Torture Photos

My guess is the real reason President Obama will not release the torture photos is that they will create such a stir as to discredit the continuation of the occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan.

War and authoritarianism in general creates sadistic sociopaths so the fact that there were rapes is not surprising.  Also in the U.S., it is commonplace for comics to make jokes about prison rapes.  Such cultural norms helps to desensitize people about this problem.

Not only should there be continued pressure to release of the photos but the demand to end all inhumane torture of all prisoners — domestic and international — especially prisoner rape.

U.S. Zionism and the Left

This is a taboo topic on the “Left” and in fact there are many so-called “leftist” who are apologist for Zionism.  One particular is the “oracle of the Left” — Noam Chomsky.  Because the Left is in such a decrepted state, many people hearing Chomsky’s critique of the United States, believe him to be a “radical”.  He is rightly accredited by many activist with introducing them to anti-imperialism ideas but when you really examine his position, Chomsky is much more reactionary than radical.

The focus by the “Left” on “imperialism” has been a way for it to ignore pressing domestic issues most especially rising Zionism in the United States.  Apparently this form of racism is not too pressing for the Left as it tries to explain all the evils in the world for the U.S. desire to “control” oil and other resources.  However, this explanation doesn’t wash when explaining the war on Iraq.

The oil company are on record being against the invasion as they were on record against the first Gulf War.  However the Left seems to be blind to the push for the war here by Zionist groups as well as Zionist sympathizers on the Left who sabotaged the anti-war movement in an effort obscure the influence that Zionism has on the inducing the U.S. to invade Iraq — and now possibly Iran.

For example Naomi Klein’s book “The Shock Doctrine” was written on the premise that the U.S. invaded Iraq in order to ram down the Iraqi people throats Milton Freedman’s like neo-liberal policies.  The irony is that Milton Freedman was against the war on Iraq.

Klein referred to her books as a thesis which by definition means that if you can find one contraction of the thesis means that the thesis is unsupportable.  Apparently Freedman’s lack of support for the war on Iraq breaks down her thesis.  So what was the real purpose of the book?

The current economic crisis makes Klein’s book appear timely but when she wrote the book it was well before the crisis that the purpose of her book was to obscure the role of Zionism’s influence in the war to make it appear that is was a neo-liberal project rather than a neo-conservative (i.e. Zionist) project.

This kind of intellectual deception by the likes of Chomsky and Klein and other members of the “Left” has been extremely deleterious to activist and to building an ideological foundation whereby the Left can build solidarity and trust among the working class.  Klein who herself says that she supports a”mixed” economy and Chomsky who is an admits to being a Zionist and excuses Israeli apartheid and Zionist influence on U.S. “Imperialism”,  rather than use their capabilities to provide economic and political clarity has unfortunately used their abilities to keep well intention activist confused and off-balance.

Bailout For Deadbeats

The U.S. Government has committed in the neighborhood of 12 trillion dollars in order to bailout the banks.  It amazing that there has been more demands coming from the “Left” demanding a bailout for deadbeats.

With unemployment up and nearly 12% of the American people are behind on their mortgages and clearly falling behind on their credit cards debts. This is not to even mention the growing student loan problems as well which will have a chilling effect for the future.

The real basis of the crisis is due to the past 30 years of stagnant wages and the growing gap between the rich and the working class.  Why is this important?  Because inequality lowers the standard of living of working people because the increasing concentration of wealth forces up prices and create bubbles that leads to crisis.  Working people maintained their demand through borrowing as the cost of housing, transportation, health care, child rearing and education skyrocketed.

Which means that the current crisis is not really a “banking” crisis but a crisis due to inequality.  Since the government found $12 trillion to commit to the banks the government could have offered relief to all deadbeats by simply canceling their debts.  Clearly the banks and the ruling class would abhor such a solution but where is the Left in offering such a demand?  The Left was in the front lines with their protest of debt cancellation for third world counties IMF loans you’d think they would adopt a closer to home demand for working class relief.

It is clear there is enough resources to resolve inequality but unfortunately the working class is just too unorganized and too weak to demand for their own bailout.

Stop Blaming The Victims

Now that Obama has been elected and has moved away from his canard of “hope”  there has been a rash of “I told you so” articles by so-called “leftist” gloating at the “rubes” who voted for Obama.

This kind of elitism and lack of analysis is one of the reason why the “Left” is so alienated from working class people especially people of color.  The assumption being made by these writers is that the Left offered a cohesive alternative.  The Left, unfortunately, is too fictionalize, lacks solidarity, and started out in 2008, in an even weaker position than they were in 2004.  Understanding that the Left was in a weaker position then fielding two candidates, Nader and McKinney, run extremely counter to building a united front.

A Nader/McKinney ticket would not be assured of winning the election but it would have built a more cohesive effort to challenge Obama and the Democrats.  It would have provided a better alternative and helped to bring together the outreach of the McKinney clique who better highlighted issues that concern people of color with the Nader clique and could have consolidated the Green Party.  But alas that didn’t happen.   So what does the Left do?  Blame voters for selecting the Democrats rather than analyze their own missteps and deficiencies.

People of color especially are always the scapegoat of the Republican Party rhetoric.  If there is no real alternative to the Democrats, people of color will vote for the “lesser evil” as a matter of practicality.  Blaming them and offering “I told you so’s” is arrogant and counterproductive to the goal of attracting working people away from the Democrats.

The demographic of the votes told the story.  Obama won 95% of the black vote, 80% of the Latino vote and white voters under 30 years old.  If it was up to white voters only, John McCain would have won the election.  This doesn’t mean the policy would be any better but what the election means is that there is a demographic that the Left can attract into its ranks if it can achieve solidarity and cohesion within its own ranks.

