Within minutes of Code Pink's emailing out a press conference invitation in the name of Blackwater's new Department of Corporate Integrity, Blackwater was on the phone to the Code Pink D.C. house. We hadn't sent them the invitation, but they got it right away, anyway.
The release read:
“Blackwater USA Unveils New Corporate Integrity Department
Where: Phoenix Park Hotel, Wednesday, Oct. 30, 11 a.m.
“As part of the 2007 Annual Summit of the International Peace Operations Association (IPOA), Blackwater will be unveiling its new Department of Corporate Integrity. Given the public's concern over recent allegations about the lack of oversight and accountability for private security contractors in Iraq, Blackwater has felt a need to defend its corporate name and clear up its public image. “Just as in warfare, a good offense is the best defense,” says Eric Prince, chairman and CEO of the Prince Group and Blackwater, USA. “So we are going on the offense to defend the image of our great company.
“Blackwater has become synonymous with mercenary, but the public doesn't understand that mercenary has actually be a positive term throughout history,” said Max Boot of the Council of Foreign Affairs at the IPOA opening plenary. [Code Pink's Medea and Gael snuck into the Sunday night opening session of the IPOA convention.] “Mercenaries have provided service to kings, popes, and national governments that armies could not provide. So instead of running from the label mercenary, Blackwater should embrace it and reclaim the term.
“Directing the new Department of Public Integrity is Kitty Laver, who has 20 years' experience in public relations and corporate responsibility. “My job is to put the mercy back in mercenary,” says Laver, who will be unveiling the department's new code of conduct and presenting new measures the corporation is taking to hold its employees and contractors accountable for unethical behavior. “I'm certain the American public and the Iraqis will embrace the new, improved Blackwater,” says Laver.
Baffled by this press release, Blackwater didn't know who they were calling, just the number in the announcement.
“We're Blackwater and we don't know anything about this,” our confused caller said.
“Well if you're Blackwater, how come don't you know anything about this?...” a Code Pinker replied.
Code Pinkers stayed in character as Kitty Laver of Blackwater while our phones rang off the hook from Blackwater and the press, confused because the mercenary firm was claiming they didn't know anything about this and the press couldn't find any information on a Kitty Laver [aka Medea Benjamin]. A television network called us to schedule Blackwater president Eric Prince for their morning talk show. We accepted, and arranged for a friend to show up as Prince, but that appointment soon fell through, given the growing questions about this press conference. Through Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning, no one admitted we were not Blackwater, though the occasional irrepressible whoop of glee in the background might have raised suspicions. Code Pinkers planned the Wednesday press conference in three hours of late-night brainstorming Tuesday.
The next morning we headed over to the Phoenix Hotel, Medea and Des all in black as Kitty Laver and her assistant, and with a “minister” carrying a wood cross marked:
M
MERCENARY
R
C
Y
“Put the mercy back in mercenary!”
We also had a “disgraced Blackwater employee” in an orange prisoner's jumpsuit, and his plain clothes guard. The rest of us wore white coveralls with (paper) Blackwater logos, logo hats, and white rubber gloves as we gathered in front of the hotel, while hefty security men in suits and ties blocked the hotel's entrance and watched us, unsmiling.
The press was gathered, waiting to find out who we really were. As we walked up, someone said, “Oh, it's Code Pink!” But we stayed in character.
Medea as Kitty explained that while Blackwater had not had corporate integrity before now, we were here to take on the task of cleaning up its tarnished image, starting with a generous gift to the disadvantaged of the next generation. As Des displayed some macho fighting man action toys bearing the fierce Blackwater logo, Kitty said the new corporate cleanup crew would be distributing them to disadvantaged youth in the city's homeless shelters during the holidays, “to help them on the road to growing up to be mercenaries themselves!”
Kitty described the public's misunderstanding of the heroic role of mercenaries in America's shining history, and introduced the new head of the Division of Corporate Spirituality. The Reverend (Jay Marx), holding his cross, spoke of Blackwater's deep missionary zeal and the need to reclaim the term “mercenary.” Finally, Laver explained that henceforth Blackwater would be policing its own employees, and in a program of tough love, imposing painful penalties on sinners, “such as the one we brought here today, for our demonstration of waterboarding.”
