Leftists Embroiled in Never-Ending War

By MATT KENNARD, Columnist

During the Cold War the political left split in spectacular and rancorous fashion and like Humpty Dumpty they’ve never really put themselves back together again.

Back then, one side consisted of those who stayed blind to the crimes of Lenin and Stalin, atrocities culminating in the Gulag prison camps and the Moscow Trials. They stayed in the Communist Party (CP) through it all, arguing that Stalinism was preferable to the victory of predatory capitalism, or that all these atrocities were a means to a better end ― that dangerous ideology so beautifully rendered by Arthur Koestler in “Darkness at Noon.” Eric Hobsbawm, the famous Marxist historian, was one case of someone who refused to leave the CP even as the atrocities were coming to light, especially under Leonid Brezhnev.

On the other extreme, leftists and liberals embraced the U.S. and their putative war against communism, even when it was destroying democratically elected governments all over the world. They argued that the Popperian “open society” was in danger and anything went, from Pinochet to Suharto. Here you could find erstwhile lefties like Sidney Hook.

Then there were the Trostkyists who sat somewhere in the middle. They argued against the crimes of Stalin, snidely calling Stalinism “state capitalism,” and holding that it would have all been different if Leon Trotsky had succeeded Lenin instead of that autocratic sadist, Stalin. Near to them were the New Left who boasted minds like E.P. Thompson and Perry Anderson and Tariq Ali. They tried to cut a course with a new program which railed against both superpowers.

These debates on the left all crumbled at the same time as the Berlin Wall. There was the “End of History,” the final victory of so-called “liberal” “capitalist” “democracy.” It was a lazy consensus on the left, with only a few thinkers on the marginalized wing still railing against so-called neoliberal economics (traditional liberal economics didn’t argue for a completely unfettered private sphere, so it’s a misnomer), but they were an ever-marginalized faction; on a grand scale we all took a breather.

The general feeling is that this happy leftie consensus ended on 9/11 and when the “war on terror” began, but the rancor started in earnest before then, as the bombing of Yugoslavia commenced in 1999. NATO (which was set up as a bulwark against the Soviet Union) flexed its muscle against the regime of Slobodan Milosevic. Well, first off, why did NATO still exist after the Cold War ended? If it was meant to solidify the military alliance against the Soviet Union, what was the purpose afterward? Mull over that.

Anyway, with the war on Yugoslavia by NATO came the gleaming centerpiece of a new movement called “humanitarian intervention” led by the poster kids of 1990s liberalism, Bill Clinton and Tony Blair.
In fact, it wasn’t that new: Every war through history has been fought for justice and altruism if you take the leaders of the countries that started them at their word. Anyway, the media went into overdrive with beautiful elegies to Western benevolence, the end of wars for economic or geopolitical objectives. Here we were coming to the aid of oppressed Kosovans against the brutal dictator (he was actually democratically elected) Slobodan Milosevic. Large parts of the left, from Ken Livingstone, former Mayor of London, to Paul Berman, the New York Renaissance man, cheered on this necessary war of altruism.

If you talk to your average Joe the Plumber on the street, or corporate journalist, they will tell you that we averted a holocaust there. In fact, the International War Crimes Tribunal came to a conclusion that 2,788 had been killed in Kosovo. That’s a serious crime, but compare that to contemporaneous crimes happening inside NATO, like Turkey’s atrocities against the Kurds, and you start to wonder what prompted Clinton and Blair into action.

The averting of genocide became an orthodoxy of the mainstream left and any demurral would be greeted with outbursts of hysteria about holocaust denial, etc. But in 2007 even the International Court of Justice found that the Serbian leadership was not guilty of genocide in Bosnia, where they carried out their most obscene atrocities, murdering 8,000 souls at Srebrenica.

But in the West, you would be forgiven for thinking this was a one-sided conflict as that is the uninterrupted presentation, but the wars that led to the breakup of Yugoslavia have seen atrocities on all sides. In fact, the Kosovo Liberation Army, a violent fundamentalist Islamic group, were agents of the West when they were carrying out atrocities against Kosovan Serbs and Gypsies. Many believe they were used to illicit a response (which would come in the crackdown starting in 1998) that served as a pretext for a NATO intervention. In the Croatian War of Independence in 1995, their Operation Storm offensive to retake Serbian parts of Croatia resulted in pogroms and ethnic cleansing that rivals Serbian crimes for barbarity. Some of those involved have been on trial for war crimes.

Because it was such a small sample of principled individuals that dared to stand up to the propaganda, this split in the left was merely a blip on the radar; it was an orthodoxy with every bad connotation of that word. But this same mind-set didn’t die and was transported wholeheartedly into the new “war on terror” after 9/11. The war in Iraq ― which had nothing to do with 9/11, which had no weapons of mass destruction ― was now framed as a “humanitarian intervention” against the barbarism of Saddam Hussein who gassed his own people (with our support), used chemical warfare against the Iranians (with our support) and committed genocide against the Kurds in the al-Anfal campaign (with our support). But this didn’t matter. Now, Paul Wolfowitz was the new Madeleine Albright, Saddam Hussein was Slobodan Milosevic, the Kurds were now the Kosovan Albanians and on we went, to a war supported by a significant portion of the intellectual “left.” A war by a Christian fundamentalist, far-right oil-industry Republican, to be fought for democracy. Yeah, right.

