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 censored 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

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I had never imagined that such a thing as Super-delegates could exist in the Democratic Party, until the media finally illuminated for the public this vile aspect of the Party structure; a component to the Democrat’s primary process that is exemplary all of the worse values and qualities that have defined the ethos possessed by the privileged factions in this country, who have endeavored – since this Nation’s inception – to monopolize its political institutions as much as possible while, nevertheless, maintaining a façade of democracy.

These anti-democratic patterns of political behavior – which spawn from ideological convictions that are so deeply entrenched that they qualify as genetic coding: the building blocks of American sociality – are embraced by a status that regards itself as uber-citizens: Those who possess self-alleged prowess and mental fitness enabling them not only to politically advocate their own interests, but to represent others in the process, despite the absence of any consent on the part of those for whom the elitist camp of surrogates will speak.

The core of elitist collaborators, who ultimately control, to a large measure, the American system of government, relish the opportunity to insert complexities into the political operations of this country. This amounts to a hierarchical inter-grouping of political decision-making bodies that distance – through the unnecessary multiplication of entities – the lowest common denominator of the American citizenry from the institutional spaces in which the final determinations, deciding the posture of American governance, are ultimately worked out.

Take for instance, the use of proportionate voting on the part of the Democratic Party. When analyzed in isolation from a detached perspective, this appears to be a relatively simple and straight forward reform that is designed to increase the influence of those who are not members of electoral majorities; providing an alternative to the more conventional American electoral practice in which the winner takes all. However, when purveyed within a scope that includes other provisions, such as the practice of valuating the votes of particular districts in some States higher than the votes cast in other districts in the same State: a device used to reward geographically defined populations that have demonstrated higher levels of electoral support for past Democratic Presidential Candidates – we are quick to fine that no concise and generally intellectually accessible description of the primary processes can possibly be constructed.

To cite another example of these excessively complicated processes, the State of Texas affords citizens the opportunity to vote twice in the Democratic Primary: once through a type of caucusing; the other instance by means of a primary ballot. I would endeavor to go on in further detail describing the primary selection practices, however, in order for me to do so, I would be pressed into conducting extensive investigations; a less than inspiring research project that would involve reading state party bylaws and state statutes as well as the National Democratic Party’s Bylaws, so that I could eventually interrelate all of the various stipulations, emanating from different bodies, when arriving at some sense of the applicable procedures that ultimately dictate how this ridiculous carnival is performed.

Because of this condition – what we can call political scholasticism – an inquiring layman, who is struggling to come to terms with the Primary selection process, will soon find himself lost in the convoluted mesh mash of procedures belonging to this social construct that is awash in a sea of obfuscation. In fact, I would venture to suggest that an accurate and precise conception of these complexities can only be rendered by the Party-hack-scholastics; some of whom were, in part, responsible for crafting this monstrosity. By extension, it surely is not spurious to suggest that there is a circuitous motivation inducing these insider-hacks into concocting what amounts to some kind of esoteric electoral alchemy: If one can monopolize the production of gold by virtue of a mastery of an arcane knowledge, then he would surely want his practices to remain opaque; or else, the precious metal could be produced by most anybody and it would fail to retain its special value.

It would be partially reassuring if the Democratic Primaries were an anomaly when understood comparatively within the full scope of institutions and practices comprising American politics and governance. Unfortunately, however, ranging back to the very inception of the United States, we can trace the same sort of Byzantine procedures, creating the same types of obscure and sometimes convoluted governing practices. To cite an obvious exemplar, consider the Electoral Delegates: super-voters entrusted with the capacity of choosing the President. Collectively, this body – which qualifies as an appendix in the sense that it is utterly extraneous to a democratic polity – counts as a democratically superfluous sub-aggregate, whose political Prerogative procedurally preempt the Popular Will of the Citizenry: The common denominator that could, otherwise, in a more authentic democratic environment, select the President independently and directly; whereby a majority or, even, a plurality of votes cast would act as the final adjudicator when selecting a candidate for the High Office.

The institution of the Electoral College, concocted by our Constitutional Founders, marks a latency in our sociopolitical history: a subtext that follows a pattern in which the uber-citizenry – those feigning the embrace of democracy while, concurrently, enacting political obstructions serving to compromise the Popular Will – has persistently committed to praxis a political philosophy that essentially boils down to a doctrinaire attachment to a Tory exceptionalness. Taking into consideration this pattern of elitist, anti-democratic conduct on the part of the privileged few in our Country’s history, one might ponder why there appears to be no resistance to this muffled, semi-tyrannical hegemony in our society.

First off, it should be mentioned that there have been popular insurrections against the American elites and the conditions they have endeavored to impose by virtue of the networked coordination of their economic and sociopolitical influences. The most salient instance of rebellion among American Plebes consisted of the formation of various Farmer Alliances and the People’s Party they would come to conjointly form.

However, despite the poignancy of the first Populist Movement during the final decades of the Nineteenth Century, this episode in American sociopolitical relations has been predictably left relatively untreated by our educational institutions. This lack of attention to an extraordinary event in American history is understandable, due to the fact that the Agrarian Revolt does not fit into the preemptive interpretive pattern organizing how we are supposed to conceptualize the course of American history. A thorough study and understanding of the People’s Party would expose contradictions to the Whiggish orthodoxy that enforces a dogmatic interpretation of American history in which democracy is in a state of perpetual improvement.