Steve Lane as the erring employee in the orange jump suit and Jim Preston then gave a chilling demonstration of waterboarding while our white-clad colleagues held the prisoner down. (It was a good fake, not the real thing. No one drowned.)
We concluded, as we'd started, with our corporate chant:
In God we trust,
Leave the killing to us.
No matter what you do,
We'll clean it up for you.
Be it blood or guts,
Leave the cleaning to us.
21 comments:
*ROTFLMAO* I love it!!!
Does the Swiss Guard know about this? Heck, they even get to wear funnier clothes than we do. ;-7
That was very smart - much love to you all - thanks - gravel kucinich paul nader
Code Pink waterboarded that old homeless hippie guy for real back during January's protest.
So it's OK to waterboard some old homeless hippie guy to show that waterboarding terrorits is wrong...
Thanks, we go fix that right away.
Doh!
I thought it was a hoax, so I'd been sending the press away all morning.
My apologies!
Doug Brooks
President, IPOA
I wouldn't brag if I were you, Doug. The Department of Corporate Integrity is watching, and we work for America, but apparently not for you! Hmm now how can THAT be?
Thanks anonymous!!!
I had been looking for a nickname for physicist Steve (waterboarding victim). From now on, he will be referred to as 'that old homeless hippie guy'. As usual, we appreciate your assistance.
Just so you have your facts straight, the January waterboarding was the same simulation as yesterday. I guess we only fooled you once. Shame on you!!
BEYOND ARROGANCE
It was well-known that Pakistan´s
Dictatorship might fall,
Yet repercussion in Japan´s
Flared unequivocal.
´Tis not wise to impose, impinge
On friendship overmuch;
As now friends of this land must cringe
Because the bully´s touch.
More than mere arrogance--if there
Had been some principle
Behind it one may be cocksure--
But it bodes never well
To pressure friends, for one´s own greed
To give up lots of stuff,
Concede, concede, and more concede,
Because one treats them rough.
Now, that had to be more fun than all that unpleasantness last week. It pains me to see people I know, and care about, being manhandled the way Liz and Lori were. I hope everyone is OK.
Des, I missed you up in Philly last weekend, and I am so sorry.
Hey coles, your precious code pink pukes had mercs protecting them...
yeah, yeah preston, you clowns posted the photos and saw how you almost killed that homeless guy.
the homeless guy's also on video at other events, and can't get out a coherent sentence, so i'm not expecting him to say E=mc2 in the right order anytime soon.
btw, the guy and the chick in black leather that held the old homeless guy down looked like they were having too much fun waterboarding him, why didn't you make them agree to use a "safeword" when their BDSM game got out of hand?
Mr. Anonymous,
Thanks for your helpful comments. 'Homeless Steve' will probably be available after his demonstration near the Hart Senate Office Building next Tuesday morning, if you would care to discuss the simulation technique, or anything else with him. I suggest you brush up on your knowledge of time-frequency analysis and the automated identification of transients in fundamentally monotonic signals if you want to be prepared for the conversation. Otherwise you might wind up looking uninformed, or even stupid, if it isn't already too late.
As far as the January video goes, I was in it, so I doubt you know more about it than I do, but you know me, always lying about something. It must be pathological. What is your problem :)?
Mark Steyn seems to have been prescient: "Fantasy is a by-product of security: it's the difference between hanging upside down in your dominatrix's bondage parlor for half-an-hour after work on Friday and enduring the real thing for years on end in Saddam's prisons." The luckier Iraqis went into the industrial plastic shredders head first - and that was no prank. It must be nice to have so much security, freedom and time on your hands for hoaxes like that - my guess is many in the world don't have that same luxury.
Mr. cking makes the powerful argument that, because we have the freedom to demonstrate torture techniques to the public so that they may be informed about the crimes of our leaders, it must be OK for those same leaders to commit those crimes. His erudition rivals that of the Heritage Foundation warmonger who instructed me to go f*** myself today. That was just before he expressed his adoration for war, in general, and in Iraq, Iran, and Saudia Arabia, in particular. Given those choices, I guess I would rather go fuck myself. Back soon, as Christopher Robin said.
