http://www.democracynow.org/2009/3/25/aig_and_the_big_takeover_matt
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20090318_perp_walks_instead_of_bonuses/
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20090401_no_more_refuge_for_scoundrels/
...and on and on ad nauseum. Unfettered capitalism run amok, as it always will do given human nature. Success defined as material gain, or the number dominated by the self. The argument itself governed by the trivial day to day minutiae of acquisition and control. Petty little men with loud voices screaming that the Republic is out of control when it was always so, and should remain so. On either side of the Sword rests the argument of Freedom vs Equality, both seek the good but are incompatible. How is it then that one side demonizes the other? Forsooth, Freedom is narcissistic, and equality coercive. But then, who looks at the bedrock, the foundation of things?--not so many it seems. A few dusty academics, a radical or two unconcerned with consequences, the always emerging dark side spreading like a shadow.
It should be obvious that neither side can be allowed to triumph, or that either side should be suppressed. No faith can be placed in the rule of men, yet the lessons of history teach us that the rule of law degenerates from the constant pressure of ambition. Each of us a tyrant, from order we seek chaos, and from chaos, order; and from each little corner of the empire dictators arise complete with orders for right behaviors and recipes for success, for us, for you, for me, for today--which passes quickly enough.
The age of the nation-state is on its last legs, technology and circumstance has presented ambition with a larger stage, sovereignty and self determination are no longer viable, more and more it will come to be realized that we are all in this together; that it is us and the world that matters, and not the petty ambitions of local demagogues fraught with narcissistic delusions, despite their area of expertise. Another hundred years or so? Give or take. A global constitution that takes the armies away from the pisspot little despots who are feeding the always miserable mob an endless line of bull, regardless once again of their area of expertise, be it real or perceived. It is all in all, who we allow to lead, and that is often a difficult choice, as we cannot know but only guess.
Is one tyranny worse than another? Shall we ask the dead? Which in due time will be ourselves,--I am this, or I am that, or I am virtuous and you are evil. I have noted, in my passage, that to be human is to fail at being Human, except in times of extreme crisis, odd moments when the underlying cause is love, take that how you will.
We fall away from the pursuit of the good, since all in all, we cannot seem to define it, torn as we are between humanism and religion, the spiritual and the material, the empty and the significant. How are we to choose, burdened as we are with existence? What is existence but choice, left or right/ How vain those choices when we have enough to eat, and how ruthless when we do not?
Foolish foolish men! squabbling like dogs over a pile of bones, when of all the creatures that have walked the Earth we are the first to have the capacity to distribute the bones equitably? What is it that gets in the way of all being fed, and clothed and sheltered? Perhaps in truth we are nearer to those dogs than we are to ourselves. Hard men walk among us killing things to raise themselves in their own regard, and it seems that is something we cannot expunge since they too are part of who we are. In the failure of Will civilizations are strangled in their own filth.
At the end of days--be it spiritual or biological--will we have been parasites or symbiotes, scavengers or caretakers? Is our legacy to be, I or we? Sounds simple enough but given the complexity one is faced with the stark realization that in due course all that we are, good and bad will be lost in a dry wind.
Friday, March 27, 2009
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
The Philosophical Underpinnings of Conservative Thought
"To understand what is distinctive about today's Republican Party, you first need to know about an obscure and very conservative German political philosopher. His name, however, is not Leo Strauss, who has been widely cited as the intellectual guru of the Bush administration. It belongs, instead, to a lesser known, but in many ways more important, thinker named Carl Schmitt."
Proto-nazi dude. Advocated that the executive should proclaim a permanent state of emergency to rule without restraints---that politics should not be be regarded as dialogue or compromise, but rather as combat in which the opponent is to be destroyed. I have an idea that Karl Rove & John Yoo read him when they were impressionable young boys...
"Liberals think of politics as a means; conservatives as an end. Politics, for liberals, stops at the water's edge; for conservatives, politics never stops. Liberals think of conservatives as potential future allies; conservatives treat liberals as unworthy of recognition. Liberals believe that policies ought to be judged against an independent ideal such as human welfare or the greatest good for the greatest number; conservatives evaluate policies by whether they advance their conservative causes. Liberals instinctively want to dampen passions; conservatives are bent on inflaming them. Liberals think there is a third way between liberalism and conservatism; conservatives believe that anyone who is not a conservative is a liberal. Liberals want to put boundaries on the political by claiming that individuals have certain rights that no government can take away; conservatives argue that in cases of emergency -- conservatives always find cases of emergency -- the reach and capacity of the state cannot be challenged."
http://chronicle.com/cgi2-bin/printable.cgi?article=http://chronicle.com/free/v50/i30/30b01601.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Schmitt
The controversy over the Yoo Memorandums and the Influence of Schmitt---
http://balkin.blogspot.com/2005/11/return-of-carl-schmitt.html
Proto-nazi dude. Advocated that the executive should proclaim a permanent state of emergency to rule without restraints---that politics should not be be regarded as dialogue or compromise, but rather as combat in which the opponent is to be destroyed. I have an idea that Karl Rove & John Yoo read him when they were impressionable young boys...
"Liberals think of politics as a means; conservatives as an end. Politics, for liberals, stops at the water's edge; for conservatives, politics never stops. Liberals think of conservatives as potential future allies; conservatives treat liberals as unworthy of recognition. Liberals believe that policies ought to be judged against an independent ideal such as human welfare or the greatest good for the greatest number; conservatives evaluate policies by whether they advance their conservative causes. Liberals instinctively want to dampen passions; conservatives are bent on inflaming them. Liberals think there is a third way between liberalism and conservatism; conservatives believe that anyone who is not a conservative is a liberal. Liberals want to put boundaries on the political by claiming that individuals have certain rights that no government can take away; conservatives argue that in cases of emergency -- conservatives always find cases of emergency -- the reach and capacity of the state cannot be challenged."
http://chronicle.com/cgi2-bin/printable.cgi?article=http://chronicle.com/free/v50/i30/30b01601.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Schmitt
The controversy over the Yoo Memorandums and the Influence of Schmitt---
http://balkin.blogspot.com/2005/11/return-of-carl-schmitt.html
Friday, March 6, 2009
An open Letter To Glenn Beck
Dear Mr. Beck;
One notes your claim that you are a libertarian--
lib·er·tar·i·an
n.
1. One who advocates maximizing individual rights and minimizing the role of the state.
2. One who believes in free will.
"Hokey religions and ancient weapons are no match for a good blaster at your side, kid."
"the belief that human behaviour is an expression of personal choice and is not determined by physical forces, Fate, or God," or Free Will.
Much of what you know is predicated upon that which you think you know, The Greeks defined that as Hubris--which is neither here nor there as you earn a living by preying on fear; another tool in the hands of the demagogues who would strip you of all that which you claim to hold so dear--and when it comes down to it what is that but the size of your bank account--the arbiter of your "safety".
"Tonight, America, here is what you need to know. We have got to make a choice. We are either capitalists or we`re not. We either believe in the free market system or we do not. We can`t play both sides."
::::::
Progressive Democrats instead favored a reserve system owned and operated by the government and out of control of the "money trust", ending Wall Street's control of American currency supply. Conservative Democrats fought for a privately owned, yet decentralized, reserve system, which would still be free of Wall Street's control. The Federal Reserve Act passed Congress in late 1913 on a mostly partisan basis, with most Democrats in support and most Republicans against it.
In 1999, the Financial Services Modernization Act overturned the Glass-Steagall Act of 1933. The Act effectively barred banks, brokerages and insurance companies from entering each others' industries, and separated investment banking and commercial banking. The law was enacted in response to revelations of gross corruption and manipulation of the market by giant banking houses that organized huge corporate mergers for their own profit, leading to the collapse of the stock market in 1929.
The Wall Street Journal celebrated the agreement to end such restrictions with an editorial declaring that the banks had been unfairly scapegoated for the Great Depression. The headline of one Journal article declared, "Finally, 1929 Begins to Fade."
::::
The unleashed and deregulated financial services sector boomed, bringing us the speculative boom that in turn gave us the temporary budget surplus of the late 1990s and the finance-led booms and busts since then. The hedge fund was not invented in the 1990s, but it was under Clinton that they were transformed into their modern form, with the Clinton White House cheerleading that transformation. In 1998, when the hedge fund, Long Term Capital Management, collapsed, leading to federal intervention, the president established the Working Group on Financial Markets. In February 2000, it concluded that hedge funds needed no regulation.
The General Welfare Clause
"Revolution of 1937."
Hughes prevailed on Roberts to desert the Conservative camp, swing over with him and join the three liberals in declaring the social security cases [Steward Machine Co. v. Davis (301 us 548, May 24, 1937)] Constitutional.[4] [P.56] This Roberts did, and by so doing, took the wind from the sails of the President's court packing plan. It went back to committee and died. one Administration official called the court's action, "the switch in time that saved nine."
This decision said in effect, Congress would no longer be held to enumerated powers but instead could tax and spend for anything; so long as it was for "general welfare."
But the words "General Welfare" in the introduction to the enumerated powers of Article I Section 8 were never intended to be an object for extension of the power to tax and spend; and up until the cases noted above, no court ever so averred.[Appx. 1]
The supreme court surrendered to the new deal on the most fundamental of constitutional issues. "it is scarcely conceivable that Chief Justice Hughes and Justice Roberts... were unaware of the political implications of their move. the President had lost a battle but won a war. In a remarkable series of decisions . ..the Court executed the most abrupt change of face in its entire history..."-
:::::::::::
...as tho the nation exists only in the moment of your latest adolescent eruption, that free market you prattle on about--is and always has been, manipulated to suit the needs of the few, not the many. Caesar, Crassus & Pompey--whose petty pauper are you--? Sweet swindles, as they divide the world; as if this nation you whine about actually exists--other than as a faction in the global chaos, and you a sop to the Mob milling about in the forum, Caesar's tame tribune spilling earnest lies.
Oh, how fierce your indignation, at these petty politicians with painted faces, puffing up the Senate steps, papers tucked under their arms, stuffed with peacock wings, and fine wine chilled in the Apennines, bought and paid for, their votes nothing more than an abject acquiesce to the highest bidder in the triumvirate.
Fool, to think your useless prattle matters to the rabid Mob that cares for little more than the next circus or the next sensation in the scheme of things.--
Heinlein:
For when the plebs discover that they can vote themselves bread and circuses without limit and that the productive members of the body politic cannot stop them, they will do so, until the state bleeds to death, or in its weakened condition the state succumbs to an invader--the barbarians enter Rome."
(To Sail Beyond the Sunset, 227)
The ebb and flow transcends the antiquated nation state; Caesar conquers Gaul to add to his coffers;--some years later Charles is crowned in Rome; just before Hamlet the Armada runs aground; new monsters roll across the Ardennes redefining the extent of the civilization, and today sit perched on desolate hilltops surveying a bleak landscape, the Last redoubt against the Beast; and you prattle on about "earmarks" which your master decides should be your latest diatribe to put coins in his basket.
BRUTUS
Be patient till the last.
Romans, countrymen, and lovers! hear me for my
cause, and be silent, that you may hear: believe me
for mine honour, and have respect to mine honour, that
you may believe: censure me in your wisdom, and
awake your senses, that you may the better judge.
If there be any in this assembly, any dear friend of
Caesar's, to him I say, that Brutus' love to Caesar
was no less than his. If then that friend demand
why Brutus rose against Caesar, this is my answer:
--Not that I loved Caesar less, but that I loved
Rome more. Had you rather Caesar were living and
die all slaves, than that Caesar were dead, to live
all free men? As Caesar loved me, I weep for him;
as he was fortunate, I rejoice at it; as he was
valiant, I honour him: but, as he was ambitious, I
slew him.
ANTONY
Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears;
I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.
The evil that men do lives after them;
The good is oft interred with their bones;
So let it be with Caesar. The noble Brutus
Hath told you Caesar was ambitious:
If it were so, it was a grievous fault,
And grievously hath Caesar answer'd it.
Here, under leave of Brutus and the rest--
For Brutus is an honourable man;
So are they all, all honourable men--
Come I to speak in Caesar's funeral.
He was my friend, faithful and just to me:
But Brutus says he was ambitious;
And Brutus is an honourable man.
He hath brought many captives home to Rome
Whose ransoms did the general coffers fill:
Did this in Caesar seem ambitious?
When that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept:
Ambition should be made of sterner stuff:
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious;
And Brutus is an honourable man.
:::::::::::::
What then, my friend? Honor or Ambition? How long will it be before the fables are allowed to die? What will you choose as your newest alcohol? How will you know the difference, in the prison of your delusions? Will you champion Sparta, or sleep with oligarchs in Athens? In the end it will not matter much, your lips pressed against the ass of your latest suitor; nor will you, as he strokes your hair, spinning the web of your newest despair; some new whimperings to delight the drunken mob.
Even so, such pretentious preaching will only serve the mob so long, its addled attention soon drawn off to some new atrocity, your mendacity nothing more than the graffiti scrawled upon the wall--the temple was profaned when Gilgamesh was just a boy, or when Achilles sulked in his tent as Agamemnon fondled Briseis as her father moaned to absent gods. Take your meager knowledge to the market to impress young girls--they are always wide eyed at the sight of Heroes, even when they do not know what they are:
from The Sixth Elegy
The hero is strangely close to those who died young. Lasting
doesn’t contain him. Being is his ascent: he moves on,
time and again, to enter the changed constellation
his risk entails. Few could find him there. But
Destiny, that darkly hides us, suddenly inspired,
sings him into the tempest of his onrushing world.
I hear no one like him. All at once I am pierced
by his darkened sound carried on streaming air.
Rilke
One notes your claim that you are a libertarian--
lib·er·tar·i·an
n.
1. One who advocates maximizing individual rights and minimizing the role of the state.
2. One who believes in free will.
"Hokey religions and ancient weapons are no match for a good blaster at your side, kid."
"the belief that human behaviour is an expression of personal choice and is not determined by physical forces, Fate, or God," or Free Will.
Much of what you know is predicated upon that which you think you know, The Greeks defined that as Hubris--which is neither here nor there as you earn a living by preying on fear; another tool in the hands of the demagogues who would strip you of all that which you claim to hold so dear--and when it comes down to it what is that but the size of your bank account--the arbiter of your "safety".
"Tonight, America, here is what you need to know. We have got to make a choice. We are either capitalists or we`re not. We either believe in the free market system or we do not. We can`t play both sides."
::::::
Progressive Democrats instead favored a reserve system owned and operated by the government and out of control of the "money trust", ending Wall Street's control of American currency supply. Conservative Democrats fought for a privately owned, yet decentralized, reserve system, which would still be free of Wall Street's control. The Federal Reserve Act passed Congress in late 1913 on a mostly partisan basis, with most Democrats in support and most Republicans against it.
In 1999, the Financial Services Modernization Act overturned the Glass-Steagall Act of 1933. The Act effectively barred banks, brokerages and insurance companies from entering each others' industries, and separated investment banking and commercial banking. The law was enacted in response to revelations of gross corruption and manipulation of the market by giant banking houses that organized huge corporate mergers for their own profit, leading to the collapse of the stock market in 1929.
The Wall Street Journal celebrated the agreement to end such restrictions with an editorial declaring that the banks had been unfairly scapegoated for the Great Depression. The headline of one Journal article declared, "Finally, 1929 Begins to Fade."
::::
The unleashed and deregulated financial services sector boomed, bringing us the speculative boom that in turn gave us the temporary budget surplus of the late 1990s and the finance-led booms and busts since then. The hedge fund was not invented in the 1990s, but it was under Clinton that they were transformed into their modern form, with the Clinton White House cheerleading that transformation. In 1998, when the hedge fund, Long Term Capital Management, collapsed, leading to federal intervention, the president established the Working Group on Financial Markets. In February 2000, it concluded that hedge funds needed no regulation.
The General Welfare Clause
"Revolution of 1937."
Hughes prevailed on Roberts to desert the Conservative camp, swing over with him and join the three liberals in declaring the social security cases [Steward Machine Co. v. Davis (301 us 548, May 24, 1937)] Constitutional.[4] [P.56] This Roberts did, and by so doing, took the wind from the sails of the President's court packing plan. It went back to committee and died. one Administration official called the court's action, "the switch in time that saved nine."
This decision said in effect, Congress would no longer be held to enumerated powers but instead could tax and spend for anything; so long as it was for "general welfare."
But the words "General Welfare" in the introduction to the enumerated powers of Article I Section 8 were never intended to be an object for extension of the power to tax and spend; and up until the cases noted above, no court ever so averred.[Appx. 1]
The supreme court surrendered to the new deal on the most fundamental of constitutional issues. "it is scarcely conceivable that Chief Justice Hughes and Justice Roberts... were unaware of the political implications of their move. the President had lost a battle but won a war. In a remarkable series of decisions . ..the Court executed the most abrupt change of face in its entire history..."-
:::::::::::
...as tho the nation exists only in the moment of your latest adolescent eruption, that free market you prattle on about--is and always has been, manipulated to suit the needs of the few, not the many. Caesar, Crassus & Pompey--whose petty pauper are you--? Sweet swindles, as they divide the world; as if this nation you whine about actually exists--other than as a faction in the global chaos, and you a sop to the Mob milling about in the forum, Caesar's tame tribune spilling earnest lies.
