US is‘worst’ imperialist: archbishop

[Shoshana]

I will start slowly but surely. All quotes are taken from ‘Man of the Century’ by Jonathan Kwitney He won the George Polk Award for best investigative reporting on television, amongst other awards. He lives outside New York City with hsi wife Wendy and son Woody.

The Jesuit oriests of Central America had just accused the American-backed government of Guatemala of killing 3,252 civilians in 10 months; the government then threatened to kill all the Jesuits, too, branding them marxist. Dictator Pinochet had seized Chile’s Catholic University and fired seventeen professors after a study was published indicatring that his policies hurt poor people.

The summer before, Sandinista rebels in Nicuaraga had driven dictator Somoza into exile. John Paul’s own Nicaraguan bishops had unanimously refused Somoza’s request to meet with them in his hour of crisis, telling him his troops should stop killing innocent people, and accusing him of having ‘an obvious disregard not only for God but all sense of human love.’ When Daniel Ortega and Violetta Cjamorro, members of Nicargua’s new Sandinista leadership, come to the Vatican, John Paul praised their new literacy program, though cautioning them to respect the rights of Catholics to relgiious education.

In Brazil itself, a decade after an American-assisted miltary coup overthrew the democratic government, the dictators still called Catholic priests 'subversive…the most active enemy of national security. P364

 

[Shoshana]

During Carter’s last days in office, leaders of the US Catholic Bishops’ conference came to the White House and pleaded with him to stick to his human rights standards and not resume aid to the Salvadorean military. Four American Catholic churchwomen-three nuns and a lay volunteer-had just been raped, mutilated, and murdered by US ‘allies’ in El Salvador, whose troups also attacked two group homes for priests. Carter turnd the bishops down and resumed military aid to El Salvador.

Reagan called his own program conservative, though it brought the most radical shift to American government at least since Franklin Roosevelt. His team came to Washington committed to raising miltary spending beyond Carter’s imagining; throwing aggressive firepower behind generals in Latin America, Africa, and Asia who would protect the owners of wealth against workers seeking a greater share of it; and putting the entire machinery of the US government at the service of the market economy.

The Reagan group would later claim an alliance with the pope in all this, though in both domestic and international matters, Reagan’s commitments directly confronted beliefs that John Paul had held all his adult life and had reiterated tirelessly throughout his papacy. P381

 

[Shoshana]

Cardinal Sin of the phillippines wrote a public letter criticizing Reagan for arming dictator Marco’s soldiers enabling then ‘to kill their fellow Filippinos,’ while at the same time Reagan cut off Philippine food aid. P406

 

[Shoshana]

I will be back.

 

[roymckenzie]

I will start slowly but surely. All quotes are taken from ‘Man of the Century’ by Jonathan Kwitney He won the George Polk Award for best investigative reporting on television, amongst other awards. He lives outside New York City with hsi wife Wendy and son Woody.

The Jesuit oriests of Central America had just accused the American-backed government of Guatemala of killing 3,252 civilians in 10 months; the government then threatened to kill all the Jesuits, too, branding them marxist. Dictator Pinochet had seized Chile’s Catholic University and fired seventeen professors after a study was published indicatring that his policies hurt poor people.

The summer before, Sandinista rebels in Nicuaraga had driven dictator Somoza into exile. John Paul’s own Nicaraguan bishops had unanimously refused Somoza’s request to meet with them in his hour of crisis, telling him his troops should stop killing innocent people, and accusing him of having ‘an obvious disregard not only for God but all sense of human love.’ When Daniel Ortega and Violetta Cjamorro, members of Nicargua’s new Sandinista leadership, come to the Vatican, John Paul praised their new literacy program, though cautioning them to respect the rights of Catholics to relgiious education.

In Brazil itself, a decade after an American-assisted miltary coup overthrew the democratic government, the dictators still called Catholic priests 'subversive…the most active enemy of national security. P364

I appreciate all the typing you have done, thank you. What I don’t that I read in your quote is where Pope John Paul II told the president to stop. I did see where the US Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) complained to the president. I am under the opinion that the USCCB is out of there competence when it demands changes in foreign policy. What I would like to see the USCCB do is before they make socialist foreign policy decisions for the US government is take a look at what is in their competence ie… Lets let politicians who publicly support abortion know that they are ipso facto excommunicated and there fore not eligible to receive communion until they correct their ways. I would like to see the USCCB actually take a Catholic stand on life issues like the Terry Schivo case. I would like to see the US Bishops more like Cardinal Pell.

