Occupied!

This blog has been largely dormant this year. There are a few reasons for that, the largest one being that I have started to see myself more as a tool for disseminating agitprop rather than a creator of it, and social media largely gives me a better vehicle to do that to whatever small world where I happen to be. There are plenty of people with more intelligent things to say than me, and I figure it's more of a service to do not as much exhaling as inhaling.

Nevertheless I think it would be abdicating some responsibility not to write a few words about what we can loosely call the "Occupy" movement, which is certainly the most significant left movement in my lifetime in the United States and likely the biggest moment for radical politics in the US since 1968.

It was not supposed to be so. The idea of a permanent encampment "occupying" Wall Street was initially conceived by the small radical magazine Adbusters and amplified around the internet by the hacktivist collective Anonymous, claiming inspiration from the Arab Spring and the Spanish Indignants. Few liberal pundits were prepared to take it seriously, foreseeing another small forgettable gathering of unintelligible hippies. Then something quite remarkable happened: A commune of protestors planted themselves in the media capital of the world armed with a simple class-war message, embodied by the ever-present slogan "We are the 99 percent," and began rapidly and inexorably gaining a mass base of popular sympathy completely unaided by the usual partisan Democratic "activist" groups. Copycat "occupations' have sprung up in dozens of cities around the world.

The mainstream press has of course been professing ignorance from the outset about what the "message" or "demands" were, and what they plan to use in place of the current system of power. This is purely posturing which is easily answered by spending any time in the occupied space, which in New York has been redubbed "Liberty Plaza." They are there to fight the war against the ruling class, and have set up a small self-governing city with a decentralized, leaderless consensus democracy of the sort enjoying wide popularity in contemporary anarchist circles. I am reminded of the old IWW notion of "building the new world in the shell of the old," there are numerous other influences as well.

 There are considerable challenges ahead, however. The first will come from the political class and its liberal enforcers, who, after a period of scrambling to take stock of the moment, are now lustily eying the protests as a kind of Democratic answer to the Tea Party, an attempt to rescue a party's sagging image with a re-branding. There is no small risk that trained political managers will step into the leadership vacuum, strip the movement of any radical elements (one already hears the usual cowering of liberals from being associated with "anarchists" and other riff-raff) and utilize the branding of the popular occupation to flak for some tepid, ineffectual reform that is more bark than bite. There will likely be considerable resistance to this; much of the core of the movement, beyond the radicals, is made up of disaffected young Obama voters who have seen the deceptiveness of electoral politics in the Democrats' utter failure to deliver barely modest reform in the wake of historically smashing victories.

This would be a disaster on many fronts. The Occupiers have deliberately chosen to rally around the all-encompassing banner of "the 99 percent" rather than the middle-class reformism which Democratic politicians and liberal pundits blather ceaselessly. They have proven, contra the establishment of both parties and their media flacks, that an explicit class war message resonates with the public imagination, even if they are shrewd enough not to use those poisoned words exactly. Becoming an Obama campaign front would ruin much of the goodwill the Occupation currently enjoys, both in its association with establishment politics and the inevitable dilution of its message into a meaningless muddle by the liberal wing of the finance party. 

I should also note as an aside that they have produced a popular non-partisan movement which is not enamoured of technocratic centrist billionaires. Old Mike Bloomberg has become something of the Scrooge of this story, in fact. I point this out just because it's fun to think of which hole Thomas Friedman has gone to hide in to console himself.

It is, however, entirely fair to wonder what the protests can accomplish. The electoral arena is dry, but, as of now, the occupiers lack the sheer critical mass to enforce change by presenting a direct threat to the well being of the ruling class. So far, marches have numbered in the thousands; that will have to increase to the millions for something like that to be achieved. Perhaps the most we can hope for at this point is the old left idea of "raising consciousness;" if the occupation continues to preach its beautifully simple, easily understood message, the great inert mass of Americans may yet shed their skepticism for a revolution.

Seeing double

David Corn, Mother Jones

Yet the president, with this brief set of remarks, has crafted something of an Obama Doctrine for military intervention: The United States will join in a multilateral fight for democracy and humanitarian aims when it is in the nation's interest and when the locals are involved and desire US participation. In short, the Anti-Bush Doctrine.

I can't believe that a nice liberal like David Corn would tell me the reason the United States intervenes here but not there can be reduced to a factor of how much the budding humanitarian disaster affects our precious National Interest. Why, David, why? You were always so Serious and so Trustworthy. Why are you throwing in with Gnome Chompsky and the other hippies who see Western imperialist interests behind every military project?

Oh wait, he meant that approvingly? Oh dear, that's interesting indeed.

No Virginia, there is no Santa Claus

To the unlearned observer, there is at least a superficial similarity between the 2009 post-election protests in Iran and the recent anti-government uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt. There are, of course, various cultural, economic and historical differences between them, but they are all essentially public expressions of popular anger at corrupt, anti-democratic governments. But while the "Green Revolution" became a celebrated cultural touchstone in the American media, which covered it breathlessly if insipidly, the uprisings in Tunisia and, particularly, Egypt have produced a considerably more hesitant reaction from the government and its stenographers in the corporate media.

The reason for this should be obvious. The government of Iran is an official Enemy of the State, while the Mubarak government in Egypt and, to a lesser extent, the Ben Ali government in Tunisia have both been important US allies in the region and received considerable aid from the American government. The Egyptian police and military are now largely supplied with US weapons; telling photographs from the Egypt rebellion show protesters holding up tear gas canisters and other ammunition with "Made in USA" stamped on them. These thorny issues, of course, can't be brought up in the mainstream press, because of the need to preserve the popular belief in the fantasy that the United States always and only supports "freedom and democracy" in the rest of the world, and would never, ever be on the side of a dictator. (Joe Biden, always good for a laugh, insists Mubarak is not a dictator, so I guess that settles that.)

