American History Rev.

Bill Fletcher Jr. on the vision of Rev. Jeremiah Wright:

Rev. Wright has, throughout his career, dared to challenge the myth of US history. For the larger society this “mistake” is of far greater importance than his performance at the National Press Club, and for that matter, whether or not he brings down Senator Obama, US history has a basic narrative: The settlers were heroes; the indigenous people were either heathens or naive primitives, but in either case they were in the way of progress. Slavery was an unfortunate episode that was cleaned up by the Civil War, though it has never been quite clear that the former slaves were ever meant to rule themselves, let alone anyone else. US foreign policy has generally been benign, nearly always driven by either a God-given imperative to improve the world or our sense that the planet would be better off with our version of capitalism and democracy. Where Rev. Wright fell into problems was by challenging this myth. Taking the standpoint of those who have seen the underside of the “American Dream”, he was prepared to speak to a counter-narrative that identifies the problematic nature of US history. By doing so he opened himself to ridicule, but only when his counter-narrative was treated in sound-bites rather than taken as a whole.   much more here

The Rich Fight Back

Linda McQuaig on how StatsCan foments revolution:

So last week the Post was quick to denounce a Statistics Canada report revealing rising inequality, even accusing StatsCan of setting off a “class war”. StatsCan’s offence was to document the fact that the earnings of middle-class Canadians have stagnated since 1980. Meanwhile, earnings have risen at the top, while earnings of the poor have declined.

It’s not that the StatsCan report was inflammatory. It went out under the heading “Catalogue no. 97-563,” with the stirring title: Earnings and Incomes of Canadians Over the Past Quarter Century, 2006.

StatsCan’s knack for dull presentation perhaps explains why the venerable institution has been able to survive and assemble much important information, even though its data sometimes embarrass its political masters. (For this, retiring Canadian chief statistician Ivan Fellegi deserves considerable credit.)

But it’s easy to see why the Post is nervous about information on rising inequality getting into the hands of ordinary Canadians.

Ordinary Canadians might also be interested to learn that in the post-war years of the 1950s, ’60s, and ’70s, most Canadians experienced real increases in their incomes.

Neil Brooks, a tax professor at Osgoode Hall Law School, notes that during this era the share of income received by the richest 1 percent actually declined - from about 20 percent in the early part of the century to about 7 or 8 percent by 1980. The rich didn’t like this, and have been waging a kind of class war ever since, convincing governments to impose “neo-conservative” policies like lower minimum wages, tighter monetary policy, less social insurance protection, open markets and shifting the tax burden from capital to labour.

More at straightgoods.ca

Should Canada Be In Afghanistan?

Candadian “lefties” Stan Persky and Terry Glavin discuss why Canada should (or shouldn’t?) be in Afghanistan:

I do find it very curious, and not a tiny bit dismaying, that otherwise intelligent Canadians don’t know much of anything about Afghanistan. For starters, it’s far and away the most important recipient of Canadian “foreign aid” at the moment, and the mobilization of our soldiers there is as robust as anything our military has done in half a century. You’d think that by now we’d at least have the semblance of a consensus about an answer to the first question-the question of why we’re there.

If I were to try to try to answer that question in a way that was intended as a kind of contribution to a proposed consensus, I’d want it to be as uncontroversial as possible. So it would look something like this:

We’re there because history put us there.

Canada is a member of NATO. Following the events of September 11, 2001, NATO invoked the self-defence clause (the all-for-one clause), and we remain in Afghanistan because we’re a member of the United Nations (and we’re one of the UN’s richest members) and the UN wants us there. The UN has explicitly asked us, in several Security Council and General Assembly resolutions, to be there, and to continue doing what we’re doing there.

Canada is in Afghanistan because we’re a member of the UN-sanctioned International Security Assistance Force, which consists of close to 40 NATO and non-NATO countries with soldiers in Afghanistan. We’re there because Canada is among the 50-or-so countries that signed the terms of the Afghanistan Compact, which sets out specific commitments in the rebuilding of Afghanistan, and in providing security in the country. We’re there because the Government of Afghanistan has asked us to be there.

That much should be without controversy. It should at least provide the basis of a conversation, before any “yes, but” chorus proceeds. If the basic facts aren’t the basis of a conversation, then there’s nothing to discuss.

Check out the rest of this fascinating conversation at Dooney’s Cafe

Mother’s Day

Audrey Smeyan

A Canadian Military Mom

Gina Whitfield reviews a mother’s story:

A Mother’s Road to Kandahar, by Andria Hill-Lehr (Pottersfield Press, 2008; $15.95)

When you think of Mother’s Day, the traditional gifts come to mind, like cheesy greeting cards, flowers and chocolates. This year, it is safe to assume that Andria Hill-Lehr would like you to skip the sweets and, instead, buy your mother a copy of her new book, detailing her own struggle as an outspoken peace activist whose son, Garrow, recently served as a Canadian soldier in Afghanistan.

