In the late nineties when the heroic investigative reporter, Gary Webb documented how both the Reagan and Bush I administrations used a Bay Area drug ring to sell tons of cocaine to Los Angeles street gangs in order to funnel millions to Nicaraguan Contras he was pilloried in the mainstream press. This despite the fact that ten years earlier Mass. Sen., John Kerry, had direct proof that the CIA was using illicit drug profits for covert operations in Central America in order to evade Congressional scrutiny.
Even after Webb was vindicated by the CIA's own report, The New York Times, like the Washington Post and L.A. Times, gave the story short shrift. The justly outraged black community was greeted with the newspapers' eminent 'liberal' scorn: the collective response amounted to, "what else would you expect from those people... they believe stuff like Kentucky Fried Chicken will make you sterile."
If you didn't know better you'd be tempted to think our mainstream press was complicit .
In her new book "Rogue Economics" Loretta Napoleoni describes how ties between intelligence agencies and organized crime are now woven into the new world economy: "The transition from Cold War economics ... left large regions unguarded ... the vacuum created by the absence of state authority guaranteed the survival of [what] became a rogue force."
At the same time Webb was exposing the CIA's drug running writers in India were decrying the increase in sanctioned government crime and corruption.
"The image of organised crime etched deep in the public mind in the media is of graphic and gratitude violence... these images, no doubt, have a sound basis in fact. To the extent, however, that they exhaust or dominate our entire vision of organised crime today, they are both false and misleading. The emergence of global financial and trading systems, and the progressive dismantling of trade barriers and, internal restrictions on businesses within the country over the past decade, has fundamentally changed the context in which criminal organisations operate... criminal organisations have expanded their territorial reach and augmented their wealth and power relative to national governments."
It is hard to gauge whether the neo-cons were crafty and venal or simply the elite's useful idiots. Now that the US is broke, our military mired in Afghanistan, a largely secular Iraq converted to an Islamic Republic more closely tied to Iran one wonders what-- if anything-- was their beef with bin Laden. From the billions that have disappeared from the Pentagon it is clear that for the fortunate few the WOT is a handy honey pot. To round out this macabre spectacle of the absurd members of Congress solicit funds for their election campaigns by inciting revolution, claiming the Obama leads a gangster government. Yet none call it treason.
If there is a single blunder that will haunt us long after the disastrous Bush years it is the reactionary and unconstitutional Patriot Act. By demonizing Muslims while compelling US banks to disclose their large transactions, trillions in Middle Eastern oil revenues and criminal black market funds that used to be laundered in Miami and New York have migrated to Naples and London where our simpatico partners in the "War on Terror" can now join hedge funds that make their money by ripping up public companies and auctioning them off as private equity.
Typically, “prominent investors” will buy the company’s debt, package it into “collateralized debt obligations” (financial weapons of mass destruction that were pioneered by Michael Milken’s team at Drexel Burnham Lambert), and then trade it in such a way as to make it seem as if the company is in trouble.'
In the middle of this indecipherable criminal mess are our beleaguered journalists. For them the choice is stark: tell the truth like Gary Webb, lose your job and perhaps end up dead ... or play along and make the most of it.
Showing posts with label Reagan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Reagan. Show all posts
Monday, August 23, 2010
Friday, April 10, 2009
An Almighty Mess
Ronald Reagan's ascent to the presidency was the CIA's final payback to Jimmy Carter. Carter had doomed his presidency by having the temerity to suggest that they act within the boundaries set by Congress and the White House.
If Carter was naive, Reagan was a Hollywood rube. The extent of his understanding of the intelligence services amounted to what he'd seen in the movies. Nevertheless Reagan pledged to untie the agency's hands and appointed his campaign manager Bill Casey as director. Casey shared the view of his hero Wild Bill Donovan that the CIA's mission was to be devious, global and totalitarian. Unfortunately it appears Casey did not also stress that it should be prudent or intelligent.
