Tuesday, December 25, 2007
GEORGE ASHMUN, REPUBLICAN STATESMAN
Good article to read. Grand Old Partisan is a good site for Republicans and Conservatives.
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Thursday, November 22, 2007
ANSWERING 20 FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS ABOUT CONSERVATISM
John Hawkins of Right Wing News is by far my least favorite conservative pundit. He is arrogant, condescending, patronizing and unkind. Having said all that, his article about frequently asked questions about Conservatism is well worth reading.
Saturday, November 17, 2007
OUT OF AFRICA, INTO THE SEMINAR ROOM
This is an excellent story about Senator Bill Frist, a true conservative, who should have run for President.
Monday, November 12, 2007
THE ANT AND THE GRASSHOPPER
The Ant and the Grasshopper (Classic Version):
The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks he's a fool and laughs and dances and plays the summer away. Come winter, the ant is warm and well fed. The grasshopper has no food or shelter, so he dies out in the cold.
The Ant and the Grasshopper (Modern Version):
The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks he's a fool and laughs and dances and plays the summer away. Come winter, the shivering grasshopper calls a press conference and demands to know why the ant should be allowed to be warm and well fed while others are cold and starving. CBS, NBC, and ABC show up to provide pictures of the shivering grasshopper next to a video of the ant in his comfortable home with a table filled with food.
America is stunned by the sharp contrast. How can this be, that in a country of such wealth, this poor grasshopper is allowed to suffer so? Kermit the Frog appears on Oprah with the grasshopper, and everybody cries when they sing "It's Not Easy Being Green". Jesse Jackson stages a demonstration in front of the ant's house where the news stations film the group singing "We Shall Overcome". Jesse then has the group kneel down to pray to God for the grasshopper's sake. Al Gore exclaims in an interview with Peter Jennings that the ant has gotten rich off the back of the grasshopper, and calls for an immediate tax hike on the ant to make him pay his "fair share". Finally, the EEOC drafts the "Economic Equity and Anti-Grasshopper Act", retroactive to the beginning of the summer. The ant is fined for failing to hire a proportionate number of green bugs and, having nothing left to pay his retroactive taxes, his home is confiscated by the government. Hillary gets her old law firm to represent the grasshopper in a defamation suit against the ant, and the case is tried before a panel of federal judges that Bill appointed from a list of single-parent welfare recipients. The ant loses the case. The story ends as we see the grasshopper finishing up the last bits of the ant's food while the government house he is in, which just happens to be the ant's old house, crumbles to the around him because he doesn't maintain it. The ant has disappeared in the snow. The grasshopper is found dead in a drug related incident and the house, now abandoned, is taken over by a gang of spiders who terrorize the once peaceful neighborhood.
The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks he's a fool and laughs and dances and plays the summer away. Come winter, the ant is warm and well fed. The grasshopper has no food or shelter, so he dies out in the cold.
The Ant and the Grasshopper (Modern Version):
The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks he's a fool and laughs and dances and plays the summer away. Come winter, the shivering grasshopper calls a press conference and demands to know why the ant should be allowed to be warm and well fed while others are cold and starving. CBS, NBC, and ABC show up to provide pictures of the shivering grasshopper next to a video of the ant in his comfortable home with a table filled with food.
America is stunned by the sharp contrast. How can this be, that in a country of such wealth, this poor grasshopper is allowed to suffer so? Kermit the Frog appears on Oprah with the grasshopper, and everybody cries when they sing "It's Not Easy Being Green". Jesse Jackson stages a demonstration in front of the ant's house where the news stations film the group singing "We Shall Overcome". Jesse then has the group kneel down to pray to God for the grasshopper's sake. Al Gore exclaims in an interview with Peter Jennings that the ant has gotten rich off the back of the grasshopper, and calls for an immediate tax hike on the ant to make him pay his "fair share". Finally, the EEOC drafts the "Economic Equity and Anti-Grasshopper Act", retroactive to the beginning of the summer. The ant is fined for failing to hire a proportionate number of green bugs and, having nothing left to pay his retroactive taxes, his home is confiscated by the government. Hillary gets her old law firm to represent the grasshopper in a defamation suit against the ant, and the case is tried before a panel of federal judges that Bill appointed from a list of single-parent welfare recipients. The ant loses the case. The story ends as we see the grasshopper finishing up the last bits of the ant's food while the government house he is in, which just happens to be the ant's old house, crumbles to the around him because he doesn't maintain it. The ant has disappeared in the snow. The grasshopper is found dead in a drug related incident and the house, now abandoned, is taken over by a gang of spiders who terrorize the once peaceful neighborhood.
