|
WRITE ON: Progressive News for Northern Michigan Issue 7 September 2003 |
|
|---|---|
| Local Links Marquette Citizens for Peace and Justice Northwoods Wilderness Recovery State, National, and International Links
Write On Issues September We would like to thank everyone who read the previous issue of Write On. Write On needs funding and articles on subjects that interest you. If you or your group would like to help us cover the costs of printing, $60 for 175 copies, please let us know either by telephone or by email. This assistance is needed if you would like to continue reading this newsletter. Articles for Write On should be no more than 600 words. Please send any questions, comments, upcoming events, or article submissions to writeonup@yahoo.com or call 228-2962. |
Hello Readers, We are providing this monthly publication to inform our neighbors of news affecting the people of Northern Michigan. This newsletter will consider such subjects as environmentalism, social justice, and local activism, which do not receive adequate coverage in other media outlets. Personal Statement, 9-11-03 Sue Rosenblum, Fort Lauderdale Florida (Excerpted from www.peacefultomorrow.org) Lies and Empire Marcus Robyns National Healthcare Reform, Part II B: Good Health & Drugs Katy Nelson,VT Naturopathic Physician, Marquette Resident
Is God on Bush’s Side? Lanni Alecia Lantto
(excerpted from "In Gandhi's Footsteps: The Gandhi Peace Awards" by James van Pelt, 1997-2002.)
Focus on a Peacemaker: Kathy Kelly Excerpted from www.vitw.org
The American Colony in Africa Mark Robertson Excerpted from Peaceworks Monitor Aug-Sept 2003, from Columbia, MO
A Progressive Agenda for Work Time Reduction Brad Lorton, Organizer, Work Time Reduction Committee of Indiana
Bush Listens to Wrong People, Says Peace Group From the War Resisters' League
Take your money, Mr. President, but at least say you're sorry Michael Kinsley (founding editor of Slate Magazine), excerpted from Slate Magazine
Stop Canadian Trash Anne Newcombe
Personal Statement, 9-11-03 Sue Rosenblum, Fort Lauderdale Florida (Excerpted from www.peacefultomorrow.org) On September 11, 2001 I sat in front of my television witnessing the annihilation of the youngest of my five children. Joshua was to have been married on September 15th. As I watched the smoke pouring out of the Trade Center’s North Tower I screamed hysterically, “Run Joshua!” but I knew he was gone. Not a day goes by when I do not think of him and the horrific act that took him from me. As the second anniversary approaches I cannot help but to think of the past 24 months. The first year went by in a state of numbness. This the second year has actually been more difficult. I suppose the reality and enormity of it all has set in. Now that the dust has literally settled I need to look closely at where we are at this point in time. Two weeks after 9/11 I delivered the eulogy at Joshua’s memorial service. I made it clear that war is not the answer as killing and hatred only breeds more killing and hatred. In order for this world to survive we must begin to eradicate this antipathy through education. Two years later, under the guise of wiping out terrorism, America (against world opinion) went to “war,” with first Afghanistan, and then Iraq. Perhaps there is something very wrong with my thought process. But I do not understand. Nor do I see what we accomplished that could be considered positive. Bombs or rockets or whatever it is that was used during these actions fell from the sky onto the homes and heads of thousands of people, most of whom were clearly not terrorists. What makes this any different than an airplane flying into the World Trade Center? Because these people were citizens of Afghanistan or Iraq, were they less innocent than my son, or any other American, who perished on September11th? Is their pain and need diminished simply because they are different from us? “Do they not bleed when they are pricked?” So two years later, here I am, sending the same message—only now, because my resolve is stronger, my message grows louder. The acts committed on September 11th should have been the world’s ultimate wake-up call. Revenge has only brought more death. With the nuclear, biological and chemical weapons that exist, how will this all end? When it’s all over, will there be anyone left to carry the message? The announcement that the bodies of Saddam Hussein’s sons had been identified--should this make me happy? Will this end the conflicts? Will this bring about a marked change in the world situation? Those who died on 9/11 have been called heroes. If asked to describe Joshua, the word “hero” would probably not be considered. He was many wonderful things, and perhaps given the chance, he might have done something heroic. But on that day, he simply did what he did: he was a responsible young man, sitting at his desk in the offices of Cantor Fitzgerald on the 104th floor. It has also been said that the deaths of these men and women were not in vain. When differences are settled through the use of talk and compromise, not through the use of weapons; when we understand there is room on this Earth for all beliefs; when we acknowledge the right of existence for all peoples; when we finally begin to achieve world peace, then will I believe Joshua’s death may have served some purpose. Lies and Empire Marcus Robyns Empire never comes easy, cheap, or at face value, eh? The war for control of Middle Eastern oil and the establishment of U.S. military supremacy in the region signals the convergence of the U.S. ruling class behind the goal of empire. To combat their scheme, progressives must first confront ourselves and accept a simple reality of geopolitics: Imperialism. It should come as no surprise to Americans that our moron president and his handlers lied about their true intentions in Iraq. A criminal regime that acquired the presidency through theft, fraud, and outright repression cannot be expected to tell the truth. And despite the appalling degeneration of The Mining Journal into a knee-jerk, right-wing shrill sheet for its editorial staff, the truth was widely available to Americans