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November 8, 2003

HOW DOES DEMOCRACY GROW?

Last night we watched the DVD of "Amandla! A Revolution in Four Part Harmony". "Amandla" translates as "power to the people!" It's a marvelous story of the co-evolution of music and liberation in South Africa.

The South African experience is the best lesson in freedom inherited from the last half of the 20th Century. It was a heroic struggle against a terrible and mighty regime. It inspired worldwide support that thwarted Apartheid's imperial alliances and facilitated the popular democratic victory. Nor was this a solitary phenomenon, just the best among many similar lessons of how people power is the only successful road to democracy: from the downfall of tyrants Marcos and Ceausescu to the most recent ouster of a Bolivian autocrat, with many other examples along the way. The outcomes are not uniform and idyllic, but democratic opportunities are born of the desires and actions of popular movements.

Whatever George W. Bush means by "democracy", it has nothing in common with "Amandla". Democracy isn't transplanted by military conquest and occupation of a country that is not waging war and has neither the will nor the "weapons of mass destruction" to constitute a threat. What grows in such soil is resistance to the occupier. Hatred of a deposed tyrant doesn't translate to acceptance of domination by foreign armies and corporations.

The Bush formula is not new. It inherits a long, failed history of bloodshed and hypocrisy. Colonial and imperialist powers trumpeted their missions as extending freedom and democracy to the uncivilized. They brought havoc and generations of tragedy instead! Democracy by that route was never more than a facade, and not even that in most instances.

Sharing the shameful legacy of failed empires portends sharing their fate— unless we exercise our own democracy to rid the White House of the addicts of war and empire.

November 16, 2003

HEED THE ALARM

The alarm has sounded loud and clear, and the Bush team is scrambling.

The worry that surpasses all others is that their grandiose aims can be aborted if they lose the election in November 2004. Everything they do in the next 12 months, in foreign and domestic affairs, is going to be dominated by a fanatic desire not to be denied their perceived destiny. Whatever it takes, they want four more years to consolidate autocratic one-party rule.

The growing panic in the Bush Administration is not a sign that it is prepared to give ground on its long-term "iron-hammer" strategies of war and domination abroad and at home. But its arrogant confidence of some months past will give way to maneuvers and retreats aimed at reversal of the spreading antagonism and distrust that threaten its future. That's the strategy of the hastily revised plan for Iraq, timed to declare an end to US occupation a few months before the 2004 elections. It's a frantic adjustment to erosion of public support in the face of the casualties, the general sense of lies and failure evoked by its Iraq mission. But there is no intention whatsoever to give up the actual military occupation. Just as the Bush strategists concluded belatedly that they should try to get the UN to provide cover for what would remain a US occupation, they now anticipate an "invitation" from a contrived Iraqi "government" for long-term US military control of Iraq as the base for extending domination over the Middle East.

At home, it's time to expect a revival of "compassionate conservatism", although tied to totally partisan scheming. So the GOP flamboyantly flies its prescription benefit and energy programs, while under the radar it subverts Medicare, pursues absolute control of the courts, and strangles civil liberties. The GOP knows it can't win a presidential election by touting its retrograde program for a rightwing fundamentalist autocracy, but beneath "compassion's" outreach to voters, the grip on the iron hammer is firm.

Which brings me to the letter we got a couple of week's ago from Terence McAuliffe for the Democratic National Committee. In three pages, he lists the main issues for the campaign to defeat Bush. I had to rub my eyes and reread— nowhere does he mention the war, what led up to it, or what flows from it!

There is no way Bush can be beat without challenging the disastrous course he has chosen for America. McAuliffe and like-minded "leadership" strategists apparently fear a groundswell of support for a presidential candidate who will say what more and more Americans are thinking: "We were fooled into an ugly war that never had to happen." What is needed from an American president is not a shift in tactics and rhetoric, but a strategic change of course. What's happening in Iraq, like the continuing tragedy in Israel and Palestine, is exactly what an occupying power cannot evade: the unstoppable sacrifice of young lives, the spilling of innocent blood, growing hatred for the occupier, isolation from most of the world, and ultimate failure.

Karl Rove and company will seek to deflect and diminish the whole range of vital domestic issues, especially applying smoke and mirrors to rosy up economic perceptions. Bush is vulnerable in most areas, and his presidential opposition needs to be confidently multidimensional. But to fail to confront him strongly on the war, the occupation and America's place in the world would be to repeat the timidity and defensiveness that gave Bush the White House in 2000. Worse, it would be acquiescing to a certain renewal of warlike adventurism and dictatorial ambitions in a second Bush term.

November 22, 2003

VISE OF TERROR

The world is caught in a vise of terror. Bush's counter to the horrendous terror in Istanbul is that we have far bigger bombs than Al Qaide and will use them with greater abandon in Baghdad. To most of the world, that is not just an obvious non sequitur; it is insanity. It is the madness that offers war in Iraq, whatever its actual objectives, as the "answer" to the massacre of innocents in New York, Bali, Tel Aviv, and Riyadh.

The danger for us in the United States is that too many Americans may see the "war on terror" as "Bush's way or no way". The measure of support that Bush retains (as with Sharon among Israelis) rests on propagating the misperception that war or surrender is our only choice. With that goes the image of Bush as the indispensable war chief and relentless foe of terrorism.

The worst of it is that Bush's course dramatically reduces other options and closes off "exit strategies" (as Orville Schell explains so well.) The more irrelevant the occupation of Iraq appears as a response to terrorism, and the more dangerous the occupation becomes, the less likely that the UN or any "coalition" will pull Bush's chestnuts out of the fire.

It is a travesty that the man whose actions have only driven the world further into dysfunctional violence and war should pose as the chief symbol of humanity's horror over the murderous blasts at Istanbul's synagogues and in its central district. Karl Rove chose this very time to launch election ads charging that opposition to Bush equals a lack of patriotic fervor against terrorism. The simple fact is that no American president would fail to direct our resources to hunting down those who plan and execute terror attacks against civilians. (Put aside for the moment assassinations, mass murders and coups spawned by the CIA and "client" terrorists over many years.).

Further, where Bush has failed spectacularly, others could do far better. Let us count the ways. Instead of pursuing a perpetual so-called "war on terrorism", the problem would be viewed both for its immediate urgency and with the perspective of changing the long-term picture. In the short run, preventive and protective actions at home would gain public trust if an administration did not exploit the issue to build fear, cancel constitutional rights, control elections, and pursue partisan advantage for a regressive social agenda. Certainly international cooperation would be enhanced if the issue were disentangled from appeals for troops and support to war, occupation and global US dominance. War and occupation inevitably evoke legitimate resistance, including violence, as well as criminal acts of terror against civilians.

No real "exit strategy" from the present mess of war and mounting terror, from isolation and worldwide antagonism, will come from the Bush Administration. The emergency exit the country needs to find is from the strategy and program of this administration.

In the long run, a safer world can come if there is a positive change in the international climate. Nothing will eliminate forever the presence on this planet of warmongers and addicts of terrorism. Their activity and ability to poison human relations can be made effectively insignificant only if they are rejected decisively by the people whom they claim to champion. That can only happen in a world that moves to an agenda of survival, of greater equality and justice, of action on human needs. As an example, the recent Geneva Accord initiated at a non-governmental level by both Israelis and Palestinians lessens the despair within both populations that violence will never end. In contrast, missiles, tanks, bulldozers and fences have only assured continuing catastrophe.

The political elites in Washington and London tout terror as the world's number one problem, but their corporate-run world is terror's home. When the unique strength and influence of the United States is responsive to the hopes of the human majority, when it joins the world community on equal terms rather than aspiring to be its superpower master, the climate will become permanently inhospitable to war and all other forms of terror.

Istanbul renews great alarm over what can happen almost anywhere. But while the hunt for bin Laden and company is heightened, we need to put our hopes in safer hands and in a saner vision than those of George W. Bush and company.

December 5, 2003

VISITING GALILEO AND HIS DAUGHTER

I just shed tears for a father and his daughter who died over three and a half centuries ago. That's what Dava Sobel's book, "Galileo's Daughter", did to me.

I cry easily since Carla died. But this was more than being touched by the timeless love of parent and child. This was a feeling that I was witness to a monumental human tragedy, the cruel and unending suffering imposed by tyrannical religious power on one of the greatest minds of all time and on his truly remarkable daughter. Most people know the bare elements of the Galileo story, that the Inquisition compelled Galileo to renounce the proposition that the earth circles the sun and is not the center of the universe. The Church's impact on Galileo, however, was much more than the banning of his "Dialogues" and the persecution that followed. Religious oppression was a pervasive force throughout Galileo's life and times. He had to profess his piety obsequiously and endlessly, even though religion was unrelated or contradictory to his scientific thinking and discoveries.

Was a mind as phenomenal as Galileo's able to accept the bible literally as the Pope demanded? Underneath all the compulsory display of religious fealty, was he really a believer? In a letter written under house arrest near the end of his life, he responds to a threat from the Inquisitor to "take me back to the actual prison of the Holy Office": "From which I can infer that my present confinement is to be terminated only by that other one which is common to all, most narrow, and enduring forever." That doesn't sound like a man who expected an after life, either in heaven or hell.

Galileo loved his daughter dearly, and respected highly the superior intelligence and character so evident in her letters. Yet she was confined, with his other daughter, in a convent where life was extremely harsh and miserable. That, too, was mandated by social and religious custom, since Galileo and the mother of his daughters were not married. The letters of the daughter, Suor Maria Celeste, corrected a false impression that I had from seeing a recent play about Galileo, namely that she acted as overseer to guarantee that he faithfully carried out the penance rituals that were part of his punishment. Devout as she was, her letters show nothing but devotion to him and his scientific work, as well as deep resentment of the persecution unjustly meted out to him.

I often think about religion in today's world and Sobel's book gives me the urge to open up some thoughts that usually go unexpressed.

The distance in personal liberty between the United States and Seventeenth Century Italy is as spaces that separate planets. Our safeguard against religious tyranny is built upon founding principles of freedom of thought and expression and on the separation of church and state. But appreciation of those principles by the powers that be, in government and in our social environment, appears now to be at low ebb. It's not just the persistent efforts of the "Christian Right", actually spearheaded by the President, to break down barriers to imposition of religious ritual in public schools and institutions and to institute public financing of private religious agencies. It's the whole atmosphere that demeans as it glorifies religion, that injects it everywhere, that equates religious self-righteousness with patriotism: God blesses America and Americans above all others; He gives us our "mission" in the world and sanctifies our wars; He even decides who should (and who should not) score touchdowns and hit home runs. As our President repeatedly tells us, our liberty and all our virtues come straight from God.

We recognize religious tyranny when it is practiced blatantly and brutally by the Taliban. But we're blind to more subtle forms of thought control and intimidation in our society.

My complaint is not with millions of people who consider their religion as the source of their morality. It's the failure to leave room and equal respect for those whose human values are not defined by religious belief. Society makes it far more acceptable to believe than not to believe. A survey reported in yesterday's San Francisco Chronicle finds that some 29 million Americans "answer 'none' or 'no religion' when pollsters ask them their religious affiliation." Some may simply not identify with any church. Others may simply not believe in God. A lot of the responders may have named a religious identification when polled because admitting to being an atheist or agnostic is to risk shocking one's neighbors. Look at the opprobrium that descends on those who object to the inclusion of "under God" in the pledge of allegiance.

And what about the impact of this stifling climate on children? Are they outcasts if they and their parents don't conform to ritual? The fact is that it is easier to believe the most outlandish myths without fear of challenge than to deny belief in some supernatural "supreme being".

These are just a few thoughts on a touchy and complicated subject. They are not matters of highest priority for me in these critical times. Galileo and his daughter led me to vent some of my inner feelings on this occasion. Still, I sure would like to see the Galileo story studied in depth in every school and college. It could be brought forward in history with a viewing of Arthur Miller's "The Crucible", and brought up to date with a keen look at what's coming out of Washington.

December 14, 2003

Today is the day I picked to write a requested 300-word article on the 2004 elections. It won't appear until February, so I note my limitations as clairvoyant.

As a reminder of political volatility, today's capture of Saddam Hussein is a thunderclap. Saddam should be put on trial by the Iraqi people. An instantaneous round up of experts by the New York Times predicts a "big lift" for Bush. Says Professor Lichtman of American University: "My first reaction was, you might as well call off the election." Even today, however, it's doubtful that huge questions about the war and occupation, and the Bush Administration itself, can be made to disappear underneath the headlines. As of yesterday, a Newsweek poll showed that more Americans wanted Bush defeated in 2004 (50%) than favored him for a second term (45%).

While the vast majority of progressives and liberals supported Gore over Bush in the 2000 elections, Michael Moore and many other strong voices on the Left argued that it didn't matter much whether Bush or Gore won. It didn't take long for the Bush Administration to change Michael Moore's mind and to convince almost everyone on the Left that the Bush crowd is really something special. In fact, most see Bush's wars at home and abroad as a crusade to create a rightist autocracy, to reverse the social advances of three-quarters of a century, and to use unlimited military power, including nuclear armaments, to force the world into compliance with superpower rule.

The drive for total power by the extreme right dominates the political challenges and choices before us. Dissatisfaction about where the Bush Administration is taking the country has already had one important political consequence. Despite frenzied efforts by conservatives who have controlled the Democratic Leadership Council, grass roots movement is assuring that Bush will face serious opposition in 2004. At this point, the candidate is unlikely to be Lieberman or any other Bush-lite type. Continued pressure can shape a candidacy that rallies the popular will for reversing the current destructive course.

Wow! There go 300 words— 351 in fact.

December 19, 2003

THE "STOP DEAN" GANG-UP

There's more to the attack on Howard Dean by some top Democrats than the familiar primary game of gang-up on the front-runner. Personally, whether or not the candidate chosen is Dean, I hope the winner is one who tells the whole truth about the Bush Administration and its wars at home and abroad. I hope it's someone willing to chart a genuinely new direction before it's too late.

That's not what Senator Lieberman, Al From of the Democratic Leadership Council and former Senator Bob Kerry of the Progressive Policy Institute in Washington want. They want a candidate, as Kerry said yesterday on NPR, who supports Bush's decision to invade Iraq while criticizing his inept diplomacy and rhetoric. They also want to play it "soft" on the domestic record— taxes, Medicare, civil liberties abuses. They want to show that Democrats can match the Administration's fear-mongering exploitation of the "war on terrorism"

The so-called "centrist" approach brings to mind the most incredible aspect of the 2000 presidential campaign. The country had just suffered through a GOP Congress that created historic excesses in partisan sabotage, capped by Newt Gingrich's attempted total shutdown of government and the frenzied effort to oust the President. Was there ever a more unpopular and partisan Congressional leadership? Yet, the DLC strategists deleted that issue, and allowed the "Compassionate Conservative" to pin the label of Washington's "partisan politics" on the Donkey! It's to Al Gore's credit that he learned that sad lesson and has spoken out so clearly at the outset of the 2004 campaign.

The DLC operatives portray the differences in the Democratic Party as a center vs. left debate on "how to win". The questions are much deeper. They concern whether Democrats identify with the aims of the Bush Administration while offering limited criticism as the "loyal opposition". Critics like Tom Friedman accept as a given that the Bush Administration, acting for the USA, necessarily has fine intentions (spreading democracy), 'if only they could do it right'. But the motives and objectives of the Bush Administration ought not to be taken as an American consensus. They have more to do with enforcing absolute control for a plutocratic elite over world and domestic "order".

The fact that the United Sates is the most powerful country in the world, the only current "superpower", has a profound effect on our politics and attitudes. This is most dangerous in the grandiose and bellicose ambitions of this Administration. That's why defeating a second term for Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and Ashcroft is the democratic priority above all others. But the problem of pervasive super nationalism is not just a GOP sickness. To the extent that it permeates the national psyche, it undermines the great good that the United States could do in the world, not least for its own people.

It would be a shame if the will of Democratic voters is derailed by "practical" politicians who cater to Bush's pre-emptive war doctrine, who justify war and occupation, who agree that we have the exclusive right to load up on nuclear weapons. The "center" they stake out is a lane on the Bush highway.

January 6, 2004

AL FROM'S DOUBLE TROUBLE

On the day that Bill Bradley joined Al Gore in endorsing Howard Dean, Al From of the Democratic Leadership Council came on the Lehrer News Hour to push the "Stop Dean" crusade.

Regardless of who may win the nomination, the bitter gang-up against Dean by From, Lieberman, and others has two dimensions. The first, which I talked about on December 19th, has to do with the direction of the country. The second has to do with the direction of the Democratic Party. Al From sounds more worried about losing control of the Party than he is about where the Bush Administration is taking America.

While the attacks on Dean are ferocious, I think the Dean campaign, not Dean himself, is From's real concern. Starting with the massive anti-war movement in opposition to the invasion of Iraq, a popular storm is sweeping into the political arena. The Dean campaign is the most creative and effective, but Kucinich supporters have also tapped into the new energy, as have innovative non-party political action movements like Move On. The floor may be shaking under the inner sanctums of professional party control.

It's so important that grassroots democracy not be overridden in the coming months. Only that can guarantee a serious challenge to Bush in 2004. Beyond that, well into the future, only massively organized and creative expression of the popular will can prevent new misadventures and realize hopes for better times.

January 21, 2004

ELECTIONS AND THE WAR

I recently heard one of the many-too-many media interviews with Richard Perle and David Frum. The super-hawks were peddling their book: "An End to Evil: How to Win the War on Terror". Asked what was the most important single thing for the future of "the war", Frum answered: 'the reelection of Bush, without which nothing….'

Avoiding the possibility of an upset in November 2004 is the top priority in every single move the Administration will make between now and then. Every word and every action will be vetted through Karl Rove's lenses.

That is bound to influence how the Administration handles the "war on terror" and the invasion and occupation of Iraq. They want their concept of a nation at war for the foreseeable future to be accepted as a given, including by the Democrats, who would thus be reduced to the supporting role of "loyal opposition". At the same time, they will try to make it appear that the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have "sent a message" throughout the Middle East and elsewhere that removes for the time being any "need" for new military adventures against "rogue states". They are willing now (in fact, desperate) to involve the UN to some extent in Iraq and to carry out what will be heralded as turning over "sovereignty" a few months before our November elections. Their hope is to have it both ways: to dominate the elections with the aura of a nation at war, and to remove war as an election issue. They don't want their strategies of pre-emptive war, nuclear weapons' use, and permanent military occupations to loom large in the election debates.

No doubt this makes it more difficult to sustain outrage over the Iraq war and the huge lies the Bush Administration used to bring it on. This is reflected already in the ambiguity that appeared in the Iowa Caucuses. Before the voting, most Democrats declared strong opposition to the Iraq war; yet eighty per cent opted for candidates who initially supported Bush on the war and the Patriot Act. Of course, given the gleeful media exploitation of Howard Dean's disappointing performance, it should be said that the remarkable surge of grass-roots anti-war sentiment and organization convinced Kerry and others (unlike Lieberman) that the Democratic nominee had to stand against Bush on the war. What then became paramount at the caucuses was voters' estimates of which candidate seemed to be the best bet to beat Bush.

As expected, the chief operatives of the Democratic Leadership Council are jumping on Iowa to argue that Iraq and "the war on terror" should go unchallenged, just as the Bush campaign strategists wish. Certainly there are too many urgent domestic and foreign policy issues to allow the electoral outcome to ride on any one-note campaign. But it is folly to suppose that Bush can be defeated without confronting his war program as emphatically as his domestic program of service to the super rich, his stark failures on jobs, civil liberties, health care, and the environment.

This is a stealth administration. It talks "compassionate conservatism" at election time, while it serves side orders of red meat to its ultra reactionary social base. So, too, it may appear to pull in its horns on its aggressive military and imperial ambitions, and may even make token gestures to bring some troops home before the elections. But don't doubt its determination to sustain a long-term military occupation of Iraq. Once the election pause is over, if Bush wins, the futile crusade to bring the world to heel goes into high gear again— now with a different America, effectively subjected to autocratic one-party rule.

The unconscionable loss of life in Iraq is not the only reason, but it is reason enough, to make Bush's responsibility for the war and the need to end the occupation a cardinal electoral issue. Beyond that, the most important question of this first decade of the 21st Century is how the United States relates to the rest of the world.

January 29, 2004

FOOLS' WAR?

Everyone (not quite) was fooled— but which fools rushed to war?

After David Kay's damning admission of the absence of WMD in Iraq, the feeble line of defense is that everyone believed weapons were there: the "intelligence community", the Clinton Administration, the French, the Germans and the Russians.

But only one set of "the fooled" demanded WAR and vilified everyone else, the vast majority of humanity that dissented. The UN inspectors could not be trusted…the French were traitors…Rumsfeld knew exactly where the weapons were…Cheney and Powell claimed connection with Al Qaeda...Bush saw a mushroom cloud on the horizon.

It was the Bush Administration— not the Clinton Administration, and certainly not the UN— whose answer was WAR from its very first day in power. "Ignorance" is no excuse for war. In fact, that's another deception. The war and occupation were not a miscalculation, but the product of an open and deliberate strategy of pre-emptive war and imperial ambition.

This Administration cannot be allowed to pass off its awful burden of responsibility as "faulty information" and common error.

February 6, 2004

"INTELLIGENCE" AND THE WAR OF CHOICE

Poor "intelligence"? Maybe.

Unjustifiable war of choice? Beyond reasonable doubt!

Above all else, what has to be answered for is the predetermined choice for war in Iraq. Before 9/11, unrelated to Al Qaeda, Iraq was the immediate priority in the strategic doctrine of pre-emptive war and global dominance. The ideologues of the Bush Doctrine advertised their blueprint for a "New American Century" built on overwhelming military advantage, especially in nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction. But even at this early stage, failure is overtaking their strategic plan. With the elections nearing, they are desperate to divert debate from the unexpected cost in lives and chaos of the Iraq war, the WMD fiasco, the loss of credibility due to systematic deceit and hysteria, the sharp rise of international antagonism and the clear evidence that military might doesn't quell terrorism.