TOP TEN CONSERVATIVE ISSUES FOR 2008
1. Illegal immigration -- 86%
2. War on terrorism -- 80%
3. Federal spending – 65%
4. Supreme Court and other judicial appointments -- 64%
5. Flat tax/tax cuts -- 61%
6. Size of government -- 61%
7. Iraq -- 55%
8. Social Security -- 45%
9. Entitlement programs -- 38%
10. Abortion -- 36%
2. War on terrorism -- 80%
3. Federal spending – 65%
4. Supreme Court and other judicial appointments -- 64%
5. Flat tax/tax cuts -- 61%
6. Size of government -- 61%
7. Iraq -- 55%
8. Social Security -- 45%
9. Entitlement programs -- 38%
10. Abortion -- 36%
Sunday, October 28, 2007
A CANADIAN'S VIEW OF AMERICA
I'm not American. I'm Canadian.
So it's odd then that I write so much about America and I care so much about what happens in America. Part of it is practicality - Canada is a US client state and American politics affect Canadians. When you throw away your freedoms, ours will soon follow (our government just launched its own "no-fly list", for example and after you put out the Patriot Act we put out our own version.)
But part of it is just that I care about America and the American experiment.
Those of us who didn't grow up in America, but under the sway of America's media, imbibed a very pure form of the American mythos and civic religion. The American Civil Religion, with its secular saints such as Jefferson, Hamilton and Washington and its written Constitutional scripture is also a source of wonderment. Canada has no equivalent, no deep sense of history, no touchstone that is written back to to justify the present. Those words of your founders, those words that resound through history are words that inspire men and women who have never seen America and never will.
The Declaration of Independence spoke to all humans, with its assertion that all men are created equal and have unalienable rights. The US system of government, with its checks and balances, seemed unique and able to take shocks that might topple other democratic forms of government.
More...
The Statue of Liberty, holding its torch aloft in New York's harbor, proclaimed that in America the wretched masses of the world might find a home, hope, liberty and opportunity.
And, of course, there was the US's role in both World War II and the Cold War. When Europe was in chains, America freed it. It may be true that the German army died in the plains of Russia, but without the US, all of Europe would have fallen into the gray pit of Russian rule and despair.
Truly, in the Cold War, America stood astride the word facing off against an evil empire. Reagan was right when he called the USSR evil - it was a totalitarian nightmare, and opposing it; keeping it in check, was the moral thing to do.
None of this is to say that America was always "the good" - there was Vietnam, there was complicity in various dictatorships; there was a distressing tendency to meddle, especially in Latin America - there were, in short, many places where America fell short of its own ideals.
Yet, in all, America was still the shining city on the hill. Even those who disliked it, when asked "well, what hegemonic nation, past or present, would be preferable to America", were stilled. In truth, as superpowers go, America was about the best one could hope for - power corrupted, but it had not corrupted absolutely.
And when the Berlin Wall went down, and the USSR with it, and the US stood astride the world, the sole unchallenged superpower, at first absolutely powerful, it was not corrupted absolutely. In the Cold War there had been no question the US needed allies and friends and there had been an acknowledgment that nations pushed too far might slip into the other camp. Perhaps the USSR wasn't an ideal patron - but the possibility was always there if the US abused its position too much. And certainly the thought of pre-emptive US use of nukes against non-nuclear nations wasn't even considered - the USSR stood ready, with missiles aimed at America, to ensure that would not happen.
