Hi. I received another e-mail from Daisy today, who is still in Hawaii (he’ll probably be there for another month or so). It made me think so thought I’d share it with everybody. ~ pinky

Dear Pinky,

Today was “free day” at the Honolulu Academy of Arts so I went. There is an exhibition going on there at the moment that I know you would have been very interested in. It is called The Dragon’s Gift: The Sacred Arts of Bhutan and is an incredible collection of 100+ Buddhist objects, mostly paintings and sculptures. I wasn’t able to photograph any of the objects in the exhibition for you, but here are a few shots from outside the museum:

There was an introductory video running as you first enter the exhibit that gives a brief overview of Bhutan. In the video it was noted that in Bhutan, the state/success of the country is measured in GNH (Gross National Happiness), rather than GNP (Gross National Product). According to an independent study, Bhutan is ranked as the 8th happiest country in the world. The U.S.A. is ranked 23rd.

Please consider the implications of this.

Daisy

[ note from Bunny: GNH seems like a good idea. Here’s a few pieces from around the internet: Gross National Happiness and Development (an e-book in pdf form by the Center for Bhutan Studies, Karma Ura and Karma Galay, editors); Gross National Happiness: Towards Buddhist Economics (presentation paper by Sander G. Tideman); Gross National Happiness (short essay by Donald Ardell); The True Measure of Success (short article by Daniel Pink, Wired magazine). There’s lots more - just Google “Gross National Happiness”. ]

[ note from Kim: Just to state the obvious - Bhutan has problems too: report from Radio Free Asia, 2006. ]

I’ve always found it a little unnerving how human beings can seem so selfish when it comes to lavishing so much care on their own children. After all, there are literally millions of starving children all over the world at this very moment, and intellectually speaking, I’m sure every parent knows this. And yet, when it comes time for parents feed their children, clothe their children, provide toys and amusements to their children and so on, people do not give their offspring as little as possible in order to have more food, clothes, and whatnot to send to all those unknown needy children. Doesn’t it seem like there’s something wrong with this kind of thinking?

But tonight, as I was giving my AntFarm™ ants some water, I caught myself feeling so happy to watch my ants contently drink their water. I was thinking to myself, “Ants, it is hot and dry out there in the desert and untold millions of your ant brothers and sisters are suffering without enough water to drink everyday. I can’t take care of all of them but I can take care of you. So drink and be happy, ants.”

That’s the same thing, isn’t it? (albeit, substituting ants for children)

Is this how we deal with the knowledge that the world is cruel and there is an incomprehensible amount of suffering going on? Do we ever give love and caring to those very close to us in order to protect ourselves from feeling too much compassion for those who are farther away? And don’t these kinds of self-protective mechanisms lead to more inaction, and ultimately more suffering?

I need to reconsider how my feelings are short-circuiting my understanding of my own responsibilities and limitations, especially as it relates to ‘helping others’. I’m sure there’s some kind of evolutionary-biological reason why such complicated emotions developed in cats and human beings, but tonight I can’t help but feel like I would be acting much more responsibly in this world if I had less feelings to contend with.

~ pinky

[ note from Bunny: That was fairly incomprehensible. What is your point? ]

[ Pinky: I don’t know. ]

[ Kim: I don’t think we have to make points. Points are overrated. ]

Via one of the more bizarre expressions of hatred against The Pinky Show we’ve encountered, I’m learning something new about internet culture (and human nature). A brief chronology of events:

1. We receive an e-mail with a link to a jumpy photo that is trying its hardest to be obscene. I’ve seen worse and just throw it away.

2. We receive a panicky e-mail that there is someone on YouTube who made a racist video in reference to our How To Solve Illegal Immigration episode. I check it out and yes, it’s racist - not a huge surprise being that this YouTuber also gives 5-star ratings to Ku Klux Klan videos and videos where people kill animals. I also happen to notice that it’s from the same person who sent us the poopy-dick e-mail (also not a surprise).

3. I did watch another video made by this same hater - Why Do People Hate Furries? - and this one was actually pretty interesting. Not because the video itself is well-made (it’s not - it’s a solid ‘9′ on the lame scale) but because I’ve never heard the term ‘furries’ before. So I looked it up.

