BOOKS / Ron Jacobs : Sparks and Wildfires

Posted on March 15, 2012 by Thorne Dreyer


Sparks and wildfires:
Wisconsin and the global revolutions:

By Ron Jacobs | The Rag Blog | March 15, 2012

It Started In Wisconsin: Dispatches from the Front Lines of the New Labor Protest, by Mari Jo Buhle and Paul Buhle (Verso: 2012); Paperback, 192 pp., $14.95.
Why It’s Kicking Off Everywhere: The New Global Revolutions, by Paul Mason (Verso: 2012); Paperback, 244 pp., $19.95.

It was about a year ago that the protests against the anti-worker legislation in Wisconsin were reaching their zenith. What had begun as a concerted effort by the Teaching Assistants Association at University of Wisconsin, their supporters, and some other activists grew into the largest pro-union/pro-worker movement in decades.

The use of tactics not seen since the 1960s, including building occupations, was essential to its organizational success. Unfortunately, the right-wing majority in the state government was equally determined to end collective bargaining rights for public workers and on March 9, 2011, passed the legislation in the dark of night.

However, the spark was lit. The eruption of popular protest against the neoliberal corporate agenda that most of the world had already experienced by the winter of 2011 had finally reached the nation most responsible for that agenda — the United States.

The rest of the year would see the expansion of that protest across the United States grow in dimension and breadth. From further State Capitol occupations to the occupations of city parks, the masterminds and profiteers of the neoliberal economy were put on notice.

Meanwhile, protest from like-minded citizens of the rest of the world also continued to spread. Politicians scrambled as they figured out how to respond to what was clearly a left-oriented popular movement against those who had bought and sold them long ago.

Naturally, there have been millions of words written and published about this wave of people power. A very recent collection of some of those words edited by Wisconsinites Paul and Mari Jo Buhle, is titled It Started In Wisconsin.

Essentially a collection of essays written by various participants and organizers of the Wisconsin protests, It Started In Wisconsin provides a reasonable and objective look at the movement. By discussing its structures and organizational strategies, the politics of the movement are also examined. Like the Wisconsin movement itself, the parameters of the discussion tend to remain limited to the parameters of the liberal-progressive spectrum.

The book begins with the first essayist attempting to place the protests firmly in the tradition of the great Progressive Robert LaFollette. However, the very fact that the movement ended up being confined to the traditional Democrat-Republican contest made even the more left elements of the Progressive philosophy irrelevant in the final outcome.

It Started In Wisconsin tends to examine the uprising and its politics from a generally anti-corporate perspective but, like the movement itself, never truly challenges capitalism at its roots as an essentially unequal system that by its nature requires growing levels of inequality.

There is one essay that stands out from the rest of those that analyze the movement in that it does look beyond the façade of neoliberalism. That essay, titled “The Role of Corporations” by Roger Bybee, is the most radical in the book. Radical, that is, in the fundamental definition of the word: “of or going to the root or origin.”

The essay is a clear and straightforward description of how neoliberal capitalism works, who it benefits and, to put it bluntly, who it screws. No other analytical piece between these covers quite approaches the clarity and depth of analysis like Bybee’s.

Yet, this book is not really about analysis. It is a collection of stories from those that participated in one of the most inspiring movements to erupt in the U.S. heartland in decades. Those stories provide the observer from afar with a fairly universal and nuanced look at the daily lives of those involved in organizing, occupying, reporting and otherwise participating in those weeks of popular democracy.

Interspersed between the tales of the workers, students, farmers and other protesters are a number of photographs and comics. The inclusion of these graphics truly enhances the overall effect.

One of the last two essays in It Started In Wisconsin discusses the position of the Wisconsin uprising in the global insurrections of the past 18 months. The authors of this short essay, Ashok Kumar and Simon Hardy, briefly discuss the possibilities and take a quick look at the lessons they see to be learned.

In addition, and most importantly, they broach the subject of the differences between the radical grassroots and the more conservative entrenched union and political leadership. It is here, they hint, that the real direction of this global movement will be determined.

In Wisconsin that outcome has already taken one turn with the shifting of the uprising’s momentum into the recall efforts against Governor Scott Walker. The outcome of this turn to electoral politics is still being hotly debated by many of the uprising’s organizers, with some of them refusing to endorse the Democratic candidate opposing Walker because they see him as just more of the same.

Moving from the local to the global, let us consider another recently published text that takes a look at the international manifestations of this movement.

This book, titled Why It’s Kicking Off Everywhere: The New Global Revolutions is authored by journalist Paul Mason. Like the Buhle’s effort, Mason’s book describes the movements against neoliberal intolerance and authoritarianism that have become part of the collective imagination this past year. Likewise, Mason’s text examines the politics of the movement from what can only be termed a New Left viewpoint.

What this means is that he places the emphasis on the cry for freedom implicit in these protests while underemphasizing the economic nature of the oppression the protesters are rebelling against.

Given the broader scope of Mason’s text, there is also a broader discussion. Several different manifestations of the movement — from Greece to London to Cairo to Spain and other points in between — are reported on. These reports are good journalism. One feels as if they are present at the rallies, occupations and riots that Mason describes.

The anecdotal tales he provides should remind anyone who participated in any kind of popular resistance in the past decades of the energy and hope one finds and feels at such events. These are the stuff that makes one join such movements.

When it comes to analysis, Mason’s text provides some interesting possibilities. He spends a fair number of words discussing the desire for freedom this global movement represents. The Egyptian opposed to the harshness of the Mubarak authoritarian regime and the British student fearing the limitations a life without affordable education will create are examined through what Mason calls the social laboratory of the self.

He emphasizes the role of social networking and the existence of a new dimension in organizing directly related to the existence of networking technology. He rightly questions the validity of the Left, but does not really examine what he means by the Left, choosing instead to adopt the mainstream media’s definition that the Left is composed of political parties like Labour In Britain, various elements of the Democratic Party in the United States, and numerous sects espousing various versions of Leninism.

By dismissing the Left, even in its current splintered formation, Mason is also dismissing a more radical analysis of the true culprit in the global economic catastrophe.

It is true, as Mason makes clear, that neoliberal policies are responsible for the numerous maladies the global uprising sprang from. However, what is unexplored in Why It’s Kicking Off Everywhere is why neoliberal capitalism is the dominant economic regime on the planet. That explanation can only come from an understanding of the economic works of Marx and his theoretical successors like Nikolai Bukharin, Rosa Luxembourg, and even Lenin. It was these thinkers and revolutionaries, after all, that studied and explained the stages of capitalism in the industrial world and how they would come about. So far, they have been pretty damn accurate.

Mason has it right when he places the search for freedom and against the authoritarianism of a Mubarak or of neoliberalism in the context of Marx’s discussion of the alienation of the human spirit under capitalism. However, by not taking a similar look at the analysis Marxist economics provides regarding the trajectory of capitalism, the analysis he provides falls short. It would be useful for Mason and the protesters he writes about if they knew that a Marxist anti-imperialist analysis does not mean that a Leninist solution is the necessary result.

Yet, Mason is not much different from the movements he describes. Rightly opposed to the excesses of neoliberal capitalism (which is merely another phase of monopoly capitalism as described by Luxembourg, et al.), the current movement runs the risk of merely removing the worst of those excesses.

If this is the result, it will only be a few decades before an even harsher manifestation of capitalist greed subordinates the world. Unless, that is, the current movement undertakes a truly radical analysis that places the existence of capitalism itself at the core of the problem.

I don’t expect that capitalism will be removed from the planet. However, without an understanding that it is capitalism that is the root of the problems of inequality and sustainability we are currently facing, there can be no substantive change in the future we face. Then again, the very fact that many elements of the movement don’t seem too concerned about the Left’s role is a call to those on the Left to get active and make it clear that what passes for the Left in today’s world is for the most part nothing of the sort. Indeed, it is a rejection of the Left’s important and earth-changing history.

Despite the aforementioned shortcomings, these two publications are worthwhile and provocative reads. The authors and editors present the primary actors in the global uprising — students, workers, and the marginalized — and describe their passion, joy, and fears. They also begin to explain where the global movement against neoliberalism came from and where it is now. Reading them in this context will certainly help guide us through that movement’s next metamorphosis.