One need not be Noam Chomsky to realize this is bullshit. Anyone with even a moderate interest in American foreign relations will shortly discover that our idealistic principles become fungible with only the slightest provocation. Indeed, the job of Serious foreign policy analysts is to explain to those people who become too curious for their own good why support for strongmen is necessary for important things like Stability! and National Interest! This is also bullshit, but mostly from a mere philosophical standpoint; it is at least closer to the government's actual decision-making process.

Why then, dear readers, are we subjected to the charade of the government and media's public broadcasts maintaining our holy, untainted crusader image when most of us have put aside similarly disprovable fantasies by the time we reach kindergarten? That's a question you'll have to answer for yourself.

The tree of knowledge of good and evil

Glenn Greenwald has as usual been doing a bang-up job on the war on Wikileaks. It's essential to read all of it, but I have only a couple things to add.

1) Visa, MasterCard, Paypal, Amazon; all private companies, all have joined the government's war on Wikileaks without any formal orders from said government. The tremendous power wielded by these corporations has made it more difficult for Wikileaks to receive funding despite the fact that the organization has never been charged or convicted of any crime. What they are doing is strictly vigilante justice, and it ought to worry anyone--regardless of their personal feelings about Wikileaks--who worries about excessive power of the government and the small private elite to unofficially prosecute class enemies.

Then there is the contradiction that seems to underlie much of the liberal tut-tutting about Wikileaks; which is that a) nothing in the leaks tells us anything we don't already know and b) it's dangerous and jeopardizes diplomacy somehow despite everything already being known. Justin of Americana has an interesting theory which is as good as anything I've heard to explain this (lots of other great posts there as well).

What wikileaks is debunking in its 'non-disclosure' disclosures, as the above esteemed members of the media call them, is the faith in the government's massive reservoir of complete information and wisdom. The leaks are revealing the belief that 'the authorities must know something we don't' is an absurd fantasy. In a perverse way, if the leaks truly contained bombshells of information that have were complete surprises and recast previously held opinions about government actions around the globe in a different light, then that would be less of an attack on the government's credibility. It turns out that government officials know about as much as the rest of us, often even less owing to the inherently blinding effects of power, and their pathological behavior is no more than it seems.

Indeed. The surprising thing is how much we actually know about how the American empire works, and how little it matters because of the networks of pressures that exist to make that knowledge invisible to most of the public. Even Jon Stewart referenced this recently.

I think you're underestimating how cynical Americans are about our government already. We've engineered coups in Chile, Iran, Guatemala, etc. We sold arms to Iran and used the money to fund Central American revolutionaries. We sell weapons to our enemy's enemy, who then somehow becomes our enemy and forces us to defend ourselves from our own weapons. It takes a lot to impress us. You really should read up on the shit we already know about us.

Yet most people probably don't know much about any of these things. Even though the facts aren't really disputed even by foreign policy professionals, the many, many excellent books on these topics from the Unserious are waived away as Trilateral Commission-esque conspiracy mongering in any public forum. It's the American Miracle! Why does the government need to suppress its dirty laundry when everyone knows that if you wish to maintain a good public face you'll ignore it? Are you a young journalist or academic who wants to write about your Unserious conclusions? Then forget about ever being published in the elite media or getting a comfortable think tank sinecure. Worried that donating to Wikileaks might make you a criminal even though the government has nothing but vague threats hanging over your head? Mission accomplished!

As you likely know, Julian Assange has been arrested in what must be a record for the most enthusiasm any international police force has ever displayed over a rape case. I endorse this post by Pink Scare for those who have mixed feelings about this. The charges against Assange are serious if true, though it would be foolish to dismiss the possibility that they are being completely worked. The timing certainly is.

Size doesn't matter

I have to say I'm confused by the debate in this thread. Surely the scope of a government has little to do with its effectiveness at defending the civil rights and liberties of the population. Is the government of Finland (pop. 5 million) less effective at this than the federal government of the United States (pop. 300 million)? Likewise, if Russia attacks and annexes Finland (past performance notwithstanding) surely we wouldn't then say that Finland wasn't a legitimate political entity before then because it couldn't defend itself against a much larger enemy.

I should back up for a minute. Liberal arguments about the necessity of centralized government are always marshalled in the defense of Reconstruction or civil rights legislation of the 1960s. But this is a case of constructing an argument around a positive conclusion and calling it a good argument. It isn't necessarily so. Cheering on federal troops for enforcing civil rights laws in Mississippi seems like a short stop on the liberal-humanitarian ladder from declaring that we must bomb the women of Afghanistan to liberate them.

Political entities are not immutable, they're just human creations. The Confederacy was created to defend slavery, of course, but what if the balance of power had been slightly tilted the other way? What if Northern states had been fed up at being bullied by the over-represented slave states and decided to take their toys and go home? Would that also have been "treasonous?" What if Vermont decided to secede? Is that also a stronghold of Bubba redneckism that has to be reigned in by the virtuous federal government? The argument, apparently, is that the more diverse the population governed, the more likely the government will have to recognize the rights of minorities to survive. I don't think that's convincing or that it's really borne out by history, and not just the most famous example but United States history as well.

On the flip side, of course, there's nothing inherently righteous about decentralization either. Many rural areas in the United States are ossified class societies effectively run as neofeudalist fiefdoms by a handful of dynastic landlords. The democratic legitimacy of a government has little to do with the number of people governed but the nature of the power represented by that government.

Say it like you mean it

Inside the Hall

So as the dust settled or the clouds lifted or the smoke cleared — whatever it was that happened in those first days after Crean arrived — it became abundantly clear that recruiting Cody Zeller would be important. Even as gawky sophomore, Zeller showed as much — if not more — promise than his brothers. He’d had to play them over and over in family games, after all. But this much was inevitable, too: he was the type of player that traditional IU fans wanted the team to be built around. He’s not flashy. He appreciates the fundamentals. He keeps it simple. He plays with gusto

Look folks, what I mean to say is that he's white.

VOTING (god God ya'll) what is it good for?

