Human Rights Activists

"As former Nuremberg prosecutor Benjamin Ferencz told NPR a week after 9/11: "It is never a legitimate response to punish people who are not responsible for the wrong done... We must make a distinction between punishing the guilty and punishing others..." And yet here we are, 17 years later...bombing ever more "nations, organizations, (and) persons" who had absolutely nothing to do with the crimes committed on September 11."

"Trump: Withdrawing from #Syria, good. Withdrawing from #Afghanistan, good. Staying in Iraq? No! Bring the troops home."

"In recent budget negotiations, Senate Democrats agreed to a boost in military spending that exceeded the cap for fiscal 2018 by $70 billion, bringing the total request to an enormous $716 billion... more Pentagon contracts will be awarded to private corporations that use endless war to line their pockets... If neither major political party will stand up to this status quo, what can be done? One answer might be found in the recent push to divest from fossil fuel companies undertaken by, among others, Norway and New York City. By December of 2016, 688 institutions, representing over $5 trillion in assets, had divested from fossil fuels... Author Naomi Klein described the fossil fuel divestment effort as “a process of delegitimizing” the sector and of affirming that it yields “odious profits.” An analogous campaign to delegitimize beneficiaries of war is long overdue."

"You might think that McCain, who suffered tremendously in Vietnam, might be more sensitive to Kissinger’s role in prolonging that war. From 1969 through 1973, it was Kissinger, along with President Nixon, who oversaw the slaughter in Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos — killing perhaps one million during this period. He gave the order for the secret bombing of Cambodia. Kissinger is on tape saying, "[Nixon] wants a massive bombing campaign in Cambodia. He doesn't want to hear anything about it. It's an order, to be done. Anything that flies on anything that moves." Senator McCain could have...[read] the meticulously researched book by the late writer Christopher Hitchens, The Trial of Henry Kissinger. Writing as a prosecutor before an international court of law, Hitchens skewers Kissinger for ordering or sanctioning the destruction of civilian populations, the assassination of “unfriendly” politicians and the kidnapping and disappearance of soldiers, journalists and clerics who got in his way. He holds Kissinger responsible for war crimes... from the deliberate mass killings of civilian populations in Indochina, to collusion in mass murder and assassination in Bangladesh, the overthrow of the democratically elected government in Chile, and the incitement and enabling of genocide in East Timor. McCain could have also perused the warrant issued by French Judge Roger Le Loire to have Kissinger appear before his court. When the French served Kissinger with summons in 2001 at the Ritz Hotel in Paris, Kissinger fled the country. More indictments followed from Spain, Argentina, Uruguay — even a civil suit in Washington DC."

"In addition to pressuring our members of Congress to refuse campaign donations from weapons manufacturers and war profiteers, we must mount a divestment effort at the institutional and municipal level. Investment in war must come at the cost of public disgrace... Divestment offers an alternate means of addressing the blight of war profiteering in an era in which traditional political routes have been closed by our craven representatives. It also brings the message into smaller communities–communities that crumble while defense contractors live in luxury...A new coalition of about 70 groups... has formed to launch a Divest From the War Machine campaign"

"President José Mujica of Uruguay, a 78-year-old former Marxist guerrilla who spent 14 years in prison, mostly in solitary confinement, recently visited the United States to meet with President Obama and speak at a variety of venues. He told Obama that Americans should smoke less and learn more languages. He lectured a roomful of businessmen at the US Chamber of Commerce about the benefits of redistributing wealth and raising workers' salaries. He told students at American University that there are no “just wars.” Whatever the audience, he spoke extemporaneously and with such brutal honesty that it was hard not to love the guy...Mujica’s influence goes far beyond that of the leader of a tiny country of only 3 million people. In a world hungry for alternatives, the innovations that he and his colleagues are championing have put Uruguay on the map as one of the world’s most exciting experiments in creative, progressive governance."

