NYSE Euronext - Deutsch Borse Shouldn't Be Allowed

  On Tuesday, February 15th, NYSE Euronext and Deutsche Borse announced that they were planning on merging the two markets. One of the problems with the agreements is the massive consolidation of these stock exchanges. Another problem is the loss of control of NYSE Euronext with the merger. In the proposed merger, the German Deutsche Borse would get acontrolling 60% share of the merged company.

  In 2008, the market capitalization value of NYSE Euronext was valued at $16.7 trillion, while the market capitalization value of Deutsche Borse was valued at $36 billion. Given the massive difference in the size and value between NYSE Euronext and Deutsche Borse, the Deutsche Borse should not be getting majority control of the vastly larger NYSE Euronext.
  It is even more problematic as a nation with the possible loss of control of the NYSE. The German stock exchanges and regulatory rules and regulations are quite different from the U.S. The German government has much greater direct governmental influence andcontrol over their stock exchange. Their reporting and regulatory rules are much less transparent, open, and stringent than that required by the U.S. government. There is no valid or beneficial reason for U.S. citizens or NYSE Euronext shareholders to allow Germany's Deutsch Borse to take over NYSE Euronext.
  As well, German companies have a poor history in relation to mergers with other countrys' companies. In the case of the U.S. company, Chrysler, Daimler Benz, in what it claimed was a "merger of equals" took over Chrysler Corporation. The claims that it was a merger of equals turned out to be fraudulent as a U.S. court later found against Daimler Benz. However, Daimler Benz had already appropriated the larger and more capitalized Chrysler Corporation and began pulling capital illegally from the company. Daimler Benz dumped Chrysler after taking it's capital, taking it off the U.S. stock exchange so it couldn't recapitalize as a U.S. company, and dumped it into the private equity firm Cerberus, leaving it bankrupt, with the U.S. government and U.S. taxpayers having to pick up the pieces. The NYSE Euronext is the primary U.S. stock exchange and it is important that the U.S. keep control of it's own stock exchange. There is no reason for the NYSE Euronext to be sold to Deutsche Borse and it shouldn't be allowed

