We approach a new year with the problems of the old one looming larger, even as the dark age of the Bush era is ending. Reality is causing more pain and anguish as we try to celebrate the holidays and begin a more positive chapter in our history.
The season of massive consumption has not been what the commercial community needs, with many dependent on the annual shopping frenzy to show a profit for the year. The frenzy revealed itself in a tragedy that saw a mob stampede a corporate employee to death in the rush for bargains that have made shopping possible for many who face a survival crisis more than one of gift giving . But what’s needed for the real economy in which people produce material goods and services - not the financial fiasco that produces immaterial gambling and theft - hasn’t been there and may not be for some time, if ever again.
We’ve heard the present problems compared with the past Great Depression and Roosevelt’s New Deal solution , but we may be facing a combination of those terms. For all the rhetoric about change and notions that an African American president will automatically bring about something radically different, we face a crisis that could produce a New Depression.
We’re deeply immersed in the same old political economy, with new people appointed supposedly for change, but really dedicated to maintaining that system . Despite high flown rhetoric to the contrary, that means it , the system of private profit, comes before us, the public who create that profit .
In a form of relatively polite national socialism , public funds are being shoveled by the trillions into the coffers of private financial corporations, with the rationale that these entities are too big to be allowed to fail. But are taxpayers too small to be allowed to succeed ? With almost no questions asked, finance capital gets hundreds of billions, but when industry asks for a fraction of that aid , controversy and congressional hearings decide whether we might be better off if millions of jobs should simply be allowed to vanish.
Capital is being placed under government control, but this “friendly fascism” without any nationalization is at the expense of a public which, so far, is exercising no control at all. And we face total public failure if we do not act to transform the system that profits a minority by inflicting ever greater loss on the majority . If such economics are the result of a political democracy, then terminal cancer is the result of a healthy immune system.
The incredible debt we are incurring to bail out finance capital could make us all wealthy, if we used those trillions to create employment, education and health care for the entire population , and to achieve social peace and environmental balance. We will see some new policies of public spending to rebuild infrastructure and stimulate consumption , but what we really need and can well afford is full security guaranteed to all our people. That’s the way a rich society like our own should conduct itself, but it must first be removed from minority control and placed under the rule of a democratic majority.
The thought that such a situation prevailed with the last election is a dream worthy of a nation in deep slumber. Given our dreadful history of slavery and racism, there is genuine pleasure to be found in the election of Obama, but carrying that symbolic joy too far indicates a society still not facing a harsh reality. And it will get worse, until we demand that the economy works for the greater good of all the people, and not simply for the benefit of a chosen few.
Continued dedication to preserving capitalism and America's world domination spells future disaster. And if you think Obama is a socialist or mankind’s salvation because he’s indicated a willingness to talk to our alleged enemies, I’ve got a bridge I’d like to sell you. That might seem like progress after the Bush experience, but masters always talked to their slaves, and that did nothing to change the relationship . We have to not only talk but act as if we understand a reality in which we don’t own or control the world, and our power and wealth do not make us chosen people of the planet. Obama’s foreign policy appointments have shown no relationship to such thinking, which is what we must have to reach a future that gets us out of the present dilemma by transforming our society and its role in the world.
Real democracy in the USA could help achieve real democracy in other places, especially by not interfering in their political economies. Ending our foreign meddling will help bring international peace and a stop to what is called global terrorism. That is simply the bloody action taken by native amateur killers to defend their nations and cultures from the bloody action of foreign professional killers, and when those foreigners back off, terrorism will end. Then and only then will there be a chance for real peace in places like the middle east, where apartheid Israel can become democratic Palestine, with immigrants and natives living as equals and not as colonial superiors and colonized inferiors.
None of that can happen without an active population that is ready to agitate, educate and organize its citizenry to pressure the new president to do its bidding, and not continue the old order under the cover of new rhetoric. And so:
Merry Christmas to all who celebrate, but please don't just wish or pray for a better future . Demand it as well , take action to get it, and make the future a newer and better reality, rather than a newer and more deadly depression.
Copyright (c) 2008 by Frank Scott. All rights reserved.
This text may be used and shared in accordance with the
fair-use provisions of U.S. copyright law, and it may be
archived and redistributed in electronic form, provided that
the author is notified and no fee is charged for access.
Archiving, redistribution, or republication of this text on
other terms, in any medium, requires the consent of the author
frank scott
email: frankscott@comcast.net
Frank Scott writes political commentary which appears in the Coastal Post, The Independent Monitor and on his shared blog at:
http://legalienate.blogspot.com
Monday, December 15, 2008
Thursday, November 20, 2008
New Deal? We Need A New Deck!
We enter the season of frenzied consumption with our economy in its worst condition in more than a generation. This means we won’t be able to celebrate Jesus , Chanukah or the Solstice by recklessly spending money we never really had . Private sector credit and employment are declining as fast as the public sector burdens of a bankrupt system are soaring. What was deified as globalization - humanity’s forced worship at the market church of the profit - has revealed itself as the faster deterioration of nature and people, reduced to commodities by the plunder, waste and devastation of capitalism.
The least popular president in history will soon be replaced by an at least momentarily most popular realization of symbolic hope. Our ugly history of slavery and racism justify some genuine celebration for the election of Obama. Symbols are important for what they represent, but you can't eat a symbol of a meal, or live in the symbol of a house. A symbol won't do much for solving the problem of a system that both the outgoing dim bulb and the incoming bright light believe is god’s gift to the world. The new CEO is smarter than the old one, but the company is still in the same business, and our problem is the business, not simply the boss.
So maybe without maximum credit and with only minimal cash, we will reach out to one another with love instead of commodities and make this an actual season of peace, joy, caring and sharing? Hope for the best, but always be prepared for the worst. This economy depends on us spending money we don’t have, on things we don't need, often for people we don't even like. While such contradictions are the core of the system , without that seasonal madness we will see even more unemployment , debt and hardship. What’s a nation to do?
Creating change we can believe in would be nice, but when we really need change in substance , what we’re likely to get is change in style .
We’re apt to see a return of primitive social democratic policies which existed before the regression to uncontrolled free marketeering. There will be money for infrastructure repair, perhaps another rebate to send us out shopping, and help for states and municipalities faced with severe cuts in support of those who need the most and always get the least. But what we require is a massive program for public works that creates full employment, environmental sensibility, and guarantees health care and education for all by spending trillions more than we have already squandered on finance capital and its imperial wars. In other words, spending to benefit the people and the country, not the people’s leaders and the country’s owners.
According to grade school civics, we are all the democratic leaders and owners of the nation, but it’s time to stop mouthing childishly empty words as though rote repetition was reality, and begin acting as adults in a real democracy by physically creating that reality.
Where would we get those trillions of dollars? From the same place we get them now, except that instead of spending them on waste, war and welfare for the wealthy, they’d be spent on saving America, and helping save the world . The last time we faced a Great Depression, as it was called, programs were introduced that made life better for many who were suffering, but they were a “New Deal” primarily created to save the political economy for capitalism. We have reached a point at which it is necessary to create programs to save the nation , humanity and the planet from capitalism . That means transforming our nation into something it has never been : a society that banishes inequality by practicing political economics that serve all of its citizens, not just some of them. We can invent a label for that democratic solution when we have it, but right now it’s important to understand that our problem is the global corporation of capitalism , and not the sex , race or religion of its CEO.
We’re likely to see domestic policy changes that will be helpful in the short term , as reactionary economics is replaced by a less fanatic tendency that doesn’t rely on totally uncontrolled market forces. But however secular it may seem by comparison to the previous holy war conducted against commoners on behalf of the rich, foreign policy will be handled by the same people who have been working to perpetuate America’s imperial domain . That global order is as near collapse as the domestic financial system, but attempts will be made to maintain America’s rule, which is plainly failing though our leadership still doesn’t seem to understand. Rather than wait for them to find out, it is for us to intervene, in truly democratic fashion, and demand action to turn this system around before it destroys not only our society, but a good part of nature and the rest of the world as well.