So, even as Bush reluctantly appoints a panel to examine "intelligence", the design is to turn attention away from bad judgment and illegitimate actions to a flawed information process. The ploy is "bipartisan" oversight of "intelligence", rather than placing responsibility for war. Congress has never had a serious debate on Bush's doctrine of preemptive war, and Karl Rove doesn't want it before November (or ever).

As to what we did or didn't know before going to war, some things are obvious without awaiting the President's panel. It isn't true that everyone thought there was, in Bush's words, a "grave and gathering threat". As it turns out, Hans Blix and the UN inspectors were closer to the truth: unable to find WMD, they reserved judgment and asked for more time.

Against the judgment of the large majority of governments, and over the protests of the majority of people in every nation, Bush chose war. The responsibility for that, and its consequences, belongs with his administration. And that judgment must be made by the voters, not postponed for a post-election report by the President's select panel.

Iraq should be where the doctrine of pre-emptive war meets its end, not the prelude to four more years of reckless adventures and disasters.

February 25, 2004

MARRIAGE AND "THE PASSION"

You don't have to be gay or a woman to feel under assault from the White House.

God has spoken to George W. Bush, Pat Robertson, and Mel Gibson and they are instructed to inflict their intrusive and violent codes of intolerance on the rest of us. Andy Rooney, on last Sunday's "60 Minutes", claimed God spoke to him too and, thank Goodness, the message he got was the very opposite of what Pat heard from Him. (I sometimes wonder why great artists and scientists never get personal calls from Above.)

On George W's demand for a Constitutional Amendment to save the institution of marriage from the gays who want to share in it, why stop there? No marriage I know of has been threatened by what gays do or don't do. But what about adultery? It's against the law in many states, but it goes on anyway. Time for the President to add that to an omnibus of amendments he and his father have favored: to save the flag from burning, to ban abortion, to sanctify school prayer and to abolish gay marriage. And how about changing the Constitution so that Prince Arnold can take over when George W's reign is over? Why not let Scalia and Thomas rewrite the Constitution altogether?

Even lame humor seems out of place when reflecting on Gibson's "Passion". The main villains in this horribly violent and concocted depiction of Christ's execution are Jews and the Jewish High Priest. That has no relevance to anti-Semitism; it's simply the truth if you accept the Gospels According to Mel. Tell that to anyone who knows history, who knows the terror and mayhem of pogroms, the demonization of the mythical "Christ killers" throughout the ages.

But what really gets to me about the "passion" of the fundamentalists, whose leader occupies the White House, is their intrusiveness, their sermonizing and proselytizing, their assumption of a divine right to impose their biases on all Americans. Gibson and the Christian Right have turned this movie into a crusade, a gigantic promotion of fundamentalist doctrine. No one can avoid the inundation. Jews, Muslims, non-believers— and most Christians— have reason to feel darn uncomfortable. We're being invaded. Our privacy, our diverse beliefs, our equality are assaulted.

I suppose this too shall pass, but only when the majority of Americans say "Enough!" Hard-won freedoms are our birthright. George W. should keep his hands off the Constitution.

Mel Gibson? The only antidote is not to be cowed by the extravagant sales job, to speak our varied truths, and to keep tolerance, diversity, and hope alive.

February 27, 2004

Now that I'm writing occasional brief Op-Eds, many things that are on my mind don't make it to my web page. Here are a few notes in a nutshell so that gaps on the website don't imply indifference:

There is the awful spectacle in Haiti, the great powers watching as another country that they have starved into chaos is ravaged by armed thugs and murderers. The arms come from the USA via the Dominican Republic, as the Bush Administration does what other administrations have done before to democratically elected governments in Guatemala and Chile…

There is the brutal wall that is a mausoleum where hopes for Israeli-Palestinian peace would be interred. Bringing down the wall and support for the Geneva Accords is the only humane and sensible way forward…

There is the hubbub around Ralph Nader's decision to run. I won't vote for him, nor will just about everyone who is focused on ousting the Bush regime. It's highly unlikely that the election will hang on the balance of Nader's votes. However, I think hysteria over his candidacy only adds to an undemocratic exclusionary climate that restricts alternative views and initiatives for electoral reform…

There is the cold wind of thought control as Administration agencies censor and override science in favor of ultra-right prejudices and corporate interests. Many leading scientists sounded the alarm in the report released last week by the Union of Concerned Scientists. About time…

There is the brazen executive appointment of racist judges in contempt of established democratic process. I had thought the Bush team would be featuring "compassion" more than "red meat" in this election season. So far that prediction is off the mark.

March 2, 2004

THE MASSACRES IN IRAQ

Today's horrific massacres of Shiites in Iraq and Pakistan destroy any simplistic notions about the conflicts of our times and the particular struggle in Iraq.

For the people of Iraq, rebuilding a sovereign nation and a decent life means both resisting US military occupation and beating back the religious fundamentalists who commit mass murder and incite civil war. That's an enormous challenge.

Sovereignty and democratic progress can never be accomplished by US military occupation and economic control, which has made Iraq the magnate for ceaseless conflict and bloodshed. War and occupation— whether by the US in Iraq, or Israel in Palestine, or Russia in Chechnya— aggravate underlying problems and yield alienation, suffering, and internecine ethnic bloodletting.

The Iraqi people need support and massive assistance. Can it come from the United Nations? It should, but that can only happen if the UN has the main responsibility, not the Pentagon, Halliburton and Bechtel. What's needed is the US cooperating at the service of the UN (which refused to join Bush's war) instead of the UN serving under the heel of a provocative US military and economic command.

No matter how desperate the situation, the Administration will do everything to hold on to its military occupation and control. Only the people of Iraq and the people of the United States can change that.

And that can happen only as the majority of Americans recognize we have been misled into a quagmire, and that permanent war can neither end terrorism nor foster democracy.

March 17, 2004

Today Alameda TV introduces a new program, ON MY MIND, on its community access channel 31. I have been invited to make monthly comments on topics of my choosing. The text of the first video production follows. It will be repeated each Wednesday at 7pm until it is replaced by a new presentation in April.

ON MY MIND

I've been given the chance in these monthly TV spots to say what's ON MY MIND, to compose little editorials about the news, our country and our times.

"Is the country on the right path or the wrong path?" That's one of the questions public opinion pollsters ask. In the last month or two, better than 50% say "wrong"! And I for one am in that new majority.

It's easy for me to think positive thoughts about our country and what has made it great. It's hard for me to guess why some people should believe we're headed in the "right" direction. What could be "right" about going to war under false and misleading assumptions? What's right about a chronic loss of jobs? About deficits galloping out of control? About a health care crisis with millions uninsured? About the enormous power of corporate wealth over what does or doesn't happen in Washington? The questions are too many to list here, so let's spend these few minutes on the war.

In my 82 years, I have seen some noble causes triumph and some false ones foisted on a deceived public. Nothing equals the deception and misinformation surrounding the war and quagmire of Iraq. No one in Washington takes responsibility. The claim is that everyone believed the same mistaken "intelligence", so no one is at fault. That's not true. For one thing, Hans Blix and the UN inspectors said there was no evidence for weapons of mass destruction. They reserved judgment and pleaded for more time. But the President and his advisers claimed to see a mushroom cloud in the making. Secretaries Rumsfeld and Powell told the world we knew exactly where the WMD were to be found.

But to claim that most people were fooled begs the question of responsibility. Only one set of the supposedly "fooled" could not wait to launch a war— virtually alone in the world, in the face of massive protests and rejection by the overwhelming majority of nations. Never in my memory has the United States experienced such isolation, near universal antagonism, and so severe a crisis in credibility.

Of course, the Administration was committed to war in Iraq from the beginning. The plan was there well before 9/ll, the fearful tragedy that did not involve Iraq. The real reasons were strategic, and what a bloody bad strategy it is proving to be. The strategy is the doctrine of pre-emptive war, based on our enormous military force as the world's only superpower. Iraq was to be the proving ground, but is proving instead to be the doctrine's failure.

Well, the cynics say, it doesn't really matter that we went to war for the wrong reason. We got rid of Saddam. Yet oppressed people have gotten rid of their tyrants, with help from the world community, but without inviting invasion and foreign occupation: the apartheid regime in South Africa, Marcos in the Philippines, Ceausescu in Romania, to name a few who were no better or worse than Saddam. Our record in Iraq, as in so many other places, was to build up the bad guy in the 1980s when Cheney and Rumsfeld considered him an ally, and to turn away while mass graves were being filled during the uprising against Saddam after the Gulf War.

In this new century, there is no future for any country, even one as great as ours, in military occupations and empire building. Tyrants are hated, but so are occupiers. Conquest breeds terrorism. International responsibilities are undermined, not served, when one or a few governments make war in disregard of international law and opinion. That's not the right course for America, and we should change it.

I hope Iraq is where the doctrine of pre-emptive war meets its end, not the prelude to future misdirected and disastrous gambles.

March 18, 2004

20TH CENTURY WAR MOTIF

When the Bush Administration declared "the war against terrorism", it said this was a very different kind of war, not to be fought like the wars of the 20th Century. Yet it seems to have believed that an invasion and conquest of Iraq (which was not implicated in the atrocities of September 11, 2001) was somehow the key to defeating Al Qaeda. Ulterior motives have driven that obsession in defiance of universal dissent. And now there is increasingly bloody proof that winning a super 20th Century-style blitzkrieg in Iraq is indeed not the way to overcome terrorism. Terrorism has proliferated, not only in Iraq, but in Istanbul, Bali, Riyadh, Tel Aviv and Madrid.

Still the Bush Administration focuses on the military occupation of Iraq and on accumulating unlimited arsenals of nuclear and all other weapons of mass destruction. Instead of collective international measures to prevent and pre-empt terrorist actions against civilians, billions upon billions are spent on weapons for war on earth and in space against hypothetical enemy nations. Even though there is no military rival anywhere in sight, we have far more killing power than all other nations together. War in Iraq has killed and maimed thousands, including our own mounting casualties, while we claim to have killed several hundred Al Qaeda militants worldwide. Making matters worse well into the future, the process of pre-emptive war is producing an endless supply of youth ready to give their lives against the United States and its friends. The Bush Administration has conjured a distorted "war against terrorism" to project a vision of a "nation at war" without end. As long as we stay the present course, war is the excuse for every failure, at home as well as abroad.

It's time to listen rather than to bully and condemn almost everyone else. It is arrogant and deceptive for our government to pose as the only one in the world concerned with public safety from terrorist actions. The necessary will to curb terrorism has to be put in a context other than war and conquest. That context is getting on with the important business of cooperation to improve the lives of people. A good start would be to stop diverting the nation's wealth to aggressive wars and massive arsenals of weapons of mass destruction that are useless for combating terrorism— but instead carry forward the 20th Century's horrible legacies of war and imperialism.

March 31, 2004

(This was published as an Op-Ed piece in the SF Chronicle , April 5, 2004)

HIDING IN THE WHITE HOUSE

It's now almost nine months since someone at the White House broke the law by telling columnist Robert Novak that Joseph Wilson's wife worked for the CIA. This was retaliation for Wilson's unwelcome revelation that Iraq's supposed purchase of uranium from Niger was already known to be a fraud when President Bush included it in his January, 2003 State of the Union speech.

For a long time after going to war (ostensibly) to find and destroy Iraq's "weapons of mass destruction", we were told the reason WMD eluded discovery is that Iraq is so big— 'WMD could be hidden anywhere in a country as vast as California.'

But how big is the White House? Why can't the culprit of the vindictive leak of a CIA agent's identity be found? Is someone in the White House keeping secrets from the boss? What does the President know? Is the guilty party (or parties) too high up? Isn't there anyone down the line willing to fall on his sword?

The reasonable answer is that the Wilson episode just happens to be the way this White House deals with critics, something now proven too often to escape notice. The messenger of bad news for the White House is personally attacked and punished. Each charge is treated in isolation from similar, corroborative revelations from independent sources. Then the formula is to allow the particular story to fade from public view.

The latest case in point is Richard Clarke. All the fury against Clarke blows a screen of smoke over truths that would seem almost impossible to hide: that the war in Iraq was an obsession that had nothing to do with a threat from WMD or combating Al Qaeda; that it expanded terrorist operations and heightened worldwide antagonism and distrust of the United States. The Bush people want desperately to avoid public focus on the central part of Clarke's charge, that the war and occupation of Iraq have made us and the world far less safe.

They hope that they can separate the Clarke story from the whole story— that by going one-on-one to nullify Clarke, no one will notice the long line of corroborative insider witnesses preceding him: Scott Ritter, Joseph Wilson, Paul O'Neil, and David Kay, as well as Hans Blix. But the line of damning evidence is even longer than the line of witnesses, from the disastrous news and mounting casualties in Iraq and from the dangerous repercussions elsewhere.

Anyway, it might be worth reminding the non-inquisitive media that the scoundrel who broke the law to get Wilson's wife is still in hiding in the White House. He or she or they should be easier to find than Iraq's WMD.

April 11, 2004

YES, DR. RICE, IT'S ABOUT "STRATEGY"

The story line of Condoleezza Rice's testimony before the 9/11 panel was uncomplicated: 'George W. Bush has always been in full command; he made no mistakes; we bear no responsibility; we have absolutely nothing to apologize for.'

Most Americans, and certainly the families of those who died on September 11, 2001, are finding that concoction impossible to swallow. But there were messages below the story line in Dr. Rice's testimony that should be even more disturbing. She boasts that Bush has little patience for tactics ("swatting flies"). "Strategy" and "structure" for a "nation at war"— words Rice kept repeating— are what the Bush Administration is about.

Unfortunately, the criticism of Bush by most "top" Democrats is confined to tactics— how ineptly Bush is running the war and the affairs of the nation— not the strategy and aims of this Administration. It would be very bad for the country if the official Democratic line on the Iraq war and occupation boils down to: "we would have done it better."

Before 9/ll, the Bush team was preoccupied with strategic and structural transformation geared to its pre-emptive war doctrine. The disaster that occurred on that day became the opportunity for implementation. The disasters that are occurring today in Iraq, and in our country's relation to the world, are the fruit of strategic choices made under the umbrella of Bush's misnamed "war against terrorism".

As the debacle of Bush's war fixation unfolds, will the Kerry campaign focus on the heart of the matter? Will it say it was wrong to launch this war? Will it challenge the deadly doctrine of pre-emptive wars and occupation of foreign lands? Will it say that structuring America for permanent war cannot advance democracy abroad, but is in fact the most serious threat ever mounted against our own constitutional democracy? Will it reject the Administration's scorn for international law and its mantra that terrorism necessitates "war rather than law enforcement"?

If the American people knew a year or more ago what we know now, more than 650 dead Americans and thousands of dead Iraqis would still be alive. There would have been no war. While the Bush Administration is properly castigated for refusal to accept responsibility and never admitting mistakes, it is time for those Democrats who allowed themselves to be misled and intimidated into authorizing war to say in all honesty: "It was wrong to go along."

What would be the response if John Kerry said today what Senator Robert Byrd has said so eloquently from the outset? Of course, Howard Dean was knocked out in the primaries for observing after Saddam's capture that 'we are not safer!' If Americans knew then what is obvious now, Dean might have experienced a kinder political fate.

A majority of Americans tell pollsters that we are on the wrong track. The Bush Administration needs to be challenged boldly not just for its tactics, its deceptions, secrecy and blunders. Its "strategic" commitment to war and the "structural" dismantling of democracy needs to be confronted if we are to get on the right track. The right track is one that accepts the United Nations, respects full sovereignty of the Iraqi people, and ends the US occupation.

Is the Kerry campaign up to that? It will be if it heeds rising public outrage over the consequences of Bush's catastrophic choice for war.

*********************

(I hope two recent articles will be read widely, including within the John Kerry campaign: 1) "A Call for an Exit Door from Iraq".Senator Robert Byrd's Senate Floor Remarks , April 7, 2004, 2) "W's Second Term: If You Think the First is Bad…", Robert B. Reich in American Prospect, April 2004.)

April 18, 2004

ON MY MIND

April commentary /Alameda TV Channel 31 /Wednesdays at 7pm

One of the most troubling stories in every day's news is what's happening to our schools. In town after town, schools are being closed; school libraries, sports, music and arts are being cut back or out altogether to adjust for "budget shortfalls". Community colleges have become an enfeebled if not an endangered species. College tuitions are further and further out of reach for much of the Y generation.

Students are angry. More and more are demonstrating to save what should be their birthright, a full and decent education. But it seems that society is ignoring them, or simply watching from the sidelines. There is some finger pointing, but most of it is directed at local targets that lack the power on their own to change anything substantial. We're told there are poor administrators and principals, inadequate teachers, too many psychologists, and, worse, that parents don't care. There is an air of helplessness, of inevitability. It's just tough luck that this generation of our youth has come along when the economy is in trouble.

The failure, though, is not in circumstances beyond control, but in the priorities of this great nation. Why not start by asking if there are basic social values that should never be left to chance. What guarantees for each new generation are fundamental to "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness"? Full educational opportunity and health care must indeed be birthrights— no exceptions, no excuses, no child told: "Sorry, you happen to have come along at the wrong time!"

Is this vision beyond us? I don't think so. Why is it so far from reality today in our America? To answer that I want to risk stepping on a couple of ideas that have been turned into political "third rails": one, that you can't reduce spending for weapons and war; and two, that you can't increase the tax share from the very rich. If these propositions stand, truly not very much can be done to remedy the erosion of social programs, let alone to meet indispensable obligations to our children.

The plain truth is that a vast military budget and low taxes for the very wealthy trump priorities for the education and health of our youth. The mantra from Washington is "testing"— more testing of children and teachers, not serious support for schools and colleges. The Secretary of Education let us in on his priorities when he labeled the nation's largest teacher organization, the National Education Association, a "terrorist organization".

"Terrorism" is a notoriously exploited term, the common excuse for everything that's done and not done in Washington. The fact is that the big bulk of expenditures for war have nothing to do with necessary concern for public safety and thwarting terrorism. Most of it is geared to the doctrine of pre-emptive war, building an arsenal of weapons of mass destruction that is greater by far than the combined military strength of all nations on earth. We can see now in Iraq the bloody initial price of making war the country's top priority. We can see it at home, too, not least of all in our critically wounded education system.

As for taxes, California is indicative of the national story. Measured as a share of family income, California's poorest families pay the most in taxes (that is the sum of income, sales, excise, and property taxes). The poorest 20 percent of the state's families, with an average income of $15,300, spent 12.1 percent of their income on state taxes in 1998. In comparison, the wealthiest one percent, with an average income of over $1 million, spent 7.8 percent of their income on state taxes.

Our children deserve better than the promise of keeping America on a permanent war footing; better than the sacrifice of lives in unnecessary wars; better than the burden of paying off the multi-trillion dollar national debt. We can do without a crash program to develop so-called "battlefield nuclear weapons". We cannot do with decaying schools. America cannot tolerate a chronic state of underdevelopment in education.

May 1, 2004

("On My Mind" tv spot for May)

DON'T DUCK THE BIG ONE

The Presidential election campaign is off and running, but so far it's well off track.

Multimillion-dollar attacks have been made against John Kerry's patriotism, his record in and about the Vietnam War. He is angry and fighting back. It does take remarkable gall for men who evaded that war, who were far from heroic, to kick off the campaign by demeaning Kerry's courage both as a soldier who put his life on the line in Vietnam and as one of many thousands of veterans who came to oppose that war. You feel like saying what finally was said to Joe McCarthy during the Army hearings many years ago: "Have you no shame?"

Kerry has the right to say, as he has, "I'm not going to take it!" But beware the trap. More important than Kerry's honor is this question: why have the President's managers decided to invest so heavily in this personal attack? The answer is they'll do anything to avoid focusing on the mess unfolding in Iraq. They hope that Kerry will continue to be sidetracked into issues of personality rather than basic policy. With support for the war dropping sharply, they hope to hold the country in a "catch-22": 'you may think the war was a mistake, but when we're at war you have to support the Commander-in-Chief.'

John Kerry had a perfect opportunity to help the country break out of that box when he was invited to respond to a particularly fierce attack by Vice-President Cheney in Fulton, Missouri. Instead he said: 'never mind our differences about going to war in the first place; we have to stay the course.' I think he's wrong to accept the terms that the Bush team has framed in its attempt to restrict the electoral debate.

The Vietnam War is history, but the whys and wherefores of the Iraq war are at the vital center of where we go from here. It would be a travesty, with tragic consequences, if the questions posed by the Iraq war were somehow finessed and dodged as we face our time of decision in November.

Recent polls show that most Americans now regret the war in Iraq. It's a sure thing that if we knew on the eve of this war what we know now, very few of us would have given our leaders thumbs up.

Why not just say that's water over the dam and move on? We won't get out of the Iraq mess without coming to grips with why it's a mess and how we got into it. Worse, we may be misled into repeating Iraq elsewhere, perhaps over and over again, if we don't change the course that got us there.

What's gone wrong is more basic than intelligence and management failures. It's the idea that our exceptional power allows Washington to override international law and disregard world opinion. It's the idea that the United States has the right to launch pre-emptive war against any nation deemed "evil", even when it presents no credible threat to us or its neighbors. It's the idea that under the umbrella of "war on terror", the President of the United States has a holy mission to rid the world of all "evil doers ".

Underpinning these dangerous ideas is a false self-image that few of us question. Yes, America is very great. But that doesn't mean that an American president and administration can do no evil. It doesn't mean that power, oil and corporate interests are irrelevant to national policy and decisions on war and peace. Nor does it mean that people ruled by a hated tyrant will welcome US military occupation as "liberation". There is no magic charm that makes American military occupation work better in Iraq than Russian occupation in Chechnya or Israeli occupation in Palestine.

John Kerry is right that we have to rejoin the world community. That is possible only if we agree to genuine sovereignty for Iraq with international support through the United Nations. It requires cooperation from the United States, not armed occupation that can only deepen wounds.

