declare endless war putting into motion their version of the Clash of Civilizations (a manufactured ideology that they can say, arguably, came to pass (of course they engineered it as such). So, while they were at work, most of the disengaged were unaware of their intentions (though it was available for anyone to read): undermine the sole authority of the US Congress to declare war and restore it to the Executive branch (realize that this was a primary reason for establishing a democratic republic with separation of powers); gain control of the purse strings for military spending (again, a fundamental principle of a democratic republic -keeping the executive from controlling the decision to go to war and how to appropriate the peoples funds for it); to dismantle the relationship between corporation and government and, in essence, making the weapons manufacturers, arms dealers and the government one in the same – now with the power to declare war endless war and spend the peoples money).

You can imagine the results of this; you live in it: the gross unequal distribution of wealth within the US and between the Global North and the Global South (as it is called); regime change by hook or by crook in Iraq, Libya, Syria, Tunisia, Egypt and so on; those endless wars in some of the aforementioned states, the Orwellian rise of terrorism to sustain the endless wars via the creation of ISIS and company in the very same and dubious way that the US organized the Base (Al Qaeda) to undermine the USSR in Afghanistan to establish their place on the Grand Chessboard… and so on.

The thing about megalomaniacal psycho-sociopaths is that they are, in fact and by definition, unaware of how they affect those around them and, similarly, disconnected from how those they are affecting feel about them. They can get away with their behavior for a little while, especially with the idealistic, well-intentioned and/or naive among us. Eventually people get hip to their game and their behavior becomes unsustainable. This can be expressed in a lot of ways but I think it is most importantly, for our sake, exemplified by the fact that few military engagements since the end of the Second World War have been successful; the ultimate outcomes of such incursions was that the moral legitimacy of the indigenous peoples percolates to create some version of non-violent “armed” resistance and finally revolution: think Rose, Orange, Jasmine, Crimson, Denim revolution, think Gandhi and King and Arab Spring. For all of the successes and the relative failures what is taking place may be described, in part, as the moral arc of the universe bending towards justice, that after a long train of abuses people get smart and organize and take it upon themselves to change their situation. That was the very nature of the US revolution as much as it is the nature of the armed resistance in Palestine.

What we are witnessing today in the US Presidential Circus is a complete shift of Karl Rove’s prediction from a period of disengagement (engineered or otherwise) to a period where they thoroughly underestimated – thanks to their disconnect from civil society – the power and potential of a disenfranchised, organized peoples who were sick of the status quo (the rich stealing from the poor: the government stealing from its citizens) to stand up to the power elite, essentially spit in their face while they use every tactic in the book and even invent some new one’s, to try to shut democracy down.

If there were not a leader, Bernie Sanders, who appears to be resonating with a YUGE contingency of the American electorate, we would probably not be organically converging to Sanders’ camp. It’s good that he’s here now and whether he wins the election or not we should remember the oscillation between the “no 60′s style revolution” Rove predicted (the sleeping sheople) and the invigorated engagement we seem to be witnessing and a part of now. WE have to remember that there is a very powerful force that is always engaged in its sole purpose: to use the tools of this democratic republic to actually undermine democracy. From a Newtonian frame of reference, if we want to keep the system from slipping deeper/back into tyranny, we are going to have to be as organized and powerful a force as the establishment. If we are going to get it to move towards justice we’re going to have to organize, strategize, and work harder than they do. Their are so few of them and so many of us. Sander’s has shown, through the financial and social support he gets, that if we each contribute a little money, a little love, a little blood, sweat and tears, we can easily over power those who are working so desperately to keep us locked in the enchanted prison and likely, with the right attitude and intention, send them to the asylum where they belong.

Without a leader we may have to organize and act on our own into the future.

we will build a playground
of our commonalities
on no one’s land
where we meet
for food and drink and song
to watch the children perform
the strange ritual they’ve invented
to remind us
the sounds of their voices
are not differentiated by the gods
nor do they fall prey to demons
when you pick up
the gun before the pen
when you kill
before you are willing to die

The Swiss Parliament passed the “Direct Engagement”  law last week by a near unanimous vote. This new law requires arms manufacturers to train and deploy soldiers, militants, resistance and terrorists to fight with the weapons they sell to foreign governments. It is seen as both a victory for peace workers who believe that a neutral country, as Switzerland, can not maintain neutrality in conflict when it is, in fact one of the largest arms dealers in the world.