"A very angry Senator John McCain denounced CODEPINK activists as "low-life scum" for holding up signs reading "Arrest Kissinger for War Crimes" and dangling handcuffs next to Henry Kissinger's head during a Senate hearing on January 29. McCain called the demonstration "disgraceful, outrageous and despicable," accused the protesters of "physically intimidating" Kissinger and apologized profusely to his friend for this "deeply troubling incident." But if Senator McCain was really concerned about physical intimidation, perhaps he should have conjured up the memory of the gentle Chilean singer/songwriter Victor Jara. After Kissinger facilitated the September 11, 1973 coup against Salvador Allende that brought the ruthless Augusto Pinochet to power, Victor Jara and 5,000 others were rounded up in Chile’s National Stadium. Jara’s hands were smashed and his nails torn off; the sadistic guards then ordered him to play his guitar. Jara was later found dumped on the street, his dead body riddled with gunshot wounds and signs of torture... Rather than calling peaceful protesters "despicable", perhaps Senator McCain should have used that term to describe Kissinger’s role in the brutal 1975 Indonesian invasion of East Timor, which took place just hours after Kissinger and President Ford visited Indonesia. They had given the Indonesian strongman the US green light—and the weapons—for an invasion that led to a 25-year occupation in which over 100,000 soldiers and civilians were killed or starved to death. The UN's Commission for Reception, Truth and Reconciliation in East Timor (CAVR) stated that U.S. "political and military support were fundamental to the Indonesian invasion and occupation" of East Timor."

"March 19 marks 15 years since the U.S.-UK invasion of Iraq in 2003, and the American people have no idea of the enormity of the calamity the invasion unleashed. The U.S. military has refused to keep a tally of Iraqi deaths. General Tommy Franks, the man in charge of the initial invasion, bluntly told reporters, “We don’t do body counts.” One survey found that most Americans thought Iraqi deaths were in the tens of thousands. But our calculations, using the best information available, show a catastrophic estimate of 2.4 million Iraqi deaths since the 2003 invasion. The number of Iraqi casualties is not just a historical dispute, because the killing is still going on today. Since several major cities in Iraq and Syria fell to Islamic State in 2014, the U.S. has led the heaviest bombing campaign since the American War in Vietnam, dropping 105,000 bombs and missiles and reducing most of Mosul and other contested Iraqi and Syrian cities to rubble."

"Right now, is a very difficult time, and there are many people who would be our counterparts in Iran who are in prison. But as you say, the U.S. has put forward a very misguided view of Iran. First of all, they always say it’s the number one state sponsor of terrorism in the world. And when we hear that, we should just say, “Stop, no, not true.” And then, in terms of internally in Iran, there are more avenues for women, for example, to study, to work. We are connected with a group of women business people that have enormous businesses. They have their own, very large factories, their own farms, their own–I’m friends with a woman who is an architect of some of the largest dams in the country. So that’s sort of something that you don’t hear about, that women are so actively involved in the economy. There is a myth that the Jewish population is such a repressed population. Being a member of the Jewish community and an American, when I first went to Iran I was very concerned about being both. And as soon as you said that to people, there went, “Oh, first of all, we love America.” And it is a very pro-American population. And then, they love Jews. And it’s funny, whether it’s among these religious Iranians, they’re saying, “Oh, we have so much in common between our religions,”..."

"The Pentagon budget is out of control. It’s been out of control since after World War II. And then especially since after 9/11 and the war on terrorism has been an excuse to keep building up and building up and building up the Pentagon budget. Even Trump himself said the other day that the Pentagon budget was out of control. But then he goes and he asked for more money for the Pentagon. So...if you add in things like the veterans’ issues and the Energy Department that deals with nuclear weapons, over a trillion dollars that we spend every year on militarism. And that’s where we have to address how we can pull money out of the Pentagon, not affect our safety and security; in fact, make us safer, because we will [not] be antagonizing so many other countries with endless wars."

"Let’s take one issue alone, and that’s U.S. military bases overseas, for example. There are over 800 U.S. military bases. The vast majority of them are serving no national security purpose. They’re relics of World War II. Why do we need dozens of military bases in Germany, in Italy? We have them in Korea now, where there’s peace talks in Korea, and yet we still have dozens of military bases. In fact, over 80 of them."

