Make Them Sweat The Big Stuff
A society reveals its values, priorities and distribution of power in the way its rulers punish deviant behavior. Here are some examples for you to ponder:
Members of Congress were in an uproar recently over a MoveOn.Org political advertisement in the New York Times titled “General Petraeus or General Betray Us?” The following copy alerted readers to their belief that he may likely testify before Congress as a political General reflecting the rosy views on the Iraq war-quagmire by his commander-in-chief, George W. Bush.
How dare MoveOn.Org criticize a General in the midst of’ Bush’s war of choice, growled Republicans and some Democrats as the Senators rushed to overwhelmingly vote for a resolution condemning the ad?
How dare those many Americans who criticized Civil War Generals, World War Two Generals, Korean War Generals (remember General Douglas MacArthur) and Vietnam War Generals (remember General William Westmoreland)?
This kind of criticism inside Army, inside the Congress and among the citizenry has been as American as apple pie.
How come a similar uproar has not come forth about the many female U.S. soldiers in Iraq raped or sexually harassed by male soldiers who are often their superiors? Where are the generals to crack down on these outrages? This story was documented in a long cover story in the New York Times Magazine some months ago, citing numerous sources, including the Pentagon.
Senators demanded the resignation of Senator Larry Craig (R-ID) caught in a toilet sting operation at Minneapolis airport. Senator Craig - he now says foolishly so - pleaded guilty to a charge of disorderly conduct. For doing what? As Frank Rich described the situation in the New York Times: “He didn’t have sex in a public place. He didn’t expose himself. His toe tapping, hand signals and ‘wide stance’ were at most a form of flirtation.”
Conservative columnist, George Will expressed similar views.
The penalty for Senator Craig is likely termination of his Senate career but not one required by law. Just by pressure from his “pure” Senate colleagues.
Now contrast what should be required of George W. Bush by our Constitution, laws and international treaties to which the U.S. is a signatory nation.
Plunging our nation into an unconstitutional war of massive carnage and cost, and committing numerous, repeated crimes along the way, from widespread torture in violation of U.S. law and the Geneva conventions to spying on Americans without court approval (a felony), does not agitate the Senators as did the airport toilet tapping.
Added to the Bush presidency’s serial and continuing crimes are his bungling and incompetence. He has enriched crooked corporations, burned tens of billions of taxpayer dollars and most seriously, deprived soldiers of sufficient body and humvee armor year after year, which has cost the lives and limbs of thousands of American GIs.
In a US court of law, such behavior would be judged criminal negligence.
Yet, there has been no demand from Congress for his impeachment, or his resignation, or even any support for Senator Russ Feingold’s modest resolution of censure (S.Res. 302 and 303).
Bush’s Justice Department has thrown the book at several plaintiff lawyers for paying people to be lead plaintiffs in securities fraud cases while not pursuing well over 90% of the corporate crooks who actually stole big money from investors and shareholders while paying themselves compensation beyond their dreams of avarice.
If the Department needed a bigger budget to go after this corporate crime wave, they should have requested it from Congress. The resulting fines and restitutions alone would have paid for such an enlarged law and order drive.
I am sure you can cite many examples of public hypocrisy, double standards and inverted priorities from your knowledge and experience. There are many explanations about why and how these powerbrokers and powerholders get away with such behavior.
But let us remember Abraham Lincoln’s observation about the power of “public sentiments.” We need to inform, focus and deliver a different quality and quantity of “public sentiments” directly to our allegedly public servants.
So that they start to sweat the big stuff.
Ralph Nader is a consumer advocate, lawyer, and author. His most recent book is The Seventeen Traditions.
” There are many explanations about why and how these powerbrokers and powerholders get away with such behavior.”
The American electorate is stupid. They elected Bush by a margin large enough to allow the corrupt Supreme Court to throw the election to him.
Such a stupid people cannot expect justice or fairness.
The only question is, how bad will the end of all of this corporatized criminality be?
