An Article:
Ben Tanosborn

It happens time and again as America’s quadrennial campaigns to gain residency at the imperial White House gather momentum.  Although our forever-cloned candidates, one for each of the two indistinct political parties, are asked to address each and every issue of the day, soft-hearted – or perhaps civically-ignorant – Americans that we are, we usually give candidates a free pass, not forcing them to commit to any specific color in their answers, true chameleons they are.  And the press, with its own corporate mission, self-preservation, plays the usual economic game in its key role of as a pleasing whore.

Progressives as well as many other change-clamoring Americans, particularly legions of young college students – many, first-time presidential would-be voters – volunteered to give this new political face of great hope, a man articulating change with a great amount of credulity, the reins of that sempiternal “lesser evil” party of peace-makers and lowly economy’s downcasts.  Of course, having reached that all important milestone which assured him the backing of the Democratic Party, Barack Obama had few options but to accept being placed in the waiting “golden stable” where he gets new handlers claiming to have magical knowledge with which to plot how the presidential race must be ran, not to place… or to show, but to win.

So now that face of great hope has been lifted, not to remove any wrinkles, young man that he is, but “to add” the necessary patriotic wrinkles required to be acceptable to what the new handlers consider to be the candidate’s initiation of trust from Middle-America, not a geographical location but a state of mind: that non-existing, totally equivocated middle of the road of an economically and morally decrepit, fading nation where the imperialism-cancer is already hovering around stage IV having spread to many, if not most, aspects of American life.  This while flags wave high in glory, and flag pins adorn the lapels of politicians and their brethren, our corps of elite corporate crooks.  Could it be that it isn’t change that Americans want… only a return, by whatever means, to easy credit, low oil prices and continuance of that fantasy dream of wealth as a birthright, or one created by motivational charlatanry, rather than the product of one’s labor?

Obama’s hundred-and-eighty-degree turn from progressivism and change should come as no surprise to those of us oft-scalded by American fraudulent politics; although we cannot help but feel deep pain for our idealist young people getting their initiation of fire.  Obama is in the hands of the handlers (visible and invisible) who require his adherence to flip-flop ambidexterity about Iraq, NAFTA (North America Free Trade Association), separation of church and state; and, recently, his unnecessary and obscene vote in the Senate favoring more federal surveillance on the citizenry.  One wonders how Obama might have voted in 2002 on the Iraq resolution had he been then a member of the Senate… with advisers; and not just an Illinois citizen unattached to the powerful.

If we add to all the above his ceremoniously recorded adhesion not long ago to AIPAC (Israel’s lobby) and his of-late windmill attitude to just about anything and everything, one must ask, is there really much of a difference between Barack Obama and John McCain?  Well, age for one thing; and, most definitely, brains.  But as for everything else, including critical foreign policy change, the two senators might have been birthed by the same mother as non-identical twins.

Some people, who have followed Obama’s political evolution since Hillary Clinton’s abdication to what she claimed to be her Democratic Party throne, are quick to give him the benefit of the doubt, saying that once he gets to the White House he’ll be his own man and his deeply imbedded progressive ideas will take root.  Fools we are… has that ever happened before…well, in recent memory?  Not a chance!

Even President Carter, as honorable a president as this nation has ever had, found it necessary to bend later on in his administration to the influence that the Miami Mafia (exiled Cubans) had on Florida politics.  Castro’s Cuba, or rather the apolitical Cubans in the Island, had to suffer the consequences of America’s WIR (Weapons of Ill Resort): embargoes, economic sanctions and other destructive, anti-people dirty tricks which are constantly being performed secretly.

There are three key issues for Americans which overrule everything else, issues that have been addressed with ignorance and/or triviality by both Obama and McCain.  They are: the complete overhaul of an economy in shambles; the imperialistic treatment we give to our presence in both the Middle East and Southwest Asia (Afghanistan, Iraq and the military-infested waters of the Persian Gulf, for which a more apropos name would be the Pentagulf); and our irreverent, imperialistic position towards Russia.  The latter, an issue which is not being played much by the American media… but an issue that will comeback for sure to hunt us… and hurt us.  Unlike Germany and Japan, Russia is not a defeated country… and to treat her with triumphal disdain and bullyism could ultimately exact too-high a price for the United States.

Arsonist Bush may be lighting up most destructive fires around the world, but no one hears either McCain or Obama speaking of putting them out.