Therefore, the aforementioned question – why no rebellion to sociopolitical elitism? – is in need of reformulation: There have been a few, sparse uprisings to the old guard of American sociopolitical relations. However, why do we fail to treat these instances of American history hermeneutically? We neglect to come to an understanding of these instances according to their own terms and their own political self-understandings, along with the related complaints that they leveled against sociopolitical institutions that they regarded as oppressive; exploitative; unfair; or unfitting for a democracy to instantiate.

Rather, such incidents of insurrection find themselves excluded from the historical alacrity that is directed upon what are conventionally conceived as American sociopolitical accomplishments. In other words, historical events that are contrariwise to the established ideological order are treated as transient deviations; inconsequential digressions, diverting consciousness away from the core thesis embodied by the American Experience: An overall process that tells of advancement and ongoing maturation of American Society and of the American State, as they evolve into a more democratic condition. I would venture to assert that it is almost an Aristotelian metaphysics of political history: The American nation-state possesses an essence that is tantamount to its potentiality that it strives to actualize, which translates into a course of events where the essence of America protrudes and emerges; a process that parallels the advancement of perfecting democratic polity.

The Whiggish character of American historical orthodoxy, however, cannot be attributed with the function of the sole antecedent precipitating the compliant and obedient dispositions that have been all too pervasively exhibited by American Plebes. In order to understand the submissiveness among American Plebes, we need to direct our attention upon another factor; one whose presence is nearly ubiquitously represented by the portraits of our governing elites offered to us by mass media.  We are incited to a state of awe in relation to our institutions of political power by virtue of the fact that our media representations - due to the competition for ratings - are dramatizations of events; not objective reports of the events that have transpired that are of social significance.  From the epic framework in which corporate journalism is packaged, we are induced into believing that our politicos are heroes in the sense attribute to the term by the Ancient Greeks:  Apart from their mortality, they are godlike.  Consequently, we see the elites who govern us not only as competent, but as transcendent, as well.

This necessity is reinforced by the arcane procedures and practices that have come to litter – and, in fact, dilute – American systems of democratic participatory polity. By creating a situation whereby the elites are the limited few who actually possess an operational understanding of the processes through which political decisions are made – whether in the party primaries; or, to cite another example, the parliamentary conventions of Congress – they incite participatory reticence on the part of outsiders – who have neglected to pass through the socializing institutions through which the Power Elite transmits its esoteric knowledge and reproduces itself. Thus, we arrive in our analysis at the concept, wonkish: a self-congratulatory expression chattered in self-reference by the governing elite. This terminology’s meaning essentially boils down to the following definition: a state of public policy expertise.

The professionalization – (a concept that is most always predicated with the notion of expertise) – of politics resembles the historically recent trends in the rest of our society. Especially in the decades following the Information Revolution – which happened to transpire in a time span that overlapped with a movement in the American Academe toward the hyper-specialization of its professionalized disciplinarity – American governance has evolved into a condition that is sometimes referred to as technocracy. This political state can be characterized as one were the ability to formulate and administer public policy has become the province of technocrats in society; a form of plutocracy in which the common masses of citizenry no longer possess the knowledge and ability to fully participate in their political and governmental affairs. The task of governance has become highly compartmentalized, technical, and esoteric; whereas, seemingly, the only members of society who possess the necessary skills to govern are those trained in the specialized knowledge pursuits that are related to public policy concerns.

The propagation of this class of public-policy-technocrats – which includes the politicians who are trained in the lawmaking rituals from which earmarks and other benefits are procured for constituencies – is justified by the following chimera: In order to administer government, one must possess the technocratic specializations associated with being a Wonk; or else, he would buckle under the enormity of the intellectual, technical challenges he would face, and he will be rendered impotent, incapable of effecting the desired outcomes from participation in the processes of polity and public administration.

To quickly dispel such an polemic that insists upon the necessity of a technocracy in our society, we can refer to recent history: The FBI, following the 9/11 Tragedy and the scrutiny it incited – which was directed upon the agencies of the Federal Government that were previously thought to be protecting us from such calamities – it was found that the FBI possessed an antiquated information technology infrastructure; a partial explanation of the nearly unbelievable inability for the FBI “to Connect the dots.” In short, the FBI’s organization of information had yet to embrace mechanisms and processes associated with the informational economy and its digitalization of documents, that can, subsequently, be manipulated through computational machineries in order to find and establish relational values between and among the various types of information, which, subsequently, can be used in order to adduce inferences regarding additional parameters. Although this seems nearly inconceivable, the FBI’s manipulation of information was actualized, for the most part, in the deployment of pre-digital technologies, involving FBI employees sorting various document types, whose embodiment took the form of ink on paper, into filing cabinets.

It should be mentioned, there was some sort of computerization extant within the FBI. However, the dumb terminals provided to agents where practically left in their state of dumbness, because one could not use them to retrieve – through some effective search engine algorithm – materials relevant to the subject, or topic, that was being addressed by an FBI agent. As a result, the nodes belonging to the FBI’s informational networking – a system, which had, in some extensively qualified capacity, crossed the digital divide; or, at least, had attempted to accomplish as much – was never endowed with the intelligence – or smartness – that is associated with terminals that constitute the nodes belonging to an advanced informational network. It is only through the role assumed by a machine, acquiring a position within many linkages through which information is transferred in and throughout a network, that it becomes a useful tool for an agent looking to increase or intensify his knowledge and understanding of a topic by relating relevant information types to other information types.

As one can anticipate, the FBI, following the revelations related to the antiquated condition of its information management, set out to create an information architecture that was in line with contemporary technologies and procedures. However, the problem with the subsequent efforts made by the FBI, when working to modernize itself, can be characterized through the following: It was the FBI that was left in charge of the project. Consequently, after spending millions upon millions and expending valuable time and man-hours when attempting to install an information management system, the FBI finally had to report to Congress that the entire project had failed; could not be salvaged; and, therefore, had to be scrapped entirely.