 

[Shoshana]

Guatala’s bishops announced that three hundred more Indians had been massacred by government troups trying to move them off their land and into settlement camps.Another five thousand were transferred to the camps under threat of death. Amnesty International counted twenty-six hundred Indians murdered in four months. John Paul wrote the US-backed dictator General Rios Montt, asking him to end death sentences by secret military courts.

In chile, the Church protested the economic policies of the Pinochet dictatorship, which had become a labarotory for Reagan’s program, overseen by colleagues of White House economic Milton Friedman. As demonstrations grew, the pope publicly endorsed the Chilean bishops in their protests against both the cut-off of welfare-state benefits and the repression. ‘We have seen…men tortured, executed, imprisoned, or chased out of the country,’ and a ‘refusal to engage in dialogue,’ the said Pinochet wrote back to John Paul that eh needed more time before he could create democracy.

The International Committee of the Red Cross revealed that the armed men who had kidnapped six missing nuns in Angola were from UNITA, a guerrilla group the Reagan administration was arming and promoting. UNITA also attacked a Catholic mission and seized eighty prisoners, including priests and nuns. P459

 

[Shoshana]

I appreciate all the typing you have done, thank you. What I don’t that I read in your quote is where Pope John Paul II told the president to stop. I did see where the US Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) complained to the president. I am under the opinion that the USCCB is out of there competence when it demands changes in foreign policy. What I would like to see the USCCB do is before they make socialist foreign policy decisions for the US government is take a look at what is in their competence ie… Lets let politicians who publicly support abortion know that they are ipso facto excommunicated and there fore not eligible to receive communion until they correct their ways. I would like to see the USCCB actually take a Catholic stand on life issues like the Terry Schivo case. I would like to see the US Bishops more like Cardinal Pell.

I will get to the quote that the Pope told the president to stop. This is just a preamble to trying to show that the US is an imperialist country. The corruption is appalling, and it is bi-partisan. I really believe we ned to all read this and everyone should read this book…it is very well written.

 

[Shoshana]

Meanwhile there was an increase in military attacks by the American-organized Contra army in neighboring Honduras and Costa Rica. Sometimes the targets were military, but the real focus seemed to be on terrorizing society in order to erode support for the government. Defenseless farming cooperatives were ambushed, adn many ordinary families lost members to gunshots or explosvies. P465

Before audiences in Europe and the US, Cardinal Arns accused rich Brazilians of treating the poor like ‘miserable creatures who are in the way and disturbing their comfort.’ He blamed foreign-owned multinational corporations for some of the violence, and said, ‘Things will not change for the better in latin America unless US foreign policy changfes first.’ P514

Contrary to what Reagan said, John Paul went to the International Court of Justice in Holland, May 13, 1985, to deliver what in papal terms was a STERN REBUKE TO THE UNITED STATES- a speech that went curiously unreported in the US. Nicaragua had complained to the court that the US had violated international law by ‘supporting a mercenary army…launching attacks on the territory of Nicaragua, and seeking to overthrow the government.’ P532

Reagan then declared that the US not only wouldn’t participate in a hearing on the merits of the case, but would withdraw its 1946 recognition of the court’s aurthority altogether, an action that would significantly weaken the court. P532

The court found in favor of Nicaragua and against the United States, citing a long list of US actions that it deemed ‘contrary to the general principles of humanitarian law.’ The US rejected the judgment. (In 1989, after the Contra war was settled, the US settled once again to use the international Court in many matters.)P532

 

[Shoshana]

Less than three weeks later, a Lebanese newspaper reported the secret, illegal arms sales to Iran, which led to a White House disclosure that money from the sales had been illegally used to fund the Contra war behind congress’s back. P556

The AFL-CIO’s Lane Kirkland also scoffed at the new American policy: ‘That freedom and democracy would be advanced by allowing capital to flow! The contrary is true in history,’ says Kirkland. 'American business loved (Chilean dictator) Pinochet. They were quite willing to embrace (dictators) Franco and mussollinni. Business doesn’t give a tinker’s damn about the evolution of a civil society outside of capital in pursuit of profit. P562

 

[roymckenzie]

I really want to take this discussion seriously, I can not take the discussion seriously if the source is Amnesty International, or if it is said that the United States is bad because Pope John Paul II wrote a dictator a letter. The story that the Reagan administration was involved with the killing of Catholic priests and nuns has been debunked a long time ago.