Oh, how fierce your indignation, at these petty politicians with painted faces, puffing up the Senate steps, papers tucked under their arms, stuffed with peacock wings, and fine wine chilled in the Apennines, bought and paid for, their votes nothing more than an abject acquiesce to the highest bidder in the triumvirate.
Fool, to think your useless prattle matters to the rabid Mob that cares for little more than the next circus or the next sensation in the scheme of things.--
Heinlein:
For when the plebs discover that they can vote themselves bread and circuses without limit and that the productive members of the body politic cannot stop them, they will do so, until the state bleeds to death, or in its weakened condition the state succumbs to an invader--the barbarians enter Rome."
(To Sail Beyond the Sunset, 227)
The ebb and flow transcends the antiquated nation state; Caesar conquers Gaul to add to his coffers;--some years later Charles is crowned in Rome; just before Hamlet the Armada runs aground; new monsters roll across the Ardennes redefining the extent of the civilization, and today sit perched on desolate hilltops surveying a bleak landscape, the Last redoubt against the Beast; and you prattle on about "earmarks" which your master decides should be your latest diatribe to put coins in his basket.
BRUTUS
Be patient till the last.
Romans, countrymen, and lovers! hear me for my
cause, and be silent, that you may hear: believe me
for mine honour, and have respect to mine honour, that
you may believe: censure me in your wisdom, and
awake your senses, that you may the better judge.
If there be any in this assembly, any dear friend of
Caesar's, to him I say, that Brutus' love to Caesar
was no less than his. If then that friend demand
why Brutus rose against Caesar, this is my answer:
--Not that I loved Caesar less, but that I loved
Rome more. Had you rather Caesar were living and
die all slaves, than that Caesar were dead, to live
all free men? As Caesar loved me, I weep for him;
as he was fortunate, I rejoice at it; as he was
valiant, I honour him: but, as he was ambitious, I
slew him.
ANTONY
Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears;
I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.
The evil that men do lives after them;
The good is oft interred with their bones;
So let it be with Caesar. The noble Brutus
Hath told you Caesar was ambitious:
If it were so, it was a grievous fault,
And grievously hath Caesar answer'd it.
Here, under leave of Brutus and the rest--
For Brutus is an honourable man;
So are they all, all honourable men--
Come I to speak in Caesar's funeral.
He was my friend, faithful and just to me:
But Brutus says he was ambitious;
And Brutus is an honourable man.
He hath brought many captives home to Rome
Whose ransoms did the general coffers fill:
Did this in Caesar seem ambitious?
When that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept:
Ambition should be made of sterner stuff:
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious;
And Brutus is an honourable man.
:::::::::::::
What then, my friend? Honor or Ambition? How long will it be before the fables are allowed to die? What will you choose as your newest alcohol? How will you know the difference, in the prison of your delusions? Will you champion Sparta, or sleep with oligarchs in Athens? In the end it will not matter much, your lips pressed against the ass of your latest suitor; nor will you, as he strokes your hair, spinning the web of your newest despair; some new whimperings to delight the drunken mob.
Even so, such pretentious preaching will only serve the mob so long, its addled attention soon drawn off to some new atrocity, your mendacity nothing more than the graffiti scrawled upon the wall--the temple was profaned when Gilgamesh was just a boy, or when Achilles sulked in his tent as Agamemnon fondled Briseis as her father moaned to absent gods. Take your meager knowledge to the market to impress young girls--they are always wide eyed at the sight of Heroes, even when they do not know what they are:
from The Sixth Elegy
The hero is strangely close to those who died young. Lasting
doesn’t contain him. Being is his ascent: he moves on,
time and again, to enter the changed constellation
his risk entails. Few could find him there. But
Destiny, that darkly hides us, suddenly inspired,
sings him into the tempest of his onrushing world.
I hear no one like him. All at once I am pierced
by his darkened sound carried on streaming air.
Rilke
Thursday, March 5, 2009
Rove has studied his Orwell and understands that "who controls the past, controls the future."
That's why we saw Rove lambasting Obama's budget deficit, conveniently skipping over the nearly $1.6 trillion added to the deficit by the administration he helped guide. Not one word about the role the massive tax cuts for the rich he championed played in creating the current economic crisis. Not a peep about the deregulation of Wall Street he held so dear.
Indeed, he tried to lay the Bush administration's fiscal legacy at the feet of "two wars, 9/11, and a recession handed to us by the previous administration."
CRAMER: Welcome to the U.S.S.A. In the worst bear market since the Great Depression, we have a president and a Bolshevik -- Democratic Congress that seems oblivious to the rampant wealth destruction that's being caused by their agenda. Or maybe they know and they don't care. Either way, it's important that you Obama-proof your portfolio, or at least make it Obama-resistant, because we know he has both the power and the will to crush entire sectors. Everything from health care to oil and gas to the defense contractors. As if dealing with this garden-variety depression wasn't enough, now you need to protect your money from the expropriator-in-chief.
Limbaugh:
We [conservatives] love and revere our founding documents, the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. We believe that the preamble to the Constitution contains an inarguable truth that we are all endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights, among them life, Liberty, Freedom. And the pursuit of happiness. Those of you watching at home may wonder why this is being applauded. We conservatives think all three are under assault.
:::::::::::
These Yahoos, and their masters, will indeed do everything within their power to insure that progressive programs fail. The downward spiral will not affect those with the wherewithal to withstand it, the inconvenience, the strong survive, despite their lip service to creationism--their only allegiance is to god, and he is green and looks a lot like George Washington, at least till he tanks and they are forced to convert to a more stable commodity. When we come out the other side, they will be covered in shit, but firmly in control, and all they need to do is sit on their hands as the largesse is thrown at them.
Capitalists are amoral they have no idealogy, other than that which they can buy, or sell. It could be said that most Americans are capitalists, large or small--the almighty buck has been in charge for a long time.
:::::
:::"Republic: Form of government in which a state is ruled by representatives elected by its populace. The term was originally applied to a form of government in which the leader is periodically appointed under a constitution; it was contrasted with governments in which leadership is hereditary. A republic may also be distinguished from direct democracy, though modern representative democracies are by and large republics."
:::"Democracy: democracy [Gr.,=rule of the people], term originating in ancient Greece to designate a government where the people share in directing the activities of the state, as distinct from governments controlled by a single class, select group, or autocrat. The definition of democracy has been expanded, however, to describe a philosophy that insists on the right and the capacity of a people, acting either directly or through representatives, to control their institutions for their own purposes. Such a philosophy places a high value on the equality of individuals and would free people as far as possible from restraints not self-imposed. It insists that necessary restraints be imposed only by the consent of the majority and that they conform to the principle of equality.":::
:::::
Therein lies the basic division between the Democratic & Republican parties. The former tends to the egalitarian & the latter towards the creation of a ruling class.
One may immediately see that the system in the United States tends to give the Republican viewpoint an advantage in that the structure set up by the Constitution favors a representative government; which over time has fostered a ruling elite regardless of party affiliation.
A second division lies in the approach to the redistribution of wealth. Broadly, the republicans favor the wealth remaining in the hands of the few, postulating that they can be trusted to redistribute it for the benefit of all, while the democrats favor the idea that the government should be trusted to redistribute it equitably. Both viewpoints seem inevitably flawed--and indeed the major dilemma of government in the US is just what to do with the money, a wheelbarrow full for this, a truckload for that; or the reverse should you belong to the opposition.
At the present time--we are on course for a civil war & a great depression combined over this very issue, the republican partnership with the corporation or the democratic distrust of the corporation. One leads to a fascist symbiosis, the other to a socialist state. For the most part, America waffles between the two, unable to choose--Teddy Roosevelt went after the big trusts in the early part of the last century, and Franklin instituted the "New Deal"--it should be noted that Teddy got tossed out of the Republican party, and that Franklin changed the role of US government irrevocably--as the republicans are only now beginning to realize.
What the Founders understood was that no-one is to be trusted, not individuals, not companies, not religious institutions, and not the arms of the government they themselves were setting up, and they therefore set everyone against everyone in a perpetual free-for-all that would continue as long as the Constitution itself was the final determining factor, and because of the faction inherent in the system the constitution would endure because no-one could afford to set it aside.
At least not yet--as the this last most recent attack upon it has shown.
That's why we saw Rove lambasting Obama's budget deficit, conveniently skipping over the nearly $1.6 trillion added to the deficit by the administration he helped guide. Not one word about the role the massive tax cuts for the rich he championed played in creating the current economic crisis. Not a peep about the deregulation of Wall Street he held so dear.
Indeed, he tried to lay the Bush administration's fiscal legacy at the feet of "two wars, 9/11, and a recession handed to us by the previous administration."
CRAMER: Welcome to the U.S.S.A. In the worst bear market since the Great Depression, we have a president and a Bolshevik -- Democratic Congress that seems oblivious to the rampant wealth destruction that's being caused by their agenda. Or maybe they know and they don't care. Either way, it's important that you Obama-proof your portfolio, or at least make it Obama-resistant, because we know he has both the power and the will to crush entire sectors. Everything from health care to oil and gas to the defense contractors. As if dealing with this garden-variety depression wasn't enough, now you need to protect your money from the expropriator-in-chief.
Limbaugh:
We [conservatives] love and revere our founding documents, the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence. We believe that the preamble to the Constitution contains an inarguable truth that we are all endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights, among them life, Liberty, Freedom. And the pursuit of happiness. Those of you watching at home may wonder why this is being applauded. We conservatives think all three are under assault.
:::::::::::
These Yahoos, and their masters, will indeed do everything within their power to insure that progressive programs fail. The downward spiral will not affect those with the wherewithal to withstand it, the inconvenience, the strong survive, despite their lip service to creationism--their only allegiance is to god, and he is green and looks a lot like George Washington, at least till he tanks and they are forced to convert to a more stable commodity. When we come out the other side, they will be covered in shit, but firmly in control, and all they need to do is sit on their hands as the largesse is thrown at them.
Capitalists are amoral they have no idealogy, other than that which they can buy, or sell. It could be said that most Americans are capitalists, large or small--the almighty buck has been in charge for a long time.
:::::
:::"Republic: Form of government in which a state is ruled by representatives elected by its populace. The term was originally applied to a form of government in which the leader is periodically appointed under a constitution; it was contrasted with governments in which leadership is hereditary. A republic may also be distinguished from direct democracy, though modern representative democracies are by and large republics."
:::"Democracy: democracy [Gr.,=rule of the people], term originating in ancient Greece to designate a government where the people share in directing the activities of the state, as distinct from governments controlled by a single class, select group, or autocrat. The definition of democracy has been expanded, however, to describe a philosophy that insists on the right and the capacity of a people, acting either directly or through representatives, to control their institutions for their own purposes. Such a philosophy places a high value on the equality of individuals and would free people as far as possible from restraints not self-imposed. It insists that necessary restraints be imposed only by the consent of the majority and that they conform to the principle of equality.":::
:::::
Therein lies the basic division between the Democratic & Republican parties. The former tends to the egalitarian & the latter towards the creation of a ruling class.
One may immediately see that the system in the United States tends to give the Republican viewpoint an advantage in that the structure set up by the Constitution favors a representative government; which over time has fostered a ruling elite regardless of party affiliation.
A second division lies in the approach to the redistribution of wealth. Broadly, the republicans favor the wealth remaining in the hands of the few, postulating that they can be trusted to redistribute it for the benefit of all, while the democrats favor the idea that the government should be trusted to redistribute it equitably. Both viewpoints seem inevitably flawed--and indeed the major dilemma of government in the US is just what to do with the money, a wheelbarrow full for this, a truckload for that; or the reverse should you belong to the opposition.
At the present time--we are on course for a civil war & a great depression combined over this very issue, the republican partnership with the corporation or the democratic distrust of the corporation. One leads to a fascist symbiosis, the other to a socialist state. For the most part, America waffles between the two, unable to choose--Teddy Roosevelt went after the big trusts in the early part of the last century, and Franklin instituted the "New Deal"--it should be noted that Teddy got tossed out of the Republican party, and that Franklin changed the role of US government irrevocably--as the republicans are only now beginning to realize.
What the Founders understood was that no-one is to be trusted, not individuals, not companies, not religious institutions, and not the arms of the government they themselves were setting up, and they therefore set everyone against everyone in a perpetual free-for-all that would continue as long as the Constitution itself was the final determining factor, and because of the faction inherent in the system the constitution would endure because no-one could afford to set it aside.
At least not yet--as the this last most recent attack upon it has shown.
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Cartoon Figures---
"What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy. As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny "failed to take into account man's almost infinite appetite for distractions." In 1984, Orwell added, people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure. In short, Orwell feared that what we fear will ruin us. Huxley feared that what we desire will ruin us."
--Neil Postman;"Amusing Ourselves to Death;"1985.
::::
We have a national spotlight, rather more like a searchlight really, it is constantly on swinging to and fro, examining, scrutinizing--a long litany of ills can be attributed to it, from 'Triumph of the Will' to the latest "Joe the plumber". It would seem that even with the best of intentions, the reduction of three dimensions to two creates a separate reality that necessarily subtracts from an essential humanity.
Broadly, the problem is not the not realbut rather the idea of an almost real; that is the spill over, the inability to distinguish between realities, that of fact, and that of illusion.
It would be necessary for this discussion to note that we are not dealing here with literature or cinema, which though pertinent to the argument in the larger sense, do not deal with the flow of information necessary to decisions which should be based on accuracy. What we receive is filtered, shaded, even suppressed, and of course manipulated to fit the needs of the searchlight which feeds on conflict. We are served personality, which is more easily digested than numbers, and drama, which is more entertaining than the gritty theory which the numbers are fed into--
Capital must create more capital; inevitably, it seems to flow inward, becoming ever more concentrated, thus the outlets for the control of information must also constrict to perpetuate and protect the system. It might be noted, that the only industry that seems immune to the boom and bust inherent in the capitalist model is the entertainment business, it has no top end, no saturation point, money can be continually pumped into it with relative security as regards the possibility of loss. It is not surprising then that actual News is on the decline; it has become irrelevant, devoid of the necessary angst, unprofitable. Unless packaged adroitly, it is a distraction from the real purpose, the manufacture of profitable personality which a potential viewer will "invest" time in.
Thus, what is said is subordinate to who says it. Who trusts the sayer, and who does not becomes that sayers demographic--the larger the demographic the more valuable the sayer: regardless of the veracity of what is said.
A person who wishes to know, rather than just be fed, must stumble through the forest blindly, hoping to fall into something of value. Opinions from one side of the aisle or the other have little validity as they reflect only the interest of the corporate entity promoting them. It is not easy to escape from Motive, be it monetary or more nakedly in the Will to Power.
The power to know is dangerous; and an actual ability to know anything in the morass of misinformation is nearly impossible; and will in the course of time become even more so, the casualty is history which can no distinguish what actually happened, from what was said to have happened.
--Neil Postman;"Amusing Ourselves to Death;"1985.
::::
We have a national spotlight, rather more like a searchlight really, it is constantly on swinging to and fro, examining, scrutinizing--a long litany of ills can be attributed to it, from 'Triumph of the Will' to the latest "Joe the plumber". It would seem that even with the best of intentions, the reduction of three dimensions to two creates a separate reality that necessarily subtracts from an essential humanity.
Broadly, the problem is not the not realbut rather the idea of an almost real; that is the spill over, the inability to distinguish between realities, that of fact, and that of illusion.
It would be necessary for this discussion to note that we are not dealing here with literature or cinema, which though pertinent to the argument in the larger sense, do not deal with the flow of information necessary to decisions which should be based on accuracy. What we receive is filtered, shaded, even suppressed, and of course manipulated to fit the needs of the searchlight which feeds on conflict. We are served personality, which is more easily digested than numbers, and drama, which is more entertaining than the gritty theory which the numbers are fed into--
Capital must create more capital; inevitably, it seems to flow inward, becoming ever more concentrated, thus the outlets for the control of information must also constrict to perpetuate and protect the system. It might be noted, that the only industry that seems immune to the boom and bust inherent in the capitalist model is the entertainment business, it has no top end, no saturation point, money can be continually pumped into it with relative security as regards the possibility of loss. It is not surprising then that actual News is on the decline; it has become irrelevant, devoid of the necessary angst, unprofitable. Unless packaged adroitly, it is a distraction from the real purpose, the manufacture of profitable personality which a potential viewer will "invest" time in.
Thus, what is said is subordinate to who says it. Who trusts the sayer, and who does not becomes that sayers demographic--the larger the demographic the more valuable the sayer: regardless of the veracity of what is said.
A person who wishes to know, rather than just be fed, must stumble through the forest blindly, hoping to fall into something of value. Opinions from one side of the aisle or the other have little validity as they reflect only the interest of the corporate entity promoting them. It is not easy to escape from Motive, be it monetary or more nakedly in the Will to Power.
The power to know is dangerous; and an actual ability to know anything in the morass of misinformation is nearly impossible; and will in the course of time become even more so, the casualty is history which can no distinguish what actually happened, from what was said to have happened.
