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| : Impeach Court of Appeals Justice Jay Bybee |
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 At noon on June 25, 2009, as
part of Torture Accountability Action Day, a group protesting against Justice
Jay Bybee gathered at the Federal Court of Appeals, 9th Circuit, in
Pasadena, California.
Prior to his appointment in
2003 by President Bush, Bybee authored several memorandums authorizing torture
in Bush’s War on Terror.
Following the protest, a
petition was filed with the clerk of the court calling for Justice Bybee to
resign, be disbarred or to be impeached.
Voters Evolt! photographed
the event and prepared a slide show set to Frank Zappa’s The Torture Never Stops.
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 Global Research: Centre for Research on Globalization June. 19, 2009
Since entering service in 1974 with many technological
innovations, such as computerized fly-by-wire control systems, user-friendly
cockpits, and extended use of composite materials, 5,717 aircraft have been
manufactured by Airbus, an European aerospace company. More than 5,100 Airbuses remain in
service.
Not including losses attributable to
terrorism, rebellion or military action, Airbuses have been involved in 23
fatal crashes causing the deaths of 2,584 passengers, crew members and people
on the ground. In addition, there
have been five nonfatal accidents causing 21 serious injuries.
While the overall number of
accidents and fatalities are not disproportionate to the crash experience of
Boeing aircraft, three of the Airbus crashes involved a separation of the
composite vertical stabilizer (tail fin) from the fuselage. Five hundred, or one in five of the
Airbus deaths, including 228 from Air France Flight 447, resulted from these
three crashes.
In addition, Airbus composite
stabilizers, rudders and couplers have also been involved in a number of other
emergency in-flight incidents that did not lead to crashes, injuries or deaths.
There is now a question whether all
Airbus aircraft equipped with composite stabilizers and rudders should be
grounded until the cause of the crash of Flight 447 can be identified and it can be determined if the aircraft
can be inspected, safely repaired, and returned to service.
Used in law, science and philosophy,
a rule known as Occam’s Razor requires that the simplest of competing theories
be preferred to the more complex, and/or that explanations of unknown phenomena
be sought first in terms of known quantities.
We do not know
if Air France Flight 447 was brought down by a lightning storm, a failure of
speed sensors, rudder problems or pilot error. What we do know is
that its plastic tail fin fell off and the plane fell almost seven miles into
the ocean killing everyone aboard.
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| : Extremism and Suffering Children |
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Consortium News June 15, 2009
What does a shootout at the Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C., the confessions of a Khmer Rouge jailer and the murder of a Kansas medical doctor have in common? The answer is “children,” and how they suffer from being targeted and used by extremists to advance their own hateful agendas.
In 1981, acting as a public interest lawyer, I represented a Holocaust survivor who had been a 17-year-old boy when his entire family was murdered in Nazi concentration camps. We sued a group of radical right-wing organizations that denied the Holocaust and, as a publicity ploy, had offered a reward for proof it had occurred.
During the hearing in the Los Angeles County Superior Court, I asked, “If the Holocaust is a hoax, then where are all the children?” The answer was that the death camps were primarily industrial operations that worked prisoners to death, and children were quickly murdered because they were too young to contribute either their labor or body fat to the enterprise.
The presiding judge wisely disposed of the primary issue by simply taking “judicial notice” of the “historical fact” that Jews were gassed to death at Auschwitz in the summer of 1944.
As I was reading in Mother Jones about the murder of a guard at the Holocaust Museum last week, I was not surprised to learn that James von Brunn, the shooter, had left a note saying “the Holocaust is a lie,” and that he was associated with the very same organizations we had defeated almost 30 years ago.
In the past, von Brunn expressed his admiration of Willis Carto, founder of the Liberty Lobby as an umbrella organization for other extremist groups, including the National Alliance organized by William Pierce, whose hatred had focused on African Americans.
Carto also established the Institute for Historical Review to promulgate anti-Semitic propaganda on college campuses, including the reward offer. And, he used the Noontide Press to publish a wide range of hate materials, including at least one book by von Brunn in which he claimed there was a Jewish conspiracy to “destroy the white gene pool.”
In our lawsuit, we established that these organizations were essentially moneymaking operations that profited by tailoring and peddling hate materials to the various prejudices and hatreds of their customers.
Ultimately, the defendants paid a $90,000 judgment and issued an apology “to Mr. Mel Mermelstein, a survivor of Auschwitz-Birkenau and Buchenwald, and all other survivors of Auschwitz for the pain, anguish and suffering he and all other Auschwitz survivors have sustained relating to the $50,000 reward offer for proof that ‘Jews were gassed in gas chambers at Auschwitz.’"
Last week, after being painfully reminded about the murdered children of the Holocaust, both Jews and Gypsies, another horrible story about murdered children came across my desktop.
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| : From the Airbus to the Spaceplane: The Future of Commercial Aviation |
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Global Research: Centre for Research on Globalization June. 12, 2009
As commercial aviation becomes increasingly dependent upon computerized digital technology and less reliant upon hands-on human control, we have to consider the crash of Air France Flight 447 into the Atlantic Ocean, with the loss of all aboard, and other similar disasters in the light of our collective experience and expectations.
The Comet
First flown in 1949 and introduced into passenger service in1951, the Comet was the first pressurized, jet-propelled commercial aircraft. Powered by four “Ghost” turbojet engines, the Comet was found to be fuel efficient above 30,000 feet and flew at almost 500 miles per hour, far faster than the most advanced piston-powered airplanes in service at the time.
England’s de Havilland Company rapidly gained a significant advantage in the commercial aircraft market, carrying more than 30,000 passengers and receiving orders for 30 Comets in the first year; however, serious problems with the innovative design quickly developed. Two crashes in the first year in Italy and Pakistan were likely caused by a defective wing profile design that resulted in a loss of lift during steep takeoffs.
A series of catastrophic crashes followed. In 1953, structural failure of the airframe beginning with the stabilizer caused a Comet to crash shortly after takeoff in India. The Comet was equipped with fully powered flight controls that were criticized because they resulted in a loss of “feel” and may have caused excessive stress on the flight control surfaces. Later in 1953, another Comet exploded in midair during a storm over India with the loss of all passengers and crew. The following year, in 1954, two more Comets experienced midair explosive decompression and fell into the Mediterranean killing everyone aboard.
Prime Minister Winston Churchill grounded the fleet saying, “The cost of solving the Comet mystery must be reckoned neither in money nor in manpower.” The Comet airframes were subjected to extensive testing that ultimately identified the most likely cause to be metal fatigue caused by stress and strain on the aircraft skin caused by repeated cycles of pressurization.
The first series of Comets were scrapped and modifications were made to the second series; however, the fleet remained grounded until the fourth series was introduced in 1958. Although the plane became the first jet used for transatlantic service, de Havilland had already lost its competitive advantage to Boeing, Douglas and other U.S. manufacturers, who profited from the Comet experience. The last Comet was delivered in 1964, and even the government-owned British Overseas Airways Corporation began to fly American aircraft.
The Airbus
Commencing in the mid-1960s, a consortium of European aircraft firms began to collaborate in an attempt to break the lock held by American manufacturers on the commercial aircraft market by agreeing to collectively manufacture a low-cost “airbus” to transport smaller numbers of passengers over shorter distances. Underwritten by the governments of England, France and Germany, the Airbus was intended to be the first mass-produced “fly-by-wire” (FBW) airliner.
