Funding and Crying: Why The Dems Capitulated To One of The Least Popular Presidents in US History to Support One of The Least Popular Wars in US History—A Response From The Religious Left
When I lived in Jerusalem and worked with the Israeli peace movement, we described our spineless Labor Party and some of the allegedly pro-peace intellectuals as “shooting and crying”-first they’d support military action, then they’d lament how terrible it felt to be “forced to stoop to the level of violence” (allegedly by “the enemy”). Nancy Pelosi and her colleagues are now “funding and crying”-first they fund the war, then they say that they are not implicated because having abandoned their promises to not allow the Bush Administration to go ahead with another year or more of war, they now say they’ll “personally vote against the bill” that they’ve approved as a caucus.
No options? They could have mastered a majority of the caucus to agree to not call up the bill, demanded party loyalty on the issue, until the Bush Administration agreed to set a time table (remember, they were asking not for an immediate end of the war, but for an end a year from now!). And they could have mobilized their friends and allies around the country to engage in a media campaign in all districts where they worried about support-focused on why it was keeping troops in Iraq that is “abandoning the troops,” while bringing home was the only sane way to protect them.
Too many critics of the Dems will reply: “They just don’t have any backbone.” But why don’t they? The answer is not that Dems are less decent human beings or less principled than their Republican colleagues who, even in the minority, keep disciplined focus on their own principles (in this case, militarism until Iraq is safe for our oil companies and other corporate bandits).
It’s rather that the Dems lack a coherent vision and ideology from which they could derive strength of purpose that would provide the foundation on which they could easily develop a moral backbone to fight for what they believe in. Thus, for example in relationship to the war in Iraq, they talk about the inability to win, rather than about the moral failure of the paradigm of trying to bring about safety and security by military or political domination of other countries.
While Republicans proudly cling to their own ideology, Dems have allowed the term “liberal” to become a political curse, not because they ever lost an intelligent argument about liberalism, but because they have been unwilling to fight for it. They are liberal about their liberalism. So why should anyone trust the country’s defense to people who won’t fight for themselves or their own views?
As it happens, we in the now-reviving Religious Left want to encourage Dems to embrace a somewhat different, but coherent, worldview, appropriate for the 21st century in which it is increasingly clear in economic, political and environmental arenas that our own well-being depends on the well-being of everyone else on the planet. We understand that the only way the human race is going to survive the next hundred years is if we overcome nationalist chauvinism and embrace our common humanity. And the first step to do that is to reject the 5,000 year old, and frequently disproven, “strategy of domination” with its misguided assumption that Homeland Security is best achieved by military, political or economic domination over others (hard version: wars like that in Iraq; soft version: diplomacy backed by military threats and economic boycotts).
Instead, we need to embrace a new paradigm: Homeland Security can best be achieved by Generosity and winning the hearts and minds of the people of the earth to the view that the US really wants the wellbeing of everyone, not just of our own corporate and political elites.
Last week The Network of Spiritual Progressives, an interfaith alliance of both religious and non-religious but spiritually atuned secularists, bought a full page ad to apply this strategy to Iraq (read it at www.tikkun.org/iraqpeace). Recognizing that many Americans want to know what would happen after the US troops were withdrawn, the ad implored the peace movement Dems to explicitly call for an international force to replace American troops and to conduct an election in which the people of Iraq could determine their own future without being under the rule of an occupying power. It also called for a Global Marshall Plan, not only to rebuild Iraq once it was safe to do so, but to dedicate 1-2% of the GDP of the US each year for the next 20 to eliminating domestic and global poverty, homelessness, hunger, inadequate healthcare and inadequate education and to repair the global environment.
The Religious Left is putting forward here a vision that could answer the misgivings that many Dems hear from their constituents about what will happen next. The NSP plans to back their ideas with a national moratorium against the war plus a “Iraq Summer-2008″ in which it will seek volunteers to go door-to-door in “red” (pro-war) Congressional districts to present its alternative. For Dems to advocate for this vision, they have to be prepared for the inevitable cynicism that the media and the Bush allies dole out to anyone with an ounce of idealism. Yet without the willingness to provide an alternative worldview of this sort, the Dems will continue to fund wars, and then cry.
