Part II

The Birth of Jovani

One Year Later — 2009:

… And so have the clowns… “bring in the clowns…”

Michael O’McCarthy

Malcolm X said it first of most recent: “The chickens have come home to roost.” At the time he was speaking on the occasion of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. While there is speculation that he was speaking to the issue of foreign policy regarding Cuba and the Kennedy’(s) ongoing attempt to assassinate Cuban leader Fidel Castro, or the “payback” by the Mafia for Kennedy’s betrayal of promises made for their help in rigging the 1960 election, or speaking of the ill brewing stewpot of imperialist rape of the third world, really doesn’t matter.

Both he and the Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr. were correct.

And the only thing faster than the corporate news to jump on this truth and turn it to an “outrage” was Barack Obama’s race from that truth. This is because he is not running to be President of the United States, but running to be the President of the White People’s United States.

With rare exception, if candor and anonymity is allowed for, people of color specifically, and poor and working people with anything other than a jingoist, dependent mental frame of reference know that both he and Malcolm X were right. Clearly, more so today than in Malcolm’s day.

As Marjorie Cohn pointed out back in December 2004, in Truthout,

I say irrational in that terrorism like torture is counterproductive. Period. Successful revolutions have at their root popular, mass action, and even then, they often turn despotic. But terrorism directed at civilians is inhumane and a war crime. Period. Whether in the United States or in Iraq. The end result of terrorism as revolution is a nation governed by a military terrorist minority.

That the Ben Ladenists choose the World Trade Towers, bastions of US imperialism; the Pentagon, headquarters for the corporate state’s enforcement arm; the White House, the house Of Bush, rather than a mall in Des Moines, Iowa, or a Sunday church carnival in Ringgold, Georgia speaks to knowing where the enemy of the people of the world reside. Period.

It is not a race or a gender issue, this contest for President of the US. This is a pathetic farce worthy of Shakespeare … perhaps the greatest of Orwellian irony, that in a time when the democracy promised in the occasion of the American revolution is in the greatest dangers in its short history that the powers that be would “send in the clowns” dressed in the drag of a faux feminism, black face and fortune 100 executive suit, and the in the face mask of Dwight David Eisenhower brought back to save the white men’s God given America in the costume of a has been war criminal posing as a war hero.

Post Script: Tuesday, March 18, 2008 – the Post Obama Philadelphia Speech:

But the speech was today. And despite Hillary Clinton’s ebullient joy at finally racially targeting Obama, there are more important issues:

While America may not be static, it is highly questionable about how much Americans are prepared to move progressively in their own interest given the less than raging support for the insurgent politics of Kucinich, and even more important, that of the open populist sounding campaign of John Edwards. There are two assumptions in this world of posturing politics:

1. There is a tacit assumption in Obama’s speech that, as Edwards pointed out time and time again, Obama would have us believe that he can sit down at the negotiating table with the corporate state, international robber barons, their paid politicians in the White House and Congress and ruling puppets internationally. This ruling class of carnivores has been ruling through the White House of Bush and Cheney and with the support of the Congress and the people of the US. \

For eight years they have done so by armed terrorism abroad, plunder and rape of the Third World, and continued exploitation of American people. Despite the apparent desire for change as interpreted via the 2006 elections, NOTHING has changed. NOTHING. Further, there is no basis, apparent or in evidence that yet another democratic politician with both political and economic ties to the corporate state and its imperialist allies abroad, from Great Britain to Israel, will do any more than window dressing reform to pacify where pacification works and repression where it doesn’t.

2. But there is another even more dangerous assumption than whether this ruling class will give “negotiate” away power. It is where the American people, Black and White, Latino and Asian alike, see their role as agents of change in the status quo domestic and internationally. Or, whether the American pubic want an agent of change that does not continue to serve up the immediate deserts from its foreign policy while enduring yet more poor treatment at the hands of their corporate masters. And I suggest that this desert of unending gross consumption feeding the greedy dog dressed in American skin privilege at home turned carnivore abroad, must be done away in the process of change.

The Killer read the coded text message on her cell phone. “Healey and Patrick first” was all it said. That was a problem. She was reading it in the Grand Hotel in San Jose, Costa Rica.

Her outfit was typical American tourist woman. Gone were the studs; the spiked hair was blonde and curly. Her brown eyes, covered with blue contact lenses. Her nails long and polished red. She wore jeans and a halter with sandals. She was headed, according to her reservations, to Tamarindo, on the northwestern Pacific coast.

Read The Whole Episode Here

The Worst Politics in the World!

“Tricknology:” In the nineteen sixties the Black Muslims coined the term “tricknology” for the method The White Man (The Devil) used to trick black people.

I think its Tricknology that’s at play in 2008 president election if never before. Its as if the white men of Madison Avenue and Hollywood were hired by the DNC to come up with the perfect trick to fool folks into keeping their ruling managers in office while at the time making believe that “change” was taking place:

To put this in context the 2008 US Presidential candidates are at play in a world of trouble:

There’s more human misery, pain and suffering among the poor, working and middle class people than any one candidate or President can remedy – even if they had it within their experience to truly care. Even when their hyped antidote is “hope!” These professional opportunists know this. What they may or may not acknowledge is that they are institutionally incapable of experiencing empathy for the Wretched of the Earth.

Sympathy, pity, guilt, yes. But empathy? Very rarely.

So the everyday plight of we “the people” becomes cataloged as the ailments of a “class,” “the poor,” “working class,” “middle class,” “people of color,” the “Third World.” For those that “pull themselves up by their bootstraps,” or even those who are the beneficiaries of good fortune, very, very few ever “remember where they came from.” Cruising in the rarified air of millions dollar campaigns not only alienates a person from those left behind, it brings about a consciousness of assumed privilege, and the insulation a million dollar “safety net.”

Thus, even the most “reform” minded soon view the world through a macro lens: The people are an abstraction, a “demographic,” a target population whose problems must be addressed, or legislated for. In other words, may “God help them,” cause very little else will be done to change the cause of their circumstance.

But as the elections of 2006 and 2008 rolled around there was a groundswell among the American people that demanded “change.” This was first evidenced in the 2006 elections. That anger was based upon the failure of the US military strategy in Iraq and Afghanistan and at the looming recession created by Bush’s economics of deficit budgeting for those wars and the inequitable tax breaks for the ruling class.

