An Appraisal on the Bush Presidency - Part IV

In my examination of the presidency of George W. Bush, I looked at his record on the Global War on Terror (GWOT) and the Iraq War; I compared the nation that he inherited in 2001 with the nation that he will deliver to his successor in 2009; and I explored his candor to the American public during his tenure. In my effort to render a verdict on his presidency, I have attempted to capture the essence of the last seven years, and sadly Bush fails miserably, with some historians wondering if he is the worst American President that this country has ever seen. There is no arguing that we have seen some of the most colossal blunders to ever come out of the White House during both Bush administrations: the lethargic response to Hurricane Katrina; the irresponsible venture in Iraq; Domestic Eavesdropping; torturing POWs; authorizing a mercenary army; the refusal to disclose the Energy Commission’s final report; the reckless spending binge that has increased the federal debt by nearly $3.5 trillion; the lack of fiscal policy leading to the current recession; and the list goes on.

Despite serving out the final 10 months of his administration with the prospect of unfavorable historical reviews on several fronts, Bush’s appointments to the Supreme Court have received mixed reviews. Conservatives see the appointments of Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito as one of the bright spots of the Bush presidency, while liberals look upon Roberts and Alito with suspicion; and for good reason: Neither one of them were willing to give too much information on their legal theories during the confirmation hearings. Consequently, they were mostly judged on their affable demeanors.

Looking at how the President has added two more conservative justices to the Supreme Court, gives the country a reason to take a pause and consider what long term implications this presents. In June 2007 the Court restricted the ability of public schools to use race to determine which schools students can attend. This ruling did two things: It showed the aggressive nature of the court in usurping state’s rights, and it demonstrated the Court’s willingness to turn its back on previous Supreme Court rulings, known as precedent. In one of the most celebrated cases, the Supreme Court ruled in Brown v. Board of Education that state laws that established separate public schools for blacks and whites denied black children equal educational opportunities.

Chief Justice John Roberts wrote for the 5-4 majority which included Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito. Justice Anthony Kennedy cast the deciding vote, but only signed on about half of Roberts’s 41 page opinion.

Meredith v. Jefferson County Public Schools and Parents Involved in Community Schools v Seattle School District is one of a number of 5-4 court rulings that are slowly chipping away at a half century of social progress:

· In Ledbetter v. Goodyear, the Court severely limited the ability of victims of pay discrimination under Title VII to recover wages unfairly denied to them, leaving thousands of workers who have suffered pay discrimination on the basis of sex, race, religion or national origin with no legal recourse;

· In Bowles v. Russell, the Court ruled that a litigant who trusted an order from a federal judge giving him 17 days to file an appeal was prohibited from appealing because the judge had given him the wrong deadline (a statute allowed only 14 days), a blow to anyone who puts faith in the promises of the judicial system.

Despite what may be a trend on the court to restrict individual rights, what concerns me even more is that the addition of Roberts and Alito gives the Supreme Court four justices whose legal theories and rulings tend to be ultra-rightwing – Scalia, Thomas, Roberts and Alito. These justices consistently rule in favor of big business, expanded executive powers and restrictions on individual rights. This combination does not bode well for “little people” seeking redress at the top court in the land.

The notion of expanded executive power or the unitary executive doctrine is most troubling, because this legal theory holds that in the time of a national emergency, the President is not accountable to Congress or the courts. The idea of the unitary executive, which forms the core dogma of the ultra-right-wing Federalist Society, to which Judge Alito belongs, is more properly identified by its modern historical name—the Führerprinzip, authored by German jurist and political theorist, Carl Schmitt, who was also involved in the Nazi Party. Schmitt's doctrine, that the head of state is the law, and can assert absolute dictatorial authority during periods of emergency, has been used to legitimize every totalitarian regime in the West, from Hitler, through Gen. Francisco Franco in Spain, through Gen. Augusto Pinochet in Chile. ^*

George Bush has pushed the limits of his authority as President, seemingly disregarding Congress and the courts. I have addressed in previous articles how Bush has consistently operated off the grid in areas that have questionable constitutional implications: preemptive strikes; the One Percent Doctrine; violations of the Geneva Convention, including torturing prisoners of war; domestic spying; entering into International Treaties without Congressional approval; and the National Energy Policy Development Group, also known as the Cheney Energy Task Force, which the vice-president refuses to make public.

The Supreme Court’s shift to the right is alarming; however, the idea that Bush could stack the court with a fifth vote to uphold his furtive grab for power is even more troubling. Many Americans take their freedom for granted, despite the fact that a war was fought to attain it. If we are not vigilant, all it will take to lose it is one more right wing appointment to the Supreme Court.

Notwithstanding John McCain’s liberal tendencies, I do not believe that the Constitution can survive eight more years of compassionate conservatism.

^* http://www.larouchepub.com/other/2006/3302alito_fuehrerprinzip.html.

An Appraisal on the Bush Presidency – Part III

It has been alleged that George Bush tampered with the election results in 2000 during his race against Al Gore. I understand the suspicion, because the final state to have its votes tallied happened to be Florida, where his brother Jeb is the governor. As you may recall, it was not until December 13, 2000 that Gore conceded the presidential election to Bush, ending an election that should have been over five weeks earlier. The American public will probably never know what happened in Florida on election night; however, despite the dubious activity that took place, there has been no proof that Bush ‘stole’ the election. Plus, if Gore had won his home state of Tennessee, Florida would not have been an issue.

I don’t think we’ll ever know if Bush stole Florida in 2000, but one thing is certain, there has been a trail of dishonesty that has followed his administration from the time he took his initial oath of office. It has been said that all Presidents lie, and if this is true, then George Bush is simply one more in a parade of presidential perjurers who have deceived the public. In fact, every President going back to Lyndon Johnson was involved in policies that deceived the American public; with the exceptions of Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter:

• Lyndon Johnson lied about the Gulf of Tonkin;
• Richard Nixon lied about Watergate and then conspired to cover it up;
• Ronald Reagan lied about Iran Contra and conspired with his vice president, George H.W. Bush, in the October Surprise where they negotiated a deal with Iran to delay the release of the hostages until after the 1980 elections;
• George H.W. Bush lied about “no new taxes;” and
• Clinton lied about his illicit relationship with intern Monica Lewinsky.