willing to find it either on the streets of Marquette or on the Internet. We have no one to blame but ourselves for the horrible mess that is now Iraq and Afghanistan and for the terrible damage done to our constitution. We must hold ourselves accountable and we must now work to repair the damage. That’s what democracy is all about. Regime change begins at home. To start the process of reconstructing our democracy and saving our constitution, we must first accept the scandalous mendacity of the current regime and the real purpose behind its lies. As with any dysfunctional family, healing can only begin once every member acknowledges the abuse, asks for forgiveness, and changes the behavior that caused the grief. Bush’s lies and assaults upon our constitution are far more heinous than Clinton’s dalliances with Monica. They are indicative of the rot and evil that comes from the pursuit of power and the violent subjugation of others. When a society such as ours finds value only in control, fear, and the pursuit of our own narrow self-interests, we will continue to choke our garden with nasty bushes and their attendant weeds. Next, we must accept that our government is bent on military, political, and economic supremacy in the world not to protect us from terrorists but to advance and protect the interests of U.S. based multi-national corporations. This process is called Imperialism and has nothing to do with democracy or freedom. Imperialism is a systematic reality that results from the very nature of capitalist development. Put simply, multi-national corporations must out bid their competitors for control and access to raw materials and cheap labor. The so-called “Washington Consensus” with its free trade treaties and institutions (IMF, WTO, etc.) is the legal means for imperialism and the U.S. military is the enforcement mechanism. Accepting Imperialism as the organizing principle of all U.S. regimes, whether democrat or republican, helps to understand and combat the report entitled, Rebuilding America’s Defenses, published by the neoconservative Project for the New American Century. This terrifying tome reads like Hitler’s Mein Kampf as a blueprint for American imperialism. Americans can find the document at http://www.newamericancentury.org/publicationsreports.htm. As you read it, you will immediately notice how striking the document’s prescriptions unfold before you like a summary of recent events. Again, no surprise since the document’s principle authors are Dick Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz, and Donald Rumsfeld – the Bush regime’s puppet masters. Rebuilding America’s Defenses confirms that elements of the U.S. ruling class had developed an explicit policy of expanding the U.S. Empire well before 9/11. Ever since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the United States has had no serious obstacle to its Imperialist designs. With the theft of the presidency by the Bush regime, the U.S. ruling class has reached consensus on the path to come. In order to defeat them, progressives of all stripes must come together as one massive grassroots movement. Only the overwhelming force of the people will stop this empire. Join Upper Peninsula’s Citizens for Peace and Justice and make a difference! National Healthcare Reform, Part II B: Good Health & Drugs
Katy Nelson,VT Naturopathic Physician, Marquette Resident
Review: Parts I & IIA: A recent World Health Organization study ranks the US 37th out of 191 nations in disease prevention as a function of national healthcare expenditures. It’s not that we don’t spend; we don’t spend effectively, preventively. Prescription drugs may cause as many problems as they treat. Do we really want to use and pay for more? It would seem a foregone conclusion that the pharmaceutical industry would relish an expanded drug benefit and increased dependence on them as a Golden Egg opportunity for maintaining profitability and increasing market share. But, is that the case? Look for them to lobby for their freedom. Why? How does the industry earn its money, what may we reasonably expect from them and what does this mean for a pharmaceutical consuming nation? The pharmaceutical industry’s marketing position (www.phrma.org) is that more drugs mean better health and reduced healthcare expenditures overall (ignoring side effects costs). Their strategy is to promote use (more prescriptions, longer dosing, and fostered consumer demand via direct to consumer advertising and office samples). Apparently effective, increased use statistically accounted for 50% of industry spending growth from 1987-‘94, and 80% from 1994-1999. They reinvest a higher percentage of sales revenue, 18.4% by 2001 statistics (www.phrma.org) than most US industries into Research & Development. The result of this laborious process, (14.2 yrs. average in the 90s), is patented drugs which retail higher than, and represent more than twice the market share of, generics. (Natural remedies, by the way, cannot be patented, although their chemical nature is often the source of pharmaceutical inspiration.) Expanded use is NOT the only game strategy and the industry’s official position in the benefits debate is support for a “market based system which promotes competition, innovation, and the highest quality of care in a cost effective manner.” Although HMO’s and others (including office-seeking politicians), generally require, support and/or espouse generics, the industry opposes any drug benefit that uses price controls or limits on choice. If we value our freedom of choice, we will oppose it also. Why? Today the pharmaceutical industry, tomorrow the vitamin industry. In fact, yet another bill is in Congress “to limit the freedom of choice of American consumers when it comes to their health” (oppose bill S.722, the “Dietary Supplement Safety” Act -- Citizens for Health, www.citizens.org) When we legislatively limit the pharmaceutical industry and/or favor generics, we limit doctors and patients, and undermine any effort toward more cost effective prevention than drugs. We undermine R&D and world leadership in innovations like retrovirals. Without defending