To take advantage of this demand for change the Republicans put together a group of creepy
right wingers. Left at the end was a huckster preacher, part Elmer Gantry, part faux Will Rogers, in the form of Huckabee, the ex-governor, touting war and abortion prohibition, and lastly an aging White Knight who is a cross between President “Ike” Eisenhower and General Douglas MaCarthur. In other words, no change in war mongering, or repressive government at home, no equitable economic plan, but a more robust clarion call for “full steam ahead” with “competence” as the method of change.

Thus, the “agents of change” demanded by the American people in 2006 had to come from the Democratic Party.

Phone calls must have been made to Hollywood and Madison avenue by the DNC suits begging the question: How can we look like change but maintain the domestic security police apparatus, economic control with a little bigger “safety net” and an imperialist-militaristic foreign policy and at the same time look like genuine “agents of change?” How can we divide and conquer while looking like we are uniting around the common good of “the people.” In other words, how can we trick the fools this time?

Madison Avenue provided the text and Hollywood provided the um, color if you will:

First came the Pink Collared First Woman President in American History puppet character in the form of a now experienced, practiced, sensible Hillary Clinton. Calling herself “an agent for change” and a “progressive” she would represent that 50% plus of all the women in this country who were victims of sexism, gender bias, misogyny and who aspired to “break through” the “glass ceiling” into true positions of power. Along with her would come the stalwart old-line democrats of the party, the power brokers, not to mention the first faux “Black President,” Wild Bill Clinton.

But they needed that something more in this time of the greatest racial disparity since the time of Segregation. Hmm, how could they solve that dilemma?

Up popped the charismatic Person of Color to be the first Black President in American History puppet character in the form of Barack Obama. By his presence alone he would in one fell swoop, redress all the grievances of slavery, post-reconstruction terror, segregation, ghetto–projects poverty and underemployment, the underinsured and poor folks, and prove at last that we could, in fact, “all getalong.” By doing so he would also capture the imagination of youth looking for a “rising star” and refresh the memory of the lost Camelot. Whew. Whata order.

But for a while they had one minor problem. The fly in the eye was a true progressive that continued to call both “agents of change” on their fake solutions to the problems of the poor, working and middle classes. He was a politician of note who put forth a contrasting and authentic progressive platform, one Dennis Kucinich. How would they rid the public arena of this pain in the ass that kept calling them on their “tricknology?”

First the wizards behind the curtains at network TV began to emphasize his eccentricities making him out to be a court jester. Then they began to marginalize his program for change in concert with the responses or non-responses from his competitors. Symbolic of this what John Edwards did at one debate when responding to Kucinich’s pointed remark about Edwards knowing how faulty foreign imports damaged Americans because Edwards was an experienced litigator:

“Cute, Dennis,” sniped Edwards, dodging the question.

Thus was Kucinich caricatured.

When Kucinich persisted, winning popular poll after popular poll, they censored him: refusing to allow him to participate in national debates. In the end underfunded and marginalized, he surrendered.

And now the two “headline grabbing front runners” had the field to them selves, for all intents and purposes, as the last voice of “concern” for the disenfranchised, John Edwards, dropped out.

The ruse for the Democrats was the proffered plight of the poor, working and middle class people of the US, once their banner had been taken up by these “agents of change,” the deal was done. Those who would vote Democratic have been suckered into the PR of voting for either the “First Female President of the United States,” or the “First Black President of the United States.” That left only one of two alternatives: Don’t vote at all or be forced to switch where possible and go with the militarist rightwing angel of vengeance, one Republican Senator John McCain.

McCain offered a complex contrast, on the one hand being the one candidate of the three who has a genuine empathy for an aggrieved peer group: A POW veteran who was tortured during his confinement must know at his root the pain veterans of America’s war suffer.

He is, after all, the one who can reach out to the vets and their families and say honestly, “I understand.” Perhaps being the one “politician” who could force sufficient funds into the VA and force delivery of the appropriate care and treatment vets deserve. That campaign cuts a wide swatch through the electorate of the US.

However what the “Tricknologists” and McCain want America to forget is that he is not only a victim of the war against the people of South East Asia, he is a perpetrator. As an unrecovered War Hawk, the wizards want us to forget the fact that if he had not been carpet bombing the people of Vietnam during the end of Operation Rolling Thunder he wouldn’t have been in the prison camp in the first place. Thus, in the eyes of the world, McCain is a war criminal.

This is not an apology for the torture he experienced. Torturing prisoners is a war crime and ought to be prosecuted in international courts.

Having said that, there is also no excuse for translating one war crime for another: McCain’s support for the criminal war in Iraq, and his aid and comfort to the two war criminals, Bush and Cheney, reflects McCain’s predisposition to wage war as foreign policy, the militarization of Globalization. As a “conservative” Republican, the poor, the working and middle class citizens can only look for more of the Reagan-Bush exploitation-economics.

So the American people are about to “get fooled again.” And the choices are again, “the lesser Evilism.”

We have yet another White Knight for the paternal racists and their co-dependents to vote for.

A First Female President who pulls at the aspirations of women tired of being second class citizens but is no more or less a puppet of Corporate America than..,

The wannabe First Black President, who can fulfill, in iconic form at least, the dream of “overcoming” their historic plight in racist America.

That none of these fools will offer the “change” so much needed to advance the American Dream of a democracy for and by the people is being hidden behind the urge for a Democratic Party victory.

Progressives caught between the two Democratic Party puppets, Clinton and Obama are yearning for “hope” in choosing whom to support. The demand for “anyone but a Republican” is driving them like the Crackers drove cattle in the panhandle of Florida. It’s a pity. But it’s our own fault. We danced with the clowns from the Demo Party as if we were going to be invited to the inqaugural ball. Ha!

In the end choosing either of these two is not about what they will do to structurally change the Corporate State of America, its what WE can do while they keep the fascists at bay long enough for us to recoup and create a progressive movement.

The real loss is that there is very little to nothing anyone can do about this situation as it is. Or, as the Brothers would say, “tricknology is a Mutherfucker!” And you can take that any way you want!

