OF THE
TIMES
I guess what I experienced was a mixture of anger, sadness, disgust at what the media will do to sell a war, but there was also a feeling like something has clicked to it's place, a growing compassion, love and respect for Gaddafi the man....
Gaddafi the family man, living in a tent, his small piece of desert in much hated city.
You can see the sparse furniture, plastic chairs, heaters, a couch no European or American official would sit his 'respectable" behind on, and an office space with computer
and a printer- in a tent.
You can see him playing with his grandchildren and letting them walk all over him.
You can see him feeding them at dinner, again in a tent, at what looks like rather cold evening, because children and all the adults, except Gaddafi, are wearing winter jackets and look rather cold. He seams used to it.
Again, we see plastic table and chairs, no fancy tableware, no crystal glasses, no alcohol, no caviar or salmon, just a simple meal shared with family.
I wonder what does the family meal between the Sarkozy couple looks like. Plastic furniture is out of the question for the first lady of France, I suppose...Not to mention the Emir of Qatari, Prime Minister Cameron or the easy target - Berlusconi....
Now, even those who never read anything written by the man himself, who never questioned the mainstream media attacks on his personality, who were raised on the 'dictator' caramel, can have a glimpse of the man behind it and maybe, just maybe, ask themselves, is this how a 'tyrant' and a 'ruthless dictator' would behave, is this how he would have lived if he could have anything he wished for?
Lugh, you're missing the point. The reason I chose Bush is precisely because his crimes ARE greater than Gaddafi's. His death toll is certainly higher, but you know what? He did some good things too!Bush did NOTHING good. Get real! YOU'RE the one missing the point.
George Bush tripled US aid to Africa!"Aid to Africa", for your information, means money to African puppet regimes and to US multinationals pillaging African resources. Maat, you are sooooo duped.
"His government sent $950 million dollars in relief aid to help the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, and deployed the US military to the zone to help at a cost of $5 million dollars a day!"Oh yes! And it was all about benevolence, right? The US got nothing back for this $5million, right? Do a little research on where USAid money really goes, and what it is a cover for, and then come back and discuss the topic.
"He increased the level of minorities serving in government to historic levels!"Token minority members in Congress have changed nothing, and Bush et al knew that.
"He boosted the number of refugees from oppressive regimes and asylum seekers into the USA by four times!"Oppressive regimes that his government created and financed.
And you know, I'm sure he loves his children and Barny the dog.I doubt it.
...Does any of that excuse the other things he did?There's a difference here Maat, these "things" that Bush did are actually lies he never "did" them. Gaddafi on the other DID do the things he claimed he did.
Does Gaddafi's track record of good things he did also excuse him for the massacre of 1200 political prisoners in Abu Salim prison? Does it excuse him for the imprisonments without trial? The total outlawing of dissent? The assassinations of Libyan dissidents who had fled to foreign countries? The sponsorship of terrorism? The brutal massacres he ordered during the uprisings?ALL of the above is vile propaganda and lies, and provably so. And you expect to come here and disseminate it and have it accepted as truth! Hah!
It seems to me that these Gaddafi pieces SOTT has been publishing are little better than propaganda. Images of him looking compassionate and sincere and not one mention of his crimes.The only propaganda being spread here is to found in your comments
Here's a little video you might like to check out [Link]It shows the private moments of a man having fun and being kind to some children. Who could this kindly looking man be? Why, It's Adolf Hitler! (He liked dogs too)Are you REALLY that ignorant? I'm finding it hard to believe that you can't grasp the very simple point that is being made to you: it is not ONLY the images or videos of Gaddafi that we have posted, it is his track record, his ACTUAL track record, not some government propaganda version of his track record.