Although pilot control of commercial aircraft had progressed beyond the direct use of cables and pulleys to move aircraft control surfaces by relying on hydraulics and electrical assistance, the introduction of electronic control of commercial aircraft increasingly shifted responsibility from human pilots to computers.
First developed by NASA to augment control of the space shuttle and high-performance military combat planes, FBW technology is similar in some respects to the anti-lock braking systems (ABS) on modern motor vehicles that prevents wheels from locking when the brakes are applied and which automatically controls the allocation of braking between the front and rear brakes. Relying upon sensors on each wheel, the hydraulic pressure to each can be increased or decreased up to 20 times per second, far beyond the abilities of any human driver. However, under conditions other than smooth dry pavements, such as deep snow and gravel, ABS can be far less effective than an experienced operator. Additionally, drivers of ABS equipped vehicles tend to overcome the safety benefit by driving more aggressively.
Airplanes that are flown by “wire” still have a stick, rudders, throttles and brake pedals; however, these controls are only connected to sensors that provide “input” to computers that pass along the information to other computers located at or near the control surfaces, engines or wheels to actuate the desired mechanical response. A software program takes the pilot’s input into consideration; however, it is the computer that controls the aircraft. Relying upon the entire range of sensors, the computer can make as many as 40 adjustments per second.
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| : FEAR OF CRIME AND THINGS TO COME |
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Axis of Logic May 8, 2009
Fear resides in all living
creatures. It’s what keeps us
alive down at the watering hole or out on the street.
The fear of crime strikes all who
live with its dread, as well as those who are personally victimized. Fear keeps us from doing what we want
to do; it causes us to distrust friends and to view strangers with prejudice;
and it can trick us into trading freedom for a false sense of security.
Hard Times
Many of us have grown up with an
expectation that we have the right to a comfortable existence and that with
education and hard work we can achieve a better than average life. Such naivetè has been mostly dispelled. Familiar patterns have been
disrupted–perhaps forever.
Billions are owed
on student loans by graduates who can’t find a job. Millions of hard-working people are suddenly out of work and
unable to sustain their dreams.
They are saddled with massive credit card debts and unpayable mortgages,
and they find little relief in new bankruptcy laws that deny them the chance to
obtain a fresh start.
More than six million workers have
lost their jobs in the last year and the “real” unemployment rate that includes
“marginally attached” workers is 15.8 percent. The actual unemployment rate that includes those no longer
looking for work is far higher, up to 25 percent. Unemployment benefits have been extended several times, most
recently under the federal economic stimulus program, but the time will come
when even this benefit will expire for millions of working families.
Tent cities are springing up around
the country as the mass of homeless, hopeless and helpless people continues to
swell. Evictions are skyrocketing,
as even formerly middle-class people including professionals, small business
owners and skilled workers can’t pay their rents.
Food banks are overwhelmed, welfare
safety nets are being shredded, and the tax revenues of municipal, county and
state governments are plummeting, just when they are needed the most.
It is likely that the number of all
children who live in poverty will exceed 27 percent next year, including 50
percent of all African American children.
As we worry about losing our jobs,
paying our bills, feeding our children, and obtaining health care, must we also
fear becoming a victim of crime?
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| : No Victors in the War on Dissent |
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Counterpunch: Jan. 13, 2009
Among the wars currently being
fought by the American government is one in which there can be no winners. Our prior law enforcement experiences
warn us that the “war on terrorism” has spawned an internal “war on dissent” in
which everyone loses.
Author William John Cox’s law
enforcement career spanned 40 years, the early part of which was spent as a Los
Angeles police officer and which included direct policing of both the riots and
terrorist incidents in that city in the late 60’s to early 70’s. One of the first assignments given to
author Coleen Rowley as a new FBI agent was to help in the processing and
releasing of the numerous files improperly gathered by J. Edgar Hoover after
the National Lawyer’s Guild won its FOIA lawsuits against the FBI in the early
1980’s.
The Church Committee unearthed
evidence in 1976 that the Viet Nam War had provided cover for the domestic
infiltration and wiretapping of civil rights and anti-war groups and resulted
in legislation and regulations against the worst abuses. However, the history of government
repression and spying on those who dissent against its policies and practices
seems to be repeating itself.
Following 9-11, the Bush
Administration erased or circumvented many of these hard-won legal
restraints. Warrantless searches
under the PATRIOT Act and illegal electronic surveillance swept up more than
terrorist threats as the government increasingly confused dissent, which builds
up a free and democratic society, with terrorism, which seeks to tear it down.
The law enforcement response has
become increasingly harsh and heavy-handed since the anti-globalization
protests in 1999 in Seattle against the World Trade Organization. In November 2003, as many as 40 different
law enforcement agencies invaded Miami during meetings relating to the Free
Trade Area of the Americas.
Protest groups were infiltrated by the police, the corporate media was
“embedded” with law enforcement, and the independent media was suppressed.
The New York City police department
used “Miami” tactics in 2004 at the Republican National Convention (RNC) during
which hundreds of peaceful demonstrators and innocent bystanders were illegally
arrested, fingerprinted, photographed, and subjected to prolonged detention in
wire cages before being released without prosecution. Repressive tactics were also used the same year as a
counter-terrorism measure at the Democratic National Convention, where Boston
police established a designated fenced enclosure topped by razor wire as the
“free speech zone.”
Despite this recent history, the
militarized crackdown and persecution of protest at the RNC in September took
many by surprise especially in an otherwise progressive city like St. Paul
(which pioneered the concept of “community policing”). It was a terrible shock to see the
riot-clad Robo-cops lined up two and three rows deep, helmet visors down, their
police identification gone or not visible, and their tasers and chemical weapon
guns pointed at the various members of the Twin Cities Peacemakers and other
social justice groups who marched on the first day of the RNC.
More than 800 citizens were arrested
(including 40 journalists, one of whom was “Democracy Now!” radio host Amy
Goodman) and hundreds of peaceful protesters were pepper sprayed, tasered, or
otherwise brutalized.
Thousands more who conscientiously
wished to demonstrate opposition to government policies and the illegal war,
were too scared to leave their homes.
Not only were they intimidated from marching, but they were prevented
from participating in other totally peaceful artistic and music events
scheduled in the Twin Cities during the week of the RNC.
More evidence for historians that
the “war on terror” has morphed into a “war on dissent” can be found in the
recently leaked reports establishing that both the Pentagon's Northern Command
(NORTHCOM) and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency participated in
planning RNC convention security and were possibly involved in crowd control
strategies.
At the very least, the intimidating
presence of armor-clad police officers at political demonstrations is a visible
manifestation of the fascist threat.
More pernicious would be any unwarranted, secret collection of
information on the various social justice, peace, independent media, musical
performance, artistic and legal groups in the lead-up to the RNC. We are currently in the process of
determining, through freedom of information type requests, if this in fact,
occurred here.
Recent revelations of how the Maryland State Police infiltrated
nonviolent groups and falsely labeled dozens of pacifists,
environmentalists and Catholic Nuns as terrorists highlights the risks of using
undercover law enforcement officers and paid informants to spy on domestic
groups. Pressure to produce
arrests and convictions justifying the expenditure of hundreds of thousands of
dollars in precious tax revenues can result in the elevation of rhetoric into
threats and dissent into terrorism.