I'm not going to be one of those people claiming that, if you vote, you're implicitly endorsing the feeble excuse for a democracy that our rulers eagerly feed us every two years. I don't think, at this point, whether they really bother to care anymore. They have no interest in increasing voter participation, and remain unmoved by low voter turnouts thus far. So I don't see how boycotting is going to make much of a difference. Follow your conscience and vote or don't, it isn't as though the act itself takes a huge effort.

But, in honor of that special day, let's roll through some propositions:

1: Choices, you hasn't got them. The present democracy in the United States is to actual self-government what baby talk is to adult speech. It is grunting and pointing at abstract shapes hoping that the adults in the room will be able to figure out what you want which, in this case, they have no interest in doing. The adults know you'll be pacified by just about anything as long as you can't choke on it, and they're careful to keep all the good stuff off the table where you can't reach it.

2: Voting shouldn't be the end of political action, though almost everyone invested in the electoral system will try to convince you that it is. Hence the endless drumbeats about "doing your civic duty" this time of year, as if afterward you can go back to your life and let someone else make the decisions that will affect you in the end. It's not like your boss is going to leave you any time to worry about it anyway! This is important to understand when you justify enabling lesser-evilism by voting; it is barely a beginning, let alone the end.

3: Campaigning and working on election campaigns is one of the least-efficient ways to spend your time/money if you're trying to bring about progressive change. This is especially true in these days where the campaign season never seems to end, and academic liberal technocrats are always insisting that we are on the cusp of great progressive change or doomsday fascism in the Most Important Election Ever Until the Next One. Cooperation, solidarity, mutual aid and direct action are the only ways to make the bosses perk up their ears and take notice. Serious liberals scoff at this nowadays, but old labor, civil rights marchers, and other fighters knew not to let themselves be herded in and out of voting booths on election day like cattle.

Why 2084 won't be like "1984"

This article by Sara Robinson strikes me as all wrong. I don't doubt that the Tea Partyists, despite their protestations about Big Gummit, represent a nascent type of American fascism and would be happy as pumpkins on the vine in a one-party state which they controlled. They're very capable of compartmentalized thinking and at any rate have never had any quarrel with the police, military, or security state that would be the most identifiable trappings of a fascist government. But Robinson's warnings that we are one election away from Tea Fascism is mistaken, both because she misapplies Paxton's descriptions, and because old fashioned fascism as they both imagine it is a 20th century idea that is probably past its prime as an option for authoritarian control by the elite.

On the first issue, the chief strike against Robinson's argument is that the business elite, with a notable exception or two, really hasn't embraced the TP candidates very much. We all know the uneasiness is probably unwarranted, but nevertheless there's still a good bit of friction between the baggers and the Chamber of Commerce-types. In order for a fascist party to seize power, the elite has to feel it is sufficiently threatened by a popular movement from the left that its only option left is to empower the fascists. Robinson, being a good liberal, might imagine that the election of Obama represents such a movement, and it is possible that the potential empowerment of traditionally disillusioned segments of the population may have made the ears on a few plutocrats twitch, hence the emergence of the Tea Party as a precautionary measure. We know better than this, however; Obama has never been a threat himself, and has successfully corralled the energy of the popular movement surrounding him in 2008 and his dawdling has sent large portions of it back to the political abyss.

Secondly, if there is to be a successful authoritarian movement in the United States, it's not going to take the form of a classic, one-party dictatorship. Indeed, if there's one thing Americans learn from the cradle to the grave it's that "democracy" means "you get to vote every couple of years." Take that away and immediately everyone knows something fishy is up. And why would you bother with such a step? The elite already has everything it could possibly want now. Elections are contested between two political parties which are often indistinguishable, have nebulous policy aims, and regularly collude to keep pressing issues off the table. In the wake of one of these elections, the "will of the electorate" is evaluated, interpreted and presented back to it by media pundits who determine the mandate of the new government. The press itself vigilantly bars Unserious views from its pages and uncritically vomits government propaganda, all without any need for a minder. What more could you ask for?

This is the blueprint from which the next generation of totalitarianism will be built. A consumerist state, where "democracy" is not something that we make ourselves, but a world where politicians are produced and sold to us and we are only so delighted that we have such freedom to choose! Who needs to be a citizen when you can be a consumer? If you want a vision of the future, imagine a human hand swiping a credit card, forever.

The Real Meaning of Christmas

FrumForum

Millennials take a very different view of politics from older cohorts of Americans. For example, offered a choice between a government that offers higher taxes and more services, or fewer services and lower taxes, older Americans choose the lower-tax alternative.

Sixty-two percent of over 65s prefer the lower tax alternative, as do 58% of voters in the 50-64 group, and 56% of voters aged 30-49.

Under 30s prefer bigger government by a margin of 53-43.

Under 30s are more socially liberal too, and less nationalistic than over 30s.

Slate

This year's surge of Republican enthusiasm is a male phenomenon. The simplest explanation for McMahon's lack of female support is that female voters aren't the ones who want to replace Democrats with Republicans.

In West Virginia, Republican John Raese leads Democrat Joe Manchin by 9 points among men but trails Manchin by 10 points among women. Time has Wisconsin Republican nominee Ron Johnson ahead of Russ Feingold by 15 points among men, but tied among women.

And in Washington state, where Democrat Patty Murray is running against Republican Dino Rossi, women favor Murray by 31 points, while men favor Rossi by 15. That's a 46-point gender gap—McMahon's gap is 27 points—with nobody making anybody bark like a dog.

Here is a paradox for you, friends. Young people, who face a lifetime of paying taxes ahead of them, are more likely to accept that tradeoff if it means increased spending on social programs. Old folks, who are heavily reliant on social spending, want to see lower taxes and Small Gummit. There is only one explanation for this that I can see. Old folks don't view Medicare and Social Security as government provisions; they view them as receiving their own money back from a private lockbox that's been kept by the government. They are only opposed to social spending that might make life easier for young people. Why? Because they want to see young people get screwed over. That's all.

If you want to explain American political behavior, you have to start with these two phenomena. Why do men hate women, and why do old people hate young people?

