Remembering Hope

[Minstrel Boy]

Posted to my blog here: http://rigorousintuition.blogspot.com/2004/10/remembering-hope.html

Remembering Hope

"We gonna charge, we gonna stomp, we gonna march through the swamp,
We gonna mosh through the marsh, take us right through the doors...."

Monday the 25th marked the second anniversary of the Wellstone crash. I recall watching the news break on CNN, and my dawning sense of dread that omigod, it's happened again. But then, two years ago, I was still prepared to concede the benefit of the doubt, that it probably was nothing but a terrible accident. I was, however, disgusted by many early responses to the news I read online, which amounted to the bullying dare, Nobody better suggest that it wasn't!

In the years since I've learned enough about the crash, and about Bush's America, to no longer make that concession. I now believe it much more likely that Senator Wellstone, his wife and daughter were political murder victims. And I'm pleased that Monday also marked the launch of American Assassination: The Strange Death of Senator Paul Wellstone, by professors James Fetzer and Four Arrows.

One of the ancillary offenses of political assassination is that the deaths of good people can come to eclipse their lives. Getting Wellstoned has entered our language, bitterly, to describe political murder disguised as accident. Undoubtedly Russians and Germans of wisdom and good conscience whispered similar neologisms to themselves in the 1930s and '40s.

It's all but certain that Paul Wellstone's killers will evade justice as surely as the Kennedys' and Dr King's. But with every terrible loss comes the small victory of added clarity: we know a little more of what the criminalized state is capable.

Fetzer and Four Arrows are right to call for an inquiry, but always we should remember that Wellstone's life is greater than his death. Wellstone is not encompassed by his Wellstoning. The legacy of his life is hope, and we ought to lift the shroud with which his killers draped it.

So then, on with hope.

Have you seen the "911 Truth Statement"? Take a look. Released Tuesday, and signed by 100 prominent Americans and 40 relatives of 9/11 victims, it demands immediate answers to 12 basic questions, including:

Why were the extensive missile batteries and air defenses reportedly deployed around the Pentagon not activated during the attack?

Why haven't authorities in the U.S. and abroad published the results of multiple investigations into trading that strongly suggested foreknowledge of specific details of the 9/11 attacks, resulting in tens of millions of dollars of traceable gains?

Why did the Bush administration cover up the fact that the head of the Pakistani intelligence agency was in Washington the week of 9/11 and reportedly had $100,000 wired to Mohamed Atta, considered the ringleader of the hijackers?

Most impressive is the list of signatories. It includes expected names such as Ed Asner, Catherine Austin Fitts, Daniel Ellsberg and Cynthia McKinney, but also prominent figures who have not had as high a profile on 9/11. Some of whom, undoubtedly, are publically identifying with the "9/11 truth movement" for the first time. Included are Ralph Nader, Janeane Garofalo, Mark Crispin Miller, Michael Parenti, Michelle Shocked and Howard Zinn.

With such names attached, 9/11 skepticism is well out of the shadows, albeit still on the margins. And a story such as the breaking report that at least three of the WTC planes' four black boxes were recovered, three years of official denial notwithstanding, is almost enough to make me expect justice, or something like it, someday.

But then along comes eminem, and makes me think today is that day.

If you haven't seen "Mosh," please do. Here's a page of links to the video, and here's a link to a direct download. This weekend, eminem is Saturday Night Live's musical guest.

This is the anthem for the last days. Whether of Bush's presidency or of America itself is yet to be determined. But the clock is ticking. And with the video's montage of "Bush Knew" headlines, and the cardboard bin Laden collapsing to reveal a chuckling Cheney and Rumsfeld on a soundstage, it appears eminem hears the ticking very well.

"Mosh" makes me think, for the first time in a long time - maybe since the Wellstone crash - that maybe, just maybe, they won't be able to steal this one.

And if they try....

"Mosh now - or die"

[seemslikeadream]

1. Homeskillet in the house, keepin' it real, reel to reel, sholda tha show

Slammin'!