Obama has been praised for expressing a desire to speak with our supposed adversaries, in contrast to the belligerent idiocy of the previous CEO. But masters spoke to their slaves, all the time, and that did not change their relationship one bit. We need to not only talk, but act to end our false notion of superiority over others, the ridiculous idea that we are a chosen people by virtue of national wealth and military power, and that the world must bow to our superiority. It will take a social movement larger and more focused than the one that got him elected to affect such a change in American policy towards the more than six billion people of the planet. And we will need such a movement to transform our political economy at home to one of real equality, in order to help create that just and peaceful world.
Copyright (c) 2008 by Frank Scott. All rights reserved.
This text may be used and shared in accordance with the
fair-use provisions of U.S. copyright law, and it may be
archived and redistributed in electronic form, provided that
the author is notified and no fee is charged for access.
Archiving, redistribution, or republication of this text on
other terms, in any medium, requires the consent of the author
frank scott
email: frankscott@comcast.net
The least popular president in history will soon be replaced by an at least momentarily most popular realization of symbolic hope. Our ugly history of slavery and racism justify some genuine celebration for the election of Obama. Symbols are important for what they represent, but you can't eat a symbol of a meal, or live in the symbol of a house. A symbol won't do much for solving the problem of a system that both the outgoing dim bulb and the incoming bright light believe is god’s gift to the world. The new CEO is smarter than the old one, but the company is still in the same business, and our problem is the business, not simply the boss.
So maybe without maximum credit and with only minimal cash, we will reach out to one another with love instead of commodities and make this an actual season of peace, joy, caring and sharing? Hope for the best, but always be prepared for the worst. This economy depends on us spending money we don’t have, on things we don't need, often for people we don't even like. While such contradictions are the core of the system , without that seasonal madness we will see even more unemployment , debt and hardship. What’s a nation to do?
Creating change we can believe in would be nice, but when we really need change in substance , what we’re likely to get is change in style .
We’re apt to see a return of primitive social democratic policies which existed before the regression to uncontrolled free marketeering. There will be money for infrastructure repair, perhaps another rebate to send us out shopping, and help for states and municipalities faced with severe cuts in support of those who need the most and always get the least. But what we require is a massive program for public works that creates full employment, environmental sensibility, and guarantees health care and education for all by spending trillions more than we have already squandered on finance capital and its imperial wars. In other words, spending to benefit the people and the country, not the people’s leaders and the country’s owners.
According to grade school civics, we are all the democratic leaders and owners of the nation, but it’s time to stop mouthing childishly empty words as though rote repetition was reality, and begin acting as adults in a real democracy by physically creating that reality.
Where would we get those trillions of dollars? From the same place we get them now, except that instead of spending them on waste, war and welfare for the wealthy, they’d be spent on saving America, and helping save the world . The last time we faced a Great Depression, as it was called, programs were introduced that made life better for many who were suffering, but they were a “New Deal” primarily created to save the political economy for capitalism. We have reached a point at which it is necessary to create programs to save the nation , humanity and the planet from capitalism . That means transforming our nation into something it has never been : a society that banishes inequality by practicing political economics that serve all of its citizens, not just some of them. We can invent a label for that democratic solution when we have it, but right now it’s important to understand that our problem is the global corporation of capitalism , and not the sex , race or religion of its CEO.
We’re likely to see domestic policy changes that will be helpful in the short term , as reactionary economics is replaced by a less fanatic tendency that doesn’t rely on totally uncontrolled market forces. But however secular it may seem by comparison to the previous holy war conducted against commoners on behalf of the rich, foreign policy will be handled by the same people who have been working to perpetuate America’s imperial domain . That global order is as near collapse as the domestic financial system, but attempts will be made to maintain America’s rule, which is plainly failing though our leadership still doesn’t seem to understand. Rather than wait for them to find out, it is for us to intervene, in truly democratic fashion, and demand action to turn this system around before it destroys not only our society, but a good part of nature and the rest of the world as well.
Obama has been praised for expressing a desire to speak with our supposed adversaries, in contrast to the belligerent idiocy of the previous CEO. But masters spoke to their slaves, all the time, and that did not change their relationship one bit. We need to not only talk, but act to end our false notion of superiority over others, the ridiculous idea that we are a chosen people by virtue of national wealth and military power, and that the world must bow to our superiority. It will take a social movement larger and more focused than the one that got him elected to affect such a change in American policy towards the more than six billion people of the planet. And we will need such a movement to transform our political economy at home to one of real equality, in order to help create that just and peaceful world.
Copyright (c) 2008 by Frank Scott. All rights reserved.
This text may be used and shared in accordance with the
fair-use provisions of U.S. copyright law, and it may be
archived and redistributed in electronic form, provided that
the author is notified and no fee is charged for access.
Archiving, redistribution, or republication of this text on
other terms, in any medium, requires the consent of the author
frank scott
email: frankscott@comcast.net
Monday, November 10, 2008
New Package: Old Contents
The conflict between Joe Six-Pack and Two-Buck Chuck was resolved after the longest , most expensive presidential campaign in history. Consumers of budget beer and cheap wine were set against one another by the owners of both the brewery and the winery. Imaginary divisions have once again been used to keep manual and mental workers from noticing that they are employed by the same people:
The wealthy they currently bail out with their tax dollars, at the risk of their own individual and social bankruptcy. A new regime has arrived, and the old system prevails. So what's new?
Symbolism may be more important than any substance Obama is thought to have. Politically, he was never more than the John Kerry of 2004 , and far less a voice of the unrepresented than the Jesse Jackson of 1984. But his affirmative action team's light and bright contrast to the other affirmative action team's dark and dim made it easy. And his impact may be greater in a world in which most people are not white, and have been furious with the white western imperial menace. If international faith, like that of the multitudes here, can be rewarded with something more than symbolism, the world will change for the better. But don't hang by your lip waiting for such change.
The professional hysterics who claimed the election would be stolen will now have to find other employment, and broadcast media will suffer declining revenue with the spending orgy of the campaign ended. But the general public may suffer the greatest loss .
Evangelicals who believe Israel was ordained by god are momentarily subdued, but zionists who see Israel as sacred homeland for europeans who believe they are semites - the way Nigerians are native to Sweden - retain control. A holder of dual Israeli-US citizenship is the new White House Chief of Staff, and the tragedy of Gaza and Palestine will likely continue, as will the warlike policy towards Iran. We can only hope the corporate rulers who know that talk is not only cheap, but more profitable than war, which kills consumers, will keep the new president from going to extremes beyond normally brutal practice.
But the american military - political juggernaut remains , and it will continue threatening movements for peace , social justice and real democracy wherever they exist , even if its style differs from the regime it replaces. So, where are we?
In a world that has spread U.S. violence to Syria and Pakistan, with plans to increase the assault on Afghanistan. Our meddling in other nations will not stop under the new regime, though it may become lower key than it was under Bush . Will that represent change? About as much as a tax payer bail out of finance capital means we've changed to socialist economics. While that belief is popular among those who think the post office is socialism and the library is communism, we will see minimal financial redistribution under another affirmative action program for capitalism .
A return to primitive social democratic policies is at hand. That means money for some things we actually need, like infrastructure repair , slight regulation of the market and a few dollars for the majority who work for a living . At least until the next breakdown in our Ponzi Scheme economy, based on Vegas principles that guarantee profits for the house owners by assuring loss for the house tenants. The economy in which people work to survive is quite real, but the gambling casino that enriches our rulers is a creation of faith based belief, as much as any theory of intelligent design or the big bang as originators of the universe. But we pay a heavy price, in the material world, for these intrigues in the immaterial.
From 1979 to 2008 the top 1% income group in the U.S.A. gained $600 billion annually , while the bottom 80 percent lost that same $600 billion. That's an average yearly gain of $500,000 at the top, while the bottom lost an average $8,000. Do we need a radical redistribution of income? Will Obama bring it about? Are you serious?