Despite their follies, they persist in their arrogance, and continue to adopt a paternalistic posture in their relationship to the common citizenry. The present Administration –impervious to any scrutiny or oversight – continues to treat us like fools, constantly informing us of the attacks upon the domestic United States that it has thwarted; all the while refusing to disclose any convincing evidence to justify such fear mongering. Making it all the more ironic, the Bush Administration has failed to competently perform is duty to protect the American Public, not once, but on three occasions: the 9/11 Tragedy; the hyper-actively and impetuously devised invasion of Iraq; and the national shame and humiliation that was Hurricane Katrina. Nevertheless, despite their ostensible incompetency, these instances of failure are simply submitted through the ordinary propaganda assembly lines – where they are reassembled, packaged up, and refurnished – only to be publicized within the same garbled mess as all of the rest of the fear mongering and baiting with which we are unceasingly bombarded.

This audacity on the part of those who claim to know better than others know for themselves is justified by what amounts to a plutocratic apologia: The popular will of the unrefined and vulgar American people constitutes a threat to the vested interests of those who are endowed with the prudence and sound judgment necessary to advance not only their own interests, but, additionally, the long term interests of the nation as a whole.

This is the type of thinking that spawns absurdities such as “Trickle-down economics:” a theory of convenience, which Naomi Klein has revealed in some of her weblog writings to be a device deployed to obfuscate unbridled greed on the part of corporatists and, more generally, the ownership class in society; economic elitists who were in need of an intellectual diversion so that the swelling of class antagonisms, fomenting among those suffering under supply-side tax reforms, could be assuaged.

Although it might seem unfair to lump together, under the rubric of uber-citizens, elitist factions such as the Clintonian Political Machinery with the neoconservatives who currently control the Executive Branch of Government, we need to remember that the differences between neocons and neoliberals are all too scarce. There remains a thematic congruency between the two uber-factions; a convergence comparable to the opposing sides of a coin: The antithetical representations – where one side is emblazon with the head; the other side, the tale – that, despite their surface distinctions, continue to be of the same ilk; formed within the same mold; and made out of the same alloy.

In fact, both the Clintonian Third-way neoliberals – who feign empathy with the plight of American labor suffering from free-trade – and the neoconservatives – who do not even bother to express acknowledgement of such hardships – share in the same condescending rhetoric that is used to dismiss voices, emanating from the masses, that raise objection to American trade policies. The elitist corps have fashioned a rhetoric with pejoratives, such as neo-populism, that they use when disdainfully depicting the sociopolitical interpretations and reactions to socioeconomic conditions produced by the populace; which stand in contradiction to the uber-citizenry’s self-allegedly detached and rationally disposed estimates of current affairs and their overall significance within larger historical chains of events; narratives that are structured according to the Whiggish premise that American social conditions are always advancing toward a better state.

So, the final consideration that I shall make in this unwieldy chain of criticisms upon the conditions under which we, as Americans, suffer, can be put simply as follows: For how long are we to entertain this carnivalesque side-show hyper-real-democracy before we impose a realist aesthetic upon this charade and expose this chicanery for what it is?

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An Article by:

Russell Cole

The purpose of this essay is to bring scrutiny to an alarming trend in American governance. This growing practice is propounded by differing groups in our society, ranging from the neoconservatives to the quasi-academicians occupying fellowships at the politically moderate Brookings Institute.

In a publication produced by members of the Brookings’ Institute, the emerging practice has been labeled with the following expression, “Governing by Network.” This philosophy of governance looks to institutions and organizations outside of government in order to outsource the work of government; thus, privatizing many of the functions that would, otherwise, be implemented by governmental agencies and the civil professionals who work under their auspices.

The purpose of this brief essay is to refocus this governing philosophy through the lens of an entirely different interpretative framework, in order to bring to the fore some of the alarming outcomes that might result from this practice of outsourcing government. I will make the case that governing by network is tantamount to corporatism, and, therefore, poses a threat to the already compromised democracy that we, as Americans, have historically struggled to enact and, presently, continue to enjoy; although in recent years our democratic system of polity has suffered a flurry of incursions made by the current Imperial Presidency.

At first glance, this might appear to be a sound policy. Looking toward corporations in the economy and NGOs in civil society might provide a means by which to rely upon organizations in society that are already specialized in particular types of operations, making them more efficient and effective agents for carrying out the missions underlying government initiatives. In the language of neoconservatism, privatizing the military, for instance, will make America’s war machinery subservient to the pressures of the market; subsequently, ensuring that America’s mechanisms for carrying out its foreign policies that rely upon militarism are the most fit for that purpose.

This whole arcade of mercenary contractors waging war in Iraq is by no means an ad hoc appendage to the military proper, whose idea and implementation were incited solely from the contingencies of the Iraqi campaign. Rather, the privatization of the military had been, from inception of the Bush Presidency, a guiding-principle for Rumsfield and his efforts to reform the American military complex. From the beginning of his tenure as the Secretary of Defense, Rumsfield had been working with his favored contacts in the private sector in order to facilitate the outsourcing of many of the functions of the military and the Pentagon; thus, increasing the role of private contractors in America’s military affairs. This protracted endeavor to outsource as many military operations as possible was part of a metaphorical war being waged against the military bureaucracy; a complex – according to Rumsfield, and in accord with neoconservative thought patterns – of obsolescent bureaucratic institutions, which burdened the American state with inefficiency, resulting in governmental waste.

