BUSH WATCH...ERNEST PARTRIDGE

The Sleeping Giant Stirs

“The Americans will always do the right thing” Winston Churchill once remarked, “after they’ve exhausted all the alternatives.”

The American public may be running out of alternatives. If so, the Bush Administration and the Republicans have reason to be very worried.

It is all too easy to despair over the ignorance and gullibility of “the American mind.” This is a public, after all, a majority of which rejects the theory of evolution – the central coordinating concept of the biological sciences. In addition, the National Science Foundation reports that more than a third of Americans believe in UFOs and that astrology “has scientific merit.”

And yet, amazingly, at many crucial moments in our history, public opinion has somehow moved toward a wise and appropriate point of view.

For example, public support for the Vietnam war eroded until eventually the war was unsustainable. Richard Nixon’s landslide re-election in 1972 was no use to him when, less than two years later, the full extent of his “crimes and misdemeanors” became known and he was forced from office.

Throughout his presidency, Bill Clinton was hounded by a hostile press, while $70 million of taxpayers’ money was expended in search of a crime to fit the punishment. Eventually he was caught in a sexual indiscretion. It was then widely assumed that Clinton’s public approval scores would drop into the basement. Instead, “the hunting of the president” backfired as Clinton’s high approval scores held steady, while those of his tormentor, Kenneth Starr, plummeted.

And so right now, something remarkable is taking place. At long last, however belatedly, the public is beginning to appreciate the shallowness and incompetence of George Bush and the unparalleled mendacity and corruption of his administration. Moreover, it has arrived at this realization on its own, despite the determination of the captive mainstream media to hide these manifest failures from the public, through distraction, non-reporting, and occasionally through outright lies.

For five years, the Rovian smoke and mirrors have worked spectacularly well. A majority of the public was persuaded that Saddam Hussein had Weapons of Mass Destruction, was somehow behind the 9/11 attacks and was an active agent of al Qaeda. At the same time, the skeletons of Bush’s past – his AWOL from the Air National Guard, his business failures, his insider trading, his suspected drug use – were all kept hidden in the closet. A package of lies about Al Gore was concocted to “prove,” ironically, that Gore was a “serial liar.” John Kerry, an authentic war hero, was successfully portrayed as a coward and a fake.

Thus did the Bush message machine vanquish the Democratic opposition and reduce it to pathetic impotence. However, there was one adversary that Bush, Inc. could not defeat: reality. And at long last, reality is retaliating and the public is taking notice.

The failure of Bush’s FEMA to deal with the Katrina catastrophe can not be hidden forever from the public. Nor can the loss of manufacturing jobs and their export overseas. Nor can the rising price of gasoline and the obscene profits of the oil companies. Nor can the upward redistribution of national wealth from the producers to the owners of that wealth. Nor can the corruption and the consequent indictments or investigations of the malefactors: DeLay, Safavian, Frist, Libby, Abramoff, and now Tomlinson. Nor can the horrendous tales of torture in Bush’s Gulag. Nor can the shredding of our Constitution and the loss of our “inalienable rights.” Nor can the mounting casualties from the Iraq war, as they return home in caskets (“transfer tubes”) or with broken minds and bodies. And despite the media conspiracy of silence, the evidence of election fraud can not be suppressed. The unthinkable is becoming thinkable.

Moreover, the public has a memory. The weak but growing voice of the independent progressive media and internet has recorded and now broadcasts the lies in the voices of the liars: “Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction." (Cheney, August, 2002) "We know where [the WMDs] are. They are in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad." (Rumsfeld, May, 2003). "We found the weapons of mass destruction." (Bush, May, 2003).

Despite their self-congratulatory myth of rugged individualism, Americans are herd animals; they look around, then follow the crowd. When Bush’s approval scores were in the high eighties and the media were meekly and uncritically passing on the official lies, few dared to resist. Troublesome news, such as election fraud, foreign opposition, citizen protests, the looting of the treasury, and the Downing Street memos, were absent from the print and broadcasts of the mainstream media. Those in the media who did resist, like MSNBC’s Ashleigh Banfield and Phil Donanue, soon found themselves out of a job. Their example was not lost on the survivors. But now the beast is wounded and just a few of the bolder predators are coming out of the woods to investigate. At last, the hidden issues are beginning to come into play.

And the public? Ever so gradually, public opinion has shifted and now the critics and skeptics are in the majority. No longer can dissenters be successfully branded as traitors who “hate America.” More and more of us are remembering that America was born out of resistance to tyranny and has flourished through dissent and open debate. Protest is once again becoming fashionable, and there is a whiff of possible success in the air. The message of the American people to the media? “Lead, follow, or step out of the way. You have made yourselves irrelevant.”

When asked the secret of success in show business, George Burns replied: “sincerity – if you can fake that, you’ve got it made.” For five years, it worked for Bush and his gang, but now the public is finally seeing through the fakery. And once the politician loses his grip on the fakery – once he has lost the trust of the public -- he can never get it back.

And so, Bush’s approval and trust ratings are now in the mid-thirties, and heading south. According to the latest Washington Post/ABC poll, two-thirds of the public has a negative opinion of Bush’s ethics and believes that the country is headed in the wrong direction. Sixty percent believes that the Iraq war was a mistake. A majority doubts Bush’s honesty and integrity, and believes that Bush misled the country prior to the invasion of Iraq. And amazingly, a majority would want to see him impeached if it were proved (as is likely the case) that Bush lied to get the U.S. into the war.

Significantly, many GOP politicians and the media are beginning to sense that support of Bush and his administration is distinct liability – a liability that can cost the politicians their offices, and the media their audiences. Moreover, as the demise of the Miers nomination attests, the religious right is finally beginning to realize that they’ve been had, cynically kept on the GOP reservation with promises, such as the repeal of Roe v. Wade, that the GOP dare not fulfill.

Is it over for the Bush Administration? Don’t count on it. As I wrote at the outset: “at many crucial moments in our history” the American public gets it right. “At many crucial moments,” not all. There are no guarantees. And the Busheviks still have formidable weapons at their disposal as they struggle to maintain their grip on power.

Accordingly, this is no time for the opposition to sit at the sidelines, content to be spectators of the self-inflicted decline and fall of Bush, Inc. This malignant regime may not go over the precipice unless it is pushed.


What then is the ordinary citizen to do? The question requires a separate essay – several, in fact. But here are some brief suggestions.

Regarding election Fraud: Spread the word, person-to-person. Do your part to make respectable a skepticism of past elections and the demand for election reform. If the conspiracy of media silence is sustained and the paperless machines and secret software remain in place, the GOP won’t lose no matter what the voters have to say about it. If the fraud is exposed, they can’t win. It is just possible that if the polls forecast a Democratic blowout – say, twenty-plus percent – the GOP won’t dare to reverse the outcome. But beware: fake polls are not out of the question.

Thankfully, there is one institution that remains independent of Bushevik control: the criminal justice system. Thus the aforementioned criminal indictments, present and forthcoming. Herein may be the best hope for the restoration of honest and verifiable elections. In the United States, elections are administered at the local and state level. Surely there must be some prosecutors somewhere in the realm prepared to investigate this crime with the powerful instruments of subpoena, discovery and perjury threat. So let us, as concerned citizens, demand criminal investigation and prosecutions of the crime of voting fraud.

Put pressure on the media. Boycott the offending corporate media and their sponsors, and tell them that you are doing so. Demand that they investigate malfeasance of office and report “all the news that’s fit to print” about issues of public concern. And if they won’t, make them irrelevant. As Sinclair Broadcasting learned in the last election, if right-wing propaganda results in a loss of market-share, the management must answer to the stockholders.