Tags: Ben Tanosborn, democracy, economics, media, politics
Categories: Commentary, Economics, Democracy, Politics, Media, Ben Tanosborn
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Insightful remarks on the nature of American politics and governance

“We’re not a democracy. It’s a terrible misunderstanding and a slander to the idea of democracy to call us that. In reality, we’re a plutocracy: a government by the wealthy.”

–Ramsey Clark

“Of all forms of tyranny the least attractive and the most vulgar is the tyranny of mere wealth, the tyranny of plutocracy.”

–John Pierpont Morgan

“I hope we shall crush in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country.”

–Thomas Jefferson

“I see in the near future a crisis approaching that unnerves me and causes me to tremble for the safety of my country. As a result of the war, corporations have been enthroned and an era of corruption in high places will follow, and the money power of the country will endeavour [endeavor] to prolong its reign by working upon the prejudices of the people until all wealth is aggregated in a few hands and the Republic is destroyed.”

–Abraham Lincoln

“The real truth of the matter is, as you and I know, that a financial element in the large centers has owned the government of the U.S. since the days of Andrew Jackson.”

–Franklin D. Roosevelt

“Fascism should more appropriately be called Corporatism because it is a merger of State and corporate power.”

–Benito Mussolini

The compilation of quotations was derived from an email correspondence authored by Dennis Morrisseau: A Vermont politician, he was the first Republican to run for Congress on a platform that included the impeachment of both Bush and Chaney. His biography also includes an incident during the Vietnam War where he, when serving as an officer in the Military, as a protest to the war, refused to engage in combat, and was subsequently court marshaled.

I have included this brief biographic description because it evidences the differences existing among the various types of political conservatism and demonstrates that the two-dimensional framework used by the punditry to index political ideologies is woefully inadequate and, indeed, in some cases misrepresentative. There are undoubtedly a whole field of ideological commonalities to be discovered between and among all of us, irrespective of the Left/Right division we have been lulled into assuming to impose barriers between us.

Russell Cole

Tags: democracy, plutocracy, political ideology, politics, Russell Coles Blog
Categories: Commentary, Democracy, Russell Cole's Blog, Politics
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An Article by:

Ben Tanosborn

Like it or not, in agreement or in disfavor by the populace, our money politics has now entered the era of networking, multi-level-marketing and thorough ad-brainwashing.

Forget about democratic ideals, exalted social justice, or even the loftier proposition of brotherhood and world peace.  Forget about political party platforms that might spouse aspirations spirited with humanistic principles.  Remember, this is America, where the only beliefs held sacrosanct, beliefs which are expected to hold popular allegiance, are embodied in the duality of market economics and market politics.

Well, in truth, probably fewer than 10 percent of our citizens have a clue as to what a free market economy is, or should be; or that our existing economy is hardly guided by a free price system, much of it being expropriatory and corrupt.  However, that 90-plus percent of ignoranti in the art of economics are well aware of this nation’s unashamed commitment to market politics, accepting by default being governed by those with the purse strings.  Most everyone seems to be in conformity with the idea that “ours is the best government money can buy,” mocking ourselves to be proud and happy fools.

Money has influenced and often dictated, at least in our lifetime, how political elections are being conducted so as to optimize a candidate’s chances for election.  Our two-way stepladder politics has been for the most part a game played by the Knights of Capital, some siding with the Democrats, some siding with the Republicans, some straddling… placing their bets on both.

Now, since the McCain-Feingold campaign-finance law went into effect (2002), there is little option but for the candidates to invite small donors, up to $2,300 each this year, to come and fill their coffers.  The fund-raising, to be effective, needs to tap a new breed of “venture capitalists,” a group that might be considered the Squires of Capital, those who not only donate the allowed max, but who pledge to collect from other donors from 10 to 100 times that amount.  Networking is called… MLM of 2 or 3 levels, if you ask me!  Enter the most successful – in obtaining financing – presidential candidate of them all, Barack Obama, who in a true effortless mode can just rake in $50 million in a single month, 80 percent via the Internet, with zero personal effort and barely cracking a smile.

And the why of that success should not be a secret to someone in my shoes.

A business plan for a political candidate should be no different from a business plan for either a start-up business, or a mature one in need of venture capital… whether for expansion or for survival.  The functional areas in politics that need to be addressed may be different from those of a profit-making enterprise… but the purpose is identical: to obtain necessary funding to achieve a set of goals.  And, in my counseling capacity to businesses for decades, I have been an integral part of that business plan process.

