Visitors to this blog divide into those who hang out in the comments and those who don't. I have no opinion either way but occasionally things get written in the comments that are better than whatever was on the front page. Further to that, what with the mere typing of words into a blog functioning as a summoning spell (by way of google), sometimes the things written in the comments take on a life of their own. Plug this into the meagre bits of intelligence one gets from statcounter and things can get curious.
And it's going on right now over in that Xinjiang Hooker thing I wrote a while back. (Hmm... struggling to remember what it was even about now - sex, I expect). Anyway, in the comments there I wondered at a very curious lobby group I'd found that was fighting for the emancipation of... wait for it... Buddhists and Muslims, and specifically those located in the People's Republic of China. Best I can make out, the magic summoning words seem to be 'snow lion foundation' and 'howard g fass', the name of one of the directors of the Snow Lion Foundation. Keep in mind that it's possible that Howard G Fass is the Snow Lion Foundation, but who can tell?
JULY 13, 2009 1:10 PM
nobody said...
Yeah VC, it's the same old story. Do these people really imagine that their money comes from legit sources? Have they not ever heard of the word 'proxy'? Cop a scrute at the Snow Lion Foundation. I came across it whilst looking up Rebiya Kadeer. See if you have any more luck than I did in finding a 'Who We Are' page anywhere in amongst it. In the 'Contact' page? No? Hmm... no one wants to put their name to it, it seems.
Mind you I did find one fellow on their offshoot blog. His name's Howard G Fass. Standing next to him, Rebiya Kadeer seems, I don't know... something other than 'brimming with enthusiasm'? Perhaps she'd just asked Mr Fass if he was as concerned for the occupied Muslims of Palestine as he was for the occupied Muslims of Xinjiang and gotten a curt reply? Who knows?
Otherwise, the Snow Lion foundation seems dedicated to the liberation of whomever is under the yoke of Chinese oppression, and Chinese oppression only. We're vaguely left to assume that they strongly identify with Muslims and Tibetan Buddhists. Like that makes any sense. Whilst who they're fighting for makes no sense, who they're fighting against is crystal clear.
What if I said that Howard G Fass was assigned to the destabilisation of China and he'll identify with whomever suits his cause, and whomever is stupid enough to believe that he's for real.
I could be wrong of course. Perhaps the Muslim/Buddhist cause is one that's very dear to Mr Fass's heart, and he selflessly gives his time, energy, and money not just to the Muslim/Buddhists under a Chinese boot heel, but to all Muslim/Buddhists the world over. In which case anyone thinking he's as crooked as the proverbial should hang their head in shame, apologise, and indeed lead everyone in a rousing chorus of 'For he's a jolly good fellow'.
Howard, if you do happen to pop in, feel free to tell us all that you are so too the right sort of fellow. If you get it right I absolutely promise I'll type out all the lyrics to the aforementioned as a penance for having called you out as bullshit. And you can't say fairer than that!
And then two weeks later Howard's defenders magically turn up.
SEPTEMBER 3, 2009 10:41 PM
Anonymous said...
I worked with Howard g.Fass in Taiwan during the recent typhoon disaster. You are all completely wrong about him, unlike yourselves who just sit back and complain, he actually trys his best to help people and is 100% for real. He worked tirelessly helping to clear away mud and help many people in Ling Bian in Southern Taiwan during the Morokot disaster. I saw it and was there.
Also I would not say that Howard is anti-china in any way. He just thinks the world should stand up for human rights more and challange china more and get them to stop all their terrible killings and murder. Maybe this is the best love that could be offered to the chinese by reminding them that they need to act more human with compassion and love.
Lien Bai
---
SEPTEMBER 4, 2009 2:22 PM
nobody said...
Hello Lien Bai,
How sweet you are, ha ha. As much as I'd like to take you up on this, I suspect you know nothing about Jewish people apart from what they've told you. Which is to say you have no idea.
In spite of your protestations, I resile from nothing.
I notice you didn't address why the 'Snowlion Foundation' has no names attached to it. Nor why they madly seem to be variously sticking up for Buddhists and Muslims both. Did you ever wonder who funds this 'foundation'? And who funded the tireless Mr Fass's trip to Taiwan? As for his standing up for human rights, where does Mr Fass stand on the human rights of the Muslims being oppressed and murdered by Israel and the US (with whom he has far more in common than he does with China)? Or do those countries not need his help like China does? And why might that be exactly?
Otherwise, as much as I'd like to fill you in on the part of the picture you don't understand, I've got better things to do and instead I'll just wish you well.
Thanks for dropping in Lien Bai, all the best!
---
SEPTEMBER 10, 2009 1:03 AM
Dolkar said...
I agree with Lien.
I am a Tibetan nun refugee and I can tell you that whoever works for human rights and religion freedom helps all of humanity no matter what color of skin or religion or country. I am a Buddhist nun and this is the perspective I am coming from. Others may think differently.
Rather than complain or make bad judgements we should first look at the work that is being done and look to see if there is a good heart behind it.
From my side I am grateful to the snowlion foundation and think its standing up for what is good and tries to help all sentient beings who suffer in samsara.
---
SEPTEMBER 15, 2009 3:49 PM
nobody said...
"Rather than complain or make bad judgements we should first look at the work that is being done and look to see if there is a good heart behind it. "
I'm in utter agreement. And DID you look to see if there is a good heart behind it? Just so you know, that 'stripping away' is more or less the point of the exercise at this blog. I'm only ever seeking to more nearly arrive at the truth.
Hmm... it seems that no one from the Snow Lion Foundation itself has popped in here to stick up for themselves - only proxies. Go figure - In a discussion that is as much about the role of proxies as it is about anything else, a couple of proxies turn up to say it ain't so.
I'll concede that it's possible that you two people might actually be what you say you are. If that is the case, tell those Snow Lion folks to pop in here and lay out how their resemblance to a destabilisation of China psy-op is purely coincidental, [and] that they are so too for real. And I'll stick my tuppence worth in too. And then you can just sit back, watch the to and fro, and see if I don't make you wonder at who these people are and why they appear to be helping you.
Here's something I'll tell you for free - In this wicked geopolitical world we live in, it's a cold hard certainty that dissident groups will be funded, if not founded outright, by the CIA (and Mossad and MI6 etc. etc.) in order to bring down regimes the West doesn't like. And believe it or not they'll lie about it. And yes, appear really credible while they're at it. Believe it or not, they can walk and chew gum at the same time.