[Rag Blog contributor Ron Jacobs is the author of The Way The Wind Blew: A History of the Weather Underground. He recently released a collection of essays and musings titled Tripping Through the American Night. His latest novel, The Co-Conspirator’s Tale, is published by Fomite. His first novel, Short Order Frame Up, is published by Mainstay Press. Ron Jacobs can be reached at ronj1955@gmail.com. Find more articles by Ron Jacobs on The Rag Blog.]

The Rag Blog

Posted in Rag Bloggers | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

RAG RADIO / Thorne Dreyer : Bobby Bridger on the Lasting Impact of Native American Culture

Posted on March 15, 2012 by Thorne Dreyer

Singer/songwriter and author Bobby Bridger at the KOOP studios in Austin, March 9, 2012. Photo by Ken McKenzie-Grant / The Rag Blog.

Rag Radio:
Bobby Bridger discusses the lasting impact
of Native American culture on our society

By Rag Radio / The Rag Blog / March 15, 2012

Author, historian, singer/songwriter, playwright, artist, actor, and theatrical producer Bobby Bridger was Thorne Dreyer’s guest on Rag Radio, Friday, March 9, 2012, on Austin community radio station KOOP-FM.

You can listen to the show here.

Bobby Bridger Discusses the Lasting Impact of Native American
Culture on Rag Radio with Thorne Dreyer, Friday, March 9, 2012


On the show, Bridger discusses the issues raised in his most recent book, Where the Tall Grass Grows: Becoming Indigenous and the Mythological Legacy of the American West, which “explores the impact of Native American culture on the American psyche… and examines the impact of indigenous American mythology on contemporary identity and the development of modern popular entertainment, particularly the Hollywood film industry.”

On the show, Bridger contrasts the roles played by iconic figures like Sitting Bull and John Wayne in depicting Indian culture, and the impact of Lakota holy man Black Elk and his book, “Black Elk Speaks.” Ken McKenzie-Grant participated in this interview and the show includes live performance by Bridger.

This is our second Rag Radio interview with Bobby Bridger; the first occurred on Nov. 18, 2011, and you can listen to it here.

Bobby Bridger, who lives in Houston, is also the author of A Ballad of the West, and other books about native American culture and the American West. A descendant of legendary “mountain man” Jim Bridger, Bobby was featured in an entire chapter of Jan Reid’s classic book, The Improbable Rise of Redneck Rock.

Bridger, who is also a trained sculptor, painter, and art educator, has appeared twice on PBS’ Austin City Limits, on PBS’s American Experience, and on Good Morning America and other major national media. He is the composer of the anthem of the Kerrville Folk Festival, “Heal in the Wisdom,” and London-based Qube Pictures released a boxed set DVD collection of his highly-acclaimed epic theatrical trilogy, A Ballad of the West.

Rag Radio, which has aired since September 2009 on KOOP 91.7-FM, a cooperatively-run all-volunteer community radio station in Austin, Texas, features hour-long in-depth interviews and discussion about issues of progressive politics, culture, and history.

Hosted and produced by Rag Blog editor and long-time alternative journalist Thorne Dreyer, a pioneer of the Sixties underground press movement, Rag Radio is broadcast every Friday from 2-3 p.m. (CST) on KOOP and streamed live on the web. After broadcast, all episodes are posted as podcasts and can be downloaded at the Internet Archive.

Rag Radio is also rebroadcast on Sundays at 10 a.m. (EST) on WFTE, 90.3-FM in Mt. Cobb, PA, and 105.7-FM in Scranton, PA. Rag Radio is produced in the KOOP studios, in association with The Rag Blog, a progressive internet newsmagazine, and the New Journalism Project, a Texas 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation.

Tracey Schulz is the show’s engineer and co-producer.

Coming up on Rag Radio:

THIS FRIDAY, March 16, 2012: Journalist and labor activist David Bacon on how U.S. policies fueled Mexico’s great migration.

The Rag Blog

Posted in RagBlog | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

BOOKS / Mariann G. Wizard : Jonah Raskin’s ‘Rock ‘n’ Roll Women’

Posted on March 14, 2012 by Thorne Dreyer


Portraits of a Generation:
Jonah Raskin’s Rock ‘n Roll Women

By Mariann G. Wizard | The Rag Blog | March 14, 2012

[Rock ‘n’ Roll Women: Portraits of a Generation, by Jonah Raskin (Santa Rosa, CA: McCaa Books, 2012); Paperback, 40 pp.]

Jonah Raskin’s new poetry chapbook, Rock’ n ‘Roll Women: Portraits of a Generation, celebrates both rock and women equally and with great good will. Its 25 brief poems follow a simple formula like the guitar, bass, and drums of a rock trio: a woman (well, 24 women and one man), a rock artist from any era, and a moment in time defined by its soundtrack.

The poems were written for performance, accompanied by drums and/or stand-up bass, and reading them might seem a bit like reading CD liner notes, but they stand on their own nicely.

Of course Raskin isn’t alone in being influenced, personally and artistically, by the musical revolution that rocked the world in the late 1950s and continues to roll across the galaxy today.

If you weren’t alive before then, forgive me, but you just can’t know how bloody bleak it was. Don’t get me wrong, I still love a lot of Big Band-era music, classical stuff, C&W. But the thing is, every single bit of it was square, and we feared for a while that was all there was.

Yes, there was some jazz and some blues if you knew where to look, but you had to be some kind of egghead-kook to even look, and frankly, both genres can be awfully depressing, reflecting bittersweet, lost worlds of heroin and gin joints.

Folk music was a breath of fresh air in some ways from the pop pap of the post-World War II 40s and 50s, but at most a breath relived from second grade, before Sputnik went up and the system started shoving math and science down our throats while still jiving the campy campfire sounds of “Mairzy Doats.”

Rock music is first, foremost, and always good time music, good times even in bad times, dancing to defy bad times, and power to the people always. The rise of rock coincided with, helped fuel, and was in turn fueled by the rise of a generation that couldn’t stomach plastic-fantastic lies any longer, emphatically including young women who didn’t really dig Doris Day or see themselves being Donna Reed.

(Women’s) liberation is implicit in rock’s hip-swinging beat. “Ladies,” by definition, do not shake their booties or groove thangs, twist the night away, or get down or funky.

That Jonah celebrates just 24 rock ‘n’ roll women in this book is surely a testament to discretion; just as the 29 choice CDs he names — admitting there are too many of the latter to list them all — are only the tip of an iceberg of life-affirming music. Every woman who came of age when Beethoven was rolled over has her own internal rock soundtrack.

The one guy included, in “Mr Tommy & Mick Jagger,” may not be the greatest example of American manhood, but I swear, I’d know this dude in any dancehall in the country, and Raskin is right, it “coulda been worse.”

I have to give an appreciative nod to Jonah’s restraint in not quoting from the rock lyrics that inspire and energize his verses; a constant temptation to me and one I seldom resist. At most, he uses a word or phrase ineluctably linked to a band or performer — “boogie” and Creedence Clearwater; a piece of heart and Janis; Otis Redding and the end of a dock — but mostly summons more subtle connections, the telling details of experience that make true songs:

Margaret & Pink Floyd

You, Margaret, cooked winter stew,
grew tarragon and didn’t rue,
made tapes of Pink Floyd,
broke down dad’s resistance,
reluctance to love, cut alternating
currents that drove him to extremes,
wild dreams,
acted out on crazy stage
your mother so kindly crafted,
Rock ‘n’ Roll woman.

Jonah has written six other books of poetry; American Scream, about Allen Ginsberg’s epic poem “Howl”; and several other books, including Marijuanaland — and is a regular contributor to The Rag Blog. Rock ‘n’ Roll Women‘s cover was designed by The Rag Blog‘s James Retherford.

[Mariann G. Wizard, a Sixties radical activist and contributor to The Rag, Austin’s underground newspaper from the 60s and 70s, is a poet, a professional science writer specializing in natural health therapies, and a contributing editor to The Rag Blog. Read more articles and poetry by Mariann G. Wizard at The Rag Blog.]