And guess what, for all the logically and beautifully presented data assigning a high probability of success in the plan, and minimization of risk, it has been my experience that, in eight out of ten cases, whether dealing with banks or in private placements, the ultimate success was achieved because of the personal talent and the inspirational, or entrepreneurial, skills of the person in charge.  At the end of the day, it is a person that defines for a venture capitalist whether a company or a project is viable.  And so it is in politics.  Barack Obama was/is that inspirational leader this year… turning him into a quarter-of-a-billion, maybe a half-billion dollar man before the Democratic National Convention in August.

So more than the political funding concept, success has been Obama himself… and his message, of course.  Needless to say, Obama needs to pay attention to the pre-printed pages that are de rigueur in any and all business plans presented by US presidential candidates: solidarity with the aspirations of the brass at the Pentagon (empire); at least a friendly attitude towards big business; total adhesion to Israel’s government; and an anti-Castro (Fidel, Raúl or any government of ideological continuity) position on Cuba.

A good politician that Obama is, he is ahead of schedule, having made the rounds at the synagogues as well as addressing the now dwindling Cuban Mafiosi in Southern Florida.  Of course, the hawkish duet in the trio, Clinton and McCain, had already done so.  But then again, foreign policy issues are pre-written in each candidate’s business plan.

Does anyone really believe that this country will change via political evolution?  I, for one, have my doubts.  Our elections are but an adventure in advancing the possibility of minimal change, but never give us an opportunity to really choose change.

Tags: Ben Tanosborn, democracy, economics, economy, government, market, politics
Categories: Commentary, Economics, Democracy, government, Politics
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An Article by:

by Susan Rosenthal

(Susan Rosenthal, MD, is a veteran American physician - Justice Lover)

When you are sick or injured, you want to know what’s wrong and what can be done. You want a diagnosis. A correct diagnosis reveals what is wrong, what is the preferred treatment and what is the likely outcome. For example, a diagnosis of pneumonia indicates a serious lung infection that can usually be cured with antibiotics.

While medical diagnoses are based on science, psychiatric “diagnoses” are not at all scientific. They do not reveal what is wrong, what is the preferred treatment, and what is the likely outcome. Nor are they reliable. Different psychiatrists who examine the same patient typically offer different “diagnoses.” Moreover, psychiatric “diagnoses” move in and out of favor, depending on a variety of social factors.

Psychiatric “diagnosis” is actually a labeling process, where the patient’s symptoms are matched with a grouping of symptoms listed in the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Psychiatric Disorders (DSM). As we shall see, this psychiatric “bible” was developed and is maintained by financial and political interests.¹

Sigmund Freud

Who decides what is normal or healthy and what is deviant or sick?
Before the 20th century, life stresses were generally seen as spiritual problems or physical illnesses, and people turned to religious advisors and physicians for help. Medical doctors treated “hysteria” and “nerves” as physical problems. Psychiatry was restricted to the treatment of severely disturbed people in asylums.² The first classification of psychiatric disorders in the United States appeared in 1918 and contained 22 categories. All but one referred to various forms of insanity.

In 1901, Sigmund Freud revolutionized psychiatry by breaking down the barrier between mental illness and normal behavior. In The Psychopathology of Everyday Life,³ Freud argued that commonplace behaviors — slips of the tongue, what people find humorous, what they forget and the mistakes they make — indicate repressed sexual feelings that lurk beneath the surface of normal behavior.

By linking everyday behavior with mental illness, Freud and his followers released psychiatry from the asylum. Between 1917 and 1970, as psychiatrists cultivated clients with a broad range of problems, the number of psychiatrists practicing outside institutions swelled from eight percent to 66 percent.⁴

The social movements of the 1960’s opposed psychiatry’s focus on inner conflict and emphasized the social sources of sickness instead. Dr. Alvin Poussaint recalls the 1969 convention of the American Psychiatric Association (APA).

“After multiple racist killings during the civil rights movement, a group of black psychiatrists sought to have murderous bigotry based on race classified as a mental disorder. The APA’s officials rejected that recommendation, arguing that since so many Americans are racist, racism in this country is normative.”⁵

Growing the industry

In 1980, the APA overhauled the DSM. The Task Force established to create the new manual declared that any disorder could be included,
“If there is general agreement among clinicians, who would be expected to encounter the condition, that there are significant number of patients who have it and that its identification is important in the clinical work it is included in the classification.”⁶

In other words, the new DSM was not based on science, but on the need to maintain existing patients and include new ones who might seek help for any number of problems. A profitable and self-perpetuating industry was born. The more people could be encouraged to seek treatment, the more conditions could be entered into the DSM, and the more people could be encouraged to seek treatment for these new conditions.

