• hate slavery
• favor access to birth control and
• accept evolution and the “Big Bang” theory

then you might have second-thoughts about joining the Republican Party.

Consider the following:

ON SLAVERY:

Jon Hubbard, a Republican member of the Arkansas House of Representatives, says in a new book that slavery was “a blessing” for African-Americans.

In Letters to the Editor: Confessions of a Frustrated Conservative, Hubbard writes:

“The institution of slavery that the black race has long believed to be an abomination upon its people may actually have been a blessing in disguise. The blacks who could endure those conditions and circumstances would someday be rewarded with citizenship in the greatest nation ever established upon the face of the Earth.”

No doubt that must now give huge comfort to all those generations of blacks who endured 300 years of bondage, usually under the most brutal conditions.

Oh, I forgot.  All those millions of former slaves are now dead.

No doubt Hubbard forgot, too, when he wrote that.

ON BIRTH CONTROL:

On August 1, Congressman Mike Kelly (R-Pa.) compared the requirement that private insurance plans provide contraception coverage to two of the most devastating attacks on American soil.

“I know in your mind, you can think of the times America was attacked,” he said at a press conference on Capitol Hill.

“One is Dec. 7, that’s Pearl Harbor Day. The other is Sept. 11, and that’s the day the terrorists attacked. I want you to remember Aug. 1, 2012, the attack on our religious freedom. That is a day that will live in infamy, along with those other dates.”

August 1 marked the first day private insurers must include birth control coverage in their plans without charging a co-pay, as required by the Affordable Care Act.

Thus, the right of even poor women to obtain affordable contraceptive coverage is now on a moral par with sneak attacks that massacred thousands of innocent men and women.

ON EVOLUTION AND THE BIG BANG THEORY:

On September 27, Congressman Paul Broun (R-Ga.) gave a speech at the 2012 Sportsman’s Banquet at Liberty Baptist Church in Hartwell, Georgia.

In this, he said that evolution and the big bang theory were “lies straight from the pit of Hell.”

“God’s word is true. I’ve come to understand that. All that stuff I was taught about evolution and embryology and the big bang theory, all that is lies straight from the pit of Hell.

“It’s lies to try to keep me and all the folks who were taught that from understanding that they need a savior.”

Broun, who is actually earned a Doctor of Medicine degree in 1971 from the Medical College of Georgia, continued:

“You see, there are a lot of scientific data that I’ve found out as a scientist that actually show that this is really a young Earth. I don’t believe that the earth’s but about 9,000 years old.

“I believe it was created in six days as we know them. That’s what the Bible says.”

Referring to the Bible as “the manufacturer’s handbook,” he said:

“It teaches us how to run our lives individually, how to run our families, how to run our churches. But it teaches us how to run all of public policy and everything in society.

To add unintentional humor to the situation, Broun is a high-ranking member of the House Science Committee.

Thus, a man who

• rejects science
• embraces primitive-era theology as a substitute for rational thinking and
• believes in devils and a savior as actual beings and Hell as an actual place

now commands power to shape scientific inquiry for the United States Government.

Americans quickly condemn and ridicule tyrants like Adolf Hitler and religious fanatics such as Osama bin Laden as psychopathic oddities–whose like could never appear in the United States.

In fact, American history is littered with political tyrants and religious fanatics.

It’s long past time for Americans to study that history–with its would-be tyrants like Richard Nixon, Huey Long, Joseph McCarthy, Newt Gingrich and Dick Cheney.

And its religious fanatics like Charles Coughlin, Jimmy Swaggart, Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell and Donald Wildmon.

And it’s long past time for Americans–who pride themselves on being a deeply religious people–to remember that warning from Jesus in Matthew 7:5:

“You hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of your own eye; and then shall you see clearly to cast out the speck out of your brother’s eye.”

Explicit 1960s discussion between US CIA Nazi Dorothy Ginsberg and Dean Levinson

Early Dorothy Ginsberg Nazi statements about Pravda, Russians, Benjamin Franklin and the Franklin Printing Press per German loyalties and obfuscation

Richard Wagner (‘Vaugner’) and Reincarnation As Olivier Messien

Propaganda and the ‘Command and Control’ military paradigm

Jews as Retained Minstrels and Enslaved Survivors in Dorothy Ginsberg’s View

Joseph McCarthy and Hollywood and New Direction for TV; Dean Levinson as THE inventor of TV show after TV show, movie after movie, and channel after channel, and commercial after commercial. As a child, Dean Levinson REDEFINES the economic role of ADVERTISING both theoretically and in practice.

Dean Levinson, Grocery Cart Advertising and the creation of the WPP Corporation.

Ownership and Control of the Media as a Deliberate Concentrated Act

The Designated ’Important’ Newspapers –

• Washington: Washington Post, Washington Times, Christian Science Monitor
• New York City: New York Times, Wall Street Journal, New York Post
• London: The Daily News, News of The World
• Dean Levinson, Gannett and the Creation of USA Today

Rewriting History, Controlling Publishing and the creation of Wikipedia

Dean Levinson as the Mainstay of Magazine Publishing, and the Creation of Publsihers’ Clearinghouse with Ed McMahon as Spokesman

Dean Levinson, Madison Avenue and the thefted creation and brand of ‘MadMen’ only as an example

[Under Construction]

Historical False Nazi Aka’s:

• Joseph McCarthy
• George McGovern

Of Current Note:

• Jim Thorpe aka John McDaniel aka Stuart McBirnie aka James K. Goldthorpe aka numerous business entities
• Malcom McComb
• Paul McCormack
• Dorothy Ginsberg aka Dorothy McCabe

[Under Construction]

isenhower at Home: 1952–1959

Events

Creeping Socialism

Eisenhower entered the White House in 1953 determined to roll back Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal liberalism, which he derided as “creeping socialism.” A Republican, Eisenhower wanted to reduce the size and influence of the federal government, give more power to state governments, and allow corporate profits to boost the national economy unfettered. Less government influence, he reasoned, would put America back on track. He appointed prominent businessmen to top cabinet posts in an effort to make the executive branch more efficient. Most Americans praised his hands-off approach to government after twenty years of heavy social engineering under Roosevelt and Truman.

Continuing the New Deal

Eisenhower’s desire to halt “creeping socialism” did not, however, mean dismantling the new social welfare programs previously put into place. Eisenhower proved to be a big proponent of programs and policies designed to help those at the bottom rung of the economic ladder, who needed help the most. He created the cabinet-level Department of Health, Education, and Welfare and allowed the government to continue to subsidize farmers so that the price of farm products remained high. Eisenhower expanded Social Security in order to benefit more Americans, including the elderly and unemployed, and also dumped more federal dollars into the Federal Housing Administration to help Americans purchase new homes.

The Federal Highway Act

Most important, Eisenhower endorsed the Federal Highway Act in 1956, calling for the construction of a network of interstate highways, which would improve national transportation. In fewer than twenty years, this highway construction became the largest public works project in U.S. history and cost more than $25 billion. New taxes on gasoline, oil, and trucks helped pay for this massive endeavor. The new interstates had an enormous impact on the growth of the suburbs and prosperity but also severely crippled the development of public transportation systems.

The AFL-CIO

Afraid that a Republican in the White House would mean the end oforganized labor, which had flourished under the Democrats and during World War II, the heads of the rival American Federation of Labor (AFL) and the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) labor unions merged in1955 to create the AFL-CIO. This new superunion joined between 10 and 15million workers under a single umbrella organization and helped millions of families achieve unprecedented prosperity. Never again have so many American laborers been organized in one body.

Scandal after scandal rocked the organization in the 1960s and 1970s, including the expulsion of the Teamsters Union from the AFL-CIO in 1957 for having ties to organized crime. The media attention tarnished organized labor in the public eye and convinced millions to leave the union. Congress eventually passed the 1959 Landrum-Griffin Act in the wake of these scandals to limit labor unions’ rights.

Ike on Civil Rights

Eisenhower privately opposed the civil rights movement and remained relatively silent as the movement began to gain momentum during his presidency. He made no comment after the Supreme Court ruled unanimously in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas , that “separate but equal” public facilities for blacks and whites were unconstitutional. He signed the Civil Rights Act of 1957 , but only reluctantly and only after assuring southern legislators that the new law would have little real impact.

Eisenhower did, however, exert federal authority that same year when Arkansas governor Orval Faubus defied a federal court order and mobilized National Guard units to prevent nine black students from entering Central High School in Little Rock. Eisenhower resolved the Little Rock crisis by placing the National Guard under federal control and sending more than 1,000 U.S. Army soldiers to protect the students and integrate the school by force.

McCarthyism

Republican Senator Joseph McCarthy’s Communist witch hunt overshadowed all other domestic issues during Eisenhower’s two terms in office. Hoping to boost his own status as a national politician, McCarthy first capitalized on Americans’ fears of Communism when he announced in1950 that the State Department had become overrun with more than 200Communists. He claimed that these Communists, including Truman’s own secretary of state, Dean Acheson, were working secretly to hinder American efforts against the Soviet Union.

Although McCarthy never offered any actual proof to back up his claims,“McCarthyism” swept across the nation like wildfire. Thousands of individuals, including liberals, critics of the Korean War and the Cold War, civil rights activists, homosexuals, feminists, and even critics of McCarthy himself, were blacklisted and fired from their jobs.

The Army-McCarthy Hearings

As a congressman and later as vice president, Richard Nixon fully supported McCarthy, as did future president Ronald Reagan, who at the time held the influential position of president of the Screen Actors Guild. In response to McCarthyism, author and playwright Arthur Miller, who had himself been branded a Communist, wrote the 1953 play The Crucible, a critique of the Red hunts disguised as a play about the Salem witch trials of the 1600s.

Eventually, McCarthy ruined his own name after accusing high-ranking members of the U.S. military of being Communists. During the televisedArmy-McCarthy hearings of 1954, millions of Americans watched as the senator made wild accusations without a shred of evidence. These hearings and the Senate’s subsequent formal reprimand of McCarthy effectively ended the Red hunts. Disgraced and discredited, McCarthy became an alcoholic and died in 1957.

Badri Raina

Seeing red: Mamata Banerjee has gone as far as describing court verdicts as purchased, Commissions as useless and civil society groups as nuisance.

Recent events seem to suggest that the patron saint of paranoia has passed on the baton to the West Bengal Chief Minister.

    My alma mater, Wisconsin, is much in the news, sadly for some unlovely reasons; and some equally unlovely events at home remind me of one Joseph McCarthy who used to be a Senator from Wisconsin during 1950-1954, a period which has gone down in American history as the “Second Red Scare”.

    The first red scare is associated with the years just after the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 when the cry went up on the American mainland that “the Russians are coming”. Much of that has been captured memorably by Robert K. Murray in his book Red Scare: A Study in Hysteria, 1919-1920, published by the University of Minnesota Press in 1955.

    But returning to the second scare: it seemed to some American right-wingers that there was a Communist in every closet on American soil, rather a tribute to the influence that Bolshevism had achieved on both the European and American continents during the period between the First and Second World Wars. A no-holds-barred campaign was unleashed to ferret out these commies from all sorts of nooks and crannies. And the method adopted was of making accusations of disloyalty or treason without proper regard for evidence, a procedure led vociferously by Joseph McCarthy, whence the term McCarthyism.