the industry or its products, R&D and patent protection pave the way for a continuously rolling cycle that employs hundreds of thousands of people in the healthcare industry at large. At the end of 2001, although the industry was ranked by “Fortune” magazine as the most profitable (www.healthpartners.com), despite their enormous advertising budget including perks to doctors and funded “studies”, since only $.08 of every healthcare dollar is for prescription meds (www.phrma.org), we might conclude certain efficiency in the industry. Do we really want to kill the cow because we’ve have enough bull? If we value the power of the dollar, and the industry itself claims to be for competition and the highest quality cost effective healthcare, wouldn’t we be better off spending our tax dollars to educate consumers in prevention, to promote healthier standards such as Secretary Thompson’s initiative in requiring the labeling of trans-fats beginning in 2006, and let the industry and marketplace thrive independently? Wouldn’t we be better off being free to make independent and educated choices away from technologized medicine and food in favor whole, organic foods, natural therapies and medicines and true prevention, without restricting our own access to therapies that have yet to be developed, even if we don’t favor the industry as a whole? Let’s become a healthier nation, not prove ourselves to be a dopier one. Is God on Bush’s Side? Lanni Alecia Lantto
“We Americans have faith in ourselves but not in ourselves alone…placing our confidence in the loving God behind all of life, and all of history. May He guide us now. And may God continue to bless the United States of America.” --George W. Bush, 2003 State of the Union Address. The historical and overwhelmingly mainstream idea that Christians should accept religion and patriotism uniformly is perplexing to me. When George W. Bush pledges allegiance to God while supporting big money domination and big wars, I can’t help but feel that he is a hypocrite. Immediately thereafter, my mind races to my early years in religious education classes and nightly Bible readings. For years I’d been reading about how Jesus professed unconditional love for all his children and preached the human characteristics of humility and compassion. Even within my own personal relationship with God, I just can’t see him justifying man’s use of unbridled power coated in greed to dominate another race of human beings, especially in His name. Of course, in history books there are a plethora of examples where men have conquered, killed, and raped on their own accord, and unfortunately even the Catholic Church is guilty of these sins. My uneasiness with accepting Bush’s holy war had created a nagging annoyance in my subconscious, but it was after reading an article by Peter Meilaender entitled “Christians as Patriots”, that really began my ardent assessment of the subject. In this article he states that there are two main reasons why people love their country: because it is good and because it is our own, and that neither reason can stand without the other. The essay concludes by making two stringent declarations. The first is that, as Christians, our loyalties should not be divided between the Church and the State but rather that they are multiplied to incorporate both. In the second statement Meilaender believes that Christians are the model for any polity to have as its citizens because they know the true meaning of loving unconditionally. Basically, his essay declares that religion and patriotism together can and should be accepted by Christians. It’s apparent that Bush also takes this stance and that a majority of Americans blindly accept his rhetoric, precisely because they are both- religious and patriotic. This rhetoric includes our need to love our society because it is God-given. This is especially apparent by the signs that have popped up everywhere saying, “God bless America”. I can’t help but question this logic and ask myself, “Is this society God’s gift or is it now so completely man-made that secularization and post-modernization have completely taken over any sort of sacred plan? Are we truly loving something that is still in God’s image”? Theorist Emile Durkheim believed that social cohesion was threatened by the breakdown of small communities and the rise of modern urban life. Whereas religion used to dominate all facets of society, it has now become autonomous in a society currently controlled by capitalist social organizations. A shift has occurred from communal religious life to industrialized self-fulfilling prophecies. When the Church became an isolated sector of society and the government became the official voice, man’s quest for his own good may have superseded that of God’s. Marx believed that religion was used as a tool by the State to maintain its capitalist goals. Throughout history societies have been constructed with religious undertones, making it easier to get an already religiously socialized mass to obey a newly formed state structure. The Founding Fathers mirrored their political dogma to that of the church by using familiar forms of symbolism. The Gettysburg Address used imagery that likened death by patriotism to the death of Jesus on the cross, “Those who here gave their lives, that the nation might live”. Abraham Lincoln was considered a martyr for the abolitionist cause as Joan of Arc was for liberating the people of France. The American flag flew from every doorstep as a symbol for our newly fought independence as the cross hung from wall to wall as a symbol of our rebirth in Christ. The church had days to commemorate past saintly heroes while the state created Memorial Day to celebrate its past uniformed heroes. These nationalist symbols were done for a reason: To make it easier for religious Americans to indubitably accept the political agendas of our leaders. We are being told that we should love our country even with its imperfections, and that those who speak out about fighting wars, foreign policy, or a need for peace are unpatriotic. Now, if religion and patriotism are to be accepted uniformly, that must mean