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Further adventures in Quantum Poetics.
it was unsaid, walking into the cave
pale, skinny chest puffed out, regulated.
not here not here in the rat's lair the sound
of dripping water upon ear, Antigone's
dried bones rattling in the dark. A quorum,
sharp teeth sunk in wet loins while the shadows\
look on, an aperitif of flesh, lustrous
in gloom. Those skulls were heroes once, maidens
with soft breasts, old men with bent canes, crones. Chill
between slick thighs will be licked off, back pressed
against wall knees high, rain is only a note
in the song; brittle limbs broken in time
the incessant drip the sun that neither
rises nor falls in eyes that are not here.
pale, skinny chest puffed out, regulated.
not here not here in the rat's lair the sound
of dripping water upon ear, Antigone's
dried bones rattling in the dark. A quorum,
sharp teeth sunk in wet loins while the shadows\
look on, an aperitif of flesh, lustrous
in gloom. Those skulls were heroes once, maidens
with soft breasts, old men with bent canes, crones. Chill
between slick thighs will be licked off, back pressed
against wall knees high, rain is only a note
in the song; brittle limbs broken in time
the incessant drip the sun that neither
rises nor falls in eyes that are not here.
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
On the Nature Of Certainty
In this very uncertain world, there are an awful of people who are certain of things. This is that, or that is this, or this is diametrically opposed to that. Despite all we know, we really know very little. How to put our pants on maybe. Friend of mine once related a tale to me: seems he was an artillery man in Nam, and he was sleeping one night when his base came under attack--he allowed that he was fully dressed and on his way to his post ten seconds after the first shell hit, never asked him if he tied his boots, passed on now, shoddy work of the VA carried him away--yeh, but in times of stress I guess we know how to put on our pants.
We are entering a brave new world; how may we certain that this theory is any better than the one it debunks? How long will it be before the parameters change; the stars shift?
No, it doesn't matter what theory, we have theories for everything--the computers leave us with a range of probabilities and we just rearrange the facts to fit the current condition, or at least as many of the facts as we can fit into an incomplete and fragmentary picture.--watching the detectives, they often say, "it's all we got to go on--sanitized for public viewing they never smoke anymore--another subtle hint for acceptable behavior, another subject--
One recalls reading the Foundation trilogy--Hari Selden's invention of Psychohistory, and the second Foundation's refinement of the data over a millennium--the project's purpose, of course, was to predict the the future history of the Galactic Empire through the movement of a vast number of people. Even so, the data was incomplete, errors could occur...
Our confrontation today, well, at least mine--is with Economics, Politics & Art, specifically poetry; and I for one, know so little about them that it would be best if I just crawled back in the cave and pulled the bearskin over my head. I should note here, that it would have been my step-dad that killed that bear, if I were confronted by such a fearsome beast, I fear the outcome would be somewhat different.
Through the good graces of our various magic boxes we are indeed bombarded each day with certainties,--yet those same certainties have led us to the brink of Armageddon rather than the steps to the gates of Eden. Something has gone awry. It would seem the experts know more than they are telling us, or they know very little at all.
"No, that's not what I meant at all, I was not sure of things, and really, it just seemed to be that be that way, at the time."
When I was a boy, over in Dogtown, I'd go up to old Earl's and listen to the old men sitting around the Burnside, spitting, telling lies and cussing the politicians. They'd all been union men, democrats and John L. Lewis was a god--one of Grandpa's favorite stories was the time he'd met John L. up in Brownton when the union was first getting going, "shook his hand," he'd always say. They was certain of God, though they weren't very good Christians, certain of the union, punching the chicken on the ballot, and damned certain every politician that had ever been born was going to pick your pocket. Back then, having only one tv channel, and having Uncle Pete as both news anchor and kiddie show host wasn't quite enough to affect the way you behaved; so I hung out with them old guys and probably learned a lot of things I shouldn't have. I suppose, through everything because of that, I have a few certainties of my own deep down inside, one's you might say as I keep for my own.
"There's nothing better that 250 mics of good acid to kick start the cosmic coonhunt for Enlightenment. It takes juice. After all sonny boy, you don't knock down stars with a bee bee gun."
-- Mad Dog Howard, Hippie Doper/Philosopher
http://www.joebageant.com/joe/
Yeh, all that was later on, something about it--where you came to a rockhard place that you knew you were going to and the Great Game was laid bare. Kinda pointless here, to try and illuminate the motel rooms, the neon, the flimsy walls and the animals--but it was what it was at the time: The whole damn world as a charnel house; everything bleeding & breeding and dying--ancient visions now, and prophesies that saw way down deep at the seams of things. I looked at the Nature of things and who we are, and was amazed at the veneer which we use to cover it up. That is another certainty which came along; I suppose if I could translate it, it might be helpful, but I reckon that particular certainty can't be taught or bought or stole.
It was round about that time, I decided I was going to be a poet--Dave's fault really, he wrote about the wheel of life in a little poem, and I was astounded, got lost in a fever from which I have never escaped, and have been lost in the uncertainty of certainty ever since. Damndest thing about it is, you have to learn all this stuff, (damn near everything) just so you can write about that which you cannot know; and that's the easy part. Damn silly thing to want to be in the first place--quite vogue these days; the net is crawling with "poets". There are some commitments you can't escape, yet all the wanting in the world won't make you what you want to be; that may or may not come along after you are gone, and by then I don't suppose it will matter much, now will it. Turns out, I was never much good at making a living anyways so it was just as well I wrote things down. Point is--I was certain that is what I wanted to be, since nothing else made any sense; everything I learned from that point on had no practical purpose, it was simply grist for the mill, stuff to be sifted through for the next poem.
Whatever other certainties I acquired, I applied to that. Studied philosophy from Thales to Sartre, dumped most because the next one proved the last one wrong, History from the Nile Valley to the second world war, literature from Homer to Ginsburg. Came away from that with a few things--Birth death rebirth, the absurd, and the dialectic--which seemed reasonable to me. I rejected the formal, preferring instead to see in each finished poem a form. To me the formal structures lacked weight, they determined, not allowed. (many consider a mastery of the forms as liberating, but that is not my view.)At any rate, I determined that I would find my own way through the maze; and that is not so easy as it sounds; everything you read sends you to the next one you will read and certainty about anything retreats ever further away.--Nowadays, and I suppose it was always true, though I cannot be certain of this--most folks will have you do something in one particular fashion; because it is their way, and therefore it is the correct way. Put the square a sixteenth of an inch longer than it should be, and maybe it will come out right, whatever it is, it's a feel for the the thing that matters and that's something you can't be certain of no matter how sure you are that you got it right.
We are entering a brave new world; how may we certain that this theory is any better than the one it debunks? How long will it be before the parameters change; the stars shift?
No, it doesn't matter what theory, we have theories for everything--the computers leave us with a range of probabilities and we just rearrange the facts to fit the current condition, or at least as many of the facts as we can fit into an incomplete and fragmentary picture.--watching the detectives, they often say, "it's all we got to go on--sanitized for public viewing they never smoke anymore--another subtle hint for acceptable behavior, another subject--
One recalls reading the Foundation trilogy--Hari Selden's invention of Psychohistory, and the second Foundation's refinement of the data over a millennium--the project's purpose, of course, was to predict the the future history of the Galactic Empire through the movement of a vast number of people. Even so, the data was incomplete, errors could occur...
Our confrontation today, well, at least mine--is with Economics, Politics & Art, specifically poetry; and I for one, know so little about them that it would be best if I just crawled back in the cave and pulled the bearskin over my head. I should note here, that it would have been my step-dad that killed that bear, if I were confronted by such a fearsome beast, I fear the outcome would be somewhat different.
Through the good graces of our various magic boxes we are indeed bombarded each day with certainties,--yet those same certainties have led us to the brink of Armageddon rather than the steps to the gates of Eden. Something has gone awry. It would seem the experts know more than they are telling us, or they know very little at all.
"No, that's not what I meant at all, I was not sure of things, and really, it just seemed to be that be that way, at the time."
When I was a boy, over in Dogtown, I'd go up to old Earl's and listen to the old men sitting around the Burnside, spitting, telling lies and cussing the politicians. They'd all been union men, democrats and John L. Lewis was a god--one of Grandpa's favorite stories was the time he'd met John L. up in Brownton when the union was first getting going, "shook his hand," he'd always say. They was certain of God, though they weren't very good Christians, certain of the union, punching the chicken on the ballot, and damned certain every politician that had ever been born was going to pick your pocket. Back then, having only one tv channel, and having Uncle Pete as both news anchor and kiddie show host wasn't quite enough to affect the way you behaved; so I hung out with them old guys and probably learned a lot of things I shouldn't have. I suppose, through everything because of that, I have a few certainties of my own deep down inside, one's you might say as I keep for my own.
"There's nothing better that 250 mics of good acid to kick start the cosmic coonhunt for Enlightenment. It takes juice. After all sonny boy, you don't knock down stars with a bee bee gun."
-- Mad Dog Howard, Hippie Doper/Philosopher
http://www.joebageant.com/joe/
Yeh, all that was later on, something about it--where you came to a rockhard place that you knew you were going to and the Great Game was laid bare. Kinda pointless here, to try and illuminate the motel rooms, the neon, the flimsy walls and the animals--but it was what it was at the time: The whole damn world as a charnel house; everything bleeding & breeding and dying--ancient visions now, and prophesies that saw way down deep at the seams of things. I looked at the Nature of things and who we are, and was amazed at the veneer which we use to cover it up. That is another certainty which came along; I suppose if I could translate it, it might be helpful, but I reckon that particular certainty can't be taught or bought or stole.
It was round about that time, I decided I was going to be a poet--Dave's fault really, he wrote about the wheel of life in a little poem, and I was astounded, got lost in a fever from which I have never escaped, and have been lost in the uncertainty of certainty ever since. Damndest thing about it is, you have to learn all this stuff, (damn near everything) just so you can write about that which you cannot know; and that's the easy part. Damn silly thing to want to be in the first place--quite vogue these days; the net is crawling with "poets". There are some commitments you can't escape, yet all the wanting in the world won't make you what you want to be; that may or may not come along after you are gone, and by then I don't suppose it will matter much, now will it. Turns out, I was never much good at making a living anyways so it was just as well I wrote things down. Point is--I was certain that is what I wanted to be, since nothing else made any sense; everything I learned from that point on had no practical purpose, it was simply grist for the mill, stuff to be sifted through for the next poem.
Whatever other certainties I acquired, I applied to that. Studied philosophy from Thales to Sartre, dumped most because the next one proved the last one wrong, History from the Nile Valley to the second world war, literature from Homer to Ginsburg. Came away from that with a few things--Birth death rebirth, the absurd, and the dialectic--which seemed reasonable to me. I rejected the formal, preferring instead to see in each finished poem a form. To me the formal structures lacked weight, they determined, not allowed. (many consider a mastery of the forms as liberating, but that is not my view.)At any rate, I determined that I would find my own way through the maze; and that is not so easy as it sounds; everything you read sends you to the next one you will read and certainty about anything retreats ever further away.--Nowadays, and I suppose it was always true, though I cannot be certain of this--most folks will have you do something in one particular fashion; because it is their way, and therefore it is the correct way. Put the square a sixteenth of an inch longer than it should be, and maybe it will come out right, whatever it is, it's a feel for the the thing that matters and that's something you can't be certain of no matter how sure you are that you got it right.
Saturday, February 14, 2009
The Case for a Fascist society
It seems to me a natural outgrowth of declining Imperium. A loss of control sociologically combined with the most powerful armed force ever known on the planet, and an economy on the verge of complete collapse--makes for a compelling scenario...
We note some differences in the modern Fascism of the Repukes and Neo-Cons--
The first is the largely Jewish makeup of the shadow leadership of the movement: although I am perplexed over whether that has any material relationship to the actual events which seem to be transpiring. Guess that will have to be left to the more paranoid of the conspiracy theorists; they could just as well be Baptists, Presbyterians--more about preserving an aggressive foothold in the Middle East than any thing else, I suppose.
The second is "the use of "champions of law, order, Christian morality, and the sanctity of private property" as ploys rather than principles--as a means to power, propaganda to advance the merger of economics & politics.
the third and most important point where they diverge is in the emergence of "The Leader" principle, until that transpires, that is, until they find a Charismatic leader they cannot move forward. Everything in the Fascist State must revolve around a leader, Fascism cannot function by committee.
________________________________________________________________________________
"Forerunners of fascism, such as Georges Boulanger in France and Adolf Stöker and Karl Lueger in Germany and Austria, in their efforts to gain political power played on people's fears of revolution with its subsequent chaos, anarchy, and general insecurity. They appealed to nationalist sentiments and prejudices, exploited anti-Semitism, and portrayed themselves as champions of law, order, Christian morality, and the sanctity of private property."
"The greatest principle of all is that nobody, whether male or female, should be without a leader. Nor should the mind of anybody be habituated to letting him do anything at all of his own initiative; neither out of zeal, nor even playfully. But in war and in the midst of peace - to his leader he shall direct his eye and follow him faithfully. And even in the smallest matter he should stand under leadership. For example, he should get up, or move, or wash, or take his meals . . only if he has been told to do so, by long habit, never to dream of acting independently, and to become utterly incapable of it."
-Karl R. Popper, The Open Society and Its Enemies, Vol I The Spell of Plato, London, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1969, p. 7
* "The Cult of Tradition", combining cultural syncretism with a rejection of modernism (often disguised as a rejection of capitalism).
* "The Cult of Action for Action's Sake", which dictates that action is of value in itself, and should be taken without intellectual reflection. This, says Eco, is connected with anti-intellectualism and irrationalism, and often manifests in attacks on modern culture and science.
* "Disagreement is Treason" - fascism devalues intellectual discourse and critical reasoning as barriers to action.
* "Fear of Difference", which fascism seeks to exploit and exacerbate, often in the form of racism or an appeal against foreigners and immigrants.
* "Appeal to a Frustrated Middle Class", fearing economic pressure from the demands and aspirations of lower social groups.
* "Obsession With a plot" and the hyping-up of an enemy threat. This often involves an appeal to xenophobia or the identification of an internal security threat. He cites Pat Robertson's book The New World Order as a prominent example of a plot obsession.
* "Pacifism is Trafficking With the Enemy" because "Life is Permanent Warfare" - there must always be an enemy to fight.
* "Contempt for the Weak" - although a fascist society is elitist, everybody in the society is educated to become a hero.
* "Selective Populism" - the People have a common will, which is not delegated but interpreted by a leader. This may involve doubt being cast upon a democratic institution, because "it no longer represents the Voice of the People".
* "Newspeak" - fascism employs and promotes an impoverished vocabulary in order to limit critical reasoning.
Umberto Eco; Essay, "Eternal fascism;" 1995
Thus, the Communist Third International published the following definition:
“ Fascism in power is the open, terroristic dictatorship of the most reactionary, the most chauvinistic, the most imperialistic elements of finance capitalism.
The historic function of fascism is to smash the working class, destroy its organizations, and stifle political liberties when the capitalists find themselves unable to govern and dominate with the help of democratic machinery. ”
— Leon Trotsky, Fascism: What it is and how to fight it
1. Right Wing: Fascists are fervently against: Marxism, Socialism, Anarchism, Communism, Environmentalism; etc – in essence, they are against the progressive left in total, including moderate lefts (social democrats, etc). Fascism is an extreme right wing ideology, though it can be opportunistic.
2. Nationalism: Fascism places a very strong emphasis on patriotism and nationalism. Criticism of the nation's main ideals, especially war, is lambasted as unpatriotic at best, and treason at worst. State propaganda consistently broadcasts threats of attack, while justifying pre-emptive war. Fascism invariably seeks to instill in its people the warrior mentality: to always be vigilant, wary of strangers and suspicious of foreigners.
3. Hierarchy: Fascist society is ruled by a righteous leader, who is supported by an elite secret vanguard of capitalists. Hierarchy is prevalent throughout all aspects of society – every street, every workplace, every school, will have its local Hitler, part police-informer, part bureaucrat – and society is prepared for war at all times. The absolute power of the social hierarchy prevails over everything, and thus a totalitarian society is formed. Representative government is acceptable only if it can be controlled and regulated, direct democracy (e.g. Communism) is the greatest of all crimes. Any who oppose the social hierarchy of fascism will be imprisoned or executed.
4. Anti-equality: Fascism loathes the principles of economic equality and disdains equality between immigrant and citizen. Some forms of fascism extend the fight against equality into other areas: gender, sexual, minority or religious rights, for example.
5. Religious: Fascism contains a strong amount of reactionary religious beliefs, harking back to times when religion was strict, potent, and pure. Nearly all Fascist societies are Christian, and are supported by Catholic and Protestant churches.
6. Capitalist: Fascism does not require revolution to exist in capitalist society: fascists can be elected into office (though their disdain for elections usually means manipulation of the electoral system). They view parliamentary and congressional systems of government to be inefficient and weak, and will do their best to minimize its power over their policy agenda. Fascism exhibits the worst kind of capitalism where corporate power is absolute, and all vestiges of workers' rights are destroyed.
7. War: Fascism is capitalism at the stage of impotent imperialism. War can create markets that would not otherwise exist by wreaking massive devastation on a society, which then requires reconstruction! Fascism can thus "liberate" the survivors, provide huge loans to that society so fascist corporations can begin the process of rebuilding.
8. Voluntarist Ideology: Fascism adopts a certain kind of “voluntarism;” they believe that an act of will, if sufficiently powerful, can make something true. Thus all sorts of ideas about racial inferiority, historical destiny, even physical science, are supported by means of violence, in the belief that they can be made true. It is this sense that Fascism is subjectivist.
