Remarks at the Obama Inauguration

Column No. 215

The most important speech at the inauguration of President Barack Obama were of course those spoken by him in his Inaugural Address. On January 19, 2009 I wrote a Commentary for BuzzFlash entitled “My Wish List for the Inaugural Address.”

It was published on inauguration day. At the beginning of that Commentary I said: “A couple of weeks ago, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee sent out a questionnaire to its contributors (of which, I must admit, I am one). It asked for one's top pick for the must-deal-with problems. The list consisted of the usual suspects, beginning with what can be called ‘The Five “E's” ‘(with liberties taken): Economic stimulus, Education, Environment, Ealth Care, and Eraq (well some people do pronounce it that way), as well as Tax Reform (?!) and, somewhere on the list, "national defense/security." My answer, had I answered, would have been "None of the above." One will likely hear some version or another of the list above in Pres. Obama's address. But I am really hoping, oh boy am I hoping, that some significant percentage of the time in what will be a relatively short speech (20 minutes or so, so we have been told) will be devoted to the Big "C:" the Constitution, and the restoration of Constitutional Democracy (C.D.) in the United States.

Well, my wish was rewarded. Below I will highlight those portions of Pres. Obama’s Inaugural that constituted my reward. But before doing that I would like to turn to the words of another speaker about whom I had also written commentary before the event, commentary that appeared both on the pages of BuzzFlash and right here on TPJmagazine. Like many other commentators on the Left, I took Warren apart. I also criticized the choice that the Team Obama had made. For it fell into the trap set by the Right that in contemporary American politics homophobia is politically OK, just as long as the putative subject is “gay marriage.” 

Then along came Rev. Warren, to give the invocation. Much to my surprise, in it I found much to admire and nothing to complain about. Indeed many observers on the left did complain about the frequent references to “God” and to “Jesus.” But the man is a Christian minister and he believes in both God and Christ, as divine, sentient, powerful beings, existing in the supernatural. I am a Secular Humanist and I don’t believe in what he believes in. But I respect him and his beliefs and I also believe in the First Amendment. Thus he is free to express them, in our country. What I do not agree with is when Christians, or the representatives of any other religion, attempt to force their particular beliefs upon me, in an attempt to control and limit my beliefs, through the force of law. But that is another matter. 

So surprising to me were the words in his invocation which completely contradicted the homophobic positions he has taken on many other occasions, from the pulpit and elsewhere. I am just wondering if, because of the furor that followed his selection the Rev. did some rethinking, perhaps even communicating in the manner in which he does with his concept of “God.” In so doing did he learn, perhaps, that his God truly loves all of his or her creations, including homosexuals? To paraphrase Lincoln, in fact God must love the gays and lesbians because he made so many of them. And so, let’s listen to the Rev. Warren:

“Now today we rejoice not only in America's peaceful transfer of power for the 44th time. We celebrate a hinge-point of history with the inauguration of our first African-American president of the United States. We are so grateful to live in this land, a land of unequaled possibility, where the son of an African immigrant can rise to the highest level of our leadership. . . . Give to our new president, Barack Obama, the wisdom to lead us with humility, the courage to lead us with integrity, the compassion to lead us with generosity. . . . [r]emember that we are Americans, united not by race or religion or blood, but to our commitment to freedom and justice for all.

“When we focus on ourselves, when we fight each other, when we forget you, forgive us. When we presume that our greatness and our prosperity is ours alone, forgive us. When we fail to treat our fellow human beings and all the Earth with the respect that they deserve, forgive us.

“And as we face these difficult days ahead, may we have a new birth of clarity in our aims, responsibility in our actions, humility in our approaches, and civility in our attitudes, even when we differ. Help us to share, to serve and to seek the common good of all. May all people of good will today join together to work for a more just, a more healthy [sic], and a more prosperous nation and a peaceful planet.”

I say that these are memorable words, with which all supporters of President Obama (and even some, but unfortunately not all, of his opponents) can agree. I say with all due respect to the Rev. Warren: “Is it possible that, having gone through the fire of the criticism aimed at you for your evil words said to our gay and lesbian compatriots, you have again been born again and moved to a higher level of understanding or your fellow man?” We shall see what the future holds for the Rev. Warren.

Turning now to the words President Obama. In my “wish list” BuzzFlash Commentary I said: “I am really hoping, oh boy am I hoping, that some significant percentage of the time in what will be a relatively short speech (20 minutes or so, so we have been told) will be devoted to the Big "C:" the Constitution, and the restoration of Constitutional Democracy in the United States.” Well, the word “Constitution” did not appear in the Address. But it was very much of a presence. 

Paraphrasing the great work by Aaron Copeland, “A Lincoln Portrait,” that opened the Inaugural Concert on January 18, President Obama said, this is what he said: “The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works — whether it helps families find jobs at a decent wage, care they can afford, a retirement that is dignified. Where the answer is yes, we intend to move forward. Where the answer is no, programs will end.”

In this light, listen to the most ignored section of the Constitution, the Preamble: “We the people of the United States, in order to form a more per­fect Union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the com­mon defence, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Consti­tution for the United States of America.” No prescription for big or small government here, but for one that works, for the benefit of all the people, in the context of the democratic government, operating under the Rule of Law, that the body of the Constitution prescribes..

