“Unless we act today, the dismantling of the greatest armed forces in history could begin tomorrow,” he writes.
“Congress can negotiate our way through impasses, but the Department of Defense is required to plan with the budget authority it is given,” McKeon writes in the letter, which was obtained by The Hill.
Rep. McKeon tells debt panel: Don’t bet that Pentagon cuts can be voided – The Hill’s DEFCON Hill.
On the 2 month anniversary of the beginning of Occupy Wall Street, and just two days are a police raid on Zuccotti Park, protesters across the country came back strong to show support for Occupiers under attack. In New York, police have responded violently to the protests, using their batons on and manhandling demonstrators. CNN is reporting that over 100 arrested so far. What is at issue? Demonstrators amassed this morning to block all entry points to Wall Street, effectively shutting it down. Bloomberg and the police respond with LRAD sound cannon. Arrests galore. A 60 year old woman loses feeling in her arms from handcuffs that are too tight. This is just a small sample of events on offer from Occupy Wall Street.
To beat the police and the Mayor, protesters have to be quicker than them. We need to pre-empt their moves and keep them guessing about ours. Through the use of live-feeds and twitter, with everything in real time, we have the tools to accomplish this. Occupy Everywhere! The whole world is watching!
And yes, I realize this post is sorely lacking in comparison to my previous ones. Been busy and hope to pick it up soon.
Last night police raided Zuccotti Park with acts of violence. The NYC sanitation department cooperated with police in assisting to throw away tents, signs, and other articles at the encampment. Nearly 200 people were arrested in the raid and on a Twitter live feed there were reports that over 5,000 of the Occupy Library’s books that had been disposed of by the police. So this is what we’ve come to? Throwing away books? So now not only are Americans being evicted from their homes, protest movements are being evicted from their encampments while trying to redress their grievances.
Responding to questions about the raid, Mayor Bloomberg replied that it was his decision alone and cited health and safety reasons as his motivation. In The New York Times blog, Clyde Haberman, reports that Bloomberg is now saying that the protesters can enter the park but cannot camp there over night. Haberman cites Bloomberg approvingly- while mocking protesters- saying that there is no First Amendment right to a sleeping bag. As if that’s what the protesters are arguing! Meanwhile, the National Lawyers Guild was able to obtain a court order to allow protesters back into Zuccotti Park. However, it is currently being blocked by police.
In all of my readings of Mayor Bloomberg’s decision, the question that goes unexplored is whether the health and safety motivation is a spurious one. After all, now would be a curious time to conduct a raid on those premises. What happened from November 13th to November 14th that suddenly made Occupy Wall Street a health and safety concern? As far as I know, there were no warnings previously issued. Also, if these were such concerns, couldn’t the city have had a dialogue with occupiers in order to determine what needs to be done to bring the park back up to standards? Perhaps this is to clear the park for the Holiday season? After all, we don’t want any pesky protesters to somehow show up on the spotlight during our lovely Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade!
I am merely raising questions and it becomes difficult for me to find answers since I am not at the park. However, the abrupt nature of this raid is suspect, especially considering the timing of it (Holiday season). After all, Bloomberg and the elites that sit high up on Wall Street have obviously never taken any pleasure in seeing what has been taking place on Zuccotti Park over the last two months. Bloomberg himself thinks that Wall Street is not to blame for the crashing of the American economy. He blames Congress almost exclusively. He also said in a recent Huffington Post Game Changer’s Event that the act of blaming people for the current crisis is “cathartic” and “entertaining” but the point is to make changes. I agree that the point is to change something, Mr. Bloomberg, and that’s exactly what the protesters at Zuccotti Park are fighting for.
To further respond to Bloomberg, I have to quote the inimitable, Matt Taibbi, “Well, you know what, Mike Bloomberg? FUCK YOU. People are not protesting for their own entertainment, you asshole. They’re protesting because millions of people were robbed, by your best friends incidentally, and they want their money back. And you’re not everybody’s Dad, so stop acting like you are.”