Awaken,
Just for info, Bush was not elected by the people.
he was elected by the corporations. PAY ATTENTION!
and The AMERICAN PEOPLE ARE NOT STUPID.
We are very aware of what we are going thru. trust me on this….
Where is our “free press” to speak for the reality that the Military are not sacred . . . ?
Where was the MSM to remind us of the many times Generals have been called to correction —
And, let’s remind ourselves again of the shame of the Joint Chiefs “Operation Northwoods” — !!!!
In the Bush attacks on the Generals we have seen 20 go down because they wouldn’t support his deadly deeds — many of them sacrificing their careers to try to tell us the truth.
And then we have the truth of Brig. Gen. Smedley Darlington Butler who gave us “War Is A Racket!” . . . . spilling the beans of the military in service to the elite and war as profiteering.
We should also remember that we have every right to question and challenge our own government and certainly the right to question and challenge our military leaders!!!
Bush was not elected in 2000 — he was appointed.
Recounts have shown that Gore won in Florida –
Some of the big stuff is the way the Bush Administration is censoring what the public here watches through the tv. Last night I stayed up to watch Bolivian President Ivo Morales on the Jon Stewart Show and the picture would freeze over and over again. This is not the first time this has happened. On NPR, if someone is voicing a strong opposition to Bush, the sound goes blank. Right now, this is the big stuff to me. It is outrageous to have this administration treat us all like enemy combatants, just because we disagree with Bush on how to have peace. Its time for our “security forces,” to put their time and energy in finding Osama Bin Laden, and bring him to justice, and stop harassing Americans, as well as killing people from other countries.
Awaken September 26th, 2007 11:37 am
” There are many explanations about why and how these powerbrokers and powerholders get away with such behavior.
The American electorate is stupid. They elected Bush by a margin large enough to allow the corrupt Supreme Court to throw the election to him”
Bush lost the popular vote in 2000.
Lobo Gris
When are you going to make it offical Ralph?
We need you now more than ever.
God help us after Clinton gets the nomination…
Never mind Clinton. She’s a New Yorker who wouldn’t stand a prayer in a national election. Even if there were no computerized voting machines to be hacked. The Red States will NEVER vote for her. And if the California voters are stupid enough to fall for this new Republican ruse in the form of a state Initiative to apportion each district their respective Republican or Democrat winners as opposed to the winner take all concept then it will be O-V-E-R.
There’s still plenty of time for Dick Cheney to throw his hat into the ring and carry on the “good fight” against the “terrorists”.
Couple Cheney with the new bogus legislation that will mandate that the computerized (and highly hackable) voting machines must have a paper trail and we’ll be talking the final nail in our American experiment with democracy.
Because the fact is that even if the machine spits out a paper “receipt” of how one voted the final “count” on that machine can be hacked from within the software. Easily. YouTube “Hacking Democracy” and you’ll see how easily it can be done.
This could be our worst nightmare. Cheney and hackable computerized voting. And Hillary Clinton as the Democratic nominee. What a genius way for the Republicans to keep power. How evil of the Democratic party to not choose a candidate who would be viable to the much needed south. (Although who has any faith in the Democrats a to do the right thing by the Constitution is deluding him/herself).
Our only hope might be to have Ralph Nader run with a populist Southerner like Bill Moyers as Independents and launch a national campaign to deep-six the computerized voting machines and DEMAND paper and ink ballots to be hand counted in each and every precinct of this country by the people. Absentee ballots to be handed in to each precinct the day of the election. Not sure exactly how the details can be worked out but something needs to be done.
That’s just my two cents.
I am ready to pull the handle and flush the US into the bowels of history.
Dear Ralph:;
You are probably the maximum authority on the relationship between corporations and government, so I would like your opinion on an idea. One that nobody here has yet shot any holes in. It’s the apparently ludicrous idea of incorporating We the People to maximize investor return for the shareholding public.
Incorporating We the People into a private, for profit corporation could give us powerful leverage against the financial institutions and corporations of the oligarchy.
