The Peace Movement in America: Status Report

 

What's that sound I hear?

Is it the masses of America demanding? . . .

Peace!  Peace Now!  We Want Peace!

Oops!  My mistake.

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news . . .

It's actually a death rattle.  The low guttural burbling of a movement on its death bed.
The sad truth is that the peace movement in America is in a coma, just a whimper away from an inglorious burial in an unmarked grave behind the county dump.

When is the last time more than a few hundred showed up at a massive rally for peace?

Is there hope?

I'd like to think there is. 

But we have to be realistic.  If we're going to have a serious national conversation about peace, ending the senseless self-sabotaging wars, and taking America off permanent war footing, we must approach everyday citizens in language they understand, in terms they can embrace, in a way that is so powerful and over-the-top they can't possibly ignore it.

The Peace Dividend concept is just that.  It's so extreme and outside-the-box -- not that that discredits or invalidates it in the least -- it can only get traction from two sources.

Either a bold and charismatic politician makes it central to his public oratory and serious political agenda.  Obama, Sanders, and (I hate to admit it) Trump would all be capable of "selling" it.  Obama and Sanders both love war.  Trump is mentally challenged.  Maybe there's another MLK out there somewhere.  We can dream!

Or we must look to the second and more likely path, which is through citizen demand.

Yet another senseless war breaks out.  Body bags are piling up.  The national debt begins skyrocketing.  People have finally had it.  They are sick of empire building, endless wars, appalling waste.  This scenario could unfold sooner than we think.  We have a tough guy president who's just proposed a 10% increase in our already bloated military budget, we have both major parties screaming for war.  Major confrontation with Iran, China, Russia -- or all three -- is on the horizon.

Unfortunately, when that happens all chaos will be unleashed, the fog and frenzy of battle will roll over everyone like a toxic oil spill, the media will go into hyper-drive to "support our troops", the imbeciles who led us into the conflagration will be grandstanding and/or pointing fingers of blame at everyone else, and clearer heads will be lopped off in displays of fanatic super-patriotism as the media fills our eyes and ears with tales of valor, sacrifice, and super-human acts of heroism.  It will be a bullshit storm of epic proportions.

So we need to act . . . and we need to act now!

We should be sounding the alarm loud and clear:  People need to know about the "rip off" of their tax dollars and the grotesque lies being told to promote slaughter across the planet purely to stuff the coffers of the military corporations and their rich beneficiaries.

We could be doing this right now.  There already exists a phenomenal network of peace activism.  But these organizations are totally ineffective now because their message, 1) is not getting heard, 2) is not engaging, 3) is stale and boring.  I have contacted hundreds of these groups and their spokespersons.  No one is interested in new ideas.  These include a lot of very famous peace activists (you would definitely recognize most of the names).

So . . .

Either I'm crazy.

Or . . .

These peace creeps can't get their heads around the idea that for 40 years now, continuing right up to the present, they have completely failed.  The old methods and battle cries from the Vietnam War days haven't worked since the 70s.  These folks need a new paradigm.  They need new memes.  They need both a new message and better messaging.

Just look around.  We just had a Peace Prize president who dropped 26,171 bombs last year on countries we're not even at war with.  The U.S. has engaged in massive military aggression in eight countries since the peace dividend was originally promised in 1992.  We are now in an open-ended war on terror that is making us and the entire world less safe.  Our military is the scourge of the planet!

Is the current peace movement actually going to claim they're making progress?  That the demonstrations, petitions, bumper stickers are working?  [Insert Einstein's definition of insanity here.]

The Peace Dividend concept is not some impulse, some catchy phrase developed over a bowl of hashish.  It's a fully developed strategy.  I've outlined what the approach entails, how it can be effected, how it can be paid for.  This last point is the important.  The Peace Dividend refund, because of its scale and the way it's underwritten, drives a host of other progressive reforms.  It is a watershed for massive realignment of our priorities and use of financial resources.  Seems like that would be worth paying attention to.

If you know anyone working in the anti-war organizations, please tell them they absolutely must take a look at my plan.  Singing Give Peace A Chance doesn't cut it anymore.  Neither does getting a peace sign tattooed to your forehead.

The world is rushing headlong toward world war, risking nuclear annihilation and the end of the human race.  Eliminating geopolitical idiocy, imperial hubris, and monomaniacal delusions of conquest by challenging our warmongering elites with an effective plan of action should be what shapes and defines the struggle of those noble organizations attempting to abolish war and promote peace throughout the world. 