that Christians must accept these wars, ballistic missile defense plans, patriot acts, and whatever grandiose ideas are next from our leaders. This is where the problem lies; religious teachings call for open communication, non-violent resolutions, human rights, and peace. So, religion and patriotism cannot be accepted uniformly anymore. Our leaders have strayed away from these teachings but are leading us to believe they are, in fact, devout Christians. So far it has been a very strategic and beneficial move. God’s most important commandment is “Thou shall love their neighbor as they love themselves”. It seems to me that currently this means our neighbors are strictly within the boundaries of the United States. We justified our patriotism after 9/11 because Christians should love their home, that which was destined to them by God. Yet, ignored that this thing that we loved was acting on its own behalf, for its own goals and not within the teachings of God. Our nation is retaliating at our enemies and not at the Taliban, the real terrorists of 9/11, through war. This is a war that is killing our earthly neighbors and invading another’s homeland for our own personal economic profit. If it is not about money, then I urge the Bush Administration to relinquish control of all oil fields to the Iraqi people. Surely this will not be done. Some Catholics may be aware of just-cause where war under certain circumstances is acceptable. The Catechism of the Catholic Church limits just-cause to cases in which "the use of force must have serious prospects for success" and "must not produce evils and disorders graver than the evil to be eliminated". In fact, just-cause is interpreted as a means of preventing wars and should be avoided at all rational costs. At a U.S. conference of Catholic Bishops in November 2002, they released this statement: “We fear that to resort to war, under present circumstances and in light of current public information, would not meet the strict conditions in Catholic teaching [for just-cause]. We hope that our moral concerns and questions will be considered seriously by our leaders and all citizens. We pray for President Bush and other world leaders that they will find the will and the ways to step back from the brink of war with Iraq and work for a peace that is just and enduring.” I don’t believe this has been the next prophetic “American Crusade”. As Christians, how can we justify a country that acts in an un-Godly manner as we sit around idly with all this love, knowing that our fellow neighbors are suffering? God’s commandment of loving your neighbor as yourself means standing in solidarity with him/her, no matter our origins of birth. We all have a social contract that binds us to the society where we were born because that is the nature of citizenship. I believe that God wants us to respect and love our societies here on earth as much as we strive to live with him in Heaven. However, modernization and capitalism have played a huge role in leading our country away from religion. Our society has become a product of man-made desires for individualistic goals, and the current administration is furthering our spiral away from God’s sincere desires. No Christian can argue with the fact that we are called to love our fellow human beings. Well, love does not just extend to our family or our personal nation; it encompasses the entire world, including the people who are dying defending our freedom and those they are killing. As the saying goes, “If we assume that life is worth living and that man has a right to survive, then we must find an alternative to war”. I don’t understand how we can applaud and vote for a man who chose preemptive war while completely ignoring resolutions of true peace. There is nothing wrong with being a Christian or a patriot, but we do not need to be forced to incorporate them both when our religious identities are being used as tool for deception. God does not take sides when terrorism and wars are pitted as rich versus rich for control over the poor. God is not on the side of Saddam Hussein or George W. Bush. We must stop killing in the name of religion and patriotism overseas and return our troops to their families. I like my country, but I cannot truly love it until it stops masking its social policies with religious overtones. “See to it that no one captivates you with an empty, seductive philosophy according to human tradition, according to the elemental powers of the world and not according to Christ.” Colossians 2:8 The Gandhi Peace Award (excerpted from "In Gandhi's Footsteps: The Gandhi Peace
Awards" by James van Pelt, 1997-2002.)
The Gandhi Peace Award is a certificate, calligraphed with an inscription summing up the work for peace of a distinguished citizen of the world. It is a medallion featuring the profile of Mohandas K. Gandhi, with his words "Love Ever Suffers/Never Revenges Itself" cast in bronze. It is a nameplate on a weighty carved statue of the Mahatma. It is a ceremony held approximately once a year, at which a distinguished peacemaker is recognized and given the opportunity to present a message of challenge and hope. It is to be awarded "for contributions made in the promotion of international peace and good will." Like all of the perennial activities of Promoting Enduring Peace (PEP), the Gandhi Peace Award was conceived by the organization's founder, Dr. Jerome Davis, in the late nineteen forties. At the Board of Director's meeting on March 13, 1959, he formally proposed that a yearly award be given to persons outstanding in their work for world peace. A famous New York sculptor, Don Benaron/Katz, was commissioned to create a work of art to serve as the symbol of the Award. He researched Gandhi at the library of the India House in New York City and by 1960 had carved a striking portrait of the founder of the century's international movement for nonviolent change. He wrote, "I carved the Gujarati word for peace on one side, and on the other a symbolic plowshare and pruning hook Ð inspired by Isaiah 2:4": They shall beat their