Support the alternative independent media and the progressive internet – the last, best hope of a free press that the founders of our republic insisted was indispensable to a republic of free citizens.

Encourage progressive candidates to oppose the “GOP-lite” Democrats in the primaries. Even if the “Democrats in Name Only” (DINOs) win, they will be given a message: “represent us, or next time your done for!”

And write your Senators and Congress members, repeatedly. Send a constant stream of letters to the editor. Add your feet and voices to the public protests. Organize!


At the close of the 1970 movie, “Tora, Tora, Tora,,” Admiral Isoruko Yamamoto warns his staff: "I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant and fill him with a terrible resolve." The words are those of the screenwriter, not the Admiral: there is no evidence that Yamamoto ever said this. No matter, the words fit our times.

Today, the great American public stirs. But will it awake? In the captive corporate media, there is no Edward R. Murrow or Walter Cronkite in evidence who will protest the evil issuing from the White House and the Congress, much less a media management willing to give them a microphone. There is no John Dean from inside this malignant regime that will step forward and volunteer to break open this criminal conspiracy – at least, not yet.

It is up to us, the American public, and it is possible that we the people are finally beginning to wake up. But there are no guarantees that we will prevail, restore our Constitution and our rights, and win back our country.

This is no time for each of us to stand alone, looking after our own diminishing self-interests, and privately but uselessly lamenting our fates. Echoing Jesus of Nazareth, Mohandas Gandhi spoke the truth that transcends political and religious boundaries: "He who loses his life will gain it; he who will seek to save it shall lose it. Freedom is not for the coward or the faint-hearted."
 

Copyright 2005 by Ernest Partridge
 

Bird Flu is Real – and You’re On Your Own.

Ernest Partridge

November 8, 2005

Several leftish bloggers have published their doubts that the alleged avian flu menace is anything more than another Bushevik distraction. – and just in time to draw our attention away from Plamegate and the "Scooter" Libby indictments.

Who can blame them?  After all, as Keith Olberman recently pointed out, each of the Department of Homeland Security's thirteen color-coded "terror alerts" shortly followed some instance of Bush Administration bungling. And sure enough, the orange alerts took the embarrassments off the front pages and the TV newscasts.

Unfortunately, this time the threat is all-too real.

And how might we know this? Certainly not because the mainstream media says so. We’ve been forewarned: if the Bush regime chooses to concoct another convenient "emergency," we can be sure that the corporate media will obediently do their part by sounding the alarm.

We can know that the bird flu is an oncoming disaster because the scientists tell us so. I count myself among the apparently declining minority of Americans who believe that science remains the most reliable source of factual information. Far more reliable than faith or George Bush’s gut.

As a member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), I subscribe to it's journal, Science, which has been warning of this menace for several years. (Most recently in the July 15 and October 7 issues). And the AAAS is no friend of Dubya’s "faith-based" anti-science administration.

In addition, the cover story of the October, 2005 issue of National Geographic, is "The Next Killer Flu: Can We Stop It?" For much, much, more, Google "Avian Influenza," and you will find over two and half million hits. Leading the list are reports from the World Health Organization and the U.S Centers for Disease Control.

The 1918 influenza pandemic killed from 50 to 100 million people. The same proportion of victims, adjusted to the increase in population since 1918, would add up to 180 to 360 million. (National Geographic). Needless to say, such a catastrophe would devastate the world economy, causing millions more to die of starvation and other diseases, as vital services and the distribution of essential supplies would be paralyzed. The good news is that medical science has advanced significantly since 1918. The bad news is that international air traffic would accelerate enormously the spread of the pandemic. The worst news: scientists tell us that the outbreak is a virtual certainty – more likely sooner rather than later.

Much more might be said here about the biological and epidemiological aspects of this looming threat. But my space here is limited, and an abundance of scientific information about avian flu from qualified experts is readily available. Instead, I will confine my comments to the politics of the bird flu menace.

To put the matter bluntly: among recent US administrations, the Bush regime is the absolute worst to be in power at a time when a global pandemic is about to break out. Bush’s Health and Human Services Secretary, Michael Leavitt, admitted as much: "There have been many who foresaw this and urged the country to begin preparations sooner, and it would have been better if we had done so." (Newsweek, October 31, 2005).

But as Katrina demonstrated to us all, planned preparations for foreseen national emergencies are just not the Bushists’ thing. Nor is it much the concern of the GOP Congress, which has slashed funding for emergency services, bio-medical research and the Centers for Disease Control. The request for influenza research this year was $119 million. Presumably, this is one of the "big government" programs that Grover Norquist and his gang would like to "drown in a bathtub." By way of contrast, the Congress readily appropriated $10 billion (with a "b") for anti-ballistic missile defense – a "defense" against a non-existent threat that does not, and arguably can not, work.

The public apathy and lack of preparation in advance of the coming pandemic catastrophe must be blamed, at least in part, on the past PR manipulations by Bush’s White House.  In addition to the  thirteen false terror alarms noted above, we've been told these demonstrably false Iraq/WMD warnings: "Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction." (Cheney, August, 2002) "We know where [the WMDs] are. They are in the area around Tikrit and Baghdad." (Rumsfeld, May, 2003). "We found the weapons of mass destruction." (Bush, May, 2003). Add to that "the smoking gun in the form of the mushroom cloud," Saddam’s bio-war "Winnebagos of Death" (Colin Powell to the UN, February 2003), the pilotless balsa-wood and bailing wire "aircraft of doom."

And now a flu pandemic? Yeah, sure! So what else is new?

Remember the fable of the boy who cried "Wolf!"?   Here’s the validation.

So what are we to do about the coming bird flu disaster? Research and development of a vaccine? Too little and too late. Emergency production of Tamiflu, the best available medication? No facilities in the United States  – they’ve been "outsourced."  The primary manufacturer and license holder of Tamiflu is Roche Holding AG of  Switzerland, and we wouldn’t want to violate its corporate rights now, would we – merely to save a few million lives? In fact, Roche is willing to license other facilities to produce Tamiflu. But all this falls short of the required massive production increase. Even so, the French now have 13 million doses of Tamiflu ready for their population of 60 million. But what would you expect: those poor souls have "socialized medicine." In the U. S., there are 2.3 million doses of Tamiflu on hand. Why not more? Because "many American drug companies no longer even make flu vaccines – because there is little long-term profit to be made in vaccine manufacturing."  Cheers for free enterprise!

Inadequate research and development. Insufficient supplies of medications and vaccines. Insufficient numbers of hospital beds and emergency equipment for the hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, of pandemic victims. Will the Bush administration provide the funding for these necessary preparations for the pending emergency? No way. But Bush has another plan:

"Send in the troops!"

Thus Bush’s pathological fascination with armed force comes to the fore. Katrina gave us a glimpse of what Bush might have in store for us for the next national emergency. In his speech to the nation from Jackson Square in New Orleans, Bush said: "It is now clear that a challenge on this scale requires greater federal authority and a broader role for the armed forces – the institution of our government most capable of massive logistical operations on a moment’s notice." And at a White House press conference on October 4, Bush reflected:  If we had an outbreak [of avian flu] somewhere in the United States, do we not then quarantine that part of the country? And how do you, then enforce a quarantine? ... And who best to be able to effect a quarantine? ... One option is the use of a military that’s able to plan and move."

Nicole Colson elaborates:

Congress may already be helping Bush's wish become a reality. The Senate Armed Services Committee is reportedly considering proposals to increase the military's role in natural disasters by creating National Guard units specializing in disaster response--and clearing the way for active troops to engage in law enforcement activities on U.S. soil, something that's currently illegal.

Congressional aides recently told U.S. News and World Report that some senators are also considering introducing legislation that would allow the Feds, in "extreme circumstances," to take command of the National Guard without first getting approval from a governor.

