Posts from — February 2012

When you see those TV images of rioters in Greece railing futilely against an oppressive austerity program inflicted by the international financial community… When you hear about child labor and factory accidents at those Apple plants in China… When you see foreclosure signs popping up in your neighborhood like mushrooms after a spring shower…

Do you tell yourself it sucks to be them? Or do you mutter, “There but for the grace of God go I?”

For if ever John Donne’s words were true, it is now: “No man is an island.”

The bell you’re hearing tolls for us all.

We – you and I – are involved in a global struggle in which powerful corporate forces are dismantling the economies of rich countries to create a world in which they have access to universally cheap labor with no regulations or consumer protections to get in their way. And they’re winning.

The success of the corporate crusade was brought home recently by an announcement that heavy equipment manufacturer Caterpillar Inc. has decided to shut down its diesel locomotive assembly plant in London, Ontario, and relocate its operations in a cheaper labor market.

In China perhaps? Taiwan? Bangladesh?

No, America.

By relocating to Muncie, Indiana, Caterpillar can get non-union employees to work for about half of the pay unionized workers were getting at their plant in Canada.

It is now plain that America is becoming a Third World country, where employers can do as they like and pay what they please. Consider the union busting legislation in Republican-governed states across America. Consider the voter suppression laws, the assault on environmental and consumer protections, the divisive “culture war,” the surge in “religious” political activism.

Consider the vast and widening gap between the rich and the rest of us.

If you have ever lived in a Latin American or Caribbean country, you must be experiencing a sense of deja vu.

If the corporate elite have their way – and it looks as if they will -  there will be only Third World countries as hard-won workers’ rights are swept away, governments are dominated by the super-rich and their paid politicians, and electorates are brainwashed by expert propagandists, divided by “wedge issues,” and emasculated by fear and deception.

The rot is spreading fast and it is spreading from within. The man and woman in the street, the voters who should be controlling their destiny, are infected by the virus of free-market capitalism. They have been persuaded to act against their own interests, thought-controlled like so many zombies in a horror movie.

And if you dare to point this out, you are dismissed as a “liberal” or worse.

As so many of us stand by watching the world around us being changed beyond redemption, the famous words of Friedrich Gustav Martin Niemöller echo in my mind:

 When the Nazis came for the communists,
I remained silent;
I was not a communist.
When they locked up the social democrats,
I remained silent;
I was not a social democrat.
When they came for the trade unionists,
I did not speak out;
I was not a trade unionist.
When they came for the Jews,
I did not speak out;
I was not a Jew.
When they came for me, there was no one left to speak out.

No one to speak out … just the zombies, working mindlessly around the clock in dank and dangerous factories as their overlords stalk the earth in triumph.

Share this:

As I watch the carnage on TV, women and children writhing in death as bombs rain down on their homes, I wonder why. The answers don’t come easily. This time it’s Syria that’s in tumult, and it looks like the most horrific conflict yet. The quick response is to ask why the world is standing by as the blood flows in the streets. What makes Syria so different from Libya? NATO did not balk at intervening in Libya, bringing down the Gaddafi regime and causing the dictator’s death.

The United Nations was blocked from intervening in Syria by Russia and China, which have veto power in the Security Council. Why the veto?

One answer appears to be the huge sale of Russian arms to Bashar al Assad, the ruthless dictator who is massacring his people. China also sells arms to Assad, though not nearly as much as Russia. Do I think Russia and China would prevent the world from helping Assad’s hapless victims because of the money they get rom him? What else can I think?

What if the bombs and bullets ripping through those Syrian homes were made in the USA? Would America have said no to the UN’s rescue proposal?

I hate to think so. But there are other repressive regimes in the world, other dictators who would not hesitate to massacre their subjects. And some of them get their weapons from America.

America is by far the world’s largest arms supplier. And the world spends more on arms than on food – more than a trillion dollars a year.

Here’s a table I found on the web:

I don’t know the details; the arms trade is shrouded in secrecy and critics say it’s among the most corrupt operations in the world. We hear details only when a massive deal is struck – like the recent multibillion-dollar sale of fighter jets to Saudi Arabia.

From what I read on the web, the militaryindustrial complex is spread across America, providing jobs and economic support for just about every congressional district. The idea that Congress might want to cut back “defense spending” is laughable. And so is the idea that the production of weapons is driven solely by the country’s security needs.

