Justice?

Yesterday, the US Supreme Court refused to hear an appeal of Canadian citizen Maher Arar who was seized at Kennedy airport by American authorities 2002 and rendered to Syria for interrogation under torture. He was held and tortured for a year, then was released back to Canada. Arar has been trying to gain a remedy in American court for years, but the Obama Administration following the diktat of the Bush/Cheney Regime, fought the Arar petition and were successful.

Arar has been fully exonerated in Canada, received an apology and a substantial monetary award from the Canadian government, Syria has claimed they could find no evidence of terrorist ties, yet American authorities deny and resist any responsibility or accountability for what happened to Arar.

By refusing to hear the case, the Supreme Court has essentially institutionalized the lawlessness of the executive branch that enabled the seizure and rendition of Arar in the first place. Whatever the Government's policies on the matter of rendition, it doesn't matter, because the court refuses to intervene. "Do what thou wilt," is their motto.

Congress could conceivably change the law, but why bother when stonewalling is so effective?

Justice? Not in this country. Won't happen. Can't happen. And Arar is not the only victim, not by an order of magnitude.

Contrast that with David Cameron's straightforward and abject apology to the People of Britain and Northern Ireland, and to the survivors of the victims of the Bloody Sunday Bogside Massacre by British troops in Derry on January 30, 1972.

Yes, it's been almost 40 years since the massacre, in which 13 Catholic protestors were shot down in cold blood triggering immense passive and active resistance to British rule and a campaign of mutual bloodshed that went on for decades.

There was an inquiry immediately after the massacre that essentially whitewashed what happened. Another inquiry was begun in 1998, with a report due in 2009, but because of elections, it was delayed until today, June 15, 2010. Promptly, as it was released, Prime Minister David Cameron spoke in the House of Commons:



As so many have said: "I never thought I'd live to see the day."

Justice?

[Added later: Remains to be seen. The Brits are notorious for playing games with lives and emotions, especially of the Irish, but by no means exclusively so. And speaking of which, I was discussing Cameron's apology yesterday, and for the life of me, I could not help becoming verklempt over the whole thing. It was a surprising -- and completely spontaneous -- reaction to... what? Cameron's acknowledgment of British wrongdoing in Ireland? Memories of what happened so long ago? Knowledge of the suffering and bloodshed that followed on the Massacre? Or is it broader than that? As discussion continued, the pervasiveness of massacre as a means of Statecraft came into focus. The Bogside Massacre was just one small incident though it led to many others in the ongoing rounds of vengeance. Once on the cycle of revenge, it is very -- VERY -- hard to get off it. The best plan is not to start down that path. We are living in the midst of way too much of a vengeance cycle again. And ultimately, it was that realization that got to me. I kept saying I hoped that what Cameron did would become a model for so many of those intent on keeping us on this wheel of death. That's all.]


And still my question remains for the Legalists and Formalists out there:

Was Justice done in the case of Sir Thomas More?

To Sit At The Big Table

As should be clear from my commentary on the Halter/Lincoln Thing here and at Glenn's Place, I'm truly gobsmacked at the level of cynicism and the lack of ethical principles involved in Accountability Now's selection of and support of Lt Governor Bill Halter to primary Corporate-Dem Blanche Lincoln in Arkansas.

Blanche was primaried as an act of revenge, not to replace her in the Senate with someone better, or even to replace her at all. The purpose of the primary challenge was to "punish" her for her political transgressions against... whom?

The spin from Glenn and Jane and whatnot is that Blanche transgressed against the People of Arkansas. Perhaps so, but in a Democratic primary, the Democratic voters decide that, and they decided otherwise. But worse, the Arkansas electorate as a whole looks to have decided that they are done with Blanche in any case and they want an even worse Republican, John Boozman, to take her place in the Senate next year.

If it’s a choice between a genuine Republican, and a Republican in Democratic clothing, the people will choose the genuine article, every time; that is, they will take a Republican before they will a phony Democrat, and I don’t want any phony Democratic candidates in this campaign. -- Harry S Truman

Ahem.

But as Glenn's statement about the campaign makes clear (Bowers makes the same points), the primary campaign against Lincoln was an act of revenge for her betrayals. As Bowers put it, "It's payback time."

The fact that it backfired and Halter was the one defeated is completely glossed over with endless rationalizations. The Victory of Lessons Learned and all that.

If the lesson learned is that primary challenges should be based on principle and should offer a genuine progressive challenger to the sitting conserva-Dem incumbent, all well and good. If the recruiters and supporters of primary challengers set aside their desire for revenge and concentrate on the need for genuine -- fighting -- progressives in the August Bodies of the House and Senate, even better.

But are those lessons being learned? There's been no evidence of it. As long as revenge is the operative rationale to primary the ass of an incumbent, it's a fool's game.

But then... maybe that's the point.

It's occurred to me that the real goal -- at least for some of the blogospheric lights involved in primarying Blanche's ass -- was to gain a seat at the Big Table.

To crash the gate, to be Teh Kingmakers, Playahs in the political firmament. And the way to do that in this country is...?

If you aren't part of the Establishment to begin with and you weren't born to the purple, you have to pass an "audition" process, much like Obama had to, during which you demonstrate your ability to "manage the masses."

Show you can make them do things they otherwise wouldn't, show you can tease substantial amounts of money out of them, show you can manipulate and direct their efforts and beliefs, etc., etc.

Demonstrate these and other abilities convincingly and often enough, and more than likely you will be asked to sit at the Big Table, and if you do well there over a period of time, you will become a Fixture, a viable Pundit, the Go-To Guy on the Rabble, Inside the Gate, instead of Outside.

If that's the real goal, then what Jane and Glenn and Arianna and Markos and Aravosis and some of the others are doing makes sense, even when their unprincipled and cynical political ploys don't.

They want more than anything to sit at the Big Table and be taken seriously by People Who Matter.

Ana Marie Cox did it. Jake Tapper went from Salon to ABC to the White House to hosting one of the Big Tables after all.

It could be that's why so many in the blogosphere are prepared to wait, and urge their readers to wait, literally decades and longer for "progressive change" to occur, and why they almost universally applaud incrementalism and baby steps rather than sudden, sharp changes or developments, even when -- as was the case with Bush/Cheney -- sudden change was actually happening, but in the Neo-Con/Neo-Liberal direction opposite the direction "progressives" insisted was incrementally desirable.

They're focused on what "actually matters." Which is... ?

The Big Table.

On This Wikileaks Thing -- Spy vs Spy?

This WikiLeaks Thing is turning in to quite the chase-movie, isn't it?

It's got everything. Enigmatic Albino Anti-Hero on the lam, now in hiding somewhere in -- presumably -- Australia, his passport seized and drones thought to be seeking him out for liquidation from Above. Governments panicking, acting stupid. An odd-duck leaker cooling his heels in Kuwait awaiting military trial for something, just what isn't clear. Even odder-odd duck who turned in the odd-duck leaker to the FBI, a notorious hacker in his own right.

It's got it all.

Myself, I've always wondered whether WikiLeaks is a black op specifically designed to encourage traitors to the Empire to leak bits and pieces of Imperial misfeasance so as to be that much easier to track down and neutralize.

The cloak and dagger routine engaged in by Julian Assange was the tip off. The sort of over the top drama surrounding the release in April of this year of the video of American gunners exterminating "suspected militants" (oh and some journalists, too) in Baghdad (that happened in 2007) seemed extreme and deliberately hyped up by WikiLeaks and our propaganda machine, the major mass media, over something that is really very common in the "battlespace" -- and has been since "warfighting" began over there, with numerous incidents not much different than the one WikiLeaks documented being splashed all over the YouTubes for years, most of them released by the military propaganda shop itself.

