Internet Archive here.
Friday, August 31, 2007
Monday, August 20, 2007
Left Libertarianism
I am often surprised to discover that the Right Libertarians have been so successful in associating libertarianism in the public narrative with a right-wing agenda that many of my friends and correspondents are unaware that one can be BOTH a leftist AND a libertarian. Hey, listen, in GWB's Amerika, anything is politically possible (so long as nothing changes).
Do you like Ron Paul for his spunk and some of his views but find yourself deeply troubled by some of his remarks? Maybe you really are a Left Libertarian like me! Check out this site and think about it for a while.
Do you like Ron Paul for his spunk and some of his views but find yourself deeply troubled by some of his remarks? Maybe you really are a Left Libertarian like me! Check out this site and think about it for a while.
Friday, August 17, 2007
The Daily Outrage: The Empire's Bankrupt Judicial System (Part 12,293): The Padilla Case
Tax dollars at work; police state in action.
I cannot improve upon Joe Kay's analysis or his concluding sentence: "Jose Padilla’s personal tragedy is a manifestation of the deep and irreversible decay of American democracy."
Down with the Empire! Re-invent the American Republic!
Thursday, August 16, 2007
Karl Rove's Head-Fake
Karl Rove knows that those who oppose W have nothing but hatred for him (Rove). Their hatred is sometimes so great that it interferes with their ability to think straight. When people cannot think straight for grief or hate, the master manipulator goes into action.
Rove left the White House this past week to focus upon his next electoral task: to assure the election of Hillary Clinton. That is why he is spending these early days of his "retirement" speaking to the press (to whom he rarely spoke--unless he was outing CIA operatives--when he was working inside the White House). And what is he saying? He is slamming HRC. Why? Because Rove knows that the more he attacks Hillary, the more Democan-lemmings will identify with her.
Obama is reported as saying as much in today's NYT's, and he is right. It's a head-fake. Don't fall for it. HRC is Nixon in a skirt. KARL ROVE LOVES HER.
Rove left the White House this past week to focus upon his next electoral task: to assure the election of Hillary Clinton. That is why he is spending these early days of his "retirement" speaking to the press (to whom he rarely spoke--unless he was outing CIA operatives--when he was working inside the White House). And what is he saying? He is slamming HRC. Why? Because Rove knows that the more he attacks Hillary, the more Democan-lemmings will identify with her.
Obama is reported as saying as much in today's NYT's, and he is right. It's a head-fake. Don't fall for it. HRC is Nixon in a skirt. KARL ROVE LOVES HER.
Wednesday, August 15, 2007
A Brief Exchange with a Critic
An "e-friend" sent me a copy of a criticism sent to him regarding his attempt to hold John Edwards accountable for his actions as a U. S. Senator. The critic wrote:
"That's right -- in your Quixote-like search for a
'pure' candidate you need to go trashing people
like Edwards, or Clinton, or whoever. You are so
naive that you have no idea of the power of the
know-nothings and neo-fascists to deceive and
enlist the vast majority of ordinary people. Keep
this up and you will guarantee us another Bush or
worse.
One step at a time. Concentrate on achievable
progress or engage in mental masturbation and pave
the way for a permanent and irreversible takeover
by the dark forces."
Sure seems like sound, level-headed advice. And, say, twenty years ago, it might have been. But here was my reply:
"Listen my friend, many well-meaning people who imagine themselves to be on the left of the Neo-Fascists simply have not caught on to the fact that playing politics as usual is what got us into the mess we are in and will never get us out.
The fix is already in. HRC is the Democan nominee and Obama is running for Veep. Edwards is less than relevant today.
We need to focus our energies on shaming BOTH the Republicrats and the Democans; neither party represents the best interests of the people of the United States or of the people of the world who will be on the receiving end of their decisions. That does not mean that a third party candidate has a snowball's chance in hell in this country. Third party runs ARE pure fantasy because the "2-party" system has the field sown up tight.
We must work today to overthrow the present system and replace it with a true multi-party parliamentary democracy. We have NO alternative. A non-violent people's revolution that will call for a Constitutional convention is our only hope. We CAN have a modern Constitutional government like the great democracies in Scandinavia and parts of Europe. We don't have to limp along with a jury-rigged 18th century constitution. Those who insist that we must are the Quixotic and deluded. So spread the word. Change, BIG CHANGE is going to have to come.
Down with the Empire; Re-invent the American Republic!"