There are, of course, manifold examples to cite when it comes to illuminating the concrete manifestations of the emergent doctrine, governing by network. To cite a more seemingly benign example, Bush’s policy of funding faith-based organizations for the purposes of providing social welfare services to the dependent and needy constitutes an instance of governing by network, because it involves integrating organizations that exist in civil society into the operations and functions of government; relieving the state from the encumbrance of constructing the institutional architecture required for it to perform these tasks on its own.

Although, prima facie, these uses of the private sector to facilitate the execution of public policies might appear innocuous and, even, pragmatic. Nevertheless, there is a more sinister dimension to these practices, which reflects a motivation possessed by the adherents of this public policy philosophy that needs to be rendered transparent, so that the full scope of consequences brought about by governing by network is apparent to the American citizen.

In the initial paragraph of this essay, I pointed out that the privatization of governance can alternatively be referenced under the term, corporatism. By this, I am indicating that the privatization of government will have the entailment of creating a political system in which the distinctions between polity and the economy are effectively blurred; resulting of the integration of the economy, along with the elites who control it, with the institutions and decision-making mechanisms of government. I say this because private entities in the economy can just as well affect the policy making processes belonging to the politic sphere of society - and will have a much greater incentive to do so if government is outsourced – through interventions such as their corporate lobbying and the campaign donations extended to politicos by corporate elites – as can the body politic impact upon the firms in the economy through the adoption of government policy.

Therefore, by privatizing governmental services, we run the risk of having corporations influencing what policies will be implemented by affecting political decision-making outcomes in an attempt to ensure revenue through governmental contracts. This networking of polity with the economy and civil society will precipitate working relationships among the agencies in all three of the affected social spheres:  polity, civil society, and economics.  Resultantly, the policies taken up by government might reflect the economic interests that stand to benefit from particular policies; rather than having government policy address the needs and desires of the populace; members of society who do not necessarily possess the wealth and influence to countervail the corporate interests that stand to profiteer through particular types of policy implementations. In short, the government and the economy will merge into a union whereby policy and the motivations that underly it will be identical with interests emanating from the economic sector and from the advocacies associated with NGOs in civil society; a collection of non-governmental agencies that stand to benefit by virtue of the contracts that will ensue from the networked administration of public policies.

There is an even more alarming aspect to the consequences engendered by governing by network: The constitutional protections that restrict governmental interference in the private and civic affairs of citizens can effectively be circumvented by implementing the policies of government through the employment of private institutions that are not beholden to the same limitations imposed upon government by the Constitution. This is what makes the discussion among neoconservatives so disconcerting, in which they are presently entertaining the prospect of outsourcing domestic intelligence gathering to private firms who will then be entrusted with spying upon American citizens.

This plan that is being advanced by the in-member ideologues of the current Administration in conjunction with their sympathizers and consultants occupying positions in various neoconservative think-tanks, if allowed to materialize, will result in more than the “soft fascism,” described by Ron Paul in his warnings about corporatism; it presents the possibility of effectively imposing a rather profound and extensive form of authoritarianism upon the American public. We will be subjected to the unfettered intrusions and spying eyes of private entities outside the constraining parameters that have been, heretofore, erected by Constitutional Rights. We will have to fear with whom we associate and with whom we transact communications – let alone indulgences in vice; or contributions to radicalized political advocacies – because we will have no expectation that we can maintain any seclusion of these activities in the sense that we will not be able to conceal information and curtail knowledge about our engagements, as private citizens, from institutions who might react punitively if presented with such renderings of our social activities. When in the hands of private firms conducting domestic intelligence gathering, what is to stop our employers from purchasing such information in order to assess our interactions outside of the workplace, so the firm can successfully impose a lifestyle – through the threat of occupational termination upon those who deviate – that they deem appropriate for those assuming positions in the ranks of their employment.

Consider, even, the current push to centralize and digitize our health records. Of course, they attempt to assuage our concerns by emphasizing the improvements to the administration of health care that will be actualized through the availability to health care professionals of an archive containing our complete medical histories that can be instantaneously retrieved via information technologies. However, what other possibilities will be enacted through the creation of such a repository of personalized information regarding matters of our biographies that we consider to be, oftentimes, sensitive and highly private? Might we be obliged by potential employers to permit their human resource agents to investigate for what we have received treatment by physicians and when that treatment was administered?  For some us, we risk even having to disclose out relationships with psychiatrists and other practitioners of mental health care. Additionally, through the nexus between the economy and polity that will be formed under the conditions depicted in the not so distant futurism that I am detailing, what recourse could we possibly have to prevent government agencies from obtaining the health records that will already be in the hands of corporations with whom government will have working relations? The rights to privacy that were referenced by the attorneys entrusted with the criminal defense of Rush Limbaugh will not be violated, they will simply be circumvented, bypassed, through the creation of cooperative enterprises involving both law enforcement and private entities in the economy or, perhaps, civil society, which might have access to personal medical records.

It is important to stress that the argument that I am making is not a polemic advancing a position in support of expanded government. However, I am quite explicitly warning against solutions to “Big Government,” that advance an agenda of privatizing government operations by outsourcing their functions to corporations and NGOs. The best remedy for inflated bureaucracy is the diminution of government and the services that it provides. The very worse trajectory in our social development would be pursuing the path followed by the ideologues in the Bush Administration, who are quite actively working to expand the powers of the Presidency; an expansion of authority that is leveled at the peril of civil liberties.

