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| September 22, 2006 Red Alert by Soren Wuerth As dreams come true
The quiet conscience is an invention of the devil.
— Albert Schweitzer There was chanting. I remembered the words later as “peace, freedom, equality,” translated from Spanish. I repeated the words into the phone handle, “paz, libertad, igualdad!” joining a chorus I heard in the background. The rally, I knew, was in Caracas and I strained to hear the chant while another noise interrupted, a noise which eventually overwhelmed the telephone call, another chanting. A television commercial blared, “lower prices, buy, buy, buy.” I hung up, repeating the Spanish slogan to escape the interference of commercialism. I would make plans to go to Venezuela. A group of us began drafting a letter (there was some debate over whether or not we should write it in English or Spanish) to Hugo Chavez. It was four in the morning when I woke up from this hopeful dream. As I lay in my tent, listening to the hard clop of rain on its nylon roof, a vow, as persistent as the Spanish slogan, repeated itself … an Alaska delegation to Venezuela. That dream came months ago. Today I was reminded of it reading a patently biased New York Times account of Chavez’s speech to the UN. The article compared Chavez’s address to that of Nikita Khrushchev and grafted his popular election to his failed coup and “a tide of poverty-driven resentment.” Yeah. No doubt, the less “liberal” side of the corporate media establishment will be less gracious in tone. Chavez, for our more ignorant fellow countrymen, will now be place aside Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Kim Jong-il, and Adolf Hitler in a line up at the shooting post. How dare he criticize US! Thrust out your chest and thump it hard. We’re backing the home team! If the refs make a bad call, they’re out of the game! We’ll live and die defending ‘Merica and George Bush, dammit! I can see him, pulling out of his driveway, in his Hummer, no seat belt, heading to Wal-Mart, tires squealing painfully. He might drive by a run-down apartment building on his way. Inside one flat, a Hispanic family takes a Sunday break after a six-day workweek. They watch the man drive by in his Hummer, a middle finger waving like a flag from the darkened driver’s side window. They look at each other. A man brushes his guitar and chuckles. “Paz, libertad, igualdad,” he sings. “Paz, libertad, igualdad!” Soren Wuerth is perhaps Alaska's best known community activist, and is the winner of the Alaska Press Club's 2006 'Best Columnist' award. He resides in an undisclosed location in rural Alaska and can be reached at soren@insurgent49.com. |
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Reserved. in-sur-gent (in sur'jent), n. 1. a member of a group which revolts against the policies of its leadership. |
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