President Obama said, this is what he said: “As for our common defense, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals. Our founding fathers, faced with perils we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations. Those ideals still light the world, and we will not give them up for expedience's sake. . . . [O]ur security emanates from the justness of our cause, the force of our example, the tempering qualities of humility and restraint. We are the keepers of this legacy.” There we can find in these words echoes of the First, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, Seventh, Eighth, Ninth, and Fourteenth Amendments.

Echoing the First Amendment once more, President Obama said: “We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus — and non-believers.” To my knowledge, no President has ever referred, as he did with these last words, to my sector of the population. It now, it has been estimated, stands at 30,000,000 strong. Echoing the Fifteenth Amendment, the original Civil Rights Act that took 100 years to be put into force, President Obama said: “This is the meaning of our liberty and our creed — why men and women and children of every race and every faith can join in celebration across this magnificent Mall, and why a man whose father less than sixty years ago might not have been served at a local restaurant can now stand before you to take a most sacred oath.”

And finally President Obama said, referring to the darkest days of the American Revolution, spent by General Washington and his Winter Soldiers at Valley Forge, “So let us mark this day with remembrance, of who we are and how far we have traveled. In the year of America's birth, in the coldest of months, a small band of patriots huddled by dying campfires on the shores of an icy river. The capital was abandoned. The enemy was advancing. The snow was stained with blood. At a moment when the outcome of our revolution was most in doubt, the father of our nation ordered these words be read to the people: ‘Let it be told to the future world ... that in the depth of winter, when nothing but hope and virtue could survive...that the city and the country, alarmed at one common danger, came forth to meet (it).’ "

The President probably does not know, for few Americans do, that the great Prussian officer Baron Friedrich von Stueben, who trained the Continental Army into fighting shape throughout that bitter winter, at the age of 47 a to be life-long bachelor, brought with him only his French secretary, a handsome young man of 19.

And that, my friends, brings us back to the words of those in this country who would deny people their civil rights, simply because they have a different sexual identity than do the majority. And so, by implication, President Obama finished his address by alluding to perhaps the most important clause of the Fourteenth Amendment: “[No] State shall . . . deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”

“Class Struggle”

Column No. 214

The classic Marxist concept of class struggle elucidates the millennia-long battle between the owners and controllers of the means of production, whether that be agricultural, trading, manufacturing, or finance, and everyone else.

Under the capitalism of Marx’ time, the bulk of “everyone else” consisted of the manufacturing working class and related occupations, such as the miners and the railroad workers. In our era things have gotten rather more complex. 

First of all, in the developed capitalist countries fewer and fewer people are engaged directly in manufacturing, more and more in “white collar” positions directly and indirectly supporting the manufacturing sector, and in small business. Second of all, while there is a definable owning/controlling class, it is much less publicly apparent than it used to be and many non-owner/controllers have the appearance of “ownership’ and an interest in it through the securities markets. Third of all, in the United States to the greatest extent, but in most of the other developed countries to some extent as well, the owners/controllers have created a very effective propaganda machine designed to suppress traditional working class consciousness. For example, when President-elect Obama refers to the “middle class” what he is really talking about is what used to be called the “working class,” but the capitalist media have made sure that that term is passé. 

Fourth of all, in the United States since the passage of the Taft-Hartley Act in 1947 and its successor state totally mis-named “right-to-work” laws and in the United Kingdom more recently since Margaret Thatcher (but less in most of the other capitalist countries) the trade union movement under which so many workers developed class consciousness has been very actively and very successfully repressed. Finally, in the United States the owner/controllers and their media have run a very successful propaganda campaign to get the term “class warfare” to be used to refer to the (relatively weak) efforts by the Democratic Party to mitigate some of the worst effects of the owning/controlling class’ ownership and control, like the ever-rising and very rapidly-rising separation in both income and wealth between the top of the o/c heap and everyone else. The result of all this is that in the United States, and to a lesser extent in the other developed countries, there is very little of the old-fashioned class consciousness on the part of the workers, whether blue or white collar. This does not mean that there is not class struggle going on. It does mean that most of the non-owners/controllers of the means of production are not aware that they are in one.

The human species is the only one that cannot survive without converting elements that it finds in its environment into other things. It began with simple food conversion, and producing clothing and shelter. It has obviously gotten a lot more complex over time. Thus it is that control over the means of production, from growing food in amounts to feed more than oneself and one’s family to converting iron ore and coke into steel and the products that can be made from it, is central to controlling human life. Central also is the ownership and control of the natural resources that literally fuel our modern economies. Karl Marx provided us with the understanding of the basic class divisions, in relation to the means of production.

It was V.I. Lenin who provided the understanding of the true relationship between the owning/controlling class and the government in any modern nation. Under capitalism the owners/controllers attempt, usually with great success, to create the illusion that the State is somehow an independent body, up for grabs. In fact, and one can observe this happening over and over again, the State serves the interests of the owning/controlling class, which in fact own it too. (In the U.S., with for the most part private financing of elections, they literally buy it.) Thus the greatest achievement of the last great reformer US President, Franklin Roosevelt, was to save US capitalism operating with a Constitutional government (Marxists call the form “bourgeois democracy”) from becoming either a fascist state or becoming, horror of horrors, possibly subject to at least an attempt at socialist revolution. 

