The Mirror Has Become An Important Antidote

British Establishment Uses "the Royal We," As In, "we Think This." You Hear A Lot Of That These Days. It Erroneously Suggests That Those Who Are Making The Decisions To Bomb Countries, To Devastate Economies, To Take Part In Acts Of International Piracy Involve All Of Us.

In These Surreal Days, There Is One Truth. Nothing Justified The Killing Of Innocent People In America Last Week And Nothing Justifies The Killing Of Innocent People Anywhere Else.

Journalists Don't Sit Down And Think, "i'm Now Going To Speak For The Establishment." Of Course Not. But They Internalize A Whole Set Of Assumptions, And One Of The Most Potent Assumptions Is That The World Should Be Seen In Terms Of Its Usefulness To The West, Not Humanity. This Leads Journalists To Make A Distinction Between People Who Matter And People Who Don't Matter.

We Are Beckoned To See The World Through A One-way Mirror, As If We Are Threatened And Innocent And The Rest Of Humanity Is Threatening, Or Wretched, Or Expendable. Our Memory Is Struggling To Rescue The Truth That Human Rights Were Not Handed Down As Privileges From A Parliament, Or A Boardroom, Or An Institution, But That Peace Is Only Possible With Justice And With Information That Gives Us The Power To Act Justly.

When Governments And Other Vested Interests Attack Me Personally I Usually Regard It As A Vindication, Otherwise They Would Use Facts. That's Why I Believe In The Wonderful Claud Cockburn Dictum, 'never Believe Anything Until It Is Officially Denied.' It Has Certainly Been My Experience.