A strategy like the Peace Dividend must be the centerpiece giving focus to their efforts.

Otherwise, the next time I file an update, the response will be . . .

"What peace movement?"

---

 

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 This originated at the author's personal website . . . http://jdrachel.com ]




The Peace Movement in America: Status Report

Success Story! Black Man Beats The Odds

With the nation so divided along the lines of both class and race, driven to the streets to protest the election to the presidency of a rancorous bigot and self-serving sociopath, it's heartening to see any African-American rise up over the historically endemic racism which used to have him hanging at the end of a rope, and even now conspires to keep most of his brothers and sisters in both physical and psychological gulags. 

The phrase 'systemic racism' was at least uttered once in passing -- that I know of -- by the white patriarchy's candidate of choice, Hillary Clinton, during the presidential campaign.  This was heralded as a real breakthrough in our national conversation about race. I guess that means that by today's standards, Hillary Clinton now sits next to Rosa Parks in the tortured struggle for human rights.

Even with the bar set so low, we are prompted seek out sources of inspiration and hope.  As luck would have it, we have one such success story right at our fingertips!

Just look at these photos of the opulent $5.3 million mansion President Obama will move his family into after Donald Trump takes the oath of office.




Granted, not every African-American was so favored during Obama's presidency.

Some of those left out of this historic uptick in the fortunes of our very first black president included Trayvon Martin, Tamir Rice, Michael Brown, and Eric Garner.  They were among thousands of blacks -- mostly males and often unarmed -- gunned downed by police across America during Obama's reign.

And the people over at Black Lives Matter still seem to be having some sort of hissy fit!  You'd think they could just put aside whatever is bothering them and vicariously enjoy the new digs Barak, Michelle, and the kids will be moving into in January.  Not to mention the million-dollar book deals, the courtesy vacation junkets all over the globe, and of course, the $200,000 speaking fees that the ex-Prez can expect to pull in, to keep the family outfitted in Autographed Nike Air Jordans.

Then you have Jeffrey Sterling, the whistleblower who was prosecuted on dubious grounds for testifying to Congress, then allegedly providing classified material to journalist James Risen about a dicey covert CIA operation gone awry.  Apparently now federal jailers are trying to kill him by depriving him of much-needed medical care.

The 23% of African Americans who still live below the official poverty line didn't do so well either.  Plus it appears the gravy train just sped right on by the 20% of black folks who are still unemployed, despite putting their best foot forward in an effort to take advantage of the widely touted economic recovery from the 2008 crash, which trashed their savings, and put many of them out on the street to live among the rats.

Jeez, Louise!

Can't all these folks stop grousing and just bask in some black dude trickle-down success?

What's wrong with everyone?



[ This originated at the author's personal website . . . http://jdrachel.com ]



Success Story! Black Man Beats The Odds

War Criminal as Stand-Up Comedian

 

President Obama said the following publicly at a fundraiser, poking fun at criticism of him by the Republican candidates during their first debate.

(You can watch the video here. Quote occurs around 4:48.)

“Have you noticed that everyone of these candidates say, ‘Obama is weak.  Putin is kicking sand in his face.  When I talk to Putin he is going to straighten out.  Just looking at him.  He is going to be ...'  And then, it turns out they can’t handle a bunch of CNBC moderators.”

We've come to expect this sort of cuteness from this charming man, who seems to think his role as a comedian trumps his responsibilities as the most powerful leader of the free world, whatever 'free' could possibly mean in this age of 24/7 surveillance.  This remark, while entertaining and clever, is instructive in many ways.  It says a lot about Obama as a man, that despite his air of constant cool, he is vulnerable even to the cheap shots of fools like the Republican candidates, and that he personalizes the challenges which America's role in international relations presents.  It's been very obvious to me for a long time that Obama perceives his differences with Putin as a schoolyard scrap, rather than a profound confrontation of ideas and alternative actions.  It seems to escape him that in our dealings with Russia, we are attempting to balance the national interests of two equally important and determined peoples, not fighting over who's going to be quarterback of the football team or who gets to take out the homecoming queen on a date.
 
