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.
Friday, November 02, 2012
Sunday, October 28, 2012
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.
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.
Sunday, October 07, 2012
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.
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.
Sunday, September 23, 2012
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.
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.
Monday, September 17, 2012
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.
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.
Thursday, September 06, 2012
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 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.
Wednesday, August 29, 2012
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.
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.
Friday, July 27, 2012
CARRY ON: THE EXAMPLE OF ALEXANDER COCKBURN
By Jack Random
I didn’t know Alexander Cockburn. When I read his columns I found much to agree with and some significant points of contention but I always found integrity. I admired his irreverence, his fierce independence and his unwavering respect for documented facts.
Alexander Cockburn served no party, no corporate or political entity and owed no allegiance to ideological doctrine. He suffered neither fools nor folly no matter where they originated on the political spectrum. If you took him on, you had better be prepared to defend your position. If he took you on, you had better hunker down and brace for the storm.
For those who are not aware, Alexander Cockburn (pronounced Koh-burn) was the longest running columnist at The Nation (Beat the Devil) and co-editor with Jeffrey St. Clair of CounterPunch. On July 20 (coincidentally my birthday) he died of cancer and the world of political discourse suffered the loss of one of its most poignant voices.
I didn’t know Alexander Cockburn but I believe I owe him a personal debt of gratitude as a writer. In the years leading up to 2000 I was writing fiction, including a contemporary political novel that told the story of an independent organization challenging the dominance of the two-party system. Imbedded in that work was a series of commentaries that I published under the title The Jazzman Chronicles: Volume I.
Then came the stolen election of 2000, the September 11 terrorist attack, the Patriot Act and the relentless march to war in Afghanistan and Iraq. These events rendered my novel impotent if not irrelevant but they aroused my political passion. I published a second volume of the Jazzman Chronicles (The War Chronicles) but discovered that publishing was far too time consuming and financially untenable. As a writer, I wanted to devote my limited time and energy to writing. So I searched for an outlet on the worldwide web.
In those days of mass protest, the largest social uprising since the days of Vietnam, I found a forum for my brand of rabblerousing first at CounterPunch and later at Dissident Voice and Pacific Free Press. Over the years I’ve published hundreds of articles on various sites but in my heart I will always be a CounterPuncher.
There came a time when CounterPunch stopped posting the Chronicles and I stopped submitting. Then, a year or so past, I emailed Mr. Cockburn to ask why. Had I made mistakes? (Of course I had.) Had I been sloppy? (At times.) Had I offended the sensibilities of CounterPunch? (I didn’t know but there are occasions when the left can be as intolerant as the right.)
Looking back today, I suspect I knew the answer. Despite my own unwavering independence, confronted with war and threats of war, I have a tendency to become pragmatic during presidential elections. In 2004 and again in 2008 I advocated the lesser of evils on the grounds that even the slender difference between lesser and greater evil could translate to tens of thousands of lives if not more. I am not proud of that advocacy but I stand by it. In my view, George W. Bush was one of the worst and most destructive presidents in history and Senator John McCain was and is one of the last persons on earth to be trusted in possession of the nuclear trigger.
It enrages me that our system offers these kinds of choices: the corporate party that is openly eager for war and the corporate party that at least seems more restrained. The truth is: War is good business for incumbent presidents but that’s another matter.
I never received a response to my query but some time after the Chronicles began appearing on CounterPunch again. Who knows what if anything transpired behind the scenes? I certainly didn’t know that Mr. Cockburn was fighting for his life. Had I known, I would not have inquired. But I believe that either he or someone at his desk empathized with my cause and sanctioned the return of my voice at CounterPunch.
Mr. Cockburn was attacked for his dissenting views on many occasions and often became the target of liberal spokespersons and Democratic advocates. He never bent to pressure and he never backed down from a fight.
Alexander Cockburn was fiercely independent. He did not compromise and never wavered. He was a writer among writers and he wrote to the very end. In short, he was what I aspire to be and I thank him for the inspiration.
My working title for this piece was: RIP Alexander Cockburn. But then I realized that Mr. Cockburn would probably not be content with either rest or peace in an afterlife should there be one. I suspect he would be happier sitting in a tavern or café engaged in passionate discourse on the affairs of the day.
Here’s hoping he’s tipping one to Howard Zinn at this very moment. Carry on, Mr. Cockburn. Carry on.
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.
I didn’t know Alexander Cockburn. When I read his columns I found much to agree with and some significant points of contention but I always found integrity. I admired his irreverence, his fierce independence and his unwavering respect for documented facts.
Alexander Cockburn served no party, no corporate or political entity and owed no allegiance to ideological doctrine. He suffered neither fools nor folly no matter where they originated on the political spectrum. If you took him on, you had better be prepared to defend your position. If he took you on, you had better hunker down and brace for the storm.
For those who are not aware, Alexander Cockburn (pronounced Koh-burn) was the longest running columnist at The Nation (Beat the Devil) and co-editor with Jeffrey St. Clair of CounterPunch. On July 20 (coincidentally my birthday) he died of cancer and the world of political discourse suffered the loss of one of its most poignant voices.
I didn’t know Alexander Cockburn but I believe I owe him a personal debt of gratitude as a writer. In the years leading up to 2000 I was writing fiction, including a contemporary political novel that told the story of an independent organization challenging the dominance of the two-party system. Imbedded in that work was a series of commentaries that I published under the title The Jazzman Chronicles: Volume I.
Then came the stolen election of 2000, the September 11 terrorist attack, the Patriot Act and the relentless march to war in Afghanistan and Iraq. These events rendered my novel impotent if not irrelevant but they aroused my political passion. I published a second volume of the Jazzman Chronicles (The War Chronicles) but discovered that publishing was far too time consuming and financially untenable. As a writer, I wanted to devote my limited time and energy to writing. So I searched for an outlet on the worldwide web.
In those days of mass protest, the largest social uprising since the days of Vietnam, I found a forum for my brand of rabblerousing first at CounterPunch and later at Dissident Voice and Pacific Free Press. Over the years I’ve published hundreds of articles on various sites but in my heart I will always be a CounterPuncher.
There came a time when CounterPunch stopped posting the Chronicles and I stopped submitting. Then, a year or so past, I emailed Mr. Cockburn to ask why. Had I made mistakes? (Of course I had.) Had I been sloppy? (At times.) Had I offended the sensibilities of CounterPunch? (I didn’t know but there are occasions when the left can be as intolerant as the right.)
Looking back today, I suspect I knew the answer. Despite my own unwavering independence, confronted with war and threats of war, I have a tendency to become pragmatic during presidential elections. In 2004 and again in 2008 I advocated the lesser of evils on the grounds that even the slender difference between lesser and greater evil could translate to tens of thousands of lives if not more. I am not proud of that advocacy but I stand by it. In my view, George W. Bush was one of the worst and most destructive presidents in history and Senator John McCain was and is one of the last persons on earth to be trusted in possession of the nuclear trigger.
It enrages me that our system offers these kinds of choices: the corporate party that is openly eager for war and the corporate party that at least seems more restrained. The truth is: War is good business for incumbent presidents but that’s another matter.
I never received a response to my query but some time after the Chronicles began appearing on CounterPunch again. Who knows what if anything transpired behind the scenes? I certainly didn’t know that Mr. Cockburn was fighting for his life. Had I known, I would not have inquired. But I believe that either he or someone at his desk empathized with my cause and sanctioned the return of my voice at CounterPunch.
Mr. Cockburn was attacked for his dissenting views on many occasions and often became the target of liberal spokespersons and Democratic advocates. He never bent to pressure and he never backed down from a fight.
Alexander Cockburn was fiercely independent. He did not compromise and never wavered. He was a writer among writers and he wrote to the very end. In short, he was what I aspire to be and I thank him for the inspiration.
My working title for this piece was: RIP Alexander Cockburn. But then I realized that Mr. Cockburn would probably not be content with either rest or peace in an afterlife should there be one. I suspect he would be happier sitting in a tavern or café engaged in passionate discourse on the affairs of the day.
Here’s hoping he’s tipping one to Howard Zinn at this very moment. Carry on, Mr. Cockburn. Carry on.
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.
Sunday, July 22, 2012
TIGER WINS 2012 BRITISH IN STUNNING COMEBACK
CLAIMS 15TH MAJOR CHAMPIONSHIP
Overcoming a triple bogey on the par-four sixth hole, Tiger Woods came roaring back to win the 141st British Open at the Royal Lytham & St. Annes golf course.