If there is any truth to the saying that 'birds of a feather flock together,' then George W. Bush is right at home with his predecessors, with the only difference between he and his colleagues is that he seems to have rewritten the playbook on presidential deceit. It is ironic that he has a prominent position on the Mount Rushmore of presidential dishonesty, considering the fact that many of his supporters claimed he was bringing integrity back to the White House. The Bush presidency has been the most furtive of any administration in the 20^th Century, and his lack of candor to the American people is astonishing.

One week after his first inauguration, Bush signed an Executive Order that created the National Energy Policy Development Group. The task force, also known as the Cheney Energy Task Force, was made up of executives from the oil industry, and it produced a national energy policy report in May 2001. Despite numerous demands by special interest groups, including the impartial General Accounting Office, the task force has refused to disclose the report to the public. This is particularly troubling since gas prices and other energy costs have skyrocketed since the task force was created.

What is so confidential about the energy taskforce’s report that the Bush administration continues to refuse to make public? Certainly if sections of the report need to be kept secret as a matter of national security, that’s understandable, but it is difficult to fathom that an entire energy report needs to be classified. There may not be any state secrets in the task force’s report. However, refusing to make it public may suggest that President Bush is embarking upon a new road where the President is not accountable to anyone including Congress; which would be a striking departure from previous administrations. To buttress this theory, the Bush White House has classified more documents than any other administration since WWII.

One of the most important policies of the Bush Administration is his Iraq War. This war, we were told, was necessary, because Saddam Hussein was vigorously pursuing an atomic weapon’s program and would be willing to launch a nuclear attack against the United States or one of its allies. This report was bolstered by a speech given to the United Nations by, then Secretary of State, Colin Powell. Powell urged the administration to obtain support from the U.N. prior to launching its offensive against Saddam. However, he did not realize until after the fact that his speech, written by Vice-President Cheney’s former Chief of Staff, Scooter Libby, contained dubious intelligence regarding Saddam’s quest to obtain weapon’s grade nuclear material from Niger known as yellow cake.

The theme of the yellow cake acquisition was not only forcefully presented in Powell’s speech to the U.N, but President Bush also made it the centerpiece of his 2003 State of the Union Address. This is highly disturbing, considering the fact that the CIA had already discounted this intelligence report as false (see former CIA director George Tenet’s statement on this issue). But what is more disturbing is that it appears that the WMD diversion and the alleged link between Saddam and bin Laden were smokescreens to obtain public support to overthrow Saddam; a foreign policy goal that the Bush Administration had developed prior to the September 11^th terrorist attacks.

Now, after nearly $500 billion, 4,000 America lives and 50,000 Iraqi lives, no series public official, Democratic or Republican, will testify that Saddam had a WMD program or was in anyway linked to the September 11^th bombing. So public support for the War in Iraq hinged on the feedback from an unreliable source in the intelligence community; however, according to the Downing Street Memo, senior officials from the Prime Minister’s office believed that Bush had already formulated his intention to overthrow Saddam in early 2001.

The secret memo recorded the head of MI6 (British equivalent of the CIA) as expressing the view following his recent visit to Washington that "Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy."

The Downing Street Memo was leaked to the Sunday Times and was first published on May 1, 2005. It is considered by many to be the smoking gun of an alarming abuse of presidential power; especially when one attempts to reconcile Bush’s public comments concerning the buildup towards war in Iraq with the facts of the secret memo. In a March 8, 2003 Radio Address President Bush is quoted saying, “We are doing everything we can to avoid war in Iraq. But if Saddam Hussein does not disarm peacefully, he will be disarmed by force.” However, the memo quotes the head of the MI6 as saying, “Military action was now seen as inevitable. Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD.”

The bigger issue is not that George Bush fixed the facts and intelligence around a pre-September 11^th policy to invade Iraq, but why was an Iraq invasion important to his administration. Since the “why” question is beyond the scope of our current subject, I will address it in a subsequent article. However, the Downing Street Memo demonstrates an unprecedented betrayal of the public trust by the President of the United States.

…to be continued

An Appraisal on the Bush Presidency - Part II

President Bush narrowly won a second term in the 2004 election against Democratic rival John Kerry. This victory was largely due to the support from the Christian conservatives, who firmly held that Bush was God’s selection to run this country…Well the only response I have to that is the same Christian leaders more recently threw their support behind Rudy “pro-choice” Giuliani, who dropped out of the campaign after losing every primary. Although hindsight is 20/20, one would think that spiritual leaders claiming to have a direct connection with the Lord would demonstrate foresight when making decisions that indirectly affect the entire world, like who to endorse for President of the United States.

I had a friendly debate with an internationally recognized minister of the Gospel shortly after Bush’s first election. He sang the party-line that Bush was God’s man and that he would advance Christian principles while in office. Although I can’t claim to have had a conference with the Good Lord on this subject, I gave this minister numerous reasons why Bush was most likely not God’s choice to run America. After about 30 minutes, I concluded my discussion by saying “If George Bush is God’s man who will support Christian principles, then let’s see if he fights for an anti-abortion law the same way he fought for tax breaks for the wealthy.”

Bush did sign the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act into law on November 5, 2003; however, there is no record of him actively promoting the Pro-Life cause in more than whispered tones. He campaigned on a Pro-Life platform, but he did not sponsor or promote this limitation on abortions. The chief sponsors of the bill that he signed were Senator Rick Santorum (R-Pa.) and Congressman Steve Chabot (R-Ohio). Unlike President Clinton who vetoed a similar bill when it was passed by Congress in 1995, I’ll give Bush credit for signing the bill into law. This law surprisingly describes the heinous nature of the partial birth abortion procedure:

The Congress finds and declares the following…A moral, medical, and ethical consensus exists that the practice of performing a partial-birth abortion--an abortion in which a physician deliberately and intentionally vaginally delivers a living, unborn child's body until either the entire baby's head is outside the body of the mother, or any part of the baby's trunk past the navel is outside the body of the mother and only the head remains inside the womb, for the purpose of performing an overt act (usually the puncturing of the back of the child's skull and removing the baby's brains) that the person knows will kill the partially delivered infant, performs this act, and then completes delivery of the dead infant--is a gruesome and inhumane procedure that is never medically necessary and should be prohibited (emphasis mine).