Nowhere has the legacy of the Reagan caused more damage than in Central Asia. No today we learn that the Pashtun under the banner of the reconstituted "Taleban" are poised to takeover Islamabad. I do not need to elaborate on the gravity for Pakistan should the fighters succeed.
For years Pakistani officials have been urging Nato to accept the Taliban in Afghanistan and work towards building a new coalition government in Kabul that would exclude Hamid Karzai. To appreciate the wisdom of that proposition it is vital to understand that there is a rift in the Pashtuns vis a vis the Taliban who have come to realize how they have been cynically exploited by both Pakistan and the Anglo/Americans.
The Pakistan-based Taliban represents that new movement, but its roots are old. These roots can be found in the isolation of the tribal areas and in the rupture of tradition caused by the import of a new Islamist ideology in the 1980s when Reagan allowed the Saudis to arm and indoctrinate the tribesmen in waging jihad against the Soviets.
According to Pashtun nationalist, Afrasiab Khattak, as many as 500,000 young men were thus socialized during the Afghan wars. Overwhelmingly Pashtun, they were bound by tribal codes of honor, loyalty and revenge. But, uprooted from their villages, they were also susceptible to new idioms of Islam, whether the Deobandi strain peddled by the Pakistani madrassas or the austere Wahhabism of the Saudi Arabians and other “Afghan Arabs” who had come to fight the Soviets.
For the first 50 years of Pakistan’s existence, the government’s policy toward the FATA was the same as that of the British Raj. Tribal leaders, or maliks, were granted semi-autonomous powers in exchange for fealty to the crown or, post-independence, the regime. In return for recognizing the British-drawn Durand Line as Pakistan’s border with Afghanistan, the maliks were granted access to their tribal lands.
For the last 30 years, FATA’s isolation has served another purpose: The state has used the region as the launching pad for Pakistan-inspired insurgencies in Afghanistan, with the first coming after the communist coup in Kabul in 1978.
Fueled by CIA and Saudi money, but engineered by Pakistan’s premier Inter-Service Intelligence (ISI) directorate, the militias incubated in the tribal areas became national, regional and ultimately global Islamist movements, of which al-Qaeda is only the most notorious. Amidst penury grew a war economy driven by opium, guns and God, while jihad was first taught, then waged, by generations of young men, dislocated and orphaned in Afghan refugee camps, but schooled in madrassas allied to one or another of Pakistan’s Islamist parties or sponsored by states like Saudi Arabia.
Pakistan’s original motive for planting this “volcano on both sides of the border” was as simple as it was myopic, says Khattak. Regionally, the regime of Gen. Zia ul Haq viewed the tribal areas as Pakistan’s bridge to a client state in Afghanistan, supplying the “strategic depth” necessary for resisting India, the “external” enemy to the east. Domestically, the socialization of so many in political Islam would produce an endless stream of foot soldiers for jihad. They, in turn, could be mobilized against the demand for Pashtunistan, the “internal” enemy.
What Zia and Reagan did not foresee was that once the Russians withdrew, some fighters would hand back their power but others like Mullah Omar, would not. They said, ‘We are the ones who defeated the Russians, not the earls.’ (This is why many Pashtun elders deserted the Taliban when it came to power and supported the American invasion -- it was seen as a restoration of the old tribal order.)
This is what is happening now on the Pakistan side of the border. The younger tribesmen ask: "why was it jihad to resist the Russians, but now it is terrorism to resist the Americans?’ Why not indeed when they have made such an almighty mess.
If Carter was naive, Reagan was a Hollywood rube. The extent of his understanding of the intelligence services amounted to what he'd seen in the movies. Nevertheless Reagan pledged to untie the agency's hands and appointed his campaign manager Bill Casey as director. Casey shared the view of his hero Wild Bill Donovan that the CIA's mission was to be devious, global and totalitarian. Unfortunately it appears Casey did not also stress that it should be prudent or intelligent.
Nowhere has the legacy of the Reagan caused more damage than in Central Asia. No today we learn that the Pashtun under the banner of the reconstituted "Taleban" are poised to takeover Islamabad. I do not need to elaborate on the gravity for Pakistan should the fighters succeed.
