Time to Start Breathing Fire

Democratic Representative Robert Wexler from Florida has served in Congress for six terms. In 2007 The Nation named him "Most Valuable Congressman" and Congressional Quarterly included him among "The 50 Most Effective Legislators in Congress." His just-published book, Fire-Breathing Liberal: How I Learned to Survive (and Thrive) in the Contact Sport of Congress is an energetic, entertaining, and hopeful account of his congressional experience set against the recent history of the United States.

Fire-Breathing Liberal offers a good introduction to its author, who belongs to the courageous wing of the Democratic Party. He and co-author David Fisher have produced a fast-moving narrative that features many laugh-out-loud anecdotes. But what I most appreciated was the ringside seat Wexler provides for such developments as

• the Gingrich-DeLay subversion of legislative process and bipartisanship within the House of Representatives,
  
• the theft of the 2000 presidential election, due in part by the mishandling of numerous ballots in Wexler's own congressional district, and
• the growing demand that Dick Cheney and George Bush be impeached for high crimes and misdemeanors against the people of the United States.

The introduction to Fire-Breathing Liberal is entitled "It's Time to Be Mad as Hell." Wexler's right about that. His final paragraph is also on target:

"After eight long years of Bush and Cheney, if we give the American people a clear choice, they will pick us overwhelmingly. But if we show them caution, hesitation, and meekness, they will remain frustrated, even despondent over the state of our government. I believe that if more liberals start 'breathing fire,' we Democrats will finally build a lasting majority."

I encourage you to read this book as a summer project in patriotism.

A Responsible Plan for Ending the Iraq War

What's happened due to the Iraq War? More than 4,000 U.S. troops are dead. Nearly 30,000 more have suffered serious injuries. Our nation's military capabilities and readiness have been severely damaged. Our international standing has plummeted, making work with other nations to address security threats more difficult. Our constitutional system has been abused by an executive branch claiming unprecedented powers. Our economy is threatened, partly because to date this war has cost $16,500 for every U.S. family of four.

No political reconciliation has occurred in Iraq and none is on the horizon. As many as a million Iraqis have been killed. Four million have fled or been displaced. Half the households in Baghdad have lost a family member. Iraqis have no reliable electrical power, no reliable hospital system, no reliable schooling for children, and no functioning civil infrastructure. Unemployment is estimated at 60%. Young, unemployable men end up joining local militias rather than helping to rebuild their shattered nation.

In light of these well-documented realities, how can we bring American military involvement to a rapid and responsible end? How can we keep from repeating the mistakes that have brought us to this calamity? Working with military and security experts, ten congressional candidates have put forth "A Responsible Plan to End the War in Iraq" (www.responsibleplan.org). Their proposal has been endorsed by four Senate candidates and fifty-four House candidates. It includes several bills introduced in Congress last year.

"A Responsible Plan" calls for an end to U.S. military involvement in Iraq and transfer of control and responsibility for Iraq to the Iraqis. This draw down of troops would not depend on Iraqi action or inaction. It would occur with utmost regard for troop safety and would result in no U.S. troops in Iraq other than those required for embassy protection.

The United States and the international community would engage in diplomacy and nation-building rather than military action. Our departments of State, Agriculture, Commerce, Justice, Transportation, and Treasury would all play a part. The United States would work to establish a regional dialogue involving all of Iraq's neighbors.

The humanitarian crisis involving millions of Iraqis who have fled their country or have been internally displaced would be addressed through accountable assistance to these populations and their host countries, increased border security, and the resettlement of Iraqis at risk. Among those at risk are Iraqis who have assisted the United States; they must not be abandoned.

"A Responsible Plan" advocates that the three branches of the United States government perform their functions in accord with the Constitution. Specifically it requires that ongoing war funding be incorporated into the normal congressional budgeting process, which is not now the case. Signing statements by the current president have involved attempts to alter the laws passed by Congress; such statements must be eliminated.