We could charge broadcasters a realistic fee for the use of our public airwaves, charge the oil companies for the use of our public lands and a fair percentage from the oil extracted (like Chavez does), charge the mining industry for a percentage of our minerals extracted, and on and on.
If We the People Inc. had equal, non-transferable shares in our trillions of dollars worth of our public resources, then these would officially belong to all of us. The dividends we received from leasing our resources would lift all Americans out of poverty.
As a for profit corporation, We the People Inc. could have an administration that works for us instead of for other corporations. And we could vote to hire and fire them at yearly stockholders meetings according to their performance, just as all other corporations do. The people would make major decisions, not the oligarchy’s politicians.
As a corporation, We the People could decide to do business only with ethical corporations that will not pollute our air, water and land. That would not sacrifice our young for war profiteering. That would give us world peace. That would carry out the democratic will of the people, not of other corporations and financial institutions of the oligarchy.
We could pay our corporate administrators fair salaries from the dividends we accrue and decide how much we want to spend on defense. We could buy out many industries to the point that We the People would be the largest corporation, working for our collective benefit. We would in effect become a direct democracy without corruptible representatives.
We mostly dislike or even hate corporations for good reason, yet we continue to buy their cars, gas, shop at their mega-stores, watch their tv programs, etc.. So if we can’t fight them, why not join them and beat them at their game?
Corporations as faceless machines that produce money often work against the public interest, but their economies of scale guarantee that they will stay on their mindless path until they destroy the planet unless We the People Inc. beat them and win.
We can complain loudly and constantly, but as individuals, we are fairly powerless against corporations. That is unless we turn things on their head and organize by incorporating ourselves.
By becoming a corporation, We the People will be the largest, richest and most powerful corporation against which all others will be forced to compete.
EZEFLYER: I hope Nader answers you.
COYOTITA: Do you think Bin Laden is important? For all we know he might have STILL been on the CIA payrole, presuming he WAS behind 911… notice how quickly he was tossed off the radar and left to get away so that the REAL reason for the bogus war, to get Iraq’s oil, could be pursued. The neocons understood that a good number of American people could NOT distinguish between one Arab/Muslim state and another; they counted on the long legacy of racism to function as a psychic conduit for the hate drummed up by Bush’s call to vengeance masked as justice right after 911. I have met otherwise reasonable people (not particularly well read or educated, however) you say “bomb them all.” Their understanding is shaped by sports and “who wins.” They don’t have the sophistication to recognize the true issues at stake; and they get pumped up with their self-righteous ignorance by the 24/7 toutings of Fox and/or hate radio. Using the analogy of “food for thought,” a great many Americans have eaten shit so long they don’t realize what assholes they’ve become.
Let’s not blame the victim — ordinary, hardworking citizens. It’s not their lack of sophistication — Senate and Congress a case in point — that is hurting the regular citizen of this country, it is the media which you know offers up propaganda for the military and the corporations. Instead of lambasting those who are not in the know, why not work at informing them? Compassion goes a long way.
ezeflyer and Ralph,
Could the “National Initiative” be a starting point? In an article some months ago, Ralph Nader wrote about this tool for making democracy work for the people rather than the corporations. You can learn more here:
www.nationalinitiative.us
http://www.peopleslobby.hypermart.net/nationalinit.htm
Why shouldn’t “the people” take charge? What is it that makes us feel helpless, paralyzed by the mere 5 percent of US citizens who seem to control just about everything. The ruling class, of course, have control of the military, the media, and most of our jobs. Although their numbers are few in comparison to the numbers of “average” Americans, each one of them has a thousand times the political power that one of us has.
The National Initiative could begin to change this unequal relationship.
RALPH: Thank you for the work you do. You have been a (sometimes lone) beacon of compassion and rationality for almost a half a century. It was your work in the sixties that first alerted me to the dangers inherent in the corporate drive for profits. Way back then, my Dad (a Repub) said: “I like that Nader guy. He’s telling the truth! This is important.” Very few have stepped up to the plate like you have. Your new book, THE SEVENTEEN TRADITIONS is what the people I love are getting for holiday presents this year - along with some home-made goodies.
