The Jackson-Tubman Thing

This is kind of interesting. The South is apparently rising again (again?) over news that the portrait of Andrew Jackson on the $20 bill will be replaced with Harriet Tubman sometime in the next four-five years. Supposedly, this is an insult to Jackson, and by extension to the South and all it stands for -- whatever that may be. Southern white men -- especially -- are incensed. Poor things.

Jackson is seen as a heroic figure by many of them, and it is precisely for the kinds of things his critics have condemned him for since forever: he was a racist, a slave owner-trader, a Indian killer in acts that amount to genocide, and he was a prime advocate of Indian Removal. He is considered by most observers to be responsible for the Trail of Tears on which so many Native Americans were ignominiously sent West -- too many of them to their deaths.

It gets interesting because Ms. Ché, a Cherokee Nation citizen, thought there was more to the story than we were being told. No matter the tales of Jackson's evil that she'd been hearing all her life, she thought there must be something redeeming in him and that his acts -- deplorable as they were -- weren't as one-dimensional as they had been made out to be.

We'd been to Nashville a few times together, and I found I didn't like it much at all. Nashville struck me as not just the South but the Bad South, some of the worst aspects of Southern Tradition were alive and well, and there was very little "Good South" to mitigate it.

Ms. Ché , on the other hand, was quite taken with the place and the people, and she's been back several times on her own. The last time she was there, she decided to go out to Andrew Jackson's plantation, The Hermitage, and see for herself just what this man done on his own land, and try to get a sense of his spirit.

She toured the mansion and rode what they call a slave wagon (a cotton transport wagon) around the grounds. She heard the stories they tell there of his life and times -- both good and bad. She researched on her own too. She came back home and said, "You know, I think they've got Jackson wrong. He wasn't quite the monster he's made out to be."

I was kind of stunned at her point of view. What about the Trail of Tears and all the suffering he caused her own people? She said, "He wasn't directly involved in that at all. It came after he left the White House."

I said that if it hadn't been for Jackson, Indian Removal probably wouldn't have become national policy. She disagreed. She said it probably would have --  and it might have come sooner and more brutally than it did if it hadn't been for Jackson's interventions.

Whoa! Talk about historical revisionism!

Where did she get these ideas? Her point of view was that Jackson was very conflicted about the Indian Question, and he had a lot of respect for Indians at a time when white folks were expected to hate them and kill them whenever they could. He may have believed that the only solution to the Indian Problem was for them to leave for the West, but he might not have believed that if the popular sentiment among white folks at the time hadn't been so racist, greedy and bloodthirsty. He himself, she said, was not like that.

He wasn't? No, she said, not really. He'd let himself become seen as a heroic Indian fighter and Indian hater, and he felt guilty about it and about what he had done. He would much rather have found an accommodation with the tribes than try to force them out of their ancestral lands. But it wasn't possible, for one thing because the white-trash rabble that coveted Indian lands wouldn't allow it. Nothing less than annihilation was satisfactory to them.

She talked about Rachel, his wife. The plantation slaves. The Indians. She said so much of the Black Legend of Jackson is false. The truth is much more complicated.

She said she knew she was supposed to harbor resentment and hatred toward Jackson, but she didn't feel that way about him. For one thing, she didn't believe such feelings were healthy. But for another, she insisted he wasn't the monster his critics made him out to be. He'd been falsely portrayed for many a long year.

Hm. Well, I can't say I'm convinced. I tend to think that Jackson represented and represents some of the worst and most destructive aspects of White America. He was sort of the epitome of White racism, resentment, violence and greed, living off the backs of his slaves and the theft of Indian land. He may or may not have had redeeming qualities, I wouldn't know, but too many people suffered too much due to his actions, beliefs and policies for him to be considered anything but a monstrous figure in American history -- at least to my eye.

When news came that the Treasury Department had decided to replace Jackson with Tubman on the $20 bill, I thought it was symbolic but fine. I didn't see it as denigration or denunciation of Jackson but as one way to honor Tubman. Jackson, ultimately, would not be affected by this move at all. He would still be honored by those who considered him a hero, denounced by his critics. That would not change by putting someone else's portrait on the $20 bill.

Ms. Ché saw the move as an unnecessary aggravation at a time when domestic animosity and factionalism has reached a fever pitch in this country. She has no problem with honoring Tubman, just that doing it this way at this time may be unwise.

It won't be done for at least four years, and by that time who knows how the national conscience and consciousness will have changed? This is far from the most important issue we face or will face, but knowing how sensitive some people have become about every perceived slight, and how resentful and violent some become, it's certainly conceivable that the Outrage!!!!™ this move precipitates could lead to yet more civil unrest among the under-appreciated white folks of this country.