The mind-numbing repetition of the
term “anarchists” in recent newspaper coverage of the $300,000, year-long
infiltration of protest groups prior to the convention fails to obscure the
great lengths to which law enforcement officials went to prevent “street
blockades” and other disruptions in St. Paul. Before the RNC even started, authorities executed
pre-emptive raids and “preventive detentions”—controversial concepts
originally concocted for the “war on terror” that have no place in our
Constitution’s criminal justice system.
Thanks to Minnesota’s version of the
PATRIOT Act, the local “war on dissent” has elevated boastful threats to
“swarm” the Republican convention and to “shut it down” into charges of
conspiracy to riot “in furtherance of terrorism.” However, there is no evidence that any of the so-charged
“RNC Eight” ever personally committed acts of violence or damaged
property.
If they were really ready to
“destroy” the City of Saint Paul as alleged, why did they operate so
openly? Why was their rhetoric,
albeit taunting, for the entire world to see on their website?
Real terrorists are usually much
more secretive. Think back to the
most significant recent cases of actual domestic terrorism in the United
States: Oklahoma Federal Building bomber Timothy McVeigh; Olympic Park and
abortion clinic bomber Eric Robert Rudolph; Unabomber (for 18 years) Ted
Kaczynski; Ft. Detrick military scientist-anthrax killer Bruce Ivins; and the
DC sniper terrorist duo. Most of
these and other American terrorists operated alone or with one main
accomplice. That's because secrecy
is critical to the success of an actual terrorist act. That means, also, that it's different
from protest and even civil disobedience where mass numbers of participants
(instead of secrecy) is the key.
The prosecution of the RNC eight
flies in the face of what Nobel Peace Prize winner Al Gore recently urged (to
heavy applause)—for young people to engage in “civil disobedience” (he
was talking about stopping the construction of coal plants). And only a few days ago, Thomas
Friedman bemoaned in his New York Times column (with respect to the national economy)
that “Our kids should be so much more
radical than they are today.” (Emphasis added).
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| : Making Smarter Cars Instead of Stupid Decisions |
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Global Research: Centre for Research on Globalization Dec. 1, 2008
When the Big Three CEOs recently descended on Washington in
their fancy corporate jets with inflated egos and high hopes for a juicy piece
of the government’s $8.6 trillion corporate welfare pie, they were sent home
hungry to do their homework and to write an essay about how they plan to spend
bailout funds.
Undoubtedly, the executives will
travel business class when they come back this week; they will each have a
business plan in hand, and Congress will
give them $25 billion of taxpayer funds to gamble with. Equally without doubt, the money will
be wasted, they will not learn from their mistakes, and they will be back
again, and again, and again.
The Big Three have a track record of
making really stupid decisions.
Manufacturers have recklessly spent thousands of dollars per vehicle on
advertising to convince drivers that they really want big gas-guzzling cars and
trucks instead of the smaller fuel-efficient vehicles they really need. The car companies have foolishly
peddled financing and leasing deals far beyond the financial means of their
buyers, and they have vigorously opposed realistic fuel economy standards.
Overall, new car sales are down 32
percent this year and October was the worst sales month since World War
II. Ford lost $3.3 billion and
General Motors lost $4.2 billion in the third quarter, and they are quickly
burning through their cash reserves.
Chrysler has not reported its most recent losses, but its sales are down
31 percent and its estimated losses were $1.28 billion in the first half of
2008.
With sales grinding to a halt and
their credit ratings plummeting, the Big Three cannot borrow sufficient funds
in the credit markets to survive.
Like drunks on a freeway, they are racing down the fast lane without a
seat belt, holding a bottle in one hand and flipping off the public with the
other, daring everyone else to stop them before they crash.
The auto companies have corporate
partners, manufacturing facilities and distributors in all other developed
nations. Their business dealings
are so entangled with foreign economies that their failure would have worldwide
repercussions.
Bankruptcy would likely force a
liquidation of assets rather than a judicially-supervised
reorganization and would, at best, result in the destruction of the automobile
unions and employees’ retirement and healthcare benefit plans. However, every American worker and
taxpayer would pay the price.
Elimination of the American
automobile industry would send shock waves through the economy, causing the
failure of thousands of automobile parts suppliers and car dealerships. Auto parts supply companies are among
the top industrial employers in 19 states, and one out of every ten jobs in
America is supported, in one way or another, by the automobile industry. It is estimated that the failure of
General Motors alone could result in the loss of more than 15 million jobs.
Failure of the Big Three would only
benefit foreign corporations who would swoop in to buy up the surplus
manufacturing capacity, such as computerized robots, at bargain basement
prices, and the balance of payments deficit would soar beyond calculation in
the absence of domestic competition.
President-elect Obama opposes a
“blank check” for the industry and says that “we should help the auto industry, but what we should expect is that ... any help
that we provide is designed to assure a long-term, sustainable auto industry
and not just kicking the can down the road.”
The Democratic majority in Congress
appears ready to provide a $25 billion Emergency Bridge Loan to the auto makers by either tapping into the Wall Street Bailout
funds or by redirecting money already approved for retooling old factories to
produce more fuel-efficient vehicles.
Companies receiving loans would have to give an equity stake to the
government and would be charged 5% interest for the first five years and 9%
thereafter. Companies could not
pay dividends to common stockholders and would have to agree to a $250,000
annual pay cap for executives.
If the Emergency Bridge Loan is the
best Congress can come up, the can will
just be “kicked down the road” – but not very far. General Motors burned $6.9 billion,
Ford burned $7.7 billion, and Chrysler burned $3 billion in just the third
quarter of 2008. Simple arithmetic
tells us that $25 billion will not even get them as far as July 2009 before the
Big Three CEOs will return with their extortionary threats against the economy
and still without a clue.
The American automobile industry can
be saved; however salvation requires America’s elected representatives,
including its new president, to get off their knees and to begin to think
outside of the box. The industry
has to be forced to make smarter cars instead of stupid decisions for its own
good and for the benefit of everyone.
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| : AMERICA HAS ALREADY CHANGED |
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Global Research: Centre for Research on Globalization Nov. 10, 2008
Against all odds, American voters
have elected a mixed-race, multi-cultural young man, who was born in modest
circumstances, as their president to lead them through an economic and military
crisis that threatens the future of their democracy.
Barack Obama campaigned on a
platform of “Change”; however, the fact of his election proves that America has
already changed.
I was born in my grandmother’s
farmhouse in West Texas almost 68 years ago, and my father often said every
American boy had a chance to be president, but I’m certain he never imagined
the boy could be black.
I was cared for by a middle-aged
African-American woman named Ora, and her husband, Tom, worked in our
fields. I don’t recall where they
lived, but it was probably in one of the barns. I do remember my father coming in the house one day to get
his shotgun. He was angry because
Tom had “talked back” to him, but my mother restrained him and the couple moved
away.
I started to school when I was five
years old after my mother died, and our school bus passed by the Bradford
Colored School, a small frame building at the end of a dirt road in a cotton
field.
My 1954 school yearbook has a group
picture of the Bradford students on the last page. There were 23 of them, and one tall boy stood off to one
side. “Charles” is handwritten
above his face; however, I have no memory of him or how he came to sign my
book. There is also a photograph
of his teacher: Mrs. Marjorie Thomas, a pleasant-looking young African-American
woman with a B.S. degree from Texas College.
