THE STRUGGLE FOR RELEVANCE: OBAMA, MCCAIN & MEDEA BENJAMIN

JAZZMAN CHRONICLES. DISSEMINATE FREELY. THIS CHRONICLE POSTED BY DISSIDENT VOICE 6/5/13.





THE STRUGGLE FOR RELEVANCE:
OBAMA, McCAIN & MEDEA BENJAMIN


By Jack Random



There is no shortage of rhetoric in American politics but as for real world consequences it begins to resemble the Bard’s immortal lament: Sound and fury, signifying nothing.

President Barack Obama gave what might have been the most significant speech of his second term, proclaiming the eventual end of the Global War on Terror, over a decade long strategic blunder that should never have happened. Lest we forget, after the terrorist attack of September 11, 2001, the Taliban government of Afghanistan offered to hand over Osama bin Laden and his Al Qaeda conspirators to an impartial, international tribunal, an offer that was summarily dismissed by then President George W. Bush.

Americans wanted revenge and would settle for nothing short of global war, even if it meant attacking a dysfunctional nation whose government had less to do with the actions of its terrorist inhabitants than our own Central Intelligence Agency, who recruited and armed them during the Afghan-Soviet war. We would have our revenge even if it meant invading and occupying a nation that was in fact an enemy of Al Qaeda on manufactured evidence concerning weapons of mass destruction.

The past is forgotten and history rewritten in the nation’s fervor never to admit wrong. We are convinced that the entire world understands our actions as the natural response of an aggrieved nation but there are families in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan and Somalia who are not persuaded. They will never forget the vengeance we have wrought and so the war continues in perpetuity, propelled by its own volition.

President Obama’s declaration is significant but only if it can be believed. Within a week of his speech, promising a shift in policy on targeted assassinations, a CIA directed drone strike killed a Taliban leader in Pakistan.

Unlike the Bush administration, this president was supposed to understand the difference between the Taliban and Al Qaeda. The latter is our sworn enemy. The Taliban is a primitive religious organization like so many others in a dangerous world. As a government, they were brutal and despotic like so many others in under-developed nations. But the Taliban had no interest in geopolitics or international jihad. Before we invaded, the Taliban had tacit American support as the best of bad alternatives to instill order in the Afghan nation.

We were supposed to be negotiating with the Taliban for the end of hostilities in Afghanistan. Clearly, those negotiations have failed. This targeted assassination of a Taliban leader had nothing to do with any threat posed to America or American interests. The threat was to Pakistani institutions, most notably the military. It appears therefore that our use of drones is extended to allies, even allies as unreliable as Pakistan.

Obama promised to curtail the practice, to make it more transparent, subject to legislative review, and to remove the CIA from control. By expanding the use of drones to intervene in the internal affairs of another nation, this action strips the president’s declaration of all meaning.

What then can we expect of his promise to restore civil liberties sacrificed in the name of the War on Terror? What then can we expect of his renewed intent to close the abomination that is Guantanamo Bay?

We begin to wonder if the CIA has gone rogue. We begin to wonder if the president and commander-in-chief is truly in charge of the nation’s foreign policy.

Any impartial observer of American history cannot doubt that our intelligence community has at times betrayed our elected government. Beyond the assassinations that turned the nation’s course on its head, there are the curious affair of the botched Iranian hostage rescue under Jimmy Carter and the subsequent arms for hostages deal that played a critical role in bringing Ronald Reagan to power.

Is it so farfetched to believe that the CIA would have its own agenda? This latest action would seem in direct contradiction to the president’s announced intentions. It is worth emphasizing that removing the CIA from control of the drone program was central to the president’s proposals. It is also worth noting that the CIA was in charge of the spying operation in Libya that cost an esteemed American diplomat his life.

If these musings are correct, how would we know? Would any American president be willing to announce publicly that the CIA is out of control? How would he prove such a charge and what actions could be taken to right the balance? The CIA should be dismantled from the bottom up and rebuilt to its original intent but it has become too powerful to allow that to happen.

His domestic agenda stymied at home by an intransigent congress, the president finds himself waiting for the midterm elections, hoping for the impossible and struggling to assert his second-term relevance.

Meantime, his former rival in the race for the White House, the man who never saw a war he did not like, Senator John McCain engaged in his own struggle for relevance by starring in a little political theater for the cause of war in beleaguered Syria.

As if we needed a reminder of how many wars we’ve missed by not electing him commander (remember Georgia?), McCain pulls off a virtual bungee jump into Syria for brunch and a photo op with Rebel Commander #9. The aging senator assures us he can tell the good guys from the bad by a simple vetting process.

Remember how adept the McCain bunch was at vetting it’s vice presidential nominee? It turns out his handlers in this bit of theater were equally adept. One of the men chosen for the senator’s photo op was quickly identified as the photographer for a terrorist group that kidnapped a dozen Lebanese pilgrims. Whether that charge turns out to be true or not, it points out the absurdity of his vetting proposal.

A decidedly under whelmed American media dutifully greeted the returning senator but failed to ask the pressing questions: First, if this was so important, where was Lindsay (i.e., Senator Graham, McCain’s sidekick in virtually all political theater)? Second, does anyone really care?

Why anyone would still listen to a man who has been wrong on every issue of any importance for the last twenty years is beyond understanding. His only claim to validity in recent years is his support of “The Surge” in Iraq but the strategy only worked to the extent it did because we paid our enemies to fight a common enemy; once the payments stopped, they returned to their own interests.

Rounding out our featured trio in the fight for relevance is veteran activist and worthy heroine of the left, co-founder of CODEPINK, Medea Benjamin. I have long admired Benjamin and CODEPINK for their constant presence and principled actions on the streets of protest against the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan but when Benjamin chose to heckle the president at the moment when his message was most allied with hers, it looked a little too staged, a little too desperate, as if all that mattered was getting on the nightly news.

Political theater has its time and place but in my humble judgment this was neither. Her explanation after the fact was that she listened carefully to what the president said and found it lacking. He did not promise to begin releasing prisoners from Guantanamo next week as if he could unilaterally take such an action. What nations will take the prisoners? If we sent them to a war zone or a nation prone to torture and brutal oppression, would CODEPINK be pleased?

Obama did not announce that CIA control of the drone program would immediately stop or questionable assassinations would immediately cease and that too was cause for dissatisfaction. To believe that the president could affect these changes immediately is more naivety than I am willing to believe Medea Benjamin possesses.

In the end, as much as I wanted to be with her and to support her action, the most I could muster was empathy.

It is no secret that the left is in decline. Since the gradual and perhaps inevitable disappearance of the Occupy Movement, the culture of principled protest has suffered. Sadly, we are not building a movement at the moment; we are struggling for relevance and ill-timed gestures with an uncertain message will not help.

So where do we stand? Do we crawl back into the cracks and shadows of the counter culture or do we find new ways to affect change?

Contrary to popular opinion, there is no left in American mainstream politics. There is the middle and the right. We can thank Bill Clinton for this state of affairs for it was Clinton who redefined the Democrats to bring in moderate conservatives. Republicans had little choice but to move further to the right.

To my way of thinking, this represents a huge opportunity. Poll after poll tells us the people are moving to the left. The younger the population grows, the more progressive the electorate becomes.

I believe it is critical for the left to mobilize its resources to engage the system directly. That means finding candidates to run for office, finding congressional races that are winnable, and supporting campaigns with time, organization and money.

If we cannot do this, if the best we can do is staged disruption, then we will fall even further into the pit of political irrelevance and the anarchists are right: Tune out, get off the grid, and refuse to participate.

Jazz.

JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CHRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). THE CHRONICLES HAVE BEEN POSTED ON NUMEROUS CITES OF THE WORLDWIDE WEB, INCLUDING THE ALBION MONITOR, BELLACIAO, BUZZLE, COUNTERPUNCH, DISSIDENT VOICE, THE NATIONAL FREE PRESS, GLOBAL FREE PRESS AND PACIFIC FREE PRESS. SEE WWW.JAZZMANCHRONICLES.BLOGSPOT.COM.

SHAME OF A NATION: GUANTANAMO BAY

JAZZMAN CHRONICLES. DISSEMINATE FREELY.





SHAME OF A NATION:
GUANTANAMO BAY


By Jack Random



Like any being capable of reflection, every nation must acknowledge not only its legacy of pride but its legacy of shame as well. A nation must have pride to bind its people together in common cause. Pride inspires achievement and enables us to withstand threats, to overcome barriers and to bear the burden of hardship along the path of history.

National pride is not only healthy; it is essential to the survival of a nation. But without concomitant shame to hold it in check, it becomes dangerous and ultimately self-destructive. A nation must have shame to right its wrongs, to alter a wayward course of action, to form a more just and democratic union, and (god forbid) to make reparations for injustice.

The American nation is rightfully proud of establishing the first modern and enduring democracy. We are rightfully proud of expanding the franchise to the landless, to women and minorities. We are proud of ending the damnable scourge of slavery though it required a river of American blood to accomplish it.

We are proud of our essential role in stopping the Nazi fascist machine from overrunning much of the world. We are proud of our advances in civil rights and civil liberties. We are proud of economic success and the technological advances that enabled an American to set foot on the moon, that led to the creation of the worldwide web, an unstoppable force that unites the global community.

America’s proud legacy is rich and varied but just as every man has his flaws so every nation has its legacy of shame.

That our founders built this nation on soil made rich with the blood of its native children is undeniable and as shameful as the Holocaust or any other attempt to annihilate an entire race of human beings.

We have fought wars without just cause against innocent people, killing millions of Vietnamese, Laotians, Cambodians, Indonesians and South Americans. We have built a military machine so powerful and omnipotent that it can only serve the cause of empire and greed. When we have squandered the greatest treasure the world has ever beheld on weapons of war and mass destruction while so many of our people go homeless and jobless and without decent medical care, we should be ashamed.

That we have witnessed the daily slaughter of men, women and children, watched drug lords outgun the police, enabled terrorists and madmen dedicated to massive harm, and failed in every effort to stem the tide of gun violence is shameful beyond belief. That we have failed to act in the name of the constitution and the Bill of Rights though we know in our hearts it is a fool’s argument, the verbal knee-jerk of the gullible, is all the more shameful.