For America, it's more than a matter of facing up to the miscalculations, obsessions and deceptions that pushed us into the Iraq war. There are some dots to be connected in order to prevent a greater disaster. Dot one: we are told that we are a nation at war and that the war will last for a very long time. Dot two: we are told that in time of war we have to place full trust in the President and give him exceptional powers. These two dots connect a straight line that points to a different kind of America, a long-term conversion from democracy to autocracy. There are other dots that fall on the same line and define it: our President scorns polls and "focus groups"; he seeks no advice from his father; for he connects with a higher Father and believes he is chosen for a Christian mission to "change the world". America has never been so close to undoing the very freedom that some claim we ought to export elsewhere by force of arms.

Our experience in Iraq, as in Vietnam not so long ago, should temper our world outlook. Our pride in our country serves us poorly if it morphs into arrogance toward other nations and cultures. No country may have more to contribute than ours to the world community, but no country is so great that it can compel all others to defer to its will and ways. Nor is any nation or ethnic group free of people in its midst who are capable of unspeakable atrocities. If war itself doesn't bring that home every day, then the horrible pictures from Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq should restore frightful memories of Mai Lai in Vietnam. The young John Kerry spoke honestly and bravely about such things.

One version of a very old proverb tells us:

Pride will have a fall

For pride goeth before and shame cometh after

Let's hope for the wisdom and courage to debate the big issues, not to blur differences that will make or break our democracy.

May 19, 2004

Reggie Zelnik is gone— suddenly, to the overwhelming grief of his innumerable dear friends.

In my mind, I keep a list of "friends of a lifetime". These are the people who during one or another period were true soul mates. These are individuals without whom my life would have been significantly diminished. The list is indelible, though the intimacy of any friendship may ebb with changing circumstances.

For over thirty years, Reggie was my dearest friend on the Berkeley campus. It began soon after I came to Berkeley, when two young Assistant Professors, Larry Levine and Reggie, responded to the nascent free speech movement, joined with the students, and helped rally the faculty to the cause of free speech. They put their potential and eventually illustrious academic careers at risk. Reggie was actually only an Acting Assistant Professor, and the Regents later voted to block his promotion to tenure. They were compelled to back down. At the time of his death, forty years later, Reggie was already long celebrated as the most important and popular faculty mentor of the FSM student generation. That, of course, was an adjunct to his academic achievements as a historian and his place in the hearts and esteem of successive generations of students and faculty.

From 1964 through to the recent publication of his book on the Free Speech Movement, edited with Robbie Cohen, Reggie and I shared ideas and involvement with almost every issue that came along on campus and in the whole wide world. After FSM, we worked together daily in the Faculty Peace Committee, opposing the Vietnam War. Reggie marched, spoke and, together with Franz Schurmann and Peter Scott, wrote "The Politics of Escalation". Reggie had a lot in common with Mario Savio, with whom each of us developed a loving friendship. He had Mario's freshness and independence of thought, immunity to mantras and cliches, and a fierce commitment to his own integrity. Above all was his humanity and natural sense of equality, his remarkable caring and accessibility to everyone. No wonder he was loved by so many.

When I went to the History Department's impromptu gathering yesterday, I was thinking I've lost my best friend. When I listened to so many others who were there, I realized there must be literally dozens who felt the loss of their best friend. That was Reggie. As people in shock began to reminisce, it was clear that while we all knew the same Reggie, his personality and talents made for a patchwork of deep, but different kinds of friendships. Everyone remembers his sense of humor, but some shared more than others in his fondness for the mandolin, or baseball, or songs in many languages. Perhaps because Roz and I are a generation older than Reggie and Elaine, our best friendship was more an intense mix of views, values and affection.

For most of our time together, we were remarkably close in our attitudes toward people and events. That wasn't quite so in the last couple of years, when we argued about aspects of humanitarian intervention and the role of the United States in the world. That started with the Balkans and became sharper in the wake of 9/11. Reggie challenged my thinking and influenced it to a degree; I will probably never know to what extent that was mutual. If labels mean anything, Reggie was somewhat of a radical liberal, while I remain a somewhat liberal radical. "Thanks" to George Bush and the war in Iraq, our views came into essential harmony again. The last e-mail Reggie sent me, May 2, 2004 was in strong agreement with my web posting of May 1st. In answer to his "warmest greetings", my last message to him was: "Thanks, Reggie. You know how much I appreciate hearing from you. Can the four of us get together before long? We'd like you to visit us when you can. Very best, Leon"

At our age, Roz's and mine, our peers are fading away month by month. But it's harder to take in the loss of younger loved ones, lives still full of vigor and purpose. Our grief upon the loss of daughter Carla nine months ago spills over into the pain over Reggie's sudden death and into the loving sympathy we feel for Elaine and the children, Michael, Pam and her family.

May 30, 2004

On My Mind ( TV spot for June)

HOW DID WE GET TO ABU GHRAIB?

When I began these little talks about what's On My Mind, I expected to share views on many different things. I might want to talk about a movie or a book, or experiences from long ago, or a dozen different social issues. But like most of America, it's the war that keeps taking over my thoughts and emotions. This month, too much has happened to keep us from changing the subject— too many lives lost, too many outrages, too little prospect of 'light at the end of the tunnel'.

Today I want to think about what Abu Ghraib means to me as an American.

We had better think deeply about Abu Ghraib. Is it an aberration? Does it just tell us that a "handful" of our own people can revel in an orgy of atrocities? Or does it uncover something basic that we need to understand?

For one thing, as more and more US Army reports show, the brutality abuses have been widespread beyond Abu Ghraib, in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Guantanamo. They involve not only humiliation and torture, but sexual assaults including rape, and even numerous homicides.

At one level, we need to know who was in charge, who gave orders, who turned the other way, what went on at the highest levels of the military and the White House— what did they know and when did they know it?

But we also need to think about what all this signifies for how we Americans see ourselves. A common bumper sticker reads: "Proud to be an American". Surely there is much to be proud of in the founding principles of this nation and in the enormous achievements of every generation of Americans, native born and immigrants from every part of the world. But if the bumper sticker is intended to boast that we're better than everyone else, then it's psychological and emotional poison.

Delusions of national and racial supremacy bring out the worst in any culture. Our own history tells us that. A recent national photo exhibition shows many large and celebratory gatherings of Americans enjoying public lynchings well into the twentieth century. The politics of hatred and fear, especially when exploited by powerful heads of state or local potentates and demagogues, can bear tragic fruit in any country. To have good reason for patriotism, there has to be more than justifiable pride; there has to be a capacity for truth, respect for others, and, when necessary, recognition of what is shameful. What we have more of than most countries is a tradition of democratic checks and balances. That makes it possible to overcome extreme abuses and threats to freedom, but only to the extent that the will of the people rises to the challenge.

Right now the country has been put on a track that makes Abu Ghraib not an anomaly, but one symptom of a severe illness. The illness that has infected our prime policy makers, and spread through much of the media into sectors of public opinion, is the disease of national chauvinism. That's the notion that the United States has a superior claim to dominance, beyond the responsibilities of international cooperation and shared leadership.

The fabrications and miscalculations that pushed us into the Iraq war were born of the obsession that we, as the world's sole superpower, must use our power to remake the world to fit current White House specifications. Instead of responding to the 9/11 attack and the menace of terrorism by drawing on almost universal sympathy and good will to build effective bonds of world community, the answer was a unilateral declaration of war without end and an ultimatum to the world to line up under our command, or else. The Administration quickly proclaimed defiance of the Geneva Conventions, acted to disregard basic tenets of our own Bill of Rights, and lashed out indiscriminately to round up many hundreds of Muslims and Arab Americans. Then there was an almost immediate build-up of propaganda, misinformation and coercion for a misdirected war in Iraq. That war of choice (the President's choice) has us in a quagmire of violence as an occupying power. Far from making us safer, it leaves us struggling isolated in a sea of antagonism and mistrust.

When the long festering story of dehumanization and torture of "detainees" came to light, most Americans were staggered and shamed by the sight. But Rush Limbaugh told his radio multitude: "I'm talking about people having a good time… you ever heard of emotional release? You ever heard of need to blow some steam off?" That's a recipe for "bad apples", and it goes with the humiliating menu of military occupation that most Iraqis resent.

You can't separate the Abu Ghraib photos from the overall picture that has hurt America so badly in the eyes of the world. The shame of Abu Ghraib is the extreme expression of a failing mission. The majority of Americans now want to see us change course. We need to do that for a lot of reasons, most of all to save lives, but also to save our national self-respect.

June 2, 2004

There isn't a scintilla of doubt for me: I'll vote Kerry to defeat Bush. But before saying why, let me say how strongly I disagree with Kerry's message thus far on the Iraq war and occupation.

Today I heard Kerry adviser, Richard Holbrooke, argue that there is a profound difference between Kerry and Bush on the way we went to war. The more often he repeated himself, the less convincing he was. The problem with Kerry's message is that he doesn't really challenge the decision to go to war. His claim is that, in contrast to Bush, his multilateral approach would have brought the world in on our side.

What world is he talking about? The overwhelming global opposition to going to war was not simply a matter of distaste for the bad manners of Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld and Rice. It was a powerful rejection of the rationale for war and the lies that fueled it. It also expressed a deep fear that those with imperial ambitions in the United States were prepared to use super military power, including "pre-emptive war", to achieve unprecedented world dominance. If at that time there had been a Kerry (or Gore) Administration, emphasis on multilateralism would have been effective only if it was based on serious cooperation, not on bullying the world into war.

By now, most Americans have had strong second thoughts about the war. A large majority feels that the country is on the wrong track. Polls show that over 80% of the Iraqi people see America as an occupying power and want the occupation to end as soon as possible. Kerry would differ profoundly with Bush if he repeated what he said during the primaries, that the American people were misled into an unnecessary war. He would really differ if he acknowledged that there can be neither sovereignty for Iraq nor an end to violence under US military occupation. Kerry could separate himself on Iraq if he opposed Bush's determination to keep troops in Iraq as long as possible. Instead of compelling soldiers and national guard units to stay on beyond their promised terms of service, the next President of the United States should commit himself to bringing the troops home.

So where is the difference that makes me certain about how to vote? Simply, the Bush regime is the most reactionary and militaristically aggressive administration ever to achieve so much power in the United States. Another four years of this monopoly on all branches of government would bring us closer to an authoritarian one party state than we have ever been. It could reproduce the Iraq disaster on a broad scale and undermine global cooperation critical to human survival. Whatever the tactical and strategic considerations that underlie Kerry's foreign policy outlook, a victory for Kerry and his broadly progressive popular base would be a smashing rebuff to the homicidal direction that the ultra right is imposing on domestic and world affairs. Moreover, Kerry's position on issue after issue is superior to that of the GOP.

Beyond that, there is so much positive that could open up in all areas if the people vote to turn the country around. For that to happen Bush must be defeated and Kerry has to hear the voice of his voters. I expect that many of those who vote for Kerry will have good reason for criticism and organized dissent in his administration. But that's so much better than the alternative. Bring it on!

June 30, 2004

I'm not going to read Clinton's book.

He persuaded me of that in his TV hours with Dan Rather, Oprah Winfrey and Charlie Rose— hours as empty as garrulous. Should I plow through almost a thousand pages to confirm that he shows little alarm about where we're heading and less vision on what needs to change? He tells us that Bush is a fine fellow, that everybody in Washington really cares and only wants to do what's good for the country. He even "loves" Wolfowitz for acknowledging surprise over the resistance in Iraq. And then there's the babble about "parallel lives" leading to his doings with Monica… Enough.

July 5, 2004

Why is Kerry failing to distinguish himself clearly from Bush on the Iraq war and occupation?

After all, there are others in establishment circles who differ sharply on the war policies of the Bush Administration. Gore, Kennedy, Byrd, and even Brezhinsky, the inveterate cold warrior of yesteryear, stand out in opposition. Several articles by George Soros, the multibillionaire, are strikingly lucid challenges to delusions of American supremacy and empire.

Part of the answer undoubtedly involves judgment on election strategy (poor judgment, in the opinion of many). It's the notion that the campaign must accommodate to an electorate that has been moved center and right since the days of Ronald Reagan. That's the strategy that— with the help of dirty tricks and the Supreme Court— gave the White House to George W. Bush in 2000. It is amplified this time around by intimidation, the fear of appearing weak and out of step with Bush's holy "war on terror".

There's another part to the answer that's even more deeply rooted than political pragmatism. That is the commitment to US global dominance that is effectively required of anyone who has a real hope of becoming President in the current climate. Kerry's most influential backers surely share the widespread alarm over the extremism of the Bush Administration. They worry about the antagonism and isolation generated by the recklessly aggressive war and foreign policy, and likely also have misgivings about the GOP push toward a monopoly of power and autocratic one party rule. But for all their justified laments about Bush's "unilateralism", their worldview is based on exploiting superpower advantage to gain universal acquiescence to US "leadership" and imperial supremacy. Furthermore, you only had to listen to Bob (the other) Kerry at the 9/11 hearings to recognize that not all hawks are Republicans.

A realistic view of aspirations to US dominance in the sweep of capitalist globalization doesn't minimize the importance of the election outcome in November. There is an enormous divide between the consequences of a second term for Bush and a victory for Kerry. The plain fact is that this administration is the most warlike and anti-democratic in our history. It may, however, have engineered its own political downfall by overreaching with its pre-emptive war doctrine, its extravagant deceits, its fundamentalist "Christian" social agenda, its "Patriot Act" and blatant favors to its "have more" base. On the other hand, the conglomerate social forces that oppose movement toward a pseudo-fascist America are also capable of compelling a progressive shift on major social and economic issues and a saner approach to international problems. So every vote against Bush is an act of hope, and a clear-cut defeat for Bush would be a mandate for democratic renewal.

True, defeating Bush would not by itself overcome the damage done to American society and to the world in the last couple of decades. It would, however, be more than a sharp turn off the road to disaster. It could be a new beginning in a long struggle for peace, justice, equality and survival. Beyond blocking the crusaders of the ultra-right, that struggle has to bring about a great change in priorities, worldwide and in the United States. The 9/11 terrorist attack on the United States and its exploitation to justify the blunderbuss extremism of the Bush Administration have changed the international and domestic agenda drastically. Banished from attention are problems that most affect the future of humanity and the needs of the majority of Americans. The travesty is that only when combating poverty and disease are at the top of the agenda can collective efforts succeed against adherents of terrorism and war.

Priority on human needs and world community can only come about by popular demand, not through spontaneous action by politicians who navigate through conflicting pressures and interests. The most important truth brought forth involuntarily by the Bush Administration's conduct is that the vast majority of humanity rejects war and resists empire. Now most Americans say the country has been put on the wrong track. If we vote accordingly in November, the odds that we can move on to a better track are greatly improved. Only the people and their persistent struggle can provide a guarantee.

The alternative of another Bush term remains a possibility. That would put democracy and the struggle for it at unprecedented disadvantage. That's why many who work for a stronger and more principled campaign will not hesitate to vote for Kerry.

July 13, 2004

On My Mind (TV spot for July)

THE STEM CELL DEBATE

When Ronald Reagan succumbed to Alzheimer's disease, Nancy Reagan and the Reagan children renewed the call for expanding stem cell research. They don't agree with President Bush, who has barred access to embryonic stem cells that scientists consider essential.

This is one of a number of issues of public interest into which a particular religious interpretation has been injected. The rapid advance of biotechnology raises many questions the public has to consider, questions of ethics and social policy as well as of priorities in scientific and medical applications. But imposing a particular religious bias to restrict scientific research or censure political expression has no ethical justification. The more such doctrine intrudes into public policy, into executive and legislative decision-making, and into public education of our children, the greater the violation of the founding principles in our Constitution and Bill of Rights.

What is stem cell research about and what's the dispute?

I spent many years in biochemical research, but I'll try to keep the biology short. The earliest cells that form an embryo each have unlimited potential. As descendant cells arise and multiply, they differentiate into the many specialized cell types that eventually make up the developed individual. Cells that constitute any organ, such as lung or heart, are effectively restricted to that role— their potential for diversity through cell division has been shut down.

Scientists still don't know enough about conditions that cause cells to become specialized. That's exactly what stem cell research needs to look at. Various hormones and other environmental factors can push embryonic stem cells along different pathways. Cell lines derived from stem cells can be cultured and studied in laboratories. The object is to learn more about normal and abnormal kinds of development, and there is the hope of discovering therapeutic applications that may one day help people afflicted with diseases or injuries that damage particular organs and tissues.

No wonder that people who have watched Alzheimer's destroy a loved one, or who must cope with a paralyzing spinal cord injury, are anxious to see stem cell research go forward.

Many embryos are produced and eventually discarded as a byproduct of established human fertility procedures. They could be a boon to stem cell research. But the President says no. Apparently more important than human welfare and possibilities in medicine, is the sectarian belief that human life is created whenever sperm and egg meet. It's an old story that the majority of the public has never accepted. People have a right to believe something whether or not it contradicts science or common sense. But does the government have the right to impose a bias as national policy affecting everyone?

Of course if the government delivers an edict that life begins at conception, that's a strong partisan wedge against the constitutionally protected right of choice. It's the underpinning for the decision to limit availability of the morning after pill, to deny support to agencies that serve the reproductive and birth control needs of women around the world. That's the mentality that treats doctors and nurses as criminals if they respect a woman's reproductive decisions and health needs. It's the dogma that injects religious intolerance into the voting booth, wherein a bishop can condemn practitioners as sinners if they vote for the "wrong" candidate.

Something else gets to me. Is the President's doctrine more respectful of human life than the concerns of Nancy Reagan or Christopher Reeves and so many others who support stem cell research? Does it show that he values human life more than you or I?

For the answer, just look past the sperm and the egg. What do you think?

July 17, 2004

KERRY AND THE WAR (ONCE MORE)

Kerry is making it hard for the many voters who oppose Bush on the Iraq war and his general strategy of pre-emptive war.

So far he refuses to say that if he knew then what we all know now, he would have opposed going to war. He suggests that he would have been able to get the rest of the world to go to war with us. That gives legs to the fable that based on the "intelligence" at the time, everyone concluded war was justified. The fact is that Hans Blix and the UN did not find the "intelligence" convincing, and popular as well as governmental resistance to starting the war reached astonishing, actually unprecedented, proportions worldwide.

Instead of challenging the doctrine of pre-emptive war, Kerry echoed Bush's provocative rhetoric at his own Washington press conference yesterday, the only caveat being the need for "improved" intelligence. He has proposed enlarging the military occupation force in Iraq, and offers no prospect for bringing our soldiers home any time soon.

To the extent that this is deliberate election strategy aimed at winning over undecided voters who favor a "strong leader", it is a very big gamble. What it may come down to is: How many voters in the small "undecided" pool can be convinced that Kerry is as "tough" as Bush? Vs. How many voters who are outraged by Bush and the neocons may be pushed into voting for Nader or not voting at all?

The case for voting Bush out in November is overwhelming. For that to happen, there has to be powerful pressure for change. Kerry has to feel that pressure from the majority of Americans who now believe it was wrong to go to war and want to get off the treacherous track we're on. That will affect the election outcome. It's not a matter of threatening to withhold votes, for opening a back door to Bush's reelection would be 'cutting off the nose to spite the face'. Putting America on a democratic course begins with regime change in November, but the battle for new directions is a long haul that will depend on public will and popular movements long after Bush and Cheney are retired.

July 25, 2004

ELECTION IMPERATIVE

A group of outstanding progressives urges a "Split Slate" strategy in the presidential elections. They urge voting for Kerry in states where the race is close and for Green Party candidate Cobb in states where the outcome is assumed to be a sure thing for either Kerry or Bush.

I agree with the opening sentence of their statement: "There is no greater political imperative this year than to retire the Bush regime, one of the most dangerous and extremist in U.S. history." Therefore, I don't agree with a strategy of gambling with votes according to odds put out by pollsters.

I live in California and will vote for Kerry. "Sure things" predicted by polls are too often wrong and the stakes are too high. Nor, if I lived in a state where the polls show Bush on top, would I concede the outcome with my vote.

The undemocratic Electoral College system dictates the winner, unfortunately. That makes the outcome state by state of paramount importance. But I also want the biggest possible popular vote victory over Bush nationwide.

None of this would be a problem for progressives if Kerry and the Democratic Leadership Council ran a campaign that fully reflected the sentiments of most Democrats and independents, especially in opposition to the war and military occupation of Iraq.

Without gambling with crucial votes, progressives have to fight for a basic change in direction for America. That means speaking out vigorously and organizing broadly for policies that serve the interests of the people, and opposing those Democratic leaders who foster "same old, same old" politics that cater to corporate control of our nation and of the world. That is the imperative during and after the 2004 elections and will always remain so no matter who is in the White House. But the imperative of imperatives is to derail the Bush-Cheney train that is racing toward autocracy and a permanent warfare state.

August 4, 2004

One year without Carla.

August 13, 2004

A WINNING STRATEGY?

There is growing reason to worry about the consequences of the Kerry campaign strategy on the outcome of the November election.

Many who faulted Kerry's failure to separate himself clearly from Bush on the Iraq War and the Patriot Act could at least hope that "playing it safe" and celebrating his military credentials might prove to be a winning strategy. No one can know for sure, but it looks as if Kerry has worked himself into a corner much to the liking of Bush-Cheney and Karl Rove. A centerpiece of their ferocious attacks on Kerry is now the use of ridicule, a cause for real alarm if one remembers what happened to Michael Dukakis.

Kerry's blurring of differences and insistence that he was right to vote for giving Bush a green light is handing the Bush campaign a field day. Bush misrepresents Kerry's equivocal comments, and welcomes him with sarcasm as a "reluctant ally" in support of the war. Cheney misrepresents and ridicules Kerry's pledge to fight the war with greater "sensitivity". And Kerry's Senate votes on numerous issues are used to contradict his campaign promises. Yesterday the ridicule was that Kerry, who promises not to turn Yucca Mountain into a gigantic nuclear dump, voted for the plan in the Senate— Bush smirks and tells Nevada's voters that Kerry will probably change his mind again.

