Yes, they do go together. In the case of the Indian rapists, like the horrible gang-rapists of Delhi last month, it's hardly about sexual expression or repression. It's about losing control and male domination at the hands of a modernity they can see but can't touch.
It's estimated that there are 200-300 million Indians, almost entirely in the cities, who have entered the global middle class. That's one of the reasons why international corporations will do almost anything to penetrate the growing Indian market: it has almost as many modern consumers as the US. They aren't the rapists.
But, India has a population that's well over a billion: that's at least 800 million who are NOT in the middle class. Rape expresses a barely repressed class war of the huge underclass, just beginning to awaken. What they see is an India they can hardly fathom and never reach, yet they see it daily on TV and in the Bollywood movies.
The traditional caste system repressed everyone, even a too numerous four-part aristocracy, but it was a stable society for almost 3500 years. Castes are still present, now, but the rules that bound them together, are not. Class often subsumes caste in "Modern India," and those left behind in India's scramble to the future are treated the way lower castes used to be. Yet, they are no longer submissive; they're rebellious, rejectionist, unmoored by tradition. Male violence against women is safer than outright revolution.
Sri Lanka's Tamils, to India's south, invented suicide bombing, which has become a signature of al Qaeda and its allies in the Middle East and North Africa. "Islamic militants," ironically, share the anger of (largely Hindu) Indian rapists; they take it out on their own people, especially women--with extreme purdah and stonings, as well as amputations and beheadings to keep the men in line. In both cases, it's the violent rejection of what they want, are terrified of and can't have: participation in modern secular society.
I don't pretend to know whether al Qaeda members are predominantly lower class, but they do have one thing in common: rejection of any trace of secular, i.e. modern, society. The savagery of al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb and Ansar al Dine may not be just a will to destroy what their societies are becoming, but that's certainly a part of it; it's also an inexpensive means to control resisters.
What's happening now, globally, is the incipient rumblings of the left out, against the newly affluent, who are the new entrants to the global middle class. With climate change, the billions of surplus people aren't anchored to the Middle East, India, or China; eventually, they will flood lands with more moderate climates.
The angry masses could become the equivalent of the Germanic and Turkic hordes, barbarians who surged into the late Roman Empire, and finally, brought it down; Classical society fell with it.
Tuesday, January 29, 2013
Tuesday, January 22, 2013
Inauguration-Coronation Vision
The Inauguration displayed history and unity: over 200 years worth, represented by 50 states, with an impressive backdrop for Obama's oath, his speech and the tradition he evoked.
Obama didn't present the soaring emotion of his first inaugural. I don't think it was one of his better speeches, except in the implied substance. After all, inaugural speeches are supposed to lay out a President's broad vision, not his legislative agenda. He said: "our country cannot succeed when a shrinking few do very well and a growing many barely make it," but he didn't lay out a tax and spending blueprint for righting this wrong--he couldn't have, unless he spoke for hours. Instead, he said, "But while the means will change, our purpose endures: a nation that rewards the effort and determination of every single American."
The general thrust of this part of his speech was an implicit rejection of the conservative creed of everyone for himself. Americans, he insisted, over and over, have to pull together.
Obama rejected the partisanship of the past four years, but instead of bipartisanship, he implied that it was the responsibility of Republicans, as well as Democrats, conservatives as well as liberals, to make government work for the good of all, rather than blocking its functions, like the previous Republican House and the Senate Republican minority.
He also addressed climate change, and how we had to confront its reality; he plugged for new, alternative forms of energy, urging that America lead rather than follow.
Obama became most emotional over his peroration for civil rights, evoking the dream of "a King," and then championing equal rights for women, and gays.
Instead of specifically naming gun control, he said our "journey is not complete until all our children, from the streets of Detroit to the hills of Appalachia to the quiet lanes of Newtown, know that they are cared for, and cherished, and always safe from harm."
Obama was following tradition. Inaugurals aren't the place for laying out an agenda, except in the broadest terms, But his vision: of peace, equal opportunity, caring and openness has potential--if he can translate this into concrete action and get it through Congress.
As the NY Times pointed out, it was a liberal vision.
Obama didn't talk about two important issues: the failed and destructive drug war that's been implicitly rejected outright by two states, and more indirectly by a handful more.
Nor did he mention his drone war, which appears to be expanding, not receding, as implied by his statement, "a decade of war is now ending." It's as if it was unmentionable: the American Empire advancing by covert means--hand in hand with his pledge to "support democracy" and peace, world-wide.
Does Obama's vision offer a chance that the US won't suffer the fate of the Roman Empire in 476? Perhaps: but only if Congress can return to its role as a functioning institution.
Obama didn't present the soaring emotion of his first inaugural. I don't think it was one of his better speeches, except in the implied substance. After all, inaugural speeches are supposed to lay out a President's broad vision, not his legislative agenda. He said: "our country cannot succeed when a shrinking few do very well and a growing many barely make it," but he didn't lay out a tax and spending blueprint for righting this wrong--he couldn't have, unless he spoke for hours. Instead, he said, "But while the means will change, our purpose endures: a nation that rewards the effort and determination of every single American."
The general thrust of this part of his speech was an implicit rejection of the conservative creed of everyone for himself. Americans, he insisted, over and over, have to pull together.
Obama rejected the partisanship of the past four years, but instead of bipartisanship, he implied that it was the responsibility of Republicans, as well as Democrats, conservatives as well as liberals, to make government work for the good of all, rather than blocking its functions, like the previous Republican House and the Senate Republican minority.
He also addressed climate change, and how we had to confront its reality; he plugged for new, alternative forms of energy, urging that America lead rather than follow.
Obama became most emotional over his peroration for civil rights, evoking the dream of "a King," and then championing equal rights for women, and gays.
Instead of specifically naming gun control, he said our "journey is not complete until all our children, from the streets of Detroit to the hills of Appalachia to the quiet lanes of Newtown, know that they are cared for, and cherished, and always safe from harm."
Obama was following tradition. Inaugurals aren't the place for laying out an agenda, except in the broadest terms, But his vision: of peace, equal opportunity, caring and openness has potential--if he can translate this into concrete action and get it through Congress.
As the NY Times pointed out, it was a liberal vision.
Obama didn't talk about two important issues: the failed and destructive drug war that's been implicitly rejected outright by two states, and more indirectly by a handful more.
Nor did he mention his drone war, which appears to be expanding, not receding, as implied by his statement, "a decade of war is now ending." It's as if it was unmentionable: the American Empire advancing by covert means--hand in hand with his pledge to "support democracy" and peace, world-wide.
Does Obama's vision offer a chance that the US won't suffer the fate of the Roman Empire in 476? Perhaps: but only if Congress can return to its role as a functioning institution.
Friday, January 18, 2013
Mali, Algeria and HIstory
About 425 years after the fall of Rome, an Islamic group not unlike those involved now in Mali and the siege in Algeria--Ansar al Dine, and AQIM--tore through North Africa as the latter two are doing today. The Islamic fanatics circa 900, were determined, much like our Wahabi-inspired "militants," to set the clock back, to undo civilization.
Driving in Tunisia (long before its revolution), I was struck by the huge Roman ruins; they ran for miles, sometimes paralleling modern highways. They were at least thirty feet high, and, with breaks, went on for miles in long lines; they were the remains of Roman aqueducts. North Africa had been, in some ways, Rome's California.
The economy of Roman North Africa was unlike anything found there today, because of those aqueducts. Instead of arid land, the Roman colonies grew a large portion of the grain the city of Rome depended upon, all irrigated, like California, today. It was like California in another way, too: Roman buildings in North African cities, like the rebuilt Carthage, were on a larger scale than in Rome, itself. It was prosperous--for free Romans.
Even after the Vandals threw out (or enslaved) the Romans, the aqueducts--and slave labor--allowed exporting bumper crops of grain to Rome and Constantinople. The Vandals grew rich and soft, like the Romans before them.
The first Muslim conquest of North Africa didn't change much; the land was still irrigated, still plentiful--unlike the deserts of Arabia. Now, Muslims were getting prosperous.
Tunisians told me what happened next. Ninth century Islamic militants tore down the aqueducts: North Africa reverted to near desert and has remained that way ever since. Tearing down these monumental structures must have been a major undertaking: there were no explosives then; it had to be done by hand. It was done thoroughly though: there were enough large breaks that no one has ever tried to rebuild them.
Driving the region back to desert was the intended result! It would revert to something comparable to the Arabian Desert, from which the Prophet and his Faith emerged.
The militant vision was much like al Qaeda's fantasy now: restoring pure Islam, as the Prophet practiced it. That requires poverty, not prosperity. The universal Caliphate is al Qaeda's grandiose goal, and again, hard times would be better than corrupt modern ones.
Both extremist Muslim movements represent rejections of the modernity of their day. Both set out to destroy civilization as it was or is.
There is a kind of nihilism in any fundamentalist religion: it requires you to destroy, before you can build the pure, envisioned world. The only modernity any of them seem to accept is the technologies of war, and of control. Those technologies are much more fearsome than in the 9th century, but the goals are about the same.
That's what the world faces in Mali and Algeria--and Pakistan, and Yemen, and--
Driving in Tunisia (long before its revolution), I was struck by the huge Roman ruins; they ran for miles, sometimes paralleling modern highways. They were at least thirty feet high, and, with breaks, went on for miles in long lines; they were the remains of Roman aqueducts. North Africa had been, in some ways, Rome's California.
The economy of Roman North Africa was unlike anything found there today, because of those aqueducts. Instead of arid land, the Roman colonies grew a large portion of the grain the city of Rome depended upon, all irrigated, like California, today. It was like California in another way, too: Roman buildings in North African cities, like the rebuilt Carthage, were on a larger scale than in Rome, itself. It was prosperous--for free Romans.
Even after the Vandals threw out (or enslaved) the Romans, the aqueducts--and slave labor--allowed exporting bumper crops of grain to Rome and Constantinople. The Vandals grew rich and soft, like the Romans before them.
The first Muslim conquest of North Africa didn't change much; the land was still irrigated, still plentiful--unlike the deserts of Arabia. Now, Muslims were getting prosperous.
Tunisians told me what happened next. Ninth century Islamic militants tore down the aqueducts: North Africa reverted to near desert and has remained that way ever since. Tearing down these monumental structures must have been a major undertaking: there were no explosives then; it had to be done by hand. It was done thoroughly though: there were enough large breaks that no one has ever tried to rebuild them.
Driving the region back to desert was the intended result! It would revert to something comparable to the Arabian Desert, from which the Prophet and his Faith emerged.
The militant vision was much like al Qaeda's fantasy now: restoring pure Islam, as the Prophet practiced it. That requires poverty, not prosperity. The universal Caliphate is al Qaeda's grandiose goal, and again, hard times would be better than corrupt modern ones.
Both extremist Muslim movements represent rejections of the modernity of their day. Both set out to destroy civilization as it was or is.
There is a kind of nihilism in any fundamentalist religion: it requires you to destroy, before you can build the pure, envisioned world. The only modernity any of them seem to accept is the technologies of war, and of control. Those technologies are much more fearsome than in the 9th century, but the goals are about the same.
That's what the world faces in Mali and Algeria--and Pakistan, and Yemen, and--
Sunday, January 13, 2013
What if a Platinum Coin?
What if the Treasury minted the platinum coin people have talked about, with a denomination of $1Trillion?
What would happen?
There would be much whining within the monopoly media that Obama had become a dictator: he's taken away Congress's power of the purse, the debt ceiling.
Obama could also simply declare, according to the 14th Amendment, that the President has to defend the "full faith and credit of the United States," by continuing to borrow whenever necessary, even if the Congress refused to pass an increased debt ceiling. That's a better alternative.
In either case, the Executive does have the power to maintain the currency. A strong case could be made: a President's first responsibility is to defend the nation, whether it derives from foreign military threats, or domestic economic ones. A default on the US dollar is a much greater threat than any of our last half-century's wars.
A default would probably spell the death knell for the greenback as the world's reserve currency. Interest rates could go sky high, stopping all growth; imports would become prohibitively expensive: a recipe for severe stagflation. Global depression could follow.
Yet, our powerful finance industry isn't leaning on the GOP to quash its debt-ceiling extortion. But then, Wall Street would dearly love to achieve some of the GOP's agenda: especially, privatizing Social Security (which doesn't contribute to the deficit), so maybe it won't press Republicans to stop, unless it looks as if Obama won't blink.
