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M.T. Karthik

~ midcareer archive, 1977 – 2017 plus 2022

M.T. Karthik

Tag Archives: Al

Lincecum and Vogelsong Continue Giants AL Dominance

25 Sunday May 2014

Posted by mtk in Mid Series Reports

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

Al, AT&T, baseball, Francisco, giants, inter, League, Minnesota, mlb, park, San, series, Twins, wins

The Minnesota Twins are tied for second in the AL Central but have a .500 record because it’s a division dominated by the powerful Detroit Tigers. Their power hitter Joe Mauer has been struggling terribly, but still, they have Kurt Suzuki and Eduardo Escobar batting above .300.

Tim Lincecum had a crazy outing on Friday – at one point Andrew Baggarly noted he had 55 balls and 55 strikes, matching his number. He ended up with six walks, five strikeouts and gave up five hits. Bruce Bochy described him as “bobbing and weaving,” but when it was all said and done, despite letting a lot of Twins on and having to pitch out of jams, Lincecum and the Giants won 6-2.

Pablo Sandoval and Brandon Hicks homered again – it’s starting to look like the Panda is back. Andre Reynier asked about Brandon Hicks in the comments and so we reflected on how well the young man has played in place of Marco Scutaro. It’s looking more and more like Scoots may never return – the back may have just  given out – so the question of Hicks’ effectiveness season-long becomes important.

Andre feels Hicks might be considered another excellent pick up by Brian Sabean, and at first blush, I agree. He has been technically exacting in the field and powerful at the plate. However, he has also made some “rookie mistakes” – like when he missed the bag legging out a double and was called out, andthere have been a couple of flippant throwing errors here and there.

The question is whether or not he can sustain the play through 162. I have no idea if he can, but even Brandon Crawford has sustained drop off in the second half over a couple of years. We shall just have to wait and see. But right now, it is working and it’s fun to watch the DP’s and homers-a-flying.

Game Two of this series was Epic Ryan Vogelsong. If we are talking about Panda like he’s back, it is starting to feel even more true for Ryan Vogelsong, who is dropping Quality Starts like it’s 2012 again.

Last night Vogey was dominant through seven. he nearly finished the 7th, but was forced from the game by silly throwing error. he would have had the last out, but flipped the ball to first too casually. Bochy, to his credit, evaluated the lapse correctly and immediately pulled Vogey in favor of our bullpen. (Though they gave up a homer before closing it out).

The Giants played their style of ball. Good Starting Pitching, crisp defense, just enough runs and taking advantage of opponents mistakes led to a 2-1 victory for Vogey, that could have been a shutout, save for a homer hit off Machi in the ninth. Machi closed it out and got the save.

Hoping to sweep today! Go Giants!

Giants Beat Indians 5-1, First Interleague Game Win of 2014

26 Saturday Apr 2014

Posted by mtk in Post Game Blasts

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

5-1, Al, american, angel, baseball, cleveland, Francisco, game, giants, Hudson, Indians, interleague, League, mlb, National, one, pagan, San, series, Tim

I didn’t see this game, but I’m trying to make at least a placeholder on the blog for every Giants game this season.

From the papers I gather that Angel Pagan had a great game at the plate and running the base paths, with two singles, a steal and two runs scored.

Tim Hudson continues his steady, consistent pitching for the Giants. He went 7+ and allowed only one run. Huddy is averaging 5Ks a game!

The Giants won in their first Interleague game, 5-1, and the Dodgers lost in 11 last night so we are back in first place by half a game.

Go Giants!

[the comment below is the comment below]

mtk

I happened to be at the game last night. The buzz where I was sitting centered around the Mike Morse homer in the 421 area of the park. A big blast! Hudson’s steady pitching–I believe he had a 5 pitch, 3 up, 3 down inning. Very cool to watch. Last but not least, Pablo legging out a triple with a thunderous belly flop into third base and no throw from the defense.

The Kuiper home run video, bobble head and interviews were fun too. Check out the Kuiper video —csnbayarea.com. Cheers

Andre Reynier

because this country, it’s not for one religion

19 Monday Nov 2012

Posted by mtk in Asia, audio, protest

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

2003, Abbas, actuality, Al, Arab, audible, audio, Christian, Franz, Hadiyeh, history, intifadah, Jew, Karthik, Kraus, Mahklouf, mtk, Palestine, Palestinian, Qawis, Rimon, visit, witness, Ziad

my full interview with Ziad Abbas, quoted above, is the second interview in the clip linked to below:

If you care at all about Palestine, please listen to these stories told to me by Palestinians in Bethlehem and Nazareth, and hear people being illegally taken from their land in East Jerusalem, stopped by the presence of myself and International media, briefly … this was 2003 … what eventually happened?