Genetic engineering of salmon a threat to the species

  On Tuesday, January 18th, Senator Mark Begich (D-AK), addressing the Marine Science Symposium in Anchorage, Alaska said that one of his top priorities in this congressional session would be legislation to stop the FDA from approving the sale of genetically-engineered salmon (GE) fish for human consumption.
  As the FDA decides whether to allow AquaBounty’s genetically engineered salmon to be sold in the United States, there are increasing concerns from a number of sources about the safety and reasons for the genetic alteration of salmon as a food source and the genetic engineering of animals overall for food and medicine.
  AquaBounty’s genetically altered salmon which adds a growth hormone from a Chinook salmon and a gene from an eel like fish, the ocean pout, causing the salmon to grow more quickly, is the first submission for approval for sale of genetically engineered animals for food in the United States. It is assumed that the approval by the FDA will open the floodgates to a large number of genetically engineered animals being produced for use as food or medicines. AquaBounty also is currently developing a genetically engineered trout and a genetically engineered tilapia. Companies in the U.S. and other countries are working to develop other genetically engineered fish as well as cows and pigs.
  The FDA has received an outpouring of negative response from politicians, the scientific community and the public, concerned about possible FDA approval of the AquaBounty genetically engineered salmon and the genetic engineering of animals for food and medicine generally.
  Senator Begich, along with ten members of the Senate, and Congressmen Peter DeFazio (D-OR), Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) and Mike Thompson (D-CA), along with 29 members of the House of Representatives, sent separate letters to the FDA asking them to halt the approval, and to address the serious problems with the FDA’s approval process. Over 300 environmental and public health groups signed letters to the FDA opposing the approval.
  The FDA requested input from the National Academies of Science about possible science based concerns about the genetic engineering of animals. The National Academies of Science stated in their response, that in many of the genetically engineered animals, “the genetic engineering often resulted in unplanned anatomical, physiological or behavior abnormalities.”
  The FDA’s 2008 document regarding the commercial approval of genetically engineered animals, the “Guidance of Regulation of Genetically Engineered Animals”, resulted in almost 29,000 public comments in response. The FDA noted that of these comments, “the vast majority opposed the genetic engineering of animals.”
  Another issue that has been raised is the FDA’s classification of the genetically engineered salmon, and all other genetically engineered animals as a drug rather than a food product, although they are being sold as food products. This classification serves to bypass the regulatory requirement that forms the base for the FDA’s oversight of animals that will be used for food to monitor the animal’s health in order to assure the health of the U.S. food supply. The allowance of the genetic engineering of animals, which is more likely to harm the animal’s health and their suitability as a food source was one of the concerns that the FDA noted was raised in their public as well as scientific responses regarding the genetic engineering of animals. In addition, there are concerns that genetically engineered animals may cause allergic reactions in sensitive people.
  Calling them “Frankenfish”, Senator Begich likened the genetically engineered salmon to a “monster that threatens our wild stocks and their habitat, our food safety and economic harm to Alaska wild salmon fisherman.”
  The risk of the genetically engineered salmon threatening the native Atlantic salmon population is one of the greatest concerns about the approval of the genetically engineered salmon. AquaBounty stated in their application for approval to the FDA that they will use two containment methods to assure that the Alaska wild salmon population would not be at risk; sterilizing the genetically engineered salmon eggs that will be produced on Prince Edward Island in Canada, and physical containment where the fish will be grown in Panama.
  AquaBounty has stated that they would be complying with the regulatory guidelines of each country where they are involved. Although the Canadian government must be notified before any genetically engineered animals can be imported or commercially manufactured in Canada and an assessment done to assure that they are not a threat to the environment, Leo Broderick, vice chair of the Council of Canadians, as part of a larger coalition of public action groups in Prince Edward Island, said that neither AquaBounty nor Environment Canada have responded to requests as to whether an environmental risk assessment is being done. The group has asked Prince Edward Island Premier, Robert Ghiz, to press Environment Canada for more transparency.
  Even if the containment methods were being implemented fully, there are concerns about the effectiveness of both means of containment. The sterilization means of containment that AquaBounty will be using, Triploidy chromosomal sterilization, is less than 100% effective.
  The FDA is required to consult with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) in order to decide whether the approval would pose a danger to wild Atlantic salmon. In FSW documents made public in a Freedom of Information Act request, by the organization, Food and Water Watch, government officials expressed doubts that the containment methods will keep the genetically engineered salmon from threatening wild Atlantic salmon. They also raised other concerns about the genetic engineering of the salmon in general.
  The internal FSW documents questioned the FDA’s ability to decide about the threats to the native Atlantic salmon population, saying that the process presented a situation, “where FDA, whose jurisdiction is not focused on natural resources is entrusted with the authority to approve an application which poses such a threat to the country’s natural resources.”
  In a letter summing up it’s recommendations to the FDA, the FSW, noted that there were “several unknowns and uncertainties regarding possible genetic, ecological and environmental effects of AquaAdvantage salmon that must be elucidated before an environmental risk assessment can be thoroughly evaluated and approved.” Which, said the FSW, “suggests that the approval of AquaBounty Technologies’ request for commercial rearing of AquaAdvantage was premature.”

U.S. - Japan Security Agreement a Threat to U.S. Security?