That's one reason why either the platinum coin or Presidential declaration, make sense. Either would stop the hostage taking. Then, if both sides still wanted to talk about deficit/debt reduction, they could have a rational discussion of corporate subsidies, of sensible cuts to the war machine, of reforms to health care and Medicare/Medicaid, by cutting costs without reducing benefits or raising eligibility.
Without the above Presidential action, negotiations would remain irrational: under duress on both sides. Just as in the fiscal cliff negotiation, corrupt deals under the table would pollute the actual bargain ("great" or not), in the rush to meet--or almost meet--the deadline. Reasonable solutions, like restructuring payment mechanisms in Medicare, (as is being tried in New York City hospitals), would be impossible to negotiate.
Wall Street, the GOP, and some Wall Street Democrats, wouldn't like either presidential response, because they'd have a harder time extorting their loopholes, gifts and grants. Conservatives would also bemoan the expansion of Presidential power--not that they opposed it under Bush II.
But maybe the US would finally get a government that governed more or less rationally, for The People.
What are the odds, if our Roman Senators don't get what they want, that the President would even try to get what the nation needs? Where is a backbone when backbone is needed? The selfish class has to be stopped. It would be ironic if a mere coin could do that.
What would happen?
There would be much whining within the monopoly media that Obama had become a dictator: he's taken away Congress's power of the purse, the debt ceiling.
Obama could also simply declare, according to the 14th Amendment, that the President has to defend the "full faith and credit of the United States," by continuing to borrow whenever necessary, even if the Congress refused to pass an increased debt ceiling. That's a better alternative.
In either case, the Executive does have the power to maintain the currency. A strong case could be made: a President's first responsibility is to defend the nation, whether it derives from foreign military threats, or domestic economic ones. A default on the US dollar is a much greater threat than any of our last half-century's wars.
A default would probably spell the death knell for the greenback as the world's reserve currency. Interest rates could go sky high, stopping all growth; imports would become prohibitively expensive: a recipe for severe stagflation. Global depression could follow.
Yet, our powerful finance industry isn't leaning on the GOP to quash its debt-ceiling extortion. But then, Wall Street would dearly love to achieve some of the GOP's agenda: especially, privatizing Social Security (which doesn't contribute to the deficit), so maybe it won't press Republicans to stop, unless it looks as if Obama won't blink.
That's one reason why either the platinum coin or Presidential declaration, make sense. Either would stop the hostage taking. Then, if both sides still wanted to talk about deficit/debt reduction, they could have a rational discussion of corporate subsidies, of sensible cuts to the war machine, of reforms to health care and Medicare/Medicaid, by cutting costs without reducing benefits or raising eligibility.
Without the above Presidential action, negotiations would remain irrational: under duress on both sides. Just as in the fiscal cliff negotiation, corrupt deals under the table would pollute the actual bargain ("great" or not), in the rush to meet--or almost meet--the deadline. Reasonable solutions, like restructuring payment mechanisms in Medicare, (as is being tried in New York City hospitals), would be impossible to negotiate.
Wall Street, the GOP, and some Wall Street Democrats, wouldn't like either presidential response, because they'd have a harder time extorting their loopholes, gifts and grants. Conservatives would also bemoan the expansion of Presidential power--not that they opposed it under Bush II.
But maybe the US would finally get a government that governed more or less rationally, for The People.
What are the odds, if our Roman Senators don't get what they want, that the President would even try to get what the nation needs? Where is a backbone when backbone is needed? The selfish class has to be stopped. It would be ironic if a mere coin could do that.
Thursday, January 10, 2013
Classic Catch 22!
"Obama Justice Department have argued individuals and organizations must be able to show they were monitored by the surveillance program to have standing and challenge it in court.
"But the program's target list is secret. The U.S. government won't tell potential targets whether they have been monitored. Therefore, the government contends, no one has standing." http://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2013/01/06/Under-the-US-Supreme-Court-Spying-on-Americans-phase-2/UPI-75011357461000/ - ixzz2HQS7khMr
This is reminiscent of Orwell--1984, Animal Farm--but this is real life! The NDAA gives the Administration the power to monitor any communications between anyone in the US and anyone overseas. If, in some cases, there have to be warrants issued by the FISA Court (a special court set up to oversee covert surveillance), warrants can be highly generalized: they might even permit surveillance on a whole class of potential suspects.
There is a whole lot going on behind closed doors! So far, the people who are supervising it, making use of it, are apparently doing so for what might pass as "the Common Good," as in protecting the US from terror attacks. What is scary: there are so few checks on this surveillance, even in the cantankerous Congress! If no one has a need to know, and it's classified, then no one will know. Except those who take unto themselves the need to know--like the President, the intelligence heads, Defense and Justice at the top levels.
And, there are ominous signs, like the upending of General Petraeus, and before him, Governor Eliot Spitzer, when both were caught in the general surveillance web, apparently by accident.
In the hands of a Stalin, or, arguably, a Nixon, the powers the President has amassed in the realm of National Security would easily lead to the kind of dictatorship Orwell described in 1984.
I wouldn't argue Obama has made the best choices, or that he's egoless in wielding power. But so far, it doesn't look as if he aspires to be the kind of dictator that sweeps opposition aside; or one who's driven to re-make the nation in his own image, through his overpowering personality.
Has no one in power really thought this through? The power they've seized since 9/11--in order to safeguard the nation--is the power to control the nation, but not the world.
US Drones may terrorize Pakistanis, Yemenis, Somalis, but look what all our vaunted power has gotten us there: recruits for al Qaeda. In Afghanistan: a lull before we leave. After we leave, who knows what will happen.
The American Empire is turning inward: the elites--government and corporate--are gaining the power to control us, power much greater than was held by Roman Senators over their serfs and slaves.
If the bipartisan drive towards austerity drives people to revolutionary desperation, then State repression will be necessary--for the survival of our Roman Senators--and the machinery will be ready to use.
"But the program's target list is secret. The U.S. government won't tell potential targets whether they have been monitored. Therefore, the government contends, no one has standing." http://www.upi.com/Top_News/US/2013/01/06/Under-the-US-Supreme-Court-Spying-on-Americans-phase-2/UPI-75011357461000/ - ixzz2HQS7khMr
This is reminiscent of Orwell--1984, Animal Farm--but this is real life! The NDAA gives the Administration the power to monitor any communications between anyone in the US and anyone overseas. If, in some cases, there have to be warrants issued by the FISA Court (a special court set up to oversee covert surveillance), warrants can be highly generalized: they might even permit surveillance on a whole class of potential suspects.
There is a whole lot going on behind closed doors! So far, the people who are supervising it, making use of it, are apparently doing so for what might pass as "the Common Good," as in protecting the US from terror attacks. What is scary: there are so few checks on this surveillance, even in the cantankerous Congress! If no one has a need to know, and it's classified, then no one will know. Except those who take unto themselves the need to know--like the President, the intelligence heads, Defense and Justice at the top levels.
And, there are ominous signs, like the upending of General Petraeus, and before him, Governor Eliot Spitzer, when both were caught in the general surveillance web, apparently by accident.
In the hands of a Stalin, or, arguably, a Nixon, the powers the President has amassed in the realm of National Security would easily lead to the kind of dictatorship Orwell described in 1984.
I wouldn't argue Obama has made the best choices, or that he's egoless in wielding power. But so far, it doesn't look as if he aspires to be the kind of dictator that sweeps opposition aside; or one who's driven to re-make the nation in his own image, through his overpowering personality.
Has no one in power really thought this through? The power they've seized since 9/11--in order to safeguard the nation--is the power to control the nation, but not the world.
US Drones may terrorize Pakistanis, Yemenis, Somalis, but look what all our vaunted power has gotten us there: recruits for al Qaeda. In Afghanistan: a lull before we leave. After we leave, who knows what will happen.
The American Empire is turning inward: the elites--government and corporate--are gaining the power to control us, power much greater than was held by Roman Senators over their serfs and slaves.
If the bipartisan drive towards austerity drives people to revolutionary desperation, then State repression will be necessary--for the survival of our Roman Senators--and the machinery will be ready to use.
Saturday, January 5, 2013
Are We Trapped?
Republicans support the wealthy, the CEO's, the corporations; the worker is chopped liver. But Democrats are afraid: of the wealthy, the CEO's and the corporations--and enough are bought off, too.
Our two party system has been described as a duopoly, and when you look at the Obama/McConnell/Reid/Boehner compromise over "the fiscal cliff," you see that it is.
Remaining on the right, are the angry Tea Partiers, who distrust government in all its forms, though they're not unwilling to rip it off. Remaining on the left are forlorn progressives, who yearn for a government they can trust: they see one that's only protecting the "One Percent."
Both fringes attempt to push government more to their liking, but the duopoly has other plans: it's owned by the corporations: the banks, oil companies, media and more.
The anger among Tea Partiers is genuine, but the billionaire lobby, from astro-turf roots to media campaigns, to think tank creations, contrives its targets.
Anger on the left is at least as real, but its targets are scattered. Their anger focuses on exploitation, of, by and for the corporations, but also on government and military-style repression: they have little money behind them.
We don't have a Fourth Amendment any longer: unlawful search and seizure has been pushed aside by Terrorism and Drugs. All a local prosecutor, or enforcement officer, need do is to record everyone within electronic reach. Soon, I predict, all they'll have to do is apply to the NSA, or whatever Federal entity has become the repository, to access phone, email and Internet files on anyone "of interest." That's why everyone's online (and cloud) records are being recorded in the massive surveillance program initiated by the NSA. The justification: to intercept any terrorists before they act.
Stalin gained power by controlling information about everyone; people need to wrest that power back. And this is an issue where both fringes could/should collaborate. Tea Partiers hate the idea of government surveillance as much as lefties.
Unless "the fringes" can come together in resistance, there is no escape. Republicans and Democrats are equally implicated in the Surveillance State. Democratic Senator Feinstein and President Obama are as much a part of it as Bush II, Cheney and Senator McCain. The renewal--and strengthening--of the NDAA in December demonstrates this.
In the Fifth Century Empire, Roman Senators and German generals collaborated in controlling and repressing the humiliores.
With powers of surveillance and manipulation of information greater than Stalin ever dreamed of, the modern American state soon will leave no room for real dissent. That could be its downfall, just like the Stalinist state before it.
Like the USSR's failed New Lands wheat projects, the US plunges into fracking, oil sands and nuclear, while the rest of the world pushes ahead with solar, wind and bio-fuel alternatives.
We'll decline, driven by government-corporate induced blindness. Others will rise--if there is any livable environment left.
Our two party system has been described as a duopoly, and when you look at the Obama/McConnell/Reid/Boehner compromise over "the fiscal cliff," you see that it is.
Remaining on the right, are the angry Tea Partiers, who distrust government in all its forms, though they're not unwilling to rip it off. Remaining on the left are forlorn progressives, who yearn for a government they can trust: they see one that's only protecting the "One Percent."
Both fringes attempt to push government more to their liking, but the duopoly has other plans: it's owned by the corporations: the banks, oil companies, media and more.
The anger among Tea Partiers is genuine, but the billionaire lobby, from astro-turf roots to media campaigns, to think tank creations, contrives its targets.
Anger on the left is at least as real, but its targets are scattered. Their anger focuses on exploitation, of, by and for the corporations, but also on government and military-style repression: they have little money behind them.
We don't have a Fourth Amendment any longer: unlawful search and seizure has been pushed aside by Terrorism and Drugs. All a local prosecutor, or enforcement officer, need do is to record everyone within electronic reach. Soon, I predict, all they'll have to do is apply to the NSA, or whatever Federal entity has become the repository, to access phone, email and Internet files on anyone "of interest." That's why everyone's online (and cloud) records are being recorded in the massive surveillance program initiated by the NSA. The justification: to intercept any terrorists before they act.
Stalin gained power by controlling information about everyone; people need to wrest that power back. And this is an issue where both fringes could/should collaborate. Tea Partiers hate the idea of government surveillance as much as lefties.
Unless "the fringes" can come together in resistance, there is no escape. Republicans and Democrats are equally implicated in the Surveillance State. Democratic Senator Feinstein and President Obama are as much a part of it as Bush II, Cheney and Senator McCain. The renewal--and strengthening--of the NDAA in December demonstrates this.
In the Fifth Century Empire, Roman Senators and German generals collaborated in controlling and repressing the humiliores.
With powers of surveillance and manipulation of information greater than Stalin ever dreamed of, the modern American state soon will leave no room for real dissent. That could be its downfall, just like the Stalinist state before it.