Those who insist that we do not have the luxury to dream of a better world condemn us to the slow grinding out of the present one. Those who are angered by attempts to hold political figures accountable for actions taken in their roles as "public servants" are threatened by the exercise of TRUE DEMOCRACY. We must press our case even-handedly against the Duopolistic mono-party that has a strangle-hold upon all of our futures. Prison for Bush and his co-conspirators; political exile for Hillary Clinton and her ilk in the Democan-party establishment.
A revolution is not a dinner-party.
"That's right -- in your Quixote-like search for a
'pure' candidate you need to go trashing people
like Edwards, or Clinton, or whoever. You are so
naive that you have no idea of the power of the
know-nothings and neo-fascists to deceive and
enlist the vast majority of ordinary people. Keep
this up and you will guarantee us another Bush or
worse.
One step at a time. Concentrate on achievable
progress or engage in mental masturbation and pave
the way for a permanent and irreversible takeover
by the dark forces."
Sure seems like sound, level-headed advice. And, say, twenty years ago, it might have been. But here was my reply:
"Listen my friend, many well-meaning people who imagine themselves to be on the left of the Neo-Fascists simply have not caught on to the fact that playing politics as usual is what got us into the mess we are in and will never get us out.
The fix is already in. HRC is the Democan nominee and Obama is running for Veep. Edwards is less than relevant today.
We need to focus our energies on shaming BOTH the Republicrats and the Democans; neither party represents the best interests of the people of the United States or of the people of the world who will be on the receiving end of their decisions. That does not mean that a third party candidate has a snowball's chance in hell in this country. Third party runs ARE pure fantasy because the "2-party" system has the field sown up tight.
We must work today to overthrow the present system and replace it with a true multi-party parliamentary democracy. We have NO alternative. A non-violent people's revolution that will call for a Constitutional convention is our only hope. We CAN have a modern Constitutional government like the great democracies in Scandinavia and parts of Europe. We don't have to limp along with a jury-rigged 18th century constitution. Those who insist that we must are the Quixotic and deluded. So spread the word. Change, BIG CHANGE is going to have to come.
Down with the Empire; Re-invent the American Republic!"
Those who insist that we do not have the luxury to dream of a better world condemn us to the slow grinding out of the present one. Those who are angered by attempts to hold political figures accountable for actions taken in their roles as "public servants" are threatened by the exercise of TRUE DEMOCRACY. We must press our case even-handedly against the Duopolistic mono-party that has a strangle-hold upon all of our futures. Prison for Bush and his co-conspirators; political exile for Hillary Clinton and her ilk in the Democan-party establishment.
A revolution is not a dinner-party.
Friday, August 10, 2007
Notes on the State of Things
Recommended Reading:
"Shine, Perishing Republic," by Robinson Jeffers. Jeffers was responding to the U. S.'s involvement in the "Great War" (WWI). I date the end of our republic and the beginning of the Empire to the poet's salient observations.
Leaves of Grass, by Walt Whitman. Whitman was the great visionary of an America that might have been but, alas, is not. His poems remind us of the road not taken. Read them and weep.
Annals, by Cornelius Tacitus. Tacitus is often considered to be the greatest historian that ancient Rome produced, and the Annals are his masterpiece. He is particularly important today because of his understanding of the social role of the historian: "to pass political and moral judgments on the past and thereby affect the future" (Ronald Mellor, The Historians of Ancient Rome, p. 393). Mellor adds: "In these books Tacitus creates a psychological portrait of the tyrant and his flatterers. The historian has no interest in sociological or economic explanations; he is concerned with political life, the loss of liberty, and the pathology of power" (pp. 393-394). The relevance of Tacitus increases when one considers the ways in which he would contrast Roman life and character under Empire with life and character during the Republic. More reading and weeping, I'm afraid.
John Hersey, Hiroshima. I first read this book in Middle School. It was a riveting read--especially so for me because my father, a nuclear chemist, had worked on the Manhattan Project (the secret government program that produced the atomic bomb). It chronicles the day America turned a moral corner that can never be un-turned; the day on which the military-industrial-complex took its "first communion" with Satan.
Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism. Even more reading and weeping.
James C. Scott, Domination and the Arts of Resistance: Hidden Transcripts. This book is suggestive of how those of us who live here in the heart of Leviathan can engage in effective political action. Entering a voting booth under duopolistic monoparty rule is no more harmful nor helpful than entering one of Wilhelm Reich's "orgone accumulators." Personally, I think I would take my chances with Reich... In any event, in a pseudemocracy such as we have in these Benighted States today, voting is an exercise in futility. Nevertheless, I recommend that people continue to do it so that we do not lose the habit. When the Empire falls, we may be able to re-invent a democratic republic.