In the 90's America mostly either used its power responsibly, or at worst, didn't use it when some hoped it would, as in the Rwandan genocide, or the slowness in dealing with the Balkans. If the new fascination with "globalization" and the fetishization of "free trade", which mostly meant "free flow of money and investments" dismayed many, still it wasn't outwardly violent and continued the American habit of binding its empire together less with troops than with alliances and economic ties that often amounted to dependency.
And then the Bush years happened. George Bush, with the acquiescence of Congress and the consent of the majority of voters, who elected him in 2004, made the US a unilateral actor on the world stage, a country that engaged in pre-emptive war and threatens to use nuclear weapons in a first strike. A nation, moreover, which has repudiated the freedoms that the rest of the world admired it for, has engaged in torture, struck down habeas corpus and openly mocked the Geneva Conventions.
America had become, in the eyes of the world, un-American.
The America we loved - the America which, if it did not always match words to ideals, still seemed to move more in jerks and starts towards those ideals, died, choking, gasping, in front of our very eyes.
What is so sad about this, to me, is that if America had lived up to its own ideals, America would be safer.
No Pre-Emptive War
Americans hung a lot of Nazis for the crime of pre-emptive war. Men who were in no way involved in the Holocaust swung high at Nuremberg because they attacked other countries that hadn't attacked them first.
The Iraq war, a war which was based on lies, and sold on classic Big Lie techniques, with 70% of Americans believing Iraq was behind 9/11, has made the US less safe, not more, by giving millions of Muslims reason to hate America. The next generation of terrorists are being terrorized right now, and as with most violent criminals, they will do unto others as was done unto them.
And the current surge in nuclear proliferation can be laid in large part at the feet of the Iraq War, the lesson of which was not "if you have nukes we'll take you out", but "if you don't have nukes we can take you out. And if you do have nukes like North Korea we'll talk and make impotent and meaningless threats." (The second reason, of course, is that the US continually violates the non-proliferation treaty itself, making non-nuclear powers wonder why they should obey it either.)
If the US had not invaded Iraq there would be less terrorists in the world today and in the future. There would be less proliferation of nuclear weapons. By doing the right thing morally, the right thing in the American tradition, the US would be safer and richer.
American Generosity
Afghanistan fell to the Taliban in the 90's in large part because the US abandoned it. When Afghanis were fighting the USSR, US aid and money flowed in. When the USSR fell, Afghanis thought that they would receive significant aid from America. None came and the country fell to the Taliban. When Afghanistan falls again to the Taliban, as it almost certainly will, it will be because America and its NATO allies couldn't be bothered to make Afghanistan work for Afghanis. For years the Afghanis were patient, sidelined the Taliban and from all indications hoped that the Coalition would make things better in Afghanistan. That didn't happen (because all the effort was in Iraq, and because NATO is resentful at being forced to clean up Afghanistan and thus unwilling to put in the money) and slowly the worm is turning. The Taliban, for years marginalized, is making new inroads, and Afghanis themselves are showing that they are tired of being occupied without anything getting better.
Oddly enough, the same is true in Iraq. During the early period after the invasion there wasn't much resistance to the occupation. During that time a Marshall Plan variant might well have turned the ill-thought invasion into a success. But instead of letting money get into the hands of Iraqis, instead of making it so Iraqis were better off under the coalition, the Bush administration insisted on rewarding its cronies with jobs, and Republican associated companies with huge contracts they mostly couldn't fulfill. (My favourite being hiring an American company to rebuild a bridge at 20 times the cost an Iraqi engineering firm, which had built the bridge in the first place, offered to fix it for.)
In both cases being American - which is to say, generous, would have served the US better than trying to be stingy and engage in domestic pork barrel politics. And, oddly, being generous to the Iraqis and the Afghanis would have cost less as well, because butter is cheaper than guns, and Iraqis and Afghanis work for a lot less than Americans on the military-industrial dole.