For years Pakistani officials have been urging Nato to accept the Taliban in Afghanistan and work towards building a new coalition government in Kabul that would exclude Hamid Karzai. To appreciate the wisdom of that proposition it is vital to understand that there is a rift in the Pashtuns vis a vis the Taliban who have come to realize how they have been cynically exploited by both Pakistan and the Anglo/Americans.
The Pakistan-based Taliban represents that new movement, but its roots are old. These roots can be found in the isolation of the tribal areas and in the rupture of tradition caused by the import of a new Islamist ideology in the 1980s when Reagan allowed the Saudis to arm and indoctrinate the tribesmen in waging jihad against the Soviets.
According to Pashtun nationalist, Afrasiab Khattak, as many as 500,000 young men were thus socialized during the Afghan wars. Overwhelmingly Pashtun, they were bound by tribal codes of honor, loyalty and revenge. But, uprooted from their villages, they were also susceptible to new idioms of Islam, whether the Deobandi strain peddled by the Pakistani madrassas or the austere Wahhabism of the Saudi Arabians and other “Afghan Arabs” who had come to fight the Soviets.
For the first 50 years of Pakistan’s existence, the government’s policy toward the FATA was the same as that of the British Raj. Tribal leaders, or maliks, were granted semi-autonomous powers in exchange for fealty to the crown or, post-independence, the regime. In return for recognizing the British-drawn Durand Line as Pakistan’s border with Afghanistan, the maliks were granted access to their tribal lands.
For the last 30 years, FATA’s isolation has served another purpose: The state has used the region as the launching pad for Pakistan-inspired insurgencies in Afghanistan, with the first coming after the communist coup in Kabul in 1978.
Fueled by CIA and Saudi money, but engineered by Pakistan’s premier Inter-Service Intelligence (ISI) directorate, the militias incubated in the tribal areas became national, regional and ultimately global Islamist movements, of which al-Qaeda is only the most notorious. Amidst penury grew a war economy driven by opium, guns and God, while jihad was first taught, then waged, by generations of young men, dislocated and orphaned in Afghan refugee camps, but schooled in madrassas allied to one or another of Pakistan’s Islamist parties or sponsored by states like Saudi Arabia.
Pakistan’s original motive for planting this “volcano on both sides of the border” was as simple as it was myopic, says Khattak. Regionally, the regime of Gen. Zia ul Haq viewed the tribal areas as Pakistan’s bridge to a client state in Afghanistan, supplying the “strategic depth” necessary for resisting India, the “external” enemy to the east. Domestically, the socialization of so many in political Islam would produce an endless stream of foot soldiers for jihad. They, in turn, could be mobilized against the demand for Pashtunistan, the “internal” enemy.
What Zia and Reagan did not foresee was that once the Russians withdrew, some fighters would hand back their power but others like Mullah Omar, would not. They said, ‘We are the ones who defeated the Russians, not the earls.’ (This is why many Pashtun elders deserted the Taliban when it came to power and supported the American invasion -- it was seen as a restoration of the old tribal order.)
This is what is happening now on the Pakistan side of the border. The younger tribesmen ask: "why was it jihad to resist the Russians, but now it is terrorism to resist the Americans?’ Why not indeed when they have made such an almighty mess.
Friday, February 6, 2009
Wasted In America
Whether from a nagging inferiority complex attributable to its youth and borrowed cultures, or simply the fruit of its puritanical roots the USA has a self-destructive streak that is fast becoming its undoing. No nation can long survive unless it can instill a healthy amount of pride and a sense of shared commitment in its people. What was so poignant about Barack Obama's election was the tearful joy on the faces of our African-American children who appeared to range in age from five to over a hundred. Finally, they thought, their parents, those already dead or very much alive, could believe they were equal American members, allowed to indulge in all the prerequisites and privileges of their powerful country. An inspiring notion, to which we grown-ups are yet to be impressed.