The Rag Blog

Posted in Rag Bloggers | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Robert Jensen : Holding Onto the Joy in Teaching

Posted on March 14, 2012 by Thorne Dreyer

Pompous professor. Image from Canadian Mysteries.

Holding onto the joy in teaching

We are the best teachers when we aren’t afraid of the dark.

By Robert Jensen | The Rag Blog | March 13, 2012

I am a tenured professor in a relatively stable university, which is quite possibly the best job in the world. I get paid well to read, think, talk, and write, and I have more job security than almost anyone I know.

Like many professors, I am critical of the increasingly corporate nature of universities. The conservative/neoliberal project of turning public schools into educational factories is also gathering steam in higher education, and there is much organizing work necessary just to protect what little space for critical thinking still exists.

But the longer I teach, the more I appreciate the privileges that come with the job, and the more fun I have. So, when I recently had to write a “statement of teaching philosophy,” I tried to reflect that gratitude and pleasure.


Statement of Teaching Philosophy:
Pay attention, be astonished, tell about it

After years of research, I have developed a three-stage teaching method that breaks new ground in pedagogical theory: Stage 1: Pay attention. Stage 2: Be astonished. Stage 3: Tell about it.

The first thing to say about this sophisticated advance in our understanding of university teaching is that I stole it, from Mary Oliver’s poem “Sometimes.”

If it appears I’m trying to poke fun at university professors’ self-indulgent tendency toward pomposity, I am. Since I am a university professor who occasionally can be self-indulgent and pompous, I have standing to poke fun. Frankly, we don’t poke fun at ourselves enough. That’s part of my teaching philosophy: Poke fun at myself, as often as possible, especially in front of students.

In this regard, poets perform an important service for professors. If we professors are ever tempted to claim that we have had an original insight into the human condition, we should pause and remember this: There’s at least one poet, and likely dozens, who had the insight long before we did and who expressed it far more eloquently than we could ever hope.

I don’t teach poetry, but I often read poetry to my class. That’s part of my teaching philosophy, to remind students that whatever the subject, poets have something important to say to us. I read to my students even though I have had no voice training and am not particularly good at reciting poetry.

That’s part of my teaching philosophy, too. I think it’s healthy for students to see professors stumble. When every word we utter in class is precise and polished, it can create distance between professor and student. Students are too easily impressed by us, and they can come to believe we are our performances.

Better that they see we are human beings, struggling and stumbling, so that intellectual work doesn’t appear to be something only specialists can do. Our job isn’t to be smart but to help students understand that they can be smart, too.

So, I read to my class, from Mary Oliver and Wendell Berry, from Marge Piercy and Faiz Ahmed Faiz. I play songs, too, though I’m sensible enough not to sing in class.

Back to Oliver. Those three recommendations comprise her “instructions for living a life.” They also are serviceable instructions for teaching. I try to pay attention, not only to the scholarship in my field but to the world around me, which means I try to get out in the world beyond the university as often as possible.

I am constantly astonished by the human capacity for both depravity and love, and I spend considerable time trying to figure out these paradoxes. I tell about it as often as possible, as a teacher, public speaker, and writer.

After 20 years of teaching at the University of Texas at Austin, I have written numerous statements about my teaching philosophy. Each exercise is an opportunity for me to challenge myself. The somewhat unorthodox style of this essay comes not from a lack of respect for the assignment but a desire to challenge myself in a new way. This might be because, after 20 years, I have a sense that I’m a better teacher than ever, but at the same time I’m less sure why that might be the case.

Here’s one plausible answer to the question of why my teaching might be better today: I’m more comfortable with ambiguity than when I was younger. As we age, we have a choice. We can conclude that we’re right in our assertions about the world and proceed based on that assumption. Or, we can conclude that we’re right and proceed based on the assumption that we’re missing something.

I have spent considerable time studying the role of news media in our culture, politics, and economy. I am confident that the assertions I make about that institution and those systems are compelling. I’m pretty sure that I’m right, and I argue strenuously that those assertions are the best way to understand journalism and society. And I also wonder about that.

Time for another poet. Faiz Ahmed Faiz concludes his poem “The City from Here”:

There are flames dancing in the farthest corners,
throwing their shadows on a group of mourners.
Or are they lighting up a feast of poetry and wine?
From here you cannot tell, as you cannot tell
whether the color clinging to those distant doors and walls
is that of roses or of blood.

I read that poem to my journalism students as a reminder that when we look, we look from one perspective. “When you look at the city from here,” from any one place, it can be easy to confuse roses and blood. Since we are always looking from somewhere, caution and humility are important. I read that poem to remind students that their point of view is a point of view. I read that poem to remind myself as well.

With that winding introduction, here’s a concise statement of my teaching philosophy: I have the best job in the world. I get paid a salary that allows me to live comfortably and give back to the community. To earn this salary, I am asked to spend my time thinking, reading, writing, and talking, all things I enjoy doing even when not being paid.

On occasion, I have to go to a boring meeting or file a stupid report, which can at times be annoying. But, all in all, this is a really good gig. The least I can do is pay attention, be astonished, and tell about it with as much joy and passion as possible. When I do that, I think I’m a pretty good teacher, and I think I do that most every day I walk into the classroom.

But I’m not 100 percent sure I’m as good as I think. When I look out at my students and see roses, maybe that’s just how the city looks from the lectern. Perhaps I simply don’t see the blood.

Time for a closing metaphor, this time borrowed from Wendell Berry’s poem, “To Know the Dark”:

To go in the dark with a light is to know the light.
To know the dark, go dark. Go without sight,
and find that the dark, too, blooms and sings,
and is traveled by dark feet and dark wings.

We are the best teachers when we aren’t afraid of the dark. When I began teaching, I went into the dark with the biggest flashlight I could find. That light allowed me to see many things, but the intensity of the beam obscured other things, in the shadows. That light allowed me to feel smart, but these days I am less reassured by being smart. The older I get, the more I realize that being smart isn’t going to get us all the way home.

So, these days I carry a smaller flashlight, and I turn it off as often as I can muster the courage. My best teaching is when I go dark.

[Robert Jensen is a journalism professor at the University of Texas at Austin, where he teaches courses in media law, ethics, and politics — and a board member of the Third Coast Activist Resource Center in Austin. His books include All My Bones Shake: Seeking a Progressive Path to the Prophetic Voice, and Getting Off: Pornography and the End of Masculinity. His writing is published extensively in mainstream and alternative media. This article was first published at Truthout. Robert Jensen can be reached at rjensen@uts.cc.utexas.edu. Read more articles by Robert Jensen on The Rag Blog.]

The Rag Blog

Posted in Rag Bloggers | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

Posted on March 14, 2012 by Thorne Dreyer

Republican Roulette: Romney vs. The Rebels

By Bill Freeland

Super Tuesday has come and gone but Republicans are hardly any closer to selecting a nominee.

Mitt Romney pulled out wins in three more states where he competed with his current rival Rick Santorum, but in the contest that mattered most, Ohio, his margin was disappointingly thin despite out-spending him 12 to 1.

What’s more, much of that outcome would likely have been reversed had the religious vote not been split between Santorum and Newt Gingrich.

This dynamic means the race will continue for weeks more, but with the focus now shifting to some southern states where Santorum holds an advantage with Christian evangelicals. The result: no one will likely claim victory for weeks to come.

But as the bitterness of the contest has revealed, the struggle within the party extends beyond this year’s election. The nominating process has devolved into a rancorous sibling rivalry between an entitled dstablishment and a diverse rebel insurgency. At stake: not just the choice of a nominee but a broader ideological fight between these two camps with the future of the Republican brand hanging in the balance.

In the choice between these two political paradigms, the focus is predictably on who wins. Yet there is a counterintuitive case to be made, depending on what happens later in the general election.

This could be the year that the losers in the GOP primary process ultimately have as lasting an influence as the winners on its future as they plot their return.

Say, for example, the party elites get their way — and their man — and Romney is nominated and goes on to win the general election. The “regulars” will be proven right, and the insurgents will return to irrelevance as the establishment types get to keep their preferred seating at the 2016 convention.