Michael Lerner is the Editor of Tikkun Magazine www.tikkun.org
As much as I greatly admire Rabbi Michael Lerner for his progressive and humanist achievments within Reform Judaism and ecumenical movements, I take issue with the semantic purpose of the “Religious Left” and “Network of Spiritual Progressives.” The expression of “putting a name on something and you own it” helps to explain why this approach is counterproductive. At it least it is in my own case as an activist, secular and non-believing Jew. Why do thinking people constantly build fences around their own turf with inappropriate religious/spiritual names and keep otherwise like-minded people away ? Pogo had it right: ” I have seen the enemy and he is us.”
Juan Siglo
Calgary, Alberta
Take responsibility for your own blind support for unDemocrats that has led to their war criminal behavior. People like you are why so many don’t vote or vote new parties, and/or Independent.
The self-appointed left leadership is so out of touch with the grassroots it is is pathetic. Don’t you realize you are talking to yourself?
Until the unDems announce they are against the US Empire and militarism it is one heartbreak after another for their taken-for-granted voters.
You can’t work for peace and vote for war.
Listen to yourself, rabbi: Democrats (i.e.liberals)…
“lack a coherent vision and ideology…(to) derive strength of purpose…(to) provide the foundation…(to) develop a moral backbone …(to) fight for what they believe in.”
Total crap.
The Democrats are a capitalist political party whose first, last, and only loyalty is and ALWAYS HAS BEEN to corporate power, the power elite, big business, bourgeoisie, ruling class, military industrial complex, national security state, entrenched institutions of political, social and economic power etc. etc. etc. (pick your own description)
As a matter of fact, the Democrats already HAVE “a coherent vision and ideology”, “strength of purpose”, “foundation,” (whatever the hell that is), and “moral backbone”. They ABSOLUTELY DO fight for “what they believe in”.
Which is:
To preserve, protect, defend and extend throughout the globe CAPITALISM’S domination, rights, priviledges, power, prerogatives, and (above all) PROFITS.
You suckers STILL hate Ralph Nader, don’t you?
Sorry rabbi, but you’re full of it.
Silk purse out of a sows ear. Watching what is going on its going to be tough to convince me that the Dems are any different and not just a bunch of “me too” types.
The problem with the idea of “religious left” activism is that we need to keep religion out of politics. The religious left will always be outflanked by the religious right. Either religous institutions are to be lobbying groups with political influence or they’re not. We can’t have it both ways. I would advise progressive and liberal religionists to join and participate in secular issue oriented groups but to leave their church, synagogue, mosque or temple out of it.
The Religious Left …I don’t know if I’ve ever seen the term before. It feels oxymoronic at first glance. Religions and their branches, generally, have that totalitarian and tribal nature that makes them of immediate suspect, even if they proclaim to be good/righteous (and they all do). I agree with much of what this article says, but there’s a poison mixed into its source. Why can’t the Rabbi just come out as a secular man, no mention of that hopelessly dividing factor of religion? I can trust a man, but not a religious man.
The democrat’s don’t want to end the Iraq war, if they did they would stop the funding for the LARGEST EMBASSY IN THE WORLD JUST ABOUT COMPLETE ON THE TIGIS RIVER IN BAGHDAD AT THE COST OF $1 BILLION DOLLARS. Now you know
I think it best if progressives include our many factions: pro-environment, spiritual, anti-war, pro-international law, anti-empire, anti-capitalist, pro-diversity, pro-GLBT, anti-racism/pro-equality, pro-feminism, pro-youth rights, pro-constitutional innovation, and more. This should include religious and spiritual progressives. I would rather the American progressive citizenry (and the “Progressive Community” here at CommonDreams) adopt an approach that creates progressive unity with internal diversity. Americans are a deeply religious people. We have a high-percentage of people who believe in religion and spirituality. If we welcome spiritual progressives and many others with a mainly progressive worldview, we can grow in influence. Dr. King is a great example of a spiritual progressive. I think Michael Lerner is too. I particularly like his distinction between domination and generosity. Lerner says to “reject the 5,000 year old, and frequently disproven, ’strategy of domination’” Instead he proposes a foreign policy based “generosity” and pursuing the humanity and well being of all. That sounds like a core of what it means to be progressive. I welcome Lerner’s views. Our Constitution forbids the establishment of a single official religion, not an abandonment of spiritual and religious values as part of the discourse of public policy.
Ive actually met Lerner at some point and he is a nice guy and all but ……
There is absolutely no place for religion in politics. All you gotta do is look around you and all over the world and this stark truth hits you in the face.
Reading the responses, there’s a lot folk wanting a white knight to ride in and save the day. People seem to be saying, “Hey, we voted to end the war, so end it already.” Right, that’s exactly how women got the vote, how anti-trust laws were established, and civil rights were won, by voting and whining.