The “pro-war left” or the “anti-totalitarianism left” ballooned at this stage and took over the blogosphere in a huge way. From Harry’s Place to Nick Cohen to Oliver Kamm to Paul Berman, they were everywhere, talking about the democratic future for Iraq (with the minor detour of a bloody war). Tons of books followed, backing them up, from the compilation, “A Matter of Principle: Humanitarian Arguments for the War in Iraq,” to “Anti-Totalitarianism: the Left-wing Case for a Neoconservative Foreign Policy,” “Terror and Liberalism,” blah, blah. When the war turned bad, when the U.S. used chemical weapons on a major Iraqi city, when they sold off all the oil, and built the biggest base in the world, they had to change the subject. So now they attacked the left that had been against the invasion of Iraq as “anti-Semites”, “fascists” and supporters of “Islamofascists.” This also gave birth to a load of books that lit up the media firmament but will soon be forgotten, from Nick Cohen’s dreary “What’s Left?”, to the recent “Left in Dark Times” from the ridiculous French poseur, Bernard-Henri Levi.

Until now, the part of the left that was principled and realistic about the war in Iraq has been reticent to fight back in book form. There was the prolix and dense offering from Scott Lucas early on, “The Betrayal of Dissent: Beyond Orwell, Hitchens and the New American Century,” which didn’t really land the hefty punch it should have. But in recent weeks, we’ve had “The Liberal Defense of Murder” by blogger Richard Seymour, which charts the historical course of this so-called “humanitarian intervention” up to its current incarnation. And then there is Conor Foley, a former aid worker, who recently released “The Thin Blue Line: How Humanitarianism Went to War,” which argues that humanitarian NGOs are becoming so powerful that they are affecting Western governments and pressuring them into military actions for which there is no legal basis in international law.

This is the latest stage in the long, stuttering fight-back of the anti-war left against the louder but cheap warmongering left. Let the battle commence.

Matt Kennard can be reached at MattKennard@gmail.com.

Obama’s Election Brings Joy to…White Supremacists?!

By MATT KENNARD, Columnist

Aside from Republicans, you might expect the American community most piqued by the election of Barack Obama would be white supremacists. There is surely no harsher blow to a single-issue political program of racism than the ascension of a black man to the highest office of the land. It’s like a hardened communist watching Milton Friedman elected Dear Leader in the Soviet Union, or Ariel Sharon taking over the Palestinian Liberation Organization. There is no way back for a movement so harshly served; it’s merely time to pack up, accept it’s over and move on.

Or so you would think.

In the increasingly surreal U.S. political landscape, white supremacists have actually greeted the election of the first black president not as the death knell of their cause, but a historic leap forward. “I don’t see anything but very positive things coming out of it,” says Tom Metzger, a former grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan, who now runs an outfit called White Aryan Resistance (or W.A.R., for short). “We don’t have to do much, everything is going sour; the economy is getting worse and worse,” he tells TakingBackPolitics.com. “I don’t think we have to do much more than sit in and be aware of what is going on and train because the government is eating itself.”

And not only is the American Nazi happy about his first black president, but he believes it occasions the way for dialogue with, of all things, the left. “We are becoming more like leftists, and leftists are coming more into agreement with us on race,” he says. “I actually agree with Ralph Nader on economics. Though he’s not a racist, I think politics is going to change a lot over the next few years, dumping of old left and old right.”

But for unbridled joy at Obama’s win you can’t beat August Kreis III, the fiery leader of the Aryan Nations, a Hitler-worshipping outfit out of South Carolina. “I can actually tell you it was the best thing that happened to our movement in the United States ever,” he says breathlessly. In fact, he even wants this new wave of pinko tolerance to spread overseas. “I’d like to see it happen in the UK, but in your case, a Muslim should be elected, because that will do something to get people off their fat asses.”

But it’s not just getting people off their fat asses (less of those in the UK) that has emboldened the American neo-Nazi movement; now white supremacists finally feel that one of their own is the president. “Obama is a racist down deep and his wife is even more,” says Metzger. “It would be better for him if he now said, ‘Hey guys! Fooled you! I’m a racist!’ and I would respect that.”

Erich Gliebe, who runs the biggest neo-Nazi group in the U.S., National Alliance, agrees. “As far as I know, John McCain is not a racist,” he says. “But Obama, he is an outright racist. He was part of a racist church, he had a racist pastor. At least he has that.”

Whether Obama is a racist or not, doesn’t this election render white supremacists in the U.S. irrelevant?

“No, actually it shakes people out of their slumber,” says Gliebe. “I think a majority of Americans still want racial segregation. There are tens of millions of people who would prefer only to marry other whites, and to send their kids to white-only schools.”

I have to remind myself that the first black president has just been elected with a large percentage of white voters. Gliebe pauses when I remind him, too. “Well, people voted for Obama because of white guilt,” he says after an awkward hiatus. “They were made to feel guilty! People were afraid of voting for McCain because they feared being called a racist!”

I refrain from mentioning that the U.S. has a secret ballot because, by now, appeals to logic are futile. Barack Obama, first black president the toast of the white supremacists. Unlikely, but true. Only in America.

Matt Kennard can be reached at MattKennard@gmail.com.

Why Aren’t We Voting Online Yet?

By JASON WALKER, Columnist

Now that the election is finally over and history has been made, blah, blah, blah, let’s get the voting process fixed up.