All the source material so far has not shown what Pope John Paul II said to rebuke the United States. Anyone is free to accept the testimony of socialists like Jimmy Carter, Hugo Chavez, Lane Kirkland or Amnesty International, I find these sources to be completely without veracity.

What I would like to have shown to me is what Pope John Paul II said against the United States of American and when he said it. In other words I want to see his actual words not what a reporter paraphrases his words to be. I don’t care what someone that hates America says the Pope said and I don’t care what a rouge Bishop’s opinion of the United States is, I care about what the Pope had to say.

 

[joe_clark]

Ignorance is bliss, but it is not smart. Remember the days when Americans were in the dark?

Quote: " Saddam Husain invaded a sovereign country Kuwait".

First untruth?: Yea and that war was over and finished in 1991. Which answer is truthful?

Quote: “The no fly zone: The only way one can honestly say the no-fly zone was working is if acts of war ie… shooting at our planes every opportunity they had to shoot at them is having the no-fly zone working.”

Second untruth?: This was the point. They shot at our planes with pea shooters shaking their fists because they could not do what they wanted outside of their borders, like invade a country like they did before.

Quote: George Bush had a goal of attacking Iraq before taking office. This is just calumny.

Third untruth: Please read the bi-partisan 911 commission report.

Also in the 911 Commission Report in the back of the book you will find a passage where after the New York towers went down the President, Cheney, Wolfson and Rumsfeld were in meeting where the suggestion was made to "Bomb A country in South America. The request was not specific to any country probably to give wiggle room. It didn’t matter who was responsible, at that time they were angry and they just saw a free ticket to bomb somebody. This is the intent and mentality that has brought us to this moment. Again I pray that cool heads prevail. We must learn to live in peace with each other or perish. Wisdom of the ages, let’s see if we take it.

 

[roymckenzie]

Ignorance is bliss, when was the first gulf war over?

Why hate the United States of America?

Also in the 911 Commission Report in the back of the book you will find a passage where after the New York towers went down the President, Cheney, Wolfson and Rumsfeld were in meeting where the suggestion was made to "Bomb A country in South America. The request was not specific to any country probably to give wiggle room. It didn’t matter who was responsible, at that time they were angry and they just saw a free ticket to bomb somebody. This is the intent and mentality that has brought us to this moment. Again I pray that cool heads prevail. We must learn to live in peace with each other or perish. Wisdom of the ages, let’s see if we take it.

This statement is a poignant, distressing, heartbreaking, and as far as I can tell lacking in veracity. I just read the last 83 pages of the report and I can not find where President Bush, Vice-President Cheney, Mr. Wolfson or Mr. Rumsfeld suggested we bomb a random South American country. Please provide and exact quote so the rest of us can confirm your accusation.

 

[joe_clark]

The war ended after General Norman Swartzkoff chased the Iraqi’s back to thier home. America with it’s allies at that time stopped at the border of Iraq. The No fly zone was under the color of the UN to keep Saddam from straying. None of the Allied forces were on foot in the country. None of the allies were bombing any cities in Iraq. The war was over for many but as I can see, for some it was only a time out.

The reason why I take this tone is because I want America to survive. I don’t believe you have to be a bully, bomb and or kill people to get them to play nice with the other nations. We are still the most powerful nation in the world and as such, it comes with great responsibility.

As for the 911 commission report, the accusation. The excerpt can be found in the rear of the book. I am at work and will give you page and paragraph. I wonder even when I do, will it matter? And this is what I fear is where the battle is won or lost, in the minds of many.

 

[Shoshana]

I really want to take this discussion seriously, I can not take the discussion seriously if the source is Amnesty International, or if it is said that the United States is bad because Pope John Paul II wrote a dictator a letter. The story that the Reagan administration was involved with the killing of Catholic priests and nuns has been debunked a long time ago.