swords into plowshares; The 2003 recipient of the award is Ohio Democrat, Dennis Kucinich. Focus on a Peacemaker: Kathy Kelly Excerpted from www.vitw.org
Kathy Kelly, 50, of Chicago, IL, helped initiate Voices in the Wilderness, a campaign to end the UN/US sanctions against Iraq. For bringing "medicine and toys" to Iraq in open violation of the UN/US sanctions, she and other campaign members were notified of a proposed $163,000 penalty for the organization, threatened with 12 years in prison, and eventually fined $50,000, a sum which they've refused to pay. Voices in the Wilderness organized 70 delegations to visit Iraq in the period between 1996 and the beginning of the "Operation Shock and Awe" warfare (March 2003). Kelly has been to Iraq twenty times since January 1996, when the campaign began. In October 2002, she joined Iraq Peace Team members in Baghdad where she and the team maintained a presence throughout the invasion, bombardment and occupation. Kelly left Iraq on April 19, 2003. She has left again for Iraq September 8, 2003. During the first two weeks of the Gulf War, she was part of a peace encampment on the Iraq-Saudi border called the Gulf Peace Team. Following evacuation to Amman, Jordan, (February 4, 1991), team members stayed in the region for the next six months to help coordinate medical relief convoys and study teams. In 1988 she was sentenced to one year in prison for planting corn on nuclear missile silo sites. Kelly served nine months of the sentence in Lexington KY maximum security prison. Kelly has taught in Chicago area community colleges and high schools since 1974. From 1980 - 1986 she taught at St. Ignatius College Prep (Chicago, IL ) She is active with the Catholic Worker movement and, as a pacifist and war tax refuser, has refused payment of all Federal income tax for 23 years. Kelly helped organize and participated in nonviolent direct action teams in Haiti (summer of 1994), Bosnia (August, 1993, December, 1992) and Iraq (Gulf Peace Team, 1991). In April of 2002, she was among the first internationals to visit the Jenin camp in the Occupied West Bank. She presently helps coordinate the Voices in the Wilderness campaign. The American Colony in Africa Mark Robertson Excerpted from Peaceworks Monitor Aug-Sept 2003, from Columbia, MO In most high school history textbooks, the nation of Liberia is lucky if it gets a two-paragraph mention, sandwiched somewhere between the Emancipation Proclamation and the Civil Rights Movement. Liberia, however, has played a much more prominent role in the minds of those concerned with American "strategic interests" on the African continent. For the past century and a half, it has been the single toehold of the United States in the region, and it came to play a particularly important role during the Cold War. A Colony for Freed Slaves In the early nineteenth century, Paul Cuffe was a wealthy African-American merchant from Massachusetts. He believed the American blacks could only achieve self-governance if they left American and returned to African to found their own nation. To achieve this, he created the American Colonization Society. With anxious support from President Monroe to quell slave rebellions at home, a colony on the coast of Africa where free blacks could be shipped was started. Liberia was founded in 1822 and became a technically independent nation when the American Colonization Society relinquished control of the nation in 1847. The freed slaves who emigrated became known as Americo-Liberians and represented ad U. S. -friendly elite class that came to dominate native-born Liberians. The nation settled into a highly stratified society, with an oligarchy of freed American slaves and their descendants oppressing and exploiting the indigenous population. Liberia in the Cold War William Tubman was Liberia's president from 1944-1971 and was considered a vital U.S. ally in the Cold War. He allowed for the construction of the largest American spy station on the African continent within Liberia's borders, and billions were funneled into surveillance equipment there. The U.S. also set up an enormous Voice of America transmitter in Liberia and used the country as a base to undermine national liberation movements throughout the continent. President Tubman's successor, William Tolbert, followed an unbroken chain of Americo-Liberians ruling the nation; however, his willlingness to shower wealth and privileges on his fellow Americo-Liberians at the expense of native descendants greatly increased class conflict between the two groups. Acting with the support of a growing army of Liberians angered by the policies of President Tolbert, Samuel Doe (a graduate of the U. S. military training program, Joint Combined Exchange Training) led a rebellion and murdered Tolbert in 1980 (along with most of the former cabinet members and some of the more contentious among his fellow insurgents). Samuel Doe ruled through assassinations, repression and fraud. He also unleashed a wave of ethnic-based terror against the Americo-Liberian population. None of this stopped the Reagan administration from flooding Does' government with nearly $5 billion throughout the 1980's, in exchange for his aid in destabilizing Libya. Reagan even went so far as inviting Doe to visit the White House. Civil War and Taylor Charles Taylor was an Americo-Liberian who had graduated from Bently College in Massachusetts. Taylor was a teacher and part of Doe's government in 1980 before being exiled. Back in the U. S., he was jailed for embezzling $900,000 from the Liberian national budget. He escaped prison in 1985 and returned to West Africa in 1989 to launch a rebellion against Doe from Ivory Coast. Doe was assassinated by rebels in 1990, not long after his support from the U.S. dried up. What followed was a power vacuum and a bloody civil war. Taylor emerged as one of the dominant players, in part because he took control of several diamond mines in neighboring Sierra Leone to fund his operations. Taylor's forces included many children. Often under the influence of drugs, they were known for their brutality. Some 200,000 people were killed in the fighting over the next six years. More than one million were displaced in a