Hank:
Mike Gravel’s National Initiative was the best idea I’d heard so far. It hasn’t gained much traction though. It’s basically direct democracy through running referendums.
Incorporating We the People accomplishes the same thing as the National Initiative in one fell swoop, digestible and of great economic and ecologic benefits for EVERYONE except perhaps other corporations and banks of the oligarchy who would have to compete for the People Inc.’s business by cleaning up their act. On second thought, that would benefit them too!
The sudden, venomous backlash against MoveOn and the NY Times over the Petraeus/Betrayus advertisement reminded me of a similar uncontrolled knee jerk reaction inside the DC beltway about two years ago, when Senator Chuck Durbin dared to condemn Bush’s torture policies in a speech on the Senate floor, in the process noting that several of the approved US interrogation techniques closely resembled those once used by the Nazis.
Holy shit! Talk about hitting a raw nerve!
All at once, chanting condemnation in unison like a great Greek chorus, the mainstream media and right wing megaphone turned its full throat righteous wrath upon the hapless perpetrators of such public sacrilege. Every elected politician of any significance within fifty miles of the Potomac was forced to issue a public statement of repudiation, quickly followed by a full floor vote Senate resolution, just to cement the nation’s total damnation formally into place for posterity.
No pundit or politician was permitted to remain neutral. And scarcely no one in all of official Washington arose to mutter a word on the malefactors’ behalf.
In retrospect, the ritual cleansing was also much like the 60 Minutes/Dan Rather forged document imbroglio that hit right before the 2004 Presidential election, when the background subject was an investigative peek at George Bush’s National Guard record from the Vietnam era.
Could there be a deeper message here?
Might it just be that the biggest knee jerk spasms are reserved for those issues where the neo cons know they are most vulnerable - where they have the most to hide from the restless natives stirring out in the hinterlands - because their callous hypocrisy towards other people’s pain is likely to be put most starkly on display?
Bill from Saginaw
We are the PEOPLE. Government is only one of the many vehicles we have at our disposal to accomplish our Will. Elected officials are the chauffeur we have hired to drive our vehicle called Government. Seems our chauffeur has become reckless. Little people are being killed and maimed by our vehicle because of the actions of the chauffeur. Maybe some prison time will help sober him up. Maybe he will listen only to a hangman’s noose from an International Court?
As you may already know, the World Court does not use the death penalty. And no matter that under the American Culture death is deserved, I have hopes of someday seeing President Shit-for-Brains in the dock before a better court than any we now have here.
Veteran ‘66-68
Ralph,
Great article — as usual. We’re onboard with you.
I wish I could afford law school ($80K here!). I’d become a pain in the system’s ass with a little more clout myself…
http://www.ontheissues.org/Ralph_Nader.htm
We needed Ralph Nader as President in 2000.
We needed Ralph Nader as President in 2004.
We NEED Ralph Nader as President in 2008.
Never before as we do now.
We also need a good blog to descuss Nader Politics…Any ideas? know of one?
Mr. Nader,
I had the opportunity to hear you speak in Las Vegas, and as usual it was both refreshing and enlightening. I am sure you are well aware that there are many progressives reading articles and posting on CD asking what we can do to change the leadership in this country. Without typing paragraph after paragraph outlining how our Commander in Thief shredded the Constitution, the Congress (both parties) enabled Bush and his crew to hijack the most powerful branches of government in this country, and enabled King George and his cronies to pilfer billions of dollars while bankrupting our country, the people who post here already are well aware of this, as I am sure you are too. We take to the streets in protest, but the numbers are too few. The majority of the populace in this country places greater emphasis on the winner of “American Idol” than electing a president. All of us who post on CD are tired of seeing the bullshit and daily violation of several domestic and international laws by the worst Presidential Administration and Congress in American history. Short of revolution, is there any legal path we can take to punish these assholes for the irreparable damage they have done to this country and others? I fear that the answer is “no,” or it would take forever to go through the legal system and cost millions of dollars to even brush lint of these morons’ customized suits. Mr. Nader, what are your recommendations?
i didn’t ever like Nader before….to my shame really. he is very profound and valuable. listened to too many other people, now i have my own mind and i’m impressed with his stuff.