9. Anti-Modern: Fascism loathes all kinds of modernism, especially creativity in the arts, whether acting as a mirror for life (where it does not conform to the Fascist ideal), or expressing deviant or innovative points of view. Fascism invariably burns books and victimizes artists, and artists which do not promote the fascists ideals are seen as “decadent.” Fascism is hostile to broad learning and interest in other cultures, since such pursuits threaten the dominance of fascist myths. The peddling of conspiracy theories is usually substituted for the objective study of history.[24]
---Fascism entry in the Encyclopedia of Marxism
We note some differences in the modern Fascism of the Repukes and Neo-Cons--
The first is the largely Jewish makeup of the shadow leadership of the movement: although I am perplexed over whether that has any material relationship to the actual events which seem to be transpiring. Guess that will have to be left to the more paranoid of the conspiracy theorists; they could just as well be Baptists, Presbyterians--more about preserving an aggressive foothold in the Middle East than any thing else, I suppose.
The second is "the use of "champions of law, order, Christian morality, and the sanctity of private property" as ploys rather than principles--as a means to power, propaganda to advance the merger of economics & politics.
the third and most important point where they diverge is in the emergence of "The Leader" principle, until that transpires, that is, until they find a Charismatic leader they cannot move forward. Everything in the Fascist State must revolve around a leader, Fascism cannot function by committee.
________________________________________________________________________________
"Forerunners of fascism, such as Georges Boulanger in France and Adolf Stöker and Karl Lueger in Germany and Austria, in their efforts to gain political power played on people's fears of revolution with its subsequent chaos, anarchy, and general insecurity. They appealed to nationalist sentiments and prejudices, exploited anti-Semitism, and portrayed themselves as champions of law, order, Christian morality, and the sanctity of private property."
"The greatest principle of all is that nobody, whether male or female, should be without a leader. Nor should the mind of anybody be habituated to letting him do anything at all of his own initiative; neither out of zeal, nor even playfully. But in war and in the midst of peace - to his leader he shall direct his eye and follow him faithfully. And even in the smallest matter he should stand under leadership. For example, he should get up, or move, or wash, or take his meals . . only if he has been told to do so, by long habit, never to dream of acting independently, and to become utterly incapable of it."
-Karl R. Popper, The Open Society and Its Enemies, Vol I The Spell of Plato, London, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1969, p. 7
* "The Cult of Tradition", combining cultural syncretism with a rejection of modernism (often disguised as a rejection of capitalism).
* "The Cult of Action for Action's Sake", which dictates that action is of value in itself, and should be taken without intellectual reflection. This, says Eco, is connected with anti-intellectualism and irrationalism, and often manifests in attacks on modern culture and science.
* "Disagreement is Treason" - fascism devalues intellectual discourse and critical reasoning as barriers to action.
* "Fear of Difference", which fascism seeks to exploit and exacerbate, often in the form of racism or an appeal against foreigners and immigrants.
* "Appeal to a Frustrated Middle Class", fearing economic pressure from the demands and aspirations of lower social groups.
* "Obsession With a plot" and the hyping-up of an enemy threat. This often involves an appeal to xenophobia or the identification of an internal security threat. He cites Pat Robertson's book The New World Order as a prominent example of a plot obsession.
* "Pacifism is Trafficking With the Enemy" because "Life is Permanent Warfare" - there must always be an enemy to fight.
* "Contempt for the Weak" - although a fascist society is elitist, everybody in the society is educated to become a hero.
* "Selective Populism" - the People have a common will, which is not delegated but interpreted by a leader. This may involve doubt being cast upon a democratic institution, because "it no longer represents the Voice of the People".
* "Newspeak" - fascism employs and promotes an impoverished vocabulary in order to limit critical reasoning.
Umberto Eco; Essay, "Eternal fascism;" 1995
Thus, the Communist Third International published the following definition:
“ Fascism in power is the open, terroristic dictatorship of the most reactionary, the most chauvinistic, the most imperialistic elements of finance capitalism.
The historic function of fascism is to smash the working class, destroy its organizations, and stifle political liberties when the capitalists find themselves unable to govern and dominate with the help of democratic machinery. ”
— Leon Trotsky, Fascism: What it is and how to fight it
1. Right Wing: Fascists are fervently against: Marxism, Socialism, Anarchism, Communism, Environmentalism; etc – in essence, they are against the progressive left in total, including moderate lefts (social democrats, etc). Fascism is an extreme right wing ideology, though it can be opportunistic.
2. Nationalism: Fascism places a very strong emphasis on patriotism and nationalism. Criticism of the nation's main ideals, especially war, is lambasted as unpatriotic at best, and treason at worst. State propaganda consistently broadcasts threats of attack, while justifying pre-emptive war. Fascism invariably seeks to instill in its people the warrior mentality: to always be vigilant, wary of strangers and suspicious of foreigners.
3. Hierarchy: Fascist society is ruled by a righteous leader, who is supported by an elite secret vanguard of capitalists. Hierarchy is prevalent throughout all aspects of society – every street, every workplace, every school, will have its local Hitler, part police-informer, part bureaucrat – and society is prepared for war at all times. The absolute power of the social hierarchy prevails over everything, and thus a totalitarian society is formed. Representative government is acceptable only if it can be controlled and regulated, direct democracy (e.g. Communism) is the greatest of all crimes. Any who oppose the social hierarchy of fascism will be imprisoned or executed.
4. Anti-equality: Fascism loathes the principles of economic equality and disdains equality between immigrant and citizen. Some forms of fascism extend the fight against equality into other areas: gender, sexual, minority or religious rights, for example.
5. Religious: Fascism contains a strong amount of reactionary religious beliefs, harking back to times when religion was strict, potent, and pure. Nearly all Fascist societies are Christian, and are supported by Catholic and Protestant churches.
6. Capitalist: Fascism does not require revolution to exist in capitalist society: fascists can be elected into office (though their disdain for elections usually means manipulation of the electoral system). They view parliamentary and congressional systems of government to be inefficient and weak, and will do their best to minimize its power over their policy agenda. Fascism exhibits the worst kind of capitalism where corporate power is absolute, and all vestiges of workers' rights are destroyed.
7. War: Fascism is capitalism at the stage of impotent imperialism. War can create markets that would not otherwise exist by wreaking massive devastation on a society, which then requires reconstruction! Fascism can thus "liberate" the survivors, provide huge loans to that society so fascist corporations can begin the process of rebuilding.
8. Voluntarist Ideology: Fascism adopts a certain kind of “voluntarism;” they believe that an act of will, if sufficiently powerful, can make something true. Thus all sorts of ideas about racial inferiority, historical destiny, even physical science, are supported by means of violence, in the belief that they can be made true. It is this sense that Fascism is subjectivist.
9. Anti-Modern: Fascism loathes all kinds of modernism, especially creativity in the arts, whether acting as a mirror for life (where it does not conform to the Fascist ideal), or expressing deviant or innovative points of view. Fascism invariably burns books and victimizes artists, and artists which do not promote the fascists ideals are seen as “decadent.” Fascism is hostile to broad learning and interest in other cultures, since such pursuits threaten the dominance of fascist myths. The peddling of conspiracy theories is usually substituted for the objective study of history.[24]
---Fascism entry in the Encyclopedia of Marxism
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
1984
One looks at our modern world askance--
We can no longer look ahead with any confidence; the forces of freedom and equality have both failed primarily it would seem because of the economic strain which permeates both of them. Alas, Man must have commerce--he must work. At this point in time the world becomes a factory, nothing more than a repository of raw material that sustains our activity. Whatever else may be said of it, this world is finite: much of what sustains us has already been ripped from her bowels. Progress is still viable, but the idea of growth is a noose around our necks.
Fostered by the economic elitist who finds significance only in acquisition this pernicious doctrine of growth has led us to a cul-de-sac from which our whole civilization must be rethought. Profit can no longer be the primary motive; the illusion of "ownership" must be set aside. It must be recognized that greed wherever opportunity exists is the primary motivation in the way our society is structured today.
We are caught between the individual and collectivism, and on both ends of the spectrum the dialectic seems to be the rise of the corporate state; that is, the economic and political spheres are combined into one entity. What sort of tyranny we may expect from this development remains to be seen, though the oppression of the many by the few is a likely outgrowth, given our history.--As an aside, one might note that oppression need not be belligerent, a seemingly benign one works just as well and is even more insidious, leading as it does to a content populace which resists change, until the dominant minority oversteps its bounds, and even then years of inertia hampers any sort of rapid response--
What rises in reaction to the emergence of The Corporate State, which given our History must arise? The union is outlawed, at best under constant attack, and discredited; its members portrayed as reactionary--disloyal to the good of the company; religion is displaced as the dispenser of the Good, all sustenance resides in the generosity of the company, good behavior i.e. obedience, is rewarded by the company, and bad behavior casts one into the darkness of unperson--
What then arises to oppose this conglomerate incipient world state?
It may take various ideological stances depending upon its local necessities, indeed it may not have any clear cut ideology, it exists to oppose--the local papers define it as "terrorism"--tho its practitioners may view themselves differently, ranging from revolutionary to holy warrior to freedom fighter. Depends upon your point of view I suppose; or who signs your paycheck if at this point in time that can be distinguished. Either way, as Orwell pointed out, the State must have an enemy to distract internal dissent.
As I began so I must conclude, askance--
For the "Terrorist" to be effective he must be armed, to be armed he must wield the fruits of the corporate state, that is to say he must be supplied by his enemy. Victory is not the goal, conflict is. Only through conflict can the dialectic be held in stasis, the ideological underpinnings of the corporate state will not stand scrutiny since that basis is only the perpetuation of a dominant minority which has endured since the dawn of the neolithic age.
How do we define madness, and who is it exactly who is mad?
We can no longer look ahead with any confidence; the forces of freedom and equality have both failed primarily it would seem because of the economic strain which permeates both of them. Alas, Man must have commerce--he must work. At this point in time the world becomes a factory, nothing more than a repository of raw material that sustains our activity. Whatever else may be said of it, this world is finite: much of what sustains us has already been ripped from her bowels. Progress is still viable, but the idea of growth is a noose around our necks.
Fostered by the economic elitist who finds significance only in acquisition this pernicious doctrine of growth has led us to a cul-de-sac from which our whole civilization must be rethought. Profit can no longer be the primary motive; the illusion of "ownership" must be set aside. It must be recognized that greed wherever opportunity exists is the primary motivation in the way our society is structured today.
We are caught between the individual and collectivism, and on both ends of the spectrum the dialectic seems to be the rise of the corporate state; that is, the economic and political spheres are combined into one entity. What sort of tyranny we may expect from this development remains to be seen, though the oppression of the many by the few is a likely outgrowth, given our history.--As an aside, one might note that oppression need not be belligerent, a seemingly benign one works just as well and is even more insidious, leading as it does to a content populace which resists change, until the dominant minority oversteps its bounds, and even then years of inertia hampers any sort of rapid response--
What rises in reaction to the emergence of The Corporate State, which given our History must arise? The union is outlawed, at best under constant attack, and discredited; its members portrayed as reactionary--disloyal to the good of the company; religion is displaced as the dispenser of the Good, all sustenance resides in the generosity of the company, good behavior i.e. obedience, is rewarded by the company, and bad behavior casts one into the darkness of unperson--
What then arises to oppose this conglomerate incipient world state?
It may take various ideological stances depending upon its local necessities, indeed it may not have any clear cut ideology, it exists to oppose--the local papers define it as "terrorism"--tho its practitioners may view themselves differently, ranging from revolutionary to holy warrior to freedom fighter. Depends upon your point of view I suppose; or who signs your paycheck if at this point in time that can be distinguished. Either way, as Orwell pointed out, the State must have an enemy to distract internal dissent.
As I began so I must conclude, askance--
For the "Terrorist" to be effective he must be armed, to be armed he must wield the fruits of the corporate state, that is to say he must be supplied by his enemy. Victory is not the goal, conflict is. Only through conflict can the dialectic be held in stasis, the ideological underpinnings of the corporate state will not stand scrutiny since that basis is only the perpetuation of a dominant minority which has endured since the dawn of the neolithic age.
How do we define madness, and who is it exactly who is mad?
Sunday, February 8, 2009
Birth, Death and Rebirth
Still, no matter what Obama does, even in making the finest of choices, somebody’s ox is going to be gored. Especially in a country whose economy and sense of identity is driven by a ridiculous infantile and pointless lifestyle of gadgets,20fads and flatulence. In other words, somebody is not going to get their goddamned pony for Christmas and be pissed as hell. Which makes them prime fodder for demagogues and profiteering corporate sharks.---Joe Baigent
"Goethe(who, With Nietzsche, was Spenglers leading inspiration, as he was also Thomas Mann's) in a brief study called "Epochs of the Spirit" had outlined, already at the opening of the nineteenth century (1817), a sequence of four stages normal to all culture cycles, whether of mankind in general, a civilization, or a nation, which he then summarized in the following diagram:
Beginnings
I Poetry folk Belief Hearty Imagination
II Theology Idealizing Holy Reason
Exaltation
III Philosophy Clarifying Wise Understanding
Devaluation
IV Prose Dissolution Vulgar Sensuality
in Banality
On the 4th Epoch--
This epoch cannot last long. Human need, aggravated by the course of history, leaps backward over intelligent leadership, confuses priestly, folk, and primitive beliefs, grabs now here, now there, at traditions, submerges itself in mysteries, sets fairy tales in the place of poetry, and elevates these to articles of belief. Instead of intelligently instructing and quietly influencing, people now strew seeds and weeds together indiscriminately on all sides; no central point is offered anymore on which to concentrate, but every odd individual steps forward as leader and teacher, and gives forth his perfect folly as a perfected whole.
And so, the force of every mystery is undone, the peoples religion itself is profaned; distinctions that formerly grew from each other in natural development now work against each other as contradictory elements, and thus we have the Tohu-wa-Bohu chaos again: but not the first, gravid, fruitful one, rather, a dying one running to decay, from which not even the spirit of God could create for itself a worthy world.
--Campbell, Creative Mythology, pp. 378-379
See:
Goethe, in "Geistes-Epochen," Sammatliche Werke (1853), Vol 3, pp.327-330
Thomas Mann, Der Zauberberg, (Berlin: S. Fischer Verlag, (1924), pp. 526-528, abridged, English transl. by H.T. Lowe-Porter, The Magic Mountain (New York, Knopf, (1927), pp. 510-511
Yes, of course, imaginative chicanery dug up from the ignorant and innocent past; then again one hopes that you are not missing the latest episode of Desperate Hosewives, or the oracle wherein the ultimate fighter is crowned again this week.--
Be content. Be happy. Despite the isolation, the loneliness and alienation which permeates everything that is touched. Be obedient to your switches and knobs, fill out your registration forms and keep a copy for yourself in the unlikely event that a record will be lost. Be diligent, work hard, pay no attention to the man behind the curtain creating the great Oz, for he is you, whitewashing the old fence over and over again. Swathed in illusion from the cradle to the grave, safe and saved by one creed or another until nothing can be discerned in the yellow fog descending.
Slowly it permeates the whole. The realization that this life you've lived is not your own, bits of it sold, some given away, some stolen, who knows? You want it back but its gone. --one narcotic or another is provided depending on the severity of the malaise, physicians clothed in gold guide you through white halls to the proper treatment areas, should your status merit such consideration, otherwise you are herded with the rest of the mob into long lines to receive injections that will render you harmless until your next premium is due.
At this point, each essential truth is examined and denied. Truth itself is pointed out as a caricature, "life is a joke, and the joke is on you;" sums up "Being and Nothingness," and the world grinds on, host to a motley crew. We founder aimlessly, pinballs bouncing between lights, moths drawn to one flame or another, leaves caught in an uncertain wind. Each succeeding anchor made of sand melts away.
Helplessly we grovel in the entrails of the machine; our hope being that the Collective Will will overcome inertia and erupt erecting barricades and smashing the shop windows once and for all dumping the manikins into the streets so that they can be burned and we can bask in the heat.--Yet the seed says, "Let me me be safe, until I am gone," then the revolution can burn the house to the ground, and the anger gnaws like the fox in a trap who leaves his paw behind to rid himself of the constriction.
Take heed of the Parthenon on the Acropolis, The Colosseum in the heart of Rome--
those who wander in our ruins will find that Myth & poetry in our accomplishments just as well, that Atlantis which rose and fell when the world was cool and abundant; that learned time when men sat about the colonnades in the evening shade and debated Birth, Death, and Rebirth but did not hear the voice inside.
"Goethe(who, With Nietzsche, was Spenglers leading inspiration, as he was also Thomas Mann's) in a brief study called "Epochs of the Spirit" had outlined, already at the opening of the nineteenth century (1817), a sequence of four stages normal to all culture cycles, whether of mankind in general, a civilization, or a nation, which he then summarized in the following diagram:
Beginnings
I Poetry folk Belief Hearty Imagination
II Theology Idealizing Holy Reason
Exaltation
III Philosophy Clarifying Wise Understanding
Devaluation
IV Prose Dissolution Vulgar Sensuality
in Banality
On the 4th Epoch--
This epoch cannot last long. Human need, aggravated by the course of history, leaps backward over intelligent leadership, confuses priestly, folk, and primitive beliefs, grabs now here, now there, at traditions, submerges itself in mysteries, sets fairy tales in the place of poetry, and elevates these to articles of belief. Instead of intelligently instructing and quietly influencing, people now strew seeds and weeds together indiscriminately on all sides; no central point is offered anymore on which to concentrate, but every odd individual steps forward as leader and teacher, and gives forth his perfect folly as a perfected whole.
