Newsflash
This just in. After analyzing subpoenaed Google search records, the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security announced that they foiled a new 9/11 Al Quaeda plot involving “blonde hair big tits.” I hope that all you refuseniks and ACLU’ers out there stop and think about what kind of busty, peroxide doomsday your interference might have caused. Have more faith in your government. You’re not even using those civil liberties, anyway.
So Long, Armistice Day
It is amazing to think that a few veterans of the first World War still provide a living link to the war that provided the blueprint for the bloody twentieth century. Naked aggression and empire-building, chemical warfare and ethnic holocaust and official lies, deceit and stupid propaganda all marked that war, which left millions dead in its wake and the world’s people and governments vowing – briefly – never to do it again, only to do it again and again. Armistice Day – which marks the end of that war – was soon enough re-christened “Veteran’s Day” to honor the bravery of all the poor kids who fought in the bloody wars that followed the war to end all wars. It is ancient history, but, conversely, still a living history and we would do well to heed certain lessons. Before he died today, Alfred Anderson was the last man left […]
Lament for the Lost Bush Years
The Bush administration’s deep problems don’t quite feel like a good reason to celebrate. Lies and incompetence have caught up with Bush, whose presidential approval rating hovers around Watergate-Nixonian levels, while Dick Cheney’s even less popular, after his chief of staff’s indictment. “I divide time now between BSI–Before Scooter’s Indictment–and ASI–After Scooter’s Indictment,” says Working Life blogger Jonaathan Tasini. First of all, I’m not sure if we’re witnessing the crucifixion or the martyrdom of Bush-Cheney’s henchmen. If Vice President Heart Attack chooses this time to “take one for the team” and resign for “health reasons,” does it really hurt the Republicans, or does it simply give Bush an opportunity to appoint an heir-apparent VP who could be spared a bruising 2008 primary, and who could tap into conservative fury over the “railroading” of such conservative superstars as Cheney and Rove. And secondly, can the Democrats – our “opposition party” by […]
Why Tuesday?
Like a good citizen, I voted today. “Yes” on 1 and 2, “No” on 3 and 4, against Whitey for Mayor, Socialist Workers where I could, Working Families where I could not and write-in votes for “Socialism” for the judges and Public Advocate. One question: why the Hell are we voting on a Tuesday?
Take Ten Percent Off the Top
As token gestures go, this one is particularly insulting. Executives at Delphi, the financially troubled auto parts producer that was spun off from GM a few years ago, are voluntarily cutting their million dollar salaries by as much as 20% as the company goes through bankruptcy procedures and seeks to void its union contracts and slash the pay of its workers by as much as two-thirds. This magnanimous act was meant to make up for the previously announced (now retracted) executive bonuses meant to “entice” these brilliant captains of industry to remain with the company through the hard times that they caused. The workers at Delphi make around $26 an hour. The business community likes to toss around the figure of $70 an hour, which would include the cost of payments for medical insurance, pension funds and other benefits. Delphi says these wages make the company uncompetitive, as similar workers […]
Citizen Roe
In another lifetime, Norma McCorvey was the anonymous Jane Roe who allowed herself to be used by the pro-choice movement as the plaintiff in the case that established the constitutional right to privacy and abortion, Roe vs. Wade. In the intervening years, the radical right violated her right to privacy, tracked Ms. McCorvey down and exploited her own ambivalence over her personal tragedy and its use in national policy debate. They turned Jane Roe into a pro-lifer, as if the simple change of heart of a turncoat would invalidate the legal principles of Roe vs. Wade, and convince all women not to have abortions. Since that “change of heart,” Ms. McCorvey has played a farcical role in the abortion debate, not unlike the titular (anti)hero of the movie, Citizen Ruth. The New York Times has dug her up one more time for an article published today, on a drug for […]
“Children by the Million”
The disastrous magnitude of Hurricane Katrina’s impact on the Gulf Coast is almost inconceivable. I’ll hardly bother with a political commentary on the government’s woefully inadequate response to, and preparation for, this utterly predictable storm. I don’t think that we, as a society, are going to learn the lessons we need from this. Global climate change is real, and it’s magnifying the size and impact of storms like Katrina, but don’t expect Bush to sign the Kyoto treaty. The National Guard belongs here, protecting the nation, not occupying foreign nations, but don’t expect our governors to demand the immediate return of their states’ troops. Natural disasters are much more likely, and predictable threats than fantastic terrorist threats, but don’t expect the Department of Homeland Security to focus on coastal evacuation. We’ll learn nothing, and this will happen again. Perhaps next time it will be Long Island. I haven’t been near […]
The End of Easy Oil
There’s lots of hand-wringing over the totally-surprising rise in gas prices in the press (I mean, who would have ever predicted that rising demand and limited supply would cause price increases?). USA Today unwittingly finds a silver lining: As she folds clothes at a Laundromat near her home in San Pablo, Calif., Thamara Morales, 30, counts up the ways high gas prices have changed her life…Trips to Wal-Mart are out. The closest one is about 15 miles away. Just to get there and back costs more than she might save by going. Yes, this might hurt Wal-Mart. It will also hurt the sales of behemoth SUVs and minivans, and certainly discourages the construction of more pre-fab “exurban” communities. This particular American Way of Life – a two car garage in an enormous shack in a white bread suburb of nowhere in the desert, an hour-long commute to an office park, […]
The Cycle of Terrorism
What follows are my opening remarks for the Socialist Party’s Free Speech Forum In Defense of Lynne Stewart (which went very well, thanks to those of you who attended): On behalf of the Socialist Party, I want to welcome you to our Free Speech forum in defense of human rights attorney Lynne Stewart. This forum is cosponsored by the New York City and New Jersey locals of the Socialist Party, and the party’s Direct Action Tendency. We have a really great panel tonight, with a number of crusading legal activists. Before we begin, I want to address the terrible events of last Thursday. The Socialist Party USA issued a statement, from which I’d like to quote in relevant part: The recent tragedy in London that resulted in murdering and maiming hundreds of working people, is a deplorable and de-humanzing act…It is our responsibility as brothers and sisters of humanity to […]
Giving Aid and Comfort to the Enemy
My Socialist Party is hosting a forum next Monday in defense of Lynne Stewart, the famed civil rights attorney who is being sent up the river for “aiding ‘terrorists’ ” by defending their constitutional rights in our modern witch-hunt times. Tom Good has organized a very interesting panel, and it looks like yours truly will be offering a few opening remarks and introducing the speakers. I strongly encourage you to attend if you are free in New YOrk City this coming Monday night. This will be the party’s biggest event in the city this summer (we have some cool things cooking up for the fall). July 6, 2005 For Immediate Release P R E S S R E L E A S E FREE SPEECH FORUM IN DEFENSE OF HUMAN RIGHTS ATTORNEY LYNNE STEWART New York, NY – The Socialist Party is hosting a Free Speech Forum in defense of […]