Barack Obama is in exactly the same position as FDR was, although given the depredations on our nation of the particular sector of the US owning/controlling class represented by what I call the “Georgites” over the past eight years, his task is rather harder than that of FDR. But he no more represents the interests of the true non-owning/controlling class (whatever label one might give them) than did FDR. But he is representative of one actor in the current class struggle in the United States. It’s just that that active, conscious-as-between-its-antagonists, class struggle is not of the traditional kind. It is occurring within the owning/controlling class, not between it and everyone else. 

There are certainly overlaps in both interests and memberships, but what one can now discern with a fair degree of confidence is that the US owning/controlling class has split into two fairly well-defined groups. They happen to have seriously competing interests in both the economy and government policy, in both the domestic realm and the foreign one. 

In one corner are the extractive industry (petroleum, natural gas, coal, and minerals), the military-industrial complex, the prison-industrial complex, and certain elements of the “health care” industry (particularly in the pharmaceutical and insurance ends of it). In the other corner is what is left of the US manufacturing sector, the service and communication industries, the public utilities, the growing “green energy” sector, the entertainment industry, the news media complex, and major elements of the financial sector (although some of them are on the other side). It is clear that Pres.-elect Obama represents this latter class-sector. For decades they had done very well under “bourgeois democracy.” The Georgites have launched a major assault on it in many sectors over the past eight years, serving the interests of their controllers, with, however, the results that readers of these pages know all too well. The other grouping, shall we for the sake of moving the argument along call them the “Constitutionalist owner/controllers,” wanted it back. And to spearhead that drive, they have put Sen. Obama in the Presidency.

Obama and his people are very smart and appear to be very well organized. They have a quite monumental task in front of them, however, for capitalism has never faced a world-wide crisis of the sort it is now facing. But the Georgites, for all their apparent failures, are not going away. In fact, while most observers rank George Bush as the worst President the US has ever had, in terms of his record of achievement of his true goals, mostly never openly stated, he is in my view the most successful President the US has ever had. I have written on that topic on these pages and plan to return to it in a couple of months. He has definitely advanced the interests of the class sector he represents. In fact, it is no coincidence that Bush made so many extractive-industry friendly rulings since the election. He is their boy.

Obama and the class sector he represents represent a major threat to them. With green energy increasing oil and coal consumption will gradually decline, and along with a decline in both their influence and their profits. With a decline in the shoot-first, maybe negotiate afterwards foreign policy, the production of military hardware, especially the high-tech, high profit type, declines, along with their profits. And kind of national health insurance system that can control costs to even some extent ins going to reduce the profits of both the pharmaceutical and the “health” insurance industries. And so on and so forth. 

The Georgites may be somewhat conflicted because of the immediate impact of the Recession/Depression on their profits. But in the long run, they want to get back into power. Even though the Team Obama has a monster challenge and may well not succeed, they just might. And the Georgites cannot take that chance. The Georgites own and control the Republican Party. While there will be some sharp battles within it over tactics, their class interest remains the same. So, trying oh-so-cleverly to hide their true intent behind various kinds of rhetoric, they will do everything they can to make sure that Team Obama does not succeed.

Of course, the failure of Obama to rescue traditional American capitalism would mean a rapid rush to squalor for many Americans. And that might mean the outbreak of anything from union organizing, to civil disobedience, to outright violence of the type that caused the Bush Regime to recently ready Army units for domestic duty and Treasury Sec. Paulson to openly refer to the possibility that it might be necessary to use them. Fascism, anyone? Well, Cheney, who directly represented the extractive industries in government, has done his best to lay the governmental groundwork for it. Oh yes, there is a class struggle going on. While capitalism is not at stake in the U.S., just what the form of government that the owners/controllers will use to maintain their power very much is. That’s the class struggle that is going on in front of our very eyes.

“President-elect Barack Obama, the Rev. Rick Warren, and the Mythical 'Middle Ground' ”

Column No. 213

Right-wing commentators such as the sometimes hard-to-categorize Pat Buchanan, the comedian Bill Kristol, the still-trying-to-shake-her "Reagan Hagiographer" label Peggy Noonan, and so-called "even-handed" cable news personalities such as "Morning Joe and Mika" of MSNBC were all het-up about why the "left" (these folks wouldn't know a real LEFT if they saw one) is so het up about Pres.-elect Obama's choice of Rick Warren to deliver the Inauguration Invocation. "It's a free country," they say. "There's a wide range of views on gay marriage" (which happens to be Rick Warren's least odious on-the-gay-question position) they say. "Obama is showing himself to be tolerant," they say. Obama is looking for "common ground," they say.

"You'se guys" (which is what they would say to us lefties if they spoke Noo Yawk) are just a bunch of whiners. Or worse, you are just as bad as the Christian Fundamentalists, except I cannot remember when any of the above listed "authorities" ever criticized the latter group for anything. For example, when Gov. Huckabee, the funny man, was riding high for a bit during the Republican primaries last winter, he was on the cable news shows a lot. And thus I saw him a lot. I don’t remember one question ever being asked him about the fact that he is not just a run-of-the-mill Right-Wing Christian Fundamentalist (which fact itself never came up in questions), but that he had major Dominionist backing. (Dominionists believe that Constitutional government in the United States should be replaced by the “Dominion of God,” based upon their particular so-called “literal” reading of a particular translation [usually the King James Version] of the Bible, in other words institution of a theocracy). No questions there. But that's another story.