In the face of all evidence that we are poisoning the planet past the point of no return, we cling to our avaricious ways and protect at all costs the right of corporations to pursue wealth without regard to cost. We would rather mortgage the health and well being of future generations than to alter our course.

For that we should be ashamed.

We exploit the vulnerable for a cheap labor force and demonize the exploited. We sanction slave labor under deplorable and inhumane conditions overseas by enforcing a hands-off, Free Trade policy, yet we are outraged when a building in Bangladesh collapses, a chemical plant in India explodes, or a sweatshop in Nepal burns to cinders. How many lives would be spared if only we insisted on the most basic labor rights and working standards from our trading partners? And to those compassionate corporations that have pledged to abandon Bangladesh after the latest catastrophe, don’t pretend you care if you only move your operations to a substandard facility in Malaysia.

For this we should be ashamed.

Our government has performed deadly experiments on unsuspecting, unknowing and innocent people. We have overthrown democratic governments in the name of freedom, shredded the Bill of Rights in the name of law and order, denied citizens the fundamental right to vote by a myriad of nefarious means, turned a blind eye to crimes against humanity, including genocide, and yet, at this time in history, viewed up close and personal, there is no greater shame than what we are doing on a small corner at the southern tip of Cuba at a godforsaken place called Guantanamo Bay.

From the beginning in January 2002, the Guantanamo Bay prison facility aka detention center was a bad idea, one in an almost infinite chain of bad ideas from the Neocon officials of the Bush administration. It was chosen because it was outside the United States and therefore not subject to American law. Our government claimed it was exempt from the Geneva conventions as well, a claim struck down by the Supreme Court, and yet few outside that small circle of Bush madmen would deny that the detainees of Guantanamo were tortured, abused and denied every protection of due process under the law.

Of the 779 men detained at Guantanamo, nearly 200 were released by 2004. Of the 517 detainees still held in 2005, independent reviews of Defense Department data found that 80% were not enemy combatants captured on the battlefields of Afghanistan but individuals turned over by Afghans and Pakistanis in exchange for bounty and favors. Far from the “worst of the worst” the officials claimed publicly, most of the detainees were “low level” combatants and individuals unaffiliated with terrorist groups. Eight detainees have died at Guantanamo, including six by suicide. By May 2011, 600 had been released, most without charges.

In 2008 five individual detainees were charged with acts of terrorism connected to the September 11 attack under the 2006 Military Commissions Act, an act ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court. Of all the proceedings against the detainees, exactly two have not been overturned.

Of the roughly 170 remaining in perpetual limbo at Guantanamo Bay, at least 86 have been deemed no threat and cleared for transfer. An estimated 100 are involved in a hunger strike protesting their conditions and status. Twenty-one have been force-fed through tubes inserted into their throats.

When elected President Obama promised to close Guantanamo Bay but he soon found that task politically impossible. As a result, the remaining detainees, including those determined non-threatening, are placed in a hopeless state. They have no access to anything resembling legal recourse. The trials that have been staged under the guise of military tribunals have been something out of an unfinished Kafka novel. They can neither go home nor anywhere on this earth where they can walk as free men.

That so many have chosen to starve themselves is not surprising. What would any man do under such circumstance?

Now they are being denied the right to die by their tormentors. If they persist in their refusal to eat to the point of starvation, a tube will be inserted into their throats so that their suffering can continue indefinitely.

Where is our sense of shame? Where is our compassion? Where is our sense of right and wrong? Where is the justice we proclaim to the world?

Mr. President, damn the politics and keep your promise. Close Guantanamo now.

Jazz.


JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CHRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). THE CHRONICLES HAVE BEEN POSTED ON NUMEROUS CITES OF THE WORLDWIDE WEB, INCLUDING THE ALBION MONITOR, BELLACIAO, BUZZLE, COUNTERPUNCH, DISSIDENT VOICE, THE NATIONAL FREE PRESS, GLOBAL FREE PRESS AND PACIFIC FREE PRESS. SEE WWW.JAZZMANCHRONICLES.BLOGSPOT.COM.

UNDER-REPORTED STORIES OF 2012

JAZZMAN CHRONICLES. DISSEMINATE FREELY.





DRONE WARS TO BENGHAZI:
THE UNDER-REPORTED STORIES OF 2012


By Jack Random



Another year has passed, another tick on the celestial clock, another moment to reflect on where we’ve been, another crossroad on the endless highway of life on the planet earth. In many ways the past twelve months have been unremarkable, full of sound and fury but signifying nothing.

We have retained a moderate Democratic president. We have elected a congress that remains intractable. We have steadied our course on the path to austerity. Our economy continues to regain its balance at a painfully slow pace. Our workers remain underemployed and underpaid. Our homes remain undervalued and far too many of our people are struggling. Our foreign wars, though winding down, have not yet ended. We have survived catastrophic natural disasters and human-made tragedies.

There were positive changes initiated by the people but the government remained stagnant at best and regressive at worst. Advances in the civil rights of the lesbian and gay communities were countered by the erosion of civil liberties (habeas corpus, due process and the right to assemble in protest). Legalization of marijuana at the state level ran counter to inconsistent federal enforcement policies.

Yes, it could have been worse but in so many ways we ended the year as we began.

Those of us who believe in change often use this occasion to reflect on opportunities lost. Those of us who follow the media often focus on what was not covered as much as what was. Every year an organization called Project Censored offers its selection of the most under-reported stories of the year. What follows is mine.

An under-reported story is one that received significantly less coverage than it deserved. By that standard one story is a perpetual holdover on the list. For while it may receive significant coverage it always falls well short of what it deserves.


1. GLOBAL WARMING. This year we learned that the polar ice caps have melted at a more rapid pace in the last twenty years than they had in the previous ten thousand years. Moreover, a comprehensive study using satellite data confirmed that the great melting and consequent rise in sea levels is occurring at an accelerating rate. The implications of this acceleration are worthy of the kind of coverage that predictions of doom based on the Mayan calendar received as the year drew to a close. Instead, such stories appeared in the back pages of newspapers and rarely made an appearance beyond the print media.

The Mayan calendar apocalypse came and went with a shrug and a chuckle. The Global Warming apocalypse delivered Hurricane Sandy, devastating the northeast with unprecedented destruction. Mother Nature cried out: Can you hear me now?

The media answered: No, we cannot. We will continue to burn fossil fuels until we can no longer breathe the air. We will continue to pretend that the debate is ongoing, that the best we can do is stand back and report both sides of the story, and that we cannot say that this storm or that catastrophe is caused by global warming. We can only infer. We can only speculate.

Fair enough. The air belongs to all of us and we will all live or die with the consequences of our neglect. The earth will abide.

2. DRUG LORDS OF MEXICO. Six years ago President Felipe Calderon pledged to crack down on the drug lords who effectively rule his nation. Unable to trust the local or national police, he used the military in a full throttle assault on the well-armed and well-established cartels in every region of the country. As a result an estimated 60,000 to 100,000 people were slaughtered in escalating violence.

In December 2012 Enrique Pena Nieto replaced Calderon and soon after pledged a new approach to the on war drugs. He’s calling off the dogs. Nieto learned what Calderon should have known: You cannot win a war on drugs any more than you can win a war on terror.

Now the cartels are facing a new challenge. An estimated forty percent of their profits come from the marijuana market and that profit is threatened by the legalization of marijuana north of the border (Washington and Colorado). This is how you fight back effectively against the illegal drug trade: by making the product legal, controlled and regulated. Now let’s talk about other drugs: Legalize, control, regulate and the cartels will fold.

3. DRONE WARS. Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness can be ended in the blink of an eye without trial, without due process, and apparently without consequences, as long as it happens on foreign soil. Welcome to the age of the drone wars. Initiated during the tenure of George W. Bush, drone warfare has accelerated under the leadership of Barrack Obama.

According to the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, beyond the war zones of Iraq and Afghanistan, of an estimated 358 drone strikes in Pakistan since 2004, 306 have occurred during Obama’s presidency. Those strikes have killed somewhere between 2,613 to 3,422 individuals, including anywhere from 473 to 889 civilians. Drone strikes have been employed a minimum of 43 times in Yemen and at least three times in Somalia, all with deadly results and civilian casualties.

Clearly, drone warfare has supplanted traditional war and covert operations as the method of choice for eliminating terrorist suspects. Reminiscent of the Bush administration, unless presented with overwhelming evidence (pictures of women and children in the rubble, for example), the Obama administration describes all casualties as Al Qaeda or Al Qaeda affiliates. When the evidence is incontrovertible, we accuse the terrorists of using civilians as shields and issue a muffled apology for collateral damage.

Media coverage of these events have been isolated and minimalist. Even those who strongly criticized the Bush administration’s war policies have held back. Why? Perhaps because we fear that the alternatives would be even more deadly. At least drone strikes come without the cost of American lives.

As a nation we have not yet addressed the implications of drone warfare. It is apparent that our technology is out front in this area. What happens when other nations, nations like Yemen, Pakistan, Iran and Somalia acquire such weapons? Can a drone fly silently and undetected across the oceans to strike a target thousands of miles away? How many civilian casualties are acceptable? How fallible are these weapons? What limitations should be placed on their deployment?

It is certain that the nature of warfare, itself, has changed with this technology. We need to explore the topic fully rather than bury it beneath an innocuous headline.

4. BENGHAZI: A CIA OPERATION. The killing of Ambassador Christopher Stevens and three employees of the Central Intelligence Agency on September 11, 2012 set off a firestorm of political protest. We were in the final months of a presidential election and Republicans were determined to extract political payment. In spasmodic leaps and bounds Republicans and their media spokespersons charged the State Department and by extension the White House with gross ineptitude and a cover up.

Respectfully, they asked all the wrong questions. The great mystery of the Benghazi attack was solved when the Wall Street Journal issued a report that the diplomatic annex in Benghazi was primarily a CIA front. It had no diplomatic status and the vast majority of officials who worked there worked for “the company” under diplomatic cover.

Given that central fact, it follows that the “cover story” centering on Libyan outrage over an offensive video on social media originated with the agency. It follows that the CIA was responsible for the ambassador’s safety. It follows that the cover was blown and the mission failed.