Habeas corpus, the individual's right to appeal to a court of law against arbitrary detention, would be reinstituted. Government surveillance without both probable cause and judicial warrants would be eliminated, as well as the torture of detainees and their secret transport to countries that practice torture during interrogations.

The renewal of our military would include reducing reliance on unregulated private militias, the provision of first-rate medical care for veterans, and the restoration of educational benefits for veterans. Holding contractors responsible for their contracts and increasing congressional oversight of contractors would help to eliminate war profiteering.

Lack of impartiality and skepticism on the part of the news media allowed administration claims to go largely unchallenged around the start of the Iraq War. "A Responsible Plan" calls for greater public participation in the establishment of media ownership rules and increased diversity in the ownership of broadcast media.

Last but far from least, this plan supports research on next generation energy technologies and the elimination of our nation's dependence on foreign oil. These efforts are viewed not only in the light of environmental responsibility, but also of economic and national security. Investment in alternative energy will create new industries and new technology which will result in new jobs and a healthier economy.

"A Responsible Plan" envisions generous and courageous goals. The United States has realized such goals before and can do so again. This plan points the way ahead for genuine patriotism in the twenty-first century. Such patriotism will contribute to the rebuilding of Iraq as well as to the restoration of the United States as a vibrant and confident democracy.

Attitudes of a Life-long Learner

The June 6 Washington Post featured a half page obituary entitled "Harlan Cleveland; Dean, Author, Statesman and Lifelong Learner." The headline intrigued me, as did the accompanying photo of an elderly man next to an elephant. I had never heard of Harlan Cleveland, but reading his obituary, I felt as though I was standing beside a theatre entrance as a jubilant audience flooded out onto the sidewalk: I had missed a remarkable show.

Cleveland packed a lot of living into his ninety years of life. "He was a journalist, an assistant secretary of state, a NATO ambassador, a university president and the author of a dozen books on leadership and public policy, and he was interested in almost everything--in part because he believed that everything is inter-related." Cleveland hated the phrase, "Have a nice day!" As he told one audience in 1989, "What I want is exciting days, passionate days, blessed days, surprising days."

Among Cleveland's books is Nobody in Charge: Essays on the Future of Leadership (Jossey-Bass, 2002). There he tells of how over the decades he reworked and refined a list of attitudes essential to what he called "a generalist mindset . . . indispensible to the management of complexity." Here are the eight attitudes he came to recognize through experience and reflection.

• First, a lively intellectual curiosity, an interest in almost everything--because everything really is related to everything else, and therefore to what you're trying to do, whatever it is.
  
  
• Second, a genuine interest in what other people think, and why they think that way--which means you have to be at peace with yourself for a start.
  
  
• Third, a feeling of special responsibility for envisioning a future that's different from a straight-line projection of the present. Trends are not destiny.
  
  
• Fourth, a hunch that most risks are there not to be avoided but to be taken.
  
  
• Fifth, a mindset that crises are normal, tensions can be promising, and complexity is fun.
  
  
• Sixth, a realization that paranoia and self-pity are reserved for people who don't want to be leaders.
  
  
• Seventh, a sense of personal responsibility for the general outcome of your efforts.
  
  
• Eighth, a quality I call "unwarranted optimism"--the conviction that there must be some more upbeat outcome than would result from adding up all the available expert advice.
  

Leadership of this sort has been conspiciously absent from both the halls of Congress and the White House for many years. It is in short supply in many other venues as well. The good news, however, is that those in conventional positions of power have no unique claim on leadership.

In his 1985 book, The Knowledge Executive: Leadership in an Information Age, Harlan Cleveland predicted that it would no longer be possible for information to be hoarded by leaders and alleged experts, but that leadership would increasingly arise from new sources rather than trickle down from established figures. Leadership would be abundant rather than scarce.

All of us can help this vision become a dominant reality. In diverse ways, we can contribute to the refreshing streams of new leadership necessary for the invigoration of our suffering society. The eight attitudes identified by Harlan Cleveland outline the shape of any future leadership worthy of the name.