With his rivals for the Claret Jug wilting under the pressure of this granddaddy of major championships, Tiger stared down a ten-foot putt on the seventy-second hole, willing the ball in the side of the cup. He then waited to see if Brandt Snedeker, his last challenger on a brutal day of links golf, could hole out from six feet to join him in a playoff. When the putt slid off the cup to the right, Woods claimed his fifteenth major golf championship, leaving the record eighteen majors by Jack Nicklaus dead in his sights.
Those who watched this year’s Open know that didn’t happen but it could have. If the Royal and Ancient Golf Club had done its duty but outlawing the anchored putter, this championship might well have come down to Snedeker and Woods. Instead, we watched the belly putter beat the long putter to claim its first British Open.
Before last year at the PGA golf had gone 140 years without crowning any golfer who used a putter that many consider an unfair advantage. The anchored putter has now won three of the last four major golf championships.
Ironically, in 2004 this year's golfer of the year (Open Champion) Ernie Els called for the both the belly and the long putter to be banned. In 2011 he switched to the belly putter and saw his scoring average drop by a full stroke over a single round.
In October of last year he was quoted as saying: “As long as it’s legal, I’ll keep cheating like the rest of them.”
He has a point. What are the odds that Keegan Bradley or Webb Simpson could have won a major championship without the anchored putter? What are the odds that Els’ chief rival for this year’s Open could have done so without his long putter? What are the odds that Barry Bonds could have hit 73 home runs in one season without some form of chemical assistance? The answer is nil or very close to that level of probability. The difference is: Bonds was a great player who probably sacrificed three or four years of his career to become Babe Ruth for three seasons. He paid a price and is probably still paying a price in terms of his health and prospects for a long life. These championship golfers face no similar sacrifice.
Adam Scott, always an excellent ball striker, had lost his putting stroke when he switched to the long putter, which he anchors to his chest, before last year’s Masters. His tour rank for putting went from 143rd to 76th, an improvement that enables him to compete for major championships.
Ernie Els won the Open with a regulation putter in 2002. He is a gentleman and a great golfer but he knows in his heart he stole this one from more deserving competitors. This one deserves an asterisk.
The time has come to outlaw the anchored putter for the good of the game.
Jazz.
Overcoming a triple bogey on the par-four sixth hole, Tiger Woods came roaring back to win the 141st British Open at the Royal Lytham & St. Annes golf course.
With his rivals for the Claret Jug wilting under the pressure of this granddaddy of major championships, Tiger stared down a ten-foot putt on the seventy-second hole, willing the ball in the side of the cup. He then waited to see if Brandt Snedeker, his last challenger on a brutal day of links golf, could hole out from six feet to join him in a playoff. When the putt slid off the cup to the right, Woods claimed his fifteenth major golf championship, leaving the record eighteen majors by Jack Nicklaus dead in his sights.
Those who watched this year’s Open know that didn’t happen but it could have. If the Royal and Ancient Golf Club had done its duty but outlawing the anchored putter, this championship might well have come down to Snedeker and Woods. Instead, we watched the belly putter beat the long putter to claim its first British Open.
Before last year at the PGA golf had gone 140 years without crowning any golfer who used a putter that many consider an unfair advantage. The anchored putter has now won three of the last four major golf championships.
Ironically, in 2004 this year's golfer of the year (Open Champion) Ernie Els called for the both the belly and the long putter to be banned. In 2011 he switched to the belly putter and saw his scoring average drop by a full stroke over a single round.
In October of last year he was quoted as saying: “As long as it’s legal, I’ll keep cheating like the rest of them.”
He has a point. What are the odds that Keegan Bradley or Webb Simpson could have won a major championship without the anchored putter? What are the odds that Els’ chief rival for this year’s Open could have done so without his long putter? What are the odds that Barry Bonds could have hit 73 home runs in one season without some form of chemical assistance? The answer is nil or very close to that level of probability. The difference is: Bonds was a great player who probably sacrificed three or four years of his career to become Babe Ruth for three seasons. He paid a price and is probably still paying a price in terms of his health and prospects for a long life. These championship golfers face no similar sacrifice.
Adam Scott, always an excellent ball striker, had lost his putting stroke when he switched to the long putter, which he anchors to his chest, before last year’s Masters. His tour rank for putting went from 143rd to 76th, an improvement that enables him to compete for major championships.
Ernie Els won the Open with a regulation putter in 2002. He is a gentleman and a great golfer but he knows in his heart he stole this one from more deserving competitors. This one deserves an asterisk.
The time has come to outlaw the anchored putter for the good of the game.
Jazz.
Sunday, June 17, 2012
PERFORMANCE ENHANCING PUTTER CHEAPENS US OPEN
Webb Simpson carded a two-under par 68, saving pars and recording birdies down the stretch while others yielded to intense pressure, executing a brilliant save from a hole in the fringe of the 72nd hole, to win the 112th United States Open.
Simpson seems a nice enough guy and on this Fathers Day Sunday he played well enough to claim one of golf’s most cherished titles. Unfortunately, he became the second player in two years to win a major golf championship with a long grounded putter. Keegan Bradley (also a talented golfer and a very nice man) won the Professional Golf Association Championship in 2011 using the same kind of putter. In my mind and in the minds of many who love the game, the putter should be deemed illegal because it gives the player an unfair advantage.
Let me explain the physics of the putting stroke. A normal putting stroke with a normal putter must be controlled with the swinging action of the arms and wrists. Any slight rotation or deviation from center will cause the ball to run askew of its target. That is why so many players have a tendency to push or pull a three-foot putt under intense pressure.
The long putter of the type that Simpson and Bradley used to win major championships is planted on the chest. That grounds the club to the core of the body, which is fundamentally still during the putting stroke. The long grounded putter thus eliminates what all golfers know as “the yips.”
The question is: Why don’t all professional golfers use the grounded putter? I believe that most professional golfers feel as I do and do not wish to yield to the temptation. However, if this trend continues more and more golfers will do just that and the game on the greens will be fundamentally changed.
The PGA along with the Royal and Ancient Golf Club have outlawed putters before, most notably the long putter used between the legs pioneered by the immortal Sam Snead. They recognized that it gave him a great advantage and understood that other players would have to follow just to keep pace. After two major championships it is time they did the same for the grounded putter.
It cheapens the win and the game itself.
Jazz.
Simpson seems a nice enough guy and on this Fathers Day Sunday he played well enough to claim one of golf’s most cherished titles. Unfortunately, he became the second player in two years to win a major golf championship with a long grounded putter. Keegan Bradley (also a talented golfer and a very nice man) won the Professional Golf Association Championship in 2011 using the same kind of putter. In my mind and in the minds of many who love the game, the putter should be deemed illegal because it gives the player an unfair advantage.
Let me explain the physics of the putting stroke. A normal putting stroke with a normal putter must be controlled with the swinging action of the arms and wrists. Any slight rotation or deviation from center will cause the ball to run askew of its target. That is why so many players have a tendency to push or pull a three-foot putt under intense pressure.
The long putter of the type that Simpson and Bradley used to win major championships is planted on the chest. That grounds the club to the core of the body, which is fundamentally still during the putting stroke. The long grounded putter thus eliminates what all golfers know as “the yips.”
The question is: Why don’t all professional golfers use the grounded putter? I believe that most professional golfers feel as I do and do not wish to yield to the temptation. However, if this trend continues more and more golfers will do just that and the game on the greens will be fundamentally changed.
The PGA along with the Royal and Ancient Golf Club have outlawed putters before, most notably the long putter used between the legs pioneered by the immortal Sam Snead. They recognized that it gave him a great advantage and understood that other players would have to follow just to keep pace. After two major championships it is time they did the same for the grounded putter.
It cheapens the win and the game itself.
Jazz.
Saturday, June 02, 2012
OBAMA'S BETRAYAL OF CIVIL LIBERTIES
Re: Myth of Equality
By Beverly Rice
"We can make the case that this administration has held back the wave of rightwing oppression that his opponents would surely pursue . . ."
It would be a weak case. The Obama administration has racheted up the civil rights and Constitution trashing of the Bush/Cheney years.
-Obama signed off on the NDAA legislation that allow the president to order the indefinite detention of anyone he/she feels like messing with - regardless of probable cause. The administration pressed Congress to include US citizens in the mix of those who could be detained. The law contains broad language regarding who can be a potential target. Section 1031 defines a potential target as a person who is either a member of, or substantially supported, al-Qaeda, the Taliban, or “associated forces that are engaged in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners.” This also includes “any person who has committed a belligerent act or has directly supported such hostilities in aid of such enemy forces.” The law doesn’t define what “associated forces” are, or what “engaging in hostilities” against the US means. And because the definition of a “terrorist” shifts according to political necessity, all of us – all over the world – are potential targets and eventual victims - including dissenters at home such as Occupy Wall Streeters, environmental and animal rights advocates.