But what if Romney loses to Obama? The elites, bitterly opposed by the rebels, will finally be disgraced and the insurgents vindicated. It will be 1976 all over again, when the party mainstream mistakenly stuck with Ford over Reagan — and lost to Carter. They corrected that mistake four years later, signing on with the Gipper and his purer vision of movement conservatism. Next time today’s agitators will likely look early on to reincarnate a symbolic Reagan and move still further to the right to win in 2016.

Compare that to a victory in Tampa by the Anybody But Romney wing of the GOP. Should its nominee win the election in the fall, the party rebels will rightly claim a stunning victory and what’s left of the Republican establishment will be further diminished.

But what if the rebel candidate wins at the convention but loses to Obama? In that case, welcome to 1964. That year Goldwater proclaimed extremism was no vice — but learned to his regret that moderation in pursuit of the presidency was a virtue — as he lost to LBJ in a landslide.

What his party learned was the virtue of moderation — and succeeded with Nixon four years later. A loss in 2012 will likely mean the party next time will avoid the mistakes of 1964 and seek a win with a similarly moderate candidate in 2016.

Now what about the Democrats? A parallel scenario could also emerge.

Recent polls, reflecting both better economic trends and perhaps a contrast with the bitter GOP primary battles, give the incumbent Obama a slight advantage over his challengers. But worsening job numbers and gas prices could still put the outcome in doubt.

If he wins reelection, his overriding bipartisan stance in the face of Republican obstruction (which has driven many Democrats to distraction) would be convincingly vindicated.

Should he lose, however, the signature policy of his administration would likely be repudiated resulting in a more assertive nominee next time. The likely outcome: a more aggressive party and an even more polarized political process.

The lesson in all this: hopes for the future are often haunted by the failures of the past–and sometimes even defined by them. Thus it can be argued that instead of imagining the future, we sometimes settle merely for avoiding the mistakes of the past.

If that is the lesson the losers of 2012 take as a guide for the future, then their party and our nation will be the poorer for it.

[In the Sixties, Bill Freeland was a contributor to The Rag in Austin and Liberation News Service in New York. Read more articles by Bill Freeland on The Rag Blog.]


Type rest of the post here

Source /

The Rag Blog

Posted in RagBlog | Leave a comment

Rag Blog : ‘Feed Your Head’ on April Fool’s Day!

Posted on March 13, 2012 by Thorne Dreyer

Art by Jim Franklin; poster by James Retherford / The Rag Blog.

‘Feed Your Head’ on April Fool’s Day:
Legendary Austin Bands at Rag Blog Bash

Go to the Facebook “Feed Your Head!” event page.

“Old Skool” will be in session on April Fool’s Day at Jovita’s in Austin, when The Rag Blog and Rag Radio invite you to “Feed Your Head.” A big slice of Austin music history will be on display at the event, which will feature performances by Shiva’s Headband, Greezy Wheels, and Jesse Sublett.

The event, scheduled for 6-9 p.m., April 1, at Jovita’s, 1619 S. First St. in Austin, will benefit The Rag Blog, an Austin-based progressive Internet news magazine, and Rag Radio, a weekly public affairs program broadcast on Austin’s KOOP 91.7-FM and hosted by Rag Blog editor Thorne Dreyer. The Rag Blog and Rag Radio trace their roots to Austin’s legendary underground newspaper, The Rag, which was published from 1966-1977 with Dreyer as its original editor.

Psychedelic rockers Shiva’s Headband, founded in 1967 by Spencer Perskin, a classically trained violinist, was the house band at Austin’s Vulcan Gas Company, and was the first group to perform at Austin’s iconic Armadillo World Headquarters. Their album, Take Me to the Mountains, was the first nationally released album by an Austin rock band.

Pioneers of the “progressive country” movement in the 1970s, Greezy Wheels was for years the unofficial house band at the Armadillo. Guitarist and writer Cleve Hattersley and “fiddler extraordinaire” Mary Hattersley, led the group that, according to the Austin Chronicle’s Margaret Moser, “owned Austin” in the mid-70s.

Bassist Jesse Sublett -– also a mystery writer and artist — founded Austin’s legendary alt-punk band, The Skunks, which debuted at Austin’s Raul’s in 1978, and Sublett continued to be a mainstay on the Austin music scene.

A poster for the event, designed by James Retherford, features original art by Austin surrealist artist Jim Franklin, who, as house artist at the Armadillo World Headquarters, helped turn the lowly armadillo into an internationally recognized symbol for the Texas counterculture and whose artwork graced the landmark Shiva’s album, Take Me to the Mountains.

Proceeds from the event benefit the New Journalism Project, a Texas 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation that publishes The Rag Blog and produces Rag Radio. Suggested donation is $10. Limited edition Jim Franklin posters and special Rag Blog t-shirts will be available. Jovita’s has a full bar and food menu.

The Rag Blog, founded in 2006 after a reunion of staffers from the original Rag, has become a force in the progressive blogosphere and receives 50,000 unique visits a month. Rag Radio features hour-long in-depth interviews with newsmakers, artists, and leading thinkers. Broadcast Fridays from 2-3 p.m. (CDT) on KOOP 91.7-FM in Austin, it is also rebroadcast on Sundays at 10 a.m. (Eastern) by WFTE-FM in Mt. Cobb and Scranton, PA, and also streams live, with a widespread internet audience.

The Rag Blog

Posted in RagBlog | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Bob Feldman : Texas Oil Industry Emerges; O. Henry Publishes, 1890-1920

Posted on March 13, 2012 by Thorne Dreyer

William Sydney Porter (later to be known as O. Henry) in Austin, circa 1880’s. Image from Austin History Center, Austin Public Library / Wikimedia Commons.

The hidden history of Texas

Part IX: 1890-1920/4 — Oil business emerges; O. Henry publishes

By Bob Feldman / The Rag Blog / February 28, 2012

[This is the fourth section of Part 9 of Bob Feldman’s Rag Blog series on the hidden history of Texas.]

It was during the 1890-1920 historical period that an oil industry first began to develop in Texas. As Randolph Campbell recalled in his book, Gone To Texas, “significant commercial production [in Texas] did not begin until 1894, when well drillers seeking water near Corsicana struck oil instead,” and “production in the Spindletop field [near Beaumont], which reached 17,500,000 barrels in 1902, created the state’s first great oil boom.”

Yet, “in spite of the major discoveries, Texas [still] stood only sixth in the nation in oil production in 1909,” according to the same book. And most people who lived in Texas did not benefit from the development of its oil industry between 1894 and 1920. As Vanity Fair magazine correspondent Bryan Burrough observed in his 2009 book, The Big Rich: The Rise and Fall of the Greatest Texas Oil Fortunes:

If Spindletop created an oil industry for Texas, little of it ended up controlled by Texans. The big money of Spindletop was initially split between groups of powerful Texas businessmen and seasoned oilmen from back east. One Texas faction was an alliance of Austin politicians and Gulf Coast attorneys led by the former governor Jim Hogg, who acquired a valuable lease on Spindletop hill for the bargain price of $180,000 in July 1901, six months after the first gush…

The strange new infrastructure of Texas oil — the storage tanks, the pipelines, the refineries — was controlled by eastern interests… By 1920, two decades after Spindletop, the discovery of oil hadn’t changed Texas much… What oil was pumped from Texas fields was still largely controlled by eastern interests…

Between 1891 to 1895 Democratic Governor Jim “Boss” Hogg rhetorically “fought against the use of corporate funds in politics, for equalities of taxation, and for the suppression of organized lobbying,” and “demanded steps to make `corporate control of Texas’ impossible,” according to Antonia Juhasz’s 2008 book The Tyranny of Oil.

In the same book Juhasz also recalled that when Hogg was the attorney general of Texas he had written “the nation’s second antitrust law and put it to work against Standard Oil,” and “while governor, he tried to extradite [John D.] Rockefeller from New York to stand trial in Texas.” As a result, “the largely `Standard-free-zone’ established in Texas allowed for independent oil companies, such as Gulf and Texaco, to develop outside of Standard Oil’s grip in what would emerge as the most oil-rich state in the nation.”