Like the USSR's failed New Lands wheat projects, the US plunges into fracking, oil sands and nuclear, while the rest of the world pushes ahead with solar, wind and bio-fuel alternatives.
We'll decline, driven by government-corporate induced blindness. Others will rise--if there is any livable environment left.
Friday, January 4, 2013
Black Panthers = Occupy = Terrorists?
Some of us remember Fred Hampton. He was a Black Panther in Chicago, a rising personality in the Black Panther Party when he was murdered. He was murdered by a tactical unit of the Cook County's Attorney General's office, in an attack planned and initiated by the FBI.
Dangerous, we were told, shooting back when the police raided, at 3 AM. Actually, a Black Panther, who was on watch, fired only one shot. He shot it reflexively, in his death throes. Fred Hampton was shot four times in the head, while he slept, drugged by an informant.
Hoover had it in for the Panthers. He ordered Cointelpro to go after them regardless of any facts: he was sure they were violent revolutionaries who threatened the nation--uppity blacks with their free schools and their breakfast program for hungry youth in the ghettos.
Now, FOIA's provided to the Partnership For Civil Justice Fund have revealed that the FBI was about to do it again, this time to Occupy activists. Only this time, they were going to assassinate leaders--not that there were any--with snipers! The plot was never carried out, but it clearly was in the planning stages. Why?
This was in 2011, when Occupy was just beginning and was primarily 'occupying Wall Street.' In the memos, they treat the protesters as if they were potential terrorists, or revolutionaries. Hoover, remember, was concerned that the Black Panther Party was going to foment a revolution for radical change.
Did FBI agents in the hierarchy see the Occupiers as similarly threatening? The BPP had been armed; it had emerged, at least in part, from violence in the black ghettos, so guns were to be expected. But the OWS was largely white, even middle class, and except for the black bloc, determinedly non-violent.
Yet, the FBI was going to kill the leaders "via suppressed sniper rifles." Later, it seems clear, there was a nationally coordinated effort, probably at least aided by the FBI, to close down the encampments, peacefully or not.
Again, why?
Occupy popularized consciousness of the extreme inequality of wealth growing in the US. It also protested the bailouts that aided Wall Street and few others. Their ideas were potentially revolutionary, but they had no revolutionary program; they had no program, at all.
Still, the FBI saw them as such a threat that they were going to assassinate the leaders!
Some Occupiers spoke of revolution: we had an activist stay with us for four days too long, but their ideas were for the kind of non-violent change that made sense--unless you felt the wealthy must be defended at all costs.
The FBI plotting reveals which people they're really defending: it ain't you and me. It's America's Roman Senators, the wealthy: Occupy identified them as "the One Percent."
Maybe their protectors are pulling Obama's strings, too. That might explain a lot. In fifth century Rome, miscreants were slowly burned alive--as a warning.
Dangerous, we were told, shooting back when the police raided, at 3 AM. Actually, a Black Panther, who was on watch, fired only one shot. He shot it reflexively, in his death throes. Fred Hampton was shot four times in the head, while he slept, drugged by an informant.
Hoover had it in for the Panthers. He ordered Cointelpro to go after them regardless of any facts: he was sure they were violent revolutionaries who threatened the nation--uppity blacks with their free schools and their breakfast program for hungry youth in the ghettos.
Now, FOIA's provided to the Partnership For Civil Justice Fund have revealed that the FBI was about to do it again, this time to Occupy activists. Only this time, they were going to assassinate leaders--not that there were any--with snipers! The plot was never carried out, but it clearly was in the planning stages. Why?
This was in 2011, when Occupy was just beginning and was primarily 'occupying Wall Street.' In the memos, they treat the protesters as if they were potential terrorists, or revolutionaries. Hoover, remember, was concerned that the Black Panther Party was going to foment a revolution for radical change.
Did FBI agents in the hierarchy see the Occupiers as similarly threatening? The BPP had been armed; it had emerged, at least in part, from violence in the black ghettos, so guns were to be expected. But the OWS was largely white, even middle class, and except for the black bloc, determinedly non-violent.
Yet, the FBI was going to kill the leaders "via suppressed sniper rifles." Later, it seems clear, there was a nationally coordinated effort, probably at least aided by the FBI, to close down the encampments, peacefully or not.
Again, why?
Occupy popularized consciousness of the extreme inequality of wealth growing in the US. It also protested the bailouts that aided Wall Street and few others. Their ideas were potentially revolutionary, but they had no revolutionary program; they had no program, at all.
Still, the FBI saw them as such a threat that they were going to assassinate the leaders!
Some Occupiers spoke of revolution: we had an activist stay with us for four days too long, but their ideas were for the kind of non-violent change that made sense--unless you felt the wealthy must be defended at all costs.
The FBI plotting reveals which people they're really defending: it ain't you and me. It's America's Roman Senators, the wealthy: Occupy identified them as "the One Percent."
Maybe their protectors are pulling Obama's strings, too. That might explain a lot. In fifth century Rome, miscreants were slowly burned alive--as a warning.
Wednesday, January 2, 2013
Falling For The Cliff
The "fiscal cliff" was a contrivance Democrats and Republicans, Obama and Boehner/McConnell, all thought would work for them. It should have worked for Obama and the Democrats.
Obama won reelection convincingly, and his most salient deficit-cutting issue was raising taxes on the wealthy with incomes over $250,000. That was part of his proposal to reduce the deficit with proper balance between expenditure cuts and revenue increases. Polls showed high levels of support. So, why did he give in to Republicans at all?
Sure, the Biden/McConnell tentative agreement is an admission by Republican Senators that they are on the wrong side of the tax issue, unemployment insurance extensions and low-income enhancers like the Earned Income Tax Credit.
On the other hand, for Democrats, trying to avoid the 'fiscal cliff' was bad strategy, because allowing tax increases to go up temporarily would have increased Obama's leverage: the no-tax-hike GOP can be assailed for opposing tax cuts, if the deadline of the fiscal cliff really passes with no agreement. Isn't it more plausible that they'd vote for tax cuts to everyone with incomes below $250,000, instead of raising taxes on the wealthy? They wouldn't even break the Norquist no-tax-hike pledge. And people wouldn't blame them for a stalemate, which growing numbers of people--and financial rating institutions--will do if they don't go along.
But, no, Obama, after months campaigning on the $250,000 figure, opens his latest bid with raising the rate to $400,000, a position Speaker Boehner had taken less than a month before.
Obama has already sounded conciliatory about cutting Social Security benefits--through adjusting the Cost of Living--yet Social Security is self-funding and its surpluses have financed some of the deficits for a long time. He's tried out cuts to Medicare eligibility, but Medicare proponents--Democratic activists--through much pressure, have persuaded him to withdraw the proposal.
Why doesn't he, or other Democrats, propose cuts to oil and coal subsidies? We have no business continuing to promote these polluters in the face of accelerating global warming.
Obama and "moderate" Democrats are either afraid of the money big oil, banks, etc. can wield against them, or they’ve been bought out by it. The same could be said of "defense" expenditures: no one spends anywhere near as much as we do on military and surveillance, yet neither Democrats nor Republicans see the mandated Pentagon cuts as an opportunity.
The US, through its dysfunctional politics and polarization, its obeisance to status quo interests and its fear of crossing capitalists, is leading the world to a violent conflagration brought on by increasingly disruptive climate change. Capitalists, said Lenin, will sell you the rope to hang them.
In fifth-century Rome, Senators even bought the rope, and applied it to their own necks.
Obama won reelection convincingly, and his most salient deficit-cutting issue was raising taxes on the wealthy with incomes over $250,000. That was part of his proposal to reduce the deficit with proper balance between expenditure cuts and revenue increases. Polls showed high levels of support. So, why did he give in to Republicans at all?
Sure, the Biden/McConnell tentative agreement is an admission by Republican Senators that they are on the wrong side of the tax issue, unemployment insurance extensions and low-income enhancers like the Earned Income Tax Credit.
On the other hand, for Democrats, trying to avoid the 'fiscal cliff' was bad strategy, because allowing tax increases to go up temporarily would have increased Obama's leverage: the no-tax-hike GOP can be assailed for opposing tax cuts, if the deadline of the fiscal cliff really passes with no agreement. Isn't it more plausible that they'd vote for tax cuts to everyone with incomes below $250,000, instead of raising taxes on the wealthy? They wouldn't even break the Norquist no-tax-hike pledge. And people wouldn't blame them for a stalemate, which growing numbers of people--and financial rating institutions--will do if they don't go along.
But, no, Obama, after months campaigning on the $250,000 figure, opens his latest bid with raising the rate to $400,000, a position Speaker Boehner had taken less than a month before.
Obama has already sounded conciliatory about cutting Social Security benefits--through adjusting the Cost of Living--yet Social Security is self-funding and its surpluses have financed some of the deficits for a long time. He's tried out cuts to Medicare eligibility, but Medicare proponents--Democratic activists--through much pressure, have persuaded him to withdraw the proposal.
Why doesn't he, or other Democrats, propose cuts to oil and coal subsidies? We have no business continuing to promote these polluters in the face of accelerating global warming.
Obama and "moderate" Democrats are either afraid of the money big oil, banks, etc. can wield against them, or they’ve been bought out by it. The same could be said of "defense" expenditures: no one spends anywhere near as much as we do on military and surveillance, yet neither Democrats nor Republicans see the mandated Pentagon cuts as an opportunity.
The US, through its dysfunctional politics and polarization, its obeisance to status quo interests and its fear of crossing capitalists, is leading the world to a violent conflagration brought on by increasingly disruptive climate change. Capitalists, said Lenin, will sell you the rope to hang them.
In fifth-century Rome, Senators even bought the rope, and applied it to their own necks.
Thursday, December 27, 2012
Christmas: Wealth Flows Up Not Down
Even the first governments redistributed wealth: in Mesopotamia and Egypt, the people who worked the land were not the ones who accumulated the surplus wealth produced (wealth above subsistence). The governments--and the priests--extracted the wealth for their own enjoyment. As a rationale for doing so, they "protected" society and maintained order.
It still works that way. In the US, approximately half of all discretionary funds are spent on "security," and much of the proceeds go to a small elite, who run or own large corporations especially created to profit from the business of "security." Their friends in the financial sector arrange to siphon off perhaps half of the rest of the surplus wealth created. How do they do it: by buying off the powers-that-be.
My conservative Venezuelan uncle used to explain that American oil-men preferred to work with the dictatorship (of which my family had been a prosperous part), because they didn't have to buy off as many people as they do in a "democracy."
True democracy hasn't been possible since societies emerged from hunting and gathering. With agriculture, with empires, with armies, with currency, some people always find ways to steal everyone else's surplus wealth: in hunting and gathering societies there was no surplus, or it was small enough to be given away. That's why the indigenous Americans of the Northwest, practiced the potlatch: surplus riches were distributed at potlatch parties, so no one would become obscenely wealthy.
In the US today, some people are obscenely wealthy, like Mitt Romney. What we need is something like the potlatch, so that surplus wealth can benefit everyone, not just a tiny few.
When the Roman Empire held sway, there was a highly compensated bureaucracy, but an even wealthier Senatorial class--as well as impoverished plebeians and slaves, the latter doing most of the work. Julius Caesar was heavily in debt until he conquered Gaul; then he became the wealthiest Roman of all.
Long before the western Roman Empire fell in 476, men with swords and armor carried off most of the wealth. The Huns, highly successful for a time in pillaging both Empires; paid no taxes to Attila, but then their king only led them to the spoil; they shared it with him, of course, and his share was mind-boggling.
Now, we have a tax and financial system that ingeniously insures that a tiny percentage of the population carries off most of the surplus wealth. The elites work hard to siphon off government's rewards and society's spoils: like buying off Pennsylvania's government so that they could gain eminent domain over fracking sites: the people are powerless to stop them. Money to the Defense complex and most other government "services" are also huge sources of profit--for a few.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year: you have been so generous to the 1%: it is better to give than to receive.
It still works that way. In the US, approximately half of all discretionary funds are spent on "security," and much of the proceeds go to a small elite, who run or own large corporations especially created to profit from the business of "security." Their friends in the financial sector arrange to siphon off perhaps half of the rest of the surplus wealth created. How do they do it: by buying off the powers-that-be.
My conservative Venezuelan uncle used to explain that American oil-men preferred to work with the dictatorship (of which my family had been a prosperous part), because they didn't have to buy off as many people as they do in a "democracy."
