that which repeats itself

Propaganda poster featuring Mao and his wife, Jiang...

Wed, 09 Feb 2011 03:41:39 -0500

Propaganda poster featuring Mao and his wife, Jiang Qing.

(I’m sorry, I don’t know what that this says.)

1934 film poster of Jiang Qing, wife of Mao Zedong

Wed, 09 Feb 2011 03:26:00 -0500

1934 film poster of Jiang Qing, wife of Mao Zedong

A piece of American film propaganda from WWII that defines...

Mon, 20 Dec 2010 03:02:04 -0500

A piece of American film propaganda from WWII that defines “us” and “them.” This is only one video of a seven-part series. It’s called “The Prelude to War” and won an Academy Award in 1942. Really fascinating stuff.

I take great pride in and highly appreciate the fact that our...

Tue, 05 Oct 2010 13:19:00 -0400

I take great pride in and highly appreciate the fact that our people have overcome the ordeals of history and displayed to the full the heroic mettle of the revolutionary people and the indomitable spirit of chuch’e Korea, firmly united behind the party … . No difficulty is insurmountable nor is any fortress impregnable for us when our party leads the people with the ever-victorious chuch’e-oriented strategy and tactics and when all the people turn out as one under the party’s leadership.

—Kim Il-sung (김일성), President of North Korea (1972-1994).
(I highly recommend a visit to the site from which I got this image, it’s fascinating. http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2008/09/recent_scenes_from_north_korea.html

“Sooner or later, [the I.R.A.] has been saying, British...

Sun, 26 Sep 2010 14:00:00 -0400

“Sooner or later, [the I.R.A.] has been saying, British troops would put the boot in good and hard. People have been half expecting this. Sunday in Derry has fitted the piece of the jigsaw in. My personal view is that the risk of civil war here has never been greater.”

—Oliver Napier, former vice chairman of the Alliance Party

(my own photo from the Free Derry Museum in Derry, Northern Ireland)

Making peace, I have found, is much harder than making...

Wed, 22 Sep 2010 15:16:00 -0400

Making peace, I have found, is much harder than making war.

—Gerry Adams (1948-pres.), President of Sinn Féin

(my own photo of the Hands Across the Divide statue in Derry, Northern Ireland)

Let us ask, where is your conscience? —Lin Zexu (林则徐) in...

Wed, 22 Sep 2010 02:54:00 -0400

Let us ask, where is your conscience?

—Lin Zexu (林则徐) in a letter to Queen Victoria (1839)

The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of...

Wed, 22 Sep 2010 02:39:43 -0400

The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.

Freeman and slave, patrician and plebian, lord and serf, guild-master and journeyman, in a word, oppressor and oppressed stood in constant opposition to one another, carried on an uninterrupted, now hidden, now open fight, a fight that each time ended, either in a revolutionary re-constitution of society at large, or in the common rule of the contending classes.

—Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, The Communist Manifesto (1848)

All men are brothers, like the seas throughout the world; so why...

Wed, 22 Sep 2010 01:58:30 -0400

All men are brothers, like the seas throughout the world; so why do winds and waves clash so fiercely everywhere?

—Emperor Hirohito (裕仁), 1901-1989

Suddenly, as the riot squad moved in, it was raining exclamation...

Wed, 22 Sep 2010 01:38:00 -0400

Suddenly, as the riot squad moved in, it was raining exclamation

marks,

Nuts, bolts, nails, car-keys. A fount of broken type. And the

explosion

Itself – an asterisk on the map. This hyphenated line, a burst of

rapid fire…

I was trying to complete a sentence in my head, but it kept

stuttering.

All the alleyways and side-streets blocked with stops and colons.

—”Belfast Confetti,” Ciarán Carson (1948-pres.)

All iron was their war array. In iron they clothed themselves....

Wed, 22 Sep 2010 00:44:00 -0400

All iron was their war array. In iron they clothed themselves. With iron they covered their heads. Iron were their swords. Iron were their crossbows. Iron were their shields. Iron were their lances.

And those which bore them upon their backs, their deer, were as tall as roof terraces.

And their bodies were everywhere covered, only their faces appeared. They were very white; they had chalky faces; they had yellow hair, though the hair of some was black. Long were their beards; they also were yellow…

And their dogs were very large…They had fiery eyes—blazing eyes; they had yellow eyes—fiery yellow eyes…

And when Moteczoma heard all this, he was much terrified. It was as if he fainted away. His heart saddened; his heart failed him.

—Aztec account of Cortés’s conquest of the Aztec Empire (1521) as translated by Arthur J. O. Anderson and Charles E. Dribble

I have not come into this world to make men better, but to make...

Wed, 22 Sep 2010 00:05:00 -0400

I have not come into this world to make men better, but to make use of their weaknesses.

—Adolf Hitler (1889-1945)

(photo of einsatzgruppen)

I want war. To me all means will be right. My motto is not...

Tue, 21 Sep 2010 23:59:00 -0400

I want war. To me all means will be right. My motto is not “Don’t, whatever you do, annoy the enemy.” My motto is “Destroy him by all and any means.” I am the one who will wage the war.

—Adolf Hitler (1889-1945)