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An Article by

Russell Cole

I have studied the development of this political and social ideology [neoconservatism] to some extent, and its primary forebear is a political philosopher by the name, Leo Strauss. He was most affected by Plato, and, in particular, The Republic. I presume this is where Strauss gained his authoritarian worldview, which is seeded in the monolithic polis speculated by Plato, where the society is structured according to a corporatist regime, negating any differentiation between polity and civil society.

Authoritarians, such as Strauss, tend to be moral realists, similarly to Plato, which provides them with their rhetorical devices needed to justify their ethnocentrism, making it appear not as an ideology spouted by a faction that strives to impose it upon others, but as the natural moral order to which all humanity should aspire and, indeed, be pushed.

However, this belief in absolutes – a single moral order that exists apart from the men and women who speculate over its contents – has the impact of diminishing reality in favor of an impression of the world that is propagated through the contrivance of ad hoc explanations for all events that seem to run contrary to the idealized vision of human sociality articulated in the moral realist’s camouflaged ethnocentrism.

This is the point at which I am mystified the most by the neo-cons: Moral realism results in a negation of the saliency that should otherwise be attributed to contingencies that unfold in empirical reality, in favor of an adoption of a faith-based form of reasoning, where one’s beliefs will always be vindicated in the long-run. In the context of this type of thinking, we can meaningfully interpret the expression “moral courage:” a quality that is lacking in anybody who espouses uncertainty as to the veracity of the neo-conservative system of beliefs. Moral realism, in this instance, ironically, appears to be more of an underlying posit supported by convictions of faith rather than any reflection of reality.

What all of this has to do with Bush, specifically, I do not know, because he is not necessarily intelligent enough to grasp the neocons’ system of thought, such as the case with the intellect of hubris personified, Paul Wolfiwitz. However, I am sure that Bush’s absolute convictions regarding his born again stature in the eyes of his god might translate into the same type of empirically uninformed decision-making processes. Only, in Bush’s case, he has mistaken Chaney whispering in his ear for the Word of the Lord Almighty.

So, then, the question now arises: Why, even as the neo-conservatives – through their follies in Iraq and other ‘terror,’ related policy matters – have completely undressed themselves - Americans continue, as a population, to fail to mobilize in opposition to the Bush Regime?

As far as getting people off of their couches and politically engaged, I believe the problem is the deference we as Americans are socialized to possess and exhibit, beginning at a young age, whereby we are instructed to demonstrate respect and obedience toward our extant sociopolitical institutions. It does not matter what people might suspect or come to believe according to the conclusions reached in their own internal contemplations as long as they are encumbered with a habitual deferential posture that is assumed in relationship to sociopolitical institutions; fixtures that we are socialized to take to be transcendent of human interference and contamination. Even Tocqueville remarked that Americans displayed obedience to sociopolitical institutions, which prevented, according to the French observer, radicalized political behavior. He speculated that American democracy might be made possible by this willing subservience. Therefore, it is a matter of reinvigorating Americans with a sense of existential angst that is the key to unlocking radicalized currents of both thoughts and their associative social undertakings.

Returning to concerns related to religion: I would assume that Bush, indeed, during moments of cynicism, does use religiosity as a political artifice. Remember, the remarks made by Bush in the lead up to the War in Iraq, where he made mention of a “Great Crusade,” that we, as a nation, were about to undertake. Obviously, in retrospect, we can recognize this as a ploy to garner support from the war-mongering-religious-right that finds a place in our unfortunate society.

These remarks are not intended to be a denouncement of all instances of religiosity. I do make a differentiation between the dogma of fundamentalism and the personal spiritualism – associated with countercultural religious movements – which I suspect Jesus – the historical figure – to have proffered the latter in his sermons, because it is only with absolutism and dogma that religiosity manifests its deleterious qualities; what we witness in the Christianity that was tragically left to us by the sexually impotent, female loathing, and physically diminutive Paul, who knew nothing of Jesus other than Christ’s appearances in Paul’s own hysteria and its precipitation of fanciful delusions.

Russell Cole

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The need for direct democracy in America has never been more apparent than it is right now. We - the populace - are left impotent as the politicians whom we elected to office as representatives neglect to embody in their advocacies the will and interests that we - the American Public - possess, whose demands for a withdrawal from Iraq; whose oppositions to the advancing diminution of civil liberties; whose sentiments concerning illegal immigration; are all falling upon the unreceptive ears of the Congress and the White House.

It has become clear following the Democratic procurement of power in the two Congressional bodies that the people of America do not have a voice in the affairs of their government. Despite the lofty declarations of intent enunciated by the Democratic leadership during the campaigns leading to the expulsion of Republicans from Congress, the Democrats have delivered nothing.

For example, the marginal increase in the minimum wage successfully installed by the Democrats is absolutely meaningless, since most States have already passed legislation rasing their own minimum wages to levels that exceed the hike enacted by the Democrats in the House and in the Senate. Furthermore, the additional sum specified in the legislation fails to amount to anything approximating a living wage. Therefore, what is the point? since those unfortunate enough to be working for minimum wage will continue to need assistance from government services, and - despite the hours and frenetic intensities at which they toil at their occupations - they will fail to accumulate the resources necessary to reinvest in themselves - through education or entrepreneurial ventures - so that they might ascend to a higher stratum within the American socio-economic stratifications.

Another instance of Democratic ineptitude involved the abundance of time that was wasted in the legislator-deal-making charade of representative democracy, which only resulted in a stunning failure to pass immigration reform. This demonstration of astoundingly acute incompetences on the parts of the Democratic and Republican leadership in the Senate will always have a place in the recesses of my memory due to the gaspingly condescending and equally idiotic speech given by Harry Reid, where he quoted Dr. Sues at length in an ill conceived rhetorical ploy to make his enormously convoluted, internally contradicting, and substantively hollow piece of legislation appear to be a pending bill that even a child could recognize as meritorious legislation in need of passing by Congress.