What might cause the Empire to fall? Any number of things, but those of us on the inside may hasten the day by subverting it from within. Scott's book shows "the manifold strategies by which subordinate groups manage to insinuate their resistance, in disguised forms, into the public transcript" (p. 136). In other words, they "booby-trap" the Narrative.
In my view, an important aspect of any resistance to the Neo-Fascist/Christo-Fascist Leviathan is to reclaim the religious imagination. Left-leaning people have made the mistake of ignoring religion, thinking, I suppose, that if they did so, religion would just go away. Let's just get this out of the way up front: RELIGION IS NOT GOING AWAY ANYTIME SOON. And since the left abandoned religion--rather than cultivating the many ways in which religious thinking and literature may bolster a leftist agenda--it has been twisted into a potent source of totalitarian motivation by the plutocratic enemies of republican (i.e., meritocratic) governance.
Religious fundamentalism represents a failure of the religious imagination. Rationality can (and should) be used as a means of curbing credulity and wishful thinking, but it will never replace religious creativity. The latter must be harnessed for worthwhile ends.
Another reason to read Tacitus was his biting wit. Perhaps the closest thing we have to a Tacitus today is Al Franken. Tacitean shaming, scolding, and ridicule all contribute to the subversive program by means of which we must drive the neo-Fascists from power. Franken understands this and is leading the charge. And since the religious right in this country is so utterly rife with hypocrites, it can seem like shooting fish in a barrel. But these aren't gold-fish we're aiming at --they're piranhas. Therefore, fire at will.
Let me be clear that the subversive activity that I am advocating is only the sort that is protected by the Bill of Rights. I do not recommend violence in any form. Violence is, in fact, anti-political. I advocate the politics of continual "nuisancery," ridicule, and non-cooperation. It is the sort of political platform that can be carried out by all of us individually and daily.
Bill O'Reilly is a swine; Ann Coulter a word I have the decency not to print. Fox News is a tele-tabloid: if you actually watch that channel for information about the world, you are a dupe. These people and the organization that pays them emit a very bad odor in civilized society. We should take every opportunity to show them the door.
Bush and his co-conspirators are criminals. There will be no justice in this land until they are arrested and brought to trial by an international tribunal. I don't give a damn that they have refused to allow the United States to submit to the jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice. That fact is just a further indication that they are well aware of their guilt. We must condemn them and their criminality at every opportunity.
And we must lament the end of the American Republic and the rise of the American Empire, the engine of which is the military-industrial-complex.
Our task is long and grim. Traitors (like the Republicrat-Democan duopoly, the 4th estate, and compliant religious communities) surround us on every side. But as Mao said: "A revolution is not a dinner-party." Nevertheless, if we work at it every day, we can make it approximate a Rabelasian carnival.
"Shine, Perishing Republic," by Robinson Jeffers. Jeffers was responding to the U. S.'s involvement in the "Great War" (WWI). I date the end of our republic and the beginning of the Empire to the poet's salient observations.
Leaves of Grass, by Walt Whitman. Whitman was the great visionary of an America that might have been but, alas, is not. His poems remind us of the road not taken. Read them and weep.
Annals, by Cornelius Tacitus. Tacitus is often considered to be the greatest historian that ancient Rome produced, and the Annals are his masterpiece. He is particularly important today because of his understanding of the social role of the historian: "to pass political and moral judgments on the past and thereby affect the future" (Ronald Mellor, The Historians of Ancient Rome, p. 393). Mellor adds: "In these books Tacitus creates a psychological portrait of the tyrant and his flatterers. The historian has no interest in sociological or economic explanations; he is concerned with political life, the loss of liberty, and the pathology of power" (pp. 393-394). The relevance of Tacitus increases when one considers the ways in which he would contrast Roman life and character under Empire with life and character during the Republic. More reading and weeping, I'm afraid.
John Hersey, Hiroshima. I first read this book in Middle School. It was a riveting read--especially so for me because my father, a nuclear chemist, had worked on the Manhattan Project (the secret government program that produced the atomic bomb). It chronicles the day America turned a moral corner that can never be un-turned; the day on which the military-industrial-complex took its "first communion" with Satan.
Hannah Arendt, The Origins of Totalitarianism. Even more reading and weeping.
James C. Scott, Domination and the Arts of Resistance: Hidden Transcripts. This book is suggestive of how those of us who live here in the heart of Leviathan can engage in effective political action. Entering a voting booth under duopolistic monoparty rule is no more harmful nor helpful than entering one of Wilhelm Reich's "orgone accumulators." Personally, I think I would take my chances with Reich... In any event, in a pseudemocracy such as we have in these Benighted States today, voting is an exercise in futility. Nevertheless, I recommend that people continue to do it so that we do not lose the habit. When the Empire falls, we may be able to re-invent a democratic republic.