On the other hand, there has been far too much bending over backwards to mollify the South for far too long and far too much tolerance for the violence that ensues.

Envisioning That Better Future -- Six: The End of Wars of Aggression

Apart from the fact that the notion that the United States does not engage in wars of aggression has always been a lie, the ease with which the US Government has become captivated by the current round of aggressive warfare since 2001 -- more than a decade now -- is truly shocking.

Wars of aggression have been refined to the point of nearly pinpoint liquidation of individuals at will (sorry about the continuing collateral damage, but we're working on it! Really!) -- by remote control, no less, operated by pimply faced boys and girls at video game terminals at Groom Lake, NV, for cripes sake -- but still, the notion that American Military Might can or should be "projected" willy-nilly, wherever and whenever Our Rulers and their owners and sponsors so determine without let or hindrance by even a whiff of International Law or Treaty or any barrier at all is still shocking to the conscience of anyone who still has a conscience after all these years of lies and propaganda about what is going on.

At first, it was obvious that the wars of choice and aggression that were being undertaken by Our Rulers, ostensibly in pursuit of so-called "enemy combatants" and rogue Terror States or what have you were actually no different than the Imperial Wars of Aggression practiced routinely during the colonial period of Western history when those who were weaker in the face of the aggressor colonialists were simply bulldozed into oblivion by the war machines assembled against them, their nations were demolished, and their things were stolen -- their wives and daughters right along with their cattle.

This was called "Spreading Civilization" back in the day, and propaganda mills churned out endless justifications for it, especially when the United States engaged in overseas empire building. Our Little Brown Brothers didn't stand a chance.

The war to subdue the Philippines that started in 1898 went on for more than a decade, with enormous slaughter of the Natives and destruction of much of the country's enduring social and political fabric, all to preserve a lie: that the United States was not building an Empire. The Natives deserved what they got for resisting the imposition of authority by their Betters.

The horror of what went on in the Philippines to establish the American Imperial presence shocked the consciences of many Americans at the time -- leading to many excuses from the Government, much "soul searching," periodic "investigations" and reports to Congress, and the simultaneous consolidation of American authority over the islands, its resources and its peoples. It was one of the most brutal colonial conquests of a very brutal colonial era, but "good works" (schools and hospitals!) were offered to the surviving Natives as modest compensation for what they had lost.

And of course there was a handy class of already "civilized" Natives (thanks to the Spanish former colonial masters) who were just as happy to transfer their loyalty from Spain to the US as long there was a benefit in doing so. In those days, American policy was to make sure there would be a benefit to being... loyal subjects.

But Independence could not be denied forever; the Japanese attack and invasion of 1941-42 put the lie to American invincibility in the Pacific even if Japan was ultimately defeated. An independent Philippines was one of the more immediate consequences of WWII in the Pacific, but of course there would always be strings attached... American military bases, for example, and American sponsored dictatorships running things from Manila on behalf of American interests.

That lasted as long as it could, but not forever. It can't last forever because the whole construct is based on a lie: The US doesn't seek Empire (it does); the US does not seek to rule overseas (it does; latterly through proxies); the US is beneficent and benign believing only in democracy and human rights(in your dreams!)

Even as they shook free of American Imperialism, the peoples of the Philippines found themselves more heavily indebted to American interests. It's not at all clear that even now they have achieved the level of independence the initial rebellion of 1898 sought.

And the Philippines was only one of America's numerous colonial/imperial expansions during the late 19th - early 20th Centuries. There were plenty of others, but the Imperial cause was temporarily derailed by the repeated World Wars, the economic Depressions, and the advent of the Soviet Union as chief rival of the United States on the world stage.

Nevertheless, the United States has been organized as a domestic Imperial State since the adoption of the Constitution. Once that domestic continental empire was consolidated through negotiations, subterfuge, strategy and many, many wars of aggression -- and of course a Civil War -- sights were set overseas almost immediately; Hawaii being the first victim. Taking over the remnants of the Spanish Empire was in some was a brilliant maneuver. In other ways, it was a moral catastrophe.

All of this had been worked out during the period of domestic expansion and expropriation. The ways and means to Empire through wars of aggression against a weaker opposition were integral to the American character.

But after World War II, the notion of any nation having the right to pursue wars of aggression for colonial or any other purpose was discredited and indeed made illegal under international law. Nazis were tried and hanged for such things.