 

That he uses the most visible public podium in the world to level cheap shots at Putin, personal insults unworthy of a street thug, much less President of the United States, is both dangerous and counter-productive.  He has squandered a ton of good will tendered by Mr. Putin.  Certainly a lesser man than Vladimir would have long ago written off Obama as a childish dilettante.  But as we've observed at the G-20 meeting, he keeps insisting that he is open to cooperation and constructive engagement whenever the U.S. decides to stop pouting over its humiliation in Syria, and its horribly misguided and murderous actions in the Middle East now being judged by the world as the shameful disgrace they are.

On an entirely different level, in broad strokes it says even more about what is wrong with America's entire world view, its self-sabotaging foreign policy, and its reckless insensitivity to the havoc and hardship we as a nation inflict on the world, all while beating our chests about our duty and entitlement as leader of all humankind to celebrate a new historic Age of American Splendor and Enlightened Empire.

However, lately we've seen an even more baffling dynamic playing out.  We have on one hand, the bellicose, dangerously provocative hyperventilating of Ashton Carter, Samantha Powers, and the Devil Woman herself, Victoria Nuland (the scary creature pictured here).
 


Carter lumps Russia in with ISIS as the greatest threat to America, Nuland blames the Syria conflict, the refugee crisis, the Ukraine, and probably her clogged kitchen drain on Putin, the increasingly shrill Samantha Powers (see photo at the head of this article) is the MICs best friend with her mad R2P obsession, putting her in Guinness Record territory for the number of countries she would bomb into peaceful mourning . . . do I have to go on?  If you watch the news programs, you get pounded with the insane rants of these saber-rattling war hawks.  So you know.

At the same time, our Dr. Jekyll-Mr. Hyde president steps into a phone booth, does a quick costume-change ala Superman, and becomes Mr. Diplomacy, all ready to do the right thing and actually start fighting terrorism in earnest.  This is, of course, after he's wasted three years bombing camels and sheep dip in the desert, while caravans of white SUVs stretching as far as the eye can see, glide by on their way into Iraq and Syria, full of weapons provided at least in part by the CIA, paid for by our allies, smuggled in through Turkey, or air-dropped by the U.S. itself.

What is this, the diplomatic version of good-cop/bad-cop?

Maybe it's the reincarnation of the Keystone Cops.

Why does anyone trust any of these people?

Yet here we see Obama, off in a corner, having a nice talk at the G-20 meeting with Putin, the same man he mocked and vilified both during his State of the Union address, and more recently with the eyes of the entire world watching at the United Nations.  How cozy.  How convenient.
 


Why does Putin still intimate that Russia is open to working with America, when time in and time out, America has proven it is entirely unreliable, lacking any concept or intent of dealing with others in good faith?  It negotiates treaties, then violates or walks away from them.  It grandstands, teetering like a circus clown on the high moral ground of dubious  self-proclaimed righteousness, while destroying countries, inflicting unprecedented levels of chaos and carnage, at the same time preparing for a major war with China or Russia, maybe both.  Is this hypocrisy, confusion, or just stupidity?

Moreover, why should we as U.S. citizens for a second believe that Obama and the motley collection of people HE CHOSE TO SURROUND HIMSELF WITH are at all sincere about engaging Russia -- and of course the countries in Europe we have flooded with refugees by  bombing the Middle East for two decades now -- in a serious discussion about a peaceful resolution to this mess?  Which one of these blowhards are we even supposed to listen to?  Talk about mixed messages.  This administration is at war with itself!

So what are we to do now?  Get our hopes up that things are turning around?  That policy makers have finally woken up and are ready to put things right?

Then again, what choice do we have?

Wait until after the next election to see which psychopath will lead the charge?

I guess we need to take stock and count our blessings.  Maybe personally, I should commit to being a dutiful patriot by firmly resolving to respect Mr. Obama and honor his service as our president . . . to our country . . . and to the world.

After all, he's the best smart-ass money can buy.

And as war criminals go, the guy can sure yuk it up!



[ This originated at the author's personal website . . . http://jdrachel.com ]


War Criminal as Stand-Up Comedian

The Unbearable Lightness of Being Shallow

 

I love all of the hand-wringing, thoughtful analysis, speculation and prognostication surrounding Obama's public addresses.

Though the ADHD American public seems to little notice or be bothered by the lack of consistency or coherence to our president's policies on just about everything, pundits lately seem preoccupied with getting to the bottom of his erratic pronouncements. You know, those policy statements which seem often at odds with the best interests of the country, and even more baffling, at odds with themselves.