What might cause the Empire to fall? Any number of things, but those of us on the inside may hasten the day by subverting it from within. Scott's book shows "the manifold strategies by which subordinate groups manage to insinuate their resistance, in disguised forms, into the public transcript" (p. 136). In other words, they "booby-trap" the Narrative.
In my view, an important aspect of any resistance to the Neo-Fascist/Christo-Fascist Leviathan is to reclaim the religious imagination. Left-leaning people have made the mistake of ignoring religion, thinking, I suppose, that if they did so, religion would just go away. Let's just get this out of the way up front: RELIGION IS NOT GOING AWAY ANYTIME SOON. And since the left abandoned religion--rather than cultivating the many ways in which religious thinking and literature may bolster a leftist agenda--it has been twisted into a potent source of totalitarian motivation by the plutocratic enemies of republican (i.e., meritocratic) governance.
Religious fundamentalism represents a failure of the religious imagination. Rationality can (and should) be used as a means of curbing credulity and wishful thinking, but it will never replace religious creativity. The latter must be harnessed for worthwhile ends.
Another reason to read Tacitus was his biting wit. Perhaps the closest thing we have to a Tacitus today is Al Franken. Tacitean shaming, scolding, and ridicule all contribute to the subversive program by means of which we must drive the neo-Fascists from power. Franken understands this and is leading the charge. And since the religious right in this country is so utterly rife with hypocrites, it can seem like shooting fish in a barrel. But these aren't gold-fish we're aiming at --they're piranhas. Therefore, fire at will.
Let me be clear that the subversive activity that I am advocating is only the sort that is protected by the Bill of Rights. I do not recommend violence in any form. Violence is, in fact, anti-political. I advocate the politics of continual "nuisancery," ridicule, and non-cooperation. It is the sort of political platform that can be carried out by all of us individually and daily.
Bill O'Reilly is a swine; Ann Coulter a word I have the decency not to print. Fox News is a tele-tabloid: if you actually watch that channel for information about the world, you are a dupe. These people and the organization that pays them emit a very bad odor in civilized society. We should take every opportunity to show them the door.
Bush and his co-conspirators are criminals. There will be no justice in this land until they are arrested and brought to trial by an international tribunal. I don't give a damn that they have refused to allow the United States to submit to the jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice. That fact is just a further indication that they are well aware of their guilt. We must condemn them and their criminality at every opportunity.
And we must lament the end of the American Republic and the rise of the American Empire, the engine of which is the military-industrial-complex.
Our task is long and grim. Traitors (like the Republicrat-Democan duopoly, the 4th estate, and compliant religious communities) surround us on every side. But as Mao said: "A revolution is not a dinner-party." Nevertheless, if we work at it every day, we can make it approximate a Rabelasian carnival.
Thursday, August 9, 2007
A Small Act of Consciousness-Raising a Day...
will eventually make the Neo- and Christo-Fascists crawl back under the rocks from whence they came in late 2000 to saddle this country with their twisted homicidal racist dreams of imperial glory.
Here is the challenge: plan to do something each day that will make another person THINK!
For example: Make posters that display the 9th and 10th amendments to the U. S. Constitution and post them in various places where you live. Be sure that the posters emphasize that there are rights and powers vested in the people of this country that have yet to be exercised. Call for a constitutional convention to create a multi-party parliamentary democracy.
Contact Democratic Party Headquarters and let them know that the Party's monopolistic strangle-hold upon our democracy will soon be over on account of its complicity with the Neo- and Christo-Fascists. Contact Republican Party Headquarters and let them know that the Party's monopolistic strangle-hold upon our democracy will soon be over on account of its being the primary vehicle of Neo- and Christo-Fascism in the world today.
Contact your local media outlet and denounce its treasonous betrayal of democracy by its failure to expose the criminality of the government and its failure to call for the end of the country's imperialistic wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Contact your political representatives in Congress and remind them that the State of Israel is an INDEPENDENT, FOREIGN NATION and that, therefore, it would be highly unusual if its interests were in perfect alignment with the interests of the United States. Remind them that if they cannot tell the difference between the interests of an INDEPENDENT, FOREIGN NATION and those of the United States, they are guilty of TREASON, have no business in our government, and will be subject to arrest and trial. Remind them that treason is a capital crime under federal law.
Buy a Palestinian flag (they are available on-line--at least that's how I obtained mine) and display it. Support the aspirations of all people everywhere to be free from political violence and oppression.
