Loose cannons

Permanent war will bring peace

"We're talking about a part of the world in which, uhh, you know, our foreign policy was, let's just hope for the best and tolerate the fact there's no free societies. And — what ended up happening was, there was a — tyrants have emerged, tyrants that threatened our security. And so not only was the action worth it, the action is worth it to make sure that democracy exists, and, uhh, because democracies will yield peace, and that's what we want." — Emperor George Bush II, April 4, justifying his "global war on terror".

Bush calls it 'democracy'

"The CIA's pre-war conviction that Iraq had WMD was 'dead wrong', the [presidential] commission [on the intelligence capabilities of the United States regarding weapons of mass destruction] said — the result of a 'culture of enforced consensus'." — Tacoma News Tribune, April 6.

Blessed are the poor I

"Churches [in Australia] generated almost $23 billion in 2004, with the Catholic Church turning over almost two-thirds of that, an investigation by BRW magazine found ... It has estimated the Catholic Church's gross revenue at $15 billion in 2004 ... BRW estimates that the Catholic Church owns property and other assets worth more than $100 billion in Australia." — Sydney Morning Herald, March 22.

Blessed are the poor II

"The papacy relies on earnings from about $US1 billion in stocks, bonds and real estate to top up donations from Catholics around the world." — Bloomberg.com, April 6.

From Green Left Weekly, April 13, 2005.

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From GLW issue 622