Doing the right thing morally would have made the US safer and cost less money.
American Respect for Human and Civil Rights
In America, all men have unalienable rights. The way this is written isn't "all citizens" either - it implies all of humanity. If you are human, you have these rights, they are granted solely because you are human and thus cannot be taken away. Primary among these rights is the right to a fair trial before punishment; to habeas corpus; to not be subject to cruel and unusual punishment (which surely includes water boarding and being raped) and to freedom from arbitrary search and seizure (which includes being wiretapped without a judge issuing a warrant).
Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib, where "suspects" have been held without trial; have been tortured, and where there have been repeated attempts to end Habeas rights, are exhibit A. These prison camps have tarnished America's image abroad as it hasn't been smeared since the Philippines war of occupation. For billions around the world, the indelible image of America today may not be the Statue of Liberty, as it was to my generation - but a hooded man with electrodes attached to him.
This destruction of America's image has destroyed much of America's soft power. Neocons may sneer, but when you aren't the good guy you don't get as many people willing to spy for you (nor are they the best spies, since the ones who remain are those motivated mostly by greed.) You don't get as many informants (and informants are the best way to deal with terrorists). Many governments see no reason to cooperate with you, so to get anything you must use force or the threat of force.
As with people who are distrusted or despised, nations who are distrusted or despised find it much harder to get their way.
American Respect for Free Speech
It may seem odd, but few things incense me more than "free speech zones" (which, for the record, started under Clinton, not Bush, though Bush has extended them greatly.) And I think that shuffling dissent off where it can't be seen by people in power has done great damage to the health of American democracy. Those of us who watch politics regularly are constantly amazed by how "out of touch" Americas elites are. The Washington bubble isn't made of soap-suds, it's made of blast hardened concrete and Congressmen vote against the majority of Americans preferred interests all the time (the majority want the war ended, the majority want universal health care, the majority don't think oil companies need subsidies, and so on.)
Part of why they do it is that they are insulated from the real world, from the world that the rest of America lives in. George Bush, the most extreme case, is so isolated that even showing a negative sign along his motorcade's passage is forbidden. In both the Democratic and Republican conventions, protesters were shut so far away from the conventions that convention-goers might never have known they were even there.
I grew up thinking all of America was a free speech zone, not just special little areas chosen so as to make sure that the elites would never have to witness someone who was angry at the decisions they had made. And if America really was a free speech zone, America might be better off, because there is nothing worse for any nation than for its elites to live in a bubble.
A Hatred for Aristocracy, Inherited Wealth and Power
America was founded in explicit rejection of aristocracy and inherited power. An American, I was taught, bowed to no one. And for most of two centuries, America tended to have less disparities of income and wealth than other western nations. Oh aye, during the gilded age, there were great disparities within America, but they were still less than in Britain, or France, or most of Europe. And America had the most social mobility - you really did have the most chance to make it to the top from the bottom (though this remained rare, despite the ideal.)
That's no longer the case - America is the Western nation with the most inequality of any. And social mobility is dropping through the floor - a generation ago it was higher than almost anywhere, but the evidence coming in now is that if you aren't born well off, your odds of moving up in the world are worse than they have been in generations. Meanwhile the tax code has been jiggered to remove much of the Estate Tax and to benefit unearned money over that earned by an honest day's work. America is becoming a nation where power and money are inherited, where the rich get richer and where the working and middle classes are expected to borrow from their betters at usurious interest rates to make ends meet.
As this has occurred, and not coincidentally, Americas trade, balance of payment and government deficits have soared. Its savings rate has crumbled to the point where it is less than zero; to where the rest of the world is sending most of its savings to the US, and all those savings can barely keep the US economy above water.
The right thing to do, the American thing to do - to fight against entrenched wealth and power, especially multi-generational money, would have left the US stronger economically. The collapse of demand caused by sending profits preferentially to the rich and corporations was the prime cause of the last Great Depression.