“How can we provide the means of war and still considered ourselves a neutral country. It is sheer absurdity to have such a belief that we do not engage in direct violence when we provide the world with the most sophisticated weapons on earth,” says Reudi Knopfler, a former parliamentarian from Bern.

Ironically, it is also considered a victory by arms manufacturers and the military. Since all men must go into the military, Switzerland’s defensive defense posture still makes it one of the most militarized countries in the world – up there with Germany and Israel.

“The very notion that we will be able to fight with and for our comrades in foreign lands, putting our training to good use and, finally, being able to utilize our sophisticated war machinery – which we are most certainly proud of – is a boon to all of our brave young men,” says General Sarmad Rossi one of the bills co-founders.

Still, there are many controversial issues surrounding the new law, yet with a majority of neo-nazi and national socialist groups now on the rise in Swiss parliament and the Swiss population at large, currently amounting to around 33% of the Swiss parliament, this sort of militarization was seen as inevitable by the left and more moderate members of parliament and civil society.

The new law has some rather peculiar features which are sure to raise red flags in the United Nations as they contradict some basic tenets of international law. However, the new law is crafted such that it treads in a sort of no mans land whereby a nations sovereignty supersedes certain aspects of international law when it comes to corporate personhood and the registration of international corporations on sovereign territory. One of the tenets, for example, forbids arms deals that will land weapons in the hands of children of those nations to where arms are sold. However, the bill allows for the training of Swiss children to go and fight as child soldiers under the flag of other nations since the skirts the issue of illegality of arming children of foreign nations. The first group of Swiss child soldiers is already set to deploy to South Sudan at the end of November after their basic training is complete. Protests in Geneva, Bern, Zurich and Basel were peacefully disrupted with tear gas canisters and rubber coated bullets sending a strong message that fringe elements of society will not control the destiny of a legitimately elected democracy.

Another battalion of resistance fighters are training in the alps to fight in Gaza as a result of a long investigation which traced arms sales from Dubai, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and the US which finally ended up in the hands of Hamas resistance fighters in Gaza. The new law does not allow for the proxy sales of Swiss weapons to foreign nationals but it does allow for the direct engagement of Swiss civil society in conflicts throughout the world and, thus legitimizes the Swiss battalions intentions to go fight alongside their Palestinian brothers and sisters who would, ultimately, be using their weapons in some sense.

Similar regiments of Swiss civilians are in training to go fight US intelligence in Syria and Iraq as well as the Ukraine, Nigeria, Sudan, and other conflict zones around the world that would ultimately see the equivalent of “made in Switzerland” printed on shells and other ordinance dropped and deployed in their countries.

Denmark, Sweden, Norway and Holland are considering similar legislation. One Dutch Parliamentarian argues, “it makes complete sense, why should we arm innocents and subject them to the brutality of our governments policies which are completely outside of their purview. We don’t see Palestinians voting in Nederlandischer Parliamentary elections, do we? So we shouldn’t see them being subject to our policies without their voice being heard and to that end I support similar legislation as the Direct Engagement law that Switzerland has pioneered. It puts the middle man back in his rightful place. Let out brave citizens fight for our agenda in foreign lands – the way we used to do it during our proud colonial days.”

Warsaw
The resistance was fierce
the jews
brutal
and ingenious
their networks of tunnels
their stores of of weapons
the underdog
damned to extermination
and fighting till the end
honor, dignity, pride, life – actually

Hamas puts bombs in babies heads when they’re born
in case your american misslies can’t find them
everyone wants them dead for their own right reasons
lest they grow up to become poets, mothers, lovers

Gaza
the resistance was fierce
the jews
muslims, christians
brutal
the indigenous
fighting for life, actually
in their networks of tunnels
weapon caches strategically placed

Zionist implants unimprovised explosive devices
in the heads of their aliyah children
right of return to hellacious lands
where love had her first fight
and will die fighting
licking the luscious last drops of blood
from the mosque floor
breathing in the last ashes of the dead
jews, muslims, christians
poets, mothers, lovers

the only thing
I have from you
is this sliver of the reflection of your face
in this chard of the mirror
from your bedroom

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