As the Katrina disaster abundantly demonstrated, George Bush presides over a government that does not believe in government – except, of course, as a device for gathering tax revenues from the masses and redistributing it to defense contractors and campaign contributors, and also for keeping dissenting citizens under surveillance and control.  Otherwise, whatever the government attempts to do, we are told by the right-wing think-tank gurus, private individuals, private property, and "the free market" will always do better.

The regressive right and its captive media have been pounding these doctrines of privatism and market absolutism into our heads since the heyday of Ayn Rand and the founding of Bill Buckley’s National Review, fifty years ago – doctrines devoid of evidence and sound argument, contrary to both practical experience and the historical record, and "proven" by little more than constant repetition by right-wing propagandists.

More and more of our fellow citizens have been persuaded to believe this nonsense and will continue to do so, until, during some emergency, they desperately need the assistance of trained professional "public servants" employed by the government, with well thought-out procedures in place. And where is the government today when we are in desperate need of its emergency services?  Perhaps "drowned in a bathtub" somewhere.

Tough luck, folks! This is George Bush’s "ownership society," and you’re on your own.
 

Copyright 2005 by Ernest Partridge
 

The Illusion of Normality

Ernest Partridge

October 24, 2005

Never in the 229 years of United States history has this government “of, by and for the people” been in greater peril. Not during the Civil War, not during the great depression, and not during the Second World War or the Cold War which followed.

Until today, gross incompetence, abuse of power, corruption, corporatocracy, and federal insolvency could be checked and reversed by balanced and separated governmental powers, and at the ballot box by a citizenry informed and provoked by an alert and independent media. Now all branches of government and the mainstream media are dominated by the wealthy elites in control of a single political party.

Can you believe this? If not, you are in the company of a majority of Americans who might respond to the above jeremiad with “Oh c’mon now, it can’t be as bad as all that! We’ve always had incompetence, corruption, waste, fraud and abuse in the federal government, and stolen elections are as old as the republic. It’s no different now.”

So long as that majority of Americans believes this, the rule of the Busheviks and its successor oligarch regimes will be secure. Thus Bush, Inc. and its obedient mainstream media are desperately endeavoring to nourish and sustain this “illusion of normality.”

The illusion has many facets.

Elections? “Get over it!”  The refusal of the public to believe that national elections can be stolen, validates the claim of the Bush Administration and the Republican Congress to political legitimacy – that they “derive their just powers from the consent of the governed.” (Declaration of Independence). The evidence clearly indicates otherwise. (For an excellent summation of this evidence, see Dennis Loo’s “No Paper Trail Left Behind.”   See also The Crisis Papers pages on “Election Fraud, 2004" and “Electoral Integrity.”). On the other hand, the evidence for the legitimacy of the elections is virtually non-existent, due to the secrecy of the software and the absence of paper validation. So all that the defenders of the legitimacy illusion have is ad hominem insults of the challengers – “conspiracy theorists,” “paranoid,” “get over it!” The mainstream media’s response is, no response, with the apparent hope and expectation, so far successful, that if it is ignored, the ballot fraud issue will go away. The primary aggrieved institutional victim of the fraud, the Democratic Party, simply won’t touch the issue, which can only serve to strengthen “the illusion of normality.” Thus allegations that the elections were stolen and thus that the government in power is illegitimate are confined to the alternative media and the internet.

And so the Democrats carry on as if the upcoming elections of 2006 and 2008 are “normal,” as they diligently solicit more votes and cheerfully look forward to taking back the Congress in 2006 and the White House in 2008 – as if the same “normal” rules and conditions apply as they have before. Those poor, naive saps! Don’t they realize that once again, Republican operatives will count the votes!, and that the results will be just what the GOP wants them to be, regardless of the wishes of the electorate?  Unless. Unless, very soon,  the people demand reform and restore the integrity of the ballot box.

The Media are biased in favor of the liberals. The right-wing talk-merchants who, until Air American Radio came along, had the AM dial pretty much to themselves, complain constantly that the mainstream media has a left-wing, anti-Bush bias. So too the cable news chatterers. Much of the public believes this myth because it is repeated so often – not, to be sure, on the strength of the evidence which clearly proves otherwise. Two brief examples: In October, 2004, immediately before the presidential election, the University of Maryland’s Program on International Policy Attitudes (PIPA) released a report that among Bush supporters, 75% believed that Saddam Hussein’s Iraq government supported al Qaeda, and 72% believed that Iraq either had weapons of mass destruction, or active WMD programs. In addition, the Bush supporters said that the US should not go to war if it were known that Iraq had no WMDs. Which means, to put it bluntly, that Bush owes his election to this WMD lie (among other lies, but those require separate arguments). Now where did the Bush voters get this misinformation if not from the mainstream media, which obviously passed it on uncritically from the Bush administration. Example two: On CNN’s “Crossfire, Paul Begala reported the following results of a Nexis-Lexis Search:

"There were exactly 704 stories in the [2000] campaign about this flap of Gore inventing the Internet. There were only 13 stories about Bush failing to show up for his National Guard duty for a year. There were well over 1,000 stories -- Nexus stopped at 1,000 -- about Gore and the Buddhist temple. Only 12 about Bush being accused of insider trading at Harken Energy. There were 347 about Al Gore wearing earth tones, but only 10 about the fact that Dick Cheney did business with Iran and Iraq and Libya."

The advantage of the myth of the liberal media to Bush and the Republicans is enormous. To those who believe it, if a story favorable to Bush and the GOP appears, the response is “it must be true, since even the liberal media reports it.” And critical stories? “Don’t believe it, it’s just the liberal media dissing our President again.” Conversely for stories about the Democrats and progressives. (For more about right-wing and pro-Bush media bias, visit the website of FAIR).

“Torture? We wouldn’t do that, we’re Americans” and “It was just a few bad apples.” Few Americans appreciate the depths of moral depravity that are are plumbed by this administration’s justification of the use of torture of prisoners captured in this “war on terror,” and by its official violation of the Geneva accords – ratified treaties that have the status of US laws. Nor are many of our fellow citizens aware of the disgust and hatred of our country’s government engendered throughout the world as a result of these policies. And why not? The mainstream media do not accurately report the tortures, assess the treaty violations, or inform the public of international opinion. Attorney General Gonzales has effectively “abolished” torture by defining it out of existence, yet the tortures still go on. The Geneva conventions are evaded by the invention of a category of prisoners, “enemy combatants,” that is unrecognized by international law. In effect, the government of the United States of America, our country, is an international outlaw. The Busheviks do not care. And sadly, the American people, by and large, do not know. They believe that our treatment of prisoners is justified, and that the opinion of us abroad, are “normal.” It is an illusion.

The President, his cabinet, and the Congress will, as they have all sworn, “protect and defend the Constitution.”  In fact, American citizens are now being held indefinitely, without charge, without counsel, without trial, in violation of four of the Ten Amendments to the Constitution (The Bill of Rights). The President claims the right  to designate any American citizen as a “terrorist suspect” and to arrest and confine that citizen in similar violation of law and the Constitution.   The same Constitution stipulates that Congress declares war, yet this “war on terrorism” is undeclared. This is but one of many clear violations of law by the Bush Administration (enumerated in my “The Bombs in the Basement"). The conventional attitude that “they all do it” just doesn’t begin to excuse the unprecedented lawlessness of this regime.