"Trump had been calling for better relations with Russia during his presidential campaign... Stooping to a new low, Friday’s (New York) Times headline screamed: “F.B.I. Opened Inquiry Into Whether Trump Was Secretly Working on Behalf of Russia.” For those interested in evidence — or the lack of it— regarding collusion between Russia and the presidential campaign of Donald Trump, we can thank the usual Russia-gate promoters at The New York Times and CNN for inadvertently filling in some gaps in recent days....NYT readers had to get down to paragraph 9 to read: “No evidence has emerged publicly that Mr. Trump was secretly in contact with or took direction from Russian government officials.”"

"Outgoing Defense Secretary Gen. James “Mad Dog” Mattis was famous for quipping, “It’s fun to shoot some people.” It remains a supreme irony that Mattis was widely considered the only “adult in the room” in the Trump administration. Compared to whom? John Bolton, the rabid neocon serving as national security adviser? That would be the epitome of “condemning with faint praise.”"

"If you are wondering why so little is heard these days of accusations that Russia hacked into the U.S. election in 2016, it could be because those charges could not withstand close scrutiny. It could also be because special counsel Robert Mueller appears to have never bothered to investigate what was once the central alleged crime in Russia-gate... Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity — including two “alumni” who were former National Security Agency technical directors — have long since concluded that Julian Assange did not acquire what he called the “emails related to Hillary Clinton” via a “hack” by the Russians or anyone else. They found, rather, that he got them from someone with physical access to Democratic National Committee computers who copied the material onto an external storage device — probably a thumb drive. In December 2016 VIPS explained this in some detail in an open Memorandum to President Barack Obama. Clinton’s PR chief... later admitted that she golf-carted around to various media outlets at the convention with instructions “to get the press to focus on... the prospect that Russia had not only hacked and stolen emails from the DNC, but that it had done so to help Donald Trump and hurt Hillary Clinton.” The diversion worked like a charm. Mainstream media kept shouting “The Russians did it,” and gave little, if any, play to the DNC skullduggery revealed in the emails themselves. And like Brer’ Fox, Bernie [Sanders] didn’t say nothin’."

"Mattis was simply incapable of acknowledging the self-destructive, mindless nature of U.S. “endless war” in the Middle East, which candidate-Trump had correctly called “stupid.” In his resignation letter, Mattis also peddled the usual cant about the indispensable nation’s aggression being good for the world."

"Now, a couple days later he’s talking about the strategic relationship and somebody says, Now, Mr. Putin—this is in an interview...six days later—somebody says, Hey, listen, Mr. Putin...would you destroy the whole world? If there were a first strike on Russia, would you really respond? It would be too late to save Russia.... Look, He says, yes, this would be a global catastrophe, but “as a citizen of Russia and as the head of the Russian state, I ask, What need will we have for a world if there was no Russia?” So he’s saying, Look, you’ve got to take this stuff seriously. Yes, we would retaliate, even if it meant that the rest of the world would be blown up as well as Russia."

"Mattis was an obstacle to Trump’s desire to pull troops out of Syria and Afghanistan (and remains in position to spike Trump’s orders). Granted, the abrupt way Trump announced his apparently one-man decision was equally stupid. But withdrawal of ground troops is supremely sane, and Mattis was and is a large problem. And, for good or ill, Trump — not Mattis — was elected president."

"Two days later, four senior senators, okay, three Democrats—let’s see if I can remember them — Feinstein, Wyden, the fellow up there in Massachusetts, and Bernie Sanders—they issue a call, a letter to then Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, Look, this is really getting out of hand. We don’t like the fact that Putin is brandishing these weapons that we really haven’t ever heard of before, but he’s calling for arms control talks, so let’s talk. Let’s talk. Guess what? That appeal appeared on all those four senators’ websites but was totally—totally—ignored by what passes for the mainstream media. So one suspects that this is an unwelcome subject, and there is proof positive...we're talking about four senior senators appealing for arms control talks on their websites but it never getting past their websites, no publicity for it. I’m thinking that Chuck Schumer said, No, no. Arms control, no, no... Don’t mention arms control talks. So that’s the reality in the mainstream media."