A Mother’s Road to Kandahar presents Hill-Lehr’s complicated and emotional experience of being a military mom who is critical of Canada’s role in Afghanistan, with her child who is voluntarily participating in the mission.

Public criticism of the military’s agenda or of the politicians’ barking the orders is rarely heard from the mouths of soldiers’ families. There are exceptions, of course, like the notorious American mother Cindy Sheehan who started a protest across from Bush’s Texas ranch after her son was killed in Iraq. Here in Canada, however, we have heard little opposition from the families of the soldiers who are fighting in Afghanistan. Hill-Lehr’s book, then, represents something of a landmark in opening this topic up for discussion.   more here

Will Bush Lies Catch Up with Him?

Vincent Bugliosi builds a case against George W. Bush:

There is direct evidence that President George W. Bush did not honorably lead this nation, but deliberately misled it into a war he wanted. Bush and his administration knowingly lied to Congress and to the American public - lies that have cost the lives of more than 4,000 young American soldiers and close to $1 trillion.

A Monumental Lie

In his first nationally televised address on the Iraqi crisis on October 7, 2002, six days after receiving the National Intelligence Estimate (NIE), a classified CIA report, President Bush told millions of Americans the exact opposite of what the CIA was telling him -a monumental lie to the nation and the world.

On the evening of October 7, 2002, the very latest CIA intelligence was that Hussein was not an imminent threat to the U.S. This same information was delivered to the Bush administration as early as October 1, 2002, in the NIE, including input from the CIA and 15 other U.S. intelligence agencies. In addition, CIA director George Tenet briefed Bush in the Oval Office on the morning of October 7th.

According to the October 1, 2002 NIE, “Baghdad for now appears to be drawing a line short of conducting terrorist attacks with conventional or CBW [chemical and biological warfare] against the United States, fearing that exposure of Iraqi involvement would provide Washington a stronger case for making war.” The report concluded that Hussein was not planning to use any weapons of mass destruction; further, Hussein would only use weapons of mass destruction he was believed to have if he were first attacked, that is, he would only use them in self-defense.

Preparing its declassified version of the NIE for Congress, which became known as the White Paper, the Bush administration edited the classified NIE document in ways that significantly changed its inference and meaning, making the threat seem imminent and ominous.

In the original NIE report, members of the U.S. intelligence community vigorously disagreed with the CIA’s bloated and inaccurate conclusions. All such opposing commentary was eliminated from the declassified White Paper prepared for Congress and the American people.

Bugliosi’s article continues at commondreams.org

 

Women’s Softball - Who Are the Champs?

A Home Run for the Ages

Sara Tucholsky’s First (and last) Home Run

US Foreign Policy

Michael Albert on US foreign policy and the US candidates:

I don’t think what the candidates say about foreign policy means much at all. They seek to appeal to funders, media, and various constituencies. They say what their pollsters tell them to say. At times they say what they believe while at other times they say what they don’t believe. They sell themselves in the same way Proctor and Gamble sells toothpaste-by saying whatever needs to be said to find a way to get support. 

To find out about candidates, the way to go about it is not by looking at what they say, but by looking at the history of American foreign policy. Since the logic of it changes barely at all, there’s no reason to suspect it’s going to change now-unless, of course, large constituencies force it to change.  

As to what their foreign policy is it’s relatively simple: U.S. foreign policy is elites in the United States- the Pentagon, the White House, the corporations-pursuing policies designed to enhance their own power, their own options, and their own wealth. So the policies are designed to extract wealth from other places in the world, whether by actual coercive behavior or, more often, just the power of threats.   here

The “Race Chasm” in America

David Sirota on the crucial racial divide in American politics:

When it comes to race, American politics is as polarized as a red and blue election map. On one side are those who try to distract from the issue; on the other side are those who work to sensationalize it. As this campaign season shows, what unifies both is bigotry. 

Take the reaction to my recent In These Times magazine article about Barack Obama winning states with either very small or very large black populations, but losing most states in the middle. 

Those results, while troubling, aren’t surprising. In very white states, racial themes are simply not part of the political dialogue, and a black candidate therefore faces fewer inherent disadvantages. In states with large black populations, race is a major political force, but the African-American vote is big enough to offset a racially motivated white vote. It is in the Race Chasm-the states whose populations are more than 6 percent and less than 17 percent black-where race is a political issue but the black vote is too small to counter a racially motivated white vote.

The trend continued in the last few weeks, with Obama losing two states in the Race Chasm (Pennsylvania and Indiana) and winning one outside the Chasm (North Carolina). Nonetheless, the response to this phenomenon by some in the intelligentsia has been willful ignorance.

more here

Toronto High School Students Act Against Male Violence