Why should we have to leave home or work early, drive out of our way and fight traffic getting to some random elementary school just to wait in line for hours to cast a vote where some near-sighted grandma with a clipboard is the last guardian protecting the so-called sanctity of our democracy?

It’s time we take voting online. Security may have been a concern in the past, but the strides we’ve made in online security and identity verification have made the possibility of voting online a much safer alternative.

Nothing is 100% secure, but I’ve been doing my taxes online for almost 10 years and I can barely clear security to view my own information. I have to change passwords every other week to log on to my computer at work. I have to type in two barely legible words compiled of random letters to buy tickets on Ticketmaster. I can access all my banking information and pay all my bills from my cell phone, but I’m still filling out a Scantron card in some dank firehouse to elect the new leader of the free world?

Can’t we get Apple to take a year off from creating a smaller iPod to create some new proprietary voting software? I can’t get any of the stuff I downloaded from iTunes to play on a non-Apple devise. They probably already have the technology to allow you to vote from a Nano iPod, so why should I have to leave my house?

There are already several companies specializing in online voting. It would probably create jobs and help stimulate the economy if the government outsourced the creation and maintenance of its online voting methods.

Any company with a fat government contract should be motivated enough to ensure the security of your vote. To be sure, you could have their systems and results audited by other contractors. Sic PricewaterhouseCoopers on them and I bet they’ll keep their affairs in check. Throw a little cash around and there will be more than enough checks and balances in place to assure an accurate election.

At this point the list of benefits far outweighs the negatives.

There would be fewer avenues for tampering or error. Your ballot can’t mysteriously end up in the trash. Some absent-minded yokel won’t be scanning your ballot upside down or incorrectly instructing hundreds of people how to fill out their ballots. Even the most competent volunteers with the best intentions can make mistakes after 10 hours of manning a polling station.

You could vote from anywhere in the world online, and participation would increase. More college students, military personnel and travelers would be voting since there would be fewer hoops to jump through. Registration would be much easier or even done away with completely. Slackers like me would have fewer excuses not to vote. Poll results would be gathered in a fraction of the time. Less traffic f’ing up my morning commute.

No more navigating through crowded municipal parking lots like it’s Christmas season at Garden State Plaza (big up Jersey), trying to find a spot and standing in miserable November weather for hours.

Around now maybe you’re thinking “What about the people who don’t have Internet access?”

1. They won’t be reading this so I don’t care.
2. Everyone at least knows one person with Internet access.
3. You can go to a café, a library, a church ― pretty much everywhere in civilization, you backwater Neanderthal, get a computer already!
4. If you’re old and all this new-fangled technology goes over your head, we’ll keep the polls open for you on Election Day or send someone to your nursing home with a laptop to walk you through it.

While we’re at it, we should move Election Day to the weekend. The whole reason we vote on Tuesday has become irrelevant. With early voting becoming more popular we’re already moving away from a single-day election. It could even go from Saturday through Tuesday if you’re really that attached to the first Tuesday tradition.

Other countries have shown that multi-day elections increase voter participation. Also, holding an election online over a period of time would not be as costly as the elections we run now. Actually, there would be more money to be made.

SNL can run specials for a week straight. The 24-hour up-to-the-minute polling results bonanza would have every anchor, reporter, politician and pundit on the edge of their seats for days. Live television coverage and YouTube videos of people submitting their votes would canvas every media outlet. Election-themed parties would happen all weekend! Drink specials would be available at bars and clubs without the burden of having to go to work the next day! Candidates would be crisscrossing the country as results came in trying to boost their numbers in various states, like a coach making in-game adjustments! Fire and brimstone coming down from the skies! Rivers and seas boiling! Forty years of darkness! Earthquakes, volcanoes! The dead rising from the grave! Human sacrifice. Dogs and cats living together … mass hysteria!

Jason Walker may be reached at Jason_R_Walker@comcast.net.

The White House on Election Night

By TOMÁS DINGES, Correspondent

All Tuesday Nov. 4, the television shots of the U.S. capitol were poor. Mist and drizzle obscured the ideal backdrop for what was seen by many as a defining presidential election in American history.

But at a little past 11 p.m. EST it didn’t matter what the city looked like. Barack Obama had been declared the president-elect of the United States. The streets of Georgetown began to flow with ecstatic young supporters. The neighborhood once derided by John McCain as the too frequent host of elite cocktail parties was now a conduit for a different sort of energy. Trailed by honking taxicabs, some weighted with passengers whose limbs flailed out the windows, and their predominately immigrant and black drivers, young people from Georgetown University, dressed in sweatpants and tight jeans, flip-flops and stilettos, marched on M St. chanting, “Yes we did, yes we did!”

Revolution was in the streets. These kids, many just 18 years old, may have thought that they were the ones who created it. Between 10 and 14 years old when George W. Bush was first elected, and gradually alienated by his reaction to 9/11 and his handling of the Iraq War, many had been passionately and personally involved with the election.

Inside a television studio on M Street, a twenty-four-year-old hockey player turned teleprompter operator checked CNN’s electoral map as he guided the moderator for ARD, Germany’s most-watched news network, through his almost 100 segments of election night coverage. Virginia’s numbers were against Obama and he was angry. “I worked so hard there,” he said. His updated vote counts varied by hundreds of votes. The channel’s political commentators began to ask him for input.

Outside, kids continued to flow by, jubilant. Tall, short, athletic, overweight, statuesque, humble, they walked, and then they ran. Some had no idea where they were going. They were just following the crowd. Others knew. M Street spills into Pennsylvania Avenue and Pennsylvania Avenue leads to the White House.