It’s all about money. The industry does 80 to 90 percent of its business with the Pentagon. Congress budgeted $725 billion for “defense” in 2011.

Now, with the war in Iraq at an end and an imminent drawdown of troops in Afghanistan, the American war machine faces a decline in domestic demand .

I wonder if that has anything to do with the clamor for war with Iran?

And the conflageration in the Middle East?

Picture above shows proesters” Assad poster.

Click here for insight into the international arms trade.

Share this:

My mother died a devout Catholic. My father’s sister, my Aunt Bell, was devoted to Mother Church. I have many loved ones who are comforted and succored by the Church of Rome. I have personally seen the good works – the schools, orphanages, hospitals – that Catholics provide for the poor.

In some ways, I remain a Catholic. Not a Roman Catholic but a Catholic nonetheless, a member – as the Apostles’ Creed puts it – of the Holy Catholic Church. I was baptized and confirmed in the Anglican Church, which is not a truly Protestant denomination – and as I wander through my garden and pass the Madonna statue my mother gave me, I pause to say my Hail Marys.

Having conceded all that, I have to confess to intense disappointment in the Catholic hierarchy.

How can so much good be combined with so much wickedness?

I am not just talking about the sadistic sexual abuse of helpless children and the complicity of the highest orders in covering it up. And I am not talking about the burning of Protestants at the stake or the Spanish Inquisition or the vicious Borgia regime or so much in the church’s history that is undeniably Satanic. That is in the past, and as a Christian I must forgive.

What disgusts me today is something much more mundane – the Catholic bishops’ claim to a religious motive in rejecting President Obama’s compromise on that spurious birth control issue.

Here is the news report from Reuters:

U.S. Catholic Church leaders said they will fight President Barack Obama’s controversial birth-control insurance coverage policy despite his compromise that religious employers would not have to offer free contraceptives for workers, shifting the responsibility to insurers.

In an abrupt policy shift aimed at trying to end a growing election-year firestorm, Obama on Friday announced the compromise.

But the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops said its concerns were not addressed and cited “serious moral concerns.”

In a statement issued Friday evening, the bishops said Obama’s proposal “continues to involve needless government intrusion in the internal governance of religious institutions, and to threaten government coercion of religious people and groups to violate their most deeply held convictions.”

“We will therefore continue – with no less vigor, no less sense of urgency – our efforts to correct this problem through the other two branches of government,” the bishops said in urging Congress to take action to overturn the rule.

The regulation at the center of the controversy requires religious-affiliated groups such as charities, hospitals and universities, but not churches themselves, to provide employees with coverage for birth control as other health insurance providers must do.

Catholic Church leaders and Obama’s Republican opponents previously led the fight against the rule requiring coverage for contraceptives as a violation of religious freedom, making it a potential big issue in the 2012 presidential race.

Obama’s compromise sought to accommodate religious organizations, such as Catholic hospitals and universities. But the reaction from the bishops and other Catholic leaders made clear the battle would continue.

It may not seem like much of an offense when viewed alongside such horrors as child abuse and torture, but I see it as blasphemy. To use Christ’s sacrifice as a political weapon is patently sacrilegious. And there is clearly no longer a moral issue here – if there ever was one. This is nothing but politics.

There is no contesting the fact that the Catholic leadership is anti-Obama. They are pawns of the far right not only in America but throughout the world. They use their position in the church to pursue political power when they should be illuminating the path to salvation.

There is no religious “issue” here. Only the naked abuse of power – the power these priests claim to derive from God.

Click here to read the Reuters report.

Share this:

In a few months, the Republican nominee for president will emerge on the campaign trail, and you can bet he will sound nothing like the candidates we’re hearing from today. We might recognize his name but the words that come out of his mouth will be different. That’s my guess, anyway. I can’t believe any American politician would hope to get elected on the kind of right-wing platform on display in the primaries. Whoever the chosen standard bearer might be, he will have to appeal to “moderates” if he hopes to defeat President Obama.

Unfortunately for America, voters have a short memory, and most of them don’t pay attention to politics. They go to the polls with a sketchy idea of a few issues, sometimes just one issue like abortion. Some might just vote for the party their parents voted for without knowing or caring why.