IT'S TIME TO GET CREATIVE. It is also time to engage in such acts of consciousness-raising and, yes, gentle provocation, on a daily basis. Act locally and without a lot of fanfare. Simply exercise your right as a citizen of a democracy to engage in political speech.
If you are active in a religious organization, engage your co-religionists in questions of justice and non-violence. Encourage their participation in a small act of consciousness-raising a day.
Don't wait for clergy and don't wait for politicians. Act on your own initiative under the U. S. Constitution as amended. And begin TODAY.
Here is the challenge: plan to do something each day that will make another person THINK!
For example: Make posters that display the 9th and 10th amendments to the U. S. Constitution and post them in various places where you live. Be sure that the posters emphasize that there are rights and powers vested in the people of this country that have yet to be exercised. Call for a constitutional convention to create a multi-party parliamentary democracy.
Contact Democratic Party Headquarters and let them know that the Party's monopolistic strangle-hold upon our democracy will soon be over on account of its complicity with the Neo- and Christo-Fascists. Contact Republican Party Headquarters and let them know that the Party's monopolistic strangle-hold upon our democracy will soon be over on account of its being the primary vehicle of Neo- and Christo-Fascism in the world today.
Contact your local media outlet and denounce its treasonous betrayal of democracy by its failure to expose the criminality of the government and its failure to call for the end of the country's imperialistic wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Contact your political representatives in Congress and remind them that the State of Israel is an INDEPENDENT, FOREIGN NATION and that, therefore, it would be highly unusual if its interests were in perfect alignment with the interests of the United States. Remind them that if they cannot tell the difference between the interests of an INDEPENDENT, FOREIGN NATION and those of the United States, they are guilty of TREASON, have no business in our government, and will be subject to arrest and trial. Remind them that treason is a capital crime under federal law.
Buy a Palestinian flag (they are available on-line--at least that's how I obtained mine) and display it. Support the aspirations of all people everywhere to be free from political violence and oppression.
IT'S TIME TO GET CREATIVE. It is also time to engage in such acts of consciousness-raising and, yes, gentle provocation, on a daily basis. Act locally and without a lot of fanfare. Simply exercise your right as a citizen of a democracy to engage in political speech.
If you are active in a religious organization, engage your co-religionists in questions of justice and non-violence. Encourage their participation in a small act of consciousness-raising a day.
Don't wait for clergy and don't wait for politicians. Act on your own initiative under the U. S. Constitution as amended. And begin TODAY.
Tuesday, August 7, 2007
Daily Outrage Dept.
As we approach the 12th anniversary of the untimely passing of Jerry Garcia (August 9th), I've been thinking about Jerry and his times. It seems to me that the mid-1960's to early 1970's was a period in which the United States came close to the advent of something like a "Great Awakening"--only one that was not propelled by Protestant preaching but, rather, by a more gnostic variety of consciousness raising. In the midst of what approached a nostalgic reverie, I happened to tune in (absent mindedly) to NPR (since 9/11, Nationalist Propaganda Radio) and listened to a Weekend Edition piece on "a touring multimedia show that has already been seen by more than 100,000 people" and that "is playing at the world's finest concert halls — with the world's finest orchestras powering through some of the world's most popular video-game music." At that moment, I should have leaped across the room for the on/off switch but, as fate would have it, I hesitated. My bad. The report continued with this charming bit of information:
And it's attracting a decidedly different audience. Take Josh Schwidel: He isn't the type you'd normally find seated in the Kennedy Center Concert Hall. He's 11 years old, and he came to see Video Games Live with one of his friends. There's a costume contest, so naturally Josh came dressed as one of his favorite video-game characters.
"I'm Ness from the Super NES game Earthbound," says Josh, who's dressed in a striped shirt and baseball cap. "It's a game about crazy things; you attack hippies with baseball bats. I brought a baseball bat, but they wouldn't let me come in with it."
You attack hippies with baseball bats...It was then that I hit the "off" button, but it was too late. For I could not erase from my thoughts an image of this Satanic "game" that not only helps to de-sensitize children to the commission of violent acts but, by targeting "hippies," is clearly fascistic. We are talking "flower children" here.
Josh Schwidel may not know it, but by playing this video-game he is exposing himself to powerful images that have the potential to influence his attitudes and decisions as he grows older. Of course, it is entirely possible that his favorite video imaginary is filling him with a lifetime of loathing for anyone who would actually engage in such socio-pathic behavior as attacking the likes of, well, the late Mr. Garcia, with a club or any other weapon. One can only hope.
I won't link to the full story. If you need to find it yourself, it should be here:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=12478692
This is just one more reason why you should have taken better care of yourself, brother Garcia.
May you rest in peace.
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