My father died when I was ten years
old and a couple of years later I began to run away from home. I was finally arrested and taken before
a judge who “allowed” me to attend the New Mexico Military Institute instead of
being confined at the Gatesville State School for Boys. Racial segregation had been ruled
unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in 1954; however, there are no black
faces in my 1958 yearbook.
I enlisted in the Navy after graduation
and, even though President Truman had ordered desegregation of the military ten
years earlier, there was only one African-American in my recruit class. At the time, most blacks served as
cooks and stewards, and there were none in my Hospital Corps training school.
I was assigned to the San Diego Navy
Hospital and was working as a senior corpsman on the chest wards in 1960 when a
young African-American patient was diagnosed with lung cancer. His condition rapidly deteriorated and
he was moved to a room where his young wife could spend time with him in
private. I do not recall his name,
but I vividly remember holding his hand as he struggled to breathe... and died.
Under Navy tradition, the body of a
deceased sailor is escorted by someone who served with him. The young man’s wife requested me to
accompany her to their home in the South and to attend the funeral; however, an
officer strongly “suggested” I decline because my presence might make his
family feel “uncomfortable.”
Whether it was acquiescence to authority or unquestioned acceptance of de facto segregation, I have always
regretted giving in to the pressure.
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| : Abortion: Government’s Choice? |
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Global Research: Centre for Research on Globalization Oct. 27, 2008
Any government having the power to prohibit abortions also has the power
to require abortions. Any
government having the power to prohibit birth control also has the power to
forcibly sterilize women (and men).
The pregnant woman is forcibly
strapped to a Gurney and wheeled into the treatment room where her fetus is
aborted and her fallopian tubes are tied.
Why? A test has shown that
the fetus has Down syndrome and she already has one living child. Where? Somewhere in the United States. When? Sometime
in the future. Was it her
choice? No. Was the procedure legal? Yes.
With a population of almost 1.4
billion people, the Chinese government has enforced strict population control
laws for 25 years restricting families to one child and prohibiting unmarried
mothers from giving birth. Women
are still being forced to undergo abortions as late as the ninth month of
pregnancy, and forced sterilizations continue to occur. Considering the program to be a
success, China intends to continue its birth control policies, and officials
will have to meet rigid family planning goals in every province.
Russia, where abortions continue to
be the top birth control method, faces an opposite population problem. In just the first six months of 2008,
deaths outnumbered live births by more than 250,000. With Prime Minister Putin reasserting centralized control of
the economy, how long will it take for the government to outlaw birth control
or abortions, not for religious reasons, but to increase production of its
human capital?
With an overall population growth
rate of less than one percent, the United States is not facing a decline in its
worker or consumer base, nor is it experiencing out-of-control population
growth. Currently, with the
availability of effective birth control methods and the choice of legal
abortions, at least in the early stages of a pregnancy, women are allowed to
exercise some control over having children. However, the freedom of choice by American women is under a
relentless and increasingly successful attack.
Trampling on the First Amendment’s
separation of church and state, a powerful religious minority has been
aggressively pursuing a broad range of worldwide restrictions on the
availability of birth control and on the privacy rights of American women to
terminate unwanted or dangerous pregnancies.
On November 4, South Dakotans will
vote on a ballot measure to prohibit practically all abortions, allowing
exceptions only for rape, incest or the mother’s health. Colorado voters are being asked to go
even further and officially define any fertilized human egg as a “person” under
the state constitution, conceivably prohibiting even widely-accepted birth
control methods.
Republican presidential candidate
John McCain opposes legal abortions, believes Roe vs. Wade should be overturned and wants to appoint like-minded
Supreme Court justices. During a
recent debate, he ridiculed the idea of a mother’s “health” exception to the
criminalization of late-term abortions.
Going even further, his running mate, Sarah Palin, believes abortions
should be prohibited even for pregnancies conceived during forcible rape or
incest.
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| : A Dream Ballot for 2008 |
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Global Research: Centre for Research on Globalization Oct. 23, 2008
“Let [the Constitution] be taught in
schools, seminaries and in colleges; let it be written in primers, in spelling
books and in almanacs; let it be preached from the pulpit, proclaimed in
legislative halls, enforced in courts of justice. In short, let it become the
political religion of the nation.” Abraham
Lincoln
Tossing and
turning, American voters are having nightmares about the 2008 election. Will it be stolen again as it was in
2000 and 2004? What will a President Obama do about the
Global War on Terrorism and militarization? What will a
President McCain do about the economy, jobs and health care? My God, will we end up with a President
Biden or Palin, and what on Earth will he or she stumble into?
In spite of
all their lofty promises, mealy-mouthed answers, and misleading advertisements,
American voters still have no clue about what any of the candidates will really
do if and when they get into office.
With $3
billion wasted on the Help America Vote Act and the unreliable electronic
machines it has purchased, voters are losing sleep worrying about whether they
will even be allowed to vote in November, much less if their votes will ever be
accurately counted.
Wake up
America! Your voting power under the
current system has been reduced to electoral slavery, and you are seriously
deluded if you think you have any real control over your government.
Can you
even dream about a National Ballot that will establish your authority, one in
which you, rather than politicians, create the policy guidelines for your
government and you, rather than hacked computers, decide whom you want to
implement your policy?
Imagine
there is a two-day paid holiday set aside for the presidential election and
that every citizen is encouraged to register and to reverently observe the most
sacred sacrament of the nation’s political religion.
Think about
walking into your neighborhood polling place and being handed a sheet of heavy
paper with 12 policy questions for you to thoughtfully answer, yes or no, and a
list of party candidates for you to consider before you carefully write in the
name of your personal choice for president and vice president.
Sleep well
with sweet anticipation during the week or two it will take to patiently hand
count the millions of paper ballots before the clear voice of American voters
is heard to echo around the world with the message that democracy is alive and
well in the land of the free.
Experience
the drama! Feel the power flowing
into your hands and sense the clarity of your mind!
Close your
eyes and picture the ballot you would like to see handed to every voter on
November 4, 2008:
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| : Betrayed by the Bailout: The Death of Democracy |
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Global Research: Centre for Research on Globalization Oct. 3, 2008
On this date, October 3, 2008, the
American people were betrayed by those whom they had elected to represent
them. The members of Congress who
voted for the Wall Street “bailout” violated their oath of office to “support
and defend the Constitution” ... “that I will bear true faith and allegiance to
the same” ... “and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the
office on which I am about to enter: ...”
Without holding any meaningful
hearings or public discussions and listening only to those most responsible for
the economic disaster, Federal Reserve Board Chairman Ben Bernanke and Treasury
Secretary Henry Paulson, Congress abdicated its responsibility to the American people.
Locking out most members from all
discussions, the congressional “leadership” emerged from their backrooms with
legislation that grants Secretary Paulson the ability to spend at least $700
billion to “take such actions as [he] deems necessary” ... “ to promote
financial market stability.”
Entrusting tremendous political and
financial power (and a ton of borrowed money that taxpayers will have to repay
with interest) into Paulson’s sole discretion, members of Congress must have
been aware that, prior to his cabinet appointment in 2006, Paulson worked for
32 years at Goldman Sacks, one of the Wall Street firms that stands to benefit
greatly from his “actions.”