"And what I’m trying to say is, Putin’s looking at all this. He knows who “the crazies” are and he knows that Bolton has a lot of influence. So this is a very destabilizing thing, because when the Russians keep telling us, Look, we’ve got these new weapons, well, you know, the press says, Ah, they’re faking it, they’re probably faking it. You know, I don’t know if they’re faking it or not. But, my God, if we knew about all this, why is it not in the annual intelligence briefing that is given to both the House and to the Senate early each year? It’s missing. All we get is rhetoric about how bad the Russians are, just as if they were the old Soviet Union, ideologically determined to bury us."

"The U.S. Constitution and international law suffered a stinging blow last night at the hands of an odd coalition... As was the case 15 years ago when the U.S. and UK launched a war of aggression against Iraq, the pretext was so-called “weapons of mass destruction” (WMD) — this time the claimed use on April 7 of chlorine (and maybe the nerve agent sarin — who knows?) in Duma a suburb of Damascus... The attacks by the Gang of Three came hours before specialists from the UN Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons were to arrive in Syria to study soil and other samples in Duma. The question leaps out: Why could the Gang not wait until the OPCW had a chance to find out whether there was such an attack and, if so, what chemical(s) were used? U.S. Defense Secretary James Mattis could only say that he believes there was a chemical attack and that perhaps sarin, in addition to chlorine, was involved. Serving until now as the only available “evidence” are highly dubious reports from agenda-laden “social media.” What is clear is that the U.S./UK/French Gang wanted to strike before the OPCW investigators had a chance to ascertain what happened. Hmm. All the earmarks of “Sentence first; verdict afterwards.”"

"Let me just start with Putin’s major address... It was really something. Not only did he advertise a whole new generation of strategic weaponry, which he claimed, and no one has disproved, would render the billions of dollars that we have wasted on antiballistic missile defenses useless. They’re useless to begin with, most scientists and engineers say, but these new weapons that he advertised, and some of which he said are operational, would upend that... he also said, Now, we tried to get you to listen to us. You wouldn’t listen to us. Now, hopefully, you will listen to us. Let’s get together at the appropriate time with experts and figure out how we address these problems, in other words, talks on arms control..."

"The Aquarian Age will be the age of right relationship, the age of reason, the age of brotherhood and love. This right relationship, of which reason, brotherhood and love are the expression, will be right relationship between all the kingdoms: between Man and his Source, which is Reality or God, however you envisage God; between man and man; and between man and the animal, vegetable and mineral kingdoms."

"Very soon, the nations of the world will realize that all political systems have much in common. There is a similarity of intention in America, Russia and Britain for instance (Britain representing the Commonwealth of Nations; Britain in Europe represents a larger body of thinking along the same lines). They are not identical but there is a wide common ground and that common ground will find its expression in the transition of each of their political systems into something which will not be identical - there is no reason at all why each nation should have exactly the same political system - but they will grow into a kind of relationship which makes coexistence not only possible but natural and inevitable. The acceptance of the principle of sharing will make this inevitable. p. 175"

"There are two kinds of thoughtforms: those which are mental and those which are the result of man's fears - these are unreal. But they become real, because every thought is real. Even if it is an astral thoughtform, it is still a potent force although it has no essential reality."

