Obama's Healthcare Shadow

Remember the old Mad Magazine piece showing a series of cartoon frames in which people are doing one thing, but their shadow is doing something socially unacceptable that they really want to do? Like the example below:

I can't remove the image of Obama, with Rahm Emanuel standing there, saying

By standing up to the special interests who have prevented reform for decades and who are furiously lobbying against it now, the Senate has moved us closer to reform that makes a tremendous difference for families, for seniors, for businesses and for the country as a whole.

Meanwhile Obama's and Emanuel's shadows are high-fiving the health industry executives on sealing the deal. 30 million people forced to buy corporate health insurance, some subsidized by tax payer money, thereby strengthening the corporate power of an industry that is already controlling our governing system. WTF?

Kyoto & the Articles of Confederation

A forgotten bit of United States history provides an analogy to what could happen to the Keyoto Protocols in Copenhagen.

The United States had a constitution before the U.S. Constitution. It was called the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union, or simply the Articles of Confederation. Article 13 stated that only the Congress of the states could amend the Articles of Confederation.

However, rather than amend the Articles, a series of conferences and conventions were held, which resulted in the Articles being discarded and replaced by the U.S. Constitution. A similar thing appears to be happening to the Kyoto Protocols to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. Powerful nations are trying to discard the Kyoto treaty and replace it with something else more favorable to corporate interests.

It's instructive to reflect back on what motivated the dismantling of the Articles of Confederation. Following a meeting in Mount Vernon to address navigation issues between Maryland and Virginia, the conveners recommended a convention of all the States for the following purpose:

"to take into consideration the trade and commerce" of the Confederation. [1]

Ah, yes. Commercial interests at work again. According to political scientist David Hendrickson:

When the war ended in 1783, certain special interests had incentives to create a new "merchant state," much like the British state people had rebelled against. In particular, holders of war scrip and land speculators wanted a central government to pay off scrip at face value and to legalize western land holdings with disputed claims. Also, manufacturers wanted a high tariff as a barrier to foreign goods, but competition among states made this impossible without a central government.[2]

So, out with the Articles of Confederation and in with the U.S. Constitution and a central government. The same interests seem to be at work centuries later trying to say out with Kyoto and in with a corporate-directed approach to global climate change. This establishment approach must be challenged.

Sources:

1. C. Tansill (ed.), Documents Illustrative of the Formation of the Union of the American States, H. Doc. No. 358, 69th Congress, 1st sess. (1927)

2. Hendrickson, David C., Peace Pact: The Lost World of the American Founding. (2003)

Obama's Exceptional View of America in Afghanistan

In his Afghanistan war escalation speech, President Obama drew on American Exceptionalism to claim US intentions are pure in Afghanistan. It's as if the US dirty wars in Central America, in support of United Fruit and other corporate interests, never happened.

AMY GOODMAN: President Obama also praised the United States as a country that has not sought world domination or occupation.

PRESIDENT OBAMA: More than any other nation, the United States of America has underwritten global security for over six decades, a time that for all its problems has seen walls come down and markets opened, and billions lifted from poverty, unparalleled scientific progress in advancing frontiers of human liberty. For unlike the great powers of old, we have not sought world domination. Our union was founded in resistance to oppression. We do not seek to occupy other nations. We will not claim another nation’s resources or target other peoples because their faith or ethnicity is different from ours. What we have fought for, what we continue to fight for, is a better future for our children and grandchildren and we believe that their lives will be better if other people’s children and grandchildren can live in freedom and access opportunity.

AMY GOODMAN: Professor Bacevich, your book is called “The Limits of Power, The End of American Exceptionalism”, responding to... President Obama’s last point about why we are in Afghanistan.

ANDREW BACEVICH*: ... This is the preferred narrative of American history, the way we prefer to see ourselves and, therefore, the narrative that we use to justify all that we do in the world. It is really telling and extraordinary that this president, whose background is quite different from all those other presidents... and who came to office promising to bring about change, it is extraordinary that he himself would embrace that narrative so uncritically. I think that is indicative of the extent to which whether there is going to be any change in Washington, it is simply going to be changes on the margins and that the Washington consensus, the status quo, is firmly in place.


*Andrew Bacevich is a retired colonel and a Vietnam war veteran who spent twenty-three years in the US Army. Bacevich is a professor of history and international relations at Boston University and the author of “The Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism.”

Source:

DemocracyNow! December 2, 2009.

Hope for the Establishment?