  Chinese government officials have recently stated that that China was “strongly dissatisfied” with remarks that U.S. Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton made that appeared to take Japan’s side in an ongoing dispute between Japan with China and Taiwan over national sovereignty of a group of islands that Japan refers to as the Senkaku Islands and that China and Taiwan refer to as the Diaoyui Islands.
  The Chinese government remarks came in response to comments that Mrs. Clinton made in a recent meeting with Japan’s foreign minister, Seiji Maehara, when she said that the U.S. was committed to help Japan defend the island group against foreign attack under the terms of the U.S. security agreement with Japan.
  These comments are coming in response to actions that the Japanese government has taken in regard to the disputed islands that have heightened tensions in the region. As well, it calls into questions what obligations the U.S. has in fulfillment of the U.S. - Japan Security Agreement.
  Recent conflict over the islands started on September 7th when a Japanese Coast Guard patrol boat in the territorial waters surrounding the Senkaku Islands, collided with a Chinese fishing trawler that it was pursuing. The Japanese Coast Guard patrol stated that the reason for their pursuit of the trawler was to investigate possible illegal operations. After the collision, the Chinese trawler’s captain and crew were arrested by the Japanese Coast Guard’s patrol ship for interfering with official duties.
  In 1997, Japan and China signed a fisheries agreement allowing free passage and fishing rights to both nations in the waters surrounding the Senkaku Islands. The agreement was implemented in 2000. There have been both Chinese and Japanese fishermen in these waters since with no problems and no incidents.
  Since the 1997 fishing agreement gave fishing boats from both nations free passage in these waters, it was not explained by the Japanese government what legal rights or powers the Japanese Coast Guard had to pursue, detain or arrest the Chinese trawler’s crew in these contested waters. By doing so, the Japanese government granted itself legal territorial rights to an area that was in active dispute between Japan with China and Taiwan.
  Japan detained the arrested Chinese trawler captain for more than two weeks, resulting in diplomatic threats from China and the cancellation of official engagements between the two countries.
  Japan has also recently pressured the U.S. search engine company Google to take Japan’s side in the dispute over the islands, when in October, Japan’s Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) filed a protest with the company urging them to delete the Chinese name for the disputed islands from their mapping service. The LDP stated in its’ protest, “It is clearly wrong to list the names as if a territorial dispute exists with China in this area. We strongly call you to delete it as soon as possible."
  Asked about the LDP's move, the Japanese Foreign Minister, Seiji Maehara said, "The LDP's action was totally upright. If necessary, the Japanese government will also take action together,” stating that his ministry would lodge a protest with Google as well.
  The actions of the Japanese government in pressuring Google to recognize only Japan’s claim to sovereignty over these disputed islands calls into question the reason for the Japanese Coast Guard’s arrest of the Chinese fishing trawler that was legally fishing in these waters in accordance with an agreement signed by both countries. It also shows that the Japanese government is actively working to assert it’s claim of national sovereignty over these disputed islands. Japan is embroiling the U.S. in it’s dispute and the question is whether and why the U.S. should support Japan militarily in Japan’s assertive moves to claim sovereignty over islands who’s sovereignty have disputed with other nations.
  The roots of the dispute over sovereignty over these islands lie in their history. As a result of the 1894-1895 Sino-Japanese war, Japan gained control of the Senkakus from China.
  With the passage of the 1953 San Francisco Peace Treaty between the U.S. and Japan, the Diaoyui (Senkaku) Islands passed from Japanese to U.S. trusteeship administrative control, along with neighboring Okinawa.
  In the late 1960’s and early 1970’s , the Japanese government began calling for the reversion of Okinawa back to Japan, claiming that it was historically part of Japan.
  On June 17, 1971, the Okinawa Reversion Treaty was signed by the U.S. and Japan, which brought the Diaoyui Islands, along with Okinawa, under Japanese administrative control. Both China and Taiwan contested Japan’s right to control over the Diaoyui (Senkaku) Islands. At the time of the reversion of the islands back to Japanese control, the U.S. stated that it considered any conflicting claims to the islands to be a matter for resolution by the parties involved and not the United States.
  The Diaoyui (Senkaku) Islands are small uninhabited islands which have no economic value or significance except possible oil and gas reserves in the territorial waters around the islands. The territorial dispute over the islands was shelved between Japan and China, on Deng Xiaoping’s proposal, with the China-Japan Peace and Amity Treaty in 1978.
  The United States has worked to diffuse the situation regarding these and other disputed territorial claims in the region. At an October meeting of defense ministers in the Vietnamese capital of Hanoi, U.S. Secretary of Defense, Robert Gates said “The United States does not take sides in competing territorial claims, such as those in the South China Sea. Competing claims should be settled peacefully without force or coercion.” He also said that territorial disputes and maritime claims were a growing challenge to stability in the region.
  While China has made a point of saying that the dispute over the issue of the sovereignty of the islands does not involve the U.S., Japanese government officials have not said, as Chinese government officials have, that the dispute between Japan and China and Taiwan over these islands does not involve the United States.
  In addition, this is not the only dispute that Japan has with neighboring countries over the issue of national sovereignty of islands in the region.
  Since the end of World War Two, Japan has had an ongoing dispute with Russia over a group of islands located between the two nations. Russia claims the islands as the Southern Kuril Islands while Japan claims them as the Northern Territories. The dispute over these islands has prevented these two nations from signing a formal peace treaty after the end of World War Two.
  In this dispute between Japan and Russia, as well as the dispute between Japan, China and Taiwan, the U.S, has urged bilateral talks between Japan and the other countries involved, but there has been an unwillingness by both Japan and the other countries involved to negotiate.
  As well, in a recent clash with South Korea, Japan has stepped up claims that it has sovereignty over uninhabited islands located midway between South Korea and Japan. In 2005, Japan created a furor in South Korea when the Japanese ambassador to South Korea publicly claimed that the islands, called Dodko in Korean and Takeshima in Japanese, were legally and historically Japanese. South Korean marine police are stationed on the uninhabited outcrops. These actions by Japanese government officials served to sour the relationship between Japan and South Korea, scuttling diplomatic relations between the nations for a period afterwards.
  The sovereignty of these island groups are all in dispute and Japan has been unwilling to meet with these nations to discuss the issue of sovereignty with them diplomatically.
  These disputes call into question what responsibilities the U.S. has to Japan under the U.S. – Japan Security Agreement and what Japan considers the U.S. responsibilities to Japan in fulfillment of this agreement. The use of the U.S. –Japan Security Agreement as an agreement that could force the U.S. to back Japanese contested sovereignty claims over these islands is serving to harm U.S. relations with China and Taiwan and possibly other nations in the region. It is also serving to endanger security in the region for all of the nations involved, including the United States.

