Are Americans a Broken People? by SignyM

I have a vote and I'm not afraid to use it!

Well, Citizen

If your heart rate was slightly lower than normal and your BP sightly higher than normal after THAT - my unofficial unprofessional diagnosis is - you're extremely healthy !

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Silence is consent.

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Friday, December 18, 2009 3:13 PM

I have a vote and I'm not afraid to use it!

The underlying divisions in the healthcare debate

By Glenn Greenwald

Ed Kilgore has a very perceptive analysis in The New Republic about the underlying (and largely unexamined) ideological and strategic differences among progressives that are at least partially driving the rift over the health care bill. He argues -- correctly -- that the current debate "displays a couple of pretty important potential fault lines within the American center-left" that have manifested in other disputes as well. That was the principal point of this much-maligned Daily Kos post observing that many (but not all) of the progressive bloggers most vehemently demanding passage of the health care bill also supported the Iraq War. As the author of that post (Jake McIntyre) explicitly said, his intent wasn't to suggest that those individuals shouldn't be listened to because of their Iraq position six years ago (that would be an invalid and unfair claim), but simply that -- as Kilgore says -- there are underlying and significant differences in strategic and ideological outlook driving the health care debate that have been present for some time but are typically ignored.

Shared contempt for the Bush administration (at least once Bush and the Iraq War became discredited) largely obscured these differences when Bush was in office. The desire to undermine the Bush GOP and dislodge that movement from power subsumed all other objectives and united people with vastly different political outlooks and agendas. There is still a shared revulsion towards the Palin/Limbaugh Right, but that faction is too marginalized and impotent to serve the same function. With the unifying force of Bush/Cheney gone, the divisions Kilgore describes are now vibrant and increasingly potent. In addition to health care and Iraq, roughly the same progressive fault lines are seen over the bank bailout, escalation in Afghanistan, Obama's economic team, tolerance for Obama's embrace of Bush/Cheney civil liberties polices, and even the reaction to Matt Taibbi's recent Rolling Stone article on Obama's subservience to Wall Street.

There are many reasons for the progressive division on the health care bill. There are differences over the narrow question of health care policy, with some believing the bill does more harm than good just on that ground alone. Some of it has to do with broader questions of political power: if progressives always announce that they are willing to accept whatever miniscule benefits are tossed at them (on the ground that it's better than nothing) and unfailingly support Democratic initiatives (on the ground that the GOP is worse), then they will (and should) always be ignored when it comes time to negotiate; nobody takes seriously the demands of those who announce they'll go along with whatever the final outcome is. But the most significant underlying division identified by Kilgore is the divergent views over the rapidly growing corporatism that defines our political system.

Kilgore doesn't call it "corporatism" -- the virtually complete dominance of government by large corporations, even a merger between the two -- but that's what he's talking about. He puts it in slightly more palatable terms:

To put it simply, and perhaps over-simply, on a variety of fronts (most notably financial restructuring and health care reform, but arguably on climate change as well), the Obama administration has chosen the strategy of deploying regulated and subsidized private sector entities to achieve progressive policy results. This approach was a hallmark of the so-called Clintonian, "New Democrat" movement, and the broader international movement sometimes referred to as "the Third Way," which often defended the use of private means for public ends.

As I've written for quite some time, I've honestly never understood how anyone could think that Obama was going to bring about some sort of "new" political approach or governing method when, as Kilgore notes, what he practices -- politically and substantively -- is the Third Way, DLC, triangulating corporatism of the Clinton era, just re-packaged with some sleeker and more updated marketing. At its core, it seeks to use government power not to regulate, but to benefit and even merge with, large corporate interests, both for political power (those corporate interests, in return, then fund the Party and its campaigns) and for policy ends. It's devoted to empowering large corporations, letting them always get what they want from government, and extracting, at best, some very modest concessions in return. This is the same point Taibbi made about the Democratic Party in the context of economic policy:

The significance of all of these appointments isn't that the Wall Street types are now in a position to provide direct favors to their former employers. It's that, with one or two exceptions, they collectively offer a microcosm of what the Democratic Party has come to stand for in the 21st century. Virtually all of the Rubinites brought in to manage the economy under Obama share the same fundamental political philosophy carefully articulated for years by the Hamilton Project: Expand the safety net to protect the poor, but let Wall Street do whatever it wants.

One finds this in far more than just economic policy, and it's about more than just letting corporations do what they want. It's about affirmatively harnessing government power in order to benefit and strengthen those corporate interests and even merging government and the private sector. In the intelligence and surveillance realms, for instance, the line between government agencies and private corporations barely exists. Military policy is carried out almost as much by private contractors as by our state's armed forces. Corporate executives and lobbyists can shuffle between the public and private sectors so seamlessly because the divisions have been so eroded. Our laws are written not by elected representatives but, literally, by the largest and richest corporations. At the level of the most concentrated power, large corporate interests and government actions are basically inseparable.

The health care bill is one of the most flagrant advancements of this corporatism yet, as it bizarrely forces millions of people to buy extremely inadequate products from the private health insurance industry -- regardless of whether they want it or, worse, whether they can afford it (even with some subsidies). In other words, it uses the power of government, the force of law, to give the greatest gift imaginable to this industry -- tens of millions of coerced customers, many of whom will be truly burdened by having to turn their money over to these corporations -- and is thus a truly extreme advancement of this corporatist model. It's undeniably true that the bill will also do some genuine good, as it will help many people who can't get coverage now to get it (though it will also severely burden many people with compelled, uncontrolled premiums and will potentially weaken coverage for millions as well). If one judges the bill purely from the narrow perspective of coverage, a rational and reasonable (though by no means conclusive) case can be made in its favor. But if one finds this creeping corporatism to be a truly disturbing and nefarious trend, then the bill will seem far less benign.

As I've noted before, this growing opposition to corporatism -- to the virtually absolute domination of our political process by large corporations -- is one of the many issues that transcend the trite left/right drama endlessly used as a distraction. The anger among both the left and right towards the bank bailout, and towards lobbyist influence in general, illustrates that. Kilgore says that anger among the left and right over corporatism is irreconcilable, and this is the point I think he has mostly wrong:

To put it more bluntly, on a widening range of issues, Obama's critics to the right say he's engineering a government takeover of the private sector, while his critics to the left accuse him of promoting a corporate takeover of the public sector. They can't both be right, of course, and these critics would take the country in completely different directions if given a chance. But the tactical convergence is there if they choose to pursue it.