This whining is nothing but the endless capacity of the left to turn against itself because of everyone’s personal litmus test: religion, capitalism, or whatever particular issue they are most passionate about. Nothing wrong with that sort of passion at a personal level, though expecting to see your passions writ large in the politicians you voted for is historically vacuous and strategically foolish.
The comparison I’d like to make here is to living with AIDS, which I’ve done for over two decades now. You don’t ever beat it, but you wake up every day determined to beat it. The Bush administration is like AIDS; there is no immediate cure, but there are things to do that are more effective than others. There are only imperfect solutions, but that doesn’t mean that the long term goals become less important just because attaining them is more difficult. You build a team and you fight.
Our job is to make the Democrats more effective, and there are many ways up that mountain. Even if it’s not a job we relish, it’s the job we have. Whining about their notable failures isn’t going to get the job done. Wishing they would immediately demilitarize America is only daydreaming. Looking for white knights is just a waste of time.
I agree with much of the sentiment in this article, but would quibble a few points. We really need to get beyond the left vs. right confused symbolism, and go straight to oppression vs. self-determination — terms with a little more meat to them, self-evident, demonstrable, etc.
I greatly enjoy crafting little thought experiments. You can make a dry-run on them, and nobody gets hurt. Here’s one: Let’s say you belong to tightly orthodoxical religious community (specific religion doesn’t matter). A trusted religious leader, his/her interpretation of the dogma, etc. requires you to do something which comes into direct conflict with the well-being, civil liberties, human rights, etc. of someone else. You are required to shoot, starve, oppress, lie, etc. Or just look the other way, or shut-up about it. Do you vocally disobey your religious leader & the dogma which “required” it?
So, essentially, I’m forced to conclude that regardless of anyone’s faith or non-faith there must still be a higher power: an ever-present and principled secular humanism which bootstraps your faith, and interfaces to people outside your own faith. That is the single greatest problem for Christians, Jews and Muslems to work out in the 21st century.
the dems a liberal party? they are just a slightly less rapacious, more cosmetic version of the fascists among the repugs. most of their squabbles w/the repugs are false drama for public consumption. when was the last time a dem put forward a “great society/civil rights” proposal, anything even slightly altering power relations in this country? that’s right. 40 years ago.
thanks, rabbi lerner. all you naysayers above are missing a fundamental point–the reason the right is in power is because it appeals to the ethical/spiritual leanings of the center–people who desire a more spiritual and ethical worldview and who are alienated by the “secular fundamentalists” of the left.
windcarver,
you’re right–for the wrong reasons.
The right appeals to the spiritual leanings of the center (not their ethics–the right have no real ethics) because the center refuses to accept that a worldview that reflects the truth of our situation is secular. They want the oldfashioned worldview to prevail even though it is hopelessly incorrect (and always was), and as such, their point of view is absolutely useless.
Yes, the right is in power–and is likely to stay there, because the center–the majority–is not, to say the least, very intelligent.
I should add that the pov of the center is useless only to progressives–regressives and fundies find it perfectly useful.
It is not about life and death. It is not about the difference of worldview.
Count the votes.
There are too few peace minded representatives. The anti-war representatives are only in reality anti-war because the USA is again losing another war . Americans like winners: “winning isn’t everything it is the only thing.”
In the Senate, Democrats who support aggression in the Middle East and in the Americas insulate the President from removal from office.
However, the really sad part is the difference on the war between Cheney and us is that he actively supports the war and we passively support the war.
Much work on our part will be needed.
Arch Stanton is absolutely correct.
People keep looking for a distinction between Democrats and Republicans. They are looking in the wrong place. The distinction in politics today is between the elites and the “masses.” Every member of Congress is also a member of the elite, as are corporate leaders and major corporate shareholders, who are often one and the same. The elite know no borders and have no loyalty to any locale.
Want proof? Look at recent legislation passed by Congress. Who benefited? The pharmaceutical industry benefited from the recent boondoggle Medicare drug law. The banking industry benefited from the recent enslaving bankruptcy law. The energy industry has had a hand in several recent energy laws. Major magazine publishers just got a sweetheart deal from the Post Office, at the expense of small publishers. What legislation has been passed to benefit the people? None that I can think of. In fact, to the contrary, the only legislation that’s been passed recently that has a bearing on the people is repressive in nature.