"All the kingdoms will come into a very active, dynamic relationship as humanity comes, more and more, into a conscious relationship with the next kingdom, above the human - the Spiritual Kingdom or the Kingdom of Souls, which is made up of the Masters and initiates in the Hierarchy. Through the teaching of the Masters and through the grounding in the human consciousness of the Plan which issues from Shamballa, mankind will come to realize his true destiny, which is to act as a great clearing house for energies flowing through him to the lower kingdoms. So he will see that he has a great responsibility, on the planet, to the other kingdoms in Nature, and a change in his relationship to the animal kingdom will take place. p. 193"

"What is happening at present is that the forces of evil are fighting a last-ditch stand, because they know that with the Christ and the Hierarchy in the world they are doomed. They are going to be sealed off to their own domain for 3,000 years, and they will not be able to affect mankind in the same way. Hence their present desperate fight to foment, as potently as they can, this fear reflex in mankind. They work through fear. They work mostly on the physical and astral planes, but also on the lower mental planes. They create fear, anxiety and chaos. They are doing this by focusing their attention on and stimulating these thoughtforms of destruction and catastrophe, so that they should become a reality. If mankind surrounds himself with a thoughtform potently enough, sooner or later he creates a situation in which that thoughtform works out. That is how our actions work out. p. 177"

"There is standing behind the Christ a great Avatar... It works only through groups; through the United Nations Assembly, through Hierarchy, through humanity as a group, ... through the New Group of World Servers; and it is bringing humanity together, making humanity One on the physical plane, which it already is on the inner plane."

"Another great entity standing behind the Christ is the Spirit of Peace or Equilibrium. He is overshadowing the Christ, in a very similar way to the way the Christ overshadowed and worked through the disciple Jesus in Palestine. He works very closely with the law of Action and Reaction, and His function is to transform the prevalent discord, confusion, chaos, turmoil in the world into its opposite, so that we shall enter an era of tranquility and peace - in exact proportion to the present discord."

"The violence and hatred of today will be transmuted into goodwill, and again, in exact proportion to the intensity of the hatred and violence. This is the great Law of Action and Reaction functioning. The law stated is that action and reaction are equal and opposite, and this great Cosmic Entity, the Spirit of Equilibrium, is working now through the Christ, producing the transformation of the world."

"Very soon we shall become aware that all political systems, without exception, are in a state of transition, more or less. All of them are changing, all of them are coming to a purer expression of the Hierarchical energy and the Divine intention which is behind them... All of them will shortly be seen to be in this state of transition, and therefore not so mutually exclusive as they now appear to be and a much greater world harmony will result from this. You will see very shortly the healing of the wounds between the nations. Over this coming year you will see things taking place which you would not have thought possible. There will be greater detente, greater synthesis."

"Inevitably, out of this change will come, generally, a vegetarian diet for mankind. This will be the norm. That is not to say that the eating of meat today by large masses of mankind is wrong. There is no single group diet today - one diet for all men. There are groups in the world today where the eating of meat is not only normal and right but essential... In time, when the true relationship between man and the lower kingdoms is seen, a more sane and balanced approach to diet will come about... Vegetarianism becomes the norm, becomes essential (but I do not mean to make that "essential" an imperative) for the man who seeks to take initiation; who is making a conscious effort to advance along the evolutionary path; who is taking a hand in his own evolution. At some point along that evolutionary path vegetarianism does become necessary. Not simply because it is 'wrong' to kill animals, but because the vibrational rate of the animal body, in particular the blood of the animal, is inimical to the higher vibrational rate which he is seeking to establish..."

"There is more in common between true democracy and true communism than there would seem to be today. What is called communism today, as it exists in Russia, China and the communist world, is in no sense true communism, but it is an evolving structure, moving towards a more perfect expression of the thoughtform as it exists in the Divine Mind; likewise with democracy."

"Russia has, fundamentally, the good of humanity at heart; has, at the basis of its approach to life, the idea that men are brothers. This is true despite the harsh and cruel imposition of a system where there is a lack of free speech, movement and belief. Despite that, fundamental to the Soviet people, is this belief that men are One, that humanity is One. And, basically, in the Chinese revolution is the same idea."

"Common sense is the great thing in all this. You eat what you find through a minimum requirement keeps your body healthy. Each individual and each group finds for itself the diet which suits its purposes, climate, tradition and background."

