Harlem Target Store Sells Watermelon Soda
with 21st Century Pickanniny on Can



Is this Blackfolk being paranoid... or is racism live and well?

Notice the contradiction of the Sista with the "Sex & the City" T-shirt commenting on the racist nature of the soda. She's advertising a show that's not only sexist but racist also (Black and Latinos are invisible in this NYC-based show/movie!)

Erasing Katrina Four Years On,
media mostly neglect
an ongoing disaster

NOTE: My good friend/comrade, Dinizulu Tinnie comments on the PostKatrina essay found below...

Muchas gracias for this, Sam,

Excellent coverage of the non-coverage, which, truth to be told, was actually a problem right from the outset, as many of us painfully remember, but not nearly as painfully as those who actually underwent the disaster, and its secondary and tertiary disasters (the story is still not fully told of the failure of the levees being a separate development from the damage by the hurricane itself, and the barely-hinted-at stories of white vigilante groups, thankfully alluded to in this piece, has yet to fully come to light).

Not to be forgotten, which is what makes this piece so good, is that the story of the news coverage, or lack thereof, was, and is, a story in itself. In that context, there is also the story -- not alluded to here -- of the absolute worst of the "coverage," which was that multi-million-dollar Hollywood-style production featuring G.W. Bush standing before the stagelit St. Louis Cathedral, acting as if he cared, and having this treated as though it were actual news. (And then there was, as if enough cannot be said about the Bush family's response to the disaster, Laura Bush's later reference to "hurricane Corina." twice, do disconnected was she from the whole matter.)

What was also a story at the time, and still now, was the coverage of the prelude -- the conditions that existed in New Orleans and the surrounding area before Katrina, much of which took on a kind of blame-the-victim character. This fed, and was fed by, the kind of racist/hateful attitude that is cited in this article, with the doctor who was deciding, essentially, whom to euthanize. (Beyond scary.) We started hearing supposedly serious comments and questions as to whether New Orleans needed to be rebuilt at all, and that horrid comment by one of the senators, I believe, who dared to state that "God did for us what we couldn't do ourselves" by "cleaning up" New Orleans, or words to that effect. That is as much of a story as the story of the lack of stories since then.

Among the preconditions there was one especially profound story which glared by its absence of coverage, but only to those who knew it existed at all. I ended up learning about it all in one day, on a visit to NOLA in 1995, when the National Conference of Artists held its Annual Meeting there. On a connecting flight from Houston back to NO, I was seated next to a white-shirted Coloured gentleman (Black man would not be an accurate description, but he's still my brother), who didn't have much to say beyond a barely grunted reply to my greeting. He sat silent by the window until, as we neared our destination, he suddenly jumped with excitement, and practically shouted, to whomever might be listening, or to no one but himself, "Oh my God! Those are our plants! I can't believe it! Wow! Those are actually our plants!" The "plants" he was referring to were a string of white-smoke-spewing installations along a swath of the Mississippi River bank. I didn't know who the "we" were who could claim the plants as "ours," and I didn't ask.

Landing in NO and reaching the hotel, the very first individual I encounterd was iconic NCA member and Washington-based photographer Roy Lewis, one of those perpetual-motion machines who talks fast and gets things done. In the course of our warm reunion, I learned of a project he was involved with, which made him glad to be in NO, because he was documenting the little known fact that along a 50-mile stretch of the Mississippi River, coming into NO, was a series of chemical plants. These were built in an area where the population was predominantly Black, and that population was experiencing a cancer rate five times the national average. His goal was to bring this story to light, since no one else -- certainly not the corporate news media -- seemed to be inclined to do so. Roy had subsequent family issues, etc., so I don't know how far he ever progressed with it.

One would think that the fate of these chemical plants, considering the possible threat that damage to them could pose to the city downstream from them, might have been the focus of some media coverage, which, in turn, would have naturally raised the Environmental Justice issues surrounding their presence there. I actually heard about a nanosecond of a mention, both of the plants and the consequences for the population living near them, and that was it.

The point that this raises is that only by the dumb luck of two chance encounters with two individuals did I become aware of what should have been a major investigative-journalism story even without Katrina, and a full decade before Katrina, so, how many more hidden stories like that are there, in and around NO and elsewhere? (A lot more than we think, I imagine. At a recent one-day EJ Conference in fort Lauderdale, I just learned of a section of that city, a predominantly Black neighborhood, with a similar disparity in cancer rates. The woman who was the primary activist in bringing this out (with only limited success in the broad mainstream) has passed away herself, and the struggle is continuing to be led by her daughter.)

The lack of coverage of the human dimensions of the story since Katrina is egregious enough, but, as this article also suggests, the lack of focus on the natural/environmental aspects is equally shameful. Among the preconditions before Katrina was the fact that parts of the city were literally sinking: driveways falling two inches below the garage apron, for example. This was attributed to the work of the good old U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (they who brought us the Everglades drainage canal system with consequences that will take decades to repair), whose canals rerouted water flows and thus prevented the usual moisture content of the alluvial soil upon which the city was originally engineered to "sit lightly" from being maintained. The media has failed to inform us of the progress (if any, or if what is being called progress deserves the name) being made on restoring and improving the levee system, but also on whether there is any real effort to improve the overall environmental management so that the healthy condition of the city's foundation is restored.

One gets the impression that in the eyes of America's prevailing Puritanical popular culture, New Orleans was just to Black, too poor, too corrupt too fun-loving, and too frank and honest about its character -- all according to stereotypes -- to deserve to live. Katrina provided the God-sent opportunity, as the senator suggested, to erase this microcosmic indicting blot from America's wannabe image of pure white innocence, so the gradual erasure of Katrina by the corporate media becomes a way of erasing New Orleans itself -- at least the one we knew and loved in its own way -- through the journalistic equivalent of "demolition by neglect." The "New New Orleans" that these fantasizers imagine will quietly replace the old, without journalistic fanfare or scrutiny, will be a gentrified and "whiter" city, where any and all overdue improvements will be for the benefit of "developers" (an artist friend sagely calls that a "one-word oxymoron") and, supposedly, "the right kind of people." The silence of the corporate media is therefore not a passive non-action, but actually a pro-active strategy (consciously or not) in this drama.

By now it should be obvious -- but obviously is not, especially to the most favored segments of the population -- that the mindless pursuit of a life of ease, comfort and privilege for the few at the expense of the many is not a sustainable proposition. What I heard on my visits to New Orleans from the regular folks consistently was that the city's greatest single problem was the great disparity in wealth, which kept the place from ever fulfilling its full potential, and allowed its worst problems to fester and grow worse. Decision-making that is informed only by the narrow and corrupted interests of the privileged few is what led (and leads) to the poor engineering decisions that have brought so much natural destruction to the city, and engendered the fear factor that fosters the founding of white vigilante groups.

It said something profound and terrible about our human species when the reflex reaction of so many to a natural disaster of the magnitude of Katrina was not to help as many people as possible to survive, but to arm oneself in fear of "looters" or of Blacks who one thinks are more concerned about revenge upon whites for past wrongs than the survival of their families and communities in a present life-and-death circumstance. (Unfortunately, sadly, shamefully, this was nothing new, but rather a logical extension of past history: This was almost mild in comparison to the response to the devastating Greenwood, Mississippi, flood of 1927, when Blacks were deliberately not rescued and left to die, if that were to be, for fear that if they were rescued they might never return to work for slave wages.)