In other words, the casual extermination of Ragheads is routine, has been since the beginning of conflict Over There and is very well known (and frequently celebrated) in the United States.

WikiLeaks claimed to have video of a similar incident in Afghanistan that they would release "shortly." They never released it, but Julian got on the teevee constantly claiming it would be released any time now, but it never was. And furthermore, the fact that these incidents go on in Afghanistan, too, has been abundantly documented in numerous YouTube videos currently on show. Julian was not "revealing" a damn thing that wasn't already known, in other words.

Death From Above is a constant in the ever-expanding Anglo-American Imperial Expeditions. This sort of killing goes on in Iraq, Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, Afghanistan, and for all we know, many other places as well, constantly. It is not a mystery.

So the sensational "revelations" by WikiLeaks that it was going on, with the gunning down of the hapless Baghdad Ragheads endlessly looped on the teevee screens of America and the World seemed severely "off" to me.

This is no revelation, I thought. We know this sort of thing has been going on relentlessly throughout the Anglo-American drive to re-establish Empire. There's no mystery here. This is how operations from Above are conducted. It is brutal and murderous and disgusting. So why was it being played for all it's worth this way?

And now that details about the drama and those involved are coming -- somewhat -- to light, the failure of the smell test is very strong.

260,000 State Department memos? All righty then. Show us.

A major marketing campaign is under way.

That's all I can say about it right now....

Testimonies of Mavi Marmara Passengers

From Counterfire.org YouTube channel:

Start with Jamal Elshayyal of AlJazeera, but there are many more.



See them all:

http://www.youtube.com/user/adycousins

And visit Counterfire for news of ongoing struggles around the world.

Don't put up with the shit that's going on.

How the testifiers stay so calm I'll never know. And of course Washington and Tel Aviv are collaborating to "investigate" the Peace Terrorist Flotilla and justify the murder, wounding, kidnapping, brutalization, and theft from its passengers. The results of this so-called "investigation" are foregone.

Israel is blameless, Peace Terrorists are guilty, all actions by Israel justified.

Oh, and by the way, Israel will now let corriander and toys into the Gaza. So there is that. Have a nice day.

Mavi Marmara Assault -- Full Video From Cultures of Resistance

YouTube Link

I watched this last night and found it to be a very powerful documentary in this extremely raw state. I posted some comments at Glenn's Place in response to ondelette's request for peoples' impressions of what they saw.

This is a transcript of my two posts last night:

Saturday, June 12, 2010 10:33 PM ET

ondelette: On the Full video released at UN

Been watching it off and on for a while now. In some ways so sad. I know, but I don't know, that some of the men, maybe many of them, in the video are either wounded or dead now.

They are so hopeful, so frightened, so determined.

There is an early sense of calm, deliberate intensity. Many conflicting emotions simultaneously.

I paused just past the point where the Israelis are pulling alongside the Mavi Marmara. The Israelis are firing at the ship; it sounds like bullets and grenades (flash/bang?), possibly tear gas as well; they are firing constantly.

The passengers are shouting, watching over the rail, moving fast from place to place. The Israelis keep up constant fire at the ship. Their fast boat is right up against the starboard side.

—Ché Pasa
Read Ché Pasa's other letters

ondelette: On the Full video released at UN (cont'd)

Blood on the stairwell, people don't know how it got there, a passenger wounded?

Firing. One shot. One shot. One shot. Burst of shots. One shot. Helicopter overhead, passengers warding it off with sling shots, ineffective. Shots are heard. Are they firing from the helicopter?

Commandos fast roping down, not much sound, view is from the deck below. No sign of what's going on up there. Helicopter choppers away. Men with slingshots continue to aim at it.

Shots heard on the upper deck, bursts of three, four. Wounded passengers carried down, and two Israeli soldiers.

Many wounded now, some dead, shot in the head; firing continues in bursts.

Men in the stairwell armed with sticks, the famous "iron bars," one tries to open a package of pepper spray with his knife. Unsuccessful. Waiting, waiting. Firing continues outside, now a shot, now another, now three, now four. Are they firing into the stairwell? Man goes down, but there is no effort to rescue him. Firing, firing.

Blood. Blood on the walls, blood on the floor, blood on the wounded, blood on the dead, blood on the men trying to be medics. Chest compressions on a badly wounded man, compressions badly done. They're trying the best they can. Is he dead?

Many wounded, some dead.

It looks like no one is afraid anymore. Firing, firing, one shot, one shot, two shots, one shot, three shots. Firing.

Dawn. The ship is traveling away from the dawn, moving westward, away from Gaza, west. Firing, firing. Shooting continues as alarm sounds on ship. Loudspeakers in other languages, then English. "Please go to your cabins. Go to your seats. The Israelis are using live ammunition. Please go to your seats."

Men mill around holding sticks, "iron bars." They pray. Smoke. So many smokers. Dawn.

Hearts are racing. What now?

—Ché Pasa
Read Ché Pasa's other letters

Permalink

The only thing I would add at this point is that what is shown in the raw footage is how a resistance struggle actually looks from the inside as an action is taking place. Superficially, it's not very dramatic most of the time; a lot of standing and milling around, nervous waiting. Flashes of bravery. Carrying and caring for the wounded and the dead. Mostly though, it's a situation of growing tension and not knowing what will happen next, nor necessarily when your own turn will come -- for whatever Fate has in store.

The dramatic action that you see on the teevee is the exception, not the rule.

I was struck, too, by all the people sitting around smoking and nervously laughing toward the end of footage. That's part of the truth of these things that people almost never see. But it is very real.

A Chart

Click to enlarge

Obama's Deficit Reduction Commission (familiarly known as The Catfood Commission) is charged with coming up with ways to reduce the deficit, with "all options on the table" -- except for raising taxes on the rich of course. That is verboten.

But in his speech in Pittsburgh the other day, Obama himself said that his administration would reduce the "discretionary budget" of the US Government by $1 trillion over the next three years. He vowed to cut everything except national security and defense spending. That's an average of $333 billion per year. Where, exactly, is it going to come from?

The chart above is from 2006, so it doesn't reflect today's discretionary budget, but proportionally things haven't changed all that much.

Observe: the Defense Department has far and away the lion's share of the Discretionary Budget, at $438.8 billion in 2006. All of the rest of the Discretionary Budget combined doesn't amount to the DoD's total ($401.7 billion for everything else vs $438.8 billion for the DoD.)

So where, exactly, is His Serenity going to find $333 billion per year to cut if DoD and other National Security items remain untouched?

What the holy hopping hell is he talking about?

Note, the chart is from the Foundation for Global Community a fine outfit that deserves every bit of support.

On Heroes

Anyone who has encountered my Internet ramblings over the last decade or so knows that I am not by nature into Hero Worship. Far from it. I am by nature a Skeptic and when the Spirit moves me I am a Rebel.

This has put me in the oddly ironic position of being seen as a Hero by others, something I find both inappropriate and grating.

Hero-worship has always been part of the political framework in this country, starting with George Washington, Father of Our Country, etc. None of his successors has quite matched his Heroic Stature, of course, but the idea that a President should be Heroic is deeply ingrained in the American psyche.

Obama inherited the Heroic Mantle of the Presidency when he ascended to the Throne, and as we know, his Heroic Stature has been frittering away ever since. It's bee One Damned Thing after another and all that.

And on the Internets, there is a kind of passionate level of Hero Worship, for all kinds of people, that almost makes me ill to witness. Whether it is Obama or Sarah or Glenn or Jane or some TV character or movie star, the Internet is rife with Heroic action figures and their devotees.