This supposedly irreconcilable difference Kilgore identifies is more semantics than substance. It's certainly true that health care opponents on the left want more a expansive plan while opponents on the right want the opposite. But the objections over the mandate are largely identical -- it's a coerced gift to the private health insurance industry that underwrites the Democratic Party. The same was true over opposition to the bailout, objections to lobbying influence over Washington, and most of all, the growing anger that Washington serves the interests of financial elites at the expense of the working class.

Whether you call it "a government takeover of the private sector" or a "private sector takeover of government," it's the same thing: a merger of government power and corporate interests which benefits both of the merged entities (the party in power and the corporations) at everyone else's expense. Growing anger over that is rooted far more in an insider/outsider dichotomy over who controls Washington than it is in the standard conservative/liberal ideological splits from the 1990s. It's true that the people who are angry enough to attend tea parties are being exploited and misled by GOP operatives and right-wing polemicists, but many of their grievances about how Washington is ignoring their interests are valid, and the Democratic Party has no answers for them because it's dependent upon and supportive of that corporatist model. That's why they turn to Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh; what could a Democratic Party dependent upon corporate funding and subservient to its interests possibly have to say to populist anger?

Even if one grants the arguments made by proponents of the health care bill about increased coverage, what the bill does is reinforces and bolsters a radically corrupt and flawed insurance model and an even more corrupt and destructive model of "governing." It is a major step forward for the corporatist model, even a new innovation in propping it up. How one weighs those benefits and costs -- both in the health care debate and with regard to many of Obama's other policies -- depends largely upon how devoted one is to undermining and weakening this corporatist framework (as opposed to exploiting it for political gain and some policy aims). That's one of the primary underlying divisions Kilgore identifies, and he's right to call for greater examination and debate over the role it is playing.

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Silence is consent.

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Friday, December 18, 2009 6:05 PM

GEEZER

Keep the Shiny side up

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Where have I insulted you?

You don't have to...directly. you've got Mike and Rue to do the enforcing. Your insult is to assume that no one but you has any understanding of how the world works.

You have no doubt that your worldview is the correct one; stangely enough, just as the folks who had the geocentric point of view felt. You have no doubt that you're right. I, on the other hand, tend to doubt pretty much every philosophy that says "you must". I don't trust folk who have all the answers, since folks such as Hitler, Chairnman Mao, and Carrie Nation thought they had "The Answer".

You scare me, since I see your world as nothing but mass conformity to the rules that you, and those like you, have decided everyone should live by. I'd much rather have a fucked-up mess than your 'utopia'.

"Keep the Shiny side up"

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Friday, December 18, 2009 7:01 PM

MAGONSDAUGHTER

Quote:
Originally posted by GinoBiffaroni:
One thing that give me hope

years ago, when this board started I brought up many of the issues we still discuss today, and was faced with a wall of " America is the best country ever " and we can do no wrong crap.

Now, after eight or is it nine? years of Bush I think many Americans are starting to see America the way people outside the US see it

kind of a geopolitical 12 step program

your starting to admit there is a problem

Yep, been there many times in the past few years. It was actually quite confronting to read the inherent racism within the 'God's own country' BS that I was faced with.

I remember doing a hypothetical scenario a few years ago on another board about 'what if China gave US the ultimatum that if it didn't disarm it's nuclear arsenal by set date, that they would invade, bring down the government and execute the President.'

Got some damned interesting reactions along the lines how the US people were unique in the world and, unlike other countries who had submitted to their invaders, would unite and fight to the last man standing, unlike people in other parts of the world which were, let;'s face it, not made of the same grit and determination.

Now I never really said that such a scenario was likely or possible, but I was bemused by the reaction of many posters, left and right viewed, I might add, who really felt that the US people a were superior to all others on the planet, even if they didn't directly state that.

Anyway, the other constant galling aspect of communicating with so many Americans on the Internet is the UScentric view of world history. America won the war, it seems, the whole war, and quite single handedly. The Eastern front didn't exist, it seems or didn't count. I love Band of Brothers, but it does make it seem like the only ones who were doing anything significant were the Americans.

Oh and there were no Americans in the Great Escape, they just put them in the film otherwise American audiences wouldn't have watched it, because who cares if a bunch of Brits, Canadians, Australians, and Europeans did something brave, it doesn't count.

And the whole issue of healthcare, how many times have I read how universal healthcare cannot work because it's never been done, because seemingly, no where else in the world exists.

So if being 'broken' means that the sense of ultimate superiority has been cracked, I think it's probably not a bad thing, not without pain, but you know what they say - no pain no gain - at least that's what my masseur says to me when she wraps my legs around my ears.

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Friday, December 18, 2009 8:37 PM

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." -- William Casey, Reagan's presidential campaign manager & CIA Director (from first staff meeting in 1981)

Quote:
Originally posted by Geezer:
Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
Where have I insulted you?

You don't have to...directly. you've got Mike and Rue to do the enforcing. Your insult is to assume that no one but you has any understanding of how the world works.

Yeah, it's not like YOU ever tried to convince anyone that you have an understanding of how things work, right? I mean, aren't you being insulting just in making a statement like that?

As for "enforcing", you make it sound like Rue and I are in communication with Signy on a regular basis, laying out our "master plan" of how we're going to hammer down the nail that is Geezer. Sorry to spoil your delusions, but no such thing has ever happened. I'd have the exact same validity if I were to argue that you use Wulfie and Auraptor to do your "enforcing", just because they share your political views.

Quote:

You have no doubt that your worldview is the correct one...

Do you run into a lot of people who are utterly convinced that their worldview is the WRONG one? How's that working out for ya?

Quote:
You have no doubt that you're right. I, on the other hand, tend to doubt pretty much every philosophy that says "you must".

Even if they say "You must let the free markets decide"? Or "you must allow capitalism, because it's the only way that could ever work!"

Quote:

I don't trust folk who have all the answers, since folks such as Hitler, Chairnman Mao, and Carrie Nation thought they had "The Answer".

I'd add Nixon, Reagan, and a couple of Bushes to that list as well, along with some guy named Greenspan.

Quote:

You scare me, since I see your world as nothing but mass conformity to the rules that you, and those like you, have decided everyone should live by. I'd much rather have a fucked-up mess than your 'utopia'.

Well, you've definitely got your wish. If there's one thing that can't be argued, it's that you've got one fucked-up mess, and it definitely isn't "utopia"...

And besides, you're a right-winger; you should be used to fear by now. It's really all you've ever had to work with.

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Saturday, December 19, 2009 1:37 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by rue:
Well, Citizen

If your heart rate was slightly lower than normal and your BP sightly higher than normal after THAT - my unofficial unprofessional diagnosis is - you're extremely healthy !

Heh, thanks. The floor did break my fall, but it had lino on it so that's got some bounce.