Reid’s lengthy quotation from a children’s book even outdid his previous remarks in support of legalizing illegal immigration, where he alluded to the need of casinos in his own State of Nevada not to lose their workforce of Latino maids. Although I certainly have sympathy for the Latino migrants who are exploited by the Las Vegas gambling industry, I cannot imagine a sector in the United States economy for which I could possibly possess less concern.

It is a wonder how this self-righteous idiot - the Senate Majority Leader - not only obtained his seat in the Senate, but came to control the Democratic caucus in this esteemed deliberative body.

To push on beyond Reid, we can cite the Democratic concessions to the White House with respect to the funding of the Iraq War. In defiance of the campaign promises that propelled the Democrats into power in the Congress, the Democrats in the House and Senate have given the Bush Administration exactly what it has insisted upon in form of the supplemental funding bills needed to persist in the financing of this black hole that has formed in what was previously the sovereign state of Iraq.

And finally, to top things off, the Democrats have passed a bill that was advertised as the modernization of FISA, which, in actuality, had nothing to do with revamping FISA in order for it to adequately address new technologies; rather, the legislation merely dismantled and discarded with significant aspects of the oversight that was previously performed by FISA. In short, going over and beyond even what was requested by the Imperial Presidency, the Democrats gave powers to the Executive Branch to monitor the activities of citizens without any oversight or check by the Judicial Branch of Government.

It has become clear that the Democratic Party presents no alternative venue of political representation for those of us who had, heretofore, perceived the Republican Party as the real threat to American civil liberties and economic prosperity. I think, at this point, we should feel compelled to accept what has become ostensible: America is not a democracy in any sense of the word. Remember, the Soviet Empire had elections, as well. However, similarly to the condition of American politics, the mere casting of a vote in an election had little or no consequence because, ultimately, government and its administration of public policies would be entirely the same no matter who came to be elected in the various branches of polity.

Russell Cole

Tags: bush, congress, democracy, Democrats, direct democracy, economics, government, labor, political parties, politics, Russell Coles Blog
Categories: Commentary, Economics, Democracy, government, Russell Cole's Blog, Politics, Congress, Labor, Direct Democracy
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Despite the best efforts of the Luddite, Jim Crow bigots residing in the backwater town of Jena, Louisiana, the cap is about to burst on these white supremacists, who are in the process of committing what amounts to a lynching of several, young African-American males. This clinical lynching is being conducted under the veneer of a juridical canard. The African-American high school students presently face decades in prison for charges related to an assault that was committed upon a white student in the Jena, LA school district. The African-American students, who have been charged with attempted murder, allegedly assaulted a white student. However, if one is to learn about the circumstances under which these charges have been leveled against the African-American male high school students, a picture emerges that screams of injustice, resulting from a racism that is so severe that I was shocked when I became fully familiar with these insidious events.

Apparently, this whole incident began after African-American students, during their launch break, sat under a tree that had been the providence of white students. In reaction to this apparent affront by the African-Americans, the next day white students had tied lynching ropes from the trees under which the African-Americans had sat. Despite the fact that this symbolic gesture on the part of the young aspiring Klan members constituted nothing less that a direct threat of murder directed against the African-American high school students - where a bystander would be left only to assume that the lives of the black students were in immediate peril - the white students responsible for this unforgivable threat were given a three day suspension. On the days that followed, the assault, for which the Black teenage boys are accused, took place. The African-American adolescent males were arrested and charged, not with simple battery, but attempted murder and the reduced crime of aggravated assault. These hyperbolic charges are only applicable in instances where a deadly weapon is used, according to Louisiana statutes. The first of the Black males to stand trial was convicted for the lesser charge of aggravated assault. According to the jury, the African-American boy’s tennis shoes qualified as a deadly weapon.

To make this whole affair even more sickening, the jury was all white. Additionally, during the case, the judge preceding over the trial had issued a gag order on all witnesses. Consequentially, the parents of the African-Americans, who were to take the stand in defense of their children, were prevented under threat of contempt from making public issue out of this miscarriage of justice; consequentially, the parents were precluded from pursuing recourse through an appeal to the innumerable law professors who would have accepted this case pro bono!

To read more of this revolting affair, you can begin by visiting an article that someone has put up on Wikipedia. It has been marked as potentially biased, but from what I have gathered from other sources, including interviews that were taken by Amy Goodman of Democracy Now!, the account on Wikipedia appears to be, for the most part, spot on:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jena_High_School

With the events that have taken place in Jena, LA, I am going to return to the issue of the Tenth Amendment and its properly conceived relation to the Fourteenth Amendment.

I had written three controversial essays focusing on the candidacy of Ron Paul. I had criticized Paul for opposing legislation and certain reforms, which could be implemented by Presidential Decree, that would effectively contribute to the alleviation of the discrimination faced by gays, lesbians, and cross-gender. Paul, of course, explained away his refusal to adopt platform positions in support of the establishment of measures contributing to the equal rights and opportunities by all members of society, via appeal to a Libertarian ideological tenet that embraces the Tenth Amendment of the Constitution over and beyond other Amendments that might lead to divergent conclusions with respect to the appropriate role of the Federal Government and its interventions into social affairs that might alternatively be left to the states in order to regulate. Using the Tenth Amendment and its implications as premises, Paul essentially concluded that the inclusion of gays in the military as well as the extension of Federal Hate Crime Statutes to include crimes motivated out of hate for gays, lesbians, and cross-gender were decisions better left to, in the case of the former, the Military - and its own independent deliberations regarding its Uniform Code of Conduct - and, in the latter, the States and municipalities, who, in the absence of Federal intervention, would assume full responsible for the prosecution of crimes against these sexual minorities.