By 1994, the DSM listed 400 distinct mental disorders covering a wide variety of behaviors in adults and children. Significantly, racism, homophobia (fear of homosexuality) and misogyny (hatred of women) have never been listed as mental disorders. In 1999, the chairperson of the APA’s Council on Psychiatry and the Law confirmed that racism “is not something that is designated as an illness that can be treated by mental health professionals.”⁷ Homosexuality was listed as a mental disorder until activists campaigned to have it removed.⁸

The women’s liberation movement condemned labeling symptoms of oppression as mental illnesses. In They Say You’re Crazy: How the World’s Most Powerful Psychiatrists Decide Who’s Normal, Paula Caplan explains,

“In a culture that scorns and demeans lesbians and gay men, it is hard to be completely comfortable with one’s homosexuality, and so the DSM-III authors were treating as a mental disorder what was often simply a perfectly comprehensible reaction to being mocked and oppressed.”⁹

Caplan describes efforts to prevent “Masochistic Personality Disorder” from being included in the DSM. This disorder assumes that women stay with abusive spouses because like to suffer, not because they lack the resources to leave. Despite protest, “Masochistic Personality Disorder” was added to the 1987 edition of the DSM, although it was later dropped.

The inclusion of “Pre-Menstrual Dysphoric Disorder” (PMDD) in the DSM also raised a protest. According to Caplan,

“The problem with PMDD is not the women who report premenstrual mood problems but the diagnosis of PMDD itself. Excellent research shows that these women are significantly more likely than other women to be in upsetting life situations, such as being battered or being mistreated at work. To label them mentally disordered — to send the message that their problems are individual, psychological ones — hides the real, external sources of their trouble.”¹⁰

As soon as PMDD was listed in the DSM, Eli Lilly repackaged its best-selling drug, Prozac, in a pink-pill format, renamed it Serafem, and promoted it as a treatment for PMDD. By creating Serafem, Lilly was able to extend its patent on the Prozac formula for another seven years.

A marketing gold mine

The DSM is a marketing gold mine for the drug industry. The FDA will approve a drug to treat a mental disorder only if that disorder is listed in the DSM. Therefore, each new listing is worth millions in potential drug sales. Most of the experts who construct the DSM have financial ties to pharmaceutical companies, and every new edition of the DSM contains more conditions than the previous one.

Once the DSM lists a new mental disorder, drugs for that disorder are heavily marketed for everyone who might fit the symptom checklist. (Doctors are also encouraged to prescribe these drugs for “off-label use,” which means to anyone they think might benefit.) Not surprisingly, the numbers of people “diagnosed” with a mental condition rise rapidly after a drug is approved to treat that condition.

In 2005, a major study announced that “About half of Americans will meet the criteria for a DSM-IV disorder sometime in their life…”¹¹ How is this possible? Has it become normal to be mentally ill, or has the definition of mental illness expanded beyond reason? Both could be true.

Capitalism damages people in many ways. It’s also true that the more people can be labeled as sick, the more profits can be made from selling them treatments. In Creating Mental Illness, Alan Horowitz warns,

“…a large proportion of behaviors that are currently regarded as mental illnesses are normal consequences of stressful social arrangements or forms of social deviance. Contrary to its general definition of mental disorder, the DSM and much research that follows from it considers all symptoms, whether internal or not, expected or not, deviant or not, as signs of disorder.”¹²

Most people know the difference between normal behavior (such as grief over the death of a loved one) and abnormal behavior that could indicate an internal disorder (such as prolonged grief for no apparent reason). However, the DSM does not consider what happens in people’s lives. With one exception (Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder), the DSM lists and categorizes symptoms outside of any social context. As a result, DSM-based surveys artificially increase the numbers of people suffering from mental disorders and, therefore, the market for drug treatments.

DSM-inflated rates of mental illness are typically accompanied by the warning that not enough people are getting treatment.¹³ The question of whether or not they are actually sick is never raised.

Social control

Psychiatry has a long history of medicating the oppressed, including children, for social control.¹⁴

Using DSM criteria, at least six million American children have been diagnosed with serious mental disorders, triple the number in the early 1990’s. The rate of boys aged 7 to 12 diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder more than doubled between 1995 and 2000 and continues to rise.

A 2007 survey of 8- to 15-year-olds discovered that nine percent met the DSM criteria for attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). The survey found that fewer than half of these children had been diagnosed or treated, “suggesting that some children with clinically significant inattention and hyperactivity may not be receiving optimal attention.” Noting that poor children were least likely to receive medication, the authors of the study recommend “further investigation and possible intervention.”¹⁵

Instead of addressing the stressful social conditions that agitate children, psychiatry imposes conformity through medication. To force compliance with this oppressive system, access to insurance benefits, medical care and social services depends on “having a diagnosis.”