With all the talk centered on rescuing the economy and ending the Iraq fiasco the giant elephant in the room, the great all-devouring threat to the nation's survival stands quiet and unseen. I'm referring to the criminal number of black and brown and native-born Americans being locked in prison and being robbed of constructive futures simply for getting involved with unsanctioned drugs.
There is something ethically grotesque about the fact that our last three presidents--Clinton, Bush and Obama--had all at one time in their youthful lives experimented with illegal drugs. Yet, since the election of Ronald Reagan the United States has incarcerated more American citizens for abusing marijuana than the total number of prisoners we had locked behind bars in 1980. (Of the 450,000 arrests during the period 1990-2002, 82% of the increase was for marijuana, with 79% for marijuana possession-- Boyum and Reuter, 2005).
As a result of these Draconian drug laws the United States has well over two million of its people in prison, the majority for non-violent drug offenses. America has the highest incarceration rate in the world and yet retains one of the highest rankings in drug abuse. More troubling still is the rate at which we are imprisoning women, many with small children, virtually guaranteeing that the family will not escape its downward spiral, their lives given over to the hedge of self-medication against hopelessness and chronic depression.
"There is considerable evidence to show that the costs of such laws do not fall equally across all segments of US society. Between 1985 and 1995, for instance, there was an increase of 200 percent in the number of females incarcerated in state and federal institutions, most for non-violent offences. Many commentators agree that much of this was the result of stricter enforcement,increased penalties and mandatory prison sentences for drug offenders" (Reichel 2005, Bush-Baskette, 1999, Gray, 2001). Additionally, while punitive US drug policies can be seen to have significantly affected the imprisonment of women in general, the greatest increase in the percentage of inmates incarcerated for drug offences is seen in African American women.
An infuriating example of these destructive policies is the case of Yraida Guanipa. Ms. Guanipa has spent the last ten and a half years a Florida federal penitentiary, locked away from her friends, her extended family and her two young children.
At first the War on Drugs" seemed a political brain-stroke-- a real twofer for the Christian Right and their control of Washington's "new Republican majority". By building the extra prisons needed in rural and exurban counties the local Republicans could use their inmates to boost their Congressional numbers-- and since the war was centered in urban communities that consisted overwhelming of black and brown Democrats-- they were concurrently keeping potential voters away from the voting booth (and those pesky unions). The real travesty of the 1990's was the fact that a Democratic president went right along. Yet as far as reducing illegal drug use the impact was virtually nil:
A recent study comparing marijuana use in Amsterdam and San Francisco showed that relative risks of punishment make no difference on levels of use. Despite significantly different law enforcement regimes in these cities, the research found remarkable similarities in drug use patterns (Reinarman, Cohen & Kaal, 2004). Figures show that from 1990 to 2002, daily use of marijuana by high school seniors approached 6%--the exact same level as in 1975.
Not much to show for a program that is costing the Federal government upwards of $9 billion dollars each year. Put another way, the cost of keeping a non-violent drug offender in prison is greater than the cost of tuition, room and board at Yale or Harvard. So while mountains of words and barrels of ink are being spent on describing the need to stimulate the economy and "Reinvest in America" we ignore the ongoing war being waged against our own citizens. As with all wars, there is terrible collateral damage being done to our most vulnerable communities. Worse, by pretending that the problem can be solved simply by locking up the poor and probably many of our most innovative and entrepreneurial minds, we have doomed ourselves to failure. No nation has ever flourished once it becomes unable to care for its least.
Tragically, though we have a president who most certainly understands the consequence of this crippling waste and destruction, Obama fears, no doubt with a bitter dose of irony, that his instincts for change are most likely to be incarcerated by the shade of his skin.
With all the talk centered on rescuing the economy and ending the Iraq fiasco the giant elephant in the room, the great all-devouring threat to the nation's survival stands quiet and unseen. I'm referring to the criminal number of black and brown and native-born Americans being locked in prison and being robbed of constructive futures simply for getting involved with unsanctioned drugs.