Along the way, 51st State Tavern blared MSNBC as a clean-shaven young man wearing a navy blue suit walked out.

A Frenchman from Paris walked in. He asked if you had to specify what beer you wanted and whether you tip the bartender. He had arrived the Friday before to work in TV production. He got two lagers and repeated how lucky his timing was. He was 200 pages into Obama’s book, “Dreams From My Father.”

The U.S., he said, is capable of electing a black man precisely because of our history of immigration and racism. France isn’t ready yet. The immigration in France is just beginning, he said, and most French have not spent any time with a Muslim or an Arab.

“We are the first generation that grew up with Arabs,” said the thirty-year-old. “I think that change will come. Maybe not soon, but it will come,” he said as he slowly drank his beer.

In front of the International Monetary Fund, the subject of furious protests by disenfranchised young people in 2000, a private security guard gave high-fives to passersby.

Waves of students seemed to roll back through the groups going to the White House, hugging, high-fiving and chanting.

A stern-faced cop and his companion in front of the old executive building were the first indication of a limited police presence.

The crowd began to come together and we dove into the teeming masses on the glistening street in front of the glowing White House. Thousands of people had accumulated, many young. Later, the crowd became more diverse in age and race.

“Grace Kohn said you can suck my dick Bush,” said Kohn, a student. Outgoing President George W. Bush had celebrated his wife’s birthday with coconut cake and a gift of earrings that night inside the White House.

Alex Rice, an 18-year-old from George Washington University took a different tack. “I love Obama and support this country,” he said. His disillusionment with Bush came when he was 13, he said, when the United States went to war with Iraq. “Finally we have a president that represents us.” There were chants of “U-S-A.”

The Frenchman saw his first American flag draped across the bare back of a bicycle rider. It was one of a few there. He was surprised. The French flag was a common site during group events, but, after years of representing national pride, it became a symbol of racist nationalism with the campaign by Jean Marie LePen. It became a regular symbol of hyper-nationalism and anti-immigrant sentiment when waved at football games. But leading up to the election of Sarkozy, that nationalism began to change to suit the times. The people reclaimed it, ironically by the political posturing of Sarkozy.

It was the political posturing of the Republican party that in the end drove Dana Mozie, “the first hip-hop producer for a sitting president,” to the Obama party that night at The Park on Fourteenth, and then, alone, to the White House.

A hip-hop producer in the early 90s for the group Salt-n-Pepa, he helped bring hip-hop to mainstream America. Starting in 2000, he worked inside the White House under Bush on so-called outreach efforts to the black community. He emerged from those experiences, as did other “guys like me who were surrogates,” disillusioned.

“Republicans never would go to the ghetto,” he said, and as a result would never get the black vote. With Obama campaigning in poor black neighborhoods he noted something special in this candidate.

Still it was difficult for this black candidate to get elected. “One drop of black blood and it costs $670 million,” said Mozie, referring to the cost of the Obama campaign.

But now, the Obama candidacy allows for the “race card” to be thrown out, and “allows for a real sense of inclusiveness,” in America, he said.

The rain had stopped for a while now and Mozie, a dapper man around forty, put his umbrella down and looked wide-eyed at the people who continued to flow past.

“I thought it was a moment for black people, but it tapped something in other people too,” he said.

Mozie had been to the 54th and the 55th inaugurations, but, he said emphatically, “this is the original inaugural parade.”

People continued to squeeze through the tightening crowd on Pennsylvania Avenue. “America is back,” someone said. The fancier election night parties began to spill forth their participants near 1 a.m. Many paused in astonishment before entering the raucous crowd.

“Obama didn’t just change the party,” said Mozie, “he changed the paradigm.”

Tomás Dinges can be reached at tdinges@gmail.com.

It’ll Still be Politics as Usual Under Obama

By MATT KENNARD, Columnist

A black president – it happened. Anyone who didn’t feel a twinge of emotion as Barack and his beautiful family came out to greet the crowds in that Chicago park officially has a heart of stone. In many ways it was a profound moment in history: the end to the centuries of white supremacism that has moved from slavery to Jim Crow to the still-existing economic exploitation – progress within what was all along referred to as “civilization.”

There on stage was the soon-to-be most powerful man in the world, the son of a Kenyan farmer and a single white mother from Kansas, beaming from ear to ear. It was as improbable as it was moving. And we should never forget the slaves who revolted against their masters and the civil rights activists who were shot dead in the 1960s; it was their sacrifices that furrowed the rocky path to this epochal moment. It was imagining their incredulity at such progress that really made the loins quiver on that night.

But Obama’s got a lot on his shoulders now. If you hear his supporters talking about his presidency, you might be forgiven for thinking Obama was the messiah, the untouchable Second Coming of Christ, who will cleanse us from the sulphureous scent of Hades, or George W. Bush, as he is more commonly known around the world.

And it’s a nice change for a world that has become accustomed to being ruled by nutcases. When Bush was elected I was 17, so most of my adult life has been lived with the most powerful man in the world as an unadulterated force for violence and pain. Whatever Obama becomes, at least he’s not mad, or stupid.