President Bush’s support of this bill should not be mistaken as the campaign of a Pro-Life President who is on a crusade to outlaw abortion. This medical procedure is so grotesque, that many Pro-Choice physicians refuse to perform it. If Bush was out to ban abortions, certainly he would have given the issue more than the lip service that he offered. It would have been much more meaningful to the Pro-Life lobby if President Bush had campaigned for an abortion ban. Despite his support of the partial birth abortion ban, this abortion procedure is only performed between 2,200 and 5,000 times per year, while the traditional abortion procedure is performed more than 1 million times per year.

Perhaps the partial birth abortion ban will rescue a few children from the abortion mills of America; however, all the law really does is put women on notice that they must seek to terminate their pregnancy at an earlier stage. But for sake of an argument, let’s say that this law does save the lives of all 5,000 children whose lives would have ended through partial birth abortions. This hypothetical example still leaves more than 995,000 unborn children whose lives will be ended by abortion. Real protection against the rights of the unborn will only come when this country sees abortion for what it is – state sanctioned murder.

What was implied in Bush’s 2000 and 2004 presidential campaigns, but has not been delivered was a Pro-Life President that will fight for the rights of the unborn. One should not expect a leader to champion the Pro-Life cause who doesn’t embrace it. However, President Bush claims to be a defender of the unborn, and many of his followers claim that he is Christian; therefore, he should be judged on the effort he made towards banning abortion.

If you use yourself as a focus group, how often have you heard him defend his tax cuts? or stubbornly pursue his war aims? or discuss his “Roadmap” of the Middle East? Now compare his enthusiastic defense of these three issues with the number of times you have heard him advance the anti-abortion theme.

Other than the campaign promises Bush made concerning his stance on abortion, I’ve never heard him promote the Pro-Life agenda. Now that is not to say that he has never mentioned the issue away from the campaign trail; it simply means that he certainly is not pushing it with the same enthusiasm as he has his other domestic and foreign policies.

…to be continued

An Appraisal on the Bush Presidency - Part I

As President George W. Bush enters the final year as Commander and Chief of the United States, the bright optimism that he possessed after his second campaign victory has taken on a more subdued nature. This restrained posture was evident as he delivered his last State of the Union (SOTU) address the other evening. As he recalibrated his approach to a congress now controlled by Democrats, I saw a chameleon of sorts standing at the rostrum. Gone were the bold assertions that he would not pander to the demands of North Korea, or waste time mediating between the Israelis and Palestinians or he would not extend diplomacy to rogue nations.

For a president who prides himself in being decisive, he seemed to morph into his own Jimmy Carter moment when he asked Congress to send him a remedy for social security. This brought back memories of President Carter asking for suggestions on how to solve the financial problems of the late 1970s. When compared with his previous SOTU addresses, this appeared to be more on the scale of little league baseball. As President Clinton’s former speech writer, Michael Waldman, put it, “For him to aim for big-altitude, swing-for-the-fences moments at a time when both parties are competing for who could turn the page from his presidency faster would look silly.”

I believe we can take a four-pronged approach to adequately judge Bush’s presidency: How well has he managed what will be the defining policy of his eight years – the two wars that he is waging – the War on Terror and the Iraq War; compare the nation that he inherited in 2001 with the nation that he will deliver to his successor in 2009; was he forthright with the American public; and what type of judicial appointments did he make.

First, in regards to the War on Terror and the Iraq War, I believe the priorities were not properly established. The President sent more than 100,000 troops to overthrow Saddam Hussein, under false pretenses I may add (see the article titled, A Disturbing Update on the Global War on Terror), while sending only 15,000 troops to the mountainous terrain of Afghanistan to wage a war against the perpetrators of September 11^th. This strategic mistake of understaffing the war theater in Afghanistan is underscored by a recent report by the Atlantic Council of the United States that the U.S. is not winning the war in Afghanistan. And with terrorist attacks occurring on almost a daily basis in Iraq and the lack of public utility services, if it were not for the United States’ presence there with the ongoing war, the United Nations would probably have declare it a failed state by now.

On both war fronts, Bush has dragged the country into a quagmire that may take a decade or more for it to extricate itself. Colin Powell is attributed with using the pottery barn metaphor with regards to Iraq – “The Pottery Barn rule” says that if “you break it, you own it.” Despite the bipartisan call for withdrawing out of Iraq, it is unlikely that we will withdraw anytime soon, because Iraq’s government is less stable than it was under Saddam’s rule. And an American withdrawal will no doubt result in a total collapse of the fledgling democracy.

It is apparent to me that history will not be kind to President Bush’s handling of the two wars, the centerpiece of his administration. In fact, he boasted about his experience as a war-time leader as the main theme for his reelection campaign in 2004.

The second prong that we will examine in evaluating the Bush presidency will be to compare the nation that was handed off to him in 2001 to the nation that he will deliver to his successor in 2009:

· He received a balanced budget with a $236 billion surplus from his predecessor Bill Clinton; he will deliver an additional $3.5 trillion in debt to his successor.

· Bush inherited a middle class whose income rose by an average of $6,000 from 1993 through 2001; he will hand off a nation whose median household income has dropped by $1,000 during his tenure.

· During his eight years in office, health care premiums doubled from about $6,000 to $12,000 per family.

· Clinton handed President Bush a military that was at a high state of readiness, prepared to fight a two-front war; however, Bush will deliver a military to his successor that has such low morale it is unable to meet its recruitment goals.

· Bush inherited a nation where gasoline prices were less than $1.00 per gallon in many places; while he will deliver to his successor a nation that is paying more than $3.00 for a gallon of gasoline.

· America was respected as an international leader when George Bush took over as President; but as he is about to turn the reigns of power over to a successor, some countries believe that the United States in the biggest threat to world peace.

· Bush inherited a country that was strong economically; however, he will deliver a nation to his successor that must rely on foreign investments of treasury bonds to prop it up.

· The housing market was blazing when Bush took the oath of office; and he will hand off a mortgage crisis to his successor, not to mention the credit crisis that we are now seeing.