THE GOSPEL OF JESUS CHRIST, AS REVEALED TO ST.GLENN, ST. SARAH, ST. MIKE, ST, JAMES, AND ST. BILL, THE APOSTLES

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

He sent forth his prophets to warn Israel about the righteous path and to write the Scriptures.

He sent His only Son to atone for the sins of the world.

For the next 1750 years, God rested.

Then God realized His work was not finished. Thus he brought forth his Kingdom on Earth, which was called America, through his many disciples including Judas who was called Thomas Paine. And through His Founding Fathers He created a paradise to be ruled through His servants the clergy.

God's new Kingdom mostly walked a righteous path, but were from time to time tempted by servants of the Lord's nemesis. Among these enemies was the New Deal, which was an abomination unto the Lord, and He sent forth His prophet Barry Goldwater.

But the Lord knew that, while He loved his Chosen People, they were not fully prepared to do the work He intended. They elected Jimmy Carter, and then the Black Muslim from Kenya, and bought tickets to Michael Moore movies. Their wickedness was a sore in the eyes of the Lord, and so He once again sent His Son down to bring them righteous teaching and correction.

SERMON IN THE MALL

Jesus procured a soft pretzel and, after revealing himself to the crowd, went to the top of the escalator in the food court where He taught them saying;

“Blessed are the rich in material wealth, for they own the Kingdom of earth.

Blessed are the war-makers, for they shall inherit the Earth's natural resources.

Blessed are the merciless, for they are real men of strong discipline.

Blessed are those who beg to be persecuted for their righteousness, for theirs is a permanent home on cable news.

Blessed are you who revile and persecute and falsely accuse others on my account. Your reward is great in the warm feeling it gives you to smash others under your heel, just like the prophets did before you.

You have heard that it was said “Do not resist an evildoer, but if someone strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also.” But I say to you, if someone strikes you on the left cheek, you are free to kick his ass, invade his country and set up a puppet government. You have also heard that it was said “If someone sues you and takes your coat, give to him your cloak also.” But I say to you, occupational safety regulations are the devil's handiwork. If the Lord had wanted steelworkers to have fingers, He would've given them new ones.

Do for others no more than what they do for you. This is the Platinum Rule. Keep a ledger if you lose track.”

Practice your piety before others so they may see you. When giving alms, do so as loudly and proudly as possible, so that the poor may know to whom they owe the privilege. Otherwise they may think basic human dignity is a right.

When you pray, do not be like those cowards who pray privately in the secrecy of their own homes. Pray as loudly as you can in public, preferably before graduations or sporting events. Always mentioned that you are likely to offend someone or get sued, because the Lord is a small Lord who can't survive the 9^th Circuit Court. Then after praying run the ball for a three-yard gain, because the Lord knows that defense and the running game win championships.”

JESUS PRINCIPALLY REFUSES TO FEED THE FIVE THOUSAND

The next day Jesus taught an all-day seminar on sharing your faith at a megachurch in suburban Chicago. A snowstorm had knocked out power in much of the city, and the attendees had nothing to eat. Many stragglers from the street joined them as well. '

The Youth Pastor approached Jesus saying; “Lord, we have many hungry people, and all we have to eat are these five loaves of Wonder Bread and two Chick-fil-A sandwiches. Can you bless this food and create enough food for this multitude?”

But Jesus rebuked them saying “You naive simpletons! Do you not understand how the Kingdom of God works according to the laws of the market? I do not produce wealth only to see it distributed to those who are starving with no food. What motivation will I have to invest in new luxury cars or provide jobs for domestic servants if I just go around sharing with my fellow humans? Do not worry about feeding the hungry; instead convert them to Christianity, for soon they will starve and be with me in paradise. As the prophet said:

Work and pray, live on hay,

You'll get pie in the sky when you die”

JESUS DOESN'T HEAL THE SICK FOR FREE

When Jesus was leaving the track after witnessing a stirring display of stock-car gladiatorial combat, a woman who had long suffered from hemophilia came near to Him and touched the belt loop of his jeans believing that Jesus had the power to heal her illness.

Jesus turned to her and, addressing the crowd, said “Truly I have met no one with any greater faith throughout the land. Unfortunately I also haven't met anyone with less health insurance. I say to you that the Lord your God does not give handouts, and being healthy is not a right but a privilege determined by your ability to pay.”

When they heard this, his disciples were moved, saying “But Lord, what about those who are saddled with medical bills they cannot pay?”

And Jesus answered them, “Those without health insurance must hold a community fundraiser with balloons, clowns and a bake sale. If they are deemed worthy in the sight of their friends and neighbors, then truly their sick shall be healed of their afflictions.”

HOW TO ENTER THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN

When Jesus was wandering in the wilderness of Arizona, he was approached by two immigrants who asked him, “Master, how do we know if we will be allowed in the Kingdom of Heaven?”

And Jesus replied to them saying “When the Lord your God sits on the throne of judgment at the Immigration and Customs Enforcement office, he will look to those seated on his right hand and say 'come, enter my kingdom you who have blessed me. For when I was hungry, you picked my tomatoes for low wages, when I was thirsty, you carried me cold drinks on a tray, when I needed a scapegoat to explain social dysfunction, you went to prison for me, when I fondled your breasts in the office you didn't sue me, when I needed cheaper clothes you gladly gave up your job to a peasant in a third-world country with no labor regulations.”

And the inquisitors looked at Him saying “Lord, when did we do all of these things for you?”

Jesus replied “Truly, what you have done for the most of these, my servants on Earth, you have done it to me.”

THE LORD'S MESSAGE TO HIS CHOSEN PEOPLE

Jesus was in his office on a Thursday night calculating third-quarter profits when two journalists approached his desk saying;

“Lord, we know America is Your chosen country from the day you sent General Washington down Mount Sinai with the Constitution on two stone tablets, but we do not know how to measure the value of all other humans when compared to the elect. How many are we allowed to slay by aerial bombardment and remain holy?”