It’s sad. And dangerous. They should be paying attention now. They should be listening to the extreme views that Republicans really espouse. Like the views being expressed at CPAC 2012 today.

In an artice for  Right Wing Watch distributed by Reader Supported News this morning, Brian Tashman reports:

CPAC will play host to anti-gay groups such as the Family Research Council, the birther leader of WorldNetDaily, and the Apartheid-nostalgic Youth for Western Civilization. But that isn’t all.

 Following speeches from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and Rep. Michele Bachmann, CPAC is hosting the panel “The Failure of Multiculturalism: How the pursuit of diversity is weakening the American Identity” with Peter Brimelow, the founder and head of VDARE.com.

You probably have never heard of VDARE.com. Most mainstream Americans haven’t. It serves an esoteric audience.  Here’s how Tashman describes it:

VDARE is a White Nationalist website, run by Brimelow, which frequently publishes the works of anti-Semitic and racist writers and is named after Virginia Dare, who is believed to be the first child of English parents born in the Americas. Brimelow, an immigrant from Great Britain, expresses his fear of the loss of America’s white majority, blames non-white immigrants for social and economic problems and urges the Republican Party to give up on minority voters and focus on winning the white vote. He also said that aNew York City subway is the same as an Immigration and Naturalization Service waiting room, “an underworld that is not just teeming but also almost entirely colored.”

VDARE has published the work of people like Robert Weissberg, who says that black and Hispanic students are responsible for problems in the American education system, Marcus Epstein, the Youth for Western Civilization leader who karate-chopped a black woman after calling her a “n****r” (he later pled guilty to assault), and J. Philippe Rushton of the eugenicist Pioneer Fund.

Surprised? You shouldn’t be. This is the face of the new Republican Party. These are the allies of people like Ron Paul, Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum. These are the folks that Mitt Romney, who pursued relatively moderate policies as governor of Massachusetts, must win over if he hopes to be the party’s presidential nominee.

And these are the people behind Marco Rubio, the Florida senator who is a likely choice as vice presidencial candidate.

To win the presidency, the nominee – whoever he might be – will have to show a different face to the American public. The rabid right wing is still a minority in America – a vociferous and vicious minority but a minority nonetheless.

So while you can be certain the Republicans will use “culture war” wedge issues for all they’re  worth, fanning the flames of contention on such divisive topics as abortion, they will have to tone down their message to appeal to the political “center.”

Will Americans be fooled? Hard to say. They’ve been fooled before.

We can only hope that the Republicans have gone too far this time, that the cat is out of the bag, and voters will know who they’re really being asked to elect come November.

Share this:

We’re hearing a lot about the First Amendment rights of religious groups in America. An innocuous regulation in the new health care reform legislation is prompting the most unctuous fulminations from Catholic politicians like John Boehner and Rick Santorum – and even Mormon Mitt Romney. They are outraged – outraged – by President Obama’s “attack on religion.”

And if you buy that, there’s a bridge you might be interested in buying.

Obviously, the issue is a canard concocted to give Republicans campaign ammunition against the president.

The fuss was triggered by the new health care act’s requirement that Church-owned schools, hospitals and charities cover birth control in their employee insurance programs. And Roman Catholics are not supposed to practice birth control (except the rhythm method, and we know how well that works).

You and I know this is a joke. The vast majority of Catholics practice birth control.

It’s important to note that the law does not apply to the churches themselves, only their outside operations. And many Catholic owned hospitals and schools already offer free birth control to employees. Most insurance plans include it, and it’s the law in most states. Furthermore, the federal law does not require women to accept the birth control that’s offered. As good Catholics, they can say no thanks.

But that’s not the most patently hypocritical thing about the “issue.”

The entire concept of separation of church and state is a fantasy. Churches across America are deeply involved in politics. My Catholic mother used to tell me who “Father” was advising his flock to vote for. And Sandra’s Baptist relatives are routinely subjected to horror movies  in their church’s crusade against abortion.

I know the Constitution doesn’t give the government the authority to tell religious organizations what to do – as far as religion is concerned.

But if a church opens a business, it has to obey the law of the land like anyone else. Right?

And I wonder how far the constitutional separation goes. Marijuana advocates are arguing that they should be able to smoke “the weed of wisdom” as a sacrament, for example. I can’t see the government agreeing to let that “religious” practice go unchallenged, can you?