You are free, Mr. Preston, to make cracks about my erudition. But I think you draw a conclusion where there is none. I did not say nor did I imply that our leaders have committed no crimes - no Administration in history has committed zero crimes. I also oppose using torture in the resistance to Jihadism. And in that vein I will admit that I'm queasy about water-boarding, but am not convinced that it is torture, though you seem to be - I have a hard time concluding that a technique, however terrifying, to which CIA officers are willing to subject themselves experimentally can properly be counted as torture. And I ponder on what the Economist said: "Dozens of plots may have been foiled and thousands of lives saved as a result of some of the unsavory practices now being employed in the name of fighting terrorism. Dropping such practices in order to preserve freedom may cost many lives. So be it." I finally concur with Bret Stephens: "[refusing to use those unsavory practices on principle] says that the civilized world would be better off sustaining a nuclear 9/11 than tarnishing its good name, that righteous victimhood is a finer thing than an innocent life saved through morally compromised methods, and that self-preservation is not the most fundamental requirement of democratic life."
What I meant to do - if my lack of erudition caused me to write unclearly - was note that it is fascinating to watch what some members of the most free and wealthy generation of the most free and wealthy country in human history do with their historically abundant spare time. Then I juxtapose that with the actions of what large numbers of Americans call the 'Greatest Generation.' I'm assuming, since you are not a war fan, that you do not consider the Greatest Generation great at all, since the thing that made anyone consider such a label was their willingness to shoot, to kill and to die defending American values. I assume, and I could be wrong, that you believe those values make our country and our world worse - so there we differ. I also assume that you believe that there is no such thing as a just war (but I could be mistaken) - so we would differ there too, for clarity's sake. Thank you for the spirited dialogue.
cking,
You know that the administration has condoned torture. You can argue about the details of waterboarding, which has been prosecuted by the US as a war crime when committed by others, but it is far from the most egregious of the torture techniques that have been used in your name. Whatever the Economist, in all its' mainstream glory may proclaim, there have been no plausible claims of actual plots uncovered or thwarted by coercive techniques, while the likelihood of further attacks upon Americans has certainly been increased by the outrageous irresponsibility of our approach to the 'War on Terror'. On one hand, in some ways I wish that I was more like your 'noble victim', but in reality I am much more of a pragmatist. I am relatively sure that you would claim to be one as well, although one who is perhaps somewhat dipped in the ideology of American Exceptionalism. Do you really think that what your president and his pals have accomplished in their prosecution of the 'War on Terror' is the best that we can do? I think that America, and the rest of the human race, is better than that myself. In fact, I insist on it.
Your borrowed rhetoric about the 'nuclear 9/11' of course, is the worst sort of hyperbolic fearmongering that must be rejected out of hand. That kind of absurdist extrapolation makes any kind of rational discussion impossible and you are left with the 'kill all the bad guys before they kill you' Bush approach, which JUST DOESN'T WORK!!
If you think we're re-fighting WWII here, then have fun, and that whole 'Greatest Generation' mythology is just a bunch of tribal chest-thumping, and you know it.
peace,
jim
Fair enough Mr. Preston. You suspect correctly that I am somewhat dipped in American Exceptionalism (I assume you would term it American Abominablism) - my father escaped Hungary in the midst of the failed revolution, and we know well how 'humanity' can act. So one point you and I would differ on is that you dwell on how much better it could be, and I instead dwell on how much better it is - here, the place where one has the greatest opportunity to be 'the architect of one's own destiny' of any place ever. Just as a side note, have you ever wondered whether your outlook or mine gives one a greater chance at happiness? Anyway, humanity on the whole rarely disappoints me, because humanity generally stinks. There are, of course, many wonderful humans, one of whom may well be you. Do things need to get better? Absolutely. But the norm in human history, and it continues today (Sudan, Tibet, North Korea, Iran...I note how none of the gov'ts that control those areas could be considered allies of the U.S.) is one of astonishing cruelty, barbarity and poverty.