country of only 3.1 million. The Economic Community of West African States along with the UN managed to negotiate a tentative peace in 1996. Special elections were held in 1997, and Charles Taylor's National Patriotic Party won an overwhelming majority, with Taylor assuming the office of president. Taylor further tightened his grip on power by sponsoring the insurgency of the brutal Revolutionary United Front (RUF) in Sierra Leone. The RUF smuggled diamonds through Liberia, where Taylor took his cut selling to Western distributors. He also backed a militia's attempted takeover of diamond mines in neighboring Guinea. Guinea, which received $3 million in U. S. military aid last year, has been backing the main anti-Taylor rebel group known as Liberians United for Reconciliation and Democracy (LURD). In early June of this year, a UN backed court in Sierra Leone charged Taylor with war crimes and crimes against humanity. This combined with increased U. S. support for LURD, led Taylor to agree to step down and accept an offer of asylum from the president of Nigeria. A cease-fire was signed among the rebel groups, but when Taylor refused to set a date for his departure, fighting quickly resumed. Taylor finally left in mid-August. top A Progressive Agenda for Work Time Reduction Brad Lorton, Organizer, Work Time Reduction Committee of Indiana You’d never know it from the press, but, work time reduction may be the most important issue for the Left in the coming decades. It’s been almost seven decades since the legal establishment of the 40-hour workweek. Since then, per-worker productivity has tripled as a result of technological progress. Unfortunately, the democratic Left has acquiesced in capitalist materialism by accepting the virtues of economic growth and increasing consumption, and forgetting that increased productivity can be realized in the form of free time. The progressive community as a whole has been somewhat lethargic on this issue. But in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the 8-hour day was a centerpiece of the political campaigns of Eugene V. Debs, Robert La Follette and Norman Thomas. The fabled Haymarket Riot, in 1886, began as a peaceful demonstration for the 8-hour day. The current weakness of American labor, coupled with a social pathology towards excessive consumption has forced work time reduction to the political backburner. We can ill afford to leave it there much longer. Of immediate importance, the 40-hour workweek is no longer compatible with prospects for a full employment economy. In the Information Age, technological displacement of workers proceeds at an increasing rate. Some projections show that by 2050 manufacturing will account for less than 2% of global employment. Even service industries – once the “job creation machines” of post-industrial capitalism – are experiencing such displacements. Every ATM and automatic cashier you encounter, constitute examples of this problem. Futurist Jeremy Rifkin has long contended that without the 30-hour workweek, substantial increases in long-term structural unemployment are inevitable. Beyond the economic benefits of spreading the work, shorter work time can largely ameliorate other social problems. Overwork is the leading cause of premature heart disease in America. It is also a recurring culprit in cases of stress, depression, occupational injury, and sleep disorders. Overwork contributes to child and spousal neglect, and a squeeze on functional free time for family and community activities. Too often we ignore the fundamental truth that freedom has a time element. The more time for our own pursuits, the less time we are subject to institutional control and chains of command. The more time for functional leisure away from the marketplace, the more breathing room we have for personal freedom. Freedom emanates not from the ability to enter employment contracts, but from access to functional free time. Such free time is only possible when people have the right to meaningful employment compensated by living incomes and equal access to social services. That is why this issue is so critical to the Left – it addresses the social and the material rights necessary for the expansion of human liberty. Moreover, this issue is a bold statement that freedom from the market is at least as important as freedom from the government. I am a recent visitor to the Marquette area, who was impressed enough with WRITE ON to want to contribute this short article. In my home town of Indianapolis I am an organizer for the Work Time Reduction Committee of Indiana. This committee supports the 30-hour week, and a progressive agenda for functional free time and a full employment economy. To learn more about these efforts please visit our website at www.onet.net/~hours30, or e-mail shorterworkweek@netscape.net. Also, October 24, 2003 will be the first annual Take Back Your Time Day in the U.S. – fashioned after the original Earth Day. The difference between that day and the end of the year illustrates the difference between the U.S. work year and that of Western Europe. For more information please visit www.timeday.org Bush Listens to Wrong People, Says Peace Group From the War Resisters' League On September 7, 2003, George W. Bush spoke to the nation about the "war on terror," and particularly about the new "terror front," Iraq. It is obvious that Bush is still listening to former corporation heads, military planners, and advisers who have oil tankers named after them. But not to ordinary people. The Bush administration is not listening to the thousands of people who lost their jobs last month, or the hundreds of thousands who have lost their pensions as more and more money is taken from the people's economy and put into the war economy. Bush is about to ask Congress for an additional $87 billion to fight against and kill people in Iraq. That request alone accounts for twenty percent of all federally funded programs for the people. Spread out over the five months we've been in occupation of Iraq, it works out to be about $402,000 a minute-and that's not counting the cost of the invasion, with its "extra" budgetary