The fantasies of the "New New Orleans" can only be pursued by the same kind of discredited decision making. The trendy saying of our time defines mental illness as "persisting in the same behavior with the expectation of different outcomes." Not only does a more intelligent -- and inclusive -- vision for the future of New Orleans need to be pursued, but there is, beyond the obvious tasks of repair and restoration, a great task of healing, which cannot be ignored. The social costs that come with unhealed wounds and emotional scars are beyond measure, and certainly beyond measure in dollars. Social health only comes with the entire population being healthy. Healing does not just mean treating or "managing" the pain, but also attacking the causes and implementing prevention. A public policy that recognizes the "right of return" of evacuees, first and foremost, can go a very long way toward the healing that is needed.

DGT

vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv

On Thu, Sep 10, 2009 at 6:09 AM, S. E. Anderson <seanderson@mail.com> wrote:

Erasing Katrina Four years on, media mostly neglect an ongoing disaster

9/2/09
<<...amazingly, according to a search of the Nexis news media database, neither the Washington Post nor the L.A. Times ran a single piece on Katrina in the past week. ABC and Fox News didn't mention the hurricane or its aftermath once.>>


August 29 marked the fourth anniversary of the day Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans and the Gulf Coast. The devastation wrought by both the hurricane itself and the government's inept response prompted remarkably critical corporate media coverage that promised to fight for Katrina survivors and change the way we talk about poverty and race (FAIR Media Advisory, 9/9/05).

As NBC's Brian Williams told the St. Petersburg Times (3/1/06), "If this does not spark a national discussion on class, race, the environment, oil, Iraq, infrastructure and urban planning, I think we've failed." But four years later, corporate media outlets seem to have largely forgotten about Katrina and its survivors, let alone the conversations about race and poverty that were supposed to accompany it.

The Institute for Southern Studies issued a report (8-9/09) in which more than 50 Gulf Coast community leaders graded officials on their response to the ongoing disaster; the Obama administration received a D+, while Congress received a D. (George W. Bush received a D- in an earlier survey.) One million people are still displaced, rebuilding continues at a glacial pace, and the levees being rebuilt have been judged insufficient to protect New Orleans from another Katrina-level flood.

But amazingly, according to a search of the Nexis news media database, neither the Washington Post nor the L.A. Times ran a single piece on Katrina in the past week. ABC and Fox News didn't mention the hurricane or its aftermath once.

CBS ran two segments (8/28/09, 8/31/09), as well as a brief headline (8/29/09) on Barack Obama's weekly radio address that discussed post-Katrina reconstruction. The one mention on MSNBC came on the Ed Show (8/27/09), when host Ed Schultz singled out right-wing talk radio host Neal Boortz for his hateful remarks about displaced Katrina survivors, such as his recent commentary: "Obama wants to rebuild New Orleans? Why? 'Build it and they will come'? 'They'? The debris that Katrina chased out?"


NBC ran four segments, all of which put a remarkably upbeat spin on the situation. In one piece (8/30/09), reporter Ron Mott declared that while a third of the homes in New Orleans are still vacant or abandoned, "positive news abounds. The population is steadily climbing as are test scores in the overhauled public school system." Another segment (8/30/09) reported that "the city and its most famous cultural treasure are now well on the mend," while a day earlier (8/29/09), Saturday Today anchor Lester Holt introduced a short piece on "encouraging new signs for the city," in which reporter Mott announced that "much has improved and a lot of people are working."

The New York Times published a few pieces on Katrina, including an op-ed chart (8/28/09) and a report (8/30/09) on Obama's speech. The cover story of its weekend magazine (8/30/09) was a long piece by Sheri Fink, of the nonprofit journalism outfit ProPublica, on the "deadly choices" at a New Orleans hospital following the hurricane--one of the few anniversary pieces to touch even obliquely on issues of racism, quoting one doctor who helped euthanize patients as saying he was worried about "the animals" outside--that "these crazy black people who think they've been oppressed for all these years by white people" might start "raping...or, you know, dismembering" people.

The Times also ran an article (8/31/09) that talked about how the goal in New Orleans isn't to "revert to the city that existed here before the flood," but instead focusing on "revitalization." (See Extra!, 7-8/07.) Further down it mentioned that "fundamental problems" still exist, like high unemployment, and some neighborhoods that "seem barely touched" since four years ago. Race, though, wasn't mentioned a single time.

The day before the Katrina anniversary, the Times did manage to run a front-page piece on the abysmal state of flood recovery--in Cedar Rapids, Iowa (8/28/09): "Flooded Iowa City Rebuilding and Feeling Just a Bit Ignored." As reporter Susan Saulny put it, "The outpouring of attention toward New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, ratcheting up again now as the fourth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina approaches, has not been seen here. In fact, the people of Cedar Rapids are feeling neglected."

As Saulny quickly made clear, her premise itself is flawed: "To be sure, Hurricane Katrina's huge reach and a botched emergency response devastated a far greater swath of the country than did the flooding in the Midwest, and no one here is trying to make tit-for-tat disaster comparisons. No lives were lost in the flooding in Cedar Rapids, and the government's initial response to the crisis was generally considered a success." And yet, the New York Times saw fit to run a front-page piece on Cedar Rapids and not Katrina. That "outpouring of attention" for Katrina victims Saulny described as attending the fourth anniversary certainly wasn't to be found in the Times.

CNN, whose relatively heavy Katrina coverage helped boost host Anderson Cooper's profile at the network (Extra!, 7-8/06), dedicated much more time than any other major outlet to the anniversary, with a few dozen segments over the days before and after August 29. But while some of the coverage dug deeper than other outlets, it betrayed CNN's lack of consistent interest in the issue. In one report, for example, correspondent Gary Tuchman "tracked down" a story on vigilante justice in which a white militia formed in a largely white neighborhood and shot black passersby in the chaotic days following the hurricane. It's a critical story--so why did CNN only come to it nearly nine months after ProPublica journalist A.C. Thompson (interviewed briefly in CNN's piece) broke the news in a lengthy investigative report published in the Nation (1/05/09)? It would seem the Katrina anniversaries are the only time such stories are considered newsworthy.

The media's neglect of the Gulf Coast is not a new thing; Extra! was writing about it as far back as July/August 2006. According to the Tyndall Report, which monitors TV news, there were 367 minutes on Katrina's aftermath that year (TVNewser, 1/3/07). In 2007 it was down to 116 minutes, while in 2008 it was not among the top 20 stories of the year. In the first seven months of 2009, Tyndall finds, there were just six Katrina-related stories (TyndallReport.com).

There are plenty of ongoing stories to be told today. The Institute for Southern Studies report also highlighted some startling statistics: In addition to the estimated 1 million people still displaced by Katrina, rents in the New Orleans area have increased by 40 percent since the hurricane, and an estimated 11,000 people are currently homeless there. The report also reveals striking racial disparities in the impacts: Less than 49 percent of households in the largely African-American and working class Lower 9th Ward in New Orleans are actively receiving mail today (compared to 76 percent city-wide), for example, and black children's enrollment in public and private schools dropped from 49 percent of all students to 43 percent.

Independent journalists and outlets, such as Jordan Flaherty (CounterPunch, 8/26/09) and Democracy Now! (8/31/09), as well as local journalists like the New Orleans Times-Picayune's Jarvis DeBerry (e.g., 8/21/09), have been documenting such ongoing disparities and unfulfilled promises. It's work the major outlets can and should be doing--and it doesn't even have to wait until the next anniversary.

SOUTH OF THE BORDER
A New Oliver Stone Film
on the
New Progressive South America

Joseph Littles-NGUZO SABA Charter School Walkathon!

A 1000Mile Walkathon for African-Centered Education
We will keep you up-to-date on this historic and vital 1000 mile walk. It will not be on TV. But, we can push our local southern news stations to cover the cover. I have only included the last 20+ minutes of the press confab. You can look at the first half of the press confab on youtube.