Jim Hogg, the 20th governor of Texas. Image courtesy of the Texas State Library and Archives Commission / Wikimedia Commons.

According to The Tyranny of Oil, the financing for the drilling in the Spindletop field where oil first gushed out on January 10, 1901, “came from Pittsburgh’s Andrew and Richard Mellon,” and “the Mellon family ultimately forced everyone else out,” before merging the 1901-founded Guffey Petroleum and Gulf Refining oil firms into the Gulf Oil Corporation in 1901.

Financing for the drilling by the Texas Fuel Company (that was founded in 1901 and later changed its name to Texaco) “came from Lewis Lapham of New York, who owned U.S. Leather, the centerpiece of the leather trust, and John Gates, a Chicago financier,” as well as from a New York investment banker named Arnold Schlaet.

It was also during the 1890s that an Austin writer named William Sydney Porter — who later, under the pen name of O. Henry, became famous in New York City as a writer of short stories with surprise endings — briefly published a weekly newspaper in Austin called The Rolling Stone — over 70 years before Jann Wenner started to publish his Rolling Stone magazine in the Bay Area in the late 1960s.

As University of Auburn Professor Emeritus for American Literature Eugene Current-Garcia noted in his 1993 book O.Henry: A Study of the Short Fiction:

O. Henry and his partner… renamed their paper The Rolling Stone… It was never a commercial success, surviving only a single year with an alleged circulation peak of 1,500, but the fact that O. Henry managed to keep it going at all at times virtually single-handedly — was a remarkable feat in itself. Each week he filled its eight pages with humorous squibs and satirical barbs on persons and events of local interest…

The portable humor sheet quietly rolled off its last issue on Mar. 30 1895, and was soon forgotten until its creator’s worldwide fame a few decades later made of it a collector’s item… For in his… little news-sheet — O. Henry’s first published body of work — lay the foundation stones of his unique short fiction edifice: his themes, plots, methods and style.

[Bob Feldman is an East Coast-based writer-activist and a former member of the Columbia SDS Steering Committee of the late 1960s. Read more articles by Bob Feldman on The Rag Blog.]

The Rag Blog

Posted in Rag Bloggers | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Brendan Smith and Jeremy Brecher : Labor’s Keystone Dilemma

Posted on March 13, 2012 by Thorne Dreyer

Unions and the Keystone dilemma. Image from Kansas Watchdog.

Dirty vs. green jobs:
Labor’s Keystone dilemma

Outside of Washington, the very same unions that support the pipeline are down in the trenches fighting for a transition to a green economy.

By Brendan Smith and Jeremy Brecher / Portside / March 13, 2012

These are tough times to be a construction worker in America. While other sectors of the economy are showing signs of life, the unemployment rate in the construction industry is getting worse, not better — rising from 16 percent to 17 percent in January.

It is against this backdrop that the titanic struggle over the Keystone XL pipeline is being waged. On one side are unions such as the Laborers International Union of North America and the United Association of Plumbers and Pipefitters, who support the pipeline because they believe that it will create thousands of high-wage jobs for their members. On the other side are environmentalists and others who believe the pipeline will hasten the climate crisis, threaten our water supplies, and increase oil prices.

The fallout from the conflict has been significant. When six labor unions joined the Sierra Club and other environmental groups in support of President Obama’s decision to oppose the permit last month, LIUNA President Terry O’Sullivan accused the coalition as being “job killers,” and withdrew his union from the BlueGreen Alliance.

Inside Washington, this divide over Keystone appears insurmountable — especially since the “jobs vs. environment” debate has been played out repeatedly for decades. But outside of Washington, the very same unions that support the pipeline are down in the trenches fighting for a transition to a green economy.

LIUNA, for example, has created OptiHome, an alliance of skilled workers and certified contractors working in the energy efficiency sector. The program includes training and job placement, and has been effective at bringing a new generation of workers into the green economy.

One of these workers is Tahlia Williams, a 30-year-old single mom who had been interested in construction work for a long time but saw it as “man’s work” and was unsure how to break into the industry. But after Tahlia completed LIUNA’s weatherization training program she was quickly hired as an energy efficiency mechanic by the Community Environmental Center — the largest residential weatherization contractor in New York City.

According to Tahlia, she is “proud to be working to protect our environment, while at the same time helping fellow residents save money on their energy bills and enjoy a more comfortable home. This is about a better future for my family, for New York homeowners, and for everyone!”

LIUNA’s green jobs agenda has also helped grow the union. They negotiated a card check agreement with Conservation Services Group, a company which conducts nearly a half million home energy assessments annually for utilities and energy efficiency organizations nationwide, reaching more than 2 million homes in the last 25 years.

And LIUNA recently chartered a green local designed for workers specializing in weatherization and other green jobs. Green Jobs Local 58’s first round of recruits graduated from LIUNA’s training center this month and are earning $14 an hour with benefits. To fund the program, LIUNA joined forces with local environmentalists to pass the New York Green Jobs Financing Law that provides funding for residential weatherization work.

Another building trades union that is riding the green wave is the United Association of Plumbers and Pipefitters. UA created the nation’s first union “sustainability office” in the country, which is developing three new “green” craft-specific certifications: Green Plumbing/Pipefitting, Green Sprinkler Fitting, and Green Heating, Ventilation, Air Conditioning and Refrigeration (HVACR).

UA has also been driving a “Green Systems Training Trailer” around the country to educate members and the general public about the importance of energy efficiency.

So despite their support for the Keystone pipeline, on the ground in cities and towns around the country building trades unions are at the cutting edge of green economic development. These green success stories show that the green jobs path for LIUNA and other construction unions is not a “pie-in-the-sky” promise — these jobs are shovel-ready and offer a secure future for their members.

It is also significant that some of these unions have stepped out in front at the international level by joining environmentalists around the globe fighting to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. LIUNA, for example, was one of three unions in the U.S. to support science-based targets and timelines for carbon reduction at the 2009 climate summit in Copenhagen.

But here is the problem: For environmentalists, the Keystone battle has called into question unions’ commitment to addressing climate change, which is the primary rationale for green jobs and energy efficiency programs. Some unions are trying to play both sides of the fence: siding with fossil fuel companies and Republicans for new coal plants, pipelines, and refineries, while simultaneously teaming up with environmentalists for green jobs programs. Keystone has laid bare this contradiction.

The Keystone campaign has also put a strain on labor’s relationship with Occupy — a movement seen by unions as a powerful new ally. Indeed, LIUNA’s own homepage features a statement that “LIUNA Backs Occupy Wall Street Movement.” In November the Building Trades launched the Jobsforthe99.com website and began running ads in newspapers and radio along the pipeline route, using the rhetoric of Occupy and the 99 percent to push for construction of the Keystone XL pipeline.

In response, the main governing body of Occupy in New York issued a statement of disavowal: “The leadership of the unions behind this campaign have made a public alliance with the oil industry and Tea Party funders… We must dissociate from this attempt at co-optation by the 1% to preserve our movement as the 99%.”

The last decades have shown that partnering with the right wing and corporations has been a devil’s bargain for workers, whereby companies use unions to push for environmental deregulation and subsidies for carbon-intensive projects, while simultaneously funding “right-to-work” and other anti-union campaigns. This unholy alliance has crippled unions’ ability to organize workers and laid the foundation for a private sector unionization rate of less than seven percent.

Unions and environmentalists agree on most issues — ranging from living wages and health care to corporate greed and green job creation — and there is consensus that defeating the right wing agenda requires solidarity of the 99%.

With this in mind, it’s time for labor and environmentalists to sit down and hammer out plans for putting union members to work rebuilding our country and protecting the planet. None of us can build a sustainable future alone.

[Brendan Smith is co-founder of the Labor Network for Sustainability and Voices for a Sustainable Future and senior fellow at the Progressive Technology Project. His commentary has appeared in The Atlantic, The Los Angeles Times, The Guardian, and The Nation. Contact him at www.bsmith.org. Jeremy Brecher‘s new book, Save the Humans? Common Preservation in Action addresses how social movements make social change. Brecher is the author of more than a dozen books on labor and social movements, including Strike! and Global Village or Global Pillage, and the winner of five regional Emmy awards for his documentary movie work. He currently works with the Labor Network for Sustainability. This article was distributed by Portside.]