Nader On The Run

Ralph Nader has announced his campaign President as an independent. In 2000 and 2004 I supported Nader’s run for the presidency. By 2000, progressives tiring of the Clinton triangulation and reactionary policies, wanted to send a message and looked like the possibility of the growth of a third party as alternatives to the Democrats. To the “horror” of these “progressives” George W. Bush was anointed the presidency. The result was a backlash by “progressives” against Nader and third parties in general. By 2004, “progressives” demobilized the burgeoning anti-war movement against the War in Iran and discourage support behind Ralph Nader’s anti-war movement using the “spoiler” canard in order to back the pro-war Democrat, John Kerry.

The ridicule and vitriol directed towards Nader by “progressives” reveals their hypocrisy. Celebrity “leftist” such as Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky supported the so-called “Anybody But Bush/Safe State” strategy in 2004. This strategy essentially states that if you live in a “blue” state it’s OK to vote for Nader. However if you live in a “swing” state to vote for John Kerry. The result of that strategy was the re-election of Bush.

The failure of “progressives” to mobilize against the Iraq War and to put forward a policy front left opened a void now being filled by Illinois Senator Barack Obama. Obama inspiring rhetoric is rich with abstractions. Unfortunately Obama’s specifics are very centrist and does not go far enough. His health care maintains the current profit-based private insures and avoid single-payer Medicare-for-all. While Obama has mentions drawing down U.S. presence in Iraq, he has suggested increasing the military. Military spending consumes over 50% of the operating budget and the U.S. spends more on the military than the combined spending of all nations. With the weaken economic condition, reducing military spending and directing it to social and infrastructure spending will stimulate the economy and improve economic conditions. Essentially Obama policies are slightly to the left of Hillary Clinton and doesn’t go far enough to impact real progressive change.

With Nader in the race, those issues will get address and his position, voice, and inspiration are what we deadbeats need.

Tim Russert’s Yellow Journalism

During the Ohio debate, Tim Russert demanded that presidential candidate Barack Obama reject the enforcement of Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan. Russert claimed that the controversial leader referred to Judaism as a “gutter religion”. Clearly this kind of hate speech ought to be rejected but the problem is that Louis Farrakhan never made the remark and therefore Obama, clearly boxed in by Russert, “denounced and rejected” a remark that was never uttered.

Tim Russert, unfortunately, engaged in the lowest form of journalism — race baiting — and it isn’t the first time. Russert did the same thing to Obama in 2006 and demand that he respond to Harry Belefonte harsh criticisms of George W. Bush.

Ironically however the remark attributed to Louis Farrakhan was never uttered by him and therefore Russert and the media are wrong. In 1984, Farrakhan in a gave a speech critical of Israel where he refers to Zionism as a “dirty religion”. It was the New York press that distorted his remarks and created the “gutter religion” canard. Had Russert checked the record he would have discovered the facts.

It is Tim Russert divisive and irresponsible tactics that should be “denounced and rejected” as he sought to fan the flames of hatred rather than accurately report the facts.

“War” is the “Economy”

The race for the Presidency, especially on the Democratic side, has generated a lot of interest. The conventional wisdom assumed that Hillary Clinton would cakewalk to the nomination by Super Tuesday. Barack Obama insurgency campaign clearly upset that notion and has extended the length of primaries and the net effect has increased public interest in politics this election cycle.

However when listening to the mainstream media and especially the questions posted by the “debate” moderators do you ever wonder why when the topic of the “economy” is raise why the spending on the War In Iraq and military spending generally is never posed as an economic issue. For example, the Friday February 29th edition of Democracy Now, featured Joseph Stiglitz, the 2001 Nobel Prize winner of Economics and co-author of the new book The Three Trillion Dollar War: The True Cost of the Iraq Conflict. His book conservatively estimates that the War in Iraq has conservatively cost the U.S. $3,000,000,000,000.00 ($3 trillon). So why haven’t the talking heads and pundits address the war as an economic issue?

Not only does the War In Iraq need to end but a reassessment of all military expenditure. From an economic standpoint, military spending is extremely wasteful because it offers has no multiplier effect. A bomb or a tank or a warship, for example, offer has no use value that adds to the overall economy unlike a road, bridge, schools or levies.

For years, military spending is the “third rail” of politics and has distorted the dialog. “Spending” has come to mean social spending and “entitlements” which both parties want to cut. However over 50% of the federal budget is dedicated to military spending and it has been estimated that 80% of the debt is the result of past and present military spending.

It is clear that “war” is the “economy” and has retarded the nation of its progressive potential and in the process turning us into a nation of deadbeats.

Welcome to Deadbeat Politics

This is the start of a new blog dedicated to the deadbeat view of the world. Deadbeat views are views not typically found in the mainstream of political thought and expression in the United States. Views that are considered “mainstream” are typically the views of the rich and powerful. Unfortunately many Americans have been made to feel that mainstream politics reflect their “values” when in fact they function against the values of the vast majority of American citizens.

Deadbeat views on the other hand run counter to mainstream views due to events and other experiences and realizations that what we are being told by the mainstream is not true. In other words we are told to live by the “golden rules” that play us for saps and turn us into deadbeats. Now that I am a deadbeat, I’ve adopted deadbeat values and this blogs will enable me to communicate my deadbeat values to fellow travelers who are now living the life of a deadbeat.

As current trends continue, I will not be the only deadbeat as there will be many new and awaiting deadbeats who will need a place to express their angst and anxieties. I believe that this blog can become that forum for all of us deadbeats to share our thoughts and common experiences.

Thanks,
Deadbeat