Refrigerator Child Poetry in Late 2010

I found the following written in refrigerator magnets on our fridge. I'm pretty sure it was written solely by our 10-year old daughter.

American peace harass apparatus influence death bomb against argue triumph knife enlist war chief president oppose law blood

Fortunately, she's a happy, intelligent, creative kid who, like most her age, doesn't listen very well.

Oh. Don't forget to contact your representatives and tell them to bargain harder on the tax legislation that Obama caved on.

• Contact the US Senate
• Contact the House of Representatives

Sources:

Honduras Counter Coup by The People and Zelaya

"The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice" and the people of Honduras are bending it despite totalitarian coup leaders and golpistas.

Old news by now, with the coup leader communications blackout hopefully outflanked, "President Zelaya Has Returned to Honduras" reports Al Giordano on The Field Blog. Read more and smile.

At about 1:00pm local time, TeleSur broadcast that The Spaniard news agency EFE reports that President Zelaya was in the Brazilian Embassy in Tegucigalpa, sovereign territory that is off limits to the coup regime. Zelaya says he is there to seek dialogue.

President Zelaya and his Cabinet
in the Brazilian Embassy, Tegucigalpa.

According to the Field Blog, The US State Department said today:

Of course, we believe that he’s the democratic – democratically elected and constitutional leader of Honduras.

Sources:

Narco News

Thanks to Ten Percent Blog for tipping me off to this story.

Congratulations, Lets Get to Work

Welcome to Washington President Obama. Now we can start sending our e-mails to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue when we want to Contact Obama. And today, we can raise our voice in unison on a specific economic issue: Obama's proposed tax cuts.

The Godless Liberal Homo blog lays out some rationals for sending this message to Team Obama:

Bush's tax cuts have been disastrous. The small checks for middle class and poor people did nothing to help our economy. They might have stimulated China's economy marginally, but China doesn't buy much anything from us.

Bush's enormous tax cuts for the rich have played a key role in our desperate economic situation. They contributed significantly to our government and foreign debt while doing nothing to create jobs here in the US. The wealthy used these unearned windfalls in an orgy of speculation, creating bubble after bubble (stocks, subprime mortgages, oil, gold, etc.) leading to crash after crash. Our treasury was looted to a huge extent to create money which mostly disappeared in 2008.

He's not alone. The January/February 2009 issue of Mother Jones Magazine also lays out the most "stimulating" actions that government can take to keep this recession from going further south.

You can read the Mother Jones article Stimulus is for Suckers for an explanation of the chart above. It's hard to see in the graph, but according to this analysis from Moody's Economy.com, an across-the-board tax cut only generates 3-cents of stimulus per dollar in cuts, whereas food stamps generates 73-cents per dollar of stimulus.

A bit wonkish I admit, but when Obama said in his inaugural speech that we need to be more responsible, this level of attention is part of what he was talking about.

Psssst... Do Something

• Contact the Broadcast Media
  
• Contact the Newspapers
  
• Contact the US Senate
  
• Contact the House of Representatives

Early Exit Poll Presidential Results

First news in from Kentucky, which goes to McCain with 8 electoral votes. Obama take Vermont with 3 electoral votes.

Update:

Then the bottom fell out for John McCain. ;-)

Sources:

MSNBC Exit Polls updated every two minutes.

Bashir and Bush

The World is witnessing the indictment of Sudanese President Omar Bashir for war crimes. A leader is being held responsible for his acts.

President Omar Bashir (Sudan) and President George Bush

With the impeachment of George W. Bush "off the table," people could turn to the next logical option to hold him responsible for his acts: criminal prosecution. Bush might wish, some day, that he had simply gotten away with impeachment rather than criminal prosecution and punishment.

Mark Levine, a University of California professor, is drawing a parallel between the indictment of Sudanese president Omar Bashir and George Bush's crimes. Levine observes that, with the change of a couple words in the Bashir indictment, it could be applied to Bush:

[Bush] was directly responsible. He is the president. He is the commander-in-chief. Those are not just formal words. He used the whole state apparatus. He used the army; he enrolled the [military]. They all report to him. They all obey him. His control is absolute.

Absolute control. Absolute responsibility. Absolute liability.

Sources:

Al Jazeera, First al-Bashir, next ... Bush? by Mark Levine, July 16, 2008. http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/2008/07/20087166397881715.html

Mark Levine is a professor of Middle East history at the University of California, Irvine and is the author of the newly released Heavy Metal Islam: Rock, Resistance, and the Struggle for the Soul of Islam.

Thoughtful Commentary on Obama and Clinton

Some thoughtful commentary on Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton from a guest contributor, who happens to be female and is an Obama supporter:

I know we over-reflect upon 9/11 but I do think it's true that our nation experienced a great sense of "common" destiny which just was not cultivated -- and I don't think the neocons are the only ones to blame for that. You're right, Obama's campaign is much about recovering that sensibilty, inviting anyone and everyone to embrace it, and allowing it to permeate our society so that "common" is actually a more popular paradigm than "elite" and, so that movements of fairness will have a real chance to sweep the political ranks and significantly change some of the "business as usual".