-Obama signed off on the The “Trespass Bill” in March 2012. This law makes peaceable protest anywhere in the US a possible federal felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison. Anyone can be charged with a federal felony for trespassing on property that is under Secret Service protection, even if the supposed person is not aware that the area is under such protection. One can also be charged if he/she impedes or disrupts the orderly conduct of govt business or official functions.” This law effectively criminalizes any form of protest.
-More March Madness ensued with Obama's signing of the Natl Defense Resource Preparedness Act. This order allows the executive branch to take control of all food, energy, health and transportation resources in the service of “national defense,” even in times of declared peace. This order updates the previous one signed by Bill Clinton.
-Patriot Act? Obama voted for 2005 Patriot Act and its renewal. Media headlines touted stand against Act despite his vote for it.
-Obama vowed in 2008 to vote against FISA bill amendment giving immunity to telcom corp that cooperate w/Bush admin warrantless surveillance program. He then voted for bill in July of that year.
- Obama admin claims right to execute US citizens w/o charge or due process.
- Obama has prosecuted more whistleblowers than any of his predecessors.
- Obama told DOJ attorneys in 2009 to argue before San Fran Fed Dist Judge Walker that he should toss out the Shubert v Bush suit brought by Electronic Frontier Foundation. Suit challenges secret state driftnet surveillance of Americans’ electronic communications. April 2009: DOJ argued for dismissal of Jewel v NSA civil suit brought by ATT customers to stop company’s ongoing collaboration w/govt’s illegal surveillance. DOJ says if suit proceeds it would require govt disclosure of privileged state secrets. Arguing under Patriot Act that state immune from suit under the Wiretap Act and Stored Communications Act.
- In April, the Supreme Court ruled that jails can perform strip searches on new inmates regardless of the gravity of their alleged offenses. Obama DOJ lawyers spoke and filed briefs IN FAVOR of blanket strip searches. Instead of using arguments with regard to smuggling of contraband such as drugs and weapons, the admin's lawyer used hypothetical political protesters as the bad guys of his argument. Sounds like someone is more concerned with deterring political dissent as opposed to deterring more weed getting into jails. The hard core activist may be brave enough to not give a damn, but most would be protesters might think twice about risking a full body cavity strip search along with whatever other Gtimo-like actions the Gestapo guard feels like doing.
With Democrats like this, who needs Republicans? Obama isn't holding back right wing wave of oppression; he's throwing the sheeple into the waves and laughing as they drown in the River of Denial.
Beverly Rice
[Editor's Note: This was in response to "The Myth of Equal Rights" by Jack Random, posted on Counterpunch, Dissident Voice and Pacific Free Press.]
By Beverly Rice
"We can make the case that this administration has held back the wave of rightwing oppression that his opponents would surely pursue . . ."
It would be a weak case. The Obama administration has racheted up the civil rights and Constitution trashing of the Bush/Cheney years.
-Obama signed off on the NDAA legislation that allow the president to order the indefinite detention of anyone he/she feels like messing with - regardless of probable cause. The administration pressed Congress to include US citizens in the mix of those who could be detained. The law contains broad language regarding who can be a potential target. Section 1031 defines a potential target as a person who is either a member of, or substantially supported, al-Qaeda, the Taliban, or “associated forces that are engaged in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners.” This also includes “any person who has committed a belligerent act or has directly supported such hostilities in aid of such enemy forces.” The law doesn’t define what “associated forces” are, or what “engaging in hostilities” against the US means. And because the definition of a “terrorist” shifts according to political necessity, all of us – all over the world – are potential targets and eventual victims - including dissenters at home such as Occupy Wall Streeters, environmental and animal rights advocates.
-Obama signed off on the The “Trespass Bill” in March 2012. This law makes peaceable protest anywhere in the US a possible federal felony punishable by up to 10 years in prison. Anyone can be charged with a federal felony for trespassing on property that is under Secret Service protection, even if the supposed person is not aware that the area is under such protection. One can also be charged if he/she impedes or disrupts the orderly conduct of govt business or official functions.” This law effectively criminalizes any form of protest.
-More March Madness ensued with Obama's signing of the Natl Defense Resource Preparedness Act. This order allows the executive branch to take control of all food, energy, health and transportation resources in the service of “national defense,” even in times of declared peace. This order updates the previous one signed by Bill Clinton.
-Patriot Act? Obama voted for 2005 Patriot Act and its renewal. Media headlines touted stand against Act despite his vote for it.
-Obama vowed in 2008 to vote against FISA bill amendment giving immunity to telcom corp that cooperate w/Bush admin warrantless surveillance program. He then voted for bill in July of that year.
- Obama admin claims right to execute US citizens w/o charge or due process.
- Obama has prosecuted more whistleblowers than any of his predecessors.
- Obama told DOJ attorneys in 2009 to argue before San Fran Fed Dist Judge Walker that he should toss out the Shubert v Bush suit brought by Electronic Frontier Foundation. Suit challenges secret state driftnet surveillance of Americans’ electronic communications. April 2009: DOJ argued for dismissal of Jewel v NSA civil suit brought by ATT customers to stop company’s ongoing collaboration w/govt’s illegal surveillance. DOJ says if suit proceeds it would require govt disclosure of privileged state secrets. Arguing under Patriot Act that state immune from suit under the Wiretap Act and Stored Communications Act.
- In April, the Supreme Court ruled that jails can perform strip searches on new inmates regardless of the gravity of their alleged offenses. Obama DOJ lawyers spoke and filed briefs IN FAVOR of blanket strip searches. Instead of using arguments with regard to smuggling of contraband such as drugs and weapons, the admin's lawyer used hypothetical political protesters as the bad guys of his argument. Sounds like someone is more concerned with deterring political dissent as opposed to deterring more weed getting into jails. The hard core activist may be brave enough to not give a damn, but most would be protesters might think twice about risking a full body cavity strip search along with whatever other Gtimo-like actions the Gestapo guard feels like doing.
With Democrats like this, who needs Republicans? Obama isn't holding back right wing wave of oppression; he's throwing the sheeple into the waves and laughing as they drown in the River of Denial.
Beverly Rice
[Editor's Note: This was in response to "The Myth of Equal Rights" by Jack Random, posted on Counterpunch, Dissident Voice and Pacific Free Press.]
Sunday, May 13, 2012
THE ARC OF HISTORY: GAY MARRIAGE TAKES CENTER STAGE
JAZZMAN CHRONICLES. DISSEMINATE FREELY.
By Jack Random
“The arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice.”
Theodore Parker, American Abolitionist, circa 1850
“President Obama has shaken his fist…at the same God who created and defined marriage.”
Franklin Graham, American Evangelical, May 10, 2012
Let us hope that the quote (frequently misquoted as “the arc of history”) made famous by Martin Luther King, Jr. and often cited by President Barack Obama has not reached the level of cliché. For when words, however profound or true, reach that level of familiarity they cease to possess the power of their intended meaning. They may be pleasant to the ear but they fail to pierce the heart and soul where change begins.
To many of us the issue of gay marriage is about justice and equality, about men and women, friends and family members and the real-life consequence of social policy. But to some it is about God. The latter rarely ask whose god, which god, at what stage of spiritual development or in which moral universe.
No. These individuals claim a certain superiority to the rest of us, a direct knowledge and connection to the one true God of all being across immeasurable time and space.
Theirs is the same god that once decreed slavery the natural order of human nature. It is the same god that once justified the murderous misadventures of the Crusades. It is the same god that directed manifest destiny to the attempted genocide of the Native American peoples. It is the same god that led men in robes to torture free thinkers who did not match their certitude of faith in the Inquisition. We should have little doubt it is the same god that informed the Third Reich in the Holocaust not only against Jews and Gypsies but against homosexuals as well.
It is a god of a thousand wars and cruelty beyond belief, a god of hatred, intolerance and bloody vengeance.
In the third millennium we have had enough of these gods that divide us and lead us in violent conflict. We are tired of brutal, racist and homophobic gods that lack the common decency of ordinary people. These are not divine; they are the creations of men.
It is time to recognize that the gods they are a changing. You can keep your old prejudiced religions and house them in temples of gold or chapels adorned in sequin but the gods of a new moral universe, the gods that speak to this century, will be gods of tolerance and kindness, gods of justice and equality, gods that uphold the universal creed of human dignity.