These folks then proceed, not surprisingly, to talk about Warren only in the context of his opposition to gay marriage. They trot out all of the traditional arguments in defense of the position (whether it is theirs or not is often left unclear) that "traditional marriage" is "between a man and a woman" and thus should not be/cannot be changed. There are two problems here, folks. First, if that were the only way that Warren demonstrated his antipathy towards gays and equal civil rights for them, one could have a rational argument with him and the people he represents, using one or more of the usual arguments in favor of the gay-marriage-is-just-fine position.

One could point out that the "nature of marriage" has changed oodles over the centuries. For example: under slavery in this country, slaves couldn't marry each other; in the 19th century, women were their husbands' property; in many states until various times in the 20th century, women had no property rights; until relatively recently in a number of states, so-called "mixed race" marriages were illegal (that one being particularly puzzling: since very few African-Americans are of "pure" African blood and therefore at least one partner of a proposed "mixed" marriage was already "mixed" courtesy of a slave-master or a successor, exactly where and how was the line drawn); in the present time, although polygamy is technically illegal, it is openly practiced in various rural areas of certain Western states, with penalties being exacted only very occasionally, usually only when there is a very big difference between the age of the "husband" and one or more of his "wives."

Then one could roll out the big gun (unfortunately very rarely used by gay marriage proponents who for some reason[s] seem to be afraid to go there). In my view, the most important argument in favor of legalizing gay marriage (and I have written extensively on this one elsewhere, is the Constitutional one. Marriage in this country is a bimodal institution, civil and religious. Each one of the 50 states has an extensive body of civil law governing marriage. To prevent persons of the same sex from taking advantage of the legal protections of the institution (as well as assuming its legal obligations) violates the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment, to wit: “nor shall any State . . . deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”

However, there is a second, and much more important problem with Warren. It is that, as is well known, opposition to the institution of gay marriage is for him only a cover. This guy is a true homophobe. In one context or another, for him homosexuality is akin to incest (a matter of opinion and definition); homosexuals are pedophiles (and surely, let's not let facts get in the way: the last time I looked, 95% of cases of pedophilia that come to light are committed by straight men, most often on their own children); gay marriage is akin to polygamy (with that stretch, was this guy a first-baseman, even Warren happily allied himself with the Mormon-funded pro-Prop 8 campaign while the vast majority of practicing polygamists in the U.S. are Mormons [heaven help the Muslim who tries it]); homosexuality by nature is in the nature of child abuse; and he may well hold to the James Dobson view that homosexuality is a choice. This latter one is as if (forgetting about all of the evidence supporting the in-built explanation) anyone would actually want to choose to be a homosexual in this most homophobic of societies in the non-Muslim world, a society in which one of the two major political parties runs in major part on the prejudice, just as the pre-Civil Rights Southern Democrats ran on racism and the post-Civil Rights Republicans did too (until they discovered homophobia and were able to turn down the former, some).

So. Despite all of this, the supporters of Pres.-elect Obama's position, from within his Campaign-soon-to-be-White-House staff, and from within the Commentatariat, say that what he is doing is showing that he is "open to other points of view." That "he wants to bring us as a people together, not divide us." That "we need to find the middle ground." Well, I see two problems with that one. First, what is happening here is that homophobia is getting a pass; it is being treated as just another "point of view," another "perspective." After all, “there are indeed many voices in the United States. They should all be heard.” Oh really? There are many anti-Semitic preachers in our Nation. They too have "another point of view." Showing his "openness" to "other ideas," why should Obama not invite one of them to give a prayer at the Inauguration? There are many racist preachers in our Nation. (Although we don't hear much about either group, The Southern Poverty Law Center could tell you a bunch about both.) How about inviting one of them?

"Well that's different," many folks would say. And aye, folks, there's the rub. Homophobia has now replaced anti-Semitism and anti-black racism as the "OK" prejudice in this country. And in the name of "openness to other ideas," it is being promoted by all sorts of folks, such as the aforementioned "authorities." What we as a nation have to realize and realize very quickly is that there is no DLC-type "middle ground" on questions such as the “on-first-appearance-not-in-any-way-homophobic” gay marriage one. “Civil unions” don’t solve the problem. They still violate the 14^th Amendment. Denying the Marriage Right to gay couples still makes gays and lesbians into second-class citizens, deprived of a basic CIVIL right. Denying that the anti-gay marriage movement is homophobia-in-full is to deny reality.

We are moving quickly in the direction of having an officially approved prejudice, one approved in search of that mythical "middle ground," by oh-so-ironically the first African-American U.S. President. HOWEVER. You either are a homophobe or you ain't. Just like in Harlan County, Kentucky, in the famous Depression-era United Mine Workers song: "They say in Harlan County, there are no neutrals there. You either are a union man or a thug for J.H. Blair." There is no "middle ground."  In Nazi Germany, before they came for the Jews, they came for the Gays. In "The 15% Solution: A Political History of American Fascism, 2001-2022" published by its pseudononymous author Jonathan Westminster in 1996, first the "Christian Republicans" came for the gays. It was only when they were all killed or expelled form the country that they returned to the blacks. As for the Jews, the antifascists among them were classified as "Renegade Jews.” The fascist government went after them too, as Jews. Beware America, beware. It is a very slippery slope that we are now collectively sliding down.