But all of that is provided you are who you say you are. I have nothing to go on one way or another apart from your say-so. But these things are figure-outerable and I'm getting better at it. Feel free to pile back in and establish yourselves one way or the other.
best regards,
n
Interesting, huh? But what do we know of our two commenters? Know for sure, that is? It's poor of me I admit, but I can all too easily imagine an individual given to lying defending his rep by pretending to be other people. For a liar this would be a logical choice since it would mean: being above the fray; not having to answer any direct questions; added weight by way of appearing to be the consensus of a group; and all the time being possessed of a borrowed cloak of Buddhist unimpeachability. All stock in trade for a spook.
And sure enough our second Howard-defender's first utterances are to express solidarity with the first Howard defender. Do we roll our eyes yet?
Back to the know-for-sure: neither of these two had any opinion on anything expressed in the article; they just wanted to talk about things connected with Fass and his foundation. Which means they dropped in directly via google searches. Between the two google-able handles of 'snow lion foundation' and 'howard g fass', it's possible that the former delivered people to that blog page. It's just that I've never seen a search for it in my statcounter. (It should be kept in mind that with the free statcounter cache of 500 entries I might well have missed it).
But to hell with that, the searches for 'howard g fass' have been unmissable, beaten only by 'fuck dolls', 'dave mcgowan', and 'impossible riddle' in the popularity stakes. And all from the same address in the US. Without declaring any certainty in the matter, I reckon the person most likely to be looking up 'howard g fass' in google is Howard G Fass himself. I mean, honestly.
And so! Never mind the proxies, I reiterate my call for Howard G Fass to come on down and pile in. C'arn Howard! Make my day! I'm sure I'm not the only one here who'd love to have you explain to us how the Snow Lion's Foundation's resemblance to a CIA/Mossad destabilisation psy-op is purely coincidental. We'd also like to hear you explain to us how it does-so-too make sense for a man who shares the religious beliefs of the most anti-Muslim nation in the world to be sticking up for Muslims, albeit geographically specific ones. Feel free to include something about the long and proud tradition of organisations fighting for the interests of two religions, neither of which has a single thing in common apart from their oppressor, and that also happen to be run by a fellow who isn't a member or either of those religions. I'm sure there's been many, many.
Just to give you fair warning, all those niceties and assumed considerations you might receive in mainstream forums will be absent here. Also keep in mind that in this neck of the woods, we're pretty ofay on all things spooky. We're a tough audience and we've been doing it for years.
That being said, you might be for real. It is possible you can give an account of yourself that makes sense. And I'd love to hear it! Honestly! Watch me admit I was wrong and type out those Jolly Good Fellow lyrics. If you can pull it off, that is. As much as I'd like to see what that picture will look like, somehow I just don't think you'll be able to paint it.
But never mind - what with me being a helpful fellow, may I point out what I think your options are?
1. Stay away. This is the spook's smart money bet, mate. You tried the proxies, they got short shrift, so what are you going to do? Best you just shrug and put up with it. Not forgetting of course that the teapot for this tempest consists solely of the comments section of a weeny few-hundred-hits-a-day blog. Oh, okay, I admit it's on the front page now, what with me being spurred by the google action, but still: It is the smart money and it's never too late to ignore a thing that's only going to get uglier otherwise.
2. Pile in! Not only is this the obvious thing to do but it's exactly what they'll expect, ha ha. My advice - Do it! Defend your good name and all of that. You've got two routes here -
A) The high dudgeon thing - sputter, say it's all lies, call me an anti-Semite (I recommend double apostrophes around "nobody" to denote sneering), question my education, intelligence, and sanity, declare I'm on drugs, stomp off.
B) Adopt a measured tone and act disappointed and regretful - BYO straw men and proxies, knock down straw men, have proxies declare you are great, ignore everything else, declare victory, leave.
C) A combination of A and B, ha ha. Oh wait, is that three things? Damn.
Motivation: How would a real campaigner for Buddhist/Muslim rights feel?
And yes, I am a cocky bastard. But never mind, best just to view it as enthusiasm. And you can't blame me: I figure I've got you in a double bind - damned if you do, damned if you don't. It's good sport isn't it? But when you signed up for the spook caper you didn't think it'd be easy did you? You want to be challenged don't you?
Excellent. Here we are.
Classic! We need some more of this upfront approach. I do hope he makes an appearance, but I doubt we'll see it.
ReplyDeleteso nobody, I am reading this post, and I check out this 'snow lion foundation'
ReplyDeleteand I think OMG nobody is on to something here.
Let me explain.....
First thing I notice, their area of concern, coincides with areas I would think are of great interest to intelligence agencies with an interest in destabilisation/balkanization of China.
" Tibet, Taiwan, Uyghur, China"
Then, the Snow lion foundation
click on contact us is located in Danvers, Massachusetts.
The snow lion foundation appears to be connected to the Sabre Foundation, located in Cambridge Massachusetts.
If we look at this update in 1994
http://www.sabre.org/archives/update94/1994update.html
"Sabre, helped to coordinate the donation with the Snow Lion Foundation in Kathmandu"
So this snow lion has been around for a while, are they an arm of the sabre organization?
If you look at where the Sabre organization has been in operation, supplying books to countries of interest, and ones we have read alot about in the news since the fall of the USSR.
It looks like the propagandization/westernisation of the former soviet bloc countries.
Then look at the funders of Sabre?
Reeks of US intelligence ops.
There is the Mellon Foundation
National Endowment for Democracy
USAID,(the smiling face of the US military)
I think you are definitly on to something here.
I mean, really how better to win favour with people?
Appear helpful and have a covert agenda.
Pen, you da man! Ahem...
ReplyDeleteHats off for looking into it. And otherwise, we're not a million miles away from Muslims Against Sharia, ha ha. (For those who don't know, Pen came under a withering barrage of shit from a spectacularly foul-mouthed Jewish boy pretending to be a Muslim collective. Pen didn't care for it but I thought it was hysterical. Honestly he couldn't have been more Jewish if he'd tried.)
Hullo Edo, yeah I'm with you. It is the smart money after all. Mind you, his name's in google now and somehow I don't think our Howard has enough grunt to remove it. Not that it would achieve anything anyway. The whack-a-mole nature of the net is irrepressible!
Im "da man" Ahem ??!!
ReplyDeletePow zoom to the moon!
;);)
Attention Nobody,...excellent; withering volley-fire from a seasoned musketeer. Seeing the enemies front rank stagger in tatters is always encouraging. And the best part; it's nice to see 'nobody' open up another Front for the Luciferians to contend with. Aaah... revel in the those things as they are 'revealed', makes me feel like I'm liv'n in the moment, "Viva l'Apocalypse".
ReplyDeleteT3E
Pen - Whee!