Some of the questions not asked and therefore never answered were: Why was the ambassador there if the annex had no diplomatic function? How common is the practice of using our embassies as cover for the CIA? Will this revelation endanger other embassies? Will it damage our relations in the region and throughout the world?

Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham were not interested in these questions. They were only interested in scoring political points. The truth is: When the CIA is involved, we will never know the full and unvarnished story. Former Commanding General and Director of Central Intelligence David Petraeus got off easy. That he was ultimately responsible for the failure in Benghazi is all but certain. The truth is: The CIA needs to be reigned in and it is not likely to happen until the commander in chief is willing to stand up to the military-industrial complex. But that’s a long and tortured story.

5. EROSION OF CIVIL LIBERTIES. The principle of habeas corpus holds that a person cannot be arrested, detained, tried or convicted without a compelling body of evidence that he or she committed a crime. Habeas corpus is one of the founding blocks of western justice predating the Magna Carta circa 1215.

The principle of habeas corpus served our nation well until the reign of King George the Lesser and the USA Patriot Act of October 26, 2001. With the signing of that legislation, all rights deferred to the suspicion of terrorism and that suspicion requires no compelling evidence, no due process and no trial by jury. When we allow the foundation of our justice system to be weakened, all rights begin to erode. Freedom of speech is curtailed. Freedom from unwarranted search and seizure is effectively eradicated. It seems the only provision in the Bill of Rights that remains untouchable is the right to bear arms without regard to a well-regulated militia.

Many of those who marched on the streets of protest during the Bush administration believed that the erosion of civil liberties would end with the election of Democrat Barrack Obama. Many believed that Obama would keep his promise to close Guantanamo Bay, a glaring violation of international law and a disgrace to the American government. Many assumed that the president would keep his promise to roll back the Patriot Act and restore the rule of law. Many should be outraged now that the president has failed to keep his promises. Moreover, when congress passed and the president signed into law legislation designed to stomp out the Occupy Movement (H.R. Bill 347), he sanctioned the effective end of the first amendment right to assemble in protest.

We have reached a new low in the protection of our individual liberties yet few have noticed and fewer have raised their voices in protest. In the name of security, in the endless pursuit of our enemies, the people and the media have given the president a pass. But when we lose our basic liberties, they are not easily restored.


The through line of these under-reported stories is clear. We focus our attention on the crisis of the moment and the tragedy of the day. We consistently fail to see the forest for the trees. The media dutifully entertains us with images of disaster, human suffering and displays of partisan rancor while neglecting to connect the dots.

We cannot continue down this path without irreparable harm to future generations. The politicians constantly warn us that we are handing our debts to our children and theirs and they are right. But it is not the monetary debt that poses the greatest threat. That debt is eminently manageable. The greater debt is the legacy of neglect and willful ignorance we are handing down. The greater harm is that they may never know the rights that were lost while we were sleeping. The greater harm is the toxic waste we continue to spew into the atmosphere even as we know the consequences. The greater shame is that we turned our heads when the world was spiraling out of control and we chose not to notice.

Perhaps it is not our fault. We turn on our televisions and we are told what to think, what to know, what to think about and what to ignore. We learn that there are two sides to every issue and the best we can do is to choose sides and vote accordingly.

If we train ourselves to become intelligent observers, sooner or later we will begin to notice what our media of choice does not report or what they cover without the depth and focus the subject requires. When we begin to peer behind the curtains, to see what is hidden in plain sight, to connect the timeline of events and to understand the greater truths, only then we will be able to affect real and substantive change.

Jazz.

JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CHRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). THE CHRONICLES HAVE BEEN POSTED ON NUMEROUS CITES OF THE WORLDWIDE WEB, INCLUDING THE ALBION MONITOR, BELLACIAO, BUZZLE, COUNTERPUNCH, DISSIDENT VOICE, THE NATIONAL FREE PRESS, GLOBAL FREE PRESS AND PACIFIC FREE PRESS. SEE WWW.JAZZMANCHRONICLES.BLOGSPOT.COM.

RE: MOURNING IN AMERICA: WHEN WILL WE EVER LEARN?

[Editor's note: This was in response to "Mourning in America: When Will We Ever Learn?" Reprinted below.]

I am in 100% agreement.

Firearms regulations have been diluted, neutered, and defeated through the efforts of a small group of politically well-financed and well-organized fanatics that believe that an amendment allowing them to keep and bear arms is there to allow them to oppose the will of the government by force if they think it’s necessary. They’ll use hunting as a crutch to win a few more votes, but we all know that fully automatic rifles with clips that hold dozens of rounds of armor piercing ammunition are not hunting weapons. Neither of the two pistols the shooter in New Town had on him were hunting weapons. Those pistols were not target pistols either. All three weapons had no other purpose than what they were used for, killing human beings, and they were obtained legally. Is there anything else we need to know about them?

I will no longer vote for or donate to any politician or political organization that allows the NRA to influence them.

Michael Caine


JAZZMAN CHRONICLES. DISSEMINATE FREELY.



MOURNING IN AMERICA: WHEN WILL WE EVER LEARN?

By Jack Random



How many times must a man look up
Before he can see the sky?
Yes, 'n' how many ears must one man have
Before he can hear people cry?
Yes, 'n' how many deaths will it take till he knows
That too many people have died?
The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind.
The answer is blowin’ in the wind.


Bob Dylan, Blowin’ in The Wind



I am a writer. It is who I am. Writing is what I do that gives my life fundamental meaning. Of course there is family and there are friends for whom I am eternally grateful to be able to share my thoughts and feelings, but writing is how I connect to the world and the worldwide web is my forum.

As the nation mourns the horrific actions of a deranged young man in a rural town in Connecticut, my eyes turn inward. I wonder what my life would be like if I were unable to formulate words or if no one wished to read or hear them. I don’t for a moment believe that I would resort to violence but I am also acutely aware of the frailty and unpredictability of human nature.

I know that words can convey only a small fraction of the depth of sorrow that the loss of a child visits to the soul. I know that the cry for vengeance after such an act is also a part of human nature and I know that it is in vain.

Who among us can say what vile acts we are capable of if the entire world seems to turn against us or, perhaps worse, turns its back as if we did not exist?

I am reminded of a moment of clarity in Michael Moore’s documentary film Bowling for Columbine, a poignant account of America’s first mass murder at a public school. Some had decided that a certain kind of music was at least partially to blame for the unthinkable actions of two young men and Marilyn Manson was at the top of the list. Moore asked Manson what he would say to the kids who perpetrated the crime. His reply was more revealing than dozens of media experts attempting to explain the event:

“I wouldn’t say a single word to them. I would listen to what they have to say and that’s what no one did.”

No one can say that a failure to listen was a cause of the massacre at Columbine or Newtown, Connecticut. No one knows or will ever know but we do know this: Every educator, every administrator, instructional aide, nurse, counselor and school psychologist can identify children who desperately need help and do not receive it.

Politicians like to say “you can’t throw money at a problem” just before they lower the hammer for another round of budget cuts at the public schools. Maybe so but you can be sure that an absence of funding for essential resources does a great deal of harm.

Every school district and every school should have mental health professionals available to troubled students whenever and wherever they are needed. Simply stated, there is no money for services the politicians consider unessential.

We hear it every time there is a shooting at a school and everyone agrees but when the story fades and the schools face another round of budget cuts, as they inevitably will, the mental health counselors are the first to fall.

Words fail and mental health services are not enough. No matter what services we provide, no matter what precautions we take, no matter how many security measures we install at our houses of education, there will always be individuals who pose a threat not only to themselves but to others, not only to friends and family members but to innocent children.

Some say it is our culture of violence. I don’t buy it. In a civilized society, human nature trumps cultural influence. We are no more violent than our European, Asian, Middle Eastern, African or South American brethren. We are a compassionate people. We care deeply and we mourn for our fallen children.

We all know the numbers. We are among the world’s leaders in peacetime firearms casualties (4th behind South Africa, Colombia and Thailand according to NationMaster.com). We lead the world in gun ownership and availability and we have the weakest gun control laws in the industrialized world. Only in America can any random Jack walk into a gun show and walk out with the equivalent of an AK-47.

In our hearts, if we are honest, we know the reason behind the numbers. Like Bill Clinton said in reference to balancing the budget, it’s the math. It’s the laws of probability. The more guns we produce, the more assault weapons we make available, the more they will fall into the wrong hands.

This is not conjecture. This is not speculation. This is simple math. Like rats breeding in a confined space, our behavior and its consequences are eminently predictable. If there is a gun in your house, you and your loved ones are more likely to fall victim to gun violence. If we make it easier for deranged individuals to get their hands on assault weapons and rapid-fire clips, we guarantee that more innocent people will die.

In our hearts we know, yet we let it go on as if change in America is impossible. It is possible. We are a democracy and the voice of the people will ultimately be heard over the roar of the National Rifle Association (NRA).

One of the unintended consequences of the Supreme Court’s unconscionable Citizens United decision (legalizing unlimited corporate contributions to political campaigns) is that organizations like the NRA are no longer major players. No politician must pander to the NRA any longer. For every dollar in NRA blood money there are at least a thousand from the elite international corporations. The gun industry can no longer dictate legislation in Washington.

That is not a good reason for long-due change but it is a political reality.

We are a nation in mourning. We cannot stop the tears with our collective sorrow. We can ease the suffering of the afflicted families only by small measures. We cannot prevent future tragedies from befalling others but this time we can at least take action that will mitigate the harm. This time we can begin to control our deadly weapons and have complete certainty that lives will be spared.

To paraphrase Pete Seeger’s anti-war ballad:


Where have all the flowers gone?
Gone to graveyards everyone.
When will we ever learn?
When will we ever learn?


To those who say they need their guns for target practice, I say the vicarious pleasures of a million target shooters is not worth the life of one child.

To those who say possession of firearms, from semi-automatic pistols to military quality assault rifles, is your god given right, I say our children have a god given right to live long and fruitful lives.

To those who hide behind the second amendment right to bear arms, I say you should be ashamed. Who appointed you the guardians of our democracy? I say: As long as we have the ballot box, we have no need for a self-anointed revolutionary militia. If ever we did, it would not be you.

Lay down your arms for the public good. Lay down your ammunition for the students of Columbine, for the people of Aurora, for the citizens of Tucson and Oak Creek, and for the children of Newtown.