 

AL QUAEDA IS THE CIA: an interview with Michel Chossudovsky

01 Saturday Nov 2008

Posted by mtk in Uncategorized

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Tags

Al, chssudovsky, cia, is, Karthik, michel, mtk, quaeda

When I first saw Adam Curtis’ BBC documentary, The Power of Nightmares in 2004, I was immediately struck by assertions made in the film by Jason Burke, author of “al Qaeda” that:

“The idea which is critical to the FBI’s prosecution (of bin Laden and al Qaeda for the 2000 attack on the USS Cole) that bin Laden ran a coherent organization with operatives and cells all around the world – of which he could be a member –
is a myth.

There is no al Qaeda organization. There is no international network, with a leader, with cadres who will unquestioningly obey orders, with tentacles that stretch out to sleeper cells in America, in Africa in Europe. That idea of a coherent, structured, terrorist network with an organized capability simply did not exist.”

The author’s research (and that of others) pointed to the creation of an al Qaeda myth by U.S. American interests. This immediately set me to conjecturing that, just like Emmanuel Goldstein’s movement in Orwell’s 1984, the diffuse enemy / al Qaeda myth would have to be sustained once created – which led me to the notion that United States interests are conducting black operations in the name of al Qaeda to this day, all over the world. This thought has tainted the way I read about terror attacks in London, Mumbai, Afghanistan. It seems to me that the neoconservatives, with their stated goals of aggressive policy, are certainly capable of it. The idea is supported by reports of the torture and abuses that have gone on in U.S. American concentration camp prisons, and by a 60 year history of the United States covertly and overtly conducting such black-ops all across the globe for their political ends – from Operation Gladio in Italy after the Second World War, through the current operations in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Recently, I have noticed a pattern in which sudden acts of terrorism have gone unclaimed. For decades, it has been the modus operandi of terrorist groups to immediately claim responsibility when they have conducted a terrorist act for attention or political communication. In the past four years, this pattern has changed. More and more often, a clear entity claiming responsibility for an act of terror is difficult to find. Meanwhile, more and more often terrorism is being attributed to the nebulous, tentacular, international al Qaeda organization that author Jason Burke says doesn’t (or at least didn’t) exist.

It is a paradox. If the post-9/11 increases in anti-Terrorism have been so successful as the Bush Administration and Neocons proclaim – freezing assets, capturing more than 75% of al Qaeda leadership, crippling the organization’s ability to move and act – then random acts of terrorism that are not attributable to anyone, and which remain unclaimed by anyone should be decreasing.

If anything only the “other kind” of terrorism should remain – the kind the U.S. cares nothing about – conflicts that don’t involve oil or U.S. American corporate interests, like those that horrifically continue across the African continent.

Instead we hear daily about new terrorist acts and links that are a part of al Qaeda – an
organization that until very recently was an ally and asset of the U.S. American C.I.A.

In 2003, I interviewed Michel Chossudovsky, who has written on this aspect of the organization, on the creation of al Qaeda by the CIA and on a number of 9/11-related topics. The interview paints a haunting picture of the relations that U.S. American politicians had with key players in the attacks on and around the days they took place. It also points to yet another foreign interest playing a hand in the attacks: Pakistan.

MC: My name is Michel Chossudovsky. I teach at the University of Ottawa. I am Director of the Center for Research on Globalization and the author of, War and Globalization, the Truth Behind September 11th.

M.T. Karthik: Tell us about your research into the creation of al Qaeda and its relationship with Pakistan and the US?

MC: I think we have to first understand that the links between al Qaeda and the U.S. government go back to the 1980’s. There is a long-standing relationship from the Soviet-Afghan War. And in fact, al Qaeda was created during the presidency of Jimmy Carter
and that relationship has been sustained. In that relationship, Pakistan’s military intelligence has played a crucial role as a relay between U.S. intelligence and these various terrorist organizations.