Paulson, who cashed out his Goldman
stock valued at $575 million to become the Secretary of Treasury (without
having to pay any taxes on the sale),
earned more than $53 million in pocket change during just his last two years at
Goldman Sacks for innovations such as a new line of “Mortgage Backed
Securities.” Gambling more than a
trillion dollars on risky subprime second mortgages, Paulson cleverly converted
them into AAA-rated “secure” investments by purchasing guarantees from the
American International Group.
AIG, coincidentally, was just
“bailed out” two weeks ago by Secretary Paulson for $85 billion (of borrowed
money that taxpayers will have to repay with interest), averting a devastating
loss by Goldman Sacks, who was holding more than $20 billion in otherwise
worthless second mortgages.
Is it surprising that Lloyd
Blankfein, Goldman’s current CEO, was present with Paulson when the decision
was made to bailout AIG?
The bailout’s $700 billion price tag
is only an arbitrary guess by Paulson and is most likely just the first
installment of many more to come.
Other economists, with more successful track records, believe the total
will be much greater, perhaps $5 trillion, as concealed losses are uncovered
and foreign companies dump their toxic investment waste into their American
offices.
In passing the “Emergency Economic
Stabilization Act of 2008,” Congress ignored the “great concern” expressed by
almost two hundred of the nation’s leading economists who pleaded with Congress
“not to rush, to hold appropriate hearings, and to carefully consider the right
course of action,...”
In addition to its ambiguity and
long-term effects, the economists believed the bailout plan to be “a subsidy to
investors at taxpayers’ expense” and to be “desperately short-sighted.” Ultimately, more than 400 top economists,
including two Nobel Prize winners, voiced opposition to the bailout.
The economists were not alone in
being ignored by the politicians.
It is widely reported that calls and emails to Congress from
constituents were running as high as 300 to one against the bailout. Mike Whitney reports one analyst saying
that “the calls to Congress are 50 percent ‘No’ and 50 percent ‘Hell,
No’.” The percentages adjusted as
the stock market tumbled, but public opposition to the bailout remains strong.
An AP poll only identified 30
percent of the public in favor of the bailout, and a CNN Money opinion poll
found 77 percent of the people believing the bailout would benefit those most
responsible for the economic downturn.
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| : The Gore Presidency: An Alternative History |
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Dandelion Salad Sept. 25, 2008
WASHINGTON, D.C. – With the
first debate of the 2008 presidential campaign now set to take place on the
campus of the University of Mississippi, it seems appropriate to reflect back
upon the Supreme Court decision in Bush
vs. Gore almost eight years ago and the subsequent history of the United
States that flows from the swing vote of a single justice.
Writing for a 5-4 majority of the
divided court, Justice Anthony Kennedy, a former Professor of Constitutional
Law, upheld the Florida Supreme Court’s decision that a vote was legal if there
was a “clear indication of the intent of the voter.” Following the recount of all “undervoted” and uncounted
legal ballots, Florida’s 25 electoral votes were awarded to Al Gore giving him
victories in both the popular vote and the Electoral College.
Justice Kennedy continued as the
Court’s “swing” voter until 2005 when, following the death of William
Rehnquist, President Gore appointed Senator Hillary Clinton as Chief Justice
and his Attorney General, former Arizona governor Janet Napolitano, to replace
retiring Justice Sandra Day O’Connor.
With Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the three female justices have had a collaborative
influence on the Court, causing even Justice Thomas to concur in several of
their decisions.
In a clear reversal of its
conservative drift, the Supreme Court has not only continued to uphold a
woman’s reproductive choice as a matter of constitutional right, but it has
also generally supported President Gore’s administrative regulations and the
federal laws intended to protect the environment, workers, and the economy.
With the appointments of former
Senator Sam Nunn as Secretary of Defense and retired Army General Colin Powell
as Secretary of State, Gore’s first serious foreign policy and national
security challenge was the threat posed by Osama bin Laden and the al Qaeda
terrorist organization.
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| : The Triple Whammy of Bigotry in the 2008 Election |
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Global Research: Centre for Research on Globalization Sept. 22, 2008
It’s been awhile since a black man was lynched in America, but the Rove Gang’s getting the crowd ginned up for another one and the town’s on edge.
The last lynching took place 10 years
ago in East Texas Bush Country when three young white racists chained James
Byrd, a 49-year-old father of three, to the back of their pickup truck and
dragged him down the highway until his body was dismembered.
If John McCain and his character
assassins and vote riggers succeed, the next one will occur in November and it
may tear apart America’s body politic.
The 2008 presidential election will make history. Americans will elect
either their first African American president, their oldest president,
or their first woman vice president who, given the medical odds, will have a
good chance of becoming the first woman president.
During this election, bigotry is the
elephant in the room; everybody is tiptoeing around wearing blindfolds, but it
and its spoor are too much to ignore.
As an expression for an evil
influence or hex, a “whammy” was added to the vernacular in 1941 when a boxing
manager said a “double whammy” was the only way African-American boxer Joe
Lewis was ever to be knocked out.
We will soon know whether Barack
Obama and the American people have suffered a single, double, or triple whammy
and we will all suffer from the assault.
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| : Valuable, Voluntary and Educational National Youth Service |
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 Online Journal Sept. 19. 2008
Irrespective of who’s anointed at
the presidential coronation in January, many more Americans will soon be
performing national service, including compulsory military tours of duty in the
never-ending War Against Terror and the soon-to-be announced Wars Against
Sedition, Starvation, Unemployment, and Internal Insurrection, et cetera, et
cetera, et cetera.
John McCain has said, “After 9/11, I
think we made a mistake by telling Americans they ought to go on a trip, or
shop. I think we should’ve told
Americans to join the military, the Peace Corps, AmeriCorps, volunteer
organizations – all the organizations that allow people to serve this
nation.” Most recently, he asked
“for a concrete plan of action on the need for all of us to serve.”
Not to be outdone, Barack Obama has
a Plan for Universal Voluntary
Citizen Service, which will help “All
Americans Serve Their Country.” He
wants to double the Peace Corps, triple the AmeriCorps, expand VISTA, the USA
Freedom Corps, the Senior Corps, and the YouthBuild Program. In addition, he wants to deploy a new
Classroom Corps, Health Corps, Clean Energy Corps, Veterans Corps, Green Job
Corps, and a Homeland Security Corps.
Regarding the last one, he has said, “We cannot continue to rely only on
our military in order to achieve the national security objectives we’ve
set. We’ve got to have a civilian
national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as
well-funded.”
Bipartisanship abounds. Senators Ted Kennedy and Orrin Hatch have filed legislation
to increase the number of Americans who participate in volunteer programs from
61 million to 100 million. Using
AmeriCorps as a model, the senators propose five new “corps” for volunteers,
including international service, disaster relief, green energy, and education
and poverty. The bill creates tax
breaks for businesses that give workers paid time off and establishes “encore
fellowships” for baby boomers seeking alternative retirements.
Volunteering is good, no doubt. However, while unpaid, out-of-work
volunteers may help, they cannot solve the critical problems we are facing in
education, health care, energy, national security and even unemployment. These complex problems cannot be
overcome by armies of untrained volunteers, no matter how well intended. Volunteer service must have real value, both in terms of the actual
service performed and the benefit to the provider.
There is a real risk that
“volunteerism” will morph into “compulsion.” With joblessness soaring, along with food, fuel and medical
costs, foreclosures and evictions, how long will it take our well-fed and
over-paid “leaders” in both parties to decide that work (“public service”)
should be the price of public assistance?