And so, the force of every mystery is undone, the peoples religion itself is profaned; distinctions that formerly grew from each other in natural development now work against each other as contradictory elements, and thus we have the Tohu-wa-Bohu chaos again: but not the first, gravid, fruitful one, rather, a dying one running to decay, from which not even the spirit of God could create for itself a worthy world.
--Campbell, Creative Mythology, pp. 378-379
See:
Goethe, in "Geistes-Epochen," Sammatliche Werke (1853), Vol 3, pp.327-330
Thomas Mann, Der Zauberberg, (Berlin: S. Fischer Verlag, (1924), pp. 526-528, abridged, English transl. by H.T. Lowe-Porter, The Magic Mountain (New York, Knopf, (1927), pp. 510-511
Yes, of course, imaginative chicanery dug up from the ignorant and innocent past; then again one hopes that you are not missing the latest episode of Desperate Hosewives, or the oracle wherein the ultimate fighter is crowned again this week.--
Be content. Be happy. Despite the isolation, the loneliness and alienation which permeates everything that is touched. Be obedient to your switches and knobs, fill out your registration forms and keep a copy for yourself in the unlikely event that a record will be lost. Be diligent, work hard, pay no attention to the man behind the curtain creating the great Oz, for he is you, whitewashing the old fence over and over again. Swathed in illusion from the cradle to the grave, safe and saved by one creed or another until nothing can be discerned in the yellow fog descending.
Slowly it permeates the whole. The realization that this life you've lived is not your own, bits of it sold, some given away, some stolen, who knows? You want it back but its gone. --one narcotic or another is provided depending on the severity of the malaise, physicians clothed in gold guide you through white halls to the proper treatment areas, should your status merit such consideration, otherwise you are herded with the rest of the mob into long lines to receive injections that will render you harmless until your next premium is due.
At this point, each essential truth is examined and denied. Truth itself is pointed out as a caricature, "life is a joke, and the joke is on you;" sums up "Being and Nothingness," and the world grinds on, host to a motley crew. We founder aimlessly, pinballs bouncing between lights, moths drawn to one flame or another, leaves caught in an uncertain wind. Each succeeding anchor made of sand melts away.
Helplessly we grovel in the entrails of the machine; our hope being that the Collective Will will overcome inertia and erupt erecting barricades and smashing the shop windows once and for all dumping the manikins into the streets so that they can be burned and we can bask in the heat.--Yet the seed says, "Let me me be safe, until I am gone," then the revolution can burn the house to the ground, and the anger gnaws like the fox in a trap who leaves his paw behind to rid himself of the constriction.
Take heed of the Parthenon on the Acropolis, The Colosseum in the heart of Rome--
those who wander in our ruins will find that Myth & poetry in our accomplishments just as well, that Atlantis which rose and fell when the world was cool and abundant; that learned time when men sat about the colonnades in the evening shade and debated Birth, Death, and Rebirth but did not hear the voice inside.
Friday, February 6, 2009
Sorrowful Beings----Discussions
Neon people remove bindings
resemble shadows
bent in angles. They ask,
is gray black?
The dog brings tidings;
the vulture is left with the leavings
Babel is choked with rising smoke
a ritual of angels
music to collide between rests;
geared time fades on the parchment:
morning midday and evening,
night. Gold silver gray and black
tinted by the angel’s roving finger
Mygod is left inside insidious.
hammer falling on iron
the sculptures are deaf
prophets no longer breathe
what spins spins ever faster-
Old Scratch dazed in the field fire
gargoyle in Neon, the poet’s pen-
next or next in ash wood mixed with oil
imprint on shadows
absent of color
flowing.
The first discussion--Portraits.
What if they killed everyone
rather
than just the ones
they told you
came to steal the children
in the night,
and then he said,
each thief must earn his place at the table.
He said it twice
so it must have been important,
...even more of the drab meater
between worlds
as he was held
by another illicit lover
or how faces coalesce
when under siege;
he knew they had some left
she just hadn’t told him
how much.
The city kept exploding like a flashbulb.
First Discussion--Angels
It was not to hurt too much
to set such gravity aside,
days that pass sweetly
the old man climbing the stone step-
as yet they must be so-
the keys used for the old door
clanking
on his hips
like coins too heavy to bear.
Vespers
the bells are muffled by distance;
in the parchments are words
shuffled they may become
legions, an essence of nether worlds,--
in the rafters the pigeons stare uncertainly
certain of the bond
that the old man scratches at,
the keys tossed on the old table
on which the parchments lie.
1st Discussion-Demons
It’s true,
that even in Winter, she would,
walk down the path to the garden
seeking blooms
her hands often trailing in the frost,
bits of the morning lost
I suppose,
bruised at the touch of petals.
who would fear
death by water
in this day & age
when the barks creak together
so harmoniously,
comfortably
between Autumn & Spring
when fire cracks in the evening?
The spider’s web
is long abandoned
a tiny twig spins
in a cold wind.
2nd Discussion--Earth
Why does she wait?
For what?--
In Odessa by the sea
the tenements stink of urine,
The churn of the water
kisses the rock strewn shore with spray.
Churn. Why does she wait?
In Odessa by the sea
Apollo tunes his lyre,
heartbeats;
rain & occasional sunlight,
lovers settle in the wasteland
fingers wet
with singing flesh,
the grotto moans with their weight,
from both worlds free,
enslaved to love;
Stephen says,
“this supreme quality is felt
by the artist when the esthetic quality
is first conceived in his imagination;”
picking his teeth with a wounded match
still, she will wait
bent under went sky
bruised by callous light
churned lovers
displayed
chopped off
white disarrayed
spent
august between infinities--
too much to bear,
they say being god by turns
in Odessa as the sea churns
one less wave subtracted.
2nd Discussion--tat tvam asi
“Life, like a dome of many colored glass
stains the white radiance of Eternity”
---Shelly
Small twigs
like fearsome beasts
peek above the water rocking--
Beyond, the fog is a white wall,
hiding the island of Avalon,
the mountain where Dioce nestles
the long valley of Byzantium,
and more besides,
I bathe in cold water
listening for the rustle of your silks,
your hot breath
the coracle rides on gentle waves,
my pole is a twisted vine
the white wall
towers into the sky;
we may follow the shore,
knowing that it lies,
or pierce the wall
and leave such concerns behind--
all that was
fading in the wake.
2nd discussion--Theory
Herein lies the fact:
within the mime
beneath the rumble of his mind
Chaos tends her garden
just as she always has;
each bean divides half way to the end of time.
“Oh, Mother please just let me be
dangling at the end with a rope
my throat sore
the juncture of my motive
worn & cold
the wind of all this noise
passed within my years,”
“skip this blue for rose”
she says fading
sowing the beans
on the stage
where the mind finds himself
abruptly,
coughing.
Discussion three--Texture
The matrix sags where I stand
over time I shall become lighter
sleep with Faust on the cathedral steps,
carry Isolt's veil,
climb upon the angel’s lap
steal feathers from his wings
and read him childrens tales;
Delayed us all,
this wicked gravity hung about the hall
with gaunt men watching the smoke fall;
I lean crossways writing obituaries
with a pen
my clothes are loose
like a shroud
my hands are long and pale,
the air is stale and hangs about too long,
the devils in my dreams carry nets
and scream,
I deem myself too heavy
turn sideways and slip through the cracks.
In the dust
there are papers scattered about
husks of dry thought
mutters or whispers
you decide which.
Discussion 3--Laughter.
bedlam, white foot
in yellow sandal, the sea
tangled in nets, snow
in deep valleys waits for spring.
trapped in corners
in the angles as words explode,
implode those eyes, corrode
the walls of sanctum
given over to the holy war
“I is I, mastuh” divine,
somewhere along the way
someone surely--
the crash of metal chairs
sliding across the parquet floor
an echo of loud smiles;
The Centurion wipes his grizzled beard
of stale wine in the sea of murderous glances,
“how brave this sanity” says the decorator
changing drapes yet again, glowing in starlight
as algae shrinks
on the bottom of the window sill;
what matter the shape of the mirror, Horatio,
if Alice were blind-
each copy bled to a startling paleness
blurred edges in those same angles.
Still it pushed its way through,
groveling
pitiful in its plea.
Discussion 3--Dog
In the dark, Finn
fiddles with his hard-on,
depicting shadows on membrane;
expanding
he counts cunt hairs
in preparation for eternity.
here he is sleeping, here he is,
beside me she says,
next to fresh meat and clear water,
thus that piercing cruelty
will taste sweet when he wakes
when he wakes with a dry tongue
and a bright sword
reflecting the dog star
and the emptiness between.
here is my daughter says the star
wide awake beneath the night sky
wide she is against the earth
and Finn sleeps on
his ardor creased on the edge of the sword--
The splash was ever more bold
than a nick from a boar--
the hound in the distance on a false trail
while Finn dreams the world.
resemble shadows
bent in angles. They ask,
is gray black?
The dog brings tidings;
the vulture is left with the leavings
Babel is choked with rising smoke
a ritual of angels
music to collide between rests;
geared time fades on the parchment:
morning midday and evening,
night. Gold silver gray and black
tinted by the angel’s roving finger
Mygod is left inside insidious.
hammer falling on iron
the sculptures are deaf
prophets no longer breathe
what spins spins ever faster-
Old Scratch dazed in the field fire
gargoyle in Neon, the poet’s pen-
next or next in ash wood mixed with oil
imprint on shadows
absent of color
flowing.
The first discussion--Portraits.
What if they killed everyone
rather
than just the ones
they told you
came to steal the children
in the night,
and then he said,
each thief must earn his place at the table.
He said it twice
so it must have been important,
...even more of the drab meater
between worlds
as he was held
by another illicit lover
or how faces coalesce
when under siege;
he knew they had some left
she just hadn’t told him
how much.
The city kept exploding like a flashbulb.
First Discussion--Angels
It was not to hurt too much
to set such gravity aside,
days that pass sweetly
the old man climbing the stone step-
as yet they must be so-
the keys used for the old door
clanking
on his hips
like coins too heavy to bear.
Vespers
the bells are muffled by distance;
in the parchments are words
shuffled they may become
legions, an essence of nether worlds,--
in the rafters the pigeons stare uncertainly
certain of the bond
that the old man scratches at,
the keys tossed on the old table
on which the parchments lie.
1st Discussion-Demons
It’s true,
that even in Winter, she would,
walk down the path to the garden
seeking blooms
her hands often trailing in the frost,
bits of the morning lost
I suppose,
bruised at the touch of petals.
who would fear
death by water
in this day & age
when the barks creak together
so harmoniously,
comfortably
between Autumn & Spring
when fire cracks in the evening?
The spider’s web
is long abandoned
a tiny twig spins
in a cold wind.
2nd Discussion--Earth
Why does she wait?
For what?--
In Odessa by the sea
the tenements stink of urine,
The churn of the water
kisses the rock strewn shore with spray.
Churn. Why does she wait?
In Odessa by the sea
Apollo tunes his lyre,
heartbeats;
rain & occasional sunlight,
lovers settle in the wasteland
fingers wet
with singing flesh,
the grotto moans with their weight,
from both worlds free,
enslaved to love;
Stephen says,
“this supreme quality is felt
by the artist when the esthetic quality
is first conceived in his imagination;”
picking his teeth with a wounded match
still, she will wait
bent under went sky
bruised by callous light
churned lovers
displayed
chopped off
white disarrayed
spent
august between infinities--
too much to bear,
they say being god by turns
in Odessa as the sea churns
one less wave subtracted.
2nd Discussion--tat tvam asi
“Life, like a dome of many colored glass
stains the white radiance of Eternity”
---Shelly
Small twigs
like fearsome beasts
peek above the water rocking--
Beyond, the fog is a white wall,
hiding the island of Avalon,
the mountain where Dioce nestles
the long valley of Byzantium,
and more besides,
I bathe in cold water
listening for the rustle of your silks,
your hot breath
the coracle rides on gentle waves,
my pole is a twisted vine
the white wall
towers into the sky;
we may follow the shore,
knowing that it lies,
or pierce the wall
and leave such concerns behind--
all that was
fading in the wake.
2nd discussion--Theory
Herein lies the fact:
within the mime
beneath the rumble of his mind
Chaos tends her garden
just as she always has;
each bean divides half way to the end of time.
“Oh, Mother please just let me be
dangling at the end with a rope
my throat sore
the juncture of my motive
worn & cold
the wind of all this noise
passed within my years,”
“skip this blue for rose”
she says fading
sowing the beans
on the stage
where the mind finds himself
abruptly,
coughing.
Discussion three--Texture
The matrix sags where I stand
over time I shall become lighter
sleep with Faust on the cathedral steps,
carry Isolt's veil,
climb upon the angel’s lap
steal feathers from his wings
and read him childrens tales;
Delayed us all,
this wicked gravity hung about the hall
with gaunt men watching the smoke fall;
I lean crossways writing obituaries
with a pen
my clothes are loose
like a shroud
my hands are long and pale,
the air is stale and hangs about too long,
the devils in my dreams carry nets
and scream,
I deem myself too heavy
turn sideways and slip through the cracks.
In the dust
there are papers scattered about
husks of dry thought
mutters or whispers
you decide which.
Discussion 3--Laughter.
bedlam, white foot
in yellow sandal, the sea
tangled in nets, snow
in deep valleys waits for spring.
trapped in corners
in the angles as words explode,
implode those eyes, corrode
the walls of sanctum
given over to the holy war
“I is I, mastuh” divine,
somewhere along the way
someone surely--
the crash of metal chairs
sliding across the parquet floor
an echo of loud smiles;
The Centurion wipes his grizzled beard
of stale wine in the sea of murderous glances,
“how brave this sanity” says the decorator
changing drapes yet again, glowing in starlight
as algae shrinks
on the bottom of the window sill;
what matter the shape of the mirror, Horatio,
if Alice were blind-
each copy bled to a startling paleness
blurred edges in those same angles.
Still it pushed its way through,
groveling
pitiful in its plea.
Discussion 3--Dog
In the dark, Finn
fiddles with his hard-on,
depicting shadows on membrane;
expanding
he counts cunt hairs
in preparation for eternity.
here he is sleeping, here he is,
beside me she says,
next to fresh meat and clear water,
thus that piercing cruelty
will taste sweet when he wakes
when he wakes with a dry tongue
and a bright sword
reflecting the dog star
and the emptiness between.
here is my daughter says the star
wide awake beneath the night sky
wide she is against the earth
and Finn sleeps on
his ardor creased on the edge of the sword--
The splash was ever more bold
than a nick from a boar--
the hound in the distance on a false trail
while Finn dreams the world.
The Gloved Hand---
The only card we had was our humanity. Our dedication to the rule of law, and the rights of Man.
We tossed it back into the deck, and descended to the level of our adversary. It is a War of Ideas, not casualties, not attacks and counter attacks--we were wrong from the outset, and we are still wrong today. Every action we have taken has only reinforced the position of Al Qaida in the Muslim world, unprovoked invasion, rendition, torture, the denial of basic human rights. Put yourself in the shoes of a young Muslim throwing rocks at tanks in Gaza, or Beirut, Kabul, or Bagdad--madness, an idiotic useless madness. One that will not depart soon--
Cheney:
The choice, he alleged, reflects a naive mindset among the new team in Washington: “The United States needs to be not so much loved as it needs to be respected. Sometimes, that requires us to take actions that generate controversy. I’m not at all sure that that’s what the Obama administration believes.”
No, we need not be loved, but respect is not gained by fear, or by ignoring our own principles. If, indeed, we have any anymore, other than our own fear, and our greed.
I would submit that our world stands upon a precipice, environmentally, economically, and sociologically. None of which will be solved by tanks, missiles, or boots on the ground. I rather doubt the leadership of Al Qaida even undertook any serious plans to attack the United States since the events of 9/11, that action itself unleashed the exact response they were looking for--the naked fist of the beast smashing everything in its path.
Like I said, we tossed the only card we had, and it read compassion.
We tossed it back into the deck, and descended to the level of our adversary. It is a War of Ideas, not casualties, not attacks and counter attacks--we were wrong from the outset, and we are still wrong today. Every action we have taken has only reinforced the position of Al Qaida in the Muslim world, unprovoked invasion, rendition, torture, the denial of basic human rights. Put yourself in the shoes of a young Muslim throwing rocks at tanks in Gaza, or Beirut, Kabul, or Bagdad--madness, an idiotic useless madness. One that will not depart soon--
Cheney:
The choice, he alleged, reflects a naive mindset among the new team in Washington: “The United States needs to be not so much loved as it needs to be respected. Sometimes, that requires us to take actions that generate controversy. I’m not at all sure that that’s what the Obama administration believes.”
No, we need not be loved, but respect is not gained by fear, or by ignoring our own principles. If, indeed, we have any anymore, other than our own fear, and our greed.
I would submit that our world stands upon a precipice, environmentally, economically, and sociologically. None of which will be solved by tanks, missiles, or boots on the ground. I rather doubt the leadership of Al Qaida even undertook any serious plans to attack the United States since the events of 9/11, that action itself unleashed the exact response they were looking for--the naked fist of the beast smashing everything in its path.
