February 6th, 2010 by admin | No Comments | Filed in elections, racism, rightwing
White Racial Resentment
Bubbles Under the Surface
of the Tea Party Movement
By Rich Benjamin
AlterNet, February 5, 2010
Editor's Note: Rich Benjamin's commentary on the underlying "white grievance" currents in the Tea Party movement were buttressed Thursday by the statements of Republican Tom Tancredo, the opening speaker at the Tea Party convention. Tancredo told attendees that President Barack Obama was elected because "we do not have a civics, literacy test before people can vote in this country," an allusion to how Southern states used literacy tests as part of an effort to deny suffrage to African American voters before the civil rights era.
The Tea Party movement, holding its first convention this weekend, is angling to be the most revolutionary force in American politics in name and in deed, since at least the 1960s counterculture. Only this time, the political insurgents command a party of Flour Power, not flower power.
The simmering movement is the whitest phenomenon on the national scene, evident not just in the millions of Caucasians committed to its cause, but in the bedrock beliefs stirring its anti-government contempt.
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January 28th, 2010 by admin | No Comments | Filed in elections, rightwing
The Roots of Liberal Fascism: The Book
By Chip Berlet
History News Network
January 25, 2010
http://www.hnn.us/articles/122245.html
Chip Berlet, senior analyst at Political Research Associates (PRA), is co-author of Right Wing Populism in America: Too Close for Comfort. His most recent study for PRA is titled Toxic to Democracy, and his article on the Tea Party protests appears as the cover story in the February 2010 issue of the Progressive magazine.
The Tea Party Patriots and Town Hall Criers are alerting us to the coming totalitarian apocalypse provoked by liberal misfeasance, nonfeasance, malfeasance, and just plain treason. In a nutshell, this mirrors the basic theme in Liberal Fascism by Jonah Goldberg. The specific looming threat, according to Goldberg and the tea-partiers, is that liberals and their closet commie/fascist friends are pushing America onto a slippery slope toward tyranny that begins with government social planning. [...]
According to Goldberg, "Today we still live under the fundamentally fascistic economic system established by Wilson and FDR. We do live in an `unconscious civilization' of fascism, albeit of a friendly sort infinitely more benign that that of Hitler's Germany, Mussolini's Italy, or FDRs America" (p. 330).
Up until the early 1900s in the United States it was widely believed that a healthy economy and, indeed, democracy itself relied on the "Invisible Hand" of the "Free Market" which stroked the members of the benevolent elites so that wealth trickled down the social ladder to their social inferiors. The government merely played the role of a "Night Watchman," identifying trash heaps containing criminals and political dissidents to be hauled off to jail or simply deported, as in the 1919-1920 Palmer Raids.
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January 25th, 2010 by admin | No Comments | Filed in elections, pushing obama
Where's The Movement?
By George Lakoff
Huffington Post
Jan. 25, 2010 - In forming his administration, President Obama abandoned the movement that had begun during his campaign for deal-making and a pragmatism that hasn't worked. That movement is still possible and needed now. Here is look at what is required, and how a version of it is forming in California.
We begin with this week's triple whammy.
Freedom vs. The Public Option
Which would you prefer, consumer choice or freedom? Extended coverage or freedom? Bending the cost curve or freedom?
John Boehner, House Minority Leader, speaking of health care, said recently, "This bill is the greatest threat to freedom that I have seen in the 19 years I have been here in Washington....It's going to lead to a government takeover of our insurance] for you."
This is exactly what Frank Luntz advised conservatives to say. They have repeated it and repeated it. Why has it worked to rally conservative populists against their interests? The most effective framing is more than mere language, more than spin or salesmanship. It has worked because conservatives really believe that the issue is freedom. It fits the conservative moral system. It fits how conservatives see the world.
The Democrats have helped the conservatives. Their pathetic attempt to make any deal to get 60 votes convinced even Massachusetts voters that government under the Democrats was corrupt and oppressive, not just inept, but immoral.