Between October 2007 and October 2008, $8.3 trillion vanished from Wall Street, which is our economic Vatican, though that Roman religious center may have more substance than the myth that serves as foundation for capital's capitol. Where did those trillions come from? Where did they go? Let's put those mind boggling numbers into some perspective:
1 trillion seconds = 32,000 years. More than 8 trillion dollars?
Personal debt in the United States was $13.8 trillion in March of 2008, while total reported income for 2007 was $12.4 trillion. If we owe more than 100% of what we make, that leaves nothing for rent, mortgage, food, clothing, health care, burgers , ballet and whatever else we need to make life wonderful, without even more borrowing. How can we survive without going into even greater debt than we've already accumulated? And credit is tightening, fast, while jobs are vanishing, even faster.
These are much bigger numbers and more serious problems than any racial symbolism or choreographed celebration can solve without radical transformation of a system that Obama is sworn to serve, not change.
Let's hope that the spirit of celebration becomes a force demanding real change, before the dream of a bright new day becomes the nightmare of a very long dark night. That fan club for an individual needs to become a movement for society, before war, unemployment and unpayable debts turn their idol into a scapegoat, and our nation into a dead zone . People need to keep the faith, by all means. But we can’t just exult over surface change and pray that it gets better. We need to organize for democratic change of substance, and work to create it, very soon.
Copyright (c) 2008 by Frank Scott. All rights reserved.
This text may be used and shared in accordance with the
fair-use provisions of U.S. copyright law, and it may be
archived and redistributed in electronic form, provided that
the author is notified and no fee is charged for access.
Archiving, redistribution, or republication of this text on
other terms, in any medium, requires the consent of the author
frank scott
email: frankscott@comcast.net
The wealthy they currently bail out with their tax dollars, at the risk of their own individual and social bankruptcy. A new regime has arrived, and the old system prevails. So what's new?
Symbolism may be more important than any substance Obama is thought to have. Politically, he was never more than the John Kerry of 2004 , and far less a voice of the unrepresented than the Jesse Jackson of 1984. But his affirmative action team's light and bright contrast to the other affirmative action team's dark and dim made it easy. And his impact may be greater in a world in which most people are not white, and have been furious with the white western imperial menace. If international faith, like that of the multitudes here, can be rewarded with something more than symbolism, the world will change for the better. But don't hang by your lip waiting for such change.
The professional hysterics who claimed the election would be stolen will now have to find other employment, and broadcast media will suffer declining revenue with the spending orgy of the campaign ended. But the general public may suffer the greatest loss .
Evangelicals who believe Israel was ordained by god are momentarily subdued, but zionists who see Israel as sacred homeland for europeans who believe they are semites - the way Nigerians are native to Sweden - retain control. A holder of dual Israeli-US citizenship is the new White House Chief of Staff, and the tragedy of Gaza and Palestine will likely continue, as will the warlike policy towards Iran. We can only hope the corporate rulers who know that talk is not only cheap, but more profitable than war, which kills consumers, will keep the new president from going to extremes beyond normally brutal practice.
But the american military - political juggernaut remains , and it will continue threatening movements for peace , social justice and real democracy wherever they exist , even if its style differs from the regime it replaces. So, where are we?
In a world that has spread U.S. violence to Syria and Pakistan, with plans to increase the assault on Afghanistan. Our meddling in other nations will not stop under the new regime, though it may become lower key than it was under Bush . Will that represent change? About as much as a tax payer bail out of finance capital means we've changed to socialist economics. While that belief is popular among those who think the post office is socialism and the library is communism, we will see minimal financial redistribution under another affirmative action program for capitalism .
A return to primitive social democratic policies is at hand. That means money for some things we actually need, like infrastructure repair , slight regulation of the market and a few dollars for the majority who work for a living . At least until the next breakdown in our Ponzi Scheme economy, based on Vegas principles that guarantee profits for the house owners by assuring loss for the house tenants. The economy in which people work to survive is quite real, but the gambling casino that enriches our rulers is a creation of faith based belief, as much as any theory of intelligent design or the big bang as originators of the universe. But we pay a heavy price, in the material world, for these intrigues in the immaterial.
From 1979 to 2008 the top 1% income group in the U.S.A. gained $600 billion annually , while the bottom 80 percent lost that same $600 billion. That's an average yearly gain of $500,000 at the top, while the bottom lost an average $8,000. Do we need a radical redistribution of income? Will Obama bring it about? Are you serious?
Between October 2007 and October 2008, $8.3 trillion vanished from Wall Street, which is our economic Vatican, though that Roman religious center may have more substance than the myth that serves as foundation for capital's capitol. Where did those trillions come from? Where did they go? Let's put those mind boggling numbers into some perspective:
1 trillion seconds = 32,000 years. More than 8 trillion dollars?
Personal debt in the United States was $13.8 trillion in March of 2008, while total reported income for 2007 was $12.4 trillion. If we owe more than 100% of what we make, that leaves nothing for rent, mortgage, food, clothing, health care, burgers , ballet and whatever else we need to make life wonderful, without even more borrowing. How can we survive without going into even greater debt than we've already accumulated? And credit is tightening, fast, while jobs are vanishing, even faster.
These are much bigger numbers and more serious problems than any racial symbolism or choreographed celebration can solve without radical transformation of a system that Obama is sworn to serve, not change.
Let's hope that the spirit of celebration becomes a force demanding real change, before the dream of a bright new day becomes the nightmare of a very long dark night. That fan club for an individual needs to become a movement for society, before war, unemployment and unpayable debts turn their idol into a scapegoat, and our nation into a dead zone . People need to keep the faith, by all means. But we can’t just exult over surface change and pray that it gets better. We need to organize for democratic change of substance, and work to create it, very soon.
Copyright (c) 2008 by Frank Scott. All rights reserved.
This text may be used and shared in accordance with the
fair-use provisions of U.S. copyright law, and it may be
archived and redistributed in electronic form, provided that
the author is notified and no fee is charged for access.
Archiving, redistribution, or republication of this text on
other terms, in any medium, requires the consent of the author
frank scott
email: frankscott@comcast.net
Friday, November 7, 2008
Obama and the Politics of Euphoria
After a seemingly eternal campaign in which Barack Obama shattered George Bush's record for gluttonous political expenditure, the U.S. has its first African American president. What it doesn't have is a president committed to a progressive agenda.
It would have been nice to have Cynthia McKinney as our first African-American president. She put Obama to shame by daring to intelligently discuss the dreadful problems the U.S. now faces, and how it might overcome them. She's got more balls than Obama and all the male members of Congress put together, but she's been run out of the House of Representatives twice by the Israel-forever fanatics, and therefore must be ignored.
Polls show the American people are much closer to Ralph Nader and McKinney in their political beliefs than they are to Obama. While the people favor a revived New Deal, Obama favors a revived U.S. Empire. His recent appointment of Rahm Emanuel as Chief of Staff does not bode well for the "change we need." Emanuel is an Israeli agent, a dual citizen, and a fanatic Jewish supremacist who once did a stint in the Israeli Army. In 2006, he was in charge of the Democratic electoral campaigns for Congress and worked to eliminate peace candidates in favor of "realistic" war candidates. Emanuel's brand of pragmatism worries that, in a worst-case scenario, pro-peace politicians might actually eliminate funding for the Iraq war. Since a large majority of Americans have long been opposed to the war, such a policy runs the risk of establishing an actual democracy in the U.S. This is intolerable. Elites must rule, and the people must stay on the sidelines.
As dismal as the political anticlimax of this election is sure to be, it is a victory of sorts that a bi-racial man has risen to the presidency in a deeply racist country that held black people as slaves for over two centuries. But it should be cause for alarm when that bi-racial man immediately appoints a Chief of Staff who has spent his career working to preserve Israeli apartheid. The stark hypocrisy calls for at least some reflection, but we're not seeing any. The evangelistic fervor on display at Obama rallies seems more like a religious revival campaign than it does a political movement. The adoring throngs have what Korean war veterans used to call the "forty mile gaze."