©

The Serialization

Posted in Main Blog (All Posts) on February 4th, 2008 6:30 pm by Michael O’Mccarthy

Michael O’McCarthy

REBELS

©

The Serialization

Shortly thereafter Healey and Patrick appeared dressed in swimsuits and shoes, carrying beach towels. They walked to the beach, and Patrick raced to the waves that were large and breaking against the sand shore.Miguel was dressed in Columbia pants and shirt. The pants had zippers mid-trouser and on a whim, he unzipped the bottom half and left the parked car. He walked barefoot some 50 yards from where Patrick and Healey had stopped.Then he noticed the sign: “Beware of Riptides.”He looked to where Patrick was swimming some 20 yards off the shore, bouncing in the waves, shouting at Healey to join him. But Healey had already taken out his book and was reading.It wasn’t until both he and Miguel looked up some five minutes later that they saw Patrick flailing, being pulled under and out by the undertow.

Healey bounded up and raced to the water as Patrick went under again. Ten yards out Healey dove, coming up moments later with Patrick, who was flailing and wrestling. It was clear to Miguel that the undertow was taking them both out now.In a huge effort Healey pushed Patrick toward a sandbar, going under as he did. He surfaced once more and again lifted and shoved Patrick up and toward the sandbar before being pulled under.Miguel didn’t realize that he was in the water until he was breaststroking in powerful pulls to where the man had gone under. Miguel was not sure why he was racing to save the man. Because his orders were to kill him publicly as an example or because he felt something for the man, the father of the son.Then he reached the man as he came up for what surely what would have been one last gasp of air, his strength exhausted. He would be towed under for good.Miguel grasped the man from behind, looking to see Patrick semi-standing, puking up saltwater. He pulled the man to the surface and began swimming them both south along the shoreline, half moving with the outgoing current of the riptides and half moving them toward a sandbar some 50 yards farther south.

Some five minutes later he pulled both of them upon the sandbar as a belated lifeguard came racing to their rescue. Behind him, the son followed, accompanied by some others who had seen the rescue. The lifeguard and another man pulled Healey ashore and began giving him mouth-to-mouth respiration. Soon the man was gushing out saltwater. He and Patrick had been saved.When the group looked for the rescuer, he was gone from sight.That night Healey knew something about himself. He had died. He had succumbed to a likely death under the sea. From whence he believed all life had come; where he wished to be when death called. And that he was not afraid.The other thing he knew about himself that day was that he had unselfishly saved his son. Not one moment in his rescue of Patrick did he think of himself. The selflessness came to him as a spiritual revelation. He’d never thought of himself that way.

Recommendations to the Democratic Party “Agents of Change” Obama and Edwards.

By Michael O’McCarthy

Tonight the President of the United States lied once again to the American people and to the world.

We live not in a time of “concern” about our economy, we do not live in a time success, and we do not live in a time of victory over the agents of terror. We live in a time economic and ecological rape, a time of treason and our country is represented by war criminals. Our nation is held the hostage of dysfunction, disunity and political cowardice.

The Republican Party is the party of this liar – and its apparent heirs continue the lie. We seem once again to be the prisoners of the Democrats to offer a change from this intolerable state. And thus, last Saturday in my resident state came the time to vote. I chose not to and the reason is simple: Neither, Clinton, Obama or Edwards represented progressive change.

Secondly, this “democratic process” is not only rigged by those who have stolen it, bought it and subverted it for their own selfish purpose, but has been negated by the alienated, disaffected masses who simply will no longer participate in the process. Whether by deliberate act of political refusal or passive disinterest or substantive ignorance, they are not moved to play an active part in their political future.

The one “progressive” alternative to the state controlled by Democrats and Republicans was Dennis Kucinich. His platform for change was rational, humane and doable – if there was a Camelot minus the apparent need for a White Knight, it could be found in his vision. Yet his percent of any primary or caucus was negligible. That was before the ruling class machine shut him down, banning him from debate after debate. Thus, the once sparkling, yet daunted, quirky prince that he is too succumbed to passing his baton to one of the Party favorites, Barack Obama. Practical electoral politics or not, it tainted his banner and disaffected those who believe in his campaign for progressive change.

History tells me that what we are about to get in 2008 is more of the same since the “election” of John F. Kennedy in 1960. That is, in my opinion, when the military-industrial-corporate state began to consolidate its rule over this nation. Coming into play after WWII the US became a gluttonous consumer nation; simultaneously it expanded its imperialistic range worldwide. Secondly, the political machines of both the Republican and Democratic parties ramped up Red Scare witch hunts that deterred any “progressive” political alternative by branding any and all dissenting opinion or movements either communist or offshoots of world communism. Nothing has changed: the US foreign policy is economic imperialism with a militarist interventionist arm. Its domestic policy is one of corporate exploitation, greed and deliberate social repression.

Today Clinton, Obama and Edwards represent the moderate wing of the corporate state’s ruling government machine and by their proposals and practice promise to deliver more of the same. History is my primer.

Read post continued at:

http://www.thehollywoodliberal.com/why-i-did-not-vote-–-the-state-of-disunion-2/ 

Read The Whole Story Here

Today we will begin serializing Michael O’McCarthy’s book Rebels in Hell. We will publish one chapter each week.
Here is Chapter 1, of this thrilling novel.

REVENGE

The Beginning
By Michael O’McCarthy © The 01-2008 Serialization

Machinima Graphic Art Cover By Pierce Portocarrero

Based on Original Artwork By Roby Hubbard

Dedicated to El Jovani
With a special salutation to Juan Santamaria, Emile Zapata and Séamas Ó Conghaile
PART I

EPISODE 1
William Smythe, the Patron’s servant, sat comfortably. One casually dressed, woolen-trousered leg crossed over the other. In the fireplace, the logs burned, the sap snapping at times. Next to him sat the silver service. The Costa Rican coffee fresh from the grinder sent a light yet pungent aroma about the room. A Mozart sonata tinkled moderately, filling the one-bedroom suite.

Smythe liked the suite. The myriad windows overlooked the park. The northern light outside filled the rooms. It brought out the mahogany of the wood and the depth of the forest-green paper covering the walls.

He liked the wood. It resonated class and solid surroundings. It meant well-spent expense. And he liked expense because it reminded him of his position. Intimately close to money. Money to Smythe meant prestige. Without his proximity to money, he would be just a hired anyone. He had no illusions about that. But with money, now, that was another matter. It was the extension of his Patron’s power, and that made him feel well.