So something very bizarre is happening as November approaches. An administration that is totally without credibility, that has lied monumentally to promote a disastrous war, has brazenly seized the offensive to deride Kerry's credibility. The picture they hope to get away with is that it is Kerry who dissembles, who talks around issues, whose word cannot be trusted.

A little more than two months before the voting, Bush's war has backfired badly and job "recovery" is miserable. His standing with a majority of Americans, not to speak of the rest of the world, couldn't be worse. That should sink his second term chances, but the trajectory of the campaign gives the GOP hope for "four more years". The key for them is to stay on the offensive against Kerry's credibility, to take advantage of his ambiguous support for the war, and not to have to answer for the sorry consequences of the Bush Administration's deceptions, military misadventures and illegal actions at home and abroad.

Can those of us who want to see a massive vote to elect Kerry rely on the candidate to work his way out of the corner? The signs are not good. Despite ever more damning revelations (Richard Clarke, Abu Graib, the Senate Intelligence report, etc, etc.) Kerry has rejected every opportunity to acknowledge in hindsight that his "authorization" vote was wrong.

The only way to get the campaign on a winning track is for millions of Americans to keep saying what Kerry should be saying: 'Knowing what we know now about George W. Bush's administration (not only about the missing weapons of mass destruction), Congress should never have empowered him to launch "pre-emptive" war. He absolutely can't be trusted with four more years.'

It would help if Kerry listened, as he did to some extent under pressure during the primaries. Confronted with a President who never admits to the slightest error as atrocious failures mount, a candidate who owned up to a particular misjudgment would provide a welcome breath of fresh air. The pressure now comes from the realization that Kerry's labored clinging to the bad mistake of endorsing Bush's war could lose him the election. That would be a tragic price to pay for equivocation and misguided "expediency", a price America simply can't afford.

August 15, 2004

Several friends urged me to e-mail my comment of August 13th, "A Winning Strategy?" to John Kerry. I didn't, but I hope he reads the editorial in today's NY Times. Campaigns probably don't bother with individual e-mail messages, but a flood of e-mails and letters expressing agreement with today's Times editorial would be a different matter.

September 7, 2004

On My Mind (TV spot for September)

TIME TO GET REAL

When I talked about what was on my mind back in May, I said, "the Presidential election campaign is off and running, but so far it's well off track." If anything, it got further off track in August. In the crossfire of attacks on John Kerry, we have a distorted debate going back decades to the Vietnam War, but there is no straightforward confronting of today's pre-emptive war and occupation in Iraq.

Maybe it would help to take a brief time out from election posturing and convention balloon drops to look abroad at Chechnya and Palestine. While the celebration was going on in Madison Square Garden, multiple massacres of civilians were occurring in Russia and Israel. What horror— over 300 children and parents slain and hundreds more wounded by the hostage takers and Russian assault troops; and in Beersheba, Israel, a new outbreak of suicide bombings!

How can this kind of terror still be happening year after year? After all, no leader has invested more stubbornly than Russia's Putin or Israel's Sharon in the notion that the ruthless use of superior military force will eliminate terrorism— no one, that is, aside from George W. Bush.

Why have hardliners Putin and Sharon failed? Because war and occupation breed hatred and resistance. They make for a linkage between the patriotic national aspirations of Chechens and Palestinians and the deadly influence of religious fundamentalist networks that promote terrorist retaliation.

That lesson should not be lost on us in the remaining weeks before November 2nd. By diverting the response to the 9/11 attack into an unrelated war of choice, we have made our own quagmire as an occupying power. Given all the disclosures and fiascos of the past year, most Americans recognize that we were badly misinformed and mislead into the Iraq war. Will we by our votes allow the dangerous doctrine of pre-emptive war to keep our troops in harm's way not only in Iraq, but again and again, perhaps in Iran or Syria or North Korea?

We are in trouble if this campaign is reduced to a contest over who talks toughest and who appears to be the fiercest warrior. That is not a climate in which vision can emerge for a better and wiser America in a cooperative world community. Yet that broader outlook is needed to counter threats and crises, improve conditions of life, and restore hope for humanity's future.

Truth fares very poorly in the macho contest. The credibility of this administration was shattered by the false claims that took us to war, by gross miscalculation of the response to occupation, by the Abu Ghraib revelations, by scandals involving Halliburton contracts. Yet this was largely drowned out during August by the "swift boat" ads that claimed Kerry was no hero in Vietnam. When the lies in the ads were exposed (after the damage had been done), the excuse was that the ad's sponsors were angry at young Kerry's statement that some Americans had committed atrocities in Vietnam.

In the fog of today's war, it's patriotic to remember only atrocities charged against the "other side"— truth be damned!. Still, don't today's Abu Ghraib pictures demand less selective remembrance? Now is the perfect time for Americans to remember what a war of intervention brings.

If you are too young to remember Vietnam, look up My Lai, where a whole village of unarmed civilians, mostly women and children, were executed by machine gun. Look up napalm and Agent Orange. And look up the Tiger Force: just this year, in April, reporters for an Ohio newspaper, The Toledo Blade, won the Pulitzer Prize, journalism's highest honor, "for uncovering the atrocities of an elite U.S. Army fighting unit in the Vietnam War that killed unarmed civilians and children during a seven-month rampage".

It's not only the truth about wars, current and past, that gets twisted. Economic reality, the miserable job "recovery", gets the same treatment. So does so-called Medicare reform— the wonders of severely limited prescription drug benefits are touted, while Medicare premiums get a giant hike. On and on—a dream world of presidential achievements is scripted, "mission accomplished", as we continue on what most Americans have said is the wrong track.

I have a wish (I hope it's more than a dream). It's that in the coming weeks the national debate gets real; that it rises above dirty tricks and diversions away from the big issues. That depends more on the good sense of most people than on calculations that go on in campaign war rooms. If you don't like the Iraq war and how we got into it, if you don't want more of the same, now is the time to be heard.

September 16, 2004

A letter to John Kerry:

All of the voters pledged to you hope that you can and will still turn the tide against the unthinkable disaster of "four more years".

Is there any doubt how the majority of all Americans would respond if asked this direct question: "Knowing then what we all know now, do you think Congress should have given George W. Bush the green light for war in Iraq?

The Bush team desperately wants to keep November 2nd from becoming a referendum on Iraq; they want it instead to be a referendum on their concocted image of John Kerry. Your supporters have the right to expect you not to let that happen.

You have criticized how Bush went to war and how the occupation has been managed. Given the magnitude of the ongoing disaster, there is no excuse and no time left for equivocation. America must not be defined by the doctrine of pre-emptive war. There is no future, except in tragedy, for America as an occupying power. That course gives terrorism access to reservoirs of deeply-rooted patriotism and anti-American resentment.

Most Democrats (and many other Americans) would not have voted as you did on the Congressional authorization that George W. Bush used and abused. Today, many voters would respect some statement like this from John Kerry:

"I made a very difficult decision to give George Bush the benefit of the doubt at a critical time. What has happened and is happening in Iraq proves that Congress should not have gone along with Bush's obsessive rush to war. We must now restore trust in America's commitment to international cooperation. A priority of my presidency will be to end the occupation and bring our soldiers home."

October 11, 2004

On My Mind (TV spot for October)

DECISION TIME: IRAQ AND BEYOND

Iraq is now the focus of the presidential contest. That is as it should be, although many crucial domestic issues share center stage.

John Kerry says the Iraq War was a "colossal error of judgment" and George W. Bush says he would do exactly the same thing all over again.

Some gaps and evasions in the debate are on my mind. I'll mention a few of them, along with a couple of "red herrings" that keep showing up.

o

First, there is the argument over whether it is the US military or a real coalition that is occupying Iraq. Bush keeps talking about 31 coalition partners; Kerry points out that 95% of "coalition" casualties and costs are American. We should also never forget that Britain, Italy, Spain and almost every other government that initially supported the war did so in defiance of opposition from an overwhelming majority of its citizens. Most governments and the United Nations refused to go along.

o

Now, after every reason given for rushing to war has vanished, the fallback excuse is that it's all about "freedom"— "freedom is on the march!" Strange that George W. Bush is now a greater disciple of freedom than Nelson Mandela, who like popular leaders everywhere strongly condemned the war. Stranger still is the fantasy that war and occupation are highways to freedom around the world.

o

Another rationale for the war is that we have to fight terrorists in Iraq so we won't have to fight them here. Does anyone really believe that we can kill more enemies than we breed worldwide by remaining an occupying power in Iraq? That formula works no differently for us than it has worked for Russia in Chechnya and Israel in Palestine.

o

And how come Abu Ghraib is never mentioned in the debates? Nothing did more damage to our most cherished values and to America's standing in the world. Who at top levels in the administration approved torture in Iraq or looked the other way?

o

Last point on what could be a very long list: I'm turned off by the argument over whether more countries can be persuaded to send troops to join the US occupying force in Iraq. That's a pipe dream. Help for Iraq will be on the way only when we are willing to move toward ending the occupation, renounce plans for permanent military bases in Iraq, and give up unilateral control over Iraq's economic reconstruction. Then most Iraqis, who desperately want peace and genuine sovereignty, can get the kind of support from the United Nations and the United States that allows them to overcome their nightmares, past and present.

In the short time remaining before November 2nd, we need to take a hard look into the future. I don't mean only the future of Iraq, but what Iraq means for the future— ours and the world's, at least over the next four years.

Will the Iraq war be the model for US policy, for our role on the world stage and the "war on terrorism"? Or is it a terrible lesson of what we should not do, should not repeat elsewhere?

That's what our vote will be about, whatever else we take to the polls on November 2nd.

October 16, 2004

FALLING SHORT ON THE FLU

Roz and I just turned around and came home without flu shots. The flu mania line at Kaiser (like those all around the country) stretched too far for the eye to see.

Panic in the midst of incompetence and greed is becoming the pattern of life in our times. Four more years? The flu scandal is another window on the disaster in health care. Bush told a rare truth in the last debate when he said that we were caught short because the making of life-saving vaccines is not a profitable enterprise for the drug industry. So much for market forces as the guarantor of public health!

Old and disabled Americans in endless lines grasping for shots as the supply runs empty— is this the best our government can do?

Many of those standing in line will think as they wait about the 40 million fellow Americans who have no health insurance. Four more years? That prospect should be buried with the debacle of "pre-emptive" war in Iraq. But anger on the flu lines and at the gas pump will weigh in as well.

Meanwhile, Roz and I choose not to scramble for the last shot.

November 3, 2004

THE MORNING AFTER

I'm taking a deep breath, but my eyes are open and my fingers are no longer crossed. Whatever stray pieces remain to be mopped up, the picture is clear. There was a national referendum on Bush, and the GOP comes away with a stronger grip on every aspect of formal political power.

There will be a lot of analysis of the election campaign, what went wrong to sustain an administration when most Americans think the country is on the wrong track. I don't think the basic answer will be found in a critique of electoral campaign tactics: 'if only' there had been a different candidate or a clearer message. Events brought out the issues starkly even when campaign rhetoric didn't. The most warlike and reactionary administration of my lifetime has been able to manipulate public fear and anger so that a narrow majority votes "yes" as it proceeds to replace democracy with autocracy, confront the world with unbridled military superpower, and seek total domination of the super rich at home and abroad.

Bush's majority is small though the menace is huge. The question now is what the other half will do to turn things around. Understanding and changing our country has become harder, but more necessary. On the other hand, Bush's election win doesn't rescue him from reality, from continuing futility and failure. An election is over, but the future will not be conceded.

November 8, 2004

On My Mind (TV spot for November)

THE MANDATE ILLUSION

Most people in this part of the country were pretty unhappy after they woke up on Wednesday morning, November 3rd. So was I.

As usual, politicians who savaged each other during the election campaign, say now is the time for finding common ground, for coming together. But I don't think the 56 million Americans who voted against four more years are likely to get with the program. In fact, many in the 51% part of the electorate that went with the winner are unlikely to stay with the program. I know that's a brash statement. It's the fashion to view the Bay Area as out of step, simply outside the main stream.

Many who voted for George W. Bush did so despite big doubts. On the eve of the elections, polls showed that a majority of Americans think the country is on the wrong track and that the Iraq war was a mistake. The President also got low approval ratings on the economy and his record on the environment. So the President won in spite of large negatives on his policies.

Why did he win? No American president has ever been voted out when the country was at war. Mess though it is, for many Americans there is the uncomfortable feeling that we're stuck with it and the Commander-in-Chief who got us into it. Then there is 9/11, the perpetual fear and anger, the sense that fighting terrorists trumps everything else.

Of course that's not all. For those in the 51% majority, Kerry failed to win their confidence, fell short of providing a convincing alternative. That's another topic, big and important for all of us who want to turn the tide, starting now and aiming at shifting the Congressional balance in 2006.

Like the businessman he is, President Bush views his win as "earned capital" that he intends to spend. But his notion of mandate is an illusion. Trying to settle things in Iraq with more massive and aggressive force won't work and will evoke more opposition, here as well as in Iraq and among all nations. On domestic issues, I believe the public has not been converted to turning away from social security and giving up on health care for 45 million uninsured Americans. Nor do I think that most Americans will accept a Supreme Court packed with Scalia and Thomas prototypes. We shall see.

There is a part of the Bush constituency that is most organized, enthusiastic and absolutely insistent on "mandate". That is the so-called Religious Right. They now claim they won the election on the basis of "moral values". They have certainly made headway. They now have a disproportionate capacity to knock off liberal candidates and to swing votes for extremist ideologues in many states. It's much like the extreme orthodox parties in Israel, who are a minority, but who manipulate and tilt public policy in the direction of their ideology.

They have struck a chord with millions of Americans who reach for moral values to live by in these troubled times. But I don't believe that Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, and James Dobson are America's standard for "moral values". They want a mandate, but they stayed out of sight at the national level during the election campaign. They do best when they work under the radar. That's because they have never won a majority nationally on their narrow-minded social agenda of intolerance.

Whatever divides Americans on such things as abortion, gay rights, and affirmative action, social justice has always been the heart and soul of moral values within the main stream of American progress, including its religious movements. President Bush talks about a "culture of life" in the narrowest terms, meaning such things as opposition to embryonic stem cell research. But the American mandate that is real and lasting is the historic imperative to combat poverty, war, discrimination and intolerance. That's the common ground we need now more than ever.

November 19, 2004

There is a flood of post-election analysis, not only by the well-known, but by many, many individuals who are writing down their thoughts via e-mail and internet, often just for neighbors and friends. We're all learning from each other and gaining insights from numerous vantage points. A lot of sound ideas have been advanced to explain why Bush won despite being caught in colossal deceptions and a record of disastrous failures. Also, many have commented on the inspiring surge of anti-war activism and political creativity that emerged before and during the election campaign. Everyone is weighing in on where we go from here.

One of many articles that impressed me is Marc Solomon's " What Next? Let's Build "The Mother Of All Coalitions", Portside, Nov 12 , 2004. There is no point repeating here things well said by Solomon and many others. I just want to comment on a couple of questions that weigh on my mind. One has to do with the shift in political power and how it may be altering our political system. The other concerns the Democratic Party and how it relates to the kind of coalition needed to reverse the ultra right's control of the federal government.

TIPPING POINT TO AUTOCRACY

Stopping the marauders was made much more difficult on November 2. There were dire warnings before the elections that we are reaching a tipping point where the traditional American democracy of checks and balances could be displaced by a dictatorial president at the head of a de facto one-party autocracy. The election advanced a trend that has given the most reactionary wing of corporate capitalism its greatest control ever over all branches of governmental power.

There are very good reasons to recognize that this state of affairs remains reversible, both because the overarching goals of the marauders drive them into repeated miscalculations and failures, and because the potential for resistance is great. Nevertheless, it's important to say without equivocation that what's happening is not just another cyclical shift in political fortunes within the two-party system. Extension and consolidation of the Bush-Cheney hold on power is driving a fundamental shift in the political process, increasingly away from democracy toward autocracy.

There are many factors that have pushed the United States so far to the right, some of them embedded in our political and social history. But the accelerated thrust to the present extreme is fueled by a relatively new turn of history, the emergence of the United States from the Cold War as the world's sole superpower. This advantage, especially the virtual monopoly of military power, has been seized on by the far right as the opportunity forcibly to reshape the world. They are eager to do whatever it takes in pursuit of an illusory goal, global pacification that would make their superpower dominance total and permanent. That's the vision behind George W. Bush's war cry: "Freedom is on the march!"

The America they want to fashion is a country suited to their global mission. The "homeland", too, needs to be pacified, conditioned by the "war on terror" to accept the long-term prospect of pre-emptive war and wartime curtailment of civil liberties. That of course is also suited to their domestic ambition: to cancel every progressive social program of the last seventy years while expanding privilege and wealth for the super rich.

Despite the major election setback, the future of America and how it relates to the rest of the world need not remain in the grasp of the crusaders of the far right. But changing the trajectory requires, as Mark Solomon says. "the mother of all coalitions".

THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY

A major electoral opportunity to derail the Bush-Cheney war train was lost in 2004. Whether new electoral opportunities will be viable in 2006 and 2008 depends squarely on the organization and power of movements to resist reaction every step of the way and create alternatives that gather a progressive majority in every part of the country. Fighting to end the bloody occupation of Iraq and bring our young men and women home to safety can't be put on hold. Nor can any other demand crucial to the welfare of people at home or worldwide.

Where does the Democratic Party come into the picture? Three things stand out. One, what the Democratic Party does will be critical, for better or worse, to the effectiveness of Congressional resistance to the aggressive Bush-Cheney agenda. Two, the Democratic Party is the main electoral vehicle that can reverse the growing reactionary grip on the three branches of federal power. Three, without a successful battle to change the course of the Democratic Party, neither will the country change course.

There is justified and necessary anger at the role of the Democratic Leadership Council in strangling the voice and ignoring the will of Democratic voters. Even as they engineer defeat after defeat, they find more reasons to push further to the right and deeper into chronic political impotence.

Is the Democratic establishment monolithic and impervious to dissent? Is their control unshakable? I don't think so.

It seems to me there are prospects for changing the "same-old, same-old" story. A bold effort is beginning to build on the surge of creative activism to create a powerful progressive infrastructure. Organized though diverse, this movement doesn't wait on sanction from above. It can assert itself on policy and challenge for recognition and leadership.

The prospects for forcing a change of direction are favored by the extreme alarm that the Bush-Cheney course has evoked in so many quarters at all levels of society. If one talks about the "mother of all coalitions", its power has to rest on a mass, energetic base that doesn't accept the notion that "it can't be done". Its breadth has to be such that it alters the dominant influence in the Democratic Party and makes it an effective instrument to break the GOP hold on government.

Frustration and disappointment with the electoral process certainly inspire the determination to build movements that don't come and go with election times. But every struggle has a stake in what happens in the electoral arena. What happened in 2000 and 2004 makes 2006 and 2008 much more, not less, important. We can't get too far past "the tipping point" before we check the downward slide to autocracy.

November 19, 2004

There is a flood of post-election analysis, not only by the well-known, but by many, many individuals who are writing down their thoughts via e-mail and internet, often just for neighbors and friends. We're all learning from each other and gaining insights from numerous vantage points. A lot of sound ideas have been advanced to explain why Bush won despite being caught in colossal deceptions and a record of disastrous failures. Also, many have commented on the inspiring surge of anti-war activism and political creativity that emerged before and during the election campaign. Everyone is weighing in on where we go from here.

One of many articles that impressed me is Marc Solomon's " What Next? Let's Build "The Mother Of All Coalitions", Portside, Nov 12 , 2004. There is no point repeating here things well said by Solomon and many others. I just want to comment on a couple of questions that weigh on my mind. One has to do with the shift in political power and how it may be altering our political system. The other concerns the Democratic Party and how it relates to the kind of coalition needed to reverse the ultra right's control of the federal government.

TIPPING POINT TO AUTOCRACY

Stopping the marauders was made much more difficult on November 2. There were dire warnings before the elections that we are reaching a tipping point where the traditional American democracy of checks and balances could be displaced by a dictatorial president at the head of a de facto one-party autocracy. The election advanced a trend that has given the most reactionary wing of corporate capitalism its greatest control ever over all branches of governmental power.

There are very good reasons to recognize that this state of affairs remains reversible, both because the overarching goals of the marauders drive them into repeated miscalculations and failures, and because the potential for resistance is great. Nevertheless, it's important to say without equivocation that what's happening is not just another cyclical shift in political fortunes within the two-party system. Extension and consolidation of the Bush-Cheney hold on power is driving a fundamental shift in the political process, increasingly away from democracy toward autocracy.

There are many factors that have pushed the United States so far to the right, some of them embedded in our political and social history. But the accelerated thrust to the present extreme is fueled by a relatively new turn of history, the emergence of the United States from the Cold War as the world's sole superpower. This advantage, especially the virtual monopoly of military power, has been seized on by the far right as the opportunity forcibly to reshape the world. They are eager to do whatever it takes in pursuit of an illusory goal, global pacification that would make their superpower dominance total and permanent. That's the vision behind George W. Bush's war cry: "Freedom is on the march!"

The America they want to fashion is a country suited to their global mission. The "homeland", too, needs to be pacified, conditioned by the "war on terror" to accept the long-term prospect of pre-emptive war and wartime curtailment of civil liberties. That of course is also suited to their domestic ambition: to cancel every progressive social program of the last seventy years while expanding privilege and wealth for the super rich.

Despite the major election setback, the future of America and how it relates to the rest of the world need not remain in the grasp of the crusaders of the far right. But changing the trajectory requires, as Mark Solomon says. "the mother of all coalitions".

THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY

A major electoral opportunity to derail the Bush-Cheney war train was lost in 2004. Whether new electoral opportunities will be viable in 2006 and 2008 depends squarely on the organization and power of movements to resist reaction every step of the way and create alternatives that gather a progressive majority in every part of the country. Fighting to end the bloody occupation of Iraq and bring our young men and women home to safety can't be put on hold. Nor can any other demand crucial to the welfare of people at home or worldwide.