ReplyDeleteAnd T3E - Ha ha ha, I'm not the only one who's watched too much 'Sharpe' I see.
For the urgent attention of absolutely nobody,....Dear Sir, "Sharpe", I 'av' 'eard the odd angree shot meself sar"! Oi vee, many apologies to Penny for not tipp'n me 'at ta ye resarrrch! "Front Rank..RELOAD,..Rear Rank,..FIRE"!! COOOEEEEE!!
ReplyDeleteCheck this out; maybe you should sign up and...yeeehaaaah! "Our Man in Havanna!".....
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/09/16/socom_psyops_against_uk/
Cheers,
T3E
N.B. Love Light & Peace
From Belgium
ReplyDeleteNice call Mr N. Patience we are told is a virtue and I reckon we will all be very virtuous waiting for Mr Fass’s reply or not, you never know for sure. As you say, who they are for and who they are against is crystal clear and as you also say, what a strange combination of allies. This is especially so since both Buddhism and Islam are two of the five permitted religions allowed to freely exist in China so in a way these are not the ones you would think that need his help the most. For completeness the other three are Catholicism; Protestantism and Taoism. I suspect that this tolerance in essence is a means to control its spread and identify its practitioners which in turn have led to followers holding unofficial services in private houses. Several years ago there was a Catholic delegation to the Chinese leadership which openly talked about increasing religious freedoms for all groups and since it was in the Chinese interests to court the West they smiled on them benignly. This delegation was told by various religious groups within China that although what they have is not ideal, they are cool with it and for the delegation not to rock the boat. Although I am not au fait with the Snow Lion Foundation I suspect that their intent is one of quiet swashbuckling.
It is reported that over time the Chinese people are becoming disinterested in politics and that although consumerism exists it has not caught on to the same extent it has in the West. Maybe the influence of Edward Bernaise stopped at the great wall, maybe it does not have the same appeal to the Chinese leadership or maybe the people just do not have enough money for it. Whatever the reasons the people are increasingly turning to things spiritual to realise their inner self and as such it can be regarded as an open event for Mr. Fass’s activities.
Well, I for one am sorely disappointed that Fass or at the very least a reasonable fascimile didn't show up.
ReplyDeleteOh well, here's hopin'.
The saddest part about the veneer of western propaganda is that it doesn't require too much work usually to peel off . . . it's just that most people can't be bothered to find out. It's just so, so much easier to believe, think you know, and move on.
Very good. Thanks FB. Any means will be taken to split those people who might otherwise cohere and, you know... more usefully direct their own affairs. Thinking about the Snow Lion Foundation, they're assisting China's splitting in the west with the Uighurs, the south with Tibetans, and the east with Taiwan. What of the north? I'm prepared to bet that studies were conducted to see if there was any means by which the Manchu could be engineered into an oppositional entity to further split China.
ReplyDeleteI actually know a Chinese chick who is Manchu. I should ask her about the nature of the Manchu/Han relationship. I suspect that the answer to the question of, 'Can the Manchu be made to rise up?' is 'no'. This due to the fact that if they could be split, they would be. (Um... unless the world just changed overnight, that is...)
And thanks Mir. Not forgetting gradualism takes time. China was truly shut down and cleared of all opposing media voices for nearly two decades. In 1975, in terms of NWO 'we-must-be-thus' it started as a clean slate. Whilst it's still not open slather there, giant steps have been made (in terms of NWO villainy, that is). Advertising is a big foot in the door with its message of desire and envy.
Anyway, the Chinese are the enemy, as we too are the enemy, and they will be frightened, sapped, and splintered just like we are. The Chinese have a long way to go to catch up to us but the programmes are in place and the Death Cult is nothing if not patient. (BTW. So far I've seen no evidence that the Chinese leaders are Death Cult members. I'm pretty sure they're not).
Otherwise, Havana eh? Hmm... I've always wanted to go to Havana...
PS. If our Howard, say, was to lob up with an all expenses-paid trip to Cuba I might consider, I don't know... deleting this page? I mean, why should the ADL get to have all the blackmail/standover fun? Folks - what do think? Am I letting Howard off too lightly with a mere trip to Cuba? What would the ADL do? How about a public discussion on the right price for keeping a thing silent? Pile in Howard, your opinion is as valid as anyone else's.
Yoroshiku!
hmmm.. the latest nooz taday...
ReplyDeletehttp://rawstory.com/news/afp/Taiwan_city_snubs_China_over_film_o_09212009.html
Taiwan city snubs China over film on Uighur leader
AFP
Published: Monday September 21, 2009
Taiwan's second-largest city Monday dismissed a warning from China against showing a biopic about exiled Uighur Muslim leader Rebiya Kadeer, in a move expected to further anger Beijing.
Kaohsiung Mayor Chen Chu shrugged off China's criticism of the city's decision to show "The 10 Conditions of Love" later this week, saying she would not submit to censorship from the mainland.
"It would harm Kaohsiung's position as a progressive city and a city of human rights if we blocked the film just because Beijing is against it," she said in reply to a query raised at the city council.
Kadeer has become a lightning rod for tensions over the western Chinese region of Xinjiang, with her travels around the world irritating Beijing.
In a concession to critics, the mayor said on Sunday the film would be screened this week rather than at the high-profile Kaohsiung Film Festival in October.
This followed concern, especially in the local tourism industry, about reaction from Beijing, which considers Kadeer a criminal responsible for bloody unrest in her home region in July this year.
Kadeer has denied orchestrating the July violence, in which about 200 people died when Uighurs and Han Chinese clashed, underlining ethnic tension lingering in the region.
China urged Kaohsiung officials "not to go their own way, and not to cause trouble again with regards to cross-strait relations".
Politicians in the Kaohsiung area recently angered China by hosting the Dalai Lama, seen by Beijing as a Tibetan separatist.
Located in the south of Taiwan, Kaohsiung is a stronghold of the opposition Democratic Progressive Party (DPP), which favours independence from the mainland.
Separately, the organisers of the Kaohsiung Film Festival confirmed its website had been hacked on Monday, apparently from a computer in China.
Observers say the film row and the Dalai Lama's visit underscore the fragility of the improved ties with China promoted by President Ma Ying-jeou of the Beijing-friendly Kuomintang party, who took office last year.
Beijing still regards Taiwan as part of China even though the island has governed itself since 1949, when a civil war ended.
Reacting further to the Chinese warning, the DPP threatened to screen the film islandwide after the festival.
"If the copyright issue can be solved, the party's elected government officials are likely to show the film in their constituencies separately," DPP spokesman Sky Chao told AFP.