He waited silently, head nodding a bit to Mozart, slightly sipping the brew.

The doorbell chimed nicely.

The Smythe put down the cup and walked to the door. He peered through the view hole, pulled open the thick, oversized door and nodded to the man.

Miguel Flores, known in the clandestine world as The Assassin, moved into the foyer. He paused waiting to be led into the sitting room.

Read the whole chapter here

HOWARD HUGHES:

The Politics of a Mogul and Sin City Despot

A Review by Michael O’McCarthy

Of

Stephens Press - February 2008

Howard Hughes has been tagged the Bill Gates, capitalist entrepreneur of his time. He was many things, but Bill Gates he was not. Rich people do not start at the bottom, and no matter how problematic their products may be upon release, (as is the Microsoft model of “buyer beware – test it for us – we’ll upgrade it based on your complaints and never refund you a cent”), the reality is that Hughes started out rich.

Power, Paranoia and Palace Intrigue is the one “everything necessary to know about Howard Hughes without having to read all those other voluminous biographies.”

Schumacher chronicles the rise and fall of Hughes from his start based on his family tool fortune to his obsession with inventive aviation that was buoyed continually by the growing military industrial complex’s war machine. He covers Hughes as Hughes pleasured himself with his myriad inventions, aerial magic, and pursuits into the Hollywood movie business with an overindulgence in Hollywood female flesh which included over a recorded number of 108 stars and wanna be stars. Schumacher takes us lastly into his dementia of escape into the seclusion of Las Vegas.

His residences in Vegas were primarily those of seclusion in top story penthouses, enclosed with layers of servants and security of whom he tolerated little liberty. There he indulged himself in maniacal paranoid delusions of both power and persecution by known and unknown germs. There he further indulged himself with volumes of varying pharmaceutical supplied drugs, far beyond the physical needs as result of body injuries.

His dance with the CIA, FBI, acquaintance with the treasonous president, Richard Milhouse Nixon, his mania for anti-communism, his racism and the reported ties to the mob are only hinted at. Like most of the villainy entwined in the lives of American icons the truths of these character defects are entombed with Hughes and his minions, or locked forever in the American corporate state’s den of black operations.

As Schumacher profiles Hughes as the epitome of American corporate respectability, it becomes clear that the reputation of Bugsy Seigel’s mob controlled paradise had to give way to the corporate approved image of a Sin City necessary to fill America’s craving for prurient fun and need for simultaneous hypocrisy.

However it doesn’t work. When I think of the Las Vegas I think of three high profile images: the first cast by Nicolas Cage and Elisabeth Shue in Leaving Las Vegas. The second, Verhoven’s Showgirls, then HBO’s Taxi Cab Confessions. What happens in Las Vegas and supposed to stay in Las Vegas seeps out through the screens that Howard loved.

When I reflect on the person of Hughes what I see is not new: the super rich indulge in obsession and greedy, appetite-driven pursuits of the latest whim. So removed from reality, many succumb to the narcotics de jour. Death is their last tango.

And remember George Raft, Bugsy’s mobster pal turned Hollywood respectable movie star by no less than Howard Hughes did in SCARFACE? Together they taught Vegas how to tango.

Principles Before Personalities

Preface to the January 29, 2008 Democratic South Carolina Primary
By
Michael O’McCarthy – opolitique@aol.com

I am one lone, politically active person, categorized oft times as “progressive.” I am, in fact, a democratic socialist, in the tradition of Michael Harrington and Dorothy Healey.

My current perspective comes from the political culture of reaction: the Red Shirt, (*) counter revolutionary state of South Carolina. If you know your history you know that South Carolina led the counter revolutionary secession from the United States of America in 1860. Though it lost and a government of “reconstruction” took place, that democratically integrated government was overthrown in 1877. That led to almost a century of racial apartheid, class, caste and gender division within the defeated nation. This same politique has fed this nation state with its toxic message for centuries. It is that which rules the Republican Party. It is enable by its cohort, the Democratic Party.

I am but five minutes from the reactionary, evangelic icon, Bob Jones University. This is Greenville County, the last county in the USA to provide a paid holiday for Martin Luther King, Jr. It is the home of Bob Ingles, Jim DeMint and Lindsay Graham, principal linchpins in the ultra-conservative wing of the Republican (counter-revolutionary,) ruling class party. This is a political landscape that has at its base the current Red Shirt mentality running like a cultural stream through the consciousness of the Republican electorate.

(*) The Red Shirts were a racist, counter reconstruction militia who wore blood red colored shirts en route to trial for the participation in 1867 massacre of black reconstruction militia just outside of Bamburg, SC. Today the Red Shirts are no more than the KKK out of their sheets with “heritage” as their rationalization for a rebirth of Southern Nationalism. This is a faction I first encountered and helped defeat in support of a County Council person in the 2004 county council election that was victorious in the establishment of the King holiday. Thus, I understand and have been deeply involved, when appropriate, in “electoral politics.”

This is the home of Republican Senator Lindsay Graham, Representative Bob Inglis and Jim DeMint, lynchpin reactionaries in the Republican Party. They thrive in a region which is a combination of conservative, pseudo-capitalist, right wing zealotry and racist religiosity that has created an environment that best reflects the America of the past, the present and the future as represented by the current candidates for the Republican nomination.

This is a political culture that has been tolerated and enabled by the other corporate state ruling class party, the Democratic Party. So it is from this frontline of American pre-fascism that I view the future of the United States of America - this pseudo-democratic empire that George Bush now rules with a domestically regressive agenda and a militaristic - imperialist foreign policy.

It is from this base that US Senator Strom Thurmond, racist heir to the Confederates, led the Dixiecrats out of the Democratic Party in 1946 setting the modern trend for the south and South Carolina to begin the Republican takeover of government. A compromise with the other ruling class party, the Democratic party, was struck based upon anti-working class, union busting (right to work – right to fire legislation,) and racial segregation and neo-segregation as it exists today. While the current form of corporate state monopoly would not take root until the election of Richard Nixon in 1968, resurfacing again under Reagan 1981–1989, it would be consolidated until the election of George W. Bush in 2001 and the full implementation until 9.11.2001. Both the domestic and foreign policy of the United States is now shaped by this resurgent reactionary politic and the compromises realized under the “liberal” regime of Bill Clinton.