I believe on prong number two, history will judge Bush harshly as well. With this record, I kept wondering while he was delivering his State of the Union Address this past Monday if he would quote Mike Tyson after his final fight against Kevin McBride in 2005 – “I don't have the guts to fight anymore. My heart is not in it anymore. I don't want to disrespect the sport I love. I wish I could give the fans their money back.”

…to be continued

A Disturbing Update on the Global War on Terror

Hold the Presses! I was working on a critique of the Bush Presidency when I saw a very disturbing article in the Washington Post – NATO’s Not Winning in Afghanistan, Report Says. According to a report by the Atlantic Council of the United States, “Afghanistan remains a failing state.” This is after the United States has spent billions of tax dollars to capture the perpetrators of 9/11. After six years, the Taliban insurgents have fought the vaunted U.S. military to a strategic stalemate, according to an independent assessment released by NATO’s former commander, General James L. Jones. “It could become a failed state,” warned the report, which called for "urgent action" to overhaul NATO strategy in coming weeks before an anticipated new offensive by Taliban insurgents in the spring. “Make no mistake, NATO is not winning in Afghanistan,” said the report.

Before I examine this report more closely, I need to draw the distinction between the War on Terror and the War in Iraq.

The War on Terror, also referred to as the Global War on Terror (GWOT), is a military campaign that was initiated by the United States as a result of the attacks of September 11^th. The GWOT has been a source of controversy for some critics who believe that it has led to reckless domestic and foreign policy objectives like preemptive strikes; the One Percent Doctrine; violations of the Geneva Convention, including torturing prisoners of war; and domestic spying.

The War in Iraq; though initially put forward as part of the GWOT, has unraveled as perhaps the biggest foreign policy blunder in the history of this country. We were told by the Bush administration that Saddam Hussein had an aggressive weapons of mass destruction (WMD) program designed to create nuclear weapons to use against America and its allies. We were also told that Saddam was an ally of Osama bin Laden and that he was also responsible for the terrorist attacks of September 11^th. The American public later discovered that neither did Saddam have a WMD program, nor was he linked to September 11^th. Consequently, the war in Iraq was a preemptive strike for reasons still debated, while the GWOT is a war of retaliation against Osama bin Laden.

Iraq is the logical result of the One Percent Doctrine also known as the Cheney Doctrine since he is largely credited with its formulation. This policy basically states –

“If there's a 1% chance that [any country is] helping al-Qaeda build or develop a nuclear weapon, we have to treat it as a certainty in terms of our response. It's not about our analysis ... It's about our response.”

This is an absolute preposterous way to run a country’s foreign policy. At 1% certainty, the threshold for military action would be lower than if the president had a suspicion that al-Qaeda was prepared to launch an attack. I’m not a foreign policy expert; however, I would not think that the United States would launch a military attack based on someone's suspicion. America is not some third world country that has to rely on soothsayers to warn it of an impending invasion or attack. This country has the most unbelievable intelligence apparatus that the world has ever seen. It is not like U.S. secret agents (spies) send intelligence information back to the White House via carrier pigeon. America has an intelligence infrastructure that can basically listen to practically every telephone conversation on earth; can read practically every email message, fax message, text message on earth; and can spot a dime on the hump of bin Laden’s camel from 22,000 miles away. Don’t believe it? Click here to access TerraServer USA, which is a public website that has millions of satellite photographs of properties throughout the United States. Simply enter an address and watch the ‘eye in the sky’ from 22,000 miles away.

Does this sound like a country that needs to deploy military action over a dream that a policy maker may have had about an attack?

The Post article is disturbing on two fronts: First it obscures the fact that this is the GWOT that is suffering from a lack of forward motion; despite the President’s mantra that the “enemy is on the run.” And second, the article was printed on the last page of the World Section (page A18 of the print edition). Huh?! President Bush’s legacy will likely be defined by how he managed the GWOT. This is not like his social security or immigration proposals being shot-down in Congress. This is America defending itself from a band of nomads who have been charged with murdering nearly 3,000 American citizens. I would think that a news report of this magnitude merits the first page, above the fold.

The media has commonly been referred to as the fourth branch of government, and from the strategic placement of this article, a blind man would have to agree; unless, however, he is not smarter than a fifth grader.

In Honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. - Part II

During the short career of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., the Civil Rights Movement rose as the greatest model of protest that this country had ever witnessed. The movement bravely confronted the fact that the United States had never lived out the true meaning of its creed: a government of the people, by the people and for the people, whose just powers are derived from the consent of the governed and established upon the principles of freedom, equality, justice, and humanity for which American patriots sacrificed theirs lives and fortunes (emphasis mine – taken from the American Creed).

While America was willing to defend these principles for foreign lands during the World Wars, the Korean War and the Vietnam War, it had turned its back on its citizens of color, ignoring their pleas for freedom, equality and justice. It was not until Dr. King seared the country’s conscience by reminding it that it was created on the principle that all men were created equal, that America began to dismantle its own form of Apartheid. In his memorable speech at the Holt Street Baptist Church, initiating the Montgomery Bus Boycott in 1955, he demonstrated with his forceful use of language that if their cause was wrong, then everything that America stood for was steeped in hypocrisy:

…And we are not wrong, we are not wrong in what we are doing. If we are wrong, then the Supreme Court of this Nation is wrong. If we are wrong, the Constitution of the United States is wrong. If we are wrong, God Almighty is wrong. If we are wrong, Jesus of Nazareth was merely a Utopian dreamer and never came down to earth. If we are wrong, justice is a lie...

Despite the insults, the sticks, the stones, the bricks and the threats, Dr. King and many others in the Civil Rights Movement demonstrated a willingness to sacrifice their lives for the principles of justice and fairness; something that has nearly disappeared from the social landscape today. Using the Civil Rights Movement as a model for contemporary dissent, does anyone believe that massive, coordinated rallies would not be taking place to protest our presence In Iraq, or the Bush administration’s furtive control of the Executive Branch of Government, or outrageous gasoline prices and other energy costs, or the lack of affordable health care for the poor and elderly, among other issues?