request of nearly $75 billion. The administration is not listening to teachers, or students and their parents, who would tell him what they could accomplish with all that money. Or to graduates with student loans. Or to people struggling with staggering housing costs. Or to people without medical insurance-ordinary people. Nor is the administration listening to New Yorkers, who bore, and continue to bear, the brunt of the September 11 attacks. The New York City Council joined dozens of other cities across the nation and voted against the invasion of Iraq last March 13, reflecting New York City polls that counted nearly 75 percent of the people against the invasion. "We of all cities," said City Councilmember Alan Gerson, "must uphold the preciousness and sanctity of human life." Since that day, New York has led the economic decline, left to fall with less and less support from the federal government. This week, a New York Times poll showed that now, after the invasion of Iraq, more New Yorkers are afraid of a terrorist attack than they were the year before. A new national poll shows that more people think that the invasion of Iraq has increased the risk of terror, rather than decreased it. Well, ordinary people would say it makes sense to be more afraid. If you send hundreds of thousands of troops into a place, bombing and shooting, destroying cities and buildings and lives, collapsing a government and bringing massive internal chaos-and then delay and delay in restoring order and power and clean water and medicine-ordinarily, people will get upset with you. If the administration had listened to those in the peace movement who had gone to Iraq and talked to the ordinary people there, it would have known that. In fact, we were not suffering any terrorist attacks in Iraq before the invasion (or in Afghanistan either, for that matter). Now we are. And under the constant threat of the terrifying situation the invasion has created, "coalition" troops (who are most often ordinary people under the command of their officers or of fear) fire upon buildings and crowds, killing civilians. And that gets more people upset, and wanting to drive the United States out. Troops parade Iraqi arrestees blindfolded or naked into the streets, or they pat down the women, searching for weapons, and mortally insult the families, creating lethal hostility. Now the administration wants to go to the United Nations to ask for help. Ordinary people urged Bush to do that before he went to war. But when it was clear that 11 of the 15 members of the Security Council would not authorize an illegal invasion, the Bush administration never brought it to a vote, and the killing commenced. And continues-more U.S. dead than before "major hostilities ended," according to Bush. And, since no one is keeping count of the Iraqis who are dying during and since the invasion, who knows how many of them? Does the administration want the United Nations to legitimate the U.S. occupation? Bush wants U.N. members to supply troops (more ordinary people), but put under U.S. command. That way, not so many ordinary Americans will be killing and dying, because ordinary people from other countries will. That ought to "mend the fences" among our allies after Bush did not listen to them before the war, right? How much U.S. pressure and money will have to be employed (and how many more ordinary people will have to be unemployed) before other governments agree to that? But the administration is not listening to the kind of questions ordinary people would. Here is something else they probably won't listen to. The Iraqis never attacked us-not on September 11 or any other time. We attacked them: in the first Gulf War, then in twelve years of bombing and sanctions that human rights observers called "genocidal," and now with this invasion and occupation. And yet those in the peace movement who go over to Iraq find an astonishing wellspring of good will toward the U.S. people. Ordinary people know that making and keeping friends is hard work. And when you hurt a friend, you say you're sorry, and try to make it up to them. In the case of Iraq, that would mean a program of reparations for all our attacks. It would mean funding a nonviolent international body, chosen by Iraqis, to help Iraqis reconstruct the people's economy so devastated by invasions, sanctions and bombing. It would mean returning the reconstruction effort to ordinary Iraqis, not to White House crony corporations and the Vichy-style occupation government in Iraq. And of course, it would mean an end to the occupation. All that would cost a lot less than the ongoing war and occupation, and reclaim for us the friendship we used to have with the Iraqi people. The War Resisters League believes that such a program, with the help of the entire international community, is the way to overcome terror. Really, ordinary people would tell the administration, the way to make sure there is no "terror front" in Iraq is to treat ordinary people with dignity and even humility; make them your friends. 87 Billion Apologies. Take your money, Mr. President, but at least say you're sorry Michael Kinsley (founding editor of Slate Magazine), excerpted from Slate Magazine
President Bush will get his $87 billion for a year's worth of victory in Iraq and Afghanistan, but he will have to endure a lot of nyah-nyah-nyah and I-told-you-so along the way. He could have avoided all this irritation “and he is just the kind of man to find it incredibly irritating” with two little words in his TV address last Sunday evening: "I'm sorry." If he had acknowledged with a bit of grace what everyone assumes to be true ”that the administration was blindsided by the postwar challenge in both these countries” this would have cut off a politically damaging debate that will now go on through the election campaign. And he would have won all sorts of brownie points for high-mindedness. Instead, he and his spokesfolk will be defending a fairly obvious untruth day after day through the election campaign. Why do politicians so rarely apologize? Why in particular won't they admit to being surprised by some development? Lack