The policies of this administration are based on “sound science.” The term “sound science” and its antithesis, “junk science,” are inventions of that semantic genius of the GOP, Frank Luntz. So too those Orwellian names, “Healthy Forests,” “Clear Skies Initiative,” “The Death Tax.” The conclusion of more than 2,000 world scientists concerning global warming?   “Junk science.” So too the warnings of geologists that the world is approaching “peak oil production.”  Industry sponsored reassurances that mercury emissions from coal-fired plants are not harmful? “Sound Science.” The fact that virtually all peer-reviewed scientific studies disagree seems not to matter. “For every Ph.D there is an equal and opposite Ph.D” – if the price is right. The public believes the “news” it is given, and does not pay attention to the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the National Science Foundation, the National Academy of Sciences, or other professional scientific journals and associations. Nor is the public much concerned with the fact that this administration’s “war against science” is costing us our long-established lead in scientific research and development – a foundation of our economic prosperity.

And the list continues: record federal deficits, a widening income gap between the very rich and the rest of us, corruption – personal enrichment at public expense, corporate “purchasing” of legislation and “regulatory relief” through campaign contributions. Massive. Unconstrained. Unprecedented. Unbelievable. And so most of the public is unwilling and unable to believe it.

Add to this the enormous stake that the Administration, the Republican Party, and their corporate patrons have in perpetuating this “illusion of normality.” Billions of dollars of public funds have been snatched from the federal treasury and billions more from the investments, retirement funds, health benefits and social services of private individuals. Add to that the deterioration of educational facilities and public infrastructure. Some of this has been done through the cover of “legitimate” congressional legislation, and some of it through outright criminal activity. Remnants of our criminal justice system are pushing back. Today, David Safavian, Jack Abramoff and even Tom DeLay are under indictment. Soon Patrick Fitzgerald’s grand jury will hand down their indictments which, it is likely, will reach into the White House. Hopefully, that will be just the beginning.

In short, the malefactors are facing not only the loss of their ill-gained wealth but perhaps federal prison cells. And don’t suppose that they don’t know it, and that they are not prepared to take extreme measures to avoid it. The injured and cornered beast is the most dangerous, and these critters have some fearful resources at their disposal.

But they are up against the most formidable and unyielding of adversaries: the truth – an adversary that they have abused and repressed throughout their reign of error. And as they must eventually discover, reality bites. “Truth crushed on earth,” wrote William Cullen Bryant, “will rise again,” and it will rise, no matter how many millions are poured into the budgets of “think tanks” or into the pockets of whore-“scientists.” “Truth will rise again,” if not here, then abroad, and if not now, then eventually.

If we are to restore our democracy, truth must rise again soon and here.

But how?

Foremost among the objectives of the progressive resistance must be to disabuse the public at large of its “illusion of normality.” We must attack the widespread but understandable unwillingness of that public to face up to the enormity of the crimes that have been perpetrated upon the body politic.

Fortunately, events are at last coming to the aid of the resistance. A “perfect storm” is descending upon the White House and Congress: the innocent lives sacrificed to the Iraq disaster, the Katrina catastrophe and the evident inability and unwillingness of the Bush Administration to attend to the business of protecting the public, the aforementioned criminal indictments – present and forthcoming. Looming ahead is a collapse of the economy as the housing bubble bursts, consumer spending crashes because the American consumer “maxes out” his credit and faces unemployment, and our international creditors decide they’ve had enough, and decide to invest in other currencies.

Public opinion polls (if we can still trust them) are reporting plummeting approval ratings for the President and the GOP, along with a loss of confidence in the direction that the country is taking, and a loss of credibility of the mainstream media. “The fear factor” is losing its potency. It’s beginning to dawn on more and more of our fellows citizens that they have been suckered and lied to, and they don’t like it.

Trouble is, they don’t at the moment have any place to turn. The “opposition party,” the Democrats, don’t fare much better in the opinion polls than the Republicans, and for good reason. They are dumb-struck, incoherent, and impotent.

The time is right for forceful, inspired and articulated leaders of the opposition to emerge. Where are they? Who are they? Who dares step forward, speak out, and take the lead? What individuals, what organizations, what factions will put aside their differences and unite in common cause?

On these questions, the issue of the restoration of our liberties, our welfare, our republic, will turn.
 

Copyright 2005 by Ernest Partridge

The Dems Have Failed Us

Ernest Partridge

Posted: October 5, 2005

The Republican Party and the Bush Administration are reeling, enmeshed in corruption and failure, and the ideology of the regressive right is in retreat.

The iron is hot – now is the time to strike.

Unfortunately, it appears that the congressional Democrats and the Democratic Party would prefer to throw cold water on the hot iron.

What in the name of God and the US Constitution has neutered the Democrats?

Clearly, if the alleged “opposition party” won’t lead, then we the people must do so. Perhaps, out of this inchoate and widespread resistance, a movement will coalesce and effective leadership will emerge. They must, if we are to rescue ourselves and our republic from this morass.

In the meantime, among the angry and disillusioned American public – apparently the majority, let us note – opposition to the Busheviks is diverse, aimless, uncoordinated and, worst of all, in despair.

Some simply refuse to be politically concerned, as they retreat into their private lives. “Politics? – I say, screw them all and leave me out of it!” Trouble is, they can’t be “left out of politics” when the prevailing politics is leading to economic collapse, is depriving millions of citizens of their health, livelihoods and occasionally their lives, is eroding our civil rights and liberties, is making our country an international pariah, and is trashing the environment.

Some look to third parties – and as they do so, the GOP poobahs smile as they reflect upon Ralph Nader’s essential role in their 2000 presidential “election victory.”

My suggestion is that we do to the Democratic Party what the radical right did to the Republicans: we take control. Join local and state Democratic committees. Put the congressional Democrats on notice that they will be opposed by progressives in the primaries. (Senators Boxer and Feingold, Congressmen Conyers and Kucinich, and the entire Congressional Black Caucus honorably excepted). Even if the progressive candidates lose (and not all of them will lose), they will still be sending a message to the establishment: “either you shape up and represent us, or we will be back next time doing our damndest to toss you out of office.”


More strikes on the hot iron:

Where Bush leads, no sane person should want to follow. Virtually all economists agree, with the exception of those on the payroll of the Bush Administration, the GOP or the right-wing think tanks: the American economy is heading hell-bent toward disaster. While it simply can’t go on like this,  Bush is nevertheless unlikely to change course unless forced to do so. When the economy collapses, all will sink with it. Bush supporters, right-wing pundits, media whores – all those who today are propping up this criminal regime will tomorrow wish they hadn’t. But then it will be too late. More and more of the fortunate rich who are benefitting today from the Bush kleptocracy are beginning to wise-up and to smell the burning coffee. These are our unlikely allies. While unmoved by appeals to morality, justice or patriotism, they just might bend to a realization of the Bushista threat to their personal enlightened self-interest.


The Fitzgerald Investigation and other gathering storms. At this time, Patrick Fitzgerald’s investigation is a mystery. Perhaps a dud, perhaps a thunderbolt. Best case: indictments of Rove, Libby and Fleitz with Bush and Cheney as unindicted co-conspirators. Meanwhile, the stink of scandal grows – DeLay, Frist, Abramoff, Safavian, and doubtless still more to come -- all of whom have grown arrogant in their power and opulence. In addition, billions (with a “B”) are missing in Iraq, down the sinkhole of corruption, with still more to follow in the post-Katrina boondoggles. These scandals put the mainstream media in a well-deserved dilemma: (a) ignore or downplay the scandals and lose still more credibility, or (b) report the scandals fairly and accurately to the great detriment of the Bushistas and the GOP.


And speaking of the media, “who has the power?” The conventional wisdom among progressives is that the mainstream media has been effectively corralled and contained in behalf of the GOP by the corporate owners. Few are aware, however, that the media holds a huge lever over the Bush administration: the threat of honest and diligent investigative reporting, at last, on voting fraud in the last three elections. Vote fraud is the great untold story, and as we all know the mainstream media has unanimously decided to ignore it – as it must, if it is to continue to serve the ruling regime. But is it not possible that there might be a break in this solid wall of silence as one or another of the corporate media empires comes to its senses and realizes that “where Bush leads, they should not wish to follow”? Such a development would, by itself, spell the doom of the Bush regime.