To me, Hero Worship is dangerous and foolish both for the object and for the subject.

Skepticism is always appropriate. Not partisan devotion; skepticism.

But that seems to be a rare characteristic among human-kind.

And getting rarer.

On the Deficit Hawkery Fraud

From New Deal 2.0:

Memo to Deficit Hawks: Let’s Get the Facts Right
Wednesday, 06/9/2010 - 10:53 am by Henry Liu

Think the deficit hawks have it all right about ‘entitlements’, spending cuts and the debt crisis? Think again.

A Panic Wave of Demand for Fiscal Austerity

The sovereign debt crisis in Greece has sparked a panic wave of radical policy demands for fiscal discipline throughout the European Union from a perverse coalition of neoliberal public finance ideologues and anti-government conservatives. Proponents of fiscal discipline argue that the EMU and its common currency, the euro, would not be sustainable without the drastic restructuring of public finance in all eurozone member states through a combination of tax increases and deficit reduction through fiscal austerity. But creditors, mostly transnational banks, will be protected from having to accept “haircuts” on their holdings of sovereign debt.

[snip]

Fiscal deficits across the eurozone are to be reduced by cutting public sector wages and social benefit and subsidy expenditures so that transnational bank creditors will be paid in full while turning a blind eye to blatant tax evasion and avoidance by the rich with non-wage income that contribute to loss of government revenue and fiscal deficits. The dysfunctional disparity of income and polarization of wealth between the wage-earning masses and the financial elite with income from profit and capital gain, are the main causes of overcapacity in the economy. In past decades, the neoliberal response to overcapacity was to shy away from the obvious solution of raising wages, turning instead to flooding the economy with huge mountains of consumer and corporate debt that eventually resulted in a tsunami of borrower defaults that turned into a global credit crisis. Yet repeating the same response to the current crisis will lead only to another global crisis down the road.

And it goes on like this. It's worth reading the whole thing as yet another reminder, straightforwardly told, of what is really going on, all over the world, as the banksters consolidate their holdings on the backs of the poor, working, and middle classes.

It is the very definition of "Shock Doctrine/Disaster Capitalism" and we are well into it. The question is, how can we get out of it?

More on Blowout Tuesday

Glenn has emerged briefly with his version of justification for putting ever so much effort into unseating Blanche Lincoln, even though she will likely lose in the fall to the Republican John Boozman.

It doesn't make sense.

The key paragraph in Glenn's explanation is this one:

The point here, speaking just for myself, was not to put Bill Halter in the Senate. While I am convinced Halter would have at least been marginally better than Lincoln (he certainly couldn't have been worse), I don't know if he would have been substantially better. Nor was the point an ideological one -- the real conflict in politics is not Left v. Right or liberal v. conservative, but rather, insider v. outsider. Lincoln's sin isn't an ideological one, but the fact that she's a corporatist servant of the permanent factions that rule Washington. The purpose here was to remove Lincoln from the Senate, or, failing that, at least impose a meaningful cost on her for her past behavior. That goal was accomplished, and as a result, Democratic incumbents at least know there is a willing, formidable coalition that now exists which can and will make any primary challenge credible, expensive and potentially crippling -- even if it doesn't ultimately succeed. That makes it just a bit more difficult for Democratic incumbents to faithfully serve corporate interests at the expense of their constituents, or at least to do so with total impunity.

Yes. Well.

There are so many problems with this, it's hard to know where to begin.

First of all, if the goal was not to put Bill Halter in the Senate, then the campaign on his behalf was pursued on false pretenses. People were induced to send money and work on behalf of a candidate who was apparently to be a sacrificial lamb for some other purpose. That's deeply cynical, at the least. It is shamefully unprincipled, even on a good day.

If Halter wouldn't have been more than marginally better, if better at all, than Blanche Lincoln, why support him? More to the point, why should anybody else support him?

If the Real Conflict is between "insider and outsider," why support a sitting office holder -- the Lt Governor of Arkansas -- an "insider" by definition, against another insider who has the support of the entire Democratic operation? What is the point of pitting one inside party operative against another when supposedly the Real Conflict is between the "insider and the outsider?" Why not find and promote an outsider?

If Lincoln's Real Sin is not her political ideology but that she serves corporate interest, what, then is her ideology?

If the goal was to "remove Lincoln from office," did anyone bother to look at the polls that showed her losing badly to the Republican candidate? Did it occur to anyone that the voters of Arkansas were already taking care of that little problem, and that in due time, she would lose her seat in the Senate? Did it occur to anyone that the cynical and unprincipled ploy of mounting this kind of primary challenge to her was deeply, morally wrong?

Did it occur to anyone that a lot of people were putting their heart and soul into this campaign based on their belief that Halter was the better candidate, who reflected progressive values, and that he would better represent the people of Arkansas in the Senate? Obviously they were deceived, but who deceived them? And to what purpose?

What is the "cost" imposed on Lincoln for her past behavior? Having to fight a primary opponent at all? Being "exposed" for the corporate whore she was already well known to be? Having to fight a primary opponent when it was already known that she was likely to lose in the fall to the Republican? Punishing her?

What goal was accomplished? Mounting a cynical and unprincipled primary campaign to "punish" the Senator? THAT was the goal? Who knew?

Democratic incumbents have long known their asses would be primaried when they went too far over to the Dark Side; viz: Jane Harman in California's 36th District.

She was first primaried by Marcy Winograd in 2006, a startling development for her. She was primaried by a Los Angeles schooteacher outraged at Harman's public support for Bushevik lawlessness, and she put the Fear into Ms Harman that hasn't let up. Winograd at least was a serious primary opponent whose policy positions fit many of the ideals of someone like Glenn, and a year ago, she said she would primary Harman's ass again because Harman continued to backslide and support wars of aggression and executive lawlessness. The White House and the Democratic Party establishment went after Winograd hammer and tong, but she got a higher percentage of votes on Tuesday than she did in 2006, a very respectable 41%. Now where was Glenn on her campaign? Why didn't he support someone like her instead of an insider like Halter who he admits was at best no more than marginally better than Lincoln?

If it really is "insider v outsider," why not support the outsider? That would be the principled thing to do.

How are Democratic incumbents in any way dissuaded by Halter's loss to Lincoln from supporting their favorite corporate interest? How in fact did that cynical and unprincipled spectacle affect their favorite corporate interest in any way, especially when an even more corporate-beholden Republican candidate is likely to take Lincoln's Senate seat in the fall?

Just what was accomplished here and on behalf of whom?

About the only thing I can say in Glenn's favor here is that he isn't crowing triumphantly, beating his chest and dragging his knuckles about how brave and bold and successful Accountability Now has been in this case, and he is apparently owning up, finally, to what was really going on with this campaign.

Unfortunately, in the process he is revealing such a level of cynicism and contempt for the process and the candidates, including the one he recruited, and such unprincipled practices in pursuit of his goals and objectives that it is very difficult to generate any regard or enthusiasm for his approach to political "change."

Since it wouldn't have resulted in more than cosmetic "change" if it had been successful, no wonder the White House openly jeered the effort.

What a shame and what a waste.

Down Below Under the Sea

Things continue to look terrible, to be sure, but observing the flow over time, it is obvious that the amount of oil and gas escaping from the funnel-like device that was put on top of the non-functional blowout preventer has diminished by a substantial amount. Most of the time, there is half or less the amount of oil going into the water than was the case before this device was put on top of the gusher. Sometimes you can actually see discreet drops of oil coming out from below the control device.

When I checked the flow yesterday, it almost looked like the gusher had burst into flames, with a bright orange glow visible through the awful muck coming out around the bottom of the control device.