U.S. TROOPS REMAINING IN IRAQ

   On August 31st, President Obama declared an end to combat in Iraq, saying that, We have met our responsibility. Now it is time to turn the page.”
Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, stated that the end of combat operations marked a return to sovereignty and independence for Iraq.
   However, 50,000 U.S. troops remain in Iraq, down from a high of 170,000 U.S. troops in Iraq in 2007. The 50,000 remaining troops are being called advise and assist brigade units by the U.S. military and will not be able to go on combat missions unless requested and accompanied by Iraqi military forces.
   The large number of U.S. forces that remain in Iraq and in a position where they could be called into combat under the direction of Iraqi government military leadership, for Iraq military goals and embedded with Iraqi forces calls into question what the role and responsibilities are of the United States military and what its’ mission is in Iraq. The U.S. military’s job is the protection and defense of the United States. The only reason that U.S. forces went to Iraq was because of faulty intelligence, including from foreign countries, that Iraq had a weapons of mass destruction program that was an imminent threat to the security of the United States.
   Since it was found that Iraq didn’t have a weapons of mass destruction program, U.S. forces have remained in Iraq for over seven years for an ever changing array of stated reasons. First as policemen for the violence in the city of Baghdad that occurred in the wake of the collapse of the Iraqi government. Then to find Saddam Hussein, and bring him to justice. Then as combatants against those who have attacked Iraqis, U.S. troops and other country’s troops. These attacks have been ascribed to a large and ever changing group of those said to be responsible, from Baathist Party holdouts, to Sunnis, to Shia, to Sadr followers, to Kurdish separatists, to Al Queda and sometimes just ascribed to random unidentified “insurgents” with seemingly no identity of who the attackers are and therefore, why they are attacking and how they might be countered. These groups use the same method of guerilla attacks with bombs and IED’s, making them difficult to catch and bring to justice and leading to a beleaguered combat situation where there is no security and an unstable military situation.
   U.S. and other country’s forces have remained in Iraq for the stated reason of fighting crime, protecting Iraqi citizens, and training Iraqi military personnel. Clearly the Iraq military should be trained after seven years of training and if they aren’t then clearly the job is incapable of being done by the U.S. or other foreign countries. As well, there’s no reason why the Iraqis can’t train themselves.
   More than 4,400 U.S. troops have been killed and thousands more injured in Iraq. An estimated 100,000 Iraqis have been killed and millions have been displaced. Over $750 billion has been spent in Iraq in an action that has clearly not been a success. This is at the same time that the U.S. is cutting U.S. military commands in the U.S., with the recent decision to cut the U.S. Joint Forces Command and cutting U.S. forces, U.S. military bases and new weapons systems that are essential for their only real legitimate mission, the protection and defense of the United States.
   The U.S.’s military mission in Iraq has to be assessed to find a way for all U.S. forces to leave Iraq, in order to leave Iraq protection and defense where it belongs, in the hands of the Iraq people and government.