    The witch-hunt led to thousands of individuals, among them Charlie Chaplin, Bertolt Brecht, W.E.B. Du Bois, Langston Hughes, Arthur Miller, Paul Robeson, Paul Sweezy and many other outstanding intellectuals and creative artists, being hauled up before governmental or private industry panels; the most infamous of these being “The House Un-American Activities Committee”. And most of those summoned found themselves answering accusation by insinuation, innuendo, third party rumour and so forth, with no evidence of actionable criminality. And never mind what Harry Truman had said on record: “In a free country, we punish men for the crimes they commit, but never for the opinions they have.”

    Recent events in West Bengal seem to suggest that good old McCarthy may have passed on the baton to our own Mamata Di. In disregard of Harry Truman, not to speak of the Indian Constitution, there is evidence now to believe that the holding of an opinion unflattering to the power-that-be in West Bengal in and by itself constitutes criminality, deserving of an “off with his head” form of justice on the instant.

    First there was Taniya Bharadwaj who was instantly branded a Maoist for asking a fairly innocuous question of the fairy queen on a TV channel, then the poor professor from Jadavpur University, Ambikesh Mahapatra, who was arrested for circulating a cartoon determined on the instant to be dangerously subversive of Mamata Di, and now a poor farmer, Shiladitya Choudhury, again, ah, a Maoist, or else why would he ask a question about the rising price of fertilizer, and his inability to obtain rice at Rs.2 a kg, as per policy. So off he goes too to the slammer, and no bail yet either.

    How “liberators” turn “oppressors” I was told in confidence by an erstwhile staunch supporter of Mamata Banerjee, the giant killer who it seems is sadly unaccountable to any democratic or legal norm.

    It will be remembered that before the last Assembly elections in West Bengal, when Mamata Banerjee was often accused of collusion with the Maoists, it was her riposte that there were no Maoists in Jangalmahal, and that the mischief was entirely owing to the cadres of the CPI(M). Now that the latter is out of power, it makes good political sense to reconstruct the enemy as the Maoist, since everybody knows how dangerous and outlawed they are.

    Mamata’s McCarthyist paranoia now seems to extend its reach. She has charged that judgements from courts are “purchased”, that Commissions are useless and wasteful (just when the West Bengal Human Rights Commission has ordered her to compensate Professor Mahapatra and his neighbour, Subrata Sengupta, for the unlawful excesses vented on them, and asked for departmental action to be initiated against two police officers in the matter), and that civil society groups are a nuisance without accountability.

    These accusations seem to take in institutions dear to the urban middle class’s heart, and it will be interesting to see whether those that sought “poribortan” for West Bengal had precisely this sort of package in mind. Indeed, there is speculation that where it took the Bengali electorate some three decades to be disillusioned with the Left Front, three years may bring them to reconsider the choices they must make.

    Given the assertiveness of Indian democracy, it would seem that McCarthyism of any sort must have a small shelf life, regardless of who its patrons are — a lesson that the Left seems assiduously to want to learn during its exile from power.

(Prof. Badri Raina is a Delhi-based writer.)

Courtesy: The Hindu

In 1945, American troops returned home, many starting new lives and families. Between 1946 and 1964, 76.4 million baby boomers were born. Over 13 million homes went up from 1948 to 1958. Most were affordable, cookie-cutter houses fashioned after the phenomenally successful Levittown, Long Island. William J. Levitt had pioneered the suburb by building neighborhoods of nearly identical, quickly built housing. America’s movement to the suburbs spurred the growth of shopping malls, drive-ins, and supermarkets. Many saw the 1950′s as a return to prosperity and social “normality.”

The prosperity and social normality was tinged with a “Red” hysteria, however. Americans saw communism on the march everywhere. By the end of the 1940′s, Americans had seen the Soviets try to cut off Berlin from the West, Mao’s Communist Party come to power in China, and the Soviet Union explode its first atomic bomb. In 1947, President Truman had outlined what became known as the Truman Doctrine: “I believe that it must be the policy of the United States to support free peoples who are resisting subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures.” A State Department official, George Kennan, later fleshed out the Truman Doctrine, introducing the policy of “containment,” which meant the United States would contain the Soviet Union’s influence anywhere in the world. The “containment of the Communist threat” colored U.S. foreign policy decisions for decades to come.

At home, politicians found it politically expedient to be hard on communism. A former Communist Party member charged former Roosevelt advisor, Alger Hiss, with being a Communist spy. Hiss denied the charges before the House Un-American Activities Committee, which investigated alleged communist subversion in the U.S. government. The statute of limitations protected Hiss from espionage charges, but he was later found guilty of perjury. At the same time, Americans learned that respected Los Alamos scientist Klaus Fuchs had been passing atomic secrets to the Soviet Union. Other conspirators testified that they had passed the secrets to Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. The Rosenbergs were convicted and executed as spies. Their defenders–then and now–claimed the Rosenbergs were framed, convicted, and executed in an anti-Semitic and anti-Communist frenzy.

• January 1950President Truman orders the Atomic Energy Commission to develop the hydrogen bomb (H-bomb).
• February 1950Senator Joseph McCarthy launches a crusade to rout out communism in America. “McCarthyism” is born.
• June 1950The Korean War begins as North Korean forces invade South Korea.
• December 1951The first usable electricity from nuclear fission is produced at the National Reactor Station, later called the Idaho National Engineering Laboratory.
• October 1952Operations begin at the Savannah River Plant in Aiken, South Carolina, with the startup of the heavy water plant.
• December 1953In his Atoms for Peace speech, President Eisenhower proposes joint international cooperation to develop peaceful applications of nuclear energy.
• January 1954U.S. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles announces U.S. policy of massive retaliation, that the United States would respond to any Communist aggression.The first nuclear submarine, U.S.S. Nautilus, is launched.
• April 1954Army-McCarthy hearings are on TV for five weeks. By the end, Senator McCarthy is publicly disgraced.
• August 1954The Atomic Energy Act of 1954 is passed to promote the peaceful uses of nuclear energy through private enterprise and to implement President Eisenhower’s Atoms for Peace Program.
• July 1955Arco, Idaho becomes the first U.S. town to be powered by nuclear energy.
• October 1956Hungarian revolution is crushed by Soviet tanks.
• November 1956Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev tells the West, “History is on our side. We will bury you.”
• July 1957The Sodium Reactor Experiment in Santa Susana, California generates the first power from a civilian nuclear reactor.
• September 1957The United States sets off first underground nuclear test in a mountain tunnel in the remote desert 100 miles from Las Vegas.
• October 1957Radiation is released when the graphite core of the Windscale Nuclear Reactor in England catches fire.The Soviet Union launches Sputnik, the first spacecraft.

  The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is formed to promote the peaceful uses of nuclear energy and to provide international safeguards and an inspection system to ensure nuclear materials aren’t diverted from peaceful to military uses.

• December 1957The first U.S. large-scale nuclear powerplant begins operating in Shippingport, Pennsylvania.
• October 1959The Dresden-1 Nuclear Power Station in Illinois achieves a self-sustaining nuclear reaction. It’s the first U.S. nuclear powerplant built entirely without government fundin

What is McCarthyism?

    McCarthyism is the practice of making accusations of disloyalty, subversion, or treason without proper regard for evidence. The term has its origins in the period in the United States known as the Second Red Scare, lasting roughly from 1950 to 1954 and characterized by heightened fears of communist influence on American institutions and espionage by Soviet agents. Originally coined to criticize the anti-communist pursuits of Republican U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy of Wisconsin, "McCarthyism" soon took on a broader meaning, describing the excesses of similar efforts. The term is also now used more generally to describe reckless, unsubstantiated accusations, as well as demagogic attacks on the character or patriotism of political adversaries.

President Truman addresses Congress

On March 12, 1947, Congress gathered at Capitol Hill for a speech that would dramatically change the political landscape both at home and abroad. President Harry S. Truman took to the podium and asked for $400 million to assist the ‘free peoples’ of Greece and Turkey who were ‘resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities’. His request received bipartisan support, and 74,000 tons of military equipment were promptly sent to help the Greek government fight a communist rebellion.

With the intervention in Greece, America had parted ways with a century and a half of isolationist tradition and stepped onto the global stage as leader of the free world. It was a world in which a new threat was emerging in Europe, rapidly diminishing the post-war hope of peace. The concrete threat was the Soviet Union, but perhaps of greater significance was the idea it represented: communism.

An ideological battle

President Harry S. Truman (left) and Senator Arthur Vandenberg (right)

Great Britain had told Truman that it could no longer afford to aid the Greek government in its fight against the communist rebels. Truman’s speech framed the issue as an ideological choice between communism’s ‘totalitarian regimes’ and capitalism’s ‘free institutions’. If the speech sounded at all alarmist, it was intentionally so.

A month beforehand, Truman and his Secretary of State, Dean Acheson, met with Congressional leaders to prepare his address. Truman persuaded the leaders that action had to be taken to stop the spread of communism across Europe, and asked Senator Arthur Vandenberg how to convince Congress. “Scare the hell out of the American people,” he reportedly replied. Vandenberg might have chosen his words more delicately if he had known what was to follow.

Widespread suspicion

Alger Hiss testifies before the HUAC

Two weeks after the speech Truman issued Executive Order 9835, initiating a search for ‘infiltration of disloyal persons’ in the US government. His administration set up a Loyalty Review Board to scrutinise the background of some 6.6 million people, including over three million federal employees. Over the next four years more than 500 people were dismissed because of ‘questionable loyalty’. There were no trials and the evidence was always kept secret. Around this time the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC), originally set up to seek out Nazis, re-emerged to find communists.

The sheer scale of the investigation convinced many Americans that the government was riddled with communist spies. Opinion was only reinforced when an actual case of espionage was found. Alger Hiss was a former State department official who had been close to Dean Acheson. He was called before the HUAC and accused of having once been a Russian agent. Although he denied the charge, he was ultimately found guilty of perjury. The case was all the more dramatic given Hiss’ involvement at the Yalta Conference and in founding the United Nations.

McCarthyism

Senator Joseph McCarthy

Deep suspicion at home and communist activity abroad provided a toxic mix of fear and anxiety which would provide fertile ground for one of the twentieth century’s most notorious demagogues. Joseph McCarthy came to national attention in early 1950 when he attended a Women’s Republican Club meeting in Wheeling, West Virginia. He held up a list of 205 names of people who he claimed were communists working in the government.

Soon enough, he appeared on the floor of the Senate and made his case with around 100 dossiers from the State Department loyalty files. Many of the dossiers represented people who had long since left government employment, but this didn’t deter McCarthy. He embellished them, changing words as he pleased if it better supported his argument.

Over the next four years McCarthy was the scourge of Washington. He exploited the widespread anti-communism of the time brilliantly, and briefly became one of the most powerful men in America as a result. His power came from the damage he could do to people’s reputations if his scrutiny turned their way. Eventually, his belligerent style cost him his own reputation. In a televised hearing on communist infiltration of the army, he was widely seen as a bully and was subsequently censured by Congress. This marked the end of the witch-hunt for communists, but not the end of the use of fear in American politics.

Robert F. Kennedy, who was managing his brother’s campaign, offered some blunt but effective debate-prep advice: “Kick him in the balls, Jack.”

John F. Kennedy and Robert F. Kennedy

As a result, Kennedy came out fighting–and stayed on the offensive throughout the debate.  At one point, he said flat-out that the United States should overthrow the year-old Cuban regime of Fidel Castro.

Nixon knew there was a secret CIA plan under way to do just that, but couldn’t afford to say so in public.  So he came out hard against such a proposal, saying it would alienate American allies throughout the Caribbean.