You who preach hatred and oppression (whether railing to the rafters or gently spoken), your time is past. Go back in your caves and castles, your gated communities, your prisons of demented thought.
We are all god’s children or we are none and if you cannot love equally then you cannot love at all.
We choose to bend with the arc of history just as those who came before us fought for our rights and dignity as human beings. You are the past and we are the future. We have a vision of a time when rights are not conditioned on gender or color or sexual predisposition. We see a time when all men and women are free of prejudice under the law.
We know that every minority and oppressed community has had to fight for decades and centuries against entrenched and powerful oppressors before change could be accepted. We know also that change is inevitable and that it will get better as long as people are willing to stand up and be counted.
We know as well that the fight will never really end. The struggle will go on through this generation and the next.
We know that black citizens and women have never achieved equity in opportunity or pay. We know that minorities are not afforded equal treatment in the workplace.
We know that schools in neighborhoods where the majority is of darker skin are under-funded and inadequate. We know that millions of immigrants survive as a permanent underclass in the shadows of American society, their rights trampled and their status uncertain.
Yes, those of us who believe in a world freed of its former prejudice recognize that the struggle will go on, must go on, but at least in this case the line is clear: Gays and lesbians cannot achieve equal rights without full access to the institution of marriage.
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.
By Jack Random
“The arc of the moral universe is long but it bends toward justice.”
Theodore Parker, American Abolitionist, circa 1850
“President Obama has shaken his fist…at the same God who created and defined marriage.”
Franklin Graham, American Evangelical, May 10, 2012
Let us hope that the quote (frequently misquoted as “the arc of history”) made famous by Martin Luther King, Jr. and often cited by President Barack Obama has not reached the level of cliché. For when words, however profound or true, reach that level of familiarity they cease to possess the power of their intended meaning. They may be pleasant to the ear but they fail to pierce the heart and soul where change begins.
To many of us the issue of gay marriage is about justice and equality, about men and women, friends and family members and the real-life consequence of social policy. But to some it is about God. The latter rarely ask whose god, which god, at what stage of spiritual development or in which moral universe.
No. These individuals claim a certain superiority to the rest of us, a direct knowledge and connection to the one true God of all being across immeasurable time and space.
Theirs is the same god that once decreed slavery the natural order of human nature. It is the same god that once justified the murderous misadventures of the Crusades. It is the same god that directed manifest destiny to the attempted genocide of the Native American peoples. It is the same god that led men in robes to torture free thinkers who did not match their certitude of faith in the Inquisition. We should have little doubt it is the same god that informed the Third Reich in the Holocaust not only against Jews and Gypsies but against homosexuals as well.
It is a god of a thousand wars and cruelty beyond belief, a god of hatred, intolerance and bloody vengeance.
In the third millennium we have had enough of these gods that divide us and lead us in violent conflict. We are tired of brutal, racist and homophobic gods that lack the common decency of ordinary people. These are not divine; they are the creations of men.
It is time to recognize that the gods they are a changing. You can keep your old prejudiced religions and house them in temples of gold or chapels adorned in sequin but the gods of a new moral universe, the gods that speak to this century, will be gods of tolerance and kindness, gods of justice and equality, gods that uphold the universal creed of human dignity.
You who preach hatred and oppression (whether railing to the rafters or gently spoken), your time is past. Go back in your caves and castles, your gated communities, your prisons of demented thought.
We are all god’s children or we are none and if you cannot love equally then you cannot love at all.
We choose to bend with the arc of history just as those who came before us fought for our rights and dignity as human beings. You are the past and we are the future. We have a vision of a time when rights are not conditioned on gender or color or sexual predisposition. We see a time when all men and women are free of prejudice under the law.
We know that every minority and oppressed community has had to fight for decades and centuries against entrenched and powerful oppressors before change could be accepted. We know also that change is inevitable and that it will get better as long as people are willing to stand up and be counted.
We know as well that the fight will never really end. The struggle will go on through this generation and the next.
We know that black citizens and women have never achieved equity in opportunity or pay. We know that minorities are not afforded equal treatment in the workplace.
We know that schools in neighborhoods where the majority is of darker skin are under-funded and inadequate. We know that millions of immigrants survive as a permanent underclass in the shadows of American society, their rights trampled and their status uncertain.
Yes, those of us who believe in a world freed of its former prejudice recognize that the struggle will go on, must go on, but at least in this case the line is clear: Gays and lesbians cannot achieve equal rights without full access to the institution of marriage.
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.
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
SELLING WAR IN SYRIA & IRAN
JAZZMAN CHRONICLES. DISSEMINATE FREELY.
By Jack Random
“The bond between our two countries is unbreakable. The United States will always have Israel’s back when it comes to Israel’s security.”
Barack Obama to Bibi Netanyahu, March 5, 2012
The atrocities of war, like a deranged soldier killing innocent women and children, may momentarily shock our senses but they do not come as a surprise. “War is hell” is cliché because it is the most accurate description we can imagine. War is a shadow on the human spirit that lingers well beyond the last bullet. It is a curse on the soul that never lifts.
There is no more violent and destructive act humans can inflict upon themselves than war. History may argue that war is an inevitable consequence of human nature but to engage in war without profound deliberation and reticence is to commit a crime against all humankind.
And yet, after ten years of war in Afghanistan and nine years in Iraq, we continue to hear the beating of the drums for war in Syria and Iran growing louder and louder as the November election approaches.
What does it say about our culture and our people when politicians routinely call for war to raise their standing with the electorate? We will not have advanced as a nation until a call for peace elicits the same response.
Let us be honest about what we have achieved in a decade of war. Forget the costs. Forget that we have lost thousands of our soldiers. Forget the tens of thousands maimed. Forget the hundreds of thousands of Iraqi and Afghan lives we have taken or destroyed. Forget the four trillion dollars added to our national debt.
Forget all of this. Pretend for a moment it was without cost.
What have we gained? Are we better off now or were we better off then with a contained Saddam Hussein leading Iraq and the Taliban leading Afghanistan?
Strategically, there should be no question that we were far better off before the wars. Under their despotic leaders, Iraq and Afghanistan were at least functional. Now they are torn and fractured. Civil war is all but inevitable in Iraq and Afghanistan will inevitably revert to a tribal nation ruled by warlords from the moment we leave until the next foolish invader seeks to conquer them.
In Iraq, where once we had an uneasy alliance, we have helped to create a new nation that more and more will look to Iran for guidance and support.
In Afghanistan, where once the people despised the Russian invaders, now they despise us. Why wouldn’t they? We kill and destroy with impunity. We burn their holy book and inform them who is fit to rule and who is not.
Neither country is better off for our efforts and neither will miss us when we go. They will seek to exploit us as we have exploited them, choosing their nations as a battleground for the global war on terror.
To countless Iraqis and Afghans we are the terrorists and that shadow will not lift for generations to come.
The law of unintended consequences might have been conceived with war in mind. We did not intend to leverage Iranian power in the Middle East. We did not intend to trigger the acceleration of the Iranian nuclear weapon program. But that is exactly what we did with our war, our declaration of the axis of evil, and our occupation of Iraq.
Iran did not pose a threat to us or to Israel before the war and it does not pose a threat today. Despite the vitriol of Iran’s largely figurehead president, Iran is not an aggressive nation. Iran did not initiate war with Saddam’s Iraq (Saddam did) and Iran has not attacked any nation in the modern era.
All accusations of Iranian aggression rest on Iran’s relationship to Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon. That Iran supports the Palestinian people in their struggle for a homeland is unquestioned but whether that cause is aggressive is open to considerable deliberation.
The mainstream media push for war in Syria suffered a major but little noted setback when Hamas, an organization with both political and military branches, announced its support for the Syrian opposition.
Up to that point, CNN, Fox and the Neocons of the American Enterprise Institute were enthusiastic in their call for war against the government of Bashar al-Assad. After the declaration of support from Hamas, things have become ever more complicated with rumors and accusations. Both the Saudis and Al Qaeda are said to be arming and supporting the rebels while the Iranian Quds Force is bolstering the government.
How can we form an alliance with organizations we have declared terrorists?
Murphy’s Law (anything that can go wrong will) and the second law of thermodynamics (all systems tend toward disintegration) might have been conceived with Syria in mind. If you saw the movie Syriana and found yourself baffled and confused, don’t blame the film; blame the subject matter. If you’re look for an enigma wrapped in a mystery, welcome to Syria.
The Syrian opposition to the Assad regime is like a seven-headed beast. To side with the regime is to claim allegiance with a brutal dictator and war criminal but to side with the opposition is to form an alliance with Hamas and Al Qaeda. It is a gamble of epic proportions and one that could trigger blowback, civil war and atrocities on a scale we cannot yet imagine. The minority Christians and Alawites fear genocide if the Assad regime is toppled.