True democracy hasn't been possible since societies emerged from hunting and gathering. With agriculture, with empires, with armies, with currency, some people always find ways to steal everyone else's surplus wealth: in hunting and gathering societies there was no surplus, or it was small enough to be given away. That's why the indigenous Americans of the Northwest, practiced the potlatch: surplus riches were distributed at potlatch parties, so no one would become obscenely wealthy.
In the US today, some people are obscenely wealthy, like Mitt Romney. What we need is something like the potlatch, so that surplus wealth can benefit everyone, not just a tiny few.
When the Roman Empire held sway, there was a highly compensated bureaucracy, but an even wealthier Senatorial class--as well as impoverished plebeians and slaves, the latter doing most of the work. Julius Caesar was heavily in debt until he conquered Gaul; then he became the wealthiest Roman of all.
Long before the western Roman Empire fell in 476, men with swords and armor carried off most of the wealth. The Huns, highly successful for a time in pillaging both Empires; paid no taxes to Attila, but then their king only led them to the spoil; they shared it with him, of course, and his share was mind-boggling.
Now, we have a tax and financial system that ingeniously insures that a tiny percentage of the population carries off most of the surplus wealth. The elites work hard to siphon off government's rewards and society's spoils: like buying off Pennsylvania's government so that they could gain eminent domain over fracking sites: the people are powerless to stop them. Money to the Defense complex and most other government "services" are also huge sources of profit--for a few.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year: you have been so generous to the 1%: it is better to give than to receive.
Friday, December 21, 2012
US House: No One In Charge
Never raise taxes!
The GOP caucus in the House of Representatives will only be mollified if taxes on the wealthy are cut even more. Further, to reduce Government debt, they demand most cuts to the budget have to come from non-Defense spending, especially programs like Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, Obamacare and food stamps (SNAP) that benefit the middle class and poor, but are unnecessary to the wealthy.
No one seems to be in charge in the House. Speaker Boehner's odious "Plan B," which would have been unacceptable to Democrats and the President, was an attempt to mollify the right-wing extremists in the GOP; still, it didn't pass Boehner's own caucus: it raised taxes on millionaires.
No one is in charge. The President's re-election, an increase in the Democratic minority in the House and of its majority in the Senate, makes no difference within the Republican caucus. This is because the House majority won convincingly in their gerrymandered districts (drawn by state majorities won in the Republican landslide of 2010). Despite receiving fewer votes overall than Democratic Congressional candidates, GOP Congressmen fear, not Democrats--their districts were drawn to be majority Republican--but members of their own party "primarying" them from the right, if they don't follow an extreme right-wing agenda. That means cutting taxes on the wealthy and sticking it to the people Romney tried to stigmatize as the dependent 47% (more like 52%).
The House majority of a majority therefore refuses to compromise, because they'd lose next time round to right-wing challengers if they did. A more moderate majority--of Democrats and pragmatic Republicans--might exist in the House, in theory. However, the majority's leadership controls the House's business, and it's likely that Boehner would block a pragmatic bipartisan majority's proposals from a vote--unless he's willing to risk his Speakership for real statesmanship. That's unlikely.
Therefore, an ideological minority (the House GOP caucus majority) refuses, as of 12/20/12, to allow any tax increases on the wealthy and won't back down from demanding large cuts to social programs, either. So, we could start sliding down the fiscal slope.
Radical Republicans appear truly determined to replay what happened in the Roman Senate in 476, when Roman Senators refused to raise taxes on themselves, and preferred to allow the takeover of the German (Ostrogothic) palace guard. That precipitated the Fall of Rome.
In 2013, taxes will automatically go up--for everyone. Then, if Republicans don't agree to cut taxes on everyone but the wealthy, they will probably cause a renewed recession. Yet, they were the ones who demanded this so-called "fiscal cliff" to cut the debt. Under that default plan, there would be more cuts to the Pentagon than to domestic spending, and entitlements wouldn't be touched. That's why I hope there isn't a bipartisan "grand bargain," except on the above tax "cuts."
Either Republicans have slashed their own throats, or everyone else's as well: welcome to European-style austerity and recession.
The GOP caucus in the House of Representatives will only be mollified if taxes on the wealthy are cut even more. Further, to reduce Government debt, they demand most cuts to the budget have to come from non-Defense spending, especially programs like Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, Obamacare and food stamps (SNAP) that benefit the middle class and poor, but are unnecessary to the wealthy.
No one seems to be in charge in the House. Speaker Boehner's odious "Plan B," which would have been unacceptable to Democrats and the President, was an attempt to mollify the right-wing extremists in the GOP; still, it didn't pass Boehner's own caucus: it raised taxes on millionaires.
No one is in charge. The President's re-election, an increase in the Democratic minority in the House and of its majority in the Senate, makes no difference within the Republican caucus. This is because the House majority won convincingly in their gerrymandered districts (drawn by state majorities won in the Republican landslide of 2010). Despite receiving fewer votes overall than Democratic Congressional candidates, GOP Congressmen fear, not Democrats--their districts were drawn to be majority Republican--but members of their own party "primarying" them from the right, if they don't follow an extreme right-wing agenda. That means cutting taxes on the wealthy and sticking it to the people Romney tried to stigmatize as the dependent 47% (more like 52%).
The House majority of a majority therefore refuses to compromise, because they'd lose next time round to right-wing challengers if they did. A more moderate majority--of Democrats and pragmatic Republicans--might exist in the House, in theory. However, the majority's leadership controls the House's business, and it's likely that Boehner would block a pragmatic bipartisan majority's proposals from a vote--unless he's willing to risk his Speakership for real statesmanship. That's unlikely.
Therefore, an ideological minority (the House GOP caucus majority) refuses, as of 12/20/12, to allow any tax increases on the wealthy and won't back down from demanding large cuts to social programs, either. So, we could start sliding down the fiscal slope.
Radical Republicans appear truly determined to replay what happened in the Roman Senate in 476, when Roman Senators refused to raise taxes on themselves, and preferred to allow the takeover of the German (Ostrogothic) palace guard. That precipitated the Fall of Rome.
In 2013, taxes will automatically go up--for everyone. Then, if Republicans don't agree to cut taxes on everyone but the wealthy, they will probably cause a renewed recession. Yet, they were the ones who demanded this so-called "fiscal cliff" to cut the debt. Under that default plan, there would be more cuts to the Pentagon than to domestic spending, and entitlements wouldn't be touched. That's why I hope there isn't a bipartisan "grand bargain," except on the above tax "cuts."
Either Republicans have slashed their own throats, or everyone else's as well: welcome to European-style austerity and recession.
Sunday, December 16, 2012
Shooters, Drones and Video Games
Is the world going crazy?
Killing children is not so unusual in this modern world of ours. It hasn't just happened in Connecticut. It's happened in Syria, in Mexico, in the Congo; our drones kill children in Afghanistan--the Taliban kill them too--and also in America, in places like Columbine, Colorado--and Newtown Connecticut.
Can you imagine going haywire and killing defenseless kindergartners and first graders cowering before you?
But someone did, after killing his mother--and then, appropriately, killed himself. Too bad, he didn't do that first.
What's American about this story: the killer was armed with two, legally acquired, large magazine, semi-automatic pistols and an assault rifle. That's why so many could be killed in minutes. And then there's the likely influence of video games, a favored pastime of the shooter; there are no plots, no heroes, only anonymous fighters: about as moral as the Roman "games" at the Coliseum.
Modern life can create unbearable stress. Industrial noise builds stress; not knowing what you're supposed to be doing, not able even to find a job is high stress and it's stressful when you can't pay what you owe. There are people who have a low threshold for breaking from stress. In retrospect, we call them crazy: the whole society is going crazy. Fast.
It's crazy that we can't control guns and that even after the Newtown massacre, President Obama can't say the words "gun control," when he mourns the dead children.
It's crazy that we have a health care system in which we can't even talk about government negotiating Medicare prescription drug prices, even when Republicans talk of "reining in entitlement spending." And we still have insurer-dominated health care, even with Obamacare.
It's crazy that in a time of high unemployment and fragile recovery, when bond prices are high and interest rates are low, that the national dialogue is about a supposed fiscal cliff. The government should be spending, and promoting jobs, not cutting them. Cutting is appropriate once you have full employment, not before. Then, cutting spending prevents an overheated economy.
In a crazy world, you can smoke a joint in Colorado, or Washington state, but it's illegal, say the feds, for someone to sell it to you.
It's legal to have an abortion, but providers are harassed out of business, (or killed) and women are legally deceived, or blocked by onerous regulations contrived by the party that inveighs--against government regulation!
Our stress may be higher than for Romans when the world was falling apart in the fifth century and war bands roved the land, but video games give twisted people a model for action: kill everyone in sight.
The Coliseum's games taught Romans to tolerate violence; with video games, you learn to participate without a moral qualm. Remote drone pilots, many likely former video gamers, share that background with the Newtown shooter.
Killing children is not so unusual in this modern world of ours. It hasn't just happened in Connecticut. It's happened in Syria, in Mexico, in the Congo; our drones kill children in Afghanistan--the Taliban kill them too--and also in America, in places like Columbine, Colorado--and Newtown Connecticut.
Can you imagine going haywire and killing defenseless kindergartners and first graders cowering before you?
But someone did, after killing his mother--and then, appropriately, killed himself. Too bad, he didn't do that first.
What's American about this story: the killer was armed with two, legally acquired, large magazine, semi-automatic pistols and an assault rifle. That's why so many could be killed in minutes. And then there's the likely influence of video games, a favored pastime of the shooter; there are no plots, no heroes, only anonymous fighters: about as moral as the Roman "games" at the Coliseum.
Modern life can create unbearable stress. Industrial noise builds stress; not knowing what you're supposed to be doing, not able even to find a job is high stress and it's stressful when you can't pay what you owe. There are people who have a low threshold for breaking from stress. In retrospect, we call them crazy: the whole society is going crazy. Fast.
It's crazy that we can't control guns and that even after the Newtown massacre, President Obama can't say the words "gun control," when he mourns the dead children.
It's crazy that we have a health care system in which we can't even talk about government negotiating Medicare prescription drug prices, even when Republicans talk of "reining in entitlement spending." And we still have insurer-dominated health care, even with Obamacare.
It's crazy that in a time of high unemployment and fragile recovery, when bond prices are high and interest rates are low, that the national dialogue is about a supposed fiscal cliff. The government should be spending, and promoting jobs, not cutting them. Cutting is appropriate once you have full employment, not before. Then, cutting spending prevents an overheated economy.
In a crazy world, you can smoke a joint in Colorado, or Washington state, but it's illegal, say the feds, for someone to sell it to you.
It's legal to have an abortion, but providers are harassed out of business, (or killed) and women are legally deceived, or blocked by onerous regulations contrived by the party that inveighs--against government regulation!
Our stress may be higher than for Romans when the world was falling apart in the fifth century and war bands roved the land, but video games give twisted people a model for action: kill everyone in sight.
The Coliseum's games taught Romans to tolerate violence; with video games, you learn to participate without a moral qualm. Remote drone pilots, many likely former video gamers, share that background with the Newtown shooter.
Monday, December 10, 2012
The Imperial Press
I've always thought we had a more or less free press, until I saw the MSM treatment of: Bradley Manning--and taxes!
Let's start with taxes. In the alarmist rhetoric of the "fiscal cliff" commentators, taxes on dividends are treated as if everyone earns them; if their tax rates go up to the same rates as earned income(!), then the bottom will fall out of the stock market; middle class people with 401K's will suffer along with billionaires. After all, they'll have to pay those higher taxes too.
But owners of 401Ks don't pay taxes on dividends their funds earn, although the funds do, so their investments might earn slightly less. But, the big losers, if taxes on dividends went up, would be the people paying the restored 39% rate. They'd pay it on their dividends, too, which is why, if capital gains were treated the same way, their tax rates would go up not from 35 to 39%, but from an effective tax rate of 15% or less, to one more comparable to what 'ordinary' people pay.
That's the idea. It not only would help pay off the deficits; it would lower income inequality. But the Media doesn't want ordinary Joe Blow to know that. Commentators want you to think these higher taxes will hit you 'ordinary' people especially hard.
The fiscal cliff was really an invention of the Tea Party Republicans to force government to shrink, favoring the wealthy. Obama, that 'poor' negotiator, locked them into a closet: to get out, they'll have to concede on higher taxes for the wealthy to avoid being tarred with raising taxes for everyone.
If Republicans want to protect their favorite charity--the military--they could be pressured to give up even more, like those favored tax-rates on dividends and capital gains, even Romney's carried interest.
Are there enough progressive Democrats to push that far, especially given the MSM's conservative corporatist bias on tax issues?
