Backed by Big Money, Congress May Gut Identity Theft Laws
As I sit here writing this, my ATM/Debit Check card (from a bank of America that shall remain nameless) has been blocked. After receiving the official notice a few days ago, I hurriedly made other arrangements for my automatic payments, as for the Internet service I used to research this article and email it to my editor; modern life runs on digital money.
Of what crime was I guilty, to receive such punishment? I had the gall to claim an identity. Apparently, my account (and God only knows how many more) “may have been compromised at a third-party location.” I am reassured that my card is covered by “both zero liability and next day refunds guaranteed credit” (subject to dollar limits) but I am also told to carefully review my “statements and report any unauthorized transactions” … although I may be (and indeed am) “temporarily unable to access Online Banking” (The last time something like this happened, three years ago, I caught the problem online before the bank did, and before the rent check bounced … and I bounced out on the sidewalk). I await my new card, said to arrive within five business days … as of a week ago.
Sound familiar? Odds are you or someone you know has suffered the same or worse fate. According to the Federal Trade Commission, there are nearly 10 million identity theft victims each year; that’s about 19 every minute! Far from a victimless crime, identity theft costs the businesses, financial institutions, and consumers of America billions of dollars a year.
Earlier this year, the FTC levied the largest civil penalty on record — a $10 million fine plus a $5 million restitution fund — on ChoicePoint, a “data broker,” or credit-reporting service, used by over 50,000 merchants and landlords for credit checks on potential customers and tenants: In 2005, ChoicePoint became the poster child for lax identity protection, by allowing an organized ring of identity thieves to gain access to over 160,000 personal records; hundreds of individuals became victims of identity theft.
Remember, too, that the 9/11 hijackers left behind piles of credit cards in their rooms; identity theft is a weapon of choice — a “weapon of mass financial destruction” — for Al Qaeda terrorists worldwide.
So naturally, the federal government must be doing everything in its power to crack down on this crime wave, this threat to national financial security, to ease the burden upon us innocent victims of this crime that has turned countless lives upside-down (To paraphrase the Bible, it’s easier to pull a camel through the eye of a needle than it is to restore bad credit).
Don’t bank on it.
The ChoicePoint debacle was brought to public attention not by some federal regulation but by the strict identity theft laws here in California, which call for notifying victims of almost any breaches in security — not just those that the financial institutions themselves determine to be “reasonably likely to result in substantial harm or inconvenience to the consumer” (as the new federal legislation would mandate) — and which freeze the accounts of potential victims: As a representative of the Consumers Union has said, “We shouldn’t have to wait until an identity thief has already bought a Lexus in your name in order to have the right [to] protect yourself.”
The same sort of strict reporting requirements and account freezes are found in the anti-identity-theft laws in several other states that will be gutted like a dead fish by the legislation that was just voted out of committee last week by the House Committee on Financial Services.
And to me, that stinks like a dead fish. Actually, it is the smell of money, and lots of it.
In particular, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, fourteen of the twenty members of the House who receive the most campaign contributions from the commercial banking industry — whose interests are not served by letting the public know their security has been breached, let alone by making good on the losses — serve on the House Committee on Financial Services: Eleven Republicans, including the Chairman, Michael G. Oxley (R-OH), and three Democrats.
And the six remaining House members out of the top twenty getting the largest contributions from the commercial banking industry are hardly ill-placed to influence legislation: In addition to Henry Bonilla (D-TX), the first Hispanic Republican elected to Congress from Texas, the big bank money goes to Dennis Hastert (R-IL), Speaker of the House; Roy Blunt (R-MO), House Majority Whip; Tom DeLay (R-TX), indicted former House Majority Whip; Eric Cantor (R-VA), Chief Deputy Majority Whip; and David Dreier (D-CA), Chairman of the House Rules Committee.
In particular, the Rules Committee is notorious for keeping legislation from reaching the floor of the House, in what longtime observers have found to be the most partisan chokehold on the democratic process in memory. As the Boston Globe reported in its groundbreaking investigation in October of 2004 (and things have gotten only worse), “the Rules Committee, the all-powerful gatekeeper of the Republican leadership, … has sidelined legislation unwanted by the Bush administration, even when a majority of the House seemed ready to approve it.”
But who would want this current legislation, H.R. 3997 (identical to S.2129, in the Senate), laughingly called the “Financial Data Protection Act of 2005″ (but I’m not laughing), just voted out of committee, to ever get that far? Who in their right mind would ever want passed what the U.S. Public Interest Research Group has called “the worst data security bill ever”?
Maybe those in big banking for whom it would become the best data security bill ever bought … at all our expense.
Sphere: Related ContentA Legacy of Damage to America: The President’s Vile Precedents Etcetera
The vile precedents established by this president must be added to the long and growing list of damages that he and his ilk are inflicting upon America and the world — a legacy that will haunt us and cripple us for generations yet to come. Let us not be as foolish or arrogant as those who misgovern us; let us never forget or dismiss their betrayals of the public trust:
George W. Bush and his administration have repeatedly and unapologetically lied and otherwise misled our nation and our allies into an unnecessary war, trashing our reputation in the world and costing thousands of Americans their lives, limbs, and loved ones and tens of thousands of innocent civilians overseas even more.
George W. Bush ignored grave warnings and opened a Pandora’s Box of ancient, violent ethnic and religious conflict right in the middle of the Middle East — at the heart of the world of the world’s billion Muslims, in the most vital region of our national interests overseas — without a clue of how to proceed, other than to spout empty platitudes and self-righteous homilies that have little or no connection to the reality that we can see all too well on the ground.
George W. Bush and his administration and their allies in the corporate world have manipulated the media both at home and abroad, deceiving the public and thus betraying the very democracy they claim to uphold, with other people’s lives.
George W. Bush has violated treaty after treaty — in everything from protecting our environment to torturing captives — made in good faith between our nation and others, thus sullying the good name of America — branding us not only a rogue state but also a hypocrite, our condemnations of others who violate international obligations now lacking any moral authority.
George W. Bush and his military administration have engaged in “bait and switch” contracts and other tactics more characteristic of confidence men than honorable men, in their dealings with National Guard and other troops and recruits, whose families and veterans and injured and dead are as neglected as were the duties of George W. Bush when he was in service.
George W. Bush continues to blatantly violate explicit federal law — to trash both the letter and the spirit of the Fourth Amendment to our Constitution — by authorizing wiretaps without warrant, as if the legislative and judicial branches of the government were irrelevant to his exercise of raw power.
George W. Bush or others in his administration have revealed the identity and, thus, the operation of a covert agent gathering intelligence on terrorists acquiring weapons of mass destruction in order to protect a lie about those very same threats.
George W. Bush is packing the Supreme Court of the United States with judges for life who have betrayed the fundamental principle of justice by advancing the claims of the powerful at the expense of those less able to defend their rights to life, liberty, or property.
George W. Bush and his administration have let big business ravage the interests of employees, consumers, and the environment — the vast majority of Americans and our priceless American heritage.
George W. Bush and his allies in Congress have saddled us and our children and countless generations yet to come with record trillions of dollars in debt — indebting us heavily to foreign powers, inviting disaster, and crippling programs needed by the needy — in large measure to provide short-term, utterly unnecessary gains for the wealthiest among us.
George W. Bush has hypocritically left children behind, as he withdrew funding he promised for his much touted initiative of education.
George W. Bush and his allies in Congress have lavished upon pharmaceutical and insurance companies hundreds of billions of dollars in new government spending for a program that does them much more good than the old, sick people it was purported to help; the numbers of all Americans who suffer and die without the means to pay for the care they need rising every day, their needless, selfish neglect a crime against humanity.
