Wednesday, October 16, 2002

Chirac denies Iraq-al-Qaeda link [BBC World] While Chirac is far from my idea of an ideal world leader and I'm sure his main motivations are political benefit at home and the opportunity to tweak America's nose, I'm glad to see someone with a veto on the Security Council laughing this whole thing out of court, as it were. I forget where I read this, but the expectation is that France is the most likely to veto force against Iraq - China's almost certain to abstain, since they have nothing to gain by vetoing it and a lot to lose by pissing off the US, while Russia will eventually get enough compensation for their vote. The question is whether France would still use the veto on its own... Seeing news like this makes me think there's a pretty good chance, especially with the continental European support (Germany most notably) they'd receive for such a vote. Good - it may not stop the war, but it damned well should.

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Identity and the Orange Order. The Orange Order is often in the news in Britain, and everyone who keeps an eye on Northern Irish politics must be at least slightly familiar with that institution. We are often shown members of the Order marching, and told that it is disgraceful that they march on certain routes, and that they must be stopped by the police and the state despite this being strangely in opposition to the fundamental human rights of every man to self assembly. Sometimes the television screens blast out condemnatory speeches by politicians interspersed with mocking pictures of men in bowler hats, wearing orange and playing flutes. But what is the Orange Order really? Why does it have such a huge coalition of enemies, enemies that include the Irish State, the British State, and the American State? How can it rouse such ire, despite (unlike the always in vogue IRA) having never planted a bomb, kneecapped a civilian, or machine-gunned a pub? [kuro5hin.org] I don't care much for the IRA, personally - violence isn't the right way to get what you want, no matter how just your cause. That said, I definitely don't like the Orangemen at all. Why, you ask? Because I vehemently disagree with their politics and bigotry. The Orange Order are virulently anti-Catholic, and have served as a symbol of the oppression their members has visited upon the Catholic population of Northern Ireland since the partition. This article links the IRA and Sinn Fein - and yes, there is some connection there, but the IRA is not part of Sinn Fein, and (contrary to Orangeman propaganda) Sinn Fein is not part of the IRA. The Orange Order isn't part of the UDF or other Unionist terrorist organizations, either - but if they have such problems with Sinn Fein because of their political beliefs, why can't we have problems with the Orange Order because of theirs? This entire article is propaganda itself. Check this line out: "It is hard to see how a swift march can irritate Catholic communities so much[.]" Hmm...maybe because a group of people who've been actively depriving the Catholics of their rights for centuries are walking through Catholic neighborhoods, boisterously celebrating their history of oppression and bigotry? How would the people of the Protestant neighborhoods feel if Sinn Fein were to march through their streets, chanting and taunting? Just noticed this at the bottom of the article: "bc [the author] is a thinker and writer who has been involved in the orange order since he was a boy." Ah, well, then. Just as I wouldn't trust a Sinn Fein party member and activist to write a fair and balanced history of the Irish Republican cause (for that matter, I wouldn't even trust myself to do that - I'm too biased), I sure won't look on this as an unbiased history of the Orange Order. I'll find some alternate perspectives to link to later today...

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Army fired 'without reason'. A former British soldier tells the Bloody Sunday Inquiry colleagues opened fire on civilians in Londonderry "without justification". [BBC News | Front Page] While it's a very good thing to see the British establishment seriously investigating Bloody Sunday, and it's a very good thing to see a British soldier placing the blame firmly where it belongs, isn't it, I dunno, thirty years late? This isn't exactly news to anyone, is it?

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