I hate to sabotage the good work all of the talking heads and pundits do. Moreover, I understand that they have to keep up the illusion they're doing something invaluable __ after all, we're talking job security. But this whole business of trying to find coherence in Obama's policies is a waste of everyone's time.

There never has been any consistency or sense to it. What can we expect? When he's talking to his "base", he spews progressive platitudes. When he deals with plutocrats, he morphs into the plutocrat he really is. When he pontificates about Mother Earth, now he's the great shepherd guardian of the environment. When he speaks at West Point, Obama becomes the mighty conquering hero, leader of the exceptionalist empire.

It comes down to this. Obama has no core principles, no political philosophy. Most of the time you can just, as they say, "follow the money". Of course, in our enlightened times, money is free speech. So sometimes it's about power and its manipulation. But there's always a "payoff" down the road __ voter support so he can continue wreaking havoc on what's left of egalitarianism and transferring the nation's wealth to his friends in the 1%.

Lately, there's been all of these noble attempts at analyzing why Obama is so hostile to Russia and Putin. The obvious answer is that he now fully subscribes to the nefarious vision of American hegemony embodied in Zbigniew Brzezinski's Grand Chessboard.

That may be true. But at the very core of Obama's Russophobic animosity . . . it's personal.
He hates Vlad the Impaler for upstaging him, not just aspiring to the higher moral ground __ shrewdly making some modest gains on the international stage __ but by Mr. Putin's actually achieving it in the eyes of the world. Putin's ratings soar. Obama's plummet.

Snowden . . . Syria . . . Ukraine.  There you have it, my puzzled pundits.

Obama now has a big chip on his shoulder and a very wounded ego. 

Despite a lot of lying, calculating and ruthless propaganda, posing, strutting, bullying, muscle-flexing, employing all of the exceptionalist weapons of the tallest, baddest bully pulpit on the planet, Obama has and continues to make a total fool of himself. And it's such a blow to his hyper-inflated ego that Vladimir Putin won't bow before his childish barbs, Obama simply can't handle it. Poor wittle boy!

We have seen in his State of the Union address before a joint session of Congress, then his speech before the U.N., and just recently his remarks to the G-7 __ using these extremely visible and internationally honored forums __ our President leveling vituperative taunts and personal insults at the leader of a great world power.
Personal insults!

This is our Nobel Peace Prize President.

This is our "don't do stupid stuff" President.

My eyes were opened to how shallow this man is during a recent interview. I had always been in awe of Obama's vast talents as an orator, delivering noble and moving sentiments, always putting himself in the best possible light, such that many believe him to be a truly great and noble man, a president who cares about the world, the people, world peace. What a shock it was to see the man in the stark personification of a self-absorbed sociopath who evidently has now lost perspective on his own public persona.

He was asked what it's like being President of the United States.

The first words out of Obama's mouth and I quote:  "It's a fun job."

Do I have to break this down for you? Let's just ignore how blatantly arrogant that remark was. The President has vast responsibilities and powers. His decisions affect everyone on our planet. He literally has life-or-death power over millions of people.

And he thinks it's a fun job.

As if we give a flying fuck whether he's having fun or not.

Obama has kept up a good front for longer than I would have expected. Many would have buckled under so much constant attention and adoration. But for seven years, he managed to fool a lot of people, even the people who are now suffering under his catastrophic lack of vision and leadership.

Obama may be a sharp guy. But it always seems that in the end, good judgment inevitably snaps under the dogged badgering of closeted narcissism. And now we have it, though it might have taken a little longer this time around. 

If talk is cheap, and the preferred use of the bully pulpit is self-congratulation over the greater good of the country __ or even an occasional nod to reality __ then the rumors of this President's greatness for the history books are grossly exaggerated, and will inevitably blow away like mere belches of hot air.

Just what the already overheating planet needs . . . more hot air.



[ This originated at the author's personal web site . . . http://jdrachel.com ]

“We want our money back!”

 

We have been ripped off!

We have been lied to, manipulated, and frightened into supporting the largest theft of our hard-earned taxpayer dollars ever __ easily the biggest heist in the history of the entire world.

If you buy a hair drier or a fruit blender at a store, then when you get home and find out it doesn't work, what do you do?  You go back and get a refund.

It's broken.

You deserve your money back.