George W. Bush and his administration failed to heed the warnings, both in the long term and short, to protect the citizens of New Orleans, the reconstruction of the ruins of this once-great American city now becoming a boondoggle benefiting big business more than the victims of the disaster, much as has been the scandalous case in Iraq.
And never forget that George W. Bush claimed election by votes whose tally did not even come close to matching the same sorts of polls by which his own administration judges the fairness of elections conducted overseas — the companies counting the votes, with machines that cannot be audited, controlled by staunch allies of the candidate claiming victory.
In case after case, the most serious injury inflicted upon our nation by this failed presidency is a betrayal of the trust of the American people — a legacy for which all of us will pay long after George W. Bush has left office.
(P.S. This Sunday on Barry Gordon From Left Field, Barry’s going to interview, among others, none other than John Dean! And we may even get a recorded interview with Rep. John Conyers. It’s the “I-Word” show! And we’re proud of it. If you can’t catch the webstream live, try the podcast later. It’s time to uproot this Bush!)
Sphere: Related ContentOne Less Bell to Answer
The problem with unfettered capitalism is that it puts itself out of business.
Big fish eat little fish, until there’s only one fish. And that’s called monopoly, which is not only the opposite of competition — the “invisible hand” of a truly free marketplace, keeping companies honest and innovative — but also a dire circumstance for consumers and workers (as if workers weren’t consumers as well): If there is only one store selling and hiring, then they can set prices as high and wages as low as they darn well please.
That “take it or leave it” situation might be acceptable for luxury items or frivolous wants; but when it comes to providing services vital to the rest of the economy, a monopoly amounts to a stranglehold on the nation. Even in the most innocent of scenarios, a lack of competition flirts with extortion.
And no sector of the economy is more vital to our Information Age than the communications industry. The announcement this weekend that AT&T Corp. has agreed to buy BellSouth Corp. is, thus, not only newsworthy but also historic, in terms not only of its sheer size (At $67 billion it is one of the largest deals ever) but also of its social impact: If the merger is approved by the shareholders — those of BellSouth are being offered a premium price by AT&T — and regulators — and the Bush Administration (very much like the Clinton Administration) never met a trust it wanted to bust — then this union of the nation’s largest and third-largest phone companies would reduce the seven regional “Baby Bells,” which the government created in 1984 by carving up the original AT&T monopoly, to just three telecom giants: the new AT&T (incorporating BellSouth as well as the current AT&T, itself the product of SBC just recently acquiring the previous AT&T), Verizon Communications (which recently bought MCI), and — smallest by far — Qwest (in the west, probably now targeted for acquisition by Verizon, trying to consolidate its uneasy second-place position).
The final word in this alphabet soup is that just two companies — the new AT&T and Verizon, a “duopoly” — would control almost all of the local residential wireline service, most of the long-distance telephone service, most of the cellphone and other wireless service, and most of the DSL wires — as used by competitors to carry Internet phone calls and broadband TV — across the USA. That’s a lot of power in a very few hands … with some 10,000 fewer pairs of hands actually doing the telephone work, as the consolidation of companies would result in the “cost efficiencies” of massive layoffs.
But the telecom environment is far more complex than in the days of the old AT&T monopoly, as any web-surfing, music-streaming, video-downloading, Voice-over-Internet-Protocol-calling teenager could testify.
We find ourselves caught not just in some big-fish-eats-small-fish food chain but in an elaborate food web, if you will, of intricately competing and supporting relationships, which if thrown out of balance can threaten the economic existence of any or all concerned. Consider the interests involved:
Major (Wireline) Telephone Companies
The major telephone companies may be stifling competition from smaller telecom companies, but they are facing stiff competition from cable companies. The telecoms claim that this will stimulate innovation and keep prices low; although it can be argued that if such benefits do indeed accrue, it will be in spite of, not because of, the monopolization now taking place within the telecom industry itself.
It is also worth noting that merged companies often succumb to “unrealized synergies”: failures to realize proposed efficiencies and other goals because of problems encountered when trying to integrate two different corporate cultures and structures, in an ever-changing market.
Bundling phone, Internet, and video services, telephone companies are trying to become “one-stop shops” for all our communications needs.
Because such services as live video feeds are clearer if their bits of digital information are transmitted rapidly and together, the telephone companies want to charge Internet content providers (See below) a premium for delivering videos with “routing priority” over generally less time-sensitive transmissions, such as e-mail. The telecoms claim that they are simply providing consumers with additional choices and recouping some of the billions of dollars they have invested in their networks, as for fiber-optic lines, even as they have cut the price of their broadband service, in competition with cable providers. As John Chambers, CEO of Cisco, recently told analysts, “very soon, all TV will be broadcast over the Internet.”
The big telephone companies are lobbying Congress to rewrite the landmark Telecommunications Art of 1996, which deregulated the communications industry, allowing telephone and cable companies to directly compete. In particular, they want to make it easier to provide television service without having to negotiate a new agreement with each city they wish to serve (An indirect but inevitable consequence of this would undoubtedly be the end of funding for uniquely, locally valuable community access television).
Wireless Telephone Companies
Owned jointly by AT&T and BellSouth — and, thus, having helped to pull the two corporations together — Cingular, the largest cellphone company in the country, competes directly with Verizon Wireless, the second-largest (jointly owned by Verizon and a British telecom), and Sprint, the third-largest wireless company, which recently bought Nextel; and wireless telephone companies in general compete at least indirectly with wireline telephone companies (See also Cable and Satellite Companies, below).
To support the new technology of high-speed wireless communications, and to thus make wireless providers more competitive, there are calls for more government auctions of unused portions of the wireless spectrum and for the release of other frequencies for unlicensed utilization.
Internet (VoIP) Telephone Companies
Internet phone services (”Voice over Internet Protocol,” or VoIP) are growing rapidly in popularity. However, because they are often offered by smaller telephone companies, such as Skype or Vonage (CallVantage, from AT&T, is an exception), they are often at a competitive disadvantage to more traditional telephony. Sensitive to that, the FCC last year ceased Madison River Communications, a telecom company, from blocking their consumers’ access to Vonage.
Cable and Satellite Companies
Facing stiff competition from telephone companies, cable and satellite companies are bundling phone and Internet services with their video services. Typically having infrastructure already in place, cable companies can often undercut the price that telecoms need to deliver video profitably.
Efforts by telephone companies to promote congressional legislation that would allow the telecoms to bypass local regulations and, thus, build into communities more quickly, have provoked some coordinated resistance by cable companies, each protective of its “turf.”
Actively competing with the major telephone companies, Comcast, Time Warner Cable, and some other cable companies are selling phone lines into homes; and they are also partnering with Sprint-Nextel to provide mobile phone services, in competition with Cingular (from AT&T-BellSouth) and Verizon Wireless. In addition, Sprint is providing its long-distance network to carry phone calls for cable companies, which are thus less dependent upon AT&T and Verizon.
Although the telephone companies have been pursuing the idea of a “tiered” pricing structure for Internet content providers (See below), cable companies have generally not embraced this controversial position, although they can be expected to side with the telecoms, as it would bring in more revenue.
Other Hi-Tech Companies
Telephone equipment companies, like Lucent (spun off from AT&T in 1995) and Nortel, may find themselves in a more difficult bargaining position, having fewer telephone companies with which to negotiate.
Even electric companies may become involved in the communications market, by offering a new technology of broadband service delivered over their power lines.