In Dr. King’s final public speech, he gave his own eulogy of a life that led the charge to slay the triplets of racism, Jim Crow and the refusal of the Federal Government to come to the rescue of the black citizens of this country. However, it was not until the next evening that those who heard the closing words of his I’ve Been to the Mountaintop speech recognized that they were not listening to the motivational speech of a civil rights activist, but the utterance of a prophet:

...Well, I don't know what will happen now. We've got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn't matter with me now, because I've been to the mountaintop. And I don't mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its place. But I'm not concerned about that now. I just want to do God's will. And He's allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I've looked over. And I've seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that we, as a people, will get to the promised land! And so I'm happy, tonight. I'm not worried about anything. I'm not fearing any man! Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord!!

At 6:01 p.m., April 4, 1968, the Dreamer fell to an assassin’s bullet, and with him, one might conclude, the heart of the Civil Rights Movement.

America has evolved from one set of struggles in the 1960s to another set of struggles: a wave of bankruptcies; outrageous interest rates for credit cards; the prospect of foreigners buying up this country; an administration that has defied the notion of a transparent government; the threat of terrorism; unusually high energy costs, led by soaring gas prices; and the list goes on. As a concerned citizen who loves America, I ask, “Where are the leaders; not black leaders, but social leaders that can harness the energy of those who see the injustice of it all?” But here’s the frightening prospect - when the masses are more interested in who will win the Super Bowl in February than paying $80 for a tank of gas that will last 4 days, then perhaps we’ve already lost our democratic form of government.

I wrote in Part I of this series about the Trilateral Commission’s report that the Crisis of Democracy was too much access to education. However, certainly this notion is incorrect, because democracies are not vulnerable to an educated citizenry. Democracies are threatened most when the collective will of the people to protest has vanished.

God Bless the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and happy birthday!

In Honor of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. - Part I

In 1975, the Trilateral Commission published its report on the governability of democratic societies called “The Crisis of Democracy.” This report examined the state of Western democracies – Europe, the United States and Japan – and their biggest threats. If a poll had been taken in 1975, asking respondents what they believed were the biggest threats to Western democracies, most would have rightfully said Communism and/or nuclear annihilation. However, according to the Trilateral Commission’s report, it was neither Communism nor atomic bombs that loomed as the agent to dismantle hundreds of years of participatory government; it was too much access to free education.

The authors of the report, Michel J. Crozier, Joji Watanuki and Samuel J. Huntington,[1] later published a book by the same name, which expanded on the ideas of democracy’s so called crisis. The following, taken from the introduction, gives a clue to how hostile some intellectuals in the Western World have viewed democratic government:

In the age of widespread secondary school and university education, the pervasiveness of the mass media, and the displacement of manual labor by clerical and professional employees, this development constitutes a challenge to democratic government which is, potentially at least, as serious as those posed in the past by the aristocratic cliques, fascist movements, and the communist party (Crisis of Democracy, page 7).

What?! Did I read the misgivings of three Western intellectuals regarding access to education, and how this access poses as much of a threat to democracy as a cabal of wealthy bankers, Hitler and Joseph Stalin?

Huntington went on further to say in the conclusion of part three of the book: “The vulnerability of democratic government in the United States thus comes not primarily from external threats, though such threats are real, nor from internal subversion from the left or the right, although both possibilities could exist, but rather from a highly educated, mobilized, and participatory society” (emphasis mine – Crisis of Democracy, page 115 ).

In addition to the obvious theme of the book that too much access to education is the leading threat to democracy, the underlying suggestion is that it is necessary to curtail access to education and personal freedoms in order to preserve the ability of democratic institutions to govern society.

The 1960s witnessed the expansion of special interest groups – Civil Rights, feminists, anti-war, and environmentalists – who felt like their rights were being infringed upon. Consequently, they demonstrated a willingness to risk life and limb to challenge the social institutions that blocked their full participation in a democratic society. Blacks and females experienced an enormous surge in social, political and economic gains, while the anti-Vietnam movement forced the hand of Richard Nixon and resulted in a U.S. retreat, disguised as a cease-fire in Vietnam. And the environmentalists forced the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency in 1970.

When one thinks of the protest movements of the 1960s, of course the marches against racial injustice in the South stands at the top of the pyramid. The marchers’ non-violent demands for equal rights for all citizens regardless of race, faced the threat of police brutality, water hoses, fire-bombs, incarcerations and lynchings. However, to the dismay of many segregationists, they were undeterred and demonstrated a willingness to endure as much punishment as the segregationists were willing to dish out. And who living during this period of protest can forget the anti-Vietnam protest at Kent State University in May 1970 when the National Guard shot and killed four students and wounded 9 others; one of whom suffered permanent paralysis?

Collectively, these movements believed deeply in the obligation of the Federal Government to protect the rights of all individuals, and that a democratic society imposed restraints on large corporations from acting solely out of self interest. In other words, the Federal Government couldn’t wink at the oppression of blacks in Mississippi or the glass ceiling that had been erected against female advancement in the workplace, and a corporation couldn’t poison a local river with waste from a manufacturing facility in order to save money and increase profits.

But when I examine the social landscape today, I wonder what has happened to the collective will of the people to demand fair treatment and transparency from ‘Corporate America’ and the Federal Government.

…to be continued

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[1] Michael J. Crozier wrote concerning the crisis in Western Europe; Joji Watanuki wrote concerning the crisis in Japan and Samuel J. Huntington wrote of the crisis in the United States.

Happy Birthday Muhammad Ali

One of the greatest athletes in American history, and arguably the greatest boxer of all time, Muhammad Ali celebrates his 66^th birthday today. He mesmerized his opponents with skills never seen before in the heavy weight division. “Float like a butterfly; sting like a bee! Ahhhhhhhh! Rumble young man…rumble…Ahhhhhhhh,” was the poetic expression that Ali and his assistant trainer, Drew Bundini Brown, would often shout at each other during times when the adrenaline charged emotions were running high; either during training or immediately preceding a fight.

In Ali’s November 1966 match against Cleveland Williams, he displayed a blend of swiftness, power and dazzling foot work, that caused some commentators to say that that was the greatest performance that he ever gave in the ring. However, some say that we will never know how good he could have been because of the almost four year’s moratorium on fighting that was imposed upon hm by the courts during his legal battle to stay out of the military.