MTK: and who are the players in this?
MC: First of all the ISI, Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence is essentially the Pakistani counterpart of the CIA. It has very close links with the CIA, very close bilateral relations. It developed into a very powerful force with secret agents – military as well as bureaucrats – from the MC(cont’d): beginning of the Soviet Afghan war. Now, al Qaeda, which is the so-called Islamic Brigades, developed during that period. It was an initiative of Jimmy Carter’s National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brszynski, and it is confirmed by numerous writings that in fact the architects of the Islamic Brigades, were the U.S. Administrations and the CIA which built this massive operation of channeling resources into the madrasas, the Koranic schools, the training camps and so on, in Afghanistan in support of the mujahadeen. That has to be borne in mind. But nobody actually denies that story. Even the CIA says, “Well, yes, we did it, but that was the Cold War Era.”

MTK: So there are examples of relationships between CIA covert operatives and al Qaeda for more than twenty years?
MC: Yes. There has been a consistent thread throughout the “cold war era” where agents of the U.S. Administration on the one hand and al Qaeda operatives on the other hand have collaborated in covert operations. This is confirmed by documents of the U.S.
Congress.
MC: During the Clinton Administration, al Qaeda collaborated with U.S. weapons inspectors in bringing weapons into Bosnia during the civil war – and that was in the 90’s. We have a number of other documents which show this linkage between successive U.S. administrations and al Qaeda. So to say that al Qaeda is some kind of outside enemy is simply a fabrication. Al Qaeda is a creature of the U.S. intelligence apparatus. It is what the CIA calls an “intelligence asset.” And the relationship has been sustained. And in that relationship, Pakistan’s ISI has played a crucial role as a relay between U.S. intelligence and these various terrorist organizations. So that in effect they would have contact with the Taleban and with other terrorist organizations. And in fact who was behind it? It was the CIA. So that institutional linkage between the ISI and al Qaeda is something which has existed at least for the last 20 years since the beginning of the 1980’s.

MC: It appears that Pakistan’s military intelligence had a role in the 9/11 attacks and that is something of course, which has to be fully investigated.

MTK: Wow. Tell us what you have found.
MC: There was a report on the FBI in late September of 2001, which was released by ABC News to the effect that $100,000 from banks in Pakistan had been transferred to the presumed ringleader (of the attacks) Mohammad Atta. It was confirmed by Time magazine as well. The FBI acknowledged these transfers of money out of Pakistan. It has not been refuted by the FBI, but it has been confirmed by other reports including an Indian Intelligence report which says that in effect that it was the ISI which transferred the money on the instruction of then ISI-chief Lieutenant General Mahmoud Ahmad.
Incidentally, another very important event: in the days before 9/11, you will remember that General Shah Massoud was assassinated the leader of the Northern Alliance –.
MTK: Yes, that’s right, on the 9th.
MC: On the 9th.
MTK: Sunday the ninth. He was executed in a suicide bombing using a fake camera as a weapon, right?

MC: Yes, that’s correct. But the Northern Alliance actually issued a statement – which must have been transmitted through official channels to Washington – which explicitly accused Pakistan’s military intelligence, the ISI, headed by General Mahmoud Ahmad
of having organized the kamikaze assassination on General Shah Massoud, the leader of the Northern Alliance. So that there you have several elements – one the one hand, the
Northern Alliance accuses the ISI of assassinating General Massoud. On the other hand you have an FBI report which is confirmed by an Indian report to the effect that the ISI was instrumental in financing Mohammad Atta (the presumed ringleader of the terrorists). The history of al Qaeda/CIA links suggests that in fact the ISI
played a role.

MTK: And you’ve further discovered that this same General Ahmad, who stands reasonably accused of being responsible for an assassination of an ally on the 9th of September and for sending $100,000 to Mohammad Atta, the ringleader of the attacks against the U.S., is considered a friend of U.S. officials and was even visiting the U.S. when the attacks take place?
MC: Yes. And then the question is: What was a moneyman of the attacks according to the FBI, doing in Washington from the 4th of September to the 14th of September in an official visit where he met … I mean he met Richard Armitage, Colin Powell. He had
meetings at the U.S. Congress. Of course he met his counterpart CIA Director George Tenet.