Internet Content Providers: “Network Neutrality” vs. “Tiered Service”
Perhaps the greatest debate in the field of telecommunications these days involves the plan by telephone companies and cable companies, normally at odds, to establish “tiered” levels of service on their systems: “fast lanes” and “slow lanes” on the “information superhighway,” if you will.
The telecom companies argue that as Internet content providers, like Google, Yahoo!, Amazon, eBay, or Microsoft, increasingly download video and other transmissions that consume enormous amounts of bandwidth (capacity), they should be required to pay a fee — in addition to the standard access fee paid by end-users — to the telephone or cable companies, which supply the costly, typically fiber-optic lines.
Moreover, by giving a video transmission priority treatment — by routing its digital bits together through the system, ahead of less time-sensitive transmissions (such as e-mails) — the quality of the video will not be degraded, even during periods of heavy Internet traffic.
In the press and before committees in Congress, which are considering and drafting legislation, the telephone companies and, less vocally, the cable companies are promoting tiered levels of service — a “pay to play” system, if you will — as a reasonable way for them to recoup their sizable investments and a method by which higher-quality sites can deliver higher-quality content to their users.
Not surprisingly, the Internet content providers — and most consumers and many legislators — feel otherwise.
Google, in particular, has termed this practice “cyberextortion.”
Less inflammatory, but no less damning, critics have accused the telecoms of wanting to be “gatekeepers” of the Internet, or “toll booths” on the “information superhighway,” impeding the free flow of ideas and innovations.
How, they ask, could a start-up company ever hope to compete with, say, a Google, which could afford to spend far more on getting priority service on the Internet? Who would use a new search engine, no matter how good, that took ten seconds to return a result that took only a second on Google?
In effect, the critics contend, the telecoms — and not a competitively free market of ideas — would be picking the winners and losers on the Internet, the winners being not only those who paid the most but also those with whom the telecoms had a working relationship (such as a subsidiary or sister company within a conglomerate). Internet phone companies would be particularly vulnerable to “discrimination,” as some have called it, by rival telephone companies being allowed by law to charge more for some than for others to use their systems.
The fundamental question is, shall the Internet be turned into a system like that of cable television, in which the content producers must pay to have their content transmitted, in addition to the fees paid by the end-users to have the content received? Or will the dissemination of information on the Internet continue to be free? And how would all that impact personal websites and blogs? The implications — for society at large as well as for the economy in particular — are as staggering as the power of the Internet itself.
Currently, the popular demand is for continuing “network neutrality” — perhaps with some accommodations for extraordinarily large transmissions — but telecom companies, and perhaps cable companies, are thought by some to already be working out deals behind the scenes for preferential treatment of various content providers.
Consumers & Workers
Both residential and business consumers of telecom services can expect to be bombarded with press releases, advertising, and other corporate communications from the new AT&T regarding the BellSouth merger — perhaps in addition to the half billion dollars AT&T is spending this year acclimating its customers to the recent acquisition of AT&T by SBC, which took the more famous brand name of its purchase.
Just as the SBC-AT&T deal was by almost all accounts a “good fit” — AT&T bringing with it long-distance; SBC, local — the AT&T-BellSouth merger also makes sense on paper — the two systems compete very little for local or Internet customers, and they own Cingular Wireless together: At least initially, customers of AT&T, BellSouth, and Cingular should experience little if any change from the deal.
It is in the long run that the impact is more debatable.
Speaking on behalf of the combined AT&T and BellSouth, for which he would serve as chairman and CEO, current AT&T Chairman Edward E. Whitacre Jr. has said, “The merger … will benefit customers through new services and expanded service capabilities.” The plan is for the company’s increased size to help hold down costs — as with those layoffs mentioned above and other economies of scale, saving some $2 billion to $3 billion a year — which may allow the new AT&T to undercut the prices of the cable and satellite companies, particularly for the television programming AT&T is beginning to deliver.
Speaking on behalf of consumers, Gene Kimmelman, policy director at Consumers Union, publisher of Consumer Reports magazine, has been quoted as saying that the merger “will lead to the end of the era of falling prices for telephone and cellphone service.” In addition, fees for Internet service may rise, particularly in areas with limited high-speed choices and perhaps with the introduction of a “tiered” system of fees for content providers (as discussed above), probably ultimately passed on to consumers.
Regulators and Legislators
Mark Cooper, research director of the Consumer Federation of America, has been reported as saying, “Telecommunications has now gone from a regulated monopoly to an unregulated duopoly with just two major players. Consumers know that is not enough competition to lower their prices and drive innovation.”
Moreover, Janee Briesemeister, a senior policy analyst of the Consumers Union, has said, “The track record of the baby Bells since the passage of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 shows a persistent pattern of bad acts, broken promises, and a failure to compete.”
And it doesn’t help at least the image of the telecom and cable companies to have so many of their members in regulatory positions: In 2003 to 2004, for example, about a third of the Consumer Advisory Committee of the FCC was composed of lawyers for AT&T, BellSouth, Cingular, Verizon, MCI, Cellular Telecommunications and Internet Association, National Association of Broadcasters, Telecommunications Industry Association, and the National Cable Telecommunications Association.
Regardless, despite all the lobbying by phone companies and by those who oppose a tiered system of fees on the Internet, Congress will probably not pass telecom reform legislation this year: it is probably too complex and time-consuming to debate in an election year. But as mentioned above, supporters of “net neutrality” fear that secret deals are already being done between phone companies and certain content providers for preferential treatment on the Internet.
And it is widely anticipated that the merger of AT&T and BellSouth will be approved by both shareholders and regulators within a year, particularly because the business environment in which the new AT&T will operate bears little resemblance to that which existed when the old “Ma Bell” was broken up: Back in 1984, cable companies were far smaller and less competitive, cellphones were a novelty, and the Internet was mostly a scholarly dream.
In Conclusion
The original Bell Telephone Company was founded in 1877 by Alexander Graham Bell. This inventor of the telephone captured the spirit of our Information Age when he said: “Great discoveries and improvements invariably involve the cooperation of many minds.”
That is precisely the reason we must so jealously guard the freedom of all our communications.
Sphere: Related ContentPriorities
“Put your money where your mouth is.” That’s how you tell the straight-shooters from the hypocrites. And see where someone’s priorities really lie.
By that standard, I’m afraid our current leadership is misleading America. Although the list of examples is endless, just consider the following:
Taxes are cut for the wealthiest Americans while the budget is cut for veterans, students, and the most vulnerable among us on Medicaid.
Pre-school is touted, quite rightly, as vital to early childhood development and, thus, later success in life, even as there is an epidemic of pre-school programs falling victim to shortfalls in funding.
Jobs are going overseas and yet we fail to fully fund the education and training of our workforce at home, to keep us competitive in the new global economy.
Human beings are suffering preventable illnesses and dying preventable deaths in the richest nation on Earth because there are too many vested interests standing in the way of some sort of national healthcare system, which most citizens demand.
Thousands of victims of the worst natural disaster in our nation’s history — exacerbated by trying to do flood-control on the cheap — are being cut off from temporary housing vouchers, thousands of trailers they were promised left standing unoccupied, six months after the floodwaters receded, despite the president’s promise on national TV to do everything required to attend to their needs.
CEOs of multi-national corporations make more every month than each of their front-line workers could make in a lifetime.
The Interior Department is preparing to give billions of dollars in federal tax relief to the very same energy companies that are making a hundred billion dollars a year in profit — the greatest net income in the history of the world — off of each and every last one of us gas-pumping, house-heating, bill-paying Americans.
Lawmakers are lavished with luxury vacations to golf tournaments and resorts around the world with money from slush funds amassed by lobbyists representing the very interests the legislators have sworn to govern.