"It is no longer just an issue of Kaohsiung, instead it has become something pitting freedom and democracy against communist suppression."
But with city hotels saying they had received cancellations from mainland tour groups under apparent pressure from Beijing, Tseng Fu-hsing, chairman of the Kaohsiung Tourism Association, called on China not to pursue reprisals.
"Following a series of severe hits, including the global economic meltdown, the swine flu and Typhoon Morakot, the city's tourism industry can no longer afford any more," he told AFP.
Chinese tourists are expected to make around 400,000 visits to Taiwan this year, and three out of four will be staying at least one night in the harbour city, he said.
***
FB
ReplyDeleteHi N, Just a few points here. I understand about divide and rule and it does make a difference who it is that is doing the dividing and the ruling but it does strike me as a little odd that the spooks and the Chinese administration should want the same objectives. I suppose the former want to split the whole thing asunder where as the Government just want to prevent critical mass forming.
I must admit that I do not know that much about the Uyghur region but I do know the Tibetans are living under duress with an army of occupation. With world financial meltdown imminent, Taiwan is being drawn back into the fold. Their business’s have attended several expo’s and trade delegations in Beijing so it appears that without refuting anything, PROC is working towards a Hong Kong type relationship with them. So far a Manchuria goes there is simply not that many of them left there. What was the heavy industry powerhouse of the Cultural Revolution is now known as the Chinese rust belt. Most of the former steel workers etc are now employed in light manufacturing for the West in the Shanghai Wencho region.
It looks like the world wide financial crisis will happen whether China likes it or not but did you catch an item on the wind a year or so ago which said that if there was any serious attempt at world population reduction, the Chinese mafia (read government) would start taking out the bloodline families. Perhaps it was just internet blather started by somebody with too much time on their hands, who is to say. You do however sometimes come across stories like this one and don’t really know what to make of them. No connection I should imagine.
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601110&sid=a0G8EFwMkukE
On the subject of the Death Cult, it is reliably reported by a military whistleblower that the killing starts on 15 Oct 2009
First this video
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ho5hY4C3ans&NR=1&feature=fvwp
This one is the must see
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zNrMY9vsiCc
Havana huh! Don’t give me any of that soul empathy with Che and Fidel crap. Come clean, we all know that you just want to see those fat Havana mamas’s rolling cigars on their thighs. Now is that an objective worth being bought for – you bet.
hey slozo- you make a good point ,it doesn't take much to peel the veneer off!!!
ReplyDeleteThat bit I dug up took me under 30 minutes, to search, read through etc.,
I think the problem is first one of awareness, people don't even know that there is such bullshit*western propaganda* to begin peeling it back.
One would have to get over a certain mindset first and that is where the problem lies
FB
ReplyDeleteRe the shortly to be released Swine flu pandemic, Belgium is the First country in Europe to suspend its government hand over control to a committee accountable to both the WHO and the UN. Most of us are aware who these two organisations are accountable to.
http://www.theflucase.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=699%3Abelgium-suspends-democracy-and-civil-rights-over-pandemic-emergency&catid=41%3Ahighlighted-news&Itemid=105&lang=en
The embedded interview with Jane Burgermeister is worth watching.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PelTWCUmTsU&feature=player_embedded
Thanks Kikz, yeah we just had the Rabiya Kadeer roadshow roll through here a few weeks back. TONS of coverage for it. In wondering who funded her film, I discovered that at one point she was in the top-five-richest-people-in-China list. I don't know if they mention this in the film but they certainly didn't mention it in the news' weeklong hypefest. Anyway, whilst I expect she's no longer top five, I reckon she could comfortably fund a wee documentary.
ReplyDeleteMind you, what with her documentary being so utterly in synch with the NWO campaign for China, she'd have to be an idiot to spend her own hard-earned cash. If $400M was set aside to destabilise Iran, think of what the budget for China is. Free money!
Anyway, my marketing line for Kadeer's film -
"Some indigenous Muslim suffering is more equal than others..."
Thanks FB. Ha! I just watched 'In Bruges' the other day. Not bad. And Bruges?... "like a dream", ha ha. And 15 October, eh? Well, there's no point speculating about what exactly. We'll just have to sit back and watch now. Food, water, power, and running from the vaccine - we'll be in amongst it soon.
PS. Sorry about my lackadaisical attendance again. Mind you, I did get something very important out of the way and things should be different now with yours truly back on the job.
ReplyDeleteAnd where's our Howard? I lob in expecting to find all kinds of sturm und drang and what do I get? Nichts! Pissweak Howard!
Anyway, I'm sick of his glabrous bonce on the front page so I'll stick something up there soon. Ciao Ciao.
Were'nt the Uyghurs the 'left behind' slaves of Alexander's army that fought but lost to the Chinese?
ReplyDeleteNow they want to claim part of the country that gave them sanctuary?
Dropped in on spec and baddabing, I wish I'd come back earlier.
ReplyDeleteYour enquiried re NE China are ringing my bell Nobody.
There's a quiet little self governing oblast out in the old Soviet far east that's been quietly waiting through all the shit since the mid 30s I beleive. Still there today happy as Larry. Waiting for what?
I always look for any indication that a PRC leader comes from up that way and if they are I reckon the odds are they've been made.
Our chum from NKorea's from that neck of the woods.
You can always tell there's something afoot with these guys when the bio is vague about their origins somewhere in the 30s-40s. Though they are always monied or, like Mao, from 19th century drug runners
I must drop in more regularly.
Good work.
(1) Brilliant, powerful post, and
ReplyDelete(2) for what it's worth, when I run my different-person-or-not detector over the two (?) Fass-defenders . . . it feels to me like those two posts came from the same brain.
Hey Bouit - Um, you got me mate, I've no idea. For the record however, it's my opinion that the Uyghurs and the Tibetans are each an ethnically distinct people with their own language, culture, etc. and deserve to be their own masters as much as anyone else does. I'm not against either of them having their independence. I'm only against bullshit artists whose help is no such thing.
ReplyDeleteIncoming - I think I know what you're talking about. What's the name of the place?
And anon, I'm glad I wasn't the only person to think so, ha ha.
Aargh! I still haven't written anything to push that stupid photo down the page. Between the old man's um... 'whimsical' behaviour and my own brain doing an impression of a loop tape, I haven't come up with anything. Well, not beyond 700 pages of 'All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy', that is. Hmm... if only Shelley Duvall was here with her baseball bat. That'd sort me out.
ReplyDeleteSince the subject still lives, to take a little posting pressure off the Just for grins, here's a wee dram of less mainstream perspective on Tibetan history that you will NOT read in Time or Newsweek...
