Wednesday, May 30, 2007

Congress and Defunding the Iraq Occupation

We all have such short memories.

To get out of Viet Nam, Congress passed a series of defunding bills. They cut funding for the huge land force. They funded only bombing from Guam. They funded "Vietnamization," that is, requiring the build up of security capability by the South Vietnamese. Then they finally pulled the plug.

I believe many of the Democrats who voted for the Iraq military funding bill last week, despite loud voices from the left, did so because President Bush acquiesced on short term funding, on funding care for veterans, and not vetoing the minumum wage add-on. Imagine, the President actually bent! That's the big story of this recent funding bill.

President Bush wants time to be the winner of that war. I would bet that he has been talking to his staff about leaving Iraq on a high note where there is relative peace in Baghdad and where the parliament has voted some kind of sharing arrangement for oil revenues. Then he can say we won. Why should Democrats get the credit for ending the war!

There is a chance the insurgency will cause so much havoc that even General Patraeus can't make it sound like a success. There is a chance the Iraqi parliament will not want any major decision to be made while the occupation is in full effect.

And do not doubt the President will face a bi-partisan Congress that will pass a veto-proof defunding bill in September.

The myth is that such a vote fails to support the troops. Even some big-name Democrats who know better played along with that myth in order to justify their vote for the current bill.

Maybe they couldn't say publicly that any defunding bill would have funding for safe withdrawal and deployments that make sense given how depleted our military resources are becoming.

They better start saying it soon or the Republicans will continue to call the Dems "cut and runners" and eventually blame the Democrats for "losing" the "war" in Iraq.

Saturday, May 26, 2007

President's supplemental plan

FYI

Left unstated in the President's plan for Iraq are the following:

Israel will join our troops in fighting Iran and the main battle will move to Armageddon. Jesus will return, take up the faithful in the Rapture, and allow the rest of the world, including the Jews who do not convert, to suffer in the world-wide holocaust along with homosexuals, Muslims, feminists, liberals, ACLU-types, Moveon.org, the educated, listeners to NPR, et al.

Those who understand the subtleties of pre- and post-millenialism will shake their heads at this bizarre aspect of the President's plan, but you have to understand, he is not a scholar of these matters. He just uses what he wants from it to keep his followers true to his cause.

Also left unstated is that once the Iraqis turn their oil over to the American corporations, he may find a way to finally pull out as if we had won a great victory.

And he will blame the Democrats that the victory wasn't greater so he can have all the more reason to use the foundation and library he is establishing at SMU to still hold out hope for the Rapture so his followers can have an enemies list that will encourage right-wing terrorists (largely quiet during the Bush administration because they are fighting in Iraq along side our troops?) to take up arms against America if the Democrats win in 2008.

Even more neat is how the Democrats will have to help the oil corporations with security in order "to follow up on our commitments to rebuild Iraq." Then the Bushites will be able to point out how inept the Democrats are at fighting wars.

There. Now you know. Shrewd, ain'so?

Thursday, May 24, 2007

A poem by a friend

SCIENCE’S FICTION
By Arthur H. Davis
(with permission)

Those tummy tucks,
That lipo-suction,
From the Greek for
“fat reduction” . . .

New Grecian nose
Replacing old.
Still, “Thar she blows!”
If you’ve a cold!

Bosom implants
Constant done
To look just like
Pam Anderson!

Lip enhancing,
Pouting miss,
So entrancing
Courting kiss.

Hair removal
Where it shouldn’t;
Hair replacement
Where it wouldn’t!

Its all the rage
Botox injections
Attacking age’s
Imperfections!

Reduction of
One’s hips and thighs,
Reducing them
To model’s size.

Teeth all straightened
Sparkling bright.
Now gone for good
Your overbite!

You must try
The skin eraser,
Removing age spots
All by laser . . .

Face uplift
To offset aging.
Looking younger,
How engaging!

Anything to
Make us young,
New chin replacing
Double hung. . .

Now what of
All this tampering.
Is it narcissistic
Pampering?

So - may come a day,
What if - perhaps,
All these improvements
Then collapse!

All that past trauma
Drives you spastic--
Despite you seem
Iconoclastic!

--Art writes poetry on a wide range of subjects. Watch for more of his gems here.--

The President did have a war plan

Okay, here’s the plan.