What did Congress get for passing such industry-favorable legislation? Plenty of bribes … oops, I mean campaign contributions, free meals, gifts, and “junkets.”
A closed loop symbiosis exists between Congress and corporations, closed, that is, to public participation. How do the elite benefit from the Iraq war and the “war of terrorism”? Can you say weapon sales? A burgeoning “security” industry. Oil profits?
If America does not presently fit Mussolini’s definition of fascism, I don’t know what does.
People are fools to vote. The most stunning vote ever would be if nobody voted. That would call attention to the farce that we call representative government and quite possibly might so ridicule the system that real change becomes possible. Before we can hope for political representation of the people we must eliminate private campaign contributions. The Supreme Court considers campaign contributions a form of free speech. To some extent I agree; people ought to be able to use their money to express their political opinions. However, it’s also clear that using campaign contributions as a proxy for free speech means that the rich get more free speech than the rest of us. That’s not very representative. Besides, it’s plainly evident what damage unrestrained private campaign contributions have wrought. Although I’m a libertarian, I’m willing to make an exception in this special case and ban all private campaign contributions.
Dave (Blondie)
Great words, wrong reality. Seriously. Oil’s running out, Earth is melting, and we’re praying for our leaders - and a huge swath of brainwashed Americans - to suddenly see the light? We are a “reactive” people - we catch criminals AFTER the fact, we drive safer AFTER the head-on collision, we oppose war AFTER the costs come home. Hoping and praying and wishing this will change is the reason we are where we are. Just another version of “faith-based” futurism, like “if only people knew how fatal greed can be,” or “if only people knew smoking was deadly,” or “if only people realized food is fattening.” If only…
I agree with Blondie. We should all not vote. Here, have some snuff.
Angel Eyes.
Well, guys, I’ve been describing this country as the one where
even liberals are fascists for a long time.
Liberals can’t be fascists. Only authoritarians can.
“Authoritarian” is the opposite of liberal, but “conservative” sounds better so authoritarians prefer it. It’s like calling the War Department, the “Defense Department”. Or like calling all profits “earnings”. Or global warming “climate change” and so on.
The Dems are ruled by corporate conservatives too. When expressing their preference for direct democracy in our Bill of Rights, our forefathers understood that only the people as lawmakers can control the authoritarian money-power.
Two notable exceptions are Maurice Hinchey, a democrat and my congressman and Ron Paul a Republican and the 1988 Libertarian Presidential candidate. Both opposed going into Iraq from day one.
Great points Joshua and Dave/blondie. Right now I feel like a character that stepped out of a Herman Hesse novel. Having spent the past week or so in some very liberated parts of California, only to return to North Florida, it’s like two separate countries within this one. Even in Florida, there’s a vast difference of consciousness between the Keys and the northern portion of the state, which is under the shadow of the Bible belt. One example is that in California I so seldom saw really overweight people. There is so much biking and so many raw organic salad bars to do lunch at. In my area people are fatter than their cattle. I am convinced their fears around sex and nature, or being natural have twisted their drives so that pleasure gets sublimated into self-destructive activities that lead to self-loathing, and from there, a hatred of others’ freedoms extend. I take it as more than coincidence that all the Baptist churches chanting hell and damnation, fire and brimstone have effectively done their part (along with the overconsumption of fuels and the idiotic “forest management” and/or development that’s wiping out so much green day after day in these rural regions) to make the state quite literally burn. Driving across the state a few days ago, it reminded me of a desert and it made me think of India where the caste system has precluded love and natural human passion. Without love, the land grows sterile… check out the mythology behind that in Marion Zimmer Bradley’s amazing MISTS of Avalon. Science can measure factual things and I respect that, but there are other levels of energetic application that do not conform to science and its linear methods of measurement. Don Juan (from Casteneda) made that clear enough… as did Shakespeare, in “there are more things in heaven and earth than dreamt of…”
“Liberals can’t be fascists.”
AMERICANS CAN.
Cowardice, avarice, cupidity. These ugly human traits are found equally in all religious and political party groups. Labels, Right/Left - Republican/Democrat - Christian/Jew - Islamist/Atheist, are only titles and have nothing to do with the decency, or lack of it, to be found everywhere.
Ipenek,
I cannot remember Angel Eyes (Lee Van Cleef) calling Eastwood “Blondie” but I guess he must have. I know Tuco called him that (I can hear Eli Wallach now).
