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An Open Letter by Punkerslut to
"Towards a New Alliance," Manifesto of the Alliance of Democrats Greetings, There is much to agree with in your policy, but little reason to think that you believe in it. This thought keeps coming to my mind again and again when I reread your article "Towards a new Alliance of Democrats." Your "Final Declaration" begins with a short piece on "Climate Changes." Yet, for about seven paragraphs, all you manage to say is that you support the Kyoto Protocol and "emissions trading," which are very minimal approaches to the question of humanity's domination and destruction of the planet for millenia. There is something peculiar about this: you advance yourselves as being Liberals, seeking Liberal reforms in society, and trying to acquire a Liberal-controlled government. Yet, the first thing that appears within the "Final Declaration" is a brief article that deals with mild reforms for ecological destruction in an exclusively small area. Nothing of conservation or renewable resources, but just a small bandage to be applied to the environmental problem of Global Warming. If this were such a true issue, perhaps you might want to rename yourselves from something involving Liberals to something involving half-hearted, environmental legislation. The section on "Terrorism," while more than twice as long as the section on Global Warming, hardly offers much at all. It's essentially an endorsement of the status quo in in our global society. "International terror is the greatest threat against peace, security and international stability." is coupled with "The fight against terror must be carried out in full compliance with international treaties and with fundamental human rights." However, there's only plenty of mention of terrorism, how it threatens people, and how government must be empowered to carry out its initiatives unopposed. "We Democrats express our deepest concerns for the recent expansion of the Iranian nuclear programme." What about the proliferation and distribution of components for nuclear arms by the United States government within the Middle East? Doesn't it seem somewhat like a contradiction that you're fighting against nuclear armament at the same time that your governments are giving nuclear arms to terrorists -- and you've seemed that this is better left unpublished? This is no conspiracy theory. The scientist who exposed the nuclear arms trading of the United States government was Mordechai Vanunu. Do you know what happened after he exposed this terror program? He was kidnapped, tortured, and imprisoned; giver more than a decade of solitary confinement for protecting us, and you've forgotten his name. How your cup runneth over with "human" rights. Here's the CNN report on it: CNN.com. Here's the BBC report on it: BBC.com. And here's the Amnesty International report on it: Amnesty.org. Your deepest concerns for the expansion of a nuclear program are not so deep at all, if your governments are managing the world's largest nuclear proliferation programs, without even a mild protest or resistance from you -- so-called anti-terrorism ideology, while you are keeping your mouth shut when your own government gives nuclear arms to terrorist groups. Again, like the environmental destruction of the planet, what a mild and uninterested way of trying to deal with a serious problem. "We, Democrats, support the new democracies and the democracies in transition and we stress the importance of sound governance, of transparency and of an open society" is another statement of years, under the section "Democracy Promotion and Human Rights," but again, you focus on OTHERS. Not what YOUR GOVERNMENTS do, but what OTHERS may have done. You have strong criticism for the violation of human rights in China, but, you close your eyes when there are more human rights violations in the United States. That is to say, the United States government has more working in forced labor camps than China. Again, not quite so radical a statement, since you can find it spoken in the mainstream media, just not so often: GlobalResearch.ca. The prison complex of the US government is left ignored. And, likewise, the kidnap and torture of people, known as "extraordinary rendition," is largely left ignored. The murder of American citizens by police is not mentioned. Why should a human right include the right to life? That's far too progressive to get mentioned in a Liberal rag. A government required to prosecute its own officials after they execute civilians in public without any process of law? No way -- politicians hold a toast and look the other way when police brutality claims another life. And so do you, since human rights is applied to what happens in nations with other races, but, well, not your nations, apparently. Finally, at the bottom of your manifesto, there's "Millennium Development Goals." In two paragraphs, you state that you support the goals of the UN for developed nations to spent 0.7% of what they produce on underdeveloped nations. The word liberal means someone who has a concept of political, social, and economic rights. Your paper focused on environmentalism, terrorism, and a relatively artificial concern over human rights and democracy. None of these things has anything to do with Liberalism as a philosophy, although they somehow are your primary points. But, the one section that does have to do with Liberal policy, is about paying a measly reparation for the right of capitalists to continue slavery in Asia, Africa, and South America until the present day. Do you see something wrong with this? Your actual liberal policy, which doesn't say much at all, is squished all the way to the bottom. It doesn't receive attention and it probably wouldn't make anyone raise an eyebrow in curiosity. Meanwhile, you jump on board the big popular bandwagons of ecology and environmentalism, anti-terrorism, and human rights and democracy. But in each case, you're clearly uninterested in the topic, and only show up to grab the attention of those who might be misled by you. A few percentages in reducing emissions isn't a stop of carbon emissions, nor is it a solution to the multiple problems facing the environment. Your anti-terrorism policy conveniently ignores the terrorism spread by your own governments, whom you support in the fashion of good patriots. And your human rights, simply put, rests on the world's largest system of forced labor and imprisonment. Political rights? "Not if we have heavily invested in the country!" Social rights? "Only when publishing about them will have no effect and can make us look like the good guys!" Economic rights? "Yes, by which of course, we mean that all government must bend itself to the will of the Capitalists in breaking any international law, whether it's propping up dictators in Venezuela and Indonesia, subduing Democracy in Iran and Chile, or setting up sweatshops in China and Mexico." On the surface, things like "rights" and "democracy" all sound good and nice. But it's quite clear that you've shut up about the violations of your own governments, probably because it wouldn't be politically-minded to make such accusations. That is to say, for reasons of self-interest, as an organization of political groups, you would lose to tell people that their capitalists use forced labor, that their governments defend this system, and that their courts first ask a defendant if they are rich or poor before prosecution. Something like that doesn't get votes, because who's going to vote for someone trying to get into government, when that someone already admits that government is a tremendous failure? Not many. It's likely to drive them away from the concept of parliamentary campaigns, with its deception and lies, altogether. I've read your papers and have perused your website. There are dozens of thinktanks listed as member organizations, and I can think of them having no greater time than debunking my claims here, should they prove to be false. Thank you for your time, and I patiently await a response. Sincerely,
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