Despite the very real contradiction in the philosophical base for the development of this “experiment” in democracy as best seen in Paine, Jefferson, Madison, Adams and Franklin, I believe that what we now have as an ideological construct is reflects its historical continuity. This indeed is living in the domestic Belly of the Beast.

There were two major turning points at which that might have changed:

First - The “War Between the States” and the government that succeeded Lincoln that failed to address the forces of the southern counter revolution and the native imperialism of the US.

Second - The failure to significantly reform the capitalist-imperialist government under Roosevelt during the 1930’s. Dialectic, historical evolution not withstanding, the “progressive agents of change” failed during both those crucially pivotal moments in US history and we got what we got. Very much as I believe we are about to get what we get in 2008. Except now the stakes for the world and US are much higher.

My holistic perspective is born of a lifetime of social activism; my politics evolved in the experiences in the poorest of cultures, the unreconstructed South and the working class of the North. Of periods of confinement and political struggles in the worst of state institutions; from a legacy of experiencing the exploitation of the national poor, working classes and the racist-misogynist exploitation and oppression of women and people “of color.”

In my opinion:
Social revolutionaries and “progressives” have now come to a point more important in time other than perhaps the “War for Southern Independence,” as called by the Southern revisionists. We are now challenged to make a very difficult choice. The choice is between principles and personalities – between the principles that demand a major, structural social change vs. corporate state politics; of those candidates and democratic activists who scream “electability” which is a clarion call for yet another form of “Lesser Evilism.” That strategy may had value in choosing between capitalism and Nazism, democratic socialism and the varying brands of Stalinism, but offers no discernible hope for the change needed in this country.

There were difficult theoretical as well as practical issues in that time and of course the Lesser Evil was capitalism. Today there really is no difficulty. While the political ideologues of the corporate state would have us believe that we are either on their side, as Bush and Cheney have raved, or on the side of the hordes, (represented by the terrorists,) the real choice is between the State and the people. I choose in the interest of the people of the world.

Indeed, like no other time in modern history, we have little ideological structure or international support for either our analysis or our struggle. We are left herein to our own devices. We do so under a national government that has only contempt for the people and little other purpose than of exploiting or destroying the rest of the world.

Thus, the Duopoly and its vehicle of “globalization” and its military imperialism now face us with the consolidation of corporate state rule, not democracy. This Lesser Evilism is no longer a valid choice for those of us who know the need for fundamental social change if democracy is to survive. In fact it is a continuing path to Hell.

It appears that the position of “progressives” in this election is “anyone but a Republican.” That distills down to “electability.” Thus, progressives and liberals, “the agents of change” in the Democratic Party – in this election – are charged with nominating, Hillary, Obama or Edwards.

The relevance of the only truly “progressive” presidential candidate, Dennis Kucinich is moot. It began when the corporate media trivialized his campaign; it was enabled with his exclusion from “Democratic Party” debates. And it bears underscoring that NOT ONE … NOT ONE of the then candidates, nor any of the three current ‘front-runners” publicly protested this act of political suppression, much less boycotted those disgraced debates. Yet “progressives” are continuing to dicker over which of these opportunists ought to get our support?

In the end the already fractionalized split in progressive support for Kucinich, Edwards or Obama was mercurially shattered when Kucinich suggested support for Obama during the Iowa caucus. (The best role for Kucinich is to continue to champion his platform, not his hopeless and flawed presidential crusade; continue to lead in the impeachment of Cheney and Bush.)

And I do understand the strategy of Lesser of Evilism. One can argue that even Hillary appears better than the socially regressive and war-imperialists McCain – Romney – Huckabee. Thus, it appears blasphemy – or politically incorrectness to challenge this premise – to be critical of these corporate controlled professionals.

However, I argue that this is not a “progressive” position. None of the above mentioned political managers chosen by the corporate state government’s “duopoly” will be “agents of change” any more than did the heir apparent to this strategy, Bill Clinton, while in office.

Clintonism. That has a true practical reality:

“…when Clinton took office, the Democratic Party controlled both houses of Congress and a majority of state governorships. By the time he left office, the Republicans controlled both Houses of Congress and two-thirds of the governorships. By the numbers, it was Clintonism that relegated the Democratic Party to the shadows….”

In terms of being an “agent of change, (Clinton was to)

“argue inside the Democratic Party that the liberal orthodoxies of the New Deal and the Great Society, as well as the culture of the anti-war and civil rights movements, had become excessive and inflexible. Not only were Democratic attitudes toward government electorally problematic, Clinton argued; they were just plain wrong for the time.” David Morris, AlterNet. Posted January 7, 2008.

Or as said by that last triumphant Democratic Party corporate state Clinton president, “The era of big government is over.” What he really meant was that it was time that the Democratic Party of the people was dead.

From NAFTA to the destruction of the welfare safety net, to The Telecommunications Act of 1996, to the Financial Services Modernization Act and not lastly, Clinton’s authorization to use depleted uranium weapons in Kosovo, indicate his true legacy and that of his “two for one” partner Hillary.

As for Hillary, her list of corporate state contributors, lobbyists and donors are longer than space permits. As for her foreign policy (aside from her not so subtle version of McCain’s Thousand Year Occupation of Iraq,) her chief foreign policy consultant

“is Madeliene Albright — the diplomat who, when asked on “60 Minutes” if she thought the 500,000 Iraqi children who died under the U.S.-led sanctions (during the Clinton years) was worth it, answered: “We think the price was worth it.”’
www.alternet.org/election08/72959/

Obama – then Edwards – then Hillary: Progress is not a color or a sex.
I argue that changing this government from the current, corporate controlled state
is the only important issue facing us since the United States defeated the nation of the Confederate States of America and participated in the defeat of world-wide German and Japanese fascism. Given the prima facie track record and current domestic and foreign policy positions of Obama and Edwards and their corporate donor lists, it is clear that only the bought and paid for corporate media call these political managers “agents of change.” The silliness of declaring “progress” in the form of sex or color is akin to likening progress to Margaret Thatcher and Mayor Marion Berry.

Nor can these Pols be considered agents of “the status quo.” There can be no “status quo” in a world in the midst of the current and coming social, political and environmental upheaval. There will either be progress or the last attempt by a white, ruling class to create a world order under the rubric of Globalization, corporate state militarism and its mutants, i.e., “the People’s Republic of China.”