“Furry fandom is a fandom distinguished by its enjoyment of anthropomorphic animal characters. Examples of anthropomorphism in furry fandom include the attribution of human intelligence, facial expressions, anatomy, speech, bipedalism, and clothing to otherwise animal characters. Members of this subculture are sometimes known as furry fans, furries, or simply furs…” [ from Wikipedia - read the whole entry if you wish… ]

Also fascinating are the concepts of furry ‘lifestylers’, yiffy art (erotic art featuring furries), furry-themed cybersex, terminology like ‘furfags’, etc. Nice to learn something new everyday.

I’m still trying to figure out the connection between anti-black racism, anti-furryism, and teenage YouTube hissyfits. I asked Pinky what she thought about all this but she wasn’t interested.

- Bunny

Tonight I’m just going to make a very short, direct appeal to everyone reading this diary entry. Bunny and I had a chance to see a prescreening of Noho Hewa: The Wrongful Occupation of Hawaii. The film is absolutely amazing, but it is also not yet finished. The filmmaker, Keala Kelly, needs a little more money to wrap things up before she can send it out into the world.

We had a chance to meet Keala while we were in Hawaii and we were very impressed with her work. But tonight when we saw a draft version of her film we were just blown away. It is so powerful and people need to see this film. Please go to the Noho Hewa website to learn about the project and make a donation. It’s not often that we all have a chance to help bring something so good and relevant to completion!

Goodnight. ~ pinky

My friend told me about this video, Food Fight. Very imaginative…

My favorite part is when the one shishkabob hits the other shishkabob!

I don’t get the ending though - anybody know what it means? (the bugs) Please let me know if you figured it out.

Go here to see what countries all the different foods represent.

Posted by Kim.

[ note from Bunny: I don’t like this video. I mean, it’s definitely very clever and I can appreciate that aspect, but there’s just too many problems with the historical perspective being presented. Just one example: I think if you show Palestinian suicide bombers, at the very least you also should include the ridiculously unjust UN partition of 1947, massive land grabs by the Israelis in 1948 and 1967, and ongoing attacks on civilian Palestinians with missiles, tanks, and helicopters. ]

[ Kim: ?!? Bunny - it’s animated food! ]

[ Bunny: I know it’s food, but I’m making a point. Most Americans don’t know anything about the Palestine-Israel conflict except what the mainstream media feeds them. And in our biased media presentations the historical context of Israeli state terrorism and land seizure is always left out, or at best, grossly misrepresented. That’s how Palestinians wearing bombs on their bodies become ‘terrorists’ while Israelis driving their tanks over Palestinian families are only ‘preserving national security’. This kind of history lesson reinforces racism against Palestinians, even if it is presented in an imaginative or funny way. ]

[ Kim: How are you supposed to represent the 1947 UN partition with play-acting food??? Anyway this video is not a historical dissertation on the Palestine-Israel conflict! It covers WWII to the present in less than 6 minutes! ]

[ Bunny: Yes it’s short but it IS a history of sorts and millions of people are going to watch it. And they are going to learn something from it. I also don’t think I’d be so critical of it if it weren’t loaded with so many real historical details. All those ‘inside jokes’ lend a kind of historical authority to the presentation, and I think that’s why it comes off as being funny. All I’m saying is given the reality of Palestinian oppression and vilification, I wish the creators of this very well-made video had thought more about the implications of siding with the dominant American perspective. ]

[ Kim: How do you know they didn’t think about it? Maybe they did consider the implications and they still decided to make it like this on purpose. ]

[ Bunny: Okay, I agree - that’s entirely possible too. If they’re consciously trying to cultivate a greater misunderstanding of the Palestine-Israel conflict, and essentially, racism against Palestinians, then I think they’re doing their part. ]

[ Kim: Whatevers. I think you have done your part to make this video lose its funniness. ]

[ Bunny: Why can’t a video be problematic and funny at the same time? ]

[ Kim: WHATEVERS!!! ]

[ from Mimi: I think the ending just means that after human beings annihilate each other, the bugs will clean up the mess. That’s my guess. ]

Today President Bush participated in a video conference with military and civilian personnel engaged in the ongoing occupation (six years and counting) of Afghanistan. During the discussion, which was organized to address the many humanitarian, socio-political, economic, and military crises still raging in that country, President Bush made a series of remarks that I can only characterize as ‘borderline insane’:

“I must say, I’m a little envious… If I were slightly younger and not employed here, I think it would be a fantastic experience to be on the front lines of helping this young democracy succeed. It must be exciting for you … in some ways romantic, in some ways, you know, confronting danger. You’re really making history, and thanks.”