I was mainly just trying to get something in a direction other than how much everyone but Geezer sucks here.

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Saturday, December 19, 2009 3:30 AM

PIZMOBEACH

... fully loaded, safety off...

Quote:
Originally posted by citizen:

I was mainly just trying to get something in a direction other than how much everyone but Geezer sucks here.

Did you pick that shade of paint or did it pick you? I know it's hard to tell from the context, but... it may be what weakened the ceiling... just sayin'.

Scifi movie music + Firefly dialogue clips, 24 hours a day - http://www.scifiradio.com

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Saturday, December 19, 2009 3:43 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by pizmobeach:
Quote:
Originally posted by citizen:

I was mainly just trying to get something in a direction other than how much everyone but Geezer sucks here.

Did you pick that shade of paint or did it pick you? I know it's hard to tell from the context, but... it may be what weakened the ceiling... just sayin'.

It was there when I moved in

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Saturday, December 19, 2009 5:58 AM

JKIDDO

Quote:
Where have I insulted you?- Signy

You don't have to- Geezer

AH! So I DIDN'T insult you! So you're lying when you said...

Quote:
and anyone who disagrees with any iota of the party line gets, not actual discussion, but insult.

...? And this from the guy who posts a personal attack the very first thing, with no discussion at all? Curious, Geezer, how it works out that you wind up accusing people not what with they've done but what you've done.

Quote:
you've got Mike and Rue to do the enforcing.

I'm in no way responsible for what Mike and Rue post. Not my style. And I would continue to post as I post, with or without them.

Quote:
Your insult is to assume that no one but you has any understanding of how the world works.

Of course I think I know how the world works. Would I be posting what YOU think, or what someone else thinks, or something I don't think is true??? And since I'm not about to tag every single statement with "I think" or "IMHO", just imagine that in front of my posts there is a phrase which says... "Signy thinks that..."

No, my "insult", such as it is, is that I DO discuss. But I insist that you give me rational, factual reasons to change my mind. Because I am willing to change my mind, but only if you literally force me. The "insult" is that you have not been able to do so bc my philosophy yours, and that frustrates you. And since you have no rational argument to force me to change my thinking, you resort to personal insult.

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Saturday, December 19, 2009 8:25 AM

Gettin' old, but still a hippie at heart...

Oh my goodness! So much

…when it gets personal, nobody’s argument means crap to me, I just bypass. However,

Sig, as you said,

Quote:
It might be more fruitful to discuss why some changes are so readily accepted and implemented (how long did it take for people to shift from horse and buggy?) and others are not, rather than to say that ALL changes are resisted, because that is clearly not the case!

Note I said “MAJOR”, if you recall...major as in civil rights…from slavery to President, how long did that take? I don’t have to look anything up to kno, observation and history speak quite eloquently. Even more major, the transition in Afghanistan, which STILL hasn’t happened in 100+years, and won’t for a long time yet. How many third-world countries have made the MAJOR change to modern culture? That’s my argument.

As to PETA, we again will have to agree to disagree…if you can concretely prove they “began” the movement, maybe there’s something to talk about. I don’t believe they did; it was begun long before PETA ever existed, here in America, back when the ASPCA was begun (the Western version in San Francisco, during the gold rush, and Britain before that). And it’s still not universally accepted. Vegeterianism was begun in the early sixties at lesat; how far has that gotten? There are examples on both sides, I was talking about “major”.

Citizen, no I’m not talking about decadence. I stand by my original opinion.

Geezer,

Quote:
You commented in another thread about the lack of folks coming to RWED, and wondered why. It's easy. You have a little clique here with one view of how things should be, and anyone who disagrees with any iota of the party line gets, not actual discussion, but insult.

That’s not what I’ve experienced. I wasn’t here during the Dumbya administration, but I’ve read over and over about how the hard right dominated then and was pretty, uh, “enthusiastic” about their domination. There are certainly more others than right here now, but I see much discussion and differences of opinion, moreso than others have said existed then.

I came from a Firefly board which wasn’t just dominated by a clique of right-wingers, it was OWNED by them, and anyone disagreeing even slightly was attacked in ways you’ve never SEEN here, truly viciously, not just snarking and occasional lapses into personal ugliness.

It’s only natural for people to believe they know best, it’s human nature. But I see back and forths which change minds and modify opinions here, tho’ not often. Mostly I see differences of opinions stated eloquently, some of which devolve and some of which do not. I’ve read it wasn’t that way during Dumbya’s time.

If you only stick around to get people’s blood pressure up, you are not the kind of people you’re talking about who might come here and want to discuss differing opinions.

The rest of the thread, consisting mainly of

by everyone to everyone else.

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Saturday, December 19, 2009 8:27 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Niki2:
Citizen, no I’m not talking about decadence. I stand by my original opinion.

You could try a justification or argument for it

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Saturday, December 19, 2009 8:32 AM

Gettin' old, but still a hippie at heart...

Okay, just one example. Our "superiority" was so believed in by Dumbya and his cronies that they felt quite justified in telling the rest of the world how to behave and in invading Iraq to set up "democracy", which lessened our influence in the world and turned a lot of the world against us. That has weakened us.

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Saturday, December 19, 2009 9:03 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Niki2:
Okay, just one example. Our "superiority" was so believed in by Dumbya and his cronies that they felt quite justified in telling the rest of the world how to behave and in invading Iraq to set up "democracy", which lessened our influence in the world and turned a lot of the world against us. That has weakened us.

But the American Empire hasn't collapsed, and the failure has led to a weakening of that belief of superiority.

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Saturday, December 19, 2009 9:04 AM

My superior posting ability has led to a collapse of single posts.

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Sunday, December 20, 2009 2:02 PM

http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/2009/12/2009121613200705468.html

The end of American exceptionalism
By Mark LeVine

While most of the US sat transfixed by the ever-widening saga of Tiger Woods' infidelities, Barack Obama, the US president, gave what might well be remembered as one of the most significant speeches by a US leader in the post-World War Two era.

It is no coincidence that the one should happen in the midst of the other. They may seem utterly disconnected, but both reflect the end of an idea of American exceptionalism that for too long has excused and even enabled the violation of the very ideals it was meant to reflect.

Woods became the richest athlete in history by creating a persona defined by unprecedented talent coupled with steely invincibility and a sense of "fair play" supposedly peculiar to golf - and to the US as well.

Sponsors paid him hundreds of millions of dollars and Americans of all classes and colours flocked to his "brand" in order to identify with such a consummate winner, the epitome of the American dream and its sense of uniqueness and historic mission.

No one cared to explore the realities beneath the dream until it could be spoon fed to them in depoliticised, sensationalised tabloid format.