Then it dawned on me. What I was seeing was not flames, it was the painted metal of the device itself, for the first time visible through the gushing oil and gas. Amazing. So they are capturing most of the flow and delivering it to the surface where the gas is burned off and the oil is deposited in ships to be taken away and sold (no doubt) to fluff up BP's deteriorating bottom line.

So my question was, "Why didn't they do this before?" The device itself is fairly simple, and it seems to be working very well, all things considered, especially given how poorly other fixes have "worked..." ie: not at all.

It is frustrating.

When I've watched from time to time, I've seen what looked like little white scraps of something that seem to float or sometimes scurry on their own. At the Oil Drum site, they are sometimes thought to be pieces of debris or possibly flakes of hydrate. Yesterday I was watching and I saw little legs and feelers: these things are shrimp. They seem to be attracted to the lights of the ROVs -- or maybe it's the oil. Sometimes they get caught up in the maelstrom. But most of the time, they just sort of dart around for a while, sometimes closer, sometimes farther away. Then they shoot off somewhere else.

Shrimp.

Who'd a thunk?

The image above is from one of the Skandi robots. All the BP robot cameras can be accessed here.

Rude

Speaks for itself

Blowout Tuesday

Blanche Lincoln beat New Progressive Bleu America/Accountability Now! candidate Lt Gov Bill Halter in the runoff for the Democratic nomination for the Senate in Arkansas last night, and the post mortems that have appeared (at Jane's and Markos's Places) have tried to market this loss as some kind of "victory" because, well, Blanche was "forced" to place "strong derivative language" in the Financial Regulation bill being considered by the Senate. So there's that. Eight million Progressive Dollars is all it cost. She wouldn't have done it without getting her ass primaried by a "progressive, non-establishment" candidate like Halter. Victory!

Horseshit.

The levels of self-delusion required by these blogospheric leading lights determined to be playahs in the game of Politics in this country is breathtaking, but when you realize that all of them are in business for themselves, and they are adding Political Enterpreneur to their operations, some of the delusion makes sense.

If they don't declare Victory! every time they lose, who's going to take them seriously?

And if nobody takes them seriously, there goes the business. It is that simple.

So Victory! it is, no matter.

And of course in the end, no matter who the Dems nominated, the Senate seat in question is widely considered to be an easy pick up for the Republicans in the fall. In other words, Blanche is gonna lose, and so would Halter if he'd won the runoff. As Markos himself says, "Say hello to Sen. Johm Boozman." Who would have beat either of them.


Given that Halter was essentially Blanche without a dress, and he ain't no "progressive," any objective person has got to wonder what the point would have been in any case? "To flex Progressive muscles!" Yeah, that's the ticket.

Nonsense.

More and more this "primary their ass!" business is looking like a racket. When every loss is a Victory! and too many of "progressives" who do get elected turn into Blue Dogs the minute they sit down in the August Chamber, we'd better start thinking there might be a systemic problem here that can't be corrected through the More and Better mantra.

A lot of us came to that conclusion a long time ago.

Lame

Markos and Arianna squared off against "Baby Dick" Cheney (heh) and George Will during last Sunday's "This Week" rountdtable hosted by former Salon writer Jake Tapper, now the It-Boy of the Sabbath Gasbag Shows.

Well.

To say it was pathetic is to be charitable. Oh. My. God.

Markos sat almost as quiet as a mouse during most of it. Will was cross, as he tends to be. Liz Cheney went into her usual venom and bark routines and either charmed or intimidated both the "liberals" on the panel, she lied openly, and routinely diverted attention from the topics at hand. She defended Daddy. Arianna appeared to be... star-struck.

What was so pathetic, though, is that Cheney wasn't crushed like a bug by either of her "opponents." If anything, they collapsed under her withering denunciations, some of which, it was clear, she was having fun throwing out -- like chum to sharks who wouldn't bite.

Cheney was treating the "liberals" like chew-toys. And for their part, they had nothing like her firepower. It was pathetic.

This was quite a contrast to Glenn's appearance on the same set a few weeks back, but the dynamic was different then, too. Glenn went after one of the "liberals" on the panel, Greg Craig, who was supporting the nomination of Elena Kagan (Glenn claims as a representative of the White House. Though I have asked for it, not a shred of evidence has been forthcoming that that is so. Consequently, I discount the accusation...). Glenn did not go after George Will or Ed Gillespie, the anti-Liberals and Republican tools on the panel.

There was a moment of potential fire last Sunday when Arianna mentioned Halliburton and its corruption and fines and whatnot. This caused the Cheney hackles to rise, but Liz's repost wasn't followed up. So it just fluttered in the wind for a bit and was gone.

Sad.

Won't somebody pull a "Have you no shame?" moment on this woman, "Baby Dick?"

Or is she just too frightening?

EEEEEEK!!!!

Part of the episode below:

To Expand A Bit on The Helen Thomas Thing (Now With Update!)

Helen did not use the word, "Jews." The Rabbi interviewing her did. And when she heard that, it seemed to dawn on her what was up; she cut her eyes at the person she was talking to and expanded her wish that Israelis would "go home" to "America and everywhere else."

She has long stated her guiding principle in the Middle East: innocent people should not be forced to pay for or die for the crimes of others.

It's the essence of her view of decency and justice. It's not a hard concept to understand, it's just rarely observed by the contending forces in the Middle East or anywhere else.

In fact, the universal policy in the Middle East and elsewhere seems to be that innocent people will always be made to pay or die for the crimes of others, at a ratio of hundreds to one.

If Helen's principle were observed in Europe during that Unfortunate Period of the 20th Century, there wouldn't have been a Holocaust, and if there wasn't a Holocaust, there probably wouldn't have been an Israel, either. The Palestinians might be living in peace and happiness, who knows.

Wouldn't want that.

In trying to seek some understanding of Israel's victim mentality -- and the violence that is Israelis' constant way with regard to their subjugated minorities and neighbors -- I came across a link to a brilliant documentary by Israeli filmmaker Yoav Shamir called "Defamation". In it, the filmmaker tries to make sense of a term he has heard all his life in Israel but has never experienced: "Antisemitism." He goes on a long journey and learns many things. One of them being that Israel lives on the corpses of the Holocaust, something that happened long ago and far away, and which is now used as an excuse to deflect any criticism of Israel or Israeli military/political action and declare it "Antisemitism." The picture is remarkable for what it bravely shows of human nature, and for the hope it gives that a less froughtful future is possible. Not easy. Possible. I cannot recommend it highly enough.

Part I (of 9) embedded below:



==========================================

UPDATE The Rabbi has posted the entire interview with Helen Thomas. Watch it, and then tell the world what a hideous antisemitic old hag Helen is. Just tell the whole wide world. The Rabbi should be ashamed.

Sometimes I just want to scream.

Rude

Helen Thomas issued the following statement today: “I deeply regret my comments I made last week regarding the Israelis and the Palestinians. They do not reflect my heart-felt belief that peace will come to the Middle East only when all parties recognize the need for mutual respect and tolerance. May that day come soon.” (June 4, 2010)

News Release from Russia Today

Helen Thomas “hung by her own words”


Published 08 June, 2010, 02:09

American Reporter Helen Thomas has covered the White House since the Kennedy administration, but recent comments on Israel are forcing her to retire.


Thomas’s controversial statements about Israel are causing quite a stir in Washington and throughout the national media.

Thomas was recorded in an impromptu video interview saying, “Tell them [Jews] to get the hell out of Palestine. […] Remember these people [Palestinians] are occupied and it’s their land, not Germany, not Poland. They [Jews] can go home to Poland, Germany and America and everywhere else.”