of scruples can't explain it: Denying the obvious isn't even good unscrupulous politics. For that reason, it is beyond spin. If spinning involves an indifference to truth, what's going on here looks more like an actual preference for falsehood. The truth would be better politics, and the administration is fanning out to the talk shows to lie anyway. This is not meant to be a partisan observation. Bush's predecessor was, if anything, a more flamboyant liar. What's going on here is something like lying-by-reflex. If the opposition accuses you of saying the world is round, you lunge for the microphone to declare your passionate belief that it is flat. Or maybe it has something to do with the bureaucracies that political campaigns have become. The truth, whatever its advantages, is messy and out-of-control. A lie can be designed by committee, vetted by consultants, tested with focus groups, shaped to perfection. Anyone can tell the truth. Crafting a good lie is a job for professionals. This $87 billion request is a minefield of embarrassments, through which a simple "We got it wrong" would have been the safest route. After all, Bush either knew we'd be spending this kind of money for two or more years after declaring victory ”and didn't tell us” or he didn't realize it himself. Those are the only two options. He deceived us, or he wasn't clairvoyant in the fog of war. Apparently, Bush would rather be thought omniscient than honest, which is a pity, since appearing honest is a more realistic ambition. Especially for him. What's more, this would have been a truth without a tail. Telling one hard truth can lead you down, down, down into a vicious circle of more truth, revelation, embarrassment, and chagrin. That's one reason for the truth's dangerous reputation. But the Bush administration's failure to realize how much its postwar festivities would cost is a truth that doesn't lead anywhere in particular. Clearly knowing about the $87 billion bill for Year 2 would not have stopped Bush from conducting the war to begin with. Nor would this knowledge have stopped opponents from opposing it. Among supporters, there may be a few people who bought Bush's initial war-on-terrorism rationale, didn't mind the bait-and-switch to his revised freedom-and-democracy rationale, reveled in the military victory, and yet would have opposed it all if they'd known about the $87 billion. But it is an odd camel whose back is broken by this particular straw. Bush needs some truth-telling points, because another aspect of this $87 billion request is driving him to dishonesty that he can't abandon so blithely. That issue is: If he gets the $87 billion, where will it have come from? Bush is sending Colin Powell around the world with a begging cup. But whatever can't be raised from foreigners apparently can be conjured out of thin air. Raising taxes to pay the $87 billion would be a bad mistake, Bush says: Economic growth "fed by tax cuts” will cover the $87 billion and then some. But however miraculous Bush's tax cuts turn out to be, economic growth will not be $87 billion more miraculous just because that much more is suddenly needed in Iraq and Afghanistan. Nor does Bush plan, or even concede the necessity, to harvest this $87 billion at some point by raising taxes (or not cutting them) by that amount. And although he talks vaguely about spending restraint, he and the Congress controlled by his party have shown very little of it. He certainly has not pinpointed $87 billion in other spending that the new $87 billion can replace. So, spending $87 billion costs nothing, apparently. This makes it even sillier to deny being blindsided. What difference does it make? While apologizing to the citizenry, Bush could win even more brownie points, at almost no cost, by apologizing specifically to his predecessor. Bush ridiculed Bill Clinton's efforts to follow up military interventions with "nation building." Believe it or not, this was a pejorative term, implying unrealistic ambitions. Now Bush talks about turning Iraq into a Jeffersonian democracy. And if Bush wants credit for a Gold-Star Triple-Whammy Zirconium-Studded apology, he should apologize to his father, who stopped Gulf War I at the Iraqi border. Armchair Freudians believe that in going to Baghdad and toppling Hussein, George II was playing Oedipal tennis with George I. If so, junior has lost. The elder Bush's most notorious decision as president looks better every day. And not just because of the $87 billion. top Stop Canadian Trash Anne Newcombe I wanted to let you know about an issue that is very important to me. In January of 2003, Toronto closed its last landfill, and now sends all of its trash to landfills around Michigan. Over 6 million cubic tons of trash from Canada ends up in Michigan landfills each year. Recently, the Toronto city council approved a contract to ship thousands of tons of raw sewage to Michigan for disposal. That's why I've joined U.S. Senator Debbie Stabenow's fight to stop Canadian trash now! Under an existing international agreement, the U.S. government has the power to stop these shipments --but only if the EPA enforces the treaty. I've signed an online petition to urge the new EPA Administrator to begin enforcing the treaty immediately and stop the Canadian trash and sewage sludge at the border. You can sign the online petition by visiting Senator Stabenow's website at http://stabenow.senate.gov/stoptrash. I hope you'll take a moment and join me in this fight to protect our state from foreign trash and sewage.
top
· September 19 The Nature Conservancy will have a workday at the McMahon Lake Cabin in Luce County, beginning at 10:00 am.
· September 20 The Nature Conservancy will hold its Annual International Coastal Cleanups in Marquette and Horseshoe Harbor from 9:00 - 12:00. There will also be a dedication of the Laughing Whitefish Lake Preserve Trail from 2:00 - 4:00. For more information on how to become involved with the Nature Conservancy contact Janet Seeds at jseeds@tnc.org or 906/225-0399.
· October 7 La Leche League will hold its monthly meeting at 6:00 at St. Johns Episcopal Church in Marquette
top |