Oil and Politics

Everyone agrees that putting gasoline in our cars and trucks is expensive, that the price has increased alarmingly in recent months, and that for many American families fueling their cars has become a threat to their economic security and even their ability to pay the rent or put food on the table.

You may have also noticed that this is an election year.

The answer to our gasoline woes, say both George W. Bush and John McCain, is to drill for oil on the North American continental shelf, something that has been prohibited ever since both Congress and the president's own father banned off-shore drilling. The reasons for this ban are obvious: drilling and the inevitable subsequent oil spills pose catastrophic threats to the complex oceanic and litoral ecosystems.

Nothing makes this threat any less significant now than when these prohibitions began. Indeed, one could argue that as the world's population continues to grow and as feeding all those people becomes increasingly difficult, we should do all we can to protect and even restore the ocean's great fisheries.

But with oil up over $130 a barrel, with voters angry about their gasoline and heating oil bills, and with reserves of oil apparently sitting off shore, the big oil lobby, abetted by Bush and McCain, is demanding a chance to suck it out and sell it to you. If you've recently filled up your tank, you might agree.

Here's what Bush and McCain are not telling you: Under the very best of circumstances--meaning no regulatory problems, sufficient refining capacity, and cooperative weather and geological conditions--not a drop of any oil found will reach your gas tank in less than ten years. More important, under the best of scenarios, the amount of recoverable oil on the continental shelf will not make any appreciable difference in the price of oil. There simply isn't enough of it to make the pump price go down. See here. There are reasons why gasoline costs so much: the declining purchasing power of the American dollar--largely brought on by a ghastly and astronomically expensive war in Iraq--is one. A growing appetite for oil in China, India, and rest of the world is another. The reluctance of American car manufacturers to invest in fuel-efficient technologies is yet another. The list goes on and on.

Drilling in environmentally sensitive areas--and this includes the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge--is not the answer. Pushing for new drilling is an election-year gimmick and yet another republican gift to the oil companies. Though the amount of oil out there will not do you and me any good, it will do plenty to engorge the already obscene profits of the oil companies that land the leases. Anyone recall what industry Bush and Cheney used to work for?

John McCain and Your Liberty

There's a lot about John McCain that scares me, starting with his unrelenting support for the invasion and occupation of Iraq and his willingness to commit American troops to that disaster far into the distant future. But something he said yesterday demonstrates with unnerving precision just how horrible a president he would be.

On 12 June 2008, the United States Supreme Court ruled, in a narrow, 5-4 decision, that habeas corpus still means something in this country. The court declared that prisoners at Guantánamo can go before an American judge to try to find out why they are imprisoned. Note carefully: this decision does NOT say that any prisoners should be released. It merely upholds the principal of habeas corpus, the only civil liberty mentioned in the US Constitution before the Bill of Rights.

What is habeas corpus? It is a simple, wonderful thing. It means that the government can't lock you up without saying why. A lot of loudmouths on the right will claim that this Supreme Court decision will lead to wholesale release of terrorists, that it endangers Americans. They'll say it means being soft on the guilty. This is utter bullshit. This decision means simply that our country is governed by law and not by presidential whim. Habeas corpus is the absolute foundation of liberty. Without it, there is no United States of America.

It is therefore profoundly disturbing to read that John McCain told a town-hall meeting in New Jersey that the Supreme Court “rendered a decision yesterday that I think is one of the worst decisions in the history of this country" (see here). McCain and his handlers have obviously decided that this issue plays well with the right-wing fanatics that are the bedrock of lingering (and diminishing) support for Bush and his assault on the Constitution. McCain is pandering to the lunatic fringe of American politics. More important, this tells us clearly what sort of judges McCain would appoint to the Supreme Court--more wingnuts like John Roberts, Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, and Antonin Scalia, who voted to suspend habeas corpus, in clear violation of the spirit and intent of our Constitution.

There are many reasons why a John McCain presidency is something we should fear and do everything we can to prevent. His callous and opportunistic indifference to the American faith in the rule of law is now at the top of the list.