Who can doubt that if Richard Nixon had media support comparable to that of Bush – if Watergate had been met with total media silence – that Nixon would have completed his second term. When he lost significant segments of the media, and then several key Republicans in Congress, Nixon’s fate was sealed. But Nixon’s crimes pale in insignificance compared to the crime of three stolen elections. This is the sword of Damocles that the mainstream media holds over the Bush regime.

However, we must not wait for the media to drop that sword. Far better to hack at the rope that holds it. The story of the stolen elections must be told relentlessly in the independent media that the progressives still have at their disposal: the internet, Air America Radio, Free Speech TV, the independent press and book publishers, the foreign press and, of course, word of mouth. If the issue is kept alive and nurtured, it may increase from a murmur to a shout that the mainstream can no longer ignore.


Election Fraud is the Linchpin. If election fraud is not addressed and exposed, the Democrat’s cry of “wait ‘till next time” is so much hot air. After all, 2002 and 2004 were “next time,” and while the voter “input” likely favored the Democrats, the output, via the “black box” manipulations of the Diebold and ES&S voting machines, compilers and secret software codes kept the Republicans in power. So they shall again in 2006 – you can count on it -- unless the issue of voting integrity is addressed and favorably resolved.

To those who insist that the 2002 and 2004 elections were legit, I ask again: “give me the evidence.” Bear in mind that “don’t be paranoid!” and “get over it!” are not evidence. In fact, there is no evidence of legitimacy because the e-vote machines were designed that way – no paper trail, secret software codes, and “back door” access to voting tallies. On the other hand, the evidence of fraud is overwhelming, and should be convincing to anyone who dares to examine and come to terms with that evidence. (The Crisis Papers has collected accounts of the evidence here).

Even so, the public simply can’t bring itself to acknowledge that their congressional and presidential elections are fixed, and that the regime in Washington rules without the consent of the governed which, in the past two presidential elections, was overruled through vote manipulation and fraud. The implications are just too much to bear; namely, that our democracy has been effectively overthrown and that we are now living under a one-party dictatorship, despite George Bush’s easy talk about “spreading freedom and democracy.” But when the economy darkens and jobs are lost, mortgages foreclosed, businesses fail, energy costs become prohibitive, the public discovers the true meaning of “tort reform” (no access to the courts) and “credit reform” (no bankruptcy relief), that public will likely become more receptive to the idea that they have also been had at the ballot box. If and when that happens, all bets are off.

Count me among those who believe that today we have lost our democracy. That doesn’t mean that we can’t take it back. But time is of the essence, for the longer we wait the more difficult will be the restoration. Today, Republican-owned companies count the ballots with secret codes, most of our media is controlled by six corporate conglomerates, The Patriot Act is still in force, and so-called “enemy combatants” including some American citizens, are being denied basic rights stipulated by the Geneva Conventions and the US Constitution. Ahead lies total media control and the police state.

But for the moment, the Busheviks, the GOP and the radical right are reeling. The iron is hot, and it is time to strike.

But as we do, we must remember that the blacksmith bends the iron with repeated blows of his hammer, then he heats the iron again. Persistence and unrelenting pressure is the key. There is still time to break and overthrow this criminal regime.

The alternative is unthinkable.
 

Copyright 2005 by Ernest Partridge

Who Lost New Orleans?

Ernest Partridge, Co-Editor

September 22, 2005

“If some people are foolish enough to live below sea level, or in flood plains, or in earthquake zones, why should the rest of us bail them out when an expected disaster strikes?”

It’s an old complaint revived, of course, by the catastrophe visited upon the Gulf states by Hurricane Katrina. It states, in effect, that the citizens of New Orleans and other devastated communities in the region are have only themselves to blame for their misfortune.

Similarly, prudent individuals will not chose to live alongside great rivers like the Mississippi, or along active tectonic zones (i.e., the entire Pacific coast), or in eastern cities such as New York, which attract terrorists, or in the St. Louis/Memphis region, the site of the New Madrid earthquake of 1812 – the most violent US earthquake in recorded history . I guess we should all pack up and move to Kansas instead.

Oh wait!  They have tornadoes, don’t they?

Who is Responsible for New Orleans’ Safety?

The free-market absolutist libertarian right proclaims, in Ayn Rand’s words, that “there is no such entity as .. ‘the public’ ... only a number of individual men.” (Rand: “The Objectivist Ethics”). Thus the optimal society emerges “automatically,” through an unregulated free market, from the self-serving economic activity of individuals and families.

By extension, apologists for the Bush Administration’s neglect of the pre-Katrina safety and the post-Katrina recovery seem to be telling us that “there is no such entity as ‘the nation,’ there are only states and ‘regions,’ whose responsibility it is to look after their own safety and recovery.

This policy is articulated in an e-mail of uncertain origin that I received last week, which states a now-familiar cop-out of the Bush-defense team:

In case you aren’t familiar with how our government is supposed to work: the chain of responsibility for the protection of the citizens of New Orleans is:

1. The Mayor of New Orleans
2. The New Orleans director of Homeland Security.
3. The Governor of Louisiana
4. The [Secretary] of Homeland Security.
5. The President of the United States.

The e-mail message then proceeds to argue that due to the alleged blunders of the Mayor and the Governor, the Secretary and the President are absolved of responsibility for the horror that followed the hurricane. This, we are told, was a city problem and a state problem, not a national problem. As is now more than obvious, this excuse (along with “this not the time to play the blame game”) has become the standard talking point of the Bush apologists.

In fact, when a Governor asks the President to declare a federal state of emergency (as Governor Blanco did two days before landfall) and the President agrees (as Bush did the same day), the above-listed “chain of responsibility” is reversed and “the buck stops” at the President’s desk. This procedure is explicitly stated in the “Homeland Security Presidential Directive/HSPD5" issued and signed by George Bush in February 28, 2003, which you can read here (see paragraph 4).  Media reports and right-wing punditry to the contrary notwithstanding, the Mayor and the Governor fulfilled their responsibilities, albeit imperfectly.  ( See “Right Wing Myths about Katrina, Debunked”).

The right, with its concept of “the nation” as a collage of autonomous states and regions, perceives a devastated gulf region as comparable to a diseased branch on a tree. Cut off the branch, and the tree will be no worse off, and perhaps more healthy. Thus: “It’s too bad about what happened to New Orleans, and maybe we’ll be charitable and send them some aid. But, once again, it is ultimately the fault of the people in New Orleans because they willingly chose to live in a sub-sea-level bowl.”

On the other hand, progressives and economically informed Republicans see New Orleans and the Gulf region as vital organs of the body politic and of the economy of the United States. Thus damage to this regional part is damage to the entire nation.

For the fact of the matter is that New Orleans is an “inevitable city” – a geographic/economic necessity. The Mississippi River drains two-thirds of the 48 contiguous states, and within its watershed most of the nation’s agricultural products are produced. And, now that we have “outsourced” most of our manufacturing base, agricultural products are our primary export, offsetting the United States’ huge (and unsustainable) trade deficit. Down the Mississippi and its tributaries, barges full of the bounty of American farms are towed toward the Gulf of Mexico, and to the necessary Gulf port at the Mississippi delta. At the same time, essential imports arrive at this port – by tonnage, the largest port in the US and the fifth largest in the world. In addition, from the state of Louisiana, the United states gets fifteen percent of its domestic petroleum and 27% of its natural gas. As George Friedman writes in his excellent article, “New Orleans: A Geopolitical prize”  before Katrina struck, “New Orleans was, in many ways, the pivot of the American Economy,” and, he adds, “there are no good shipping alternatives.” The cargo ships can go no further upstream, and downstream are swamps and wetlands that prevent development.