Be American
Those of us who grew up in other countries; those of use who are America's real friends, want what all good friends want for those they care for - that you live up to your own ideals. That you be the nation we know you can be. A bastion of freedom; a nation with the highest respect for civil rights; a country that never gives up "a little freedom for a little safety" and finding neither. A country that doesn't torture, that believes that pre-emptive war is never excusable.
And we want it for you not just because it'd be best for the rest of the world, though it would be, but because it would be best for you. You would be safer, more prosperous, less fearful and have a more assured future if you lived up to the best of what it means to be America - to be American.
So, on July 4th, on your birthday, this is my wish for America and for Americans - that you remember that the right thing to do morally is almost always the right thing to do pragmatically. There is no choice between "freedom and safety"; there is no choice between prosperity and massive inequality; there is no choice between generosity and fiscal prudence and there is no such thing as "managed free speech".
Be the America the world loved. Be the America you can be proudest of - the one that does not torture, that treats all men as equal and with unalienable rights. Be the America that rebuilt Europe and that lends a helping hand to countries like Afghanistan. Be the America that would never invade a country that had not attacked you first. Be the America that is about lifting all boats and not just a few.
Be that America, and we will all be Americans.
Ian Welsh July 4, 2007 - 1:02pm
So it's odd then that I write so much about America and I care so much about what happens in America. Part of it is practicality - Canada is a US client state and American politics affect Canadians. When you throw away your freedoms, ours will soon follow (our government just launched its own "no-fly list", for example and after you put out the Patriot Act we put out our own version.)
But part of it is just that I care about America and the American experiment.
Those of us who didn't grow up in America, but under the sway of America's media, imbibed a very pure form of the American mythos and civic religion. The American Civil Religion, with its secular saints such as Jefferson, Hamilton and Washington and its written Constitutional scripture is also a source of wonderment. Canada has no equivalent, no deep sense of history, no touchstone that is written back to to justify the present. Those words of your founders, those words that resound through history are words that inspire men and women who have never seen America and never will.
The Declaration of Independence spoke to all humans, with its assertion that all men are created equal and have unalienable rights. The US system of government, with its checks and balances, seemed unique and able to take shocks that might topple other democratic forms of government.
More...
The Statue of Liberty, holding its torch aloft in New York's harbor, proclaimed that in America the wretched masses of the world might find a home, hope, liberty and opportunity.
And, of course, there was the US's role in both World War II and the Cold War. When Europe was in chains, America freed it. It may be true that the German army died in the plains of Russia, but without the US, all of Europe would have fallen into the gray pit of Russian rule and despair.
Truly, in the Cold War, America stood astride the word facing off against an evil empire. Reagan was right when he called the USSR evil - it was a totalitarian nightmare, and opposing it; keeping it in check, was the moral thing to do.
None of this is to say that America was always "the good" - there was Vietnam, there was complicity in various dictatorships; there was a distressing tendency to meddle, especially in Latin America - there were, in short, many places where America fell short of its own ideals.
Yet, in all, America was still the shining city on the hill. Even those who disliked it, when asked "well, what hegemonic nation, past or present, would be preferable to America", were stilled. In truth, as superpowers go, America was about the best one could hope for - power corrupted, but it had not corrupted absolutely.
And when the Berlin Wall went down, and the USSR with it, and the US stood astride the world, the sole unchallenged superpower, at first absolutely powerful, it was not corrupted absolutely. In the Cold War there had been no question the US needed allies and friends and there had been an acknowledgment that nations pushed too far might slip into the other camp. Perhaps the USSR wasn't an ideal patron - but the possibility was always there if the US abused its position too much. And certainly the thought of pre-emptive US use of nukes against non-nuclear nations wasn't even considered - the USSR stood ready, with missiles aimed at America, to ensure that would not happen.
In the 90's America mostly either used its power responsibly, or at worst, didn't use it when some hoped it would, as in the Rwandan genocide, or the slowness in dealing with the Balkans. If the new fascination with "globalization" and the fetishization of "free trade", which mostly meant "free flow of money and investments" dismayed many, still it wasn't outwardly violent and continued the American habit of binding its empire together less with troops than with alliances and economic ties that often amounted to dependency.