Nuking the Great Lakes

Here's an important issue that's sneaked under the radar:

Ontario Power Generation is seeking permission to construct a huge, underground storage pit for nuclear waste on the edge of Lake Huron, at Kinkardine, Ontario. If permitted, nuclear waste with toxic potential that will last hundreds of thousands of years will be stored where it can leak into Lake Huron. So far, the Canadian authorities responsible for reviewing this project have not considered its impact on Michigan and other parts of the United States.

It's vitally important that Michigan residents express their views on this threat to environmental sanity. In addition to the fact that polluting Lake Huron is, in any form, unethical and stupid, consider this: the Michigan economy is in the tank, and one of the only hopes we have for recovery is the fact that the Great Lakes constitute about one fifth of the world's available fresh water. Storing nuclear waste on the Bruce Peninsula is a threat to everyone who lives in Michigan. Of course, it's also a threat to millions of Canadians.

Send an email, asap, to the Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency. The address is DGR.Review@ceaa-acee.gc.ca. The deadline for public comment is June 18. For an easy way to do this, go the Citizens for Alternatives to Chemical Contamination (CACC) website.

Here are some important points, courtesy of CACC:

1. The study area for this deep geological repository should be expanded to include Michigan and all communities in the Great Lakes Basin.

2. The Environmental Impact Panel should be made up of members entirely independent of the nuclear establishment in Canada and should not include members of the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission.

3. The comment period should be extended by at least 90 days to properly inform all communities affected by the proposed repository of its likely serious impact.

4. The Canadian Environmental Assessment Agency should hold informational meetings in Michigan and other impacted parts of the United States, in addition to meetings in Canada.

It's also important to send copies to your state and federal representatives, which you can do via the CACC site.
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For more information, see this article in the Times Herald (ht/jj).

June 21 Rally for Peace and Justice

BlueNovember.Org Peace and Justice Rally

Saturday, June 21, 2008
1:00 to 3:00 P.M.
Corner of Pine Grove and Sanborn
Port Huron, MI

Signs are available, but feel free to bring your own expressions of peace.

This is a non-violent, non-confrontational event. We intend to be a peaceful voice of dissent. All participants are instructed not to impede traffic or engage in confrontational debate with passersby.

As bad as Bush. Or worse.

Looking for a portrait of John McCain? Cliff Schecter has given us one in The Real McCain: Why Conservatives Don't Trust Him--and Why Independents Shouldn't, published by PoliPoint Press. Schecter, a political commentator and consultant, tells the McCain story in a fashion that is lively and well-documented.

The picture he offers is not a pretty one. Consider a few observations:

• In 2007, McCain voted to abolish the federal minimum wage.

• The Action Council of the Children's Defense Fund recently named McCain "America's Worst Senator for Children."

• Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA), the country's first and largest Iraq veterans' group, graded all members of Congress for their votes affecting the welfare of troops, veterans, or military families. 36 senators received a B+ or above. McCain's grade was a D.

• In 1999, McCain joined a group of neoconservatives calling for the removal of Saddam Hussein with or without support from the U.N. Security Council. Along with Paul Wolfowitz, Donald Rumsfeld, and others, he bears major responsibility for the U.S. invasion and occupation of Iraq.

• Former Representative John LeBoutillier, a New York Republican, has said that when McCain and Bush were both seeking the Republican presidential nomination, "Nearly all the Republican senators endorsed Bush because they knew McCain from serving with him in the Senate. They so disliked him that they wouldn't support him. They had been on the hard edge of his behavior."

The Real McCain is a valuable resource for the months ahead. Give it to any family member or friend who talks about voting for this candidate. Sadly, John McCain has proven himself to be not a maverick, an independent, or a reformer, but a legislative follower of the worst sort and a profound disappointment to a wide range of Americans.

Fairness and Equality: John McCain is clueless

Most of the debate about my participation at John McCain's Oakland University town hall meeting has been about me -- the T-shirt I wore, how I got the senator to notice me, and even whether I had a right to be involved at all. Although these issues are worth discussing, the question I asked John McCain and the answer he gave me are more important.