Where does the Democratic Party come into the picture? Three things stand out. One, what the Democratic Party does will be critical, for better or worse, to the effectiveness of Congressional resistance to the aggressive Bush-Cheney agenda. Two, the Democratic Party is the main electoral vehicle that can reverse the growing reactionary grip on the three branches of federal power. Three, without a successful battle to change the course of the Democratic Party, neither will the country change course.

There is justified and necessary anger at the role of the Democratic Leadership Council in strangling the voice and ignoring the will of Democratic voters. Even as they engineer defeat after defeat, they find more reasons to push further to the right and deeper into chronic political impotence.

Is the Democratic establishment monolithic and impervious to dissent? Is their control unshakable? I don't think so.

It seems to me there are prospects for changing the "same-old, same-old" story. A bold effort is beginning to build on the surge of creative activism to create a powerful progressive infrastructure. Organized though diverse, this movement doesn't wait on sanction from above. It can assert itself on policy and challenge for recognition and leadership.

The prospects for forcing a change of direction are favored by the extreme alarm that the Bush-Cheney course has evoked in so many quarters at all levels of society. If one talks about the "mother of all coalitions", its power has to rest on a mass, energetic base that doesn't accept the notion that "it can't be done". Its breadth has to be such that it alters the dominant influence in the Democratic Party and makes it an effective instrument to break the GOP hold on government.

Frustration and disappointment with the electoral process certainly inspire the determination to build movements that don't come and go with election times. But every struggle has a stake in what happens in the electoral arena. What happened in 2000 and 2004 makes 2006 and 2008 much more, not less, important. We can't get too far past "the tipping point" before we check the downward slide to autocracy.

January 5, 2005

Personal Note

A few friends and visitors to my website have expressed concern about my uncharacteristic lapse into silence for about seven weeks. I am alive and well, but there is an explanation. Roz, who is also reasonably well, has had an infection in her ankle that requires many weeks of treatment. She was hospitalized and has to spend six weeks in a skilled nursing facility. She's doing well, but our "normal" routines are not faring as well. My days are spent with Roz, which is fine for both of us, but "extra-curricular" activities are on hold.

More serious, my brother Malcolm died on December 23rd after heart surgery and a very rough struggle over several weeks. I am writing something about him and our special relationship over my 83 years.

I probably will not get back to posting comments as often as in the past, but there will be something from time to time. And I will say more soon about Malcolm.

My e-mail address is now: lwofsy@berkeley.edu

January 8, 2005

MALCOLM

My brother Malcolm died December 23rd, near the end of 2004, a bad year. The only thing he was spared was news of the tsunami calamity. The high hopes for the future that inspired much of his life were damped down by anger and foreboding over the way this new century has begun.

Malcolm was four years older than I. He was part of my life longer than anyone else. We shared an unbroken connection of ideals, ideas, and brotherly love until his death. His influence in my years of childhood and youth was enormous. I grew up wanting to follow in his footsteps, and did so as best I could through high school and college. In elementary school, four grades apart, we were both suspended from school (believe it or not) for observing May Day 1930 in defiance of President Hoover's proclaimed ban on the workers' holiday. To this day I remember my alarm, and my Mother's, when Malcolm disappeared for hours after hearing that our father had been badly beaten in jail by cops after a large and peaceful demonstration for unemployment insurance in our home town of Stamford, Connecticut. Malcolm wanted to be by himself to absorb what had happened, something neither of us ever forgot.

When Malcolm graduated from Hillhouse High School in New Haven, Connecticut, I followed for the next four years, taking pretty much the same courses, including German, unfortunately with the same pro-Nazi teacher. Our very best years together (there were many good ones to follow) were when we overlapped for a couple of years at CCNY. Malcolm got there first, but the only way he could support himself was by working a full time job in a print shop for two to three years. So he was still a junior when he made it possible for me to enter City as a freshman. He was enamored of City College; in those years, it was free and open to the poorest and brightest youth of a generation coming out of the Great Depression. It was a hotbed of intellectual activity, of early anti-fascist protest, of rebellion and idealism. Coming to CCNY became my dream as well.

When I got to City, Malcolm was a leader of the Marxist student movement with lots of friends not only in the famous alcoves, but also in the adjacent Harlem community where he lived and was involved. Among his very best friends were Lou Burnham and Howard "Stretch" Johnson, who were to become major figures in struggles for racial equality and justice. For four years, I was part of the household that Malcolm shared with Ida and her parents on 124th St. and St.Nicholas Avenue. In that home, as well as in classes and alcoves at City, our love of music and literature came alive, as we grew into a lifetime of commitment to the dream of a world free of oppression and capitalist greed. Our parents had given us our sense of direction in political outlook and appreciation of culture. But fruition came during those years together in New York. Malcolm and I ran for office together and won as representatives in CCNY's Student Legislative Congress. We listened together enraptured as our friend, Clint Oliver, played Cesar Frank's Symphonic Variations on Ida and Malcolm's piano. We mourned together the death of Wilfred Mendelson and other comrades who fell fighting the fascists in Spain. We wrote and distributed leaflets together, and were frowned on together by the Dean's office. The Dean told Malcolm that he should expect a hard time when it came to applying for any job post graduation. That hint of "black list" was only a foretaste of what Malcolm was soon to confront in the Army during World War II and, later, in academia.

Since this is a remembrance, not a chronicle of Malcolm's long life, I'll move on to other highlights of experiences we shared. There was a strange one in 1984 that shed retrospective light on why Malcolm's career is science was largely outside a university faculty setting. We were in Nicaragua together at a conference of health workers. We were chatting with another US delegate, who got around to a story about his difficult relationship with his father. His father admitted to him that, as head of a university department of biochemistry, he had been pressured during the time of Joe McCarthy into denying tenure to an outstanding young faculty member. That rang a bell, and sure enough it turned out that the university in question was Wisconsin and Malcolm was the assistant professor of Biochemistry. He was punished because he was one of the founders of the Joe Must Go movement that swept McCarthy's home state and contributed to his eventual downfall.

Malcolm went on to a creative research career, heading up laboratories and institutes in brain biochemistry, always his main fascination. This was often coupled with adjunct academic appointments, but he could have contributed so much more as a teacher. I benefited from Malcolm's love of teaching. He always pushed the boundaries of curiosity, of wanting to dig deeply. He was excited, enthusiastic about ideas. He loved to explore problems and puzzles, ranging from mathematics to the origin of life.

Of course what we both were always most passionate about was the enduring struggle for social justice, the conviction that a better world is possible. An aspect of this was mutual support when the going got rough during McCarthyism and similar periods of aggressive reaction. As a national officer of the Labor Youth League in the early 1950s, I was hauled before the House Un-American Committee and was subject to an inquisition under the McCarran Internal Security Act. When I had to leave home for months at a time, Malcolm and Mildred, living in Wisconsin with their first two children, Marc and Jon, took Roz and our children, Carla and David, into their home. And about a dozen years later, Malcolm and Mildred and their children (now including Sara) took my organizer father, who was dying of cancer, into their home in Hartford, Connecticut. They took care of our Mother as well, while I was geographically out of reach in my first year at Berkeley.

One of our best together times, Malcolm's and mine, was when he came to spend several months as a Visiting Professor in my department of Microbiology and Immunology. Berkeley had been even more exciting in the 60s than CCNY in the 30s. Even though the 60s were over, Malcolm loved Berkeley, the science and the politics, and everyone warmed up to and appreciated him. I didn't mention earlier that my own scientific career, which began when I was unemployed and 37 years old, could not have happened if I hadn't let my older brother talk me into a chemistry major when I was in my third year at CCNY. That major lay fallow, unused during 14 years of organizing activity, but it was the crutch that got me in the door of graduate school when the future looked bleak.

Malcolm's life can't be tied together in a simple package. Much of it was hard. He was too unusual and intelligent not to be a complicated personality. I don't think anyone who knew him could fail to see and admire his qualities. Wherever he went there were young people surrounding him and eagerly learning from him. Often, though, he liked to shock. He was no fan of "political correctness", of adjusting his strongly held opinions to the sensibilities of others. He was intolerant of "sacred cows", especially of religion or nationalism. In turn, he was often quite sensitive and hurt if someone he respected challenged his statements.

Malcolm's happiest years, I believe, were with Grace, his third wife, in New Mexico and when they returned to New York. After they retired, and until her death, he was more relaxed with life than anytime I can remember. He got particular joy from George, their big golden retriever. After that, anger at "old age" and his untreatable deafness was irrepressible. Marc and Susan, Jon and Marta did the very best for him as his health deteriorated. .

Still, in the months before his death, his many e-mails to me were engaged fully with world and national events. I mentioned at the outset his foreboding about where we're heading. Needless to say, he was hoping, as we all were, that Bush would go down in November. But he kept hope alive. For the last couple of years, he felt hope rested with a rising movement against capitalist globalization. He sent me outlines and texts of his talks in The Nation group discussions. In his last e-mail to me on November 21st, he included part of a letter sent to Jon and Marta that he said "expresses both my pessimism and the hope for a better future". He wrote of the need for the progressive movement to grow into a new version of "international workers of the world" and "to reestablish the power to change the world." "Only the people of this country can promote such a change. A golden opportunity has been lost. Let us hope that the next one will not lie too far in the future. Capitalism can destroy the world…. It is a race between the end of the biosphere and the end of a rapacious system."

As Malcolm passes from our lives, I see an image from one of his favorite books (that of course became my favorite too). At the end of Emil Zola's "Germinal", a heroic miner's strike has been brutally crushed. Etienne, the organizer, is leaving town. He overcomes despair as he walks on the ground above the mine and sees "the April sun now well up in the sky, shedding its glorious warming rays on the teeming earth". Below, "ever more insistently, his comrades were tapping, tapping as though they too were rising through the ground. On this youthful morning, in the fiery rays of the sun, the whole country was alive with this sound…. a black avenging host was slowly germinating in the furrows, thrusting upwards for the harvests of future ages. And very soon their germination would crack the earth asunder."

March 7, 2005

Changes are being made to the Home Page. They should be completed soon.

March 8, 2005

SUPERPOWER USA:

Overestimated by Bush and the neocons, but neither should it be underestimated

At home and abroad, the reality of the unthinkable "four more years" is still setting in. Governments, organizations, and people in general are getting their bearings, rethinking expectations and strategies.

Bush and his sponsors think that US superpower can reshape the world according to their specifications. They believe that their domestic political advantage can reshape America, removing all constraints on the rule of big business and all that remains of the hard-won social-legislative advances of the 20th Century. Both history and the current course of events indicate that these extreme ambitions are unrealizable, but the arrogant aggressiveness of their pursuit dominates international concerns and shapes the US political agenda.

To assume that Bush and Co. would simply go from failure to failure would be to underestimate the reality of US power and the stubborn resolve of this Administration. The Bush Administration has laid claim to powerful mantras to cover the nakedness of its grasp for absolute domination. The declared purpose in whatever it does— whether resort to war or torture or foreign aid— is to spread "freedom" throughout the world: American security depends on pressuring all nations to choose democracy, "free elections and free enterprise". At home, overturning social gains is a matter of adapting to a new world, serving youth by dropping programs designed for the last century.

During Bush's first four years, the failures were overwhelming and obvious to almost everyone everywhere, even to many voters who reelected him by a small majority when most Americans felt the country was on the "wrong track". Aside from the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the only strategic gain the Administration could tout was the turn-about of Libya's Omar Khadafy. Now suddenly, as Bush trumpets "Freedom on the March", the claims expand to include the Iraq elections, the ouster of unpopular governments in the Ukraine and Lebanon, election of a new Palestinian leadership, and hints of changes of electoral policies in Egypt and Saudi Arabia.

Isn't this just what the architects of the Iraq War predicted? Isn't this validation of Bush's mission to change the world? Hardly. No doubt some opposition forces in the Middle East and elsewhere have been able to take limited advantage of US intervention to weaken old autocracies, but that's a far cry from assuring either the general triumph of democracy or Bush's actual objective of absolute US control. Through all the convolutions and excitement over elections, what remains constant is the Administration's insistence on US military control, the long-term occupation of Iraq and the placing of US generals as overseers of Iraqi and Palestinian "security forces".

The claim that the war in Iraq is having a domino effect in spreading democracy is debunkable on many grounds, not least that war and occupation have intensified terrorism and sparked resistance, that the contradictions between the rhetoric of freedom and superpower hubris are flagrant, that the toll in lives and resources mounts with no end in sight, and that our own democracy and social fabric are being assaulted systematically.

Yet, aside from countering falsehoods and hypocrisy, one has to take account of some of the dynamics of Bush's "freedom" crusade. The most important fact is the popular will for democracy and against puppet tyrannies that is worldwide and deep and has produced major political changes in many countries in the last twenty-five years. The objective of US supremacists, especially under Bush, is to exploit that momentum, tie it to dependence on US superpower influence and control, and use it to justify political, economic and military interventions. That game has been played everywhere from the Philippines to Eastern Europe, making a false equation between democracy and submission to capitalist globalization ("free enterprise"). The result is generally to frustrate hopes raised by popular democratic upheavals, "regime change" being followed by a debilitating economic and political aftermath.

Saddling the "spread of democracy" to US superpower may well produce another dynamic, that of the double-edged sword. Bush may put "free elections" at the top of the global agenda, but new opportunities for democratic change can raise aspirations to self-determination and freedom from foreign intervention. In Iraq, many political forces that oppose US military occupation took part in the very elections that Bush needed to "legitimize" the occupation. The Palestinian people, who oppose the US-backed Israeli occupation, held elections which Bush and Blair (and Sharon) favored for strategic reasons. As complex as these interactions are, the popular pressure for ending military occupation in Iraq and Palestine is likely to persist and gain effectiveness to the extent that channels for democratic expression expand. (That may be happening now in Lebanon, where the public outcry against US intervention is even louder than the demand for Syrian troop withdrawal.)

This interplay of conflicting interests is reflective of a world in which US superpower is insufficient to compel global subservience, but still dominates attention and the terms of engagement on vital issues. No one can ignore US power. Governments, no matter how antagonized by George W. Bush, avoid confrontation. In turn, Bush— while remaining aggressive and posturing as global commander-in-chief— maneuvers to regain ground with would-be allies alienated during his first term.

The unstable impasse between superpower overreach and the diverse resistance it engenders is unlikely to be broken in either direction any time soon. When and if it does break in a direction favorable to democracy, it will be because events drive a linkage between support for democracy and freedom from military and economic occupiers.

Whatever the limitations of US superpower, Bush and his fundamentalist cohorts have been able to dominate the policy agenda and push it far to the right. They weren't able to get international sanction for the war in Iraq, nor have they been able to pacify Iraq, but the occupation goes on and Europe is called on to render after-the-fact compliance. They have not been able to compel North Korea and Iran to accept terms for unconditional nuclear surrender, but they have reframed "nuclear non-proliferation" to free the "haves", especially the United States, from restraints based on mutual obligations toward nuclear disarmament. Domestically, they have not been able yet to overturn Roe v Wade, but they have created a climate where doctors and nurses who support a woman's right to choose have to fear for their lives They have not been able to ban teaching evolution, but teachers across the country are afraid to teach because of evangelical intimidation. Now, with their aim of privatizing social security in trouble, they are determined to manipulate the debate through fear and generational conflict.

Aside from the awful costs in lives and destruction, the worst fall-out from the ambitions and abuse of US superpower has been to divert the world and the country from the most urgent challenges in human history. Not long ago one could hope that the end of the Cold War would direct attention to collective efforts to save the planet, to make headway against poverty and disease, to move all countries toward equality and racial justice. Bush and company are sucking up the time and energy that humanity needs so desperately.

Still, they may discover that popular protest and democratic upheavals are destined to collide with rather than bolster reactionary aims and imperial hubris. That's the time-tested way to prevent more outrages and to gain the power to change tracks.

March 23, 2005

THE INCREDIBLE SHRINKING "CULTURE OF LIFE"

In 1999, the Columbine shooting dominated the headlines for days. Not so the high school shooting at Redlake Minnesota a couple of days ago. News of ten lives lost on an Indian reservation was a distant second to the tragic Shiavo story.

The more fundamentalist preachers and politicians expose us to the "culture of life", the fewer it seems are the lives to be valued. Top priority is the fertilized egg, less precious are mothers and children, still less the homeless and downtrodden and those of a different color or religion. And the mounting sacrifice of lives in war is to be accepted by all "good Americans" along with God's blessing.

When George W. Bush and Tom Delay staged their Sunday Congressional coup against the courts, the President said he prefers to "err on the side of life". But he routinely and exclusively gave death the benefit of the doubt in presiding over a record number of executions as Governor of Texas. Despite monumental doubts, misinformation and deception, he went to war in Iraq, erring on the side of death on a grand scale.

This ever-narrowing conception of the "culture of life" is more than bizarre. When absolutist religious dogma and political opportunism obliterate common sense and broadly humane values, fanaticism directs fear and hatred against all who beg to differ. Fortunately, polls show that most Americans deplore the intervention of Congress and the President into the personal Shiavo tragedy. Last Sunday's political charade may be restoring a sense of smell and alarm for many Americans.

April 23, 2005

Visitors to this website over the last few months have found little new. I guess the realities of aging are compelling me to wind this project down.

My health is good, but Roz had spent the last four months in and out of hospitals fighting infections, especially one that disappears for a time but then recurs. We have good reason to hope that her recovery this time will be sustained. Nevertheless, I think it's time to adjust to a different rhythm.

The website will remain available for anyone who may find something of interest among the commentaries and op-eds of the last few years. I may even be unable to resist posting an occasional comment.

My thanks to East Bay Democrats whose website regularly reproduced my essays and to others who circulated many of them via multiple e-mail lists.

I'll continue to keep up with the good stuff that appears on Common Dreams and Portside as well as the best columns by Bob Herbert, Molly Ivins, Frank Rich, Maureen Dowd, and Paul Krugman.

July 13, 2005

On "21st Century World Order"

The July 1st joint statement by China and Russia on "21st century world order" merits serious attention. Some may be inclined to dismiss it, because in many respects the record of China and Russia, like that of all world powers, falls far short of the vision the statement projects. Nevertheless, it hits head-on the overriding issue of at least the next several decades: the choice between a superpower effort to impose a unipolar "world order" that inevitably yields war and chaos and a multi-faceted alternative approach that opens doors to a range of innovative developments toward world peace and social progress.

There are many aspects of the joint statement that warrant scrutiny, but let's focus here on the historic significance of the clash between contrasting approaches to "world order" in this new century. That is of great consequence to everyone who hopes that a different and better world can emerge despite present calamitous circumstances. It's especially worth contemplating for those of us who have long conceived of the future from a socialist perspective.

The call for a "new world order" (words recycled from a frightful past) was advanced by father Bush at the end of the Cold War. Since then the underlying assumption in US military and economic policy is that a "new world order" can be imposed by virtue of superpower might and universal accommodation to US global "leadership". But the notion that an American President and a few obedient heads of state can take control of world affairs is proving to be a direct route to an unending state of war and disaster.

The failure of the aggressive militaristic crusade that equates "order" with US global control is everywhere in evidence, although a stubborn Bush regime persists without let-up. Most of the world rejects war and resents the arrogant ideology of US hegemony. There is growing disenchantment at home as staggering costs and casualties mount, and the toll of innocent victims of war and terrorism escalates with no end in sight.

Without doubt, the future depends first of all on strong rejection of the Bush regime's ultra-reactionary international and domestic objectives. That's a big mountain peak to scale, but there are many signs (including ongoing changes in attitudes of most Americans) that it can be done. In that process, questions will arise concerning transition to a genuinely different world outlook.

The unipolar superpower model of "world order" operates in conjunction with the institutions of global capitalism to try to freeze out any alternative pathways of social development. That, beyond its terrible human costs and futility, is ultimately its most damaging aspect. Thus, even when the people of any country try to take control of their destiny, the governments they bring into power by revolution or reform are pressured to adapt to the prevailing world power structure. No government can ignore the sole superpower and the pressures of global capitalist arrangements. Even the limited elbowroom for alternative social experiments that was possible during the Cold War is diminished. The "real world" compels compromise or distortion of ideals or both.

Beyond the absolute necessity that America and the world turn away from the Bush regime's plunge into catastrophe, the key to the future is to establish conditions that permit nations and people everywhere to create pathways of social progress within a framework of international cooperation. The ideas and principles of that kind of world order, as opposed to the unipolar straitjacket, are not new or unique to the Sino-Russian statement, although they are well expressed there and brought up to date from what can be read in the UN Charter.

What is new for the first time since the end of the Cold War is that the superpower way is becoming badly discredited and conditions are shaping up for a major adjustment in global realities over the next couple of decades. There is no mistaking the rejection by the vast majority of people around the world of the notion that problems can be solved by war and bullying. The Bush regime's aggressive overreach has earned it universal distrust and condemnation to a degree never before directed at an American president. Nor is it likely that any future President of neoliberal persuasion can bring the world into line with a superpower agenda of imperial supremacy. The momentum of globalization and the information explosion has accelerated the economic and political emergence of some formerly "third world" countries as rising world powers, even as it has expanded the shameful gap between rich and poor. New regional alliances are surfacing that are a potential challenge to superpower dominance and the exclusivity of the global institutions that dictate rules of world economy and finance.

Most important for the future is the rising tide of "people power", popular movements that are bringing about political transformation in a number of countries. Perhaps most significantly in Latin America, this popular upsurge expresses deep anti-capitalist outrage and the determination to achieve a more equitable social system. The thirst for freedom that Bush seeks to exploit rhetorically and manipulate conspiratorially is clearly not a process he can control. All of these varied developments have the potential to reach a critical mass that would alter international relations and even breath new life into the United Nations.