Then Jesus taught them saying, “Gentlemen, if English is good enough for Me, then it is good enough for you. Therefore, all English-speaking white people are equal to nine-tenths of one of you. Be careful of harming another of these brothers or sisters, because it may accidentally show up on the evening news. Especially if one of the sisters is blonde and attractive.”

The two journalists took studious notes as Jesus continued.

“White non-English speakers are secretly plotting against America in their gibberish tongues and should be watched carefully. However, most of them are too concerned with being lazy in their decadent welfare states to cause you any trouble. Brown People, encompassing the greatest mass of humanity are on the other hand an invaluable resource and can be used however you see fit, as their lives are essentially meaningless. Blow them up, use them for cheap labor, whatever you want. Occasionally try to convert a few of them to Christianity so it looks like you care about their needs, although in a strictly non-material way of course. If I had wanted them to be something other than dirt-poor and starving, then I would have seen to it.”

JESUS RECUSES HIMSELF FROM THE ALDURTERER'S TRIAL

Jesus was kicking back in the Orange County sun when three of his disciples came to him with a young woman in tow. Jesus said to them “Why are you bringing this woman to me?”

They replied, “Lord, we grabbed her coming out of the Planned Parenthood and she has admitted to having an abortion. Shall we post her picture on the internet and make sure everyone she sees knows that she is a whore?”

Jesus looked forward idly, stirred his drink absentmindedly for a few moments and then said finally;

“Look, isn't one of you going to cast the first stone? Gentlemen, the Son of Man is too busy being a wealth-producer to sit in judgment of every little thing. That's why I need people like you to go forth and do it for me.

I am the Subway, the Wal-Mart, and the MetLife. No one comes to the Father except through my appointed representatives on Earth. In my father's house there are many McMansions, which I am preparing for you once you make CEO or head pastor, or both. So I don't have the time or inclination to go rustling through everyone's private lives. That's your job.”

JESUS TEACHES ABOUT WEALTH

One day an unemployed recent graduate came up to Jesus while He was seated behind the church's table at a city job fair and said “Lord, what must I do to have eternal life? I have kept all the commandments to love my neighbor as myself, honor my parents, and not to kill.”

Jesus gave him a look of disdain and said “That's not important. In fact, if you had joined the military and gone to kill some infidels you would be sitting pretty right now. If you want to be saved, renounce all the government handouts you are getting and sign up for a real job washing shoes or something. Make sure to never join a union, always follow your boss's orders even when he is stone drunk and incoherent and then take the blame when he decides to change his mind later. And always, always vote to cut his taxes. I say to you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a moocher and parasite like you to enter the kingdom of heaven.”

And the young man went away discouraged, for he had no possessions.

JESUS DOESN'T DIE FOR YOUR SINS, HE MAKES THE OTHER BASTARD DIE FOR HIS

After Jesus had tired of his careers as a hedge fund manager and financial adviser to megachurches, he settled on a career in the military where he quickly proved his value as an expert in overthrowing governments who transgressed against God's holy will and ushering many men, women and children into the afterlife. One day He was summoned by the representatives to give his testimony before Congress.

While being questioned Jesus said to them “All who live by the cruise missile shall continue to live by the cruise missile, because the other suckers have already been bombed back to the Stone Age.

Truthfully I say to you, every day you must give an offering of thanks to the American military, for through them you have received your salvation; the gift of freedom to work 80 hours a week for minimum wage, to not be able to pay the rent, heating bills, or give your family three meals a day. The freedom to choose your elected representative every couple of years between two candidates with nebulous, indistinguishable views who have been bought and sold several times over by the wealthy. The freedom to be told who you can marry or whether your religion is acceptable, and the freedom to sell your labor and become dependent on a boss for the rest of your life. All of these things have been freely given to you by the sacrifice of a few heavily armed men and millions of impoverished people around the world.”

JESUS GIVES HIS DISCIPLES THE HOLY INVISIBLE HAND

Finally Jesus elected to retire to a nice seaside resort town to further his wind-surfing habit. One day on the 15^th fairway he gave a final message to his disciples. “All power and authority on Earth I've given to you, but you already know that. Go forth and subjugate all the inferior nations of the world, baptizing them in the name of the Sport Utility Vehicle, the Holy Hand Grenade, and the Holy Invisible Hand of the Free Market, teaching them to obey everything you tell them if they want to stay in one piece.”

“Now, watch this drive.”

Every day's the end of days for some

New York Times

“Climate change is real, and man is causing it,” Mr. Hill said, echoing most climate scientists. “That is indisputable. And we have to do something about it.”

A rain of boos showered Mr. Hill, including a hearty growl from Norman Dennison, a 50-year-old electrician and founder of the Corydon Tea Party.

“It’s a flat-out lie,” Mr. Dennison said in an interview after the debate, adding that he had based his view on the preaching of Rush Limbaugh and the teaching of Scripture. “I read my Bible,” Mr. Dennison said. “He made this earth for us to utilize.”

Let us not be too hasty to judge Mr. Dennison, dear readers, because we can't know his particular circumstances. Instead, let us analyze this sentiment as it is most assuredly pronounced within the same short sequence of breath by those who are deeply, deeply concerned with burdening their children and grandchildren with a crippling national deficit. Yes, brothers and sisters, thanks to Tea Partyism not only will our children be saved from functioning roads, hospitals and libraries, they will not have to worry about having a habitable biosphere either. Because, children, the Lord did not give the earth to you, he gave it to us!

Oh well, not like it was going to last anyway.

Against the "Rally to Restore Sanity"

Patrick Nielsen Hayden, Making Light:

The premise of Jon Stewart’s “Million Moderate March” is vacuous. There’s no inherent virtue in political “moderation.” The “moderates” weren’t the ones who were right about whether we should have marched into Iraq; it was the so-called extremist peaceniks who had it right from the start. The “moderates” aren’t the ones who are right about the priority we should be giving to the threat of global climate change; again, the people who are correct on this issue are labelled as “extremists.” And contrary to Jon Stewart’s foolish assertion, while it may be “moderate” to reject charges that the Bush Administration committed war crimes, it’s also wrong. Because in fact they committed war crimes. (Nor are the current administration’s hands much cleaner on this score, and those who point this out continue to be marginalized.)