Like I said, we tossed the only card we had, and it read compassion.
Thursday, October 16, 2008
Harlequin
What becomes of the prey,
silk in the seams of the harlequin's gown,
as though the angel might be induced to smile
they become scarce
emeralds into broaches
the accompaniment of bird
song,
the clown tumbling in a mauve landscape.
II.
Likkered up he ain’t no poem,
is: the hawk distended fells
the sparrow in open air
ordination in the village
with high song
continues
fraught with the Widow’s final rites
some years hence;
the boy’s gray hair sparse and disheveled
in the wind-
the low orbit of the hawk
will carry him screaming over the earth.
III.
Set against the wall of the angel
it must void itself,
mark the trail of the sparrow flailing
leave its worth in unsaying
particular or worse
in the shoals where the rocks are sharp
and blood is dispersed.
had the angel spoken
leisure would be at hand-
the sparrow safe upon the widow’s shoulder
a word
to shatter ill-kept stars
shuddering to an end
a calliope no longer shouldering the wind;
the owned word listless with praise
broken
sun raised
a blood salt
ungiven to pain
the harlequin tumbles in plain sight
soundless
in the eye of the hawk.
IV.
Set against silence
the eye world does not blink
turbulence shears the blood
the pink foam laughing
seeds the sea,
The leaf falls
lovers seat themselves in coves
the beaten flesh endures
coveting words,
the widow’s web
a bridge to soar upon
while the hawk weaves
between the threads
his wings outspread.
silk in the seams of the harlequin's gown,
as though the angel might be induced to smile
they become scarce
emeralds into broaches
the accompaniment of bird
song,
the clown tumbling in a mauve landscape.
II.
Likkered up he ain’t no poem,
is: the hawk distended fells
the sparrow in open air
ordination in the village
with high song
continues
fraught with the Widow’s final rites
some years hence;
the boy’s gray hair sparse and disheveled
in the wind-
the low orbit of the hawk
will carry him screaming over the earth.
III.
Set against the wall of the angel
it must void itself,
mark the trail of the sparrow flailing
leave its worth in unsaying
particular or worse
in the shoals where the rocks are sharp
and blood is dispersed.
had the angel spoken
leisure would be at hand-
the sparrow safe upon the widow’s shoulder
a word
to shatter ill-kept stars
shuddering to an end
a calliope no longer shouldering the wind;
the owned word listless with praise
broken
sun raised
a blood salt
ungiven to pain
the harlequin tumbles in plain sight
soundless
in the eye of the hawk.
IV.
Set against silence
the eye world does not blink
turbulence shears the blood
the pink foam laughing
seeds the sea,
The leaf falls
lovers seat themselves in coves
the beaten flesh endures
coveting words,
the widow’s web
a bridge to soar upon
while the hawk weaves
between the threads
his wings outspread.
A Modest Analysis:
"In a system...where the entire continuity of the...process rests upon credit, a crisis must obviously occur -- a tremendous rush for means of payment -- when credit suddenly ceases and only cash payments have validity. At first glance, therefore, the whole crisis seems to be merely a credit and money crisis. And in fact it is only a question of the convertibility of bills of exchange into money. But the
majority of these bills represent actual sales and purchases, whose extension far beyond the needs of society is, after all, the basis of the whole crisis. At the same time, an enormous quantity of these bills of exchange represents plain swindle, which now reaches the light of day and collapses; furthermore, unsuccessful speculation with the capital of other people; finally, commodity-capital which has depreciated or is completely unsaleable, or returns that can never more be realized again. The entire artificial system of forced expansion of the economy cannot, of course, be remedied by having some bank, like the Bank of England, give to all the swindlers the deficient capital by means of its paper and having it buy up all the depreciated commodities at their old nominal values. Incidentally, everything here appears distorted, since in this paper world, the real price and its real basis appear nowhere, but only bullion, metal coin, notes, bills
of exchange, securities. Particularly in centers where the entire money business of the country is concentrated, like London ...the entire process becomes incomprehensible."
-- Karl Marx's Capital, Volume 3, Chapter 30, "Money-Capital and Real Capital", 1867.
majority of these bills represent actual sales and purchases, whose extension far beyond the needs of society is, after all, the basis of the whole crisis. At the same time, an enormous quantity of these bills of exchange represents plain swindle, which now reaches the light of day and collapses; furthermore, unsuccessful speculation with the capital of other people; finally, commodity-capital which has depreciated or is completely unsaleable, or returns that can never more be realized again. The entire artificial system of forced expansion of the economy cannot, of course, be remedied by having some bank, like the Bank of England, give to all the swindlers the deficient capital by means of its paper and having it buy up all the depreciated commodities at their old nominal values. Incidentally, everything here appears distorted, since in this paper world, the real price and its real basis appear nowhere, but only bullion, metal coin, notes, bills
of exchange, securities. Particularly in centers where the entire money business of the country is concentrated, like London ...the entire process becomes incomprehensible."
-- Karl Marx's Capital, Volume 3, Chapter 30, "Money-Capital and Real Capital", 1867.
Saturday, October 4, 2008
The Bankers
"The Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, also known as the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Financial Services Modernization Act, Pub.L. 106-102, 113 Stat. 1338, enacted 1999-11-12, is an Act of the United States Congress which repealed part of the Glass-Steagall Act, opening up competition among banks, securities companies and insurance companies."
old Uncle Ezra says--
"I have of course never said that cash is constant
(Douglas) and in fact the population (Britain 1914)
was left with 800 millions of "deposits"
after all the cash had been drawn, and
these deposits were satisfied by the
printing of treasury notes."
...he goes on, that was some years ago in a canto. Mad as a hatter, so they say, Uncle Ez, going on and on about the bankers, and Greed. 'Course everyone knows Bankers are not greedy, that's why they're bankers, and not lawyers running for office.
Everybody knows how to fix this thing. --Some say it has already been fixed by the Bankers and the lawyers who have gotten into Office.--Others say they have gone about it the wrong way; others that it ought to stay broke cause there ain't no fixin it anyways.
Didya ever shake up a soda and take the cap off?
Be a shame to lose all this ease and convenience, phoning in your prescription on your Medicare card; watching old movies on tv when you are half asleep, or reading the bad news on your computer screen and weeping.
"Trust no-one, little marmoset." That's what Herod told Claudius upon his ascension to the Imperium, well according to Mr. Graves. Seems like someone forgot that in the maze of contracts, the blind alleys and paper shuffling. Another thing about it is the infantile mandate, "I want", but that sandbox is already full of discarded toys, lumps of coal pretending to be diamonds, garages full of Things that haven't been seen for years.
So we'll have a yard sale they say! Biggest in years--
"I have lost the cutting but apparently
such things do still happen, he
suicided outside her door while
the family was preparing her body for burial
and she knew this was the case."
...Uncle Ez a few lines earlier. Ain't it amazing how the tone can change?
Let's just look at all this: first they pass that above law so the bankers can get into real estate from front to back--then they sell a lot of it so the price goes up on their papers, then the deal goes south and the paper they got is worthless so they sell it to the government and now they are going to buy it back with the government money and then resell it as the price begins to climb? (This is called a Crisis, since if they don't get their way they sell stock in a frenzy, and withold their cash from the market). Don't matter to the little guy he's burnt from asshole to elbow anyways, cause he thought he was getting over in the first place.
Yeppie doodles. Uncle Ez says somewhere that the first thing people should learn is Economics. Some folks think they do.--Seems to me the first law you gotta learn, is where to hide the money. Poor folk don't get much practice at that, the money being mostly gone by the time they get it. It doesn't really matter how much they give you in Mr. Marx's labor pool, they find a way to get it back from you before you even know you had it. That's probably the second law they teach in Economic school. The third is to say even less than a politician is apt to which isn't a lot so just write out the check.
I know some places back in the hills where money has always been in short supply. The good times was back in the day when you could get government checks for babies, and the only thing wrong with the Cadillac on blocks in the backyard was a busted waterpump. Things change; though I don't suppose babies are in short supply, you can't even find the waterpump on a Caddy anymore, not that it matters to the Bankers, or the lawyers who got into office they'll just buy a new one with their government check.
old Uncle Ezra says--
"I have of course never said that cash is constant
(Douglas) and in fact the population (Britain 1914)
was left with 800 millions of "deposits"
after all the cash had been drawn, and
these deposits were satisfied by the
printing of treasury notes."
...he goes on, that was some years ago in a canto. Mad as a hatter, so they say, Uncle Ez, going on and on about the bankers, and Greed. 'Course everyone knows Bankers are not greedy, that's why they're bankers, and not lawyers running for office.
Everybody knows how to fix this thing. --Some say it has already been fixed by the Bankers and the lawyers who have gotten into Office.--Others say they have gone about it the wrong way; others that it ought to stay broke cause there ain't no fixin it anyways.
Didya ever shake up a soda and take the cap off?
Be a shame to lose all this ease and convenience, phoning in your prescription on your Medicare card; watching old movies on tv when you are half asleep, or reading the bad news on your computer screen and weeping.
"Trust no-one, little marmoset." That's what Herod told Claudius upon his ascension to the Imperium, well according to Mr. Graves. Seems like someone forgot that in the maze of contracts, the blind alleys and paper shuffling. Another thing about it is the infantile mandate, "I want", but that sandbox is already full of discarded toys, lumps of coal pretending to be diamonds, garages full of Things that haven't been seen for years.
So we'll have a yard sale they say! Biggest in years--
"I have lost the cutting but apparently
such things do still happen, he
suicided outside her door while
the family was preparing her body for burial
and she knew this was the case."
...Uncle Ez a few lines earlier. Ain't it amazing how the tone can change?
Let's just look at all this: first they pass that above law so the bankers can get into real estate from front to back--then they sell a lot of it so the price goes up on their papers, then the deal goes south and the paper they got is worthless so they sell it to the government and now they are going to buy it back with the government money and then resell it as the price begins to climb? (This is called a Crisis, since if they don't get their way they sell stock in a frenzy, and withold their cash from the market). Don't matter to the little guy he's burnt from asshole to elbow anyways, cause he thought he was getting over in the first place.
Yeppie doodles. Uncle Ez says somewhere that the first thing people should learn is Economics. Some folks think they do.--Seems to me the first law you gotta learn, is where to hide the money. Poor folk don't get much practice at that, the money being mostly gone by the time they get it. It doesn't really matter how much they give you in Mr. Marx's labor pool, they find a way to get it back from you before you even know you had it. That's probably the second law they teach in Economic school. The third is to say even less than a politician is apt to which isn't a lot so just write out the check.
I know some places back in the hills where money has always been in short supply. The good times was back in the day when you could get government checks for babies, and the only thing wrong with the Cadillac on blocks in the backyard was a busted waterpump. Things change; though I don't suppose babies are in short supply, you can't even find the waterpump on a Caddy anymore, not that it matters to the Bankers, or the lawyers who got into office they'll just buy a new one with their government check.
Friday, October 3, 2008
Armageddon
Everywhere there is the call to Action; yet the great mass does not move. It seems frozen in place. Waiting. The crisis, if upon us, seems hollow, distant. When will it come we say, looking at the darkening sky. though we know it to be so, and feel it in our bones we will not believe that it is so; do The Nobles not play at dice before their crackling fire? The wheels appear to turn. Here and there an odd man reads the paper unconcerned by its deceits, the scores are true, and who has murdered whom, the name of the stars might change but they are still luminous, the pipers play a happy tune.
Some might see the shadow of a Man, he has his own name, but he has gone by many in the past, when the fires descend, when there is ruin, more often then not, some say, he leaves death in his wake.--No-one listens to dreamers, do they? Not in this day and age when we have surpassed all that our fathers ever dreamed of...
Prophets are a dime a dozen, poets even cheaper, it's too easy to string together words, to make dire thoughts. I have lived in a cold clime, and the warmer weather suits me just fine, I have no need to worry about old men in fine suits who walk under sunny skies discussing the weather...as yet I do not see the smoke from distant fires, but the merchants are wringing their hands and moping about.--
How is it they have become bedfellows with the politicians? Surely this was not always so? Something is amiss in the cosmos. The world moves too slowly, bodies are ground to a fine powder and sold as fertilizer, grease for the wheels, they say, mumbling of their poverty; yet all is well as they will have saved us once again, some say, by selling the beggared children into slavery for the glory of our bright tomorrows. We will be well and prosper--though the dreamers, and prophets and the poets would not have it so; tinkering with our madness as if all we know is just an illusion, or a bit of paper emblazoned with cartoon saints stabbing themselves.
Still! there is that need, deep down, that something wants to be done, and still the great Machine groans on raping the stripped earth. We die quietly in its path hugging our hoarded wealth; though always in the end we are left with nothing more than our bloated skin.
Some might see the shadow of a Man, he has his own name, but he has gone by many in the past, when the fires descend, when there is ruin, more often then not, some say, he leaves death in his wake.--No-one listens to dreamers, do they? Not in this day and age when we have surpassed all that our fathers ever dreamed of...
Prophets are a dime a dozen, poets even cheaper, it's too easy to string together words, to make dire thoughts. I have lived in a cold clime, and the warmer weather suits me just fine, I have no need to worry about old men in fine suits who walk under sunny skies discussing the weather...as yet I do not see the smoke from distant fires, but the merchants are wringing their hands and moping about.--
How is it they have become bedfellows with the politicians? Surely this was not always so? Something is amiss in the cosmos. The world moves too slowly, bodies are ground to a fine powder and sold as fertilizer, grease for the wheels, they say, mumbling of their poverty; yet all is well as they will have saved us once again, some say, by selling the beggared children into slavery for the glory of our bright tomorrows. We will be well and prosper--though the dreamers, and prophets and the poets would not have it so; tinkering with our madness as if all we know is just an illusion, or a bit of paper emblazoned with cartoon saints stabbing themselves.
Still! there is that need, deep down, that something wants to be done, and still the great Machine groans on raping the stripped earth. We die quietly in its path hugging our hoarded wealth; though always in the end we are left with nothing more than our bloated skin.
The consolidation of Disparate Positions
Here is another voice crying in the wilderness.
The Republican Party is on the verge of Collapse--but it needs a push.
The Democratic party no longer has an ideological center--it needs a spur--
--and you guys in the baby parties are all running around without a snowball's chance in hell of ever getting anywhere in the pursuit of the office of "The Big Cheese", (currently occupied by Mr. Paulson by virtue of the senatus consultum currently being passed by congress), and consequently none of your supposedly innovative ideas will ever see the light of day.
Yeh well-you dimwits, this is supposed to be a Democracy, wherein compromise and coalition are weapons the people should be able to use as a bulwark against elitism. Holy corporation, Batman, we're fucked again.
Why's that? Well, everybody wants to be the big cheese.--and the only two (besides Mr. Paulson, may his reign be long and prosperous) who have a chance for that; are big on platitudes but mired in cookie cutter personalities who all want a piece of the action. Which sucks pond water as far as the future of the republic is concerned. I don't really see that changing, we've gotten too big for our britches (we've got Aircraft Carriers, for Gods Sake)--and we have to be first in everything, all the time. Even if serious consideration were given to my proposal, (which I haven't given yet, were adopted: fat chance) there you'd be wanting to be Secretary of this or that, huffing and puffing about, forgetting where you came from and all that, as if you might actually be better than someone else--which has gotten us into all this trouble in the first place.
America, dudes.
Now me, down here at the bottom of the heap; just waiting for the electric to get turned off, or the sheriff to finally catch up to me for my various indiscretions in the matter of survival has a different point of view. I got no property, I don't have no stinking job where some witless yahoo is telling me what to do, my lover is married to some other dude, and for a career path I have chosen to write poetry which by way of remuneration earns nothing but ridicule in this the best of all possible worlds.
Not to worry, I get by--just don't ask me no questions. The fact that your world is falling down about your ears worries me not at all. I gotta kitten on my lap, and my lover plans to slip away today, despite the stock market's imminent fall. "Been down so long it looks like up to me," he said warbling an old song--
Ah! But you guys you ain't so lucky. You gotta a long ways to fall when the wells run dry. The Free Money dropping out of the sky won't fall so far. And like as not you're going to get buried in the crop dust. 9/11 and the holy wars take a seat on the back burner, the gas is turned off anyway, how do you get the point across?
Simple, really. Have yourselves a cabal, I suppose you'll have to invite yourself, just to make sure nothing goes wrong, no-one in my generation ever wanted to miss a party anyways--a consortium: agree not to disagree so vehemently for a while--toss your names in a hat, then do it again for a number two. What have you got to lose?
America, dudes?--Aircraft Carriers rusting at the pier.
shortly after the birth of a New American Party, a man said this:
"Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this."
I would submit to you that democracy is a constant battle, your decision rests not on your petty ideas of Left vs Right, or in the constancy of your ambitions--rather, it is the very survival of the republic that is at stake. Whine all you want about your goddamn principles and the fact that you are right and they are wrong, put your name in the hat. It is altogether possible that within a small span of years, indeed it may already be impossible, that such a coalition will not be viable--you will be deemed "illegal" and a threat to the Empire. Recall the death of Cicero, at the hands of a nervous Octavian--the punishment of patriots is often cruel.
Wednesday, October 1, 2008
The Case Against John McCain
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/10/01/mccain-aspire-dictator/
Straight Talk Express:
Here’s the list.