Of all people, socialists cannot overlook the enormous significance of contrasting approaches to "world order" in the first part of the 21st century. At this juncture in history, the need is to unfreeze capitalism's blockage of humanity's search for new paths of social development. A climate has to be secured that permits the people of South Africa and Brazil and Cuba and China— and, for that matter, of the United States and Europe— to explore and choose their way forward. What social experiments modify or replace the present capitalist order will vary from place to place, diverse in form and tempo according to different circumstances and cultural histories. The search is not for some uniform ultimate model, but for societies that are driven by commitment to human needs and aspirations rather than by the greed of an elite minority.

If a multitude of factors (popular movements most of all) mitigate the present international imbalance in power so that a multilateral approach to world problems and community takes hold, the doors to social progress and creativity will be open. People will find their ways forward even if the ultimate goal of a whole world free of exploitation, racism and human misery is a project in progress beyond the lifetime of a few generations. The socialist perspective is meaningful in finding transitions to a better world, and its vision of the future can embody and inspire humanity's hopes along the way.

July 16, 2005

Postscript:

So far only a couple of my usual correspondents have had anything to say about my comments on "21st Century World Order" (7/13/05). I think I know why, and my hunch is supported by conversation with a couple of friends.

First, the fact that the piece takes off from a China-Russia statement is no doubt off-putting. When one sees Putin's signature, the immediate reflex is "Chechnya". And China's policies in international and domestic affairs are surely more strongly pragmatic and self-centered than high-minded and humanitarian.

Second, while my arguments emphasize the perils and evils of the superpower model of "world order", ignored are the weakness and failures of international responses particularly in crisis situations of genocide or imminent threats to peace.

On the first point, the ideas in the joint statement are important and welcome on their actual merit, whatever mixed motivations may be operative. Further, the discrediting of the superpower model is occurring not just because of its moral bankruptcy; it is being breached because most governments and populations (not only Chinese and Russian) don't deem it in their self-interest.

The second point is more important, because the idea that only the United States has the power and will to act in international emergencies has been promoted as an article of faith. Many liberals, even as they strongly oppose the Bush Administration, see the need for "humanitarian intervention" by US forces in desperate situations. This is a difficult and vital subject in its own right, but I should have included a few points in the initial argument.

First, the disastrous failure of the superpower model of "world order" is not reason to deny the exceptionally important role of the United States on international problems. No nation has more to offer. What would be the strength and effectiveness of the world community if the United States, instead of flaunting and deriding UN-based international institutions, participated and supported them on the basis of mutual respect among nations?

Second, there is no real substitute for international cooperation in coping with international crises, whether concerning poverty, disease, terrorism, natural disasters, or the obligation to act promptly to stop massacres and genocide. When there are obstacles to necessary collective action, every effort has to be made to surmount them rather than resorting to military intervention under superpower command and in disregard of international law. The fact is that the really tough problems cannot be resolved any other way. Is there any doubt that problems in Africa demand regional cooperation with international support? No doubt US resources and influence could contribute mightily to such humanitarian solidarity, whereas US military intervention would produce another disaster. Or take the problem of nuclear proliferation: Can the US convince North Korea and Iran that only the United States has the right to expand nuclear power and weapons? Or do we have to back off from warlike posturing in favor of peaceful collective efforts and, sooner rather than later, establish our own compliance with international commitments toward nuclear disarmament?

The issue of "world order" is not a matter of choosing between fixed models or formulas that claim to answer all problems. It is a matter of accepting the reality that the unipolar supremacist approach is grossly incompatible with the needs, desires and interests of humanity in this 21st Century. The answer is in genuine international cooperation fueled by the strivings of powerful and diverse popular constituencies all over the globe. The point is to open all channels to human creativity and social progress.

September 12, 2005

TRUST AND A NUCLEAR NIGHTMARE

On September 11, the Washington Post reported the current version of the Pentagon's "Doctrine for Joint Nuclear Operations", dated March 5, 2005, now declassified on a Pentagon website. It plans the "preemptive" use of nuclear weapons against an enemy that is using "or intending to use WMD".

On the same weekend, multiple national polls showed Bush's "approval rating" dipping to and below 40%. Newsweek found that 52% of Americans do not trust the president to make the right decisions in either a domestic or international crisis.

Bush and his masterminds swore there were WMDs in Iraq. They were hapless as Katrina's devastation unfolded. Trust them with nuclear first strike potential? That would be the crime that survivors could never forgive.

November 8, 2005

This morning's e-mail brought a nice surprise.from the media director of Alameda Power and Telecom:

"I just wanted to let you know we are showing all 8 episodes of On My Mind tomorrow night beginning at 9:30 pm. We repeat all 8 again the following Wednesday.

"We're promoting it on the home page.

http://www.alamedatv.org/

"A listing of the episodes is on the program page itself.

http://www.alamedatv.org/programs/leonwofsy.html"

The programs can be seen only on the City of Alameda Cable Channel 31. I can make a DVD copy available on request: lwofsy@berkeley.edu

From the Alameda TV program page:

What a Difference a Year Makes

The mass media and public have recently been questioning the decisions, ethics and policies of the Bush Administration. But throughout 2004, Professor Leon Wofsy produced monthly commentaries on Channel 31 that challenged the Republicans and the Democrats on the very same matters.

All 8 of Professor Wofsy's commentaries have been compiled and will be aired on two consecutive Wednesdays.

The Commentaries

1. The Right or Wrong Path

2. The Budget, Education and the War

3. Don't Duck the Big One

4. What Did We Do to Get to Abu Ghraib

5. The Dispute Over Stem Cell Research

6. Time to Get Real

7. Decision Time: Iraq and Beyond

8. The Mandate Illusion

December 16, 2005

To our friends and all who have visited us via this website, we send SEASON'S GREETINGS AND BEST WISHES FOR THE NEW YEAR!

2005 was not a good year for Bush. The GOP strategists of war and empire, and those Democratic politicians who share the folly, have dragged America into a swamp of hostility, distrust and failure. They have lost the confidence of a majority of Americans. Disastrous events of 2005 have exposed their callousness toward young American and Iraqi lives, contempt for the Bill of Rights, total commitment to corporate wealth against the dignity and welfare of most Americans. Even those who don't recognize the venality of the Bush-Cheney autocracy now see its incompetence. It is not fit to deal with emergencies and basic human problems at home and abroad.

We hope 2006 is a better year, not for Bush, but for America and the world. We hope it brings each of you happiness, health and renewed hope for a better future.

Roz and I are now in our mid-80s, have no apparent life-threatening issues, and look forward to 2006. Sometime in the coming year, we will shut down this website. We will find other outlets for occasional op-eds when we're moved to write them. So, we say farewell to blogging, and wish you a HAPPY NEW YEAR!

March 18, 2006

Editor, NY Times:

Re Brooks on "Rumsfeld's Blinkers", NY Times 3/17/06

According to Brooks, virtually all pundits knew in the week of March 24, 2003 what only Rumsfeld refused to see: "the U.S, was confronting an insurgency" and "more boots on the ground would be needed." Brooks assumes that the mission could have been accomplished "if Rumsfeld had made adjustments to the new circumstances."

But does vastly superior military force wipe out resistance to foreign occupation? Not in Chechnya. Not in Palestine. And, remember, not in Vietnam.

If the lesson from Iraq is that the balance between success and failure rests on troop numbers and military tactics, we are doomed to stay on the course of disastrous and losing "wars of choice". In March of 2003, many people (even some pundits) knew that the Bush doctrine of preemptive war and military occupation was the essential miscalculation. The mistake was the war itself.

Leon Wofsy

July 31, 2006

7/27/06

Hi Leon

I know you are not writing anymore but I would be interested in your take on the Middle East.

Marc

_________________________________

7/30/06

Dear Marc,

You persuade me to try again to voice some dark thoughts. What I see in the Middle East — beyond the unbearable misery, death and destruction — are forces that are pushing blindly, stubbornly and brutally toward global catastrophe.

Stripped of arguments over particular incidents, provocations and retaliation, common denominators connect the bloody wars in Palestine, Lebanon, Israel and Iraq. There are many deep-seated and complicated issues, but one problem is at the root of the worsening carnage: the persistent illusion that the Middle East and the world as a whole can be brought by force into compliance with the will and superpower might of the US government. Regardless of powerful evidence to the contrary, the notion is that militant challenges to occupation regimes in Iraq and Palestine can be eliminated by terrifying military responses and merciless bombing. Instead, support for resistance grows, hatred of the US and Israel sweeps the Arab and Muslim worlds. Moreover, fanatic religious fundamentalists gain popular backing as the only leaders willing and able to fight against Israel and the US and to do something to meet the needs of populations living in misery. Meanwhile, no one has a monopoly on the ability to murder civilians, and Israelis can gain no hope or comfort from the fact that for every Jewish child killed by a Hezbollah shell, 20 or more Arab babies are bombed to smithereens (as in Qana today).

How long can the US hold out against the rest of the world's demand for an immediate cease-fire in Lebanon? How long can the maniacal and futile effort to gain a military "final solution" be allowed to rage on?

I don't know. The horrors mount as the failures of the Bush regime are apparent to all. No doubt political changes are ahead in the United States, and some reactionaries will not escape the wrath of the people. But my expectations are far lower than my hopes. Too many Americans, not to speak of most of the political establishment, see only mistakes and incompetence, not evil, in pressing for general acquiescence to American superpower.

I'll quit now although a dozen other questions are rattling around in my head. I guess I'll stay retired from blogging, allowing for an occasional relapse like this.

Best,

Leon

August 6, 2006

WHERE TO FROM IRAQ?

…"staying the course" is pointless, and it's time to start thinking about Plan B— how we might disengage with the least damage possible - - Thomas L. Friedman (NY Times Aug. 4, 2006)

When Tom Friedman and so many others who supported the Iraq war finally give up on "Plan A", it's really past time to think way beyond "Plan B". The problem is not just exiting Iraq, but changing direction and priorities before all hope for a livable future is squandered.

The debacle in Iraq and the horror of war in the Middle East reveal a paradox that we absolutely have to acknowledge: "war on terror" is the surest way to hold the world in the grip of terror. As long as "war on terror" is the top priority of US policy, as long as Washington insists that support for its "war on terror" trumps all else on the international agenda, terror in all forms—state and non-state -will burgeon beyond control.

It's not simply that "war on terror" in an oxymoron, since war is terror. Nor is it solely that war and occupation of foreign territory breed more and more hatred, resistance, terror and counter-terror. The worst of it, beyond unforgivable death and destruction, is that the world's attention is not on the priorities of human survival. One such priority is to reduce the level of violence and the potential for war and acts of terror, but that is inseparable from other challenges that can no longer be postponed. What has to end is paralysis on global warming, global environmental havoc, unconscionable inequality that feeds the plagues of poverty and disease, genocidal ethnic eruptions, and the dislocation and starvation of millions.

Collective international action to protect populations against acts of terror and war can be effective if not subjected to the pursuit of an aggressive foreign policy that relies on ultimata and the threat of superpower force. It is global stupidity to say in effect that terror must be eliminated before issues of human survival get urgent attention. Similarly, it is futile to demand compliance with an ultimatum before agreeing even to talk with designated adversaries; criminal to reject a ceasefire until the balance of slaughter is deemed sufficiently favorable to one side.

If there is any hope for a less violent and terrorized world, it can only come about in a healthier and more hopeful political climate. A decent future on a secure planet Earth may already be a long shot for humankind, but it is a far wiser direction to take out of Iraq than the road to wider war and catastrophe.

August 15, 2006

Two articles on the "big picture" that I recommend highly:

TOO LATE FOR EMPIRE : The Origins of the Crisis of the Republic, Jonathon Schell, The Nation, August 14/21, 2006

THE FOREIGN POLICY THE US NEEDS , Stanley Hoffman, The New York Review of Books, August 10, 2006

The first one puts present US policy in perspective. The second favors a very different direction for our country. Both flesh out the main thoughts expressed in many of the entries in this journal.

October 4, 2006

THE RUMSFELD DIVERSION

'It's Rumsfeld's fault. If only Rumsfeld had sent more troops, the Iraq War could have been a success instead of a disaster. Better late than never, Bush should fire Rumsfeld.'

That's a consensus that joins Senators John McCain and Hillary Clinton, journalists David Brooks and Tom Friedman, and most retired generals. That's the mantra some supporters of the war have chosen to distance themselves from its failure. Pointing to Rumsfeld's sorry performance, neither pundit nor politician need say that the war itself was and is the folly.

My primary concern is not with an apparent lack of candor among some who point the finger at Rumsfeld. And it certainly is not to belittle Rumsfeld's critical responsibility in the Bush Administration's disastrous war. It is that the narrow focus on Rumsfeld fosters a terrible myth, that with more troops and different military tactics the invasion and military occupation of Iraq could succeed.

What Bush saw early on as "mission accomplished" proved to be "mission impossible." The failure to recognize that reality could produce a new crop of horrendous consequences. While the Bush Administration can no longer salvage its war or its credibility, the course it has set at home and abroad can be followed by others who blame "incompetence" for the Iraq debacle.

Behind the smoke and mirrors that maneuvered a reluctant nation into war in 2003, the Bush Administration was supremely confident that our superpower might would overwhelm Iraq, establish a commanding influence in the Middle East, and signal an era of unchallenged US global dominance. Instead, Iraq proved an opposite reality: the limits of military superpower in today's world. War and foreign occupation are not palatable to the victims; they produce international resentment and antagonism; they cause resistance to metastasize and breed far more enemies worldwide than they eliminate. A political version of Newton's Law may apply: the greater the application of force by an occupying army, the fiercer the resistance. In the National Intelligence Estimate of April 2006, all US intelligence agencies found that the Iraq War has actually expanded terrorism as an international phenomenon.

As the elections of 2006 and 2008 unfold, most candidates will want to stand clear of association with the failures of George W. Bush's presidency. But that is not necessarily a blessing if candidates who support the basic foreign and domestic goals of the Administration can finesse criticisms of its "performance" into self-serving claims of independence and integrity. Dumping on Rumsfeld, who deserves it, ought not to be enough. That is no assurance against further aggressive misadventures of choice. Our world and our nation cannot afford to travel further down that road.

October 29, 2006

CONVENTIONAL WISDOM'S "CATASTROPHE"

With President Bush's press conference of Wednesday, October 25th, the "state of denial" about the course of the Iraq War supposedly gave way to reality. Not so.

Denial is kept torturously alive through a "conventional wisdom" imparted by many pundits: 'the consequence of ending the occupation any time soon would be a catastrophe for the United States and Iraq.'

So far that assumption has been countered by the argument that military occupation is increasing the violence and spreading it around the world (an assessment confirmed recently by all sixteen US intelligence agencies). But the assumption itself should be challenged, especially given the dire predictions raised to fear-mongering pitch by President Bush on the eve of the Congressional elections.

No one can deny any longer that things are going very badly in Iraq, but the greater reality not be denied is that war and occupation are losing strategies— even for the super-powerful United States. Our problems in this century need other answers. Would it be a catastrophe to accept that view?

Ending the occupation would certainly confirm the collapse of the Bush Administration's ambitions. But would it be a disaster for America's standing in the world? Far from it. The end of illusions about reshaping the world on the basis of superior military power would be a new beginning in realization of America's rightful place in the world community. No one underestimates America's enormous potential for advancing international efforts to deal with the great problems of our time. Facing up to truths that have become obvious is not weakness, but strength that would be acknowledged and welcomed with relief by most of the world.

Now again, as in Vietnam, too many lives are sacrificed in homage to domino theories of catastrophe that postpone acceptance of reality and acknowledgement of policy failures. The dominoes didn't fall when we left Vietnam, and ending the occupation of Iraq will not bring on the terrorist invasion of the United States that the President conjures up in his stump speeches.

Ending the occupation would not make chronic problems disappear in Iraq or anywhere else, but every problem could be dealt with more constructively if the United States embraced cooperative efforts rather than an aggressive role apart from and "above" the international community. Renouncing any intention to maintain US military bases in Iraq and starting the withdrawal process would underscore the right of the Iraqi people to work out the solutions for the future of their nation. That would improve conditions for constructive international assistance that Iraq surely needs to achieve peace and overcome the disastrous legacies of Saddam's dictatorship and the destructive forces unleashed by war and occupation.

Bringing our soldiers home— and relieving ourselves of the burden of trillion dollar expenditures to sustain a disastrous war— is hardly a formula to increase America's vulnerability to attack. We would surely be in better shape to deal with critical matters at home and abroad.

A more positive international climate of collective action and a healthier, less fractured, less isolated America would not make Osama bin Laden happy. Nor would it please our neo-conservatives who mirror bin Laden's false challenge to a "clash of civilizations". Despite the Iraq fiasco, they remain in denial and view a crusade to enforce US military control in a "new world order" as the "great cause" of this century.

Breaking with that obsession is not to invite catastrophe, but to abort it.

November 27, 2006

letters@nytimes.com

Re Learning From Iraq, Editorial 11/26/2006

To the Editor:

There is an alarming near-consensus among pundits that the main lesson from the Iraq disaster is a "catastrophic planning failure, which left too few troops in Iraq..." Implied is that enough force could have made the folly of the war itself irrelevant and crowned the invasion and occupation of Iraq with "success". Looking at the tragedy of Iraq (and Palestine and Lebanon), it's hard to come up with a more dangerous and futile formula than an even more unrestrained application of US military force. The lesson from Iraq is the one learned at great cost in Vietnam and that the Bush Administration has tried to erase with the doctrine of preemptive war. Even overwhelming military superiority has severe limits, and bad choices to go to war have very bad outcomes.

Leon Wofsy

January 22, 2007

LARRY LEVINE

Lawrence Levine Memorial, UC Berkeley, January 21, 2007

Larry and I met and became friends at Berkeley in 1964. In a normal academic year, that probably would not have happened. I'm not a historian and, even though we both went to CCNY, I was older than Larry and we didn't overlap. But 1964 was not an ordinary year, and the usual barriers that kept faculty and students apart in separate disciplines came tumbling down.

There is a seamless connection between the Larry I first saw in 1964 and the Larry we said goodbye to in 2006. Over those 42 years, there was so much history, so many surprises that changed us all. Some hope and optimism faded along the way. People drawn together in the turbulent enthusiasm of the 60s moved in diverse directions. It might be hard to recognize a youthful idealist in today's careful liberal politician, or a once 'more radical than thou' rebel in today's spiritual progressive. But when I sat down with Larry in his final months, with me was the brave spirit, the unmistakable integrity and decency of the newcomer who rattled the austerity of a still oblivious Academic Senate on the 23rd of November, 1964.

It was Larry who chose— rather, was chosen — to make the first attempt to put the faculty on record in support of the student free speech demands. Reggie Zelnik wrote: "I cannot overemphasize how intimidating from our perspective the Senate atmosphere was on that day, how difficult it was then to speak up in the face of 525 (mainly senior) faculty members, at least half of them very impatient with our challenge… and there can be little doubt about the presence among untenured faculty, both then and later, of fear for one's job security."

There was an uncommon harmony in Larry's life. His intellectual and cultural contributions, his personal values, his causes, and his friendships all fit together— so, too, his marriage and wonderful partnership with Cornelia. Larry, who shined a light on Black folk culture, who championed multiculturalism against Allan Bloom's closed mind, who won recognition as a major American intellectual, also was arrested for protesting UC's apartheid investments. As a young man, he joined the historic civil rights trek from Selma to Montgomery. He marched again against the Vietnam War and, with Cornelia, again and again against the invasion of Iraq.

For Roz and me, some of our warmest Berkeley moments were together times, all too few, with Larry and Cornelia. For some years we shared a Saturday opera night, and intermission banter was anticipated almost as eagerly as the show. Sometimes a visit, a meal together, an unplanned encounter left lasting images: talking and walking together along the route of an anti-war march in San Francisco, being captivated by the Mozart violin sonatas one evening in the Levine home, sharing impressions during Larry's last months of Barack Obama's "Dreams of My Father". And there was the awful day of disbelief and tears when Larry phoned on the morning of Reggie's tragic accident. The compassion and support that Larry and Cornelia gave to grieving friends was unbounded, and we, too, felt their love when our daughter Carla died.

In my fondest memories of eventful times on campus, Larry and Reggie are always together. I was drawn to them from the beginning. They were Berkeley's finest.

It's so hard to say goodbye.

April 3, 2007

WHAT'S THE "BOTTOM LINE"?

King George talked again today in the Rose Garden about the "bottom line". For him, funding the war is "supporting the troops"; the Commander-in-Chief and his generals should run the war undeterred by Congress and the American people.

The bottom line is not how the war should be managed, but that the war itself is an abomination and has been from its inception. The real issue is not about military tactics, escalation or redeployment. It's that the choice to undertake "preventive" war, to invade and occupy foreign lands, is a disaster. It is immoral and a criminal violation of international law. It was bound to be massively destructive of lives as well as of the needs and hopes of millions who are "in harm's way".

The enormous harm to our own country is not accidental, not the result of mistakes in military tactics. The world has changed in many ways that make military force and occupation a terribly costly and ultimately losing strategy. Not even a superpower can impose its will as an occupier without meeting bloody and unquenchable resistance.

The bottom line for Congress should be: for or against this war. The large majority of Americans are against the war. The Commander-in-Chief must not be allowed to manipulate public concern for the troops to blackmail Congress into enabling more funds and more casualties for his war. The war that never should have started has to be brought to an end.

August 3, 2007

THE "SURGE"

Buying Time for Whom and for What?

What does the Bush-Chaney-Petraeus "surge" strategy aim to accomplish?

The op-ed piece by O'Hanlon and Pollack in the NY Times, July 30, 2007, spins an inflated story of "military progress" in Iraq, but acknowledges that the "surge" hasn't and can't produce a "political solution". Moreover their "good news" account, seized on by the White House, bogs down as the authors question, "how much longer can we wear down our forces in this mission?" They bemoan "the reality that the surge cannot go on forever". Further, every day's bad news from Iraq belies the myth of military victory: US casualties remain high and the horrendous toll in Iraqi lives grows.