Brand Tiger

'Brand Tiger' became the epitome of the American dream [GALLO/GETTY]

Few fans, never mind the mainstream media, will look beyond the sex to scrutinise the engine that has powered brand Tiger. Serial infidelity can be safely condemned and ultimately forgiven.

It would be a lot harder to ignore the implications of the relationships with unsavoury corporations that have made Tiger fabulously wealthy when he inevitably returns to professional golf.

But who wants to be reminded of exploited third world labour or toxic oil spills while watching Tiger sink another miracle put?

Like the trans-fats or preservatives in fast foods, thinking about them will only detract from the consumer experience.

And so while Woods has admitted personal mistakes in order to preserve his brand, the underlying rationale and costs of the system that sustains it (and all those who feed off it, from television networks to tabloids) will not be challenged, or even mentioned.

And this is where the Tiger Woods saga intersects with the situation Obama now faces.

Brand America

Like Woods, America's brand is under threat. Unlike Woods, however, Obama cannot be blamed for the problems that so tarnished the country's image in the last decade.

Indeed, as Thorbjorn Jagland, the chairman of the Nobel committee, all but admitted, he was awarded the Peace Prize in good measure because of his attempts to re-brand the US as a less bellicose, more cooperative global leader.

Read through the "Obama Doctrine" outlined in his Nobel speech, however, and the similarities to the strategy behind the rehabilitation of 'Brand Tiger' are clear.

"We lose ourselves when we compromise the very ideals that we fight to defend," the president eloquently intoned.

The reality is that Obama is willing to admit to "mistakes" made by predecessors, but he will not question, or even mention, the larger system that has produced them.

He cannot do so because that would call into question the myth of American exceptionalism that for so long has been used to justify them.

As long as the US is a unique, divinely appointed and essentially just power, its mistakes, however costly, do not threaten the core values that have made it exceptional.

System of global dominance

Obama cannot acknowledge what the rest of the world well understands: that the wars he has inherited, and have now made his own, are the direct result of decades of policies aimed at supporting a system that enabled the global dominance of the US, but at the cost of large-scale violence, oppression and exploitation across the developing world.

Rather than challenge or even scrap the system that produced this violence and the periodic blowback it generates, the Obama doctrine will reinforce it.

Thus the bewildering continuities between Obama's policies and those of George Bush, his predecessor, emerge: the continued presence in Iraq - which is not close to "winding down" as the president described it, the deepening footprint in Afghanistan, the refusal to support treaties banning land mines and biological weapons, the continued use of private mercenaries, the ongoing detainee abuse at Guantanamo and Bagram prisons, and defence spending higher even than his Republican predecessor's.

These are not mistakes; they are inevitable policy choices in a system built on imperial dominance. And like empires past, they are justified by the use of rhetoric and arguments that exalt one's own ideals while misrepresenting and denigrating those against whom the mistakes are committed.

But where Bush administration officials readily admitted America's imperial status, Obama has banished the idea from polite conversation even as he shores up the system.

And so Obama declared in Oslo that when the US fights it does so as the "standard bearer" of morally justifiable violence, engaging only in "just wars" to pacify otherwise unresolvable conflicts.

Good versus evil?

Obama accepted the Nobel Prize and said the US has 'underwritten global security' [AFP]
To be just, war must be against implacably evil opponents. And so, the president declared sternly in Oslo, "Make no mistake: evil does exist in the world."

There are, he continued, "limits [to] reason," particularly when one is fighting an enemy that can only be associated, as Obama - like Bush before him - did, to Hitler.

Because America's intentions and values are uniquely pure, its sacrifices alone are worthy of mention.

Obama declared, "The plain fact is this: the United States of America has helped underwrite global security for more than six decades with the blood of our citizens and the strength of our arms."

The fact that the global security so underwritten was, like that ensured by other empires past and present, derived from the subjugation, exploitation and death of countless people - described by Obama in strikingly imperial tones, as "tribal" and unable to "reason" - cannot be mentioned.

Their deaths, in the millions in Vietnam, in the hundreds and tens of thousands in Iraq and Afghanistan (not to mention in Latin America and Africa during the Cold War) are left unremarked.

When they must be mentioned, conflicts underwritten by the US, such as that between Israel and Palestine, are historically and morally whitewashed.

Instead of condemning a client state continuing to occupy a besieged nation, Obama laments the "hardening" of "tribal lines" between "Arabs and Jews" - a description so devoid of factual relevance that Obama the law professor would have surely scolded any student who uttered them.

Seeking new vocabulary

At its heart, Obama's Nobel acceptance speech reveals that even this most eloquent and reflective of presidents cannot find a new vocabulary to describe America's relationship with, and role in, the world.

The reason is clear: such a vocabulary cannot exist in the geopolitical framework in which Obama, whatever his intentions, feels constrained to operate.

Instead, the myth of American exceptionalism must be reasserted; it is the only way the president, and the American people with him, can imagine that the US will not ultimately suffer the same fate as the empires before it; that the iron laws of imperial rise and decay, and the violence attending both, simply will not apply to it.

Only then can it be imagined that the "evil in the world" has not touched us; that the "imperfections of man and the limits of reason," as the president described them, apply to other men and ideas, and not to ours.

Only then can Obama mention human rights seven times in his speech while leaving unsaid what everyone sitting before him well knew: that US aid and support for regimes that systematically violate these rights would continue the next morning uninterrupted.

Voices from below

The awarding of the Peace Prize to Obama reads like a desperate attempt to resuscitate the discredited idea of a "Great Man" of history ushering in a new era. It is an understandable fantasy, given the magnitude of the problems the world confronts.

But it distracts from the reality that it will be movements from below, however imperfect and irrational they can be, that will create, in Obama's words, "the world that ought to be," not leaders from above, however audacious their rhetoric.

In that regard, perhaps the most historically significant aspect of Obama's speech is its irrelevance on the ground.

Around the world people who once looked to the US for inspiration or support are taking matters into their own hands. No one is waiting for the US to save or even support them anymore. The signs are everywhere, particularly in nearby Copenhagen, where smaller nations and a global NGO community is standing up to the US and other powers with unprecedented force.

But perhaps the most interesting signs surround the conflict Obama would not name, in the Holy Land.

Capital: East Jerusalem

In Oslo, Obama did not address the Israeli-Palestinian conflict [EPA]
No doubt in part to assuage its members' growing "Muslim problem" as well as to fill the void left by the absences of even a semblance of impartial American mediation, the European Union is suddenly asserting its diplomatic weight by demanding Israeli recognition of East Jerusalem as Palestinian and refusing to support unilateral Israeli border drawing in the West Bank.