Thomas has been a long time critic of Israel and Israeli policy. She has been admired by her in the past and in known for raising sharp questions on international issues.

"This was right after the incident happened on the high seas outside of Gaza. She was obviously very emotional and very upset, not very elegant in the way she spoke and not making the distinctions she later made in her clarification,” said blogger Danny Schechter.


Clarifications made later by Thomas indicated she has continually supported the peace process and respect and tolerance among the parties involved.

“She’s been hung by her own words,” said Schechter.

Many defending Thomas cite her right to free speech, however the issue came down to who Thomas represented when she made her comments, notable the White House press corp and Hearst Newspapers.

Schechter said that the White House correspondents have become increasingly soft in their coverage of the White House, in past and present administrations, referring to them as “hypocrites.”

“I think Helen Thomas apologized. I think Helen Thomas explained her comments. I think Helen Thomas then became a convenient target for the people who want to just limit all debate and discussion about Israel. I don’t think Helen Thomas should be crucified here. I think she should be honored for her 50 years of service,” said Schechter.

In other words, she was rude. And in today's Versailles on the Potomac, populated by squadrons of Heathers, popinjays, sycophants, toadies, and courtiers masquerading as "journalists," being rude is the worst possible sin.

Cranky, cantankerous and eccentric, certainly. But rude? Never.

Be gone with her.

Enough of this monstrous woman.

Sic transit and all that.

Helen who?

Our Good Emperor, Neo-Liberal Deficit Hawk

Now let us be seated.

Our Good Emperor, Barack Obama I, speechified in Pittsburgh PA (no sign of Sestak, BTW) on the topic of "Moving Forward on The New Foundation." Yes. Yes. Yes.



And what we have here is a somewhat mitigated recipe for neo-liberal economic restructuring of the United States based on the continued and perpetual impoverishment of the masses and the extended enrichment of the upper 1%. The Rich Get Richer and Everyone Else Gets Poorer model of economics.

The Way It Should Be.

This isn't the New New Deal, this is what would have happened if Hoover had been re-elected in 1932. We need to get real. Obama is no liberal let alone a Socialist. He is a double-dip dyed Neo-Liberal whose policy prescriptions are Neo-Liberal.

And in Pittsburgh, he made that double-plus clear.

"The New Foundation" is what he calls his program of reduction of services and benefits for the masses, while maintaining and increasing the wealth and power of the aristocracy.

His New Foundation, he says, has five pillars:

It's a foundation built upon five pillars that will grow our economy and make this new century another American century: Number one, new rules for Wall Street that will reward drive and innovation, not reckless risk-taking -- (applause); number two, new investments in education that will make our workforce more skilled and competitive -- (applause); number three, new investments in renewable energy and technology that will create new jobs and new industries -- (applause); number four, new investments in health care that will cut costs for families and businesses; and number five, new savings in our federal budget that will bring down the debt for future generations. (Applause.)

What exactly does he mean? We don't know, do we. That's the point. After all the high-flying calls on the People's better angels, we find that the actions of Our Mister Barack serve the interests of the Plutocracy first, foremost and always. You plebes may -- or may not -- get a crumb in due time. Oh, and by the way, you plebes are paying for whatever the calls for Hope and Change require.

It's the way the world works.

The goal is to reduce the spending deficit by $1 trillion over the next three years, at the rate of approximately $333 billion a year, by raising some taxes and cutting solely from "discretionary spending," cutting nothing from defense and national security, and given the way these things have been going, that's tantamount to enabling increases in defense and national security spending while tightening the belt on discretionary entitlements like social programs. We'll get to that.

The Federal Budget has been running about $3 trillion a year, so cutting $300+
billion or so means a 10% reduction in budget overall, and since discretionary spending is around 65% of the whole budget, that will mean an overall discretionary spending cut (primarily from social programs and services) of around 20+% each year for the next three years. And counting.

How do they think they will do that? Well, of course, nobody will say. That's the point of the Deficit Commission meeting behind closed doors.

The Deficit Hawk measures Obama brought up in Pittsburgh include: letting the Bushevik tax cuts on the rich "expire." Of course he mentioned this first, because it is the one suggestion that will get the masses riled up and cheering, even though it is the one suggestion that has the least likelihood to succeed in our Bought and Paid For Congress. Given so much bitter experience with these things over the this and the previous administration, it is fair to predict that the tax cuts for the wealthy will remain; they could conceivably be expanded. Since "taxes are punishment" according to the received wisdom of the American Enterprise Institute, it's only natural to confine taxes to the "losers." Yes?

Secondly, Obama will recommend that the Deficit Commission's recommendations be followed. This commission is purposely set up to provide cover for cutting Social Security and Medicare, for increasing taxes on the working class, for streamlining and reducing taxation on the Aristocracy, and for presenting a framework for a neo-liberal government "austerity" program far into the future.

Education, research and development, transition to a green economy and so forth are held out as baits in order to achieve the prime objective -- which is the neo-liberal wet dream of enhanced private wealth for a few while forcing most social and other costs (including education, R&D, etc.) onto the increasingly impoverished masses.

Bueno. What's not to like?

This "austerity" regimen is essentially what's already under way in Europe, will be under way in Britain shortly, and has long been the IMF's practice to impose on "debtor" countries world wide. The living standards of the masses are to be reduced. Substantially. And permanently. And it will be done in order to ensure the continued comfort and convenience of the Upper 1%, and to fund their extra-curricular activities such as wars of aggression and colonial occupation.

You think you've been seeing a transfer of wealth from the bottom to the top over the last 30 years? You ain't seen nothin' yet. That wealth transfer process is about to go into hyperdrive.

But in the end, we are assured by the Good Emperor Obama, it will all work out for the best.

It always does.

You may arise. Please. ARISE! you servile masses!

"What Should The Israelis Have Done?"

The hasbaraniks continue to infest the Interwebs like locusts, presenting the IDF Spokesman's Line on the Mavi Marmara Affair, rigidly adhering to the talking points that they repeat by rote over and over and over again, about how surroundsed, beset and victimised poor little friendless Israel is in the midst of a ravening horde of Arabs and how necessary it is to prevent weapons from being smuggled into Gaza, and how Hamas is a Terrorist Organization that has vowed to wipe Israel off the map, and how many times the convoy was offered safe passage to Ashdod and how cruel and vicious the passengers were to the kindly IDF Commandos who carefully rappelled down to the decks so as not to disturb the passengers' slumbers, only to be met with a ravening horde of Peace Terrorists who pummeled them with Terror Sticks and stabbed them with Terror Knives and threw them over the Terror Rails of the Terror Ship until the patience of the Gentle Commandos who were only enforcing the necessary blockade was exhausted and with Immense Sorrow in Their Hearts for what the Peace Terrorists were forcing them to do, they fired into the ravening hordes of Peace Terrorists on that one ship, just the one remember, and finally, with great difficulty, brought the unfortunate situation under control. Heroically.



That's the Line from hasbara HQ. Now some of the hasbaraniks will embroider this basic story with tales of the Holocaust and all the Little Hitlers that have popped up in our midst, or they will go on about how the many outspoken Jewish critics of Israel's behavior are objectively Pro-Terrorist and clearly self-hating Jews, etc. etc. Each hasbaranik has their own little quirk. But the core story is repeated over and over and over again, in an almost trance-like state. A wonder to behold.

Every now and again, a hasbaranik will ask, "Well, what should Israel have done, Mister Smartypants?"

My answer? Simple:

Welcome the humanitarian aid ships, issue no threats or orders, offer to escort them to the Port of Gaza, and assist in the unloading and distribution of supplies by paying for personnel and transport. Then thank the Peace Terrorists and peacefully escort them back to international waters.