Nixon had been warned by Henry Cabot Lodge, his Vice Presidential running mate, to tone down his “assassin image.”

During the 1950s, as a colleague of Red-baiting Senator Joseph R. McCarthy, Nixon had made himself immune from the damning charge of “soft on Communism.”

And yet, pitted against a surprisingly aggressive Kennedy, he came off as decidedly second-best in standing up to the sons of Joseph Stalin.

The Kennedy-Nixon Debate

Commentators generally agreed that Nixon lost that first debate–the most-watched of the four.  And it may have proved fatal to his electoral chances that year.

“Kick him in the balls, Jack.”

It’s advice that someone should have given to President Barack Obama.  Not just before his October 3 debate with Mitt Romney, the Republican Presidential candidate, but at the start of his Presidency.

Romney came on strong from the outset and never let up.  He attacked the President relentlessly.  And he repeatedly ignored calls by the alleged moderator, Jim Lehrer, to stop because he had exceeded his time-limit.

The Obama-Romney Debate

But, surprisingly, Obama:

• Never called out Romney on any of the lies he had aimed at the President throughout more than a year’s worth of campaigning.
• Never demanded that Romney produce specifics about the programs he would cut.
• Never mentioned Bain Capitol, Romney’s private equity firm, as a job-killing corporate predator.
• Never attacked Romney for having personal assets in Swiss bank accounts.
• Never mentioned the infamous “47%” videotape in which Romney contemptuously wrote off almost half of the electorate.

Obama is a supremely decent and rational man.  He seems to believe that if he is decent and reasonable toward his sworn enemies, they, in turn, will treat him the same way.

They haven’t.  And Obama has repeatedly failed to learn the only possible lesson from it.

As a result, he has endured relentless personal insults and the stonewalling of his legislation by Republicans in the House and Senate.

But it did not have to be this way.

More than 500 years ago, Niccolo Machiavelli, the Florentine patriot, offered this advice in The Prince, his primer on political science:

From this arises the question whether it is better to be loved than feared, or feared more than loved.  The reply is, that one ought to be both feared and loved, but as it is difficult for the two to go together, it is much safer to be feared than loved. 

For it may be said of men in general that they are ungrateful, voluble, dissemblers, anxious to avoid danger and covetous of gain. As long as you benefit them, they are entirely yours. 

They offer you their blood, their goods, their life and their children, when the necessity is remote,.  But when it approaches, they revolt.

And the prince who has relied solely on their words, without making other preparations, is ruined…. 

And men have less scruple in offending one who makes himself loved than one who makes himself feared.  For love is held by a chain of obligations which, men being selfish, is broken whenever it serves their purpose. 

But fear is maintained by a dread of punishment which never fails.

Obama should have put this truth into practice with the case of South Carolina Rep. Joe Wilson.  It was Wilson who yelled “You lie!” at the President during his September 9, 2009 health care speech to Congress.

Wilson later apologized, and Rahm Emannuel, Obama’s Chief of Staff, accepted the apology on the President’s behalf.

Instead, Obama could–and should–have sent this directive to all Federal agencies: “If you have to make cutbacks, make them first in the Congressional district of Joe Wilson.”

When military bases and hospitals and highway projects started disappearing from Wilson’s district, word would have quickly gotten around: Don’t screw with Obama. 

During the Civil War, General William Tecumseh Sherman said of his Confederate enemies: “They cannot be made to love us, but they may be made to fear us.”

General William Texumseh Sherman

If Obama loses the election, the reason will be that, for all his brilliance as a Harvard graduate, he failed to learn and apply this most essential lesson.

First, what is a Constitution? A Constitution is a document. A Constitution, according to Thomas Paine, must exist in written form. A Constitution is a written document that is used to create a Government. This is an important distinction that is often overlooked: Constitutions create Governments. People come together, they write their Constitution, and they use that Constitution as a guideline in creating their Government. A Constitution is more than just the definition of a Government–it is the very embodiment of what the Government is supposed to be.

Government Powers

Next, it must be understood that all Government Powers (Laws) come directly at the expense of the People’s right to choose. In a truly 100% Free society, there can be no government, because the People would hold all the Powers, and the Government would have none.

When a Government makes it illegal to commit murder, the Government immediately takes away the People’s ability to choose to commit murder. Obviously, it’s a good thing that People can’t choose to commit murder–we’ll come back to that idea momentarily. When a Government makes it illegal to commit rape, the Government immediately takes away the People’s ability to choose to commit rape. Again, this is obviously a good thing.

This is true of any and every law ever passed by every Government in all of our species’ history. If the Government makes it illegal to drive without vehicle insurance, then the Government immediately takes away the People’s ability to choose to drive without insurance. If the Government makes it illegal to not own health insurance, then the Government immediately takes away the People’s ability to choose not to purchase health insurance.

Legality and Morality

We can easily get into some grey areas with this. Is it wrong to drive without vehicle insurance? Is it wrong to not buy health insurance? Is it wrong to drive on streets without a driver’s license? Surely, all these things are illegal, but being illegal doesn’t make something morally wrong. (For simplicity’s sake, I will use the term “sin” as a catch-all for things that are morally wrong. I’m not using the term in a religious sense.)

Murder is a sin; it is morally wrong to commit murder. Rape is a sin; it is morally wrong. Driving without insurance is in no way a sin, because it isn’t morally wrong. Refusing to own health care is obviously not a sin (and if you need me to tell you that, then you probably didn’t make it this far), and it’s obviously not morally wrong by anyone’s standards. It may be a good idea, sure, but so is lacing up your shoes, and it isn’t “wrong” to not lace up your shoes.

My point is that it’s important to intellectually separate the ideas of Morality from the ideas of Legality. Morality is what one should and should not do. Legality is what one is and is not allowed to do. There can be overlap between Morality and Legality, such as when murder is made illegal, but there doesn’t have to be an overlap. Something can be morally wrong without being illegal (such as a huge number of business practices), and something can be illegal without being morally wrong (such as Obamacare making it illegal to not own health insurance).

Rights and Power

Our Natural Rights are so expansive and so extensive that an Individual literally has the right to do any and every thing the Individual wants. Natural Rights are those rights that an Individual has simply by being born; Natural Rights are those rights that an Individual would have if stranded on a secluded desert island: freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and so on. When an Individual enters into a Society, the Individual surrenders a portion of those Natural Rights in exchange for new Social Benefits, in exchange for better safety, and in exchange for technological progress. So we end up with Individuals in a Society maintaining some of their Natural Rights but losing others (such as the right to kill) (often justifiably), and gaining Social Benefits (roads, bridges, economies, doctors, cell phones, etc.).

But some members of the Society do not obey the implied rules of the Society. Some members commit rape, theft, and murder. Other Societies threaten this society, so this society needs a way to defend itself. These needs gave birth to the demand for Government.

The People of the Society sat down together and created a Constitution. They looked at allll their Rights and Social Benefits, they analysed those Rights and Benefits, and they debated and decided on which of those Rights and Benefits they’d be willing to give up in order for this Government to have Power. They knew, just as we know today, that the only way a Government can get Power is to get it from the People, so they sat down and wrote down in the Constitution exactly which Rights and Benefits they’d surrender in exchange for exactly what Powers the Government would have.

A Nation’s Government’s Power and Rights/Benefits (grouped together, never separately, because Rights and Benefits do not have an inverse relationship) always add up to 100%. If the Government has 99% of the Power of the nation, then the People are left with very few Rights/Benefits–they live under a wretchedly despotic and totalitarian government (think Soviet Union under Stalin). If the People hold 99% of the power of the Nation, then the People are (basically) completely free and can do any and every thing they want, and the Government has very little authority over them.

(I’m not going to try to postulate a theoretical number that would perfectly balance Government Power and Rights/Benefits, but I will point out that a proper balance is not 50/50. The only acceptable percentages have the People’s Rights/Benefits at 51% and above–the Government should never have an amount of power equal to that of the People they are supposed to govern; the People should always be more powerful than the Government)

When the United States Founding Fathers sat down to debate and work on the Constitution, they set in stone (see next parenthesis) exactly what Rights and Benefits the American People would surrender, and they set in stone (or in paper, rather, but it should have been as permanent as stone) exactly what Powers the Government would have, how those Powers would be divided among the 3 branches, and how the People would ultimately be the final check against the Government. The designed a Constitution that left the People with 51% or greater.

The Line in the Sand

If a Society doesn’t tell their Government what the Government can and can’t do, then the Government will flip the script and start telling the Society what the People can and can’t do. Someone must be limiting the actions of others; it is the nature of Society, it is the nature of Power, and it is the nature of human beings. If Society drops the ball and doesn’t limit their Government’s actions, then their Government will fill the power vacuum quickly and decisively.

If we give the Government the power to illegalize certain actions, then right off the bat, they’ll make illegal the things that everyone would agree are morally bad. Right at the beginning, the Government would make stealing, rape, torture, and murder illegal, and the People would applaud their Government for this. The Government will not be satisfied to stop there, though. Soon enough, the Government will make illegal actions that are not morally wrong: it could become illegal to drive without insurance, it could become illegal to go on a nature hike through someone else’s land, and it could become illegal to install a toilet in your house that uses up more than 5 gallons of water per flush.

The Government will exercise these Powers by passing arbitrary laws which have no moral implications whatsoever. Remember that either the People are controlling the Government’s actions or the Government is controlling the People’s actions (Even when it seems the People and Government go back and forth in controlling each other, eventually things will come to a head, and one or the other will become the dominant one–this happened in the United States with the assassination of both JFK and MLK, Jr).

MLK, Rest In Peace

The United States was on the verge of revolution under Martin Luther King, Jr. It was to be a peaceful revolution, just like Gandhi’s revolution a few decades prior in India, but it was nevertheless to be a full-blown revolution. King’s message did feature race heavily, but race equality was not the only cause for which King fought. King didn’t seek equality for blacks. Martin Luther King sought equality for ALL. All meant all, and “all” included the wealthy elite like politicians, bankers, and CEOs. They did not like that idea.

If you think that Obama considers you an equal, if you think that David Rockefeller considers you an equal, if you think that Ben Bernanke considers you an equal, or if you think that Mitt Romney considers you an equal, then you are a deluded fool. None of these people have time for you. None of these people have respect for you. If you see Rockefeller on the streets and wave at him in a friendly way, he won’t wave back. He might glare at you or look at you in disgust, but he’s not going to wave and smile back. If Obama wasn’t President (and thus having an image to maintain), he wouldn’t wave back either. The same is true for Romney–he waves at his “lessers” because he has to for his candidacy. Just write Obama a letter and let me know what kind of response you get. “Well, Obama receives too many letters to reply to them all,” the reader may say. That doesn’t matter. Even if Obama only received one letter from a citizen in his entire term, he’s not going to read it. His aides will read it; his underlings will read it, because your concerns are not worth his attention. Then his stooges will copy and paste you a response, stamp it with a signature stamp of his, and mail it to you, then you’ll receive it and say, “Golly gee! I got a letter from the President!”

Yes, you are beneath these people–so they believe. MLK fought for equality for blacks, women, Asians, whites, men, Mexicans, and everyone else. MLK’s message was poised to benefit blacks the most, but that’s because blacks were then the victims of the “unequal” establishment, not because his message was intended to benefit blacks the most. His message was that everyone should be treated equally, with no bearing on the color of their skin; his message wasn’t that black people should be treated better (than they were then being treated). Blacks at the time were the biggest victims of racial discrimination, though, so they stood to gain much more than whites did.