But I’m not holding out much hope about the next four years. Not because of Obama. I think he is probably an upright, nice guy. Certainly his writing seems to be sensitive and thoughtful. But what people don’t seem to understand as they undertake the flights of hope-infused rhetoric is that the president, while powerful, is often merely a vector in a vast tapestry of powerful forces that govern government policy. No matter how good, nice or genial he is, he is being pushed by decidedly malicious influences from all sides.

Most crucially, state power is nearly indistinguishable from big-business interest, limiting what a democratically elected leader can do. Essentially they are beholden to what Noam Chomsky has called “private tyrannies”: corporations and big money. They are private tyrannies because they have no democratic input and are driven by one sole motivation: profit.

This was revealed in stark terms with the financial bailout of the world’s biggest investment banks, where money was redistributed upward with no stipulations that the capital be used for loans, resulting in vast amounts going to shareholders, not the attested “stimulus.”

But while this was a particularly egregious case that has admittedly elected anger across the political spectrum, the same thing happens all the time behind closed doors. It’s how state capitalism works. There is a revolving door between big business and government in policy-formation and personnel. Dick Cheney went from the board of Halliburton to the executive branch of government like an oily fish, and will probably go back the other way. And look who benefited in Iraq.

Every superpower through history has sought to dominate lesser powers and make them pliant to their own economic interests. This has happened whether the superpower has been communist, socialist, capitalist, Nazi, whatever. The common denominator to all superpowers is that they have extraordinary amounts of power, and power by its nature will try to dominate. The ancient Greek historian Thucydides expressed this timeless maxim most baldly in his History of the Peloponnesian War. “Since you know as well as we do that right, as the world goes, is only in question between equals in power,” said the Athenians to the Melians. “While the strong do what they can, the weak must suffer what they will.”

That fundamental dynamic has not altered since his time and probably never will. So essentially in the two-party system the individual leader is irrelevant to the real big picture. Be it Barack Obama, or Tony Blair or George W. Bush, the empire and power structure will continue to run unimpeded, with only variations in style. Political scientist Robert A. Dahl famously called this system polyarchy: a competitive elite ruling the rest of us.

That doesn’t mean that Barack Obama has tweaked his opinions to get into office, it means he couldn’t have gotten there if he believed anything different. As Comment Factory writer Laurence Witherington pointed out, it’s hypocritical of people to say that Obama is going against his principles; in fact, Obama has been consistent in his support of the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and the war in Lebanon in 2006.

And there’s more too. If we can stretch our memories, we should remember that Obama suggested he would bomb the sovereign nation of Pakistan during his primary campaign, he has said he is against Iran enriching uranium even for energy purposes even though Israel is not part of the Non-Proliferation Treaty and he has proposed a surge in Afghanistan. He has also most egregiously gone in front of the vile outfit AIPAC and said Jerusalem should be the undivided capital of Israel, a position even hardened Likudniks like Ariel Sharon would gasp at.

Real change this election season didn’t begin and end with Obama. The Green Party had the first all-people-of-color ticket in history, as well as the first all-female ticket too. But how many people have heard of presidential candidate Cynthia McKinney or vice presidential candidate Rosa Clemente? They were given a complete media blackout because they posed a real threat to the corporatocracy that runs American politics. The change they proposed wasn’t a cosmetic retouching of an imperial system, but the overhaul of a democratic system, which is saturated in private dollars that aren’t given altruistically by lobbyists, but are seen as an investment, like treating the federal government as a hedge fund.

Ralph Nader was another who provided a real alternative, but was ignored. Without the corporate backing he received one percent of the vote.

Maligned by both the “left” and “right” in the U.S. mainstream, he is one of the most principled individuals in politics. Here is his verdict on Obama: “Well, obviously we all congratulate Barack Obama. We wish him well.”

But the precursor to his election has not been very encouraging, and he has repeatedly taken up the positions of the corporate supremacists, not just his latest vote for the $700 billion Wall Street bailout, but a whole string of votes and policy positions. He opposes single-payer health insurance. Well, the HMOs and the insurance companies do, too. He wants a bigger military budget. So does the military-industrial complex. His idea of a living wage on his Web site is $9.50 an hour by 2011. That would make it less than it was in 1968, adjusted for inflation.

He matched McCain in the third debate — belligerency for belligerency — toward Russia, toward Iran, more soldiers in Afghanistan, supporting the Israeli military repression and occupation and blockade of Gaza and the West Bank. And virtually nothing about 100 million poor people in this country. That’s why I really fault him; that he played the Clinton linguistic game by talking constantly about the middle class and not mentioning the word “poor.”

And we expect more of him. And I don’t think he has a public philosophy of where corporations must operate in this country. How? Under what rule of law? Under what regulation? Under what vulnerability to litigation in the courts? He’s proud of tort reform, supports the nuclear industry, supports the coal industry. So we’re really talking about just more of the same, in terms of the corporate domination of Washington.

I detected no concern, no quaking of concern, among the drug industry, oil, gas industry, nuclear, coal industry, Wall Street, over his probable election in the last few weeks. Usually, when they’re really worried about a politician, they will issue warnings. But Barack Obama has raised far more money than John McCain from Wall Street interests, corporate interests and, above all, corporate lawyers. And the question to be asked is, why are they investing so much in Barack Obama? Because they believe he’s their man. So, prepare to be disappointed, but keep your hope up.

Until people like Nader, and Bob Barr on the other side, are able to stretch the narrow political spectrum in the U.S., and likewise around the world, we will never be able to hope for change and not in the back of our minds think that in fact nothing ever changes.