National Security Policy
1. McCain thought Bush’s warrantless-wiretap program circumvented the law; now he believes the opposite.
2. McCain insisted that everyone, even “terrible killers,” “the worst kind of scum of humanity,” and detainees at Guantanamo Bay, “deserve to have some adjudication of their cases,” even if that means “releasing some of them.” McCain now believes the opposite.
3. He opposed indefinite detention of terrorist suspects. When the Supreme Court reached the same conclusion, he called it “one of the worst decisions in the history of this country.”
4. In February 2008, McCain reversed course on prohibiting waterboarding.
5. McCain was for closing the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay before he was against it.
6. When Barack Obama talked about going after terrorists in Pakistani mountains with predators, McCain criticized him for it. He’s since come to the opposite conclusion.Foreign Policy
7. McCain was for kicking Russia out of the G8 before he was against it. Now, he’s for it again.
8. McCain supported moving “towards normalization of relations” with Cuba. Now he believes the opposite.
9. McCain believed the U.S. should engage in diplomacy with Hamas. Now he believes the opposite.
10. McCain believed the U.S. should engage in diplomacy with Syria. Now he believes the opposite.
11. McCain is both for and against a “rogue state rollback” as a focus of his foreign policy vision.
12. McCain used to champion the Law of the Sea convention, even volunteering to testify on the treaty’s behalf before a Senate committee. Now he opposes it.
13. McCain was against divestment from South Africa before he was for it.
Military Policy
14. McCain recently claimed that he was the “greatest critic” of Rumsfeld’s failed Iraq policy. In December 2003, McCain praised the same strategy as “a mission accomplished.” In March 2004, he said, “I’m confident we’re on the right course.” In December 2005, he said, “Overall, I think a year from now, we will have made a fair amount of progress if we stay the course.”
15. McCain has changed his mind about a long-term U.S. military presence in Iraq on multiple occasions, concluding, on multiple occasions, that a Korea-like presence is both a good and a bad idea.
16. McCain was against additional U.S. forces in Afghanistan before he was for it.
17. McCain said before the war in Iraq, “We will win this conflict. We will win it easily.” Four years later, McCain said he knew all along that the war in Iraq war was “probably going to be long and hard and tough.”
18. McCain has repeatedly said it’s a dangerous mistake to tell the “enemy” when U.S. troops would be out of Iraq. In May, McCain announced that most American troops would be home from Iraq by 2013.
19. McCain was against expanding the GI Bill before he was for it.
20. McCain staunchly opposed Obama’s Iraq withdrawal timetable, and even blasted Mitt Romney for having referenced the word during the GOP primaries. In July, after Iraqi officials endorsed Obama’s policy, McCain said a 16-month calendar sounds like “a pretty good timetable.”
Domestic Policy
21. McCain defended “privatizing” Social Security. Now he says he’s against privatization (though he actually still supports it.)
22. On Social Security, McCain said he would not, under any circumstances, raise taxes. Soon after, asked about a possible increase in the payroll tax, McCain said there’s “nothing that’s off the table.”
23. McCain wanted to change the Republican Party platform to protect abortion rights in cases of rape and incest. Now he doesn’t.
24. McCain supported storing spent nuclear fuel at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. Now he believes the opposite.
25. He argued the NRA should not have a role in the Republican Party’s policy making. Now he believes the opposite.
26. In 1998, he championed raising cigarette taxes to fund programs to cut underage smoking, insisting that it would prevent illnesses and provide resources for public health programs. Now, McCain opposes a $0.61-per-pack tax increase, won’t commit to supporting a regulation bill he’s co-sponsoring, and has hired Philip Morris’ former lobbyist as his senior campaign adviser.
27. McCain is both for and against earmarks for Arizona.
28. McCain’s first mortgage plan was premised on the notion that homeowners facing foreclosure shouldn’t be “rewarded” for acting “irresponsibly.” His second mortgage plan took largely the opposite position.
29. McCain went from saying gay marriage should be allowed, to saying gay marriage shouldn’t be allowed.
30. McCain opposed a holiday to honor Martin Luther King, Jr., before he supported it.
31. McCain was anti-ethanol. Now he’s pro-ethanol.
32. McCain was both for and against state promotion of the Confederate flag.
33. In 2005, McCain endorsed intelligent design creationism, a year later he said the opposite, and a few months after that, he was both for and against creationism at the same time.
34. And on gay adoption, McCain initially said he’d rather let orphans go without families, then his campaign reversed course, and soon after, McCain reversed back.
35. In the Senate, McCain opposed a variety of measures on equal pay for women, and endorsed the Supreme Court’s Ledbetter decision. In July, however, McCain said, “I’m committed to making sure that there’s equal pay for equal work. That … is my record and you can count on it.”
36. McCain was against fully funding the No Child Left Behind Act before he was for it.
37. McCain was for affirmative action before he was against it.
38. McCain said the Colorado River compact will “obviously” need to be “renegotiated.” Six days later, McCain said, “Let me be clear that I do not advocate renegotiation of the compact.”Economic Policy
39. McCain was against Bush’s tax cuts for the very wealthy before he was for them.
40. John McCain initially argued that economics is not an area of expertise for him, saying, “I’m going to be honest: I know a lot less about economics than I do about military and foreign policy issues; I still need to be educated,” and “The issue of economics is not something I’ve understood as well as I should.” He now falsely denies ever having made these remarks and insists that he has a “very strong” understanding of economics.
41. McCain vowed, if elected, to balance the federal budget by the end of his first term. Soon after, he decided he would no longer even try to reach that goal. And soon after that, McCain abandoned his second position and went back to his first.
42. McCain said in 2005 that he opposed the tax cuts because they were “too tilted to the wealthy.” By 2007, he denied ever having said this, and falsely argued that he opposed the cuts because of increased government spending.
43. McCain thought the estate tax was perfectly fair. Now he believes the opposite.
44. McCain pledged in February 2008 that he would not, under any circumstances, raise taxes. Specifically, McCain was asked if he is a “‘read my lips’ candidate, no new taxes, no matter what?” referring to George H.W. Bush’s 1988 pledge. “No new taxes,” McCain responded. Two weeks later, McCain said, “I’m not making a ‘read my lips’ statement, in that I will not raise taxes.”
45. McCain has changed his entire economic worldview on multiple occasions.
46. McCain believes Americans are both better and worse off economically than they were before Bush took office.
47. McCain was against massive government bailouts of “big banks” that “act irresponsibly.” He then announced his support for a massive government bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.Energy Policy
48. McCain supported the moratorium on coastal drilling ; now he’s against it.
49. McCain recently announced his strong opposition to a windfall-tax on oil company profits. Three weeks earlier, he was perfectly comfortable with the idea.
50. McCain endorsed a cap-and-trade policy with a mandatory emissions cap. In mid-June, McCain announced he wants the caps to voluntary.
51. McCain explained his belief that a temporary suspension of the federal gas tax would provide an immediate economic stimulus. Shortly thereafter, he argued the exact opposite.
52. McCain supported the Lieberman/Warner legislation to combat global warming. Now he doesn’t.
53. McCain was for national auto emissions standards before he was against them.
Immigration Policy
54. McCain was a co-sponsor of the DREAM Act, which would grant legal status to illegal immigrants’ kids who graduate from high school. In 2007, he announced his opposition to the bill. In 2008, McCain switched back.
55. On immigration policy in general, McCain announced in February 2008 that he would vote against his own bill.
56. In April, McCain promised voters that he would secure the borders “before proceeding to other reform measures.” Two months later, he abandoned his public pledge, pretended that he’d never made the promise in the first place, and vowed that a comprehensive immigration reform policy has always been, and would always be, his “top priority.”
Judicial Policy and the Rule of Law
57. McCain said he would “not impose a litmus test on any nominee.” He used to promise the opposite.
58. McCain’s position was that the telecoms should be forced to explain their role in the administration’s warrantless surveillance program as a condition for retroactive immunity. He used to believe the opposite.
59. McCain went from saying he would not support repeal of Roe v. Wade to saying the exact opposite.
60. In June, McCain rejected the idea of a trial for Osama bin Laden, and thought Obama’s reference to Nuremberg was a misread of history. A month later, McCain argued the exact opposite position.
61. In June, McCain described the Supreme Court’s decision in Boumediene v. Bush was “one of the worst decisions in the history of this country.” In August, he reversed course.
Campaign, Ethics, and Lobbying Reform
62. McCain supported his own lobbying-reform legislation from 1997. Now he doesn’t.
63. In 2006, McCain sponsored legislation to require grassroots lobbying coalitions to reveal their financial donors. In 2007, after receiving “feedback” on the proposal, McCain told far-right activist groups that he opposes his own measure.
64. McCain supported a campaign-finance bill, which bore his name, on strengthening the public-financing system. In June 2007, he abandoned his own legislation.
65. In May 2008, McCain approved a ban on lobbyists working for his campaign. In July 2008, his campaign reversed course and said lobbyists could work for his campaign.Politics and Associations
66. McCain wanted political support from radical televangelist John Hagee. Now he doesn’t. (He also believes his endorsement from Hagee was both a good and bad idea.)
67. McCain wanted political support from radical televangelist Rod Parsley. Now he doesn’t.
68. McCain says he considered and did not consider joining John Kerry’s Democratic ticket in 2004.
69. McCain is both for and against attacking Barack Obama over his former pastor at his former church.
70. McCain criticized TV preacher Jerry Falwell as “an agent of intolerance” in 2002, but then decided to cozy up to the man who said Americans “deserved” the 9/11 attacks.
71. In 2000, McCain accused Texas businessmen Sam and Charles Wyly of being corrupt, spending “dirty money” to help finance Bush’s presidential campaign. McCain not only filed a complaint against the Wylys for allegedly violating campaign finance law, he also lashed out at them publicly. In April, McCain reached out to the Wylys for support.
72. McCain was against presidential candidates campaigning at Bob Jones University before he was for it.
73. McCain decided in 2000 that he didn’t want anything to do with former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, believing he “would taint the image of the ‘Straight Talk Express.’” Kissinger is now the Honorary Co-Chair for his presidential campaign in New York.
74. McCain believed powerful right-wing activist/lobbyist Grover Norquist was “corrupt, a shill for dictators, and (with just a dose of sarcasm) Jack Abramoff’s gay lover.” McCain now considers Norquist a key political ally.
75. McCain was for presidential candidates giving speeches in foreign countries before he was against it.
76. McCain has been both for and against considering a pro-choice running mate for the Republican presidential ticket.
http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/flipflops
The Reform Institute
Links to Current Meltdown:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/01/watchdog-group-links-mcca_n_130840.html
The Dictator
In mid-September The Nation's website published a photo of McCain celebrating his seventieth birthday in Montenegro in August 2006 at a yacht party hosted by convicted Italian felon Raffaello Follieri and his movie-star girlfriend Anne Hathaway.
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20081020/ames_berman
McCain support of domestic terrorism:
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/10/06/mccain-abotion-bombers/
– Voting against making anti-choice violence a federal crime. As the Jed Report notes, McCain voted in 1993 and 1994 against making “bombings, arson and blockades at abortion clinics, and shootings and threats of violence against doctors and nurses who perform abortions” federal crimes.
– Opposing Colorado’s “Bubble Law.” McCain said he opposed Colorado’s “Bubble Law,” which prohibited abortion protesters from getting within 8 feet of women entering clinics [Denver Post, 2/27/00]. The law was later upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court.
– Voting to allow those fined for violence at clinics to avoid penalties by declaring bankruptcy. NARAL Pro-Chioce America notes that McCain “voted to allow perpetrators of violence or harassment at reproductive-health clinics to avoid paying the fines assessed against them for their illegal acts by declaring bankruptcy.”
The Party In Bermuda
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20081110/tuttle
Asian Entertainment Corporation
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-donorsoct29,0,1269595.story
The Car Crash In '64
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/28/news-orgs-investigate-pos_n_138449.html
Some editorial Comment:
Never forget Sinclair Lewis’ prophetic words, “When facism comes to America it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross”.
some familiar words that have been bandied about here in the Fatherland urr Homeland recently:
"The national government will maintain and defend the foundations on which the power of our nation rests. It will offer strong protection to Christianity as the very basis of our collective morality. Today Christians stand at the head of our country. We want to fill our culture again with the Christian spirit. We want to burn out all the recent immoral developments in literature, in the theatre, and in the press — in short, we want to burn out the poison of immorality which has entered into our whole life and culture as a result of Liberal excess during the past years.” —
Adolph Hitler - Taken from The Speeches of Adolph Hitler, 1922-1939, Vol. 1, Michael Hakeem, Ph.D. (London, Oxford University Press, 1942), pp. 871-872.
Straight Talk Express:
Here’s the list.
National Security Policy
1. McCain thought Bush’s warrantless-wiretap program circumvented the law; now he believes the opposite.
2. McCain insisted that everyone, even “terrible killers,” “the worst kind of scum of humanity,” and detainees at Guantanamo Bay, “deserve to have some adjudication of their cases,” even if that means “releasing some of them.” McCain now believes the opposite.
3. He opposed indefinite detention of terrorist suspects. When the Supreme Court reached the same conclusion, he called it “one of the worst decisions in the history of this country.”
4. In February 2008, McCain reversed course on prohibiting waterboarding.
5. McCain was for closing the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay before he was against it.
6. When Barack Obama talked about going after terrorists in Pakistani mountains with predators, McCain criticized him for it. He’s since come to the opposite conclusion.Foreign Policy
7. McCain was for kicking Russia out of the G8 before he was against it. Now, he’s for it again.
8. McCain supported moving “towards normalization of relations” with Cuba. Now he believes the opposite.
9. McCain believed the U.S. should engage in diplomacy with Hamas. Now he believes the opposite.
10. McCain believed the U.S. should engage in diplomacy with Syria. Now he believes the opposite.
11. McCain is both for and against a “rogue state rollback” as a focus of his foreign policy vision.
12. McCain used to champion the Law of the Sea convention, even volunteering to testify on the treaty’s behalf before a Senate committee. Now he opposes it.
13. McCain was against divestment from South Africa before he was for it.
Military Policy
14. McCain recently claimed that he was the “greatest critic” of Rumsfeld’s failed Iraq policy. In December 2003, McCain praised the same strategy as “a mission accomplished.” In March 2004, he said, “I’m confident we’re on the right course.” In December 2005, he said, “Overall, I think a year from now, we will have made a fair amount of progress if we stay the course.”
15. McCain has changed his mind about a long-term U.S. military presence in Iraq on multiple occasions, concluding, on multiple occasions, that a Korea-like presence is both a good and a bad idea.
16. McCain was against additional U.S. forces in Afghanistan before he was for it.
17. McCain said before the war in Iraq, “We will win this conflict. We will win it easily.” Four years later, McCain said he knew all along that the war in Iraq war was “probably going to be long and hard and tough.”
18. McCain has repeatedly said it’s a dangerous mistake to tell the “enemy” when U.S. troops would be out of Iraq. In May, McCain announced that most American troops would be home from Iraq by 2013.
19. McCain was against expanding the GI Bill before he was for it.
20. McCain staunchly opposed Obama’s Iraq withdrawal timetable, and even blasted Mitt Romney for having referenced the word during the GOP primaries. In July, after Iraqi officials endorsed Obama’s policy, McCain said a 16-month calendar sounds like “a pretty good timetable.”
Domestic Policy
21. McCain defended “privatizing” Social Security. Now he says he’s against privatization (though he actually still supports it.)
22. On Social Security, McCain said he would not, under any circumstances, raise taxes. Soon after, asked about a possible increase in the payroll tax, McCain said there’s “nothing that’s off the table.”
23. McCain wanted to change the Republican Party platform to protect abortion rights in cases of rape and incest. Now he doesn’t.
24. McCain supported storing spent nuclear fuel at Yucca Mountain in Nevada. Now he believes the opposite.
25. He argued the NRA should not have a role in the Republican Party’s policy making. Now he believes the opposite.
26. In 1998, he championed raising cigarette taxes to fund programs to cut underage smoking, insisting that it would prevent illnesses and provide resources for public health programs. Now, McCain opposes a $0.61-per-pack tax increase, won’t commit to supporting a regulation bill he’s co-sponsoring, and has hired Philip Morris’ former lobbyist as his senior campaign adviser.
27. McCain is both for and against earmarks for Arizona.
28. McCain’s first mortgage plan was premised on the notion that homeowners facing foreclosure shouldn’t be “rewarded” for acting “irresponsibly.” His second mortgage plan took largely the opposite position.
29. McCain went from saying gay marriage should be allowed, to saying gay marriage shouldn’t be allowed.
30. McCain opposed a holiday to honor Martin Luther King, Jr., before he supported it.
31. McCain was anti-ethanol. Now he’s pro-ethanol.
32. McCain was both for and against state promotion of the Confederate flag.
33. In 2005, McCain endorsed intelligent design creationism, a year later he said the opposite, and a few months after that, he was both for and against creationism at the same time.
34. And on gay adoption, McCain initially said he’d rather let orphans go without families, then his campaign reversed course, and soon after, McCain reversed back.
35. In the Senate, McCain opposed a variety of measures on equal pay for women, and endorsed the Supreme Court’s Ledbetter decision. In July, however, McCain said, “I’m committed to making sure that there’s equal pay for equal work. That … is my record and you can count on it.”