MC: And it just so happens that on the morning of September 11th, this individual who is pinpointed in the FBI report as well as in the official statement of the Northern Alliance as a possible accomplice in the 9/11 attacks is having breakfast hosted by Senator Bob Graham, Chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee and Representative Porter Goss, his Intelligence committee counterpart in the House of Representatives and several other members of Congress who were there.
MTK: Amazing.
MC: Yes. And the irony of this whole thing is … that if you read carefully the reports in the U.S. media that came- In fact they came much, much later, nobody acknowledged this meeting except a couple of small papers in Florida, because both Bob Graham and Porter Goss are from Florida, so they had a blurb. But the Washington Post brings out the story several months later, in May of 2002, and in the Washington Post report they say very specifically that Bob Graham and Porter Goss were having breakfast with a man who is known to be close to al Qaeda and the Taleban and to be sympathetic to Islamic terrorism, saying, I’ll read you the quote: “Ahmad ran a spy agency notoriously close to Osama bin Laden and the Taleban.” That is taken from the Washington Post. Well the Washington Post acknowledges the links between ISI Chief Ahmad and Osama bin Laden, but it fails to ask doesn’t it point to some kind of linkage.
MC: What is the proximity group of this individual? So the question we have to ask is: What were these guys, Bob Graham and Porter Goss, who were responsible for investigating 9/11, what were they doing with an alleged moneyman behind 9/11 – (laughs) having breakfast on the morning of 9/11. I am just saying this is something that needs to be investigated. And what was Colin Powell doing with Mahmoud Ahmad in meetings at the State Department? What was Richard Armitage doing?

MTK: Is Ahmad still head of the ISI?
MC: No he was retired in October shortly before the bombing campaign against Afghanistan.

MTK: Has anyone addressed these questions with them about the cover-up?

MC: No, look, Bob Graham is the cover-up. First of all I should say that Bob Graham and Representative Porter Goss, they went to Pakistan on the 28th of August and they had meetings with General Mahmoud Ahmad, a man notoriously close to Osama bin Laden and the Taleban according to the Washington Post. They had meetings with the President. They came back to Washington a few days later, and a few days later Mahmoud Ahmad arrives in Washington – on the 4th of September – and had meetings with them. They had meetings with this individual. They know all about him and when asked they are saying the information is withheld. Are they going to release the information of their personal linkage with this presumed moneyman behind 9/11?

Professor Michel Chossudovsky’s research and numerous books are available from the Center for Research on Globalization, which can be found at: http://www.globalresearch.ca

Sharpton, DC Protest, 2002

26 Saturday Oct 2002

Posted by mtk in music video

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

2002, Al, bill, dc, evans, frank, Karthik, mtk, protest, Sharpton, sosa, washington

Al Gore at Trinity University

23 Thursday Apr 1992

Posted by mtk in Commentary, protest, San Antonio, self portrait, talks, thoughts, TX

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

1992, Al, antonio, april, balance, deforestation, ecology, Gore, Karthik, m.t., mtk, politics, San, Senator, speaking, talk, talks, texas, Trinity, university

Senator Al Gore was on a book tour promoting Earth in the Balance. He hadn’t yet been picked as Bill Clinton’s running mate when I saw him at Trinity University in San Antonio, Texas, in April of 1992. He spoke for about forty minutes about the grave responsibility people around the world had to be more conscious of environmental degradation and then allowed for questions. I raised my hand and asked the Senator what he thought about the fact that the United States was the world’s greatest polluter and the greatest abuser of the earth’s resources.

I asked what the Senator thought of an editorial suggestion in the Houston Post that countries with large rainforests like Brazil and Malaysia should be allowed to tax the rest of the world for their usage of the primary resource they produce: clean air. (The idea was that the U.S. should be made to pay these countries not to deforest – the Post editorial had called it an Oxygen Tax).

I suggested to Senator Gore that the Global capitalist system – authored out of the U.S. and Europe – may have been the root cause for much of the irresponsibility he wrote about, quoting then Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohammad, who had that year remarked that “Democracy and free markets are not magic. They do not make backwardness and ignorance disappear.”

In response, Senator Gore asked me if I was from Malaysia.

When I said I was not he replied, “Good – because they’re the worst!” and went on to complain about deforestation of the islands of South East Asia, ignoring the responsibility of facing the economic facts of environmental degradation.

When he’d finished, some grad students in the audience tried to pick up my call for greater responsibility to be placed on the demands of Northern and Western markets, but Senator Gore just didn’t want to get it. While Republican President GHW Bush was the one who’d said he would never apologize for the actions of the U.S.A., whether or not they were wrong, by the early 1990’s the Democrats weren’t much better at owning up.

M.T. Karthik

This blog archives early work of M.T. Karthik, who took every photograph and shot all the video here unless otherwise credited.

Performances and installations are posted by date of execution.

Writing appears in whatever form it was originally or, as in the case of poems or journal entries, retyped faithfully from print.

all of it is © M.T. Karthik

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