Couldn't be simpler.

No deaths, no violence, and... Israel breaks its own blockade.

What a concept.

So far nearly everyone is thinking about this incident and the situation that led to it tactically. "What would you have done to preserve the blockade?" when the simple and I believe correct answer is strategic: Israel breaks its own blockade and assists the humanitarian convoy in achieving its humanitarian objectives.

If the Israelis had done that, the picture today would be very different, many people would still be alive and healthy, the situation in Gaza would start to measurably improve, and Israel's image would undergo a transformation.

Israel has the power to make this kind of strategic move, power that Hamas doesn't have. Israel has the ability to move forward.

Why doesn't it do so?

Peace Terrorists (h/t Baldie McEagle)

Of course the Whole Wide World is all abuzz over the cowardly IDF's latest atrocity, this one on the high seas, commandeering international vessels headed to Gaza to deliver 10,000 tons of much needed basic supplies like wheelchairs, medicine, cement, to the encaged inhabitants. In the process of commandeering the vessels, the IDF cowards murdered a shifting number of passengers of one vessel (the Official IDF Number today is 9, but it has varied substantially so much and so often -- from 9 to as many as 20 dead -- there is no way for an independent observer to know for sure. No doubt by design). They injured dozens of passengers, some with gunshots, others with stun grenades, rubber bullets, electrical shock devices, and just plain mano-a-mano brutality.

It's a "public relations disaster" for the cowardly Likud coalition regime in Jerusalem and the cowardly IDF, as if the only concern they or anyone else really need have about this act of war against Turkey and other nations is the "Narrative."

The perpetual Narrative. Worry about what we and others say not about what happened.

What Israel has become is heartbreaking for someone like me. I grew up with Israel.

And when I was younger, until the aftermath of the 1967 War, I was a strong supporter of Israel, even subscribed to some magazine they put out for young people all about the kibbutzim and the hardy Zionist pioneers who were transforming the Holy Land, yadda, yadda, yadda. It was really thrilling, and prior to 1967, there was no concept in my mind that there might be something a little off about this experiment of settling (mostly) European Jews -- refugees and Holocaust survivors -- in Palestine. The facts of the foundation of Israel were... murky to say the least, at least to someone like me who was fascinated with the energy and excitement of it all. Israel was the kind of progressive, forward-looking, strong, independent, youthful, happy society most Americans aspired to in one way or another. Israel was doing what so many idealists believed had to be done.

And prior to 1967, it seemed possible that Israelis and Palestinians would live together in peace, harmony and prosperity, eventually if not immediately. It seemed -- at least until then -- that the Israelis and the Palestinians were trying to come together, but Jordan and Egypt were preventing it.

Then Israel initiated war in 1967, took the West Bank and Gaza and all of Jerusalem, and while at first there was hope that this conquest would work out for the best for the Palestinian inhabitants, soon enough, it became clear that they would be under military occupation and not integrated into Israel, and it wasn't good.

The situation has deteriorated ever since.

In 1973, Israel went to war again against its neighbors and seized the Sinai Peninsula and the Suez Canal from Egypt and the Golan Heights from Syria, and defied anyone to do anything about it.

At that time, I became a "neutral" when it came to Israel, thinking -- to the extent I thought about it at all -- that if Israel acted like a grown up, or just followed concepts of human decency, things would work out.

But they didn't.

Over the years, the Israeli dilemma has gotten worse and worse, and in the last few years, Israel has turned into a bloodthirsty rogue monster state, a tiny version of what the United States has become, without the USA's redeeming qualities, and this latest misadventure against "Peace Terrorists" has just about sealed the deal for the whole world.

Nope. No more of this shit. They've gone too far. They are a pariah state for whom the end will come.

Of course nothing will happen in the short term. Likudniks will rage and fulminate the way they do, probably killing a few score more Palestinians to prove they "can" (I heard three were slaughtered in the Gaza yesterday; there will be more).

The supply convoy intended to break the Israeli blockade of Gaza; instead the ships and passengers were abducted and hauled off to Ashdod. Oddly enough, though, the reaction of world opinion was so swift and so fierce and so negative that Egypt opened the Rafah crossing without restrictions the day after the seizure of the convoy and its passengers, thus effectively breaking the blockade, while the rest of the world called for its ending. Israel apparently swiftly unloaded the supplies from the vessels and transported them all to Gaza, apparently without restriction. (I have to say "apparently" because Israel has an annoying habit of lying about everything it does and says it is doing and/or will do. "Information Management/Information Warfare," don't you see.) Most of the passengers, if not all of them, have been or shortly will be released and repatriated.

Another convoy is on the way, this one from Ireland, and the question is whether the Israelis will try to commandeer these vessels as well. Turkey says it will escort the next convoy with naval ships. Israel has already committed an act of war against Turkey by seizing a Turkish-flag ship and murdering and wounding dozens of Turkish passengers. If there is a confrontation between the Turkish navy and the Israelis, it could turn very nasty and very ugly very fast. We'll know more within the week.

Someone asked, "What should Israel do?"

The answer is very simple: escort any aid vessels to Gaza, and assist them in unloading and distributing supplies, lift the blockade by land and sea, and pay substantial reparations to Gazans and Palestinians in general.

For a start.

And then get some national social and political therapy.

Social Democracy is Hard; Libertarian Paradise, Not So Much

LAND in Arizona!!! Only $22,500 for 36 Acres!!!! Get yours NOW!!!! Before it's All GONE!!!! LAND!!!! Just like the Old West only Better!


The Euro-presence in this Land of the Free and Home of the Brave is largely predicated on the notion that Liberation means getting away from the Authority of whatever the Power Center happens to be.

Liberation means going it alone into the trackless wilderness, fighting for your share -- and whatever else you can grab -- against all others. Murder, pillage, rape, genocide, who cares? You do what you have to to get what's rightfully yours, and once you have it, you fight off any one or any Authority that would try to either take it from you or skim off just a bit for the "common good." It's yours, goddammit, you stole it fair and square by any and all means necessary. There is no such thing as "common good."

You fight and you hunker down. Until the big-bellied sheriff comes with his shotgun and his dog and a warrant and you either go out in a blaze of glory or you surrender in ignominious defeat.

These days, someone with that overweening belief in their independence and arrogance doesn't have to venture very far into the trackless wilderness to acquire a decent sized plot of land that they can fortify against outsiders and become squires of their domains. People do it all the time. These days, given the collapse of the real estate market, good-sized parcels, sometimes with habitable structures on them, can be picked up for a relative song. There is nothing to stop Libertarians from making their Paradise right here and right now. It is ridiculously easy. Just get yourself some land, build a hut or a castle, plant a garden, do something creative, and there you are. With a little foresight, work, and some skill, you can live as free as you want to, avoid most if not all taxes, and enter into all the voluntary markets and associations with others of your ilk as you please, and almost nobody from the Government will even ask what you're doing.

There have been endless Utopian schemes in this country since day one of European settlement, and they continue. So why don't Libertarians do it? It's so easy.

Social Democracy is hard. Social Democracy requires some semblance of society -- civilization in a word -- and some concept of Democracy, neither of which are important to Libertarians. Social Democracy requires physical infrastructure -- a city for example -- and a functioning economy of some sort, even if it is not highly developed. It requires a population that understands concepts like "common interest," "public good," "progress for all," "misery for none."

Social Democracy requires citizens and government and the close interaction between them on a premise of Democracy. In a functioning Social Democracy, the People are the Government. But for the People to BE the government takes hard and lasting work by the People, individually and collectively.