The psychiatric-pharmaceutical industry treats illness as strictly individual and internal — the result of faulty genes or chemical imbalances. In reality, human problems exist in a social context.

Most of the symptoms listed in the DSM describe human responses to deprivation and oppression (anxiety, agitation, aggression, depression) and the many ways that people try to manage unbearable pain (obsessions, compulsions, rage, addictions). Depression is strongly linked with poverty,¹⁶ and alleviating poverty can lift depression.¹⁷

Under capitalism, addressing the social causes of misery is politically risky and unprofitable. So psychiatry extracts the individual from society, splits the brain from the body, severs the mind from the brain and drugs the brain.¹⁸

A sick society

Capitalism is a system that requires the majority to have no control over their lives and to believe that this condition is normal. Therefore, all reactions to inequality and deprivation must be viewed as signs of personal inadequacy, biological defect, mental illness — anything other than reasonable responses to unreasonable conditions.

During slavery days, experts argued that Black people were psychologically suited for a life of slavery, so there must be something wrong with those who rebelled.¹⁹ In 1851, the diagnosis of “drapetomania”(runaway fever) was developed to explain why slaves try to escape.²⁰ Not much has changed. Today, exploitation and oppression are considered normal, and those who rebel in any way are considered to be sick or deviant and in need of medication or incarceration.

What’s the diagnosis for a sick society? We know what’s wrong. Most people are kept in sick social conditions so that a few can maintain their wealth and power. What is the treatment? Putting human needs first would eliminate most human misery. Who will deliver the medicine? The majority must organize to take collective control of society.

I don’t expect this diagnosis to appear in the DSM anytime soon.

(Emphasis by Justice Lover)

1. Kirk, S.S. & Kutchins, H. (1992). The selling of DSM: The rhetoric of science in psychiatry. New York: Aldine De Gruyter. #
2. Horowitz, A.V. (2002). Creating mental illness. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. #
3. Freud, S. (1901/1991). The psychopathology of everyday life. New York: Penguin #
4. Shorter, E. (1997). A history of psychiatry: From the era of the asylum to the age of Prozac. New York: John Wiley & Sons. #
5. Poussaint, A.F. & Alexander, A. (2000). Lay my burden down: Suicide and the mental health crisis among African-Americans. Boston: Beacon Press, p.125. #
6. Spitzer, R.L., Sheeney, M. & Endicott, J. (1977). DSM III: Guiding principles. In Psychiatric diagnosis, (Eds). Rakoff, V., Stancer, H. & Kedward, H. New York: Brunner Mazel. #
7. Egan, T. (1999). Racist shootings test limits of health system and laws. New York Times, August 14, p.1. #
8. “DSM and homosexuality: A cautionary tale.” in Kirk, S.A., Kutchins, H. (1992). The selling of DSM: The rhetoric of science in psychiatry. New York: Aldine De Gruyter p 81-90 #
9. Caplan, P. (1995). They say you’re crazy: How the world’s most powerful psychiatrists decide who’s normal. New York: Addison-Wesley, pp.180-181. #
10. Caplan, P.J. (2002). Expert decries diagnosis for pathologizing women. Journal of Addiction and Mental Health. September/October 2001, p.16. #
11. Kessler, R.C., Berglund, P., Demler, O., Jin, R. & Walters, E.E. (2005). Lifetime prevalence and age-of-onset distributions of DSM-IV disorders in the National Comorbidity Survey Replication. Arch Gen Psychiatry. Vol.62, No.6, pp.593-602. #
12. Horowitz, A.V. (2002). Creating Mental Illness. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. p.37. #
13. Talen, J. (2005). Survey says nearly half of all Americans will be affected by a mental illness, some before adulthood. Newsday, June 7. #
14. Breggin, P.R. & Breggin, G. R. (1994). The war against children: How the drugs, programs, and theories of the psychiatric establishment are threatening America’s children with a medical ‘cure’ for violence. New York: St. Martin’s Press. #
15. Froehlich TE, et.al. (2007). Prevalence, recognition, and treatment of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder in a national sample of US children. Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med. Vol.161, pp.857-864. #
16. Duenwald, M. (2003). “More Americans Seeking Help for Depression.” New York Times, June 18. #
17. Costello EJ, Compton SN, Keeler G, Angold A.(2003). Relationships between poverty and psychopathology: a natural experiment. JAMA. Oct 15, Vol.290, No. 15, pp.2023-9. #
18. Ross, C.A., & Pam, A., (1995). Pseudoscience in biological psychiatry: Blaming the body. New York: Wiley. #
19. Poussaint, A.F. & Alexander, A. (2000). Lay my burden down: Suicide and the mental health crisis among African Americans. Boston: Beacon Press. #
20. Cartwright, S. (1851). Report on the diseases and physical peculiarities of the Negro race. New Orleans Medical and Surgical Journal. May, p. 707. #