As far as Hilary's challenge, I really feel that she already has a legacy -- as a unique first lady who insisted that the powers-that-be take a clear hard look at a private, monolithic system, which has been bleeding our citizens instead of healing them. She can always be proud of that. This whole "first female president" stump however is a hollow carp to my ears. Do we really need a "Hillary" in the oval office to assure our daughters that they can achieve their dreams in this country? Don't get me wrong. I do think it's GREAT that she's pursuing her dream in this context. But if she doesn't succeed there better not be any suggestion from her that it was because she was a gal. That would be discouraging to girls....and would, I think, discredit her as a role model. Anyway...

Cindy Sheehan: Moving on and Up

Cindy gets it. Our so-called "democracy" is corrupted by the corporate military industrial congressional complex. Yes. Eisenho original farewell address included the word "congressional" before it was removed. His words are worth repeating, and have been added at the end of this entry.

Cindy gets it, as did some researchers who published in Foreign Affairs. Their conclusion? The United States does not practice democracy. It is an imperial force in the world, driven by commercial and material goals at the expense of human needs. The transition is so deep, encompassing the vast majority of the mass communications media, that only external forces can correct the situation.

I posted several comments on other web sites, over the Memorial Day weekend, in response to reading Cindy Sheehan's "resignation letter." The gist? It seems that Cindy is moving on from the peace movement to the justice movement. My commentary is that we CAN wait for peace, because justice is a priority.

If anyone wants an answer to, "what's next?" it is provided by the Program on Corporations, Law and Democracy (POCLAD). If you're serious about change, then you should read through the POCLAD research, which is laid out to some degree in a 10-part self-study program compiled by the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (it's a misnomer... they're all about Justice ;-) Their program is entitled "Challenge Corporate Power, Assert the People's Rights."

The three-part activist strategy is worth repeating (Dave Henson gets credit for this):

1) Devote some time to deep, multi-generational struggles, like freeing slaves, women's suffrage, and revoking corporate power.

2) Devote some time to fighting the immediate struggles, like humanitarian relief, saving historical artifacts from destruction, and key legislative battles.

3) Devote some time to developing alternative social structures (solutions to the problems), like alternative economic frameworks, alternative governance and electoral frameworks, and exploring means of positive cultural change.

Excerpt from Eisenhower's Farewell Address

Until the latest of our world conflicts, the United States had no armaments industry. American makers of plowshares could, with time and as required, make swords as well. But now we can no longer risk emergency improvisation of national defense; we have been compelled to create a permanent armaments industry of vast proportions. Added to this, three and a half million men and women are directly engaged in the defense establishment. We annually spend on military security more than the net income of all United States corporations.

This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms industry is new in the American experience. The total influence – economic, political, even spiritual – is felt in every city, every Statehouse, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications. Our toil, resources and livelihood are all involved; so is the very structure of our society.

In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.

We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defense with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.

Corruption within World Bank?

I don't claim to know "the facts" about Wolfowitz's supposed career advancement of his girlfriend at the World Bank. However, the issue is a big deal because of the weight that the World Bank places on preventing corruption when it makes funds available. If the World Bank is itself corrupt on the surface, what can be expected from those to whom the Bank makes loans?

That said, most people realize that the World Bank was captured and corrupted, long ago, by transnational corporate interests.
~

Give the President Sufficient Rope to Surge

Although Congressman John Murtha is leading an effort to withhold funds for the President's troop surge, Congress will ultimately allow the President's troop surge to go forward. Succeed or fail it is the President's troop surge, and his Iraq strategy.

If Congress pulls the plug on more troops, it would be Congress's Iraq strategy. Failure in Iraq, and the increase in Iran's geopolitical influence would be Congress's failure.

Rather than risk taking the blame, Congress is going to give Bush all the rope with which he needs to hang himself. That is my prediction.

My hope, however, is that Congress will try to prevent a troop surge. If they take this route, they must give the President an unabiguous directive. They must, pursuant to Section 5(c) of the War Powers Resolution, preclude any additional deployment of United States Armed Forces to the operations in Iraq. Congress must explicitly refused to authorize or appropriate the use of funds for an increase in troop levels. This is necessary to establish an actual confrontation between the legislative and executive branches sufficient to confer standing to Congress in the U.S. Supreme Court should the President disobey their directive and should they seek intervention of the judicial branch. (Campbell vs Clinton).

That's the legal side. But the political side could be influenced by the voices of the people. How strongly do the people feel against a troop surge? Is it strong enough that the Congressional offices are going to be flooded with phone calls and correspondence? Are vast numbers of people going to demand meetings with their Senators and Representatives to voice opposition to an escalation? If not, the Democratic leadership will exercise the "give-him-enough-rope" option.

Write the US House of Representatives
Write the US Senate
Write the Major Media Outlets