It is time we answered the question “When will we ever learn?” emphatically: Now!

Jazz.


JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CHRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). THE CHRONICLES HAVE BEEN POSTED ON NUMEROUS CITES OF THE WORLDWIDE WEB, INCLUDING THE ALBION MONITOR, BELLACIAO, BUZZLE, COUNTERPUNCH, DISSIDENT VOICE, THE NATIONAL FREE PRESS, GLOBAL FREE PRESS AND PACIFIC FREE PRESS. SEE WWW.JAZZMANCHRONICLES.BLOGSPOT.COM.

THE WASICHU’S LAST STAND: FALL OF THE WHITE MAN IN AMERICAN POLITICS

JAZZMAN CHRONICLES. DISSEMINATE FREELY.


By Jack Random



“The Wasichu wore so many faces, an endless sea, wave after wave, more than the stars, and each one carried the same darkness beneath his pale skin, each afraid and filled with hate. Two thousand years of hatred and slaughter, two thousand years of death and poverty, two thousand years of genocide and white man rule yet still they feared and hated.”

From The Killing Spirit by Jack Random


Given the gender gap and the extraordinary racial divide demonstrated in the recent election, it does not take a political genius to conclude that today’s Republican Party is more dependent on the white man than at any time since the civil rights movement under Lyndon Baines Johnson.

The Lakota had a name for the pale skinned invaders who came to their land, massacred their people, slaughtered the buffalo, spoiled their sacred lands and destroyed their way of life, pushing them and all native peoples to the brink of extinction. They called them the Wasichu.

The Wasichu has been translated to white eyes or pale face or the white man but its meaning goes deeper. It refers to a class of men who believe in conquering, killing, defeating all others and bending them to their will. It refers to men who are motivated by greed and power. It refers to men who would rather exploit the earth, kill its animals and rape its natural wonders rather than learning to live on the land in harmony.

More than anything else, the Wasichu represents the spirit of greed and that spirit has taken complete control of the Republican Party that was soundly rejected in the 2012 election.

The Wasichu has not changed but the nation has.

In 1876, one hundred years after the founding of the United States of America, the most infamous Indian killer in western lore foolishly attacked the largest encampment of Native Americans ever assembled in one place. The seven tribes of Lakota called it the Greasy Grass but it would be known in the annals of the nation’s history by the white man’s name: Little Bighorn.

Colonel George Armstrong Custer along with every member of his five companies in the notorious Seventh Cavalry was killed on the field of battle.

Watching Republican candidate Mitt Romney deliver his brief but gracious concession speech two hours after the issue was settled, I was reminded of Custer poised on Last Stand Hill, still believing that somehow fate would intervene, that reinforcements would arrive, that something miraculous would arise to deliver victory from certain defeat.

The miracle never happened and both Custer and Romney would suffer a crushing defeat. Custer’s Seventh Cavalry would have its revenge years later at the Wounded Knee Massacre. Romney’s Grand Old Party, the last bastion of white man rule, will have no such revenge.

History will record the 2012 presidential election as the white man’s last stand.

For two and a quarter centuries the most exclusive white man’s club in America was the executive office of the presidency. That exclusivity ended in 2008 with the election of Barrack Obama. His re-election in 2012 marked the last election in which any political party can hope to win based almost entirely on the support of white men.

Yes, Mitt Romney could have won this election by gaining two-thirds of the white male vote. The record will show a landslide victory in the Electoral College but the margin of victory in nearly all of the contested states was thin. President Obama won not only by dominating the minority vote but also by peeling off enough of the white woman vote to close the deal.

Had the Republicans not chosen to openly attack women’s rights on equal pay, abortion and contraception, their chameleon standard bearer would likely have won.

Four years from now, given the same strategy and the same policies, it will not be so close. The march of changing demography, the browning of America, continues unabated.

Custer is dead and buried and this time the only revenge will come from women and the minorities as they redefine party politics in America.

The GOP will rue the day their corporate sponsors created and financed the Tea Party, that predominantly white working class coalition who took the reins of power by preaching fiscal conservatism but governed by attacking unions and pressing forward with their radical and increasingly unpopular social agenda.

A wholesale rejection of the Tea Party was one of the underlying themes of this election. If not for census year redistricting, the House of Representatives would have gone the way of the Senate. But redistricting cannot hold back the tide of demographics.

The GOP created this beast and the GOP must now perform the delicate operation of eradicating their influence without alienating their members.

The party must now cater to those it vilified only yesterday and the transformation has already begun. Within hours of the election results, spokespersons affiliated with the Republicans made the first overtures to the Latino community and the word Amnesty, verboten for over a decade, was introduced in the debate on immigration. The first test of the party’s ability to bring the Tea Party radicals in line will be the Dream Act, a modest reform that will provide a pathway to legalization for young illegal immigrants.

Beyond immigration reform, the GOP must act to stop the erosion of support among women, particularly unmarried women. The party tried and failed to sever its ties to its candidates who spoke openly about the immorality of contraception, God’s will when rape or incest results in pregnancy and other radical right positions. The party did little to separate itself from the decree that life begins at conception or the requirement that women who chose abortion must be compelled to undergo an intra-vaginal examination. That must and will change if the party wishes to be viable in future elections. We may even see movement on equal pay for equal work and day care for women in the workforce.

The Democrats will also be forced to the left on social issues. Obama initiated the process with his embrace of gay marriage and his executive decision that effectively enacted the Dream Act as long as he remains president. The process of liberalizing what is supposed to be the liberal party will continue as they attempt to hold on to their current advantage, even as they continue their rightward migration on economic issues.

The forgotten of the electorate in this equation is also the largest: the working people. The mystery factor is the working white man who has notoriously and consistently voted against his own interest for decades. In recent years working people have witnessed their jobs exported overseas, their homes foreclosed or devalued, their wages diminished and benefits stripped down to a bare minimum largely as a result of Republican policies. Still, they are counted on to get in line and vote GOP at every opportunity.

Some have suggested that white men or indeed the entire electorate is just plain dumb. I don’t buy it. Many working class Americans may lack sufficient education and may choose to rely on a propaganda machine (Fox News, Rush Limbaugh) for political information but they are by no means dumb. Just surviving in the modern world requires moxy, know how, the ability to adapt and work with others. They may be misinformed, they may even be bamboozled but they are not dumb.

Others, including myself, have pointed to willful ignorance to explain the phenomenon of voting against one’s interest. I stand by that conclusion but there is something else operating here, something underlying willful ignorance, something most everyone knows but very few in the world of mainstream political discourse openly discuss: Today’s Democratic Party is not what it used to be.

There was a time when it could fairly be generalized that the Republicans were the party of business and Democrats were the party of labor. Today they are both the parties of big business (more specifically, large multi-national corporations). The difference is the Republicans are more so, clinging to deregulation and tax cuts for the elite even after the collapse of 2009, holding to an absolute support of Free Trade and openly attacking the very right of workers to organize in the workforce.

If the Democrats have done anything to secure the rights of labor I am not aware of it. Moreover, they have actively supported Free Trade, the single most important policy to all working people. They have won the support of organized labor by default.

Working people is the new frontier of American politics. If the Democrats restore their status as the party of labor, if they push hard for labor rights in America and embrace Fair Trade in our relations with other nations, they will become the dominant party for at least a generation to come. If they fail to take hold of labor, they will leave the door wide open to independent or third party challenge.

There are strong pro-labor and Fair Trade advocates within the Democratic Party, most notably Senator Sherrod Brown of Ohio. The Senator won re-election in the most critical battleground state in the nation and did so against the full force of corporate funding and every dirty trick in Karl Rove’s handbook.

Today the Democrats have a decided advantage but if they wish to secure the future they would do well to listen to Senator Brown.

The white working man is dazed, confused, and cruising down the highway to political irrelevancy. He desperately needs a bridge to rejoin the fold. Fair trade and a strong push to protect American workers may provide that bridge.

Jazz.

JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CHRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). THE CHRONICLES HAVE BEEN POSTED ON NUMEROUS CITES OF THE WORLDWIDE WEB, INCLUDING THE ALBION MONITOR, BELLACIAO, BUZZLE, COUNTERPUNCH, DISSIDENT VOICE, THE NATIONAL FREE PRESS, GLOBAL FREE PRESS AND PACIFIC FREE PRESS. SEE WWW.JAZZMANCHRONICLES.BLOGSPOT.COM.

OCTOBER SURPRISE: THE SUPERSTORM AND THE 2012 ELECTION

JAZZMAN CHRONICLES. DISSEMINATE FREELY.


By Jack Random



“I have a job in New Jersey that is much bigger than presidential politics… I have to say, the administration, the president, himself, and FEMA Administrator Craig Fugate have been outstanding with us so far. We have a great partnership with them. I want to thank the president personally for his personal attention to this.”

New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, October 30, 2012


No one can predict what will happen in the final days of a presidential election. Last time around the October surprise was the impending total collapse of Wall Street and the global financial system, a crisis so acute it forced a Republican president to go against a fundamental tenet of his party’s philosophy by advocating a massive financial bailout.

For those whose memories are short, we were on the verge of a catastrophe that went to the very foundation of our economic system. Had it been allowed to unfold (let the markets correct themselves), a worldwide Great Depression would certainly have followed.

Republican John McCain’s muddled response, contrasting with Barrack Obama’s decisive leadership, paved the way to a clear and decisive victory.

In the 2012 election, the crisis came in a different form. As if to remind us that the effects of climate change cannot be denied by political decree, Mother Nature spawned a Super Storm whose breadth and depth of destruction throughout the northeastern seaboard was unprecedented.

Just when we thought climate change would not make an appearance this election cycle, along comes Hurricane Sandy to provide a grim vision of what our willful ignorance can do. And while we cannot with certainty attribute one extreme weather event to global warming, we would be fools not to acknowledge that this is exactly the kind of event climatologist have predicted.

Every Romney supporter who laughed when their candidate belittled the idea of a president fighting the rise of the ocean might now have second thoughts, particularly if they live on the east coast.

Welcome to the new world where catastrophic weather events become more commonplace, more extreme and less predictable.

As our hearts go out to the millions of Americans affected by this storm, the lives and homes lost, the towns and communities decimated and the hardships that will be faced for years to come, our responsibility as citizens compels us to connect these events to the choices we face in the coming election.

