"The Quiet Death Of Freedom"

[kpete]

The Quiet Death Of Freedom
Submitted by davidswanson on Fri, 2006-01-06 00:03. Media
By John Pilger

01/05/06 "ICH" -- -- On Christmas Eve, I dropped in on Brian Haw, whose hunched, pacing figure was just visible through the freezing fog. For four and a half years, Brian has camped in Parliament Square with a graphic display of photographs that show the terror and suffering imposed on Iraqi children by British policies. The effectiveness of his action was demonstrated last April when the Blair government banned any expression of opposition within a kilometre of Parliament. The High Court subsequently ruled that, because his presence preceded the ban, Brian was an exception.

Day after day, night after night, season upon season, he remains a beacon, illuminating the great crime of Iraq and the cowardice of the House of Commons. As we talked, two women brought him a Christmas meal and mulled wine. They thanked him, shook his hand and hurried on. He had never seen them before. "That's typical of the public," he said. A man in a pin-striped suit and tie emerged from the fog, carrying a small wreath. ""I intend to place this at the Cenotaph and read out the names of the dead in Iraq," he said to Brian, who cautioned him: "You'll spend the night in cells, mate." We watched him stride off and lay his wreath. His head bowed, he appeared to be whispering. Thirty years ago, I watched dissidents do something similar outside the walls of the Kremlin.

As night had covered him, he was lucky. On 7 December, Maya Evans, a vegan chef aged 25, was convicted of breaching the new Serious Organised Crime and Police Act by reading aloud at the Cenotaph the names of 97 British soldiers killed in Iraq. So serious was her crime that it required 14 policemen in two vans to arrest her. She was fined and given a criminal record for the rest of her life.



Freedom is dying.This cannot change until we, in the west, look in the mirror and confront the true aims and narcissism of the power applied in our name: its extremes and terrorism. The traditional double-standard no longer works; there are now millions like Brian Haw, Maya Evans, John Catt and the man in the pin-striped suit, with his wreath. Looking in the mirror means understanding that a violent and undemocratic order is being imposed by those whose actions are little different from the actions of fascists. The difference used to be distance. Now they are bringing it home.



http://www.afterdowningstreet.org/?q=node/6419

[punpirate]

1. Wish we had a few...

... John Pilgers, Robert Fisks and George Monbiots in this country, to go along with the Robert Parrys and Robert Scheers and Molly Ivinses. *sigh*