To get rid of Saddam Hussein, we have to have a triggering event like Al Quaeda blowing up the twin Trade Towers in New York. Since we are told something like that is going to happen, we can then plan a “shock and awe” campaign against Baghdad where we drop hundreds of bunker buster bombs with plenty of used uranium to make the bomb casings hard enough to go through thick concrete. We’ll make the Sunni triangle radioactive for centuries.

Then we’ll aggravate the Sunnis by disbanding the army and Baathist party which are their main employers and put hundreds of thousands of men on the streets with nothing to do except throw flowers at us as we roll into town.

Then we’ll aggravate the Shiites by not protecting them any more than the U. S. did during the decade following the first Gulf War. And, yes, we must shut down their newspapers to protect their freedom.

And we won’t send enough troops to provide security of the banks, national treasures, hospitals, universities, and arms caches.

Then we’ll set up a safe zone for our people and build the biggest safest embassy in the world in the middle of downtown Baghdad but we’ll take our time letting our no-bid contractors consider starting to rebuild the electric grid and the oil infrastructure without setting up any serious accountability program. Gotta keep them working to earn their money and pay for their cost overruns.

We’ll have elections so we can get a parliament who will vote to give American oil companies an advantage at taking control of the oil profits.

If all goes as planned, the Shiites will get Iranian help to battle us and, even though Saudi Arabia is providing larger amounts of aid to the Sunnis, we’ll blame Syria. Then because Iran sees us as a threat, they will increase their efforts to get an atom bomb to counter Israel’s.

Meanwhile, we can keep the minds of the world off Israel who can continue building their wall cutting off any hope of Palestinians to have water, an economy, and an effective state. Maybe we’ll get the Palestinians to then support Hamas in free elections which would give us an excuse to further isolate and weaken the Palestinians to make everything safer for Israel.

Next to controlling Middle East oil, we want to protect Israel by letting our military fight the wars against their enemies.

So, we set up a situation where the majority of our troops are caught in a battle (we won’t call it a civil war) between the Sunnis and Shiites for control of Iraq right there where we dumped all that uranium in the blitz and add troops to more than we used to invade Iraq in the first place. We’ll call it a “surge.”

Meanwhile, Iran will get hyper and give us an excuse to send an attack fleet into the Gulf to go bomb Iran’s nuclear facilities which Israel is anxious for us to do. We’ll bomb Iran. That leaves us with 200,000 of our troops plus another 150,000 contract mercenaries we’re paying corporations to provide to stand in the uranium dust, ready to fight the Iranian army while being shot at by the Sunnis and Shiites.

And we’ll make sure that the families of our soldiers have to send body armor they pay for and other things like boots and socks made for desert warfare to their loved ones.

Of course our soldiers are so well trained they can do anything, survive anything, and will not come home in body bags or all broken up requiring long term care which we can’t afford.

There’s the plan. Any questions?

Thursday, May 17, 2007

Robertson may be next?

As a hobby, I write mysteries. My protagonists tend to be members of an adult Sunday School Class. Maybe when I am a good enough writer, those novellas or their successors will be published.

For me, a retired clergy, to become something of a mystery writer is not odd at all. I have enjoyed mysteries first on radio and then on television since the 1940s.

You won't then be surprised that I have a zillion mystery plots behind me. Nor will you be surprised that when I read AMERICAN FASCISTS by Chris Hedges and observed in this blog on May 10 that those at the top of the far right wing will start rubbing out each other in order to take the leadership, I am not astonished that one of them dies.

I do not mean to trivialize the death of a man whose influence has been applauded and/or appalling (depending on your point of view). No one's death goes unnoticed by God any more than a sparrow's. (Iraq and Darfur et al must be driving Him/Her crazy!)

Let's hope the family of Brother Falwell retains the traditional values of burial. If Rev. Robertson should pass away sometime soon, I think someone should do autopsies on both bodies.

Monday, May 14, 2007

Moss and Favre

Bret Favre was tremendously disappointed that the Packers did not sign Randy Moss. Through agent Bus Cook, Moss and Favre had been anticipating a serious run for Moss to join the Packers. For Bret to have an offensive player with Moss’ record would have been, as Favre said, intimidating.

But Moss has this reputation of being a divider, being a bad locker room influence, and I think he showed it in this whole scene.

Yes, it would have been good if someone of Moss’ capabilities had been picked up by the Packers! Moss played that up with Bret, I’m sure.