Wednesday July 15 at 9AM the 1000mile journey will begin in West Palm Beach and wind its way up to Jacksonville, FL via Route 1.

Thursday 13 August will be when we all can join the trekkers from West Palm Beach at a celebration whose time and location will be announced later.

For all those interested in joining the Walkathon for African Centered Education, please go to: http://jlnscs.org/index.php/walkathon for details. Of course, financial contributions are greatly appreciated! And, I'm sure they will take in-kind services like, copying, computer/camera/software donations, bottled water, walking shoes, sweat bands, first aid needs...

SCHOOL’S FOUNDER TO WALK FOR AFRICAN-CENTERED EDUCATION

Florida’s only African-centered public school today announced that its co-founder and current Board Chairman, Amefika D. Geuka will walk from the school to Washington, DC to dramatize the urgent need for African-centered education for children of African descent. Geuka and his colleagues have dubbed this venture a “Trek for African-Centered Education,” to be conducted from July 15th through August 12, 2009. In addition to gaining credibility for African-centered education, the walk is expected to raise money to close the funding gap for Geuka’s Joseph Littles-NGUZO SABA Charter School which completed ten years of continuous operation on January 20th of this year. Overall coordination and planning for the walkathon has been contracted to iZania, LLC based in Columbus, Ohio.

Geuka’s walk will cover 1,011 miles, with pledges being sought for every mile walked by him and dozens of expected collaborators along the route. Geuka and surrogate walkers plan to average 33 to 35 miles per day, requiring 10 to 12 hours. Walkers will depart from the school at 5829 Corporate Way in West Palm Beach at 9:00 AM on Wednesday, July 15th, and culminate on or about August 12th with ceremonial stops at the U.S. Department of Education and White House where prepared statements in support of African-centered education will be read.

African-centered schools in the nation’s capital will be asked to host a victory rally after the statements have been read. Both President Barack Obama and his Secretary of Education Arne Duncan have spoken strongly in favor of public charter schools, which are designed to explore creative and innovative approaches to educating students who do not fare well in traditional public schools. Geuka and other advocates and practitioners of African-centered education argue that theirs is the most effective way to encourage children of African descent to aspire to be successful in education and personal development.

The African-centered approach to providing a strong cultural foundation for children of African descent is being adopted across the country by school districts, public schools, private schools, and charter schools. This pedagogical approach is gaining acceptance as an important and necessary component in the development of Black children. They draw parallels between the ‘ACE’ approach and the generally accepted contention by Jews and Catholics that their respective students learn best when their formal education is rooted in study and appreciation of their own heritage history, and culture.

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Capitalism's Crises Analysed

Video: Anwar Shaikh on Marx and the Global Economic Crisis

Submitted by Erin on June 9, 2009

Anwar Shaikh, Professor at the New School for Social Research, gives a Marxist account of historic fluctuations in the capitalist economy and how the current crisis fits in the overall picture. From the Marx and the Global Economic Crisis panel at Left Forum 2009, New York.

Shaikh's homepage, which includes an extensive selection of his articles on economics, can be found here: http://homepage.newschool.edu/~AShaikh/

=====================

Video: David McNally on Marx and the Global Economic Crisis

Submitted by Erin on June 9, 2009 - 2:59pm.

David McNally, Professor at York University and leading member of the New Socialist Group (Solidarity's sister organization in Canada, www.newsocialist.org), talks about the roots of the the financial crisis and its precise role in the worldwide economic downturn--as well as the depth of its social costs. From the Marx and the Global Economic Crisis panel at the 2009 Left Forum in New York.

WALL STREET INTERVIEW WITH SAM ANDERSON

Dr. Samuel Anderson, at March on Wall St. from All Things Harlem on Vimeo.

An interview given on April 3 at a Bailout the People! Rally on Wall St. Produced by All Things Harlem: A Black Independent VideoJournalist and Creative Collective dedicated to making progressive and positively Black videos to help uplift our people and push the Black Liberation Movement forward.

Elder Veteran FreedomFighter
Speaks Truth To Power

Subtley, Rev. Lowery gives props to Liberation Theology, Black History of Resistance & Struggle and Rev Wright. Since his closing benediction there has been a ton of commentary... most of which has been negative by whitefolks and their negro allies. But, the millions of ordinary everyday Blackfolk and veteran Black activists who listened/watched knew what he was trying to do: That Barack Obama's rise to being the most powerful man on Earth comes out of a long history of Resistance and Struggle that Obama and the world must honor and never forget.

Rev. Lowery, in essence, did what any African Elder would do: Charge Obama with being a righteous being out to preserve and advance humanity. Anything short of that will be the work of the Devil capitalism loves.

Without True Black History, There Would Be No WORLD History

Without True Black History, there would be no WORLD History... much less American History (North, South, Caribbean). True Black History is not only a history of Resistance & Struggle. It is also a history that reveals that capitalism was shaped by it... from its very inception. It is a history that reveals that European culture was shaped by it from its very inception.

Black History is a way of exposing the TRUTH about Humanity's journey to Now. What we should be celebrating/remembering/passing on is the inextricable link between the history and struggles of African Peoples- captive and free- and the evolution of US History/ Civilization and World History/Civilizations. Not promoting a history of assimilation into a beastly culture as the Tuckers of the world get trotted out to spew and legitimize.

We can no longer separate from the US or any other part of the Americas as we can separate from our melanin: we are in and of the Americas... just like we are in and of Africa. We are that dualness that Dubois spoke over over a hundred years ago... but now even more so. This does not mean that we have to embrace assimilation and submit ourselves to whims of whitefiolks and capitalism. This means that we recognize we were capital producing capital with our bodies, brains and wombs....This means that at the very core of our ancestors' daily existence was resistance and struggle so powerful that it shaped nations and economies the world over.

So... it is not about getting into white history books. True Black History ERASES those white history books. White supremacy ideas and policies get exposed for our children and the world to see when True Black History is taught and studied.

Black History Week was a political and psychological weapon used by Carter G Woodson and others to counter the in-your-face-racism Black encountered everyday of their lives in the early part of the 20th Century. Black History Month today- right now -must have the same purpose because in-your-face-racism is still here along with a deeper in-your-mind-racism never dreamed of by Brother Woodson. We use this month's celebration and commemoration to recruit and rejuvenate. Recruit even more of our people into understanding that Black History IS World History and a history of Resistance and Struggle for Liberation and Self Determination. Rejuvenate those of us who are weary of the Struggle to Be Free... and, in turn, rejuvenate our organizing and institution-building efforts.

If we celebrate Our History of Resistance and Struggle in this manner, the rest of the year will be about applying what we have learned from our ancestors' unrelenting quest for Liberation... and making them beam with pride.

In Struggle,
Sam Anderson
Feb2009

My Open Letter to President-Elect Barack Obama On the Gaza Invasion

Note: I sent this to change.gov's foreign policy section on January 8, 2009.

President-elect Obama must come out and condemn what Israel is doing in Gaza. Otherwise, US citizens and the world who voted for him and supported him for the sake of change, have only been awarded with a change in personnel in charge of using Israel as a surrogate Middle East cop to help maintain imperial and racist rule. President-elect Obama can speak as a Public Human Being. He does not have to hide behind his not being president yet.

The world interprets his silence as support for Israel's genocidal invasion into Gaza. Just look at the millions of people demonstrating all over in every manner possible. If he does not come out with a strong condemnation of this invasion, this will be one of President-elect's Achilles Heels... tripping him up thruout his tenure as the 44th US president.

Obama can be the real agent of change on this issue. He has the majority of US citizens and the world behind him. Hence, he need not cave in to the rightwing Israeli lobbyists and US proIsrael military-industrial complex forces so emboldened by the Bush-Clinton policies.