I certainly love The Daily Show; it's the finest mainstream outlet for ridiculing the American political scene out there. But Stewart seems to have let the news clippings about his great political influence among the youth go to his head. The"Rally to Restore Sanity" is based around the idea that he is the lone voice of rationality crying out in the wilderness, and that our political problems could be hashed out if everyone put away their signs and let the nice sensible people sit down and have a crack at governing. Which makes him far from iconoclast he apparently fancies himself to be. Rather, he is taking up the mantle of every wannabe High Broderist pundit in the mainstream press; oh, if only we could come together, hold hands, and agree to a solution that both Republicans and Republicans can agree on!

Liberals who are looking to get some yuks at the expense of Tea Party yokels should take heed. As should be clear from the announcement video, the rally is steeped in the sort of conventionally equivalence that says that if you must find fault with a conservative, you have to find several hippies to punch to make up for it. If you marched against the Iraq war, in favor of LGBT or immigrant rights or workplace safety or anything else, this is not the rally for you. It is, by Stewart's own definition, a rally for people who don't go to rallies. In fact, given that Stewart's audience is mostly comprised of hip liberals like you, you are precisely the target audience for this message. "Leave us alone" the political class cries, "to do the Sensible Moderate work of the American people!" Is it any surprise that the rally is being organized by a couple of ex-Clintonite flacks and has been enthusiastically endorsed by celebrity peddlers of wishy-washy nothingism such as Oprah Winfrey and Arianna Huffington?

Finally, blaming "extremists" for the present condition of the American political climate is a cruel joke. Most of the present crises facing us, from the wars to the financial and climate disasters and the complete ownership of the legislative process by business interests, have been fully approved abetted by a bipartisan consensus that the Broderists insist they are always seeking. The problem with the likes of Glenn Beck is that he is a raving hack and dishonest huckster, not that he is an extreme political outsider. Vile as he is, neither he nor his cohort have as of yet any actual political power to affect any of these problems for better or worse. People who consider themselves to the left of the center-right wing of the Democratic Party should be careful about tossing in with the same folks who would gladly kick them to the curb shortly after they finish making fun of the bad spelling at a Tea Party rally.

What we need are more political extremists willing to put a few applecarts upside down in the name of dissent, not to have them herded like docile cattle to be told that the Sensible, Serious people have everything under control.

The cloak of conservatism

Kind of a follow-up to this post.

""Our government makes no sense unless it is founded in a deeply felt religious faith -- and I don't care what it is."-Dwight Eisenhower

There are plenty of interesting and baffling things about Glenn Beck. Here is another. Glenn Beck is a Mormon. (Even stranger, apparently a convert.) You may not consider that unusual until you consider that Mormons used to be considered vile heretics by the same sort of evangelical Christians which Beck spends a great deal of time and effort wooing and hobnobbing.

Beck in this way is in the same boat as soon-to-be perennial presidential candidate Mitt Romney. You may recall that Fellow Mormon Romney gave a much-hyped speech during the 2008 primaries for just this purpose, to reassure other religious conservatives that the contents of any theological debate are moot in comparison to the broader shared experience of being pious about something and conservative (I stole the Eisenhower quote from this slacktivist post on the speech. Fred has a couple others as well.)

It's not just Mormons, however. The general trend among conservative public figures of any sort, and the particular stock in trade of the Beck/Palin populist variety, is to talk vaguely about "values" and "faith" while only very rarely making any specific comment on creeds or doctrines. The enemies are no longer people of the wrong religion (with the exception for the moment of Muslims until the Middle East runs out of natural resources), it's people of no faith, or at least people who don't believe faith should interfere with the political process. It's oddly ecumenical for people who would otherwise regard ecumenism as a dangerously relativistic liberal subversion. These are people (various Protestant sects vs. each other and Catholics, Christians vs. Jews etc.) who have historically been at each others' throats over doctrinal minutiae, who adhere to strict scriptural literalism, and regard the tiniest heresy as tempting damnation. Why are they suddenly able to handwave all of these differences and get together in a friendly drum circle?

It's because they do not believe in any creed so much as the ecumenical creed of conservatism. They have discovered that their shared interests--preservation of sexual/gender hierarchies, etc--and a shared duty to act as a barrier between the elite and the working class trumps any temporary concern they might have about eternity and damnation and all the rest. So shockingly, religious conservatives are not sincere in their beliefs. Hoocoodanode?

The dumbest thing I've ever heard in my life

I hate to be all "we've finally succumbed to the vortex of stupid!" on you, but the fact that this "Ground Zero Mosque" non-story still has legs makes me feel we have crossed some final threshold of no return.

Yes, the "controversy" which initially began as a few far-right Islamophobes getting all pouty that the brown heathens were approaching the consecrated crucifixion scene has somehow transformed itself into a legitimate political issue on which our Serious leaders are being asked actual questions and are expected to respond in some way other than "Have you dumbasses ever read the First Amendment?" If there was any doubt about how much the right controls popular discourse, and how desperate the ruling class is to talk about something other than the shape of the economy, this should be proof enough.

How many mental hoops do you have to jump through to manufacture some outrage about this story? Well, there's the fact that the "Ground Zero Mosque" is neither a) a mosque (not that it matters) nor b)at Ground Zero (it's two blocks away, and can't even be seen from there.) Then you have to bypass the dangerous precedent of declaring where and when a minority religion gets to practice, although, given the rise across the country in anti-Muslim fervor I suppose this is past the point now. Why don't we skip right to the yellow crescent stickers? Nevermind that, though, because how could you have missed the outrage of scary Muslims praying in the Pentagon of all places! To steal Elliot's great number, they didn't even have the decency to move two blocks away!