I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America
And to the Republic for which it stands
One nation under God
Indivisible...
(With liberty and justice for all)
It feels so good to be back..

I scrutinize every word, memorize every line
I spit it once, refuel re-energize and rewind
I give sight to the blind, my insight through the mind
I exercise my right to express when I feel it's time
It's just all in your mind, what you interpret it as
I say to fight, you take it as I'mma whip someone's ass
If you don't understand, don't even bother to ask
A father who has grown up with a fatherless past
Who has blown up now to rap phenomenon that has
Or at least shows no difficulty multi-task
And in juggling both perhaps mastered his craft
Slash entrepreneur who has held onto few more rap acts
Who's had a few obstacles thrown his way through the last half
Of his career typical manure moving past that
Mr. kisses ass crack, he's a class act
Rubber band man, yea he just snaps back


Come along follow me as I lead through the darkness
As I provide just enough spark that we need to proceed
Carry on, give me hope, give me strength
Come with me and I won't steer you wrong
Put your faith and your trust as I guide us through the fog
To the light at the end of the tunnel
We gonna fight, we gonna charge, we gonna stomp, we gonna march
Through the swamp, we gonna mosh through the marsh
Take us right through the doors (c'mon)

All the people up top on the side and the middle
Come together let's all form and stomp just a little
Just let it gradually build from the front to the back
All you can see is a sea of people some white and some black
Don't matter what color, all that matters we gathered together
To celebrate for the same cause don't matter the weather
If it rains let it rain, yeah the wetter the better
They ain't gonna stop us they can't, we stronger now more than ever
They tell us no we say yeah, they tell us stop we say go
Rebel with a rebel yell, raise hell we gonna let em know
Stomp, push, shove, mush, Fuck Bush, until they bring our troops home (c'mon)

Come along follow me as I lead through the darkness
As I provide just enough spark that we need to proceed
Carry on, give me hope, give me strength
Come with me and I won't steer you wrong
Put your faith and your trust as I guide us through the fog
To the light at the end of the tunnel
We gonna fight, we gonna charge, we gonna stomp, we gonna march
Through the swamp, we gonna mosh through the marsh
Take us right through the doors (c'mon)

Imagine it pouring, it's raining down on us
Mosh pits outside the oval office
Someone's tryina tell us something,
Maybe this is god just sayin' we're responsible
For this monster, this coward,
That we have empowered
This is Bin Laden, look at his head noddin'
How could we allow something like this without pumping our fists
Now this is our final hour
Let me be the voice in your strength and your choice
Let me simplify the rhyme just to amplify the noise
Try to amplify the times it, and multiply by six...
Teen million people, Are equal at this high pitch
Maybe we can reach Al Queda through my speech
Let the president answer a higher anarchy
Strap him with an AK-47, let him go, fight his own war
Let him impress daddy that way
No more blood for oil, we got our own battles to fight on our own soil
No more psychological warfare, to trick us to thinking that we ain't loyal
If we don't serve our own country, we're patronizing a hero
Look in his eyes its all lies
The stars and stripes, they've been swiped, washed out and wiped
And replaced with his own face, Mosh now or die
If I get sniped tonight you know why,
Cause I told you to fight.

Come along follow me as I lead through the darkness
As I provide just enough spark that we need to proceed
Carry on, give me hope, give me strength
Come with me and I won't steer you wrong
Put your faith and your trust as I guide us through the fog
To the light at the end of the tunnel
We gonna fight, we gonna charge, we gonna stomp, we gonna march
Through the swamp, we gonna mosh through the marsh
Take us right through the doors (c'mon)

And as we proceed,
To Mosh through this desert storm,
In these closing statements, if they should argue
Let us beg to differ
As we set aside our differences
And assemble our own army
To disarm this Weapon of Mass Destruction
That we call our President, for the present
And Mosh for the future of our next generation
To speak and be heard
Mr. President, Mr. Senator
Do you guy's hear us...hear us... (Hailie)

Toa, MB