Here's what progressive Palestinian people have to say to President-elect Obama:


=============================================

Obama's deadly silence

Ali Abunimah The Electronic Intifada 2 January 2009

"I would like to ask President-elect Obama to say something please about the humanitarian crisis that is being experienced right now by the people of Gaza." Former Georgia Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney made her plea after disembarking from the badly damaged SS Dignity that had limped to the Lebanese port of Tyre while taking on water.

The small boat, carrying McKinney, the Green Party's recent presidential candidate, other volunteers, and several tons of donated medical supplies, had been trying to reach the coast of Gaza when it was rammed by an Israeli gunboat in international waters.

But as more than 2,400 Palestinians have been killed or injured -- the majority civilians -- since Israel began its savage bombardment of Gaza on 27 December, Obama has maintained his silence. "There is only one president at a time," his spokesmen tell the media. This convenient excuse has not applied, say, to Obama's detailed interventions on the economy, or his condemnation of the "coordinated attacks on innocent civilians" in Mumbai in November.

The Mumbai attacks were a clear-cut case of innocent people being slaughtered. The situation in the Middle East however is seen as more "complicated" and so polite opinion accepts Obama's silence not as the approval for Israel's actions that it certainly is, but as responsible statesmanship.

It ought not to be difficult to condemn Israel's murder of civilians and bombing of civilian infrastructure including hundreds of private homes, universities, schools, mosques, civil police stations and ministries, and the building housing the only freely-elected Arab parliament.

It ought not to be risky or disruptive to US foreign policy to say that Israel has an unconditional obligation under the Fourth Geneva Convention to lift its lethal, months-old blockade preventing adequate food, fuel, surgical supplies, medications and other basic necessities from reaching Gaza.

But in the looking-glass world of American politics, Israel, with its powerful first-world army, is the victim, and Gaza -- the besieged and blockaded home to 1.5 million immiserated people, half of them children and eighty percent refugees
-- is the aggressor against whom no cruelty is apparently too extreme.

While feigning restraint, Obama has telegraphed where he really stands; senior adviser David Axelrod told CBS on 28 December that Obama understood Israel's urge to "respond" to attacks on its citizens. Axelrod claimed that "this situation has become even more complicated in the last couple of days and weeks as Hamas began its shelling [and] Israel responded."

The truce Hamas had meticulously upheld was shattered when Israel attacked Gaza, killing six Palestinians, as The Guardian reported on 5 November. A blatant disregard for the facts, it seems, will not leave the White House with George W. Bush on 20 January.


Axelrod also recalled Obama's visit to Israel last July when he ignored Palestinians and visited the Israeli town of Sderot. There, Obama declared: "If somebody was sending rockets into my house where my two daughters sleep at night, I'm going to do everything in my power to stop that. I would expect Israelis to do the same thing."

This should not surprise anyone. Despite pervasive wishful thinking that Obama would abandon America's pro-Israel bias, his approach has been almost indistinguishable from the Bush administration's.

Along with Tony Blair and George W. Bush, Obama staunchly supported Israel's war against Lebanon in July-August 2006, where it used cluster bombs on civilian areas, killing more than 1,000 people.

Obama's comments in Sderot echoed what he said in a speech to the powerful pro-Israel lobby, AIPAC, in March 2007. He recalled an earlier visit to the Israeli town of Kiryat Shmona near the border with Lebanon which he said reminded him of an American suburb. There, he could imagine the sounds of Israeli children at "joyful play just like my own daughters." He saw a home the Israelis told him was damaged by a Hizballah rocket (no one had been hurt in the incident).

Obama has identified his daughters repeatedly with Israeli children, while never having uttered a word about the thousands -- thousands -- of Palestinian and Lebanese children killed and permanently maimed by Israeli attacks just since 2006. This allegedly post-racial president appears fully invested in the racist worldview that considers Arab lives to be worth less than those of Israelis and in which Arabs are always "terrorists."


The problem is much wider than Obama: American liberals in general see no contradiction in espousing positions supporting Israel that they would deem extremist and racist in any other context. The cream of America's allegedly "progressive" Democratic party vanguard -- House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, House Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Howard Berman, New York Senator Charles Schumer, among others -- have all offered unequivocal support for Israel's massacres in Gaza, describing them as "self-defense."

And then there's Hillary Clinton, the incoming secretary of state and self-styled champion of women and the working classes, who won't let anyone outbid her anti-Palestinian positions.

Democrats are not simply indifferent to Palestinians. In the recent presidential election, their efforts to win swing states like Florida often involved espousing positions dehumanizing to Palestinians in particular and Arabs and Muslims in general. Many liberals know this is wrong but tolerate it silently as a price worth paying (though not to be paid by them) to see a Democrat in office.

Even those further to the left implicitly accept Israel's logic. Matthew Rothschild, editor of The Progressive, criticized Israel's attacks on Gaza as a "reckless" and "disproportionate response" to Hamas rocket attacks that he deemed "immoral." There are many others who do nothing to support nonviolent resistance to Israeli occupation and colonization, such as boycott, divestment and sanctions but who are quick to condemn any desperate Palestinian effort -- no matter how ineffectual and symbolic -- to resist Israel's relentless aggression.

Similarly, we can expect that the American university professors who have publicly opposed the academic boycott of Israel on grounds of protecting "academic freedom" will remain just as silent about Israel's bombing of the Islamic University of Gaza as they have about Israel's other attacks on Palestinian academic institutions.

There is no silver lining to Israel's slaughter in Gaza, but the reactions to it should at least serve as a wake-up call: when it comes to the struggle for peace and justice in Palestine, the American liberal elites who are about to assume power present as formidable an obstacle as the outgoing Bush administration and its neoconservative backers.

Co-founder of The Electronic Intifada, Ali Abunimah is author of One Country: A Bold Proposal to End the Israeli-Palestinian Impasse (Metropolitan Books, 2006). This essay was first published in The Guardian's Comment is Free and is republished with the author's permission.



+++

Arnie Duncan As Ed Secretary is Great News for the Privateers and Bad News for US Education

Here are a couple of reactions to Obama's choosing of Chicago Schools head Arne Dunce to be his Secretary of Education.

From me...
Arne Duncan is a very WRONG choice for Ed Secretary if Obama's seeking CHANGE in the nation's education crisis. Arne Duncan is a Continuator of the No Child Left Behind Mess. He is another noneducator who is pro-privatization, pro-hi stakes testing... a minimizer of parental and student involvement, a- at best -middle of the roader when it comes to curriculum reform. He is NOT an advocate of nonEurocentric curriculum development. Rather, he favors the replication of elite white private schools' a la KIPPS Academy- not cultural literacy and culturally relevant teaching and learning. Obama's choice of Duncan tells us that is in agreement with the Bush-Bloomberg-Klein policies of further institutionalizing public schools as cash cows for big business and anti-intellectual centers for workingclass children. Further, the selection of Arne Duncan signals the continuation of Schools-as-preprisons within our mainly Black and Latino urban centers. He may last two years in this position, furthering the spiralling national education crisis and throwing billions at big business's versions of "education solutions." Fellow Educators for Real Change, our fight for quality free public education, our fight to repeal the No Child Left Behind Mess, our fight to mandate antiracist curricula continues.... We clearly have our work cut out for us. Sam Anderson
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From brianroa@hotmail.com...
Arne Duncan called Englewood students a "culture of failure" as Chicago Public Schools worked on charterizing that school. Senn High School got called a "dumping ground for immigrants" at a school board meeting by an advocate of a naval academy being bulldozed into Senn. Senn has students from over 50 countries. Julian High School students have endured being called 'trash' by those who demonize it for being a school which accepts students displaced by Renaissance 2015. Renaissance 2015, AKA Renaissance 2010, is the school 'reform' plan trumpeted by Duncan, designed by Chicago business interests, and unrolled by Mayer Daley.