Dr. Martin Luther King once said that “cowardice asks the question – is it safe?…but conscience asks – is it right?” Mayor Bloomberg and his cohorts- including the police- need to ponder this question before any more actions regarding Occupy Wall Street commence. The Occupy Wall Street movement is one of conscience and ideas. They can remove Occupiers from our parks but they cannot remove what happened there. What happened was the spreading of ideas- of solidarity and love- and it’s happening everywhere. To erase us from the space is just a waste. Our ideas are immovable and their spread now is unstoppable!
The whole world is watching!
I wrote this poem in a rather surreal moment, as I sit comfortably in my home while bombs fell over Iraq. There was a walk out planned for that day and I was on Spring Break. Before heading to the rallies in Boston that day, I had to write. The pain of knowing this was happening and we didn’t stop it just took over me. I thought of how things would turn out and how many more people would suffer as a result. I also thought of how wars begin and we accept a culture that embraces war. I thought of my grandmother and my uncle who told me stories of living under military occupation in Poland. First it was the Germans and then the Russians. How many more miserable stories do we need to hear before we have had enough of the evil scourge that is war. This poem is dedicated to all involved in this grizzly game.
The Faces of War
A businessman sits in his chair
And watches the news without the slightest bit of care
The bombs dropped while his stock prices soared
With Dollar signs in his eyeballs, he sighed and thanked the lord
As he looked out of his office window, he came away with a smile
And thought to himself, “so long as they do my dirtywork, my life will be worthwhile
A professor sits at his desk
Writing his proofs, arguments, and syllogisms
Providing Causus Bellus is the name of his game
His argument seems sound and he has not a feeling of shame
For the cause, he has done his duty
Of raising the terror of our time
Incubating young minds to justify violence
While the truth stares him in the eye, this man chooses silence
Later you will see him, on a talk show or at a lecture hall
Justifying war, violence, and death
In the name of truth, justice, and freedom he tends to confide
Yet he knows not the meaning of any of these words due to the hell in which he’ll reside
A young man stands on the battlefield,
Puzzled about his surroundings
Cold, tired, and alone
He’s been sent out to kill and be killed
The reasons? To him they are unknown.
He thought about it a moment and remembered some inspiring words
They were his father’s,
A man who’s demeanor was always gentle, but whose face always seemed void of humanness
He said, “son, now it is your turn to make history and to preserve freedom. Remember these words forever, we will proceed to victory.”
The words troubled the boy deeply as he sat and pondered
He saw his buddies die before him and thought that their lives had been squandered
But then again, he questioned what he surmised
After all, who was he to question the old and the wise?
A woman stands in the corner of what is left of her home, with a long face
The salted liquid dripping on the floor Does not come from the rain or a leaking pipe in the room above
Nor does it come from her mouth or her eyes, though she may wish it were any of these things
It comes from her daughter whom she holds in her arms
Her daughter who could not read or write, let alone do anyone harm
And the mother weeps alone in what is left of her home
She has joined scores of others just like her whom she cannot see nor hear
And yet they are just like her, emotionally disfigured, alone, and filled with fear
A child looks up to the sky and watches the planes fly by
He looks down to the ground and stares his father in the eye
Severely mutilated, the man in pain cannot speak
As a soldier is approaching, the boy toughens his look so as not to appear weak
The father looks at the boy and says “son, why do you act like this has not affected you…” and suddenly, he dies
And the soldier takes the body away and when he leaves…the little boy cries.
In The Right Nation Wooldridge and Micklethwait contrast the old conservatives with the latter day ones. They use Prescott Bush as a model of the old, describing him as non-partisan, in support of abortion, and as a supporter of the Peace Corps as well as other social projects that have been deemed liberal. Bush is contrasted with his son and grandson, George H. W. and George W., the latter being the most conservative. This is a useful device to track the evolution of the party over a period of 50 years. In between we learn of the revered figure, Barry Goldwater whose campaign in 1964 set out to highlight the issues a conservative should advocate, such as opposition to the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The authors note that although Goldwater’s campaign was a failure, his candidacy rejuvenated the party and was the jumpstart to the party’s prominence today. Notwithstanding this energy, the conservative movement still suffered from problems of legitimacy. Its members were still working out ideas, branded in society as extremist, and were still out of power.