Is it the best we can do in the 'War on Terror' (I'm no fan of that nomenclature, though I'm sure for different reasons than yours)? You're sure it isn't, and you may be right. I'm not so sure. I would have bet my house the day after 9/11 that there would have been another attack on the U.S. (here or at one of our embassies) within 6 years, but there has not. I'm sure you would disagree, but I'd rather play offense over there than hunker down and play defense over here.
I don't think we're re-fighting WW II, I think we're fighting an even greater threat (call it WW III or 4 or call it an absurdity if you like). Because unlike fascism, Nazism and communism, which were imposed on people from without, Jihadism is an extension - an amplification - (and in certain ways a truer version) of an already strong belief system with well over 1 billion adherents. All the polls show that at least 10% of that group supports this ism - that's 100 million people at least. And sad to say, we're funding much of it with the money we use to buy Saudi Arabia's oil. God/nature has quite a sense of humor putting that resource in that region of the planet.
Finally, we certainly differ on the Greatest Generation. I believe the two greatest were the Founding Fathers and the WW II generations. Who gets your chest-thump?
Thank you, sir, for the sharp repartee. Good luck to you.
jim, thanks for clarifying that you're the S to Steve's M, in these little exhibitionist S&M displays
not only does code pink divert bread meant for the homeless, you torture them too
you are beneath contempt
CKing:
You don't understand. Our country would be more secure if we had leaders like Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez. We are led by the great Satan i.e. George W. Bush. We need a communist revolution here to turn the US into the same type of paradise that North Korea is. We can only have peace if we get rid of the corporate capitalist pigs!
Desiree
remember how code pinks leaders and cindy sheehan got the royal treatment and the tour of hugo chavez's presidential palace?
yesterday, hugo used water cannons, rubber bullets and teargas on peacefully protesters who opposed Chavez rewriting thier constitution so he could continue to serve for life
i seem to have missed code pink's protest/petition/ press release condeming the use of water cannons, rubber bullets and teargas on peacefull protesters in Hugoville
medea,...medea...
gael,...gael...
buller,...buller...
class?
You'd let torture happen, it's ok as long as you don't have to actually see it - but we're the ones into S&M because we are willing to show you what it looks like.
You claim we're the wimps, but you haven't got the guts to sign your name.
Hypocrite, much?
The Liars March for Tyranny and Oppression: Commie Claws are Coming to Town
Kerri Houston
The media is already characterizing the protesters as “anti-war activists” and their organization as “peace groups.”
Nothing could be further from the truth. They are communists. They are not in favor of peace; indeed, they are hell bent on inciting a communist revolution here in the United States.
Because there aren’t enough of them to occupy an entire city block, they snatch the well meaning into their grasping clutches by misrepresenting their true agenda and hoodwinking college students, grandparents, and soccer Moms with a social conscience into participating in their rallies. Afterall, a rally with only 10 people is, well, a meeting held outside.
So far the media either has not discovered the true nature of protest organizers, or it is generally unwilling to report it.
Communism is a failed political ideology spawning government sponsored terrorism responsible for the murder of over 100 million souls and the unimaginable misery of hundreds of millions more during the 20th century. Its political leaders have sanctioned genocide, giving us the killing fields of Pol Pot’s Cambodia, and the intentional starvation of 10 million Ukrainian peasants in 1933 by Josef Stalin. Millions of innocent Chinese were starved by their communist government resulting in reports of horrifying stories of villagers sacrificing children as a food source.
Modern communists recognize that most people find murderous thuggery distasteful. They wisely do not want to be associated with the brutal realities of past and present communist dictatorships of Stalin, Castro to Kim Jong Il. They have therefore hidden their real agenda behind ideals of which we all approve, such as “peace” and “justice.”
United for Peace and Justice is the chief sponsor of the Inaugural protests and it is run by Leslie Cagan, a longtime communist activist and devotee of Fidel Castro who was active in the American Communist Party commencing in the Vietnam War era. She was also a member of the Communist Party USA’s Committee for Correspondence. Her goals are the promotion of communism and the destruction of the current U.S. system of democracy.