Millions of dollars are being spent nationwide on voting machines that are vulnerable to hacking at best, rigged at worst — political allies of the owners of the voting machine companies, up to and including the president, pulling off wins that defy the exit polls and defile our democracy.
Our troops are denied the armor for their bodies and vehicles that they need to survive, even after this national scandal is brought to light.
Military contractors are being paid millions of dollars in Iraq for trucks that don’t work and services they never even render to our troops.
Attempts to repeal the “widow’s tax,” which penalizes the survivors of those killed in combat by reducing their benefits, are thwarted by the congressional leadership.
And up to a half trillion dollars that should have been invested in our people and infrastructure right here at home are being spent — along with thousands of lives and even more limbs — on a war based on a pack of lies and half truths that should have never been fought and that has no end in sight.
America is still a great nation, because of the good spirit of its people. But if we don’t wish to have history judge us unkindly, we had better demand better of those we empower.
Sphere: Related ContentJason Leopold & Others Webcast on "Barry Gordon From Left Field"!
Sunday from 2 to 5 p.m. Pacific Time, guests on “Barry Gordon From Left Field” will include:
Jason Leopold, one of the top investigative reporters today, who will discuss his news-breaking article just published by Truthout.org, with hard-hitting revelations from Leopold’s sources inside the CIA, NSC, and State Department on Cheney, Libby, and others in the CIA leak investigation;
The Rev. Dr. Davidson Loehr, minister of the First Unitarian Universalist Church of Austin, Texas, and author of “America, Fascism, and God,” who will provide refreshingly liberal views from a “heretical” religious perspective; and
Two couples who met through the Internet and who for Valentine’s Day will discuss the risks and rewards of the hot cultural phenomenon of online dating.
So catch the webcast, on http://www.kcaaradio.com/, and call in, to 1-800-809-0802. Don’t let the Right monopolize the airways!
(P.S. My girlfriend, Frances, and I will be one of the Valentine’s couples on the show!)
Sphere: Related Content"DON’T TREAD ON ME"!
One of the greatest hypocrisies of our time is the claim by the Right to stand up for “rugged individualists” whose life, liberty, and property are constantly under assault by “big government” of the Left.
Putting aside for a moment the fact that the federal government has grown under the current Republican president while it shrunk under his Democratic predecessor, the Right purporting to be champions of “libertarian” ideals is a bit like the Confederacy purporting to be guardians of “states rights” — it depends on whose liberties and whose states we’re talking about: the powers-that-be or those over whom they wield power.
For the leaders of the Right are the political and philosophical bastard heirs of the slaveholding aristocracy that ruled the feudal fiefdoms of the Old South — the haunting similarity of the Red State / Blue State maps of the 21st Century to the Slave State / Free State maps of the 19th is much more than sheer coincidence — but today, although the country has yet to awaken fully from the nightmare of racism, bondage is becoming a matter less of skin pigmentation than of class distinction (not unlike how the system of castes evolved over the centuries in India).
The policies of the Right will if unimpeded take us to an “ownership society,” but one less in keeping with the folksy homilies of George Bush than the dire warnings of George Orwell.
Make no mistake about it: The ultimate goal of the Right is no less than to own us — not simply lock, stock, and barrel but also body, mind, and soul.
When the Right opposes a woman’s right to choose, is it not laying claim to her body?
When the Right opposes universal healthcare or supports a prescription boondoggle that benefits the drug and insurance industries who sponsored it far more than the seniors it was advertised to help, is not the Right laying claim to the wellbeing of our bodies?
When the Right wages unprovoked war on unsubstantiated rumors, killing and maiming untold thousands of human beings (both on “our side” and “theirs”), is not the Right laying claim to any and all bodies that get in the way of its insatiable greed and lust for power?
When the Right holds individuals never given the benefit of a lawyer or trial let alone a sentence of guilty or not, in isolation from their families and nations, and tortures them for information (whether useful or, all too often, not), is not the Right laying claim to not only their bodies but also their minds?
When the Right propagates propaganda through an all-too-complicit or -complacent multi-national multi-media and continually and unabashedly violates the private communications of millions of citizens, in defiance of explicit federal law, is not the Right laying claim to the innermost secrets, both personal and professional, of our very minds?
When the Right teaches our children that modern biological science is no more real than ancient religious myths, is not the Right laying claim to not only the minds but also the souls of our children?
And whenever the Right imposes its particular vision in matters of faith with the force of laws legislated, executed, and adjudicated, and damns all those who dare to think, act, or believe to the contrary, is not the Right laying claim to our souls … and thus in effect playing God (at the peril of their own souls)?
The Right has no right to our bodies, minds, or souls (let alone the fruits of our labors, which they apparently cannot help but try to horde for themselves).
In the words of a serpentine flag from the earliest days of our nation, when patriots pledged their lives, property, and sacred honor in a life-and-death struggle against the most powerful, greedy despots of their day:
Sphere: Related Content
Today on "Barry Gordon From Left Field" Progressive Talk Radio
Barry’s guests today include Bob Barr, conservative activist and former Republican congressman from Georgia, who will discuss being “political bedfellows” with former Vice President Al Gore, in speaking out against the NSA wiretapping and other abuses of civil liberties by this administration;
Corey Robin, author of “Fear: History of a Political Idea,” who will talk about the use of fear to manipulate public opinion; and
Demtric Collins, music producer, who will talk about his company’s new hit CD “Doggie Dog World & Kitty Cat Kingdom,” which teaches children to appreciate animal life.
So catch the webcast, on www.kcaaradio.com, or the broadcast, in the Inland Empire of California, and call in, to 1-800-809-0802, each Sunday from 2 to 5 p.m. PST to let the world know the Left is right!
Sphere: Related ContentThe Top Ten Reasons to Reject Samuel Alito
Listen very carefully within the marbled, storied corridors of the Capitol and you’re apt to hear one question above all whispered from senatorial lips to senatorial ears: “Give me one good reason I should filibuster Samuel Alito and not simply allow him to be confirmed for the seat being vacated by Sandra Day O’Connor on the Supreme Court? Why risk the majority’s wrath, their threat to violate the rules of the Senate and exercise the Nuclear Option”?
Fair enough. I’ll give you not just one but ten good reasons for Democrats, Independents, and moderate Republicans to stand tall and reject this nomination, pandering to those far to the right of the mainstream (Source: SaveTheCourt.org):
10. Alito has supported extremist positions overall.
“There will be no one to the right of Sam Alito on this Court.” — Jonathan Turley, law professor who supported John Roberts but opposes Sam Alito
Alito’s dissents are more conservative than those of even fellow Republican judges 91% of the time.
Alito’s dissents argue against individual rights 84% of the time.
Alito has been criticized by many of his fellow judges for “ignoring, abandoning, or overruling precedent” and for “disregard of established principles of stare decisis.”
Alito testified that the meaning of the Constitution should be interpreted strictly in accord with its text and the “meaning someone would have taken ‘from the text’ at the time of its adoption”; a position that The Oregonian characterized as an “18th century view” that could “roll back many hard-fought federal protections that Americans enjoy today.”
9. Alito has opposed “one person, one vote.”
Alito wrote that he disagreed with Supreme Court decisions on reapportionment that established the “one person, one vote” principle inherent in equal voting rights.
8. Alito has opposed the First Amendment separation of church and state.
Alito ruled that a child evangelism group was discriminated against by a school district that did not allow it to distribute and post materials in back-to-school nights.
Alito voted to allow group prayer at school-sponsored graduation ceremonies; O’Connor and a majority of the Supreme Court struck down a similar policy.