Anyway, I can’t agree that we should not vote. You are just depriving the system of your own wisdom and experience and guaranteeing that the fascists and their useful idiots have even greater influence.
We need to think about the process. How well have third parties done in the past 100 years? How well has not voting worked? Why do other countries have greater participation and greater satisfaction with their democratic processes? When examining these questions, I am led to the conclusion that our constitution, as innovative as it was when it was drafted, did not set up a very good system for democratic representation.
The electoral college is problematic, particularly with the winner-take-all feature in every state, which makes it extremely difficult for third parties to become viable. The bicameral legislative system(having two houses) with the separate office of president does not seem to work that well either. A parliamentary system with the leader being the prime minister and being chosen by the members seems to function more democratically (though let’s not think about Tony Blair). Also, some nations have proportional systems with parties getting some proportion of representation based on proportion of the vote they garner. And in parliamentary systems, the minority parties can form coalitions and have relevance.
And certainly the problematic interpretations of the Supreme Court, particularly granting personhood to corporations and allowing corporations to participate in the political process, must be undone. And maybe we could eliminate campaign contributions and require those with licenses to broadcast over the public airwaves to provide free time to candidates who have gathered some number of names on petitions supporting their candidacies.
We need to amend the constitution and until we do we will not have very good representation. And amending the constitution is something that many independents and even conservatives have an interest in. That is the debate we need to encourage.
And, in the meantime, with four pure fascists on the Supreme Court (Scalia, Thomas, Roberts, and Alito), we absolutely cannot afford one more, or all of our rights will be out the window and we will find ourselves longing for the good old days of Bush.
I believe we do still need to hold our noses and vote for Democrats, but if you are sick of that, then support amending the constitution so we can finally start voting for people we really like without handing the elections to the worst of the worst.
There are solutions to getting money out of politics. Next to accurate voting, it’s really the #1 issue. One part can be this: allow anyone to give as much as they want. But for each $1 you give to your candiate, you give $1 to the other side, or how many other sides there are, something like that. we can do it.
Too many people have hysterical reactions at the mere mention of the word “religious” or “spiritual.” Get over it. Most people in the U. S. identify with some religion or spirituality. All the endless atheist overkill and blather about how religion causes all our problems is ridiculous overgeneralization. Kings’s movement, Gandhi’s movement, the nineteenth century antislavery movement, much of the sixties peace movement (try Fathers Phil and Dan Berrigan, Rev. William Sloan Coffin, the American Friends Service Committee) were actuated by spiritual impulse and religious people. To the anti-religious folks: “Methinks thou do protesteth too much.” Lerner and the spiritual progressives are not trying to convert anyone or impose any religious ideas or dogmas on anyone. They are simply trying to live out the ethics of their faith. More power to them. These are good ethics, whether Christian, Jewish, Buddhist or whatever. Their Network also is friendly to and fully accepts secular people and even people who don’t believe in God who want to work with them. I’m tired of all the “God Delusion,” “God Is Not Great” and all the other overgeneralized crap by journalists and others who haven’t got the vaguest idea what spirituality is really about. Tolerance, both ways, is the best thing in a pluralistic society.
Siouxrose,
Forget going from California to N. Florida, I can feel like you when I go outside of the city limits into the suburbs. Cross a river, go up a hill and you go from anarchists and artists to Bush-lovers.
Voltare,
Thanks for writing what would have my exact thoughts on this matter…
Voltaire, I “hear you” as they used to say, but ME thinks YOU protest too much the protestations too much of others. Er…
God Delusion, End of Faith, etc. are reactionary outcries against religious violence and religiously motivated terrorism. Let’s just say it: 9/11 caused the spat of western atheist books. You know it, I know it and the people know it. And can you blame anyone for it? People are sick and f-ing tired of religious dementoes, whether they be middle-eastern or our home-grown variety, like a certain recently deceased corpulent example.
However…
Your sentiment is not exactly fitting with your moniker, but I am forced to agree. I am a reformed rabid atheist, but I’ve been convinced that too much good has come from religion and spiritual motivation to just discount them out of hand. We need bilateral understanding here. Secularists have been slapped in the face once too often, they’re warry of “religious” anything, and 9/11 was the coup de grace. This is going to take time, patience, understanding but mostly the open familiarity that only comes with working together. In the mean time the flood of atheist books will likely continue and you know, I hope it does. I can’t remember his name, but there was a rabbi that welcomed atheist criticism because he thought it kept believers on their toes. THAT is the attitude we need.
kivals,
I think you’re right: Angel Eyes didn’t address TMWNN (the man with no name) as Blondie. Tuco certainly did. Arch Stanton was the name on the grave.
