MSNBC Reports . . . A decade-and-a-half late

In 1975 I was instructed by my "Creative Writing" teacher to compose a pro-death penalty essay for a contest that some group, with a high social approval rating, was holding. The prize was a $25 scholarship to the University of your choice. 

I suppose it accomplished the goal, it made me write "creatively," and more especially in light of the fact that I was morally opposed to the death penalty - but it certainly was a systemic effort to curb my first amendment right to free speech. 

I made all of the juvenile arguments for the death penalty: "Why should these murders get to watch color TV in their cells, get three hots and a cot at our expense," blah, blah, blah. Needless to say I won the scholarship. 

Blood money. 

I should have learned then what I know now. Success is contingent upon saying what people with narrow minds and fat wallets want to hear. But I didn’t learn that lesson and it’s been a struggle ever since.

That the murderous nature of some cultures (any and all empires come to mind) are a petri dish for raising psychopathic killers, and that these same cultures devalue human life (whether by feeding Christians to lions or cutting programs that are exemplary of compassion), while outside the scope of this article, is noteworthy.  

So it is, with some interest, that I read MSNBC’s headline article about finding a mass grave with the bodies of over 1,200 prisoners in Libya. The atrocity, they noted, was committed by Gaddafi. 

That, in my estimation would have been ample reason to remove the son-of-a-bitch right then and there. 

But there’s a problem with the timing of the article. You see, this reprehensible act was committed against the people (prisoners) of Libya 15 years ago. And it was known, around the world, soon after. 

Since then Joe Lieberman, John McCain, and Lindsey Graham shook hands with the Colonel and offered US arms to further his cause. But here it gets confusing. Presumably, to bury any memory of their complicity with the since vilified Colonel, these same men called on Obama to engage NATO to accomplish Gaddafi’s ouster.    

It is interesting that (for comparison) "during 2007, 24 countries (88% in China, Iran, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and the United States alone) executed 1,252 prisoners. Although the United States is the only NATO member no multinational (NATO) air strike was called in. 

One also has to wonder how many innocent civilians have been killed by NATO’s relentless bombing attacks on Libya. Was it also 1,200+?

Rick Perry and George Bush have nearly boasted about their use of the death penalty for prisoners. They would be proud of Gaddafi’s single day execution record. 

So why is MSNBC making much ado about this now? 

It should be obvious that the killing of prisoners is NOT what MSNBC’s timing of this article’s release is about. "Justification" would be the operable word.  

A "mass grave" is probably one of the most repugnant concepts imaginable to the Western -"God’s gonna raise us all from the grave"- Christian mindset. In a mass grave, since there is no individualized headstone, how will God know which of us is which? But I digress. Suffice it to say that a mass grave is all that Americans need to hear to cheer (in beer guzzlin’ bars and home entertainment dens) the bombing of a country half way around the world. 

Nor has there been any word of Gaddafi’s humanitarian side (he wanted free higher education for all Libyans) and found water, developing one of the most extensive infrastructure improvements in the history of man (with a goal of reclaiming the Sahara dessert for agriculture) - which NATO promptly bombed the fuck out of. 

So my dear MSNBC reading, NPR listening, PBS watching children don’t forget that these "progressive" media outlets are either OWNED by corporate handlers (who want only to steal oil and other resources from relatively unarmed countries) or, in the case of PBS and NPR, have an overseer appointed by Bush (ever wonder why Bill Moyers disappeared?). 

It’s notable, as well, that MSNBC has said very little about the occupation of Wall Street - could it be because they are owned by Wall Street pillar GE?
 
You bet it could.