Since there is no military solution to the debacle in Iraq, what is the White House looking to gain from General Petraeus' surge?

The Bush administration is buying time, not, as claimed, for its hopeless client government in Iraq, but for itself. It hopes to influence the political landscape in the United States to circumvent the popular fervor for ending the war and bringing the troops home. What it hopes to salvage from the disaster of the Iraq war is to force a "bipartisan" commitment in "our national interest" to continue an aggressive, militaristic pursuit of dominance over the Middle East and to further US global supremacy.

The surge was undertaken when the realization had sunk in for a majority of Americans that there was no alternative to withdrawal from the Iraq fiasco. The Bush administration hopes desperately to escape coming out empty handed and aims to secure conditions after all for long-term US military entrenchment in Iraq. By inflating the occupation force, the calculation is that the public demand for ending the war can be finessed with an eventual "draw-down" that would leave almost as large a military presence as before the "surge".

Above all, with the 2008 presidential campaign under way, the Petraeus build-up aims at a fait accompli to commit the next administration to continued military occupation of Iraq and further aggression in the Middle East. (The idolatrous focus on Petraeus as the "savior", as a latter day General McArthur, has its own negative implications for American democracy, as Frank Rich warned in his sharp dissent, New York Times, July 29, 2007. The ploy is that to challenge Bush, the most discredited of all US presidents, is actually to challenge Patraeus and "our troops" — and that approaches "treason".)

Can the "surge" strategy work? Even as it fails to control political reality in Iraq, can it change the political equation here at home?

What hasn't changed is that Americans are sick of the war in Iraq. There is also no doubt that most establishment figures, who largely went along with the Bush-Cheney-neocon plunge into war, now are horrified by the Administration's extremist course and the toll it is exacting internationally and on the state of the nation. But the political landscape is more complicated. The timing and circumstances for ending the war remain unresolved.

While the 2006 election results and the unfolding presidential primary campaign have pushed congressional Democrats and all potential Democratic candidates to call for ending the war, there is equivocation. Hilary Clinton is on record (quietly) for keeping 50-75,000 US troops in Iraq indefinitely. Obama, who has had a stronger anti-war position, is outdoing his rivals in pledging aggressive military intervention against Iran and Pakistan.

Republican defections from Bush on Iraq have a double-edged aspect. While serious and significant, they blunt direct efforts to force an end to the war. They mount pressure on the Democrats for a "bipartisan compromise" that will sustain as much of an occupation force as possible in Iraq and expand US military power throughout the Middle East.

If the will of the people to bring the soldiers home is to prevail, it will have to override both propaganda for extending the "surge" and bipartisan obfuscation aimed at salvaging an occupation mission.

Clearly confrontation over the Iraq war and its consequences will dominate the politics of the 2008 presidential campaign. As of now, hopes are high for getting rid of the Bush-Cheney cabal and keeping its choice replacement out of the White House. Nothing is more important than rescuing constitutional democracy and hopes for peace from a dictatorial and war hungry regime. But it's far from a slam-dunk. We need only recall the election of 2000, which began with the Gingrich Republican Congress as the most unpopular in history, and ended with the presidency stolen by the GOP's "compassionate conservative".

Beyond ending the war in Iraq, how soon and how far America recovers from the Bush years depends on a change in the hearts and minds of millions of Americans. Will the harsh lessons of Vietnam and Iraq lead us to a different view of America and its place in the world? Will we refuse to accept excuses for war and recognize that America cannot succeed (and cannot save its soul) as an occupying power in foreign lands? Will we embrace leadership by example and cooperation rather than allowing politicians to exploit "American leadership" as a rhetorical code for superiority and global dominance?

The "surge" we need is not in Baghdad. It is in the long struggle for our consciousness and conscience as a people.

August 3, 2007

THE "SURGE"

Buying Time for Whom and for What?

What does the Bush-Chaney-Petraeus "surge" strategy aim to accomplish?

The op-ed piece by O'Hanlon and Pollack in the NY Times, July 30, 2007, spins an inflated story of "military progress" in Iraq, but acknowledges that the "surge" hasn't and can't produce a "political solution". Moreover their "good news" account, seized on by the White House, bogs down as the authors question, "how much longer can we wear down our forces in this mission?" They bemoan "the reality that the surge cannot go on forever". Further, every day's bad news from Iraq belies the myth of military victory: US casualties remain high and the horrendous toll in Iraqi lives grows.

Since there is no military solution to the debacle in Iraq, what is the White House looking to gain from General Petraeus' surge?

The Bush administration is buying time, not, as claimed, for its hopeless client government in Iraq, but for itself. It hopes to influence the political landscape in the United States to circumvent the popular fervor for ending the war and bringing the troops home. What it hopes to salvage from the disaster of the Iraq war is to force a "bipartisan" commitment in "our national interest" to continue an aggressive, militaristic pursuit of dominance over the Middle East and to further US global supremacy.

The surge was undertaken when the realization had sunk in for a majority of Americans that there was no alternative to withdrawal from the Iraq fiasco. The Bush administration hopes desperately to escape coming out empty handed and aims to secure conditions after all for long-term US military entrenchment in Iraq. By inflating the occupation force, the calculation is that the public demand for ending the war can be finessed with an eventual "draw-down" that would leave almost as large a military presence as before the "surge".

Above all, with the 2008 presidential campaign under way, the Petraeus build-up aims at a fait accompli to commit the next administration to continued military occupation of Iraq and further aggression in the Middle East. (The idolatrous focus on Petraeus as the "savior", as a latter day General McArthur, has its own negative implications for American democracy, as Frank Rich warned in his sharp dissent, New York Times, July 29, 2007. The ploy is that to challenge Bush, the most discredited of all US presidents, is actually to challenge Patraeus and "our troops" — and that approaches "treason".)

Can the "surge" strategy work? Even as it fails to control political reality in Iraq, can it change the political equation here at home?

What hasn't changed is that Americans are sick of the war in Iraq. There is also no doubt that most establishment figures, who largely went along with the Bush-Cheney-neocon plunge into war, now are horrified by the Administration's extremist course and the toll it is exacting internationally and on the state of the nation. But the political landscape is more complicated. The timing and circumstances for ending the war remain unresolved.

While the 2006 election results and the unfolding presidential primary campaign have pushed congressional Democrats and all potential Democratic candidates to call for ending the war, there is equivocation. Hilary Clinton is on record (quietly) for keeping 50-75,000 US troops in Iraq indefinitely. Obama, who has had a stronger anti-war position, is outdoing his rivals in pledging aggressive military intervention against Iran and Pakistan.

Republican defections from Bush on Iraq have a double-edged aspect. While serious and significant, they blunt direct efforts to force an end to the war. They mount pressure on the Democrats for a "bipartisan compromise" that will sustain as much of an occupation force as possible in Iraq and expand US military power throughout the Middle East.

If the will of the people to bring the soldiers home is to prevail, it will have to override both propaganda for extending the "surge" and bipartisan obfuscation aimed at salvaging an occupation mission.

Clearly confrontation over the Iraq war and its consequences will dominate the politics of the 2008 presidential campaign. As of now, hopes are high for getting rid of the Bush-Cheney cabal and keeping its choice replacement out of the White House. Nothing is more important than rescuing constitutional democracy and hopes for peace from a dictatorial and war hungry regime. But it's far from a slam-dunk. We need only recall the election of 2000, which began with the Gingrich Republican Congress as the most unpopular in history, and ended with the presidency stolen by the GOP's "compassionate conservative".

Beyond ending the war in Iraq, how soon and how far America recovers from the Bush years depends on a change in the hearts and minds of millions of Americans. Will the harsh lessons of Vietnam and Iraq lead us to a different view of America and its place in the world? Will we refuse to accept excuses for war and recognize that America cannot succeed (and cannot save its soul) as an occupying power in foreign lands? Will we embrace leadership by example and cooperation rather than allowing politicians to exploit "American leadership" as a rhetorical code for superiority and global dominance?

The "surge" we need is not in Baghdad. It is in the long struggle for our consciousness and conscience as a people.

January 10, 2008

To family and friends:

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

This greeting is written on the last day of 2007. At 87 and 86, we've taken to blaming our tardiness and all our other deficiencies on old age. We do apologize, though, as we wish your holidays were happy.

We're actually in pretty good shape, still managing to take care of ourselves and keep on enjoying music, books, netflix, and time with family and friends. We've bought tickets for all eight of the Met HD opera transmissions in a local movie theater. Roz is quite disabled and needs a walker and/or a wheelchair to get around. Otherwise, neither of us has any threatening conditions that we're aware of. Leon still takes long walks with friends and is able to keep us eating well and the house in comfortable order. But he does get tired, so we're thinking of finally getting some help to come in a few days a week. Roz's walks are real short, but she doesn't miss many days. Her most recent favorite book is "Jump", short stories by Nadine Gordimer.

As you've noticed, Leon doesn't write much any more. There was a time when he was burning to say things that weren't being said widely. Now so much is said and written that more words don't seem to be what matters. We haven't lost any enthusiasm for seeing the Bush-Cheney-GOP cabal smashed in 2008— nothing is more important. We're worried that McCain will emerge as the GOP candidate after all, and there's no guarantee that the pro-war demagogues and neofascists won't thwart the popular will for "changing course" either by an actual upset or a close to 50-50 split. Let's hope Democrats can be kept from blowing the chance for an anti-GOP landslide that would create a new climate and political conditions needed for any real progress. Beyond that, there are many good reasons to hope and strive for the fundamental changes in national and world priorities that have to come, even if we oldsters no longer expect them in our time.

We'll be glad to update you upon request on the doings of our family's younger generation(s). Let's just say they're our pride and joy.

Love,

Roz and Leon

January 30, 2008

We will vote for Obama in Tuesday's California primary. Our reasons, reservations and hopes are much the same as those voiced by Tom Hayden in The Nation.

March 6, 2008

SUICIDAL EMBRACE

The most dangerous turn in the Democratic primary campaign is the Clinton camp's decision to couple Senator Clinton with John McCain as having "passed the Commander-in-Chief threshold". "I have the experience, John McCain has the experience, Barack Obama has a speech".

What is the threshold that entitles Clinton and McCain to answer the phone in the White House at 3am? How did McCain earn that trust? By being the strongest supporter of the Iraq War, by chanting "bomb, bomb Iran", by pledging unending occupation of Iraq and loyalty to George Bush's pre-emptive war doctrine?

Senator Clinton has finally said she wouldn't vote for the Iraq War if she had it to do over again. How deep are her regrets if her criterion for Commander-in-Chief couples her with John McCain? Is the point that she is "ready on day one" to pull the trigger based on a 3am phone call?

If the primary outcome were to turn on a Democrat's embrace of reckless GOP fear tactics and posturing on "national security", it would be a prelude to the unthinkable: another election campaign in which the Democrats surrender the initiative and abet the revival of dismal GOP fortunes.

Whether for Obama or Clinton, Democrats should insist that no one who carries on the tragic policies of George W. Bush is qualified to be Commander-in-Chief. The tactical embrace of John McCain to frighten voters is suicidal for Democrats and for the country. It should be renounced publically now, so that it is not permitted to distort and poison the primary contests that remain.

March 17, 2008

How Lucky to be Black?

Now that Rush Limbaugh and the GOP have picked up the race cudgel, what began as a drip of pollution in South Carolina threatens to become a major sewage spill befouling Election 2008.

The revelation of this historic campaign is that most Americans seem ready to elevate either Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton to the presidency. That's remarkable progress toward overcoming age-old patterns of discrimination and exclusion. But prejudices and false notions about race and gender run very deep. Events of the past week and the level of media dialog on race are particular cause for alarm. The problem is not only, or even primarily, the ultra-right radio talk jockeys who gleefully stir the pot. Layers of misunderstanding, and unwitting insensitivity to the reality of racial experience and perceptions, could still undermine general good will and good sense.

This week, Barack Obama has been targeted on the "race" issue from two directions. One is the claim that he's lucky to be black, otherwise he wouldn't be where he is. The other is the rising clamor that he denounce militant black religious leaders. It's no surprise that these lines of attack find acceptance by some in the media and general public, even as they cause dismay among others and overwhelming resentment among black Americans.

Geraldine Ferrara can't understand the resentment. (In fact, she dismissed Jesse Jackson with the very same remark in 1984.) Whether you support Obama's candidacy or not, what he has overcome and achieved is astonishing by any standard, all the more so in the context of the realities that confront black youth. It is indeed absurd to ignore his exceptional attributes and accomplishments and pass him off as "lucky" to be black. It's not really surprising that such put-downs are taken as prejudiced and insulting not only to Obama, but to every young person inspired by his example.

More dangerous is the flooding of YouTube and TV news shows with clips from sermons by the pastor of Obama's church. It's not enough for Obama to speak for himself, to disagree emphatically with statements of Rev. Wright. He must damn or be damned through "guilt by association". This is not a new story, not a new way to evoke suspicion and hostility against a public figure who is black or brown or "other". Martin Luther King's views were different than those of Malcolm X or youthful militants in the Southern Negro Youth Congress, but he would not be goaded into denouncing them. He would not deny that they voiced the real and understandable outrage shared by millions coping with racism and inequality.

The remarks of black guest commentators on last Sunday morning's news shows may have come as a surprise to many viewers. Donna Brazile and Michele Norris pointed out that views and emotions like those highlighted by Rev. Wright are commonly expressed in many predominantly black congregations all over the country. We also learn that Rev. Wright is highly respected in major religious and human-rights communities. Rather than shock, that bit of news should give pause to the complacent among us who feel that racial injustice and the anger it rouses are done and gone, history to be forgiven and forgotten. The community that feels poverty, unequal justice, joblessness and incarceration of so many of its young does not accept with passivity the status quo or the legacy of a bitter past. This is as true for beleaguered immigrant communities across America, who resent punitive treatment, the shameful splitting of families, the denial of opportunity and essentials of a decent life.

So when Obama is "cornered" by aggressive reporters and political rivals to go further and further to prove he "denounces" and "rejects" the views of militant black clergy, he is really being pushed to alienate a large part of his community. The not-so-hidden message is that a black man (even if he's white and black in equal parts) can't be trusted in the White House.

How Obama deals with this is an ongoing story. How America will deal with it is the more important story. It's not a matter of whether or not to vote for him, to endorse or to criticize his political positions. It's up to us, especially those who are "white", to counter blackmail on matters of race in the election of the next president. There should be no exceptional burden on a candidate to prove his trustworthiness because he's black. The self-righteous accusers who deliberately use race, subtly or overtly, to poison the electoral atmosphere are the ones who belong in the dock.

Have we come far enough not to fall victim to confusion and smug double standards on "race"? That may turn out to be the most difficult challenge for an electorate anxious to turn the page on the bad Bush years.

March 19, 2008

No American president or aspirant to the office has ever dealt with race in America with as much insight as Obama did yesterday. Millions are reading the speech and discussing it. Everyone should.

July 4, 2008

Thinking about Change

Change is the keynote of this election year. The vast majority of Americans want it after two terms of George W. Bush. Most of the world, too, wishes eagerly for a changed America.

This sweeping embrace of "change" is not a Barack Obama phenomenon, although he has called it forth as no other living political figure has. His election to the presidency would be a powerful mandate for turning the page on a ruinous course that extends hardship for millions of Americans and puts the US in confrontation with the world as a flailing warrior superpower.

But what change can we hope for or believe in? That's much more than a matter of what any candidate may say or intend.

Change is not mainly something we can choose or reject by ballot. We are already in a period of great, even monumental change. The real choice is how our politics will change to react to a changed and changing reality. There is a huge disconnect between prevailing governmental and establishment politics and the real world of changes in culture, economics and the natural environment.

Reality already departs drastically from how things seemed to be at the start of this new century. Evidence of global warming has overwhelmed any reasonable doubt and complacency about our endangered environment. Illusions about globalization, "free" markets, and immunity to economic crisis are collapsing in a world food crisis, rising poverty and severe shocks in the US economy.

Establishment politics has lagged behind profound cultural change. For decades the political trajectory of government, particularly during the Bush years, has generally been in a right-wing reactionary direction, but the realities of life (and struggle) have favored important advances in popular support for civil rights and diversity, against discrimination and exclusion on the basis of race, gender or sexual orientation. The history-making Obama and Clinton primary candidacies became possible despite deeply rooted problems of racism and sexism in our society.

Perhaps the biggest departure from prevailing expectations at the beginning of the century has been the change in America's status astride the post-cold war world. A new "American Century" was proclaimed by the neoconservatives associated with the Bush-Cheney Administration. It was preordained by our standing as the world's only superpower, overwhelmingly superior militarily and economically to all other nations separately or combined. After the tragic events of September 11, 2001, the Administration moved rapidly from retaliation against Al Qaeda and the Taliban to its grander design to be advanced by war and occupation of Iraq. Military "shock and awe" would quickly dispatch the universally hated regime of Saddam Hussein, establishing American power in the Middle East and a controlling interest in Iraq's oil. "Mission accomplished" would be a message to the world of US resolve, of Washington's unilateral and unchallengeable dominance unrestrained by the United Nations or international protest.

Of course Iraq has proved the very opposite of what the neocons intended: the limitations of military power and empire in this new century. In less than a decade, the "American Century" as conceived by Bush and the neocons is expiring.

Beyond the Iraq fiasco, the bubble of unchallenged supremacy as the world's only superpower is being pierced by the rapid development of major economic powers in other parts of the world, most notably in Asia. It has been a disaster, and will be even more so, to view the world as subservient to and manageable by US superpower. That failed outlook has to give way to recognition of inevitable competition and expanding participation in shaping human destiny. Authority is not exclusive to any present or future world power; leadership will demand active championing of the sheer necessity for cooperation to cope with universal issues and crises.

Our next presidential administration will not be able to escape the reality of ongoing change within the USA and in our place in the world. McCain and the GOP would resist and delay changing course from Bush's reactionary domestic policies and aggressive military pursuits abroad— and that would be a tragedy. But there's no way to salvage the Bush-Cheney vision of world control or the Karl Rove strategy for autocracy under permanent GOP rule.

What would be the prospects for affecting change if Obama wins and the GOP suffers a big defeat in the Senate and House? What are the possibilities? What do they depend upon? What may limit expectations for change?

The opportunities arising from a decisive election victory would be major, but delivering on them is far from a given despite Obama's remarkable successes in inspiring the hopes of millions. Obama clearly is a strong leader, but what he says and does is always conditioned by how he assesses the political waters. It is a valuable quality in a leader to have a good sense of what the traffic will bear, to know what it takes to win. But there is a real downside as well to riding the winds of political calculation. That can increase vulnerability to pressure from major interests that wield power in the corporate world and its largely controlled media. It can also reinforce an assumed common denominator of public attitudes that makes it inexpedient to challenge prevailing prejudices and orthodoxies. Given the vitriol aimed at Obama as the first person of color who may become President, it is no surprise that he feels he must pull out the stops to prove his "trustworthiness" on patriotism, religious faith, national security and all the rest of the media's hallmarks of conformity. It is disappointing but not surprising to see him slide backward on the campaign trail on forthright opposition to key elements of Bush's investment in war and aggression in the Middle East and drastic curtailment of domestic civil liberties. It's good to see that the extraordinary grassroots movement that propelled him to the nomination is the source of sharp criticism of his retreat on Bush's wire tapping dragnet: the participatory website that drives Obama's campaign now also fuels the popular demand that he honor his promise to oppose immunity for the telecom corporations. This may be a rehearsal for the interactive mass pressure that surely must be projected into the battle to realize progressive change after the election is over.

Important as Obama is and may prove to be, the answer to what the future may bring is not programmed in his personality and agenda. Rather than engaging in speculation to discover the "real" Obama, it may be worth considering what change of course might be possible. A clear election mandate for changing direction would first of all set a new tone and begin the process of shifting national priorities. That's not just an abstraction, because nothing is more important than making the real needs of people and the developing crises of human survival the center of attention nationally and internationally— as opposed to priorities dictated by fear mongering, imperial greed and a delusionary quest to impose "solutions" by military and interventionist means.

As for advances on particular issues, many doors that Bush and the GOP congressional bloc slammed shut would now be open. But if an unprecedented groundswell of organized popular support was what the Obama campaign needed to win in the primaries and still needs to beat McCain, then organized popular pressure is the formula for getting through the door on any significant issue. No one can really expect that vacillation in a new Democratic administration and pressure from a wounded Right will fade away on January 20, 2009. That goes for ending the war in Iraq, universal health care, economic and energy relief, immigrant rights, securing the Supreme Court from reactionary control, and any other issue that produced such a cavalcade of interest and involvement in the Democratic primaries.

The Bush Administration, ignoring its "lame duck" status, has done everything possible to lock the next administration into its failures. It uses its "war on terror" to dominate every aspect of foreign and domestic policy. With the help of too many cooperating and cowed Democratic leaders, Bush's latest war budgets and "national security" legislation aim at a fait accompli of continued war and occupation as well as dismemberment of essential constitutional liberties. One can hope that a President Obama will not be trapped into adapting to any part of the Bush legacy. One can hope that he will evolve into the transformational leader the times call for. But that depends on how strongly the times press him forward, how strongly the tides of change rise from the bottom up.

To put the problem of change in a broader global context: history has reached a stage of unmistakable peril to the future of humanity; consciousness of that ultimate challenge is too limited and collective human effort is obstructed by competing drives of capitalist society. Endeavors in various countries to change society in fundamental ways are thwarted and often distorted by the realities of the global marketplace and dominant imperial power. Although the dream of "American Century" has turned quickly into a nightmare, the facts of American empire remain. The vast military and corporate holdings all over the world inevitably present conflicts of interest not only with particular nations but also within the United Nations, starkly evident during the Bush years. Empire will continue to be a serious drag on aspirations for change and on a new type of shared leadership in the world community.