It wouldn't be fair to call Obama a sellout, since he has never challenged the imperial agenda in the first place. He just doesn't believe in democracy. His brand of "change" is slightly less obnoxious than John McCain's, but it's no bargain. He has no problem with the slow genocide in Gaza, favors a stepped up war in Afghanistan, and serenely contemplates a U.S. invasion of Pakistan and nuking of Iran in the interest of "fighting terrorism." In Iraq, he says the Bush "surge" has been a success, so he wants to draw down the troop levels to free up soldiers for expanding the war in Afghanistan. This is planned disaster masquerading as pragmatism. As Malcolm X used to say, you don't plunge a knife six inches into a man's back, then withdraw it two inches and call it progress. Progress would be an end to the politics-of-force altogether. Obama isn't going to stand up for that, we can be sure.
The good news from the election is that the American people have completely repudiated the ideology of the Reagan/Bush years. The bad news is that Obama hasn't, and won't.
-----Michael K. Smith is the author of "Portraits of Empire" and "The Madness of King George (illustrations by Matt Wuerker)," both from Common Courage Press.
It would have been nice to have Cynthia McKinney as our first African-American president. She put Obama to shame by daring to intelligently discuss the dreadful problems the U.S. now faces, and how it might overcome them. She's got more balls than Obama and all the male members of Congress put together, but she's been run out of the House of Representatives twice by the Israel-forever fanatics, and therefore must be ignored.
Polls show the American people are much closer to Ralph Nader and McKinney in their political beliefs than they are to Obama. While the people favor a revived New Deal, Obama favors a revived U.S. Empire. His recent appointment of Rahm Emanuel as Chief of Staff does not bode well for the "change we need." Emanuel is an Israeli agent, a dual citizen, and a fanatic Jewish supremacist who once did a stint in the Israeli Army. In 2006, he was in charge of the Democratic electoral campaigns for Congress and worked to eliminate peace candidates in favor of "realistic" war candidates. Emanuel's brand of pragmatism worries that, in a worst-case scenario, pro-peace politicians might actually eliminate funding for the Iraq war. Since a large majority of Americans have long been opposed to the war, such a policy runs the risk of establishing an actual democracy in the U.S. This is intolerable. Elites must rule, and the people must stay on the sidelines.
As dismal as the political anticlimax of this election is sure to be, it is a victory of sorts that a bi-racial man has risen to the presidency in a deeply racist country that held black people as slaves for over two centuries. But it should be cause for alarm when that bi-racial man immediately appoints a Chief of Staff who has spent his career working to preserve Israeli apartheid. The stark hypocrisy calls for at least some reflection, but we're not seeing any. The evangelistic fervor on display at Obama rallies seems more like a religious revival campaign than it does a political movement. The adoring throngs have what Korean war veterans used to call the "forty mile gaze."
It wouldn't be fair to call Obama a sellout, since he has never challenged the imperial agenda in the first place. He just doesn't believe in democracy. His brand of "change" is slightly less obnoxious than John McCain's, but it's no bargain. He has no problem with the slow genocide in Gaza, favors a stepped up war in Afghanistan, and serenely contemplates a U.S. invasion of Pakistan and nuking of Iran in the interest of "fighting terrorism." In Iraq, he says the Bush "surge" has been a success, so he wants to draw down the troop levels to free up soldiers for expanding the war in Afghanistan. This is planned disaster masquerading as pragmatism. As Malcolm X used to say, you don't plunge a knife six inches into a man's back, then withdraw it two inches and call it progress. Progress would be an end to the politics-of-force altogether. Obama isn't going to stand up for that, we can be sure.
The good news from the election is that the American people have completely repudiated the ideology of the Reagan/Bush years. The bad news is that Obama hasn't, and won't.
-----Michael K. Smith is the author of "Portraits of Empire" and "The Madness of King George (illustrations by Matt Wuerker)," both from Common Courage Press.
Monday, October 20, 2008
Change? Yeah, Right
“It is now clear that the U.S. financial system is in cardiac arrest.”
– New York economist Nouriel Roubini
“The world is on the edge of the abyss because of an irresponsible system.”
– French Prime Minister François Fillon
“If money isn't loosened up, this sucker could go down.”
-George Bush
And those are supporters of capitalism. Here’s what one socialist has to say :
“The world will never be the same after this crisis. A new world has to emerge, and it is a multipolar world. We are decoupling from the wagon of death.”
-Hugo Chavez
Chavez is kind in calling global capitalism a “wagon” of death , given the speed at which this missile is hurtling towards destruction. Problems unnoticed by establishment leaders only a short while ago have become major threats to the superstructure of an economy which has been rotting at its foundation for quite some time. But present fears expressed by those most responsible for speeding up the process of decomposition never question the system. Only greedy people and bad ideas are responsible for market chaos , and it’s easy to find individual demons for the blame game. But we need to see the whole picture and not just the trees on which mind managers focus our attention, while they blur the rest of the forest. We live as renters in a fast deteriorating public environment , while we are directed to protect only specially chosen private landlords.
This system has always privatized profits and socialized loss, but never to the massive extent of recent experience. The sorry state of political disorganization allows this gigantic rip-off to go on without a furious demand for a new economic order. We collectively lend billions to the banks, and then go to them as individuals and plead for a loan or credit line. But don’t hang by your lip expecting leadership for a new order to come out of this election.
That seemingly endless Halloween Horror of a campaign will likely bring victory (?) to the lesser evil half-white, over the greater evil half-wit. Both serve corporate command, sharing slavish devotion to the privately controlled market, the global empire and the Jewish colonial state in Israel. Representing those with the highest capacity for accumulating wealth , the greater evil has directed his campaign at those with the lowest capacity for accumulating knowledge. The lesser evil has relied on a massive ad campaign stressing symbolic hope and is certainly less debased than the other, as polio is less deadly than cancer. But whichever one moves into the publicly subsidized usually All - White House , both assure that we will still be suffering a malignant disease . The taxpayer burden of support for rich welfare chiselers, now claiming billions in payments almost every day, will continue no matter which chairperson capital has had rubber stamped by a minority of the electorate.
A choice of Nader or McKinney would be for real change, but given the control still exercised in support of crackpot realism , few will cast such a vote. Perverse democracy reproduces perverse leadership, with differences that are physically minimal and only appear significant to the psychologically desperate. But they mean continued disaster for a society still addicted to the political drugs administered by servants of the status quo, presented to them as agents of a word without meaning in this context: change.
The drain on taxpayers is greatest in supporting a global killing machine of weaponry, armies and foreign military bases to make wars that preserve the empire . It will still be a while before this imperial energy guzzler finally runs out of gas, but its over extended forces were helpless in Georgia , and further signs of its diminished capacity are evident, for which we should be at least slightly grateful. The ghouls who wish to increase bloodshed in Afghanistan , like the half-white and the half-wit , can only do so by decreasing bloodshed in Iraq. The end may indeed be near, but it can’t come soon enough for those still in the path of this “wagon of death”.
But singling out presidents, CEOs and other market culprits only clouds the mind with satanic symbols so that a demonic system escapes perception, let alone understanding. For the present that system will continue bringing great wealth to some, but for the future, it threatens more wars, poverty and devastation for all .
We need real democratic change, from the roots of our political economy, and we need to create it before it is forced on us by further calamity . Americans should take heart at foreigners who, with far less material wealth, take control of their own social environments. They are ridding themselves of corrupt and unjust old orders run by and for minorities , and creating truly democratic new ones for the benefit of previously unrepresented and terribly exploited majorities. We will eventually have to do the same thing, for our own survival. The signs are clear that this farce cannot go on much longer, unless we believe in race suicide.