All the source material so far has not shown what Pope John Paul II said to rebuke the United States. Anyone is free to accept the testimony of socialists like Jimmy Carter, Hugo Chavez, Lane Kirkland or Amnesty International, I find these sources to be completely without veracity.

What I would like to have shown to me is what Pope John Paul II said against the United States of American and when he said it. In other words I want to see his actual words not what a reporter paraphrases his words to be. I don’t care what someone that hates America says the Pope said and I don’t care what a rouge Bishop’s opinion of the United States is, I care about what the Pope had to say.

The argument between john Paul and Reagan over economic sanctions sparked the closest thing the pope had had to a public tiff with the civil political leader, communists included. The Pope had sent what he thought was a confidential, polite note to Reagan in response to the President’s phone call and letter supporting poland. He expressed his opposition to US economic sanctions in his usual euphamistic way, by thanking the presidrnt for the ‘humanitarian and food aid’ Americans had sent. Such aid, he said, represented ‘attitudes that are directed not against the life and progress of Poland (an apparent reference to trade sanctions) but toward supporting the aspirations of her people.’

John Paul was reported stunned when Reagan publicly claimed that the pope’s letter supported his economic sanctions. It was especially embarrasing because the pope had just endorsed a statement by the polish bishops opposing sanctions on the ground that they always increase popular suffering, while the ruling class finds a way to stay supplied. The pope was put in a position of either calling Reagan a liar or admitting that he himself had lied to the Polish bishops,’ a senior Vatican bishop said.

The Vatican issued a statement politely denying support for the sanctions, though American reports still suggested that Reagan’s initial statement relfected the pope’s true feelings. P430

There He Goes Again . . .

THE POPE. Answering a question about the U.S. sanctions against the Soviet Union after the crackdown in Poland, Reagan said that he had received a letter from Pope John Paul II and that the Pontiff “approves what we’ve done so far.” The papal message did not mention the sanctions, and the Vatican issued a statement insisting that the Pope had only praised Reagan for supporting “the aspiration of [Polish] people for liberty.”
time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,954974,00.html

 

[Shoshana]

At oen point in Denver, John Paul attacked ‘the media’ for promoting violence, then ad-libbed ‘So the Pope is speaking against the television that presents him!’ The audience cheered his attacks on commercialism and popular culture-a ‘culture o fdeath’, he said, where ‘objective goodness and evil no longer …matter. Good comes to mean what is pleasing or useful at a particular moment. Evil means what contradicts our subjective wishes.’

He sttod all the more starkly during as nationally televised exchange with the new president, Bill Clinton. Knowing that clinton had run a right-o-abortion platform, the pope challenged him to ‘defend life’ if he really wanted to promote ‘justice for all and true freedom.’ He wondered aloud on camera --as he must have wondered to himself many times—whether the americans who applauded him really wanted to hear his message. P642

 

[Shoshana]

Ignorance is bliss, but it is not smart. Remember the days when Americans were in the dark?

Quote: " Saddam Husain invaded a sovereign country Kuwait".

First untruth?: Yea and that war was over and finished in 1991. Which answer is truthful?

Quote: “The no fly zone: The only way one can honestly say the no-fly zone was working is if acts of war ie… shooting at our planes every opportunity they had to shoot at them is having the no-fly zone working.”

Second untruth?: This was the point. They shot at our planes with pea shooters shaking their fists because they could not do what they wanted outside of their borders, like invade a country like they did before.

Quote: George Bush had a goal of attacking Iraq before taking office. This is just calumny.

Third untruth: Please read the bi-partisan 911 commission report.

Also in the 911 Commission Report in the back of the book you will find a passage where after the New York towers went down the President, Cheney, Wolfson and Rumsfeld were in meeting where the suggestion was made to "Bomb A country in South America. The request was not specific to any country probably to give wiggle room. It didn’t matter who was responsible, at that time they were angry and they just saw a free ticket to bomb somebody. This is the intent and mentality that has brought us to this moment. Again I pray that cool heads prevail. We must learn to live in peace with each other or perish. Wisdom of the ages, let’s see if we take it.

<Pope Voices Opposition, His Strongest, to Iraq War

VATICAN CITY, Jan. 13 - Pope John Paul II today expressed his strongest opposition yet to a potential war in Iraq, describing it as a “defeat for humanity” and urging world leaders to try to resolve disputes with Iraq through diplomatic means.