Governor Chris Christie of devastated New Jersey rose above partisan politics when he praised President Obama’s quick and decisive response to this catastrophe.

Republican candidate Mitt Romney staged a fake relief event and refused to comment about his previous positions advocating cutbacks in emergency management, handing responsibility to the affected states and privatizing the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).

We all remember what the last Republican president did to FEMA and how miserably that agency responded to Hurricane Katrina.

Candidate Romney is spending his final days of the campaign talking about big change but what he’s really offering is a change back to the policies of George W. Bush. When a president fundamentally does not believe in the role of government, agencies like FEMA, the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Environmental Protection Agency and the Consumer Protection Agency inevitably decline.

To suggest that a state hit by a disaster and still struggling to climb out of the financial hole created by Republican policies, should somehow manage its own emergencies is flagrantly irresponsible. To suggest that a profit-motivated private corporation would do a better job of emergency management is absurd.

We have already witnessed what private insurance companies did in the wake of Katrina, drawing artificial lines between wind and water damage, finding loopholes and any excuse to deny claims or tie them up in court until wary and beleaguered homeowners are forced to sell out at a loss.

In times of crisis the people deserve and indeed demand an effective federal response to save lives, to mitigate damage and to help rebuild. President Obama is fulfilling that basic governmental responsibility because his administration was prepared for it. He has promised to stay the course and we must hold him to that promise.

That is not the kind of federal response we could expect from a Romney administration. Yes, he would appear on television, he would express his sincere condolences, he would make promises but in the end every state, every community, every homeowner and every individual would be left on their own. When the cameras leave and the coverage fades, the promises would be forgotten.

It is times like these that test the spirit of the nation. It is events like these that touch our hearts and trigger our empathy for our fellow citizens because we know, at another time and place, it could happen to us, to our families and loved ones.

At times like these we are made stronger by our sense of unity and our confidence that our elected leaders will help us to recover and rebuild.

At times like these we know what good government looks like.

It is perhaps unfair that a presidential election should be decided by a single event but when a candidate disavows virtually everything he has campaigned on to hide the fact that his agenda is to maximize the profits of the corporate elite while the rest of the nation pays for it with an age of austerity, then fairness is no longer in the equation.

The polls say the election is a toss-up (at least in the popular vote). I have no reason to doubt their validity. But with four days to Election Day, with the devastation of the Super Storm fresh in our collective consciousness, I believe we will see a clear and decisive victory for the Democrats in the House of Representatives, the United States Senate and in the White House.

Jazz.

JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CHRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). THE CHRONICLES HAVE BEEN POSTED ON NUMEROUS CITES OF THE WORLDWIDE WEB, INCLUDING THE ALBION MONITOR, BELLACIAO, BUZZLE, COUNTERPUNCH, DISSIDENT VOICE, THE NATIONAL FREE PRESS, GLOBAL FREE PRESS AND PACIFIC FREE PRESS. SEE WWW.JAZZMANCHRONICLES.BLOGSPOT.COM.

ALI & OBAMA: THE PRESIDENTIAL DEBATES

JAZZMAN CHRONICLES. DISSEMINATE FREELY.





ALI AND OBAMA:
PUGILISM AND THE PRESIDENTIAL DEBATES


By Jack Random



“It’s gonna be a thrilla and a chilla and a killa, when I get the gorilla in Manila.”

Mohammed Ali


In the world of boxing no one compares to the greatest heavyweight champion of all time: Mohammed Ali. He is remembered for his conversion to Islam and his refusal to be drafted for the Vietnam War (a conscientious objection that would cost him many years of his boxing prime) as well as for his accomplishments in the ring.

As a boxer he is best known for his eighth round knockout of reigning champion George Foreman in the 1974 Rumble in the Jungle and for a series of three fights against his nemesis, Smoking Joe Frazier. In the Rumble, Ali debuted rope-a-dope, a strategy of playing possum, planting himself on the ropes, covering his face with his gloves, taking punishing blows without retaliation before emerging to stun his opponent.

In the series of fights against Frazier, Ali displayed the full range of his boxing abilities, including his ability to bounce back from defeat, his resilience, toughness, and his unrivaled ability to take a punch and come back dancing.

For the third and decisive match against Frazier, the Thrilla in Manila, employing rope-a-dope, Ali absorbed blows round after round that would have killed a lesser man, but then he came out dancing like a butterfly, stinging like a bee, winning the match when Frazier could not answer the bell in the fifteenth round.

Mohammed Ali emerged from the Thrilla in Manila a legend, a man who transcended the sport that propelled him to fame. As a boxer, he was the most talented combination of power and speed the heavyweight division has ever known.

Whatever you may think of his policies or philosophy (a progressive moderate who has been attacked as ferociously from the left as from the right), Barrack Obama is to politics what Ali was to boxing.

His oratorical skills beckon the days of Camelot: John Kennedy, Robert Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr. And in the closed one-on-one quarters of the presidential debates, he has proven as resilient as Ali against Frazier.

In 2008 he out-pointed a formidable opponent in Hillary Clinton during the primaries and handily defeated a badly overmatched John McCain. In 2012 he went up against an aggressive, ever-shifting chameleon, a man completely unbound by his own words, his own campaign pledges, promises and policies.

A stunned and frankly unprepared Obama had little choice but to plant himself against the ropes, cover and absorb the best blows Mitt “Slick Willy” Romney could throw, hoping against hope that the American electorate would understand the duplicity, hypocrisy and deception his opponent was displaying. It was a dirty fight, filled with sucker punches and below the belt shots, but the viewing public either did not understand or did not care. Victory went to the challenger.

Like Ali after the first showdown with Frazier, Obama took his defeat like a man and yearned for a rematch.

In the second debate, Slick Willy seemed convinced he was dealing with a weak and wounded president. He came out of his corner with the same aggressive posture, like a bully in the playground, using the same shape shifting tactics. But this time Obama was prepared. Landing counterpunch after counterpunch, he waited patiently for the chance to land a crushing blow.

The opportunity came mid-debate when Slick Willy circled his opponent, certain he had the president cornered. His campaign managers had telegraphed what they believed would be their candidate’s golden moment: the attack on the consulate in Benghazi, Libya, an attack that killed our ambassador and three other Americans.

Holding to the conviction that the president had waited fourteen days before calling the event a terrorist attack, when Obama stated that he had used that very term the day after the attack in the White House Rose Garden, Slick Willy closed in for the kill.


ROMNEY: I think [it’s] interesting…the president just said…that on the day after the attack he went into the Rose Garden and said that this was an act of terror.

(Romney stares at the president.)

OBAMA: That’s what I said.

ROMNEY (staring): You said in the Rose Garden the day after the attack, it was an act of terror?

OBAMA: Please proceed, governor.

ROMNEY (to the moderator): I want to make sure we get that on the record because it took the president fourteen days before he called the attack in Benghazi an act of terror.

MODERATOR: …he did in fact, sir…call it an act of terror….


No amount of spin or obfuscation can erase the stinging blow of that moment. Slick Willy was ill prepared for his own line of attack. He hit the canvas and stayed down for the count. The bully was beaten. He stumbled to his feet and finished the match but the damage was done.

In the final and decisive showdown, Obama danced like a butterfly and stung like a bee, schooling his overmatched opponent on foreign policy like a mentor to a rambunctious youth. Slick Willy was out of his league. He emerged from the event in the never land of Republican denial where up is down, night is day and Slick Willy won the debates. In fact, he never knew what hit him.

From my perspective securely to the left of the president, it is a shame that neither of these candidates was truly held to account. Neither Romney nor Obama has an effective answer to what has come to be known as the China problem. It should be called the Free Trade problem.

Slick Willy is stuck on currency manipulation, otherwise known as the status quo or the Obama approach.

The real and essential solution to the China, India and third world trade problem, a problem that goes to the heart of trade imbalance, job exportation and depressed wages and benefits is Fair Trade: a trade policy that takes the cost of labor fully into account. But that is a line neither of these candidates will ever cross. Their ties to monolithic international corporations are far too tight.

It is worth noting that the only Fair Trade advocates in our government are Democrats. There is not a single Fair Trade Republican in either house of congress. So if you think Slick Willy will get anywhere near the real China problem, you’ve been drinking from the punch bowl of Republican fantasy.

In the end, given the choice we have and not the one we wish we had, Barrack Obama has emerged from these battles the stronger, the wiser and by far the better choice for at least 95% of the American people.

Mohammed Ali emerged from Manila an eternal legend, whose star burned ever brighter when he refused to be a spokesman to the Islamic world for the Bush administration. Whether Obama reaches that lofty status depends on the election and a successful second term.

At this juncture, his challenger’s flaws and shortcomings fully exposed (conviction is a terrible thing to waste), every citizen of this nation and indeed the entire world should be hoping he succeeds.

Jazz.

JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CHRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). THE CHRONICLES HAVE BEEN POSTED ON NUMEROUS CITES OF THE WORLDWIDE WEB, INCLUDING THE ALBION MONITOR, BELLACIAO, BUZZLE, COUNTERPUNCH, DISSIDENT VOICE, THE NATIONAL FREE PRESS, GLOBAL FREE PRESS AND PACIFIC FREE PRESS. SEE WWW.JAZZMANCHRONICLES.BLOGSPOT.COM.

SLICK WILLY BAMBOOZLES OBAMA: THE FIRST PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE

JAZZMAN CHRONICLES. DISSEMINATE FREELY.


By Jack Random



Most of us have heard about the time Willard Mitt Romney exercised his youthful exuberance by joining his prankster friends in holding down a gay student and cutting his hair. I imagine young Willard’s father was upset when he heard the story. I imagine he called his son into his office for a private scolding.

I imagine young Willard listening to his father’s admonitions before holding up his hand to say: You know me. I didn’t do it and I’ll give you three reasons why.

I imagine Willard’s father shaking his head as his son proceeded with his three-point presentation and at its conclusion replying: From now on we’re going to call you Mitt.

He understood that if his ambitious son went by the name of Willard, it was inevitable that he would someday be known as “Slick Willie.”

The scene of course is fictional but the moniker is absolutely appropriate. In the world of Slick Willie the distinction between truth and fiction is irrelevant.