The Rag Blog

Posted in RagBlog | Tagged , , , | 2 Comments

Lamar W. Hankins : Religion and Secularism in the Public Square

Posted on March 13, 2012 by Thorne Dreyer

Sen. John F. Kennedy speaks attempts to allay fears about his Caltholicism before the Greater Houston Ministerial Association on Sept. 12, 1960. Photo from Houston Chronicle / AP.

Religion and secularism in the public square

Opposing the promotion of religion and religious practices by government is not the same as opposing religious expression…

By Lamar W. Hankins / The Rag Blog / March 13, 2012

Whenever he speaks, it has become common for Republican presidential aspirant Rick Santorum to state that because of the beliefs or actions of various public figures or the society at large, people of faith no longer have a role in the public square.

Santorum has claimed at various times that this was the position of John F. Kennedy, and is the position of President Obama. And he seems to believe that there are others, many others, who want to prevent religious people from having their say about public policy.

A fair and complete reading of what John F. Kennedy said in 1960 cannot possibly lead to such a conclusion. If anything, Barack Obama sometimes has seemed to agree with Santorum on this issue.

With this repeated assertion, Santorum makes what is often called a “straw man” argument. He has set up a false premise so that he can easily knock it down. But this straw man argument has a purpose beyond mere deception: to galvanize the evangelical vote in his favor. And many evangelicals claim that if the government doesn’t promote their brand of Christianity, then they are being denied access to the public square.

To understand the deceit inherent in this argument, we need to understand what is meant by the “public square.” Generally, and quite literally, the public square is an open public space found near the center of a community and used for public gatherings. It may refer also to all areas of public property which may be used for a variety of events, either with or without permission of the government that controls the property — reference the Occupy Movement in the last half year.

In another sense, public square refers to the use of public places for exercising our rights to free speech. Some communities have areas where people hold forth on whatever topic may interest them and the passers-by who linger to listen to what they say.

This activity was likely more prevalent in the days before the media took information to the masses through newspapers, magazines, radio, and television; and now individuals do so by email, Facebook, and tweets. Of course, we have had mail service since the founding of the country, but that was not a way to reach the masses about public policy concerns until the advent of direct-mail political campaigns, which started about 30 years ago.

In some cases, public buildings have been open for public expression, much like the open areas owned in common by the people. But normally, public expression has taken place in these venues only when the governmental authority responsible for their maintenance has allowed them to be used in this way. Otherwise, the buildings are designated for particular uses, rather than any use a member of the public desires.

For instance, a high school gymnasium or a meeting room at a city activity center is not a public forum unless a group or individual pays a fee to use the facility for such a purpose, or the government opens the facility at a specific time for the purpose of having a public forum.

When an area becomes a public place for free speech, the government may not limit what views are expressed there. All views, including religious views, may be expressed, which gets us to the claim that religion is being driven from the public square. Presidential candidate Rick Santorum recently declared that the First Amendment’s guarantee of the free exercise of religion by all Americans “means bringing everybody, people of faith and no faith, into the public square.”

On this I agree completely.

But Santorum went on to claim that presidential candidate and later President John F. Kennedy said that “faith is not allowed in the public square.” I have quoted Kennedy’s 1960 Houston speech in which he discussed this matter in previous columns and have read it many times. Nowhere in that speech did Kennedy say that faith is not allowed in the public square, but in Santorum’s mind, Kennedy’s views would “create a purely secular public square cleansed of all religious wisdom and the voice of religious people of all faiths.”

Santorum’s thoughts on this issue are so ridiculous that I address them only to suggest that Santorum has it wrong. Kennedy was not trying to drive religion or religious values from the public square with his 1960 speech to a group of Protestant ministers. He was trying to allay fears among Protestants that, as a Catholic, he would perform presidential duties under orders from the Pope.

Of course, considering Santorum’s membership in Opus Dei, which strictly follows traditional Catholic doctrine, he might seek the Pope’s advice on U.S. policy were he to become President.

But this is not the first time a political figure has distorted the views of Americans to deal with a fictitious issue. In 2006, Barack Obama spoke about religion in public life in a speech at a religious conference in which he accused secularists of asking “believers to leave their religion at the door before entering the public square.” He also equated secularism with a lack of moral values, as though moral values come only from religion.

While I know more religious people than secularists, I have never read or heard a secularist (a non-religious person) who claims that religion and religious ideas are forbidden in the public square. What I have often thought, however, is that if your only argument on a matter of public importance is that God has a position on the issue, you might not have a winning argument.

God’s views are hard to document — something I learned as a pre-ministerial student at a Methodist-related university. Even the “holy texts” leave much room for interpretation and differences of opinion about meaning.

In 2002, a San Marcos city council member explained his vote in favor of a resolution supporting the War in Iraq by quoting Ecclesiastes — “there’s a time for war.” I thought then that the remark was less than shallow and a poor excuse for actual thinking about the matter. Of course, people use “holy texts” frequently to bolster some position or other — against homosexuals, against prostitutes, against money-lending, against slavery; or in favor of slavery, child-beating, war, adulterer-stoning, capital punishment, mass murder, etc.

As to the origin of moral values, perhaps the most universal moral precept is what we usually term The Golden Rule: do unto others as you would have them do unto you. It has ancient origins that have been traced back nearly four millennia to the birth of writing in Egypt (though writing may have begun about the same time in Mesopotamia). But even the Golden Rule has its drawbacks. I certainly would not want a delusional or masochistic person treating me the way she might want to be treated.

What is important to me is that moral values do not depend on religion. Moral values have risen wherever there are people capable of thinking about themselves as distinct entities related to others. In fact, self-reflection may be what distinguishes humans from other species.

In America’s public square, broadly conceived, all people can be participants in the discussion. Perhaps the most inclusive definition of the public square is found in David E. Guinn’s paper written for The Encyclopedia of American Civil Liberties:

[The public square is] that forum in which the people discuss, debate, and evaluate public activities with the idea of persuading their compatriots and influencing the state in the development, enactment and enforcement of public policy. It is a forum, by definition, available to all…

The public square is not necessarily a place or a building. Today, forums are developed anywhere ideas can be discussed. In the on-line world, anyone wanting to make a comment can participate in that discussion.

As anyone who has read the Constitution knows, religion is mentioned three times — to guarantee religious freedom, to prohibit government establishment of religion, and to assure that there be no religious test for holding public office. God does not appear in the document except in relation to the date given at the end.

This should not prevent God and religion from entering public discussions, but it does suggest that the government should neither dominate religion, nor religion government. Opposing the promotion of religion and religious practices by government is not the same as opposing religious expression in the public square. Those who equate the two are not being intellectually honest.

According to a 2011 study by the nonprofit, nonpartisan research and education organization Public Religion Research Institute, “Nearly two-thirds (66 percent) of Americans agree that we must maintain a strict separation of church and state.” And 88% of Americans “strongly affirm the principles of religious freedom, religious tolerance, and separation of church and state.” Religious freedom is for everyone.

Contrary to the assertions of people like Rick Santorum and those who use fear to promote their theocratic views, the public square in America is doing fine, open to all ideas, religious as well as secular. And the public square can be used to promote moral values by everyone who has moral values, be they religious or secular.

It is possible to be good without God, even if some people claim otherwise. If you don’t agree, just listen to the values being expressed in the public square and observe the public behaviors represented there. Morality is not exclusive to our religious brethren, nor does being religious assure moral behavior.

[Lamar W. Hankins, a former San Marcos, Texas, city attorney, is also a columnist for the San Marcos Mercury. This article © Freethought San Marcos, Lamar W. Hankins. Read more articles by Lamar W. Hankins on The Rag Blog.]

The Rag Blog

Posted in Rag Bloggers | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Posted on March 10, 2012 by Thorne Dreyer

Alice Embree reports from San Antonio on that city’s 22nd annual Women’s Day celebration, organized by a coalition of “fierce ‘mujeres'” from community and social justice organizations, including union organizers and advocates for reproductive choice and LGBTQ rights. The event, which “crossed boundaries of race, age, class, national origin, and sexual orientation,” included a lively dose of political theater provided by CodePink and others. Includes a great gallery of photos from the event.