When I asked John McCain why he did not "show up to support equal pay for equal work," he stated he opposed the legislation because the only ones who would benefit from it would be trial lawyers and others in that profession.
Here's why I found McCain's answer unacceptable: The legislation McCain opposed would have given backbone to anti-discrimination laws. As it is now, a woman has only 180 days to figure out her pay is not fair and equal.
What is so magical about 180 days? Does John McCain believe it is OK to pay a woman less than a man or pay an African-American less than a white person simply because it might be necessary to hire a lawyer in the pursuit of justice? People who have been the victims of any crime, including discrimination, will need lawyers, period.

The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act makes every unfair, unequal paycheck a crime, and it removes the 180-day, ridiculously unfair statute of limitations. After all, if a man is robbed, but he does not discover the theft until the 181st day, does it mean there has been no crime?

This November, I hope voters remember John McCain refused to support a law that would have made it easier to find equality and fairness in the workplace.

Our future depends on it.

HAYLEY ALDERMAN
BlueNovember.Org
Fort Gratiot, May 13

The McCain Initiative

Oakland University Campus, Rochester, Michigan

Seven members of BlueNovember.Org participated in John McCain's May 7th town hall meeting at Oakland University, Rochester, Michigan, to ensure the discussion included issues important to average Americans.

Each member was prepared to ask a substantive question of the senator, who chose to limit his opening remarks to three topics:

Human trafficking
Internet pornography
and Religious freedom

Hayley, one of BlueNovember.Org's youngest members chose not to wait until the question and answer period for an opportunity to create a meaningful dialogue. She stood up to display the tee shirt she was wearing which stated:

JOHN MCCAIN DOESN'T CARE ABOUT OUR FUTURE

The senator acknowledged her and gave her the first question. She asked him why he opposed a bill that would have helped support a woman's right to equal pay for equal work. Basically, Senator McCain explained that the bill would only benefit trial lawyers, not women.

Susan, another BN.Org member, asked Senator McCain to discuss his philosophy that "Free Market Forces" should be the way we protect our environment. Susan stated that our government and the American people should decide how to best protect the environment, not corporations. Additionally, Susan asked if oil was the real reason we invaded Iraq. To this, McCain stated, "No Ma'am, we thought they had weapons of mass destruction."

Other populist issues were brought up, but the question lingering in the minds of BN.Org members was this: Do the McCain supporters of Southeast Michigan really think internet porn, sex slaves, and religious freedom are the issues most Americans struggle with on a daily basis?

If so, they are the most out-of-touch audience this side of $4.00 a gallon gasoline and wrap-around unemployment lines.

Read more about the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act here.
http://themiddleclass.org/bill/lilly-ledbetter-fair-pay-act-2007

Democracy?

The last seven years have been a scary time. We've seen so many horrors that the mind sometimes simply fogs up, and it's hard to keep them in any sort of remotely clear focus: the pointless slaughter in Iraq, the violation of civil liberties, torture, the suppression of sound science, the failure to heed the warnings before 9/11, the shameful indifference to the needs of veterans, the ever-widening gap between rich and poor, the growing control of our government by corporate lobbies--the dreary list goes on and on.

Last week a new bit of right-wing nastiness passed across our newspapers and computer screens; it ought to be getting more attention. This was the decision of the United States Supreme Court in favor of an Indiana law requiring voters to furnish a picture ID before voting. Sounds innocuous, doesn't it? In fact, it's a transparent Republican maneuver to suppress the votes of people--the poor, African-Americans, the elderly--that traditionally vote Democratic.

The important point to bear in mind is that there is absolutely no evidence that voter fraud is a problem. There is no plot among any group of voters to cast fraudulent votes. It doesn't happen. There is no need for this law. It does not address a current or imminent threat.