“there’s a vast difference of consciousness between the Keys and the northern portion of the state, which is under the shadow of the Bible belt. One example is that in California I so seldom saw really overweight people.”
Yes, consciousness is all about a person’s weight.
Nothing else in life matters.
I pity the world.
Voltaire,
I am a Pascallian agnostic, and I agree with you.
I do have a problem with pseudo-spirituality and it’s charlatans (as I have a problem with religious charlatans).
IMHO, there is a problem with “spirituality” focused on “me, me, me.”
“Lerner and the spiritual progressives are not trying to convert anyone or impose any religious ideas or dogmas on anyone. They are simply trying to live out the ethics of their faith. More power to them. These are good ethics, whether Christian, Jewish, Buddhist …”
This is a very important point.
Personally, I am sick and tired of ignorant and/or dishonest people who are trying to sell everyone something they have no idea about
“This one talks about peace, that one talks about peace.” Everyone talk about peace, including the greatest dictators.
It’s important to know the whole context, and not to extract
one theme.
“All the endless atheist overkill and blather about how religion causes all our problems is ridiculous overgeneralization.” It’s also a dangerous diversion.
I am sick to death of someone else’s religion being shoved down my throat! That’s what happens when religion is even connected with politic’s in any way. We have done reasonably well in this country for over two hundred years keeping someone elses religion out of it. I detest people who have to wear their religion like a garment and preach every time they open their mouth. This is one of the biggest things I have grown to dispise about the current Republican party. Their using religion for their own personal gains! Why religious people don’t resent this manuver is beyond me. Progressive’s need to say as far away from the religious aspects as they can get. It only lends crediability to the hacks on the right! And makes them look like they are following in these nut’s footsteps.
Rabbi Lerner says “It’s rather that the Dems lack a coherent vision and ideology from which they could derive strength of purpose that would provide the foundation on which they could easily develop a moral backbone to fight for what they believe in. Thus, for example in relationship to the war in Iraq, they talk about the inability to win, rather than about the moral failure of the paradigm of trying to bring about safety and security by military or political domination of other countries.”
I don’t agree that we Dems (at least those not in DC - I am royally PO’d about the vote on this war bill) are so unfocused. My position on the war is:
1. Why are we there in the first place? The war was built on lies.
2. Why are we staying? Assuming there is some goal for Iraq, it ain’t working. All we are doing is making mortal enemies of the Iraqis we don’t kill.
3. The problem isn’t a lack of will, it’s that the whole invasion was a very, very bad idea in the first place.
For a truly different perspective, please see my new web site: www.prophecyrevealed.info.
With love and respect,
messenger
WHY DO THEY HATE US SO MUCH?? (the all-time most audacious question asked by supremacist xenophobic Yanks and their Fascist allies)
——————————————————————————–
Read that question w/ some whining noise added to it for fun!!!
This is a response from a world citizen to the all-time most naive question I have heard/read so much from the so-called analysts, writers, politicians, and hands of IMPERIALISM in your dishonest media.
In your undying, never-ending hatred for Iran and drowned in an ocean of narcissism, you simply have forgotten, or yet better, chosen to forget, the crimes, inhumane policies, arrogant attitudes, and pain inflicted by you “patriotic” psychos on many a nation, including Persians.
Well, the Northern Christian hypocrisy and self-love on one side; its harsh animosity and blood thirst for Iran is something else. It was evident in your clownish, arrogant President’s speeches and now it’s epitomized by the most blatantly hateful, Nazi pieces of propaganda which Goebbels himself would love you for ), there it comes, suck it and swallow it w/ AMERICAN (w/ a thick R the way you like it) pride and xenophobia.
By what I have read from the likes of you in your very “OBJECTIVE” media (no shortage in the ” objective, informed, and bright” nation of yours), you completely epitomize what the monstrous Northern Christian imperialism means to billions of impoverished, victimized, oppressed masses of the world and what it has done for the past several centuries only in order to secure its own filthy interests derived from your selfish, self-indulged, self-centered, egotistic, materialist, and Calvinist lifestyles and worldviews. If and only if you were interested in the truth and facts, you could easily find the answer by reviewing your friends’ list and also crimes’ list for decades or centuries (for those Euro liberals!!). It doesn’t take a genius, does it?