Alito supported city-sponsored religious displays; in a similar case, the Supreme Court, with Justice O’Connor in the majority, ruled otherwise.
7. Alito has opposed a woman’s right to choose.
Alito wrote: “The Constitution does not protect a right to an abortion.”
Alito upheld in Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey a law requiring a woman to notify her husband before obtaining an abortion; Sandra Day O’Connor and a majority of the Supreme Court disagreed, stating “a State may not give to a man the kind of dominion over his wife that parents exercise over their children.”
6. Alito has opposed remedies for victims of discrimination.
Alito as an applicant for a job in Edwin Meese’s Justice Department proudly cited his membership in an alumni group notorious for opposing admission of women and minorities to his alma mater.
Alito repeated wrote dissenting opinions putting up barriers to victims of discrimination — particularly women and people of color — to bring their cases to trial, let alone to prevail; one court majority went so far as to write that Alito’s view would have “eviscerated” federal anti-bias laws.
Alito has sided against 75% of people raising discrimination claims and against immigrants in seven out of eight cases before him.
Alito as a federal judge agreed that American citizens could be kept off juries in some cases simply because they spoke Spanish.
Alito as a federal appeals court judge argued that discrimination cases should not even reach a jury if an employer claimed to have picked the “best candidate,” even if the employer exercised conscious racial bias; the other judges in the case rejected his reasoning as having the potential to gut legal protections against racial discrimination.
5. Alito has opposed workers, consumers, and small business hurt by big business.
Alito applied legal doctrines inconsistently in various discrimination cases, consistently siding with powerful corporate interests against such victims as disabled or injured workers.
Alito has “seldom sided” with consumers suing big business.
Alito as judge ruled against a small business hurt by the anti-competitive practices of a large corporation that violated the Sherman Antitrust Act; the other judges in the case overruled him.
4. Alito has opposed environmental protection.
Alito voted to make it more difficult for citizens to sue alleged polluters under the Clean Water Act; his reasoning was soundly rejected by the Supreme Court in another case.
Alito as a government lawyer and as a federal judge tried to limit the power of Congress to apply the Commerce Clause of the Constitution, which gives the federal government the authority to regulate activities within and between states, as to protect the environment with pollution controls or the Endangered Species Act; the Supreme Court will soon hear cases that could well render the Clean Water Act unenforceable.
3. Alito has opposed laws to protect society from violent crime as well as Fifth and Sixth Amendment rights of the accused.
Alito as a government lawyer and as a federal judge tried to limit the power of Congress to apply the Commerce Clause of the Constitution, as to regulate the distribution of machine guns.
Alito rejected claims by an African American that he had been denied a fair trial by an all-white jury from which black jurors had been excluded because of their race; a higher court reversed the ruling and criticized Alito’s analysis as absurd.
Alito as Assistant Solicitor General argued that it was acceptable for police officers to shoot in the back an unarmed 15-year-old boy fleeing the scene of a burglary; not only the Supreme Court but also every police group that acted as friends of the court in the case rejected Alito’s argument.
2. Alito has opposed Fourth Amendment restraints on abuse of power.
Alito upheld the strip search of a mother and her ten-year-old daughter, unnamed in a search warrant; Michael Chertoff, then judge, now head of the Department of Homeland Security, warned that would turn the Constitution’s search warrant requirement into little more than a “rubber stamp.”
Alito as judge upheld video surveillance by the FBI without a warrant.
Alito in the Solicitor General’s office argued that Cabinet officials are entitled to immunity from legal liability for authorizing illegal wiretaps of Americans in America; the Supreme Court rejected his argument.
And the Number One reason to reject Samuel A. Alito for the Supreme Court:
1. Alito on the Supreme Court would effectively hand George W. Bush — and each of his successors as president, from either or any party — virtually unrestrained power.
And what could be more “extraordinary circumstances” — worthy of filibuster — than that?
Sphere: Related ContentWaxman et al. Today on "Barry Gordon From Left Field": Progressive Talk Radio
Former president of SAG and candidate for Congress Barry Gordon hosts “Barry Gordon From Left Field” on progressive radio station KCAA 1050 AM, broadcast from the Inland Empire (the fast-growing area east of L.A.) and webcast on http://www.kcaaradio.com/, every Sunday from 2 to 5 pm PST.
Today’s noted guests are:
Rep. Henry Waxman, leading congressional Democrat, who will discuss healthcare and other issues;
Quentin D. Young, MD, former physician to the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King and Jesse Jackson, Past President of the American Public Health Association, and Chairman of the Health and Medicine Policy Research Group, who will also discuss healthcare issues; and
Terrence Blanchard, jazz trumpeter, film composer, and current Grammy nominee, who will discuss the upcoming awards from The Recording Academy.
Listeners are encouraged to phone in. “It’s a whole new ballgame!”
Sphere: Related ContentToday on "Barry Gordon From Left Field": Progressive Talk Radio / Webcast
Former president of SAG and candidate for Congress Barry Gordon hosts “Barry Gordon From Left Field” on progressive radio station KCAA 1050 AM, broadcast from the Inland Empire (east of L.A.) and webcast on http://www.kcaaradio.com/, every Sunday from 2 to 5 pm PST.
Today’s noted guests are:
Author David Heenan, who will discuss his newest book, “Flight Capital,” about the “reverse brain drain” that is sending U.S.-educated foreigners and even U.S. citizens back to their ancestral homelands to build up their economies at the expense of our own economic well-being;
Steven Gardner, lawyer for the Center for Science and the Public Interest, who will talk about their lawsuit against Viacom, owner of Nickelodeon, and Kellogg Corp., to stop the marketing of junk food to children; and …
Dianne Bates, entertainment journalist, who will report on the Sundance Film Festival and especially on the new political documentaries that have surfaced there.
Listeners are encouraged to phone in … and let the public know the Left is right!
– Doug Drenkow (working on a piece about Bush invasions of our privacy etc.)
Sphere: Related ContentBeyond the "Dream": The Wisdom of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Speaking to the Challenges of Our Times
“I have a dream …”
Every year at this time, that stirring phrase — with the hopes for racial harmony that followed — is repeated time and again, in reports on the heroic life of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., whose birth we celebrate today.
However, there was much more than even that noble sentiment to the Nobel Prize-winning message of this truly great man. (And no, I do not use the word “great” lightly; for although Dr. King did have his well-publicized flaws, as have men from Ben Franklin to Bill Clinton, those are the inevitable manifestations of the weaknesses that each of us descendants from Cain is heir to: What is truly, remarkably great is the ability of mere mortals to ever express and effectively promote selfless, timeless ideals in an all-too-selfish, sinful world.)
Read here, if you will, some of the wisdom so eloquently written and spoken by the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., which speaks to the heart, mind, and soul of our nation and to the very issues that confront us in our time.
We may never know another like Dr. King; we should be thankful to have ever been blessed with his inspiring presence and lasting legacy.
Dr. King on Justice
(When reading these quotes, my fellow Progressives, remember the current nomination to the Supreme Court of a champion of the Regressives, who has consistently sided with the powerful, against the interests of those less influential — in the workplace, the environment, the courtroom, and the bedroom.)
“Power at its best is love implementing the demands of justice. Justice at its best is love correcting everything that stands against love.”
“I am not interested in power for power’s sake; but I’m interested in power that is moral, that is right, and that is good.”
“Law and order exist for the purpose of establishing justice and when they fail in this purpose they become the dangerously structured dams that block the flow of social progress.”
“A just law is a man-made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. An unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law.”