Perspective:
To think only of what’s good for “America” however is just pure racist, class Selfishism. It is important to step back from this nation-corporate-centric election and look at the US from down under and from abroad. I believe the fate of the world lies in the balance. And the fate of the world has never been more endangered than today:

The levels of starvation and genocide; human exploitation and theft of the people’s wealth has never been greater in the history of the world. No matter how bad was the conquer-and-exploitation of peoples and nations throughout the stages of history, nothing is comparable to that after Columbus and the rise of the European and American regimes. Until this day, those two forces, now along with the rise of the “communist capitalist state” of China, now rule the world. The result can only be glimpsed:

Unlike any other the continent of Africa is fractured, awash in European history’s rape, reconstituted artificially under colonialism and neo-colonialism, when Europe withdrew, and the set-up of puppets states and governments and continues as the preyed upon victim of the new imperialism called “globalization.

Russia is reverting to a pseudo-capitalist dictatorship; the middle East is a Machiavellian nightmare: from the contrived State of Israel and the despotic oppression of the Palestinians and the murder of Lebanon; the wholesale theft of the people’s riches in Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Dubai under despotic monarchies and puppets of Britain and the US; the new terror state of Pakistan, the rising capitalist corporate state dictatorship of India; the long and tortured murder of the central and south American peoples. It is not necessary for me to state the data. All the recipients of this missive are familiar enough with the conditions generally described here.

All require thought and perspective when looking at this new class of corporate managers whose primary task will be to try to keep the white people of America happy with the spoils the corporate state steals from the underdeveloped world. Like George W. Bush, they will do so in the name of the “American way of life,” its illusory “democracy,” and its inalienable right to pray to a God who the deluded believe can both watch one sparrow fall from the sky and manage Huckabee’s Christian presidential campaign simultaneously.

Thus it is left to us “progressives” and social activist “radicals” to set the standard for what are and are not “agents of change.” As it appears we are about to see the coronation of yet another Democratic Party bureaucratic manager, anther CEO for the nation.

Without the ability to enliven a mass movement for change, it is left to us to enunciate principles and act on them. It is both a politically principled act and one of individual existential choice. I believe in principles before personalities and the effort at spiritual progress and not perfection. In the end we are what we do, not what we say.

Without a living progressive “agent of change” to vote for, I suggest that we write-in either Michael Harrington or Dorothy Healey for President in the national election. In the state of South Carolina I suggest writing in Harriet Tubman or Robert Smalls. Then we can stop mourning Kucinich and organize.

Jerry Brown, heir apparent to his Democrat Party elder would-be presidential candidate and father, Governor Pat Brown once told me that American politics is like the great American past time, baseball.“They got their turn at bat, (the Republicans,) and now it’s ours.” I believe Jerry Brown knew then, what we all ought to know by now: The rich love their sport on a level very, very few of the rest of us get to play. While they love golf, polo and the stock market, what they truly love is playing with people. Us!Thus, oh contraire Hillary, who said today,“Some people think elections are a game — it’s about who’s up and who’s down,” she said. “It’s about our country’s future, it’s about our kids’ future — it’s really about all of us together.”Then she took her turn and nailed it,“It’s not easy, it’s not easy, and I couldn’t do it if I just didn’t passionately believe it was the right thing to do,” she said. “I have so many opportunities for [from] this country. I don’t want to see us all fall back[wards],” she said, her voice breaking in the last phrase. “This is very personal for me,” she said to supportive applause from the small gathering…”I believe every word she said. It is very personal for her; she has “so many opportunities for this country.”Hillary is experiencing a melt down. It’s a real disappointment not to be able to lead her team to their turn at bat, akin to the millionaire New York Yankees beating the Boston Red Socks in the next playoffs.

Populist Leaders of Change or Patented American Hucksters?
Or
Which looks more like Elmer Gantry?

Listening to the semi-folksy – ministerial delivery of Huckabee’s acceptance of his Iowa win wasn’t rousing as the network clucks declared. It was scary.

Listening to Obama wasn’t rousing, it was far too similar to the rhythm and rhyme of the old Civil Rights moderates, somewhat mimicking of Martin Luther King, Jr., but the King of 1970, not 2008, nor the King who declared war on poverty and imperialism.

What we are hearing is that this duopoly party dominated country needs is a good ole candidate up from the common Joe and Joan – on the Right they pray for one embedded by Christian fundamentalism, war imperialism and reactionary faux capitalist politics. On the Left, with some racial integration tossed in, a fellow of color who speaks in the coded language of the African American pulpit.

The question is whether Huckabee is that Elmer Gantry of the political Right? Not if you read through his tax and pardon history. What Huckabee may be is a Republican insurgent that can pull enough of the practical evangelical vote and mix it with independents and moderately racist Democrats to become the next white, male President and all that means.

Do not be fooled by his pardons and his outreach to the poor. Down here the southern country Christian hallmark charity and forgiveness as part of their mission. At the other end is an expected level of servile gratitude: “Yes, boss – thank you preacher – bless your Governor,” is the grateful’s patent mantra.

With a Huckabee President what we can expect is a reversal of all the moderate gains made by women in their choice of contraception, a regressive social policy regarding constitutional rights, continued fear mongering that will drive the agenda of “Homeland Security” that will piggy back on a foreign policy that will continue the White Christian crusade against the world of color within and without our borders.

“Governor Huckabee has pledged to support every item on the Radical Right’s wish list: a constitutional ban on abortion, a veto of legislation to protect gay and lesbian Americans from discrimination, support for a bill to keep federal courts from intervening when local officials violate the separation of church and state, and most importantly, a far-right Supreme Court.

When asked about what kind of justices Huckabee would appoint to the Supreme Court — something CNN predicts the next president could get to do three or more times — his answer was:

“I would want people who are in the spirit of Scalia. He’s probably my hero in the Court.”
Which is simply more of the same Nixon – Reagan – Bush – Bush and then worse.

Obama on the other hand, looking like a nice guy, is wedded to the American political system that has delivered the Hubert Humphreys, Bill Clintons and Joe Liebermans to us. The former two were not good enough in solving the crucial class, race and gender issues of this nation during their time, and Lieberman … (are you kidding, Lieberman a “liberal?”) … nor is Obama now expected to face-off against the corporate monster their parties are heir to.