If you find my use of phrases like “the whites” and “the blacks” to be offensive, then please: get fucked. I have better things to do than use a different terminology for something every six months based on the whims of whatever Jesse Jackson says is proper–fuck Jesse Jackson. The man has done more to continue racial strife in America than anyone else in the past 30 years. Again, fuck Jesse Jackson. Jessie Jackson. Whatever. 

I don’t have to explain myself to anyone, but I do want to. I’m not racist in any way. I’ve dated white chicks and black chicks. I’ve lived with black friends; I’ve lived with white friends. I’ve got white friends and black friends. My best friend for years now has been a black dude–and yes, we make racist jokes at each other. It’s funny, and it’s proof that the idea of “race” really has no importance to either of us. I don’t mind using terms like “whites and blacks” because a) that’s what they are; b) it’s easier than repeatedly saying “white people and black people” and simply removes the word “people,” changes “white” and “black” into nouns, and gives the words the plurality from the word “people;” c) because I live in Mississippi, and I’ve lived in other states like California and Illinois, and I can say with absolute certainty that Mississippi is the least racist State in the Union. 

Powers and Rights Part 2

The United States Constitution drew the line in the sand for us. The United States Constitution declared to the Government exactly what powers it had, and it told the People exactly what rights they could keep. Like I said above, the United States Constitution gave the People 51% (or more), and it gave the Government 49% (or less). The Constitution clearly gives the People power over the Government.

Then the People stopped putting so much faith in the Constitution, though. The Government and media told us how limited the Constitution was, and how life could be so much better for us if we overlooked a few minor transgressions. This really happened. Just a few days ago, I watched a re-run of Tosh.0 where he said, “The Constitution isn’t relevant anymore.” But that’s getting a bit ahead.

So the People allowed it. The People believed that the Government could make their lives better if only the Government had just a teensy-weensy bit more power. If only the Government could do just a teensy-weensy bit more than the Constitution allows; if only the People lost just a teensy-weensy bit of their rights, the Government could make everything better.

Then there was the battle, as both the Government and the People came to own 50% of the power. The Government was no longer subservient to the People; the People no longer had power over the Government. The Government had 50% and the People had 50%, and the battle came as a result. The Government fought to climb just one more percent. Just one more percent, yes, but it was that decisive percent–going from 50% to 51% is a huge landmark. And the People fought to maintain their 50%, hoping to re-establish their Rights and Benefits, then, when that battle was over, fight once more and take back their power over the Government.

Two shots in Dallas decided the battle. I’m not going to say much about the JFK Assassination, but let me say this: it was the single greatest tragedy in American history. The JFK Assassination was equally as devastating, tragic, and disheartening as it would have been if the colonies had lost the American Revolution. There is zero truth in the Government’s version of the JFK Assassination. It just doesn’t add up–you’ve got 56 people testifying to a gun shot, you’ve got dozens of eyewitnesses seeing someone on the grassy knoll, you’ve got JFK’s head going “back and to the left” even though the entrance wound was on the back of his head, which would have sent his head forward–it just doesn’t add up. The Government lied about the JFK Assassination, and they lied about 9/11. I don’t pretend to know what really happened in these two events, but I know what didn’t happen, and the Government’s versions did not happen. Our universe is ruled by very clear and precise physical and mathematical laws. The Government’s versions of the JFK Assassination and 9/11 break those physical and mathematical laws–they are impossible events, so they literally cannot be true.

That was much more than I intended to say about it.

The assassination of MLK, as I said above, was almost equally as devastating, and JFK’s was worse only because JFK was the President. Surely, MLK would have been the first black President if no one had assassinated him. Both of these were battles in the war for dominance, but they weren’t the only battles. There was also the great robbery of the American People when Nixon defaulted on the USD and the Government stole the gold from the American People (ask your grandparents about it). It’s pretty easy to see how confiscating all the wealth of a nation (literally) for no reason (really) except to put your boot on their necks (seriously) is a battle for dominance.

The American People didn’t realize what was happening, so they didn’t fight back. The Government brought the shit to the fan, so to speak, and the American People, rather than fight back, ran for cover, because they didn’t realize that a battle for dominance was being waged. But the American People didn’t fight back, and the Government took its extra 1% with relative ease. The Government established itself as over the People and as dominant over the People. The U.S. Government went from being a big brother to being a stern father.

With dominance now established, the Government was in no hurry to continue grabbing power at the expense of Rights. Besides, the Government knew that if it reached for these powers without justification, then the People would become aware of what the Government was doing, and the People would fight back. The only thing that kept the People from fighting back was (and still is) the fact that the People did not (and do not) realize that the battle was (and still is) being fought.

The Government only had to wait, and soon their justification for Government expansion was practically delivered to them on a platter. We had the Cold War, and suddenly the greatest threat the nation had ever faced was present and was called Communists. Communists shared remarkable similarities to the German and Austrian Jews of Hitler’s Germany. Hitler told the Germans he had to wage war and take away rights to protect the Germans from the evil, thieving, and corrupt Jews; Hitler told them that Jews were the greatest threat to Germany’s sovereignty and prosperity, and we can’t blame the German people for going along with it because we’ve gone along with it ourselves; we only replaced “Jew” with “Communist.”

It’s hard to describe what the Cold War was like, particularly since I wasn’t there, but I do understand Pink Floyd’s The Wall and some of their other music, and I’ve read about the Cuban Missile Crisis and what it was like to constantly be under the threat of nuclear attack. To make matters worse, Joseph McCarthy led a campaign of slander, coercion, lies, deceit, and betrayal. McCarthy told us there were Communists everywhere, who looked just like everyone else and were working subversively to destroy the values of the American People–he basically said the same things that Glenn Beck is saying today about Muslims.

Then the Soviet Union collapsed. It didn’t take long for the United States Government to give us a new enemy to be terrified of–radical Muslims. Unfortunately, everyone in America missed the memo that pointed out that there aren’t any more radical Muslims than there are radical Christians and that radical Christians will do the same kind of terrorist shit (bombing abortion clinics and so on) (and the Christian woman who was a leader at a Christian camp who talked about how great it would be if Christian kids had the same passion for Jesus that terrorists have for Allah), and they didn’t get the memo that says 99.999% of everyone just wants freakin’ peace and that it doesn’t matter what religion people follow, because they’re all crap–

Then 9/11 happened, and anyone with the ability to put 2 and 2 together can tell you after examining the evidence that the Government’s versions (note the ‘s’; that’s right–the Government has, I think, 4 different versions [it may be 5] of what happened on 9/11) are wrong. The inescapable conclusion of the evidence is that either the Government knowingly allowed the attacks to happen or that the Government itself executed the attacks. One of these two statements is true, but I don’t know which. This is why I say, “The Government either executed 9/11 themselves or knowingly allowed 9/11 to happen.” That’s the only conclusion we can reach, and we don’t have enough evidence to pick which is right.

Since the Government claimed dominance over us with the assassinations of JFK and MLK, though, the motive that the Government used for expanding its power changed. Initially, the Government asked for teensy-weensy bits of more power so they could make our lives better–”We’ll solve everything!” they said. “We just need a tiny bit more power…” But since the assassinations, since the Government took 51%, the motive has been that they needed to restrict our rights to protect us. It’s important to remember that it doesn’t matter if they Expand Power and that causes us to lose rights or if we Lose Rights and that causes their power to expand; the results are the same. It’s just a word play. To-may-to, to-mott-o.

By telling us they needed to restrict our liberties to protect us, by telling us they needed to ignore the Constitution so they could go after “the Taliban”, and by saying the word “terrorist” so many times every single day that it made it obscenely clear that the Government was the terrorist, they continued expanding their power at the expense of our Rights with the Patriot Act, HR 1955, the NDAA, and others. Then Katrina hit, and the Government (I would say intentionally) did such a shitty job that it was obvious some new law was needed, so the new FEMA bill was passed, which just kind of “accidentally” gave the President a shitload of new powers, one of which was the power to declare martial law any time he wanted.

The Modern Executive Branch

Someone I was debating with told me once that I was putting way too much stock in the President and that the President had nowhere near as much power as I seemed to think. That was true in 1776. And it’s still Constitutionally true today, but the Constitution means nothing in modern Washington. Our politicians never ask, “Do we have the power to do this?” The Constitution amounts to nothing in Washington, because We the People don’t make it amount to something. The Constitution only has as much authority as we give it by standing by it, and if we don’t stand by it and hold our politicians to it, then the Constitution isn’t going to hold back their legislating hands.

The modern Executive Branch has powers that the Constitution explicitly gives to Congress, not the Executive Branch. All through high school, we were told how great our systems of checks and balances was, but those checks and balances don’t really exist any more. When we allowed the Executive Branch to just take whatever powers it wanted (either from Congress or from the People), then the balances were destroyed–obviously, since that’s what “balance” means. If you have a scale and you put 10g of weight on each side, it is balanced, but if you take 1g from the right and move it to the left, then it’s no longer balanced. This is what has happened in Washington.

The powers held by the modern Executive Branch are identical to the powers held by King George when the American Revolution began. This isn’t some clever analogy; it’s a fact. King George restricted free speech, imposed ridiculous taxes, “declared’ war, restricted freedom of religion–all things that Obama and Bush have been doing and that Obamney will do after 2012.

In Conclusion

We have allowed the Government to become virtually indistinguishable from the very same system that we revolted against in 1776. Indeed, many of the problems of today can be found in the list of grievances included in the Declaration of Independence. We’ve allowed the Government to cross the line in the sand, and we’re going to have to fight to push the Government back to the other side. It won’t be easy. Governments do not like giving up powers, and Governments do not like giving People rights. Power is addictive.

We must first realize that we are in the middle of a fight between the Rights of the People and the Power of the Government. We must realize that the fight we’re waging now is a direct result of our failure to properly respect the Constitution and hold the Government to the Constitution. We must start fighting back, because the Government will not stop until the lives of its people are dictated by laws, every moment of every day, from birth to death. The longer we wait to fight back, the harder it will be.

Do I Call For Revolution?

I do. And that’s a risky thing to say with World War 3 probably just around the corner. We know what will happen in World War 3. Dissidents, in the “interests of protecting the nation” will be rounded up and put down so quickly it will remind reasonable people of the Holocaust. The stakes of World War 3 will be so high that the Government will use it as an excuse to destroy the right to petition and the right to question the Government–these two thorns in the Government’s side will finally be pulled out and destroyed. It’s only a matter of time.

Even if I’m wrong about the Iran situation (I stand by what I said a few blogs ago), the trend of Government taking more power is going to continue, and with each new Power the Government has, the People lose a right. Well, when two numbers must add up to 100, and you continually increase the first number, the second number must decrease. And it will.

I promote a peaceful revolution like Gandhi’s and MLK’s. I like to think “Hey, we’re all adults here; we can settle this without killing each other.” That may not prove true, though. Maybe a peaceful revolution would march by the millions onto Washington, only to have the U.S. Government’s military disperse the crowd, launching tear gas, arresting, attacking, and otherwise harming revolutionaries. What must be will be, and if that comes, by all means, secure some arms. But that means the Government will have to launch the first attack against the citizens.