I have no comment other than my characterization. ~ pinky

[ note from Bunny: Why ‘borderline’…? ]

[ Kim: I believe the clinical term is ‘psycho’. ]

The first Winter Soldier hearings were organized by Vietnam Veterans Against the War (VVAW) in January/February 1971. At those hearings over a hundred fifty U.S. military veterans of that war testified publicly about war crimes and other atrocities against the Vietnamese people that they had either participated in or personally witnessed. Initially largely ignored by the mainstream media as the hearings were going on in Detroit, Winter Soldier would eventually play an important role in the transformation of Americans’ consciousness regarding the systemically criminal nature of that colonial war in Southeast Asia.

And now, thirty seven years after the first, there is a second Winter Soldier event being held at Silver Spring, Maryland. This time the U.S. military veterans coming forward with their first-hand experiences of war crimes and atrocities are recently back from Iraq and Afghanistan. The event is being organized by Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW).

As expected, the mainstream media has (again) largely ignored the event. A quick scan of today’s CNN, New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and a few other big papers’ websites don’t mention the hearings on their front pages.

On the internet though, the testimonies will be archived at the IVAW website; so you’ll be able to watch them there. Today Democracy Now! had a good story on Winter Soldier (including a brief interview with two Vietnam War veterans; one testified at the original 1971 hearings), and The Real News Network will be posting excerpts from Silver Spring for the duration of the event (click here to view the intro video to the series). Please help spread the word about this very important event.

Okay, goodbye for now, I need to get to bed. Can’t seem to rid myself of this nasty cold… ~ pinky

P.S. Thank you to Brian Koontz for reminding me to post this information.

[ note from Bunny: Free Speech TV is also broadcasting the hearings live. ]

[ Pinky again: Brian just sent me links to the Winter Soldier documentary (1972): Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9. ]

[ Kim, 3/15: I found a story about Winter Soldier in the Washington Post (it’s in Section B though) and there’s also a story in the Boston Herald.  The media blackout continues in the big ones - NYT, LAT, CNN, etc. ]

This is a good video I found at YouTube, I hope everybody watches it. It was made by AFSC (American Friends Service Committee - I really like those guys).

This internet video was posted by Kim.

On anniversaries like today, people tend to produce lots of numbers in an attempt to understand and reflect upon the situation. I respect numbers, but I have to admit, more often than not I have to really stare at a numerical figure for a long time before it begins to have real meaning for me.

For example, today I read (NYT article) that Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph E. Stiglitz estimates the total cost of the Iraq War at “more than four trillion dollars.” But what is four trillion dollars? I can’t really relate to that - I mean, to me, $1,000 is already a lot of money. You can write it out:

$4,000,000,000,000.00

That’s a lot of zeros. Four trillion is the same as saying four thousand billion dollars. Or four million million dollars. Wow.

But even more ‘wow’ for me was the discrepancy between this total and the Bush administration’s pre-war estimate. Before the war started, President Bush and friends said they thought it would cost between $50 and $60 billion dollars to invade Iraq, overthrow their government, and replace it with something we like better. $50~$60 billion vs. $4 trillion - that’s not close. How far off were the President’s men? Well, the difference between the two is like this: say you go to a deli and order a tomato sandwich. The sandwich guy says, “Sure, that’ll be $5 or $6 dollars.” (it’s an estimate - has to see how many tomatoes he’s going to put in it before he comes up with the final price; he’s not psychic you know) So he makes that sandwich and then when he’s done he hands it to you and says “That’ll be $400.” Proportionately speaking, that’s the same difference. So like I said, $60 million and $4 trillion are not close.