In opposition to Paul’s stance, I had countered by contending that Federal intervention has been historically demonstrated as a necessary device to extend civil liberties and citizenship rights to marginalized minorities who suffer from persecution and exclusionary practices within the provincial affairs of certain states. In short, my conclusions came down to unavoidable inferences drawn from the brute raw fact that without Federal interdiction these vulnerable minorities might not have their rights protected. I further argued that the Fourteenth Amendment was at stake - which in my opinion is far more significant than any appeal made to the nebulously defined Tenth Amendment

The Tenth Amendment - if one analyzes it with care - does not make specific references to the instances in which it should be prioritized over and beyond other possibly germane and applicable Amendments. In other words, rather than an Amendment intended to delineate specific rights, such as a clear and certain range of defined circumstances, where states should be deferred the sole authority when it comes to issues of civil liberties - the Tenth Amendment, according to my readings, appears to be intended only to limit Federal intrusions when the National Government is in the process of curtailing rights. However, in instances, such as hate crimes, the Federal Government is not inhibiting individuals from practicing types of social actions that fall under the extension of their own negative rights. Contrarily, the Federal Government is merely extending civil liberties by protecting the rights of vulnerable segments of society, who all too often are the deliberate and persistent targets of crimes, which impede the minorities from enjoying their own personal liberties, motivated out hate for the social minorities and the characteristics, which they embody, that make them socially different and identifiable as social outsiders.

This is not to say that the Tenth Amendment should not take on any significance and it should not be appealed to in instances where the Federal Government is in the process of extending its authority in a modality that is an affront to civil liberties. However, conversely, the Tenth Amendment should not be used as a juridical-politico artifice for what amounts to curtailing civil liberties by deferring the responsibility for protecting individual rights to the judgments of states and their provincial practices, in which the manifestation of racism and hate related crimes might be afoot, leading to the legalization of practices that only serve to curtail the rights of minorities. I think that most would agree that the Golden Rule - although not explicitly mentioned in the Constitution - nevertheless, serves as a guiding post for the formation of our best conclusions regarding what social conduct is permissible versus actions on the part of individuals and groups that should be interdicted. Those who act upon others in a manner that prevents the enjoyment of liberties by those upon whom the actions are committed should expect no better by other agencies who might act upon them. I cannot put it any more succinctly.
Returning to the case in Jena, I cannot think of a more compelling example of why the Federal Government must sometimes be permitted to intervene in order to prevent the most egregious instances of the persecuting of disliked minorities. To reiterate, Ron Paul needs to go back to the drawing board, and thoroughly recalculate his position on Federal hate crimes as well as the rights of sexual minorities.
Russell Cole

Tags: bill of rights, constitution, decentralization, democracy, education, government, National, politics, power, Russell Coles Blog, social responsibility, society, sociology
Categories: Commentary, National, Society, Democracy, constitution, government, Russell Cole's Blog, Decentralization, Education, Power, Politics, Sociology, social responsibility
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There is a term that tends to be deployed when referring to atheists in American society, who have the apparent audacity of publicly iterating their convictions. It is the referring expression, militant atheists; a phrase used to designate any instance where atheology is defended or supported by an interlocutor, who demonstrates a cognitive disposition that indicates that he or she fails to be immured in the theism that has taken a center stage in the public discourse throughout this Country’s history.

The connotative implications of using such a phrase to refer to atheists who fail to ‘politely’ remain hidden in their bedroom closets; instead, mustering the courage to openly articulate their lack of beliefs, and, further, argue against the pervasively reinforced second class position they assume in American society; is more than transparent: Atheists fall outside of the spectrum of ideological manifestations that are considered to be demonstrative of reasonability and rationality. In other words, atheists are a breed comparable to fanatical Islamists - who commit violent acts of terror - or, individual anarchists - who carry out assassination attempts upon government officials.

The ultimate effect engendered by these crude, implicit comparisons indicated by the phrase, militant atheists, is the persistent identification of atheists under a social label, which renders their skepticisms and the polemics they put forth against their socially legitimized marginalization in American society as expressions that should be interpreted as outside the rationally treatable; falling, alternatively, in the regions inhabited by the delusional madman who rants and raves on the street corner.

Despite the best attempt of religious leaders to portray atheists according to the stereoypical forms that are used as representations of cognitive illness and pathology, the looking glass could not be more transparent. I have no knowledge of any war that has been waged by atheists; although I can think of innumerable wars that have been conducted under the sanctums of religiosity. To intransigently insist upon the existence of invisibles - which cannot be demonstrated through any appeal to empirical evidence - is certainly not a criticism that can be aptly leveled against atheists; although it is by all means an inescapable aspect belonging to the discourses produced under the auspices of religion. Atheists point to reality and experience when arguing the validity of their conclusions; the pious revert to faith, dogma, and knowledge based on authority, in order to propagate their prejudices.

To take the argument a step further, Catholic Universities often insert in their mission statements a principle that serves within the institutional philosophy they stake out as a premise for all of their ensuing intellectual engagements. To paraphrase in a modality that goes beyond giving the proposition justice: Faith and reason do not contradict one another, and are, contrarily, mutually compatible and amenable to each other’s interests.