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January 20th, 2010 by admin | No Comments | Filed in elections, rightwing
Tea Bags, Taxes, &
Productive Citizens
By Chip Berlet
February issue, Z Magazine
A conundrum of right-wing populist movements like the tea bag and town hall protests is that they often mobilize in ways that undermine the economic self-interest of participants. The solution to the puzzle is that these folks are simultaneously defending their existing relative power and privilege in other spheres, such as race and gender-or at least they think they are in some conscious or unconscious way.
To understand how this works, sociologist Rory McVeigh suggests using a Power Devaluation Model in which right-wing movements emerge to defend their interests in three arenas: political power, economic power, and social status. The importance of these spheres varies over time. In right-wing populism, economic power often takes a back seat to political power and social status, but not always. Hard economic times can lead anti-abortion and anti-gay Christian Right adherents to vote for Democrats who offer a clearly articulated and believable plan to fix the economy-at least for the middle classes.
In Right-Wing Populism in America, Matt Lyons and I argued populism was built around four interwoven elements:
* Producerism
* Demonization
* Scapegoating
* Conspiracy Theories of Power
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January 12th, 2010 by admin | No Comments | Filed in financial crisis, pushing obama
Tax Bank Bonuses and Capital Gains
of Wealthy to Pay for Jobs Program
By Robert Creamer
Huffington Post
Jan. 11, 2010 - This column is about pornography. Yesterday's New York Times ran a front page story headlined: "For Top Bonuses on Wall Street, 7 Figures or 8." The story was chocked full of obscenity:
"Bank executives are grappling with the question that exasperates, even infuriates, many recession-weary Americans: Just how big should their paydays be?" asked the Times.
"Despite calls for restraint from Washington and a chafed public, resurgent banks are preparing to pay out bonuses that rival those of the boom years," it continued. "The haul, in cash and stock, will run into many billions of dollars."
"Industry executives acknowledge that the numbers being tossed around -- six-, seven- and even eight-figure sums for some chief executives and top producers -- will stun the many Americans still hurting from the financial collapse and ensuing Great Recession."
"During the first nine months of 2009," the Times reported, "five of the largest banks that received federal aid -- Citigroup, Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase and Morgan Stanley -- together set aside about $90 billion for compensation."
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January 10th, 2010 by admin | No Comments | Filed in antiwar, militarism
Photo: A little girl with a birth defect attributed to Agent Orange languishes at Tu Du Obstetric and Gynecological Hospital in Ho Chi Minh City, formerly Saigon.
Agent Orange
and the Horror of
the U.S. War Crime
by Bill Fletcher Jr.
January 7, 2010
(NNPA)—You may not notice a victim of Agent Orange. They may look healthy on the outside, full of life and vigor. Yet inside them there is a time-bomb, a time-bomb set during the U.S. war against Vietnam more than 35 years ago. In over three million people, including U.S. troops who were involved in that war, this bomb has been going off over the years creating an ongoing catastrophe.
On a recent visit to Vietnam I had the opportunity to meet with leaders and activists in the Vietnam Association of Victims of Agent Orange/Dioxin (VAVA). Formed in 2003 by physicians, Vietnamese war veterans and other activists, this mass organization spread throughout the country amounting to more than 60,000 members in chapters in most provinces. VAVA came together to remind both Vietnam, but also the world, of the continuing impact of the human-made plague that served as an instrument of war by the U.S. against Vietnam.
Agent Orange is a form of chemical warfare. It was promoted as a defoliant by the U.S. government, allegedly for the purposes of destroying jungles and forests where soldiers of the National Liberation Front and North Vietnam were encamped during the Indochina War. As one leader of VAVA informed me, Agent Orange was described by the U.S.A as being so safe that soldiers were informed that they could use it on their skin against various insects.
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January 8th, 2010 by admin | No Comments | Filed in antiwar, militarism
‘Afghan Insurgency Can Sustain Itself Indefinitely’: Top U.S. Intel Officer
The Taliban not only has the “momentum” after the most successful year in its campaign against the United States and the Kabul government. “The Afghan insurgency can sustain itself indefinitely,” according to a briefing from Major General Michael Flynn, the top U.S. intelligence officer in the country. “The Taliban retains [the] required partnerships to sustain support, fuel legitimacy and bolster capacity.”