Once we have millions of hungry people out of work, out of benefits, and
out of hope, will our “civilian national security force” be deployed to
maintain order? At foreclosures
and evictions? At food lines? At work gangs?
Another problem with the various
volunteer initiatives being bandied about is that none allow voluntary public service as an
alternative to the specter of compulsory
military service lurking just around the bend.
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| : DELIVER US FROM CHAOS: TEN POLITICAL COMMANDMENTS |
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 Axis of Logic Sept 14, 2008
When
the CIA engineered the overthrow of the democratically elected prime minister
of Iran in 1953 in favor of the more compliant Shah, who would have ever
thought that 26 years later the nation’s youth would invade our embassy and
take our diplomats as hostages?
When our president’s national security advisor instigated secret support
for the Afghanistan Mujahideen the same year in their resistance against the
Russian army, who would have imagined that 22 years later one of the Mujahideen
leaders, Osama bin Laden, would direct the 9-11 attacks on America? When the U.S. invaded Iraq in 2003
without just cause, who could have foreseen that five years later as many as a
million Iraqis have been killed, tens of thousands of American soldiers have
been grievously wounded or died, more than a trillion tax dollars have been
wasted, and our troops are still not welcomed as liberators? When the CIA and the U.S. ambassador
secretly engineered the “Rose Revolution” in Georgia in 2003 and after the U.S.
encouraged the Israeli-trained Georgian army to invade the disputed enclave of
South Ossetia five years later, who could have predicted Russian peacekeepers
would be killed causing Russia to invade Georgia and overrun its lilliputian
army provided by U.S. taxpayers?
The only thing for certain to result from all such Machiavellian
maneuvers is chaos, pure chaos.
The
classical theory set forth in Chaos:
Making a New Science by James Gleick in 1987 is that “a butterfly stirring
the air today in Peking can transform storm systems next month in New
York.” Basically, any attempt to
accurately discern outcomes from discrete and random inputs is much like reading
entrails or trying to guess which card will be dealt after God reshuffles the
deck “under the table” after each hand.
From
a political standpoint, chaos theory requires us to consider the effect of a
vice president flapping his lips on an aircraft carrier in the Persian Gulf or
in the former U.S.S.R. republic of Georgia on starting World War III or Cold War II.
In
May 2007, Vice President Cheney threatened that, “With two carrier strike
groups in the Gulf, we’re sending clear messages to friends and adversaries
alike, we’ll keep the sea lanes open.”
And, “We’ll stand with others to prevent Iran from gaining nuclear
weapons and dominating the region.”
Last
week, Cheney belligerently stated, "America will do its duty to work with
the governments of Georgia and our other friends and allies to protect our
common interests and uphold our values."
Given
the fact that between them, Iran and Russia control a substantial portion of
the world’s oil and natural gas reserves, it would seem such bellicosity can
only have dire consequences for those of us whose petroleum supplies are
running thin and whose military is dangerously overextended.
With
the presidential election only a few weeks away, and the candidates all trying
to out-tough the others by threatening war against Iran and Russia or promising
to “finish the job” in Afghanistan by invading Pakistan, a brief discussion of
how an application of chaos theory could improve the practice of politics might
of interest.
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Voters Online There are currently, 28 guest(s) and 1 member(s) that are online.
You are Anonymous user. You can register for free by clicking here |
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| PROGRESS ON YOUTH EVOLT! SITE |
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Website Update
Interest
in The Voter’s peaceful political evolution continues to grow with the Voters
Evolt! site now attracting more than 40,000 unique visitors every month from
all over the world.
Development
of the YouthEvolt.com site has taken longer than originally expected because of
the extreme difficulties involved in constructing a complicated interactive
flash web site.
Our
goal continues to be the creation of the most interesting and effective youth
protest site on the Internet.
In
preparation, we have continued to photograph youth participants at political
events.
Here’s
a preview of the YouthEvolt! splash page.
Here’s
a slideshow of the March 15, 2008 anti-war march in Hollywood.
Here’s
a slideshow of the May Day 2008 march in downtown Los Angeles.
Here’s a slideshow of the August 2, 2008 protest
in Los Angeles Pershing Square.
Here’s a slideshow of the March 21, 2009 anti-war
march in Hollywood.
Here’s
a slideshow of the May Day 2009 march in downtown Los Angeles.
The
Voters are continuing the process of incorporating Evolt Inc. as a nonprofit
corporation to more effectively manage the expansion of their peaceful political
evolution.
In
furtherance of its master plan, the Voters have secured the domain names of
WomenEvolt.com, WorkersEvolt.com, and SeniorEvolt.com.
As
a preview of other future sites, here’s a slideshow of women protesting at the
March 15, 2008 anti-war march in Hollywood.
Economic Chaos and Political Survival
Global Research: Centre for Research on Globalization Oct. 11, 2008
" –That to secure these rights,
Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the
consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes
destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish
it, and to institute new Government,… organizing its powers in such form, as to
them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness." ~The
Declaration of Independence
How many more lies must we listen
to?
How many more political scandals
must we endure?
How many more of our young people
have to be grievously wounded or die in unnecessary and illegal wars, and how
many more trillions of dollars in economic waste must we clean up before we are
sickened enough to demand effective changes in our government?
Are we ready for a peaceful
political "evolution" to
safeguard our personal and economic freedoms in this country and to avoid
committing war crimes against others?
In Washington’s Crossing, an excellent history of the near failure of
the American Revolution in the winter of 1776, David Hackett Fischer concluded
that neither Washington’s leadership nor the victories at Trenton and Princeton
saved the revolution following his resounding defeat in New York City.
To the contrary, Washington’s
victories resulted from the revival of spirit that arose among the ordinary
people in the Delaware Valley as they began to read Thomas Paine’s American Crisis.
According to Fischer, "This
great revival grew from defeat, not from victory. The awakening was a response to a disaster. Doctor Benjamin Rush, who had a major
role in the event, believed that this was the way a free public would always
work, and the American republic in particular. He thought it was a national habit of the American people
(maybe all free people) not to deal with a difficult problem until it was
nearly impossible."
Although we are calculating the cost
in thousands of lives and billions of dollars, we cannot imagine the full extent
of damage that will flow from our president’s having misled our nation into an
illegal war with Iraq and our innocent troops into the commission of war
crimes.
We are only beginning to get a
glimpse of the devastation to the American economy caused by unrestrained
deregulation and reckless Wall Street gambling, as our president threw away our
hard-earned money, eliminated taxes for his wealthy friends, ran up debts for
our children and grandchildren to pay in the future, tried to destroy our
Social Security, encouraged the shipment of American jobs out of the country,
and allowed the international value of our currency to depreciate.
All of us, liberals, conservatives and independents, are going to be
increasingly harmed by the failures of our government and those we’ve allegedly
elected to run it.
We must anticipate that there are
more lies on their lips waiting to be told, even more ugly secrets waiting to
be uncovered and even worse scandals yet to unfold.
The good news is that the American
people remain the best, the bravest, and the brightest our human civilization
has ever produced. America is the Promised Land, and Americans are
an amalgamation of all races and all cultures on Earth.
The American genetic pool is the
most robust and diverse of any society on earth, and the revolutionary spirit
continues to run deep and true in the blood lines of all who yearn for freedom
and the full fruits of their labor.