In short, the port of New Orleans is an indispensable national asset. Its loss, while an inconsolable tragedy to its residents, now scattered around the nation, is also an economic hardship to all Americans, and to millions abroad – as we are all about to discover.

And so, the response to the opening taunt – “it’s their fault for living in a disaster-prone region” – is simple and straightforward: someone had to live there, and because the entire nation has benefited from the city and port of New Orleans, it is appropriate that the entire nation should invest in its reconstruction and assist in the rehabilitation of its unfortunate residents.

Similar considerations apply to the Pacific coast with its seismic hazards, and the Northwest with the additional threat of volcanoes. The national economy requires Pacific seaports, along with the timber of the Northwest and the agricultural production of California’s incomparably fertile central valley. And so, if disaster strikes, compensation to the victims is appropriate.

Any politician who believes that these regions are autonomous and economically detachable and thus not the responsibility of the federal government is unqualified for national leadership. To the great misfortune of the United States, such individuals are nonetheless in political control of the federal government.

Why a Federal Emergency Management Agency?

Why shouldn’t the city of New Orleans and the state of Louisiana take full responsibility for “emergency management.” Why should there be a Federal agency charged with such tasks?

Answer: for the same reason that cities have fire departments. Just as some fires can not be controlled by individual home owners, some disasters are of a scale that overwhelm municipal and state capacities. Often these disasters, like Katrina, affect several states, and in such cases the only political entity qualified to deal with multi-state disasters is the federal government.

It is conceivable, of course, that each state might invest in massive, federal-scale, emergency response facilities, just as each homeowner might purchase and park a $100,000 fire truck in his driveway, “just in case.” But the irrationality of both procedures is immediately obvious. Neither is cost-effective. While a fire in your home is unlikely, the probability of fires breaking out somewhere in a city is sufficiently high to justify a municipal fire department that is frequently engaged in fire-fighting and constantly prepared to respond anywhere in the city, including, of course, your home. Similarly, the minimal annual probability of a Katrina-scale disaster in any particular state is not worth the investment of fifty large-scale separate “just-in-case” response facilities. However, if we multiply the low-probability of a disaster in each state by fifty, we then have a justification for an in-place and “at the ready” federal agency such as FEMA. In short: fifty multi-billion dollar agencies for each state is folly; one multi-billion dollar agency for all states is rational.

Just as most home fires can be put out with a fire extinguisher or a garden hose, most disasters can be managed with municipal and state agencies. But for those rare and massive events, such as Katrina and the much-anticipated major California earthquake, a coordinated national response is imperative. As evidence for this claim, just contrast the effectiveness of FEMA under James Lee Witt during the Clinton administration with that of the crony-ridden fiasco of FEMA under Bush.

So Who Lost New Orleans?

None of the leading official players in this tragic drama are totally blameless – each one, “if they had it to do over again” would respond differently and more effectively. But that does not mean that each responsible official is equally culpable. Despite false media reports to the contrary (notably by The Washington Post and Newsweek), Governor Blanco declared a state of emergency on August 26, three days before the hurricane made landfall. The following morning she requested Bush to declare a federal state of emergency, which Bush granted, following which Bush, Homeland Security Secretary Chertoff and FEMA Director Michael Brown were inexcusably unresponsive for the next two days. Mayor Nagin’s mandatory evacuation order proved to be too little and too late (by a whole day). Subsequent events would show that FEMA, severely incapacitated by Bush Administration cutbacks, the loss of key professional personnel, and management by unqualified political appointees, was worse than ineffective as it refused assistance by relief agencies such as the Red Cross and numerous municipal police and fire departments, and blocked assistance to victims by volunteers. (For a detailed timeline with links to validating documents, see Salon.com’s “Timeline to Disaster”).

George Bush’s remark to CBS’s Diane Sawyer that “I don't think anybody anticipated the breach of the levees," is contradicted by numerous studies and media reports. In fact, the flooding of New Orleans was long-anticipated and feared, and aggressive flood control measures were proposed to Congress. All were slashed by the Bush Administration to small fractions of the amounts requested. (See Will Bunch: “Why the Levee Broke”).

It is impossible to determine with certainty whether a repaired and improved levee system could have spared New Orleans from this Category Four hurricane. If it could not, then the answer to the question “who lost New Orleans” must be “Katrina.” If fully-funded and fully installed levees would have held, then the answer to “who lost New Orleans is clearly the Bush Administration and the Republican Congress which refused to fund the repair and re-enforcement of the levees.

But Katrina was two disasters: one natural – the hurricane, and the other administrative – the botched relief effort that followed. And for that second disaster the fault lies squarely with the Bush Administration and its under-funded and atrociously administered Federal Emergency Management Agency. The message of the Bush spin-machine, and much of its enabling media, is that the blame lies with Governor Blanco and Mayer Negin. But the documented evidence, available on the internet for all to see refutes this allegation.

At the root of the second, post-storm, disaster is the right-wing’s visceral distrust of government: the Reaganite conviction that “government is not the solution, government is the problem,” and the Bushite proclamation that “you can spend your money more wisely than the federal government can.” (Bush in the second debate, 2000). As Thom Hartmann has observed, “You Can't Govern if You Don't Believe in Government."   Katrina has proved that because the Busheviks don’t believe in government, they can’t govern. And so, faced with a regional crisis with devastating impacts upon the national economy, the Bush administration was incapable of acting effectively in the national interest. Indeed, they are scarcely capable of recognizing the very existence of a “national interest” apart from the separate interests of privileged individuals and corporations.

It is difficult to find any silver lining in Katrina’s storm clouds. But if there is any, it might be the dawning public realization that there are good reasons why no civilized society is without a government – why our founders recognized that an enlightened government, “deriving its just powers from the consent of the governed,” exists, in the words of our Constitution, to "establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity."

Those who dare to call themselves “conservatives” would have us believe otherwise.
 

Copyright 2005 by Ernest Partridge
 

Randville, Rawlsburg, and New Orleans

Ernest Partridge

September 12, 2005

 

Since there is no such entity as “the public” – since the public is merely a number of individuals – any claimed or implied conflict of the “public interest” with private interests means that the interests of some men must be sacrificed to the interests of and wishes of others.

Ayn Rand

A society is a cooperative venture for mutual advantage... Social cooperation makes possible a better life for all than any would have if each were to live solely by his own efforts.

John Rawls

 

In his second debate with Al Gore, candidate George Bush said “I think you can spend your money more wisely than the federal government can.”

You think? Ask the survivors of the New Orleans Super Dome and convention center.

Who is better equipped to prepare for natural disasters and, when they strike, to deal with them? Individual citizens acting on their own, or government agencies acting in behalf of the community at large – acting professionally, with expert information, and with clear command and coordination?

Again, for your answer, consider New Orleans.

It comes down to this simple question: Is there such a thing as a “public interest” distinct and apart from a simple summation of private interests? The libertarians and the regressive right say that there is not. Progressives say that there is a public interest, and both history and common sense bear this out. In a free society, the appropriate protector and administrator of this public interest is a government of, by, and for the people. Our founding documents affirm this explicitly.

The regressive right (falsely called “conservatives”) tells us otherwise. Thus we are now experiencing the bitter consequences of Ronald Reagan’s 1981 inauguration pronouncement: “government is not the solution, government is the problem.” The Reagan administration and the two subsequent Bush administrations have crippled and dismantled government agencies almost the point at which, as Grover Norquist puts it, government can be “drowned in a bathtub.” And so today it is the unprepared and unprotected city of New Orleans that is drowning in the filthy flood waters left by Hurricane Katrina.