GERMANY RECOMMENDS RECESSION FOR OTHER COUNTRIES

   This past Tuesday, in Stuttgart, Germany, before a conference of the Lutheran World Federation, Germany’s finance minister Wolfgang Schaeuble made a disturbing statement when he urged western nations to “deliberately put the brakes on economic growth and enjoy what they have.” He said that Germany also should “campaign for a limitation on economic growth in western nations.”
   This is at a time when most of the western nations; the United States and Canada, as well as most of the nations of Europe, are in the deepest recession since the great depression and all, except Germany, are experiencing negative economic growth. They all have massive trade deficits with the other countries in the world, including foremost, China, Japan and Germany itself, all of which have massive trade surpluses with the rest of the world. In the case of China, almost all of the goods being exported from China are products made by other country’s companies, including large percentages of Japanese and German products. Japanese and German companies, wherever they are located, including in China, are by far the two largest exporting nations in the world in terms of their national company products. China may have just passed Germany as the largest trading nation in the world; however, a large number of the products that China is exporting to the rest of the world are German company products.
   The German finance minister is making this statement at a time when the other nations of Europe, as well as the United States, have been pressing Germany for years, as well as Japan, to stop treating the rest of the world solely as an export market for their national companies’ products, and start importing more goods from the United States, the nations of Europe, and elsewhere, which both countries have refused to do. While the rest of Europe flails in a deepening recession with high levels of debt, incurred partly by massive trade deficits with Germany that have persisted since the end of World War Two, and increased social costs due to the job loss that Germany’s trade and capital practices have entailed in violation of GATT and WTO trade agreements, Germany has consistently refused to import more goods from other countries.
   Economists have said that Germany’s trade practices have been a primary cause of the European economic crisis. French economist Guillaume Duval, has stated that “Germany’s obsession with maintaining a positive balance of trade makes it a predatory nation.”
   Germany, along with Japan, have had their feet firmly planted on the brakes of their own economies. They have focused all of their capital, energy and effort on exporting their national company products to other countries, in order to challenge and harm other countries’ competing industries.
   As well, is the question of what right the German government has to tell any other nation what it should do about it’s economy. It’s particularly disturbing right at the present time, given that all of the western nations, except Germany, are in terrible recessions, which infers that Schaeuble wants the nations of the west to remain in a state of recession, and negative growth, something that certainly is not beneficial to these nations. The recession that the U.S. and other western nations find themselves in, is massively destructive not only to these countries, but the world economy, since these nations have historically been the largest markets for the world’s goods, including the primary markets for Germany’s goods.
   Disturbingly as well, Germany, as well as Japan, are using their increased economic might, and the economic problems of other nations, to increase their political power and control and lessen the political power and control of nations that are in economic difficulty vis a vis Germany and Japan.
   Both Germany and Japan have been exerting an ever greater hemispheric economic domination; Germany in Europe, and Japan in Asia. They have also been increasing economic control over the rest of the world, having attained monopoly control over a large number of industries worldwide. They are the largest foreign investors in the world as nations.
   Just this past Wednesday, Germany, as well as France, which has a foreign relations pact with Germany, said that they wanted to suspend the voting rights of EU member states which run up excessive deficits and impose financial sanctions on them. This is occurring as the EU as a body, has been used to assume ever greater political and economic power and control from the nations that belong to the European Union.