What Moss didn’t say to Bret was that if a better offer came along, he’d take it.

How can the Packers this year compete with New England? GM Ted Thompson is in his third year and is still not a proven leader (although he has Koren Robinson coming off suspension in September, and still has a chance to pick up talent when the teams have to cut to the limit for the season) and the Patriots’ leadership has been in place and successful for the last half dozen years.

Brady will extend Moss’ career. With the Packers, Moss would have extended Favre’s career. For Moss, that’s a no brainer. And I think he suckered Bret. And I’m glad he is now New England’s problem.

Sunday, May 13, 2007

Karl Rove Came Here

Karl Rove was only six miles away. My activism is more writing than demonstrating so I didn‘t go. Sometimes when we ignore others, they fade away. But that hasn’t worked with me . . . .

The newspaper the next day had a front page spread with a picture of Mr. Rove and a substantial report on what he said to several hundred Republicans. I didn’t read that.

The newspaper also opened its middle section front page with a shorter article about the fifty or so demonstrators who stood along the highway near the motel banquet hall where Mr. Rove spoke. It had two pictures which included some of the signs made by the locals. Total space was about the same as the front page. I skimmed that to see if the local sheriff had gotten involved in removing the protesters as he did when Governor Jeb Bush gave a speech at a local public center. He hadn’t, thankfully.

The letters to the editor exploded with a flurry of angry protests that the paper favored the protestors, that the paper was not being fair and balanced.

The editor, David Dunn-Rankin, responded today, giving the number of words in each story (634 words for Mr. Rove and 573 for the protesters). He went on to say the reporters in the banquet were kept behind a police yellow tape cordon. Neither Mr. Rove nor the Republicans came near them for interviews.

However, no such barriers or attitude prevented reporters from interviewing the protesters out on the highway. Mr. Dunn-Rankin opined that simply reporting what Mr. Rove said, something that’s been heard many times before, did not have the interest for local readers as did interviews with people on the street.

The Pulitzer Committee probably won’t recognize the CHARLOTTE SUN for covering this event and handling its aftermath as they did after the SUN covered Hurricane Charley (second place honors). But I think the paper (www.sun-herald.com) deserves a plug for what they did.

Thursday, May 10, 2007

AMERICAN FASCISTS - a book review

Chris Hedges has written a book that is most upsetting.

He has done what most of us progressives have failed to do: go see the rightwing leaders and talk to their people, some of whom left working for them. And listen to them.

The book, AMERICAN FASCISTS, published by Free Press, 2006, has as its premise that many in the rightwing of the Christian Church are being groomed to be the political and spiritual (and maybe military?) shock troops to overthrow America and turn it into a theocracy which has its highest loyalty to its leader, a loyalty that supersedes any concern for the humanity of those listed by the leader as enemies of the state, you know, like homosexuals, liberals, secular humanists, supporters of the United Nations, Jews, Muslims, ACLU supporters, anyone who disagrees with the leaders, and just about anyone who does not believe in Jesus the way they do.

The kind of sociopath mindset he describes and documents is very real. He has provided a red alert about a movement that can destroy America. His description of their projecting on all their “enemy” groups just what they plan to do clearly shows just how dysfunctional the people the left calls “wing nuts” really are.

You have to read his book. I look forward to his doing research on the movement among women which demonizes men and American institutions.

Just how potent is the “American Fascist” movement he documents?

We may have to find out the hard way when, as Hedges observes, the country is beset by a major calamity that shows just how inadequate our support systems for the large number of poor really are.

I see a couple things that work against such a takeover being successful.

Since the heart of the potential problem is one leader rising to the top, I am not sure any one man has enough loyalty to him. I see the religious right has divided loyalties and those individuals who lead their respective groups will not give up their dreams of power to others. It would probably require assassinations to lead to one person holding power. I’m not sure any but very small minority could stomach that.

Even in the religious right, there are many different interpretations of things like the Rapture and the “Tribulation” which would leave many not comfortable with whomever tries to become the one true prophet. Dissent would be rife in the ranks over such differences of interpretation.
And finally, I think there are too many people who will balk at any attempt by the religious right to take over politically. When I was a poll worker in the 2006 Congressional elections, it was old home week among the voters. They knew each other. They didn’t even come close to looking at each other as voting one way or another. Only one young woman tried to “politic” using two small lapel pins. No one else did anything even close to that! Everyone else was so glad to see each other.