And then the Bush years happened. George Bush, with the acquiescence of Congress and the consent of the majority of voters, who elected him in 2004, made the US a unilateral actor on the world stage, a country that engaged in pre-emptive war and threatens to use nuclear weapons in a first strike. A nation, moreover, which has repudiated the freedoms that the rest of the world admired it for, has engaged in torture, struck down habeas corpus and openly mocked the Geneva Conventions.
America had become, in the eyes of the world, un-American.
The America we loved - the America which, if it did not always match words to ideals, still seemed to move more in jerks and starts towards those ideals, died, choking, gasping, in front of our very eyes.
What is so sad about this, to me, is that if America had lived up to its own ideals, America would be safer.
No Pre-Emptive War
Americans hung a lot of Nazis for the crime of pre-emptive war. Men who were in no way involved in the Holocaust swung high at Nuremberg because they attacked other countries that hadn't attacked them first.
The Iraq war, a war which was based on lies, and sold on classic Big Lie techniques, with 70% of Americans believing Iraq was behind 9/11, has made the US less safe, not more, by giving millions of Muslims reason to hate America. The next generation of terrorists are being terrorized right now, and as with most violent criminals, they will do unto others as was done unto them.
And the current surge in nuclear proliferation can be laid in large part at the feet of the Iraq War, the lesson of which was not "if you have nukes we'll take you out", but "if you don't have nukes we can take you out. And if you do have nukes like North Korea we'll talk and make impotent and meaningless threats." (The second reason, of course, is that the US continually violates the non-proliferation treaty itself, making non-nuclear powers wonder why they should obey it either.)
If the US had not invaded Iraq there would be less terrorists in the world today and in the future. There would be less proliferation of nuclear weapons. By doing the right thing morally, the right thing in the American tradition, the US would be safer and richer.
American Generosity
Afghanistan fell to the Taliban in the 90's in large part because the US abandoned it. When Afghanis were fighting the USSR, US aid and money flowed in. When the USSR fell, Afghanis thought that they would receive significant aid from America. None came and the country fell to the Taliban. When Afghanistan falls again to the Taliban, as it almost certainly will, it will be because America and its NATO allies couldn't be bothered to make Afghanistan work for Afghanis. For years the Afghanis were patient, sidelined the Taliban and from all indications hoped that the Coalition would make things better in Afghanistan. That didn't happen (because all the effort was in Iraq, and because NATO is resentful at being forced to clean up Afghanistan and thus unwilling to put in the money) and slowly the worm is turning. The Taliban, for years marginalized, is making new inroads, and Afghanis themselves are showing that they are tired of being occupied without anything getting better.
Oddly enough, the same is true in Iraq. During the early period after the invasion there wasn't much resistance to the occupation. During that time a Marshall Plan variant might well have turned the ill-thought invasion into a success. But instead of letting money get into the hands of Iraqis, instead of making it so Iraqis were better off under the coalition, the Bush administration insisted on rewarding its cronies with jobs, and Republican associated companies with huge contracts they mostly couldn't fulfill. (My favourite being hiring an American company to rebuild a bridge at 20 times the cost an Iraqi engineering firm, which had built the bridge in the first place, offered to fix it for.)
In both cases being American - which is to say, generous, would have served the US better than trying to be stingy and engage in domestic pork barrel politics. And, oddly, being generous to the Iraqis and the Afghanis would have cost less as well, because butter is cheaper than guns, and Iraqis and Afghanis work for a lot less than Americans on the military-industrial dole.
Doing the right thing morally would have made the US safer and cost less money.
American Respect for Human and Civil Rights
In America, all men have unalienable rights. The way this is written isn't "all citizens" either - it implies all of humanity. If you are human, you have these rights, they are granted solely because you are human and thus cannot be taken away. Primary among these rights is the right to a fair trial before punishment; to habeas corpus; to not be subject to cruel and unusual punishment (which surely includes water boarding and being raped) and to freedom from arbitrary search and seizure (which includes being wiretapped without a judge issuing a warrant).
Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib, where "suspects" have been held without trial; have been tortured, and where there have been repeated attempts to end Habeas rights, are exhibit A. These prison camps have tarnished America's image abroad as it hasn't been smeared since the Philippines war of occupation. For billions around the world, the indelible image of America today may not be the Statue of Liberty, as it was to my generation - but a hooded man with electrodes attached to him.
This destruction of America's image has destroyed much of America's soft power. Neocons may sneer, but when you aren't the good guy you don't get as many people willing to spy for you (nor are they the best spies, since the ones who remain are those motivated mostly by greed.) You don't get as many informants (and informants are the best way to deal with terrorists). Many governments see no reason to cooperate with you, so to get anything you must use force or the threat of force.
As with people who are distrusted or despised, nations who are distrusted or despised find it much harder to get their way.
American Respect for Free Speech
It may seem odd, but few things incense me more than "free speech zones" (which, for the record, started under Clinton, not Bush, though Bush has extended them greatly.) And I think that shuffling dissent off where it can't be seen by people in power has done great damage to the health of American democracy. Those of us who watch politics regularly are constantly amazed by how "out of touch" Americas elites are. The Washington bubble isn't made of soap-suds, it's made of blast hardened concrete and Congressmen vote against the majority of Americans preferred interests all the time (the majority want the war ended, the majority want universal health care, the majority don't think oil companies need subsidies, and so on.)
Part of why they do it is that they are insulated from the real world, from the world that the rest of America lives in. George Bush, the most extreme case, is so isolated that even showing a negative sign along his motorcade's passage is forbidden. In both the Democratic and Republican conventions, protesters were shut so far away from the conventions that convention-goers might never have known they were even there.
I grew up thinking all of America was a free speech zone, not just special little areas chosen so as to make sure that the elites would never have to witness someone who was angry at the decisions they had made. And if America really was a free speech zone, America might be better off, because there is nothing worse for any nation than for its elites to live in a bubble.
A Hatred for Aristocracy, Inherited Wealth and Power
America was founded in explicit rejection of aristocracy and inherited power. An American, I was taught, bowed to no one. And for most of two centuries, America tended to have less disparities of income and wealth than other western nations. Oh aye, during the gilded age, there were great disparities within America, but they were still less than in Britain, or France, or most of Europe. And America had the most social mobility - you really did have the most chance to make it to the top from the bottom (though this remained rare, despite the ideal.)
That's no longer the case - America is the Western nation with the most inequality of any. And social mobility is dropping through the floor - a generation ago it was higher than almost anywhere, but the evidence coming in now is that if you aren't born well off, your odds of moving up in the world are worse than they have been in generations. Meanwhile the tax code has been jiggered to remove much of the Estate Tax and to benefit unearned money over that earned by an honest day's work. America is becoming a nation where power and money are inherited, where the rich get richer and where the working and middle classes are expected to borrow from their betters at usurious interest rates to make ends meet.
As this has occurred, and not coincidentally, Americas trade, balance of payment and government deficits have soared. Its savings rate has crumbled to the point where it is less than zero; to where the rest of the world is sending most of its savings to the US, and all those savings can barely keep the US economy above water.
The right thing to do, the American thing to do - to fight against entrenched wealth and power, especially multi-generational money, would have left the US stronger economically. The collapse of demand caused by sending profits preferentially to the rich and corporations was the prime cause of the last Great Depression.
Be American
Those of us who grew up in other countries; those of use who are America's real friends, want what all good friends want for those they care for - that you live up to your own ideals. That you be the nation we know you can be. A bastion of freedom; a nation with the highest respect for civil rights; a country that never gives up "a little freedom for a little safety" and finding neither. A country that doesn't torture, that believes that pre-emptive war is never excusable.
And we want it for you not just because it'd be best for the rest of the world, though it would be, but because it would be best for you. You would be safer, more prosperous, less fearful and have a more assured future if you lived up to the best of what it means to be America - to be American.