Matt Kennard can be reached at MattKennard@gmail.com.

Veterans’ Health Care Under Bush a Disgrace

By MATT KENNARD, Columnist

It’s hard to think of a more nauseating spectacle than George W. Bush – draft dodging, chicken hawk extraordinaire – turning on his lachrymal glands for U.S. veterans. But as the country drew together on Nov. 11 for the annual national holiday to honor their fighting men and women, there was the commander in chief waxing unlyrically about the “inspiration” he has gotten from the veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan, his wide-eyes and rictus smile belying his solemn tone.

The media reported his words conscientiously but failed to add the apposite context, which as usual is important. Because not only did Bush and his cronies do the obvious and send the young men and women into harm’s way for a completely pointless war that has cost 4,192 American and over a million Iraqi souls to date, this “War President” has also overseen the calculated destruction of the thin safety net that helps veterans as they cope with the health problems brought on by war.

In 2005, only two years into the war in Iraq, Bush was widely condemned for his budget for veterans’ health care that fell well short of maintaining the levels of the years before, bearing in mind the huge numbers of new soldiers that were returning from war. In that year not only did Bush try to double the co-payment that veterans would pay for prescription drugs, he also proposed a flat $250 new fee for some veterans to use the health care. Even Republican Sen. Daniel K. Akaka warned at the time that this could put 192,000 people out of the veterans’ health care system because of the price hike. Later in 2005 it was revealed that the Bush administration had left a $1 billion shortage for veterans’ health care that had to be plugged by emergency supplemental funds voted for by Congress again.

In 2006, with discretionary spending apparently needing to be cut to deal with the massive deficit, the White House predicted a 16 percent cut in veterans’ health care, despite the increasing numbers of veterans needing the services. In that budget year Congress had to add another $2.7 billion to emergency funding to the Veterans Association on top of Bush’s budget.

Under the current Bush plan being touted, even though the number of soldiers needing treatment in veterans’ health care has been rising about 5 percent per year, in 2009 the budget would be cut again and kept at this smaller number until 2012. The hope is Obama will find a way around these disgraceful estimates and reevaluate the priorities of an administration that has lost any bearings they once had.

The effect of turning veterans’ health care from the most important of government responsibilities into an expendable superfluity has had painful consequences for the veterans of the U.S. Vast numbers of soldiers are returning with mental health problems ranging from schizophrenia to post-traumatic stress disorder, but a study in the American Journal of Public Health estimated that in 2004, 1.8 million veterans were without health insurance, constituting 12 percent of all uninsured people in the U.S. The number of uninsured grew by 290,000 from 2000, Bush’s first year, to 2004, two years into his “war on terror.”

This year the Bush administration was even employing lawyers to fight a case that insists that mental health should be included in health care provisions for veterans. You did read that right: The Bush administration somehow doesn’t think mental health qualifies as a health issue.

On Veterans Day, Bush unsurprisingly didn’t mention his squalid record on looking after the veterans of his wars of ideology:

“I am committed to making sure that today’s veterans get all the health care and support they need from the federal government for agreeing to serve in a time of danger,” he said.

And the headlines read: “Bush praises veterans on Veterans Day,” when they should have been, “Bush praises veterans on Veterans Day, while destroying their health care.”

There are many ironies to Bush’s tenure: some, like his IQ, are comical; some, like this one, are just tragic. Despite the Republican Party’s insistence that they are the party of patriotism and strength and “country first,” over the last eight years they have treated the veterans of their wars like every other group that infringes on their ability to stuff cash into the pockets of their rich friends. McCain’s plan was even worse than Bush’s: he wanted to privatize veterans’ health care, turn it into a market-oriented trust. Just imagine what would have happened during the financial crisis if this had happened. It’s time to fight the Republicans on their own turf and say the patent truth: they just really don’t care about vets or anyone else who isn’t rolling in money.

Matt Kennard can be reached at MattKennard@gmail.com.

Blame It On the Lame Duck

By SARAH N. LYNCH, Correspondent

Senator John McCain can take solace in one thing when he thinks back on his recent electoral defeat: Senator Barack Obama’s win does not really say that much about John McCain. Instead, Obama’s resounding victory was a referendum on President George W. Bush.

Shortly after NBC projected Sen. Obama the winner of the evening, people from around the world poured into the streets. They were excited to be witnessing a piece of history as voters overwhelmingly elected the nation’s first black president. But more importantly, they wanted to let the current administration know their true feelings.

The people are tired of this unjust and inhuman war that was spawn on a lie. They are struggling beneath the crushing weight of the economy that has come crashing down on them thanks to the lax regulations that let Wall Street cannibalize itself. They are sick of the United States using the Oval Office as a bully pulpit.

The crowds that gathered on Election Night were a stunning sight. They cheered in Kenya, the United Kingdom, France, Japan, New York City and Obama’s hometown of Chicago.

Here in Washington, a large crowd stood in front of the White House – not because it represents Obama’s future home for the next four years, but because they wanted to send Bush a message.

Yes, those crowded rejected John McCain, but it was not personal. Sure, it didn’t help that McCain ran a God-awful campaign.

He failed to vet Sarah Palin and wound up isolating independent voters and even some staunch conservatives who felt she was unqualified for higher office. He then yet again failed to vet Joe the Plumber, thrusting the man into the national spotlight for his criticism of Obama’s tax policy before he eventually discovered that Joe doesn’t even pay the taxes he owes now.