Anyone can see that religion and politics are inseparable in America. Listen to the sanctimonious pleadings of the presidential candidates for instance. And how about those convoys of Southern Baptist buses ferrying voters to the polls?

It’s no secret that many religious leaders are anti-Obama – motivated by their crusade to reverse Roe vs. Wade. And Catholic clerics are among the Supreme Court ruling’s most outspoken critics.

Across the world, the Church of Rome is vigorously political – and staunchly “conservative.” The Vatican is a political power, and has been for centuries.

Fortunately, the members of this massively pwerful church don’t necessarily vote the way the leadership decrees. Most of them are sensible enough to form their own political opinions.

Click here for more on the debate.

Share this:

With good news on the economic front, you had to know the Republicans would activate Plan B – for bigotry. So, ladies and gentlemen, we give you the quintessential bigot, former senator Rick Santorum. I am sure I don’t have to tell you this far-right crusader is the GOP flavor of the month – or at least of the day. If you own a TV you know that Santorum won all three Republican contests last night and the pundits are proclaiming him a serious contender for the party’s presidential nomination.

In a rational world, such an idea would be unthinkable. But how many American voters think?

A lot of them might vote for Santorum in November if he gets the nomination. They’ve voted for him before.

Pennsylvanians sent him to Congress in 1990 and to the U.S. Senate in 1994. They didn’t get sick of him till  the Obama sweep of 2008.

Santorum makes no secret of his beliefs. He keeps reminding Republicans that he is a true conservative. And he is – if you define “conservative” as intolerant. A devout Roman Catholic, he is so anti-abortion that he believes rape victims should bear their rapist’s child. Naturally, he is getting a lot of traction from the Obama Administration’s recent ruling that requires employers – including religious organizations – to provide free contraceptives for female employees.

He is aggressively intolerant of gays, and opposes same-sex marriage as an abomination. He is reliably far-right on such issues as immigration, welfare and national defense. He disputes evolution and scoffs at the idea that pollution is a major contributor to climate change.

The UK Guardian portrayed him this way::

Social conservatism has been the most defining factor in Santorum’s political and personal life…. As a senator, Santorum became a vibrant symbol of the power of the religious right and by 2005 was named by Time magazine as one of the 25 most influential evangelists in America. Santorum has raised doubts about the theory of evolution and wants a constitutional ban on gay marriage. He has called the scientific evidence behind global warming “junk” and “patently absurd”. He opposes abortion even in cases of rape.

He also opposes diversity.  The Guardian notes that he warned an Iowa meeting that ”if we celebrate diversity, we create conflict,” and accused President Obama of “un-American activities.”

What do you think those code words mean -  “diversity” and “un-American”? I think they are signals to the racist element still festering in right-wing America. I think that when Santorum talks about his “stark contrasts” to Barack Obama, he isn’t talking just about policies, he is talking about skin color. Or at least that’s how some Republicans hear it.

I shudder to contemplate the possibilites when I read that a Rasmussen national poll puts Santorum ahead of the president  45% to 44%.

But the prospect of a Santorum presidency is unthinkable. Isn’t it?

Click here for the Guardian profile.

Share this:

It must be difficult for Karl Rove to recognize a fact when he hears it. Republican gurus like Rove deal in spin so when they hear a simple factual statement they think it’s spin. And that’s how Rove (shown above, left, complaining to Fox viewers) and the other “offended” conservatives saw Clint Eastwood’s powerful Superbowl ad (above, right). They cried foul, calling it pro-Obama, accusing Chrysler of repaying the president for his support.

They’re mistaken, of course.

The simple fact is: It is halftime in America.

Four years ago, when Barack Obama became president, this country faced a horrendous challenge. The economy was in freefall and jobs were vanishing at the rate of 700,000 a month. It was the worst economic disaster since Herbert Hoover.

Today, jobs are reappearing – despite the Republicans’ best efforts to prevent a recovery. The economy has turned around. Recovery is underway.

But no one could expect the recovery to be complete in just four years – especially with Republicans in Congress frustrating the president’s every productive move. There’s work to be done. The second half is coming up.

In their hearts, Americans must know this.

Chrysler knows it.