When the First Civil War began, Abraham Lincoln thought that it was about the Constitution (no provision for secession there, and no provision for necessary expansion of slavery into the Territories). By the time he wrote his Second Inaugural he had learned that the Civil War had been about slavery all the time: “One-eighth of the whole population were colored slaves, not distributed generally over the Union, but localized in the Southern part of it. These slaves constituted a peculiar and powerful interest. All knew that this interest was, somehow, the cause of the war.” Obama may think that there is some “middle ground” on gay marriage, or on abortion rights, or separation of church and state, or on the Rule of Law and Constitutional government. Just as there was no middles ground on slavery, there is none on the matters just above either.  “You either are a union man or a thug for J.H. Blair.”  If he learns the latter lesson, his election will mark a true political turning point in the history of our country. If he does not, his election will just have given us a four-year pause on the steady, slow march to fascism which began with the election of Ronald Reagan.

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This column is based in part on one of mine by the same name published on BuzzFlash on Dec. 30, 2008.

BUSH’S ESCALATION (by our Editor/Publisher, Judge Stephen Gheen)

Column No. 131A By Steven Jonas, MD, MPH – December 31, 2006

Saddam’s execution is complete.

Mark Silva of the Chicago Tribune succinctly states the consequences for Bush:

[T[he hanging of the longtime Iraqi strongman does not alter the fundamental problems that Bush faces: Reclaiming public support in the U.S. for a war that a majority of Americans now oppose, and charting a convincing course for the victory that Bush vows to achieve before withdrawing U.S. forces.  . . .

For Bush, the key to regaining public confidence in his handling of the war is likely to lie in the success of "the new way forward" in Iraq that he promises to spell out with the arrival of the New Year.

Meanwhile, Sunni Iraqis are calling for revenge against Americans occupying Iraq:

Saddam Hussein's Baath Party exhorted Iraqis to "strike without mercy" at the U.S. occupiers and Shi'ite Iran to avenge the execution of Iraq's former president but warned them not to be drawn into a civil war.

"Today is your great day. Strike without mercy at the joint enemy in Iraq -- America and Iran," the party said in a statement posted on an Iraqi Web site on Saturday.

"Forget your organisational structures and take the stand of honour you deserve which is to take revenge for Saddam Hussein," said the statement, posted on the www.albasrah.net.

All of this occurs as Bush remains in Crawford, Texas planning the escalation of the war in Iraq.  Dr. Steven Jonas, TPJ’s Contributing Author, authored an insightful analysis for Buzz Flash (a TPJ favorite):

Bush appears to be delusional about Iraq, at least in public. At his Dec. 20, 2006 news conference he said that the U.S. needs to increase the overall size of the Army and the Marine Corps (when neither service can presently meet its recruiting goals). He also said that insurgents in Iraq thwarted U.S. efforts at "establishing security and stability throughout the country" in 2006. These "enemies of liberty ... carried out a deliberate strategy to foment sectarian violence between Sunnis and Shia. And over the course of the year they had success." He announced that the Selective Service would be running "tests" at some time in the future related to reinstating the draft. He also pledged to work with the new Democratic Congress. Further, he announced that first four of the 20-30,000 additional US troops to be sent to Iraq would be his two daughters and his niece and nephew, all, it happens, of draft age, were the draft to be reinstated as Bush has said it might have to be. (Yes, I did sneak that last one in.)

It seems that Bush has decided to send those additional 30,000 troops, in a "surge" to do something (although exactly what has not yet been announced). So why 30,000? Not that we have them to spare without recycling and extending tours, but why not 50,000, or why not 20,000? Since "I always listen to my Generals and make my military decisions based on what they tell me, except when I don't" Bush is obviously not listening to his military Generals, who is he listening to?

Well, this one has the fingerprints of General "I change Constitutions" Rove (The Guardian (UK) Nov. 25, 2004, Sidney Blumenthal) all over it. Militarily it makes no sense, so the generals tell us. Politically it does, for Rovian, always attack, never defend, politics. This move is clearly intended to put the Democrats, not the Iraqi insurgents, Sunni, Shiite and other, on the defensive. Bush wants to appear to be "doing something," to "be in charge," and surely to be in a position to be able to blame the Dems. for any failures, as he defines them, should they somehow block the 30,000. His talk of the draft is of the same ilk. The buck never stops on his desk, and if he can kick it onto the desk of an enemy, and for him the Democrats are just as much enemies as are the Iraqis, so much the better.

In his superb history of the Era of Georgite Propaganda, Frank Rich (The Greatest Story Ever Sold), repeatedly makes the point that every major decision about the Iraq War, from the occasion the invasion was publicly announced to be timed with the 2002, on to, as Rich puts it, the point when (p. 222): "[the] administration was forced into rebuilding Iraq, it would [further] time every pivot point, from the creation of a constitution to the scheduling of elections, to deadlines dictated by Rove's political goals at home (whether a State of the Union speech or a domestic election), rather than to the patience-requiring realities of forging a post-Saddam government."

And so, it is not Bush, but the Democrats who are delusional, about Bush, if they cannot see this for what it is: a naked political ploy.

Well stated.