You’ll never come upon a truer soul than Ralph Nader. Some say he doesn’t even own a car. He does nothing for his own betterment. He only endeavors to improve the American condition. We haven’t seen his kind since John Adams who refused to join any party even at his own political peril because he knew the evils they would stoop to.
These are rare men you encounter once in a lifetime if you’re lucky.
pacplyer
Yeah, Ralph we need you now more than ever — to split the vote to assure the Republicans (who were your biggest financial backers in 2004) are assured to win the election.
We need a Republican president to make sure we invade Iran if Bush doesn’t do it before he leaves office. Oh, and don’t forget to make sure the billionaires get tax cuts. And to feed the military-industrial complex instead of rebuilding our infrastructure. And to prevent anything at all to provide health care for 40 million uninsured.
Go Ralph go!
NOT!
claudius September 26th, 2007 11:47 pm
“Short of revolution, is there any legal path we can take to punish these assholes for the irreparable damage they have done to this country and others?”
I am not Ralph but sadly the answer is no. A group of Viet Nam veterans tried to sue Robert McNamara after the Viet Nam war for his actions as Secretary of Defense. The courts determination was that he could not be sued for official decisions he made while acting in an official capacity as an official of the U.S. government.
The only thing that can be done is impeachment which Nancy Pelosi has unilaterally taken off the table.
Lobo Gris
Ralph, you were my number one idol since my youth, but you blew it all when you ran for President in 2000, and siphoned just enough votes away from Al Gore to elect the Texanazis Bush and Cheney. Take responsibility for this ongoing catastrophe and do what you can keep Republicans away from the White House forever.
Some people, like Dragonslayer, never learn the lessons in life about having the courage of your convictions. They use terms like responsibility and heap abuse on someone else, for the way things turned out, trying to negate their own responsibility for the results. Imagine if all those ready to crucify Ralph Nader for these years of suffering under George W. Bush, had in fact voted out of courage instead of fear? Dragonslayer and others who continue to blame someone else for their lack of courage in voting their conscience, have another go at it this coming election. If we have more of the same after the dust settles, it is because they lack the courage necessary for a true democracy.
You’re right. Really big stuff, like the over four million - that’s million - Iraqi civilians displaced by Bush’s war is barely looked at while paltry matters are often examined under a microscope.
First, I agree that criticism of the general is well founded. The most casual follower of Bush sound bites in the months leading up to his report would have noticed the president’s reiterated “Let’s just wait to see what General Petraeus has to say” and wonder “Gee - could it possibly be that there’s a reason for Bush’s near gloating level of confidence in the forthcoming report?”
Bush’s incompetence is complete. He’s not even a good liar. It still boggles my mind that about half the nation voted for him, twice. I wonder if anything can be done to address public gullibility. Maybe current events should be stressed like never before in high school.
That said, I’m frankly not a fan of how the ad was done - the “betray us” thing. Name calling and other sophomoric tactics don’t serve to promote thoughtful discourse, as recently demonstrated by the president of Columbia U.
Henry Kissinger (PBUH) once told the true story of two bank presidents who made mistakes. The one who made a $900,000 mistake went to jail; the one who blundered away billions of dollars was never held accountable by anyone. One was the Pres. of a small black-owned bank, the other was the Pres. of the Bank of America. So of course a toe-tapper looking for quicky sex loses his career and the killer of a million Iraqis can expect different treatment. As Kissinger said, if you are going to screw up, make it a catastrophic screw-up so that you can get away with it. People understand small screw-ups too well.