Duncan and his cartel want to privatize schools and need radical rhetoric in order to justify the destruction of this public good. Students and the teachers get demonized and become collateral damage in this violence .

Schools are badly in need of improvement. Parents and the community are desperate for good schools in an environment where schools are starved for funds.. Well funded schools and slick PR campaigns, followed by Duncan's talking points of 'choice,' 'accountability' and 'children first,' deceive the public into believing that we are receiving the best possible schools for children. A false dichotomy of "accept the status quo or accept privatized education is spewed throughout." No viable alternatives are considered.

Education is a basic human right. All people have a right to equitable education. Chicago's two-tiered school system showers a small minority of schools with vast resources and warehouses the rest of the students. The warehoused students then get slandered and attacked when their school needs to be shut down to make way for 'better' students.

This is the system that Duncan represents. He is a smooth-talking destroyer of the public good.

Now's the Time for a National Black Education Agenda

Sisters and Brothers in Education,

We all know the dire state of Black Education in every sector: preK-16, public and private. We all may not agree on how we got into this state of education emergency. We all, therefore, not agree on how we can stop this downward spiral. But we all can agree that we gotta do something NOW!

I suggest that we have an opportunity to start on that hard, bumpy spiraling road to victory with a set of unprecedented historical convergences: Obama becoming president of the US, the economic crisis, the environmental crisis and the national educational team assembled under Sister Prof.Linda Darling Hammond.

Obama's presidency has inspired millions of Blackfolk to come out of a decades long political slumber. Among these millions are millions of young Blacks 35 and under who are directly or indirectly inspired to see themselves in a more positive light. It may not be an immediate effect, but positive effect it will be. Hence, over the next few years, there will be great opportunities to recruit more Black men and women into the education field.

The economic and environmental crises are hiliting the need for the US to take bold economic steps in the field of public works on rebuilding the US infrastructure and new forms of producing energy. The fallout from the US auto industry will also bring new industry- but not as labor intensive as auto production. President-elect Obama has proposed a 2.5 million jobs producing economic stimultant that will require thousands of educators in all education levels.

In order for us Blackfolk not to repeat history and continue to be on the edges of major social and educational reform, we a need to put together a bold vision of we can be at the very center- and, at times, its leadership -of the educational developments needed to support this economic and environmental challenge.

It is in this context that I offer an outline for us to discuss and build upon to present to our Good Sister Prof Linda Darling Hammond and her transition team. She knows, like you and I, there are many great Black minds out here who have thought thru and implemented brilliant educational policies. I think in this historical moment (and that's all we have- a moment) we can find a way to maximally tap into thos great Black minds and deliver a proposal from national united body of Black Educators to her transition team who would have no option but to incorporate all or major parts of our proposal into the nation's challenge to make education relevant to reversing the economic and environmental crises and to bring antiracist reform directly into US education policy.

What we should present to Prof. Linda Darling Hammond (and I'm sure you have many other proposals!);

• Repeal the NCLB Act

• Education is a Human Right. Have US policy abide by the International Declaration of Human Rights mandates around education

<http://nesri.org/fact_sheets_pubs/Right%20to%20Education.pdf>

• Create an African American Education Commission/Dept/Working Group that would create and oversee policy relevant to the education goals and needs of people of African Descent in the US. It would be a distinguished group of scholars, education activists, students, public school teachers and administrators. This would be a permanent and fully funded group within the US Dept of Education (Obviously, this implies a Latino/Asian/Native American groupings as well- even tho Native Americans already have theirs)

• Mandate the teaching of Black History/Latino History a central curriculum core from PreK to 16

• Create a Black History/Latino History Teacher Training & Curriculum Development Department that links to Education schools (public and private)

• Create a national Urban Science & Technology Department that:

(a) institutionalizes the recruitment and retention of Blacks/Latinos from preK to 16 to join the teaching and/or industry sectors of science and technology

(b) brings skilled science and technology jobs and training to the Black and Latino neighborhoods

• Guarantee that our HBCUs get First Call on all of the above efforts by having them represented at all levels of the National Program (the "Devil's in the Details" here)

Like I said, there are obviously a lot more national proposals we can and should add on. And there are a lot of complex details that need to be worked out. We have the Black Talent to do this. I am suggesting that we submit to Prof. Darling Hammond a proposal that has the necessary skeleton to be fleshed out within the US Dept of Education.

Our time is very short. We need to submit our proposal while the Transition Team is still working. This means we have about two or three weeks of deliberation to do among ourselves. Then, by the first week in January, have it in the hands of Prof. Darling Hammond with signatures of all those individuals and organizations who support this proposal.

No matter who is the next Secretary of Education, we need this proposal. Even more, OUR Children need to know that we progressive Black Educators came together, discussed, argued, united and created a powerful National Black Education Mandate for the First Black President.

I look forward to your critiques, queries, proposals, strategies and tactics.

In Struggle,

Sam Anderson

Obama Cabinet Predictions: Who Could Get Picked?

I predict that President-elect Barack Obama's cabinet will not be as diverse- in terms of race and nationality -as the Bush administration-- the most diverse presidential administration ever. I also predict that the Obama cabinet will be a center-right cabinet... not that much different than the Bush administration. I predict this because Obama believes in the capitalist system and believes that it can be fixed for the betterment of those corporate rulers... and therefore, having benefits trickling down to the ordinary citizens of the US.



I also predict this because Barack Obama must never ever show any sign of "racial favoritism".... Hence, he will not try to reflect the demographic reality of the US in his cabinet. Obama is defined as a postracial man in a postracial world. This new myth has and will be used by those who rule to enshroud/obfuscate racism and race relations from this day forward.



The next couple of weeks will reveal to the more progressive "for change" forces in this nation that we need to immediately keep Obama's feet to the social change/social justice fire. Without a vigilant, persistent and organized progressive front on ALL the issues, Obama will go down in history as the Continuator of the Bush-Clinton imperial global bumrushing policies at home and abroad.
About Obama's Cabinet
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

The Current Capitalist Crisis-
A Marxist Analysis

Sistas and Brothas, we are in the midst of a major major historical shift in the political economy of the world: capitalism- international finance capitalism -is in a state of swift free fall failure. The world's rulingclasses are trying to put this gigantic broken Humtpy Dumpty egg back together again and keep the anger of us masses under control via the institutionalized dumbing down process and the police state in its various forms.

We, in the US, all have looked to the TV pundits and printed editorials for explanations of this megabursting of finance capital bubbles. We looked to Barack Obama and John McCain for explanations and solutions. A tiny few of us get to hear from Sister Cynthia McKinney and Ralph Nader about how they see this historic crisis and their solutions. But, they all come up like lite beer: bland and never satisfying your thirst.

In the coming weeks, I will try to bring to you analysis that not only clearly and deeply explains this epoch-changing crisis, but also how we can begin to solve this megacrisis thru mass mobilization and struggle. I hope to bring to you a special focus on how this crisis is directly and indirectly impacting Black America, Africa and its Diaspora.


First, however, we need to look at this unfolding crisis from a critical and scientific perspective. That is, a Marxist analysis of what is going on and how we are going to solve it. And Prof Rick Wolf has made an important and clear starting contribution to this effort. He is professor of economics at UMass Amherst and in this video below, talks on the current "financial" crisis and capitalism. A form of socialism is presented as a possible alternative. This talk was presented by the Association for Economic and Social Analysis and the journal Rethinking Marxism. The video below is a little jittery, but is worth watching. In the next few weeks, we should have a better video of Prof Wolf posted here.