Just don't expect anything substantial to happen after November’s vote , except for; a possible market boom, tales of new riches , the survival of capitalism, and shortly thereafter , the next bust. Let’s hope it isn't the final explosion, and we’d best be working to uncouple ourselves from this “wagon of death” long before that occurs. While prayer for that outcome may be useful to some, action will need to be taken by all for real change to occur.
And that doesn't simply mean changing the age, sex or race of a leader, but the nature and practice of democratic organization of a society in order to truly serve all of its people. In the process of creating such change in the USA, we would not only save ourselves, but help serve humanity as well.
Copyright (c) 2008 by Frank Scott. All rights reserved.
This text may be used and shared in accordance with the
fair-use provisions of U.S. copyright law, and it may be
archived and redistributed in electronic form, provided that
the author is notified and no fee is charged for access.
Archiving, redistribution, or republication of this text on
other terms, in any medium, requires the consent of the author
frank scott
email: frankscott@comcast.net
– New York economist Nouriel Roubini
“The world is on the edge of the abyss because of an irresponsible system.”
– French Prime Minister François Fillon
“If money isn't loosened up, this sucker could go down.”
-George Bush
And those are supporters of capitalism. Here’s what one socialist has to say :
“The world will never be the same after this crisis. A new world has to emerge, and it is a multipolar world. We are decoupling from the wagon of death.”
-Hugo Chavez
Chavez is kind in calling global capitalism a “wagon” of death , given the speed at which this missile is hurtling towards destruction. Problems unnoticed by establishment leaders only a short while ago have become major threats to the superstructure of an economy which has been rotting at its foundation for quite some time. But present fears expressed by those most responsible for speeding up the process of decomposition never question the system. Only greedy people and bad ideas are responsible for market chaos , and it’s easy to find individual demons for the blame game. But we need to see the whole picture and not just the trees on which mind managers focus our attention, while they blur the rest of the forest. We live as renters in a fast deteriorating public environment , while we are directed to protect only specially chosen private landlords.
This system has always privatized profits and socialized loss, but never to the massive extent of recent experience. The sorry state of political disorganization allows this gigantic rip-off to go on without a furious demand for a new economic order. We collectively lend billions to the banks, and then go to them as individuals and plead for a loan or credit line. But don’t hang by your lip expecting leadership for a new order to come out of this election.
That seemingly endless Halloween Horror of a campaign will likely bring victory (?) to the lesser evil half-white, over the greater evil half-wit. Both serve corporate command, sharing slavish devotion to the privately controlled market, the global empire and the Jewish colonial state in Israel. Representing those with the highest capacity for accumulating wealth , the greater evil has directed his campaign at those with the lowest capacity for accumulating knowledge. The lesser evil has relied on a massive ad campaign stressing symbolic hope and is certainly less debased than the other, as polio is less deadly than cancer. But whichever one moves into the publicly subsidized usually All - White House , both assure that we will still be suffering a malignant disease . The taxpayer burden of support for rich welfare chiselers, now claiming billions in payments almost every day, will continue no matter which chairperson capital has had rubber stamped by a minority of the electorate.
A choice of Nader or McKinney would be for real change, but given the control still exercised in support of crackpot realism , few will cast such a vote. Perverse democracy reproduces perverse leadership, with differences that are physically minimal and only appear significant to the psychologically desperate. But they mean continued disaster for a society still addicted to the political drugs administered by servants of the status quo, presented to them as agents of a word without meaning in this context: change.
The drain on taxpayers is greatest in supporting a global killing machine of weaponry, armies and foreign military bases to make wars that preserve the empire . It will still be a while before this imperial energy guzzler finally runs out of gas, but its over extended forces were helpless in Georgia , and further signs of its diminished capacity are evident, for which we should be at least slightly grateful. The ghouls who wish to increase bloodshed in Afghanistan , like the half-white and the half-wit , can only do so by decreasing bloodshed in Iraq. The end may indeed be near, but it can’t come soon enough for those still in the path of this “wagon of death”.
But singling out presidents, CEOs and other market culprits only clouds the mind with satanic symbols so that a demonic system escapes perception, let alone understanding. For the present that system will continue bringing great wealth to some, but for the future, it threatens more wars, poverty and devastation for all .
We need real democratic change, from the roots of our political economy, and we need to create it before it is forced on us by further calamity . Americans should take heart at foreigners who, with far less material wealth, take control of their own social environments. They are ridding themselves of corrupt and unjust old orders run by and for minorities , and creating truly democratic new ones for the benefit of previously unrepresented and terribly exploited majorities. We will eventually have to do the same thing, for our own survival. The signs are clear that this farce cannot go on much longer, unless we believe in race suicide.
Just don't expect anything substantial to happen after November’s vote , except for; a possible market boom, tales of new riches , the survival of capitalism, and shortly thereafter , the next bust. Let’s hope it isn't the final explosion, and we’d best be working to uncouple ourselves from this “wagon of death” long before that occurs. While prayer for that outcome may be useful to some, action will need to be taken by all for real change to occur.
And that doesn't simply mean changing the age, sex or race of a leader, but the nature and practice of democratic organization of a society in order to truly serve all of its people. In the process of creating such change in the USA, we would not only save ourselves, but help serve humanity as well.
Copyright (c) 2008 by Frank Scott. All rights reserved.
This text may be used and shared in accordance with the
fair-use provisions of U.S. copyright law, and it may be
archived and redistributed in electronic form, provided that
the author is notified and no fee is charged for access.
Archiving, redistribution, or republication of this text on
other terms, in any medium, requires the consent of the author
frank scott
email: frankscott@comcast.net
Sunday, October 12, 2008
The Great Depression and the Myth of FDR
For once the ticker tape was not exaggerating.
Panicked traders scrambling to dump everything at once bellowed like a herd of wounded beasts. On the floor of the exchange Post Two descended into outright madness as General Oliver Bridgeman's plummeting U.S. Steel stock flushed the entire economy away. Crouched down to scribble frantically on a pad of paper, Bridgeman leaped up shouting over the din in a vain attempt to stop the hemorrhaging prices.
At Post Four - Anaconda, Caterpillar Tractor, Southern Pacific, U.S. Pipe and Foundry, General Motors - a sweaty trader went insane, shrieking hysterical orders until friends took him by the arm and led him away.
Leading industrials dropped forty points and the Dow Jones Industrial Average plummeted a record 13% in a single day. With ruined investors devastated, a reporter announced that brokers were working "like shell shocked soldiers," sweat pouring down their faces, their collars and shirts torn to shreds.
Outside the exchange, a hint of violence charged the air as a silent crowd stood on the steps of Federal Hall, hands in pockets, hats pulled low, eyes fixed grimly ahead. A strange noise arose from the streets - first a murmur, then a hum, finally a roar of stunned disbelief.
At the House of Morgan Thomas Lamont dangled his prince-nez and addressed a mob of reporters: "There has been a little distress selling on the Stock Exchange . . ." Representatives of thirty-five of the largest wire houses on Wall Street issued a joint statement claiming that the market was "fundamentally sound" and that "the worst has passed."
So occurred the Great Crash of 1929. The reason was a growing disequilibrium between capitalism's immense productive capacity and its aggregate purchasing power. In the twenties low wages and high profits caused industrial productivity to outstrip consumer purchasing power. By the end of the decade a microscopic minority of investors possessed far more wealth than it could productively spend or invest while 70% of non-farm families lacked sufficient income with which to sustain an adequate diet. Six million families, 42% of the total, earned less than $1000 a year and could not make the profit system respond to their unmet needs.
Soaring productivity exacerbated the problem, as mechanization, increasing sophistication of industrial processing, and greater specialization of the labor force produced more for less and concentrated wealth in ever fewer hands. Foreign investment, installment credit, and stock speculation postponed the day of reckoning for a short time, but when hugely inflated stock prices and proliferating numbers of stocks spooked buyers in October 1929, the market went into a deep crash.
