Aristides de Sousa Mendes ignored the orders of the facist Portuguese government during WWII, by helping people escape to Portugal. A diplomat in Bordeaux, he gave visas to thousands of Jewish and nonJewish refugees trying to escape the Nazi occupation. When it was discovered, he was fired, disgraced, and died poor dishonored by his country. More than 50 years later, the truth is finally coming to light of the around 30,000 lives he helped save, and the plight that he suffered at the hands of the facist Portuguese government. This screencast is me getting to know this story, which was the topic of the evening for my family here in Brussels.
Tag Archives: history
Statehood Doesn’t Pay Bills
Nationalism has long been the cause of alot of pain and broken dreams in the history of the world. Yet nationalism is the force that brings about so many changes in so many places, even in this day and age.
I was working in Portugal several years ago when East Timor formerly declared it’s independence from Indonesia. Needless to say it was a big deal in Lisbon, at some level, as the nation watched a new country set out on the quest for freedom, prosperity… insert lofty goal. And of course, as I watched the ceremony in Dili, I can’t deny a feeling, based on all that I know from world history and the inequality that is the world economy, that East Timor would never really achieve much of a quality of life. For all the beauty and nobility of independence, you could spin the globe, crunch the numbers, and know that the new nation’s odds of a prosperous survival were slim to none.
Now we watch Kosovo. I know, I know, different details, different history, some different problems. But the facts still spell out the same feelings. Independence and freedom from whatever oppression, past or present, that certainly sounds good. No wonder lots of good people out there support the declaration. Yet what chance does it’s people have in this global economy and the political chess game that leaves a majority of the new nation as a bunch of expendable pawns; useful for flag waving news footage, but not worth a serious investment or some serious problem solving strategies. Powerful forces in the world of business and politics might have been salivating at the chance to use the cause and the region for their own goals, but now they can salivate even more as disorganization and internal struggles make it easy to profit.
Now you hear the whispers in different parts of the world get louder; Turkish Cyprus, Abkasia, Chechnya, Ingushetia, Palestine, Western Sahara, Aceh… places where the calls for independence grow louder now. And who would dare speak against many of those cases, where people have suffered and hoped for independence for so long.
While I don’t speak against most of these calls, I will add a question to the equation. How will they live? Will there be a way to seriously live without the threat of famine, violence, or some other terrible factor. Do they have some way to stand on their own two feet in a global economy that specializes in picking apart new nations without the luxury of lots of money or some magic resource?
Independence sounds lovely. But when calculating and dreaming of the kind of life people should have, I wish we would factor in what happens once you’ve got that independence. That’s the part that could really help make a better future for all people.
Followup On Money
Next week I will move beyond the US elections, but so long as the big media does such a poor job of looking behind the show, I feel the need to bring forward whatever information I feel is of importance.
Some months back my internet colleague Chris Weagel recommended a media source to me, by the name of consortium news. I’ve subscribed to that site, and have indeed found useful information that is not available in the mainstream.
The latest eye-opening article went over Hillary Clinton’s income, on the heels of her 5 million dollar loan to her own campaign. Some people may not be surprised or remotely uncomfortable about the numbers, but I want to lay it out anyway.
According to author and journalist Nat Parry, Hillary’s income breaks down like this:
- Senate salary of $169,300 a year.
- From her memoir Living History, 9.9 million$
- $10.2 million for giving 57 speeches in 2006
And then there is husband Bill’s money coming from such places as:
- $20 million via business relationship with Yucaipa Cos., the investment firm of his longtime supporter, billionaire Ron Burkle, which has connections to the ruler of Dubai, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum. – according to the Wall St. Journal
- Helped Canadian mining financier Frank Giustra in securing a lucrative uranium deal with the repressive government of Kazakhstan in 2005, shortly before Giustra made an unreported $31.3 million donation to Clinton’s foundation. – according to the New York Times.
This is just a taste, read the full post for details as well as links to the sources.
Seeing these numbers just makes me do a double-take, as sometimes I forget how very wealthy politicans in the United States can be; especially if they’ve lived in the white house.