The wars that the United States engaged in after the end of WWII -- principally in Korea and Vietnam -- were justified under the rubric of "defense" of allies who had been attacked by "aggressive" neighbors. But of course, this was fiction, too, as the "neighbors" were created by the very external forces that then engaged in the wars. It was a sophisticated means of continuing wars of aggression, and it failed dismally in the swamps of the Mekong Delta among other places.

The collapse of the Soviet Union, however, seems to have released the hounds of aggressive war once again. This time around, it seems that the United States and its allies are intent on going back to those parts of the former British Empire where the Lessons of Liberty didn't quite "take" -- Iraq, obviously, and Afghanistan; but a good deal of Eastern Africa and parts of the Persian Gulf and Middle East as well. Most of the places now under the aggressive gaze of American forces are ones that failed to become integrated under the British Imperial umbrella back in the day, and it seems that the main point of the current round of aggressive wars against them is to whip them into shape for proper rule and exploitation under some Native version of Anglo-American "law."

That it is being done on the same basis as colonial wars and imperial expansions of the past is grotesque; that's exactly what led to the world wars and other catastrophes of the 20th Century. Is this not understood?

Apparently not. And why not?

Apparently, Our Ruling Classes cannot see their own failures except through the prism of an arch-rival, such as the Soviet Union was back in the day, that held a constant critical mirror up to the failures of the West and pointed out what frauds the Western "democracies" were.

The collapse of the Soviet Union took that mirror away, and despite the efforts of the current rulers of the Russian Federation to hold their cracked and de-silvered mirror up to highlight the hypocrisy of the West, there is no real global rival to Anglo-American Imperial hegemony these days. Nations like China and India, that should be more than a little interested in using a cudgel against Anglo-American Imperial adventurism and their consequent wars of aggression are far more interested in their own domestic development (which is in hyperdrive at the moment) than they are in curbing Anglo-American excesses overseas.

In fact, I suspect they approve of much of the aggressive warfare against uppity Natives that the Anglo-American alliance has been engaged in, for in the case of China (to some extent, India as well) they are financing it. If they see a danger to their own interests from the aggression of the Neo-Imperialists, they aren't showing it.

Yet it is vital for the United States to pull out of its current aggressive international posture, just as it is vital for Britain to do the same. There is no sign whatever of its happening, no matter the calls from the People and wide swaths of the intellectual communities to do so.

The Ruling Class neither listens to nor cares what the People "think." They only care about what the People DO; and so far, they have seen nothing that they feel they need fear from the People anywhere.

Certainly nothing -- yet -- equivalent to the Global Communist Conspiracy they once trembled before and made some positive accommodations to.

Yet there is nevertheless a global rising against the unfettered continuation of Neo-Imperialism, against the arbitrary imposition of authority, against the indignities and exploitation that are inevitable in the dictatorships propped up by the Neo-Imperialists, and against Neo-Imperialist indignity and exploitation as well.

People everywhere are saying "No!" -- but they haven't figured out yet how to stop it.

That is going to take a good deal more thought, struggle, experiment and failure to discover, but it will be discovered. For Peoples everywhere know that the Better Future they seek can only come once the new round of imperial wars of aggression are ended.

Aggro

It's impossible to keep up with everything that's going on in these Revolutionary Times.

So I'm just coming across these videos that come from Way Back When: November 2.

Seattle; Direct Action at Bank:





In these videos, we see the extraordinary aggression of the Seattle Police in not only clearing a path through the demonstrators at the bank, but they continue their confrontation and aggression against the demonstrators to the point of absurdity. And they use pepper spray.

De-escalation is not in their play book, and it is obvious from these videos that the Seattle Police enjoy being aggressive with the people they are supposedly there to serve and protect. They like getting in their faces and acting like roided-up pigs.

In the comments to the video of the pepper spraying of the demonstrators in the previous post, note is taken of glee with which at least one of the officers is spraying everyone in the vicinity, even though the demonstrators are already in compliance with those all-important Police Orders. It doesn't matter. The police want to provoke mayhem.

In the Mayor's statement about that incident, he mentions the WTO protests of 1999 (and Mardi Gras in 2001) as excuses for the behavior of the Seattle police in 2011, but anyone who has followed those incidents knows that there is a strong suspicion of plainclothes police provocation. Whether it's true or not, I don't think we'll ever know, but at least the retired Seattle Police Chief who was in charge at that time knows and has clearly stated that it was the aggressive actions of the police that precipitated the destruction that took place during the WTO protests.

Escalation not de-escalation is their motto. Not for the purpose of arrest, mind you. Look at what happens in the second video above. There is a man who repeatedly confronts police -- one officer in particular -- and it's a pissing contest, mano-a-mano throughout. No arrest.