On the ground, Palestinians are slowly taking responsibility for resistance back into their own hands, literally taking apart sections of the Separation Wall piece by piece rather than wait for Hamas or the Palestinian Authority to make another ineffectual move.

At a closed door meeting I just returned from in Istanbul, Palestinian and Israeli scholars and activists, including those deeply involved in the settlement movement, are beginning the hard but necessary work of envisioning a new architecture of identity that would allow Israeli Jews and Palestinian Arabs to share sovereignty and territory throughout the whole of Israel/Palestine.

These and other uncoordinated attempts to change the basic structure of the system Obama is trying to reinforce represent the first stirrings of a new vocabulary, even language of change.

When coupled with the burgeoning struggles for democracy and human rights in the Muslim world, and even broader struggles across the global south, they constitute a direct challenge to the system President Obama, like his counterparts in Moscow, Beijing, and other global power centres, prefers to leave unnamed.

Such a multi-layered, often disorganised movement will likely remain too amorphous and hard to define ever to award a Nobel Peace Prize. But if history is kind, it just might help usher in the global transformation that Obama and the Nobel committee can only dream of.

Mark LeVine is currently visiting professor at the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Lund University, Sweden. His books include Heavy Metal Islam: Rock, Resistance, and the Struggle for the Soul of Islam and Impossible Peace: Israel/Palestine Since 1989.

The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera's editorial policy

Either your with the terrorists, or ... your with the terrorists

Lets party like its 1939

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Sunday, December 20, 2009 2:34 PM

PIZMOBEACH

... fully loaded, safety off...

It's damn near impossible to exorcise the idea of "winning" from any male in any country anywhere. 2 guys living alone on an island sooner or later are going to try and beat each other at something, beach combing, whatever.
And if you have a notion that you are top dog, whether well founded or a total lie, you will do whatever it takes to hold onto it IN YOUR MIND. So don't hold your breath waiting for "Amerikee" to lose that version of themselves any time soon.
Hopefully - since it seems we don't have too many allies right now and most people would rather just piss on our grave than wish us luck - we'll do some serious personal reflecting, drop the self-pity, and have a new awakening.

Scifi movie music + Firefly dialogue clips, 24 hours a day - http://www.scifiradio.com

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Sunday, December 20, 2009 4:13 PM

PIZMOBEACH

... fully loaded, safety off...

bump

Scifi movie music + Firefly dialogue clips, 24 hours a day - http://www.scifiradio.com

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Sunday, December 20, 2009 11:12 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by pizmobeach:
It's damn near impossible to exorcise the idea of "winning" from any male in any country anywhere. 2 guys living alone on an island sooner or later are going to try and beat each other at something, beach combing, whatever.
And if you have a notion that you are top dog, whether well founded or a total lie, you will do whatever it takes to hold onto it IN YOUR MIND. So don't hold your breath waiting for "Amerikee" to lose that version of themselves any time soon.
Hopefully - since it seems we don't have too many allies right now and most people would rather just piss on our grave than wish us luck - we'll do some serious personal reflecting, drop the self-pity, and have a new awakening.

Scifi movie music + Firefly dialogue clips, 24 hours a day - http://www.scifiradio.com

Over in the Canada panics over overpopulation we are getting into a parallel topic, racial and genetic memory things like that if your interested.

Either your with the terrorists, or ... your with the terrorists

Lets party like its 1939

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Monday, December 21, 2009 8:12 AM

Gettin' old, but still a hippie at heart...

Citizen; it's long been on that road, and will continue on it until collapse is inevitable. All empires collapse over time, ours is no "exception", tho' we might think so.

Gino and Pizmo, thank you and right on!

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Monday, December 21, 2009 8:57 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Niki2:
Citizen; it's long been on that road, and will continue on it until collapse is inevitable. All empires collapse over time, ours is no "exception", tho' we might think so.

Gino and Pizmo, thank you and right on!

I suppose the question is, is it going to be a total collapse and fragmentation like Rome, or the contraction from empire to middle power like Britain...

Either your with the terrorists, or ... your with the terrorists

Lets party like its 1939

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Monday, December 21, 2009 9:03 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by GinoBiffaroni:I suppose the question is, is it going to be a total collapse and fragmentation like Rome, or the contraction from empire to middle power like Britain...

Why not both? Didn't Rome first shrink and lose influence, becoming a bit of a "middle empire" on its way to irrelevance and complete collapse and fragmentation?

It tends to happen quite slowly when it happens, sometimes taking generations. 'Course, in the modern world, things seem a bit more accelerated. The USSR collapsed seemingly overnight, and the American Empire is scarcely 200 years old and seems on a rapid downslope.

Personally, I'd be happy if we were a bit shrunk down. Middle Empires seem to have it pretty good - France, Germany, Great Britain (or is it just Adequate Britain now, since it's not all that great?

), Japan - all once had their days of empire, and all still exist, but in smaller, seemingly happier forms...

Mike

Work is the curse of the Drinking Class.
- Oscar Wilde

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Tuesday, December 22, 2009 5:47 AM

BYTEMITE

Quote:
I suppose the question is, is it going to be a total collapse and fragmentation like Rome, or the contraction from empire to middle power like Britain...

Either way, the strongest arm of enforcement deteriorates, and maybe once people wash the shiny veneer off their eyes, maybe we'll stop listening to the powers that be.

This is assuming that the inevitable collapse of the American empire wasn't pre-planned and caused by the powers that be, but I doubt it. They're usually too certain of their own infalliability. And the schemers in the past have been the FDR, Winston Churchill, and Stalin's of the world. Maybe as a former Russian ally China has been promoted into the globalization, but I doubt it, they just seem to see an opportunity and are taking advantage. Globalists only like the idea of globalization if they're the ones to implement it; while they can't quite see themselves as disasterous, they certainly would see China as disasterous.

China is certainly the next emerging superpower. I don't care if America loses superpower status to China so long as their ideology doesn't begin to influence us (and they don't invade).

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Tuesday, December 22, 2009 7:15 AM

A lot of those "middle powers" are members of the G8, so I'm not sure what terms you're using for middle?

Anyway, I think the smart money would be on a break up for the united states. It's a country founded on division, still fighting a civil war that ended over a hundred years ago. A nation that has purposefully constructed itself on the notion of being a union of states. Historical precedent would seem to indicate that as the Federal Government's power wanes, state governments will begin to exert more power, and you'll end up eventually with something like the Holy Roman Empire circa 1600.

Quote:
(or is it just Adequate Britain now, since it's not all that great? )

--------------------------------------------------

If you play a Microsoft CD backwards you can hear demonic voices. The scary part is that if you play it forwards it installs Windows.