Whatever the future may hold in the way of fundamental social change, something of great urgency has to happen today and tomorrow: people everywhere have to force a change in the agenda, in the priorities that move public policy. There is more than enough experience past and present, more than enough political sentiment and people power, to end the dominance of war and militarism over our own Congressional agenda, and to force primary attention to economic and environmental crises.

In contemplations of the future, the usual question is: optimist or pessimist? The answer may depend on one's view of the possibilities. No one can now foretell how, and even whether, humanity will make it to survival in reasonably good times for all. But one can have the optimism and the will to climb the mountain before us. We have to believe passionately that priorities of realism and hope can replace selfishness and fear. If in the next several years, the main business on the agenda becomes vital human needs— dealing with poverty, disease, global warming— a huge change will be underway.

That can happen.

February 1, 2009

OBAMA AND THE CROSS WINDS OF CHANGE

My web page has been sitting silent, unchanged since July 2008. Now, a little update, asking and answering a few questions about how things look to me as Obama begins his historic presidency:

1. Is Obama committed to far-reaching progressive change?

All things considered, including the flurry of activity in the first ten days following inauguration, President Obama's commitment to changing America for the better comes through loud and clear. That we have a President who recognizes that drastic changes are imperative, and who is open to the challenge, is cause indeed for the unprecedented massive celebration that has welcomed his election. The first African-American, the first person of color, to rise to the presidency is itself testimony to the possibilities of historic progressive change.

2.Does his emphasis on bipartisanship and national unity square with a commitment to a new and different direction for America?

Obama's vigorous outreach to Republicans, religious conservatives and business chiefs is a matter of considerable complexity and uncertainty. He wants maximum support for his initiatives to deal with multiple unprecedented crises, domestic and global. He wants to show the public that he is doing his best to overcome gridlock and make government work. He wants to unify Americans around his change agenda in numbers significantly beyond the majority who voted for him in November.

The fact that no Republicans voted for the stimulus bill in the House shows that a reactionary hardcore will fight progress today just as stubbornly as their forbears fought the New Deal, social security, Medicare, trade unionism and civil rights. Hopefully their public base will continue to shrink. Obama will no doubt continue to reach out, but too many compromises on issues may prove futile and too costly for the American people. So far, while Obama courts the Republicans, he's not holding back on his agenda in order to wait for them.

Obama has been more successful in gaining support for his election and his administration from major sectors of the political establishment and the financial world. That bonding is reflected in his cabinet appointments, particularly the many carryovers from the Clinton years. Can Clintonites change with the times, or is Obama reinviting past neoliberal disappointments? That, too, isn't easy to answer. Obama aims to rescue and revive the capitalist economy, not to undermine or alter its essential character. Likewise he wants to improve the weakened global influence of the United States and check significant erosion of far-flung imperial interests. No one who reneges on those basic commitments could hope to become President of the United States at this time in history. Yet the present extremely deep crises absolutely demand a bold progressive agenda, at least somewhat in the spirit of the New Deal. Obama believes that. He hopes that his powerful electoral mandate and soaring post-election support, his powers of persuasion and leadership, and, above all, the shared recognition of monumental crisis will make his administration truly new, not a collection of retreads with high IQs. Going forward, however, depends more than anything on an aroused and actively demanding public.

3.Can US foreign policy change for the better and adjust to a new multipolar world?

Changing US policies and posture relative to the rest of the world is no less critical than the great changes needed at home. While Obama is already changing the tone away from Bush's arrogance and bullying, substantive change won't come easily. The prevailing mindset of "American exceptionalism" and the far-flung interests of the military-industrial-financial complex are huge and entrenched obstacles. The problems of terrorism, both non-state and state inflicted, have been made intractable by Bush's "war on terror" and the relentless epidemic of religious and nationalist fundamentalism. The hapless notion that overwhelming military force can prevail in Afghanistan lingers even with Obama, while the neocons and most Israeli politicians still conspire to bomb Iran. Nevertheless change is possible because the consequences of avoidance or delay are so bad. Moreover historic methods of brute force and thinly disguised interventionism cannot control major shifts in power and influence on the world stage, nor counter the sweep of independence and progress in Latin America. The end of the incredible Bush years inspires new hope for a turn toward peace at last. War as a solution to problems in the Middle East or elsewhere is a failed and bloody concept that most people find intolerable. Even some elites of the Cold War now see that non-proliferation of nuclear weapons is unrealistic as long as nuclear powers, especially the US and Russia, fail to renew a framework for mutual nuclear disarmament.

There are mixed signals in Obama's pronouncement that America is ready to lead again. The world has changed and no country or alliance has the capacity to dictate the course of events. Nor will world opinion accept any country's claim to national superiority. Certainly the United States with Obama can do much to foster cooperation for peace, targeting global warming, poverty and disease as the main priorities for international attention. That would be a great advance. No country has more to contribute to the mutual good than the USA.

4. What are the prospects that Obama's call for "changing America and the world" will make real headway?

Obama knows that the levers of change are in the very crises we confront in all their enormity. They are so urgent that only idiots or diehard obstructionists can deny the need for bold leadership and action. Immediate steps to cope with the deepening economic crisis merge with the need to invest in the future, to tackle chronic problems in infrastructure, health care, education, economic and social inequality. While the economic crisis evokes the most immediate anguish, each of the multiple global crises of climate change, war and violence, disease, poverty and inequality can make the demand for effective action irresistible before it is too late.

Of course, as Obama has shown so well, all hope rests ultimately on popular mobilization, organization and action. Community organization and twenty-first century grass roots communication changed the election and may change the future of American politics. Obama has moved to establish a permanent framework for community organization based on some thirteen million people who became activists during the 2008 campaign. That will give him unprecedented support for pressing Washington and the states forward. But that energy can push Obama on as well, can criticize and inform his actions and vision. It's too early to tell, but the new wave of community organization could lead to new alignments that weaken the hold of political elites within the traditional two party framework. It should evoke new experiences and new ideas that redefine the forms and perspectives of an American "left" that is integral to a rising progressive tide.

February 7, 2009

SECOND THOUGHTS

Several responses to my February 1 blog felt it was too optimistic about the Obama presidency. A couple were angry that I didn't express more outrage at continued catering to Republicans and big business at the expense of millions losing their jobs, homes, education and health care; also more outrage over Obama's stepped-up military action in Afghanistan and Pakistan and his failure to condemn Israel's war that killed thousands of civilians, women and children in Gaza.

One wrote: ".... What we're looking for are realistic alternatives, not just going along with the Democrats.... I want the left to act as if they still hope for a more just distribution of power and wealth, not to scorn people who hope to build alternative parties.... Where are the people who will speak, write, proselytize for socialism, try to make it something beside a scare word?"

I guess my comments didn't reflect how much people are hurting and how justified is the growing anger. I agree that the developing depression and continuing atrocities of war should give rise to militant popular actions and the spread of ideas that challenge the system and values of capitalism.

I'm not persuaded to change my opinion that Obama's election and the circumstances around it provide an historic opportunity for advance toward justice and peace. It's far from simply a question of "can you trust the Democrats". It would be too bad if a small socialist-minded left separated itself from the left-leaning majority supporting Obama by nay-saying the possibilities for major change as a result of his presidency. Right now, those of us on "the left" should be second to none in supporting Obama's efforts to overcome rightist GOP obstruction of stimulus measures and necessary social legislation. That support isn't diminished by the necessity to criticize sharply and oppose administration policies that run counter to the change Obama has promised.

There is a rush to figure out who Obama really is and what he intends. I don't see the need to make conclusive judgments at this early stage. This is a new and very complicated period. The pressure of unprecedented crises and events, and of political action here and around the world, will influence crucially how the Obama presidency evolves. Surely there are much better opportunities for progressive change (both on domestic and international issues) than we've seen for a long and bitter time— and for that Obama deserves great credit and strong support going forward

February 15, 2009

The GOP's Wager

Why has the GOP congressional bloc voted so solidly against the stimulus bill? Why has it turned its back on Obama's overtures, confronting him so directly despite his high popularity?

The underlying ideology, favor the rich and damn the rest, is no surprise. But ideology alone doesn't explain tactics, as in the stubborn rejection of all compromise. Are they stupid, oblivious to their declining political fortunes? Maybe, but that answer might be too comfortable— and wrong.

I think they have decided on a very calculated bet. They read the predictions of almost every economist: the crisis is deepening and is likely to persist, perhaps for years, whatever the government can do to ease the pain. They are counting on economic failure and the perception down the road in 2010 that the failure is Obama's, not the system itself that they have helped steer to disaster. That's a risky wager because the cynicism is transparent and popular anger against the GOP is rising well beyond the 53% who voted for Obama.

It isn't some rapid and miraculous economic turnaround that will doom the GOP's calculation. As in the 1930s, what counts will be the unity and action of millions to defend and expand their right to a decent life. That means energetic mass support for progressive and innovative programs to ease the hurt and open up new opportunity. It means rallying around Obama's efforts in that direction and pushing them further.

The passage of the stimulus bill is a victory, but it isn't as bold as it should be, largely because of the GOP's ability to hamstring the Senate majority. The need is to create a new reality across the country, so that GOP diehards in Congress are no longer strong enough to limit what has to be done. If the gamblers can't advance their self-fulfilling prophecy of failure, their bet will be lost.

April 25, 2009

Rosalind Wofsy, a pioneer community organizer in support of people with developmental disabilities, died on April 23, 2009. She was 88.

From 1964 through 1984, Rosalind Wofsy was Executive Director of the Developmental Disabilities Council of Contra Costa County. When she retired, she wrote of those years in a memoir, "The Best Years of My Working Life", published by the DD Council of Contra Costa in 1992. This was described by the late Henrik Blum, Professor of Public Health, UC Berkeley, as "superb and human-scale history … an important piece about the genesis of relevant and humane services for the developmentally disabled". Dr. Blum, who was the chief health officer of Contra Costa County, 1950-1966, wrote of Rosalind Wofsy's key role: "It was by being a perceptive, fair, and conscientious person who believed in the democratic process and the opportunities it offers to citizens to create what they sorely need that she accomplished what she did." For her leadership, she received a California State Citation in 1983.

Diana Jorgensen, who succeeded Rosalind as Executive Director of the DD Council, remembered her: "Roz was revered by all those who knew and worked with her for both her unusually gifted skills and her steadfast commitment to people with developmental disabilities and their families. She was able to accomplish incredible changes in the field of service to this population because of the strength of beliefs combined with her dynamic personality."

Rosalind was born in Bronx, New York City on September 5, 1920; her parents were Mollie and Chaim Taub. She graduated from Hunter College, NY in 1941. She married Leon Wofsy in 1942 and they have been together until her death. They had two children, Carla Wofsy, who became a Professor of Mathematics at the University of New Mexico and who died of breast cancer in 2003; and David Wofsy, now Professor of Medicine at the University of California San Francisco. Roz, as she was called, also leaves four grand children, Danielle, Kevin, Susan and Grace; and her brother, Leon Taub.

Roz came to the East Bay in 1964 when husband Leon joined the faculty at UC Berkeley, where he is now Professor Emeritus of Molecular and Cell Biology. Before her position as Executive Director of the DD Council of Contra Costa County, she directed youth and children's programs at Jewish Community Centers in New Haven, Connecticut and San Diego, California. In the 1950s, when Leon was Chair of the left-wing Labor Youth League, the young family faced difficult times of harassment during the McCarthy period. During those years, Roz was the main provider and mainstay of the family and was herself actively engaged in the civil rights movement.

Since her retirement, Roz had serious health problems that resulted in gradually increasing physical disability. These difficulties she faced bravely while maintaining the sweetness and hopeful outlook on life for which she is so loved. The great joy of her last year of life was the election of America's first president of color.

A public memorial is scheduled for Sunday, May 10, 2pm, at Bayside Pavilion, 2203 Mariner Square Loop in Alameda. Donations in her memory may be made to the Developmental Disabilities Council of Contra Costa County, Partners in Health, or the Middle East Children's Alliance.

April 29, 2009

(I started writing this before Roz's last illness. Today I labored to finish it, however inadequately, for a moment's release

from the personal thoughts that overwhelm me. Normally Roz would be my first reader and critic for anything outside science.)

TRANSITION WITH OBAMA

from where to where?

As President Obama points out, we are in a time of transition. He likens the ship of state to a huge tanker that can only be turned slowly, but will eventually be headed in a very different and favorable direction.

It's not simple, but very important, to examine what's in transition, where it may or may not be headed, and how to measure progress or shortfalls along the way. For some, this is not a complicated matter and it all boils down to judging Obama. Many, including progressives and leftists, have faith in Obama; a few on the left see him as essentially like past presidents loyal to the interests of a wealthy ruling elite. One commentator on a left blog goes so far as to tie Obama to Reagan and a revival of Reaganism (David Sirota on AlterNet, 4/1/09). Naomi Klein writes that "hope" for Obama is a sickness that we should get over (upcoming May 4th edition of The Nation). In my 87 years, I can't remember a time of greater complexity, such a multiplex of historic challenges and uncertain prospects. So it's surprising that quick and certain judgments abound.

Evaluating Obama's presidency without trying to understand this period of transition is to put things upside down. Important as he is, Obama didn't begin the process of transition either for the United States or for the world. What's going on are major adjustments to new realities that cannot be ignored. Reality for the United States is that, while still the strongest world power, its dominance is sharply curtailed; it is engulfed in a severe worldwide economic crisis; the political limits of its military power are starkly exposed; economic rivals have surged to prominence especially in Asia; left populist movements have gained ascendancy in what used to be the anointed US sphere of influence in Central and South America. For the world as a whole, the economic crisis severely aggravates chronic problems of inequality, poverty and disease. That and the looming consequences of global warming cry out for new priorities, transition from a period in which aggressive militarism, wars, occupations, and torture— under the flag of Bush's "global war on terror"—trumped everything. Underlying Obama's election was stark evidence that old "free market" economic policies and doctrines of bluster and war were driving the ship of state to hell. Obama picked up the challenge of the times and brilliantly inspired a nation to join in the cry for change.

There is no telling at this point how profound a change this transition will generate. No one can know the extent to which it might open up possibilities for fundamental restructuring of society and the global system. What we can be sure of is that transition will be meaningful and measurable if it really shifts priorities to focus on the historic economic and environmental crises, to the real needs and demands of aroused populations. That may seem too modest a hope, but all progress depends absolutely on achieving this initial turnaround. That will be the most important measure of the first stage of the Obama presidency.

Turning the United States around means coming into conflict with entrenched institutions and policies that favor a privileged wealthy oligarchy and its imperialist global outreach. That's a lot of resistance to overcome, especially since the American people— as badly as the majority wants progressive change— do not yet challenge the basics of the established order and generally adhere to an exceptionalist faith in US supremacy. Still, the perfect storm of crises that profoundly imperils the future of our people, and of all people, expands consciousness and makes for unprecedentedly broad participation in the processes of change. That is why Obama's support is so remarkably deep and inclusive.

So far Obama's presidency has advanced significant, even dramatic movement toward new humanist priorities. It also has steered a calculated course aimed at avoiding what he views as diversionary conflicts with established institutions and constituencies that have vested interests in the status quo. My intention here is not to play the media game of a report card on the first 100 days, not to go issue by issue through the long list that Obama has weighed in on in an incredibly active few months. Obama is certainly pressing for a new agenda, emphasizing the economy, health care, the environment, and energy. Forward steps are often bold, sometimes hesitant, sometimes followed by a step backward. Thus, Obama commits to closing Guantanamo and releases the horrible record of torture practices, but he avoids confronting the CIA. He pushes for the stimulus package, but compromises to seek (unsuccessfully) bipartisan support. He condemns greedy CEOs and unregulated Wall Street, but tempers corrective measures applied to banks and other financial institutions. There appears to be a new tone and more pacific outreach in foreign policy, but changes in military policy are incremental, minimizing the potential for conflict with the generals. By far the most backward step is the beefed up war in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The media rather gleefully makes much of the left's supposed disappointment with Obama, but I would guess that most of the left, however that's defined, is an unwavering part of the almost 70% of Americans who favor Obama. There is a big difference between vigorous opposition to bad policies and joining the dwindling chorus of rage against Obama. Nothing dictates that protest against Wall Street, or opposition to more war in Afghanistan or to the coddling of a militaristic Israeli government should be low-balled because Obama is President. The more vigorous the protests and demands, the more that becomes part of the reality that drives a serious transition forward. If Larry Somers had to bow out, of if the military escalation in Afghanistan had to be reversed, the Obama presidency and its possibilities would be strengthened. Nevertheless, it would be blind to dismiss this presidency as "same old, same old", to imply as some do that he shouldn't be treated differently than his predecessors "just because he's black." This is a highly important time in history. The door to progressive change has been cracked open and not a moment too soon. If the left wants a clearer way forward, it won't find it in debates or speculation about Obama. The real answer may be in helping to highten the understanding and action of the broad swath of Americans who rightly see the Obama presidency as something new and better. Their hopes, our hopes, are not a sickness.

May 1, 2009

(I started writing this before Roz's last illness. Today I labored to finish it, however inadequately, for a moment's release from the overwhelming sadness of the week since her death. . Normally Roz would be my first reader and critic.)

TRANSITION WITH OBAMA

As President Obama points out, we are in a time of transition. He likens the ship of state to a huge tanker that can only be turned slowly, but will eventually be headed in a very different and favorable direction.

It's not simple, but very important, to examine what's in transition, where it may or may not be headed, and how to measure progress or shortfalls along the way. For some, this is not a complicated matter and it all boils down to judging Obama. Many, including progressives and leftists, have faith in Obama; a few on the left see him as essentially like past presidents loyal to the interests of a wealthy ruling elite. One commentator on a left blog goes so far as to tie Obama to Reagan and a revival of Reaganism (David Sirota on AlterNet, 4/1/09). Naomi Klein writes that "hope" for Obama is a sickness that we should get over (upcoming May 4th edition of The Nation). In my 87 years, I can't remember a time of greater complexity, such a multiplex of historic challenges and uncertain prospects. So it's surprising that quick and certain judgments abound.

Evaluating Obama's presidency without trying to understand this period of transition is to put things upside down. Important as he is, Obama didn't begin the process of transition either for the United States or for the world. What's going on are major adjustments to new realities that cannot be ignored. Reality for the United States is that, while still the strongest world power, its dominance is sharply curtailed; it is engulfed in a severe worldwide economic crisis; the political limits of its military power are starkly exposed; economic rivals have surged to prominence especially in Asia; left populist movements have gained ascendancy in what used to be the anointed US sphere of influence in Central and South America. For the world as a whole, the economic crisis severely aggravates chronic problems of inequality, poverty and disease. That and the looming consequences of global warming cry out for new priorities, transition from a period in which aggressive militarism, wars, occupations, and torture— under the flag of Bush's "global war on terror"—trumped everything. Underlying Obama's election was stark evidence that old "free market" economic policies and doctrines of bluster and war were driving the ship of state to hell. Obama picked up the challenge of the times and brilliantly inspired a nation to join in the cry for change.

There is no telling at this point how profound a change this transition will generate. No one can know the extent to which it might open up possibilities for fundamental restructuring of society and the global system. What we can be sure of is that transition will be meaningful and measurable if it really shifts priorities to focus on the historic economic and environmental crises, to the real needs and demands of aroused populations. That may seem too modest a hope, but all progress depends absolutely on achieving this initial turnaround. That will be the most important measure of the first stage of the Obama presidency.

Turning the United States around means coming into conflict with entrenched institutions and policies that favor a privileged wealthy oligarchy and its imperialist global outreach. That's a lot of resistance to overcome, especially since the American people— as badly as the majority wants progressive change— do not yet challenge the basics of the established order and generally adhere to an exceptionalist faith in US supremacy. Still, the perfect storm of crises that profoundly imperils the future of our people, and of all people, expands consciousness and makes for unprecedentedly broad participation in the processes of change. That is why Obama's support is so remarkably deep and inclusive.

So far Obama's presidency has advanced significant, even dramatic movement toward new humanist priorities. It also has steered a calculated course aimed at avoiding what he views as diversionary conflicts with established institutions and constituencies that have vested interests in the status quo. My intention here is not to play the media game of a report card on the first 100 days, not to go issue by issue through the long list that Obama has weighed in on in an incredibly active few months. Obama is certainly pressing for a new agenda, emphasizing the economy, health care, the environment, and energy. Forward steps are often bold, sometimes hesitant, sometimes followed by a step backward. Thus, Obama commits to closing Guantanamo and releases the horrible record of torture practices, but he avoids confronting the CIA. He pushes for the stimulus package, but compromises to seek (unsuccessfully) bipartisan support. He condemns greedy CEOs and unregulated Wall Street, but tempers corrective measures applied to banks and other financial institutions. There appears to be a new tone and more pacific outreach in foreign policy, but changes in military policy are incremental, minimizing the potential for conflict with the generals. By far the most backward step is the beefed up war in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The media rather gleefully makes much of the left's supposed disappointment with Obama, but I would guess that most of the left, however that's defined, is an unwavering part of the almost 70% of Americans who favor Obama. There is a big difference between vigorous opposition to bad policies and joining the dwindling chorus of rage against Obama. Nothing dictates that protest against Wall Street, or opposition to more war in Afghanistan or to the coddling of a militaristic Israeli government should be low-balled because Obama is President. The more vigorous the protests and demands, the more that becomes part of the reality that drives a serious transition forward. If Larry Somers had to bow out, or if the military escalation in Afghanistan had to be reversed, the Obama presidency and its possibilities would be strengthened. Nevertheless, it would be blind to dismiss this presidency as "same old, same old", to imply as some do that he shouldn't be treated differently than his predecessors "just because he's black." This is a highly important time in history. The door to progressive change has been cracked open and not a moment too soon. If the left wants a clearer way forward, it won't find it in debates or speculation about Obama. The real answer may be in helping to highten the understanding and action of the broad swath of Americans who rightly see the Obama presidency as something new and better. Their hopes, our hopes, are not a sickness.

May 20, 2009

There seems to be a problem with my Home page. I'm checking it out.