We cannot go to war in Syria because we have no clue as to whom the good, the bad and the worst parties are and we cannot predict the consequences.
We cannot go to war in Iran because we know what the consequences would be. With the first bomb or missile directed at Tehran’s nuclear facilities, the price of gasoline would shoot for the stars. If we engaged Iran in a military showdown the result would be quagmire and the national debt would explode.
You might recall that every Republican candidate for president not named Ron Paul has all but promised to wage war in both Syria and Iran, on the one hand, and to balance the national debt on the other. Now they are promising cheap gas.
They are not shooting straight. They are in fact creating an alternative reality where the laws of cause and effect are governed by what we wish.
That is not the world we live in.
Every Republican candidate not named Ron Paul has promised to stand behind Israel and its aggressive Prime Minister Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu under any and all circumstance. That would be unfortunate.
It is to the great shame of the Israeli people that they have placed in power a man of war at this critical time in history. Netanyahu is the Israeli equivalent of Senator John McCain, who never saw a war he didn’t like. He is like the village bully whose solution to every conflict is physical and whose idea of negotiations begins with F and ends with U.
Netanyahu has effectively obstructed and sabotaged negotiations with the Palestinians at every opportunity. One senses that he is all too eager to launch the strike on Iran.
He has taken the hard line by refusing the right of return, refusing the possibility of sharing Jerusalem, demanding unconditional recognition of Israel and demanding the demilitarization of the Palestinians.
What is left to negotiate when Netanyahu will not even acknowledge the fundamental rights of the Palestinian people? And the settlements move ahead, claiming mile after mile, neighborhood after neighborhood of Palestinian land. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad famously said he wanted to wipe Israel off the map but Netanyahu is effectively doing so to Palestine.
Are Hamas and Hezbollah terrorist organizations or are they simply a necessary response to Israeli aggression?
What is happening in Syria is horrific but we have no viable options.
The only policy that makes sense in Syria, Iran and throughout the region is negotiation and restraint but such a policy does not appear possible given the political realities of an election year. Our politicians take turns delivering a harder line than their opponents and we are bound to support Israel no matter how belligerent its policies and aggressive its actions.
Somehow this must change. We must grow an electorate that rejects the path of war and values the path of negotiated compromise. Given the ongoing disasters of Afghanistan and Iraq it should be a lesson learned but clearly it is not.
The greatest threat America now faces does not come from Iran or Pakistan or terrorists. The greatest threat is that Bibi Netanyahu will take matters into his own hands by launching a preemptive strike against Iran.
Should it happen, he will pass the baton to us and demand that we keep our word.
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.
By Jack Random
“The bond between our two countries is unbreakable. The United States will always have Israel’s back when it comes to Israel’s security.”
Barack Obama to Bibi Netanyahu, March 5, 2012
The atrocities of war, like a deranged soldier killing innocent women and children, may momentarily shock our senses but they do not come as a surprise. “War is hell” is cliché because it is the most accurate description we can imagine. War is a shadow on the human spirit that lingers well beyond the last bullet. It is a curse on the soul that never lifts.
There is no more violent and destructive act humans can inflict upon themselves than war. History may argue that war is an inevitable consequence of human nature but to engage in war without profound deliberation and reticence is to commit a crime against all humankind.
And yet, after ten years of war in Afghanistan and nine years in Iraq, we continue to hear the beating of the drums for war in Syria and Iran growing louder and louder as the November election approaches.
What does it say about our culture and our people when politicians routinely call for war to raise their standing with the electorate? We will not have advanced as a nation until a call for peace elicits the same response.
Let us be honest about what we have achieved in a decade of war. Forget the costs. Forget that we have lost thousands of our soldiers. Forget the tens of thousands maimed. Forget the hundreds of thousands of Iraqi and Afghan lives we have taken or destroyed. Forget the four trillion dollars added to our national debt.
Forget all of this. Pretend for a moment it was without cost.
What have we gained? Are we better off now or were we better off then with a contained Saddam Hussein leading Iraq and the Taliban leading Afghanistan?
Strategically, there should be no question that we were far better off before the wars. Under their despotic leaders, Iraq and Afghanistan were at least functional. Now they are torn and fractured. Civil war is all but inevitable in Iraq and Afghanistan will inevitably revert to a tribal nation ruled by warlords from the moment we leave until the next foolish invader seeks to conquer them.
In Iraq, where once we had an uneasy alliance, we have helped to create a new nation that more and more will look to Iran for guidance and support.
In Afghanistan, where once the people despised the Russian invaders, now they despise us. Why wouldn’t they? We kill and destroy with impunity. We burn their holy book and inform them who is fit to rule and who is not.
Neither country is better off for our efforts and neither will miss us when we go. They will seek to exploit us as we have exploited them, choosing their nations as a battleground for the global war on terror.
To countless Iraqis and Afghans we are the terrorists and that shadow will not lift for generations to come.
The law of unintended consequences might have been conceived with war in mind. We did not intend to leverage Iranian power in the Middle East. We did not intend to trigger the acceleration of the Iranian nuclear weapon program. But that is exactly what we did with our war, our declaration of the axis of evil, and our occupation of Iraq.
Iran did not pose a threat to us or to Israel before the war and it does not pose a threat today. Despite the vitriol of Iran’s largely figurehead president, Iran is not an aggressive nation. Iran did not initiate war with Saddam’s Iraq (Saddam did) and Iran has not attacked any nation in the modern era.
All accusations of Iranian aggression rest on Iran’s relationship to Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon. That Iran supports the Palestinian people in their struggle for a homeland is unquestioned but whether that cause is aggressive is open to considerable deliberation.
The mainstream media push for war in Syria suffered a major but little noted setback when Hamas, an organization with both political and military branches, announced its support for the Syrian opposition.
Up to that point, CNN, Fox and the Neocons of the American Enterprise Institute were enthusiastic in their call for war against the government of Bashar al-Assad. After the declaration of support from Hamas, things have become ever more complicated with rumors and accusations. Both the Saudis and Al Qaeda are said to be arming and supporting the rebels while the Iranian Quds Force is bolstering the government.
How can we form an alliance with organizations we have declared terrorists?
Murphy’s Law (anything that can go wrong will) and the second law of thermodynamics (all systems tend toward disintegration) might have been conceived with Syria in mind. If you saw the movie Syriana and found yourself baffled and confused, don’t blame the film; blame the subject matter. If you’re look for an enigma wrapped in a mystery, welcome to Syria.
The Syrian opposition to the Assad regime is like a seven-headed beast. To side with the regime is to claim allegiance with a brutal dictator and war criminal but to side with the opposition is to form an alliance with Hamas and Al Qaeda. It is a gamble of epic proportions and one that could trigger blowback, civil war and atrocities on a scale we cannot yet imagine. The minority Christians and Alawites fear genocide if the Assad regime is toppled.
We cannot go to war in Syria because we have no clue as to whom the good, the bad and the worst parties are and we cannot predict the consequences.
We cannot go to war in Iran because we know what the consequences would be. With the first bomb or missile directed at Tehran’s nuclear facilities, the price of gasoline would shoot for the stars. If we engaged Iran in a military showdown the result would be quagmire and the national debt would explode.
You might recall that every Republican candidate for president not named Ron Paul has all but promised to wage war in both Syria and Iran, on the one hand, and to balance the national debt on the other. Now they are promising cheap gas.
They are not shooting straight. They are in fact creating an alternative reality where the laws of cause and effect are governed by what we wish.
That is not the world we live in.
Every Republican candidate not named Ron Paul has promised to stand behind Israel and its aggressive Prime Minister Benjamin “Bibi” Netanyahu under any and all circumstance. That would be unfortunate.
It is to the great shame of the Israeli people that they have placed in power a man of war at this critical time in history. Netanyahu is the Israeli equivalent of Senator John McCain, who never saw a war he didn’t like. He is like the village bully whose solution to every conflict is physical and whose idea of negotiations begins with F and ends with U.
Netanyahu has effectively obstructed and sabotaged negotiations with the Palestinians at every opportunity. One senses that he is all too eager to launch the strike on Iran.
He has taken the hard line by refusing the right of return, refusing the possibility of sharing Jerusalem, demanding unconditional recognition of Israel and demanding the demilitarization of the Palestinians.
What is left to negotiate when Netanyahu will not even acknowledge the fundamental rights of the Palestinian people? And the settlements move ahead, claiming mile after mile, neighborhood after neighborhood of Palestinian land. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad famously said he wanted to wipe Israel off the map but Netanyahu is effectively doing so to Palestine.