And we have the Government’s words on our side. The Declaration of Independence clearly states that it is the right of the People to alter or abolish a Government that does not act in the best interests of the People, and the Declaration of Independence is one of our Nation’s (Nation = Government + Society) main documents, so in a very real way, our Government has given us their permission to abolish them when we see fit. *shrug*

Like we’d need the Government’s permission to revolt against the Government. What’s wrong with you people?

English: The Eastern Bloc – after the annexations and installations. Dark red is the expanded Russian SFSR, light red are annexed or expanded Soviet Socialist Republics and pink are Soviet satellite states. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In Soviet Union the top leaders of Kremlin, enjoyed the labors of capitalism. They owned luxury wines and cars from the West. They enjoyed these in their palaces, called Dachas. Brezhnev’s Rolls Royce had met with an accident. The Kremlin went on to put layers of secrecy around that incident. It leaked out somehow as the Washington journalists were always on the look out for juicy bits from behind the Iron Curtain.

China on the other hand followed a policy of isolation. Its leaders were known to lead austere lives and were building upon the gains of Cultural Revolution (although the cost in human lives was enormous). They introduced village level committees that carried out development in their villages. There were barefoot doctors who worked in the remote and far-flung areas for pittance and lived like peasants.

The American way of life revolved around consumption. They measured their progress by how many things they were able to produce. Their scientists and engineers worked hard to innovate. Their industries strove hard to produce newer and shinier goods. Often because of overproduction, employees found themselves on the dole. This resulted in mass unemployment. During the oil shock of the 70s when the Americans found that they could not afford to run the large American cars (see my blog, “Our Planet”), people started buying cheaper imports from Japan. This resulted in mass unemployment in the car industry in the US.

English: Former President of Iraq, Saddam Hussein, makes a point during his initial interview by a special tribunal, where he is informed of his alleged crimes and his legal rights. Deutsch: der ehemalige Präsident des Irak, Saddam Hussein, bei seiner Stellungnahme während seiner ersten Hörung vor dem Sondertribunal, bei der er über die Anklagepunkte und seine Rechte informiert wurde. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The Soviet Union and the US had interests in ensuring that neither gained an upper hand globally. The Soviets helped the Egyptians build the Aswan High Dam, when Nasser invited them to. Nasser nationalized Suez Canal. Western powers responded by gathering the Allies around them and attacked Egypt. Soviets set up a puppet government in Afghanistan, US responded by arming Taliban to fight against the Soviets. The whole idea behind the Vietnam war was to prevent communism from spreading. The US got involved in the Korean war for the same reason. The US failed in Vietnam. Korea was divided into North and South; North Korea is a totalitarian country that is so centered around one family of leaders that it has isolated itself. There is famine in that country. While South Korea enjoys fruits of openness and liberal economy and politics. It is now ranked among the developed countries of the world.

World map in 1980, during the later stages of the Cold War. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The western world focused on middle east. The object was to corner their oil wealth for themselves. More than that they felt that if the dictators turned against them then they and other nations (that were in their sphere of influence) would suffer. So they launched an attack on Saddam Hussein and helped the rebels to eject Gaddafi (although both may be hailed as laudable in purely humanitarian terms) the objective was to keep these countries from forming a block unto themselves.

The US and Europe speak a language of geo-politics that talks of high morality although the aim is to ensure wealth for few countries. It suits the US and the western world to overlook human rights issues in some gulf states. While it becomes idealistic and talks about democracy and human rights in others. It conducts carrot and stick diplomacy in some countries while ignoring blatant violations in others.

My idea has some small parallels with the original Star Wars trilogy. Maybe I should pattern it after the movies. Then I would have not just one, but three books that I could write.

Now before you get all hot and bothered about stealing ideas from other creators, let me remind you of one thing: THAT’S WHAT WRITERS DO!

Seriously, there are only so many plots available to write. Every author takes one (or more) of them and creates his own story from that basic idea. I’m certainly not going to plagiarise George Lucas. There is no way that I can write about my Valkyries fighting a demon incursion and have to worry about George setting his lawyers after me.

What I mean, is that I can write my story in such a way that my characters will be hooking up with a rebel force and at the end they will take down a major demon stronghold. It won’t be the Death Star, but it will be big, nasty, and destroying it will be a huge setback for the demons. After that I can write a second book in which the demons “strike back”, and lastly one in which the rebels, led by my main characters, take down the evil empire.

Although I won’t be copying the movies, I do want to watch them again before I start writing. I’ve got a whole stack of other dystopian films to go through as well, so I will certainly be busy for the next month.

I may end up changing my mind about this idea, but for now that is what I am going with. Let me know what you think. I could use a second (or third, fourth, ninety-eighth) opinion before I make a big mistake. Meanwhile, I’m trying to figure out who will be the evil emperor behind all the chaos.

Speaking of evil empires, I learned today that the governor of my state (but definitely not MY governor), the weasel Scott Walker, is going to start a national narc campaign. “If you see something, tell somebody.” This whole idea gets under my skin in so many ways.

First off, remember that this is from a man who has to have a legal defense fund, has had several of his political “achievements” turned over because they are illegal and/or unconstitutional, and who has spent most of his term touring the country because he is afraid to show his face in Wisconsin. If this goes into effect, you would think he would realize how many calls they are going to get about him and his cronies. Not a good idea.

Secondly, if I remember my history correctly, the Nazis had a similar program to flush out Jews. I know Joseph McCarthy did at the height of the Red Scare. This is how it started. A seemingly innocent program that sounds like it is only intended to flush out the criminal element, but it quickly turns neighbors and co-workers against each other.

For the last ten years we have been trying to regain our privacy and freedom from the “Homeland Security Agency”. The paranoid extremists took the opportunity given them by the tragedy of 9/11 to get a toe hold into our democracy, and that crack has only widened over the last decade. I really don’t think this country needs another witch hunt. It will bring nothing but pain and injustice to a country that needs, more than ever, to come together.

Whatever happens in the next couple months, I hope and pray that we as a nation will be able to come to our senses and go back to the good and decent country that I grew up in. Please remember to VOTE in November. Do your part to make my dream come true.

I’ll be back on Wednesday with another update. Don’t forget to leave a comment for me!

Ben Ferguson, a syndicated radio host, vocalized his support for possible Vice President Paul Ryan, saying that he appreciates what Ryan is doing as Ryan takes his daughter hunting for her first time. During Ben’s escapade, he talked about how the left is freaking out because Ryan is a hunter and is teaching his daughter to hunt, and he also said something along the lines of: “Besides, the hunters are out there every year keeping populations down, and even feeding the deer. I’d wager hunters care more about the wildlife than the leftists do in their protesting…”

Nature doesn’t need mankind to take care of it. Nature balances itself. It always has, and always will. Mankind is the only animal that has difficulty maintaining a natural equilibrium with the environment. If the deer overpopulate, they’ll start dying of starvation, and the problem will fix itself. Again, Nature doesn’t need mankind to maintain it. All Nature needs is for mankind to stop destroying it–Nature does need mankind to stop the actions of other members of mankind, but if mankind was completely removed from the picture, Nature would survive.

He may be right in his mention of hunters feeding deer and stuff. But hunters don’t feed deer because deer need to be fed or because it’s the right thing to do. Hunters feed deer because it brings deer to the hunter.

Tangent 1: That’s Not Hunting. It’s Land-Fishing.

There is a difference between hunting and fishing. The word “hunting” describes an activity that you’d probably picture a Native American doing: sneaking through the woods in a crouched stance, wielding a bow–you know, hunting for deer. Hunting is not creating a set of conditions that lures wildlife to you then killing said wildlife for coming to you. Fishing, on the other hand, is about throwing out bait and using that bait to kill fish–essentially. See why I say what hunters do today is actually Land-Fishing? Land-fishing involves baiting deer with corn; land-fishing involves climbing a tree before the break of dawn and sitting perfectly still and quiet until a deer falls for your bait and comes within range of your gun.

Paul Ryan, Then Moving On

I don’t like hunters. I don’t. I don’t care that they call themselves environmentalists because they feed deer, since the purpose of their feeding the deer is to lure the deer to them so they can kill the deer. We’d all think it was fucked up if a little old lady gave bread to ducks every day and a few months out of the year shot all the ducks that came up to her. I don’t see a difference. Furthermore, deer don’t need humans to feed them. If deer die out because of starvation, then Natural Selection has merely taken the deer off the playing field. No big deal. It happens. As long as deer perform a vital role in Gaia, though, the only thing that will make them extinct is mankind’s bloodlust. I do think it’s funny that most hunters do use corn how I mentioned above, and most of them will also give the excuse of: “Well, if we don’t hunt the deer, they’ll overpopulate and starve!” They won’t starve if you keep giving them corn, motherfucker. The motive of preventing deer from starving justifies feeding them; it doesn’t justify shooting them.

New Age Holocaust

A friend and I were discussing the prospects of World War 3 on Facebook, and he said:

Watch the project part 2 on the blaze tonight at 7:00… Dish network channel 212… Watch online at theblaze.com sign up for free 2 week trial and then cancel it… Glenn beck started this channel and it’s only on dish so far…Glenn beck himself says to watch the show on free trial and then Cancel it tomorrow…

 

The project shows the the infiltration of America on American soil by the Muslims… I watched part one last night and it was awesome…. This next war will be all powers against American democracy and it has been being planned for a very long time… Muslims and communists united against us and they don’t need to deploy… They are already here…

 

That’s what makes this so dangerous .. We are fighting a war we can’t truly identify the enemy of… And they are among us…

 

My first response to this was about Glenn Beck. There is nothing that Glenn Beck has to say that I think is worth hearing. I don’t remember why, but Glenn Beck lost all credibility with me. I don’t remember what he said or did; it was years ago, but I did have a reason then. I’m sure it had something to do with his saying Obama is a Muslim.

Anyway, my next response was that his thinking is extremely dangerous. I can’t say that enough. THAT KIND OF THINKING IS EXTREMELY DANGEROUS. That’s the kind of thinking that gave us the Holocaust. “The enemy is within our nation, posing as our friends! They are pretending to be just like you and I, but don’t be fooled! They ARE the enemy, and we must find them all and destroy them like any other enemy!”

One can almost hear Hitler saying the very same thing. “The Jews are the enemy within our nation, posing as our friends! They are pretending to be just like you and I, but don’t be fooled! They ARE the enemy, and we must find them all and destroy them like any other enemy!” The only difference, in fact, is that my friend (and apparently Glenn Beck) substitute Jews with Muslims–I doubt Glenn Beck has the sense to even pretend to think there’s a difference between Muslims and Extremist Muslims (there is, but I doubt Beck thinks so).

If the idea that the line of thinking shown above could lead to an Islamic Holocaust isn’t cause enough for concern, consider that his words are almost exact mirrors of what Joseph McCarthy told us during the Cold War about “communists.” McCarthy started a witch trial with the very idea that my friend iterated. It’s extremely dangerous thinking. It’s also ineffective. Rounding up the internal enemy and separating them into camps or killing them will never destroy the internal enemy; it will only add to the internal enemy’s numbers as people who are allies refuse to go along with such a horrible plan and resist.

The only way to defeat an enemy who is within is to stand by the principles of love, peace, and liberty. That’s the only way. The presence of extremist Muslims masquerading within our government to bring the collapse of America would have no power to bring the collapse of America if we stuck to those principles. If we stuck to the ideas of peace, they couldn’t drive us to destruction by sending us into wars we can’t handle. If we stuck to the ideas of liberty, they could never start a witch trial. If we stuck to the ideas of love, they wouldn’t want us as enemies. It has to be said again: the only way to defeat an internal enemy is to stick by the principles of peace, love, and liberty.

