#middle easy

[mysharona1987]

[kharakardashian]

Dude honestly.. I just thought- what if when Europeans colonized like the whole world they fucjing poisoned the food supply or something/changed the food/environment of their host countries in some way that decreased the intellegence/motivation (for lack of a better word) of the natives? Like for example how bombings/radioactivity causes birth defects (as seen in Afghanistan from america).. what if the white people did some kind of version of that to their host countries to have better control over the population + generations to come. Like it’s literally a big fucking possibility and not unrealistic at all.

[auskultu]

WEDNESDAY, MARCH 6, 1968

Quan Long, a Mekong Delta city of airy, stucco buildings and thatched peasant huts, was invaded yesterday by a Viet Cong force that occupied a hospital there for a few hours, burned many huts and then retreated through the surrounding rice paddies. Early this morning they struck again with mortars, setting fire to a dispensary building.

The United States, according to informed sources in Cairo, has released to Egypt the contents of a message from Secretary of State Rusk to the Israeli Foreign Minister, Abba Eban, urging that Israel settle for indirect rather than direct negotiations with the Arabs. The note, whose apparent purpose is to generate goodwill for the United States among the Arabs, also appealed to Israel to accept the Security Council resolution calling for a withdrawal from captured Arab territory. 

The new Czechoslovak leadership under Alexander Dubček dismissed its ideological aide, who has attacked rebellious writers and students, and announced that it would publish a “full account” of the Central Committee sessions that resulted in the ouster Jan. 5 of the former party leader, Antonin Novotný. The moves were seen as symptoms of the growing openness of public debate in the country. 

According to Bolivian and American sources, Ernesto Che Guevara talked freely with a C.I.A. agent for two hours before he was executed. The C.I.A. is reported to have been instrumental in the destruction of the guerrilla movement in Bolivia, but there is no evidence that it participated in the decision to eliminate Mr. Guevara. 

With only the stanchest liberals objecting, the Senate tacked an amendment onto the civil rights bill making it a crime to cross state lines with intent to incite a riot. The Senate also rejected by a close vote an amendment that would have removed single-family, owner-occupied homes from the proposed ban on housing discrimination. 

White House spokesmen are fending off a lot of questions these days about President Johnson's reaction to his riot commission's report Mr. Johnson has remained silent it is reported, because he thinks the panel should have addressed its suggestions to a reluctant Congress and doesn’t want to quarrel over the report’s failure to praise his programs.

Without an opponent in the New Hampshire primary, Richard M. Nixon has begun campaigning against President Johnson. If the Administration fails to bring the war to a satisfactory conclusion by November, he said, the people would be justified in electing a new President He said he would end the war and bring peace to the area. 

Mr. Johnson’s name will not be entered-in the Massachusetts primary, leaving only Senator Eugene McCarthy’s name on the ballot

[lets-talk-about-politics]

Why 9/11 wasn’t another Pearl Harbor.

On social media this year, I really don’t see anybody saying much about 9/11.

This isn’t to diminish the lives of those who died that day, or the public servants who heroically gave their lives to save others. I feel an unbelievable sadness when I read the stories of families who lost someone dear to them. 

But it’s to remember that the legacy of 9/11 is tragic, disturbing, and sad. It’s to remember that we’ve honored those who died by lying and deceiving in order to start vicious wars that killed hundreds of thousands in the Middle East, by committing human rights abuses at Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib, by massively scaling up the surveillance state. And that’s just the start of it.

So it’s no wonder that Americans don’t feel the way about 9/11 that they do about Pearl Harbor. Our leaders wholly and completely failed us, and have made 9/11 nothing more than a reminder of our country’s decay.

[mysharona1987]

[libertariantimes]

Turkey Coup: HELICOPTER SHOOTS PEOPLE IN TURKEY

[descrier]

Fears raised over Middle East stability as Sunni states bomb Yemen

Yemen, the poorest country in the Middle East and known to have more weapons than citizens, has been a security nightmare for some time – but its recent downturn has finally spurred its neighbours to military action.

[mayainmena]

يوم في الحياة

Ok, time for a break from posting pictures of my weekend trips and actually talking about my daily life here. Here's a timeline of a usual weekday here in Amman:

7:40 am: wake up, huddle by our space heater and drink tea as I get ready for classes

8:25 am: head out of the house and try to catch a cab to the university - this is super variable, so most of the time my roommate and I end up getting to the university either slightly late or ridiculously early

9:00 am: Modern Standard Arabic - I'm in a class with 5 other students, so while it's definitely hard to get away with zoning out if I'm tired, we get a lot of control over what we get to learn, which is awesome

10:15 am: short break between classes when Muriel and I walk to a nearby coffee stand

10:30 am: Jordanian Colloquial Arabic - this class also has 6 students, and because the curriculum is slightly less formal we get to spend a lot of time talking about Jordanian culture, listening to music, or learning Jordanian swear words

11:40 am: lunch break - my group usually alternates between a cheap falafel place (with 50 cent sandwiches and amazing fruit juice) or a slightly pricier but still super cheap (on average $3 for a meal) Yemeni restaurant with addictive bread and amazing spiced tea:

12:30 pm: on Sundays and Tuesdays, this is when I'm off to my two subject courses: Gender in the Arab World and Politics of the Arab World. Because these are classes for those of us who came in with 3 years of Arabic or less, we don't learn a ton of new information about the topics themselves but we learn a lot of helpful vocab to help us talk about the subjects we're interested in

3:30 pm: on Wednesdays, at this time I'm off to the Academy for the Blind where I volunteer once a week (it hasn't worked out to be quite this often because the sessions sometimes get cancelled for testing or because of the weather, but that's the ideal. Most of the time I bring my ukulele and we sing a few songs together, but a few weeks ago I got to help out with a trip to a nearby mall that had a mini amusement park on the third floor:

6:00 pm: by this time I'm usually on my way back to our house to relax and/or get caught up on homework - I often take a cab to a nearby mall to run an errand or two and then walk the 20 minutes or so to the house. This involved navigating a somewhat crazy roundabout but is a nice way to get some fresh air and a bit of exercise without taking up too much time of the day:

7:00 pm: by this point I'm either relaxing in my room or spending time with my host family:

(my host sister and host nice at my host sister's graduation party)

10:00 pm: then it's time to go to bed since tomorrow I'll once again be waking up much earlier than I'd like to...

12/2/2014