Another media bias is harder to see: it often is carried out by an absence of coverage, as in Bradley Manning, Wikileaks, et al. Here is a whistleblower with global impact, and he's treated like a terrorist and held incommunicado for almost two years, before he's allowed to speak. And then the media hardly covers him, or Assange, or Wikileaks, which revealed more embarrassing state secrets, and gave newspapers more issues to write/pontificate about for months than any other source. It showed how petty and conniving most governments are--especially the United States.
That's not terrorism. Was the boy who yelled: "The Emperor has no clothes!" a terrorist, or a truth teller?
A free press? We have a press dedicated to maintaining the American Empire and its prime supporters--and beneficiaries--the very wealthy. In Fifth Century Rome, the Emperor and Roman Senators had panegyrists, too.
Let's start with taxes. In the alarmist rhetoric of the "fiscal cliff" commentators, taxes on dividends are treated as if everyone earns them; if their tax rates go up to the same rates as earned income(!), then the bottom will fall out of the stock market; middle class people with 401K's will suffer along with billionaires. After all, they'll have to pay those higher taxes too.
But owners of 401Ks don't pay taxes on dividends their funds earn, although the funds do, so their investments might earn slightly less. But, the big losers, if taxes on dividends went up, would be the people paying the restored 39% rate. They'd pay it on their dividends, too, which is why, if capital gains were treated the same way, their tax rates would go up not from 35 to 39%, but from an effective tax rate of 15% or less, to one more comparable to what 'ordinary' people pay.
That's the idea. It not only would help pay off the deficits; it would lower income inequality. But the Media doesn't want ordinary Joe Blow to know that. Commentators want you to think these higher taxes will hit you 'ordinary' people especially hard.
The fiscal cliff was really an invention of the Tea Party Republicans to force government to shrink, favoring the wealthy. Obama, that 'poor' negotiator, locked them into a closet: to get out, they'll have to concede on higher taxes for the wealthy to avoid being tarred with raising taxes for everyone.
If Republicans want to protect their favorite charity--the military--they could be pressured to give up even more, like those favored tax-rates on dividends and capital gains, even Romney's carried interest.
Are there enough progressive Democrats to push that far, especially given the MSM's conservative corporatist bias on tax issues?
Another media bias is harder to see: it often is carried out by an absence of coverage, as in Bradley Manning, Wikileaks, et al. Here is a whistleblower with global impact, and he's treated like a terrorist and held incommunicado for almost two years, before he's allowed to speak. And then the media hardly covers him, or Assange, or Wikileaks, which revealed more embarrassing state secrets, and gave newspapers more issues to write/pontificate about for months than any other source. It showed how petty and conniving most governments are--especially the United States.
That's not terrorism. Was the boy who yelled: "The Emperor has no clothes!" a terrorist, or a truth teller?
A free press? We have a press dedicated to maintaining the American Empire and its prime supporters--and beneficiaries--the very wealthy. In Fifth Century Rome, the Emperor and Roman Senators had panegyrists, too.
Wednesday, November 28, 2012
The Fiscal Slope
It really isn't a cliff; most people don't pay taxes in January; Congress will have time to fix things after the first of the year and has often written tax and spending bills that are retroactive.
One of the advantages of delay is that a "tax increase" on Dec. 31st, i.e. not extending Bush tax cuts, becomes an opportunity for "tax cuts" on January 1st. The Obama/Democratic program of maintaining the lower tax rates for the middle class, becomes "tax cuts" in January. The higher rates, for those with incomes over $250,000, does not become a tax increase: it would simply remain as part of the agreement reached between Congress and the President, as part of the bargain to cut the deficit and debt. The Republican House agreed to this as the fall-back position for cutting the deficit.
This whole "cut the deficit" mania came from the Tea Party caucus in the House: it's miss-timed. The Great Recession has driven most of the current deficit by stimulus and aid to people in distress, and collecting less revenue because fewer people are working.
The whole mechanism of government spending more in a recession in order to ameliorate misery, despite revenue shortfalls, was an innovation of the New Deal. It's not surprising that reactionary Republicans want to repeal the practice.
Consider what would have happened if we'd adopted the balanced budget amendment long advocated by "fiscal conservatives": as revenue went down in the financial collapse of 2008, government would have been required either to raise taxes on those still working, and/or to cut expenditures--on food stamps, schools and everything else, even Defense. The result would have been an ever deeper, broader and self-reinforcing hole in the economy and mass misery. Today we'd still be in a deep depression with no way to dig ourselves out. We'd be in worse shape than Europe.
Once we've spent enough to create jobs (and hopefully to restructure the economy), then is the time to raise taxes on those who currently can't afford it, or to find other ways to balance the books: now is not that time; the economy is still too fragile and too many people are still out of work.
However, to avoid the so-called cliff, to begin to reduce the deficits in ways the nation can afford, raising taxes on high income earners makes sense. They do not "create jobs," from their rising incomes. The corporations they own will hire when there is demand for the goods and services they produce. Not before. High-income earners have garnered almost all the increased wealth since the start of the Great Recession: they are largely sitting on it, or investing it elsewhere.
The Republican insistence on lower tax rates for the wealthy is like the Roman Senate in 476 refusing to raise their taxes to pay the Ostrogoth palace guard. That action precipitated the "fall of Rome."
One of the advantages of delay is that a "tax increase" on Dec. 31st, i.e. not extending Bush tax cuts, becomes an opportunity for "tax cuts" on January 1st. The Obama/Democratic program of maintaining the lower tax rates for the middle class, becomes "tax cuts" in January. The higher rates, for those with incomes over $250,000, does not become a tax increase: it would simply remain as part of the agreement reached between Congress and the President, as part of the bargain to cut the deficit and debt. The Republican House agreed to this as the fall-back position for cutting the deficit.
This whole "cut the deficit" mania came from the Tea Party caucus in the House: it's miss-timed. The Great Recession has driven most of the current deficit by stimulus and aid to people in distress, and collecting less revenue because fewer people are working.
The whole mechanism of government spending more in a recession in order to ameliorate misery, despite revenue shortfalls, was an innovation of the New Deal. It's not surprising that reactionary Republicans want to repeal the practice.
Consider what would have happened if we'd adopted the balanced budget amendment long advocated by "fiscal conservatives": as revenue went down in the financial collapse of 2008, government would have been required either to raise taxes on those still working, and/or to cut expenditures--on food stamps, schools and everything else, even Defense. The result would have been an ever deeper, broader and self-reinforcing hole in the economy and mass misery. Today we'd still be in a deep depression with no way to dig ourselves out. We'd be in worse shape than Europe.
Once we've spent enough to create jobs (and hopefully to restructure the economy), then is the time to raise taxes on those who currently can't afford it, or to find other ways to balance the books: now is not that time; the economy is still too fragile and too many people are still out of work.
However, to avoid the so-called cliff, to begin to reduce the deficits in ways the nation can afford, raising taxes on high income earners makes sense. They do not "create jobs," from their rising incomes. The corporations they own will hire when there is demand for the goods and services they produce. Not before. High-income earners have garnered almost all the increased wealth since the start of the Great Recession: they are largely sitting on it, or investing it elsewhere.
The Republican insistence on lower tax rates for the wealthy is like the Roman Senate in 476 refusing to raise their taxes to pay the Ostrogoth palace guard. That action precipitated the "fall of Rome."
Monday, November 19, 2012
O'Reilly & Romney on "Gifts and Stuff"
Has anyone else noticed: the line Romney handed his donors--and via a surreptitious recording, the rest of the American people--is the same trotted out on Election night, not by Romney, but by Bill O'Reilly on Fox News. It was O'Reilly who blithered on first about why the election was going Obama's way: those "gifts and stuff" Obama had given out to blacks, Hispanics, women, the poor and the middle class.
Romney was simply parroting the nastiness of Fox News and then going further to all but say that 52% of the electorate was dependent on government largess, so of course they voted for Obama. What's a poor powerless multi-multi-millionaire going to do?
Is the Romney-O'Reilly contention true?
What is this "stuff"? Both O'Reilly and Romney speak as if these were bribes given to greedy people, in order for them to vote for Obama. However, when they mention specifics, what do they list: immigration reform, contraception for women, same-sex marriage and higher taxes for, er, "job creators". Unmentioned, except in the Republican primaries was the expansion of Food Stamps (officially SNAP), which has become critical to survival for a lot of people chronically unemployed.
Are these bribes, or are these policy intentions? Immigration reform is something this country has needed for a long time, since it's estimated we have 12 million illegal aliens living in the shadows, and a lot of hiring "under the table," which may work to employers' advantage, but is not a sustainable policy. Is immigration reform a "gift," or is it a needed reform of a broken system?
What is democracy, anyway? Some conservative wags have suggested that Rove and Adelson would have been better off just distributing the money they spent for political ads on directly buying votes. Hah hah.
Same-sex marriage has become something a majority of people feel is justified. So, is Obama's endorsement of it a gift, or a response to changing cultural attitudes?
Contraception for women, paid for by insurance in the ACA, may be seen by O'Reilly as a gift to unmarried women (who voted for Obama by a large margin), but contraception is necessary for women of childbearing age, in order for them to control their own lives. The subsidy means that poor women as well as wealthy ones can decide on their own. Republicans apparently want them "barefoot and pregnant."
So, "gifts" were Democrats offering substantive policies--and Republicans were offering what? God's blessing on a child of rape?
Fox News, it turns out, was giving Romney his lines. Fox is the perfect representative of the .001%, the media arm of our contemporary Roman Senatorial class. Romney's remark about the 47% was how he really thinks. Only now it's 52%, and aren't we lucky enough people knew this, or intuited it, that they didn't vote for this empty shirt!
Romney was simply parroting the nastiness of Fox News and then going further to all but say that 52% of the electorate was dependent on government largess, so of course they voted for Obama. What's a poor powerless multi-multi-millionaire going to do?
Is the Romney-O'Reilly contention true?
What is this "stuff"? Both O'Reilly and Romney speak as if these were bribes given to greedy people, in order for them to vote for Obama. However, when they mention specifics, what do they list: immigration reform, contraception for women, same-sex marriage and higher taxes for, er, "job creators". Unmentioned, except in the Republican primaries was the expansion of Food Stamps (officially SNAP), which has become critical to survival for a lot of people chronically unemployed.
Are these bribes, or are these policy intentions? Immigration reform is something this country has needed for a long time, since it's estimated we have 12 million illegal aliens living in the shadows, and a lot of hiring "under the table," which may work to employers' advantage, but is not a sustainable policy. Is immigration reform a "gift," or is it a needed reform of a broken system?
What is democracy, anyway? Some conservative wags have suggested that Rove and Adelson would have been better off just distributing the money they spent for political ads on directly buying votes. Hah hah.
Same-sex marriage has become something a majority of people feel is justified. So, is Obama's endorsement of it a gift, or a response to changing cultural attitudes?
Contraception for women, paid for by insurance in the ACA, may be seen by O'Reilly as a gift to unmarried women (who voted for Obama by a large margin), but contraception is necessary for women of childbearing age, in order for them to control their own lives. The subsidy means that poor women as well as wealthy ones can decide on their own. Republicans apparently want them "barefoot and pregnant."
So, "gifts" were Democrats offering substantive policies--and Republicans were offering what? God's blessing on a child of rape?
Fox News, it turns out, was giving Romney his lines. Fox is the perfect representative of the .001%, the media arm of our contemporary Roman Senatorial class. Romney's remark about the 47% was how he really thinks. Only now it's 52%, and aren't we lucky enough people knew this, or intuited it, that they didn't vote for this empty shirt!
Monday, November 12, 2012
Letter to a Right-Winger
Workers create value; employers organize a workplace, but only when there is demand for products/services: employers DO NOT CREATE JOBS. Governments create jobs more directly than most investors. And produce value, like census data, standard weights and measures, highways, civil peace, international stability. If you want to know what it's like without government, look at Somalia.
You need taxes to pay for collective values. People with wealth, and owners of businesses benefit more from these collective goods than those who live in ghettos, or under bridges. So, they should pay more. Currently, they don't pay their fair share.
The current tax system is more skewed in favor of the rich than it has been since the 1920's. The money created from economic growth should not all go to the investor, but 95% of all increased value since 2008 has gone to investors, not workers. Is that a fair distribution of value? When you tax, or even if you don't tax, you distribute wealth.