NYC Public Forum on School Governance-
History First

September 17 at Murry Bergtraum High School- Manhattan

Below is an hour+ long video where panelists Diane Ravitch, historian and critic, Jitu Weusi, educationactivist and former teacher as well as one of the organizers of the Ocean Hill-Brownsville struggle for Community Control, Betty Rosa, former principal and superintendent of District 8 in the Bronx and now a Regent. The panelists not only give us some great historical insights, but also begin to address the horrendous Bloomberg-Klein mayoral control policies and practices.

The session was moderated by Pedro Noguera of NYU.

http://www.brightcove.tv/title.jsp?title=1811520616

The Black Holocaust For Beginners Back In Print!

Folks,

For those of you who are looking for my book- The Black Holocaust for Beginners -it is still available either online or in local bookstores across the US. Since the 2001 death of the Brother publisher, Glen Thompson, Writers and Readers has morphed into another publishing house and has another distributor. Please check into: for any inquiries and orders.

I am available for various kinds of discussions and presentations around the book: classes, seminars, workshops, lectures. It can be in community organizations, activist groups, book clubs, spiritual centers and classrooms from Kindergarten all the way thru Graduate School.

Just email me here- seanderson@mail.com

In Struggle,

Sam Anderson
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Here are a few responses to the book from

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars - The single-most impacting book of Black history I've read.
I've been reading everything "black" I could get my hands on since I started my awakening. I stumbled upon the Holocaust book in a small bookstore in Albuquerque, NM and had it read by that afternoon; I couldn't put it down. I was so impacted upon by the pictures, particularly of Sister Translator hanging from her tongue because she could speak to many and because she dared to strike a white man. It was so very interesting to learn about the Arab slave trade, especially the current state of affairs regarding slavery in Mauritania and the Sudan. Of great interest to me was the numbers Mr. Anderson cites. My husband, who is also a Black activist, has said for year he felt there were 100-150 million involved; it's easy to see there were really more than that. I applaud Mr. Anderson's bravery in writing a book about things no one wants to hear. I was moved to tears. Thank you, Mr. Anderson and may the Lord of your Fathers richly bless your life for your contribution to the cause.


Rating: 5 out of 5 stars - There may be more scholarly treatments...
There may be more scholarly treatments but the impact that this little book gives the reader makes it one of the most important books you can buy. Don't wait for the professor to assign it. Whatever your heritage/ancestry is, these are pages that you have to read for yourself. You REALLY don't know much until you do.

Rating: 5 out of 5 stars - A Must Have
I bought this book based on the previous reviews and its better than I expected. The illustrations and graphics are excellent!


Rating: 5 out of 5 stars - An Absolute Must Read
The book is part of an ongoing series that explores individuals and topics that unfortunately receive little or incorrect coverage by "mainstream" historians/books.

This nation has never faced the fact that its economy was built by the slave trade. Equally, many of the so-called heroes of the nation were the ones who pushed hard to continue or expand the buying and selling of humans. And the ramifications still reverberate today in the society.

The book brilliantly uses text and drawings to vividly bring the facts surrounding slavery to life. You will be equally touched and angered about the blood and chains & what must be seen for what it was - the planned extermination of a race of people solely to build a nation.

Critics will say that the book rewrites history. Yes it does. It places the sordid times in its proper context.


Rating: 3 out of 5 stars - Black African slavery did not begin with the Atlantic trade
Anderson and Holley rightly tackle a topic that deserves study, however, they de-emphasize the well-developed Islamic slave trade that kidnapped more than 11 million Black Africans from their homes between 700 to 1900. This slave trade began centuries before the Atlantic trade and continued for centuries after. Islamic scripture fully embraces the institution of human slavery. Mohammed left many instructions to slaveowners. This express endorsement of human slavery by Mohammed accounts for the fact that human slavery was not abolished in Saudi Arabia until 1964 and not until 1968 in Kuwait. Islamic slavery was no less brutal than the Atlantic variety. Males slaves were routinely castrated and forced into military service.Female slaves become sexual servants whose children were not their own.


Rating: 5 out of 5 stars - Truth In Your face
This is excellent literature, with extremely vivid graphics! Texts such as this should be written more often, as it is a well researched source of Black History.


Rating: 5 out of 5 stars - For library black studies and American history collection
The systematic exploitation, enslavement and extermination of Africans in the Western Hemisphere dates from the start of the European slave trade around 1500 BCE to the conclusion of the American Civil War in 1865. The Black Holocaust killed millions of African human beings and is (because of the social prejudice and dehumanization necessary to justify slavery) the most under-reported event in western history. The Black Holocaust For Beginners is an ideal introduction to this incredible human chronicle of suffering and is a "must" for every school and community library black studies and American history collection.

"Putting Africa Into the Computer"
Brotha Kwabena Boahen is a brilliant young African scientist who is conscious of the possibilities of the uniquely "African" contributions to contemporary science and technology. One of the key components of this "Africanity" is its nonlinear nature... its embracing of complexity within collectivity... using networks over rigidity in processing and informing. Watch this video to the very end to get an understanding of where Boahen is coming from... and where his ideas can go- IF we bring African traditional cognition into the 21st Century science & tech. Brotha Boahen's very last example of infusing "Africa" into Western technology and culture really helps to clarify where he's coming from... and how Africans and our descendants must move forward for not only our survival and development, but also for the survival and development of Planet Earth.-- Sam Anderson

Kwabena Boahen: Making a computer that works like the brain

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

Why you should listen to him:

Kwabena Boahen is the principal investigator at the Brains in Silicon lab at Stanford. He writes of himself:

Being a scientist at heart, I want to understand how cognition arises from neuronal properties. Being an engineer by training, I am using silicon integrated circuits to emulate the way neurons compute, linking the seemingly disparate fields of electronics and computer science with neurobiology and medicine.

My group's contributions to the field of neuromorphic engineering include a silicon retina that could be used to give the blind sight and a self-organizing chip that emulates the way the developing brain wires itself up. Our work is widely recognized, with over sixty publications, including a cover story in the May 2005 issue of Scientific American.

My current research interest is building a simulation platform that will enable the cortex's inner workings to be modeled in detail. While progress has been made linking neuronal properties to brain rhythms, the task of scaling up these models to link neuronal properties to cognition still remains. Making the supercomputer-performance required affordable is the goal of our Neurogrid project. It is at the vanguard of a profound shift in computing, away from the sequential, step-by-step Von Neumann machine towards a parallel, interconnected architecture more like the brain.

Continuing the Obama Drama...

A Comment from Brotha Dinizulu...
He's commenting on the Nation's August 18, 2008 article entitled (see below):
Change We Can Believe In: An Open Letter to Barack Obama

Well, this does a pretty good job of making it clear that many more people are feeling the exact same things that the folks closest to us are feeling.

The Obama campaign, however, seems committed to its own version of "realpolitik," the euphemistic excuse which has been offered (even by no less an apologist than Amiri Baraka) for why the compromises and "tilting toward center," as the WSJ called it, must be done -- "in order to get elected" -- which, of course, begs the question of "And Then What?"

We have seen this movie before -- the Dukakis and Kerry versions, and the Jimmy Carter version once he got elected -- and we know it doesn't work. There is even a proverb about changing horses in the middle of a stream, and an even better known one about the obligation to "Dance with who brung you."

These foolish moves by the Dumb-ocrats over the years can be, and have been, attributed to simple poor judgment, or the stereotyped notion of hard working, good-hearted, sincere folk being outplayed by very rich, slick and unscrupulous players on the other side, but I ain't with that. What seems to be in play here is exactly what we suspect most and know best about American politricks.