The American people will survive
and, ultimately, we will achieve a government that better cares for us and is
less threatening to the rest of the world.
The bad news is that we will have to
go through hell to get there. So,
h
A National Policy Referendum
Perhaps the most basic problem with
our government today is that, irrespective of the party in power, it primarily
responds to the demands of large corporations and moneyed special interest
groups, rather than respecting the hopes and aspirations of ordinary workers
and small businesses.
Every four years the two main political
parties construct "platforms" to serve as publicity gimmicks to get
their candidate elected. After the
election, both parties generally ignore the policies they set forth in their
platforms and begin to take care of themselves and their financial supporters,
rather than to do what they said they were going to do for the rest of us.
The process is supposed to result in
policies that reflect the interests of the voters, but it is a scandal at
best. At worst, it is a continuing
political disaster.
Access by individuals to their
elected officials is the foundation of a republican form of government. However, the election of our
representatives is now more dependent upon massive expenditures of campaign contributions
from their corporate sponsors, their wealthy friends, and well-funded,
single-issue, special interest groups rather than upon a meaningful vote by an
informed electorate.
Special interest groups deploy more
than 35,000 lobbyists and spend more than $10 billion each year to promote
their agendas. While there are
allegedly some limits on campaign contributions, there are no restraints on
institutional schmoozing.
No matter how deeply we ordinary
citizens dig into our pockets, we cannot financially compete with the powerful
special interests. No matter how
well we organize, we cannot match the influence of the financial and political
insiders. No matter how often we
march and picket, they will always beat us through the side door into the
corridors of power.
Not only are we are no longer represented;
we have also been stripped of Constitutional protections we once enjoyed. Thoughtful people of every political
persuasion are increasingly alarmed about the reductions in freedom we have
passively accepted in response to 9/11.
Many of us, irrespective of party or political beliefs, now question
whether the Bill of Rights will survive another terrorist attack, which is sure
to come.
Since we have been abandoned by our
government, we must collectively focus upon a peaceful method to modify our
government to one which more attentively considers the needs and protection of
all voters, whether Republican, Democrat, Reform, Libertarian, Green or
Independent.
An intolerant, non responsive and
repressive government cannot endure.
The choice is whether political change results from a violent revolution
or a peaceful evolution, from a
revolt or an evolt.
One way we can regain control of our
government is to require it to hold a National Policy Referendum every four
years when we vote for our president.
Such a referendum would not make law; rather the purpose would be to
express the collective policy of the people through their answers to the major
political questions that should most concern the new administration and
Congress during their terms of office.
Individuals and organizations could
nominate policy questions; Congress would have to debate the issues in
formulating 12 current policy questions to be listed on a national ballot, and
the president would have to either sign or veto the bill.
To ensure passage of the policy
bill, perhaps the pay of all members of Congress and the president and all members of their senior staffs
should be withheld commencing on the New Year’s Day of each presidential
election year until the issues are identified. Or, maybe all national political campaign contributions to
parties and candidates should be prohibited until after the policy referendum
bill is passed and signed.
Once the questions are promulgated,
presidential candidates (and other elected representatives) would be forced to
take positions on a wide variety of real issues.
Politics has been defined as the art
of not telling the truth, and politicians quickly learn to avoid telling the
truth at all cost. Because there
are special interests on both sides of every issue, it is impossible to please
everyone, yet the politicians strive onward, lying and denying, twisting and
hiding, trying to grab every vote.
The best theater can be seen during
the presidential debates. Trying
to get a straight answer from any of the candidates is like waiting for pigs to
fly.
Most importantly, we the voters
would be more likely to study and question the issues and to arrive at our own
opinions, rather than to have them spoon fed to us by the corporate media.
Not only must we increasingly talk
about the issues over the back fence or in the break room, we must also insist
that the Fairness Doctrine eliminated by the Reagan-appointed Federal
Communication Commission be resurrected to require fair comment and competing
points of view by ordinary voters to be aired for all to hear.
Instead of responding emotionally to
brief television and radio ads, most of which are designed to evoke a negative
reaction, we would be far more likely to thoughtfully consider positive
information and political analysis.
A number of countries, including
Canada, Sweden and Switzerland refer policy matters to their voters for binding
decisions, and the European Union resulted from a referendum in the
participating countries. During
its 2004 presidential election, Taiwan submitted two policy questions regarding
its relations with China to voters.
However, no nation presently holds a non binding policy referendum as a
matter of course.
There are those who might argue that
the presidential election is a
referendum on the candidates’ platforms; however, the winner-take-all results
do not, in any way, suggest the level of voter support for any of the competing
issues. The outcome turns far too
often on which of the candidates makes the fewest mistakes or which has devised
the most effective smear campaign.
A National Policy Referendum will
not be a national opinion poll.
The process of articulating the political questions, the more lively
debate, and our thoughtful vote will validate the results far beyond that attainable
by any random sampling, no matter how scientific. Voters will not be expressing a snap opinion. Nor, will voters make law. Voters
will make policy!
A right to vote in a National Policy
Referendum can be found in the First Amendment to the Constitution, which
expressly provides our right to petition our government for redress. Our right to peaceably assemble and to
seek redress was intended as the bedrock of our free society and as a safety
valve to avoid violent revolution.
In a free society, we have a duty to
avoid the use of force, even if we believe our existence under ineffectual
government is being seriously threatened.
It is also our duty to peacefully petition our government, before we
resort to violence.
If we are to effectively modify our
government through a peaceful political evolution, we must be allowed to
exercise our vote in a National Policy Referendum. Otherwise, what can we do?
A Peaceful Write-in Protest
As effective as a national
referendum may be to establish government policy, little good will come of it
unless those we elect are forced to pay attention to our interests and to
actually carry out our policies.
As it is, presidential candidates say one thing and do another to the
extent they believe they can get away with it, and because of party politics,
we keep getting stuck with having to decide upon the lesser of two evils.
Imagine if we combined a National
Policy Referendum with a grass-roots rebellion in which a majority of us were
to actually write in the name of the
person we wanted to preside over our government. Wouldn’t we seize the power that legitimately belongs to the
citizens of this country and wouldn’t we evolve
a far more effective and representative government?
Can we trust the current method by
which we elect our president? Are
there good reasons why we should rebel against the present system?
In 2000, more than a half million
voters selected Al Gore, the Democratic candidate, over George Bush, the
Republican candidate. However,
Bush prevailed in the Electoral College because a fraudulent election in
Florida gave him that state’s 20 electoral votes, even though the candidates
were only separated by a few hundred popular votes.
Bush had an edge and the fix was
in. His brother, Jeb, was governor
and the Secretary of State chaired his reelection committee. Not only were thousands of eligible
(mostly Democratic) Florida voters disenfranchised before the election, but
every effort to manually recount the ballots, including thousands of rejected
votes, was blocked by the Secretary of State.
A phony riot was staged by
Republican Party operatives flown in from out of state to intimidate local
election supervisors, and five Republican-appointed members of the U.S. Supreme
Court contrived a politically-motivated decision that reversed a far more
reasoned opinion by Florida’s high court, which had ordered that every voter’s
intention be determined as accurately as possible.
Following the election, Congress
passed the $3 billion Help American Vote Act, which encouraged the States to
purchase secret computerized voting systems manufactured and maintained by
companies whose officers uniformly support the Republican Party.