So why was it passed? For one reason and one reason only. The republican-controlled Indiana legislature knows that many elections are decided by narrow margins. If they can keep a few voters from the polls or make voting more difficult, they could swing an election. And they also know that the voters who currently do not have a photo ID are overwhelmingly likely to vote Democratic. According to Professor Amitai Etzioni of George Washington University, roughly 11% of the population lacks a picture ID that would satisfy the requirements of this law (see here). And it's obvious that the people without driver's licenses and passports are not your typical Republican voters.

This law is so brazen in its intent to disenfranchise certain segments of the American electorate that you have to go back to the poll taxes and other nefarious mechanisms of the Jim Crow South to find a parallel. It's one more Republican effort to steal elections they cannot win on the issues.

Robert Byrd on "Mission Accomplished"

Robert Byrd, Democratic Senator from West Virginia, was one of the few brave souls who consistently and eloquently opposed the invasion and occupation of Iraq. People sometimes mock Byrd for his grandiloquent style, his antique, courtly manner, and his dedication to pork-barrel projects for his home state, but in this case, he was far wiser than most Americans and most members of the United States Senate. Here is what he said on the Senate floor yesterday:

Tomorrow, we mark the fifth anniversary of the now infamous “Mission Accomplished” speech, which was delivered by President Bush on the deck of the U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln on May 1, 2003. Five years ago, I took issue with the President’s choreographed political theatrics because I believed that our military forces deserved to be treated with respect and dignity, and not used as stage props to embellish a presidential speech.

The President’s declaration of “Mission Accomplished” and the “end of major combat operations” proved wildly premature and dangerously naïve. The complete lack of foresight and planning by the President for what lay ahead became tragically clear in short order. Our nation continues to pay the price every single day. More than 97% of the more than 4000 Americans killed in Iraq lost their lives after the President’s flashy declaration of victory.

Years from now, I expect that history books will feature the sorry “Mission Accomplished” episode as the epitome of this administration’s reckless and arrogant foreign policy, which has reaped disastrous consequences for our nation and the world. We have seen a President who is eager to use American troops for a political backdrop, yet is seemingly indifferent when it comes to providing them with the equipment they need, quality health care, or a real plan for ending the war.

President Bush has said that history will judge him on his decision to go to war in Iraq. I say that history is already delivering its verdict. It is evident in the strains of the long and multiple deployments that are wearing down our mighty military, and in the suffering of the American people as they bury their fallen heroes. It is evident in the fear and distrust with which the rest of the world views us, and in the instability wracking the Middle East, Iraq and Afghanistan as a result of the Bush policies.

President Bush has recklessly squandered more than 200 years of American leadership, good will, and prosperity. If that is what he was aiming for when he took office, then he can claim “Mission Accomplished.” That is his legacy. As we write the next chapter in our nation’s history, let us commit to building a new legacy that restores the promise of America, both at home and around the world.

Mission Accomplished?

Today, 1 May 2008, is the fifth anniversary of the infamous "Mission-Accomplished" speech, delivered by President Bush on the aircraft carrier, Abraham Lincoln. Since the beginning of this war—begun in deceit, executed and expanded with incompetence—over 4000 Americans and perhaps a million Iraqis have died. Millions more Iraqis fled the country and now live in uncertainty and destitution, while those remaining in Iraq endure unreliable services and rampant corruption. Divided into mutually antagonistic regions and neighborhoods, Iraq is ravaged by sectarian war. The rights of women have been diminished, as religious fanatics have imposed misogynistic, medieval laws throughout the country. The United States has become a debtor nation, and economic recession lowers our standard of living. Allowed to prosper in Pakistan and Afghanistan, Al Qaeda has grown in strength. The reputation of the United States is in tatters. Iran has become the dominant local power in the Gulf. The United States has engaged in torture, kidnapping, and the violation of civil liberties, at home and abroad.

Way to go, George! And way to go, John McCain, who has enabled this war from the start, enthusiastically supported the administration's "surge," and completely failed to show the slightest understanding of the realities of Iraqi culture and politics. If you think the Iraq war was a great idea, then John McCain is just the president for you.