Amidst the vast economic misery occasioned by the collapse, an increasingly militant working class resistance emerged, ushering in social democratic reforms that had been won decades earlier in more civilized societies. In 1932, the Norris-LaGuardia Act was passed, exempting unions from antitrust prosecution. Three years later the Wagner Act legalized the right to organize, elevating workers from an anonymous mass of productive atoms to a legitimate class whose grievances had to be negotiated. The same year the Social Security Act opened the door to government funded old-age insurance - over the screams of private industry. (Old age pensions had been enacted in Bismarck's Germany in 1870, in Austria in 1881, Norway in 1894, Finland in 1895, Britain in 1897, and France, Italy, and Denmark in 1898.)
The upsurge of strikes, demonstrations, and factory occupations that made such changes possible alarmed the business community, which worried about revolution and the guillotine just a few years after having declared history over with an assumed permanent victory for the business classes. The National Association of Manufacturers warned in 1938 that "the newly realized political power of the masses" posed unprecedented danger. "Unless their thinking is directed," it added, "we are definitely headed for adversity." A corporate counteroffensive quickly developed new methods of strike-breaking, manipulative "human relations" policies in personnel, and enormous propaganda efforts dedicated to smearing union organizers as treasonous "Reds."
Contrary to much mythologizing, President Roosevelt sought to harness the working class to capitalism, not emancipate it from the exploitative system, and he actually started out more conservatively than Herbert Hoover. He handed government authority to people who wanted to control workers and retain power in the business classes. He was sincere in his efforts to ameliorate the worst symptoms of the profit system, but only in order to stabilize it and prevent stronger measures from being undertaken by angry workers determined to find a permanent cure to the booms, busts, panics, and breakdowns that had plunged millions of workers into untold misery for generations. For example, the Wagner Act was designed to reverse labor's radical direction and restore passivity and continuous production by institutionalizing the authority of conservative labor leaders over the rank and file. The goal was to direct labor militancy into legalistic procedure and away from sit-down strikes. In general, FDR's labor laws sought to make labor "responsible" by inducing its leaders to become dependent on state and corporate support that could later be contracted or withdrawn.
Similarly, federal relief was implemented to cool off mass protest, defeat Norman Thomas's bid for the presidency as the Socialist Party nominee, limit violent upheaval, and banish the threat of revolution. Wherever organized labor was strong, the New Deal offered concessions, but where it was weak it declined to help; and when militant upheaval abated, aid was sharply cut, imposing suffering worse than any since the Crash itself.
Such policies were only to be expected from FDR's appointees, most of whom were decidedly anti-working class. His first Secretary of State, Cordell Hull, was from the overtly racist and anti-labor wing of the Democratic Party. Jesse Jones, a conservative millionaire newspaper owner, headed the Reconstruction Finance Corporation and later the Commerce Department, and was a great friend of the monopolists. War Secretary Henry Stimson was a Wall Street attorney who negotiated General Somoza into power in Nicaragua. The under-secretary of State was Edward Stettinius, a U.S. Steel millionaire. The Chief of the National Recovery Administration was General Hugh H. Johnson, who went to San Francisco and declared the 1934 general strike there a "menace to the government," which it certainly was. But he offered no clue why government that ushered in economic collapse shouldn't be menaced with workers' control.
New Deal reforms did go well beyond prior legislation, but they never contemplated far-reaching changes in the system that had created the disaster. The Roosevelt Administration's reforms called not for a realignment of classes, but for industry cooperation in implementing government-directed reforms. As a result, men were paid to rake leaves and build mausoleums, but not to work idle machines producing the means to feed and clothe themselves. Only massive public enterprise could have moved the U.S. fully into the era of social democracy, but the New Deal shunned social planning and rejected government responsibility for full employment, in favor of high joblessness and unemployment insurance. Charity for workers and entitlement for the corporations that held them down continued to be the operative values.
In fact, the New Deal was a boon to private industry. The "code authorities" of the National Recovery Administration were drawn heavily from the ranks of big business. They restricted production and set prices that benefited major corporations at the expense of their smaller rivals,, and primed the production pump by funneling torrents of public cash into the hands of financial elites. In nine years the Reconstruction Finance Insurance Corporation extended big business $15 billion in loans.
The federal housing program awarded subsidies to construction firms and insured the loans of mortgage bankers. Agricultural price supports and production cutbacks aided large producers while displacing tenant farmers and sharecroppers when federal acreage rental programs withdrew lands from cultivation. The Civilian Conservation Corps provided subsistence jobs for just three million of the 15 million people out of work. The Works Project Administration sporadically employed 9 million people at wages below the norm in private industry. Of twelve million people working for less than 40 cents an hour, only half a million benefited from the minimum wage law - just over 4% of them. The Social Security Act covered but half the population and offered no medical insurance or protection against pre-retirement illness. Welfare programs were funded not by a wealth tax, but by regressive payroll and sales taxes.
Finally, only the massive war orders of the 1940s lifted the economy out of the Depression, so if anyone deserves credit for curing that catastrophe it is Adolf Hitler, not Franklin Roosevelt.
As for the grotesquely lopsided distribution of wealth that precipitated this and every other economic crisis under capitalism, researchers have found that income inequality persisted unchanged through the Hoover, Roosevelt and Truman years.
Sources:
Professor Frank Stricker, "Causes of the Great Depression," California State University Dominguez Hills course materials 1993
Howard Zinn, "A People's History of the United States," (Harper, 1995)
Michael Parenti, "Democracy For the Few," (St. Martins, 1995)
Daniel R. Fusfeld, "The Economic Thought of Franklin D. Roosevelt and the Origins of the New Deal," (Columbia, 1954)
I. F. Stone, "The War Years, 1939-1945," (Little Brown & Company, 1988)
Noam Chomsky, "Deterring Democracy," (Hill and Wang, 1991)
Noam Chomsky, "Year 501 - The Conquest Continues," (South End, 1993)
Richard O. Boyer and Herber M. Morais, "Labor's Untold Story," (Cameron Associates, 1955)
John Spritzler, "The People As Enemy - The Leaders' Hidden Agenda in World War II," (Black Rose, 2003)
Gardner, Lloyd C., "Safe For Democracy: The Anglo-American Response to Revolution, 1913-1923," (Oxford, 1984)
Wiesen-Cook, Blanche, "Eleanor Roosevelt - The Defining Years, 1933-1938," (Penguin, 1999)
------Michael K. Smith is the author of "The Madness of King George" (illustrations by Matt Wuerker), "Portraits of Empire," and "Rise To Empire" (forthcoming), all with Common Courage Press
Panicked traders scrambling to dump everything at once bellowed like a herd of wounded beasts. On the floor of the exchange Post Two descended into outright madness as General Oliver Bridgeman's plummeting U.S. Steel stock flushed the entire economy away. Crouched down to scribble frantically on a pad of paper, Bridgeman leaped up shouting over the din in a vain attempt to stop the hemorrhaging prices.
At Post Four - Anaconda, Caterpillar Tractor, Southern Pacific, U.S. Pipe and Foundry, General Motors - a sweaty trader went insane, shrieking hysterical orders until friends took him by the arm and led him away.
Leading industrials dropped forty points and the Dow Jones Industrial Average plummeted a record 13% in a single day. With ruined investors devastated, a reporter announced that brokers were working "like shell shocked soldiers," sweat pouring down their faces, their collars and shirts torn to shreds.
Outside the exchange, a hint of violence charged the air as a silent crowd stood on the steps of Federal Hall, hands in pockets, hats pulled low, eyes fixed grimly ahead. A strange noise arose from the streets - first a murmur, then a hum, finally a roar of stunned disbelief.
At the House of Morgan Thomas Lamont dangled his prince-nez and addressed a mob of reporters: "There has been a little distress selling on the Stock Exchange . . ." Representatives of thirty-five of the largest wire houses on Wall Street issued a joint statement claiming that the market was "fundamentally sound" and that "the worst has passed."