I will make no excuses for the president’s performance in the first presidential debate but I will offer one explanation: Obama was bamboozled by a barrage of deceptions, contortions and outright falsehoods bordering on the absurd.

Slick Willie could deny that the earth is round, that the sun rises in the east and offer three reasons why the moon is only the shadow of our collective imagination.

Some criticized moderator Jim Lehrer for not pressing Romney for the details and specifics he promised in his introduction. He deserves some of that criticism but pressing Romney is like pressing jello; it takes any shape you desire and bounces back for more.

Governor Romney, you have proposed a 20% across the board income tax cut yet deny the estimated five trillion dollars it would cost over the next ten years. If you in fact reject that figure, what is your own estimate of the cost?

It wouldn’t cost a penny. If I’ve said it once I’ve said it a dozen times before breakfast, my tax cuts are revenue neutral. I’ve promised the American people that I will enact no tax cuts that increase the deficit or the national debt. We owe that to our children and our grandchildren, who expect no less of our elected leaders.

So what you’re saying is: You will eliminate deductions equivalent to the 20% tax cuts?

That’s right.

But you won’t tell us what those deductions are…

I’m a businessman. You don’t put your cards on the table before you enter negotiations. We’ll sit down together on day one, Republicans and Democrats, and we’ll make the hard decisions that will secure America’s future without sacrificing the economic security of our hard working middle-income homeowners.

You don’t feel responsible to tell the American people what deductions will be on the table?

That would be irresponsible. What the hard-working American people need to know is that I will create jobs, protect Medicare by repealing Obamacare and his $716 billion cuts, and by securing a fiscally responsible future for our children. That’s what the people want and that’s what my administration will deliver.

Then the home mortgage deduction will not be on the table?

Certainly not. During these difficult economic times, the last thing we would want to do is impose additional burdens on hard-working middle income families.

But you would retain the pre-existing condition provision of the healthcare law and the provision that allows children to remain covered under their parents’ health insurance until the age of 26.

Yes. Of course, pre-existing conditions are covered under existing law without Obamacare. But I would repeal the irresponsible $716 billion cut to Medicare funding.

You know that those cuts are to insurance companies and healthcare providers, not to the benefits of Medicare recipients.

That’s a lot of money and if you think it won’t affect the quality of medical care in this country, all I can say is: You’re mistaken.

So…you would repeal the cost savings of the Affordable Care Act but retain those provisions that cost money and add to the deficit.

I’ll say it again. My plan will reduce the deficit and put the nation on a secure financial path toward a balanced budget. Any allusions to the contrary are quite simply misguided. I know how to balance budgets. Unlike our president, I’ve run a business. I’ve been responsible for the bottom line. In Massachusetts, I worked with Democrats to balance the budget and maintain a high standard of living for all our citizens.

Will corporate loopholes and tax havens, like accounts in the Cayman Islands and foreign countries, be on the table for negotiations?

Everything is on the table but you and I both know and economists will tell you that now is not the time to burden the job creators. My administration will unleash the power of free enterprise, create millions of jobs, which by the way will reduce the deficit because people will be able to pay more in taxes, as we move to a more vibrant and prosperous economy with well-paying jobs not only for our hard-working middle income folks but for their children and grandchildren going forward. That’s what the American people expect, that’s what every hard-working mother and father deserves, and that’s what my presidency will deliver. It all starts with leadership.

Let’s talk about Medicare and Social Security. You’ve said that current seniors and retirees along with those approaching retirement will not have to worry about cuts to their benefits. Is that a promise?

No one can promise the moon and the stars but what I can promise is: If I’m elected president and my policies are put in place, today’s senior citizens will not have to worry about their retirement checks or Medicare coverage. You can put it in the bank. I’m a man of my word.

What about their children and grandchildren? Isn’t that really like a reverse mortgage for the family home? If you agree to give us your home after your death, we’ll take care of you but your children will not enjoy the benefits of your hard-earned labor?

That’s a rather bizarre analogy. A lot of senior citizens will take issue with your characterization. A reverse mortgage can often be a very reasonable solution to the economic difficulties that this president has been unable to resolve. Let me say again, those hard-working seniors who have earned their social security and Medicare benefits will not have to worry about losing them under my presidency. And we will repeal the president’s $716 billion cuts to the Medicare program.

You also propose a two trillion dollar increase in military spending but you won’t tell us how you’ll offset that spending.

I believe in a strong military. The first duty of the president is to provide for national security. Cutting military spending in these troubled times would be irresponsible.

And you can do that without increasing the deficit?

Yes. By putting the people back to work. I have a plan that will create twelve million well-paying jobs. When people are working, they pay more in taxes. They buy more products. They live happier lives. That is what my administration is all about.

So on the one hand, you propose tax cuts of anywhere from four to five trillion dollars over the next ten years, two trillion in increased military spending, a repeal of $716 billion in Medicare savings, and the only savings you’ve specifically proposed are eighty billion dollars in incentives to green energy and eliminating federal funding to the arts, an insignificant amount. How do you balance the books?

It’s clear you haven’t read and don’t understand my plan. It’s on the website: MittRomney.com. You can go there, you can read the details. It’s all there. What I have proposed is a vision of an American future, a future that builds on the founding principles of the American republic, a future that supports and builds up our job creators, and by doing so lifts all the American people by providing well-paid jobs for our middle-income workers, and that enables all Americans to lift our heads high, proud and strong. That’s what America is all about and that’s the kind of leadership I will provide.

Congratulations, Governor, you’ve managed to talk for forty-five minutes without answering any questions and without saying anything of substance.

It’s been a pleasure. Now if I could just talk directly to the American people for a few minutes…

Slick Willie.

Jazz.

JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CHRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). THE CHRONICLES HAVE BEEN POSTED ON NUMEROUS CITES OF THE WORLDWIDE WEB, INCLUDING THE ALBION MONITOR, BELLACIAO, BUZZLE, COUNTERPUNCH, DISSIDENT VOICE, THE NATIONAL FREE PRESS, GLOBAL FREE PRESS AND PACIFIC FREE PRESS. SEE WWW.JAZZMANCHRONICLES.BLOGSPOT.COM.

THE GREAT GOP LIE: Defenders of Medicare

JAZZMAN CHRONICLES. DISSEMINATE FREELY.


By Jack Random



In the modern era of California politics you can count on two rock solid truisms:

First, in presidential elections the state as a whole is blue. If California is so much as contested, the Republicans will win the White House in a landslide and probably both houses of congress as well.

Second, the great central valley of the golden state is as red as Oklahoma, Arkansas or Tennessee, where many of its residents have roots. The only Democrats who win in the valley are Blue Dogs. Traditionally known as fiscally conservative social Democrats, they are now more or less moderate conservatives across the board. There is no place for them in a Republican Party co-opted by the rightwing Tea Party, so they press on as representatives of the Democratic compromise.

If you want to have a political career in this part of the country you have to bend to the right. That is why it is so foreign to observe the generic Republican campaign in the current election. In all my years I never thought I would ever witness Republicans running in central California as the defenders of Medicare.

The singular hero of both Blue Dog and Republican politicians is Ronald Reagan, who famously attacked Medicare as socialized medicine. Reagan’s charge was not without merit. For those covered by Medicare, the elderly and the disabled, it is an effective government run program that eliminates the need for private insurance. As a presidential candidate, Reagan lacked the political courage to take on the third rail of American politics but at least he did not have the gall to stake his claim as Medicare’s defender.

Not so for today’s Republican politicians. Candidate after candidate approves this message: My Democratic opponent would cut $716 billion from Medicare. I will protect our senior citizens. Vote GOP.

Reagan must have turned over in his grave a few dozen times. Of course, the advertisements, often paid for by anonymous third party donations (read: insurance companies), never use the words Republican or Democrat. To do so would risk reminding even the most casual observer that Medicare is a signature Democratic program and everything that Republicans traditionally abhor. Voting Republican to protect Medicare is like voting for the Ku Klux Klan to uphold civil rights. To believe that Republicans will defend Medicare is to turn everything we know about the major parties on its head.

Recalling that the Grand Old Party was once the party of Lincoln and the Democrats the party of the Jim Crow south, are we witnessing a fundamental change in party identification or a deception so profound it defies explanation?

The truth behind the phantom $716 billion savings is that they will not come from the beneficiaries but from the providers, the hospitals, insurance companies and a subsidized private insurance program known as Medicare Advantage, a program that has not delivered on its promise of cost efficiency. Never mind that every Republican in congress voted for the Ryan plan, which proposes those same savings and would ultimately transform Medicare into a voucher program.

If you actually believe that today’s Republican Party will stand up for the social safety net (Medicare, Social Security, job training, unemployment benefits, food stamps, affordable housing) and against the rising tide of austerity measures, you’ve been living on another planet for better than half a century. More than anything else, Medicare and Social Security define the major American parties. Democrats are philosophically committed to defending and protecting these social programs while Republicans are philosophically committed to their demise.

Those who have lived on the solid ground of earth know that the only change we have witnessed in the Republican Party is that it has turned hard right and is even more determined to eliminate social programs. Their only concession to electoral politics is that they are willing to spare today’s elderly voters as long as they agree to sell out their children and grandchildren.

What then can we make of this great Republican deception? If indeed the party operatives believe it necessary to run on a fundamental lie, a lie in direct conflict with their very foundations, even in districts firmly grounded in conservative politics, then the party must be in far greater danger than any of the polls have suggested.

I conclude that the Grand Old Party’s difficulties are infinitely greater than the weakness of their presidential candidate. I conclude that a clear majority of the electorate is on the verge of rejecting the Republican brand and the conservative philosophy. I conclude that the majority of our citizens are finally awakening to the betrayal of an economic theory that under the cover of freedom is designed to press the working people down while enriching the elite.

Based on these conclusions, I predict a massive Democratic landslide in November, returning Obama to the White House, building a stronger majority in the Senate and taking back majority control in the House of Representatives.

If my prediction comes to fruition, we will then see if the Democrats can deliver on the largely unspoken promise to rebuild a broken economy from the ground up. We will see if Fair Trade will replace Free Trade as the American standard. We will see if the Democrats are indeed the party of the working people or just pretenders trying to survive the next electoral cycle. We will see if corporate money can be contained if not eliminated from the electoral process. We will see if America has the commitment to take the lead in building a green economy.