There is something ethically grotesque about the fact that our last three presidents--Clinton, Bush and Obama--had all at one time in their youthful lives experimented with illegal drugs. Yet, since the election of Ronald Reagan the United States has incarcerated more American citizens for abusing marijuana than the total number of prisoners we had locked behind bars in 1980. (Of the 450,000 arrests during the period 1990-2002, 82% of the increase was for marijuana, with 79% for marijuana possession-- Boyum and Reuter, 2005).
As a result of these Draconian drug laws the United States has well over two million of its people in prison, the majority for non-violent drug offenses. America has the highest incarceration rate in the world and yet retains one of the highest rankings in drug abuse. More troubling still is the rate at which we are imprisoning women, many with small children, virtually guaranteeing that the family will not escape its downward spiral, their lives given over to the hedge of self-medication against hopelessness and chronic depression.
"There is considerable evidence to show that the costs of such laws do not fall equally across all segments of US society. Between 1985 and 1995, for instance, there was an increase of 200 percent in the number of females incarcerated in state and federal institutions, most for non-violent offences. Many commentators agree that much of this was the result of stricter enforcement,increased penalties and mandatory prison sentences for drug offenders" (Reichel 2005, Bush-Baskette, 1999, Gray, 2001). Additionally, while punitive US drug policies can be seen to have significantly affected the imprisonment of women in general, the greatest increase in the percentage of inmates incarcerated for drug offences is seen in African American women.
An infuriating example of these destructive policies is the case of Yraida Guanipa. Ms. Guanipa has spent the last ten and a half years a Florida federal penitentiary, locked away from her friends, her extended family and her two young children.
Her offense: She agreed to pick up a package for a friend, which turned out to contain cocaine. Although Ms. Guanipa had never been arrested -- had never been a drug user--she received a thirteen-year "drug conspiracy" prison sentence. Her good standing in the community, her lack of criminal background and the fact that she had a 1-year-old and a 2-year old had no impact on her sentence.
At first the War on Drugs" seemed a political brain-stroke-- a real twofer for the Christian Right and their control of Washington's "new Republican majority". By building the extra prisons needed in rural and exurban counties the local Republicans could use their inmates to boost their Congressional numbers-- and since the war was centered in urban communities that consisted overwhelming of black and brown Democrats-- they were concurrently keeping potential voters away from the voting booth (and those pesky unions). The real travesty of the 1990's was the fact that a Democratic president went right along. Yet as far as reducing illegal drug use the impact was virtually nil:
A recent study comparing marijuana use in Amsterdam and San Francisco showed that relative risks of punishment make no difference on levels of use. Despite significantly different law enforcement regimes in these cities, the research found remarkable similarities in drug use patterns (Reinarman, Cohen & Kaal, 2004). Figures show that from 1990 to 2002, daily use of marijuana by high school seniors approached 6%--the exact same level as in 1975.
Not much to show for a program that is costing the Federal government upwards of $9 billion dollars each year. Put another way, the cost of keeping a non-violent drug offender in prison is greater than the cost of tuition, room and board at Yale or Harvard. So while mountains of words and barrels of ink are being spent on describing the need to stimulate the economy and "Reinvest in America" we ignore the ongoing war being waged against our own citizens. As with all wars, there is terrible collateral damage being done to our most vulnerable communities. Worse, by pretending that the problem can be solved simply by locking up the poor and probably many of our most innovative and entrepreneurial minds, we have doomed ourselves to failure. No nation has ever flourished once it becomes unable to care for its least.
Tragically, though we have a president who most certainly understands the consequence of this crippling waste and destruction, Obama fears, no doubt with a bitter dose of irony, that his instincts for change are most likely to be incarcerated by the shade of his skin.
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Who We Are
Barack Obama's maternal grandparents, Stanley and Madelyn Dunham
Barack Obama will be taking time this week to visit his ailing 86-year-old nana, the woman from Kansas he affectionately calls "Toot". Several thoughts raced through my mind when I came across the photo of Madelyn Dunham and her husband. The first was Barack's striking facial resemblance to his grandfather and the second, how astonishingly the world has changed since that picture was taken.