"And I am finding it hard to believe that you completely fail to understand the point I am making. Your use of gentle images of Gaddafi is taken directly out of the pages of propaganda techniques. They are an appeal to emotion, an attempt to circumvent the intellect, something which the philosophy espoused on this site usually condemns. I showed you equivalent images of Hitler. Such images mean nothing. Just stick to the facts."You are again failing to grasp the fact that the images are not being presented on their own, but as part of the other picture of Gaddfi that has been CONSISTENTLY DENIED TO THE WESTERN PUBLIC FOR 40 YEARS! Note I said PART of the other picture, the rest of that picture is the HARD DATA on the GOOD he has done in Libya and the MASSIVE number of people in Libya who support him. In July, 1.7 MILLION Libyans came out in support of their "brutal dictator", and now NATO have murdered him, and here you sit, spouting what is essentially NATO propaganda.
Nothing seems to be able to stem the tide of the 'pro-rebel' discourse on the web since the NATO bombing campaign began.This discourse not only includes the absurdly exaggerated human rights allegations that were manipulated so frantically by both rebel supporters and the US and several European countries but also contains a constant stream of lies about rebel battlefield achievements, and most importantly about the level of popular support enjoyed by the rebels. This is a vitally important point, and it is something that distinguishes this uprising from others in the Middle East recently. There is a virtually constant stream of completely unsubstantiated allegations pouring out of hundreds of rebel twitter and facebook accounts. These claims virtually never contain any supporting evidence, and we are apparently supposed to accept this at face value regardless. Of course, in reality when you make a completely unproven allegation, it is treated as automatically doubtful or unreliable until you present compelling proof. In the rebel case, the mainstream media has played an opposite role, accepting virtually any allegation, no matter how obviously untrue, as if it unchallenged fact.
This contains several instances. First, it uses a video of a man in extreme closeup making unverified claims. Note that these claims, unlike what is related in this article, do not seem to specifically relate to a particular protest. Thus they are vague at the outset. This article than openly manipulates this to imply that this claim (which is itself false) somehow applies to the July 1st protest. This is of course absurd and any rational mind can see this. The claim here is that a demonstration larger than the one in the square (completely filling it) took place and that it was dispersed by gunfire. Now if this had actually happened, there would have been sustained gunfire for probably several days, and the chaos would have been easily perceived. Thus the use of this video in this context is deliberately misleading.
Next we see unsubstantiated claims about the size of the demonstration. Note that if anyone views the you tube videos, these claims are facially absurd and anyone who makes them has a serious credibility problem. It is hard to argue with a straight face that the demonstration had less than 250,000 people, given the size of the square and the fact that the demonstration filled it completely. It is entirely possible, indeed probable that 500,000 or more demonstrated.
With respect to the quality of the video, CGI, etc. A full 30 minute version of the demonstration can be found on you tube.
FOUND HERE: [Link]The video contains many different angles, panning shots, closeups, shots from a variety of distances, and focusing shots (both pulling away and focusing in). It is absurd to assert that some ultra sophisticated group of Libyan programmers was able to create such a thing, considering both the technical skill required and the expense involved.
Now we get the twitter element. Gamal Gamaty (who recently tweeted about black magic, which pretty much destroys him as a credible source, see his account for this) makes a completely unsubstantiated claim that can be disproven by simply looking at the video. Once again absurd. In addition, a claim that protesters were paid, once again no evidence, and note the arrogance of the rebels as they imply that no one can oppose them because of honestly held beliefs.
In conclusion, this piece is a bad attempt to deceive people who will not actually examine the footage (of the Pro-Gaddafi rally in July), and it fails completely. It reflects the approach taken in pretty much all other rebel propaganda. It reflects the arrogant assumption made by the rebels that they represent a majority of the country when facts show otherwise. There are now over 2 million armed Libyans in the vicinity or Tripoli and other areas, and if they wanted to overthrow the government, it would probably take them a matter of hours. In fact we see that the rebels have virtually no support in any area that they do not already control. And finally with respect to your accusations of cowardice. If Gaddafi was a coward, he would have taken the deal offered by the Western imperial powers now trying to subjugate Libya. As a human being he does not wish to be murdered by NATO warplanes, and in addition he, unlike NATO, cares about the many innocent civilians that NATO would be willing to murder without a second thought to kill him.
Didn't quite find the devil in there, anyone got a time frame if/when it appears?