“EXITING IRAQ, THE GEORGITE WAY, Revisited”

Column No. 131 By Steven Jonas, MD, MPH  -  December 14, 2006

Note to the reader: This column is based in part on a column on this subject that was published on TPJ just about a year ago, on December 10, 2005.  Except that many more Americans and many, many more Iraqis are dead, Iraq is much more of a physical and socio-economic wreck than it was then, and the US position there is even more tenuous and provocative of violence, things haven’t changed much.  Except that some major and powerful forces on the right wing of the American power elite now want the US out of Iraq.  However, that branch of the same side that is headed by Dick Cheney doesn’t.  And so to the substance of this column.

Since the time of 9/11, starting with comments made by Attorney General Ashcroft very early on, the Georgite line of attack on critics of their foreign policy in general and their Iraq policy in particular has been that such people are traitors. Dick Cheney has been a prime promulgator of the “traitor” line.  Over the past year, especially during the mid-term elections campaign, Cheney’s attacks, along with those of his clones among Republican candidates, the Privatized Ministry of Propaganda and Bush when he was off his minders’ leash, with possibly even more venom than previously, were focused on those critics of the War who are and have been for quite some time calling the Georgites liars. And the chosen epithets changed from “traitors and cowards,” to “corrupt,” “shameless,” and “reprehensible.” “Totally reprehensible,” Cheney said, in charging the Georgite critics with lying about the Georgite lying.

At the end of 2005, when the original version of this column was written, I was convinced that Bush was preparing for a 2006 withdrawal. While Bush then as now was saying that a pullout was a “recipe for disaster,” it did seem to me and others (Agence France Presse, “White House Has Withdrawal Plan,” Nov. 28, 2005) that the Georgites were suddenly focusing on a pull-out of US forces by the 2006 elections.  It obviously didn’t happen then.  As were those who have been predicting a bombing attack on Iran since the spring of 2005, I was wrong.  But now comes the Report of the Iraq Study Group.  There is a new game in town.  The question is will Bush, or more particularly Cheney, play, or rather one should say, be forced to play.

I have been characterizing the conflict within and among the Administration and its close advisors as between the “Baker Wing” and a “Cheney Wing.”  I have said, here and elsewhere, that the Bakerites felt the time had come to pull out because the two original objectives of the invasion, oil and bases, had been achieved.  I have also said that the objective of the Cheney wing is no pullout, ever, because they need Orwellian permanent war if they are ever to achieve their goal of overthrowing US Constitutional Democracy and establishing what they call the “Unitary Executive” and what everyone else calls “fascism.”

Now it would appear a) that I was wrong to a certain extent and b) that the Baker wing has broader concerns.  If they can characterize the situation as “grave and deteriorating” and recommend eventual solutions that guarantee neither oil nor permanent bases, there are obvious other factors in play for the wing of the power elite that they represent.  And it has now become very clear that that wing is a very broad one.  For example, it should be noted that among the members of the ISG are former Senator Alan Simpson, one of the most conservative Republican Senators ever, before the Santorum-Inhofe crowd arrived, and a mentor for Cheney when Simpson was a Senator from Wyoming and Cheney was the Representative.  Also a member is Ed Meese, one-time President of the National Council for Policy (he may still be; they are very secretive), the organization for all of the major right and far right-wing organizations in the US.  The conclusions of the Report, particularly those concerning the utter failure of the Administration’s policies and programs for Iraq, are particularly striking because, as Sen. Russ Feingold pointed out on Keith Olbermann’s program on the day of the issuance of the Report, not one member opposed the war from the beginning (as Sen. Feingold did) and not one member nor any of the “experts” interviewed by it were either originally opposed to the war or are for as quick an exit as possible.

Nevertheless, even with growing opposition within his own party, the principal supporter, for policy reasons, of a US presence forever (or at least as long as possible) is “Permanent War” Cheney.  Bush himself obviously wants to stay here until “victory is achieved,” however one might define victory and Bush surely hasn’t let on, on exactly what he has in mind (see “The BushGuide to Defining Victory in Iraq, II,” http://www.buzzflash.com/articles/jonas/034).  The bully and the totally inadequate person inside him  wants to stay because he’s “The Decider” and what he says goes, in his mind (or what’s left of it).  But in this equation, he doesn’t really count.  He will follow the directions of whoever has his ear.  Cheney obviously has it now, but Baker and his people are surely moving to get it.  One important move for them was to replace Cheney’s Rumsfeld with their man Gates (although the Baker folks had no way of knowing that Rumsfeld was about to abandon the Cheney ship resulting in his firing by Cheney before Baker could arrange it.)  Other moves on both sides will surely follow.  But in following those moves as an observer, it will help very much to understand who is doing what for what real reasons and why.

OK.  Let’s say that Cheney loses the battle, for now at least, and Bush reverses course (as he has done so many times in his Presidency) and starts to move towards withdrawal (before the 2008 elections, surely a concern of Baker and the other Republicans on the ISG, one might add).  One might say, isn’t that a good idea?  On paper, yes –- but the way the Georgites will be doing it, possibly not so good.  Totally ironic is the fact that the Georgite version of withdrawal will be a variation on “cut and run,” in time for Nov., 2008.  It will be accompanied by tall tales of how successful the “Coalition” has been in training the Iraqis “to do the job.”  However, just because they will be withdrawing (while all the time saying that they are not except that they are) doesn’t mean that they will have given up attaining their principal objectives for going in the first place.