Posted in RagBlog | Leave a comment

Bernardine Dohrn and Bill Ayers : Come to Chicago!

Posted on March 8, 2012 by Thorne Dreyer

Graphic by Dave Wittekind / The Rag Blog.

UPDATE: In a major development, the G8 summit has been moved from Chicago to Camp David by President Obama, who apparently gave Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel only an hour’s advance notice of the move. The NATO gathering will still be held in Chicago.

There is speculation about a widening rift between Obama and Emanuel.

From the Chicago Tribune:

Mayor Rahm Emanuel today wouldn’t get into the particulars of why Chicago lost the G-8 summit in May, deferring to President Barack Obama.

The mayor was touting the importance of Chicago hosting the back-to-back G-8 and NATO gatherings of world leaders as late as Monday morning. Hours later, the Obama administration announced it was yanking the G-8 summit out of Chicago in favor of Camp David.

From the Chicago Sun-Times:

The mayor said he saw no slight or embarrassment for Chicago in President Barack Obama’s move. Emanuel, a former White House chief of staff, said he “takes at face value” Obama’s explanation that Camp David would be a more relaxed setting in which the world’s leaders could connect.

Organizers of Occupy Wall Street said:

The Group of 8 Summit, a meeting of the governments of the world’s eight largest economies, was supposed to convene in Chicago this May. For months, Occupy Chicago, international anti-war groups, Anonymous, and hundreds of allies have publicly planned to shut it down.

Now, only two months before the meeting is scheduled to begin, U.S. President Barack Obama is moving the assembly of over 7,000 leaders from the world’s wealthiest governments to the Camp David presidential compound, located in rural Maryland near Washington, DC, one of the most secure facilities in the world. The Chicago Tribune reports that summit organizers are “stunned” by the news.

In an article distributed by Truthout, the Occupied Chicago Tribune said:

The prospect of such a response [from massive demonstrations], and the political context in which it will take place, was enough to force the Obama administration to reconsider bringing the G8 summit to the president’s hometown and the site of his re-election campaign headquarters.

According to the Uprising Radio website, demonstrations will still take place in Chicago:

Chicago activist Andy Thayer, who is working with a coalition of groups in preparation for the May summits told the Associated Press on Tuesday, “Guess what? The protests are going to happen anyway.” There is also a possibility that activists will follow the G8 to Maryland.

An open invitation:
Come to Chicago

Occupy this/Occupy that!
NATO/G8: May 18-21, 2012

By Bernardine Dohrn and Bill Ayers | The Rag Blog | March 8, 2012

The tiny fraternity of concentrated wealth and power that calls itself the Group of Eight (G8) is meeting in Chicago in mid-May, overlapping with representatives of history’s largest global military cohort, NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization), the gently self-named military behemoth dominated by the U.S.

Heads of state, spooks, foreign ministers and generals, cabinet members and secret operatives, advisors and bureaucrats — the 1% of the 1% — plan to gather in barricaded opulent surroundings while coordinating and conspiring to extend and defend their obscene wealth, to exploit the remaining fossil fuels, natural resources, human labor, and the living planet, to the last drop, and to dominate the people of the global majority.

A 1984-style national security dragnet is descending on the city to attempt to lock Chicago down. Chicago’s Mayor is concocting a culture of fear, suggesting that it is the human resistance to NATO/G8 that represents danger, outside agitators, violence and invasion.

Universities and schools are being urged to close early in May; communities of color are told that this is not their concern; merchants are preparing for assault. In reality, NATO/G8 represents the masters of war; it is they who are the greatest purveyors of violence on this earth.

NATO/G8 will not be alone in Chicago: Occupy’s 99% will gather in a festival of life and peace, joy and justice. Two permitted, family-friendly rallies at the Daley Center and marches for justice, jobs, and peace are scheduled on May 18 and 19 (and perhaps another on May 21). Music, dance, teach-ins, and peoples’ tribunals will overflow the parks and theaters.

Image from Occupy All Streets

We will all be there to open Chicago back up. In the spirit of the Arab Spring and Occupy, the Madison labor struggle, the Pelican Bay hunger strikers, teachers and nurses, the Dream youth, returning veterans against the wars, women insisting on reproductive dignity, foreclosure resistance, LGBTQ equality and, many more, Adbusters, CanG8, CodePink, Portoluz, and others have called for people to come from near and far, armed with their spirit and their creativity, pitching their tents and staking their claims.

We’re excited and you’re invited: Come to Chicago, May 18-May 21. Bring a sleeping bag, and if we have room, you can stay with us on the Southside.

Mayor Rahm Emanuel has made it entirely clear that he alone will happily host NATO/G8, but that the 99% are decidedly not welcome. He has funding to further arm and mobilize the police and militarize the city; he has announced plans to contain and suppress demonstrators; he has pushed through legislation that restricts and criminalizes free speech and assembly, and requires insurance for public demonstrations; he is issuing a steady stream of pronouncements about Chicago-under-siege from ominous and dangerous outside forces.

But Chicago is big enough for all — it is after all a nuclear-free and cease-fire city, cradle of the Haymarket martyrs and the eight-hour day, labor and peace actions, vast civil rights and immigration rights manifestations, home of Ida B. Wells Barnett, Jane Addams, Richard Wright, Gwendolyn Brooks, and Studs Terkel.

The rich and the powerful do gather here, but Chicago is a public space with historic parks, monuments, neighborhoods, and streets for popular mobilizations as well — Chicago belongs to all of us.

We underline the right — the moral duty — to dissent and demonstrate, to resist and to be heard, to participatory (not billionaire-paid-for) democracy. Mayor Emanuel can still change course, and he should; so far he has obstinately and foolishly chosen to frame mid-May solely in military and security terms.

The mayor, not the popular resistance, is creating conditions — once again — for a police riot in Chicago against people who have every intention and every right to assemble peacefully deploying humor and music, art and play, civil disobedience and imagination, to forcefully express rejection of imperial and permanent wars, to challenge racial/ethnic/gender discrimination and hate, to demand justice, education, health care, and peace, women- and gender-dignity, the opportunity for meaningful work and reversing epic income disparities, an end to mass incarceration, and the urgent need to shift course and live differently for the sake of the planet and future generations.

Join us in Chicago in May (or, if you can’t come, act in solidarity — Occupy the suburbs, cities, and communities across the land): stand up for civil and human rights, exercise your voice and be a witness, act up and speak out. Be part of a wave of people power, creative direct non-violent action, and the most vast, determined resistance in memory.

History calls!

Occupy the future!

Another world is possible!

[William Ayers is Distinguished Professor of Education and Senior University Scholar at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Bernardine Dohrn is Clinical Associate Professor of Law and Director and founder of the Children and Family Justice Center at Northwestern University. Both Ayers and Dohrn were leaders in SDS and the New Left, and were founders of Weatherman and the Weather Underground. This article was also posted at Bill Ayers. Find more articles by and about Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn on The Rag Blog.]

The Rag Blog

Posted in Rag Bloggers | Tagged , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Richard Raznikov : Battlefield America

Posted on March 8, 2012 by Thorne Dreyer

“Dissent is terrorism.” Art by Anthony Freda / Activist Post.

Battlefield America:
‘We had to make some sacrifices…’

There are no more legal barriers to arrest without warrants, prison without lawyers, condemnation and even execution without trial.

By Richard Raznikov | The Rag Blog | March 8, 2012

There was a declaration in the Congress during the passage of the National Defense Authorization Act, to the effect that in the “war on terror” the United States was a part of the field of battle.

This statement was made by Senator Lindsey Graham, among others. It was consequent to the continuing fantasy that we now live in a “post-9-11 world” which, presumptively, means that the laws which have protected Americans from their government for 200 years no longer apply.

Sorry about your freedom, but we had to make some sacrifices to keep you free.

Because of 9-11, we were told, we needed the grotesquely-named “Patriot Act” which took large pieces out of the Bill of Rights. In order to be safe from the “enemy” we had to give up the Constitution. The Patriot Act was passed as emergency legislation with no debate. The senators and representatives who voted for it did not read it. For that alone, they deserve impeachment and removal from office.