YOU are the epitome of unfairness, injustice, governmental terrorism and bigotry. These are some of the crimes against humanity committed by your patriotic asses all over the planet (the list would be only too long but I mention a few here):
U.S. sponsored coup against democracy in Guatemala in 1954 which resulted in the deaths of over 120,000 Guatemalan peasants by U.S. installed dictatorships over the course of four decades.
U.S. overthrew the governments of the Dominican Republic in 1965 and helped to murder 3,000 people.
1973, the U.S. sponsored a coup in Chile against he democratic government of Salvador Allende and helped to murder another 30,000 people.
1965 the U.S. sponsored a coup in Indonesia that resulted in the murder of over 800,000 people, and the subsequent slaughter in 1975 of over 250,000 innocent people in East Timor by the Indonesian regime with the direct complicity of President Ford and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger
U.S. sponsored terrorist contra war (the World Court declared the U.S. government a war criminal in 1984 for the mining of the harbours) against Nicaragua in the 1980s which resulted in the deaths of over 30,000 innocent people (or as the U.S. government used to call them before the term “collateral damage” was invented–”soft targets”).
U.S. war against the people of El Salvador in the 1980s, which
resulted in the brutal deaths of over 80,000 people, or “soft targets”.
U.S. sponsored terror war against the peoples of southern Africa (especially Angola) that began in the 1970’s and resulted in the deaths and mutilations of over 1,000,000.
U.S. invaded Panama over the Christmas season of 1989 and killed over 5,000 in an attempt to capture George H. Bush’s CIA partner, now turned enemy, Manual Noriega.
U.S. sponsored a brutal coup that resulted in the deaths of over 70,000 Iranians from 1952-1978.
This doesn’t even mention the crimes in Vietnam, Laos, Cambodia, Grenada, Bay of Pigs and before that the support for and direct involvement w/ Batista’s regime in Cuba, the 8-year war against Iran -including chemical weapons usage- by (the former friend!!) Saddam, death squads in Central America, the 5 decades of Israeli crimes in Palestine and Lebanon (the veto policy), the “missing” in Argentina, and of course the “silent coup” in Algeria in 91 (w/ deceitful cooperation from the French bastards) that stopped the FIS from winning the elections thus plunging the country into a civil war for years…………….
We can never forget your crimes or undying sense of self-love and ego that make the Yankees and their NATO/G7 lovers the most detested nations on this planet, perhaps galaxy.
Now kill as many innocent people as you want. LAUNCH, LAUNCH as a bastard called JAMES WOODS declared on JAY LENO. Brag about Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and Beirut bombings. Brag about killing of the innocent family members of Kaddafi, all the countries’ leaders and revolutionaries who had the guts to say no to your Fascist Empire.
It matters not. The U.S. (and the British disgusting colonialism) will go where the Romans, German Nazis, Mongols, and the rest of the arrogant sorry excuses for humanity went. Now celebrate killing Moslems, Nationalists, and Leftists (not to mention nuns and priests), etc. in your never-ending fire of hatred, supremacy and ego.
Unlike many other foreigners, I am not simplistic enough to think you are just the minority and the “rest” are simply decent, nice, culture-loving individuals. The fact is it’s filth like you that votes for the criminals you call leaders (Reagan and Bushes, Blair, Merkel, Harper and Howard come to mind immediately). Also I don’t think, despite the popular belief, you are ignorant or just stupid; I think you know enough and simply choose to ignore because you are the most selfish, inhumane, robotic bastards this planet has seen for a long time. Your sense of “SELECTIVE MEMORY and JUDGMENT” is proof enough.
I think legendary Orwell got it right in this passage from Nineteen Eighty-Four, an account of the ultimate supremacist empire:
“And in the general hardening of outlook that set in . . . practices which had been long abandoned - imprisonment without trial, the use of war prisoners as slaves, public executions, torture to extract confessions . . . and the deportation of whole populations - not only became common again, but were tolerated and even defended by people who considered themselves enlightened and progressive.”
As a reaction to your actions, our (the South) hatred for you could only be compared to the feelings we have against Serbs, Nazis, Genghis Khan and Alexander the Criminal.
THE NEW ROME WILL FALL…… AND ITS FOLLOWERS, FRIENDS, ALLIES AND APOLOGISTS….. WE’LL MAKE SURE OF THAT. DEATH TO THE U.S. and EU!!!
Saladin74 –
You forgot the CIA coup in Iran in ‘53. You also forget the history of whatever backwash nation you’re writing from. Whereever the hell it is I’m sure it isn’t pure as the driven snow.