While employers may play some positive role in providing goods and services, investors are much less important, since there is an abundance of capital in the world. Why do you think interest rates can be kept so low? Investment should not be valued more highly than people's work, but that is exactly what our current tax system does. It's unjust (capital gains or "carried interest" at 15%, work: 20-35%). Our current system steals value from workers and transfers it to investors. That's Robin Hood in reverse, and that's what Obama proposes to undo.
If we continue along the same path of taxing investors lightly, then we'll end up like a Third World country with a small wealthy class and a poor, desperate class. Don't be surprised if we end up not with a moderate Obama, but with a revolutionary like Venezuela's Chavez, who gained political traction because of the extremes of wealth and poverty in Venezuela. My mother's family lives there behind doors that look like safe vaults!
In Sweden and Canada, people don't have to lock their doors even in Stockholm and Toronto, because those countries have fairer taxes and higher levels of equality.
Do you want people desperate, or relatively satisfied and willing to support the status quo? If you want stability and civil peace, you have to pay for it. If you have more, then you should pay more: you've benefited disproportionately. Does a black son of a waitress in a central city have your advantages? He struggles not because he's lazy, or stupid, but because our system intensifies his disadvantages; it should eliminate them.
Obama is no revolutionary Robin Hood; he's attempting to rectify a system that favors only a tiny proportion of the population. If that imbalance continues it will impoverish us all, not enrich us--except for the tiny few, like the Roman Senators of Fifth Century Rome prior to the Empire's collapse.
You need taxes to pay for collective values. People with wealth, and owners of businesses benefit more from these collective goods than those who live in ghettos, or under bridges. So, they should pay more. Currently, they don't pay their fair share.
The current tax system is more skewed in favor of the rich than it has been since the 1920's. The money created from economic growth should not all go to the investor, but 95% of all increased value since 2008 has gone to investors, not workers. Is that a fair distribution of value? When you tax, or even if you don't tax, you distribute wealth.
While employers may play some positive role in providing goods and services, investors are much less important, since there is an abundance of capital in the world. Why do you think interest rates can be kept so low? Investment should not be valued more highly than people's work, but that is exactly what our current tax system does. It's unjust (capital gains or "carried interest" at 15%, work: 20-35%). Our current system steals value from workers and transfers it to investors. That's Robin Hood in reverse, and that's what Obama proposes to undo.
If we continue along the same path of taxing investors lightly, then we'll end up like a Third World country with a small wealthy class and a poor, desperate class. Don't be surprised if we end up not with a moderate Obama, but with a revolutionary like Venezuela's Chavez, who gained political traction because of the extremes of wealth and poverty in Venezuela. My mother's family lives there behind doors that look like safe vaults!
In Sweden and Canada, people don't have to lock their doors even in Stockholm and Toronto, because those countries have fairer taxes and higher levels of equality.
Do you want people desperate, or relatively satisfied and willing to support the status quo? If you want stability and civil peace, you have to pay for it. If you have more, then you should pay more: you've benefited disproportionately. Does a black son of a waitress in a central city have your advantages? He struggles not because he's lazy, or stupid, but because our system intensifies his disadvantages; it should eliminate them.
Obama is no revolutionary Robin Hood; he's attempting to rectify a system that favors only a tiny proportion of the population. If that imbalance continues it will impoverish us all, not enrich us--except for the tiny few, like the Roman Senators of Fifth Century Rome prior to the Empire's collapse.
Thursday, November 8, 2012
We Won!
I remember when Harold, the school's maintenance man, came into the dining room as we kids were eating breakfast, and announced to my father: "We won!" The president re-elected was Truman, and the year was 1948.
Money didn't play such an outsized role in 1948 as it did in 2012, but the most important thing: "money," as the song goes, "doesn't buy you love." That was proven pretty decisively in 2012; money didn't buy love for Romney.
Tuesday night I stayed up until NBC declared Obama's victory--I didn't hear about Karl Rove's objections until the next afternoon. Obama really did win and it wasn't as close as Truman over Dewey.
Obama didn't campaign against a "do-nothing" Congress, but he could have; perhaps he should have. Considering Republican obstruction in Congress, it's extraordinary that Obama won on his accomplishments and his character--despite my evangelical friend's deeply held belief that Barack is the Antichrist.
What justifies Obama the Antichrist label? Maybe that he won? Or maybe that he's black, but doesn't act like a 'Yassuh, no Suh' N….., but as a powerful, articulate, well-educated man, who happens to be black.
Some now say Obama is a brilliant politician; I agree. But Obama's win, and that of the Democratic candidates who won a majority of Senate seats, despite the $100's of millions deployed against them, won because, in a democracy, numbers of voters ultimately prevail against raw cash. And Americans, like any people not cowed by authoritarianism, reacted to attempts to suppress them with impressive, stoic determination to push back and prevail. They may have voted in greater numbers than in the previous election when Republicans didn't so actively try to suppress the vote.
That's the strongest message and mandate in this election. Issues like global warming, collective bargaining rights and even inequality were often ignored by both sides--a defeat for democracy--but such a surge of money into the campaign (the money raised by billionaires and spent by "super-pacs"), encouraged Republicans to be more open and more aggressive about their extremist policies.
That was a good thing, because of the reaction: Americans reacted to the concerted effort to buy their votes through indirection, and they didn't like it. They turned out in droves in response to the attempts at voter suppression, and apparently ignored, or discounted, the negative ads flying nationwide. They may also have voted more decisively for Obama because of his real action in the face of Hurricane Sandy.
The day after the election, we still had a slowly diminishing empire, an artificially created "fiscal cliff," and need for a real stimulus to bolster jobs growth. And we still had Republican control of the House. But, for the moment, we've dodged the ultimate takeover of the selfish class, our equivalent of Roman Senators in the Fifth Century.
That's something to be thankful for.
Money didn't play such an outsized role in 1948 as it did in 2012, but the most important thing: "money," as the song goes, "doesn't buy you love." That was proven pretty decisively in 2012; money didn't buy love for Romney.
Tuesday night I stayed up until NBC declared Obama's victory--I didn't hear about Karl Rove's objections until the next afternoon. Obama really did win and it wasn't as close as Truman over Dewey.
Obama didn't campaign against a "do-nothing" Congress, but he could have; perhaps he should have. Considering Republican obstruction in Congress, it's extraordinary that Obama won on his accomplishments and his character--despite my evangelical friend's deeply held belief that Barack is the Antichrist.
What justifies Obama the Antichrist label? Maybe that he won? Or maybe that he's black, but doesn't act like a 'Yassuh, no Suh' N….., but as a powerful, articulate, well-educated man, who happens to be black.
Some now say Obama is a brilliant politician; I agree. But Obama's win, and that of the Democratic candidates who won a majority of Senate seats, despite the $100's of millions deployed against them, won because, in a democracy, numbers of voters ultimately prevail against raw cash. And Americans, like any people not cowed by authoritarianism, reacted to attempts to suppress them with impressive, stoic determination to push back and prevail. They may have voted in greater numbers than in the previous election when Republicans didn't so actively try to suppress the vote.
That's the strongest message and mandate in this election. Issues like global warming, collective bargaining rights and even inequality were often ignored by both sides--a defeat for democracy--but such a surge of money into the campaign (the money raised by billionaires and spent by "super-pacs"), encouraged Republicans to be more open and more aggressive about their extremist policies.
That was a good thing, because of the reaction: Americans reacted to the concerted effort to buy their votes through indirection, and they didn't like it. They turned out in droves in response to the attempts at voter suppression, and apparently ignored, or discounted, the negative ads flying nationwide. They may also have voted more decisively for Obama because of his real action in the face of Hurricane Sandy.
The day after the election, we still had a slowly diminishing empire, an artificially created "fiscal cliff," and need for a real stimulus to bolster jobs growth. And we still had Republican control of the House. But, for the moment, we've dodged the ultimate takeover of the selfish class, our equivalent of Roman Senators in the Fifth Century.
That's something to be thankful for.
Monday, November 5, 2012
Bribes Literal and Legal
I don't live in a battleground state, but Friday I received three unattributed flyers and another only identified as Republican by the micro-print postal stamp code: all were negative ads. One was against the incumbent Republican State Senator, possibly from the Independence Party; the Republican ad was against the Democratic challenger. The only TV ad I saw (I watch TV rarely) was also unlabeled, in lurid colors, against the Democratic Congressional challenger of the tea-flavored incumbent Congressman.
The Obama campaign has solicited my wife and I at least five times a day. Each. I have given small amounts several times and used Obama's phone tool; my wife has given more. Democratic Senatorial and Congressional candidates from Washington and Montana to New Mexico and Massachusetts have solicited me, plus at least five progressive Democratic organizations, and the DCCC, DGA and DSCC. That's only the political groups!
Occasionally, I've given really small amounts ($3.00) to Democratic groups or candidates, but it finally occurred to me: the whole campaign is an enormous business, a sector subset of Entertainment. I've encouraged them--I and all the other millions giving to both parties. But we don't get the kind of returns from the mega-bucks that billionaires "donate."
Neverthelss, I'm investing in the continued viability of Social Security, Medicare, and a universal right to health insurance: my investment will pay me back in kind if Obama wins. So will the aid programs for people in need, like fully funding Food Stamps and expanding grants to education. None of this makes me money; some save money for everyone. All maintain social stability.
Why does someone like Sheldon Adelson pledge to spend "whatever it takes," more than $100 million, to defeat Obama? What does he get out of it, if Romney wins? Adelson is under investigation and may be charged a felony: bribing Chinese officials with $600,000 to $1million, to set up gambling casinos in Macao, China's "autonomous" ex-Portuguese colony. He's likely violated the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act to build the largest gambling complex in the world. He could go to jail, or, he could have a new President, Romney, name an Attorney General who would find a way to dismiss the charges.
How much is that worth to a billionaire worth $25 billion, a good part of it from Macao?
If Obama wins, this should be a whole new source of revenue. An invigorated DOJ could search for other sources of income: Wall Street bankers, private fund speculators like Bain Capital: people gambling with other people's money for their own gain.
Maybe that's the kind of money politics we really need! Take Crime Out of the Suites--To Pay Our Debts. Expropriate ill-gotten wealth and fund services for people they squeezed it from.
That would make it politically possible to reverse the apparently inexorable rise of our contemporary Roman Senators: the super-rich who increasingly monopolize the wealth we all produce.
The Obama campaign has solicited my wife and I at least five times a day. Each. I have given small amounts several times and used Obama's phone tool; my wife has given more. Democratic Senatorial and Congressional candidates from Washington and Montana to New Mexico and Massachusetts have solicited me, plus at least five progressive Democratic organizations, and the DCCC, DGA and DSCC. That's only the political groups!
Occasionally, I've given really small amounts ($3.00) to Democratic groups or candidates, but it finally occurred to me: the whole campaign is an enormous business, a sector subset of Entertainment. I've encouraged them--I and all the other millions giving to both parties. But we don't get the kind of returns from the mega-bucks that billionaires "donate."
Neverthelss, I'm investing in the continued viability of Social Security, Medicare, and a universal right to health insurance: my investment will pay me back in kind if Obama wins. So will the aid programs for people in need, like fully funding Food Stamps and expanding grants to education. None of this makes me money; some save money for everyone. All maintain social stability.
Why does someone like Sheldon Adelson pledge to spend "whatever it takes," more than $100 million, to defeat Obama? What does he get out of it, if Romney wins? Adelson is under investigation and may be charged a felony: bribing Chinese officials with $600,000 to $1million, to set up gambling casinos in Macao, China's "autonomous" ex-Portuguese colony. He's likely violated the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act to build the largest gambling complex in the world. He could go to jail, or, he could have a new President, Romney, name an Attorney General who would find a way to dismiss the charges.
How much is that worth to a billionaire worth $25 billion, a good part of it from Macao?
If Obama wins, this should be a whole new source of revenue. An invigorated DOJ could search for other sources of income: Wall Street bankers, private fund speculators like Bain Capital: people gambling with other people's money for their own gain.
Maybe that's the kind of money politics we really need! Take Crime Out of the Suites--To Pay Our Debts. Expropriate ill-gotten wealth and fund services for people they squeezed it from.
That would make it politically possible to reverse the apparently inexorable rise of our contemporary Roman Senators: the super-rich who increasingly monopolize the wealth we all produce.
Tuesday, October 30, 2012
Frankenstorm and FrankenLeader
We lost power for about three hours, but were lucky: we lost only one large spruce far from the house.
It's tropical here (the eastern side), but this storm is not normal, dumping feet of snow on the western side. We now know: extreme weather is an effect of global warming.