So, on July 4th, on your birthday, this is my wish for America and for Americans - that you remember that the right thing to do morally is almost always the right thing to do pragmatically. There is no choice between "freedom and safety"; there is no choice between prosperity and massive inequality; there is no choice between generosity and fiscal prudence and there is no such thing as "managed free speech".
Be the America the world loved. Be the America you can be proudest of - the one that does not torture, that treats all men as equal and with unalienable rights. Be the America that rebuilt Europe and that lends a helping hand to countries like Afghanistan. Be the America that would never invade a country that had not attacked you first. Be the America that is about lifting all boats and not just a few.
Be that America, and we will all be Americans.
Ian Welsh July 4, 2007 - 1:02pm
Saturday, October 20, 2007
THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE
The Declaration of Independence: A Transcription
IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.
We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.
The 56 signatures on the Declaration appear in the positions indicated:
Column 1
Georgia:
Button Gwinnett
Lyman Hall
George Walton
Column 2
North Carolina:
William Hooper
Joseph Hewes
John Penn
South Carolina:
Edward Rutledge
Thomas Heyward, Jr.
Thomas Lynch, Jr.
Arthur Middleton
Column 3
Massachusetts:
John Hancock
Maryland:
Samuel Chase
William Paca
Thomas Stone
Charles Carroll of Carrollton
Virginia:
George Wythe
Richard Henry Lee
Thomas Jefferson
Benjamin Harrison
Thomas Nelson, Jr.
Francis Lightfoot Lee
Carter Braxton
Column 4
Pennsylvania:
Robert Morris
Benjamin Rush
Benjamin Franklin
John Morton
George Clymer
James Smith
George Taylor
James Wilson
George Ross
Delaware:
Caesar Rodney
George Read
Thomas McKean
Column 5
New York:
William Floyd
Philip Livingston
Francis Lewis
Lewis Morris
New Jersey:
Richard Stockton
John Witherspoon
Francis Hopkinson
John Hart
Abraham Clark
Column 6
New Hampshire:
Josiah Bartlett
William Whipple
Massachusetts:
Samuel Adams
John Adams
Robert Treat Paine
Elbridge Gerry
Rhode Island:
Stephen Hopkins
William Ellery
Connecticut:
Roger Sherman
Samuel Huntington
William Williams
Oliver Wolcott
New Hampshire:
Matthew Thornton
IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.
He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.
We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.
The 56 signatures on the Declaration appear in the positions indicated:
Column 1
Georgia:
Button Gwinnett
Lyman Hall
George Walton
Column 2
North Carolina:
William Hooper
Joseph Hewes
John Penn
South Carolina:
Edward Rutledge
Thomas Heyward, Jr.
Thomas Lynch, Jr.
Arthur Middleton
Column 3
Massachusetts:
John Hancock
Maryland:
Samuel Chase
William Paca
Thomas Stone
Charles Carroll of Carrollton
Virginia:
George Wythe
Richard Henry Lee
Thomas Jefferson
Benjamin Harrison
Thomas Nelson, Jr.
Francis Lightfoot Lee
Carter Braxton
Column 4
Pennsylvania:
Robert Morris
Benjamin Rush
Benjamin Franklin
John Morton
George Clymer
James Smith
George Taylor
James Wilson
George Ross
Delaware:
Caesar Rodney
George Read
Thomas McKean
Column 5
New York:
William Floyd
Philip Livingston
Francis Lewis
Lewis Morris
New Jersey:
Richard Stockton
John Witherspoon
Francis Hopkinson
John Hart
Abraham Clark
Column 6
New Hampshire:
Josiah Bartlett
William Whipple
Massachusetts:
Samuel Adams
John Adams
Robert Treat Paine
Elbridge Gerry
Rhode Island:
Stephen Hopkins
William Ellery
Connecticut:
Roger Sherman
Samuel Huntington
William Williams
Oliver Wolcott
New Hampshire:
Matthew Thornton
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