You ALSO forget, or perhaps you really disagree, that many or most Americans are completely opposed to the policies of this government and have been throughout the long line of greivances you offer. Don’t be a fool. It’s been this way through history. Rome fell, yes. Do you think there weren’t citizens of Rome against its actions?
Re: your last unhinged paragraph. I’ll say this: I’m for peace and I most definitely “get” where you’re coming from, but put this in your processing bank: I’ll be the first one to paint “Hello Saladin74″ on a cruise missile and send it up your ass if you advocate terrorism. Two wrongs don’t make a right, and self-preservation always trumps righteousness.
Peace.
Dear Rabbi Lerner, Have you really explained why the Democrats capitulated? I think they capitualted because of the same reason just about everyone capitulates. FEAR. Fear of what? Fear of losing what you’ve got, however you got it. One has to think people whose lives are centered on politics are afraid of losing their positions. Afraid of losing the money sources. Their least fear seems to be from the people who elected them … until it’s election time again.
Dear Rabbi Lerner, Even the Republicans “vision” has been challenged of late. Is this the “vision” of might makes right? Is this the vision that government is so big, it must be dismanteled, that all of us must be subjected to the might of capitalism,capitalism uber alles? That the rich get richer while the poor get poorer. I wish you’d be more specific about “visions.” Your words are interesting, but vague in their logic.
Dear Rabbi Lerner –
Organized patriarchal religion is not a liberal platform. It’s about oppression of females. It’s based on a vile book intended to cement patriarchy.
True spiritual is anti-capitalim, anti-monopoly.
True spirituality is against blind obedience and protects freedom of thought and free will.
True spirituality stands against concentrated power in a few hands; against hierarchies.
True spirituality stands against all violence and aggression.
True spirituality stands against domination of anyone by anyone else.
I think you need a new spiritual vision.
To lpenek and other beloved patriots,
A senior US military investigator describing the view all along the US chain of command: “Iraqi civilian lives are not as important as US lives, their deaths are just the cost of doing business…”. (Josh White, ‘Report On Haditha Condemns Marines,’ Washington Post, April 21, 2007).
That’s exactly the point. I am not a diplomat and never have been! We are fed up being nice to you people and your cultures, etc. And I know this is supposedly a “liberal, anti-war site”, but it really means nothing to us, for you and your allies simply have too much blood on your hands for forgiveness (not that most Northerners would even for one minute contemplate that). Only this time “YOUR” pile of corpses is getting out of hand, thus the nation that so vehemently voted Mr. Bush in the second time around (after all the crimes in Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine, etc. I must add) is suddenly growing anti-war. Sadly, you are fooling no one but yourselves.
Every minute, every day we are paying the price for your criminal, Fascist regimes and bloodthirsty, maniacal troops due to the so-called “voter inaction” or the silent approval, a much better term, by you narcissists in the North that cost our brethren, women and children lives, suffering, torture, and mayhem. My side said goodbye to being kind, diplomatic, and other nonsense a long time ago. We have seen the napalms, cluster bombs, tortured and violated bodies way too often. Your freakish bastardly right-wing zealots, ironically, have gotten it right for once! WE ARE AT A HEMISPHERIC WAR.
The lines have been drawn through centuries of your crimes, and hell we are sick of you. You have declared war on us and nothing can turn the clock back. I love physics: “for every action, there’s a reaction equal and as DEADLY AND RUTHLESS”!! Sorry Newton, it’s my version.
And you know what, I lived most of my life in the decadent North; now, if you have successfully!! radicalized me to this point, fathom the rest. You can still imagine, can’t you “peace-loving” Calvinist, McCarthyist patriot??? Await us, (w/ your cruises or w/out) you self-appointed, civilized rulers of the planet!!!!!!!
Saladin –
To quote Indiana Jones, “How many times do you want me to say sorry?”
You’re preaching to the choir. If you still want to come at me with a bayonet, forgive me if I shoot you first, but that’s how it’s gonna be.
How about instead you try to help us: the factions within the US that are trying to change things for the better. And we’ll try to help you. This isn’t a “hemispheric” war. Come on, you can’t be that dumb. Don’t fall for the right-wing propaganda. This is a war between the “haves” and the “have not” regardless of nationality.
You have it all wrong. You want to attack the workers because the CEO is embezzling. You’re operating on all the wrong levels, man. Here’s a dollar, go buy a clue.