Well, the World Bank is a dirty word in some circles. But I've recently had some experiences that suggest the Global Justice Movement might have influenced The Bank.

Perhaps, the cynic would say, the following statistic is just the Bank engaging in self-promotion the justify their own existence.

According to the World Bank, 75-80 of the effects of climate change are being felt in the developing world. So, you have this inverse relationship between cause and effect.

But another take is that the Bank is, 1) acknowledging the existence of climate change, something the Palinistas won't do, and 2) providing evidence for a legal challenge with reparations as the remedy.

By chance I discussed the changes at the World Bank with someone who is #2 for a particular geographic region. In response to a question about changes at the Bank over the past decade, he said that the Bank has deeply changed it's perspective on two things. First, the Bank recognizes the use of "structural adjustments" as a condition of loans was bad policy, in part because it was coercive. Thus, nations would do what was necessary to secure the loans, but were not really committed to the changes.

Second, and related to the first, was to take a more holistic view of the loans, recognizing distribution issues and social issues. In other words, recognizing that the results of the loans need to affect a broader spectrum of people in the recipient country, with particular attention on impacts of the poorest people.

The purpose here isn't to praise the World Bank as much as it is to point to the success of the Global Justice Movement in helping raise the consciousness of an institution like the World Bank.

Financial Elite in a Sea of Poverty

Back in 1975, when oil wealth in the Middle East was accumulating, the Kuwait fund for Economic Development pledged $16 billion to developing countries. According to National Geographic,

The fund's director general, Abdlatif Al-Hamad, 39, explained the philosophy behind such generosity: "We cannot close our doors and say to hell with everyone else. Nothing is clearer than the danger of having an island of prosperity in a sea of poverty."

We've all heard that about the 1% of Americans who own 38% of the wealth. The bottom 40% owned less than 1% of the nation's wealth. These are 2001 statistics and the disparity has grown since then.

Sounds like an island of prosperity in a sea of poverty.

Where is Abdlatif Al-Hamad today?

Source:

National Geographic, "Arabs," October, 1975.

Bogus Wall Street Profits Attract Investors

Trust your instincts on your reaction to the following:

Wall Street Headed for Record Profits in 2009

New government figures show Wall Street is on pace to have its most profitable year to date. On Tuesday, the New York Comptroller Office said Wall Street profits are set to exceed the record set three years ago, before the onset of the nation’s financial meltdown. The four largest firms—Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley and JPMorgan Chase—took in $22.5 billion in profits through September. The top six banks set aside $112 billion for salaries and bonuses over the same period. In a statement, New York Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli said, “The national economy is slowly improving, but Wall Street has recovered much faster than anyone had envisioned.” [1]

My take on this is that the Obama administration knows the following and hopes you don't:

1. These too-big-to-fail financial institutions are insolvent, probably even despite the trillions in tax-payer bailouts.

2.The establishment, including the Obama administration, cannot expose this insolvency because they are trying to attract private capital (investors) to overcome the insolvency.

3. Investors need to see the too-big-to-fail financial institutions as "good investments," therefore these institutions need to be seen making profits.

4. The "profits" of these financial institutions are founded on complex accounting gimmicks.

5. This is all being done for one basic reason: To avoid the social chaos that would follow if the bottom were allowed to drop out of these financial institutions, which would lead to loss of power among many in the establishment.

Source:

1. Democracty Now Headlines, November 18, 2009.

Let Down by Obama? Steps you can Take

So the Obama afterglow is fading and the word "establishment" is starting to look like both major parties? No need to hyperventilate; you're not alone. There is support among like minded people.

One of those like minded people has taken the time to consolidate some advice for doing something about it. I don't agree with it all*, but you can be the decider.

Check out the recent post: "What to Do If You Are Disatisfied with Obama and Bush" at the Godless Liberal Homo blog.

Aside:

* One of the "action items" is to "Stay a Registered Democrat." This can be argued both ways.

An alternative perspective is to "Register Green." In doing so, you cast a vote that will be recorded for all to see in the County Election Board tables of registered voters, including Democratic Party operatives.

As the numbers in the Green Party column grow, the Democrats will realize that they are actually to the right of a growing group of people... this will help pull the Dems back to the left. True, you give up your primary vote, so be sure to convince at least one friend who would NOT have voted in the primary to do so... now you've offset the minor benefit of remaining registered Dem and you still have your number reflected in the County Election Board's tally of registered voters for all to see. Simple.

Final Note: Is it only me, or when you first glance at the photo in the upper right, doesn't it look like "Change Label"?