Established power is a hell of a force to reckon with, especially when we are talking about those at the top of a sociopolitical matrix that is characterized by the most extreme disparity of wealth to be found anywhere on the planet. Power, to para phrase the late Rick James's profound statement about cocaine, "is a hell of a drug." (Dave Chapelle did some hilarious stuff with that.) It is an addiction, and, as such, has no propensity whatsoever to listening to reason or exercising itself in any way that even appears to diminish the possibility of acquiring more.

In the orchestrated scam known as the American political scene, it seems like the villain behind the scene is money. Elections have come to be accepted by the public as money raising contests instead of competitions for the votes of the masses, who are fast on our way to being "shirtless," "unwashed," and all those other epithets. (Any pretense to democracy in this country was stillborn from the getgo, but the will of the people to make it a reality has never quite been crushed. Today, we are closer than ever to that reality.) But extreme concentrations of money are the result, rather than the cause, of undue political influence on the part of those at the top of the matrix, whose single agenda, like that of the junkie on the street, is to feed their addiction to power, which not only leads them to do literally anything in that pursuit, but also allows them to do so without fear of punishment or reprisals. "Nice work if you can get it..."

So now comes this bright, fresh, intelligent, promising face to the world of politics, who seems to be so sharp that he can even command the scene, rather than being commanded by it. He garners the attention of the masses, even some of the most jaded, who are duly impressed. He looks good. He sounds good. He even seems untainted by the poisons coursing through the nation's veins for centuries. This is starting to look like a "We-Can-Do-This" moment. America might be saved! He is perfect!

The most powerful few agreed on that even before the first of the masses got an inkling, and therein lies the rub. In our lifetime we have rarely seen the office of the presidency to be much more than a sales executive position: Advertise and sell predetermined policy on behalf of the most wealthy and powerful to the masses as something that we want and need. Who better to make Americans think that we still have a democracy than this perfect candidate? But this strategy comes with a serious caveat. It is one thing for him to freshen the scene and create a Britney Spears-type distraction from more serious matters at hand, but it is another for him to start being listened to and to have a real chance at winning this thing. So the faster and farther he runs, the more the reins have to be tightened.

In the end, he might win, if he wins, by a nose, and will do so knowing who is in charge and with no foolish sense of having any "mandate from the people." That is their dream. Then there is ours, which is the impetus for this letter. "Go ahead, big guy! You can do it ! We got your back! The entire human race will be grateful beyond words, for generations to come! We need you! We love you!" A hell of a choice.

He was once (now famously), a "community organizer" in Chicago, an activist, one might even say, one of the good guys with some kind of cred on the street. People saw. People heard. People listened. People noticed. All kinds of people. And among those were the people who persuaded and encouraged him to run for political office. A fateful decision. Like so many others -- the "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" fantasy comes to mind --he certainly made the choice based on what he could bring to politics rather than what it could do for him. Like the best of candidates, he was there for what he could do, rather than for what he could be.

But once there, what? Where is the courageous voting record? Where is the advocacy other than on the campaign stump? What have we here, really? For sure, the man's genuine temperament and disposition as a bridge-builder who prefers reasoned negotiation and diplomacy to rash and destructive confrontation is an asset, but to whose advantage, really?

What it looks like from where I, and a whole lot of other people, sit, is good ol' politricks as usual. "Realpolitik," it is said to be, as if to impart some sense of historical justification or dignity to the strategy. "Look, ya got the so-called 'progressives' i n your pocket. They're not going anywhere, and they're too cared not to vote for you, a) because they actually believe in democracy, and b) because they are deathly afraid of a McCain continuation of the Bush regime, so you don't have to pander to them anymore, now that they got you the nomination. Sure, that's who brung you to the big dance, but there's a bigger dance coming up, and we know you don't like the sleazy old madam's reputation, but, listen, she's got the connections to make or break you, so what are ya gonna do, big guy? Chuck the whole thing? May we remind you of who really got you here. Some very powerful people have invested a lot in you, and have even risked their reputations in gambling on you as one who can be trusted to do the right things. You guys know how to play ball, right? In fact, you're famous for it. That's all ya gotta do: play good ball and everybody'll be happy. What more can you ask for? You're in. If you want to opt out, hey, it's a free country, but you'll make some people very unhappy. So the choice is yours. We know you'll make the right decision."

Outside of that backroom where the high-stakes game of politricks is being played (the powerful just love their power), an even more serious game is unfolding, with nothing less than human survival (including that of the most powerful) at stake. Immoral and unnecessary wars, massive resources being poured into destructive weaponry rather than productive improvements to the quality of life, global warming, environmental crises (which include foodstocks), dysfunctional health care, increasing symptoms of collective madness like domestic and child abuse, school shootups and random violence, what should be an alarming rate of incarceration, failing schools, divorces outweighing marriages, the AIDS pandemic, exacerbated disparities in material wealth and energy use, sweatshop nations ruked by propped-up dictators, torture made acceptable, etc, etc. Are we supposed to believe that this is normal; just "human nature"; "the way it has always been"; "just business, nothing personal"; etc., etc., in the same way that we are supposed to accept that slavery was, well, OK, or that genocidal "Indian Removal" (which has now reduced the Indigenous population to less than 3%) was "God's will," carried out by "His" people? Are we, as members of a species, not just an "interest group" of one kind or another, supposed to just accept that what passed for "business as usual" in the past, which has created all of these consequences today, is supposed to be acceptable in the present and the future?

I don't expect Mr. Obama, in his position, to give much attention to this open letter, no matter how many people sign it or who the signers are (unless some of his most generous corporate sponsors are on the list), but we, on the other hand, have no choice other than to give it a lot of attention and to stand for what we have been standing=2 0for, whether he stands with us or not, and even if, in the end -- "realpolitik" being what it is -- he stands against us.


We have simply passed the point in history, like it or not, ready or not, when the occupant of the White House can be "The Decider" of who lives and who dies, who enjoys life and who suffers, who eats and who starves. This is partly because the real power of these decisions lies elsewhere -- in oil and energy, pharmaceuticals, agribusiness, global finance capital and other such centers, whose longstanding agenda has been a marginalization or elimination of government as a relevant entity at all, with its power to tax, regulate and monitor private profit making; they can easily envisage a world run by corporate warlords with private armies, not so much to combat one another as to compete for the precious prizes of cheap labor and lucrative consumer markets. Government's only role is to tax the common people, conscript their sons and daughters into the low-paid armed forces that will save corporate expenses to protect their global interests, and, of course feed those interests healthy contracts. That is all stereotypical enough, but even so, the real world is much more subtle.

The rise of the Euro on one side and of the Asian economies on the other are straws in the wind that the role of the U.S. government in world affairs is changing rapidly. The oldthink notions of maintaining some kind of global military empire are just not applicable in the same ways to the 21st century. History has moved on. New generations are being born, with reflexes and responses to reality for which the Old Order is in no way prepared -- the price of not caring. The old fantasy that all opponents (if you ain't with us, you're agin us) can be shot, bombed, gassed, tortured or intimidated out of existence is a pathetic misconception that can only be propped up by ignorance and fear, and both of those props are fast disappearing, in spite of Power's best efforts.

The only hope in all of this is sanity. You can't fix anything that is broken until you have sense enough to know and acknowledge that it is broken. That may not mean that you know how to fix it, but at least it is the first step. Right now, fear and addiction is making that first step look like a leap into the unknown. (Who in America has ever learned how to live in an equitable society, without prejudices and discrimination, for example?) But new generations, born into the world as it is, having no appetite for the game because reality is too compelling, will have much to say about where we are headed.