We will see if our political institutions are capable of breaking the chains of corporate dominance, putting people back to work with decent jobs at decent pay, rebuilding the middle class, protecting the rights of labor, rejecting war as a means of settling international conflict and finally delivering a government for, by and of the people.

Jazz.

JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CHRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). THE CHRONICLES HAVE BEEN POSTED ON NUMEROUS CITES OF THE WORLDWIDE WEB, INCLUDING THE ALBION MONITOR, BELLACIAO, BUZZLE, COUNTERPUNCH, DISSIDENT VOICE, THE NATIONAL FREE PRESS, GLOBAL FREE PRESS AND PACIFIC FREE PRESS. SEE WWW.JAZZMANCHRONICLES.BLOGSPOT.COM.

FREE SPEECH IN A DANGEROUS WORLD

JAZZMAN CHRONICLES. DISSEMINATE FREELY.




FREE SPEECH IN A DANGEROUS WORLD:
FANNING THE FLAMES OF RELIGIOUS VIOLENCE


By Jack Random



“Nothing tests one's intellectual honesty and ability to apply principles consistently more than free speech controversies. It is exceedingly easy to invoke free speech values in defense of political views you like. It is exceedingly difficult to invoke them in defense of views you loathe.”

Glenn Greenwald, “Conservatives, Democrats and the Convenience of Denouncing Free Speech”, The Observer / UK, September 16, 2012.


I believe in freedom of religion. Every man and woman should be free to worship whatever god and practice whatever system of belief he or she chooses. But there are limits to freedom of religion.

No religion should entitle its followers to assault any other human right (freedom of speech, freedom of the press, the right to assemble in protest, or indeed the freedom to practice other religions). No religion should be used as a pretext for violence against nonviolent adversaries.

I believe in freedom of speech. I believe every man and woman should be able to speak or write or create and disseminate any work or any message within the realm of human imagination. But there are limits to freedom of speech.

The classic example is the individual who cries out “Fire!” in a crowded theater. The act is intended to do harm and does so with a high level of probability. In that sense speech can be used as a weapon and should be constrained.

How then do we consider the incendiary device unleashed on the Arab street on the eve of September 11 with the clear intent of inciting violence? Because it took the form of a crude film by a fake filmmaker are we to forgive this malevolent act?

For those unfamiliar with the chain of events, it began with an obscure radical right activist on a crusade against Islam, placing a crude 15-minute film clip attacking the character of the Prophet Mohammed on You-Tube. With the assistance of Arab media, purportedly centered in Saudi Arabia, the hack job was widely disseminated across the Arab-Islamic world on the eve of September 11. A brief statement by the man assumed to be behind the film suggested that violence on the Arab streets was the expected and intended outcome.

Predictably, the film inspired protests, some massive and some small, from Egypt and Somalia to Yemen and Libya. The US Embassy in Egypt sought to constrain the protests by issuing a statement distancing the American government from the deranged work of a misguided individual. Hours later, angry mobs attacked American embassies in Cairo and Benghazi, Libya. The latter resulted in the death of Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens and three of his aides.

We do not at this time know whether the fatal attack in Benghazi was the direct work of the protestors or the work of a terrorist group using the cover of the protestors. We do know that Mitt Romney, Republican candidate for president of the United States, used this opportunity to attack the incumbent president for coddling the enemy. We know that his statement was based on a fictional timeline and a deliberate misreading of the facts.

The protests continue across the Middle East and the stability of an already fragile region is thrown into question.

At this juncture Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu decided to weigh in by attacking the American president for failing to draw a “red line” on Iran’s development of nuclear weapons beyond which military intervention is pre-determined. Knowing full well that no responsible president could draw such a line and would not do so on the eve of an election, Netanyahu’s statement was clearly intended to influence the American election by throwing the Jewish American vote to Romney.

It enrages me that an isolated extremist living in obscurity somewhere in Southern California could unleash a chain of events that potentially could tip the balance of power in the US and affect the course of global history. It enrages me that a presidential candidate could potentially further his ambition by capitalizing on an act of sabotage and terrorism with a statement so irresponsible it should disqualify him from higher office. It enrages me that the Prime Minister of Israel would play politics with a tragic event.

It enrages me but none of it surprises me.

I join those who condemn this so-called filmmaker for his irresponsible act. I believe that much of the responsibility for the damage done belongs in his soul. I join those who condemn Mitt Romney for his arrogant display of ignorance and carelessness. I condemn Netanyahu for his irresponsible betrayal of an American president who has never failed to defend Israeli interest, even to the point of raising the wrath of the American left.

While I find the actions and statements of these individuals despicable and hope that each is somehow held to account, I must nevertheless uphold their right to speak. As one who is committed to the universal rights of all, I am compelled to defend the right of every individual, however despicable, to say or create works with any message under any circumstances without fear of censorship or legal consequences as long as the exercise of this right does not directly interfere with the rights of others.

If we believe in freedom of speech it is not sufficient to say that an individual’s actions are a metaphor to crying “Fire!” in a crowded theater. In matters of human rights, a metaphor cannot stand as a barrier to protected speech.

Similarly, while I may believe than any number of organized religions are foolish or primitive and potentially harmful to human kind and human dignity, I must defend every individual’s right to choose his or her own creed and system of belief.

I have my own beliefs, my own opinions and my own convictions of moral behavior and I claim the right to express them under any and all circumstance.

I know what it is like to feel constrained in speech. Many of us do. We felt it in the days and weeks and months following September 11, 2001. Even those of us who felt compelled to speak out against the vengeful storm of war that was building to a crescendo in those fearful times felt a need to hold back, to temper our passions, if for no other reason than that we would lose our ability to communicate with and influence our fellow citizens if we were perceived as anti-American.

If we have learned anything at all after eleven years of unnecessary and immoral war, it is that we have not only a right but also a duty to speak out against the mob. We are living in dangerous times. We cannot allow the danger to compromise our core principles and we cannot be silent when politicians for their own self-serving reasons begin to beat the drums of war.

We must defend the right of those we disagree with to speak out but we must also exercise our own free speech in opposition.

Jazz.

JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CHRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). THE CHRONICLES HAVE BEEN POSTED ON NUMEROUS CITES OF THE WORLDWIDE WEB, INCLUDING THE ALBION MONITOR, BELLACIAO, BUZZLE, COUNTERPUNCH, DISSIDENT VOICE, THE NATIONAL FREE PRESS, GLOBAL FREE PRESS AND PACIFIC FREE PRESS. SEE WWW.JAZZMANCHRONICLES.BLOGSPOT.COM.

THE MENDACITY OF REPUBLICAN POLITICS: THE GOP STRATEGY FOR WINNING THE WHITE HOUSE

JAZZMAN CHRONICLES. DISSEMINATE FREELY.



THE MENDACITY OF REPUBLICAN POLITICS:
THE GOP STRATEGY FOR WINNING THE WHITE HOUSE


By Jack Random



“What's that smell in this room? Didn't you notice it, Brick? Didn't you notice a powerful and obnoxious odor of mendacity in this room?”

Big Daddy, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof


If it were possible to come to America without any knowledge of its politics or culture, like Alexis de Tocqueville in another age, and your first exposure was the Republican National Convention in Tampa, Florida, you would have an impression that is as far from the truth as Anchorage is from Manhattan.

Among the milieu of misconceptions you would believe that the Republicans are the party of the working people, the party of Medicare and Social Security, the party that cares for the poor, the elderly and destitute, the party that protects the rights of women and immigrants, the party that welcomes all races and creeds with open arms, and the party that can be counted on to save the American auto industry.

You would think that our military has remained idle too long, that we are not a nation weighed down by the long war in Afghanistan, but a nation that should go to war in Syria, Somalia, Iran, Venezuela, Pakistan and anywhere in the world where governments do not bend to our will. You would think that we are still engaged in a cold war with China and Russia.

You would think the Republicans are the party that would stand up against job exportation, low wages and benefits, and unfair trade policies. You would think they stood firmly behind labor.

None of these assumptions would hold a kernel of truth. They are in fact close to the opposite of true but politics is politics.

Any honest Republican would tell you that theirs is the party of free enterprise, free trade, small government, low taxes, balanced budgets and individual liberty. Whether the party has lived up to its ideals is another matter (on deficits, small government and balanced budgets they decidedly have not); these are the ideals at the core of the party.

Any honest Republican would tell you that they are the party opposed to labor. They are the party of business and they side with corporate interests against working people on every issue from trade policy (shipping jobs to nations with the cheapest labor force) to the minimum wage. The Grand Old Party is the mortal enemy of organized labor, having waged open and aggressive war against unions and the right to organize in every field of private and public employment.

The Republican Party fundamentally does not believe in Medicare or Social Security or any other government program to feed the hungry or house the poor. They believe in starving the beast, which is their way of saying eviscerating the social safety net.

Any honest Republican would tell you that if you are interested in the rights of women, the rights of minorities or the rights of immigrants, they are not your party. To suggest that they are still the party of Lincoln is to ignore the history of the Civil Rights movement and the demise of the Dixie Democrats. The modern Republican Party is the party of the South.

These are the solemn truths of the GOP that went largely unspoken in Tampa, Florida. What then was this four-day festival of partisan glorification all about?

It is true that most if not all political parties and candidates will bend the truth and engage in subterfuge or deception if they believe it will work to their advantage. Dick Nixon won an election on a “secret plan” to end the Vietnam War and the last Republican president whose name was never uttered at his party’s national convention, promised to avoid nation-building and the kind of foreign entanglements that lead to it.

Now Mitt Romney wants to help the poor, the homeless and the oppressed.

The question arises: Do the Republicans actually believe they can piece together a majority of the electorate from the gullible and clueless or is there some other strategy at work here?

From my political perspective, the Republican electorate breaks down like this:

The Tea Party Republicans are entrenched and motivated by irrational fear and loathing of President Obama. They comprise about 25% of the electorate and they can safely be taken for granted. This convention was not for them.

Another 5-10% of the electorate is the wealthiest of Americans. They are Mitt Romney’s peers and they will vote for him because they believe (with ample cause) that it is in their personal interest (an assumption that breaks down if the economy crashes as it did under Bush). They need no assurances and this convention was not for them.

