Doing Something

Joe Carter at Evangelical Outpost pokes a little fun at the LIVE 8 festivities:

Last weekend hundreds of thousands of people gathered in ten spots around the globe for a series of free concerts meant to persuade world leaders to give more money to fight poverty in Africa. The idea for the concerts was conceived in May and hastily organized by Bob Geldof. Within two months the former Boomtown Rat was able to convince dozens of actors, musicians, and politicians to join in forming LIVE8, "the largest mandate for action in history."

Unlike most benefit concerts, though, Live8 won't be raising a dime to actually end poverty. As the web site notes, "LIVE 8 is calling for people across the world to unite in one call - in 2005 it is your voice we are after, not your money." Geldolf says the event is intended to raise consciousness and exert political pressure on the G8 summiteers.

According to the New York Times, the concerts included more than 200 musical acts scheduled to play more than 69 hours of music. Organizers said 5.5 billion people would be able to watch or listen on the Internet and more than 182 television stations and 2,000 radio networks and stations. Coldplay's Chris Martin called the concerts "the greatest thing that's ever been organized, probably, in the history of the world."

The greatest thing that's ever been organized (probably) in the history of the world?

Hmm, sounds like a challenge. Well, ... the blogosphere accepts.

The greatest thing that has ever been organized - probably - in the history of the world will occur in the blogosphere. By linking blogs we shall create a revolution in consciousness raising. We shall raise our consciousness higher than has ever been attempted before. And once our collective consciousnesses have reached stratospheric levels, the G8 will have no choice but to consent to our demands.

Here is how you can participate in the greatest thing that has ever been organized - probably - in the history of the world:

1. Raise your consciousness.

2. Show others that you have raised your consciousness by linking to this post and displaying the Official Logo of LotR (at Carter's post) on your blog.

3. Tell the world exactly what it is you are raising your consciousness about (it can be anything you want).

4. Use your raised consciousness to exert political pressure on the G8 summiteers.

5. Feel good about having participated in an action that, while not having actually affected anything, has allowed you to be part of the greatest thing that ever been organized - probably -- in the history of the world.

As Geldolf said, "Something must be done, even if it doesn't work." By participating in the Linkers of the Revolution event, you can do something. It won't work, of course, but that doesn't matter. Something must be done. And this is, technically speaking, something.

Viva la Revolution!

Maybe Carter's being a little hard on the LIVE 8 folks. They mean well, after all, and isn't that all that matters?

A Friend's Admonition

A friend reproves us for being both unfair and guilty of the same fault we imputed to others in a couple of our posts of 7/7. His argument is in our Feedback section. Check it out and see if you agree.

Life in Hell

A South Korean newspaper sheds a little light on life in the socialist workers' paradise of North Korea:

Citing interviews with North Korean defectors, a Seoul-based research institute said yesterday that the regime in Pyongyang is continuing an aggressive campaign to suppress underground churches in the country.

The 2005 North Korea Human Rights White Paper published by the Korea Institute of National Unification reported a number of executions of religious figures operating underground Protestant churches in the North. In 2001, five people found guilty of conducting missionary work were executed by firing squad in Nampo.

North Korean defectors are quoted in the report as saying that Pyongyang is doing everything it can to stop the spread of Protestantism in the communist country. According to the report, 86 members of underground churches were rounded up in the early 1990s in Anak, South Hanghae province, some of whom were executed while the rest were sent to political prisons.

A North Korean defector said he had once participated in a three-year long operation to uproot an underground church in 1996. Since 1997, North Korea has been instructing its people to report any kind of proselytizing to the authorities. As a pretense that religious freedom exists in the North, Pyongyang has built a number of churches, but underground churches have been vigorously suppressed.

According to the report, economic crimes in particular continue to be punished through public executions. Disclosures were also made detailing executions of people who had been selling human flesh at the height of the country's food crisis in the late 1990s. The research institute said a number of defectors had given testimony about the sale of human flesh.

They're so hungry for food that they'll eat human flesh. They're so hungry for God that they'll risk imprisonment or death in order to find Him. The poor masses of North Korea find themselves languishing in a state-imposed hell. They're starving both physically and spiritually, but their leaders are determined to manufacture nuclear weapons which will neither fill their bellies nor nourish their souls. For what?

A Simplistic View

If anyone would like insight into the thinking of true-blue lefties and why the Democratic Party is doomed to utter irrelevance short of a miraculous turn-about, they ought to read today's discussion thread at Democratic Underground.

General Theme: The London atrocities were all the fault of Bush/Blair.

The belief seems to be that if we hadn't invaded Afghanistan and Iraq London wouldn't have happened. Never mind that 9/11 predated the invasion of Afghanistan and that Islamic terrorism has been striking western targets at least since the 1970s. What the DU contributers don't seem to accept is that Islamo-terrorists are only proximally concerned with Iraq. The real reason for their hatred of the west is that our values are antithetical to Islam.

Moreover, we, the infidels, have produced a steadily advancing civilization while they, the faithful, have failed in every measure to move beyond the middle ages. This is a maddeningly difficult fact to accept and it fuels their rage against us. Their only accomplishment in the last five hundred years has been to devise more ingenious ways of killing people. Finally, as long as the west, or at least the U.S., stands behind Israel's right to exist the Islamists will hate us.

To blame the London horror on Bush and Blair is to hold a very simplistic view of the struggle we're in.