Bachmann?

About a month ago, some Congresswoman–I want to say it was Michelle Bachmann–made the allegation that one of our Senators was connected the the Muslim Brotherhood. Well, it turned out she had no evidence at all to support her claims. She had what she called “proof” that turned out to be… absolutely nothing, really. It’s like saying I have ties to a group of people who want to kill all homosexuals because I ate at Chik-Fil-A once; that’s what Bachmann’s evidence (if it was Bachmann; if not, sorry, Michelle) amounted to.

The “evidence” was thoroughly debunked and refuted, but we all know that doesn’t matter to most people. There are still plenty of people who say Obama wasn’t born in America, and he’s given us the evidence of his birth certificate (On this note: I don’t know if Obama’s birth certificate is real or not. I’ve seen both sides of the evidence, and neither side is strong enough to support a conclusion, so I remain undecided–and indifferent to the matter). So having Bachmann’s evidence torn to shreds really isn’t a problem for people like Glenn Beck, who can do mental gymnastics and go on believing Bachmann to be correct anyway. It’s the same kind of mental gymnastics that lets them believe in God to protect their egos.

Russia, China, and Iran

I can’t write a blog in modern times without making some mention of this situation.

First:

There’s no evidence that supports the idea that Iran is trying to make a nuclear weapon.

Second:

Ahmadinejad’s statements that “Israel doesn’t have a right to exist,” are political rhetoric. He’s nearing the end of his time as Iran’s leader, and he hasn’t made any move to attack Israel. What Ahmadinejad said is exactly the same kind of thing as what Romney said about Russia; Romney said Russia is our greatest foe, and blah blah–none of us take this to mean he’s going to attack Russia. Obviously, it’s campaign rhetoric to appeal to certain people.

Third:

Russia and China are our FRIENDS. Well, they should be. The last thing we need is for China or Russia (Russia consistently refers to us as their “partner”) to start calling us their greatest foe. Why can’t we be friends? We do we have to fight over stupid shit? Isn’t the time for war gone? Haven’t we spiritually evolved beyond war?

Time for civics class!

Please read these excerpts from a recent article in the Chicago Examiner.  I’ve added some essay-type questions, at the end. Please feel free to write on both sides of the paper, if necessary.

At a round table discussion on “This Week with George Stephanapoulos,” Ann Coulter, conservative commentator, made the provocative claim, “Democrats are dropping the blacks and moving on to the Hispanics,” and added that immigration rights are not civil rights.

Univision anchor, Jorge Ramos criticized President Obama for not aggressively pursuing immigration reform and said that “if Republicans don’t do something with immigration . . . they’re going to lose not only this election, they might lose the White House for a generation.”

This is when Coulter interjected, “That’s why the Democrats are dropping the blacks and moving on to the Hispanics.” She was saying that Democrats are aggressively pursuing the Latino vote more aggressively than the African America vote, which polls show is definitely behind President Obama.

Coulter added, “I think what – the way liberals have treated blacks like children and many of their policies have been harmful to blacks, at least they got the beneficiary group right . . . there is the legacy of slavery and Jim Crow laws. We don’t owe the homeless. We don’t owe feminists. We don’t owe women who are desirous of having abortions, but that’s – or – or gays who want to get married to one another. That’s what civil rights has become for much of the left.”

When questioned as to whether immigration rights were not civil rights, Coulter responded, “No. I think civil rights are for blacks . . . What have we done to the immigrants? We owe black people something. We have a legacy of slavery. Immigrants haven’t even been in this country.”

Questions:

1)  Ann Coulter seems to regard “civil rights” as something earned. Do you feel that you have civil rights? If so, at what point did you earn them?

2)  As a member of the United Nations (which Ann Coulter abominates), the United States acknowledges that everyone partakes of something called “human rights.” Do you agree with this? Shouldn’t people earn their rights?

3)  According to Ann Coulter, an aggrieved group (like post-slavery black Americans) can be given “civil rights.” These “civil rights” are presumably given to them by some central authority. Some groups (like feminists and gay activists), however, don’t deserve “civil rights.” Question: What the hell is Ann Coulter talking about here? Please tell me, because frankly I have no idea.

4)  According to Ann Coulter, immigrants either aren’t here legally, or haven’t been here for very long. Therefore, they haven’t earned their rights. Ergo: civil rights accrue over time. Question: my father’s family came to America in the 1600s, but my mother’s family didn’t arrive until the turn of the 20^th century. Did my mother have less civil rights than my father? And what about me? Discuss.

5)  Ann Coulter implies that helping disadvantaged people makes them dependent and helpless. In Ann Coulter’s world, it’s every man for himself, and government shouldn’t be helping people, because it just creates a lot of whiny needy people. (Actually, this is kind of what Mitt Romney said in that pesky video). How do you feel about that? Did you ever need help? If so, where did you turn? Be honest.

6)  Who paid for your education?

7)  Did you know that Ann Coulter thinks that Joseph McCarthy is a misunderstood man, and a forgotten American hero? Isn’t that nice? Doesn’t it make you feel better about Ann Coulter?

And finally:

8)  Don’t you wish the election were today?

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• …Once re-elected, Barack Obama, as confirmed by his willingness to do or say anything and his unscrupulous re-election tactics, would not only threaten government shutdowns but would deliberately withhold payments to those dependent on government support as a means of intimidating and forcing a Republican controlled Congress to surrender to his demands, thus neutering their ability to control the administration through spending constraints.

THE REALITY:

• Republicans–not Democrats–have repeatedly threatened to shut down the government if they didn’t get their way. 
• In 1994, during Bill Clinton’s Presidency, Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich shut down the government because he felt slighted by Clinton on a trip to Israel. 
• And earlier this year, Republicans threatened to force the United States to default on its loans by refusing to raise the debt ceiling unless Democrats agreed to an extortionate budgetary deal–which expires in December. 
• When that happens, Republicans will once again pull their extortion routine at the expense of the nation they claim to love.
• Democrats have never threatened to shut down the government.

• Further, this administration has shown contempt for the courts by…stonewalling subpoenas and requests issued by Congress.
• The  Eric Holder Justice Department has become the epitome of corruption as part of the most dishonest and deceitful administration in American history.
• “Fast and Furious”–to which the reference to “stonewalling” alludes– was an operation begun during the George W. Bush administration. It involved allowing guns to be bought by members of the Mexican drug cartels to trace them to the outlaw bands.
• Such operations–whether begun under Democratic or Republic administrations–are inherently risky and have nothing to do with politics.
• When they go right the top leaders of the cartel go to prison. When they go wrong, it’s a scandal.
• This one just didn’t work out.  Agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms lost control of the firearms–and one of the guns was used to kill a U.S. Border patrol officer.

• In a second term the arrogance of Barack Obama and his minions will become more blatant as he will not have to be concerned with re-election.
• Who will be there to enforce the rule of law, a Supreme Court ruling or the Constitution? No one.
• Barack Obama and his fellow-travelers will be unchallenged as they run roughshod over the American people.
• “Fellow-travelers” is a term used by 1950s Republicans–such as Joseph McCarthy–to mean Communists. 
• If Obama is a Communist sympathizer–let alone a card-carrying one–this email offers no evidence to prove it.  But then, for the Right, evidence of treason isn’t necessary–only accusation.

• Judging by his actions, words and deeds during his first term, [Obama] does not intend to work with Congress either Republican or Democrat in his second term but rather to force his radical agenda on the American people through the power he has usurped or been granted.
• During the last three years. Obama has repeatedly sought compromises with Congressional Republicans.  But the Republicans have been the ones refusing to compromise.
• Indiana State Treasurer Richard Mourdock, who’s now running for U.S. Senator, perfectly summed up the Republican attitude: “I have a mindset that says bipartisanship ought to consist of Democrats coming to the Republican point of view.”
• That’s the sort of “compromise” Adolf Hitler understood, but it’s not the sort that’s acceptable in a democracy.

• …We the American people also must come to grips with this moment in time and our role in denying Barack Obama his lifelong goal of “transforming” us  into his slaves working on his government plantation.

It’s hard to imagine Americans’ being enslaved when, because of President Obama:

• They’re finally able to get healthcare insurance that was previously denied them because of a “pre-existing condition.”
• They’re able to get such insurance for their children.
• U.S. forces are finally being recalled from Iraq, where they never should have been sent.
• American forces are being withdrawn from Afghanistan, where they’ve spent eleven years trying to remake a backwards, alien land into a modern nation.
• There’s finally legislation to prevent another Wall Street meltdown because of the uncontrolled greed of corporate “leaders.”
• A massive polluter like BP is called to account and forced to put up money to at least partially repair what it has monumentally spoiled.

But for the Right, black-and-white have always been inverted.  Thus one of the marching songs of Hitler’s black-uniformed SS offered these lyrics:

Or, as Ernest Hemingway once put it: “Fascism is a lie told by bullies.”

Gen. George C. Marshall – in line for Defense Secretary, even though it was supposed to be a civilian job.

Click on the link here for audio player: Edward R. Murrow and the News – Sept. 13, 1950

News for this September 13th in 1950, came from the legendary newscaster Edward R. Murrow and his daily news program Edward R. Murrow And The News.

And the news was cautious. In Korea, it was reported that General Walker claimed the days of retreat for UN forces were past and that advances were taking place all along the front and had been continuing for some time.

Another Big Three Conference being held argued over the future of Germany with the Soviet Union voting against any consideration of unification. The Allies were circulating a White Paper claiming the Soviet Union was actively stoking anti-U.S. sentiment around Yugoslavia and other border countries.

Meanwhile, back at home – the subject of the Excess Profits Tax was being argued with the charge of Socialism being bandied about on the Republican side of the isle.

But the majority of the newscast this day was regarding the proposed appointment of General George C. Marshall to the position of Defense Secretary. Marshall, who had already served as Secretary of State was warmly regarded in many circles and especially well regarded in Europe as architect of the Marshall Plan in aiding recover to Europe. The argument was the Defense Secretary had always been a civilian and Marshall’s appointment was unprecedented.

And that’s most of what went on this September 13, 1950 with Edward R. Murrow.

• The Environmental Protection Agency on a near daily basis issues new regulations clearly out of their purview in order to modify and change environmental laws previously passed and to impose a radical green agenda never approved by Congress.

THE REALITY:

• In April, 2010, a  BP oil rig exploded off the coast of Louisiana, spilling untold millions of gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico.   
• Up to then the Right–led by Sarah Palin–had been literally screaming: “Drill, baby, drill!”  Then, suddenly, that shouting fell silent.    Now it’s back again–as in this email. 
• The vast majority of scientists in the United States have confirmed that global warming is a reality and that man-made pollution is the main cause. 
• But the Right refuses to accept those findings–or the rises in temperature and accompanying drought across the country.

The left in America knows this usurpation of power is nearly impossible to reverse unless stopped in its early stages.

