‘Freedom Convoys’ gaining steam across Europe
RT | February 4, 2022
Truckers in France are reportedly planning to emulate the Canadian ‘Freedom Convoy’ by mobilizing groups of big rigs to protest vaccine mandates and other Covid-19 restrictions set by Paris. According to a BFM TV report, demonstrators plan to “paralyze” the French capital next week before joining a wider “European convergence” in Brussels.
The outlet reported that a leaflet announcing the ‘Freedom Convoy France’ has been circulated on social media networks, calling on “citizens” to “recover their freedom, their fundamental rights, unconditional access to care, education, and culture, respect for the essential values of our Constitution.” It also noted that the truckers in “Canada [had] paved the way for us.”
After final preparations on Monday and Tuesday, the convoy will set off in three waves from across France – with those furthest from Paris setting off on Wednesday, according to an itinerary on the leaflet. All three waves are expected to reach the national capital Friday evening. On Sunday, the convoy is slated to leave and “join our European friends” in Brussels.
The BFM TV report noted that a Facebook group, called ‘Le convoi de la liberte’, had been created on January 26 and reached nearly 197,000 members. The outlet said the convoy may reinvigorate protests against vaccination passes, which have apparently been flagging [???] in recent weeks.
In addition, the report pointed to a ‘World Freedom Convoy’ group that has been set up on Telegram. This is thought to include demonstrators from Germany, Italy, and Croatia, among others. The Bruzz news outlet in Belgium reported on Thursday that some 40,000 people had joined the group within the past week – with the focus on free speech and the right to make one’s own health choices.
According to Bruzz news, the truck drivers hope to head toward their respective capital cities starting Monday before heading on to Brussels. The outlet noted that it was unclear how many would actually take part, but added that police were monitoring the situation.
Meanwhile, The Guardian reported that a Facebook group of US truckers called ‘Convoy to DC 2022’, who planned to drive to Washington, DC next month, had gained more than 100,000 members before being deleted by Meta. The organizers have reportedly since moved to Telegram, where over 28,000 have joined.
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Allies Don’t Need Lobbies
By Jay Knott | Dissident Voice | September 24, 2013
In a recent article on Counterpunch, Rob Urie defended the traditional Marxist analysis of US policy in the Middle East. He argues that support for Israel is driven primarily by economic interest, not the Jewish lobby.
He starts by paying tribute to the idea that Western societies are uniquely racist. He says that the “Western narrative” claims there is an “Arab character”, and that this is “antique racist blather”. He gives no definition of these terms. Further, he establishes his credentials as part of the dominant current in the American left by claiming that “over a million people in Iraq died so ‘we’ in the West can drive SUVs.”1
When he tries to criticize bourgeois economics, he makes it clear he doesn’t understand the developments it has made since Marx’s day, using the mathematical discipline known as “game theory”. He dismisses the basic abstraction of economic theory, the idea of the rational individual, on the grounds that it is “devoid of history, culture and political context”. But abstractions are always devoid of something.
He defends a more concrete economic theory, mostly Marxist, with some input from another theorist of capitalist crisis, Hyman Minsky. This concrete theory leads him to the view that US activity in the Middle East is primarily driven by rational capitalist motives, the need to secure a supply of oil.
“Taking the totality of circumstance — former oil company executives launching war on an oil rich nation on a pretext they publicly proclaimed they didn’t believe shortly before taking office — and that upon launching their war proved to be non-existent, requires a willingness to overlook the obvious — that the war on Iraq was for oil, that is difficult to support.”1
Perhaps I’ve misunderstood him, but based on what he says in the rest of the article, this convoluted sentence seems to argue that, because president Bush and vice-president Cheney attacked Iraq on false premises, and they also said it was all about oil, and they are former oil executives, and Iraq has a lot of oil, it’s difficult to deny US attacks on Iraq are all about oil.
In fact, it’s not hard at all. As Urie points out, at times Bush and co. said that attacking Iraq was “protecting the world’s supply of oil.”1 But, as he also points out, they are congenital liars. Why should we believe them when they say they are trying to “protect” the oil supply? Protect it against what? When politicians “admit” attacks on Middle Eastern countries are wars for oil, they are parroting the neo-con party line, feeding the public, both left and right, with a plausible-sounding pretext. For right-wingers, “it’s a war for oil” is a reason to support war, and for leftists, it’s a way to feel better by complaining impotently about corporate greed. Both approaches help the war drive. … continue
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