Hedges would challenge me by saying that in Germany while the Nazis were taking over, they established a kind of cultural religion that seemed to satisfy the religious moderates like the Methodists. This religious veneer was used very successfully to override the real religious differences among the Germans who went to church, no matter what denomination. Only a handful of conservative Lutherans and professors like Paul Tillich and Dietrich Bonheoffer stood up to the Nazis. Way too many Christians did not.

By the way, there are many others who are writing articles and books that are saying things similar to what this Pulitzer Prize-winning writer is saying.

It takes someone crazy to think they can take over the U. S. But some of them are out there. And we have to be sure they do not end up setting the American agenda.

Sunday, May 6, 2007

The right problems

I just sat through listening to Newt Gingrich on "Face the Nation" with Bob Schieffer. Gingrich is an extraordinarily bright man. But some how I felt like he was not talking about the right problems.

He gave lip service to health care and to disagreeing with President Bush. But I could not get too interested in some of his issues. In fact, I can't even tell you what his issues are!

But when he was through, I realized he does not appear to want to talk about the same issues that progressives want to discuss.

For example, he ignored the huge debt the war has engendered. He didn't address our standing in the world because of the arrogance and ignorance of the current administration's policies which he admits to criticizing.

More important, he did not address two other issues which I do not hear being addressed by anyone among the candidates. Our empire - protection of our business interests all over the world by use of military bases still open around the former Soviet Union; and our lack of policy on Israeli/Palestinian issues and copying of Israeli tactics in the Middle East (torture and guns).

What can any newsman do with ten minutes with such vast areas of concern, with so many problems? (Do what Jon Stewart does and ask incisive questions?)

Until we can articulate all the problems facing us, not letting any of them be sacred cows, and prioritize them, we will continue talking past each other and trying to play to our respective bases' priorities rather than try to resolve the most important national priorities.

Real students and scholars of the issues may already have done this surfacing, articulating, and prioritizing of problems and I missed it. So let me know and I'll pass it on!

Saturday, May 5, 2007

On Civility

Over a decade ago, our denomination set up a study group made up of liberal and conservative people to discuss homosexuality. While they did not settle the dispute, they passed along their learnings about discussing issues over which there was serious disagreement. This is what they wrote:

Civility's "Ten Commandments"

1. Respect the personhood of others while engaging their ideas.

2. Carefully represent the views of those with whom you are in disagreement.

3. Be careful in defining terms, avoiding needless use of inflammatory words.

4. Be careful in use of generalizations; where appropriate offer specific evidence.

5. Seek to understand the experience out of which others have arrived at their views. Hear the stories of others as we share our own.

6. Exercise care that expressions of personal offense at the differing opinions of others not be used as a means of inhibiting dialogue.

7. Be a patient listener before formulating responses.

8. Be open to change in your position and patient with the process of change in the thinking and behavior of others.

9. Make use of facilitators and mediators where communication can be served by it.

10. Always remember that people are defined, ultimately, by their relationship with God - not by flaws we discover or think we discover in their views and actions.


From UNITED METHODIST REPORTER, March 6, 1998

Tuesday, May 1, 2007

Impeachng the President and VP

I just got a note urging me to call Speaker Pelosi’s office to accept impeachment of President Bush and Vice President Cheney.

I was ready to have him impeached after FAHRENHEIT 9/11 and all the books that came out about him his first term. It is tempting to call and add my voice to the others she will receive.

But knowing how long fair legal processes take, I don’t see how it will be possible without using up precious time to try to turn the country around as much as possible now that the Democrats have the majorities in Congress.

So I have an idea: I expect that the President will veto everything the Democrats want to undo. I think the Democrats should push legislation that they need to pass. I think they need to consult with the Republicans on as much of it as possible to try for bi-partisan support. When the President vetoes those key bills, then I think the public will tolerate impeachment proceedings. The President may succeed in stringing out his term to its end but to have him leave office while facing impeachment charges would be meaningful to those of us who believe he has indeed violated his trust with the American people and violated the Constitution.

I would love to see the Vice President impeached now because he has earned it! But if the intent of my strategy times out, that would not make any difference.

But I can imagine a scenario where the President, as Richard Nixon did, resigns, leaving us with V. P. Cheney.

Hmmm. What do you think?