Great MLK Talk
It has been some time, since the show changed format, that I was blown away by an episode of Radio Open Source. They’ve been doing alot of arts related interviews, they being Chris Lydon, and I’ve felt the show has lost its global conversation feel. But nevermind that, today I was riding my bike from the University of Amsterdam and I almost forgot where I was… as the interview Chris did was really that powerful.
His guest is a gentleman named Michael Haynes, who had a special relationship with Martin Luther King Jr, and founded a church with him in Boston. The man has tremendous insight into MLK and his philosophy. Often times, when someone starts on about what MLK would say about the state of the US today, it is almost cliché…. and empty. But not in this case… Haynes had me rewinding and listening again and stopping just to consider what he said.
I strongly recommend you take some time from all that is so important in your daily routine, or maybe just pop this onto your mp3 player instead of that Radiohead album you’ve been listening to over and over again. In fact, if you happen to be a teacher, make this one a special lesson this week. It is better than any history book, I can promise you that.
On This Oz Day
January 26th is Australia day, and what a good year to talk about the land down under, where changes are taking place that have caught my attention in a positive way.
Prior to his election, I confess I didn’t know much about the new Australian PM Kevin Rudd. Observers in and around Australia said that he was different, a man who would shake things up… they even called him an environmentalist.
Obviously time will tell how much he is or is not the real deal when it comes to an Australian leader who challenges the status quo. But in the last month he has already gotten my full attention, especially when he formally apologized and re-enforced the plan to pay reparations to Aboriginal people in Tasmania.
Throughout the 18 and 1900’s, aboriginal people of Tasmania were subjected to diseases and sicknesses brought over with European settlers. Between 1800 and 1833 their population decreased from 6,000 to 300. Later other attrocities would take place, with children of aboriginal people being taken away from them by the government, or when a christian missionary promised a safe place to live on another island for the remaining people, and when they arrived they were left to their own devices, once again facing starvation, disease, and death.
Which a history like this, seems rather insulting to celebrate Australia day. But what I’d like to do instead is celebrate some overdue positive steps in Australia, towards coming to grips with history, as well as the present. Not to mention, finally electing leaders and adopting policies that reflect an compassionate, forward thinking, and mature society.
Manipulation Through Nationalism
Watching video of last week’s Iowa Caucuses on the Uptake, it left me severely disturbed to watch as people stand in a room and yell at each other about which candidate is best. They scream and shout and hardly anyone listens and they spout rhetoric that anyone could have heard from the candidate themselves over the past year. They use adjectives to praise a candidate who they think they know, “honest”, “determined”, “strong”, “experienced”… naturally it is the same list people have been using since the feudal days when the king and queen were the most suited to lead us thanks to their nobility and wisdom.
Meanwhile I gather what information I can on the situation in Kenya, where people are also dedicated to their candidate. Questionable election results, a familiar theme throughout the planet, lead to supporters of the opposition taking to the streets. Police are dispatched with little concern for the safety or rights of citizens , demonstrators are shot and killed. Elsewhere one group that supports one candidate targets the other group that supports the other candidate, they attack with weapons and whatever they can get their hands on. They’re convinced that their guy should have won; they believe so strongly in a person they think they know, they’re willing to kill or be killed for him.
Famous and Infamous people have said, throughout history, that nationalism is one of the most dangerous forces on earth. With the power to make people hate each other, convinced that their cause, their flag, their candidate.. is the answer. And when he or she occasionally gets power and then does nothing, they find another to support, re-directing their blind loyalty.. or maybe they stick with their incompetent leader no matter how bad it gets… as if they are required to by some natural law.
Whether they are yelling at each other in a room in Iowa, torturing people in Guantanamo, beating and burning each other alive in Kenya, or rigging election results in Georgia to help a western-friendly oil man stay president, it is all a very cruel and dangerous game. Cruel because those in power use people… they use people’s lives.. people are expendable to them. Dangerous because beyond the yelling comes hatred. After the hatred can come violence. And from violence comes more violence that can and will tear countries, regions, and the world apart. All in the name of what people like to call democracy…. all in the name of some candidate who swears he or she can fix all that is wrong with the society we live in, and the lives so many people feel trapped in.