ReplyDelete(in multiple parts, due to the 4,096 character posting limit)
War Nerd: Tibet: Five to One Against
By Gary Brecher
FRESNO, CA — Writing a column on the military history of Tibet seemed like a good idea in the good old days, a week ago, before I started actually trying to research it. I’ve never, ever had a harder time finding decent info on a topic.
One reason is sheer shame; the Brits, for instance, don’t want anybody to know they invaded Tibet in 1904 and slaughtered a whole bunch of Tibetans for no reason except they were bored.
But some of the stuff on Tibetan military history is just so damn weird it made me feel like that scene in Ghostbusters where Rick Moranis gets possessed by some ancient demon and starts ranting: “During the rectification of the Vuldronaii the Traveller came as a very large and moving Torb. Then of course in the third reconciliation of the last of the Meketrex supplicants they chose a new form for him, that of a Sloar. Many Shubs and Zuuls knew what it was to be roasted in the depths of the Sloar that day I can tell you.”
I always liked that last bit, “…I can tell you.” Gives that human touch, especially from a five-foot-nothing little dweeb like Moranis. But let me tell you, that story about the Torb and the Shubs was light reading compared to what I’ve been digging through to research medieval Tibetan military history. Here’s an example from Karl-Heinz Everding’s lively little article, “The Mongol States and their Struggle for Dominance over Tibet in the 13th century”:
“…The troops of approximately ten myriarchies of Central Tibet (Tib. dbus gtsang) marched toward the [Stod Hor—the Mongol army, I think—GB]. They met on the dpal mo dpal thang. [Oh, that thang!—GB Sorry, couldn’t resist.] The ten myriarchies of Tibetan troops defeated the many hundreds of thousands of Stod Hor troops. As proof of having killed many thousand Hor, they cut off only the right ears [of the dead] and put them into many donkey loads (Tib. ‘drel khal). Having made Gad du Rin chen and the Dgon pa dbon prisoner and having taking [sic] them along, the ears started stinking. After they had exposed them to the sun on a cool plain, the stone enclosure where the [smell] disappeared, is today known as ‘stone enclosure of the ears’ (Tib. Rna ba’i lhas).”
And that’s one of the lighter bits. If life has been too easy and fun for you lately, you’re welcome to read the whole article in a volume with the catchy, original title of “Tibet: Past and Present.”
It’s a funny thing about writing columns on war: some pretty insignificant conflicts have tons of stuff written about them, and others, big and important wars, get no press at all. Like when I had to write about the Algerian civil wars, there was nothing any good about them anywhere.
Sometimes it’s a language problem, like with Algeria, where anything that might be any use was in French or Arabic. That was part of the problem reading up on Tibet, because I don’t read Chinese and there’s no translation program for Chinese that seems to work. (If anybody knows of one, let me know.) But there’s a much bigger problem: Tibetans are steppe people, inland Asian people, which makes them alien to us Western sea-oriented cultures, just like Mongols are alien to us. I found that out back when I was a huge fan of the Mongols—well, I still am, but I’m content to worship the Khans from afar now; back then I wanted to learn everything about them. So I checked out a book called “The Secret History of the Mongols,” supposedly written by a tame scribe taking dictation from the Khans’ family genealogist himself.
(end Part ONE)
That book defeated me as one-sidedly as the British defeated the Tibetans in their 1904. That’s right, by the way, the Brits invaded Tibet just a hundred-odd years ago, though nobody seems to remember. I’ll get to that later. My point here is that after I read the “Secret History of the Mongols” I knew less than I did before. Or maybe I just knew once and for all that much as I admire the Mongol warriors, I’ll never really understand how they thought.
ReplyDeleteThe Tibetans are even harder to figure out, because on top of that Central Asian weirdness is all this Richard-Gere do-gooder nonsense about the peace-loving Tibetans assaulted by the ruthless Red Chinese. Both parts of that story are wrong, wrong, wrong. The Tibetans were never peaceful people at all. They were one of the most warlike peoples in Central Asia and even conquered the Chinese capital, Chang’An, in their heyday. And the Red Chinese—who could be brutal when the situation called for it, sure—were actually very decent when they took over Tibet in 1950. They felt bad about it at the time, a weird mixture of professional military embarrassment and sheer pity, taking the PLA, battle-hardened from twenty years of fighting the Kuomintang and the Imperial Japanese, into battle against the “Tibetan Army,” such as it was.
The military history of Tibet divides pretty clearly into two parts: the glory days of the 7th-9th century, when Tibet actually challenged China for dominance in south-central Asia, and the sad, slow decline ever since, where the slogan would be: “Tibet, where old meets new and loses.” The Chinese takeover in 1950 was just the latest in a series of one-sided defeats for Tibet.
The invasion was organized by one of Mao’s best generals, a short little dude with a knack for one-liners and a can-do attitude. You may have heard of him: Deng Hsiao-Peng. The guy who brought down the Gang of Four, coined the anti-Cultural Revolution line, “It doesn’t matter if a cat is black or white as long as it catches mice”? Yeah, him. He had one of his classic lines about how organizing the attack on poor ol’ Tibet made him feel: “….like a tiger trying to catch a fly.” They love those animal sayings, the Chinese. Don’t like actual animals much, but they love to make them into proverbs—or soup, depending on whether it’s quip-time or lunchtime.
Deng only requested 80,000 troops for the invasion—not much for the PLA and its alleged addiction to human-wave tactics. The plan was always to do an Invasion Lite, with lots of talk about the ancient friendship of Tibet and China—which was also a lie, of course.
Against the Chinese the Tibetans had not so much an army as a mobile family campground—the Tibetan soldiers took their whole families with them on maneuvers. The governor of Tibet’s eastern province called the Lamas back in Lhasa to say, “Umm, I’ve got Chinese massing on the border, Your Holiness Sir!” He was told that it was very impertinent of him to bother the Holy Administrators because they were on their annual picnic. I’m sorry but it’s hard to feel much sympathy with a country like that.
(end Part TWO)
When the Chinese crossed the border, the Tibetans fought as well as they could, which was pretty damn badly. Their army was mostly cavalry, a lot of it still armed with swords. There were about 200 artillery pieces and about that many machine guns to defend the whole country. The Chinese veteran soldiers, who’d marched thousands of miles and fought every kind of enemy, couldn’t believe it when they saw Tibetans charging them with swords raised. They didn’t so much defeat the Tibetans as restrain them, the way you would an escaped lunatic. “Whoa, take it easy there fella, c’mon, put down the sword before somebody gets hurt….” They could have wiped out the entire Tibetan force like the British did in similar circumstances in 1904, but whatever else you can say about the ChiComs, they were a lot harder on their own people than on foreigners, and they just flat-out pitied the Tibetans. They got the captured Tibetan soldiers together and lectured them on socialism—they were big believers in motivational seminars, those Maoists, talk your ear off—then gave the Tibetans money and noodles and a pat on the back and told them to go home and not play with swords any more.