Another 5-10% of Americans will vote Republican out of habit. It is the party of their parents and grandparents, the party of John Wayne (read: Clint Eastwood) and Ronald Reagan whose portraits were once displayed alongside a blond, blue-eyed Jesus over the fireplace. This convention was not for them.

Add it all up and the Republican coalition is still insufficient to win the election. The decisive 5-10% of active voters must be peeled away from those who are clearly not represented by this Republican Party, including women, minorities and working people whose politics are not governed by wealth or religion.

These are the people who elect presidents. They are not entrenched. Most of them voted for Obama in the last presidential election and swung to the Republicans in the midterm. By and large, they are not pleased with what the Tea Party did with the power they gave them. They have no overriding interest in the social-religious agenda. They are not anti-labor. They are not anti-immigrant. They are certainly not against birth control. In 2010 they wanted a change in economic fortune and they did not receive it from the representatives, governors and legislators they elected.

This Republican National Convention was for them.

To persuade them to vote Republican again they need assurances that this is not the same party they elected in the midterms. They need reasons they can understand why they are a better option than Obama and the Democrats. They need to believe that placing the Republicans in the White House would not result in the same catastrophe that George W. Bush visited on the American people in two terms of office. They need to believe that this is not the same party that caused our economic breakdown.

With the exception of John McCain, who brought the Neocon nightmare back in stark and vivid detail, this convention was the soft side of Republican politics. That it was entirely fiction hardly matters. It is the best hope of a party with a poor track record and a candidate so bland and without conviction that virtually no one on either side of the political divide likes or believes him.

Jazz.


JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CHRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). THE CHRONICLES HAVE BEEN POSTED ON NUMEROUS CITES OF THE WORLDWIDE WEB, INCLUDING THE ALBION MONITOR, BELLACIAO, BUZZLE, COUNTERPUNCH, DISSIDENT VOICE, THE NATIONAL FREE PRESS, GLOBAL FREE PRESS AND PACIFIC FREE PRESS. SEE WWW.JAZZMANCHRONICLES.BLOGSPOT.COM.

THE CREEPING CYNICISM OF POLITICAL DISCOURSE: GUNS, TAXES & OTHER MATTERS

JAZZMAN CHRONICLES. DISSEMINATE FREELY.

By Jack Random



At an uncertain age and threshold of experience, something dark and cynical takes hold of the human psyche. Given any topic, event or policy, you realize that you have already engaged every argument from virtually every point of view.

Pity the poor soul who makes a living at political discourse. The quest for some fresh detail or novel nuance to keep the mind rolling must be tedious labor. Common sense abandoned, consistency discarded like obsolete technology, and passion tossed aside like yesterday’s waste, the march of punditry carries on in an endless procession to the same dull beat.

Consequent discourse is as moving as elevator jazz yet we move forward hoping somehow that it will make a difference, knowing within that it very likely will not.

I reached the threshold of cynicism after the latest lunatic with an arsenal of weapons tripped over the rainbow and splattered a crowded theater featuring comic book cinema with blood. You think it might be time to put a lock on the door to domestic weapons of mass destruction? The left says yea, the right says nay. We should arm everyone with deadly weapons so we can all shoot back in a dark theater. Should we outlaw automatic weapons? Not a chance. Bigger guns and better clips for all! It’s in the constitution. How about requiring an individual to provide a first name and middle initial before purchasing a Glock .357? Sure but only if he or she can use a pseudonym, something like The Joker. How about closing the Gun Show loophole that enables drug lords to enforce their will with mass murder below the border? Sorry, it’s the second amendment: Thou shalt protect drug lords and homicidal lunatics at all costs.

The truth beneath the veneer of second amendment fervor is that we must retain an armed populace to overthrow the government of a moderate dark skinned Democrat should he be elected to a second term. If you do not recognize the lunacy in this proposition then you are the problem.

In an interview that raised the concerns of the political left, candidate Barrack Obama expressed admiration for Ronald Reagan as a transformative president. There is in fact little in his record as president with which Reagan would disapprove. He has forwarded the Free Trade movement despite the awakening resistance of an electorate opposed to job exportation. Facing a financial crisis born of Wall Street malfeasance unrivaled in depth and breadth since the Great Depression, he has limited the backlash to the relatively tame Dodd-Frank reform. The restoration of Glass-Steagall has not even entered the debate. He renewed the Bush tax cuts in exchange for extended unemployment benefits. He has pressed forward in the war on terror, refused to repeal the draconian statutes of the Patriot Act, enacted drone warfare without congressional consent and prosecuted the war in Afghanistan beyond what reason and compassion would allow.

He has handed authority for the administration of welfare back to the states and strengthened private control of the healthcare system with the Affordable Care Act.

The truth is Bill Clinton did more to enact the Reagan vision of government than any other succeeding president and Obama has followed the Clinton tradition. The truth is the left has little or no representation in any of the three branches of government and yet a growing number of Americans are filling their basements and garages with weapons and ammunition in preparation for civil war.

It is the left that should be alarmed. It is the left that should be crying out for revolutionary change. Instead, we are reduced to political gadflies, defending the president’s infinite moderation and opposing a contender with no more backbone than a slug.

To say Mitt Romney is a man without conviction is like saying John Wayne Gacy was a murderer. He has elevated the art of duplicity and triangulation to a level that Machiavelli would envy. He is the kind of man only his inner circle of friends and family could like and even they might be lying. His ambition is so great it would make Caesar blush. He will say anything his advisors tell him will bring him closer to winning the peculiar chess game that is presidential electoral politics. If elected he will do what his advisors tell him to do. His foreign policy will be placed in the same neoconservative hands that delivered us into Iraq and muddled through the nightmare of Afghanistan. His corporate sponsors will control his economic policy and every initiative will be designed to maximize corporate profits at the expense of working folks.

The man who once proclaimed himself a moderate progressive now stands proudly at the helm of the primitive regressive party and smiles as they introduce compulsory pregnancy for rape and incest victims and a general ban on contraception. They want more babies but they don’t want to care for them. They favor steep cuts in all social programs to pay for tax cuts and increased military spending. Their idea of tax equity is that the rich pay less and the poor pay more.

What choice do we have but to oppose this man?

But opposing Mitt Romney is hardly the same as supporting President Obama. He took office to great fanfare, an historical precedent, and possibilities of greatness. His party controlled both houses of congress. As a Senator he knew the power of the filibuster and should have understood the willingness of Senate Republicans to use it. Either he did not or he accepted obstructionism as a part of the game. He did not press his former Democratic colleagues for rule changes (by a majority vote) that could have stymied obstructionism at the start. Consequently, he squandered much of his first term and produced a healthcare reform package so compromised few could defend it without deep reservations. He is essentially correct in describing his keystone legislative accomplishment as the Republican reform of another era.

President Obama has offered tokens to his political base on women’s rights (Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act), gay marriage (public support), immigration (an administrative reprieve to young immigrants to pursue higher education and employment), green energy (stimulus) and college students (financial aid reform).

He has failed to deliver anything of substance on trade policy and labor. While he can rightly claim credit for rescuing the American auto industry, he fell silent as the Republicans waged war against unions and collective bargaining in Wisconsin and elsewhere. As a candidate he promised to support and protect labor but he allowed the Employee Free Choice Act to die on the vine while he pursued his healthcare agenda.

He has failed to address environmental concerns of offshore, deep water drilling, chemical fracturing for natural gas and nuclear energy in the wake of Fukushima. Solar and wind are perpetually stalled, mass transit is on hold, and the road to expanded use of the world’s dirtiest sources of energy (tar sands and coal) is fully paved.

While military operations are substantially ended in Iraq, the president has failed to recognize reality in Afghanistan. Those of us who opposed both wars from inception should awaken every day to the nightmare of a thousand American soldiers and uncounted thousands of Afghans and Pakistanis killed on Obama’s watch.

Osama bin Laden is dead and Al Qaeda crippled as Obama has prosecuted the war on terror with the full force of our military and Special Forces but he has allowed the egregious and draconian measures of the Patriot Act to not only stand but also gain broader authority. Under his watch an American citizen can be shot down or indefinitely detained without due process of law.

This is the man the right wants us to fear as a secret socialist agent? The unspoken hope on the left is that he will emerge in the second term as what we used to call a Kennedy Democrat.

Forgive me for my cynicism but I have heard that theory before. The year was 1996 and Bill Clinton, who had reinvented himself and redefined his party as the conservative Democrats with a social conscience, was seeking reelection. We hope that his second term would be different and we were left waiting for four long years.

My last hope for the Clinton administration was that he would grand a presidential pardon to Lakota political prisoner Leonard Peltier (falsely convicted on trumped up charges of murdering two FBI agents). Peltier remains behind bars today while Mark Rich, a white-collar criminal and contributor to the Clinton campaign, received a full pardon.

Presidents do not change in the second term. Whatever policies and positions are set in the first term, they will be pursued in the second.

Whichever party takes control in the upcoming election, this nation will continue on its rightward path toward corporate rule. The only difference is the Republicans will accelerate the process.

In the wake of Citizens United (the Supreme Court ruling that allows unlimited corporate contributions to political campaigns), real change will not come until the system collapses under its own weight. Under the excesses of the Bush administration, we came perilously close to total economic collapse in 2008-2009. Following the same policies, making the same mistakes, we will inevitably arrive at that same crossroads in the near future.

While few would look forward to the pain and suffering that would follow an economic meltdown that is the only scenario that would have the potential to produce transformative change. Like the New Deal after the Great Depression, only a catastrophic crash could break the stranglehold the world’s mammoth corporations currently hold on our government.

Meantime, we will choose our candidates like horses at the Kentucky Derby and cheer them down the final stretch.

The rich will prosper, the poor will grow in numbers, and nobody wins in the end.

Jazz.


JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CHRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). THE CHRONICLES HAVE BEEN POSTED ON NUMEROUS CITES OF THE WORLDWIDE WEB, INCLUDING THE ALBION MONITOR, BELLACIAO, BUZZLE, COUNTERPUNCH, DISSIDENT VOICE, THE NATIONAL FREE PRESS, GLOBAL FREE PRESS AND PACIFIC FREE PRESS. SEE WWW.JAZZMANCHRONICLES.BLOGSPOT.COM.