But worse: his main campaign advisor, and who may well become part of his cabinet, is a man named Zbigniew Brzezinski, who worked in Carter’s administration, (whose administration’s claim to fame is the Yankee corporatization of The South.)

In Brzezinski’s book, “The Grand Chessboard,” we see a corporate ideologue like Kissinger and like Dick Cheney–highly intelligent, but without an ounce of compassion in his body. In his book he describes U.S. strategy: American Imperialism and furthering and maintaining our Empire against the emerging hordes.

Obama’s bankroll has the stamp of corporate America, (the same stamp on Hillary’s millions.) You have to be idiotic not to understand the meaning of what millionaire attorney John Edwards means when he diagnoses that “corporate greed has an iron clad hold on our government.” Just in case you’re having a dumber or dumber moment: That means who gets paid does what the payer pays for. Obama will deliver whatever his corporate owners pay him to do. Period!

So we come to that expected, very loudly shouted question: “What, another George Bush because the “left” is to pure to compromise?”

Aside from the fact that Ralph Nader DID NOT COST GORE THE ELECTION, there is no point in being a political progressive if in the end you enable the Corporate State Democrats to take “their turn at bat,” as Jerry Brown once called the game played every two – to – four years by the operatives of the American two-party, ruling class system.

Ah, yes, the electoral two-party ruling class hegemony. It’s as if we’ve all been struck dumb and dumber thinking that electoral politics is real “the agent of change” in this country. As if in any country dominated by the Corporate State. But apparently the Bill Clinton version of “Camelot” came not only to mean the explosive burst of “globalization” it also brought about the death of radical politics in the US,

That then left us with the one Progressive agent of change in 2008, Dennis Kucinich. After the Des Moines Iowa Register blackballed him from the debate I emailed one of the chief campaign personnel,

“Pretend I am a complete idiot and have someone tell me why Dennis Kucinich and every one of his supporters are not taking to the streets after what occurred in Iowa (or did not occur)…If this is the campaign plan for Kucinich…then we are all missing the point…or the campaign manager needs to be fired. Or K needs to quit.”

His reply: “You want Dennis running around Des Moines ranting and raving like the dis-inherited bastard child? Or picket lines in front of the Des Moines Register? Or what?”

I don’t know about the “what?” part — but he was fucking correct: I wanted to see this valiant “American Hero” (*) in the streets in front of the Register – in front of the Democratic National Party Headquarters, in front of AARP which barred him from their debate, challenging the other candidates on this basic abrogation of the First Amendment. And now I want them in front of ABC headquarters in LA and NY.

But that sadly is not going to happen. It is not the practice of the “Kucinich” progressives, perhaps not of the progressive body politic in toto. And in all kindness to Kucinich, who I have listened to throughout this campaign, his explanation on Moyers the other night was a stammering refusal to face the truth: It was at he could not explain that what at best a blunder – at worst, an indication that on some basic level Kucinich does not believe his own message. Perhaps he has spent far too many years in the Compromise … uh, Congress.

As for the two Democratic Party “voices of change” now being showcased by the same media, the Wunderkind Obama and the anti-corporate rebel Edwards, if you believe they will change the government of the United States, I have some sub-prime mortgage offers for you.

If you disagree at least strip yourself of your childish illusions about Obama and your gamble on Edwards and go out and work for Dame Hillary. You may at least get to meet the first “Black President” who duped “hopeful” African Americans and their white allies who prayed for “anybody but another Reagan or Bush,” and along with Fleetwood Mac, sang the anthem of the time: “Dot.com greed and tooting cocaine is good. Let use Depleted Uranium Bombs and make movies in Hollywood.”

(*as Jennifer Lynne Ziemann and I dubbed him as a result of our feature length interview that appeared on this blog, The LA Free Press and Greenville, and South Carolina’s The BEAT.)

There is no pleasure in this. It is a troubling thing I must do, but I must do it.

I have met and interviewed Kucinich and liked and admired him, for surviving the hell of his childhood and persevering through a sea of ridicule heaped upon him for both his politics and his seemingly eccentric personality. I have read and participated in the review of his biography. I have utilized my columns and blogs to support him; to defend him because he represented the very best progressive politics of a lifetime stretching back to the 1940’s.

I have made attempt after attempt to volunteer for the campaign at the lowest possible fee that would allow me to pay my bills. Within the last two weeks I called upon the Kucinich campaign to demand of us progressives that we stand united, on principle and on progressive politics. I am sad to say that night before last Kucinich did just the opposite. In going to the American people and giving away his principled position opposing Obama and what the Democratic Party hierarchy represents, he gave away his right to champion progressive politics.

I have been briefed on the reason, aside from his apparently losing status in Iowa. His attempt to use his support for Obama on the second Iowa call so that he might win Obama and Michigan Congressperson John Conyers’ support in Michigan is on its face pathetic; worse, it is an endorsement of the corporate state’s party politics as usual.

No person of conscience can stand for progressive politics in this imperial beast of a nation and capitulate to a candidate who is now and will be in the future enwrapped in the arms of the corporate state as is Obama, nice guy or not.

As Michael Moore said:

“Personally, Congressman Kucinich, more than any other candidate, shares the
same positions that I have on the issues (although the UFO that picked ME up
would only take me as far as Kalamazoo). But let’s not waste time talking
about Dennis. Even he is resigned to losing, with statements like the one he
made yesterday to his supporters in Iowa to throw their support to Senator
Obama as their “second choice.”’ …

But who is he? I mean, other than a guy who gives a great speech? How much do any of us really know about him? I know he was against the war. How do I know that? He gave a speech before the war started. But since he joined the senate, he has voted for the funds for the war, while at the same time saying we should get out. He says he’s for the little guy, but then he votes for a corporate-backed bill to make it harder for the little guy to file a class action suit when his kid swallows lead paint from a Chinese-made toy. In fact, Obama doesn’t think Wall Street is a bad place. He wants the insurance companies to help us develop a new health care plan — the same companies who have created the mess in the first place.” MMFlint@aol.com - www.MichaelMoore.com

In a letter sent me via Progressive Democrats of America on January 3, 2008 entitled, “Edwards Reconsidered,” Norman Solomon capsulated it:

Quoting Kucinich’s final statement, “Sen. Obama and I have one thing in common: Change.” ‘

Solomon went on to say:

This statement doesn’t seem to respect the intelligence of those of us who have planned to vote for Dennis Kucinich.