Well . . . it's the same deal with wasteful government spending.

We paid our taxes in good faith. We trusted our political leaders to do the right things, to put it to good and proper use.

But they lied to us.

And we didn't just get a defective fruit blender or broken hair drier. We got defective wars, defective military equipment, defective leadership. We got a defective economy where only the rich do well and for the rest of us, it's broken.  The con artists we elected to office took our money, sometimes under false pretenses, and wasted it. We now have broken bridges, broken roads, broken schools, broken communities, broken homes!

In my previous two blogs, here and here, I railed against the enormous waste of taxpayer money on defense-industry profiteering, boondoggles, and the pursuit of unnecessary and fraudulent wars.

By my calculations, since 1992, over 24 years of bloated defense budgets resulting from bad foreign policy decisions, psychopathic delusions of world domination, two major wars, paranoid obsession with security which has trashed the Constitution and is well on its way to making America a police state, and pork barrel squandering of hard-earned taxpayer dollars, I came up with a total of $4.52 trillion entirely wasted.

$4.52 trillion, folks!

Look at this and try not to faint or have your head explode . . .
 
All this time, we regular Americans __ the ones that don't belong to country clubs __ could have used this money. 

If we had had this $4.52 trillion, we wouldn't be so far in debt, we wouldn't be struggling from paycheck to paycheck. We wouldn't have so many foreclosures and bankruptcies. We would have put this money to good use: Improving our homes and communities, properly feeding and clothing our kids, modernizing our schools.

Yes, we've been had. Big time!

And there it is in black-and-white __ with some green and purple thrown in for cheer.

Americans got a defective product. We were cheated and conned.

Now the bill has come due. 

$4,524,000,000,000!

This comes to $14,186 for every man, woman and child in America.

Or it means refunding $25,416 to each and every living person who filed a tax return in the last twenty-four years.

Either way you look at it, this money is due and payable . . . IMMEDIATELY!

And don't tell us the check is in the mail. We want to see some green!

Just load up all those MRAPs and other military trucks roaming around everywhere these days with some cash and start going house-to-house.

For the NSA clowns that are reading this blog and unconstitutionally spying on me, please do me a huge favor and pass along the above invoice to President Obama and Secretary of the Treasury, Jack Lew.  Please mark it 'Urgent'.  We expect to see some prompt action.

Write on the envelope . . .

You've had OUR MONEY long enough.
People are getting real IMPATIENT.
You stole it. Now give it back!

If this refund is not in the hands of every deserving American citizen very soon, I suspect a lot of people are going to get real testy.  I don't know how many pitchforks there are, but I do know there are over 300,000,000 guns floating around.

Just sayin'.

Yes, we want our country back.

Of course, we want our democracy back.

But for starters . . .

We want our money back!



[ This originated at the author's personal web site . . . http://jdrachel.com ]



“We want our money back!”

The Bully Pulpit vs. American Idol

I have long criticized Obama for not using the bully pulpit. When he had the vast majority of the country at his feet after his election in 2008, instead of laying out a positive vision for the country and leading the charge for rebuilding the nation, he embarked on a charm offensive directed at Wall Street, big banks, neoconservative empire builders, and became the Appeaser-In-Chief towards those responsible for the Afghanistan and Iraq disasters, a wink-and-nod apologist for the criminal bankers who crashed the economy in 2008, and a card-carrying member of the inside circle who continue to inflict our country with the fraudulent War on Terror.

It was all in the name of love __ the cuddly love Obama craved from the oligarchs, whose approval was more important to him than the enormous groundswell of support he had from the people. Remember them? The ones who have to work to make ends meet, the ones who see their kids off to school in the morning __ the same ones who flocked to the polls and elected our first black president, duped into thinking he was one of them, a man of the people with their best interests at heart.

In a fascinating analysis of Obama's presidency that appeared in Truthdig, author David Bromwich
discusses what a shallow and self-serving enterprise it has proved to be.

What an understatement.

There is no coherency to this president's policies. In a clear attempt to promote image as a substitute for substance and apparently with an insatiable desire to be loved by everyone, President Obama often fashions positions totally at odds with one another.

Protect the environment vs. drill baby drill.

World peace vs. bomb bomb bomb.

Individual freedom vs. the NDAA.

Jobs for Americans vs. TPP and TTIP.