Is this storm a plus for Romney? Or will it favor Obama?
Obama can be completely non-partisan and still look Presidential, managing the storm, and can make the case that his government works, unlike the response to Katrina: Bush treated FEMA as a dumping ground for cronies.
Obama doesn't have to say this, but others illuminate the difference, even if unintentionally. Republican Governor Chris Christie effusively thanked Obama for his help and concern for New Jersey and remarked on how well they worked together! Christie was the keynote speaker at the Republican convention, who gave Romney a tepid endorsement while inflating himself.
Romney, meanwhile, has slowed the pace of his campaign, and released an ad that is a complete fabrication against Obama, saying Chrysler was going to outsource Jeep production to China. Chrysler released a statement: the charge was false. Romney continues to run the ad!
The big question is: can the Romney campaign get away with lies like this, and simply ignore Chrysler's charges? Will voters finally see that Romney is willing to lie about virtually anything? Abortion: he was pro-choice running for Governor, but now advocates banning abortion with exceptions for rape, etc. Yet, his party platform bans abortion without exceptions. He lies about his tax plan, about his foreign policy, and he's willing to lie about documented facts. Can he get away with this because he looks so clean-cut--because he's not black?
Back to the storm: will Romney complain that FEMA is doing a lousy job because of Obama? Before he began to "re-draw" his program Romney advocated abolishing FEMA, leaving disaster relief to the states. Now, if/when critics bring that up, what will Romney say? FEMA has been doing a good job with Cyclone Sandy. It's likely he'll claim he never said that; he'll find some way to wiggle away from it.
Romney is a sociopath as are most Republican Party leaders. They have no scruples about changing their positions, according to the audience, or the flavor of the minute. If Romney is elected, we will face an unpredictable non-entity wielding power in the world's most powerful nation, backed by radical Republicans. Will he do what he said last, or what his "handlers" tell him?
The US and the world could face chaos: the empire could die of violent storms and foreign adventures, but Romney's fellow Roman Senators probably believe they could move to "pleasant places" elsewhere if Romney's policies wreck us. That didn't work in the Fifth Century: few of the western elite survived. Further, frankenstorms and violent weather aren't respecters of wealth: look at Manhattan!
Comments? Click below, scroll down.
It's tropical here (the eastern side), but this storm is not normal, dumping feet of snow on the western side. We now know: extreme weather is an effect of global warming.
Is this storm a plus for Romney? Or will it favor Obama?
Obama can be completely non-partisan and still look Presidential, managing the storm, and can make the case that his government works, unlike the response to Katrina: Bush treated FEMA as a dumping ground for cronies.
Obama doesn't have to say this, but others illuminate the difference, even if unintentionally. Republican Governor Chris Christie effusively thanked Obama for his help and concern for New Jersey and remarked on how well they worked together! Christie was the keynote speaker at the Republican convention, who gave Romney a tepid endorsement while inflating himself.
Romney, meanwhile, has slowed the pace of his campaign, and released an ad that is a complete fabrication against Obama, saying Chrysler was going to outsource Jeep production to China. Chrysler released a statement: the charge was false. Romney continues to run the ad!
The big question is: can the Romney campaign get away with lies like this, and simply ignore Chrysler's charges? Will voters finally see that Romney is willing to lie about virtually anything? Abortion: he was pro-choice running for Governor, but now advocates banning abortion with exceptions for rape, etc. Yet, his party platform bans abortion without exceptions. He lies about his tax plan, about his foreign policy, and he's willing to lie about documented facts. Can he get away with this because he looks so clean-cut--because he's not black?
Back to the storm: will Romney complain that FEMA is doing a lousy job because of Obama? Before he began to "re-draw" his program Romney advocated abolishing FEMA, leaving disaster relief to the states. Now, if/when critics bring that up, what will Romney say? FEMA has been doing a good job with Cyclone Sandy. It's likely he'll claim he never said that; he'll find some way to wiggle away from it.
Romney is a sociopath as are most Republican Party leaders. They have no scruples about changing their positions, according to the audience, or the flavor of the minute. If Romney is elected, we will face an unpredictable non-entity wielding power in the world's most powerful nation, backed by radical Republicans. Will he do what he said last, or what his "handlers" tell him?
The US and the world could face chaos: the empire could die of violent storms and foreign adventures, but Romney's fellow Roman Senators probably believe they could move to "pleasant places" elsewhere if Romney's policies wreck us. That didn't work in the Fifth Century: few of the western elite survived. Further, frankenstorms and violent weather aren't respecters of wealth: look at Manhattan!
Comments? Click below, scroll down.
Wednesday, October 24, 2012
Who's the Antichrist?
My Jews-for-Jesus friend maintains that Obama is the Antichrist. Does he mean because he is: "the final Head of the last great Empire before the establishment of the millennial kingdom of our Lord?" [Bible Believers Antichrist]
No, he means, he's "truly so arrogant that he reminds me of Hitler Mussulini(sic) and Castro as a true Demagogue."
I shouldn't be surprised: a super-articulate black man might be perceived as "arrogant." In the debates, Obama, tried to make sense of the complicated world we live in. In the last debate, Romney blithered and was ignorant of basic geography. Syria does not have a common border with Iran, and both have their own access to strategic Seas: Syria, the eastern Mediterranean, Iran, the Persian Gulf, one of the world's most strategic straits, as well as the Gulf of Oman, opening out into the Arabian Sea! But Romney accused Iran of taking sides in Syria to gain "its pathway to the sea." Why didn’t the media jump all over this gaffe?
Romney also remade his Middle Eastern foreign policy on the spot--his etch-a-sketch--so that Obama couldn't attack him; suddenly, they were almost exactly the same: on Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran and Syria, and hardly a whimper about Libya and Egypt, either. He was "Moderate Mitt."
Obama did elide, and inflate, but he wasn't lying: he was explaining--to his own advantage--what he'd already done, and why it was working.
Neither dealt with important issues like climate change, or the European financial crisis and Romney was caught out in his ignorance of the Navy--and the rest of the Defense complex, despite campaigning on a huge increase in Defense spending. Where's the media to jump all over him on that?
Fox News said the debate was a tie!
Obama knew what he was talking about, at least, but if Romney isn't the AntiChrist; he's the False Prophet.
Does that make Obama the Antichrist, with his right to blow up or assassinate anyone he deems a threat to the United States? At least it isn't just a personal threat to Obama, or the wealthy, or Democrats, but it's still wrong.
If, then, Obama is the Antichrist, then we must have entered into the end times! But remember: Revelations was written in the late first century, not by John, the Apostle, and evidently the writer saw end-times coming, but in his own era.
Evangelists revel in Revelations, yet so far the end times haven't manifested throughout the ages. Yet so many, in this era, anticipate that they will; they look forward to it.
Romney's election might not be the end of the "last great empire," but he could push it there more rapidly. Obama might delay it, at least--or, if pushed adequately, embark on a less destructive path.
No, he means, he's "truly so arrogant that he reminds me of Hitler Mussulini(sic) and Castro as a true Demagogue."
I shouldn't be surprised: a super-articulate black man might be perceived as "arrogant." In the debates, Obama, tried to make sense of the complicated world we live in. In the last debate, Romney blithered and was ignorant of basic geography. Syria does not have a common border with Iran, and both have their own access to strategic Seas: Syria, the eastern Mediterranean, Iran, the Persian Gulf, one of the world's most strategic straits, as well as the Gulf of Oman, opening out into the Arabian Sea! But Romney accused Iran of taking sides in Syria to gain "its pathway to the sea." Why didn’t the media jump all over this gaffe?
Romney also remade his Middle Eastern foreign policy on the spot--his etch-a-sketch--so that Obama couldn't attack him; suddenly, they were almost exactly the same: on Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran and Syria, and hardly a whimper about Libya and Egypt, either. He was "Moderate Mitt."
Obama did elide, and inflate, but he wasn't lying: he was explaining--to his own advantage--what he'd already done, and why it was working.
Neither dealt with important issues like climate change, or the European financial crisis and Romney was caught out in his ignorance of the Navy--and the rest of the Defense complex, despite campaigning on a huge increase in Defense spending. Where's the media to jump all over him on that?
Fox News said the debate was a tie!
Obama knew what he was talking about, at least, but if Romney isn't the AntiChrist; he's the False Prophet.
Does that make Obama the Antichrist, with his right to blow up or assassinate anyone he deems a threat to the United States? At least it isn't just a personal threat to Obama, or the wealthy, or Democrats, but it's still wrong.
If, then, Obama is the Antichrist, then we must have entered into the end times! But remember: Revelations was written in the late first century, not by John, the Apostle, and evidently the writer saw end-times coming, but in his own era.
Evangelists revel in Revelations, yet so far the end times haven't manifested throughout the ages. Yet so many, in this era, anticipate that they will; they look forward to it.
Romney's election might not be the end of the "last great empire," but he could push it there more rapidly. Obama might delay it, at least--or, if pushed adequately, embark on a less destructive path.
Thursday, October 18, 2012
Emperor Mitt?
Perhaps you've heard about the Sensata plant in Freeport, Ill.? Its workers were required to train their Chinese replacements: yes, the manufacturing operation is being relocated to China. Sensata is owned by Bain Capital, the company that Romney founded, the company that pays the majority of his oversized income.
And Romney is going to "get tough with China?"
Right.
Mitt makes it abundantly clear, whenever the subject comes up, that he doesn't manage Bain Capital anymore. He retired from it--either in 1999, when he says he did, or in 2002, when the signed documents say he did. He was the sole owner and CEO. When he retired, Bain Capital didn't hire a new CEO. A management committee manages it, following the business model of its sometime CEO, who still gets the bulk of his income from Bain-related investments, although they're in a "blind trust," wink, wink.
So, about that Sensata plant: it makes high tech automotive parts, and has been highly profitable in Illinois. The plant netted $355 million in 2011, a 16% increase over 2010, part of $1.8 billion in profits to the company that year. Nevertheless, it will be closed down by the end of the year, and its equipment is being shipped to China, which is providing a subsidized new site. A pretty good deal: except for the 170 employees, and the country, since the high tech manufacturing will now be in China, instead. Sensata's owners will profit from the move; they'll deduct the cost of moving from their taxes (a deduction Obama would like to close), and they'll probably be able to defer US taxes on their profits in China--and pay the employees there much less, too.
Is it significant that Romney, with Bain Capital, was an innovator in this kind of operation? It's called off-shoring, and it has cost millions of American jobs. Is this how he's going to "grow American jobs?" Is this how he "knows" how to manage the economy?
The laid off employees of the Freeport plant are camping out in front of the plant and are calling it Bainport. They even have a website with a petition at bainport.com and they've invited Romney to show up, and/or stop the plant's closure. I expect it'll be a long wait.
This really is what Romney's plan for the economy looks like: profits for management, tax breaks for owners, and unemployment for workers. It's part of the monopolization of wealth and power intended by Romney's backers: the .001%, which closely parallels the monopoly of wealth and power held by Roman Senators as the Roman Empire trundled towards its last hurrah. In the fifth century, workers had to become serfs or slaves in order to survive. What will happen to America's workers if Mitt becomes Emperor?
And Romney is going to "get tough with China?"
Right.
Mitt makes it abundantly clear, whenever the subject comes up, that he doesn't manage Bain Capital anymore. He retired from it--either in 1999, when he says he did, or in 2002, when the signed documents say he did. He was the sole owner and CEO. When he retired, Bain Capital didn't hire a new CEO. A management committee manages it, following the business model of its sometime CEO, who still gets the bulk of his income from Bain-related investments, although they're in a "blind trust," wink, wink.
So, about that Sensata plant: it makes high tech automotive parts, and has been highly profitable in Illinois. The plant netted $355 million in 2011, a 16% increase over 2010, part of $1.8 billion in profits to the company that year. Nevertheless, it will be closed down by the end of the year, and its equipment is being shipped to China, which is providing a subsidized new site. A pretty good deal: except for the 170 employees, and the country, since the high tech manufacturing will now be in China, instead. Sensata's owners will profit from the move; they'll deduct the cost of moving from their taxes (a deduction Obama would like to close), and they'll probably be able to defer US taxes on their profits in China--and pay the employees there much less, too.
Is it significant that Romney, with Bain Capital, was an innovator in this kind of operation? It's called off-shoring, and it has cost millions of American jobs. Is this how he's going to "grow American jobs?" Is this how he "knows" how to manage the economy?
