It Says It All - Occupy Wall Street

I haven't commented yet on the Occupy Wall Street movement that has taken the United States by storm since September. It came slap bang in the middle of my mini-hiatus from writing in this, and also took a momentum so diverse and so unexpected that I didn't really know how to comment. Well, I did - but on so many different levels, I didn't know where to commence...

So, for now, these brilliant cartoons are what I think are the best of the wry, sardonic cartoons that have proliferated online since the Occupy movement took hold...









Possibly one of the best of the lot...

RANT: Seeing Orange

It's World Cup time and with my seeing red because of those infernal and wretched vuvuzelas, I'm now seeing orange. A bevy of thirty-six ladies from the Netherlands dressed in orange, to be exact.

And the skimpy orange miniskirts that got them all arrested.

The whole debacle arose when said thirty-six Dutch beauties wore a certain orange miniskirt ensemble to their Dutch side's match against Denmark. Just after the match all the ladies were promptly arrested by our ever-vigilant South African police.

Their crime? They were supposedly part of some 'ambush marketing campaign' by the Dutch beer company, Bavaria beer. Turns out that their alluring orange attire is somehow 'sneaky' backdoor advertising by the beer company. Of course, the real issue is that one of the official sponsors to this FIFAdom love fest, namely Budweiser, took offence to a rival beer company getting a 'free ride' without having to fork out all those millions in sponsorship fees to the FIFA Mafia in Zurich. 

I also have a sneaking suspicion that another Dutch rival, Heineken, may also have sparked the FIFA-sanctioned arrests, given that Heineken are also affiliated with the FIFA capos via their deal with UEFA. 

FIFA cried foul, stating that this ambush marketing was in defiance of sponsorship money (all to FIFA, of course), trademarks, etc. South African law, uber-capitalist to the hilt, whatever the governing ANC might say about being the 'peoples' party', didn't hesitate to put the ladies in handcuffs given our particularly strong intellectual property laws.

South African law is very harsh (read: uber-capitalist, patriarchal and, ultimately, anti-competition) when it comes to ambush marketing or any other type of 'unfair' marketing or trading practice.

As a South African I'm embarrassed and infuriated. Here we are, yet again, kowtowing to corporatist special interests and the Mafiosi henchmen of the Local Organizing Committee, yes, good ol' FIFA.

This is just plain sour grapes by the likes of Budweiser (and, let me say it again, Heineken) who've spent a fortune paying the protection racket dues (aka 'sponsorship') of the FIFA Mafia, when a much smaller brewer has come along and stolen their thunder - without having spent a cent and without a single one of their logos in view. And, of course, the FIFA Mafia having to protect their racket, benevolent godfathers of the football world that they are.

Yeah, I know, it's all business. And it stinks. Copyright legislation and sponsorship contracts and deals are strangling any initiative for ordinary South Africans to make a decent buck out of this bloody World Cup. And now not even a market-savvy and smart foreign company can try and capitalize by spending less than the big boys - even if not a single one of their own logos or brands are visible in any way, shape or form.

I believe Bavaria beer pulled a similar stunt at the 2006 World Cup in Germany and were thwarted at the last minute by German authorities at the stadium. So, they did it again in 2010, this time probably thinking that they'd get away with it if they didn't show their logos or brand. But they got 'caught out'. What a damn pity - and all power to them for having tried, even if their main goal was to obviously sell more beer of their own.

Now I see pundits on Sky News parroting at how FIFA must protect their trademarks and sponsorship deals, etc. Yeah, right. And where's the free enterprise in all of this overt protectionism of contractual and commercial 'rights'?

It makes me so angry.

I'm ashamed that this gutless host country that I call home for now genuflects with such ease to foreign, corporate interests. That's right, South Africa - show your ass. That's all you're good at doing when it comes to foreign interests that line the pockets of this country's elite and strangle any attempts to not be part of the racket.

I'm ashamed that 36 women who are guests in my country are arrested and treated like common criminals, even if for four hours or so, just because they partook in a game of corporate gamesmanship, all in the name of uber-capitalist, apartheid era legislation that only protects Big Money.

And I'm furious that a bunch of unaccountable and corrupt Zurich-based Mafia in full collusion with transnational corporations, not to mention this country's authorities, see fit to allow this to happen here in this country.

It's an outrage. And the further encroachment of just how much increasing power commercial and transnational entities believe (AND KNOW) they have in a supposedly global market based on 'free enterprise'.

This is not free enterprise. It's not even about the protection of commercial rights. This is genuflection to the highest bidder; the most extreme whoring of the entire market to those with the most money vested and, therefore, the most rights.

This is a warning to us all as to just what lengths corporations will go to protect their (self) interests. It is dangerous precedent.

Do you get my point?

SITE OF THE DAY: WikiLeaks

It was inevitable for to me to make Wikileaks the site for today. My last post on this blog was on a huge scandal that erupted yesterday regarding American soldiers firing on to Iraqi civilians from their Apache helicopter back in July 2007 . The massive news story was broken due to the sheer tenacity and bravado of just one site:

WikiLeaks.

I've often heard of this site, but for whatever (stupid) reason have never really taken the time to have a look at what WikiLeaks had to offer (at http://www.wikileaks.com/). That is to my discredit. After hearing about the breaking news on the 2007 massacre of Iraqi civilians by airborne American soldiers, I just had to take a look at the site that had been so instrumental in breaking the story.

Their lead expose on the 2007 Iraq massacre from the air is brilliantly entitled "Collateral Murder".

It's quite a site. It is just one leak after another on some of the biggest news stories and scandals of the last few months. They include leaked documents regarding different aspects of the recent Icelandic financial and banking crisis, as well as a stunning expose by a well-known anti-secrecy online site that was forcibly shut down after exposing a secret manual being used by police and intelligence services regarding user online activities (read: snooping of what people do online), a manual put together by none other than the corporate giant...Microsoft. I'd never even heard of this until I took the time to look at this site today.

There's even an investigation as to what lengths the US Intelligence Service had tried hard to shut down WikiLeaks itself. And that's just on their home page!

Talk about indefatigable journalism - you know, the kind that was once the mainstay of the serious printed media, but which is now long dead due to the corporate takeover of world-renowned newspapers over the past 20 years.

But it's quite shocking to me to read that this invaluable site nearly shut down entirely towards the end of last year owing to a lack of funds. You can see it on the site - it looks so pared down, owing to the site's inability last year to save all its articles and links. The site looks clearly very scaled down - but, thankfully, not out.

And there are quite a few mirror sites that allow one to access some of the older articles and leaks that are currently not available on the official site. One such mirror site is mirror.wikileaks.info - thank goodness for the ongoing spirit of open source and keeping dissent and the truth alive at all costs in the online community.

The good news is that they have raised over 300 000 US dollars to date, which is keeping them afloat - at least for now. They still need to raise more funds. Which is why I too must try to ensure that this site gets as much financial support as possible, even if I do so primarily by spreading the word about what this site does (and means) to other people and potential financial supporters I might know.

It is the least one can do to ensure that a group of people who are trying so hard and so valiantly to do the type of investigative, expose journalism  that is so desperately needed in the world today. As we are fed more and more disgusting corporate hogwash masquerading as news by much of the world's media, so the importance of fact-finding online sites like WikiLeaks, warts and all, must keep growing. Otherwize we will be all the poorer for it.

If knowledge is power, then a site like WikiLeaks is our means to ensure and to harness that power.

Ignorance is not always bliss.