• There’s a story about a peasant in a poor Jewish village in Russia who subscribed to several anti-Semitic newspapers.  These warned constantly about how Jews ran the banks, the governments, and virtually everything else..  One day a friend of his demanded: “How can you, a Jew, read such garbage?”  And the peasant said: “I love to see how powerful I am.”
• The same thing applies here.  The writer of this email gives far too much credit to the “power” of the left. 
• In doing so he ignores the rise of the Tea Party movement and its power to stalemate legislation in Congress. 
• He also ignores the truth that, economically and politically, real power lies with the Right.  But to acknowledge this would demolish his pet theory of Leftist all-powerfulness. 
• Most of the donors backing Mitt Romney are elderly billionaires.  Their median age is 66, and their median wealth is $1 billion. 
• In the primary season, they invested $52 million in his  Super PAC, Restore Our Future. 
• They all expect to profit from Romney’s pledges to eliminate inheritance taxes, extend the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy, and slash the top tax rates by another 20%.  
• “Money buys power,” warns the Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman.  “And the increasing wealth of a tiny minority has effectively bought the allegiance of one of our two major political parties.  Support from billionaires has always been the main thing keeping those charlatans and cranks in business. And now the same people effectively own a whole political party.”

• It is clearly the Mindset of this administration and its appointees that Congress is merely a nuisance and can be ignored after they were able to take full advantage of the useful idiots in the Democrat controlled House and Senate in 2009-2010 and the Democrat Senate in the current Congress.

• Contempt of Congress is a long-running story with Presidents.  The administrations of Lyndon B. Johnson, Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush held Congress in absolute contempt. 
• Johnson prepared the now-infamous “Gulf of Tonkin” resolution–giving him unrestricted right to wage war in Vietnam–before hostilities erupted.  And he got Congress to pass it overwhelmingly. 
• Reagan ignored Congress’ ban on sending weapons to the right-wing Nicaraguan “Contras” and instructed his aides to raise money by selling anti-aircraft missiles to Iran in exchange for a handful of American hostages. 
• Bush intended to attack Iraq from Day One of his Presidency, to “avenge” his father’s losing re-election in 1992 for “failing” to topple Saddam Hussein. 
• He mounted a major PR campaign to persuade Congress that Iraq had WMDs and had plotted 9/11 with Hussein–even there was absolutely no evidence of either.

• Additionally, Barack Obama knows after his re-election a Republican-controlled House and Senate will not be able to enact any legislation to roll back the power previously granted to the Executive Branch or usurped by them.
• His veto will not be overridden as there will always be at least 145 Democratic members of the House or 34 in the Senate in agreement with or intimidated by an administration more than willing to use Chicago style political tactics.

• Republicans dominate the House–which pushed the country to the brink of bankruptcy earlier this year.  They’re now trying to win control of the Senate, and may well do so. 
• Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell has said the top priority of his party is to “make Barack Obama a one-term President.” 
• This does not seem to be a party that’s “intimidated” by “Chicago-style political tactics.”   

It’s aimed at voters who might vote to re-elect Barack Obama.  And it’s filled with generalizations, slanders and paranoid conspiracy theories.

Reading it is to journey into the darkest regions of the American electorate–and the right-wing organizations that seek to exploit them in the pursuit of absolute power.

Let’s take that journey.

THE EMAIL:

Obama’s Second Term Transformation Plans

• The 2012 election has often been described as the most pivotal since 1860. This statement is not hyperbole.
• If Barack Obama is re-elected the United States will never be the same, nor will it be able to re-capture its once lofty status as the most dominant nation in the history of mankind.

• The overwhelming majority of Americans do not understand that Obama’s first term was dedicated to putting in place executive power to enable him and the administration to fulfill the campaign promise of “transforming America ” in his second term regardless of which political party controls Congress.
• That is why his re-election team is virtually ignoring the plight of incumbent or prospective Democratic Party office holders.

• It’s commonplace for incumbent Presidents to hoard their own popularity (if they have it) and not spend a lot of time campaigning on behalf of other politicians.  Or to spend as little time doing so as they can. 
• One reason for this is they want to spend their time passing legislation or dealing with foreign affairs.  Every moment they spend on the campaign trail leaves them less time for what they consider their real duties as President. 
• Another reason is that campaigning is a high-stress business and many Presidents don’t see much to be gained–by them–for doing it for others.

• The most significant accomplishment of Obama’s first term is to make Congress irrelevant.
• Under the myopic and blindly loyal leadership of Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi, the Democrats have succeeded in creating an imperial and, in a second term, a potential dictatorial presidency.
• If anyone is to blame for making Congress irrelevant, it’s Congress itself.  Earlier this year, Congressional Republicans pushed the country to the brink of bankruptcy simply to get their way on budgetary negotiations. 
• They got their way as extortionists–and the nation’s credit rating fell accordingly.  And so did the job-approval rating of Congress–which, according to Gallup, now stands at 16%.

• During the first two years of the Obama administration when the Democrats overwhelming controlled both Houses of Congress and the media was in an Obama worshiping stupor, a myriad of laws were passed and actions taken which transferred virtually unlimited power to the executive branch.
• The birth of multi-thousand page laws was not an aberration. This tactic was adopted so the bureaucracy controlled by Obama appointees would have sole discretion in interpreting vaguely written laws and enforcing thousands of pages of regulations they and not Congress would subsequently write.
• Congress has passed  laws running to hundreds or thousands of pages during both Democratic and Republican administrations. 
• The tax code alone runs to 17,000 pages and 5.5 million words.  The Patriot Act–which completely rewrote the laws governing Federal law enforcement agencies–runs to 342 pages.   
• Major spending bills frequently run more than 1,000.  The climate bill that the House passed in June, 2009, was 1,200 pages.
• Bill Clinton’s 1993 health care plan was 1,342 pages long.   In 2007, President Bush’s budget bill ran to 1,482 pages.

• The same is true in the 2,319 pages of the Dodd-Frank Financial Reform Act which confers nearly unlimited power on various agencies to control by fiat the nation’s financial, banking and investment sectors.
• The bill also creates new agencies, such as the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, not subject to any oversight by Congress.
• This overall process was repeated numerous times with other legislation all with the intent of granting unfettered power to the executive branch controlled Barack Obama and his radical associates.

• The Dodd-Frank Financial Reform Act was passed to prevent a repeat of the 2008 Wall Street meltdown.  Its stated purpose:
• “To promote the financial stability of the United States by improving accountability and transparency in the financial system, to end ‘too big to fail’, to protect the American taxpayer by ending bailouts, to protect consumers from abusive financial services practices, and for other purposes.”
• Only the Federal Government has the power to protect citizens from the overwhelming greed and stupidity of the men who run the financial community. 
• But to prevent the wealthy few from destroying the financial standing of the United States is, for the Right, an act of Communism.

“The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposing ideas in the mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.” F. Scott Fitzgerald

Elvis Presley with Richard Nixon at White House along with aides Sonny West and Jerry Schilling, December 21, 1970

Fitzgerald’s quote above first appeared in The Crack Up, a posthumous collection of the artist’s work a few years after his death in 1940. The quote is often used by writers in an attempt to justify or rationalize the thought process or philosophy of persons who seem to carry extremely discordant views with nary a concern or thought to the irony and unsound mental footwork needed to keep from toppling over from the weight of mental dishonesty. Fitzgerald probably was being ironic, as I think another of his lines from the same work better speaks to the heart of his thoughts on the matter: “Of course all life is a process of breaking down.”

A little known historical fact: during the height of the anti-communist McCarthy hearings in the early 1950′s, Senator Joseph McCarthy listed Woody Guthrie as one of his favorite singers despite the fact Guthrie was known to travel in circles populated with well-known communists. OK, you got me. I dreamed that scenario after recently reading an article on Republican Vice-President Paul Ryan‘s love of the music of Rage Against the Machine. In an article published in the New York Times (my conservative friends can insert proper shudder here) on August 13, 2012, Ryan is described as follows: ” Yet even if he is viewed as politically pure by the modern-day standards of his party’s base, he is not without contradictions. The nation’s first Generation X vice-presidential candidate, he is an avowed proponent of free markets whose family has interests in oil leases. But he counts Rage Against the Machine, which sings about the greed of oil companies and whose Web site praises the anti-corporate Occupy Wall Street movement, among his favorite bands.”

If this were a dance club and the DJ was playing Bombtrack on the turntable, the needle just jumped and scratched the hell out of the vinyl. Paul Ryan, the newly named Republican vice-presidential candidate, who is the ardent right-wing, fiscal conservative poster boy of the Tea Party and whose main focus the last few years has been in dismantling Medicare and other social services for the poor and disenfranchised likes the music of ultra left-wing Rage Against The Machine?? RATM, an LA based rap/metal/punk band released their first album in 1992 and played together until 2000, released songs such as Voice of the Voiceless, Know Your Enemy, Vietnow and People of the Sun which spoke out against, to name a few, the American  two-party political system being controlled by corporatist, cultural imperialism, and the treatment of Native Americans while supporting leftists rebels in Mexico, labor unions, the homeless, immigrants  and social justice for all here in America and around the world.

While I whole heartedly believe that all people have the right to listen and support the music of their choosing, I don’t understand the dichotomy of listening to the music of a band that stands in direct opposition to everything you stand for politically and philosophically. Ryan has said he likes the band’s sound but willfully tunes out the lyrics. This is like someone saying they are die-hard anti-war pacifists, but they like country music and can’t help be drawn to Toby Keith’s Courtesy of the Red, White and Blue. While the band’s pounding beats, driving rhythms and guitar hooks can be hypnotizing, it’s hard to miss the meaning of the lyrics to songs such as Bombtrack:

Instead I warm my hands on the flames of the flag

As I recall our downfall

And the business that burned us all

See through the news and views that twist reality

Enough/I call the bluff/Manifest destiny

Landlords and power whores

On my people they took turns

Dispute the suits I ignite and then watch em’ burn

The thoughts of a militant mind

Hardline, hardline, after hardline

And it’s hard to ignore the lyrics and meaning in another Rage track, Killing In The Name, when lead singer Zach de la Rocha implies that some law enforcement and military personnel may also be part of the KKK, “The same that were enforcers, are the same that burn crosses.” de la Rocha then launches into the phrase “F$%@ you I won’t do what ya’ tell me” repeatedly at the top of his lungs, over and over. 16 times to be exact. This is why I think Ryan is being more than just a little disengenous, to borrow John McCain‘s description of Michael Moore at the 2008 Republican convention.

Tom Morello, the band’s guitarist who, since the band broke up in 2000, has been performing under the guise of The Night Watchmen, spoke out emphatically against Paul Ryan’s politics in Rolling Stone on August 16, 2012 in a piece entitled, Paul Ryan Is the Embodiment of the Machine Our Music Rages Against, in which he writes, ”Ryan claims that he likes Rage’s sound, but not the lyrics. Well, I don’t  care for Paul Ryan’s sound or his lyrics. He can like whatever bands he  wants, but his guiding vision of shifting revenue more radically to the one  percent is antithetical to the message of Rage.”

“I wonder what Ryan’s favorite Rage song is? Is it the one where we condemn  the genocide of Native Americans? The one lambasting American imperialism? Our  cover of “F$!# the Police”? Or is it the one where we call on the people to  seize the means of production? So many excellent choices to jam out to at Young  Republican meetings!”

Read the full article here:
http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/tom-morello-paul-ryan-is-the-embodiment-of-the-machine-our-music-rages-against-20120816#ixzz24uH6c9Iz

And apparently, Rage and Morello are not the only ones who feel this way as in the past week alone, Dee Snider of Twisted Sister asked Ryan’s office to stop using We’re Not Gonna Take It and Silversun Pickups requested Ryan stop using their song Panic Switch.