“The church must be reminded that it is not the master or the servant of the state, but rather the conscience of the state. It must be the guide and the critic of the state, and never its tool. If the church does not recapture its prophetic zeal, it will become an irrelevant social club without moral or spiritual authority.”
“The Negro’s great stumbling block in the drive toward freedom is not the White Citizens Councilor or the Ku Klux Klanner but the white moderate who is more devoted to order than to justice.”
“Success, recognition, and conformity are the bywords of the modern world where everyone seems to crave the anesthetizing security of being identified with the majority.”
“The hope of a secure and livable world lies with disciplined nonconformists who are dedicated to justice, peace, and brotherhood.”
“The question is not whether we will be extremist but what kind of extremist will we be. Will we be extremists for hate or will we be extremists for love? Will we be extremists for the preservation of injustice, or will we be extremists for the cause of justice?”
“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”
“He who passively accepts evil is as much involved in it as he who helps to perpetrate it.”
“The hottest place in Hell is reserved for those who remain neutral in times of great moral conflict.”
“Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed.”
“History will have to record that the greatest tragedy of this period of social transition was not the strident clamor of the bad people, but the appalling silence of the good people.”
“In the end, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends.”
“Never forget that everything Hitler did in Germany was legal.”
Dr. King on Brotherhood
(When reading these quotes, my fellow Progressives, remember the recent legislation by the Congress, dominated by the Regressives, cutting aid to the needy, in order to pay for tax cuts to the wealthy.)
“The first question which the priest and the Levite asked was: ‘If I stop to help this man, what will happen to me?’ But … the good Samaritan reversed the question: ‘If I do not stop to help this man, what will happen to him?’”
“Life’s most persistent and urgent question is: What are you doing for others?”
“Philanthropy is commendable, but it must not cause the philanthropist to overlook the circumstances of economic injustice which make philanthropy necessary.”
“Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness.”
“We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools.”
“All men are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality.”
“The good neighbor looks beyond the external accidents and discerns those inner qualities that make all men human and, therefore, brothers.”
“The spirit of Lincoln still lives; that spirit born of the teachings of the Nazarene, who promised mercy to the merciful, who lifted the lowly, strengthened the weak, ate with publicans, and made the captives free. In the light of this divine example, the doctrines of demagogues shiver in their chaff.”
“The curse of poverty has no justification in our age. It is socially as cruel and blind as the practice of cannibalism at the dawn of civilization, when men ate each other because they had not yet learned to take food from the soil or to consume the abundant animal life around them. The time has come for us to civilize ourselves by the total, direct, and immediate abolition of poverty.”
“A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual doom.”
Dr. King on Peace
(When reading these quotes, my fellow Progressives, remember the war being unnecessarily waged based on the misleading half-truths and outright lies told by this Regressive administration, slaughtering the masses to enhance the wealth and power of the few.)
“Man was born into barbarism when killing his fellow man was a normal condition of existence. He became endowed with a conscience. And he has now reached the day when violence toward another human being must become as abhorrent as eating another’s flesh.”
“Nonviolence is the answer to the crucial political and moral questions of our time; the need for mankind to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to oppression and violence. Mankind must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression, and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.”
“Nonviolence means avoiding not only external physical violence but also internal violence of spirit. You not only refuse to shoot a man, but you refuse to hate him.”
“Like an unchecked cancer, hate corrodes the personality and eats away its vital unity. Hate destroys a man’s sense of values and his objectivity. It causes him to describe the beautiful as ugly and the ugly as beautiful, and to confuse the true with the false and the false with the true.”
“Have we not come to such an impasse in the modern world that we must love our enemies — or else? The chain reaction of evil — hate begetting hate, wars producing more wars — must be broken, or else we shall be plunged into the dark abyss of annihilation.”
Dr. King on Progress
(When reading these quotes, my fellow Progressives, remember that the challenges facing our cause — the eternal struggle for justice, brotherhood, and peace — are formidable but not insurmountable.)
“The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.”
“Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.”
“Rarely do we find men who willingly engage in hard, solid thinking. There is an almost universal quest for easy answers and half-baked solutions. Nothing pains some people more than having to think.”
“Human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable. … Every step toward the goal of justice requires sacrifice, suffering, and struggle; the tireless exertions and passionate concern of dedicated individuals.”
“Change does not roll in on the wheels of inevitability, but comes through continuous struggle. And so we must straighten our backs and work for our freedom. A man can’t ride you unless your back is bent.”
“Never succumb to the temptation of bitterness.”
“And I’ve looked over, and I’ve seen the promised land. I may not get there with you, but I want you to know tonight that we as a people will get to the promised land. So I’m happy tonight. I’m not worried about anything. I’m not fearing any man.”
“I still believe that one day mankind will bow before the altars of God and be crowned triumphant over war and bloodshed, and nonviolent redemptive goodwill will proclaim the rule of the land.”
“And when this happens, when we allow freedom to ring, when we let it ring from every tenement and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God’s children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of the old Negro spiritual, ‘Free at last, free at last. Thank God Almighty, we are free at last!’”
(Sources: MLK Online, InfoPlease, BrainyQuote, University of Florida [no endorsement or disendorsement implied], QuotationsPage.com)
Sphere: Related ContentToday on "Barry Gordon From Left Field": Progressive Radio Talk Show
Former president of SAG and candidate for Congress Barry Gordon hosts “Barry Gordon From Left Field” on progressive radio station KCAA 1050 AM, broadcast from the Inland Empire (east of L.A.) and webcast on http://www.kcaaradio.com/, every Sunday from 2 to 5 pm PST.
Today’s noted guests are Douglas Massey, professor from Princeton and author of what Barry believes is one of the most interesting and important books of 2005 — “Return of the ‘L’ Word” (as in Liberal) — and Stephen Farber, online critic for Movieline.com, who will talk about the awards shows and the films in contention for 2005.
Listeners are encouraged to phone in … and let the public know the Left is right!
– Doug Drenkow (working on a piece for M. L. King Day)
Sphere: Related ContentNew Progressive Radio Talk Show / Webcast: "Barry Gordon From Left Field"
Former president of SAG and candidate for Congress Barry Gordon brings his talk radio show “Barry Gordon From Left Field” (no relation, “Comments” fans) to progressive radio station KCAA 1050 AM, broadcast from the Inland Empire (east of L.A.) and webcast on http://www.kcaaradio.com/, every Sunday from 2 to 5 pm PST.
Today’s noted guests will discuss Ariel Sharon and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Bush’s overreaching and constitutional history, and commitments vs. resolutions for the new year and the rest of your life.
Listeners are encouraged to phone in … and let the public know the Left is right!
– Doug Drenkow (Barry’s protege from “NewsRap”)
Sphere: Related ContentIf Bush & Alito Have Their Way, Our Votes May Not Count.
Call me old fashioned; but I sorta think that if we’re going to call ourselves a “democratic republic,” then a couple things better be guaranteed under law:
First, that every citizen’s vote is counted; and
Second, that every citizen’s vote counts just as much as — no more, no less than — every other citizen’s vote.
Surely every American stands for ensuring an accurate, honest tally of the votes and for the principle of “one person, one vote.” I mean, who could either actively or passively oppose these most fundamental values of America — voting rights, which guarantee every other right we deserve and enjoy? What would you call such a quintessentially un-American individual?
How about “Mister President” or “Associate Justice of the Supreme Court”?
After the debacle in Florida in 2000, the Congress in 2002 passed HAVA (the Help America Vote Act), which devoted nearly $4 billion to assist states in upgrading their often antiquated voting systems. But the federal Election Assistance Commission, established by HAVA, did not materialize until 2004, over a year late; and it did not release voting-machine guidelines until last month — voluntary guidelines at that.