Are Hamas and Hezbollah terrorist organizations or are they simply a necessary response to Israeli aggression?
What is happening in Syria is horrific but we have no viable options.
The only policy that makes sense in Syria, Iran and throughout the region is negotiation and restraint but such a policy does not appear possible given the political realities of an election year. Our politicians take turns delivering a harder line than their opponents and we are bound to support Israel no matter how belligerent its policies and aggressive its actions.
Somehow this must change. We must grow an electorate that rejects the path of war and values the path of negotiated compromise. Given the ongoing disasters of Afghanistan and Iraq it should be a lesson learned but clearly it is not.
The greatest threat America now faces does not come from Iran or Pakistan or terrorists. The greatest threat is that Bibi Netanyahu will take matters into his own hands by launching a preemptive strike against Iran.
Should it happen, he will pass the baton to us and demand that we keep our word.
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.
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Rotten Apple: A Symbol of Labor Exploitation
JAZZMAN CHRONICLES. DISSEMINATE FREELY.
ROTTEN APPLE:
A SYMBOL OF LABOR EXPLOITATION
By Jack Random
In 1984 I bought one of the first Apple Macintosh computers to roll off the line in Cupertino, California. At 132 K ROM (hardly enough to power a toaster by today’s standards), the Mac came loaded with a serviceable writing program (Mac Write) and an ingenious graphics program (Mac Paint) and the age of personal computing was born in earnest.
In those days Apple was a fiercely independent alternative to IBM, the corporate beast that monopolized the computer industry. Apple was a symbol of American ingenuity and innovation. Apple users were loyal to the company and we believed that Apple was loyal to us. We remained loyal even through substandard products because we believe that Apple had a social consciousness.
I don’t know when Apple changed. It doesn’t really matter. But when Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels delivered the Republican response to the State of the Union address, trumpeting the late Apple co-founder Steve Jobs as a job creator, I knew something was rotten to the core. Daniels was right about Apple job creation. The trouble is some 95% of those jobs were created in China under deplorable working conditions.
In America the very same politicians whose policies wreaked havoc on the global economy spend most of their time attempting to exploit the devastation by attacking what remains of the rights of labor. Too often on the so-called liberal establishment falls silent on the right to organize and the right to collective bargaining (an alternative to a general strike).
In Europe the same voices that claim to represent the left are planting their staffs with the anti-labor forces of austerity.
The recent New York Times article exposing Apple’s exploitation of Chinese labor (“How the U.S. Lost Out on iPhone Work” by Charles Duhigg and Keith Bradsher, January 21, 2012) reads more like a rationalization if not an outright defense. On international labor rights the Times is as bankrupt as the Greek treasury. An unashamed proponent of Clintonian Free Trade, the Times argued with an unmistakable tone of admiration that Chinese workers at substandard wages (workers at the leading Apple manufacturer, Foxconn Technology, recently received two wage increases from an equivalent of $135 per month to roughly $300 per month) were so motivated that they could be roused to work at a moment’s notice. They frequently work 24 or 36-hour shifts at tedious jobs with little complaint (except for the occasional riot or threatened mass suicide). The story noted that there were plenty more sweatshops making complementary products just down the road.
The Times glossed over the rumored suicide rate and the fact that the company running the largest sweatshop on the planet had to install nets outside its walls to prevent workers from jumping to their deaths.
The Times’ Nicholas Kristof and his fellow compassionate compliciters will tell you that the workers are better off as exploited labor than they otherwise would be. They could be back on the farm tending rice fields at a meager existence or worse; they might be on the streets of protest in open rebellion.
There is little to distinguish the defense of Apple and labor exploitation from the antebellum defense of slavery. The advocates of slavery also argued with characteristic audacity that the slaves were better off than they would have been on their own accord. They had roofs over their heads, clothing, medical care and meals on the table. They were slaves, subject to beatings, inhuman treatment and whatever torture can be imagined, but at least they had food to eat. Their white masters could rape the women at will and the men could do nothing about it but at least their basic needs were fulfilled. If not for a few rabble rousers, malcontents and radical idealists, the slaves would have been happy to live out their lives, generation after generation, in contented servitude.
We recognize now that such arguments are an affront to human decency but in the land of antebellum slave plantations they were tolerated if not embraced.
It is by no means admirable that workers can be roused from sleep at any time of the day or night to work another twelve-hour shift. It is not laudable that workers can be forced to work in unsafe environments with toxic chemicals and hazardous waste. It is not acceptable that children of twelve are subjected to these conditions. When workers riot and threaten mass suicide it is not a sign of relative wellbeing.
I know that Apple is not alone. Foxconn has contracts with Dell, Hewlett-Packard, Sony, Motorola, Nokia, Toshiba, Samsung, Amazon, Nintendo and IBM.
Apple has responded predictably to the negative publicity of the Times report and the potent monologue of Mike Daisey now playing at the Public Theater in New York (“The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs”). It has hired an “independent” watchdog to monitor and report on labor abuse in China and elsewhere. Unfortunately, that organization receives its funding from the industry.
Apple perceives labor abuse as a public relations problem because Apple does not care about workers in China or anywhere else. Apple cares about the bottom line and Apple is afraid that this wave of negative publicity will forever tarnish its image and affect its profit ratio.
I know the futility of calling for a boycott. We are addicted to our intelligent devices and there are no viable alternatives. We cannot for a moment believe that the sweatshops in Indonesia or anywhere else where the economy thrives on cheap labor are any better than those in China.
I am calling for a different response and one that would have an impact on the bottom line. We do not need the latest gadget. We do not need the immediate upgrade to the latest technological innovation. We can wait.
That is what I am suggesting that every conscientious consumer should do. Delay that next purchase. Delay it as long as possible. Make that purchase only when it is necessary.
If enough people take this approach, Apple and all the others will notice. They will make changes. They may not move their plants back home immediately but in time, who knows?
If they were to move back home, you can bet that those 750,000 Chinese jobs would translate to 500,000 robotic devices and a handful of managers and maintenance crews.
So be it. If they continue to operate as they are, they need to know that the fight for labor rights does not end at our shores.
Jazz.
[This article posted by Counterpunch, February 16, 2012.]
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.
ROTTEN APPLE:
A SYMBOL OF LABOR EXPLOITATION
By Jack Random
In 1984 I bought one of the first Apple Macintosh computers to roll off the line in Cupertino, California. At 132 K ROM (hardly enough to power a toaster by today’s standards), the Mac came loaded with a serviceable writing program (Mac Write) and an ingenious graphics program (Mac Paint) and the age of personal computing was born in earnest.
In those days Apple was a fiercely independent alternative to IBM, the corporate beast that monopolized the computer industry. Apple was a symbol of American ingenuity and innovation. Apple users were loyal to the company and we believed that Apple was loyal to us. We remained loyal even through substandard products because we believe that Apple had a social consciousness.
I don’t know when Apple changed. It doesn’t really matter. But when Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels delivered the Republican response to the State of the Union address, trumpeting the late Apple co-founder Steve Jobs as a job creator, I knew something was rotten to the core. Daniels was right about Apple job creation. The trouble is some 95% of those jobs were created in China under deplorable working conditions.
In America the very same politicians whose policies wreaked havoc on the global economy spend most of their time attempting to exploit the devastation by attacking what remains of the rights of labor. Too often on the so-called liberal establishment falls silent on the right to organize and the right to collective bargaining (an alternative to a general strike).
In Europe the same voices that claim to represent the left are planting their staffs with the anti-labor forces of austerity.
The recent New York Times article exposing Apple’s exploitation of Chinese labor (“How the U.S. Lost Out on iPhone Work” by Charles Duhigg and Keith Bradsher, January 21, 2012) reads more like a rationalization if not an outright defense. On international labor rights the Times is as bankrupt as the Greek treasury. An unashamed proponent of Clintonian Free Trade, the Times argued with an unmistakable tone of admiration that Chinese workers at substandard wages (workers at the leading Apple manufacturer, Foxconn Technology, recently received two wage increases from an equivalent of $135 per month to roughly $300 per month) were so motivated that they could be roused to work at a moment’s notice. They frequently work 24 or 36-hour shifts at tedious jobs with little complaint (except for the occasional riot or threatened mass suicide). The story noted that there were plenty more sweatshops making complementary products just down the road.
The Times glossed over the rumored suicide rate and the fact that the company running the largest sweatshop on the planet had to install nets outside its walls to prevent workers from jumping to their deaths.