I am prepared to assert that nothing could be farther from reality. The pursuit of knowledge is never founded upon convictions of faith. Instead, it is skepticism that serves as the antecedent for knowledge. It is the ability to hold to scrutiny the narratives that have traditionally served as an explanation for the ordering of cosmos. Knowledge flows from criticality toward that which has - as its only pillars of support - legitimation based upon tradition and authority. Faith is not an extension, or co-pillar, of reason; but, rather, the antipathy to reason; the manifestation of ignorance.

Consequentially, the terminology, militant atheists, should be understood not as an expression that refers to the elements in society who possess the intellectual tenacity to hold to scrutiny the mythology that continues to dominant the worldviews possessed by the religious; the flocks of mindless followers. To the contrary, the unfortunate phrase is best understood as the projection upon the reasoned and rational, by those who lack such lucid deliberations, of the very shortcomings that impede the intellectual maturation of the faithful.

Just remember, atheists did not launch the Crusades. Atheists have not burnt people alive on the stakes. Atheists do not instruct the meager to turn the other cheek in hopes of rewards that consist entirely of invisible conditions in some posit called the afterlife.

Atheists are, in fact, the living embodiments of the temperaments that the religious claim to possess but fail to embody.

Russell Cole

Tags: atheism, power, religion, Russell Coles Blog, society
Categories: Commentary, Russell Cole's Blog
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They are simply exacerbating the Problem

NORML - the advocacy group for the legalization of marijuana - has just released figures that appear to be derived from a credible source, which demonstrate that minors who are exposed to the most contents stemming from the government sponsored ad campaigns that are targeted toward children - developed and deployed as a mechanism intended to decrease the use of marijuana among adolescents - actually has the polar opposite impact: Apparently, the more children are exposed to the adds; the more likely the child is to use marijuana.

Now, of course, there are multiple explanations for this, such as the adds are reaching the targeted audience - children more likely to use marijuana, with which to begin. Consequently, we should not be too quick to conclude that the adds themselves are causing the elevated rates of marijuana usage. So this is not definitive evidence that the marketing campaign is the antecedent to the elevated rates of marijuana use among its audience; however, this is an indication of how poorly our money is being spent by these government agencies who take it upon themselves - impervious to direct democratic processes - to use money allocated to it by Congress for these insanely stupid projects - i.e., curtailing marijuana use - without any sufficient foresight into whether their programs have any chance for success.

First off, I fail to see why money would be spent attempting to curtail marijuana use in the first place. If my kid - not to indicate that I actually have any - was using marijuana and only marijuana, I would be quite pleased. Therefore, why do we not implement a marketing campaign endorsing the use of marijuana as a safe alternative to harder drugs, which from my own painful experiences, I can conclude in hindsight that I would have been much better off deploying such a strategy rather than elevating my narcotic consumption to more potent and more damaging drugs. In fact, I would rather see my hypothetical children using marijuana rather than, even, alcohol. For those of us familiar with driven while smoking pot, we already know that the only immanent threat from such a combination results from driving too slowly and too cautiously, causing other drivers to take chances when passing us.

The Reason why we would not want to implement my add campaign proposal - iterated above - is because we are not knowledgeable of all of the possible unintended consequences!!!

To use an example, Evangelical who have their teenage daughters take these ridiculous chastity vows are, unwittingly, contributing to increased rates of anal sex engaged in by adolescent girls. In other words, teenage girls who take these vows have, apparently, found a loophole in the contract by circumventing vaginal sex by having anal sex instead. Of course, anal sex is far more dangerous - in respect to the communicable diseases that can be transferred - than vaginal sex, indicating that the chastity vows are placing adolescent girls at a higher risk for acquiring HIV.

This is the problem with these attempts at engineering society: There are always too many contingencies to take into consideration if one is to actually know before hand the consequences of his or her implementation of social policies undertaken for reasons of adjusting the behaviors of others to fit his or her moral sensibilities. As a result, perhaps, a moratorium is in order for all tax payer financed projects - engaged in by officials not directly accountable to tax payers - designed to modify the behaviors of the people, who - ironically - are financing their own engineering.

Russell Cole [send him email]

Tags: government, government waste, marijuana, norml, Russell Coles Blog, social policies, waste
Categories: Commentary, Russell Cole's Blog
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I have indulged myself – intellectually for the last several years – with the entertainment of a postmodern ideology; one that dismissed convictions of truth for one that – as an alternative – adopted perspectivism.

In other words, I dismissed with a monolithic conception of reality, where a single truth prevailed over other versions – which, subsequently, would have assumed the qualified stature of ideologies – in favor of an epistemology of pluralism, in which perspectives stood along side other perspectives, and the trick was not to relegate others in an adoption and endorsement of a single narration of reality. It seemed to me – at still does – to be a posture of humility; a promotion of egalitarianism, which entailed tolerance and inclusion while leaving space for separation and difference.

However, under the influence of the last 6 years of consistently unsuccessful domestic and foreign policies, emanating from a regime that fancies itself as faithed-based, with a President who obviously has no concern for pending environmental turmoil, who, after all, claims that evolutionary theory has yet to acquire empirical substantiation, I am beginning to question my questioning of reality.

I am indeed to the brink of abandoning whatever pretenses I have had with respect to postmodernism; simply because what previously seemed to be emancipatory now appears indulgent, irresponsible, dangerous, and, in fact, preposterous.

In order to understand the depth of my concern, one merely needs to read the following extract from a popular blog on atheology, http://atheistrevolution.blogspot.com/, which contains descriptions of a new museum that is being erected in Kentucky:

According to Reuters,