The laid off employees of the Freeport plant are camping out in front of the plant and are calling it Bainport. They even have a website with a petition at bainport.com and they've invited Romney to show up, and/or stop the plant's closure. I expect it'll be a long wait.
This really is what Romney's plan for the economy looks like: profits for management, tax breaks for owners, and unemployment for workers. It's part of the monopolization of wealth and power intended by Romney's backers: the .001%, which closely parallels the monopoly of wealth and power held by Roman Senators as the Roman Empire trundled towards its last hurrah. In the fifth century, workers had to become serfs or slaves in order to survive. What will happen to America's workers if Mitt becomes Emperor?
Wednesday, October 10, 2012
Columbus and a Deracinated Carib
Some of my present-day relatives, unknown to me, must mourn the coming of that man, whose name changed over time. He was never known to himself as Christopher Columbus.
Colon stumbled on the Americas. He didn't discover them, since whole societies had been there for thousands of years. The people Colon mistakenly landed amongst were not particularly happy that he did so; he kidnapped, enslaved and killed them. Essentially, Colon, and almost every European following him, until a few enlightened souls in the 19th and 20th centuries, saw the indigenous peoples as sub-humans to be subjugated, enslaved, or eradicated.
Unbeknownst to Colon and to most of his successors until very late, the diseases Europeans brought with them unknowingly were the most effective destroyers of the healthy indigenous peoples. Late, in the 19th century, smallpox-smeared blankets were distributed to the Plains Indians to accomplish one of the most horrendous acts of "ethnic cleansing" ever attempted, perhaps the first biological warfare.
Before Colon, indigenous Americans were about as numerous as people in Europe, according to recent archaeology, yet soon after him, Europeans saw the Americas as nearly empty continents ripe for the picking. The Europeans' diseases preceded them, probably because refugees fleeing each plague spread it everywhere, from the Europeans' common cold, to the flu to small pox to malaria. No one understood diseases, then, not Europeans, not First Americans.
Siphilis, America's contribution to global diseases, didn't kill off whole European populations, but did precipitate mass craziness, like the Inquisition.
Spanish Conquistadores in Florida, shortly after Colon, strung up murdered Indians' bodies, and fed them to their dogs. Even now in the US indigenous transsexuals need protection from whites.
None of my indigenous heritage has been acknowledged by my Venezuelan family, but all you had to do was look at my mother and uncle to see it: straight, coarse black hair, not-white skin (except when sheltered always from the sun, as my grandmother apparently did), high cheekbones and small stature. My grandmother's family couldn't afford to admit its heritage: they were prominent landowners, business people and, reputedly, owners of a pearl fishery off the small island where my mother was born. The Coello's, island people, were probably half-Carib for generations, until my grandfather, a "100% Spanish" Andino, married my grandmother.
Columbus didn't just "discover" America. He set in motion the destruction of a whole hemisphere's cultures and societies, and the reduction of its original inhabitants to genetic remnants; I am one small, deracinated part. He also launched Europe onto the world's stage, and the US extended European dominance with its huge new resources in the hastily emptied hemisphere.
But that is past. Despite Republican posturing, Pax Americana will be more fleeting than Pax Romanum; American resources are stretched thin. The American Empire cannot maintain itself militarily, but Republicans would try: until the last penny of the not-rich has been poured down war's rat-hole--and billionaires escape.
Colon stumbled on the Americas. He didn't discover them, since whole societies had been there for thousands of years. The people Colon mistakenly landed amongst were not particularly happy that he did so; he kidnapped, enslaved and killed them. Essentially, Colon, and almost every European following him, until a few enlightened souls in the 19th and 20th centuries, saw the indigenous peoples as sub-humans to be subjugated, enslaved, or eradicated.
Unbeknownst to Colon and to most of his successors until very late, the diseases Europeans brought with them unknowingly were the most effective destroyers of the healthy indigenous peoples. Late, in the 19th century, smallpox-smeared blankets were distributed to the Plains Indians to accomplish one of the most horrendous acts of "ethnic cleansing" ever attempted, perhaps the first biological warfare.
Before Colon, indigenous Americans were about as numerous as people in Europe, according to recent archaeology, yet soon after him, Europeans saw the Americas as nearly empty continents ripe for the picking. The Europeans' diseases preceded them, probably because refugees fleeing each plague spread it everywhere, from the Europeans' common cold, to the flu to small pox to malaria. No one understood diseases, then, not Europeans, not First Americans.
Siphilis, America's contribution to global diseases, didn't kill off whole European populations, but did precipitate mass craziness, like the Inquisition.
Spanish Conquistadores in Florida, shortly after Colon, strung up murdered Indians' bodies, and fed them to their dogs. Even now in the US indigenous transsexuals need protection from whites.
None of my indigenous heritage has been acknowledged by my Venezuelan family, but all you had to do was look at my mother and uncle to see it: straight, coarse black hair, not-white skin (except when sheltered always from the sun, as my grandmother apparently did), high cheekbones and small stature. My grandmother's family couldn't afford to admit its heritage: they were prominent landowners, business people and, reputedly, owners of a pearl fishery off the small island where my mother was born. The Coello's, island people, were probably half-Carib for generations, until my grandfather, a "100% Spanish" Andino, married my grandmother.
Columbus didn't just "discover" America. He set in motion the destruction of a whole hemisphere's cultures and societies, and the reduction of its original inhabitants to genetic remnants; I am one small, deracinated part. He also launched Europe onto the world's stage, and the US extended European dominance with its huge new resources in the hastily emptied hemisphere.
But that is past. Despite Republican posturing, Pax Americana will be more fleeting than Pax Romanum; American resources are stretched thin. The American Empire cannot maintain itself militarily, but Republicans would try: until the last penny of the not-rich has been poured down war's rat-hole--and billionaires escape.
Monday, October 8, 2012
Gilded Age Reaction or Progressive Reform
Obama has to win re-election simply to allow the possibility of a more progressive politics and to prevent an accelerating slide into a revived Gilded Age of Robber Barons. Mitt not only represents the Robber Barons, he is one.
But Obama has been nearly half-bought himself.
Still, that leaves 50% of him that is open to the interests of the rest of us, not just the billionaires. Consider the XL Tar Sands pipeline. Obama's State Department initially passed on it, but under dramatic pressure by environmental activists--surrounding the White House in linked arms, for example--Obama delayed, but did not cancel the project. His department has pushed for a more environmentally benign route, but Obama still might agree to cancel it altogether--if pressured enough.
Romney would have had the protesters arrested and jailed.
If Obama is re-elected, taxes on the wealthy probably will go up and disincentives for outsourcing and offshoring would be a priority. Romney would cut taxes on the wealthy and would encourage offshoring (which he pioneered). It's also likely that Obama would maintain, or lower, tax rates on those least able to pay, maintain the safety net (unemployment insurance, Medicaid, food stamps and entitlements). Romney wants to gut, privatize and merge most, if not all, of these programs.
If Obama is re-elected, the rights of women and gays will be enhanced. If Romney gets elected, they'll be diminished. The same holds true for minorities and immigrants: their rights would be enhanced with Obama, restricted with Romney.
So, why do people support Romney? Why did the Tea Party so capture the GOP that elder statesmen not ideologically pure enough, like Senator Lugar, go down to defeat in their party's primaries? For all his sweet nothings (lies), Romney's attempts in the first debate at softening the hard right positions he's campaigned on are meaningless: he'd be kept in line by the Republican Congress likely to be elected with him if he won.
Obama is no pure progressive. To pull him leftward, we need Democratic progressives like Sherrod Brown in greater numbers in the House and Senate; both bodies need solid Democratic majorities and progressives must mobilize activists on all the issues important to us. Examples: stopping the imperial creep of our military abroad, and our police at home; pushing alternative energies and stopping fracking cold; passing the Dream Act.
Obama is different from Romney, as Gore was different from W. Gore would have responded to the vast demonstrations against starting the Iraq war; W ignored them.
With the improved job numbers, perhaps Obama has a chance. If he does, we also have a chance: to reverse the slide into the kind of lopsided dominance of the few wealthy that characterized the Roman Senators in the fast declining empire of fifth century Rome.
If Romney and Republicans win, the march towards chaos and impoverishment reminiscent of Rome's fall could look inevitable.
But Obama has been nearly half-bought himself.
Still, that leaves 50% of him that is open to the interests of the rest of us, not just the billionaires. Consider the XL Tar Sands pipeline. Obama's State Department initially passed on it, but under dramatic pressure by environmental activists--surrounding the White House in linked arms, for example--Obama delayed, but did not cancel the project. His department has pushed for a more environmentally benign route, but Obama still might agree to cancel it altogether--if pressured enough.
Romney would have had the protesters arrested and jailed.
If Obama is re-elected, taxes on the wealthy probably will go up and disincentives for outsourcing and offshoring would be a priority. Romney would cut taxes on the wealthy and would encourage offshoring (which he pioneered). It's also likely that Obama would maintain, or lower, tax rates on those least able to pay, maintain the safety net (unemployment insurance, Medicaid, food stamps and entitlements). Romney wants to gut, privatize and merge most, if not all, of these programs.
If Obama is re-elected, the rights of women and gays will be enhanced. If Romney gets elected, they'll be diminished. The same holds true for minorities and immigrants: their rights would be enhanced with Obama, restricted with Romney.
So, why do people support Romney? Why did the Tea Party so capture the GOP that elder statesmen not ideologically pure enough, like Senator Lugar, go down to defeat in their party's primaries? For all his sweet nothings (lies), Romney's attempts in the first debate at softening the hard right positions he's campaigned on are meaningless: he'd be kept in line by the Republican Congress likely to be elected with him if he won.
Obama is no pure progressive. To pull him leftward, we need Democratic progressives like Sherrod Brown in greater numbers in the House and Senate; both bodies need solid Democratic majorities and progressives must mobilize activists on all the issues important to us. Examples: stopping the imperial creep of our military abroad, and our police at home; pushing alternative energies and stopping fracking cold; passing the Dream Act.
Obama is different from Romney, as Gore was different from W. Gore would have responded to the vast demonstrations against starting the Iraq war; W ignored them.
With the improved job numbers, perhaps Obama has a chance. If he does, we also have a chance: to reverse the slide into the kind of lopsided dominance of the few wealthy that characterized the Roman Senators in the fast declining empire of fifth century Rome.
If Romney and Republicans win, the march towards chaos and impoverishment reminiscent of Rome's fall could look inevitable.
Thursday, October 4, 2012
The Hunger Games and Romney
What do the Hunger Games tell you about American society right now? In the movie, the images of people from the capital, of the powerful, compared to the images of Katniss's District 12 are stark contrasts. The capital is a gleaming, futuristic metropolis; District 12 is strongly reminiscent of Appalachia in the sixties. Images of the other outlying districts are equally bereft and impoverished, compared to the artificial glitz of the capital and especially its stars.
And then there's the white uniformed security forces, reminiscent both of Star Wars Imperial Guard and of our militarized riot squads today. That leads you to realize: the contour of the Hunger Games future begins to look familiar. It's the kind of class division in the future that we could have with the Republican agenda, and the security forces are already in place--to repress popular protests, like an escalation of Occupy, and to keep people in line, which they did in both District 12 and 11 in the movie.
Even if Obama wins re-election, the power of the wealthy will continue to grow, unless we elect a progressive Congress willing to stand up to them and, as a first step, pass and organize the ratification of the repeal of Citizens United. Otherwise, the kind of society envisioned by Hunger Games looks much more likely than some progressive alternative.
Why? Okay, let's posit a question: why does Romney propose spending 4% of GDP on Defense, when that would add 100's of billions to its budget with no real programmatic reason advanced.
Perhaps you need a more powerful military not only to bully the rest of the world, but to guard against popular, or populist revolution at home. Why would Romney, et al, worry about revolution? How else will people react if it becomes starkly clear to them--as clear as it was in District 12--that they are oppressed by an unfair political system, a system that was supposed to be democratic?
So, if you propose policies that will intensify inequality, which Romney-Ryan have done, then you are also logically required to beef up domestic security: to guard against popular protest--especially if you can successfully steal their votes--and enough people know it.
I suspect that's the real rationale for Romney's proposed Defense buildup, but of course, he'd never tell us. The reason for the Hunger Games, and the disappearance of the 13th district (the Northeast?) was the suppression of "treason"--by the heroic security forces.
Given Romney's energetic sale of himself, and Obama's lackluster rebuttals in the first debate, this kind of future looks all the more possible. His election, too, would include an attempt to extend our shrinking empire. The Roman Empire bankrupted itself in similar attempts; it's likely we would, as well.
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