Tags: mental health, politics, psychology, religion
Categories: Commentary, Politics, Religion, mental health
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It is time for Harry Reid – the Majority Leader of the Democrats – to strip Joe Lieberman of his Chair on the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs.

In the past week, Lieberman has made several outrageous comments, directed at Obama, that were malicious and dishonest. Lieberman, who apparently has assumed the role of hit man for the McCain Campaign, has slurred the kind of rhetoric we should expect of a Fox peon, such as Hannity; someone who is utterly bankrupt when it comes to intellectual integrity and will say anything in order to defend any of his partisan positions.

Lieberman went so far as to accuse Obama, reverberating what was babbled by Bush when speaking in Israel, of advocating a foreign policy of appeasement when it comes to dealing with terrorists in Muslim countries.

For clarification, Lieberman should, at the very least, identity to whom he is precisely referring when he uses the term, terrorists. Is he referring to the terrorists in Afghanistan and Pakistan, whom this country has ignored for the most part over the past 5 years, in order to direct our military resources toward the invasion and pacification of Iraq; a country that had no connections to terrorism prior to our destabilization of the foundations of their society? Moreover, what ‘head of state’ – or, more plainly, what fictional leadership is Lieberman alluding to when he invokes this vacuous terminology, using references, such as ‘appeasing terrorists,’ as though American is at war with an integrated, cohesive adversary in possession of a body politic capable of conducting diplomacy?

Perhaps even worse, Lieberman said that the fact that the supposed, according to the McCain Campaign, North American spokesman for Hamas has ‘endorsed,’ Obama raises justifiable concerns over Obama’s candidacy for President. No doubt speaking to the most uninformed and intellectual impoverished segments of America’s electorate, Lieberman asserted that Hamas actually endorses American candidates for President, as though Hamas is entirely oblivious to the fact that their public support of a candidate would probably have only negative effects for that individual’s campaign.

How stupid does Lieberman think that we are? and to what depths will he sink in order to propagate his militaristic vision for the United State’s role in the Middle East? a policy of aggression that is so unmistakably a reflection of right-wing Israeli colonialist interests; certainly not the foreign policy interests of the United States.

At this point, Lieberman, in my own assessment, is more a cartoon character than a statesman who embodies the prudence and judicious temperaments that one would expect of a Chair for one of the Senate’s most influential committees.

It is time for Harry Reid to strip Lieberman of all of the privileges he has acquired through his accumulation of seniority as a Democratic, because Lieberman – judging from his performance when campaigning as Vice Presidential nominee to Gore’s Presidential bid – never was a Democrat from the beginning.

Russell Cole

Tags: american empire, congress, foreign policy, Harry Reid, homeland security, Joe Lieberman, politics, Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, Terrorism
Categories: Commentary, Politics, Congress, Homeland Security, Terrorism
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When will the Green Party ever learn?

When, finally, will the Green Party accrue the wisdom necessary for it to recognize the false prophets that come under the pretenses that they can transform the Party from its presently obscure and politically inconsequential status. Such charlatans publicly pronounce their affinity for Green Values. However, more times than not, the opaque agenda of such aspiring politicos incorporates the Green Party as merely a vehicle for personal political aggrandizement.

As it stands now, the Green Party suffers from a lustful wish to become a competitor in mainstream politics. As a result, the Green Party is always seeking to run candidates for high level governmental positions; political offices that any Green Candidate possesses a less than negligible chance for winning; or, for that matter, to even marginally compete with the candidates nominated by the two major business parties; and, more likely, the Green Candidate will either fail to acquire a slot on the ballot, or, under the remarkable condition that ballot access is obtained, the Green’s electoral success in the election will fail to pass the threshold for the Party’s automatic entry onto the ballot for forthcoming elections.