As confusion, chaos, and evidence of even the newest generation of electronic voting machines being vulnerable to hacking and other irregularities (innocent or otherwise) mounts — county by county, state by state — the lack of guidance from federal authorities only adds to the frustration.
But did we really expect the Bush administration to push for meaningful reform of the systems that record our votes? Without fraud — proven mathematically and demonstrated, even if not yet fully explained, electronically — they could not have “won” the election in 2004.
Really, though, if Bush’s most recent nominee for Supreme Court, Samuel Alito Jr., cements a Right Wing majority on the highest court in the land, it may not really matter much how the votes are counted: Democratic votes could just be legislated away to irrelevancy.
You see, as he stated proudly when applying for a plum position in the Reagan Justice Department, Mr. Alito as a student chose a career in constitutional law “in large part by disagreement with Warren Court decisions, particularly in the areas of criminal procedure, the Establishment Clause, and reapportionment.”
In layperson’s terms, that means Mr. Alito began his “illustrious” career in the law — which ultimately led him to be now nominated for the Supreme Court — because he was adamantly against the rights of defendants, the separation of church and state, and the principle of “one person, one vote” — the last point being most ominous to me and reportedly to Sen. Joseph Biden Jr. (D-Del.), who will be prominent among those questioning Mr. Alito during the confirmation hearings (Biden feels this will be an even greater hurdle for the nominee to overcome than his well-known opposition to Roe v. Wade).
You see, most of us are too young to remember that the principle of “one person, one vote” was not always respected in America. Indeed, it was not until 1962 that the Supreme Court decided to get involved in the “political thicket” of reapportionment; that year, the Warren court decided the case of Baker v. Carr: The court decided in favor of voters in Tennessee who protested that their votes were diluted because state legislative districts had not be redrawn in decades, apparently despite unequal population growth between districts. And it would not be until 1964, in the case of Reynolds v. Sims, involving legislative districts in Alabama, that the court defined with mathematical precision the gold standard of voting we as Americans enjoy today: Because of the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment, “as nearly as is practicable one man’s vote” must “be worth as much as another’s” — the principle of “one person, one vote” was finally enshrined in law.
Within months, the “reapportionment revolution” swept the nation. And although “gerrymandering” — providing districts with equal numbers of voters but lopsided representation of political parties within the districts — has proved a stubborn problem, no longer at least can a powerful minority of voters disenfranchise a majority of voters in a state by simply lumping them together in a precious few districts, outvoted in the state legislature by a greater number of less populous districts — a patently undemocratic, yet all-too-common practice in the nation before 1962.
A practice that nominee Alito in effect defended by vehemently opposing the Warren court decision of Baker v. Carr — which drew him into constitutional law in the first place, about which he boasted in applying to the Reagan Justice Department, and for which an American Enterprise Institute scholar — echoing sentiment expressed throughout the Far Right — recently praised nominee Alito.
Yep, call me old fashioned; but I thought that the president, sworn to uphold the Constitution, and a potential justice of the Supreme Court would hold democracy in reverence, not contempt.
Evidently, the president — who preaches democracy when sending thousands of Americans to their deaths overseas — doesn’t feel obligated to practice or promote democracy here at home.
Sphere: Related ContentMore Bush Insanity: Fomenting Instability in Iraq
Let’s see now. We’re told that it would be patently irresponsible to withdraw our troops from Iraq without first making the country stable and then handing it over to Iraqi security forces.
Well, what’ve we got to show for our “investing” over 2,000 American lives and $300 billion in Iraq so far? Most Iraqi troops have only side arms and ride around in little pick-up trucks (Most of the insurgents have more than that) and there’s still massive unemployment (between 20 and 40 percent, depending on the source you consult) and lots of rebuilding left to do: Not exactly the picture of stability.
So does that mean we’ve got to redouble our efforts to restabilize Iraq, so we can get the hell outa there? Well, maybe not. Consider this report from today’s Washington Post:
The Bush administration does not intend to seek any new funds for Iraq reconstruction in the budget request going before Congress in February, officials say. The decision signals the winding down of an $18.4 billion U.S. rebuilding effort. …“The U.S. never intended to completely rebuild Iraq,” Brig. Gen. William McCoy, the Army Corps of Engineers commander overseeing the work, told reporters at a recent news conference. …
From 14 percent to 22 percent of the cost of every nonmilitary reconstruction project goes toward security against insurgent attacks. …
But the insurgency has set back efforts across the board. In two of the most crucial areas, electricity and oil production, relentless sabotage has kept output at or below prewar levels despite the expenditure of hundreds of millions of American dollars and countless man-hours. …
Iraqis nationwide receive on average less than 12 hours of power a day. For residents of Baghdad, it was six hours a day last month, according to a U.S. count, though many residents say that figure is high.
The Americans, said Zaid Saleem, 26, who works at a market in Baghdad, “are the best in destroying things but they are the worst in rebuilding.”
Oh yeah, things are getting plenty stable over there. We’ll be getting out real soon.
P.S. What must the displaced residents of New Orleans think of such reports?
Sphere: Related ContentIf George W. Bush Had Not Been An Un-American Un-President …
If George W. Bush had not been an un-American un-President, then he would have been elected by the greatest number of citizens voting for a candidate in the presidential election, or at least the greatest number of electoral votes cast based upon the popular vote; he would not have been put in office by an election rigged by his supporters who manufacture and operate the electronic voting machines, with no paper trail to audit.
If George W. Bush had not been an un-American un-President, then he would have led the international community to condemn any actions even vaguely resembling torture as patently inhuman and un-American; he would not have had the man who would be his attorney general torture logic and language and his vice president speak passionately before Congress and the public in pathetic attempts to justify and identify barbaric practices as anything but torture, which not only offends any being remotely human but also tends to yield information that those being interrogated just believe their tormentors want to hear.
If George W. Bush had not been an un-American un-President, then he would have championed the precious civil liberties that each of us as Americans is supposed to enjoy, that every human being deserves to exercise (as the administration repeatedly gives lip service to when waging war overseas), and that our sworn enemies swear to extinguish in the U.S. and the world; he would not have defied the explicit laws of the land, written by the legislative branch and equally rightly overseen by the judicial branch, in that most-American of institutions — the system of checks and balances — and he would have never even dreamed of employing the most powerful intelligence operations the world has ever known to go on fishing expeditions through untold millions of personal and business communications, almost all of which were made by innocent citizens thinking, naively, that their privacy would never be invaded except by court order, as guaranteed by the Fourth Amendment to our once-respected Constitution.
If George W. Bush had not been an un-American un-President, then he would have kept the international coalition formed in the wake of our tragedy of 9/11 together, hunting down those who actually attacked us and rebuilding societies we had to tear apart to root them out; he would not have squandered international good will, thumbing his nose at our traditional and new allies, calling them names, and feeding them — and the American public and Congress — “cherry picked intelligence,” half truths, and outright lies in order to lead our nation to war against a nation that never attacked us — for reasons that range from the discredited or imperialistic to petty or, most charitably, overly idealistic — stretching our forces to the breaking point and, as a consequence of scandalously poor planning, setting in motion a chain of potentially catastrophic events in a strategically vital area of the world over which we have precious little control.
If George W. Bush had not been an un-American un-President, then he would have done everything in his power to prevent the drowning of an American city or at least have done everything in his power to save its inundated survivors and rebuild its vital, storied region; he and his subordinates would not have installed in positions responsible for not only that but also other concerns vital to America (such as protection vs. an avian influenza pandemic or a bioterrorist attack) cronies whose only “qualifications” for the jobs, often taken at the expense of renowned experts in the fields, were their purely political connections.