Much ink has been spent contemplating the pros and cons of globalization. Up to now we have tended to discuss it in abstract terms--such as fair trade and integrated markets. But perhaps the greatest challenge born in this age of rapid communications and highly-mobilized capital is managing to soothe the antipathies and reignited antagonisms brought on by the social displacement and cultural disintegration.
Barack Obama's white American grandparents were raised in a stabler time when race and religion defined one's identity. I doubt when Stanley and Madelyn brought Barack's mother into the world they could have ever imagined that their future grandson would be seen as an "exotic" by their friends back in Kansas. From all accounts, their daughter's marriage to an atheist Kenyan intellectual was not immediately welcomed. I imagine their reaction might have been akin to being told that after growing up on bacon and eggs and steak dinners the Dunham family diet was to henceforth include Kuku choma and Mtuzi wa Samaki.
Had the Dunhams given in those initial misgivings the world would not be on the verge of a major transformation, at least in its perceptions. And yet, as profound as Barack Obama's impact has been on American politics it is conceivable, depending on how the fickle worm turns, that in a few hundred years his name will be a mere footnote. Take the curious and possibly ironic origin of "Hoosier", the sobriquet still worn proudly by residents of a state that was once base for the Ku Klux Klan and could now possibly swing to Obama.
John Finley describes the denizens of an Indiana backwoods cabin in his 1833 poem, "The Hoosier's Nest":
To seat him by the log heap fire,
Where half a dozen Hoosheroons,
With mush and milk, tincups and spoons,
White heads, bare feet and dirty faces,
Seemed much inclined to keep their places…6
In trying to divine the meaning of "Hoosheroons" ethnographers suggest it simply comes from "Hoosiers" and the word in the poem was a humorous take-off on such racial terms as "quadroon" and "octoroon" that were in common southern usage.
The obvious African-American point of reference led others to speculate that the term was coined for the black evangelist Harry Hoosier who accompanied the Reverend Francis Asbury and other Methodist preachers on their traveling rounds through Appalachia.Born a slave around 1750, Hoosier gained his freedom by the turn of the century and became a well-known Methodist exhorter. Indeed, Black Harry was such an impressive proselytizer that Benjamin Rush conceded that "making allowances for his illiteracy he was the greatest orator in America." Before his death in 1806, Hoosier's homiletical gifts had made him the most widely known black preacher of his time, and arguably the greatest circuit rider of his day.
Hoosier was particularly disliked by Virginia Baptists for his preaching against the Calvinist proposition that those who were once in grace would always remain in grace. At the time Methodists were not only slighted as unsophisticated and unlettered but harshly denigrated for calling into question the virtues of slavery. The promiscuous mixing of blacks and whites that took place at frontier camp meetings was considered a serious mark against their breeding and good taste. So, it does not seem at all unlikely that Methodists could have been derided as "Hoosiers" in honor of old black Harry.
Whether or not the explanation holds water, it was that clash over race and religion that culminated in the civil war followed by the birth of the Klan and the vengeful institution known as Jim Crow.
America's 1950's Economic Expansion
With the United States emerging the dominant power post-WWII there was a great need for a new professional class that included business managers, lawyers, doctors, and teachers. Unlike the Garvey Movement of the 20's and 30's, the NAACP and most other civil rights organizations were far less concerned with the working classes which represented the overwhelming majority of black Americans. They wanted greater upward mobility for the race's "talented tenth".
The Black civil rights movement devoted itself expressly to the opening of the professional world to blacks and other minorities. Though Brown vs the Board of Education involved integrating primary schools, the earliest NAACP test cases focused on postgraduate study. One of the group's first victories was in 1938 in "Missouri ex rel Gaines v. Canada", which held that Missouri violated equal protection guarantees by failing to provide in-state law school education for black students.
Igniting the Culture Wars
In the fall of 1957 President Eisenhower faced the first grave challenge created by the NAACP's drive for equality in education and greater integration among the professions. When Arkansas' Governor Faubus reneged on his promise to protect nine black students who wished to attend Little Rock's Central High School, the president responded by sending 1,000 U.S. Army paratroopers to command the state's National Guard and quell the violence.