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Tuesday, December 22, 2009 9:08 AM

Cit, I think you misunderstand me. I'm definitely not slagging the UK, just playing word games. :)

As for the "middle powers", I'd be happy for the U.S. to become what we tend to refer to as a "middle power" - those nations who seem to have left "empire" behind and moved on to better (not bigger) things. Places like Denmark, France, Portugal, Spain, Italy, Greece, and Great Britain have all had their days of empire, and seem to be better places now that they've left that all behind.

Mike

Work is the curse of the Drinking Class.
- Oscar Wilde

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Tuesday, December 22, 2009 9:20 AM

I think of a middle power as a country that has the political / economic / military power to influence the world, but not enough of it to run amok become arseholes on their own.

It other words they need to have a real coalition ( not a Bush one ) to exert big influence...

keeps things on more of a even keel

without superpowers screwing up the works perhaps we could fix the UN

Either your with the terrorists, or ... your with the terrorists

Lets party like its 1939

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Tuesday, December 22, 2009 9:33 AM

WULFENSTAR

http://youtu.be/VUnGTXRxGHg

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Tuesday, December 22, 2009 9:52 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Kwicko:
Cit, I think you misunderstand me. I'm definitely not slagging the UK, just playing word games. :)

Huh? I was going for a more of an Al Murray moment

. Al Murray plays up the far uk right wing, that likes to ignore that the empire collapsed and all. He's a brilliant comedian and very intelligent guy, he's got a grounding in history (being a history student at Oxford if I remember rightly), and loves to lampoon the Daily Mail/Express archetype with his pub land lord character.

I was not understanding the term middle power. Europe wields an awesome amount of power compared to it's size. I'd put a middle power as say India and current China (for all the rhetoric, they've got no military power projection capability, yet). At the time Britain is the second most powerful nation in terms of military power projection, and one of the largest economies, despite having a comparably minuscule population and few natural resources. Thus my question, if you remove the Us from consideration, the UK, France, Germany and Japan are the worlds most powerful nations, not middle powers.

Now Gino has given a different explanation. It's good in current circumstances, since we're in a world that had two superpowers (US and USSR) that could do as they pleased, and only had each other to worry about, and is now a world with the US that could (on paper at least) take on any two or more other nations with little worry. In an historical sense having a mutli-polar world is more normal, I think in history you'll see the uni-polar US centric world as a post 2nd world war aberration, that was a brief period between the collapse of one world order, and the cementation of another...

I happen to agree on the UN. It's a good idea screwed up by the fact that it's a democratic assembly in a dictatorial world.

--------------------------------------------------

If you play a Microsoft CD backwards you can hear demonic voices. The scary part is that if you play it forwards it installs Windows.

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Tuesday, December 22, 2009 1:11 PM

Some of this I agree with, and some not so much

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

I do like this bit

Definition

There is no standard agreed method to decide which states are middle powers. Some researchers use Gross National Product (GNP) statistics to draw lists of middle powers around the world. Economically, middle powers are generally those that are not considered too "big" or too "small", however that is defined. However, economics is not always considered the defining factor. Under the original sense of the term, a middle power was one that had some degree of influence globally, but not dominance over any one area. However, this usage is not universal, and some define middle power to include nations that can be regarded as regional powers.

According to academics at the University of Leicester and University of Nottingham;

"middle power status is usually identified in one of two ways. The traditional and most common way is to aggregate critical physical and material criteria to rank states according to their relative capabilities. Because countries’ capabilities differ, they are categorized as superpowers (or great powers), middle powers or small powers. More recently, it is possible to discern a second method for identifying middle power status by focusing on behavioural attributes. This posits that middle powers can be distinguished from superpowers and smaller powers because of their foreign policy behaviour – middle powers carve out a niche for themselves by pursuing a narrow range and particular types of foreign policy interest. In this way middle powers are countries that use their relative diplomatic skills in the service of international peace and stability. Both measures are contested and controversial, though the traditional quantitative method has proved more problematic than the behavioural method."[citation needed]

Either your with the terrorists, or ... your with the terrorists

Lets party like its 1939

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Tuesday, December 22, 2009 2:38 PM

Quote:

Huh? I was going for a more of an Al Murray moment

Ah, then the misunderstanding was all mine! :)

I thought you were ticked about my "Adequate Britain" snark. Sorry 'bout that.

Mike

Work is the curse of the Drinking Class.
- Oscar Wilde

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Wednesday, December 23, 2009 12:38 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Kwicko:
Quote:

Huh? I was going for a more of an Al Murray moment

Ah, then the misunderstanding was all mine! :)

I thought you were ticked about my "Adequate Britain" snark. Sorry 'bout that.

"Dozy Yank" :p

--------------------------------------------------

If you play a Microsoft CD backwards you can hear demonic voices. The scary part is that if you play it forwards it installs Windows.

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Wednesday, December 23, 2009 7:15 AM

Gettin' old, but still a hippie at heart...

Gino, I like the definition and explanation of "middle power" you provided, and I wish we could become one, rather than crash altogether. I also think that "Empire" is more of what we've been and have been dwindling as such for decades now. To me, "empire" has the connotation of wanting to expand their domination outside their own nation, and we've done that--as much by economic influence as military. Tho' we SAY we haven't "conquered" any country, we certainly have, and have put puppet governments in, same as any Empire.

Quote:
Anyway, I think the smart money would be on a break up for the united states. It's a country founded on division, still fighting a civil war that ended over a hundred years ago. A nation that has purposefully constructed itself on the notion of being a union of states. Historical precedent would seem to indicate that as the Federal Government's power wanes, state governments will begin to exert more power, and you'll end up eventually with something like the Holy Roman Empire circa 1600.

I've long said America is too big to be run effectively, but at the same time I'd be sad as hell to see us break up. Given the conflicts between smaller nations throughout history, I think the same would happen to us. JMHO

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Wednesday, December 23, 2009 9:07 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Niki2:
Gino, I like the definition and explanation of "middle power" you provided, and I wish we could become one, rather than crash altogether. I also think that "Empire" is more of what we've been and have been dwindling as such for decades now. To me, "empire" has the connotation of wanting to expand their domination outside their own nation, and we've done that--as much by economic influence as military. Tho' we SAY we haven't "conquered" any country, we certainly have, and have put puppet governments in, same as any Empire.

I'm pretty happy with Gino's definition, and I think the Mexicans and Native Americans would have an issue with the concept of America not conquering any one. Canadians too, 'cept they fought the Yankee's off in 1812.

--------------------------------------------------

If you play a Microsoft CD backwards you can hear demonic voices. The scary part is that if you play it forwards it installs Windows.