In this incubation period, conservative groups started to germinate in what were called, “universities without students.” Examples of these include the American Enterprise Institute, the Hoover Institute, Cato, and the Center for Strategic and International Studies. These think-tanks had ready-made policies to promote through the press and to politicians. This makes for an effective strategy because it narrows one’s focus to getting policies implemented, regardless of whether the public truly understands them. This is also favorable to these groups in the sense that policies are desperately sought after by a Congress facing a restive population searching for instant results. As long as one has the ability to effectively market their policies, they will be implemented with ease or will at least gather major public attention.
In one of these think-tanks, The American Enterprise Institute, another prominent group of conservatives emerged- neoconservatives. Neoconservatives became prominent in the Reagan administration and later George W. Bush’s. This group of conservatives merged and cooperated with social and religious conservatives to make for Bush’s 2004 victory. The authors are right to point out that the neoconservative movement represents nothing new in terms of US foreign policy. Unilateral action has been put into place several times in the past (Panama, for example) and crusades against human rights abusers have always been used to whip up public opinion in favor of a war. Perhaps what makes neoconservatives so different is their willingness to be frank about their agenda, all the while remaining secretive about how they will implement it. The National Security Strategy document in 2002 is particularly brazen in its approach. It clearly outlines a doctrine of unilateral preemptive action which is now at the forefront of US foreign policy. This is in stark contrast to Madeline Albright’s doctrine that the US will act “multilateral if we can, unilaterally if we must”.
In the last part of the book the authors address American Exceptionalism.
They ask why America, indeed American Conservatism, is so different from
its European counterparts. The reasons, they argue, are rooted in its religiosity and the belief in individualism. In Europe the God question is rarely on the table, the UN is something that is heralded, and a belief in the state’s protection of general welfare is sacrosanct. Guns are outlawed in most countries and the death penalty is not in
practice. In the United States the opposite is true. I found this discussion to be incisive, especially when the authors point out that John Kerry is right of center by European standards. Nevertheless, we must also note positive differences. The United States does not have mainstream politicians like Jean-Marie Le Pen who holds a nostalgia for the Vichy days in France and is openly racist. What makes the conservative movement in the US so different from the right wing in Europe is shown through the example of Trent Lott. In a speech in 2002, Lott expressed his solidarity with Strom Thurmond’s failed 1948 presidential bid in which he ran as a segregationist. The Republican Party immediately called upon Lott to step down as Majority leader in the Senate.
Although it is an ambitious book, The Right Nation makes for lucid reading and lives up to its goal. Its thesis is convincing and thoroughly substantiated. It is a great introductory text to the study of how America came to be in the last half of the 20th Century.
When one thinks of failed states, countries like Haiti, Nicaragua, and Afghanistan come to mind. Could the United States be considered one as well? In his book, Failed States, Noam Chomsky cogently confronts some of the most pressing issues facing the United States and determines whether it fits the criteria of a failed state. Moreover, this book dissects the role of the United States government at home and abroad and makes an urgent call to citizens to consider their role in influencing its decisions. Among the many issues he addresses are the flagrant disregard of international law and human rights and the deficit in democracy. With a plethora of evidence at his disposal, Chomsky convincingly argues that, contrary to popular belief, the United States falls short of living up to its stated goals of promoting democracy at home and abroad. Rather, the opposite has occurred, namely that the United States has a dysfunctional democratic system and regularly promotes its interests abroad at the expense of democracy.
To determine whether the United States constitutes a failed state, Chomsky devotes a major portion of his book to analyzing whether it has been law abiding. To make this case he uses a quote from the historian, Arno Mayer, who after 9/11 observed that in the post-World War II world, “America has been the chief perpetrator of ‘preemptive’ state terror…and innumerable other rogue actions always in the name of democracy, liberty and justice” (108). Moreover, he uses compelling examples to back up this claim. For example, he tells of the United States intervention in Nicaragua where he recounts that the United States was convicted by the World Court of “the unlawful use of force.” In addition, he points out that the United States attack on Iraq constituted an act of aggression outlawed by the Nuremburg Tribunals and the United Nations Charter. Iraq and Nicaragua are now textbook cases of failed states due to these interventions. They cannot, in Chomsky’s words, “provide security for their population, guarantee rights at home or abroad, or to maintain functioning (not merely formal) democratic institutions” (109).