McCain resorted to petty arguments over why Obama was not fit for the presidency. He ran too many negative ads. His reaction to the collapse on Wall Street was chaotic and embarrassing to the GOP.

But none of that really mattered in the end. The truth is, no Republican had a chance of winning this election. George W. Bush’s disastrous policies have essentially left the Republicans with a large scarlet A on their chests.

Just ask John Sununu or Elizabeth Dole. They were both casualties of war. They finally lost their seats thanks to Bush, who hijacked his party eight years ago thanks to a stolen election in Florida.

John McCain should know this better than anyone. And although Palin was definitely the wrong pick, his aides should stop putting so much blame on her for their loss and instead direct their anger toward the right person: our lame-duck president.

That means that now, more than ever before, is the time for John McCain to truly be the maverick he claims to be. It means he must publicly reject the Bush legacy, call for his fellow GOP colleagues to do the same and steal his party back.

Only then can the Republicans hope to pick up the pieces and regain the confidence of the public.

Sarah N. Lynch can be reached at sarahnlynch@gmail.com.

Elizabeth Edwards On Health Care

By EUGENE MULERO, Correspondent

Most political scientists agree senior citizens are the kingmakers in national elections. And, for much of the campaign, those 65 and older eluded Barack Obama’s steady sweep across the country, especially in the swing states of Florida and Pennsylvania. But in the final stretch Sen. John McCain found it difficult to keep this older demographic, which eventually leaned toward the Obama column. One of the reasons this happened, according to some experts, was that voters found Obama’s health care proposal more agreeable than McCain’s. Health care has always been one of the leading priorities for seniors.

A week before the election, Elizabeth Edwards was at George Washington University in Washington, D.C., addressing an audience of nearly 300 on health care, her cancer and Obama’s plan. She said she took on this role because the issue had taken a “back seat” during the campaign. The financial crisis and the wars in the Middle East had eclipsed the matter. But, she explained, “the financial crisis would be solved through health care” reform.

After her husband dropped out of the presidential race, Edwards became one of the ambassadors of Obama’s health care plan, which called for, among other things, universal coverage by 2012.

“Sometimes you get politicians who dig their feet into the sand and aren’t willing to listen to another voice. That’s not the case with Senator Obama,” she told National Journal On Air. “I think that’s a very encouraging sign about him.”

Edwards would not confirm rumors that she would have an active role in the Obama administration. Sources have told National Journal on background that Edwards would be called on to join the new administration.

Edwards, a Center for American Progress senior fellow, was diagnosed with breast cancer in October 2004. Two years later, she wrote “Saving Graces: Finding Solace and Strength from Friends and Strangers,” a book about her son’s death and her battle with cancer. Then, in the spring of 2007, she announced her cancer had returned, and in a 60 Minutes interview she said doctors told her the cancer was treatable but not curable.
Mammograms are recommended for women beginning at 40, earlier if there are risk factors or a history of cancer in the family. Overall, she advocates a greater emphasis on prevention.

Douglas Holtz-Eakin, the Congressional Budget Office’s former director, headed McCain’s health care team. Holtz-Eakin could not be more different than Edwards. He seemed uncharismatic, and too much of a suit-and-tie Washington insider. Holtz-Eakin pushed McCain’s proposal, which focused less on maintaining the employer-based health care system than on giving individual incentives to buy insurance. Edwards criticized McCain’s plan for relying heavily on insurance companies, which she said were being shortsighted about costs.

“In response to me, [McCain] added a new section [to his health care plan] which was to put people with pre-existing conditions in high-risk pools,” Edwards told National Journal On Air.

Edwards dismissed comments from the audience at the George Washington University forum that consumers should be making their medical decisions without government support, stressing that the issue is much more complicated.

“It’s a moral imperative,” she said. “It’s immoral to know that [the health care system] is disadvantaging good people and not do anything about it.”

Eugene Mulero may be reached at eugene.mulero@gmail.com.

Palin Didn’t Know Africa Was a Continent

By EUGENE MULERO, Correspondent

When piranhas run out of food, they start to devour themselves. That’s how the McCain and Palin staffs are acting lately. Their attacks on each other over which team F’ed the campaign have become vicious.

The latest assault came from the McCainers, which using Fox News’s Carl Cameron as proxy, ridiculed Gov. Palin for her geographical ignorance. Cameron reported on the O’Reilly Factor that “senior” sources told him Palin could not identify NAFTA’s members, she failed to prepare for national interviews, and at one point she was unaware Africa was a continent. The sources apparently said Palin thought Africa was a country—you mean it’s not a country?! (Kidding.)

All this doesn’t change my view of Palin. It has the opposite effect.

I am even more disappointed at the Maverick and his team (Steve Schmidt & co.) for being naïve. Why the heck would they pick a candidate who did not know NAFTA, had zero foreign policy experience and was unproven nationally?

Also, let’s remember, there are many Republican governors with more political readiness than Palin (ie, Connecticut’s M. Jodi Rell). I don’t think Palin cost the GOP the presidential election. President Bush did that.

Palin was a small town mayor, who came from humble beginnings, who loves the outdoors. Yes, we all recognized her acute ego, which blinded her from her political immaturity. But Palin was slowly building her GOP base to eventually make it inside the Beltway. The McCainers were the ones who brought her to us. And now they intend to destroy her (what are friends for).