WORKING TO BAN IMMIGRATION FROM MUSLIM MAJORITY NATIONS

     In the last few days, an anti-Muslim politician in the Netherlands, Geert Wilders head of the Freedom Political Party, stated that he would be forming an international alliance, working to ban immigration from “Islamic countries” to other nations. Wilders gave no indication how he would or could define nations as “Islamic countries” since Islam is a personal religious belief system and is not identifiable by nationhood. In fact most nations have those who practice the religion of Islam and in countries where Islam is the predominant religion, they all have citizens who do not practice or believe in the faith or belong to other religions.
     Wilders stated that he would launch this movement later in the year initially in five countries, the U.S., Canada, Britain, France and Germany. Wilders has not stated why he felt as a Dutch politician, he should be “fronting a “movement” in other countries in regard to their immigration policy which has nothing to do with Geert Wilders personally and nothing to do with these other nations in regard to Geert Wilder’s position as a member of the Dutch government. As a Dutch citizen and Dutch politician, Wilders has the right to publicly propose any immigration policy for the Netherlands he wants, however he has no right to be involved in the immigration policies of any countries outside of the Netherlands.
     There is the issue, as well, of what right Wilders has to discriminate against people from a specific nation due to the religion of a majority of the people in that country. According to Wilders, he defines anti Islam and discrimination against Islam as being “for freedom”, stating that “The fight for freedom and (against) Islamisation as I see it is a worldwide phenomenon and problem to be solved.”
     Clearly this discriminates against the freedom of nations who have a majority of Muslim religious believers to travel or be able to move freely in the world and also discriminates against those of other countries who are not predominantly Muslim in terms of their population, from having discourse and contact with those who live in Islamic predominant countries.
     Wilders is incorrectly defining existing secular nations as “religious” rather than civil secular, including countries that have a predominantly Muslim population and those that have a predominantly Christian population, in this case, the nations of Europe, the United States and Canada.
     The countries of the Middle East are not “Islamic nations” they are nations. The countries of Europe and the U.S. and Canada are not by definition “Christian nations” they are by definition, specific nations of Europe, in the case of Wilder’ home nation, the Netherlands. The Netherlands is not by “definition” “as a nation” “Christian”. It is by definition “Dutch”.
     Wilder’s goal to form a movement to ban immigration to and from countries, based on religion, serves to shift the identity of nations and a sovereign national right, power and function to set their own national immigration policy from “national” to the identity of the “majority religion of the nation’s inhabitants” as the “criteria” to be used to set immigration policy from other countries. Furthermore, it serves to set in conflict nation against nation in discriminatory immigration policies based on the religious practices of their population, rather than the historical reasons for immigration policy based on the actions and relationship of these nations individually as individual nations.
     Furthermore, it serves to give foreign countries illegitimate and unconstitutional powers, rights and privileges in other countries in coercing them to set immigration policy that they want, based on the criteria that they choose, rather than the immigration policies that the individual nations, their citizens and governments choose, based on what they determine is best for that nation.
     Geert Wilders has no right, either as a Dutch citizen, or certainly as a Dutch politician, to press any other nation to set their immigration policies to suit his goals. He also certainly has no right to press them to work to ban immigration from countries that have a majority population of a specific religion.
     His actions are one of a number of actions being seen by some individuals recently in European nations and the U.S. and Canada that appear to seek to have these nations defined and treated as “religious nations” and “Christian nations” rather than the secular, democratic, nations they are. As well, these same individuals appear to be working to set the nations of Europe and the U.S. and Canada “in conflict” with those nations that have predominantly Muslim populations, based on that criteria alone, rather than the actions of these nations and their people in regard to the individual countries of Europe, the U.S. and Canada.
     Disturbingly, these individuals criticize and rightly so, the actions of some in Muslim predominant countries who appear to be working to push to make their nations more Muslim religious centered in identity, rather than the civil, secular nations they have been and that their citizens wish to be. At the same time, a number of people like Geert Wilders appear to be working to do the exact same thing in the nations of Europe, the U.S. and Canada. The nations of Europe, the U.S. and Canada are not theocracies. They are democracies that are inclusive of all the people who are citizens of their nations, no matter what their religious beliefs.
     Furthermore, those people such as Geert Wilder’s statements and actions are deliberately confrontational, racist and hateful toward those of the Muslim faith and the religion of Islam and shouldn’t be tolerated on that basis. In an interview about an anti-Muslim film that he made, called “Fitna”, Wilders called Islam “retarded”.
     Wilder’s actions appear to have the goal of setting the Christian religions in conflict with Islam and incorporating the nations of the world that have majority Christian and Muslim populations to a “consolidated with each other stance” in conflict with each other, on that basis. These types of actions are no different and no less destructive than the actions of some of those of the Muslim faith who are pushing for “Islam” as the criteria for what should be the sole identity for their nations in terms of governance and “in conflict” with other religions, and it is no less destructive. It is “in and of itself” racist and discriminatory whether in regard to the religion of Islam in Islam predominant countries or Christianity in Christian predominant countries.
     There has, in other countries, been a process of “conflict and dispossession” being practiced against others, based not only on religion, but also on racial, tribal and ethnic identity, particularly in the last 15 years. In these other countries there have also been claims that these places are and should only be identified and occupied by those of that particular “ethnicized group” and that all others should be not only banned from being there but in many cases, driven out of these regions so that they can be made “ethnic monolithic regions”. Often these claims and actions are carried out along with violence by militias formed to deliberately drive those not identified as belonging to that “ethnicized identity” out of the regions that those involved claim are for only those of a “specific religious, racial, tribal and ethnic group”. We have seen this horrific process in Yugoslavia, between Serbs, Croats and Bosnians and Kosovoans. We have seen this same process in Rwanda between Tutsis and Hutus. We have seen this same process in Iraq between Kurds, Shia and Sunni. It is not an acceptable process there and it is not an acceptable process in Muslim predominant states in the Middle East and elsewhere and it is not an acceptable process in European nations, the United States and Canada.