I'm struggling to come up with ways to express how ridiculous and outrageous this story is, and what it says about the complete depravity of our elite opinion-makers and the right-wing knuckle-draggers they are so eager to swoon over. What's somewhat surprising is that the United States has generally been better at integrating its Muslim population, probably moreso than Western Europe, for example. Even George Bush, perhaps unconvincingly, tried to insist he was not at war with the entire religion of Islam. That appears to be very over. Why now? Obviously, there's always the opportunity that economic crisis brings to facilitate the scapegoating of a small, unpopular and powerless minority. The more likely cause, though, is the need of the war party to wave the bloody shirt of 9/11 martyrdom and keep the public's thirst for destruction primed for the liberation of the next enemy.

In the beginning, God created snake-oil and called it good

I've been spending some time today browsing the website of Chris Rodda, a senior researcher for the Military Religious Freedom Foundation. Rodda wrote a book a few years ago called "Liars for Jesus" which, while it could encompass any number of things, in this instance focused on the charlatans who sell Christian-nationalist revisionist history to churches and homeschool parents. Playing the John Brinkley to Rodda's Morris Fishbein is a Texan (where else?) named David Barton, who's come into some provenance recently as a "professor" at Glenn Beck's online "university." (The scare quotes are going to be hot and heavy in this post, folks.) A couple observations occurred to me, laid out here in easy to understand bullet points.

1. The strategy of Christian revisionists is basically to scour documents from the early history of the United States, cherry-pick quotes that have an affirmative reference to Christianity, and then declare it as unassailable that the founders really intended, if not for a theocratic government, then some arrangement in which Christianity would be enshrined with special privileges. As Rodda aptly demonstrates time after time, however, these quotes are almost always ripped completely out of context and demonstrate a total lack of understanding of the historical moment. This isn't surprising, though, when you consider that the Christian revisionists read the Founders in exactly the same way conservative evangelicals read scriptures. Memorizing a random assortment of prooftexts, mashing them together and then interpreting them through the lens of contemporary Christianity is the order of the day for folks like Barton. One shouldn't accept their Biblical pronouncements with any more credulity than their analysis of the United States founders. Unfortunately, many mainstream and Nu Atheist commentators do exactly that.

2. The contrast in style between Rodda and Barton is in itself very telling. Barton presents himself as a comic jockey, delivering one big whammer after another each punctuated with a variation of "har har are secularists dumb or what?!" Barton's clearly not trying to win anyone over; just to provide ammunition to the faithful and instill them with a dose of that smug superiority. Rodda combats his snideness with measured, even-tempered coolness. Relating to my post yesterday, if you were to pick a side solely on the basis of which of them you'd spend a lot of time around, there's no doubt about who most would choose. This blustering smart-assed swagger is the same kind of thing you'll get out of Ken Ham and the Creation Museum; it's apparently an involuntary tic produced by the subconscious realization that they are hopelessly grasping at straws.

A little birdhouse in the sky

I don't generally get asked that often about my religious views because, well, I don't generally get asked about much at all. But there is something that tends to come up frequently in those conversations, something which I remember quite well from my evangelical days also.

That is, the assumption that I am no longer espouse any spirituality because of some personal bad experiences with religious believers. That's hardly the case. I thought many of the young evangelicals I knew in my time with that crowd were sincerely decent people caught in a belief system that made them act inhumanely. Sure, some of them were creeps who had found a home to justify their superiority and personal authoritarianism. And, of course, there are a great many religious types whose bad theology results directly in their being terrible people. If you believe in some future divine-stomping extinction of humanity, then you're a borderline sociopath. You're mostly harmless in that there is of course not going to be any rapture; not so much if you are sitting on your smug ass while the world is struck by preventable afflictions. That makes you a terrible person, no matter how much we seem to revere any kind of faith as worthwhile.

Digressions aside, the point is that my religiosity or lack thereof has little or nothing to do with the actions of religious people. There are a lot of religious folks whose actions for social justice causes I find very admirable. From my perspective on the left, anyone who's on the side of peace, justice and equality is on my side regardless of what their motivations may be (and I suspect in many cases our fundamental presuppositions about the world aren't that different at all. I try to keep abreast of the news from progressive religious groups, but I could not join them for the simple reason that my own experience has never left me feeling any kind of personal spiritual connection to the supernatural. That is why I am not a religious believer in a nutshell; I cannot find any reason to suspect that there is any kind of extra-dimensional presence that is puling the world around on a kite string.

In a nutshell, my religious philosophy is this: if a God exists and has any kind of personal opinion about how the planet operates, he or she must care primarily about how we go about making the lives of people we can see around us better, and furthermore that we have been given the capacity to understand how to do this on our own. Otherwise, God would be a deceptive, unreliable bastard who wouldn't be worth paying attention to. The god of say, fundamentalist Christianity who selfishly demands arbitrary tasks be performed to no practical end whatsoever can't in any sense actually exist anyway. Furthermore, any god that's going to demand personal recognition of some kind as an arbiter between salvation and damnation had better do a damn sight better job of making itself more readily apparent.

If Christianity could turn itself around from being a mystical self-help religion of navel-gazing and panty-sniffing and recover its tradition of social justice and egalitarianism, I would be happily cheering from the sidelines. But I still wouldn't be reapplying for membership.

More to say on this another time.

Have you given up on Democrats yet?

Arkansas Sen. Blanche Lincoln survived a primary challenge yesterday from the state's Lt. Gov. Bill Halter. Organized labor and other progressive groups had been backing Halter against Lincoln, a staunch, business-friendly Blue Dog and, when it appeared she was in jeopardy, the establishment Democrats showed up in force to bail her out, even though polls had given Halter a better chance of winning the seat in November. People say Democrats don't have principles. Nothing could be further from the truth. Business Democrats have such strong principles, in fact, that they would rather lose elections than betray them. There is nothing new under the sun in that department, as Upton Sinclair will tell you.

Gabriel Winant sums it up nicely:

In other words, elite Democrats had a real choice, and they decided to stand with the Chamber of Commerce and treat the unions like the misbehaving hired help. They ran the same campaign that conservative Southern Democrats have been running for the better part of a century to keep labor out of the South, and it worked.