To add insult to confusion, in critical areas of leadership, we see policies diametrically opposite to the high sounding and noble words of Obama's breathtaking rhetoric and crafted public image, offering inconsistencies, even outright hypocrisy and treachery.

You've got a Nobel Peace Prize winner who has become a drone assassin.

You've got an putative constitutional scholar who using his phenomenal intellectual gifts to trample on the Constitution, squashing dissent, and openly harassing journalists and undermining freedom of the press.

You've got a president who spoke eloquently during his first campaign about inclusive democracy and transparency in government __ promising to change the way Washington DC does business __ who has built upon the worst aspects of Bush's nascent police state and now oversees a vast growing domestic surveillance complex spying on its own citizens, who is classifying record volumes of government documents, restricting citizen access to the inner workings of our government, conducting questionable military adventures often in secret, fostering aggression against the express will of the American citizenry who are sick of war and the self-defeating politics of confrontation, and prosecuting well-meaning whistleblowers at an unprecedented rate.

You got the self-declared "environmental president" who refuses to even attend the Kyoto summits, who is promoting risky East Coast and Arctic drilling, nuclear power, fracking for natural gas, so called “clean coal”, and now boasts about America being the number one oil and gas producer in the world __ so much for concern about climate change.

You've got a man who offered the world the outstretched hand of peace in the first months of his presidency, who has since bombed his way into creating more enemies and hatred for America than ever before in our history.

But we get what we pay for. Obama is just another brand, like Cheerios and StarKist Tuna.

We wanted a great president. We got a rock star.

We desperately needed leadership. We got self-aggrandizement.

I will say this. Obama talks a good game. He is incredibly articulate. Charming. Funny. Always gives an Oscar level performance at all of his public outings.

And he is beautiful . . . his wife is beautiful . . . his family is beautiful!

But when presidential elections are run as beauty pageants, talent contest spectacles, when making history is just more reality TV, we can't expect real leadership. We can only expect a president who struts and works the audience, plays the judges, postures and poses for his fan base, puts on dazzling, crowd-pleasing shows, and soaks up the all the love he can get. We certainly can't expect thoughtful, principled stands on the vital issues, responding to the greater needs of the country and serving the general welfare of the public.

There's no business like show business.

And politics has become American Idol.

We no longer look for results. We look for good ratings.

What an epic disappointment. We certainly had high hopes, didn't we?

There is one thing I will concede. Who can deny it? . . .

He sure looks great in a suit and tie!


[ This originated at the author's personal web site . . . http://jdrachel.com ]

The ‘H’ Word

 

It used to be imprudent or just plain vulgar to say the 'F' word.

Now we just say it . . . fuck.

It's such common parlance, so acceptable, it's become the language of diplomacy,
as with the policy declaration by Deputy Secretary of State Victoria 'F**k the EU' Nuland about the crisis she and her neocon friends precipitated in the Ukraine. 

But I'll tell you a word we don't dare say anymore.

You know the one . . .

The 'H' word.

Sometimes it's written as 'h*pe' or 'ho*e'.

We used to actually use the word often. It was on everyone's lips.

 

But after President Obama __ or I should say Brand Obama __ and the
corporate lapdog Democrats made it central to their 2008 and 2012
campaigns, then turned it into both the brunt of cruel jokes and the
poisonous pill of despair, it became as popular as leprosy, not even
whispered anymore in polite company.

Who wants to cry in public?

They sure got us all wide-eyed and teary-eyed with all those 'H*pe and Change'
bumper stickers and campaign posters. People started believing things
would turn around and America would get back on track, after eight
tortuous years immersed in the stupidity, boorishness and arrogance of
George W.

Then this phalanx of feel-good experts and spin doctors responsible for the
propaganda juggernaut we experienced __  especially during the heady
days running up to the 2008 election __ took the faith and good will,
the higher aspirations of the American public and threw them in the
toilet, took several healthy dumps on our heartfelt desire to embrace
the American Dream. They even continue cynically to this day to peddle
fresh variants of their snide charm-offensive h*pe-and-change
trash-talk, assuming the public is none the wiser, and still thirsty for
the arsenic-spiked lemonade of their duplicity.