HATE PROPAGANDA UNCONSTITUTIONAL?

   In the last week, protestors picketed a Kroger grocery store in Tennessee which was refusing to carry a local newspaper, the Rutherford Reader, because of comments the paper printed defaming the religion of Islam by calling it “evil”.
   The newspaper is now threatening to sue Kroger, claiming that Kroger’s actions are a blatant breach of First Amendment Rights. The publisher and co-owner of the Rutherford Reader, Pete Doughtie, said that “when a group or individual can force a corporation to take something out of their store which is printed material and not offensive, then we’re headed in the wrong direction.”
   However, Kroger did find what the newspaper printed in a guest column that described Islam as “an evil, de-humanizing, backward and defiling 12th century ideology”, offensive.
   The idea that a publisher or owner of a paper that is deliberately publishing hate propaganda has the right to force commercial outlets to sell their product and disseminate hate propaganda is reminiscent of what the German Government in World War Two forced publishers to do in Germany and many nations in Europe. Leading up to, and during, World War Two, the German government forced German publishers to pump out vast amounts of hate propaganda against the Jews, which was used to incite hate and violence against the Jews and served to facilitate the German governments’ actions to exterminate the Jews of Europe.
   The Rutherford Reader has no legal grounds on which to sue independent distributors who choose not to distribute their paper for any reason, certainly including if they find it offensive. However, the Rutherford Reader’s actions in publishing defaming propaganda against the religion of Islam, may meet the criteria of a criminal offense as group libel against Muslims and the religion of Islam.
   Group libel laws penalize speech or other communication that attacks or defames a particular group on the basis of it’s race, ethnicity, religion or other similar group identities. Group libel laws are based on the belief that group libel might foster a social climate that could encourage violence against the group being libeled and curtail the free speech of the libeled group.
   In Beauharnais v. Illinois (1952), the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of a state statute criminalizing the libel of a group of citizens. The Court said that like “fighting words” (words that would cause the average addressee to fight), these statements are not within a constitutionally protected category of speech. The Supreme Court ruling found no difference between libel against individuals and libel against groups in terms of speech that was not protected by the constitution. (Beauharnais v. Illinois, 343 U.S. 250, 254-58 (1952).