Social Democracy requires that the economy function primarily to serve the interests of the People, secondarily to serve individual interests for wealth, power and prestige. The People's interests have to come first, and those interests are found, not by directives from above, but by the active participation of the People in Democratic institutions. In a Social Democracy agreement is sought as broadly as possible through Democratic processes, but as a rule, the Tyranny of the Majority is avoided by making as many allowances for dissent and dissenters as possible consistent with the overall Public Good. Not everyone has to go along with everything. On the other hand, dissent that will damage the Public Good is routinely quarantined. For example, in a Social Democracy, predatory capitalism would be quarantined because it damages the Public Good.

But nothing happens without the informed consent of the People, and nothing is allowed to seriously disrupt the People's ability to govern themselves through Democratic processes and to prosper from an economy founded on Democratic principles.

To accomplish that is extremely hard. The frequently encountered human tendency to cupidity, rebellion, and disruption as well as the typical disinterest most people have in the social, economic and political minutiae of their city or nation make participatory democracy a generally elusive ideal.

But it can be done, and the process of participatory democracy can be streamlined so as to make it somewhat less burdensome than otherwise. There is really no escaping from the citizen's responsibility in a Social Democracy, and it takes real effort and concentration, hopefully inculcated from childhood, for a citizen to be fully engaged and involved in the society, government and economic life of his or her community and nation.

Elements of Social Democracy do exist in the United States, though Social Democratic ideals have no place in our National Government. Locally, however, socially conscious democratic institutions are seen widely, especially in secular university towns, in parts of New England, in the Upper Midwest where Scandinavians settled in large numbers, in "advanced" coastal cities like San Francisco, and so on. Conceptually, Social Democracy is not foreign to Americans on the local level. But it has never been a significant factor in National affairs.

Part of the reason is the nature of our Nation's political institutions as well as the fact that the Constitution formed a Government that is in no way a "collective" or even "participatory" Democracy. And too, the absence of Social Democratic ideals and practices at the National level may well be a matter of scale. Because Social Democracy requires such close interrelationships between the Government and the People, and our national Government doesn't work that way in the first place, and the size of the country and the size of the population are so huge that unless the governing institutions are reformed and expanded many-fold, the Social Democratic ideal will probably never take hold in DC.

But then, maybe it shouldn't. Libertarians and Social Democrats might well agree that the nation is too big to be governed successfully, and it would be better for all concerned to break it up into smaller constituent parts. So there is that potential convergence.

An irony is that Social Democracy can incorporate many of the ideals of Libertarianism, but Libertarianism cannot abide Social Democratic ideals and would seek their destruction.

Social Democracy is just too difficult for Libertarians.

Where the Cheneys At?

Where are the Cheneys, Father and Daughter, who used to be on all the shows all the time roasting Obama over hot coals and spitting venom at all and sundry. Haven't seen hide nor hair of either of them for months.

Where are they and what are they up to?

Of course they may feel they don't need to be on the Warpath for the time being because so much of what they said was necessary for the Government to do -- ie: protecting the Cheneys asses first and foremost, preserving and extending unlawful Bush Era power grabs and autocracy secondarily, blasting Muslims to pink mist whenever the spirit moved them -- has pretty much been instituted in whole or in part. In other words, the Cheneys spent most of 2009 running around screaming that there were a bunch of wusses in the White House and we we all gonna DIE! And then they stopped.

Quiet as mice they are.

But since most of their demands have been met, what do they have to yowl about?

This is how the Good Emperor Barack has chosen to rule, and for him, I think it has been fairly effective. For the rest of creation, not so much.

The Wars continue unabated, though troop presence in Iraq is being reduced in order to increase troop levels in Afghanistan. Pakistan is still under attack from drones. Same with Somalia and the Yemen. Threats and imprecations against Iran have, if anything, redoubled, and plenty of diplomatic double-crossing is the order of the day (viz: the deal brokered with Iran by Brazil and Turkey and denounced by DeeCee, even though it is what was wanted by the Palace.) Indefinite detention and rigorous interrogation of terror suspects is the policy position of the White House as detailed in the latest National Security Strategy statement, so the dismissal of the Constitution and the tyranny of the Bush years continues without a break. There is no investigation, let alone prosecution, of the criminals who infested the White House in the previous administration, military commissions have resumed in Guantanamo, and not only that, but Government attorneys at the DoJ and DoD seem happy as clams, unlike the case under the Bush/Cheney regime when at least some of them would resign rather than put up with more tyrannical impositions. They don't do that any more. Indeed, lawyers who defend terror suspects are now to be investigated, intimidated, and thwarted from doing their jobs as a matter of DoD policy. YAY! The banksters are fatter and happier than ever, oil is gushing uncontrolled into the Gulf of Mexico and the People are groaning under a heavier and heavier burden of poverty and despair. Social Security and Medicare are about to be cut, and everyone is about to be forced to carry private health care insurance, adding further to the People's burdens.

What's not to like?

So why should the Cheneys have to emerge from their undisclosed lairs?

They got what they wanted just by barking and growling some on the teevee.

Brilliant.

Under the Seas

Just a note:

It's truly fascinating to watch the live feeds of operations under the sea to attempt to gain control of the runaway oil well that is causing so much pollution and destruction. It is very much like watching something in outer space or a science fiction movie.

Just wish what's going on wasn't so awful.

The picture above is a screengrab of something being sawed by the robots.

The Dance

One faction of the Establishment contends with the Other for Power, Money, Dominance, Sex -- and possibly Survival.

It's the Dance.

Interesting that the recent primary elections were characterized (by people like Glenn, but also widely throughout the Major Mass Media) as insurgents defeating -- or almost defeating -- the Establishment. No, I said. That isn't actually what was going on.

The three "insurgent" candidates who were featured -- Lt. Governor Bill Halter of Arkansas who has forced Senator Blanche Lincoln into a runoff, Dr. Rand Paul of Kentucky, son of long-time Texas "Libertarian" Confederate Congressman Ron Paul who defeated the KY Secretary of State for the Republican Senate nomination, and Congressman Joe Sestak of Pennsylvania who defeated Former Republican now Democratic Senator Arlen Specter for the Democratic Party's Senate nomination -- were all, I argued, very Establishment characters. There were no genuine insurgents -- as in non-Establishment -- candidates in these races. If there had been, we probably wouldn't have heard of them, and it is almost certain they wouldn't have won or even come within hailing distance of winning.

A sitting Lt Governor, a sitting Congressman, and the son of a sitting Congressman run for Democratic and Republican party nominations, and they are not "Establishment?"

Please.

No, they ARE "Establishment," and they represent factions of said Establishment.

Interestingly two of these crypto-"insurgents" are under fierce attack from the faction of the Establishment currently holding the reins of Power.

Joe Sestak, a middle of the road Democrat who would be considered conservative in any rational world, is being subjected to a fierce pummeling by his own and the other party over his offhand comment that the White House offered him a job if he would desist. Well, isn't that special. Republicans are making whatever hay they can out of the "revelation" -- and according to Digby are cranking up the Scandal Machine in an effort to get rid of Sestak and to cripple, even bring down, the President, whereas Sestak is bungling and bumbling the way he does, and not playing the politics very well at all.

Of course All the World knows how the Tedious Little Peckerhead, Rand Paul, in Kentucky is being ground up into chum for the Media and is being (occasionally) skewered -- or at least used for all-important fundraising purposes -- by the Democrats. He has been turned on in ways his father never was. Which strikes me as largely Kabuki because all the signs are that arrogant little twerp will indeed wind up in the Senate, where conceivably he can actually throw a tantrum and cause a ruckus and bring Government as an enterprise to a screeching halt. Conceivably, he could boot Lieberman out of the Catbird Seat, even give Little Lindsey a run for his money. Then where would we be? So of course all the Big Guns are turned on him right now, not so much to keep him from winning the seat (I think it is presumed he will win), but to attempt to... erm... socialize him somewhat to the ways of Our Government before he gets to the August Body.