This is shameful on so many levels. After the horror of George W. and his band
of blatant liars, the ignorant, delusional, self-serving oligarchs who
mockingly led us into a false war, bankrupted the economy, reversed
fifty years of progress toward becoming a humane and sane society, we
had all but given up. Then the sun burst through the storm clouds of our
collective misery and revulsion. People were so engorged with h*pe,
many even heralded Obama as the new Messiah. Okay. Okay. That was over
the top. Yet not just America, but the entire world was at his feet,
expecting this man who spoke with such eloquence, such passion,
sincerity, intelligence, to deliver on the noble promises contained in
his books, Dreams From My Father and Audacity of Hope,
given in soaring oratorical performances at his campaign rallies, in
his inaugural address, and any number of speeches given during the first
few months of his presidency __ most notably the one delivered June 4,
2009 at Cairo University titled "A New Beginning".
Many of us, arguably an overwhelming majority, naively thought this
heralded a new age built around peace and prosperity spanning the entire
globe, and the ascendancy of justice and respect for others.
And what do we have?  You know . . .

Mr. Nobel Peace Prize has proven to be more trigger happy than the sneering
gun-slinging Texan he replaced, Mr. Transparency is far more secretive
and presides over a regime that spies on everyone, the jails
are bulging with more and more people of color __ but none of the
bankers and financial predators who crashed the world economy in 2008 __
the rich just get richer, the poor get poorer, the banks are looting
the treasury, corporations are out of control, fracking is out of
control, global warming is out of control, wealth inequality is out of
control, poisoning our food, air and water are out of control, the
police are out of control, the imperial neocon warmongers are out of
control, the military is out of control, maybe everything is out of control.

Or more accurately, it's in control of the wrong people.

So now the 'H' word is a very dirty word. It's too charged with treachery, the
violation of the best intentions and wholesome expectations of a lot of
very good but obviously gullible people. No one dares utter it without
everyone within earshot going into convulsions of indignation or crying
fits of despair.

There is, however,  another 'H' word I'm hearing more and more these days . . .

Hypocrisy.



[ This originated at the author's personal web site . . . http://jdrachel.com ]

Author John Rachel Wakes Up Black!

 

Apparently my voter registration card has been nullified. The letter I got said that to reinstate my voting privileges, I would have to provide a birth certificate, proof of U.S. citizenship, blood and urine samples, DNA from my natural parents and at least four aunts and uncles, a copy of a recent utility bill, a notarized letter of commendation from my high school counselor, two color photos taken within the last twenty minutes, a clean bill of health from my doctor showing I'm not lactose intolerant, and a list ten references five of which must be active members of my local Kiwanis Club. I also have to pay two outstanding parking tickets for a car I never owned __ I'm disputing this by offering proof that I was in Kenya with President Obama at the time of the parking violation citations.

I guess I understand. It's important to maintain the integrity of the right to vote in a system where the voice of the people weighs in so heavily in shaping public policy.

[ This originated at the author's personal website . . . http://jdrachel.com ]

Spreading The Love

                "I'm America's CEO."

In the post-election euphoria, we've been led to believe that President Obama's trip to Asia is about spreading goodwill, creating new friendships, renewing old alliances, and making the world safe for democracy.
It's a charm offensive that's much longer on "offensive" than "charm".

What this trip is actually about is selling TPP, the Trans-Pacific Partnership" __ "selling" here being the equivalent of jamming a building the size of the New York Federal Reserve between the spread cheeks of the leaders of the countries in this part of the world.

TPP is not exactly popular even in the U.S. In fact, the more people learn about it, the more they realize that it's a Trojan Horse, another so-called trade agreement, which in point of fact mitigates the effectiveness of many environmental and worker-protection laws, compromises the sovereignty of nations, and puts in place yet another powerful mechanism for the already bloated and rich transnational corporations to amass more socially unproductive profits. Encouragingly, more and more people are outraged and speaking out against it. This is predictably being countered by a public relations campaign using our public officials as spokespersons for the transnational corporate elite who are promoting this onerous, ill-conceived weapon of economic destruction.

Don't be fooled by this self-serving and bogus propaganda.

Yesterday, for example, I read an article called Canada Sued under NAFTA for Banning Fracking which tells about an American corporation initiating a lawsuit for damages of $250,000,000. You see, if a business entity feels that the laws of a participating country interfere with their now inalienable rights to exploit that country, NAFTA sanctions "investor-to-state" litigation. In this case, Lone Pine Resources Inc. spent large sums of money securing mining permits, but Quebec Province, where the mining was to take place, later determined that exercising those rights would cause grave environmental damage. NAFTA allows U.S. and Mexican companies to sue the Canadian government if they feel they have been wronged by a government policy or action. This is saying that Lone Pine Resources had no responsibility in determining in advance the environmental impacts of its plans. It can throw money down, then if local authorities discover that their proposed mining will pollute the water, dump toxins in the soil, subject people to carcinogens and other life-threatening chemicals, Lone Pine Resources has to be compensated for their own shortsightedness and stupidity.