So occurred the Great Crash of 1929. The reason was a growing disequilibrium between capitalism's immense productive capacity and its aggregate purchasing power. In the twenties low wages and high profits caused industrial productivity to outstrip consumer purchasing power. By the end of the decade a microscopic minority of investors possessed far more wealth than it could productively spend or invest while 70% of non-farm families lacked sufficient income with which to sustain an adequate diet. Six million families, 42% of the total, earned less than $1000 a year and could not make the profit system respond to their unmet needs.
Soaring productivity exacerbated the problem, as mechanization, increasing sophistication of industrial processing, and greater specialization of the labor force produced more for less and concentrated wealth in ever fewer hands. Foreign investment, installment credit, and stock speculation postponed the day of reckoning for a short time, but when hugely inflated stock prices and proliferating numbers of stocks spooked buyers in October 1929, the market went into a deep crash.
Amidst the vast economic misery occasioned by the collapse, an increasingly militant working class resistance emerged, ushering in social democratic reforms that had been won decades earlier in more civilized societies. In 1932, the Norris-LaGuardia Act was passed, exempting unions from antitrust prosecution. Three years later the Wagner Act legalized the right to organize, elevating workers from an anonymous mass of productive atoms to a legitimate class whose grievances had to be negotiated. The same year the Social Security Act opened the door to government funded old-age insurance - over the screams of private industry. (Old age pensions had been enacted in Bismarck's Germany in 1870, in Austria in 1881, Norway in 1894, Finland in 1895, Britain in 1897, and France, Italy, and Denmark in 1898.)
The upsurge of strikes, demonstrations, and factory occupations that made such changes possible alarmed the business community, which worried about revolution and the guillotine just a few years after having declared history over with an assumed permanent victory for the business classes. The National Association of Manufacturers warned in 1938 that "the newly realized political power of the masses" posed unprecedented danger. "Unless their thinking is directed," it added, "we are definitely headed for adversity." A corporate counteroffensive quickly developed new methods of strike-breaking, manipulative "human relations" policies in personnel, and enormous propaganda efforts dedicated to smearing union organizers as treasonous "Reds."
Contrary to much mythologizing, President Roosevelt sought to harness the working class to capitalism, not emancipate it from the exploitative system, and he actually started out more conservatively than Herbert Hoover. He handed government authority to people who wanted to control workers and retain power in the business classes. He was sincere in his efforts to ameliorate the worst symptoms of the profit system, but only in order to stabilize it and prevent stronger measures from being undertaken by angry workers determined to find a permanent cure to the booms, busts, panics, and breakdowns that had plunged millions of workers into untold misery for generations. For example, the Wagner Act was designed to reverse labor's radical direction and restore passivity and continuous production by institutionalizing the authority of conservative labor leaders over the rank and file. The goal was to direct labor militancy into legalistic procedure and away from sit-down strikes. In general, FDR's labor laws sought to make labor "responsible" by inducing its leaders to become dependent on state and corporate support that could later be contracted or withdrawn.
Similarly, federal relief was implemented to cool off mass protest, defeat Norman Thomas's bid for the presidency as the Socialist Party nominee, limit violent upheaval, and banish the threat of revolution. Wherever organized labor was strong, the New Deal offered concessions, but where it was weak it declined to help; and when militant upheaval abated, aid was sharply cut, imposing suffering worse than any since the Crash itself.
Such policies were only to be expected from FDR's appointees, most of whom were decidedly anti-working class. His first Secretary of State, Cordell Hull, was from the overtly racist and anti-labor wing of the Democratic Party. Jesse Jones, a conservative millionaire newspaper owner, headed the Reconstruction Finance Corporation and later the Commerce Department, and was a great friend of the monopolists. War Secretary Henry Stimson was a Wall Street attorney who negotiated General Somoza into power in Nicaragua. The under-secretary of State was Edward Stettinius, a U.S. Steel millionaire. The Chief of the National Recovery Administration was General Hugh H. Johnson, who went to San Francisco and declared the 1934 general strike there a "menace to the government," which it certainly was. But he offered no clue why government that ushered in economic collapse shouldn't be menaced with workers' control.
New Deal reforms did go well beyond prior legislation, but they never contemplated far-reaching changes in the system that had created the disaster. The Roosevelt Administration's reforms called not for a realignment of classes, but for industry cooperation in implementing government-directed reforms. As a result, men were paid to rake leaves and build mausoleums, but not to work idle machines producing the means to feed and clothe themselves. Only massive public enterprise could have moved the U.S. fully into the era of social democracy, but the New Deal shunned social planning and rejected government responsibility for full employment, in favor of high joblessness and unemployment insurance. Charity for workers and entitlement for the corporations that held them down continued to be the operative values.
In fact, the New Deal was a boon to private industry. The "code authorities" of the National Recovery Administration were drawn heavily from the ranks of big business. They restricted production and set prices that benefited major corporations at the expense of their smaller rivals,, and primed the production pump by funneling torrents of public cash into the hands of financial elites. In nine years the Reconstruction Finance Insurance Corporation extended big business $15 billion in loans.
The federal housing program awarded subsidies to construction firms and insured the loans of mortgage bankers. Agricultural price supports and production cutbacks aided large producers while displacing tenant farmers and sharecroppers when federal acreage rental programs withdrew lands from cultivation. The Civilian Conservation Corps provided subsistence jobs for just three million of the 15 million people out of work. The Works Project Administration sporadically employed 9 million people at wages below the norm in private industry. Of twelve million people working for less than 40 cents an hour, only half a million benefited from the minimum wage law - just over 4% of them. The Social Security Act covered but half the population and offered no medical insurance or protection against pre-retirement illness. Welfare programs were funded not by a wealth tax, but by regressive payroll and sales taxes.
Finally, only the massive war orders of the 1940s lifted the economy out of the Depression, so if anyone deserves credit for curing that catastrophe it is Adolf Hitler, not Franklin Roosevelt.
As for the grotesquely lopsided distribution of wealth that precipitated this and every other economic crisis under capitalism, researchers have found that income inequality persisted unchanged through the Hoover, Roosevelt and Truman years.
Sources:
Professor Frank Stricker, "Causes of the Great Depression," California State University Dominguez Hills course materials 1993
Howard Zinn, "A People's History of the United States," (Harper, 1995)
Michael Parenti, "Democracy For the Few," (St. Martins, 1995)
Daniel R. Fusfeld, "The Economic Thought of Franklin D. Roosevelt and the Origins of the New Deal," (Columbia, 1954)
I. F. Stone, "The War Years, 1939-1945," (Little Brown & Company, 1988)
Noam Chomsky, "Deterring Democracy," (Hill and Wang, 1991)
Noam Chomsky, "Year 501 - The Conquest Continues," (South End, 1993)
Richard O. Boyer and Herber M. Morais, "Labor's Untold Story," (Cameron Associates, 1955)
John Spritzler, "The People As Enemy - The Leaders' Hidden Agenda in World War II," (Black Rose, 2003)
Gardner, Lloyd C., "Safe For Democracy: The Anglo-American Response to Revolution, 1913-1923," (Oxford, 1984)
Wiesen-Cook, Blanche, "Eleanor Roosevelt - The Defining Years, 1933-1938," (Penguin, 1999)
------Michael K. Smith is the author of "The Madness of King George" (illustrations by Matt Wuerker), "Portraits of Empire," and "Rise To Empire" (forthcoming), all with Common Courage Press
Friday, October 10, 2008
CHANGE?
“It is now clear that the U.S. financial system is in cardiac arrest.”
– New York University economist Nouriel Roubini
“The world is on the edge of the abyss because of an irresponsible system.”
– French Prime Minister François Fillon
“If money isn't loosened up, this sucker could go down.”
-George Bush
And those are supporters of capitalism. Imagine what socialist critics of the system are saying? Here’s an example:
“The world will never be the same after this crisis. A new world has to emerge, and it is a multipolar world. We are decoupling from the wagon of death.”