Bill Halter in Arkansas isn't being given this treatment -- yet -- because he isn't seen to be going anywhere. If he defeats Lincoln in the runoff, though, you can bet he will get the same "scrutiny" Sestak and Paul are getting. [Note to add: What little polling I've seen indicates that neither Lincoln or Halter can defeat the Republican candidate. So "scrutinizing" Halter may not even be worth the trouble.]

Does that mean there are any real non-Establishment insurgents among this trio? Of course not. Sestak is as solid an Establishment figure as you can find, a retired Navy Admiral and sitting Congressman; he defeated a tired ancient Republican for the Democratic Senate nomination, and -- assuming he goes to the Senate -- he will be a solid Establishment Democrat in the August Body. On the other hand, the Tedious Little Peckerhead could turn into quite a problem in the Senate if he isn't tamed before he gets there. He seems to be undergoing an Extreme Makeover to sandpaper off his rougher anti-Government edges and to get him up to speed with the current Republican Party Line. He seems to be doing fine as far as that goes. And Republicans in Kentucky back him almost unanimously, far more so than Democrats back the Democratic Senate candidate What's-His-Name.

(A side note: Li'l Rand reminds me somewhat of Dr. Howard Dean; in fact, I think the two are complimentary, and the Tedious Little Peckerhead is running as a kind of mirror image of Dean. He uses some of the same rhetorical devices (with a twist of course: "I've got a message from the Tea Party. We've come to take our government back.") and -- somewhat disturbingly -- he actually looks a little like Dean and speaks something like him. But Dean, as Establishment as he was, was not welcomed as a Power Player, in fact he was denied even a modicum of respect in that regard. Of course that may have had something to do with the fact that he could never gain more than low double digit support in the 2004 primaries, in stark contrast to expectations, whereas the Peckerhead has not only defeated his Republican rival, he is -- by some polls --- way out in front of his Democratic rival as well. Might have something to do with it, I don't know.)

It's a dance. A show. Yes, of course, it is a real struggle for advantage and power -- within the Establishment. It is nothing at all like its marketing, though, of some sort of "insurgency" from outside the Establishment trying to worm its way into Power.

Real insurgents would be monkeywrenching the System, not trying to take it over by securing a place or a better place within it.

Trade-offs

In all the verbiage spilled over the Tedious Little Peckerhead, Rand Paul of Kentucky, one of the things that pops out at me about Libertarians as a class and Puritans in general is a complete failure to recognize that living in a civilized -- or even just a civil -- society involves trade-offs.

As the poet put it:

You can't always get what you want...

People who have adapted to living in a civil society accept that as a fundamental tenet. You can't always get what you want, and there are always trade-offs -- sometimes ugly ones -- in establishing and maintaining relatively peaceful and mutually rewarding civic, social, and economic conditions.

And if you try sometime you find you get what you need...

The example that is the focus of the current controversy over Rand Paul is that of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which no one under 40 is thoroughly cognizant of on the one hand, and people over 60 still remember the struggles over it as if they were yesterday. The measure is that important to the way society in this country functions, and it took major upheavals and some very bold leadership in Washington, in the States, and at the local levels to get from where we were in matters discriminatory to where we are.

The Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the subsequent civil rights and voting rights legislation undid the strange and twisted Apartheid state that Jim Crow legislation and long-time social custom had imposed -- and not just in the South.

It was as radical a transformation of American society as there has ever been, and its effects appear to be lasting and profound. At least so far as we know, most Americans under 40 wouldn't even dream of reverting to the Jim Crow past, not even in the Heart of Dixie. The idea is absurd to them. They've seen a couple of generations of relatively peaceful, more or less racially integrated living, and the genuine liberation of all sorts of groups, including women, from the restrictions of a straight-laced discriminatory and overtly oppressive white male privilege society.

There's no going back.

But we didn't get where we are without some pretty heavy, and to some extent catastrophic, trade-offs.

We should be discussing those trade-offs much more than we are.

Jim Crow wasn't overcome without a massive trade off. The United States is now a prison society, incarcerating and adjudicating the lives millions upon millions of Americans. Approximately one in three black men being ground up in the prison state mechanisms. Liberation for all has meant imprisonment for many.

This trade off has devastated black families.

The liberation of women from the home has come with a trade off: the stagnation of worker wages over generations. It now takes two workers -- instead of ordinarily one -- for typical households to support families in a comfortably modest lifestyle.

We could go on and on with examples of trade offs for liberation, and we should recognize that both "liberated" society and oppressive, discriminatory society involve trade-offs, and we should recognize what they are and evaluate their social, economic, and political worth.

For example, is the trade-off of living in a prison society like we do right or just or necessary in order to implement the "equal rights for all" premise that underlies civil rights legislation?

Do we have to have the Drug War, "fought" primarily against black and brown men, in order to overcome the racial fears and animosities of a shrinking middle class?

Does liberation of women require flattening and eventually reducing household living standards?

Puritans and libertarians don't accept trade-offs in their pursuit of Liberation to do what they want, when and how they want, with no regard for others if they don't choose to have such regard. They are would-be petty tyrants within their own spheres, which they would endeavor to increase as much as possible. They don't accept trade-offs; it's their way or no way. However, adopting their political, social and economic determinism would mean certain very obvious trade-offs that most rational people reject out of hand. Accepting Puritan/Libertarian "liberation" means the vast majority would be subject to outright and potentially very fierce tyranny.

The Puritan/Libertarian Motto: "I demand the Liberty to impose my Authority on you." The only way the tiny faction of Puritan/Libertarians can have their "Liberty" is by imposing their Tyranny on everyone else.

Which is their goal.

No wonder most people reject it.

On the other hand, there is not nearly enough discussion and consideration of the trade-offs that have been made in order to secure the Blessings of Liberty implicit in the concept of Equal Rights for All.

That's where social, economic and political discussion needs to go.

And I went down to the demonstration
To get my fair share of abuse
Singing, "We're gonna vent our frustration
If we don't we're gonna blow a 50-amp fuse"
Sing it to me now...

[NB: I have seen the Rolling Stones... but I have never seen... "Glee" ]

Blood In The Water

How about a little change of pace?

From Legally Blonde, The Musical

Arizona Continues Seceding

And getting away with it, too.

Make no mistake. That's what the crazies are doing. Next up, denying citizenship to "anchor babies." Mm. Sounds like a plan. Thing of it is, there's this "Constitution" that says anyone born in the US is a citizen. It would take an amendment to change it; little pissant fucktard states like Arizona can't do it by themselves. But I'll bet that if an amendment were proposed, it would pass overwhelmingly in the Congress, and in state legislatures, just to calm the rabble.

So why don't the no-accounts in Arizona do that instead? Oh, easy: the state, run by clowns and conmen, is seceding. They don't care about your stupid Constitution -- not that anybody but purists and eccentrics do any more -- they want OUT.

They're gonna keep pulling this shit until somebody forces them to stop. And who is that going to be? The Wholly Owned Subsidiary of Goldman Sachs and BP in the White House?

Not likely.

As I mentioned in my previous post on the Oil Catastrophe, I'm not really into Doomblogging. But... there are signs that the strain the nation has been under at least since the lawless Supreme Court ruling which decided the election of 2000 is reaching the critical point.

Chaos up next?

Well, as they say, "Never let a good crisis go to waste!"

Batten down. It's gonna be a rough ride.