The controversy will rage for years to come whether Ali was the greatest boxer ever. Some would argue Jack Johnson, Jack Dempsey, Joe Lewis, or Rocky Marciano, but one thing is without argument, Ali was more than a boxer or a poet. Muhammad Ali exhibited a quality in his life that appears to be extinct in the sport’s world: He stood-up for a principle that only those who are willing to give their life for a cause can understand. He refused induction into the United States Military at the height of his professional career. As a result of this courageous stand, the Courts denied him the right to practice his boxing trade and made him forfeit his heavyweight championship.

Ali’s refusal to enter the Army was based on his religious belief that the War in Vietnam was evil. In fact, he was vilified for ‘truth-mongering’ when he said the following:

Why should they ask me to put on a uniform and go 10,000 miles from home and drop bombs and bullets on Brown people in Vietnam while so-called Negro people in Louisville are treated like dogs and denied simple human rights? No I’m not going 10,000 miles from home to help murder and burn another poor nation simply to continue the domination of white slave masters of the darker people the world over. This is the day when such evils must come to an end. I have been warned that to take such a stand would cost me millions of dollars. But I have said it once and I will say it again. The real enemy of my people is here. I will not disgrace my religion, my people or myself by becoming a tool to enslave those who are fighting for their own justice, freedom and equality. If I thought the war was going to bring freedom and equality to 22 million of my people they wouldn’t have to draft me, I’d join tomorrow. I have nothing to lose by standing up for my beliefs. So I’ll go to jail, so what? We’ve been in jail for 400 years.

His stand cost him millions of dollars in boxing purses, the loss of the prime of his career and the threat of a five year prison term hung ghastly over his head. However, this did not alter Ali’s stance. In fact, he once said he would face machinegun fire before denouncing his beliefs.

While today’s top athletes can earn as much as the gross national product of third world nations, I’d be curious to know which one would risk it all for a cause. When Ali fought Joe Frazier during the first fight of their trilogy, both fighters were guaranteed $2.5 million. Based on the way promotional rights are negotiated today, that could easily be $40 million to $50 million per fight in 2008. Ali risked a lifestyle that most people only dream of, but in doing so, he ascended beyond the ring as a sport’s figure into the rare stratosphere as a world-changer. On June 28, 1971, the United States Supreme Court upheld his right to refuse to join the military based on his religious beliefs.

I may as well make a full disclosure now that Ali is my favorite sport’s personality of all time; even greater than Michael Jordan, who I loved as an athlete and greatly admired his prowess on the court as well. However, Michael refused to speak out against Nike for its exploitation of low wage earners in its manufacturing facilities in China and other Asian countries, while being the sports apparel giant’s biggest endorsement. This certainly does not make Michael evil. It simply suggests that he is willing to profit from the exploitation of others, while I believe Ali would have been a forceful opponent of sweatshops before he allowed his name to be associated with one.

Here is another disclosure – I love history for a number of reasons; not the least of which is because it is so refreshing to read about the Ali’s of the world who faced a Goliath with nothing but a slingshot and one smooth stone, because we are certainly not witnessing that type of advocacy today. Would Ali have sacrificed the 2008 equivalent of his first purse against Joe Frazier? Absolutely yes! Because men and women of conscience see beyond money and know that they were born with something that is more valuable than silver, gold or a piece of paper that we call a dollar – it’s called integrity.

Two of the great social revolutionaries in our country, Martin King and Muhammad Ali, celebrated their birthdays two days apart. There’s nothing mystical about that, but what is pretty astonishing is that both men, taking separate paths, slew the dragon they confronted, making this world a better place for us all.

Happy Birthday Muhammad Ali!

Happy Birthday Dr. King

There are times when dying is more gentle than living: for instance, some of us have probably known people who were in excruciating pain at the end of a long battle with an illness and people actually prayed that God would take them out of their misery. Aside from these rare instances, I believe that most people in America can be thankful for their current condition and position in life. It is a blessing to live in “the home of the brave and land of the free.” However this country could not always make the case that this was so. America has an ugly past of genocide against the Native Americans, and more recently its history with respect to its Americans of African descent, include slavery and brutal treatment under the racist culture that evolved after the Civil War.

Thanks to the Civil Rights Movement, led by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., America discarded its racist past in favor of a society that was inclusive. If this great American Patriot were still alive today, we would be helping him celebrate his 79^th birthday. Dr. King was born January 15, 1929, and lived a life that changed the course of American history. He once said that he wanted people who are born in the future to understand that the new rights and privileges that they enjoy did not come without someone sacrificing; without someone dying. And he paid the ultimate price for his beliefs by sacrificing his own life.

Dr. King’s working for peace, campaigning for justice and loving his enemies has been recognized by this great country by bestowing upon him the greatest honor of recognition that a nation can offer – a national holiday in recognition of his birth date. Although, the United States celebrates his birthday on the third Monday of January (this year – January 21^st), I would like to take a moment to honor his memory with a moment of thanksgiving:

Thank you Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Happy Birthday!

Bill Clinton's Legacy - Part III

Money spent by the Federal government does not always bring the anticipated results. There are two shooting stars of Federal spending to buttress this point: First, the Bush administration has spent nearly $500 billion on the Iraq War, with no tangible results, unless one considers the overthrow of Saddam as one of the positive outcomes of the war funding to date. It wouldn’t take much to convince me that he was a cruel dictator that needed to be removed; however, it would be a challenge for someone to persuade me that it was worth $500 billion to remove him. Plus, if we use cruelty as the standard for preemptively striking regimes that are out of step with democratic principles, then let’s line-up the rest of the world’s dictators and select the next one to overthrow.

Second, the government is celebrating the fifth anniversary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS); the Federal agency that was created as a result of September 11^th to align all of the intelligence agencies under one department and to protect the homeland. In its first big test to prove the virtue of its creation, it failed miserably when confronted with Hurricane Katrina, notwithstanding that it had one week to prepare for it. To date, DHS has cost the tax payer more than $200 billion.

In two fatal swoops, the Bush Administration has spent nearly three-quarters of a trillion dollars in failed ventures. If this were a public corporation, the stock holders would literally demand the head of the CEO on a silver platter. However, since the Bush administration convinced the public that these funding requirements were matters of national security, it has simply been permitted to “print” money to pay the bills. But as we witnessed under Clinton, money for the poor, a dispensable segment of the population, was withdrawn.