The Times’ Nicholas Kristof and his fellow compassionate compliciters will tell you that the workers are better off as exploited labor than they otherwise would be. They could be back on the farm tending rice fields at a meager existence or worse; they might be on the streets of protest in open rebellion.
There is little to distinguish the defense of Apple and labor exploitation from the antebellum defense of slavery. The advocates of slavery also argued with characteristic audacity that the slaves were better off than they would have been on their own accord. They had roofs over their heads, clothing, medical care and meals on the table. They were slaves, subject to beatings, inhuman treatment and whatever torture can be imagined, but at least they had food to eat. Their white masters could rape the women at will and the men could do nothing about it but at least their basic needs were fulfilled. If not for a few rabble rousers, malcontents and radical idealists, the slaves would have been happy to live out their lives, generation after generation, in contented servitude.
We recognize now that such arguments are an affront to human decency but in the land of antebellum slave plantations they were tolerated if not embraced.
It is by no means admirable that workers can be roused from sleep at any time of the day or night to work another twelve-hour shift. It is not laudable that workers can be forced to work in unsafe environments with toxic chemicals and hazardous waste. It is not acceptable that children of twelve are subjected to these conditions. When workers riot and threaten mass suicide it is not a sign of relative wellbeing.
I know that Apple is not alone. Foxconn has contracts with Dell, Hewlett-Packard, Sony, Motorola, Nokia, Toshiba, Samsung, Amazon, Nintendo and IBM.
Apple has responded predictably to the negative publicity of the Times report and the potent monologue of Mike Daisey now playing at the Public Theater in New York (“The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs”). It has hired an “independent” watchdog to monitor and report on labor abuse in China and elsewhere. Unfortunately, that organization receives its funding from the industry.
Apple perceives labor abuse as a public relations problem because Apple does not care about workers in China or anywhere else. Apple cares about the bottom line and Apple is afraid that this wave of negative publicity will forever tarnish its image and affect its profit ratio.
I know the futility of calling for a boycott. We are addicted to our intelligent devices and there are no viable alternatives. We cannot for a moment believe that the sweatshops in Indonesia or anywhere else where the economy thrives on cheap labor are any better than those in China.
I am calling for a different response and one that would have an impact on the bottom line. We do not need the latest gadget. We do not need the immediate upgrade to the latest technological innovation. We can wait.
That is what I am suggesting that every conscientious consumer should do. Delay that next purchase. Delay it as long as possible. Make that purchase only when it is necessary.
If enough people take this approach, Apple and all the others will notice. They will make changes. They may not move their plants back home immediately but in time, who knows?
If they were to move back home, you can bet that those 750,000 Chinese jobs would translate to 500,000 robotic devices and a handful of managers and maintenance crews.
So be it. If they continue to operate as they are, they need to know that the fight for labor rights does not end at our shores.
Jazz.
[This article posted by Counterpunch, February 16, 2012.]
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.
Monday, December 19, 2011
The Coming Explosion & Omission in Osawatomie
Regarding Omission in Osawatomie (a Jazzman Chronicle reprinted below):
I completely agree with your thesis. There was a great poet by the name of Langston Hughes with whom Barack Obama would be well served to heed in his neglect of the rhetoric he used to obtain the office of the POTUS. In the final stanza of the poem, it reflects the inevitable outcome of the body politic. There will be an uprising at some point; an explosion!
Wakiza L. McQueen
HARLEM by Langston Hughes
What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
or fester like a sore—
and then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over—
like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?
December 14, 2011
A Line Obama Will Not Cross
Omission in Osawatomie
by JACK RANDOM
Like the sirens to Odysseus, President Obama’s address at Osawatomie, Kansas, was pleasing to the progressive ear but if you allow its seductive tone to capture you, it could well prove fatal to the cause.
We have heard this song before. It takes us back to the soaring oratory that uplifted the masses and propelled a one-term senator to the presidency. Then as now, the president correctly and brilliantly deconstructs the problem: The middle class is under siege, hemorrhaging skilled and unskilled jobs to cheap labor markets overseas, resulting in depressed wages and declining benefits, depleted retirement funds, union busting and unregulated industries.
But, then as now, his solutions fail to approach the heart of the matter. Proclaiming a new world economy based on innovation, he advocates government funding for research and education, science and engineering, progressive taxation, regulation, consumer protection and a commitment to building and rebuilding the nation’s infrastructure.
These are all worthy ideas that the president strings together with a rising intonation in order to avoid the obvious, central and core solution. Consequently, he builds to a dull crescendo, sounding a sour chord and all too familiar refrain: Technology and innovation will save us.
The president prides himself on his knowledge of history, so much so that he summoned the memory of Theodore Roosevelt in this address. Unfortunately, history does not uphold his case. Technology and innovation have never sustained the middle class. They have created fortunes and whole industries but how it affects the working people depends entirely on where the industries are located and how the workers are paid.
Take a good look at the major innovations of the Free Trade era: The personal computer, the laptop and the smart phone are all made in China and serviced in India. Solar technology created advanced solar collectors and panels, creating a thriving industry in China. Hybrid vehicles may be assembled in America but by-and-large they are constructed in foreign nations where the cost of labor trumps all other concerns. Even our bridges are made in China.
Within the parameters of a global Free Trade economy, there is no innovation that can revive American industry. The idea that innovation and education are going to create jobs for 300 million Americans is a pipe dream, a fantasy and, in this case, an excuse not to address the heart of the matter.
The obvious answer and the one that perpetually evades the president and the majority of his party is Fair Trade. American workers can compete and win on a fair playing field but no one can compete with dirt-cheap labor. The masterminds behind the new global economy have built corporate profits by exploiting the cheapest possible labor overseas and simultaneously undermining labor in our own country.
What is Fair Trade?
It is built on the conviction that all nations that engage our nation in trade should uphold the rights of labor, including the right to organize, and pay their workers living wages.
How would Fair Trade be implemented?
The most direct route would be to reserve preferred trade status to nations that protect the rights of labor, provide basic health and retirement benefits, and pay living wages to their workforce. All other nations would be subject to a tariff proportionate to the cost of compliance.
The message to China, India and all other nations that now benefit from the imbalance of trade would be clear: Pay your workers at home or pay to protect our workers at the border.
Human rights and the critical issue of carbon emissions also come into the equation but if the goal is rebuilding American industry, then the heart of the matter is labor.
Why is Fair Trade off the table?
There was a time when simply raising the cry of “Protectionism” could defeat any such proposal but after decades of job exportation, Americans are losing their fear of words. Protecting our workers in the current environment is a moral imperative.
Accordingly, Fair Trade is alive and well in the United States Congress. Even Republicans in the House and Senate are afraid to go on record in opposition. The Trade Reform Accountability Development and Employment Act proposed by Senator Sherrod Brown of Ohio and Representative Michael Michaud of Maine would fundamentally reshape America’s trade policy, bringing labor to the forefront.
Unfortunately, the silence of the White House enables congressional leadership to keep the measure from coming to the floor for a vote. President Obama presses forward on Free Trade deals with Korea, Columbia and Panama, ensuring the exportation of jobs to even more nations.
Even progressive economists are reluctant to address trade policy, preferring to attack trade imbalance through so-called currency manipulation. The idea is if our trading partners increased the value of their currency it would be more expensive to buy their goods and less expensive for them to buy ours. If the revaluation were large enough and sustained, it would certainly have an effect.
The problem with the currency approach is that it allows the tenets of Free Trade to stand. It does not end the anti-labor measures enforced by austerity regimes under the dictates of the International Monetary Fund. That is why even the prototypical corporate candidate, Republican Mitt Romney, feels free to advocate punitive actions against China based on the charge of currency manipulation. It leaves workers out on the lurch and the rights of labor out of the picture. Moreover, all nations manipulate currency. That is the primary function of the Federal Reserve.
Of course, if we were to insist that other nations respect the rights of labor we would have to do a better job of protecting our own workers. We could no longer allow individual states to effectively crush unions with so-called Right to Work laws. We could no longer allow legislative attacks on collective bargaining without paying a price.
It is as if the entire liberal establishment, from the politicians to the intellectuals to the media, signed on to Bill Clinton’s Free Trade mandate back in the eighties and have adhered to that agreement ever since.
It was a deal with the devil, a betrayal of every working man and woman not only in America but throughout the world, and it demands to be revisited now.
In 2008 candidate Barack Obama said, “I voted against CAFTA, never supported NAFTA, and will not support NAFTA–style trade agreements in the future. While NAFTA gave broad rights to investors, it paid only lip service to the rights of labor and the importance of environmental protection.”
Where is that candidate now? He disappeared upon taking the oath of office.