As I pointed out a year ago, those objectives (none of which were clearly stated as objectives for the invasion beforehand) have been or in the case of certain ones where cannot know for sure (as in the matter of the bases) may (or may not) have been achieved.  But the Baker wing says that it is time to go anyway. Why?  They have gotten rid of Saddam (not stated as an objective independent of the “WMD” and the “al Qaeda link,” but it was a major one, enunciated by the Project for the New American Century in the mid-90s).  And oh yes, the oil.  They will likely “acquiesce” (encourage behind the scenes) in the establishment of a semi-independent Kurdistan, which will become a full US protectorate, along with, it just so happens, those potentially gigantic oil reserves.  According to Joshua Holland, (AlterNet. Posted October 16, 2006. http://www.alternet.org/story/43045) there are even larger potential oil reserves in that Western Desert where the original plan called for the installation of those permanent bases.  But apparently they won’t be needed.  As Holland said: “Both independent analysts and officials within Iraq's Oil Ministry anticipate that when all is said and done, the big winners in Iraq will be the Big Four -- the American firms Exxon-Mobile and Chevron, the British BP-Amoco and Royal Dutch-Shell -- that dominate the world oil market.  Bush's (sic) petro-cartel almost has Iraq's oil.”

So, for these and for domestic political reasons for the Republicans and the Democratic original supporters of the war, it is time to go.  Of course, none of the band-aids, “training, reconstruction,” embedding, out-bedding, will change the reality on the ground.  In sum, the Georgite withdrawal will leave nothing in place that might bring some kind of stability to Iraq, might lead to the massive reconstruction program that Iraq so badly needs, might fend off the establishment of a totally undemocratic fundamentalist Shiite theocracy (built along the lines of what the Georgite Christian Right proposes for the US, ironically enough).  Only the Iraqis can do that, and they might.  So as not to go on forever here, I will be dealing (or will already have dealt) with that subject on BuzzFlash.

When the possible disaster on a variety of fronts (unless the Iraqis arrange to prevent it) gradually overtakes Iraq, the Georgite Privatized Ministry of Propaganda will be out in force of course (as they already are, in slamming the Iraq “Surrender” Group).   Blaming it all on the ‘traitorous peace-niks” and worse, who “stabbed the military and the noble Bush Administration in the back.”  Believe me, if the US is out of Iraq before the 2008 elections, even with Baker and his right-wing buddies as prime movers, the Republican/Roveite take-no-prisoners political machine will be going oh-so-strong with:  “We could have won if it weren’t for those traitorous Democrats (and you know what the penalty for treason is, don’t you.)”

Let me conclude with another of my wild scenarios (and regular readers of mine know how I love them).  Supposing the US withdraws and a coalition of Iraqi leaders makes sure that the country doesn’t collapse.  But part of the settlement is indeed a semi-independent secular Kurdish republic, under behind-the-scenes US protection as it was during the Clinton years, standing astride all of that oil, between Iran and Turkey.  Then supposing the Isamicists fully take over the Turkish government and, turning their eyes eastward, give up the idea of getting into the European Union.  Islamicist Turkey and Islamicist Iran launch an all-out war on secular Kurdistan. For its part, Turkey, which has no oil, gets a share of what lies under Kurdistan.  A federation of those two theocracies is established, along with the Shiite portion of present-day Iraq.  The Saudi Monarchy is overthrown in a Wahabbist revolt.  The new, massive federation, soon to be armed with nuclear weapons acquired one way or another, turns its eyes on their suffering co-religionists in Palestine.  And the US military, massively weakened by the Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld triumvirate, can do nothing about it, unless they choose to go nuclear.  And then Cheney has his Permanent War after all.

Speculative?  Indeed.  Possible?  Unfortunately.

ON REPUBLICAN IRAQ POLICY AND WHY NO GRAND THEFT ELECTION (THEY’RE RELATED)

Column No. 129 By  Steven Jonas, MD, MPH - November 16, 2006

What’s Happening on Iraq?

As I said in an article on Iraq published on BuzzFlash last month (“So Whassup on Iraq, Jim?” 10/24/06): “the Georgite Iraq policy is in a spin and the Georgites are spinning it as fast as their spinning wheels can carry them.”  Before the election, first there was Repub. Sen. John Warner’s warning that “things weren’t going so well.” Then there was the National Intelligence Estimate from Bush’s own intelligence agencies that, among other things, the US occupation was creating more terrorists than it was killing (which report the totally isolated Bush treated as if it came from another planet).  Then negative stuff “leaked” from certain US generals on the ground.  Then there were the “leaks” from the Baker Commission.

These straws in the wind all indicated that a major overhaul of Administration policy on Iraq was underway, no matter what the figurehead President said during the election campaign. Then after telling the world on the Sunday before the election that Rumsfeld would be in the job until Jan. 20, 2009, on the Wednesday after it Rumsfeld goes and is replaced by Robert Gates, who just happens to be a member of the Baker Commission.  (He’s got some bad Reagan/Bush I Iran hostages and Iran-Contra stuff in his baggage, but that is not why he was picked for this job.)   Whether Bush himself was fully aware of it or not (and he likely did find out for sure on Nov. 13, when the Baker group met with him), the planning to get US forces out of Iraq has been well underway for some time.  But why, and why now?