McCain and Katrina

Yesterday, John McCain popped down to New Orleans, to show his sympathy for the victims of Hurricane Katrina. More hypocrisy. On the day that Katrina struck, as the always sharp David Corn reminds us, McCain was in Arizona celebrating his birthday with you know who:




Where was McCain during the horrible weeks and days after Katrina? What did he do then to express his outrage? Nothing. For him, as for Bush, Cheney, and the rest of the Republican-corporate-military machine, the people of New Orleans whose lives were wrecked by Katrina, mostly poor and African-American, are no more than photo opportunities. When not needed for a public-relations event, they are ignored and cast aside.

McCain and his wife possess a fortune of over $100 million. His political career has never displayed the slightest concern for ordinary people. Why in the world should we believe, now that he's the certain Republican nominee, that he suddenly cares about the poor, the dispossessed, or even those losing their homes to foreclosure? It's all transparent political theater.

McCain and the Real World

The other day, John McCain stopped by Selma, Alabama, as part of a tour of America's "forgotten places." This is a piece of public-relations hypocrisy that defies reasonable description. He says he cares about our country's poor, the economic outcasts, those whom the American dream has abandoned. He talks pretty, about justice and fairness, but he offers not one word about policy, the actual steps that he might take to address the incredible gap between rich and poor in the United States. His plan to improve our economic health is nothing more than rehashed bushism: tax cuts for the rich and impossible claims about cutting government spending. See this excellent assessment of "McCainomics" by Marie Cocco at Truthdig .

For another detailed analysis of where John McCain actually stands on the issues that matter to American families, go here, where the AFL-CIO has assembled McCain's own words to reveal what he will do for us. McCain monotonously promotes himself as different from the current administration, and the media so far have more or less given him a free pass on this bit of carefully crafted fiction. Whoever gets the Democratic nomination can win in November only if she or he can effectively make this point: McCain is in all meaningful respects merely Bush with an older face. McCain is just another right-wing, corporate friendly Republican. The bit about straight shooting is empty rhetoric, and, as Robert Scheer cogently outlines in this piece at Truthdig, if McCain's elected, he will give us nothing other than the third term of Bush-Cheney.

McBush

Last Friday, John McCain was a guest on a right-wing radio talk show, The Mike Gallagher Show.

Here's a verbatim quote: “no one has supported President Bush on Iraq more than I have.” Here's a link where you can hear it yourself (h/t jj).

What else do we need to know?

Is McCain a Maverick?

The key to John McCain's candidacy, the thing that appears to appeal to a wide range of voters, is his reputation for being his own man, for not adhering to a party line. He claims to be a straight shooter, a no-nonsense, independent thinker, not tied to special interests or bound to any ideology.

The truth is so distant from this narrative that one has to admire its brazen, shameless construction, abetted at every turn by a compliant press. McCain and his handlers have so fooled so many voters and, far more important, have so bedazzled so much of the press with this fiction that they might just lie their way into the White House with it.

In fact, McCain is a boringly conventional right-wing Republican. He doesn't look as baffled or talk as mindlessly as the current president, but in terms of policies, values, and utter obeisance to big business and the military-industrial complex, he'll give us the third term of the Bush administration.

If he's such an independent thinker, why did he vote against a ban on waterboarding?

Why has he voted with the Bush administration 89% of the time, supporting disastrous policies on Social Security and children's health care?

Most important, why has he consistently supported the debacle in Iraq? McCain repeats all the administration lies about defeating al Qaeda in Iraq. He's either hopelessly confused about the civil war in Iraq or he's knowingly pandering to media-induced ignorance.

McCain is no maverick. He's an old guy who wants to cut taxes for the rich, gut Social Security, and send more of our sons and daughters to Iraq (don't take my word for it; got to his web site, where the first thing we see is his relentless determination to send more troops to Iraq). He is Bush lite, and he's bad for us and our country.

Lessons of History?

The first two episodes of the HBO series about John Adams last night led me to ponder where we, as a country, started and where we have arrived.