Another number-oriented piece of information I’ve encountered a few times today: since the beginning of the invasion in 2003, approximately 4,000 U.S. military personnel have died in Iraq. 4,000 people! But U.S. newspapers and television news hardly seem to mention the war dead anymore - it’s almost as if they’ve gotten used to the idea and moved on. But what does this mean - “4,000 people”? Invisible to the public or not, this number can be stated in the most brutal terms:

• All together the bodies of the dead would weigh about 360 tons.

• Their brains alone would weigh over 5 tons.

• Laid end to end, their bodies would extend beyond 77 football fields; almost 4 and 1/2 miles.

• The blood from 4,000 people would fill 10 large tanker trucks.

If you want to know the human cost for Iraqis, multiply the above by a factor of about 250.

We need to find an alternative to war culture, and war vision.

~ pinky

[ Bunny: Pinky forgot to mention that all the calculations were by me. ]

[ Pinky: Sorry about that - yes, that was all Bunny. ]

[ Bunny: For those of you who asked, here’s an example tanker truck. ]

I received a letter from someone at the Jonah House today. In her letter she spoke about nuns living in their community who had been in prison for their peace actions. I just sent a letter back; hopefully we’ll be able coordinate some kind of interview or something.

I went to their website (www.jonahhouse.org) to do a bit of background reading and among other things (there is a lot to digest there) I came across a list of political prisoners, most of whom are being held here in the United States. For example:

Ft. Huachuca Witness:
Stephen Kelly (out March 2008)
Louis Vitale (out March 2008)

Cuban Five:
Gerardo Hernandez (life)
Fernando González Llort (out 04-20-2015)
Ramón Labañino Salazar (life)
René González (out 10-07-2011)
Antonio Guerrero (life)

Nuclear Resisters:
Helen Woodson (out 09-09-2011)

Native American Political Prisoner:
Leonard Peltier

Other political prisoners:
Igor Sutyagin (15 years, Russia)
Dr. Rafil Dhafir (out 04-26-2022)
Lori Berenson
Brendan Walsh (five years, out 7/15/08)
Mumia Abu-Jamal
Marilyn Buck (out 2/8/2011)

I read Leonard Peltier’s and Mumia Abu-Jamal’s prison writings a while ago, but still don’t know much about political prisoners. Actually, I just remembered: the first time I saw a “Free Mumia!” poster I thought to myself “What’s mumia and where can I get some?” It’s embarrassing to say but I guess it’s fairly indicative of how ignorant most of us are regarding political prisoners since the powers that be like to make believe that they somehow cease to exist once they are locked up.

One thing that I really liked about the above list is that it includes contact information for most of the people listed. So for example if you wanted to write a letter to Leonard Peltier, here is his address:

Leonard Peltier (#89637-132)
Lewisberg USP
P.O. Box 1000
Lewisberg, PA 17837

Somehow when I see addresses listed I feel like I need to start writing letters. As of today Mr. Peltier has done 11,739 days of illegal imprisonment. That’s over 32 years.

~ pinky

[ note from Bunny: Pinky and I had dinner with our friends Dean and Heijin last night. Dean said something like “If you really were a good citizen, everything you do would be illegal.” I’m sure I have the wording a little wrong, but I think that’s the basic idea. Think about it. ]

I’m always fascinated by how powerful people go about doing their history-changing business. I like news stories like the one below (60 Minutes, Inside the Bush White House, 2004) because they offer a nice little peek behind the closed doors of the White House.

Like, did you know that in January 2001, President Bush’s National Security Council was already trying to figure out how justify a U.S. overthrow of the Iraqi government, the best plan for occupying Iraq, and (my favorite part) how to award worldwide contracts for Iraqi oil? [3:40] No? How about this - does anybody still remember that in 1999/2000 then-presidential candidate George W. Bush ran a campaign platform that was critical of the Clinton administration’s excessive use of foreign interventionism and nation building? [6:10] Oooh the irony…

Actually, the real reason why I’m writing a diary entry today is because I’m testing a new interface that’s supposed to make it easier for us to post videos in this blog. If it works good then maybe we’ll post and discuss more videos from now on. Here’s the video.

- Bunny