First and foremost it is because the principal original goals of the invasion, postulated by some, some time ago, have been achieved. Those goals were postulated, for example, by an anonymous friend of mine just after the Iraq invasion in the spring of 2003. I retailed them in a column of mine posted on The Political Junkies.net in the spring of 2004, "You Know Me Al: The Iraq War --- So What was it About, Anyway?" Those goals are the securing of full, independent access to the enormous oil reserves that are thought to lie under Iraqi Kurdistan (yes, the trifurcation of the country will take place, either overtly or covertly), and the completion of a string of permanent US military bases in the Western Iraqi desert.  Second, given what the Dems did with the war issue this time around, there are the political considerations for the Republicans going into the 2008 election.  They would like very much to have this political albatross off their collective necks by then.

Do you think that Jim Baker is talking the path he is taking because he is a nice guy, or a man of principle, or a recent convert to positive internationalism?  Why no.  Jim Baker is a major power broker and the public face of the sector of the US power elite that put George W. Bush in power in the first place --- the extractive and military/aerospace industries and their allies. He was the front man for the Bush Theft in Florida in 2000.  These folks called the shots then and they are calling the shots now. Because their principal goals have been achieved, they are going to figure out a way to get the U.S. out of Iraq as neatly, and as quickly, as possible, with the least possible damage, not to the Iraqis, but to the Republican Party.

They will try to blame the “loss” (when it is really a win for them) on the “stabbed-us-in-the-back” Democrats.  But they have got their oil and they have got their bases and they want to try to get the issue off the main page for the 2008 election.  And they coincidentally have a Democratic Congress (or at least a Democratic House depending upon what Lieberman does when push comes to shove around organizing the Senate) which will make it easier for them to achieve that end on the ground, at the same time their front men in the Privatized Ministry of Propaganda will be blaming the Democratic “cowards” and Republican “turn-coats.”

Gates is hand-picked by Baker to manage the job.  And if Cheney doesn’t get out of the way, he will be gotten out of the way, as I first noted in that BuzzFlash column of Oct. 24, 2006.  Maybe even Bush too, if he doesn’t.  Want a really far-out scenario, as I postulated back then? Bush goes into a sanitarium for undisclosed "problems," and does not re-emerge until he is safely ensconced on his new ranch in Paraguay. Cheney succeeds to the Presidency long enough to appoint Baker to the Vice-Presidency, then resigns for "reasons of health." Baker succeeds to the Presidency and appoints Colin Powell as Vice-President. Both pledge unconditionally to seek no Republican nomination for national office in 2008.

A true Center-Right government is established with the center-Right Democrats of Emanuel-Schumer-Clinton in control of Congress. A center-right government is then elected in 2008, with either McCain, Clinton, or Obama as president. And the country goes back to providing a very good living for the power elite, without the trouble of engaging in endless and very expensive foreign wars.  They may even kiss off Big Pharma and the “health” insurance industry and enact some kind of fairly retrograde national health insurance plan because so many other powers in the economy desperately need it done for cost-containment.  Stay tuned.

Why No Grand Theft Election

I and many others, like Greg Palast and Mike Whitney, firmly predicted that that Rovian Grand Theft Election would be operating at full throttle this time around, and they would do it again, just as they did in 2000 and 2004.  There were indeed scattered instances of voter suppression, both before and during the election, as well as scattered instances (in Florida in particular) of computer tampering.  However, it is quite clear that the computer-tampering operation was shut down nationally. I think that that decision was taken at the highest level.   That it could be shows just how sophisticated the Rovian Grand Theft Election Machine is.  They were able to turn off the switch or switches on very short notice.  And who did that?  Rove, Bush, Cheney?  None of the above, in my view.  The decision was made by the current most powerful single person in America: once again, Jim Baker, representing that powerful element of the power elite he does indeed represent.  And once again, why did they do this?

As noted above, their Iraq goals have been achieved and it is time to get out.  Moderate centrism worked electorally for the Democrats.  Despite opposition from the center-right of the Democratic Party represented by Rahm Emanuel, Howard Dean’s “50 State Solution”  is well on its way to becoming a reality.  With its 6-year electoral dependence on the Christian Right which, if it doesn’t get its way completely picks up its balls (if it has any) and goes home, fizzling out at the polls. All of a sudden the Republican Party that seemed to be on its way to becoming a permanent majority may well be on its way to becoming a permanent minority, and a regional (Southern) one at that.  Instead of Rove’s “Republican Permanent Majority” forever, it may well have lasted only these six years (not even as long as the 12 that their role-model Hitler’s “1000-year Reich” lasted).

Next, in a country with even the only the moderately free press ours has, the blogging nation, lots of lawyers, and a highly decentralized voting system, a massive nation-wide cheat machine can last only just so long before it is exposed.  Finally, Constitutional democracy works very well for the well-to-do in this country, thank you very much.  While some of them obviously like the idea, many, at this time at least, don’t want it replaced by fascism.  It’s not needed now and it wouldn't be good for the economy among other things.  They have gotten a close look at just how much the Christian Right would be interfering with our personal lives, using the force of the criminal law to do so, were it really to be in control through fascism, and they don’t like that at all. That is not to say that the threat is not still there and that liberals and progressives do not have to work very hard to put the fascist beast back into its cage.  But for now at least, a major portion of the power elite has decided to give American democracy as we have known it some breathing room.