As this show and a mountain of scholarship show, the men we call the "Founding Fathers" were a flawed lot: they were vain, petty, and contentious, and many of them saw nothing wrong with owning and exploiting other human beings as chattel slaves.

But they were also serious thinkers, who agonized over their decisions, thought deeply about such matters as liberty and justice, and were willing to risk everything they had, including their lives, for what they considered a noble cause. One feature of the drama of the Declaration of Independence that we often forget is that if the Revolution had failed--and it easily could have--every one of the signers would have been hanged for treason.

Compare them to the current president. Where they were serious, he is a fool, a capering clown who launched--exactly five years ago, with a rationale based equally on incompetence and deceit--an absurd and costly war at no risk to himself or his family. Our economy is in chaos, with the dollar and financial markets sinking, while the deficit swells like an over-inflated balloon. Yet the president indulges in sophomoric jokes, blandly assures us that all is well, and demands further tax cuts for the rich. He is a man who evinces no curiosity, cannot express himself coherently, shows little interest in science or the arts, and wouldn't recognize a complex idea if it bit him on the nose.

The explanations for how we accomplished this decline are legion: an irresponsible press, a relentlessly self-serving plutocracy, a political system based on lobbying and favors, and an electorate often more interested in celebrity sex than in our constitution or our military misadventures. However it happened, we've gone from George Washington, who could not tell a lie, to George Bush, who cannot tell--and doesn't even have a passing acquaintance with--the truth.

McCain's War

For the next seven months, our airwaves, our TVs, our computer screens, and our newspapers and magazines will be overflowing with republican claims about al Qaeda in Iraq. John McCain has already begun using a formula he will return to obsessively; he will endlessly accuse Obama (or Clinton if she should happen to pull off an upset and win the nomination) of willingness to "surrender" to al Qaeda in Iraq. This is illogical and ahistorical, but it will resonate with some voters, and the election may well turn on our ability to counter it.

Here is what we must say, repeatedly:

* Al Qaeda was not in Iraq before the Bush-Cheney invasion.

* The small but vicious group calling itself "al Qaeda in Iraq" consists almost entirely of foreign fanatics who easily entered Iraq to take advantage of the chaos following the ineptly executed American invasion and occupation.

* There is no evidence that "al Qaeda in Iraq" follows orders from bin Laden or others in the inner circle of the real al Qaeda.

* "Al Qaeda in Iraq" has been responsible for a relatively minor percentage of the sectarian carnage in Iraq since 2003.

* "Al Qaeda in Iraq" is exclusively a Sunni movement and as such will be quickly rounded up and either slaughtered or expelled by the majority Shi'ites when American troops leave.

* The real threat of al Qaeda comes from Pakistan and Afghanistan, where it has been reorganizing and gaining strength ever since the Bush-Cheney team insanely shifted our strategic focus to Iraq.

Al Qaeda, I believe, is indeed a threat to world peace and security, and the Bush-Cheney invasion of Iraq was precisely the worst thing this country could do in addressing the real horrors of al Qaeda. John McCain has been a cheerleader of the Iraq occupation since its onset (with some minor quibbles about strategy). The Iraq debacle should be McCain's to defend and explain. But we can't expect the mainstream media--inept, lazy, often corrupt, always subject to herd behavior--to force McCain to answer the hard questions, let alone show how his rhetoric is confused and incomplete, just another Rovian con, rewriting history and substituting republican talking points for reality.

If the American electorate buys McCain's claims about Iraq, he's the next President.

US a Christian Nation?

We have all encountered people who claim that the United States was founded to be a "Christian Nation," that the founders were born-again Christians, and that any resistance to the agenda of the evangelicals trying to establish a theocracy today is thus a violation of the founders' intent. We know this is nonsense, but it's often hard to come up with convincing contrary evidence on the spot. Here's a terrific web page, provided by "Archiving Early America," with documented quotations from and references to what the founders actually said and wrote.

One excellent and useful example, from the Treaty of Tripoli, signed by President John Adams and ratified by the United States Senate in 1797: "the Government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion." Can it be any clearer than that?