This definition seems fitting for the United States as well, which failed to protect its citizens during 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina, has elections which deactivate populations and exclude whole voting blocks, and has taken an active role in the surveillance of its citizens. As a matter of fact, Chomsky has demonstrated that what ordinary people think of as democracy-participation by a wide array of individuals- is thought of by the elites as a “crisis of democracy.” In order to avert such crises, it is a necessity for these elites to deceive and manipulate the public through the use of propaganda. Thus, we read that the majority of Bush voters actually believed that he supported the Kyoto Protocols. Furthermore, we learn from the book that 2004 presidential candidate, John Kerry, took great care in emphasizing that in his health care plan there would be no government intervention because he understands that the public doesn’t will that. However, as Chomsky shows, polling statistics reveal that at least two-thirds of the public support national universal health care. Chomsky notes that the disconnection between what the public wants and what it is told it wants, is something we should expect. This is because elections are controlled by the public relations industry whose task is not to inform, but to market in favor of someone who will represent their interests.
Another of Professor Chomsky’s contentions is that the United States has not been sincere in its stated intentions abroad and in fact, he further shows that it meets the condition of being an outlaw state. He demonstrates that the United States has regularly supported dictators in countries where its control over resources would be threatened if the country went democratic. This is true in Iran in 1953 when the United States overthrew Mossadeq and re-installed the Shah Reza Pahlavi. Moreover, the United States has reacted with contempt toward democratically elected regimes which are at variance with its interests. For example, he documents that the United States response to the democratic election of a Hamas-led government in Palestine was to cut off economic aid. He also shows that the concept of democracy in Iraq is anti-thetical to US interests because the demographic make-up of the country would insure an alliance with Iran. It would also be a threat to Turkey because it would mean that Kurdish groups in Iraq might advance its interests in having an independent state. This is a convincing argument, especially upon consideration of the fact that the United States government had very little problem supporting Saddam Hussein while he was invading Iran, gassing Kurds, and even massacring thousands of rebels after he was driven from Kuwait in 1991.
I have only commented on a few aspects of this book but its depths go well beyond what I have touched upon. Indeed, the crises Chomsky has illuminated are, “stark, dreadful, and inescapable,” to refer to the appeal from Bertrand Russell and Albert Einstein that appears in the beginning chapter of the book. It is high time to consider seriously the role that the United States plays in the world and our role as citizens within it, in order to build democratic institutions which can allay the potential of these ominous prospects.
Last weekend 15 people were detained while protesting at Goldman Sachs. One of the participants in the demonstration, author and journalist, Chris Hedges, was arrested. Before being taken away by police, he delivered an impassioned speech which, among other things, touched upon the rise in the price of food. He laid blame squarely on Goldman Sachs whose “commodities index is the most heavily traded in the world.” He added that, “those who trade it have, by buying up and hoarding commodities futures, doubled and tripled the costs of wheat, rice and corn.” The result of these trades, he said, are that they leave, “hundreds of millions of poor across the globe…hungry to feed this mania for profit.” Hedges finished his declaration with a criticism of Universities which he claims fail in their duty to explain what is really taking place by speaking in “technical jargon” that “effectively masks the reality of what is happening—murder.”
When I read Hedges’ words, I was a bit startled. It wasn’t that I didn’t believe him. It was more that I didn’t want to. After all, who wants to believe that Wall Street would be artificially driving up the price of food for their own profit in spite of the misery it would cause? The shock of this thought lead to consternation. I didn’t bother to read into it. However, after hearing about the increase in the price of peanut butter and pecans, I decided that this issue required my attention.
The story that I heard on my local news station attributed the rise in food prices to a rise in demand and not to market speculation. After hearing that pecans would reach over $11 per pound, I distrusted this explanation. I decided to research. In so doing, I stumbled upon an excellent article in Mother Jones by Tom Philpott that challenges the prevailing explanation of food price hikes. In it, he alerts us that according to a UN FAO report, food prices are “hovering at all time highs,” and have increased by 26 percent in the last year. More alarming, food prices have tripled since 2004. While demand for food has increased, due to a growing world population, a rising of a middle class in China and India, and government-backed biofuel programs, Philpott argues that it has been speculation that has caused the increase.