ReplyDeleteIf there were any Tibetan war nerds around in 1950, which is kind of hard to imagine, then it must have been a hard day for them. But they should have seen it coming, because the Brits had invaded Tibet just a half-century before—and they weren’t nearly as nice to the Tibetans. I keep telling you guys, you’ve got the completely wrong idea about the Brits. You’ve been watching too many of those BBC comedies where everybody’s cute and harmless. The Brits, up to the mid-20th-century, were stone killers, the most ruthless conquerors of the past thousand years.
They invaded Tibet in 1904 basically because they were bored. I’m serious. They owned everything on the planet worth having, so they were always having to invent new “menaces” to get funding for more invasions, grabbing the places they hadn’t considered worth taking in their earlier waves of conquest. So in the late 1800s they started talking up the Russian “threat” to swarm over the Himalayas and take away India. That was such utter crap that even the Brits talking up the threat must have had a laugh about it over their port, back at the officers’ club. Russia was weak, so weak that the Japanese crushed it on land and sea in 1905. The British knew Russia was in no position to threaten India. What they wanted was an easy conquest that would produce lots of medals, honors, stuff to wear on their chests in the London social season so they could snag an heiress and never have to work. So they invaded Tibet.
The guy who ran that invasion, Francis Younghusband, was quite a piece of work himself. One of those India-born Brits, who were generally fiercer and crazier even than the homegrown English. And he had that other feature that makes for a really ruthless conqueror: he was, like his biographers say, “deeply religious.” If you hear that about a guy who’s about to invade your country, go down to the basement, hoard lots of water and canned goods, and try to make yourself invisible for the next few years, because it’s not going to be pretty.
(end Part THREE)
Younghusband marched into Tibet in December 1903 with a force of Sikhs and Gurkhas—pretty scary mix, like rottweiler plus pit bull. And the Gurkhas were definitely the pit bulls in that pair. Sikhs are very tough but not blood-crazy. The Gurkhas were not only devoted lovers of knife-work, especially on POWs, but ancient enemies of the Tibetans. It didn’t take much to push them to a massacre. The Tibetans knew the British were dangerous and tried not to resist at all. But as the British force pushed farther and farther into Tibet, the local commanders decided to resist. That was a mistake. This wasn’t Tony Blair’s cool Britannia they were dealing with. On March 31, 1904, Younghusband encountered a Tibetan militia force of about 2000 guarding a pass near Gyantse. He must have had a hard time keeping a straight face or wiping the drool from his lips, thinking about the medals he’d get for this one, because the Tibetans were armed either with spears and swords or at best with matchlock muskets. That’s right: the kind of 17th-century firearm that won’t fire unless you apply the smouldering wick to the firing pan. Younghusband decided to play with the poor fuckers he was facing. He said, “My friends, my friends, what’s all this hostility? Why dees paranoia? Here, I’ll tell MY soldiers to take the bullets out of their rifles, and you tell YOUR soldiers to put out the flame of their matchlocks.” The Tibetans, who had no idea that Younghusband’s troops had modern repeating rifles, put out their matchlocks. Younghusband then ordered his troops to open fire. 1300 Tibetans were killed, with almost no British casualties.
ReplyDeleteYounghusband thought it was a great triumph. But this was already late in the Imperial era and the people back home had had enough of this kind of triumph; in fact, it sort of made them sick. The whole thing was hushed up, and remains hushed up to this day—ask any Brit you know if they ever heard of their invasion of Tibet and I guarantee they’ll plead ignorance. It’s probably better that way, makes it easy to put one of those “Free Tibet” rising-sun stickers on your Land Rover without feeling like a hypocrite.
It’s much easier to be a do-gooder about Tibet if you’re totally ignorant of Central Asian history, like the days when Tibetan conquerors filled up whole carts with the ears of guys they’d killed. Even this idea that Tibet is the homeland of Buddhism, the most Buddhist place on the planet, is crap; Tibet got Buddhism very late, trying it on a couple of times before it took.
The glory days of Tibet were before Buddhism, which is probably not a coincidence. If I had to respect any religion it’d be the Buddhists because they’re quiet and they seem pretty well-behaved, but it’s not the kind of creed you’d want to conquer with. Before you got your army out the door, some annoying Zen type would be saying in that quiet serious voice they put on, “Is not the greatest conquest that of peace?” To which you’d have to say, “No, it’s a tossup between Alexander and the Mongols and would you please put your neck a little farther out the door? It’s at a bad angle for me from there.” And that wouldn’t set the tone for a happy war of conquest, the local monk getting his head blown off at the start.
The Tibetans in their conquering days—which means roughly in Charlemagne’s time—were followers of something called Bon, or Bun, which sounds either like the department store in Seattle or part of a hamburger, but apparently was some sort of mix of Taoist magic and Mongol shamanism. Sounds pretty fun. And it worked as a military religion, almost as good as Mithras or Anglicanism. The Tibetans had a fearsome reputation as warriors who were honored to die in battle, thought they were headed for their version of Valhalla, which would probably involve big vats of tea with yak-butter and maybe central heating if they were especially worthy.
(end Part FOUR)
The little I’ve been able to find out about medieval Tibetan armies came mostly from a great site I found where Chinese military buffs get together and talk about really cool stuff, like why the Tibetans had a reputation for particularly tough, impenetrable body armor.
ReplyDeleteAccording to these Chinese war nerds, who really seem to know their stuff, the Tibetans’ main weapon was something like the Persian/Byzantine cataphract or heavily armored cavalryman, and they used mail to cover the horse as well as the rider. According to their enemies, the Tang-dynasty Chinese warriors, the Tibetans were excellent with the sword and spear but weak on missile weapons, i.e. archery. One of the cool details I read on this China History Forum site and can’t help mentioning even though it’s kind of off-topic is how the Tang armies dealt with barbarian enemies who wore lacquered armor: they fired burning arrows into the breastplates! Whoa! “One clay-pot barbarian roasted in shellac, coming up! Rice or noodles with that?”
The Tibetan Empire these warriors protected stretched from the Silk Road to the Bay of Bengal. Tibetans ruling Bangladeshis—wish I could’ve seen that. Sitting there in the felt boots they never took off from one year to the next, pouring sweat like the Abominable Snowman in Bugs Bunny: “Gosh it’s hot!”