Four years ago, when the American automobile industry was written off as dead, when Mitt Romney and his ilk were ready to let General Motors and Chrysler go bankrupt, President Obama came to their rescue. Today, GM is once again the world’s number one car maker, and Chrysler is prospering. The American automobile industry is back on its feet. The nation did not lose the industry’s million-plus jobs.

As the Chrysler ad recognizes, the industry was saved not only by the government but also by the auto workers union. The workers understood the gravity of the crisis and agreed to share in the sacrifices that were necessary. It’s an inspiring story of cooperation for the common good.

And Clint Eastwood told it as only he could tell it. Powerfully.

It’s half-time for Chrysler. It’s half-time for the auto industry.

And it’s half-time for America.

Go team!

Four more years!

Click here for more on the ad.

Share this:

So Iran is trying to build a nuclear bomb. And that is setting off alarm bells from Jerusalem to Washington DC. But, somehow, I don’t feel any goosebumps.

I don’t have a list of all the countries with nuclear bombs but I bet it’s a pretty long one. Israel has several, I’m sure. And there are scores of missile silos all over America just waiting to be activated. Russia and China have had The Bomb for decades.

Even turbulent Pakistan has The Bomb, and if my memory can be trusted, some Pakistani scientist was selling the formula all over the place a few years ago.

And I seem to recall that when the Soviet Union imploded, somebody apparently left the door to the safe wide open and their “nuclear secrets” spilled out on the open market.

I believe there is – or used to be – a blueprint for building The Bomb on one of those internet sites.

Don’t get me wrong. It’s very scary that so many people have access to such a deadly weapon, especially in this crazy world. But no country is crazy enough to use The Bomb. Not Iran. Not Israel. Not America.

Especially not America. If America was going to use The Bomb, the Nine-Eleven terrorist attack provided the perfect excuse. Instead, the U.S. sent its young people to Afghanistan to get blown up by homemade explosives, concocted from the kind of ingredients you probably have in your refrigerator.

Using The Bomb would trigger retaliation in kind, of course, and one thing would lead to another. And it would be goodbye world.

But – as scary as it is – nuclear weapons are not the only things we have to fear.

Poison gas has been around for as long as I can remember. But you don’t hear politicians yelling about some country planning to stockpile mustard gas.

The bottom line is that there’s a lot of bad stuff lying around – from rusty nails and cow dung-smeared bamboo spikes to deadly germs and chemicals – and nuclear “devices.” Everyone has access to something lethal. Remember the blast that leveled those government buildings in Oklahoma and killed all those innocent children? It was created by bags of fertilizer.

I am not saying the crazy Ayatollah and his despicable puppet Mahmoud Ahmadinejad aren’t dangerous. They are.

It’s a good idea to keep an eye on them.

But not because they’re planning to drop The Bomb on Israel. They wouldn’t dare. I think they’re bluffing.

Share this:

Unless you’ve been a recluse for the past two or three decades, you have probably participated in some kind of fund raiser for the Susan G. Komen foundation. Or at least  tacked one of those pink ribbons somewhere on your person to raise awareness of the fight against breast cancer.

It’s one of the most high-profile charities in the world. And one of the richest. Komen reports revenues of nearly $350 million a year, with 24 percent going to research and 20 percent to fundraising and administration. I don’t know where the rest goes.

Nice work if you can get it.

Still, since its founding 30 years ago, Susan G. Komen for the Cure has contributed nearly two billion dollars to cancer education, research and screening.

I am enough of a curmudgeon to wonder why cancer is still such a scourge – considering all the money that charities and governments have devoted to fighting it in my lifetime. You would think they would have found a cure by now.

But I have to concede that breast cancer rates have declined sharply, and what was once a death sentence is now often treatable.

That’s the good news. The bad news is that the supposedly nonpartisan Komen charity is contaminated by right-wing politics.

And this has caused the cancellation of its funding for Planned Parenthood’s breast cancer screenings.

Writing in Salon.com today, Mary Elizabeth Williams points out that:

In many cases, Planned Parenthood is the only access to healthcare that low-income women and men have.

She wonders:

What happens to the women who depend upon Planned Parenthood to tell them whether or not they have breast cancer? What becomes of mothers and daughters and wives and friends who believed that Komen’s commitment to “the cure” meant something more than protecting its catchphrase?