-Hugo Chavez
Calling global capitalism a “wagon of death” might seem rather kind, given the sonic pace at which this missile seems to be speeding towards destruction. Problems totally unnoticed by mainstream economists and politicians only a short while ago have become major threats to the entire superstructure of the global economy. Its foundation has been rotting for quite some time, but present cries of fear and panic coming from those most responsible for speeding up the process of decomposition will not look to the system, but only the evil people and bad ideas which they blame for this deadly mess.
In the short term it will be easy to find demons for the individual blame game, but for the long term we’d better begin looking at the whole picture and not just which trees our mind managers choose to bring into sharp focus, while they blur the forest.
The shock and awe of murderous foreign policy has always been an extension of the shuck, jive and owe of domestic economic policy. But none of that works any more, even though it may still take a while for this imperial energy guzzler to finally run out of military gas. Already, the puppet in Georgia saw how weak the imperial protector was when he foolishly invaded Ossetia and expected aid from the U.S. and its NATO lackeys. But over extended global forces could hardly help, and the Russians easily prevailed while asserting themselves, once again, as a global power . Further signs of systemic diminished capacity are evident, for which the world should be slightly grateful. For the murderous ghouls who wish to do so , the only way to increase bloodshed in Afghanistan is to decrease bloodletting in Iraq. The end may indeed be near, but it can’t come soon enough for those still in the path of this “wagon of death”.
And the seemingly endless Halloween show of a presidential campaign will finally bring victory (?) to either the Democrat half - white lesser evil, or the Republican half - wit greater evil. Both are servants of the same corporate command, sharing slavish devotion to global empire and the Jewish colonial state of Israel. One may certainly be less debased than the other, as polio is less malevolent than cancer. But whichever one moves into the subsidized housing at the usually all-White House, both assure that we will still be suffering a malignant disease . It will only add to the taxpayer burden of support for the rich minority of welfare chiselers, now claiming hundreds of billions from the majority bill payers, every minute of every day.
Corporate media and members of congress responsible for letting things get out of hand are fond of singling out overpaid CEOs and other market culprits, but naming individuals only continues clouding minds with satanic symbols so that a truly demonic system cannot be perceived. That system works to continue bringing short term wealth to a few, but only by threatening everyone else with long term destitution.
A vote for Nader or McKinney will be for real and not simply rhetorical change, but only a few will cast it , given the control mind management still exercises over the population. That control may not last much longer, and good riddance. Like the perverse economy, perverse democracy can only reproduce perverted leadership, with differences that only look significant to those who can afford to pay for them. But they represent continued disasters for those unable to afford the drug of servants of the status quo , presented to them as agents of populist change.
We desperately need real democratic change, and not the kind that is forced on us by calamity and war. The kind being affected by foreigners who are demanding and taking control of their own social environments, ridding themselves of the old order by creating a new one. We will eventually have to do the same thing, for our own survival. The signs are clear that this farce cannot go on much longer, unless we consider committing race suicide.
Just don't expect anything substantial to happen after November, except for a possible temporary market boom and tales of new riches and the survival of capitalism, which will soon be followed by the next bust. Let’s hope it isn't the final explosion. But we’d best be uncoupling ourselves from this “wagon of death” before that occurs, and while prayer may be useful to some, action will need to be taken by all for real change to occur. And it must be not simply in the age, sex or race of an individual leader, but in the nature and practice of a democratic organization of society to truly serve all of our people. We could help save humanity in the process. We’d better get to it, fast.
Copyright (c) 2008 by Frank Scott. All rights reserved.
This text may be used and shared in accordance with the
fair-use provisions of U.S. copyright law, and it may be
archived and redistributed in electronic form, provided that
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frank scott
email: frankscott@comcast.net
– New York University economist Nouriel Roubini
“The world is on the edge of the abyss because of an irresponsible system.”
– French Prime Minister François Fillon
“If money isn't loosened up, this sucker could go down.”
-George Bush
And those are supporters of capitalism. Imagine what socialist critics of the system are saying? Here’s an example:
“The world will never be the same after this crisis. A new world has to emerge, and it is a multipolar world. We are decoupling from the wagon of death.”
-Hugo Chavez
Calling global capitalism a “wagon of death” might seem rather kind, given the sonic pace at which this missile seems to be speeding towards destruction. Problems totally unnoticed by mainstream economists and politicians only a short while ago have become major threats to the entire superstructure of the global economy. Its foundation has been rotting for quite some time, but present cries of fear and panic coming from those most responsible for speeding up the process of decomposition will not look to the system, but only the evil people and bad ideas which they blame for this deadly mess.
In the short term it will be easy to find demons for the individual blame game, but for the long term we’d better begin looking at the whole picture and not just which trees our mind managers choose to bring into sharp focus, while they blur the forest.
The shock and awe of murderous foreign policy has always been an extension of the shuck, jive and owe of domestic economic policy. But none of that works any more, even though it may still take a while for this imperial energy guzzler to finally run out of military gas. Already, the puppet in Georgia saw how weak the imperial protector was when he foolishly invaded Ossetia and expected aid from the U.S. and its NATO lackeys. But over extended global forces could hardly help, and the Russians easily prevailed while asserting themselves, once again, as a global power . Further signs of systemic diminished capacity are evident, for which the world should be slightly grateful. For the murderous ghouls who wish to do so , the only way to increase bloodshed in Afghanistan is to decrease bloodletting in Iraq. The end may indeed be near, but it can’t come soon enough for those still in the path of this “wagon of death”.
And the seemingly endless Halloween show of a presidential campaign will finally bring victory (?) to either the Democrat half - white lesser evil, or the Republican half - wit greater evil. Both are servants of the same corporate command, sharing slavish devotion to global empire and the Jewish colonial state of Israel. One may certainly be less debased than the other, as polio is less malevolent than cancer. But whichever one moves into the subsidized housing at the usually all-White House, both assure that we will still be suffering a malignant disease . It will only add to the taxpayer burden of support for the rich minority of welfare chiselers, now claiming hundreds of billions from the majority bill payers, every minute of every day.
Corporate media and members of congress responsible for letting things get out of hand are fond of singling out overpaid CEOs and other market culprits, but naming individuals only continues clouding minds with satanic symbols so that a truly demonic system cannot be perceived. That system works to continue bringing short term wealth to a few, but only by threatening everyone else with long term destitution.
A vote for Nader or McKinney will be for real and not simply rhetorical change, but only a few will cast it , given the control mind management still exercises over the population. That control may not last much longer, and good riddance. Like the perverse economy, perverse democracy can only reproduce perverted leadership, with differences that only look significant to those who can afford to pay for them. But they represent continued disasters for those unable to afford the drug of servants of the status quo , presented to them as agents of populist change.
We desperately need real democratic change, and not the kind that is forced on us by calamity and war. The kind being affected by foreigners who are demanding and taking control of their own social environments, ridding themselves of the old order by creating a new one. We will eventually have to do the same thing, for our own survival. The signs are clear that this farce cannot go on much longer, unless we consider committing race suicide.
Just don't expect anything substantial to happen after November, except for a possible temporary market boom and tales of new riches and the survival of capitalism, which will soon be followed by the next bust. Let’s hope it isn't the final explosion. But we’d best be uncoupling ourselves from this “wagon of death” before that occurs, and while prayer may be useful to some, action will need to be taken by all for real change to occur. And it must be not simply in the age, sex or race of an individual leader, but in the nature and practice of a democratic organization of society to truly serve all of our people. We could help save humanity in the process. We’d better get to it, fast.
Copyright (c) 2008 by Frank Scott. All rights reserved.
This text may be used and shared in accordance with the
fair-use provisions of U.S. copyright law, and it may be
archived and redistributed in electronic form, provided that
the author is notified and no fee is charged for access.
Archiving, redistribution, or republication of this text on
other terms, in any medium, requires the consent of the author
frank scott
email: frankscott@comcast.net
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