A report by none other than the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food, Olivier de Schutter, confirms this when he writes,
Certainly, supply and demand fundamentals played an important role in the creation of the food crisis. However, closer examination reveals that the abovementioned arguments of supply and demand are insufficient to explain the full extent of the increases and volatility in food prices
Instead,
...the changes in food prices reflected not so much movements in the supply and/or demand of food, but were driven to a significant extent by speculation that greatly exceeded the liquidity needs of commodity markets to execute the trades of commodity users, such as food processors and agricultural commodity importers.
To back up his argument, the Rapporteur mentions a study by Lehman Brothers that tracked the increase in the volume of index fund speculation increased by 1,900% from 2003-2008 and that holdings in commodity index funds jumped from $13 to $317 billion during that time.
The results of such increases in food prices are very real. When they reached their height in 2008, nearly 150 million people were forced into extreme poverty and roughly 40 million were driven to what the UN organization refers to as “chronically hungry.” Worst hit have been countries in the Global South where a combination of American, British, and Middle Eastern investors are buying up farmlands. This has been most prevalent in the Latin American and African countries.
In light of these facts, Hedges’ words do not seem shocking, but believable. This is yet another example of Wall Street’s rapacious dealings that ravage farmlands and starve millions worldwide. We have yet to see the scale of damage that current speculation will wrought. However, if the 2008 food crisis is any indicator, we’re in for a rough haul. This is especially worrying in the US, considering that a census bureau report recently showed that roughly 45 million Americans survive on food stamps. This reflects an increase of 74% on food assistance since 2007.
Fortunately, there are solutions on offer. The UN special rapporteur names five, which include regulating derivatives, setting up regulatory commissions, banning access to commodities futures markets, strengthening spot markets, and creating physical grain reserves. These are reasonable solutions but raise other questions, to which I believe Hedges offers the best answer in his speech, namely the rejection of the “unequivocal acceptance of ruling principles such as unregulated capitalism and globalization as a kind of natural law.” Yet our political leaders do not seem to get it. In tonight’s nationalized Republican debate, specifically focused on the economy, the rise in food prices went unmentioned. Instead, we heard endless sermonizing about how the government needs to get out of the business of regulating our markets.
This is an issue that transcends politics and ideology. It is about time we had a national discussion about it. But if you are waiting on the Establishment to lead the way, I hope you’re not holding your breath.
In their book, Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media, Noam Chomsky and Edward Herman sketch out a propaganda model which they argue serves to distort news. One of the factors in such distortions is a dependence on government agencies as sources. In the book, Chomsky and Herman show a glaring pattern of where the US government approved of a regime, mainstream media generally reported favorably upon its policies, and sometimes served as apologists when its crimes were on too grand a scale to simply ignore. Furthermore, they show, with remarkable consistency, that when the United States did not support a regime, mainstream news often looked at its policies under a microscope, even sometimes fabricating events to paint it in a negative light. As I was reading today’s Boston Globe, I saw a demonstration of this bias in a much milder context.
In the last week, two Latin American countries held presidential elections and had very different results. In Guatemala, an ex general, Mr. Otto Perez Molina, won in a landslide with 54% of the vote. In Nicaragua, Sandinista leader, Daniel Ortega, also won in a landslide with 64% of the vote. Both countries have a history of civil warfare and have been plagued by US intervention. Both countries also have been ruled by military dictators. Furthermore, each of these elections raises many concerns, the first of which being the veracity of them. However, the other more pressing concern is what kind of policies will arise from them.
In Guatemala’s case, there is concern over the drug fueled violence between the Zetas and other Mexican cartels. Guatemala’s homicide rating is one of the highest in the world. In Nicaragua, there are worries over the fairness of the election, and the status of the Constitution, which many claim was “eviscerated” in order to keep Ortega in power. He is the first Nicaraguan president to seek a third term, and the first to win.