Walden W. O’Dell was the chief
executive of one of those companies, Diebold Inc. In August 2003, he sent a letter to 100 wealthy friends
inviting them to a Republican Party fund-raiser at his home in Columbus,
Ohio. He said, "I am
committed to helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the president next
year." It appears that he
did.
The 2004 election differed from 2000
in that George Bush may have received a higher percentage of the popular vote;
however, it has been proven he should have lost in the Electoral College,
except for another fraudulent election, this time in (no surprise) Ohio.
The Ohio Secretary of State, Kenneth
Blackwell, served as the chairman of Bush’s Ohio reelection campaign and
publicly called Senator Kerry, the Democratic candidate, a "disaster"
sure to reap "terrible" and "horrible" results if elected. Not only did Blackwell cause the
registrations of Democratic voters to be rejected because they were on the
wrong weight of paper, there were too few voting machines allocated to poor
(and largely Democratic) precincts.
class=Section2>
When combined with a Republican
Party program of aggressively issuing personal challenges to voters and the
casting of provisional ballots, the vote suppression tactics led to long lines
and waits of up to seven hours to vote, primarily in poor neighborhoods. Many people finally gave up and lost
their right to vote.
Exit polls across the nation
appeared to give Kerry an advantage in the popular vote, up to 3 percent in the
swing states of Ohio, Pennsylvania and Florida. Even before the votes were counted, Blackwell was bragging
that he had helped "deliver" Ohio in announcing Bush’s
"victory." In just these
three states, the odds of the dramatic swing between the exit polls and the
final tabulation have been calculated as 250 million to one!
During the joint session of Congress
on January 6, 2005 to certify the electoral vote, only one dozen Democratic
House members and one Democratic senator stood up to complain about the voting
irregularities in Ohio. However,
their objections did force a debate about Electoral College results for only
the second time since 1877. After
a two-hour session, the Senate voted 74-1 and the House voted 267-31 to reject
the protest. Can it be said that
either party truly had the interests of the voters at heart?
Our democratic republic is founded
upon our ability to trust the results of our collective vote. Is there any doubt that the advent of
black-box voting, systematic election fraud, and the widespread intimidation of
voters dictate that we seize control
of the election process before the chance is lost forever?
Each of us must find within us the
individual courage and initiative to perform one simple rebellious act –
refuse to use the computerized voting machines or any other machine ballot.
Instead of responding like
laboratory animals pushing a button in response to the stimulus of the latest
ten-second television smear ad, we can each take a little longer to carefully
consider the candidates presented on the ballot by the various political
parties.
Once we decide, we can demonstrate
our literacy and our power by clearly writing in our personal choice for
president of the United States, whether or not his or her name is on the
ballot!
Presently, half of all voters don’t
bother going to the polls and less than one quarter actually elect the
president for all of us. Imagine
the immense power that would flow to the people if voting truly became
universal.
If voter turnout was to dramatically
increase, and if only 15 to 25 percent of all voters were to write in their
electoral choices, trust that the politicians would be scrambling to ensure
that all write-in votes cast for them are legally counted. We would quickly find all of them
registering their willingness to accept every write-in vote naming them for any
office of public trust.
The Future
If we simple voters are smart enough
to earn a living and to figure out how to pay our taxes – if we have
courage enough to fight the wars started by our government, we are also
entitled to collectively establish basic policy to guide our government, and to
personally write in the name of whomever we consider most qualified to
effectuate our policies.
We, the ordinary voters of every
party, must evolt against politics as
usual and join in a nonviolent evolution
to transform our government.
We must demand a national
ballot for president that presents the 12 most important national
policy questions and which lists the
presidential candidates nominated by the major political parties.
All paid political advertising
should be prohibited during the week before the election, and everyone should
enjoy a four-day paid holiday weekend to celebrate the most sacred sacrament of
our national political religion.
No voter should ever be turned away from the polls, and every vote must
be patiently hand counted.
We should go to our polling place
and thoughtfully answer the policy questions presented on the ballot. Then, we should carefully write in the
name of the person we select to
implement our policy.
It could take a week or two to
slowly and carefully hand count (or recount) the ballots. So what! The results will be felt far beyond two weeks.
We will again evolve a new system of
government that will better serve to provide freedom, justice and prosperity to
all who share this fragile planet.
We will decide who is in charge of
the United States and we will chart
the direction of its future. We are The Voters!
William John Cox is a retired supervising prosecutor for the State Bar of
California. As a police officer he
wrote the Policy Manual of the Los Angeles Police Department and the Role of
the Police in America for a national advisory commission. Acting as a public interest, pro bono
lawyer, he filed a class action lawsuit in 1979 on behalf of every citizen of
the United States petitioning the Supreme Court to order the other two branches
of the federal government to conduct a National Policy Referendum; he
investigated and successfully sued a group of radical right-wing organizations
in 1981 that denied the Holocaust; and he arranged in 1991 for publication of
the suppressed Dead Sea Scrolls.
His 2004 book, You’re Not Stupid! Get the Truth: A Brief on the Bush
Presidency is reviewed at http://www.yourenotstupid.com, and he is
currently working on a fact-based fictional political philosophy. His writings are collected at http://www.thevoters.org,
and he can be contacted at u2cox@msn.com.
Copyright
© 2008
William
John Cox
Febuary 21 , 2007
The Last Generation of Mindkind on Earth
The following essay was written many years ago and, although a little lengthy for the Internet, it is posted here for those who like to mix a little philosophy with their politics.
Should the citizens of the United States engage in a peaceful political rebellion to avoid economic disaster and future wars founded, not upon wishful thinking and hopeful denial, but on a simple and specific agenda for effective collective action?
Is not the desire for freedom a universal trait of all sentient beings? Otherwise inequality of opportunity forever retards the intellectual evolution of their species.
Discussion: Once the melody of freedom's song is raised in democratic harmony, it echoes throughout the heavens for all to hear, as there is but peace in all of the universe, and it has been that way for all of eternity. No being, truly thinking, makes war instead of exploring the stars, for without peace, no being can fly far from their birth planet. They can only foul their nest and peck their siblings to death, thinking conditions beyond their nest are the same as surround them, never knowing that there's no Star Wars, except in the blind fantasies of those who never learn to see.
Danger. If there is but peace in all the universe and it has been that way for all of eternity, what then must we do to have any voice in our fate? Are we to continue living in fear of atomic-tipped missiles in the former USSR? Is there a more real danger that one day some small dispute ignites a financial war and China dumps its dollars or OPEC begins to trade its oil in Euros? Or, what if some other tiny economic turmoil twists the stock, bond, currency, and real estate markets into a chaotic contractual tailspin, and for whatever reason, in a single day, paper and electronic money simply cease to have economic relevance and virtually all legal wealth is eliminated? Then, only gold and other metals will have any real value; not silicon, plastic, or credit ratings.
Quick. Then, when there's no gasoline for sale, nor cabs to call, my spare change will be worth more than your former millions, and my bicycle will get me farther than your BMW. Without electricity and wave transmissions, your telephone, computers, televisions, DVDs and stereos are worth less than my knife. If all houses are for sale and all apartments are for rent, all titles are worthless, and all property is available for the taking. If everybody is looking for work, nobody will be hiring. If everything worth stealing has been stolen, you will find nothing to eat, no matter the caliber of your gun, or the number of your last few bullets.
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