As the article goes on to say: "Amazingly, instead of looking for ways to scale back and eliminate the rules in our trade agreements that threaten public interest policies in favor of corporate profits, eleven countries, including the United States and Canada, are currently in the middle of negotiations to expand the NAFTA investment rules in the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade pact."

This is madness!!

TPP is NAFTA on steroids. Yes. Anyone who has looked at this "trade agreement", as its being misrepresented, can see it's nothing but another monstrous assault weapon being handed to transnational corporations to bulk up their bottom line at the expense of just about everything having to do with quality of life __ safety, human rights, worker rights, sustainability, environmental protection. Please! Just read this and this and this, then do your own research. This is not a shades of gray issue. It's black and white, folks.

Let me give a brief example from my own experience.

Japan Post is the postal service here. It is truly amazing in every respect. It's essentially a privatized, public service institution that with scrupulous government oversight, conjoins several organizations to provide a variety of services. At Japan Post, not only can you mail letters, cards, and packages locally and internationally, but you can pay your bills with a fully-functioning cash transfer system, do banking with an ATM machine, secure an entire range of insurance (home, life, auto, accident), purchase gifts, make travel plans and purchase tickets. When I look at the shell of an institution the U.S. Postal Service has become under the relentless assault of private corporations there, it's no contest. It's like comparing a scrub game of neighborhood football to the Superbowl.

The Japanese are furious about TPP. Under TPP, corporations in the U.S. through legal challenges would tear Japan Post apart. They'd claim the panoply of services and the incredibly competent and efficient delivery of those services are "unfair competition".

It's competition alright. It actually works! It provides useful services making the lives of Japanese citizens better and more hassle-free.

This is just one small example. I'm not going to do all of the work for you. Just extrapolate from this, read the recommended articles and imagine what will happen if these countries are "persuaded" __ read that as "coerced" or "bullied" __ into this agreement. America's military and economic power often makes such negotiations a sham. America is good at making less powerful nations an offer they can't refuse.

For those of you who might not have heard, America is a very unpopular country in most of the world. Despite the whitewashed image which is promoted by corporate media in the U.S., anti-Americanism is exponentially on the rise. I have experienced this first hand.

People defensively suggest that I don't love my country. This is both silly and ignorant.

I've always loved and always will love what America represents. I love the energy, the optimism, the whole idea of government of the people, by the people, for the people.

But TPP is not America. Corporation X and Corporation Y just because their registered in Delaware isn't America. The tiny powerful coterie of wealthy elite investors and Wall Street bankers who are turning our government into a puppet show isn't America.

You and I are America __ the people referred to in "of the people, by the people, for the people." We are America.

And no proud, sane, decent American would get behind TPP and the expanding corporate juggernaut that's being done in the name of proud, sane, decent Americans. Proud, sane, decent Americans believe in opportunity, justice, fairness, the "general welfare". Proud, sane, decent Americans truly love their country, and would never put corporate profits ahead of how America is supposed to serve its citizens. Proud, sane, decent Americans don't compromise the integrity of communities and schools to improve the bottom line. Proud, sane, decent Americans understand the hope America represents to the world. Proud, sane, decent American respect human rights and human life.

No, I don't hate America. But a lot of people in the world do. And if TPP and similar such agreements are put in place, the worst is yet to come.

We won't have time to spread the love.

We'll be too busy defending ourselves from all the hate.



[ This originated at the author's personal web page . . . http://jdrachel.com ]

“Free as a butterfly in a hurricane.”

Give me your tired, your poor
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free
The wretched refuse of your teaming shore
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me
I say lift thy skirts, lo! come to my door
I embrace thou even as a common whore
'Tis the illusion of freedom you implore?
Here you have it, you shall seek no more

President Obama signed the National Defense Authorization Act on December 31, 2011.

Happy New Year!

[ The title of this blog is a quote from my recent novel 12-12-12. Visit http://jdrachel.com/12-12-12 ]