In response to the Nicaraguan elections, my local paper, the Boston Globe, focuses its story on the disputation of the election itself. More than 600 complaints of irregularities, they report. Additionally, they quote a State Department spokesperson, Victoria Nuland, highlighting the poor conditions going into the election, adding, “frankly, if the Nicaraguan government had nothing to hide, it should have allowed a broad complement of international monitors.” The article also notes that the European Union will issue a report of its investigation into the election. Meanwhile, the head of the Organization of American States observer mission, Dante Caputo, said that previous issues regarding access to polling stations had been resolved. The report then goes on to mention Ortega’s rise to power and briefly discusses his role in the 1979 effort to overthrow the dictator, Anastasio Somoza. Left out of the article are the great successes by Ortega’s government to increase literacy. Also not mentioned is Ortega’s moderation over the years, including his endorsing of the free market system he once opposed. Nor is their mention that he is widely popular among poor peasants throughout the country whose position in Nicaragua has improved significantly under his presidency.
In Guatemala, we see a very different picture. Even though the Guatemalans have experienced brutality under military dictators, the Globe, does not seem to see any problem questioning the result of this election. There is no State Department spokesman quoted. Instead, while mentioning the 200,000 people slaughtered under the numerous regimes from the 1950s to the 1990s, international groups are noted as having concerns. None are explicitly named, but this apparently does not matter to the Globe because, ” Guatemala has a young population, and many don’t remember the war.” It is as if having no memory of the war means there is no history of it worth looking over. For example, the Globe fails to mention that Mr. Otto Perez Molina commanded troops during that war which earned him accusations of committing none other than torture and genocide. In a climate of violence between the government and drug cartels and the promise of ‘iron fisted’ policies by the new president, it is amazing that the Globe rests its unconcern on the shoulders of the Guatemalan population because it is young and doesn’t remember the war. Might this be because the United States has friendly relations with Guatemala’s government and not Nicaragua’s that the Globe is reporting so differently on them?
Clearly, the elections of both Ortega and Molina are a cause for concern. I no more dislike the violation of any country’s Constitution than the US government or the Boston Globe. However, the disproportionate concern on the part of the US State Department and newspapers like the Boston Globe over Nicaragua’s election where there is not a drug war raging and where there is no threat to peace is despicable. It is especially so when compared with the lack of concern over the election of a former general, once accused of war crimes, who promises “iron-fisted” policies in a country already torn apart by violence. This is yet another example to be added to the mountain of evidence confirming the thesis of Chomsky and Herman.
It is unbelievable that we live in a country where in order to get a job you need to first have one. There have been a plethora of reports recently that highlight the sad reality that companies are actively discriminating against the long-term unemployed in favor of passive job seekers. Nearly half of the 14 million who are officially unemployed have been without a job for more than six months. This means that roughly 7 million Americans are immediately cast out of candidacy for a position simply because they have been out of one for too long. Companies justify their hiring policy with the canard that those who have been unemployed for a long period of time will have a more difficult time to adjust and will not have their skills sharpened enough to do the job. If this broad brushed approach isn’t discrimination, I don’t know what discrimination is. Worst yet, job boards like Monster take part in this discriminatory process by refusing to take down advertisements that explicitly discount the long-term unemployed.
Fortunately, there are groups fighting for the long-term unemployed. The National Employment Law Project has circled a petition around that has gathered over 250,000 signatures. Also, in August, three Congressional members proposed the Fair Employment Opportunity Act, which would outlaw such discriminatory practices. These are all steps in the right direction toward helping the unemployed. However, there are others.
We have match making websites for dating, why not for the unemployed? Job boards just do not match compatibility between professions and places of employment with individual job seekers. This sounds campy but it would be an easier way to filling positions than blindly sending and receiving resumes. In tandem with this, employers should stress more emphasis on face to face meetings with job seekers instead of so much focus on online. Even at job fairs, I’ve noticed a startling trend. When I’ve met representatives, they refer me to a website and sometimes do not even have a card, nor do they accept resumes. The point of a job fair is to get your foot in the door of a company by meeting face to face with its representatives. It gives a whole new depth to the relationship and can make or break a job candidate. With the influx of resumes coming in through websites and job boards, it is difficult to screen candidates. But in fact, while you lessen the amount of candidates through face to face meetings, you will have an easier time screening them. It also helps that in these times there is no shortage of talent on the job market.
This by no means exhausts the solutions that are on offer for job seekers and employers. However, getting away from discriminatory methods and embracing more traditional ones of face to face meetings can help job seekers find jobs and employers find the candidates they need without discrimination!
toxic
insightyou 