If George W. Bush had not been an un-American un-President, then he would have focused on helping our fellow citizens most in need — the grassroots of our economy, to be perfectly dispassionate about it — including any and all of us when facing medical catastrophe; he would not have concentrated on enriching those already rich, tried to gut Social Security, promoted legislation that benefits drug and insurance companies more than the seniors it was purported to help, and sent his vice president to cast the tie-breaking vote cutting off help for those less fortunate than most (let alone those in the president’s inner circle).
If George W. Bush had not been an un-American un-President, then he would have practiced fiscal responsibility, balancing budgets and continuing to amass surpluses for our treasury, as did his predecessor; he would not have put this country unnecessarily deeper in debt, particularly to foreign powers.
If George W. Bush had not been an un-American un-President, then he would have encouraged legislation protecting our irreplaceable American heritage of land, air, and water; he would not have done everything he could to exploit the priceless treasures of our nation as a whole for the short-term greed of a few.
If George W. Bush had not been an un-American un-President, then he would have demanded the resignation of anyone in his administration who revealed the identity of an intelligence agent, and thus her operatives and contacts overseas, fighting terrorism, and encouraged whistleblowers to come forth and help root out inefficiency and corruption at all levels of government; he would not have fostered a climate of stonewalling and antagonism towards those who speak the sometimes uncomfortable truth, vital to our national security.
If George W. Bush had not been an un-American un-President, then he would have nominated for the Supreme Court those whose primary mission in public life was to protect the powerless from the powerful; he would not have nominated those whose professional life was devoted to serving the powerful, at the expense of the powerless.
If George W. Bush had not been an un-American un-President, then his popularity might be growing, not shrinking, as he became respected for standing up for what is best in America; he would probably not be increasingly mentioned in terms of impeachment on a variety of high crimes and misdemeanors (far more serious than Oval Office hankie pankie).
So as the GOP rats increasingly desert the sinking Bush ship of state, allow me to wish you a happy midterm congressional election year of 2006. And remember, it takes a village — or at least a majority in one house of Congress — to raise a subpoena.
Sphere: Related ContentTruth, Suffering, Growth: "A Liar’s Tale," by Andre Coleman (book review)
What if every lie you ever told became a reality, as long as someone believed it? Money, sex, love, you name it — all is yours if you simply master the skill of deceit. No longer would you have to bother with the truth and the sacrifices it entails; then again, from suffering can come growth. And a world built upon lies, like a house of cards, inevitably comes crashing down upon itself. (Can you hear me, Mr. Bush?)
Those are the central themes in “A Liar’s Tale,” the wonderfully inventive, thought-provoking first novel by Andre Coleman, who, as a journalist (the city reporter for the Pasadena Weekly), has dedicated his life to a search for the truth (one of many delicious ironies infusing this story).
The setting is modern-day America, whose rhythms of life and speech — from the forbidding back alleys of homelessness and the claustrophobic confines of prison to the working class apartments of New York City and the oak-paneled courtrooms of justice — Coleman apparently effortlessly captures with veracity and immediacy.
The central character is Scott Hampton, a young black man originally from an upper-middle-class family. His father is as hard and cold as the marble floors in their spacious home. His mother is warm and supportive, yet in the shadow of the father. His older brother, Kevin, is the apple of his parents’ eye, successful in all he does. And Scott, the chronic underachiever, has become a habitual liar (although there is more to the genesis of his prevarication, as we will learn).
One evening, Scott sneaks out of the house and into the park, where he chances upon a mysterious, cold-eyed figure, the Rastafarian, in the first of several appearances throughout the story. He appreciates Scott’s sense of suffocation in his real life and appeals to his overly developed sense of fantasy: With the gift of some very exotic sticks of incense (”truth and lies”), the Rasta man offers to make all of Scott’s dreams come true. Fearing perhaps a Faustian bargain — which indeed will be the case — Scott runs back to his dysfunctional home; after watching his hero Batman on TV, hidden from the world by his mask as Scott is by his lies, he lights the incense (or, rather, it lights itself) and he falls back in bed.
Over the years, his father became a judge; his mother, a published professor; his brother, a professional football player; and Scott, an artist who didn’t want to suffer for his art. Living in New York City, as far away from his family as possible, Scott becomes a technician in a hospital (where there has been a series of “mercy killings” of elderly patients). Living in an apartment, he shares brotherly banter, laughs, and thought with “his boys,” Darius and Rich, and love with his long-suffering girlfriend, Dorene, who never knows when to believe her boyfriend: Scott is as uncommitted to the truth as he is to her.
At this point it is worth mentioning that Coleman has said: “I don’t write heroes and villains. Instead I try and write flawed people.” As with everything else in “A Liar’s Tale,” Coleman has created characters whose imperfections only heighten their reality.
Which only heightens the believability and, thus, the impact of the unreality that is about to come.
Scott has tempted fate far too long, his words in effect playing God, by creating false, new identities and histories for people in his life every time he has gotten someone to believe that he couldn’t be at work because his brother was in the hospital, or he was worth sleeping with because he owned a Porsche, or he couldn’t turn in his school report because his dog ate his homework. The day of reckoning finally arrives.
In the course of a day, because of his lies, Scott loses his job, his girl, and almost everything he owns. “I was suffering, and I hated the suffering,” Scott laments, “It’s fate’s joke, and once fate finds a sucker it doesn’t let up and it keeps laughing at you even after you’ve been defeated.”
Digging through what is left of his belongings, searching for his emergency cash to make his way, tail between his legs, back home, Scott comes across the mysterious incense. “Truth and lies,” he thinks to himself, as the incense ignites itself and fills the room with colorful smoke.
Scott arrives at the train station, but you can’t go home again. Rather, from this point onward, Scott embarks on a Kafkaesque adventure in a world turned upside-down, where every lie he has ever told that anyone has ever believed has come true, with profound, often disastrous consequences for all concerned. (”It’s like throwing a rock in a pond and watching the ripples it creates.”)
Far be it from this reviewer to reveal the intrigues that threaten to overwhelm our increasingly enlightened and repentant central character; but suffice it to say that Coleman has crafted a marvelously creative, modern-day morality tale, involving the gain and loss of all the wealth and love one could hope to enjoy, solving a murder mystery created (appropriately enough) by deception within deception, and utterly dripping with irony (For example, at one point Scott is hooked up to a lie detector to prove that he truly believes that his lies have become true).
Ultimately, “A Liar’s Tale” is a classically heroic tale, of growth through adversity; indeed, it examines that very premise by standing it on its head! Again, Mr. Coleman has written a decidedly intelligent, wondrously inventive novel, whose elements of fantasy as well as reality work only because he describes every scene and portrays every character — most especially his or her very individual manner of speech — with a clarity and attention to detail that place you right there with them (a quite shocking realization in the very first scene).
But at the core of the book is the conscience of Scott, asking questions of others or simply of the fates that each of us asks, often in the most trying times of our lives, but rarely have answered — especially “Why does God let people suffer?” In the end, Scott concludes: “Suffering is the road to revelation. We travel on it to realize our dreams. When we lie to make the journey easier, we veer off the road.”
“A Liar’s Tale” is a road well worth traveling.
###
“A Liar’s Tale”
By Andre Coleman
Razor7 Publications
P.O. Box 6746
Altadena, CA 91003-6746
(626) 205-3154
Seven@Razor7.com
http://www.razor7.com/
(Website includes sample chapter, additional information, and online ordering through PayPal)
Sphere: Related Content