36. McCain was against fully funding the No Child Left Behind Act before he was for it.
37. McCain was for affirmative action before he was against it.
38. McCain said the Colorado River compact will “obviously” need to be “renegotiated.” Six days later, McCain said, “Let me be clear that I do not advocate renegotiation of the compact.”Economic Policy
39. McCain was against Bush’s tax cuts for the very wealthy before he was for them.
40. John McCain initially argued that economics is not an area of expertise for him, saying, “I’m going to be honest: I know a lot less about economics than I do about military and foreign policy issues; I still need to be educated,” and “The issue of economics is not something I’ve understood as well as I should.” He now falsely denies ever having made these remarks and insists that he has a “very strong” understanding of economics.
41. McCain vowed, if elected, to balance the federal budget by the end of his first term. Soon after, he decided he would no longer even try to reach that goal. And soon after that, McCain abandoned his second position and went back to his first.
42. McCain said in 2005 that he opposed the tax cuts because they were “too tilted to the wealthy.” By 2007, he denied ever having said this, and falsely argued that he opposed the cuts because of increased government spending.
43. McCain thought the estate tax was perfectly fair. Now he believes the opposite.
44. McCain pledged in February 2008 that he would not, under any circumstances, raise taxes. Specifically, McCain was asked if he is a “‘read my lips’ candidate, no new taxes, no matter what?” referring to George H.W. Bush’s 1988 pledge. “No new taxes,” McCain responded. Two weeks later, McCain said, “I’m not making a ‘read my lips’ statement, in that I will not raise taxes.”
45. McCain has changed his entire economic worldview on multiple occasions.
46. McCain believes Americans are both better and worse off economically than they were before Bush took office.
47. McCain was against massive government bailouts of “big banks” that “act irresponsibly.” He then announced his support for a massive government bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.Energy Policy
48. McCain supported the moratorium on coastal drilling ; now he’s against it.
49. McCain recently announced his strong opposition to a windfall-tax on oil company profits. Three weeks earlier, he was perfectly comfortable with the idea.
50. McCain endorsed a cap-and-trade policy with a mandatory emissions cap. In mid-June, McCain announced he wants the caps to voluntary.
51. McCain explained his belief that a temporary suspension of the federal gas tax would provide an immediate economic stimulus. Shortly thereafter, he argued the exact opposite.
52. McCain supported the Lieberman/Warner legislation to combat global warming. Now he doesn’t.
53. McCain was for national auto emissions standards before he was against them.
Immigration Policy
54. McCain was a co-sponsor of the DREAM Act, which would grant legal status to illegal immigrants’ kids who graduate from high school. In 2007, he announced his opposition to the bill. In 2008, McCain switched back.
55. On immigration policy in general, McCain announced in February 2008 that he would vote against his own bill.
56. In April, McCain promised voters that he would secure the borders “before proceeding to other reform measures.” Two months later, he abandoned his public pledge, pretended that he’d never made the promise in the first place, and vowed that a comprehensive immigration reform policy has always been, and would always be, his “top priority.”
Judicial Policy and the Rule of Law
57. McCain said he would “not impose a litmus test on any nominee.” He used to promise the opposite.
58. McCain’s position was that the telecoms should be forced to explain their role in the administration’s warrantless surveillance program as a condition for retroactive immunity. He used to believe the opposite.
59. McCain went from saying he would not support repeal of Roe v. Wade to saying the exact opposite.
60. In June, McCain rejected the idea of a trial for Osama bin Laden, and thought Obama’s reference to Nuremberg was a misread of history. A month later, McCain argued the exact opposite position.
61. In June, McCain described the Supreme Court’s decision in Boumediene v. Bush was “one of the worst decisions in the history of this country.” In August, he reversed course.
Campaign, Ethics, and Lobbying Reform
62. McCain supported his own lobbying-reform legislation from 1997. Now he doesn’t.
63. In 2006, McCain sponsored legislation to require grassroots lobbying coalitions to reveal their financial donors. In 2007, after receiving “feedback” on the proposal, McCain told far-right activist groups that he opposes his own measure.
64. McCain supported a campaign-finance bill, which bore his name, on strengthening the public-financing system. In June 2007, he abandoned his own legislation.
65. In May 2008, McCain approved a ban on lobbyists working for his campaign. In July 2008, his campaign reversed course and said lobbyists could work for his campaign.Politics and Associations
66. McCain wanted political support from radical televangelist John Hagee. Now he doesn’t. (He also believes his endorsement from Hagee was both a good and bad idea.)
67. McCain wanted political support from radical televangelist Rod Parsley. Now he doesn’t.
68. McCain says he considered and did not consider joining John Kerry’s Democratic ticket in 2004.
69. McCain is both for and against attacking Barack Obama over his former pastor at his former church.
70. McCain criticized TV preacher Jerry Falwell as “an agent of intolerance” in 2002, but then decided to cozy up to the man who said Americans “deserved” the 9/11 attacks.
71. In 2000, McCain accused Texas businessmen Sam and Charles Wyly of being corrupt, spending “dirty money” to help finance Bush’s presidential campaign. McCain not only filed a complaint against the Wylys for allegedly violating campaign finance law, he also lashed out at them publicly. In April, McCain reached out to the Wylys for support.
72. McCain was against presidential candidates campaigning at Bob Jones University before he was for it.
73. McCain decided in 2000 that he didn’t want anything to do with former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, believing he “would taint the image of the ‘Straight Talk Express.’” Kissinger is now the Honorary Co-Chair for his presidential campaign in New York.
74. McCain believed powerful right-wing activist/lobbyist Grover Norquist was “corrupt, a shill for dictators, and (with just a dose of sarcasm) Jack Abramoff’s gay lover.” McCain now considers Norquist a key political ally.
75. McCain was for presidential candidates giving speeches in foreign countries before he was against it.
76. McCain has been both for and against considering a pro-choice running mate for the Republican presidential ticket.
http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/flipflops
The Reform Institute
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20081006/ames
"The "Reform Institute" has taken a lot of heat as a front organization designed to funnel money to McCain's political career. As Ari Berman wrote, McCain's campaign co-chair, Rick Davis, served as the president of the nonprofit Reform Institute for three years, earning $395,000 in salary. Davis also headquartered his lobbying firm, Davis Manafort, in the Reform Institute's offices at that time. He is just one of several McCain people who passed through the Reform Institute's revolving door while McCain prepared for the 2008 campaign. McCain formally stepped down from his own institute in 2005, but he remains deeply linked to the Reform Institute to this day. "
On The Georgia Conflict:
Yet despite McCain's tough talk, behind the scenes his top advisers have cultivated deep ties with Russia's oligarchy--indeed, they have promoted the Kremlin's geopolitical and economic interests, as well as some of its most unsavory business figures, through greedy cynicism and geopolitical stupor. The most notable example is the tale of how McCain and his campaign manager, Rick Davis, advanced what became a key victory for the Kremlin: gaining control over the small but strategically important country of Montenegro.
According to two former senior US diplomats who served in the Balkans, Davis and his lobbying firm, Davis Manafort, received several million dollars to help run Montenegro's independence referendum campaign of 2006. The terms of the agreement were never disclosed to the public, but top Montenegrin officials told the US diplomats that Davis's work was underwritten by powerful Russian business interests connected to the Kremlin and operating in Montenegro. Neither Davis nor the McCain campaign responded to repeated requests for comment.
Links to Current Meltdown:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/01/watchdog-group-links-mcca_n_130840.html
The Dictator
http://blogs.reuters.com/trail08/2008/10/01/musing-with-mccain-if-i-were-dictator/
In mid-September The Nation's website published a photo of McCain celebrating his seventieth birthday in Montenegro in August 2006 at a yacht party hosted by convicted Italian felon Raffaello Follieri and his movie-star girlfriend Anne Hathaway.
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20081020/ames_berman
McCain support of domestic terrorism:
http://thinkprogress.org/2008/10/06/mccain-abotion-bombers/
– Voting against making anti-choice violence a federal crime. As the Jed Report notes, McCain voted in 1993 and 1994 against making “bombings, arson and blockades at abortion clinics, and shootings and threats of violence against doctors and nurses who perform abortions” federal crimes.
– Opposing Colorado’s “Bubble Law.” McCain said he opposed Colorado’s “Bubble Law,” which prohibited abortion protesters from getting within 8 feet of women entering clinics [Denver Post, 2/27/00]. The law was later upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court.
– Voting to allow those fined for violence at clinics to avoid penalties by declaring bankruptcy. NARAL Pro-Chioce America notes that McCain “voted to allow perpetrators of violence or harassment at reproductive-health clinics to avoid paying the fines assessed against them for their illegal acts by declaring bankruptcy.”
The Party In Bermuda
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20081110/tuttle
Asian Entertainment Corporation
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-donorsoct29,0,1269595.story
The Car Crash In '64
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/28/news-orgs-investigate-pos_n_138449.html
Some editorial Comment:
Never forget Sinclair Lewis’ prophetic words, “When facism comes to America it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross”.
some familiar words that have been bandied about here in the Fatherland urr Homeland recently:
"The national government will maintain and defend the foundations on which the power of our nation rests. It will offer strong protection to Christianity as the very basis of our collective morality. Today Christians stand at the head of our country. We want to fill our culture again with the Christian spirit. We want to burn out all the recent immoral developments in literature, in the theatre, and in the press — in short, we want to burn out the poison of immorality which has entered into our whole life and culture as a result of Liberal excess during the past years.” —
Adolph Hitler - Taken from The Speeches of Adolph Hitler, 1922-1939, Vol. 1, Michael Hakeem, Ph.D. (London, Oxford University Press, 1942), pp. 871-872.
Sunday, September 28, 2008
notes from the communist manifesto
Each step in the development of the bourgeoisie was accompanied by a corresponding political advance of that class. An oppressed class under the sway of the feudal nobility, an armed and self-governing association in the medieval commune(4): here independent urban republic (as in Italy and Germany); there taxable “third estate” of the monarchy (as in France); afterwards, in the period of manufacturing proper, serving either the semi-feudal or the absolute monarchy as a counterpoise against the nobility, and, in fact, cornerstone of the great monarchies in general, the bourgeoisie has at last, since the establishment of Modern Industry and of the world market, conquered for itself, in the modern representative State, exclusive political sway. The executive of the modern state is but a committee for managing the common affairs of the whole bourgeoisie.
The bourgeoisie, wherever it has got the upper hand, has put an end to all feudal, patriarchal, idyllic relations. It has pitilessly torn asunder the motley feudal ties that bound man to his “natural superiors”, and has left remaining no other nexus between man and man than naked self-interest, than callous “cash payment”. It has drowned the most heavenly ecstasies of religious fervour, of chivalrous enthusiasm, of philistine sentimentalism, in the icy water of egotistical calculation. It has resolved personal worth into exchange value, and in place of the numberless indefeasible chartered freedoms, has set up that single, unconscionable freedom — Free Trade. In one word, for exploitation, veiled by religious and political illusions, it has substituted naked, shameless, direct, brutal exploitation.
The bourgeoisie cannot exist without constantly revolutionising the instruments of production, and thereby the relations of production, and with them the whole relations of society. Conservation of the old modes of production in unaltered form, was, on the contrary, the first condition of existence for all earlier industrial classes. Constant revolutionising of production, uninterrupted disturbance of all social conditions, everlasting uncertainty and agitation distinguish the bourgeois epoch from all earlier ones. All fixed, fast-frozen relations, with their train of ancient and venerable prejudices and opinions, are swept away, all new-formed ones become antiquated before they can ossify. All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned, and man is at last compelled to face with sober senses his real conditions of life, and his relations with his kind.
The conditions of bourgeois society are too narrow to comprise the wealth created by them. And how does the bourgeoisie get over these crises? On the one hand by enforced destruction of a mass of productive forces; on the other, by the conquest of new markets, and by the more thorough exploitation of the old ones. That is to say, by paving the way for more extensive and more destructive crises, and by diminishing the means whereby crises are prevented.
At this stage, the labourers still form an incoherent mass scattered over the whole country, and broken up by their mutual competition. If anywhere they unite to form more compact bodies, this is not yet the consequence of their own active union, but of the union of the bourgeoisie, which class, in order to attain its own political ends, is compelled to set the whole proletariat in motion, and is moreover yet, for a time, able to do so. At this stage, therefore, the proletarians do not fight their enemies, but the enemies of their enemies, the remnants of absolute monarchy, the landowners, the non-industrial bourgeois, the petty bourgeois. Thus, the whole historical movement is concentrated in the hands of the bourgeoisie; every victory so obtained is a victory for the bourgeoisie.
The lower middle class, the small manufacturer, the shopkeeper, the artisan, the peasant, all these fight against the bourgeoisie, to save from extinction their existence as fractions of the middle class. They are therefore not revolutionary, but conservative. Nay more, they are reactionary, for they try to roll back the wheel of history. If by chance, they are revolutionary, they are only so in view of their impending transfer into the proletariat; they thus defend not their present, but their future interests, they desert their own standpoint to place themselves at that of the proletariat.
****
from Wiki on the dialectic:
In classical philosophy, dialectic (Greek: διαλεκτική) is controversy: the exchange of arguments and counter-arguments respectively advocating propositions (theses) and counter-propositions (antitheses). The outcome of the exercise might not simply be the refutation of one of the relevant points of view, but a synthesis or combination of the opposing assertions, or at least a qualitative transformation in the direction of the dialogue.[1][2] The presupposition of a dialectical dialogue is that the participants share at least some meanings and principles of valid inference, even if they do not agree.
****
The bourgeois seeks no synthesis of the Dialectic. It it is interested only in preservation & profit. By maintaining the struggle between freedom & equality, rather than participating in negotiations to resolve the conflict, it divides the proletariat in a permant struggle which serves only its primary interests. The perceived gains of the proletariat are illusion, products of the progression of materialism. Life itself, that of symbol & worth are abdicated in favor of an empty comfort.
The bourgeoisie, wherever it has got the upper hand, has put an end to all feudal, patriarchal, idyllic relations. It has pitilessly torn asunder the motley feudal ties that bound man to his “natural superiors”, and has left remaining no other nexus between man and man than naked self-interest, than callous “cash payment”. It has drowned the most heavenly ecstasies of religious fervour, of chivalrous enthusiasm, of philistine sentimentalism, in the icy water of egotistical calculation. It has resolved personal worth into exchange value, and in place of the numberless indefeasible chartered freedoms, has set up that single, unconscionable freedom — Free Trade. In one word, for exploitation, veiled by religious and political illusions, it has substituted naked, shameless, direct, brutal exploitation.
The bourgeoisie cannot exist without constantly revolutionising the instruments of production, and thereby the relations of production, and with them the whole relations of society. Conservation of the old modes of production in unaltered form, was, on the contrary, the first condition of existence for all earlier industrial classes. Constant revolutionising of production, uninterrupted disturbance of all social conditions, everlasting uncertainty and agitation distinguish the bourgeois epoch from all earlier ones. All fixed, fast-frozen relations, with their train of ancient and venerable prejudices and opinions, are swept away, all new-formed ones become antiquated before they can ossify. All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned, and man is at last compelled to face with sober senses his real conditions of life, and his relations with his kind.
The conditions of bourgeois society are too narrow to comprise the wealth created by them. And how does the bourgeoisie get over these crises? On the one hand by enforced destruction of a mass of productive forces; on the other, by the conquest of new markets, and by the more thorough exploitation of the old ones. That is to say, by paving the way for more extensive and more destructive crises, and by diminishing the means whereby crises are prevented.
At this stage, the labourers still form an incoherent mass scattered over the whole country, and broken up by their mutual competition. If anywhere they unite to form more compact bodies, this is not yet the consequence of their own active union, but of the union of the bourgeoisie, which class, in order to attain its own political ends, is compelled to set the whole proletariat in motion, and is moreover yet, for a time, able to do so. At this stage, therefore, the proletarians do not fight their enemies, but the enemies of their enemies, the remnants of absolute monarchy, the landowners, the non-industrial bourgeois, the petty bourgeois. Thus, the whole historical movement is concentrated in the hands of the bourgeoisie; every victory so obtained is a victory for the bourgeoisie.
The lower middle class, the small manufacturer, the shopkeeper, the artisan, the peasant, all these fight against the bourgeoisie, to save from extinction their existence as fractions of the middle class. They are therefore not revolutionary, but conservative. Nay more, they are reactionary, for they try to roll back the wheel of history. If by chance, they are revolutionary, they are only so in view of their impending transfer into the proletariat; they thus defend not their present, but their future interests, they desert their own standpoint to place themselves at that of the proletariat.
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from Wiki on the dialectic:
In classical philosophy, dialectic (Greek: διαλεκτική) is controversy: the exchange of arguments and counter-arguments respectively advocating propositions (theses) and counter-propositions (antitheses). The outcome of the exercise might not simply be the refutation of one of the relevant points of view, but a synthesis or combination of the opposing assertions, or at least a qualitative transformation in the direction of the dialogue.[1][2] The presupposition of a dialectical dialogue is that the participants share at least some meanings and principles of valid inference, even if they do not agree.
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The bourgeois seeks no synthesis of the Dialectic. It it is interested only in preservation & profit. By maintaining the struggle between freedom & equality, rather than participating in negotiations to resolve the conflict, it divides the proletariat in a permant struggle which serves only its primary interests. The perceived gains of the proletariat are illusion, products of the progression of materialism. Life itself, that of symbol & worth are abdicated in favor of an empty comfort.
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