The Federal Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996, aka Welfare Reform, effectively eliminated welfare for millions of poor people and removed safety-net programs. A Wisconsin study looking at the impact of Welfare Reform on the state, demonstrated that more than 100,000 children had been removed from the rolls of Aid to Families with Dependant Children and more than 50,000 no longer benefited from Medicaid, despite growing numbers of uninsured children. Food stamps enrollment also declined by more than 70,000 or 41 percent.

Clinton’s Welfare Reform severely weakened the centerpiece of the Great Society; a series of domestic programs established by President Lyndon Johnson. The main objective of the Great Society was to eliminate poverty. This aspect of Johnson’s program provided food stamps, financial assistance and Medical care to poor families; however, they were virtually eliminated under Welfare Reform.

Clinton also signed the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, aka the Crime Bill that provided $31 billion for increased law enforcement in the United States. Despite the promise of funds for drug rehabilitation, there was only $383 million for drug rehabilitation. Although this may sound like a lot of money, it was only slightly more than 1 percent of the cost of the bill, while $9 billion went to hiring more law enforcement officers and $8 billion went to building more prisons – more than 50 percent of the bill.

I wonder what the impact would have been if the $500 billion that had been spent on the Iraq War had been spent on domestic programs, with $17 billion of that going toward drug rehabilitation and training programs in high crime areas. This country has expressed a willingness to bring liberty to a nation that is more than 6,000 miles away and leans under the heavy sway of terrorist regimes, but will not fight to bring liberty to crime infested areas in its own country. What a paradox. Are you kind of getting the picture of where the black community is on the national priority list? It’s not at the bottom of the list, but it is far, far from its position of the 1960s.

The crime bill also added 52 Federal Crimes for which the death penalty can be imposed, which, again, adversely affects blacks since a black male is more likely to be executed than anyone else.

In November 1991, Congress enacted the U.S. Federal Sentencing Guidelines, which established guidelines for judges to use when sentencing someone who has been convicted of a crime. The sentencing disparities fell harshest among black drug users. Anyone caught with 500 grams of powder cocaine received the identical sentence of someone found guilty of possessing 5 grams of crack. What was even more bizarre than the 100:1 ratio was that someone possessing 5 grams of crack would be sentenced as if he intended to distribute that quantity. Now I am not a math scholar, but I was able to convert 5 grams to ounces, and I came up with .176 (one hundred and seventy-six thousandths) of an ounce. I would have to believe that anyone caught with .176 of an ounce of crack would intend to use it him/herself and certainly is not intending to distribute it.

The cocaine sentencing disparity immediately became an issue after its authorization under the Clinton Administration. Consequently, the Sentencing Commission was mandated to provide a report to Congress not later than December 31, 1994 (see page 620 of Appendix B of the Guidelines), to address how the penalty levels were applied and to make recommendations to correct the imbalance. Despite this mandate, the bias in the sentencing guidelines for cocaine was not remedied until 13 years later. Don’t misunderstand me; I certainly am not attempting to give criminals a free-get-out-of-jail-pass for breaking the law. I am simply demonstrating that President Clinton allowed racial bias in the sentencing of typically black drug users, and made no effort to correct this disparity during his entire presidency.

And finally, while affirmative action and set aside programs were under severe attack during his administrations, Clinton refused to stand strong to prevent their erosions. Affirmative action and set asides were centerpieces of the Civil Rights Movement, and he simply gave lip service with a clever spin-campaign of “Mend but don’t end.” Well, mending affirmative action and set aside programs has made them vulnerable to all types of assaults from organizations that have been attacking them since they were established in the 1960s.

Although Bill Clinton has been successful in masking his true disposition towards domestic policies affecting blacks, a recent statement about Barack Obama’s campaign for president, may demonstrate his true nature. In a campaign stop for Hillary, he seemed to suggest that the Obama Campaign is the biggest fairy tale that he’s ever seen. Chuckle, chuckle. After nearly 20 years of shucking and jiving[1] the black community, the true Bill Clinton begins to show.

Between black-on-black violence, epidemic proportion AIDS infection rates, high incarceration rates, and Bill Clinton, no wonder some refer to the black male as an endangered species.

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[1] Shuck and jive – Not the whole truth; or manipulating something to get it your way; to get rid of, ditch, throw away; to try to shed your true image in favor of a false one; trying to adopt a new social status, pretending to be "all that" + a bag of pentium chips (from the Urban Dictionary).

Bill Clinton's Legacy - Part II

Somehow Bill Clinton was able to strike a chord in the black community; often referring to himself as the first black President and maintaining a durable bond that has lasted to this day. Surprisingly, this carefully crafted propaganda has bewitched some who were once stalwarts in the Civil Rights Movement. Former Atlanta Mayor and confident of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Andrew Young, recently catered to the notion that Clinton is black, by claiming that “Bill is every bit as black as Barack. He’s probably gone with more black women than Barack.” This is extraordinary on two fronts: First, considering the fact that Clinton did more to dismantle years of hard fought Civil Rights’ gains, one must wonder how Young could have such a blind allegiance to this man. And second, how could the once implacable foe of racism, stoop to such gutter suggestions about the sexual preference of a former President?

The Civil Rights Movement, against enormous odds, slew the dragon of Jim Crow and forced America to live out the true meaning of its creed – the land of the free that guarantees equal rights and opportunities to all men and women regardless of color. And certainly one would have to be cynical and/or naïve to argue that black people have not been afforded opportunities unimaginable just 40 years ago. Oprah Winfrey is the most popular TV personality in America with net assets of more than $1.5 billion. Colin Powell was promoted to 4-star General under George H.W. Bush and served as Secretary of State under George W. Bush. And Barack Obama appears to have a serious chance of winning the Democratic nod for the presidency of the United States. These are only a few of many great success stories, demonstrating the long strides that this country has made to repair its race relations with people of color.

It is easy to take for granted that the United States is only one generation removed from treating blacks with a despicable disdain. Consequently, many in the white community and some in the black community have this notion that opportunities exist on an equal basis for all people. This social pathology is partly to blame for the loss of momentum in the Civil Rights Movement. So when Clinton embarked upon his slash and burn policy of Civil Rights’ gains, the black community no longer had the political muscle that caused a reformation of the social landscape during the 1950s and 1960s under the leadership of Dr. King.