"When he comes into correct relationship to his brother and his Source, he will inherit that Divine Science, which is his birthright, but is known today only by the Masters of Wisdom."

"Whatever of significance happens in any country at all happens under the inspiration of Hierarchy. There is an entire department in the Hierarchy, the Department of the Manu, which deals with the politics of the world: the great movements of the races; the building of races; the forming of nations; the destiny of nations; the working out of the political, governmental and racial divisions of humanity."

"Great experiments are going on in China and Russia, America and Great Britain."

"Through the power of sound, man will build and create the artefacts of his civilization and control his environment, relating it to his real needs."

"Today, freedom from enforced activity; freedom from want; freedom from hunger; freedom to explore the nature of one's own Being; the freedom to create, is known to a relatively small number of people. It is the privileged few who have this kind of freedom. Most people work to earn enough money to keep themselves and their families, and the vast majority of the people in the world work at deadly, mechanical work which bears no relation to man's true nature, his creativeness... Some people, of course, enjoy their work immensely, and get a great emotional, mental and spiritual return in terms of energy from that work... It engages their creativity. But for the vast majority of mankind this is not so."

"In the future... The nature of work will change. We shall have to learn to live much more simply, not geared to this great mechanical civilization we have built around ourselves, especially in the industrialized West. The Christ and the Masters will show that we can live perfectly happily, even more happily, in a much simpler way, with fewer things. But those things will be beautiful. They will be made because they are needed, and they will be made with the creativeness of man behind them, whether they are man-made or machine-made."

"One of the most interesting today is what is happening in China... It is watched with extreme interest by Hierarchy, and could still go in many directions, well, or not so well. The changes which have taken place have had traumatic, chaotic effects in China, for example, the great Cultural Revolution. The kind of changes that I am envisaging, which will take place in the five centres at first, will take place without these traumatic effects; in the normal democratic way, by logical legislation and general agreement. All sections of society will take part, which will ensure the adoption of the various changes, whereas in China, and Russia, many of them were imposed. In America and Britain, today, many social changes are opposed by finance rather than by decree, but the result is the same."

"A completely new attitude will take place in relation to work."

"The Churches have gone very far away from the religion which the Christ inaugurated; which is to do with sharing, with love, with brotherhood and right relationship."

"The history of humanity really can be seen as the history of man's response to certain great ideas which are put into the mind-belt, into the mind of humanity... So it has been down through all the ages [...]"

"It is not primarily as a religious leader that He is coming. You may look for Him rather as an educationalist in the widest sense of the word, advocating changes in our political, economic and social life."

"He [the World Teacher] will show humanity the steps which it should take to regenerate itself, and to create a civilisation based on sharing, cooperation and goodwill, leading inevitably to world brotherhood."

"We do not have democracy today, true democracy. There is no true democracy in the world - not in China, Russia or Britain."

"He has never left the world, but for 2,000 years has waited and planned for this immediate future time, training His disciples, and preparing Himself for the awesome task which awaits Him..."

"The Masters of the Hierarchy are now ready to return, for the first time in countless thousands of years, to the everyday world... Under Their great leader, the Master of all the Masters, the World Teacher, the One known in the West as the Christ, the esoteric Hierarchy will walk openly among us and lead us into the Aquarian experience. They stand now, waiting for us to take, of our own free will, the needed first steps in the direction of unity, cooperation and fusion. Then They will emerge with the Christ at Their Head, and Their Presence in the world will be an established fact."

"The major area of concern in the immediate future will be the problem of leisure: how mankind will utilize the leisure which he will have. A great many people today, because of the world labour situation, have endless leisure. They do not want it, they do not want to be unemployed, but they have leisure. However, they have not been educated, for the most part, to use that leisure correctly. In this coming time, gradually (I am not talking about something that is going to happen overnight, but eventually) mankind will create machines which will do the work which today is done by the bulk of humanity. Mankind will be released into a state of leisure which will give him the opportunity to explore his own inner nature, to know what he really is, the great divine Being he really is, and allow him to manifest that quality."