Two years ago, with the Katrina catastrophe just one of many grim possibilities,  I published a parable  about two communities, about to be hit by a flood. Given the dreadful events of last week, it bears repeating.

Imagine that two communities are situated on opposite sides of a great river. On the right bank (appropriately) is “Randville,” populated by libertarians – rugged individualists who are contemptuous of “collective” activity and who assume full personal responsibility for their personal safety, welfare and property. On the left bank is “Rawlsburg,” comprised of individuals who, while covetous of their personal rights, fully acknowledge the existence of public interests. They are therefore aware of the desirability of acting collectively, in the words of the Preamble to the US Constitution, “to insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, [and] promote the general Welfare."

News arrives that a great flood is approaching from upstream. The citizens of Randville immediately get to work piling sandbags around their individual homes. Across the river brigades of Rawlsburg citizens are working together to build a levee around the town.

One of the towns survives the flood, while the other is devastated. Need I identify which is which?

Consider another case: this one is not fanciful – it is quite real.

In April, 2003, California Governor Gray Davis requested $430 million in federal funds to reduce the fire hazard in the southern California forests. The request was ignored until, October 24, George Bush rejected it.  A few hours later, “the Old Fire” broke out in the San Bernardino mountains, followed by several more fires, eventually consuming three quarter of a million acres and 3577 homes, and causing 22 fatalities.

This particular disaster struck close to home – precisely 150 feet close to my home, where the fire was stopped at my property line. “The Old Fire” almost surrounded the cluster of houses in our neighborhood, and only the combined, coordinated and professional effort of the US forest Service and the state and local firefighters saved our homes. Several days earlier we were ordered off the mountain while these “big government bureaucracies” did their work – magnificently.  (See my “If it burns, it earns”).

Presumably, the method preferred by the Bush administration would have been to de-fund the government fire-control agencies and then to leave it to each of us individual property owners to take a valiant stand by our individual homes, garden hoses in hand. Who can doubt that had we tried that, all our houses would have been reduced to ashes and many of us would have ended up as “crispy critters.”

All of us San Bernardino mountaineers – democrats, republican, independents – were convinced, contrary to George Bush, that “the government” spent our money better than we could.

One final example: Had the December, 2004 tsunami occurred in the Pacific Ocean instead of the Indian Ocean, the death toll would have been much lower. This is because there is an international tsunami warning system in place in the Pacific, and following the earthquake that triggered it, populations around the Pacific rim would have had advance warning from several minutes to several hours. (In deep water, tsunami waves travel up to 500 mph, and much slower near shore). Because there is no such system in the Indian Ocean, the December 26 tsunami struck without warning.

An international tsunami warning system, and the scientific research and development behind it, is clearly beyond the resources or the incentives of private individuals, or even of corporations. Only governments are capable of such an undertaking. And governments are singularly authorized for such an undertaking, for public safety is not an exclusively private matter, it is, as they say “in the public interest.”

The role of government in protecting the lives and property of its citizens, one of the sole legitimate functions of government recognized by the libertarians, is universally acknowledged in civilized societies, as it was in the United States until, apparently, January 2001. No longer. The policy of the Bush government is to cut the FEMA funds and put a political hack in charge, send the National Guard to Iraq, and slash the funding for the New Orleans levees. And if you don’t like it, private citizen, here’s a shovel and a sand bag, now get to work!

Just remember, to the Busheviks and the GOP, “government is not the solution, government is the problem.” And so, after our government has been drowned in Grover Norquist’s bathtub, we will all be on our own in George Bush’s “ownership society.”

Well that’s just fine if you happen to be one of the fortunate 1% who has “invested” in the GOP and Bush campaign juggernaut, and are thus the beneficiary of Bush’s tax cuts and deregulation. If not, then you are out in the cold – or if you are poor and in New Orleans, stuck in the toxic soup.

So why did Michael Brown, the former horse-trader and present Administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, allow FEMA to fail so spectacularly? Simply because he was not appointed to manage emergencies. He was appointed to dismantle the Agency – one of many Busheviks selected to “starve the beast” of government bureaucracy.

Michael Brown, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, and their sort fail to function as public servants because, as true Randvillians, they believe that “there is no such entity as ‘the public.’” There are only individuals responsible for their own personal welfare. And so, when the storm approaches, the sole responsibility of government, they believe, is to tell the citizens to “get out of town, now!” No further thought as to how these individuals are to manage their exit – and so the school buses and the army trucks remain idle as the waters rise. No thought about how those who are trapped in the city are to be fed, sheltered, and protected. That’s their misfortune. Government? It’s “the problem,” not a solution.

In contrast, Rawlsburgers, who readily recognize the existence of public goods and public interest, know how to work together in the common interest. In the spirit of our founders and their Declaration, they establish and support an institution, government, to act in behalf of this public, “deriving its just powers from the consent of the governed.” Then they put government agencies in the hands of qualified and dedicated individuals, like Bill Clinton’s brilliant FEMA Administrator James Lee Witt, who anticipate disasters, prevent them whenever possible, and who plan and then implement contingency plans when disaster strikes. When the disaster is imminent and foreseeable, as was the case with Hurricane Katrina, rapid response facilities are assembled close to the affected area, prepared to take action at the earliest opportunity.

All this requires personnel, equipment and cash appropriations – personnel and equipment that Bush preferred to deploy in Iraq, and cash that Bush chose instead to give as tax “relief” to his super-wealthy sponsors.

Adaptability that is “reality based” – founded upon scientific information and practical experience – is the hallmark of intelligence, and of effective and just governance. But the Busheviks, openly contemptuous of “reality based” policies are immobilized by their Randvillian dogmas and by the dictates of their corporate “stockholders.” Thus they cannot adapt.

For proof, look to New Orleans and the Gulf coast.

Today, the port of New Orleans is closed, through which our leading exports, agricultural products, flow to offset in small part our gigantic trade deficits. In addition, imports of essential strategic raw materials are blocked and must be re-routed to other ports, ill-prepared to deal with them.  This grossly under-reported consequence of Katrina, along with the reduction of Gulf coast petroleum and natural gas production, will have devastating consequences for the U.S. economy. None of this can reasonably be blamed on Al Qaeda or the Clinton Administration – not that Karl Rove and his henchmen in the media won’t try their damndest to do just that.

Some very tough economic times are just ahead, and it’s the Busheviks’ worst nightmare, for at last, the public at large may be forced to face up to the enormity of the crimes and mal-administration of Bush, Inc.

The ancient Chinese curse is upon us: “May you live in interesting times.”

 

Copyright 2005, by Ernest Partridge

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The Bombs in the Basement

Ernest Partridge, Co-Editor
The Crisis Papers

August 28, 2005

By all outward appearances, the Busheviks and the Republicans have it made. They are, as the late Red Barber used to say, “sitting in the catbird seat.” They own the White House, the Congress, and soon the Federal Judiciary. The mainstream media are safely corralled, with just enough dissenting voices (such as Krugman, Rich, Dionne and Oliphant) to give credence to the absurd right-wing complaint of “liberal media bias.”  Potentially devastating news developments and issues, such as election fraud, the Downing Street Memos, Plamegate, political corruption, growing domestic dissent and international hostility are not refuted in the media as much as they are ignored – crowded out with trivial reports of runaway brides, disappearing teenagers, celebrity trials and romances, etc., ad nauseum.