And if that isn’t enough, Flynn also warns that “time is running out” for the American-lead International Security Assistance Force. “Regional instability is rapidly increasing and getting worse,” the report says.
Since General Stanley McChrystal took over as top commander in Afghanistan, there have been a series of dark appraisals about the state of the war. In August, McChrystal warned of an “urgent need for a significant change to our strategy and the way that we think and operate.” A report recently obtained by NBC News said Afghanistan’s security forces won’t be ready to fight the Taliban for years — if ever. Earlier this week, Flynn issued a white paper complaining that “eight years into the war in Afghanistan, the U.S. intelligence community is only marginally relevant to the overall strategy.”
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January 7th, 2010 by admin | No Comments | Filed in elections, pushing obama
Photo: Rahm Emmanuel shows 'third way' gang signals
Three Reasons Why Progressives AreSo Frustrated
By Chris Bowers
Open Left-12.26.2009
If I may be so bold, I believe I can sum up, in three main points why progressives are so frustrated right now:
1. They are on the short-end of a left-progressive vs. Third Way ideological divide with the leadership of the American center-left coalition;
2. In attempts to not be on the short-end of #1, and persuade the coalition rank and file to join them, they face a massive organizational deficit against the coalition leadership;
3. Finally, if progressives look to split with the coalition in response to #1 and #2, more often than not they just end up getting squashed for it.
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December 28th, 2009 by admin | No Comments | Filed in elections, financial crisis, pushing obama
Democrats Do Not
Need to Become
More 'Moderate'
to Win in 2010
Four Rules for
Victory in November
By Bob Creamer
Huffington Post
There is little doubt that over the last several months President Obama's poll numbers -- and those of Democrats generally -- have taken a swing for the worse. The president's job approval numbers have drifted below 50 percent. The popularity of some of his signature initiatives has dropped. Last week, Democratic Congressman Parker Griffith of Alabama announced he was switching parties -- presumably in order to enhance his odds of political survival next fall.
These events have given rise to calls that the Democratic agenda needs to become more "moderate" or "centrist" and that this would somehow be more attractive to Independent voters.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
"Moderating" our goals is not a recipe for victory. It is a recipe for failure. Last fall, voters overwhelming voted for change, and they knew then -- and still know now -- the kind of change they wanted.
They wanted to end the stranglehold of the private insurance companies that continues to put every American a single illness -- or one layoff -- away from financial catastrophe. They want to take bold, clear action to assure that America is in the forefront of creating the clean energy jobs of the future -- and leave a thriving healthy planet to our children. They wanted to fundamentally change the bull-in-the-china shop foreign policy of the Bush years and re-establish American leadership in the world. Most importantly, they rejected the failed economic policies that allowed the recklessness of huge Wall Street banks to plunge the economy into free fall -- and cost millions their livelihoods. They desperately want leadership that will lay the foundation for long term, bottom-up, widely shared prosperity.
In other words they wanted... and still want... fundamental change.
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December 22nd, 2009 by admin | No Comments | Filed in financial crisis, rightwing
Regulatory Reform -
Then Break Up the
Big Wall Street Banks
By Robert Creamer
Huffington Post
Dec. 15, 2009 - Last Friday, the House passed critical regulatory reform legislation aimed at preventing the recurrence of the kind of financial meltdown that devastated our economy at the end of the Bush administration.
The lobbyists from Wall Street worked hand-in-glove with the Republicans, and a few Democrats, to try to kill the bill. Astoundingly, the Republicans argued that Wall Street should continue to be free to engage in the same reckless speculation that led directly to 10 percent unemployment and required the taxpayers to inject hundreds of billions into the markets so that the geniuses of private finance would not plunge us all into the abyss of another Great Depression.
With no regard for history -- and here I mean the events of only 12 months ago -- the Republicans and Big Banks have the audacity to contend that the creation of jobs and a growing economy requires the lowest levels of regulation and government involvement possible.
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