   Doughtie stated that the paper’s “not out to hurt anybody” and has never called for violence against any person or group. However, the issue of inciting violence is a valid one and particularly in regard to constitutionality of free speech. In terms of libel against individuals, the constitutionality of free speech has been challenged if the speech is what is termed “fighting words” that have a direct tendency to incite violence in the individual to whom the speech is addressed as ruled in Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire. In this ruling, Justice Murphy stated, that there were “certain well defined and narrowly limited classes of speech, the prevention and punishment of which have never been thought to raise any constitutional problem. This includes… the libelous, and the insulting or “fighting” words – those that by their very utterance inflict injury or tend to incite an immediate breach of the peace.”
   Although the ruling was specific to individuals and not groups in regard to what was considered “fighting words”, in both rulings regarding the constitutional protection of free speech, the issue of inciting violence or a breach of the peace is a pertinent one.
   In regard to Islam, it is particularly pertinent because we are engaged in a conflict that involves military action in other countries as a result of terrorist attacks that have been termed a “war against Islamicist terrorism”.
   What has been seen recently is hate propaganda against Islam and Muslims, particularly in Europe, serving to meet the criteria of both group libel, defaming the religion of Islam and inciting violence in response to the hate propaganda.
   The actions by the Rutherford Record and their claim that their right to publish deliberately defamatory statements about Islam, is just an “exercise of their free speech” is the same claim that has been made by some publications in Europe who claim that they as well are just “exercising free speech” in publishing things that are deliberately defamatory to Muslims and Islam.
   One of the most publicized cases of this type of hate propaganda was the cartoon in a Danish newspaper, the Jyllands-Posten on September 30, 2005, that showed the Prophet Muhammed carrying a bomb shaped like a turban. This cartoon was one of a series of cartoons that were defamatory to Islam that the Jyllands-Posten published. The deliberately defaming cartoons were commissioned by the Jyllands-Posten, because of what they perceived as “self-censorship” among artists dealing with Islam and as a test of “free speech”.
   The response to the cartoons were protests by Muslims and threats against both the newspaper and Kurt Westergaard, the author of the Muhhammed turban cartoon and cuts at the very heart of what is massively problematic with the hate propaganda that is being printed. And how this hate propaganda should be considered and what it should be considered “as”.
   Historically, before this period, these publications have not published defamatory statements about the religion of Islam or the prophet Mohammed. Clearly in this situation, where there has been a defined war against and in relation to “Islamicist terrorism” there needs to be even more scrutiny over what is being published and for what purpose and the possible result.
   Is this propaganda supportive of and does it promote war itself? When virulently defamatory statements defaming the nation of Israel, and the religions of Judaism and Christianity are published in Muslim-predominant area publications they are criticized in the press in Western countries as being inflammatory and helping to foster and incite violence among the readers. It is a valid criticism and one that should be just as critically applied to anti Islam and anti Muslim defamatory statements in countries that are not predominantly Muslim. There is no reason to assume that these types of anti Islamic statements don’t serve to set up a climate whereby Islam is something that should be fought. Clearly the terming of a religion that for a thousand years has been one of peace, forebearance and tolerance, as “evil” is in and of itself untrue and could be said to be terminology that could be used to incite readers to “fight against it”. Just as similar criticism of the religions of Judaism and Christianity could foster the same thing.
   This type of hate propaganda is specifically having the effect of furthering the conflict between the religions and inciting violence and conflict.
   We must be quite clear, in the United States, what we are sending our soldiers off to fight for in other countries. It can’t be because of prejudice against the religion of those in other nations, and in our own.
   The reality is that this type of hate propaganda against ethnic, religious and racial groups, has in fact been used to foster conflict and facilitate it in the past. One example was the propaganda that was used against the Tutsis in Rwanda by the media that helped to facilitate the extermination of almost a million Rwandan Tutsis by Rwandan Hutu militias. Leading up to, and during the time of the attacks, radio broadcasts portrayed the Tutsis as “cockroaches that must be eliminated”. This followed an ever increasing pattern of violence inciting hate propaganda being published and broadcast in Rwanda that helped to set the stage and facilitate the mass extermination.
   This is not the only country where this type of ethnic, religious or racial group hate propaganda has accompanied and appeared to help incite violence recently. In a number of countries around the world, ethnic, religious, racial and tribal conflict is occurring with an accompanying occurrence of hate propaganda in ethnic specific publications railing against the opposite group, serving to both drive conflict and to create a climate of social acceptance of violence and attacks against the group being defamed and attacked.
   Historically, the most well known example of this same type of propaganda being used to set up conditions to make it easy to discriminate against, assault and mass exterminate people was the World War Two German government extermination of 6 million Jews. The extermination of the 6 million Jews by the World War Two German government followed a long period of ever increasing hate propaganda directed against the Jews, depicting them as violent, criminals, rodents and evil. There are horrifically disturbing parallels between anti Jewish propaganda that was being pumped out in European countries by the German government in World War Two and the anti Islamic propaganda that is now being seen in Europe.
   The anti Jewish propaganda by the German government in World War Two, served a number of purposes. It not only served to facilitate the increasing isolation and attacks against the Jews, but resulted in their ultimately being rounded up, deported and exterminated, with little protest from those in the countries where they were deported from. The German government in World War Two also used massive hate propaganda against the Jews, which they pumped out all over Europe, as a means and rationale that they presented as to “why they were invading other countries” in Europe, in order to protect both Germany and the Christians of the other countries of Europe from the “Jewish threat”.
   This too, is a particularly disturbing parallel with today and military involvement in Muslim predominant nations, and we have to be sure that our actions in other countries militarily is not being inflamed or driven by this type of hate propaganda.