This impetuous disposition on the part of the Greens - whereby they shoot for the stars; a strategy reflecting their considerable lack of sociopolitical farsightedness - has engendered a condition were possible Green candidates who possess some notoriety are either courted by High Standing Party Members, or, contrarily, the Greens acquiesce to the prominent newcomer’s desire for the spot on the Green Party ticket.

As we observe the latest inner-organizational events occurring within the Green Party, as the Nation moves closer to a new Presidential Election, it appears that the impending quasi-celebrity to be embraced by the Greens will be no other than the former Georgia Representative, Cynthia McKinney. The only difference, however, between McKinney and other quasi-celebs who have used the Green Party in order to advance their own political aspirations is the fact that McKinney’s public persona - albeit recognized widely - is, more often than not, associated with feelings of contempt and annoyance.

McKinney’s public conduct has been one characterized by somewhat of a paradox. On the one hand, she advocates important issues about social problems that impact the most vulnerable members of American Society. In fact, she is one of the few politicians to publicly admit that the crisis in the Middle-East is primarily attributable to the Israelis and their violations of international law as the Israeli colonists strive to usurp more and more territory from the subjugated Palestinians.

Nevertheless, whatever goodwill might be garnered from McKinney’s tenacity for speaking forthright is obfuscated by her supreme arrogance and elitism. She is, of course, the Representative who assaulted a police officer, who had stopped her because she stormed through a corridor when entering the Capital Building that was reserved for members of Congress. McKinney’s reaction was to strike the police officer, as if he was out of line and he had no business even approaching her.

What is important to remember about this event is that McKinney was not wearing her Congressional Pin - which would have identified her as a Member of Congress - therefore, for her to suspect not to be stopped seems to rest upon an inflated ego that instructs her to presume she is pervasively known and recognizable to everyone, and therefore should not be subject to the same inconveniences as the rest of us, even if she neglects to have the alacrity of mind to wear appropriate identification.

This rather minor incident, however, could have been quickly resolved if McKinney simply apologized and explained her actions as being kneejerk and quite clearly inappropriate. Nevertheless, McKinney’s hyperbolic ego got in the way, and she elected to cry bigotry, going so far as to accuse the Officer, whom she had struck, as being motivated out of racism when stopping this Congresswoman who had decided not to wear the lapel required for her to be recognized as a Member of Congress. In other words, McKinney - overestimating her self-importance - was willing to ruthlessly attack the civil servant, who, in this context, was the actually vulnerable, underpowered party in the dispute; not the other way around, as McKinney suggested.

So, considering all of this, why does the Green Party - or, at least, quite a few of its notable members and supporters - seem to embrace McKinney and her decision to run for the Green Party’s ticket for the Presidency? I suspect the answer to this question rests in the fact that she has acquired national recognition, and among the leftist extremes in American political culture she is still looked upon with credibility and respect. Nevertheless, from my own vantage point, I am prepared to denounce McKinney as just another self-absorbed false prophet, who is less concerned with the incremental growth of the Green Party as she is obsessed with herself and her own ascendency to higher offices.

Russell Cole

Tags: congress, cynthia mckinney, government, green party lack of democracy, politics, third parties
Categories: Commentary, Politics, Third Parties, Congress
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An Article by:

Ben Tanosborn

Where are your friends when you really need them? Isn’t that time of need when true friends really surface, sharing their buoyancy as they try to help keep you afloat? Well, we really haven’t seen many of those friends around, not for America, although we have seen the traditional parasites – those who instigate our misguided foreign policy for their own ends, as well as those who either go along with America’s criminal government, or simply look the other way.

In some regions, such as Latin America, one would hardly expect to find any friends of the United States – of the non-servile kind, that is – given the long history of bullying and the oppressive hand this nation has had in that region… but what about Europe? All NATO nations should be America’s true and tried friends, right? But they aren’t… not when they are unwilling to strongly influence our government’s behavior.

For several years some of us have been asking just what this NATO outfit is all about! And no, we don’t seem to find the answer by looking at the baptismal records and its purported reinstatement as “a military alliance of democratic states in Europe and North America for a concerted mutual defense.” Its purpose might have appeared clear back in 1949: a mutual defense pact against the feared advances of communism. But that was then, and now is now. And the now is becoming rather obvious: NATO is just a military toy-tool for the policies drummed up at the White House and the Pentagon.