After Tuesday, Maverick should be really aware that W. ruined his chances at the White House twice. In 2000, Karl Rove and his politicos destroyed his reputation in South Carolina. In 2008, Bush had destroyed the country’s confidence in a GOP White House, which made it impossible for a Republican to succeed him.

So while Palin spends the next four years studying Africa and cramming Wilsonian doctrine for a run in 2012, the Maverick should stop blaming the Hockey Mom for his demise.

Eugene Mulero may be reached at eugene.mulero@gmail.com.

Why I Voted for Obama

By AMANDA KOCH, Assistant Managing Editor

I am a registered independent. I voted for Obama, and this is why (in no particular order):

1. I want my president to be smarter than me. I don’t want Joe Six-pack to be anywhere near the presidency. I appreciate that my president can beat me in the high school octathalon. In fact, I pray he does. And not by a little. By a lot. He should remember every important Supreme Court case, because I won’t. Maybe he should even be elitist, or at least he shouldn’t be forced to pretend he’s not. I am intelligent; my president should kick my ass in that respect. I eat arugula, the president should eat more; it’s grown by U.S. Farmers; you should probably eat it too, it’s good for you.

2. I don’t mind losing (and this may be the thing that bothers me most in McCain speak). When I played sports when I was younger – softball, volleyball, basketball, track – winning was everything. When I became an adult, compromise became everything. I don’t mind losing, as long as it works out for the better. In my life, in my business, I have to talk to people. Sometimes I have to back off, sometimes I have to push them. Honestly, it’s not about winning; it’s about accomplishing something better than what is going on now. I think Obama gets this.

3. I don’t think he’s a socialist, so he doesn’t seem so bad to me. I don’t think he’s going to take all my wealth and give it to the less fortunate. Actually, I don’t have a lot of wealth, so when my friends complain about this sort of thing I laugh to myself – we are the poor the rich are sharing with! But, even besides that, and this is where my disdain of all politicians plays in Obama’s favor. He doesn’t really mean what he says. Sure, maybe we’ll lean a little further in that direction, but not as much as he promises. We will never be a socialist nation.

4. I really don’t mind the rich helping the poor. Carnegie did it. Rockefeller did it. Gates does it. I do believe helping the poor is a virtue, so buck up. I also believe that my contribution to the betterment of society makes my country a more pleasant place to live – for me. Call it selfish, I call it self-preservation. I want to live in a nice place, so I help and better my community the best way I can. This is not a novel idea. Like I said, Carnegie did it; it just sucks that we don’t have as many helpful rich, so we have to force them to be helpful. If only they would realize, what’s good for them is good for me.

5. I’m tired. I’m tired of the way things are going and I need a change. It’s not good right now, and McCain does agree, fundamentally, with a lot of Bush policies, that makes him a loser. I do need a change. I’m not as afraid as change as some other people. Change is never as big, as traumatic, as you think. It’s just change, not the end of everything we know.

6. Obama is good for the world. Yeah, I know, overarching in an overbearing way. It may be trite and unnecessary to some, but I’d like to regain the respect of our allies. I’d like some acceptance in the world community – isn’t that what we preach to others? I’d also like some help, and we don’t get that now, because we are assholes. I try not to be an asshole to others.

7. The economy sucks and I think Obama will be logical and even-keeled when it comes to dealing with the economic troubles. That’s what we need, because, frankly, I don’t think any administration completely owns the economy, but they most definitely have to deal with it. Cool as a cucumber is better than pink as a pickle any day in any situation.

8. I think Obama owned the debates. It was close, but Obama explained things to me, and I understood. I got why his health care is a problem solver. I have no doubt McCain thought his proposal for health care was good, but am I eligible for his $2500 tax rebate on top of my employer health coverage? I still don’t know. On his web site it told me if I make $180,000 I can get better coverage than a member of Congress, with no increase in taxes. I don’t make this kind of money, and I am still wondering why he headed this section by addressing the middle class. Is $180,000 average for the middle class?

9. I think I’ll just add this at the end here, because after all this I want to be honest you – I really do not like Sarah Palin and her views, and I am really disappointed McCain chose her. He was OK in my view, he’s not the devil like some people think; I really think he thinks his policies will help America, even if I may disagree with some of them, but Palin was a poor choice. He catered to the far right even though he claims to be a “maverick”, and if he had chosen his own running mate he or she would undoubtedly be more centrist. His choice lacked political smarts, and he needs political smarts to get us through the labyrinth of world situations/communities/events/problems/triumphs/etc. Palin is the first failure of a possible McCain term. I do believe this.

10. After I realized my Palin rant was No. 9, I thought I should come up with a legitimate No.10. — so, I’m going to go back to Obama’s old-school argument which he used in debates. Iraq was a bad choice; Iraq was a horrible choice; Iraq was a mistake. I remember when the war was about to begin, and I was talking to my friend, I said, “What about Afghanistan? We aren’t done. How is Iraq more of a threat than a country like Iran?” If Obama had been president, I have not doubt he would have started the war against the Taliban and al-Qaida in Afghanistan, and, you know what, he probably would have won it, because he realized Iraq was a mistake, it was a distraction, it was completely unnecessary. We would never have even gotten into the Iraq mess, and maybe we’d even have the upper hand on al-Qaida.

It’s late and I’m tired, but I just wanted to sort this out. It helped to write it all down. I think I made a good choice. I do live in Jersey though, so does it even matter?

Amanda Koch can be reached at amandarosekoch@gmail.com.

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