No to war!" the pope said during his annual address to scores of diplomatic emissaries to the Vatican, an exhortation that referred in part to Iraq, a country he mentioned twice.

bulatlat.com/news/2-49/2-49-readerbruni.html

 

[Shoshana]

I The story that the Reagan administration was involved with the killing of Catholic priests and nuns has been debunked a long time ago.

Debunked by whom?

 

[bones_IV]

<Pope Voices Opposition, His Strongest, to Iraq War

VATICAN CITY, Jan. 13 - Pope John Paul II today expressed his strongest opposition yet to a potential war in Iraq, describing it as a “defeat for humanity” and urging world leaders to try to resolve disputes with Iraq through diplomatic means.

No to war!" the pope said during his annual address to scores of diplomatic emissaries to the Vatican, an exhortation that referred in part to Iraq, a country he mentioned twice.

bulatlat.com/news/2-49/2-49-readerbruni.html

This cannot be equated with an official Church teaching. The Pope of course is obliged to oppose any war and we should thank him for his wisdom. HOWEVER, that’s not the same thing as saying that the Iraqi war is immoral. If the Vatican had in fact declared the war immoral than why are so many Catholics participating in it? Why are so many Catholics supporting it? Those are my questions. Plus the Iraqi war was as Fr. Steven Toracco correctly asserts is not within the expertise of the Church to declare this war unjust. I don’t know how many times I’ve had to tell people this.

 

[roymckenzie]

At oen point in Denver, John Paul attacked ‘the media’ for promoting violence, then ad-libbed ‘So the Pope is speaking against the television that presents him!’ The audience cheered his attacks on commercialism and popular culture-a ‘culture o fdeath’, he said, where ‘objective goodness and evil no longer …matter. Good comes to mean what is pleasing or useful at a particular moment. Evil means what contradicts our subjective wishes.’

He sttod all the more starkly during as nationally televised exchange with the new president, Bill Clinton. Knowing that clinton had run a right-o-abortion platform, the pope challenged him to ‘defend life’ if he really wanted to promote ‘justice for all and true freedom.’ He wondered aloud on camera --as he must have wondered to himself many times—whether the americans who applauded him really wanted to hear his message. P642

On this point I have been bested, yes, he rebuked President William Jefferson Clinton as did Blessed Mother Teresa on a solid point of morality, Abortion. What they did I believe was the Holy Spirit from their mouth to his ears.

With regard to the war on terror we have been quoted from a book full of emanations, penumbra, vagaries, half truths and untruths, what we have yet to see are specific verifiable examples.

Being honest Catholic Christians we can have disagreements on the war and that is ok. What is not ok is to practice calumny; I believe most of the other side of the argument from mine believes strongly with a Christian faith. What I am hoping for is specific verifiable examples.

 

[Shoshana]

This cannot be equated with an official Church teaching.

Do you honestly believe that, if it was official catholic teaching, any government would listen?

The Pope of course is obliged to oppose any war and we should thank him for his wisdom.

It is wisdom that SHOULD be heeded. He is the only pope that was able, just by empowering the people, to overthrow Pinochet, etc.

HOWEVER, that’s not the same thing as saying that the Iraqi war is immoral.

This is about the Persian Gulf war that he made this statement on. Of course, this war on Iraq was a continuum of that war. Funny it would be decided to do it right after 911.

If the Vatican had in fact declared the war immoral than why are so many Catholics participating in it?

Why are so many catholics use birth control, abort? divorce and remarry once, twice, ad nauseum?

Why are so many Catholics supporting it?

Many cahtolic support same sex marriage also.

Those are my questions.

And these are mine. Why would so many catholics support dictators? or oppress their own people?

Plus the Iraqi war was as Fr. Steven Toracco correctly asserts is not within the expertise of the Church to declare this war unjust.

And plese tell me, what secular government can declare a war just/unjust? Evil can be justified if you use whatever information is available…as is abortion…birth control…divorce…etc.
I don’t know how many times I’ve had to tell people this.

This argument comes from partisanship more than catholic loyalties. Nationalism has become the god and sugar coating a war by declaring one is helping the oppressed doesn’t jive with enough of us. Especially if dictatorship/oppression exists in so many other countries and no one blinks an eye.