In retrospect, it seems amply clear that candidate Obama made a deal with Wall Street, his leading campaign contributors, before he embarked on his road to the White House. Fair Trade was off limits. It was the one territory he could not visit. It was the one line he could not cross.
An original sponsor of the Employee Free Choice Act (an affirmation of the right to organize and establish a union by majority vote) had President Obama remembered his labor roots in his address at Osawatomie, had he raised the banner of Fair Trade to initiate his campaign for a second term, then that address might have stood alongside Teddy Roosevelt’s New Nationalism or Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal inaugural address.
As it stands, it is the perfect symbol of his presidency to date: A promise unfulfilled.
If we were to initiate the age of Fair Trade it would fundamentally change the debate and ultimately alter the structure of the global economy. The world would face a choice. The European people would insist that their governments follow our lead. China and India would fight back but they are as dependent on us as we are on them. A bargain would be struck and a transition would be negotiated.
America would win back her industries and the middle class would re-emerge at the heart of the global economy.
It will happen in any case. It is inevitable. To continue on the path we are on will lead only to massive civil unrest and the result will be the same. By initiating Fair Trade now we could avoid much of that inevitable pain and disruption.
If only we had a leader with the courage to break his pact with Wall Street in order to keep his promise to the American people.
[Article posted by Pacific Free Press, CounterPunch and Dissident Voice.]
Jack Random is the author of Jazzman Chronicles (Crow Dog Press) and Ghost Dance Insurrection (Dry Bones Press.)
I completely agree with your thesis. There was a great poet by the name of Langston Hughes with whom Barack Obama would be well served to heed in his neglect of the rhetoric he used to obtain the office of the POTUS. In the final stanza of the poem, it reflects the inevitable outcome of the body politic. There will be an uprising at some point; an explosion!
Wakiza L. McQueen
HARLEM by Langston Hughes
What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
or fester like a sore—
and then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over—
like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?
December 14, 2011
A Line Obama Will Not Cross
Omission in Osawatomie
by JACK RANDOM
Like the sirens to Odysseus, President Obama’s address at Osawatomie, Kansas, was pleasing to the progressive ear but if you allow its seductive tone to capture you, it could well prove fatal to the cause.
We have heard this song before. It takes us back to the soaring oratory that uplifted the masses and propelled a one-term senator to the presidency. Then as now, the president correctly and brilliantly deconstructs the problem: The middle class is under siege, hemorrhaging skilled and unskilled jobs to cheap labor markets overseas, resulting in depressed wages and declining benefits, depleted retirement funds, union busting and unregulated industries.
But, then as now, his solutions fail to approach the heart of the matter. Proclaiming a new world economy based on innovation, he advocates government funding for research and education, science and engineering, progressive taxation, regulation, consumer protection and a commitment to building and rebuilding the nation’s infrastructure.
These are all worthy ideas that the president strings together with a rising intonation in order to avoid the obvious, central and core solution. Consequently, he builds to a dull crescendo, sounding a sour chord and all too familiar refrain: Technology and innovation will save us.
The president prides himself on his knowledge of history, so much so that he summoned the memory of Theodore Roosevelt in this address. Unfortunately, history does not uphold his case. Technology and innovation have never sustained the middle class. They have created fortunes and whole industries but how it affects the working people depends entirely on where the industries are located and how the workers are paid.
Take a good look at the major innovations of the Free Trade era: The personal computer, the laptop and the smart phone are all made in China and serviced in India. Solar technology created advanced solar collectors and panels, creating a thriving industry in China. Hybrid vehicles may be assembled in America but by-and-large they are constructed in foreign nations where the cost of labor trumps all other concerns. Even our bridges are made in China.
Within the parameters of a global Free Trade economy, there is no innovation that can revive American industry. The idea that innovation and education are going to create jobs for 300 million Americans is a pipe dream, a fantasy and, in this case, an excuse not to address the heart of the matter.
The obvious answer and the one that perpetually evades the president and the majority of his party is Fair Trade. American workers can compete and win on a fair playing field but no one can compete with dirt-cheap labor. The masterminds behind the new global economy have built corporate profits by exploiting the cheapest possible labor overseas and simultaneously undermining labor in our own country.
What is Fair Trade?
It is built on the conviction that all nations that engage our nation in trade should uphold the rights of labor, including the right to organize, and pay their workers living wages.
How would Fair Trade be implemented?
The most direct route would be to reserve preferred trade status to nations that protect the rights of labor, provide basic health and retirement benefits, and pay living wages to their workforce. All other nations would be subject to a tariff proportionate to the cost of compliance.
The message to China, India and all other nations that now benefit from the imbalance of trade would be clear: Pay your workers at home or pay to protect our workers at the border.
Human rights and the critical issue of carbon emissions also come into the equation but if the goal is rebuilding American industry, then the heart of the matter is labor.
Why is Fair Trade off the table?
There was a time when simply raising the cry of “Protectionism” could defeat any such proposal but after decades of job exportation, Americans are losing their fear of words. Protecting our workers in the current environment is a moral imperative.
Accordingly, Fair Trade is alive and well in the United States Congress. Even Republicans in the House and Senate are afraid to go on record in opposition. The Trade Reform Accountability Development and Employment Act proposed by Senator Sherrod Brown of Ohio and Representative Michael Michaud of Maine would fundamentally reshape America’s trade policy, bringing labor to the forefront.
Unfortunately, the silence of the White House enables congressional leadership to keep the measure from coming to the floor for a vote. President Obama presses forward on Free Trade deals with Korea, Columbia and Panama, ensuring the exportation of jobs to even more nations.
Even progressive economists are reluctant to address trade policy, preferring to attack trade imbalance through so-called currency manipulation. The idea is if our trading partners increased the value of their currency it would be more expensive to buy their goods and less expensive for them to buy ours. If the revaluation were large enough and sustained, it would certainly have an effect.
The problem with the currency approach is that it allows the tenets of Free Trade to stand. It does not end the anti-labor measures enforced by austerity regimes under the dictates of the International Monetary Fund. That is why even the prototypical corporate candidate, Republican Mitt Romney, feels free to advocate punitive actions against China based on the charge of currency manipulation. It leaves workers out on the lurch and the rights of labor out of the picture. Moreover, all nations manipulate currency. That is the primary function of the Federal Reserve.
Of course, if we were to insist that other nations respect the rights of labor we would have to do a better job of protecting our own workers. We could no longer allow individual states to effectively crush unions with so-called Right to Work laws. We could no longer allow legislative attacks on collective bargaining without paying a price.
It is as if the entire liberal establishment, from the politicians to the intellectuals to the media, signed on to Bill Clinton’s Free Trade mandate back in the eighties and have adhered to that agreement ever since.
It was a deal with the devil, a betrayal of every working man and woman not only in America but throughout the world, and it demands to be revisited now.
In 2008 candidate Barack Obama said, “I voted against CAFTA, never supported NAFTA, and will not support NAFTA–style trade agreements in the future. While NAFTA gave broad rights to investors, it paid only lip service to the rights of labor and the importance of environmental protection.”
Where is that candidate now? He disappeared upon taking the oath of office.
In retrospect, it seems amply clear that candidate Obama made a deal with Wall Street, his leading campaign contributors, before he embarked on his road to the White House. Fair Trade was off limits. It was the one territory he could not visit. It was the one line he could not cross.
An original sponsor of the Employee Free Choice Act (an affirmation of the right to organize and establish a union by majority vote) had President Obama remembered his labor roots in his address at Osawatomie, had he raised the banner of Fair Trade to initiate his campaign for a second term, then that address might have stood alongside Teddy Roosevelt’s New Nationalism or Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal inaugural address.
As it stands, it is the perfect symbol of his presidency to date: A promise unfulfilled.
If we were to initiate the age of Fair Trade it would fundamentally change the debate and ultimately alter the structure of the global economy. The world would face a choice. The European people would insist that their governments follow our lead. China and India would fight back but they are as dependent on us as we are on them. A bargain would be struck and a transition would be negotiated.
America would win back her industries and the middle class would re-emerge at the heart of the global economy.
It will happen in any case. It is inevitable. To continue on the path we are on will lead only to massive civil unrest and the result will be the same. By initiating Fair Trade now we could avoid much of that inevitable pain and disruption.
If only we had a leader with the courage to break his pact with Wall Street in order to keep his promise to the American people.
[Article posted by Pacific Free Press, CounterPunch and Dissident Voice.]
Jack Random is the author of Jazzman Chronicles (Crow Dog Press) and Ghost Dance Insurrection (Dry Bones Press.)
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