In another political campaign song choice gone awry, last year Michelle Bachmann chose to open many of her campaign stops with Elvis Presley’s cover version of Chuck Berry’s The Promised Land. While not nearly as politically divisive or perplexing, but to me equally disturbing, given the original intent and meaning  of the song for both Chuck Berry and Elvis Presley, and Bachmann’s far right conservative views, Bachman misappropriated the song for her political agenda and, given her beliefs and statements in religion, meant the song to be thought of by her supporters as a biblical theme.

Elvis recorded his cover of Chuck Berry’s Promised Land in 1973. Berry wrote his version in 1963, ironically enough, while he was serving time in prison. Given that Martin Luther King’s “I Have A Dream Speech” was given in August of 1963  in which he talked about making it to the “promised land”, it is very possible that Berry was influenced by King. Elvis Presley covered many of Berry’s songs, both in concert and in recording studio. Presley’s recording of Promised Land stands as one of his finest rock recordings ever, driven by the core of his touring band musicians, and was almost a telling of Presley’s own story of a poor boy from East Tupelo, Mississippi finding his way to the American Dream through sheer tenacity and determination.

During the Republican presidential race last year, Bachmann told a crowd of supporters that they needed to say happy birthday to Elvis despite the fact the date, August 16th, was actually the 34th anniversary of Elvis Prelsey’s death, not his birthday which was January 8th, 1935. She told the crowd, “You can’t do better than Elvis Presley.” Well, I guess there is one thing she and I can agree on.

But I digress. Back to Morello’s main argument about the inherent contradiction of Paul Ryan being an ardent supporter of RATM. I think his concern is the same of many artists who struggle, through their work, to reach their observers and fans and to truly communicate a part of themselves only to find out the message isn’t clear. Morello writes, “Paul Ryan’s love of Rage  Against the Machine is amusing, because he is the embodiment of the machine  that our music has been raging against for two decades. Charles Manson loved the Beatles but didn’t understand  them. Governor Chris Christie loves Bruce  Springsteen but doesn’t understand him. And Paul Ryan is clueless about his  favorite band, Rage Against the Machine.”

Morello’s use of Springsteen here carries significant weight for a few reasons. First, Morello is a die-hard  fan of Springsteen’s music and has guest appeared with Springsteen on stage to play scorching guitar solos on The Ghost of Tom Joad and appeared together again on  Late Night With Jimmy Fallon on Death To My Hometown from the Wrecking Ball album, for which Morello added incredible guitar solos on recorded versions to My Depression and Jack of All Trades. Secondly, Springsteen and Morello have similar thoughts on some political and social justice issues. But more importantly, Morello may have mentioned Springsteen’s name in this situation given what happened when Ronald Reagan misappropriated Bruce’s name and song Born in the USA during the 1984 presidential campaign.

‘Yankee Doodle Springsteen’

In June 1984, Springsteen, the self-described “hardest working white man in show business” (James Brown being the hardest working black man in show business), released the album Born in the USA, a collection of songs he had been working on since The River album was released in 1980. The album’s title track was a song he had originally written during the Nebraska project and which was recorded in a solo, acoustic fashion that leant great credence to the power of the lyrics which told the story of a Vietnam veteran who came back to the United States only to find there was no place for him anymore at work, at home or in society in general and was told by his VA man, “Son you just don’t understand.”

The album became a smash sensation, propelling Springsteen from a rock star into a world-wide phenomenon. The album sold 15 million copies in the US alone, peaked at #1 on the Billboard chart, spawned seven top ten singles, and remained on the charts for over 2 years. Speaking on this new stage of his career, Springsteen said, ” I don’t really think [money] does change you. It’s an inanimate thing, a tool, a convenience. If you’ve got to have a problem, it’s a good problem to have. (…) Money was kind of part of the dream when I started. I don’t think…I never felt like I ever played a note for the money. I think if I did, people would know, and they’d throw you out of the joint. And you’d deserve to go. But at the same time, it was a part of the dream.” Another part of that dream was getting unwanted and misunderstood attention from media members and even politicians.

In early September, 1984, conservative columnist George Will attended a Springsteen concert at the invitation of E Street Band drummer Max Weinberg and his wife. A few days later, his column, entitled Yankee Doodle Springsteen was published in papers across the country and contained this, “I have not got a clue about Springsteen’s politics, if any, but flags get waved at his concerts while he sings songs about hard times.  He is no whiner, and the recitation of closed factories and other problems always seems punctuated by a grand, cheerful affirmation: ‘Born in the U.S.A.!’”

George Will alone cannot be held responsible for hearing the thundering, anthemic song as recorded on the album and performed in the same arrangement on that tour, as a patriotic, flag waving send up to Old Glory and all it stands for, because millions of other listeners made a similar mistake. The ‘cheerful affirmation’ Will wrote of was written specifically as a paean to the trials and tribulations of returning military personnel best exemplified by Ron Kovic, who wrote Born on the Fourth of July about his own experiences. While Springsteen often played concerts on that tour with a huge American flag behind him, ala Bob Dylan in 1960s, that flag might have easily been turned upside down, which is the universal sign of distress for those Springsteen was singing about.

George Will had some friends within the Reagan White House who either were impacted by Will’s column or were whispered advice, and worked a Springsteen reference into a campaign stop speech within days of the column’s publication. In a stop in Hammonton, NJ, Reagan told the crowd,  “America’s future rests in a thousand dreams inside your hearts. It rests in the message of hope in songs so many young Americans admire: New Jersey’s own Bruce Springsteen.  And helping you make those dreams come true is what this job of mine is all about.” Reagan’s office also quietly reached out to Springsteen’s management about the possibility of using the song for their campaign interests, and the request was politely declined.

Playing a concert on September 22, 1984 in Pittsburg, Springsteen addressed the situation directly with his audience while introducing his song, Johnny 99, a song about an unemployed auto worker who turns to murder.  “The President was mentioning my name the other day, and I kinda got to wondering what his favorite album musta been.  I don’t think it was the Nebraska album [about hard times in America].  I don’t think he’s been listening to this one” ["Johnny 99"].

To clarify his thoughts even further, Springsteen told Rolling Stone, “I think people have a need to feel good about the country they live in.  But what’s happening, I think, is that need — which is a good thing — is getting manipulated and exploited.  You see it in the Reagan election ads on TV, you know, ‘It’s morning in America,’ and you say, ‘Well, it’s not morning in Pittsburgh.’”

If you strip down the song to its’ bare essentials and look at the song in the stark realities of black and white by reading just the lyrics on the page, it’s hard to miss the true meaning of this enduring song:

I had a brother at Khe San

Fightin’ off the Vietcong

They’re still there, but he’s all gone

He had a woman that he loved in Saigon

I got a picture of him in her arms

Down in the shadow of the penitentiary

Out by the gas fires of the refinery

I’m ten years, burning down the road

Nowhere to run now ain’t got nowhere to go

I was born in the USA

I’m a long gone daddy now

You can also get a full sense of the meaning and emotion of the song by watching the clip below of the blues version, played solo with a slide on a 12-string acoustic taken from the Live in New York video.

Earlier this year, Springsteen released his 17th studio album, entitled Wrecking Ball, which partially plays as a retelling of what happened with our economy and society over the last four or five years. The first track on the album is We Take Care of Our Own. On first glance, the song plays as a scorching indictment of the Bush presidency response to Katrina and the aftermath with the following verse and chorus:

From Chicago to New Orleans
From the muscle to the bone
From the shotgun shack to the Superdome
We yelled “help” but the cavalry stayed home
There ain’t no-one hearing the bugle blown
We take care of our own
We take care of our own
Wherever this flag’s flown
We take care of our own

With pounding drums, guitars wailing a warning call, catchy guitar hooks and the refrain that “wherever this flag is flown, we take care of our own,” the song is a perfect companion piece in the irony of Bruce Springsteen. What he really thinks is that we haven’t and don’t take care of our own, whether here or around the world, as a people and as a government. In 2008, Springsteen openly campaigned for Barack Obama and sung at many campaign rallies. Since then, like many who supported the president, Springsteen has quietly separated himself and has openly stated he will not campaign for the president this year. However, Obama has begun using We Take Care of Our Own at some campaign stops, apparently with Springsteen’s blessing as Obama has not been asked to stop using it. The past truly is prologue.

To bring this back around, in a 1987 BBC interview Springsteen said, “Born in the USA is not ambiguous. All you gotta’ do is listen to the verses. If you don’t listen to the verses, you’re not gonna get the whole song, you’re just gonna get the chorus. What you do if someone doesn’t understand your song is you keep singing it.” If that is true, then I guess Tom Morello needs to stand outside of Paul Ryan’s campaign headquarters with a boom box held aloft over his head, just like John Cusak in Say Anything, while blaring Know Your Enemy over and over until Ryan can no longer just hear the catchy beat but has to confront the verses.

I wonder what songs Paul Ryan likes from Morello’s latest album entitled Union Town that was recorded and released in support of the Occupy Wall Street movement, as well as the demonstrations in Wisconsin last year surrounding Governor Walker’s actions against state employee unions, for which Morello travelled to Madison, WI to play and support the cause. Maybe it is Morello’s cover of Woody Guthrie’s This Land Is Your Land, or maybe What Side Are You On,  or just maybe it is the title track. I can’t quite remember the lyrics, something about if you live under a bridge, then all roads lead to  home and this being a union town all down the line. Not sure what that guys is saying, but it sure is a foot stomper and a catchy little ditty.

Notes of Interest:

Elvis meets Nixon- In true irony, Elvis Presley went to the White House on a whim a few days before Christmas without an appointment or prior notice to ask the President to issue him official documents certifying Elvis as an honorary member of the federal Drug Enforcement Agency. Elvis and two of his friends/body guards Sonny West and Jerry Schilling, flew from Memphis to Washington without notifying anyone else of their whereabouts. On the flight, Elvis met a serviceman returning from Vietnam who was in route to visit his family for Christmas, and in typical Elvis fashion, gave the soldier the only cash the three had on them, $500, so the soldier could buy his family and friends gifts, much to the consternation of his aides. After arriving in Washington, Elvis went to the White House and gave a guard a personal letter he had written to the President along with a gift of a pearl handled, Colt .45 pistol. Shortly after, a presidential aide reached out to Elvis at his Washington area hotel and made arrangements for the meeting. After some wrangling and arm twisting, President Nixon obtained the papers and DEA badges Elvis requested and presented them to him along with White House trinkets for Sonny and Jerry and their wives.

While Nixon was President, his office contacted Colonel Parker to request Elvis to perform at the White House. Parker demanded a performance fee of $150,000  which was declined as all such performances up to that time had been done gratis.

Vietnam/Light of Day/Born In The USA:

In 1981, Springsteen was asked to write music for a film by Paul Schrader called Born in the U.S.A. (Schrader’s movie would eventually be released 1987, entitled Light of Day, featuring Michael J. Fox and Joan Jett). Shortly after, when Springsteen was working on a song titled “Vietnam,” he glanced at the script and sang the title. The song, entitled as the work-in-progress movie, was already finished during the sessions of Springsteen’s introspective album Nebraska, and Springsteen originally wanted to include it on the album. However, it was removed as it did not coincide with the dark feel of the rest of the songs.

Chris Christie on Bruce: Christie is an ardent, militant Springsteen fan who has seen him in concert more than 200 times and has the ticket stubs to prove it. Christie recently gave the opening keynote address at the 2012 Republican Presidential convention and dropped this line into his speech, ”I was her son as I listened to “Darkness on the Edge of Town” with my high school friends on the Jersey Shore.”