The United States was simply supposed to be another NATO member, just like Canada and the European members, regardless of size and economic-military strength. But if you believe that, you believe in fairy tales, particularly when Bush makes that reality clear time and again. His latest proclamation last week in Croatia made it clear once again when he delivered a mixture of mini-harangue and cheerleading chant to a crowd from that state, formerly part of communist Yugoslavia. Joining the organization, they were told by Bush, would mean their nation would be defended by “America and the NATO alliance.”

and NATO, you say? Was it yet another of Bush’s ignorant misspeaks? No, not really. America, or rather its present government, thinks of itself as a distinct and separate entity, all powerful and meritorious… the rest is the lesser NATO, a janissary pool of troops commanded not from Brussels but from the Pentagon.

Truth be said, NATO is an illusory relic that has served past its needs and now should be given a burial; or better still, it should be broken up to reflect a true world’s desire to achieve and maintain peace. If Europe, or more apropos, the European Union, feels a need to retain defensive military teeth, so be it; but its defense force must be its own without providing hegemony to, or be dictated by, anyone else. Can anyone just picture the proximity of the waters in the North Atlantic and the poppy fields of Afghanistan?

Shouldn’t Europe be more assertive in its dealing with the peoples of the Middle East, instead of sheepishly following the lead, or be under the leash, of the United States? A greater harmony would likely develop between the Muslim population throughout Europe and native European people who are hosting and/or assimilating them. If such were the case, one could foresee a greater probability of success for a quicker and long-lasting resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in which the United States has continuously served as a gully instead of a bridge.

Shouldn’t Europeans try to find more common ground with next door Russia, and try to secure stronger economic ties, instead of providing a source of friction and unnecessary confrontation by submitting to the forced military requirements of the US? Much of the existing divisive tribulations affecting the Ukraine and Georgia have been caused in no small part by US sub-rosa involvement. The Europeans should ask themselves, to what end is this conflict-seeding by the US beneficial to them?

One needs to ask, just what are the Europeans afraid of? Being, perhaps, cut off from energy sources unless the US remains on top? A less beneficial world trade situation for them as a result? Nonsense, the opposite would likely happen as a result. And one would think that tensions would lessen uninviting more cold wars, and offering greater prospects for peace throughout the Middle East.

And for America, the return of the prodigal European friends, as brothers tendering advice and help of the right kind – not just troops for a struggle in Afghanistan that will only be resolved via mediation with the Taliban – not just vassals and prostitutes for an empire that, if unchecked, will ultimately claim both peace and the economic well being of the American people. That’s what our European friends could do for America.

Tags: Ben Tanosborn, Drug War, economics, empire, latin america, military, neoconservatism, politics, power
Categories: Commentary, Economics, Power, Politics, Empire, military, neoconservatism, Ben Tanosborn
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Monique Davis needs to resign from her seat in the Illinois State Senate.

Due to social journalism, the State Senator has been exposed as a rather outspoken bigot, who scorns religious minorities without pause or hesitation. When listening to testimony given to a committee upon which Davis sat, she erupted in an outburst directed upon Rob Sherman – an atheist who was testifying on matters relating to the separation of church and state – in which she screamed, “It’s dangerous for our children to even know that your philosophy exists,” among other things.

There are several extrapolations that can be drawn from such a bewildering statement. Most saliently, Davis has revealed that she believes free thought and expression to be dangerous and out of place in the various public spheres belonging to American civil society. She obviously thinks that some forms of speech – namely, those with which she fails to agree – should be curtailed, in order for such thoughts not to reach impressionable members of society.

There are, of course, other inferences to be drawn from Davis’ hate speech, but they all seem to reinforce a thematic congruency that can be reduced as follows: Monique Davis is not a good American.

In support this conclusion, consider the following: She is a bigot who wants to interfere with the religious practices that are predicated upon beliefs whose veracity she disputes. Further, since she obviously fails to possess the intellectual faculties necessary for her to produce arguments in opposition to a particular system of beliefs, she is reduced to cruelly shouting at those whose beliefs she denies, citing hysterically fabricated consequences that will ensue if her opponent’s abilities to publicize his or her arguments are not curtailed. Therefore, her only recourse is to fear monger in an attempt to illicit the censorship of her adversaries.

At the very least, Monique Davis must be censured by her legislative colleagues. The venomous hate that she spews must by rebuked, and she must face public humiliation. If there is anything dangerous to which children can be exposed, it is the bigotry and the hatred that Davis embodies. This does not indicate that we should curtail her ability to speak publicly. However, responsible members of the political body, in which she has procured a seat, need to clearly state that her speech – which is at odds with our most fundamental values as Americans – is not demonstrative of the guiding-principles that instruct the Illinois State Senate as it deliberates over public policy.

Russell Cole

Tags: atheism, freedom of religion, government, illinois, illinois legislature,