It’s hard to think of a single major issue — including “the war,” “health care” and “trade” — for which Obama has a more progressive position than Edwards. But there are many issues, including those three, for which Edwards has a decidedly more progressive position than Obama.

But the most disturbing part of Dennis’ statement was this: “Sen. Obama and I have one thing in common: Change.” This doesn’t seem like a reasoned argument for Obama. It seems like an exercise in smoke-blowing.

I write these words unhappily. I was a strong advocate for Kucinich during the race for the 2004 Democratic presidential nomination. In late December, I spoke at an event for his campaign in Northern California. I believe there is no one in Congress today with a more brilliant analysis of key problems facing humankind or a more solid progressive political program for how to overcome them.

As of the first of this year, Dennis has urged Iowa caucusers to do exactly what he spent the last year telling us not to do — skip over a candidate with more progressive politics in order to support a candidate with less progressive politics.

The best argument for voting for Dennis Kucinich in caucuses and primaries has been what he aptly describes as his “singular positions on the war, on health care, and trade.” But his support for Obama over Edwards indicates that he’s willing to allow some opaque and illogical priorities to trump maximizing the momentum of our common progressive agendas.

Presidential candidates have to be considered in the context of the current historical crossroads. No matter how much we admire or revere an individual, there’s too much at stake to pursue faith-based politics at the expense of reality-based politics. There’s no reason to support Obama over Edwards on Kucinich’s say-so. And now, I can’t think of reasons good enough to support Kucinich rather than Edwards in the weeks ahead.”

http://pdamerica.org

As for Edwards: As I have said, the bottom line is twofold. It’s difficult to trust a millionaire and a lawyer. My experience is that they hang with their class every time. That Edwards hasn’t the courage of his rhetoric in cleanly breaking from the health insurance industry, (thus, miming Obama and Clinton,) is evidence enough of just how hard he “will fight those greedy corporate interests.”

Very, very few patricians have been known to bring about economic justice for the producer’s of their wealth. And economic justice that defines social justice requires a just share of the profits from what a human produces.

FDR, the most memorable Democratic Party patrician of all time, broke the back of the progressive movement for social and economic justice when his “New Deal” failed. Aside from the controversy concerning his foreknowledge of the attack on Pearl Harbor or not, his foreign trade policy was that was that that took America to war. He followed the allied victory then by building the largest war machine in the history of mankind and while fighting fascism, set the stage for what would become the greatest imperialist crusade in America’s history.

Aside from the ethical issues involved, the wealth produced by his war industry simply made his class all the more powerful, and all the more wealthy. The booty from this imperial machine trickled down to the working class and for a time grew a new white middle class of managers who were then trained and slotted for the corporate world his class was creating.

The next “liberal” to play the “reformist game” was his heir apparent, Lyndon Baines Johnson. His price for signing a “Civil Rights” bill was the endorsement of McNamara’s One Hundred Thousand of the poor and ethnic disenfranchised that was skiploaded into the death and torture trap of America’s war on South East Asia

Edward’s apology for his war vote is not reassuring. When asked about withdrawal from Iraq he is equivocal about when and how many. But that is not the question!

The real question is: if President will you get American forces out of countries where they do not belong and are not wanted? Only Kucinich stated that his foreign policy would not be imperialist.

The rest, Obama, Clinton, Edwards, et al are wedded to the machine. Anyone who trusts that the agents of terror working for this corporate state will not drive these “liberals” to military use are just fools.

Nor has any of them said the magic phrase: “redistribution of wealth.” Or that those that produce the wealth deserve a just share of the profits from the GNP. Only Kucinich’s progressive platform addressed those two absolutely essential challenges to the death machine of the new CSA: the Corporate State of America.

Kucinich may come out of this being a nice guy in congress. But he has just shafted the people he represented. That is an old political act. Way too old. Shame on him. But “don’t mourn organize!”

Activist Tells Congress About Suicide Epidemic Among Vets
By Penny Coleman, AlterNet - January 2, 2008

This is one of today’s Alternet headlines. The one that grabbed me. Another recent headline was about the failure of the VA to accurately diagnose and treat the growing victims of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD,) among the returning Iraq - Afghanastan vets. Another chronicled the extraordinary percentage of vets who compose the nation’s homeless. Again and again these headlines are Vietnam Deja Vu All Over Again. And again, the Congress and the Bush-Cheney war maching do nothing. As if!

Here’s the truth: NOTHING - NOTHING will be done as long as the vets themselves don’t rise up, rally the American people and force this war mongering goverment to change policy.

We set the precedent, albeit very late, in 1981 when Vietnam vets, era and combat veterans began a sit-in strike at the Brentwood VA hospital after the death of Jim Hopkins, a suicide by all reliable accounts. Failing an honorable response by the Reagan administration that called them “rabble,” Vietnam combat veterans began a hunger strike that finally reached the halls of congress: the vets marched everyday into the offices of the all too silent Congresspeople; finally striking a nerve with then Congresspeople like Daschle and Bonoir who were vets themselves.

Threatening to die in front of the White House raised the ante. The American people were not prepared to accept their guilt at letting their government continue Washington’s malfeasance and negligence. The vets won, keeping the threatened Vet Centers open and forcing the further studies into Agent Orange (the poisonous, dioxin-based herbicide sprayed over “enemy” and friendly alike in the “bush” of Southeast Asia,) and into the reality and effects of PTSD.

As for any victimized populace, rarely do the “do gooders” come to the rescue. Complaining, lobbying, getting Alternet headlines will not work: The people, drugged with the messianic BS of Bush, reality run way model and dysfunctional nut case family TV shows, terrified of confronting the Homeland Security apparatus that can dub them suspect at any moment without rhyme nor reason, will not respond until forced to. Forced to by either having the veil of denial ripped from their eyes by direct action, or confronted by their own vulnerability as their brothers, sisters, fathers and mothers, kin and neighbors continue to be victimized.

But somebody must lead. If not the Vets themselves, who? - If not now, when?

Michael O’McCarthy