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Wednesday, December 23, 2009 9:15 AM

Gettin' old, but still a hippie at heart...

Yes, like I said, "we "say" we haven't conquered any other country" (at least, most Americans would disagree with that idea--or excuse the conquest of THIS country by saying it was a good thing 'cuz it was full of savages, or some other excuse), and Native Americans and Mexico are two good examples that disprove that claim! Also, can we claim Hawaii, Puerto Rico, etc., come under the concept of "conquest"?

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Wednesday, December 23, 2009 12:40 PM

I have a vote and I'm not afraid to use it!

So, I keep getting back to the title.

It seems to me that there are many deep, structural problems in the US - especially economic problems. And it's not as if the problems are 'out there' somewhere in a remote country. They are here, in our cities, factories, paychecks - or lack of them - and homes.

How is it that you can have so many people - virtually all of us - working so hard and seeing so little for our efforts ? Seeing a society that has so little to go around that few have anything to spare ? And then, you look to the inevitable future. Sooner or later we will be in a position to not be ABLE TO. To not be able to work. To not be able to take care of ourselves. To not be able to afford health care. To be as dependent as the day we were born. What then ? Should we get thrown away like human trash ? Do we believe in 'work or die ' ?

Are we SO habituated to our mantras that we fail to realize that there are no shackles, no chains, no whip, no overseer - in fact, no force that keeps us in this state except our own ideas ?

How else can you explain the abject apathy of the vast majority of those who have the least ?

In that regard, yes, we are broken.

***************************************************************

"Arbeit macht frei" - or so I've been told.

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Wednesday, December 23, 2009 1:12 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

I think it can be extended to the whole world. Often, those who have the least are the least able to imagine or fight for anything better. Billions... billions... slave away in a system that really only benefits a few thousand. Why is that???

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Wednesday, December 23, 2009 2:54 PM

BYTEMITE

Oh, no, not discarded, at least not all at once. They still need their peons, for labour and such, so they'll keep breeding us after they've refined most of the worker pool to the strongest, dumbest, and least questioning. This is happening even now through social engineering education to be completely ineffective and through creating "opiates" (to borrow from Marx) and other distractions.

But they do want a smaller, more manageable population so they don't have to share as many resources and so their quality of life improves.

Quote:
Are we SO habituated to our mantras that we fail to realize that there are no shackles, no chains, no whip, no overseer - in fact, no force that keeps us in this state except our own ideas ?

It's true, though either everyone has to give up the system at once to become truly unshackled, otherwise working for pay will continue to exist. Unless people become self-sufficient.

Quote:
How else can you explain the abject apathy of the vast majority of those who have the least ?

Too busy to look around at the people around them or to care about strangers, which is bitterly funny, because even considering a 40 hour work week, there actually is time for charity. I know I could do charity work myself, and I really want to. Yet I never seem to get around to it.

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Wednesday, December 23, 2009 3:33 PM

Charity is what you make it.

A lot of my actions benefit people I will never see, never meet, who often as not have not a clue that they have benefited or even any awareness of what might have been - gratitude ain't and never was the point of it, as much as trying to benefit humanity as a whole thing, irrespective of governments, states, corps, etc...

I suspect you're giving yourself short shrift there, Byte, cause I know for a fact you have taken upon yourself to help folk, one of which should have received notice of reconsideration by now, mind you.

S'funny - I couldn't even glare at the salvation army bell banger this afternoon on my way out of the store because the girl looked so damned happy to be doing what she was that I couldn't bear to darken her day like that, despite how much them bells irritate the heck outta me, heh.

-F

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Thursday, December 24, 2009 11:31 AM

Gettin' old, but still a hippie at heart...

Sig: I agree with what you said.

Byte:

Quote:
Too busy to look around at the people around them or to care about strangers, which is bitterly funny, because even considering a 40 hour work week, there actually is time for charity. I know I could do charity work myself, and I really want to. Yet I never seem to get around to it.

Me, too. Unfortunately, the work I did and would return to, I am no longer able to do physically, which saddens me greatly because I'd LOVE to do it again. Didn't know what I had...sigh...

So I content myself FOR NOW with giving to charities and supporting two chidren via Save The Children. I always give a dollar every time I pass those damned bell ringers, tho' they irritate me too. ;o) When I worked in SF, I made sure to carry a lot of dollar bills, and gave one to every begging person I met. I also got to know a few of them and gave clothing and dog food to them. It's pretty much all any of us can do besides give our labor, 'cuz everyone's hurting. I buy clothes from the Salvation Army and sometimes Goodwill, as much for myself as them, and at one time I engaged in LITA (Love is the Answer) with my dogs--where you take them to convalescent homes and hospitals. Unfortunately they were so screwed up, sent me to the wrong place or at the wrong time, that my time with them wasn't very long.

I'd rather work with people than animals, I'm afraid, but that's just me. I figure anything anyone does to help another counts, and it doesn't have to be through organized charities; a helping hand like Frem aluded to counts just as much, in my book.

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Thursday, December 24, 2009 11:58 AM

I have a vote and I'm not afraid to use it!

But in a land where so many work so hard - why are there so many of us poor ? Why are so many of us desperate ? Why are people so ground-down ?

And don't you think - dollar bill hand-outs are not the answer ?

***************************************************************

Silence is consent.

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Thursday, December 24, 2009 12:21 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

I just realized ... here comes my DOH! moment... that the system goes on as it does not because people are "broken" but because the system BREAKS PEOPLE- deliberately.

It's not JUST poverty, and lack of time, and fear of change, and typical human lack of large-scope initiative, and willingness to cooperate, and confabulation about what appear to be "environmental" factors... and other relatively passive, systemic, impersonal factors.

Uh uh.

Right now, even as we "speak", there ARE people busy planning how to "spin" this and that, how to "break" populations, how to get us accept the yoke w/o even realizing it.

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Thursday, December 24, 2009 1:04 PM

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
I just realized ... here comes my DOH! moment... that the system goes on as it does not because people are "broken" but because the system BREAKS PEOPLE- deliberately.

It's not JUST poverty, and lack of time, and fear of change, and typical human lack of large-scope initiative, and willingness to cooperate, and confabulation about what appear to be "environmental" factors... and other relatively passive, systemic, impersonal factors.

Uh uh.

Right now, even as we "speak", there ARE people busy planning how to "spin" this and that, how to "break" populations, how to get us accept the yoke w/o even realizing it.

So your saying the US is the victim of it's own propaganda...

nice

Either your with the terrorists, or ... your with the terrorists

Lets party like its 1939

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Thursday, December 24, 2009 2:25 PM

Gettin' old, but still a hippie at heart...