Nature always seeks balance. The extreme degree of imbalance in the world today can be measured by how much violence (actual and threatened) is required to maintain it. Violence (especially the tools and weapons required) requires a great consumption of resources and energy (mental and spiritual as well20as material). If the human species becomes such a source of imbalance as to make nature more healthy without our presence then I don't think any number of our most dreadful weapons will defend us against that. (As if to show us a lesson in that reality, while our chickenhawks in DC were boasting about their "shock and awe" terrorism in Iran, and threatening others with what "the full might of American military force" can do, there was this tsunami, whose effects were felt from Indonesia to Somalia, killing how many humans in its path. Was it not interesting that so many other species of animals and birds "knew" not to be there when it struck, having moved on to higher ground far away, without evacuation plans, traffic jams, dysfunctional FEMA incompetents, etc.?)

Until we get about the business of seeking that kind of sanity, instead of being concerned with celebrity gossip (which is just about what the race for the White House has been reduced to, in real terms -- which was the material for that "I've Got a Crush on Obama" spoof), we aren't even half serious about the real business of being human on this earth, in the ways that our Ancestors knew we had to be. It is truly said, in our folk wisdom, that "An empty wagon makes the most noise." All around us, we can barely think (mission accomplished!) for all of the noise and distraction -- advertising, politics, religion, violence (attested to by the constant wail of police sirens, if not actually witnessed or experienced) -- all that stuff assaults our senses unrelentingly, especially in urban environments. TV, video games, computer stuff -- like what I am doing right now, consumerist notions of our individual worth, etc., etc., are always there to fill even what might be our quiet moments. Even our music is what we buy, download, or hear on the radio, not what we make. And for all the noise and cacophony, it's all empty, just a big game to get our money so a few of us, like cancer cells can live bloatedly overfed lives at our expense.

Politics and preachers have little to offer, at least at present, to this struggle for sanity amidst the madness-made-fashionable. In fact, many will feel so threatened by our pro-active embrace of another agenda than theirs that we can predictably be put on the threat-to-national-security list, for daring to live simpler and truer lives. In doing so, however, they would do well to be reminded of the nature of the beast they are attempting to ride to the promised land. Its belly stays full of those who have attempted to ride its back; in fact that is the bait and lure by which it feeds. We do well to stay out of its way.

In struggle,

DGT
==========================

Subject: An Open Letter to Barack Obama

Change We Can Believe In: An Open Letter to Barack Obama

August 18, 2008, The Nation.

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20080818/open_letter

Dear Senator Obama,

We write to congratulate you on the tremendous achievements of your campaign for the presidency of the United States.

Your candidacy has inspired a wave of political enthusiasm like nothing seen in this country for decades. In your speeches, you have sketched out a vision of a better future-- in which the United States sheds its warlike stance around the globe and focuses on diplomacy abroad and greater equality and freedom for its citizens at home--that has thrilled voters across the political spectrum. Hundreds of thousands of young people have entered the political process for the first time, African-American voters have rallied behind you, and many of those alienated f rom politics-as- usual have been re-engaged.

You stand today at the head of a movement that believes deeply in the change you have claimed as the mantle of your campaign. The millions who attend your rallies, donate to your campaign and visit your website are a powerful testament to this new movement’s energy and passion.

This movement is vital for two reasons: First, it will help assure your victory against John McCain in November. The long night of greed and military adventurism under the Bush Administration, which a McCain administration would continue, cannot be brought to an end a day too soon. An enthusiastic corps of volunteers and organizers will ensure that voters turn out to close the book on the Bush era on election day. Second, having helped bring you the White House, the support of this movement will make possible the changes that have been the platform of your campaign. Only a grassroots base as broad and as energized as the one that is behind you can counteract the forces of money and established power that are a dead weight on those seeking real change in American politics.

We urge you, then, to listen to the voices of the people who can lift you to the presidency and beyond.

Since your historic victory in the primary, there have been troubling signs that you are moving away from the core commitments shared by many who have supported your campaign, toward a more cautious and centrist stance--including, most notably, your vote for the FISA legislat ion granting telecom companies immunity from prosecution for illegal wiretapping, which angered and dismayed so many of your supporters.

We recognize that compromise is necessary in any democracy. We understand that the pressures brought to bear on those seeking the highest office are intense. But retreating from the stands that have been the signature of your campaign will weaken the movement whose vigorous backing you need in order to win and then deliver the change you have promised.

Here are key positions you have embraced that we believe are essential to sustaining this movement:

• Withdrawal from Iraq on a fixed timetable.

• A response to the current economic crisis that reduces the gap between the rich and the rest of us through a more progressive financial and welfare system; public investment to create jobs and repair the country’s collapsing infrastructure; fair trade policies; restoration of the freedom to organize unions; and meaningful government enforcement of labor laws and regulation of industry.

• Universal healthcare.

• An environmental policy that transforms the economy by shifting billions of dollars from the consumption of fossil fuels to alternative energy sources, creating millions of green jobs.

• An end to the regime of to rture, abuse of civil liberties and unchecked executive power that has flourished in the Bush era.

• A commitment to the rights of women, including the right to choose abortion and improved access to abortion and reproductive health services.

• A commitment to improving conditions in urban communities and ending racial inequality, including disparities in education through reform of the No Child Left Behind Act and other measures.

• An immigration system that treats humanely those attempting to enter the country and provides a path to citizenship for those already here.

• Reform of the drug laws that incarcerate hundreds of thousands who need help, not jail.

• Reform of the political process that reduces the influence of money and corporate lobbyists and amplifies the voices of ordinary people.

These are the changes we can believe in. In other areas--such as the use of residual forces and mercenary troops in Iraq, the escalation of the US military presence in Afghanistan, the resolution of the Israel-Palestine conflict, and the death penalty--your stated positions have consistently varied from the positions held by many of us, the “friends on the left” you addressed in recent remarks. If you win in November, we will work to support your stands when we agree with=2 0you and to challenge them when we don’t. We look forward to an ongoing and constructive dialogue with you when you are elected President.

Stand firm on the principles you have so compellingly articulated, and you may succeed in bringing this country the change you’ve encouraged us to believe is possible.

Here is a list of early signatories to this open letter:

Rocky Anderson

Moustafa Bayoumi

Norman Birnbaum Professor Emeritus Georgetown University Law Center

Tim Carpenter Progressive Democrats of America

John Cavanaugh, director Institute for Policy Studies

Juan Cole

Chuck Collins

Phil Donahue

Barbara Ehrenreich

Tom Engelhardt Tomdispatch.com

Jodie Evans, co-f0under CODEPINK: Women for Peace

Thomas Ferguson

Bill Fletcher Jr., executive editor, BlackCommentator.com

Eric Foner

Milton Glaser

Robert Greenwald

William Greider

Jane Hamsher

Tom Hayden

Christopher Hayes

Richard Kim

Stuart Klawans

Bill McKibben

Walter Mosley

Richard Parker, president Americans for Democratic Action

Gary Phillips Writer and activist

Jon Pincus achangeiscoming.net and member of Get FISA Right

Chip Pitts

Frances Piven

Elizabeth Pochoda

Katha Pollitt

Marcus Raskin

Betsy Reed

Bob Scheer

Herman Schwartz

Jonathan Schell

Gene Seymour

David Sirota

Norman Solomon Author and Obama delegate to Democratic National Convention

Mike Stark

Jean Stein

Matt Stoller

Jonathan Tasini

Zephyr Teachout

Studs Terkel

Katrina vanden Heuvel

Gore Vidal

David Weir

Howard Zinn

Affiliations have been added when requested by the signatory.

Add your name to the Open Letter calling on Barack Obama to stand firm on the principles he so compellingly articulated in the primary campaign.