It is important to remember that in 1957 Eisenhower, like most black voters, was a Republican, while Arkansas, like the rest of the South, was a white Democratic bastion that staunchly supported FDR's populism. A point vividly borne out by this bit of 1948 audio:
By pursuing upward mobility and social integration concurrently, the NAACP's strategy not only separated its potential leaders from the black community, it created a backlash of white resentment. It was the anger over "forced integration" that encouraged the GOP to abandon the aspiring black "elite" and employ Nixon's Southern Strategy. A strategy copied by Ronald Reagan whose second wife Nancy encouraged his startling about-face on behalf of big business.
It has taken over three decades but after eight years of George W. Bush, the put-upon, exploited white worker is getting past his daddy's resentment. He reckons to his buddies that in a globalized world where ethnic distinctions are fading as fast as good-paying jobs and old-age pensions, it's time to realize we'll all sink or swim as Americans.
Shocker:From rednecksforobama.net: Bluegrass legend Ralph Stanley endorses Obama.
--"It’s high time regular country folk understand that Republicans do not have their best interests at heart."
This anecdote from an Arkansas "redneck" on his way to an Obama rally puts just how far we've come in telling perspective.
"We arrived around 1:00 PM, parked the Redneckmobile and got in line at the WW I Memorial. The line was already several thousand people long. We waited in line for about 2 hours, then another hour or so in the crowd. It was amazing! No friction, no short tempers, nada! And, buddy, we were packed in like sardines.
"About an hour before Barack was to take the stage... my dear wife has a massive asthma attack! She drops unconscious to the ground. I am unable to even pick her up because of my disability. A young black man we had been chatting with immediately picks her up and literally runs out of the crowd carrying her. On the way, a young white man joins the procession... they both run for the edge of the crowd and yell for the EMS personnel on site.My gratitude to these two men is without measure. I know that without the cool and quick action on both their parts, she would not have made it."
Will Obama, thanks to Stanley and Madelyn Dunham's care and devotion to their biracial grandson, be able to heal the wounds from our three-hundred war between the races and our intolerant religions? Only his election and presidency will tell. But whether we conquer those fear-based animosities and survive will depend on whether as Americans we can put aside old labels, even when it means having to say good-bye to your grandfather's Grand Old Party.
To that I say, good-on-ya Susan-- Hang in there, Toot, change is comin'!
Monday, August 4, 2008
Bushonomics: Fooled Again
In 1912 Eugene Debs stood in New York's Madison Square Garden before 15,000 cheering supporters, waving red aprons, red handkerchiefs and red flags, as the Socialist Party candidate for the presidency of the United States. The most beloved man in America then reminded the clapping, stomping throng that, "two years ago workingmen and women were pelting us with eggs but now those eggs are a lot more expensive..."
Today in Barrons magazine, NY economist, Nouriel Roubini predicts that thanks to the Bush Administration's support of corporate welfare, hundreds of U.S. banks are on the verge of failure.
Ironically, the triumphant rise of neo-liberalism from the ashes of Soviet Communism may be hastening the death of capitalism. An analogy for what has taken place over these last thirty years is a casino that lets its richest clients bet against the house with borrowed chips.
"when asset wealth and the leverage that this provides becomes as concentrated as it was in the 19th century (which is a scenario we are approaching), then markets encourage nothing other than gambling masking itself as sound investment."--Philip Bond, UK Independent
It is popular to claim that Marx has been discredited, but Victor Considerant, Marx's philosophical mentor, warned in 1847 that the "large entrepreneurs" were "sucking up" capital and "crushing" the middle-class. He cautioned that "concentrations of wealth in the hands of the few resulted in the infeudation of the government to the aristocracy".
1848 saw the start of the French Revolution that would end the monarchy and create a Second Republic.
Deregulation and "voodoo economics"
The green light for Wall St to bet on margin has created a giant wealth-devouring bubble.
M1, is restricted to the most liquid forms of money; it consists of currency in the hands of the public; travelers checks; demand deposits, and other deposits against which checks can be written.