The direction we're headed in, judging by that White House official, is for Democrats to show the door to working-class voters. For years, Democratic leaders have desperately wanted theirs to be the party of upper-middle-class suburban professionals. And if Blanche Lincoln loses in November to her Republican challenger, as she probably will, all we'll be able to say is that Democrats got their wish: They wrote off working people, and working people wrote them off too.

The message could hardly be clearer. Democrats would rather be the minority party than leave their corporate masters at the mercy of the grubby hands of the working class. Stop wasting energy and resources believing they will someday change if you ask nicely enough.

Dolce et decorum est

So Sarah Palin apparently plagiarized this poem on her Twitter feed. I couldn't care less about that, but let's take a closer look at the sentiments in this post, which are commonly held by military fetishists.

It is the Soldier, not the minister
Who has given us freedom of religion.

It is the Soldier, not the reporter
Who has given us freedom of the press.

It is the Soldier, not the poet
Who has given us freedom of speech.

It goes on like this for some time, but you can get the basic idea here. I am generally of the philosophy that you shouldn't get much credit for fixing something you broke in the first place. And indeed, all of the benefits the author claims as the byproduct of the military require similar armed coercion to remove them in the first place. Indeed, the more present the military is in public life, the less free the society tends to be, as any citizen of Burma or North Korea could tell you. Which they won't because, well, you know.

Individual soldiers may well believe in their mission as entirely benevolent crusaders for all sorts of high-minded enlightened causes. As a unit, though, their actions are entirely controlled by an absolute hierarchy ending with the government at the top. They are no more and no less than the muscle behind the Gummit's interests and are completely dependent on the state for moral direction, or the lack of it. Thus, this poem attributes a philosophical independence to the military which doesn't exist, and would be highly dangerous if it did. Conservatives, I suspect, know this, which explains the paradox between condemning Big Gummit while enthusiastically backing the Gummit's Hammer. They hold out hope such a break will occur and save them from the unfortunate democratic impulses of their fellow citizens.

Smedley Darlington Butler gave a much better summary of the soldier's duty in 1935.

I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903. In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went on its way unmolested. Looking back on it, I might have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents.

Don't know much about title-ry

I'm not sure quite what future conflicts over religion in the world will look like, but one thing seems clear enough; the era of struggles between different world religions as they are traditionally understood is coming to an end. What we will get in its place are struggles between interfaith coalitions consisting of hierarchical, patriarchal fundamentalists and egalitarian progressives.

I got the impetus for this train of thought from reading James Loewen's "Lies my Teacher Told Me." Loewen mentions that American history textbooks rarely emphasize the role religious conviction has played in the lives of historical figures because of the objections of both religious fundamentalists, who will object to any unflattering portrayal of their religion, and axe-grinding atheists, who will object to any positive mention of sincerely-held beliefs. The latter note is extraneous for the moment. The interesting corrollary is how many formerly combative sects have come together to scrub any mention of their historical conflicts from the record. This is part of a larger compact between Protestants and Catholics, and between Christians in general and conservative Jews, which has been made in the past few decades, a trend which I think will continue into the future as more and more fundamentalists realize that shared material and power interest outweigh their theological differences.

Now, Ditchkins*-flavored Nu Atheists will doubtless jump in here to say that it is their gains and not the liberal religious which has caused the global circling of the wagons. This I doubt. Nu Atheists have a symbiotic relationship with the fundamentalists in which each replenishes the other's raison d'etre. They share, in the apostate class, a common enemy. And why would the Nus want to get rid of their most valuable resource; easily-manipulable strawmen? Plus, there is the reality that Nu Atheism in its design can never become a mass global movement; it exists to make Western liberals feel smugly superior from the ignorant masses, not achieve any kind of social change to threaten the entrenched power structures.

The greater threat here, as it always has been, is the apprehension by the religious elite that their own theological impulses can be turned against them. This has been most readily apparent in the past few decades with the Vatican's war on liberation theology and its association with the Latin American left movements. More recently (and more ambiguously) it has been the struggle between old-line evangelical Christians and the younger "emerging" movement which is dangerously apostate on the Real Issues. I suspect there were similar sorts of ecumenical kumbaya moments at comparable points in history; just before the Civil War, for example.

The other point of note here is that Western fundamentalists do at least still claim to be in conflict with fundamentalist Muslims. But this too seems to be more as a result of ongoing political necessity than any material disagreement. One would imagine that, when all sides come to realize their shared interest in censorship, patriarchy, and preserving the proper political succession, any alleged differences will also melt away.

*h/t Terry Eagleton

Got a Polish email in my pocket...

Stephen F. Hayward:

Surprisingly, the survey reveals Tea Partiers to be slightly more economically secure than the general population. Combine those findings with the fact that Tea Partiers are a well-educated cohort, and the narrative that the Tea Partiers are a bunch of pitchfork populist rubes becomes harder to maintain.

Hayward presumably means this as a defense of Tea Partyism, but says it only one paragraph after approvingly asserting the Teabaggers populist bona fides. Consequently, his own narrative that tea marchers are spontaneously organized bands of working people genuinely concerned that over-taxation is grinding them into poverty also becomes rather hard to maintain. As Michael Lind succinctly puts it elsewhere in the Times compilation, "Tea Partiers put the “petty” in petty bourgeoisie."

The Tea Parties have arisen (in such cases as where they are not simply a rebranding of local Republican Parties) out of an honest concern that their privileged position in American political and economic life could be threatened by the present moment. Naturally, then, there's little they fear more than an organization of the working class, thus even such modest organizations such as the SEIU or the late ACORN play a pivotal role in Teabaggers' conspiracy lore. Like most self-proclaimed advocates of liberty, their principled stand against the tyranny of federal governments erodes quickly when it comes to the dissolution of voluntary mass organization along class lines. It's instructive to compare their rhetoric of liberty to that of Eugene Debs in 1895 righteously upbraiding government intervening on behalf of the Pullman car company. Certainly libertarians wouldn't be nostalgic for such days of tyranny would they?

Oh.