Certainly if the President backed a bill to outlaw guns, the NRA would invade Capital Hill with a contingent equivalent to the National Guard. Likewise, if there were efforts to limit support for Israel, the very formidable Israel lobby would mobilize its forces and bring pressure on the President and every member of Congress. However, when it comes to a lobbying presence on Capital Hill, the black community’s interests are rarely articulated or defended. I often wonder if our lack of political presence on Capital Hill was an unintended consequence of the great Civil Rights Era victories.

If 100 people were polled in the 1950s regarding the five most important issues facing the black community; certainly equal access to education, voting rights, employment discrimination, access to loans and civil rights protection would be tops on most lists. However, if that same poll was taken today, it would be clear that there is no consensus of what are priorities within our community. Is this a function of a lack of centralized leadership? Probably, but there is another fundamental issue at play here that is equally as important: If a lobbying group is to effectively represent the needs and aspirations of its constituents, it needs financial and moral support. Using The People’s Pulse as a focus group, I ask this question – when is the last time you made a contribution to an organization that represents the interests of black people?

Many of the Civil Rights Era organizations are still around, like the NAACP, the Urban League, and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). However, these special interest groups are shadows of their former glory days of sit-ins, boycotts and legal challenges to unjust laws. As a result of the black community’s inability to effectively represent its interest on Capital Hill, Clinton was able to authorize a number of landmark laws at its expense – Welfare Reform and the Crime Bill. He also lacked the political courage and will to exhibit a strong defense of affirmative action, along with the fact that he oversaw a biased, Federal Sentencing Guideline program that generally imposed longer sentences against blacks for drug offenses.

Clinton's dubious distinction as an ally to the black community must be brought to task before his wife, Hillary, begins a third Clinton administration.

...to be continued

Bill Clinton's Legacy - Part I

Why does it disturb me that some in the black community somehow believe that it shares some type of special kinship with former President Bill Clinton? The notion that Clinton was the first black President was spawned almost immediately after he was elected in 1992. However, it was not until the fall of 1998 after Nobel Laureate, Toni Morrison, launched a vigorous defense of then President Clinton in the New Yorker Magazine as he was coming under attack for his sexually depraved behavior in the Oval Office, that this idea began its public ascent into the lexicon of the black community. Clinton himself has gained a lot of mileage out of this idea, occasionally laying claim to the title as the first black President while in the presence of blacks.

I’ve often wondered if Clinton himself deserves the credit for churning this ridiculous perception that he was the first black President. Politicians are not above deigning themselves on the campaign trail for a vote, and to consider that he may be the maestro behind this necessary illusion, disturbs me even more. I say this about Bill Clinton especially, because he practically had the black vote locked up during his runs at the White House under the false impression that he felt black people’s pain.

Morrison bolstered the perception of this bond between Clinton and the black community in her New Yorker article by laying out a list of black stereotypes that were also related to him: single-parent household, born poor, working-class, saxophone-playing, McDonald's-and-junk-food-loving and so forth. And then to leave the White House and secure office space in Harlem was a stroke of genius to mask the fact that he did more to erode the gains of the Civil Rights Movement during his eight years as President than the combined 12 years of Ronald Reagan and Bush 41.

I don’t mean to be an apologist for the gay community, but he also betrayed their trust, and he simply threw the labor movement under the bus.

Clinton campaigned on the promise that he would bring full civil rights to all Americans regardless of their sexual orientation. However, after one losing battle in his attempt to root out bias in the military against homosexuals, the best he could offer them was, “Don’t ask, don’t tell.” Now I’m not suggesting that I endorsed his campaign pledge to the gay community, because I didn’t; however, I’m simply demonstrating that Clinton backpedaled from a campaign promise to one of his largest constituents. What he did to the gay community was a reflection of his lack of integrity, but what he did to the AFL-CIO, the largest Democratic supporter, seems to reflect a more hideous side of the man.

By signing onto the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), and the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT), he endorsed open borders that would help accelerated our move towards a global government. This was done at the expense of people on the factory floor, along with their 401(k)s. Although Bill Clinton cannot make a decision for a corporation to close a factory, he can facilitate it and make it attractive by removing free-trade barriers that complicate the import-export process, which is exactly what he did during his time in office. In fact, his domestic and foreign policies encouraged corporate zeal to outsource many functions; a practice that continues to occur at a furious pace. You ever call your local bank branch and reach a call center in India? Well, thank Clinton for that.

Clinton was trained in global government as a student at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service and as a Rhodes Scholar. He says something very curious during his Acceptance Speech to the Democratic National Convention in 1992: Towards the end of the speech, he invokes the name of Professor Carroll Quigley, whom he considered as one of his most influential professors at Georgetown University:

“As a teenager, I heard John Kennedy’s summons to citizenship. And then, as a student at Georgetown, I head that call clarified by a professor name Carol Quigley, who said to us that America was the greatest Nation in history because our people had always believed in two things- that tomorrow can be better than today and that every one of us has a personal moral responsibility to make it so.”

To invoke Quigley’s name was extremely significant, because Clinton campaigned on the theme of change, but for the powerfully, wealthy men in the Western World who were intimately aware of Quigley and what he stood for, that line was a refreshing acknowledgment that there would be no change. Quigley is the author of a classic study on the powers that control the destiny of civilization – Tragedy and Hope. This book exposes to the public, perhaps for the first time, that there is a furtive movement in the United States and Europe that is aiming for global government (http://www.seanet.com/~barkonwd/quigley.htm). He doesn’t expose the book in hopes that the cabal behind the trek to world government will run and hide. He actually states that it is a good thing and he only wishes that they would be more forthright about what they are doing. What makes the book so significant is that the cabal actually invited him in to see the plan for global government.

So we can see that Clinton was not the portrayal of progressive politics that he made many believe. He was a pawn that furthered the agenda of the men that Quigley spoke of. Time is the judge of all things, and history will not only buttress my suspicion of him, but it will articulate how he was able to betray his constituencies and still maintain their support. Now that is a masterpiece of politics! While volumes will be written on the 8 years of Bill Clinton, I can summarize his cloak and dagger waltz that he did with the black community, but I must do it in Part II of this post.

...to be continued