In the following video which was taken in Portland on November 7 or 8 by an outspoken opponent of the Occupy Movement -- someone who apparently thinks it discredits the Movement -- a demonstrator (whether with Occupy Portland or not, it's impossible to say) -- confronts a news crew:



This is textbook anarchist aggro, and really well done, though it's obvious the videographer doesn't get it. The demonstrator is in the news crews' faces constantly, repeating charges over and over, and verbally -- but not physically -- abusing them to the point where they cannot function at all. Which of course is the point of the confrontation. But there is more to it than that. The demonstrator is shaming them for being/serving the 1%. It is likely that the news crew had never thought that they were part of the problem not the answer. It never occurred to them how deeply resented they are for their service to the Overclass. And they get a strong lesson on the sidewalks of Portland by someone who won't shut up and won't go away. Of course it's rude. But it's meant to be an awakening. If any of those people have a conscience, they will not soon forget that encounter and like Norm Stamper, they might just come to a dawning that they have been part of the problem for many years. This is akin to the notion of "taking back" -- or "Occupying" -- the media; but at the same time, an opponent of the Occupation has provided the video of what happened. In other words, he was the media in this case. Much as the video streamers from the Occupations are the media. Anybody can be "media" these days, and the dinosaur Major Mass Media doesn't have to be "taken back" -- it was never "ours" anyway -- or even "Occupied."

It needs to be replaced.

I've been saying that for many years. Bit by bit it's been happening, but the march forward to a real New Media has been very slow, and many people in the so-called New Media have made whole blogospheric careers out of media criticism (not that they can take criticism themselves unfortunately.)

We're at last seeing an acceleration of the process of media replacement and renewal as part of this Movement-Becoming-Revolution. Video streaming, Facebook and Twitter have largely replaced legacy/traditional media coverage of the uprisings. It's axiomatic: you're not going to find real news from the standard outlets -- not even, in many cases, on the blogs. On the other hand, I am very leery of anything that appears on the Twitter feeds because the whole system is infested with provocateurs and there is much "not-news" that fills the feeds.

Finally, I'll bring up The Incident at Town Hall Seattle that was cited by DCBlogger at Corrente.

Oh my goodness gracious deary me.

This was another case of apparent aggro from the activists who went to the Town Hall with the intent (it appears) to disrupt, hijack, and teach those people a thing or two about what's really what.

It was rude, it was at least partially effective.

Some people were turned off by it, of course. Few people really want to be in the midst of a Revolution. Revolutions aren't pretty and they aren't nice and they don't follow the protocols of polite society or panel discussions. That's why they are Revolutions, hello? It is all on video now. See for yourself what happened. Start here: http://youtu.be/fk0eqlMjFU4 There are 21 total videos of the event on this page: http://www.youtube.com/user/Sweatshopfreelife#g/u all labeled "Occupy Town Hall". Make of it what you will.

I will keep saying, "This is a Revolution." "This is THE Revolution." It's happening right here, right now. And there's no stopping it, nor is there any controlling it. It is happening regardless of what any of us may think about it, and regardless of how we want it to proceed. Each of us might -- or might not -- be able to have some minor or perhaps major effect on it, primarily through our participation in the many activities of The Revolution, but no matter what we do or don't do, we can't make it go away and we can't make it go the way we want it to. Even those in the midst of it are finding that out, in some cases to their despair, in others to their delight.

I'm personally torn. I'm very excited by the fact that "it's happening." OMG, after so many years of whining about how apathetic and passive the American people are in the face of outrage after outrage, I am not only seeing them rise up in their multitudes, I am seeing astonishing levels of sheer energy and belief in the possibility of taking charge of our own fate and Building a Better Future.

But I see plenty of warning signs and cautions along the way; I've been very disturbed by some of the things I've witnessed -- though I don't really find the Aggro examples I've posted here to be all that disturbing, whether initiated by the authorities or by the activists. You have to have that kind of tension in order to move forward.

What has bothered me more are the evocations of the Period of Unpleasantness as I call it, when so many people went or were driven to their slaughter in blind obedience.

The most recent evocation was the destruction of the library at the Zuccotti Park camp.

I'm still coming to grips with the issue of destruction/liberation that is coming up more and more as the Raids continue and the piles of Occupy Debris grow. But passivity in the face of destructive aggression (passivity as opposed to non-violent resistance; there is a difference) really bothers me.

Enough blather for this installment. I must tour the Livestreams.

Dignity. Justice. Community. Peace.