M2 includes M1, plus savings accounts, time deposits of under $100,000, and balances in retail money market mutual funds.
M3 includes M2 plus large-denomination ($100,000 or more) time deposits, balances in institutional money funds, repurchase liabilities issued by depository institutions, and Eurodollars held by U.S. residents at foreign branches of U.S. banks and at all banks in the United Kingdom and Canada. (The blue line is shadow- stats estimate that includes the Fed's secret add-on to our money supply.)
Trickle Down Right Into the Pisser
It should be plain as the nose on one's face to see that as globalization cheapens the cost of labor there is bound to be an oversupply of goods. So this notion that cutting taxes on the rich will spur investment should be laughed off the minute its dribbles from McCain's dumb, indentured mouth.
There is no evidence that the tax cuts caused any increase in economic growth, let alone growth sufficient to offset their cost. In fact, the 2001-2007 economic expansion was among the weakest since World War II with regard to overall economic growth. [2] Moreover, revenue growth was very poor during 2001-2007. Real per-capita revenues fell deeply in 2001, 2002, and 2003
--Center on Budget and Policy
(Why investing to maintain our infrastructure and educate workers is anathema to Wall Street pundits points to the stupidity of our current mindset)
Either we Americans will learn that the rich need to be reined in (if just to save them from themselves and save the planet) or we'd best learn to grow our food and stock up on kindling.
Today in Barrons magazine, NY economist, Nouriel Roubini predicts that thanks to the Bush Administration's support of corporate welfare, hundreds of U.S. banks are on the verge of failure.
Ironically, the triumphant rise of neo-liberalism from the ashes of Soviet Communism may be hastening the death of capitalism. An analogy for what has taken place over these last thirty years is a casino that lets its richest clients bet against the house with borrowed chips.
"when asset wealth and the leverage that this provides becomes as concentrated as it was in the 19th century (which is a scenario we are approaching), then markets encourage nothing other than gambling masking itself as sound investment."--Philip Bond, UK Independent
It is popular to claim that Marx has been discredited, but Victor Considerant, Marx's philosophical mentor, warned in 1847 that the "large entrepreneurs" were "sucking up" capital and "crushing" the middle-class. He cautioned that "concentrations of wealth in the hands of the few resulted in the infeudation of the government to the aristocracy".
1848 saw the start of the French Revolution that would end the monarchy and create a Second Republic.
Deregulation and "voodoo economics"
The green light for Wall St to bet on margin has created a giant wealth-devouring bubble.
M1, is restricted to the most liquid forms of money; it consists of currency in the hands of the public; travelers checks; demand deposits, and other deposits against which checks can be written.
M2 includes M1, plus savings accounts, time deposits of under $100,000, and balances in retail money market mutual funds.
M3 includes M2 plus large-denomination ($100,000 or more) time deposits, balances in institutional money funds, repurchase liabilities issued by depository institutions, and Eurodollars held by U.S. residents at foreign branches of U.S. banks and at all banks in the United Kingdom and Canada. (The blue line is shadow- stats estimate that includes the Fed's secret add-on to our money supply.)
Trickle Down Right Into the Pisser
It should be plain as the nose on one's face to see that as globalization cheapens the cost of labor there is bound to be an oversupply of goods. So this notion that cutting taxes on the rich will spur investment should be laughed off the minute its dribbles from McCain's dumb, indentured mouth.
There is no evidence that the tax cuts caused any increase in economic growth, let alone growth sufficient to offset their cost. In fact, the 2001-2007 economic expansion was among the weakest since World War II with regard to overall economic growth. [2] Moreover, revenue growth was very poor during 2001-2007. Real per-capita revenues fell deeply in 2001, 2002, and 2003
--Center on Budget and Policy
(Why investing to maintain our infrastructure and educate workers is anathema to Wall Street pundits points to the stupidity of our current mindset)
Either we Americans will learn that the rich need to be reined in (if just to save them from themselves and save the planet) or we'd best learn to grow our food and stock up on kindling.
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