Rue, I'm not rich, I can't give as much as I want. But isn't that better than nothing? Bsides sponsoring kids and giving what I can to charities, it's all I can do...

Yes, Sig, there is a certain amount of truth in what you say, but think it's more a matter of power being greedy and manipulating without thinking long-term than any specific grinding down. Just how I see it.

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Thursday, December 24, 2009 2:27 PM

HKCAVALIER

Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
I just realized ... here comes my DOH! moment... that the system goes on as it does not because people are "broken" but because the system BREAKS PEOPLE- deliberately.

It's not JUST poverty, and lack of time, and fear of change, and typical human lack of large-scope initiative, and willingness to cooperate, and confabulation about what appear to be "environmental" factors... and other relatively passive, systemic, impersonal factors.

Uh uh.

Right now, even as we "speak", there ARE people busy planning how to "spin" this and that, how to "break" populations, how to get us accept the yoke w/o even realizing it.

Hey Signy,

What ya got there is a pretty important insight but beware: understand that these folks seemingly running the show are, themselves, broken. Nobody wins in such a system, no one is protected, no one is safe; only the system benefits, only the system is protected and only the system endures while we either serve her, are served to her or do what we can to opt out.

Don't make the mistake of the conspiracist and jump to the conclusion that someone is masterminding this mess.

I'm reminded of my old analogy of the "alcoholic conspiracy." You know, how all the alcoholics in the world go to meetings in their safe houses (called "bars") and plot to undermine the happiness of mankind. How else to explain the consistency of their attack, the sytematic destruction of families and communities, unless they are being ordered to beat their wives, run over pedestrians and periodically programed by the PTB (powers that booze) to self-terminate against neighborhood trees.

One needs no conspiracy to account for the cumulative affect of drunks world wide. One only needs to know the pathology. And what's our cultural pathology, our addiction, our fearless leader? Any Guesses? Do I have to Give you a hint? Gee...

HKCavalier

Hey, hey, hey, don't be mean. We don't have to be mean, because, remember, no matter where you go, there you are.

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Monday, December 28, 2009 4:49 PM

Ayep, you get that in any oppressive system of any kind, Alice Miller does a hell of a lot better job exploring that than I do - but I do a right damn good job of teaching kids to protect themselves from being as messed up as their parents.

Of course, given the importance of intervention earlier than that, this is of limited effectiveness, but when THOSE kids grow up and have kids they are less likely to corrupt their own, and so on, and so forth.

Once again, Pullman nails it.
"Every advance in human life, every scrap of knowledge and wisdom and decency we have has been torn by one side from the teeth of another. Every little increase in human freedom has been fought over ferociously between those of us who want to know more and be wiser and stronger, and those of us who want to obey and be humble and submit."

The reason I am so fond of that quote is that when kept in mind it allows one to easily determine what side of it someones actions are on, and while I don't subscribe to the yes/no on/off fallacy that enemies cannot become allies, it's a useful point for determining what actions to support.

Oh, and Niki - at one point I used to do "community service" (Juvie courts favorite penalty for the heinous act of self defense) through an organization similar to that, carrying a sweet old loveable lap kitty to the elderly and chatting with them, which also gave me some wonderful insights onto more recent history cause I got to talk with folks who were actually there for it - who themselves were so tremendously pleased at a youngster who was attentive and willing to listen, that they gave me a personal perspective on it I could never have gotten from books, like the mass-pyschosis-hysteria fear of the McCarthy days, and the horror and sorrow of what happened to Kennedy, the rage at the depth of Nixon and the governments betrayals, etc.

And yet these were also the folk who saddled me with their debts and problems, so I always have to struggle with a dichotomy of feelings for my supposed elders, although during Katrina what folks were with us on that evacuated them by priority when FEMA left em swing, one old geezer was a former navy vet who signaled our little bass boat from a window with a flashlight, a quite resourceful man who chose to actively assist us rather than simply accept rescue.

People are who they are, not black or white, but a whole rainbow of shades of grey.

-F

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Monday, December 28, 2009 5:25 PM

Rue, I don't think dollar-bill handouts are THE answer, but that's only because I don't believe that there is always ONE correct, all-encompassing answer for every problem. Dollar handouts are a HELP, nothing more - but if more people helped, more people would BE helped. And that's going some ways towards an answer.

Soup kitchens likewise are not the answer, but they're not a hindrance or an obstacle, either. I give dollars when I can, take non-perishables to the hobo camps (or "Obamavilles", if that's what we're calling them now), donate to charities what I can spare. None if it is as much as I *should* do or *could* do, but all of it is more than nothing.

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Monday, December 28, 2009 8:07 PM

Gettin' old, but still a hippie at heart...

Cavalier: reeeelly good point, thanx for making it, and making it so cogently.

Frem: Gosh, are you that much younger than I? I lived through the Kennedy and Nixon stuff, and remember it myself all too well, but I'm only 61! Makes me feel reeeely old to hear you talk about folks in convalescent places giving you insight into them...eeep! ;o)

Mike: That's precisely how I feel.

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Tuesday, December 29, 2009 2:51 PM

Ha!

It's been a long, LONG time since someone made me feel like a snarky young upstart, but yeah, I ain't even forty yet, I just packed a lotta livin in them years, and never found the company of my own "peers" anything but repellent since I was maybe eight - I was all but born a cynical, crabby old git, which leads most folk to take me for a lot older, especially since I deal most often with folk young enough to consider anyone past thirty "old".

And yes, I dressed like a "damn libertine" even THEN, only now it's a bit more like this.

Anyhows, the fact that I might just be around ANOTHER 20-40 years is a wonderful deterrent to some, especially since if anything does happen to me they'll still have to go lookin over their shoulder for many a year cause there's no way in hell be to sure, yanno ?

And that pleases me entirely too much.

-F

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Tuesday, December 29, 2009 4:01 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

HK- Thanks for your response. I always value your insight even if I don't always comment on it. (Still chewing over that one about adulthood consisting of fighting over and over the same battles that you lost as a child. Hmm. Ouch. Rings waaaay too true. And I can see it in almost every one of us.. with just maybe a few exceptions. But, be that as it may... )

I guess what hit me between the eyes is this:

There ARE people who think about manipulating entire populations.

Why?

Because they can.

Because they have more money than satan and more power than god. Because they can think about starving this region and employing in that... or invading here or bombing there... or "working with" their friends in media to hid, manipulate and distort the truth... or buying up little companies with better ideas and then killing 'em. They have options, they have choices that we don't have. I don't know if we CAN think like that. They may be broken... or more accurately shackled... but their shackles are golden.

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Tuesday, December 29, 2009 5:14 PM