Seriously though, heat was a real danger to steppe armies. The Mongols actually abandoned part of what’s now Pakistan because they just said fuck it, it’s too hot. Not that they couldn’t handle heat, but they expected the occasional nice refreshing blizzard out of Siberia to cool themselves and their beloved ponies off. Uninterrupted heat, year-round, they considered disgusting and unnatural. And speaking as a fat man, I have to say I agree. (There were fat Mongols, by the way. Subotai was so fat no pony would carry him. You skinny people think you own everything.)
Climate seems crucial to the whole idea of a Tibetan empire. I mean, have you seen a map of Asia? Tibet is one big flat mountaintop. Only place in the world as high and dry as Tibet is the Andean highlands in South America. Now there they grew potatoes; what did the Tibetans grow to feed their armies? I haven’t been able to find out yet, but one thing that occurred to me is that the era when the Tibetan empire was going strong was the same time the Vikings pushed into the far north and even set up a colony in Greenland. It was one of those warm phases you get every few centuries, when some Dark-Ages Al Gore starts shrieking, “Global warming! ‘Tis Satan’s work! We’re doomed!” But more enterprising conquerors see opportunity, like the sales seminars say, where doomsayers see only crisis. Warm weather meant the Norsemen could pop out enough kids to send the long ships into every creek in Eurasia. And I’m thinking maybe it meant the Tibetans could have their day in the sun too—before those ears started to stink.
So if the planet really does warm up again, who knows? Watch out, all you tropical products: the Norse might ride again! The Tibetans might grow enough barley or whatever to march on Beijing!
Yeah. Those are about equally likely. Makes a nice fantasy though.
# # #
This article was published on April 17th, 2008 in Issue #287 of The eXile.
Yevreyskaya Avtonomnaya Oblast
ReplyDeleteAs I said sitting there in the middle of it all still!!!!
"700 pages of . . . "
ReplyDeleteLOL!! On the weekend I randomly ran into Theda, who works where I do (this is in San Francisco USA) and she was on her way to a cafe date with Maynard, who was to show her his laptop slide show of (a) the Canadian campground where he grew up and which he now helps manage, and (b) his recent trip to Yosemite. So I went with Theda and met Maynard and saw his slides . . . and the pictures of the main room in the big old "lodge" building at Yosemite had me doing vivid flashbacks to . . . that very movie, and to its back story ("hotel built on 'Indian' graveyard"). The Yosemite lodge pictures felt like they were confirming the theme of that movie, that all of "this," i.e., 'America' and the sudden collapse thereof, is all built on and resultant from the casual murder of that earlier culture. I wanted to say to Theda and Maynard, "Have you ever seen 'The Shining', because it explains these pictures that you're showing me," but I could not think of the name of the film! I just mumbled someting about "Jack Nicholson in a movie about a haunted hotel," and Theda said, "That sounds interesting." And that was that.
Thanks Mir, it's on the desktop and I'll read it tonight.
ReplyDeleteTa incoming - Yep, Oblast, that's it. I've actually read a bit about it but not in any terms connected with China or Korea. Off to do a bit of the old who/what/when/where etc.
Anon, I shake my head - that's you failing the pop-culture quiz mate. Anyway, I was about to point you at the Timberline Lodge in Oregon (that stood in for the film's Overlook Hotel) but lo and behold, most of the exteriors, and ALL of the film's interiors, were sets at Elstree studio in the UK. So your mate's photos are as close to the film as anything else.
Back again. No need to correct me Incoming - I dropped into wikipedia and quickly realised 'Oblast' merely means 'zone'. 'Yevreyskaya' is the name of the place.
ReplyDeleteinteresting stuff mira...
ReplyDeletethe gurkha were mentioned a couple of wks ago.. someone in the uk was campagning to get their 'services rendered' acknowledged and open the way for preferred citizenship w/in the home realm... wish i could remb who was tooting that horn...hmmm. it was a bird, i do remb that.
and of course, one doesn't acquire and run the world in totality w/out brutality...
after all, soldiering is not generally known to attract the most egalitarian/refined elements w/in any society.
i had another uyghur datapoint the other day...a rerun from '03
pbs/natl geo. docu... journey of man, some cat dna traced a uyghur man somewhere in one of the k-stan's as being the oldest connection (marker going back 40K years) to all subsequent peoples that migrated across the bering straight and peopled the americas.
"That's you . . . "
ReplyDeleteTotally. I flunked all pop culture quizzes in my teen and pre-teen eras and it's been a task catching up for the last several decades.
Only now I'm finding out, the very pop culture I "should have" learned, is not at all what it was presented as [ see Dave McGowan on "Laurel Canyon" ] and it looks like I was right to be leery after all!
BTW I'm The Poster Formerly Known As Ellis and now I'm subanonymous.
Nice add-on, Doug. All true and more . . . took me so long, months after I left Tibet (I was there for a month) that I started shaking out all the western propaganda from my ears and started actual research on the history . . . I had to ask my future wife's forgiveness, as it were.
ReplyDeleteSprinkled in among Doug's history lesson one must remember that Tibet society was a religious slavery pyramid, with the Dalai Lama at the top, various huofos and lamas below, monks below them, and then hordes of slaves. All women were slaves basically, as they could not be monks. And at the top of every slave pyramid was a beautiful temple in the mountains, where everyone had to pay tithes, often willingly, as they were as brainwashed as an American is nowadays to fight for imagined freedom.
The Chinese also always had a standing army in Tibet, which may also not have been mentioned. They often had to help protect against the Indian kashmir region where there was always a dispute. I believe the British when they invaded avoided the Chinese army somehow . . . anyways, Chinese royalty and Tibetan royalty always intermarried and stuff to bring peace to all the slaves.
But like Doug said, it is difficult history to find.
I knew it was you Ellis. No one else is quite that breathless, ha ha. Nice to have you pop in again, LTNS. And yeah, Laurel Canyon - nothing was what we thought it was.
ReplyDeleteHey Kikz, Slozo. Joanna Lumley, mate.
OMG... lumley..she went on some walkabout awhile bak..*headscratch*?
ReplyDeleteshe's be 4evr ABFAB Patz to me :)
terrible huh?
Post Scriptum, five months later...