But betraying the country is no longer a crime when it’s done by the government.

It seemed at the time like an odd construction, the insistence that America’s own turf was now a part of the battlefield, but that’s what Graham and others insisted.

There were reasons for this.

For one thing, as the NDAA legislation makes clear, the protection afforded Americans from the use of the army against us, the so-called Posse Comitatus Act, has effectively been nullified. Last month, the army conducted “exercises” with Homeland Security operatives and the L.A. police force in a section of downtown Los Angeles.

For another, by calling the United States part of the battlefield, the president, any president, can direct the army to arrest and detain without trial any citizen “suspected” of actions in “support” of an “enemy.” The person imprisoned with no rights, in violation of the most fundamental clauses of the Constitution, can’t get judicial review and may never be released because the “war” against “terror” is a war which will by definition never end.

Pretty neat trick, huh?

Last time I looked, only fascist countries and totalitarian regimes did these sort of things. I must’ve been mistaken.

A week ago, in testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Steven G. Bradbury, former acting assistant Attorney General, principal deputy for the Office of Legal Counsel, and one of the authors of the infamous Bush “torture memos,” told Senators that an amendment to the NDAA which would exempt American citizens from indefinite detention without charge or trial would be a mistake.

…the evident purpose of the legislation is to prevent the President from detaining as an enemy combatant under the laws of war, without criminal charge, any American citizen or lawful permanent resident of the United States who is apprehended in this country, even if the person is captured while acting as part of a foreign enemy force engaged in acts of war against the United States, such as a U.S.-based terrorist recruit of al Qaeda acting to carry out an armed attack within our borders…

Bradbury believes such a limit would hamper the President in waging the war against terror. America’s a battlefield, he believes, echoing the words of Graham and Chuck Grassley, the senator who brought him in to testify, and that means that anyone on the side of the “enemy” should not be able to count on the protection of the Bill of Rights.

According to an article on the hearing by Kevin Gosztola in Firedoglake, Graham, who was present, “contended the ‘homeland’ was part of the battlefield and reading Miranda rights is not the best way to collect intelligence. He firmly asserted that homegrown terrorism could be a problem and he wanted the legal system to recognize ‘the difference between fighting a crime and fighting a war.'”

No, reading a suspect ‘Miranda rights’ was never the best way to get a confession, either. A rubber hose or simple, repetitive beatings, or simulated drownings, for that matter, could get people to confess to anything just to make it stop. The use of torture, which Obama claimed to oppose but which his administration continues to authorize, is good only for the purpose of satisfying the perverse, sadistic interests of the torturers; nobody in law enforcement thinks it extracts much truth.

Bradbury testified that since President Obama believes he has the authority to order the killing of American citizens in other countries — such as the victims of U.S. targeted drones in Yemen — it doesn’t make sense that such a target could become entitled to constitutional rights simply by “making it to the homeland.”

See where this is going?

If the “war” against “terror” is fought everywhere on earth, and if Americans can be legally killed by order of the President on foreign soil, then the President can order the killing of American citizens anywhere, including the United States.

Attorney General Eric Holder. Image from MSNBC.

That was the point of Lindsey Graham’s continued harping on the “battlefield” terms; that was the point of the NDAA and its lightning-swift passage through a somnolent and hopelessly corrupt Congress which barely raised any questions. If America is part of the battlefield, whatever may be legally done on a battlefield may be done here, right here, maybe in L.A. or Oakland, or wherever you live.

True, the use of drone attacks might have to be minimized; too much political fallout from killing a bunch of neighbors along with the “enemy” suspect.

A year ago, the idea that the President had initiated use of death lists, lists of people who were to be killed by the CIA, was considered fanciful or paranoid. Such a claim in the New Yorker by Pulitzer Prize winner Sy Hersh, drew little public response and no Congressional outcry. Now, it’s a conceded fact. And still very few object.

Now, Attorney General Holder, obviously speaking for Obama, tells Congress that the President has the right to order the assassination of whomever he wants. And if America’s now in a permanent state of war, and if that war is taking place right here, in the Fatherland, then there is nothing to prevent Obama — or any future president — from killing people, or simply letting the army do it.

That is the situation. It’s not exaggerated. Right now, the U.S. uses death lists. Right now, people are targeted for assassination not because of what anyone’s proven them to do but because of what they are said to have done, or even are said to be thinking of doing.

Obama and Holder are telling us that in plain English. Right now, with the Patriot Act and NDAA, the U.S. is considered part of the “battlefield,” which means that the army may do to anyone suspected of wrongful behavior, or of planning such behavior, whatever it wishes. That gives the formerly proscribed act known as prior restraint a whole new meaning.

There are no more legal barriers to arrest without warrants, prison without lawyers, condemnation and even execution without trial. It is a situation so antithetical to what America has by law always been that it is beyond belief. Yet it is so.

Here’s Holder again:

Now, let me be clear. An operation using lethal force in a foreign country targeted against a U.S. citizen who is a senior operational leader of al-Qaeda or associated forces and who is actively engaged in planning to kill Americans would be lawful at least in the following circumstances: first, the U.S. government has determined after a thorough and careful review that the individual poses an imminent threat of violent attack against the United States; second, capture is not feasible; and third, the operation would be conducted in a manner consistent with applicable law of war principles.

The government “has determined.” “Careful review.” “Capture is not feasible.”

And this:

Some have argued that the president is required to get permission from a federal court before taking action against a United States citizen who is a senior operational leader of al-Qaeda or associated forces. This is simply not accurate. Due process and judicial process are not one and the same, particularly when it comes to national security. The Constitution guarantees due process. It does not guarantee judicial process.

If due process under the American system, under the Bill of Rights, does not consist of judicial process, of what does it consist? For Holder and Obama, it consists of their own judgment. Don’t worry. Your government will not mistreat you.

Holder:

Some have called such operations “assassinations.” They are not. And the use of that loaded term is misplaced. Assassinations are unlawful killings. Here, for the reasons that I have given, the U.S. government’s use of lethal force in self-defense against a leader of al-Qaeda or an associated force who presents an imminent threat of violent attack would not be unlawful, and therefore would not violate the executive order banning assassination or criminal statutes.

“Self-defense” against someone who has yet done nothing but who “presents an imminent threat” as determined by, well, by the government.

And Barack Obama, on the heels of drone attacks which have specifically targeted not only individuals, such as the 16-year-old son of Anwar al-Awlaki, but funeral processions and first responders, such as medical teams, had this to say:

I want to make sure that people understand, actually, drones have not caused a huge number of civilian casualties. For the most part, they have been very precise precision strikes against al-Qaeda and their affiliates. And we are very careful in terms of how it’s been applied.

So, I think that there’s this perception somehow that we’re just sending in a whole bunch of strikes willy-nilly. This is a targeted, focused effort at people who are on a list of active terrorists who are trying to go in and harm Americans, hit American facilities, American bases, and so on. It is important for everybody to understand that this thing is kept on a very tight leash.

People who have not attacked America but who “are trying to go in and harm Americans” based on the secret information that we have. The President wants people to understand.

I understand, all right. Here’s Hina Shamsi, an ACLU lawyer, on Democracy Now!:

President Obama has used more targeted killings than the Bush administration ever did. And we do not have the memos, the Office of Legal Counsel memos, that justify the targeted killing policy. And so, very disappointingly, we see the administration claiming a broad and dangerous authority without adequate public transparency, disclosure, and refusing to defend its authority in the courts.

We do not get to see the memos, the memos that “justify” murdering, that is using “lethal force” against Americans, drafted by a government agency. Thanks for the transparency, Mr. President, that you promised. But don’t worry, we trust you. You would never lie to us. You would never violate the constitution. You want to make sure that people understand.

I understand, all right, and so do plenty of other people. This Constitution means something to us, brother, and we’re not giving it up just yet.

[Rag Blog contributor Richard Raznikov is an attorney practicing in San Rafael, California. He blogs at News from a Parallel World. Find more articles by Richard Raznikov on The Rag Blog.]

The Rag Blog

Posted in Rag Bloggers | Tagged , , , , , , , | 1 Comment