UPF was deliberately formed as a false public and “moderate” voice to shield the American Marxist movement. Their water was originally carried by A.N.S.W.E.R., a communist front “anti-war” organization that was the brainchild of the Stalinist Workers World Party, but when A.N.S.W.E.R. showed its true colors at one too many anti-war rallies, the organized Left became nervous, prompting the formation of United for Peace and Justice with Ms. Cagan in charge.
Formal members of the Peace and Justice Coalition include state chapters of A.N.S.W.E.R., Committees for Correspondence, Communist Party USA, Communist Party of Vietnam, Ruckus Society, Not In Our Name (NION), September Eleventh Families for a Peaceful Tomorrow, MoveOn, the Communist Parties of Maryland, New York and Indiana, The Exploding Goldfish, Tennessee Guerrilla Women, Code Pink and the Marxist Feminist Lesbian Jamaican Radical Poets.
One of the leaders of A.N.S.W.E.R. is President Johnson’s former Attorney General, Ramsey Clark, an outspoken communist activist who has volunteered for the Saddam Hussein defense team. He founded an organization that supported former murderer Slobodan Milosevic and current murderer Kim Jong Il. He is a director of the post-Trotsky Workers World Party and claims that Osama bin Laden is a victim of U.S. terrorism. He believes that our government deliberately set out to make Islam its enemy so that we had a reason to build more things that go boom.
Brian Becker, another protest organizer and member of UPJ’s partner A.N.S.W.E.R was recently found in North Korea proudly denouncing the U.S. for “war crimes” against that country’s citizens while accusing our soldiers of committing mass murders. He is also a member of Clark’s organization and the anti-Semitic Workers World Party, which incidentally, is on the FBI’s terrorist watch list.
Code Pink, another “anti-war” organization hiding its ideology, is run by communist associate Medea Benjamin. Code Pink has primarily chosen women to lie to, taking advantage of the genuine concern that some homemakers and grandmas have about the Iraq war and using them to add voices at local protests.
Benjamin’s main claim to fame is organizing the violent 1999 World Trade Organization protests in Seattle in which she used the Marxist World Worker’s party to help supply bodies. The ensuing riots injured innocent bystanders, caused millions of dollars of property damage for business owners and taxpayers, and left many out of a job. A long time friend of Cagan and Central American communists, Ms. Benjamin was instrumental in the founding of Peace and Justice.
Ms. Benjamin also has formed a group in Baghdad called Occupation Watch dedicated to demoralizing U.S. troops by encouraging them to abandon the Iraqi people and obtain discharges under false pretenses. She was also behind placing in Baghdad the pre-war “human shields” whose dedication to the cause was quickly revealed when they headed for high ground just prior to shock and awe.
UPJ’s partner Not in Our Name is a group with connections to the Revolutionary Communist Party and the Maoist Revolutionary Communist Party. Communist activist Clark Kissinger was an instrumental member of the 1960’s violent Students for a Democratic Society and the Black Panthers and founded an organization dedicated to halting U.S. security interests during the cold war. He is a co-director of NION.
Parents, if your well-intentioned college student is participating in a “peace” protest on Inaugural Day, these are his or her partners.
They are not patriotic Americans who love peace and hate war. They are unpatriotic Americans who love communism and hate us. Human freedom is their enemy, and they have snared thousands of uninformed protesters into their web.
They are brilliantly deceptive as they cleverly incorporate their communist beliefs into activism that they cover in a mainstream cloaking device. But if they are so dedicated and proud of their beliefs, why do they strive to hide them?
Communism was, and continues to be, a plague on mankind. It has caused incalculable economic and ecological destruction as well as extinguishing the human spirit of millions of our global neighbors, past and present.
As today’s communist movement ironically uses the freedom of speech stripped from those under communist rule to ruthlessly and deliberately promote their agenda, we must never forget those who have suffered under its hands.
In our own act of irony, let’s commit a positive act of compassion by taking an active step to honor communism’s victims. Thank them for reminding us of the tyranny that is communism and go to www.VictimsofCommunism.org to donate some of your ill-gotten gains of evil capitalism for a monument to be built in Washington that reminds us of a brand of human suffering we must never allow again.
That’ll really hack them off.
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