ReplyDeleteThe searches for 'howard g fass' tapered off massively and now trickly in at ance a fortnight maybe. But just lately this one caught my eye -
housegate10.house.gov (U.s. House Of Representatives) [Label IP Address]
District Of Columbia, Washington, United States, 0 returning visit
Date Time WebPage
27th February 2010 05:25:55
www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4DMUS_enUS301US308&q=Howard Fass Tibet
churchofnobody.blogspot.com/2009/09/howard-g-fass-come-on-down.html
Which is quite jolly but I thought now would be as good a time as any to put a 'whatever-happened-to' fullstop ('period' for Americans) on this story. The big question is: Did anyone else ever pop in to stick up for Howard. If there were two in two weeks, how many were there in the five months following? I take great satisfaction in declaring that there were none at all. A big fat ZERO.
Howard, I hate to tell you this but it was a trap and you fell for it. When I said you had two options (pile-in versus stay-away) there was actually a third option that I chose not to mention. And that was - get a bunch of other people (with various disparate IP addresses) to pile in and swear that, a) they are not you and that, b) you are for real.
Actually I'm thinking I may as well have mentioned it since it was always a non-starter anyway. Honestly, like you have any friends! Actually I admit I have no way of knowing which of these is most likely - that you have no friends, or that were you to ask your acquaintances to help you out you'd make yourself a laughing stock - but one of them is absolutely true.
Never mind that, how are you otherwise? And how's that spook caper going Howard? Is it as glamourous as you imagined? Did you know they're looking you up in the House of Reps? You must be chuffed! Fame at last. It's a pity they arrived here but never mind, into everyone's life a little rain must fall.
Ha ha ha ha, ya git!
Enlightening.
ReplyDeleteInteresting how Jewish folks are apparently part of the destabilisation of China, India etc.
I wonder how many of the Chinese generals are now working for the CIA?
- Aangirfan
Hullo Aang, well that's a tough question. To be honest I'd be thinking very few if any at all. How would anyone have had the opportunity? China was closed for decades and since then have there been any military exchanges? Somehow I don't think so.
ReplyDeleteI've read that Deng Xiao Peng spent time in Paris before the Chinese revolution and that was the opportunity to debase or otherwise entrap him with, um... whatever it is satanists offer people. (Ha, have you seen LA Confidential? Fleur De Lys - whatever your heart desires ha ha ha. And isn't that precisely how the world works?) But even so, that's only one guy and besides, he's dead.
Still! In regards to China as a whole, I'm dubious. I've yet to see anything that denotes the Chinese leadership being in bed with the banking satanist elite and plenty to indicate that they are instead enemies (whether they understand what that means or not...).
I'm thinking a more accurate question at this point would be how many influential blogger/opinion-maker types have been targeted and in what fashion? I will admit however that the Taiwanese and Honkies will be perfectly corrupt. But sure enough they will always be viewed as suspect by the Chinese rulers.
I have Howard over to my house allmost every Friday. He is a lively conversationalist. With many views I'm sure you wouldn't understand. I find it interesting that you quoted the Tao Te Ching in your header,it would appear that you have no understanding of it, but perhapes you are Taoist sence you neglected to bash them. Though your need to apear intelegent and important tell me that you are not. Howard would never say that he is this, or that and therefor shows his true stature. Remember without hate one could not apprecate love, so I thank you for your hate,and stupidy.
ReplyDeleteHullo Godhead,
ReplyDeleteLovely to have you pop in! And with such an interesting comment too.
Except for that bit about Tao Te Ching. I have no idea what you are talking about. It's in the header? Really? Which bit? Whilst it is true I didn't bash Taoists, it is not true that I am one.
For the record I am a Buddhist, albeit of my own devising. To that end I have my unpatented selflessness / selfishness continuum at the top of the page followed by the words the only certainty is change. And as much as I'd like to take credit for the italicised words there, I can't, they're the Buddha's.
Speaking of which, did you not see the swastika immediately underneath those two bits? Actually don't answer since I know that you did. You clicked on it no less. I also know that you did not read the piece you arrived at. Which is a shame since it's one of my better ones.
But whatever! It's all moot. The key thing is that this whole piece you've taken umbrage at is in fact one long extended invitation to Howard - as opposed to proxies (which in spite of declarations otherwise only ever seemed to emanate from Danvers, Massachusetts) - to stop in and sort us out on his resemblance to a spook. I couldn't have been clearer. And did you not notice my promises to apologise should he prove me wrong?
Says you, Howard would never say he is 'this, or that'. Huh? What an odd thing to say. Clearly he is saying such a thing. He has a couple of websites for that express purpose. And there he very publicly says that he is not so much 'this, or that' as much as he is 'this, and that', to wit, a campaigner for Buddhist and Muslims.
And what it is you are saying exactly? That we may not question him? That to do so marks one as hateful and 'stupidy'?
(Speaking of epithets, which is it that I am guilty of? Is it wanting to appear intelligent or inelegant? It's hard to know. May I recommend a spell check? And if you can find one with an irony alert that would be handy. But never mind, I'm happy to concede your point and declare that I am neither of the two aforementioned).
But to hell with me, we're talking about Howard who, you assure me, is a lively conversationalist. This comes as good news what with this being that very thing, a lively conversation. When you next see him, do ask him to pop in and sort us out as to his being, um... 'this, or that.'
All the best Godhead!
PS Like the name! Very oomphy! It easily trumps my puny 'nobody'.
Greetings to everyone here,
ReplyDeleteA friend of mine in FAPA recently told me about this blog and said that I should check it out, which I just did.
I have to say that I like the name and concept of this blog and was somewhat suprised (and a little entertained) by some of the content about us here; especially the part that our small organization has anything to do with the likes of the CIA etc and is somehow tasked with the job of destabilizing China. How funny is that! This is silly and is completely not true.
Despite the various postings back and forth here (some positive and some negative)(all authors of which I do not know), The Snow Lion Foundation is completely independent and rather than seeking to harm (destabilize) anyone; seeks to only try to do a little bit of good in the world for human rights and religious freedoms. Its as simple as that.
I do, however, understand that taking a stand for human rights will not always be popular with everyone and will not always win friends in this often negative world.
In the spirit of keeping the conversation about human rights and freedoms alive for China, Tibet, Taiwan (and ultimately for us all) I am writing here...
As far as the actions of The Snow Lion Foundation, whatever they may have been, stand completely for themselves. Check it out and judge for yourself:
www.thesnowlion.com
You can also come visit the weekly peace vigils for Tibet at Harvard Square in Boston every Wednesday from 6PM to 8PM, and also at the monthly peace vigil for Taiwan also at Harvard Square on the second Saturday of every month...
For more information about Tibet, China and Taiwan etc you guys can check out the following organizations:
1. Students for Free Tibet
2. The International Campaign for Tibet
3. FAPA
4. Amnesty International
5. Epoch Times
6. Uyghur Human Rights Project
7. Freedom House
8. The Liberty Times from Taiwan
Best regards to you all,