According to Planned Parenthood, in the past five years support from Komen provided nearly 170,000 breast exams and 6,400 mammogram referrals. The charity’s decision to end this funding will deprive thousands of low-income women of possibly life-saving services.

Salon’s Williams points out:

It’s worth noting that while breast cancer rates are dipping, an October report from the American Cancer Society warned that they are declining more slowly among low-income women, and that “Poor women are now at greater risk for breast cancer death because of less access to screening and better treatments. This continued disparity is impeding real progress against breast cancer.” You know who loses when Komen backs away from Planned Parenthood? Probably not those nice, pink-clad ladies who attend Susan Komen wine-tasting events.

Not “nice ladies” like the charity’s senior vice president of public policy, Karen Handel.

Williams recalls that when Handel ran for governor in Georgia, she declared, “I do not support the mission of Planned Parenthood,” making clear that she “strongly supports” laws prohibiting “the use of taxpayer funds for abortions or abortion-related services.”

And that is hardly surprising, considering that Handel was a Tea Party candidate and a close ally of Sarah Palin.

You might have noticed that Planned Parenthood is being demonized by Republican politicians as some kind of abortion mill despite the fact that only a small fraction of its services are abortion-related. Its major services – in addition to breast cancer screenings – are ovarian cancer screenings and HPV tests.

Do you see what’s going on?

Right-wing fanatics in America are attacking any and every institution that does not comply with their extreme agenda. These are the people who brought down ACORN by fraud and lies. Their crusade is wreaking havoc among America’s most vulnerable citizens – minorities and the poor.

So while I applaud the Komen crew for giving some of its money to cancer research, I deplore its war on poor women.

You won’t see me with one of those pink ribbons pinned to my golf cap any time soon.

Photo above shows the start of the 2009 Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure in New York City.

Click here to read the Salon.com article.

Share this:

I have always been an advocate of free speech. I can honestly say (with Voltaire) that even when I disagree with what you say I will defend your right to say it. Not “to the death,” of course. That would be crazy.

As crazy as some of the things people are saying.

There is so much madness in the world. Terrorists by definition are mad. And so are the egomaniacs who seek political and military power at any cost.

To me, the Wall Street looters are crazy. What on earth will they do with all that money? Isn’t it insane to have millions and still want more?

Imagine the burden of Mitt Romney’s $270 million. What would you do with that much loot? I doubt you could spend the interest on it as fast as it comes in.

I guess you have to run for president to get rid of some of it.

The craziness is spreading around the globe. More and more, people in Third World countries are choosing to squander their brief lives toiling in dank and dangerous sweat shops to “get ahead.”

And in America, all kinds of people – rich and poor – have developed an insane hatred of the president.

Who is Barack Obama, after all?

He is certainly not an Arab. Or a Muslim. Or a Nazi. Or a Communist. . Or a dictator. Or any of the other crazy things I hear people calling him.

He is a Harvard educated lawyer and law professor, the Hawaiian-born son of a white woman and a black man. He spent much of his youth with his white grandparents, and his experiences in a prejudiced and intolerant society helped shape his character. It made him want to make the world a better, more tolerant, place.

From all I know of him, he is a good-hearted man who believes he can help his country and the rest of mankind. I know, that’s pretty ambitious. But it’s better than pretending you want to serve your country when all you’re after is money and power.

As America’s president, he faces a monumental task. The global economy is in flux, and many Americans are suffering because of it. America is mired in Afghanistan, and is paying for it in lives and treasure. The economic collapse precipitated by Wall Street has left millions of Americans struggling to keep their homes and millions more without jobs. Europe is beset by “austerity,” apparently under attack from a global corporate cabal. Even Canada and Australia appear to be wrestling with the same kind of corporate assault.

Unrest is boiling over in the Middle East. Crazies control key countries like Iran. And Palestine. And, in my opinion, Israel.

The slightest miscue by President Obama could plunge America into another war – possibly a global conflagration.

And with all of this going on,  the crazies in the Tea Party – and the presidential hopefuls who covet their blessing – are making the president’s job more difficult by spreading lies about him and inventing bizarre scenarios to discredit him.

When “free speech” is this harmful, I wonder whether it’s worth fighting for, after all.

Photo shows a billboard ordered and paid for by Tea Party crazies in Mason City, Iowa.

Share this: