The student editors chose to publish sexually-explicit drawings to illustrate their recent issue devoted to the topic of sex, which they said was a taboo topic at the Jesuit school. Editor in chief Bre Kidman had asked the magazine's adviser, dean of students Jane Neufeld, to review it. Neufeld declined, saying, "I'm not going to censor you." The Rev. Richard Salmi, Loyola's vice president for student affairs, said the issue should have been reviewed ahead of time, particularly because the students offered to show it to Neufeld. Neufeld since has resigned as adviser.

Superstitious junta members believe that any contact with female undergarments - clean or dirty - will sap them of their power. They believe that touching a woman's pants or sarong will make them lose their strength.

I was to see that sight again, but once was enough. Flames were coming from a human being; his body was slowly withering and shriveling up, his head blackening and charring. In the air was the smell of burning human flesh; human beings burn surprisingly quickly. Behind me I could hear the sobbing of the Vietnamese who were now gathering. I was too shocked to cry, too confused to take notes or ask questions, too bewildered to even think... As he burned he never moved a muscle, never uttered a sound, his outward composure in sharp contrast to the wailing people around him.
Halberstam, David, p. 211, The Making of a Quagmire, New York: Random House (1965)

In English and Vietnamese, a monk repeatedly declared into a microphone, "A Buddhist priest burns himself to death. A Buddhist priest becomes a martyr."
Jones, Howard, p. 268, Death of a Generation, New York: Oxford University Press, ISBN 0-19-505286-2 (2003)

Police who tried to reach him could not break through the circle of Buddhist clergy. One of the policemen threw himself to the ground and prostrated himself in front of Thich Quang Duc in reverence. The spectators were mostly stunned into silence, but some wailed and several began praying. Many of the monks and nuns, as well as some shocked passers-by, prostrated themselves before the burning monk.
Karnow, Stanley, p. 297, Vietnam: A history, New York: Penguin Books, ISBN 0-670-84218-4 (1997)

My moral principles prevent me from doing harm to anyone else or their property, so I must perform this act of violence against myself. .... The attention of the media is only caught by acts of violence.

On Saturday -- exactly one year after his death -- two dozen people came downtown to Federal Plaza to protest the war and honor his life. They also read from the "mission statement" he left behind. "If I am required to pay for your barbaric war, I choose not to live in your world," reads one passage.

The U.S. foreign policy of "peaceful evolution" encourages the democratization of authoritarian regimes ... through constructive commercial engagement; that is, the promotion of free market capitalism abroad.

However, some American companies promote and reinforce authoritarian capitalism and suppress democratic movements. When our high-tech firms engage in such behavior abroad, they undermine a basic tenet of our foreign policy. The question is: How endemic is corporate-facilitated authoritarianism?

Congress called in the general counsels of four of our leading high tech firms - Cisco, Google, Microsoft and Yahoo - to account for their collaboration with the Chinese government. In the course of events, it became clear that the problem in the high-tech sector was not isolated but endemic.

Are we genuinely concerned with the wider social harm of some transnational commerce? If so, what public or private institutions - domestic, foreign or international, or combination thereof, are the appropriate ones to assess and mitigate transnational high technology social risk? Whether de facto or de jure, our companies are our foreign policy organs. American hi-tech companies - Yahoo, Google, Microsoft, Cisco - may not fly an American flag, but Chinese citizens, and others, may see it otherwise.

America couldn't dominate the rest of the world if they were democracies, their people would refuse to go along. When we've expanded our empire, it's been by backing tyrants that dictate to their subjects how it will be. Somoza, Marcos, Trujillo, The Shah of Iran, Sharon, the list is nearly endless. The phrase goes "he may be a sonofab!tch, but he's OUR sonofab!tch".

Juan Cole: The Bush administration had been attempting to get Musharraf to take off his uniform and cohabit as president with former prime minister Benazir Bhutto, who has been allowed back into the country. But all that it accomplished was to set the stage for a major confrontation between the civilian political parties and the military.

At 2:50 PM, Anonymous said...

I think the U.S. administration's desire to have Benazir Bhutto in the picture has less to do with bringing democracy to Pakistan, but rather to have someone in leadership who is willing to cooperate with U.S. interests in every way; a puppet, in other words. (While Bhutto has already agreed to allow U.S. military incursions into Pakistan, Musharraf has firmly rejected any such operations in the past.)

At 8:43 PM, Anonymous said...

Judging by the US muted reaction (considering they are supposedly democracy merchants,) I would say that the USA is complicit. It is difficult to believe that the general would do such things with no green light from Washington. There must have been some Islamists' angle to it.

At 8:48 PM, kooshy said...

anybody thinks that this foreign policy comes out of a democratic country that peruses the will of it’s people is either dishonest or has know knowledge of what kind of bubble he or she is being raised in.

The rule of law no longer has any party to defend it. We live under the lawless protectorate we deserve. And such lawlessness is always the result when cowards refuse to confront bullies. This is how democracies perish.