For all that, the Bush regime has reason to be nervous. For its continuing success depends totally on the public’s inattention to, apathy toward, and even ignorance of several potentially explosive issues which, if brought to light, publicized, investigated, and then criminally prosecuted, could demolish the House of Bush and the Republicans. These “bombs in the basement” of the GOP establishment are not disarmed. They are fully armed and ready to go off, if only the opposition can get to them and mobilize the public. And the Busheviks know this all too well.

I am not referring here to mismanagement or incompetence on the part of the Bush Administration and the Congress, although there is certainly plenty of that. Instead, I mean criminal activity – indictable and impeachable violations of the law. Amazingly, many of these crimes are no secret, rather they are open and plain to see by all with eyes to see. What additional crimes lurk beneath the surface is anyone’s guess. Even so, the crimes that are out in the open do not arouse the media or a significant portion of the American public. Abroad, its quite another story, as the foreign press freely reports and comments on these crimes, and international outrage at the Bushista outlaws continues to grow.

Among these open and confirmable crimes:

• Lying to Congress is a crime.
   

• Disclosing the identity of a covert intelligence agent is a crime.
   

• Perjury is a crime.
   

• Influence peddling (“graft”) is a crime.
   

• Torture of prisoners and violation of the Geneva Conventions is a crime.
   

• Violation of civil liberties (denial of rights to counsel, trial, etc.) is a crime.
   

• Failure to obey a court order (i.e. of the Supreme Court) is a crime.
   

• Misprision (i.e., incitement) of a felony is a crime.
   

• Voting fraud is a crime.
   

• Obstruction of Justice is a crime.

Yet the Congress refuses to investigate, and the mainstream media refuse to investigate and report, which means that the Congress and the media are (in an unindictable sense) “accessories” to these crimes.

Each of these is a momentous offense, totally incompatible with a political order that claims to function under the rule of law. Yet there they are, recognizable and still unpunished – and tolerated by a public that appears to be unwilling or unable to appreciate the gravity of the crimes openly committed by their government.

But for how long? History teaches us that public opinion can be “turned on a dime,” by a catalyzing event. On December 6, 1941, a majority of Americans opposed entering the war. That all changed the following day, when the bombs fell at Pearl Harbor. Senator Joe McCarthy had the Congress, the Press, and even President Eisenhower intimidated until the day that an obscure lawyer, Joseph Welch, stood his ground and said to the Senator: “have you no shame!”  The public, as it turned out, was more than willing to listen.

Regimes also die gradually of a thousand cuts. In 1964, Lyndon Johnson soundly defeated Barry Goldwater by twenty percentage points, and four years later recognized that he was unelectable. In 1972, Richard Nixon was re-elected in an electoral college landslide, carrying every state but one. A year and a half later, he was forced to resign in disgrace. Soon after the 9/11 attacks, George Bush’s approval ratings were above 80%. Now they are half of that, and falling – the result of which is still to be known.

And so, if, at last the public at large comes to appreciate the magnitude of the crimes of this administration, the Bush crime syndicate will soon be swept from power, despite the best efforts of the captive media to prop it up.

But can the public be aroused from its slumbers? On that question, history will turn.

In the meantime, uneasy sits the junta in the mansion atop the unexploded bombs.

However, we, the public, need not sit silently, as helpless spectators, hoping for a reversal of fortune while our democracy is being taken from us. In fact, a significant and growing portion of the public is taking action, as the Bush administration and its bodyguard media lose credibility. The public is acquiring immunity to the official lies and Karl Rove’s smear machine. They worked against Al Gore, Max Cleland and John Kerry, but against Joe Wilson and Cindy Sheehan, the slime appears not to be sticking. The mainstream media, having shed its sense of responsibility to the truth and to the public, is now losing circulation and ratings, while it remains answerable to its stockholders. That media might thus face the choice of either becoming irrelevant or, to avoid bankruptcy, practicing honest journalism again.

There is movement afoot and the public is beginning to stir. As gas prices and interest rates rise, the disastrous consequences of Bushenomics are coming into view. Some conservative pundits appear ready to wander off the GOP reservation. “The I-word” – impeachment – is heard more frequently. And yet, amazingly, and disgracefully, the Democratic Party establishment appears reluctant to play a significant role in this movement.

Thus it remains the responsibility of each private dissenting citizen to join the struggle – a thousand, better millions, of “points of light,” to use George H. W. Bush’s metaphor in a manner he never intended. The citizen can act with boycotts, letters to editors, demonstrations, and by supporting progressive voices in the independent media and the internet. The citizen can act by being heard in public meetings and private conversations, and, if sufficiently resourceful and courageous, with acts of civil disobedience.

But can private citizens make a difference? Ask that question of the protesters at Camp Casey, and you will find your answer. Joseph Wilson made a difference.  Cindy Sheehan made a difference. Colleen Rowley made a difference. Who’s next? Maybe you. As Margaret Mead once said: "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful committed citizens can change the world: Indeed it's the only thing that ever has."

What, if anything, might set off the bomb that puts an end to the Bush regime? Possibly Patrick Fitzgerald’s investigation. He has no shortage of indictable felonies to deal with. The great unknown is the courage of Fitzgerald, his legal team, and the grand jury. Also unknown is whether Bush’s Justice Department dares to fire Fitzgerald, possibly igniting a Nixonian fire-storm.

To my mind, the most vulnerable line of attack against the Bush/GOP machine is voting fraud. The evidence is compelling (see Dennis Loo’s “No Paper Trail Left Behind”  and The Crisis Paper’s “Election Fraud” page).  The best that the GOP and the media can offer as rebuttal is (a) stonewall silence, (b) the laughable, unsupported and refuted hypothesis of “the reluctant Bush voters” at the exit polls, and (c) predictably, smearing the election-critics by calling them “conspiracy theorists.” Substantive proof that the paperless e-voting machines and central compiling were totally honest is non-existent. That’s the way the e-voting machines were designed.

Nothing, except perhaps a collapse of the economy, is more likely to move the public to open revolt than proof, possibly in the form of criminal indictments and conviction, that their votes were stolen, and that the administration and Congress in Washington have put themselves beyond the reach of recall by the voters. Despite the determination of the mainstream media to ignore the issue of voting fraud, it will not go away. Occasional doubts of the integrity of the ballot break through the media’s wall of silence: first Keith Olberman, and just this week, Paul Krugman.  Citizen doubts must now be relentlessly expressed. As more White House lies are exposed, as casualties mount in Iraq, and as the economy darkens, more and more citizens will be open to the idea that they’ve been had – at the polls.

Obviously, the Congress and Bush’s Attorney General will not investigate the issue of voting fraud. But no matter. National elections are administered on the state and local level, and thus any state attorney general or local district attorney is authorized to investigate and bring charges of voting fraud. One must wonder why it hasn’t happened yet. (Perhaps such investigations are underway and the media won't tell us about them). Citizen pressure has more clout on the state and local level than on the federal level. So that’s where demands for action must be made.

The Bush Administration is energizing a formidable array of opponents: foreign governments that it is bullying and betraying, ordinary citizens that it is robbing of social services, health care, and job security, military personnel that it is sending in harm’s way to Iraq (and who knows, next Iran?), and the grieving parents, spouses and children losing their loved ones in that atrocious war.

And finally, the Bush Administration is engaged in a contest against the truth and against reality, as it spins out lie after lie, and as it rewrites and censors scientific reports. This is a contest that it must eventually lose. Presumably, the primary objective of the Busheviks now is to prolong their charade until January 2009, when they leave office. Our job as responsible citizens is to pull away the curtain and expose the wizard as soon as possible, to minimize further damage to our country – to its economy, to its international reputation, to its honor.

For, to quote the late physicist Richard Feynman in his dissent to the Challenger Disaster report,  "reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled."

Copyright 2005 by Ernest Partridge

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Previous Partridge Essays

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