Nukes from North Dakota’s Minot Air Force Base shipped to Louisiana were intended for the Middle East. Those “B-52 Nukes were Headed for Iran, Not For Decommissioning, but the Air Force refused to fly the weapons to Middle East theater.
The mission was aborted due to internal opposition within the Air Force and U.S. Intelligence according to reliable sources:
http://www.oregontruthalliance.org/?q=node/245
Did Cheney issue the order to send nukes to the Middle East
as part of the Pentagon’s highly classified PROJECT CHECKMATE ? Since June 2007 the U.S. Air Force has been working on an attack plan for Iran 2007, around the same time that Cheney was also working on a joint Israeli-U.S. attack scenario on Iran.
Will Congress call Cheney, and his puppet Bush to account? And if not, why not?
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Coyotita September 26th, 2007 4:38 pm
“Let’s not blame the victim — ordinary, hardworking citizens. It’s not their lack of sophistication — Senate and Congress a case in point — that is hurting the regular citizen of this country, it is the media which you know offers up propaganda for the military and the corporations. Instead of lambasting those who are not in the know, why not work at informing them? Compassion goes a long way.”
My thoughts exactly, thanks for posting it first.
Lobo Gris
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trippin September 27th, 2007 7:57 am
“Yeah, Ralph we need you now more than ever — to split the vote to assure the Republicans (who were your biggest financial backers in 2004) are assured to win the election.
We need a Republican president to make sure we invade Iran if Bush doesn’t do it before he leaves office. Oh, and don’t forget to make sure the billionaires get tax cuts. And to feed the military-industrial complex instead of rebuilding our infrastructure. And to prevent anything at all to provide health care for 40 million uninsured.
Go Ralph go!
NOT!”
After we voted the Democrats into office in 2006 they not only haven’t done their jobs, they haven’t even tried. My take on it is that they think they can just coast along doing nothing, watching Bush self implode, and they will win in 2008 by default. Wrong IMO. We didn’t elect them to just coast. We elected them to do the hard things that need to be done because they are right. What did we get? A Speaker that took impeachment off the table before she was even elected to the position. And we got a bunch of whining about how they can’t beat a filibuster or override a veto. Both are wrong factually.
The Democrats could stop the war anytime by simply not funding it. They don’t even have to let a spending bill out of committee, and if there is no bill it can’t be filibustered or vetoed.
My take on it again, the Democrats are scared that if they do stop the funding they will be labeled as not supporting the troops. Not supporting the troops is lying to put them in harms way and getting almost 4,000 of them killed and almost thirty thousand of them wounded. They are also scared that if things get worse in Iraq after the defunding that they will be blamed. We heard the same thing about Viet Nam which ended drawing out that war for over ten years with 58,000 dead before it was over. The end result? We still left in 1975 in an ignoble retreat, helicoptering people off the embassy roof and pushing the helicopters off into the sea when they reached the waiting carriers.
The Democrats have a chance to do the right thing here and avoid a repeat of the Viet Nam fiasco. And that is what they get paid the big bucks for, not whining about how they can’t do this or they can’t do that when they can.
Don’t tell me to wait until 2008 when the Democrats will have a big enough majority to get us out. I watched the Democratic candidate debates last night and none of the three front running candidates would even promise to have our troops out by the end of their first term in 2013.
As for impeachment, we have the worst president in U.S. history that has blatantly violated the constitution, the law, international treaties, and the Democrats won’t even try to impeach him. My God, the Republicans impeached Clinton for lying about getting a BJ in the White House.
So no don’t expect me to support or vote for the Democrats in 2008 if they refuse to stand up and do the right thing now. And I’m one of the voters they need, an independent swing voter. Isn’t it a shame that in this country neither one of the two major parties can attract enough voters on their own merits to be able to win elections on their own without help from independents? Both parties IMO need to take a close look at themselves and see what they are doing wrong, and correct themselves if they want to remain viable. The voters, myself included, in this country are crying out for competent leadership that will turn the country around and head it in the right direction, rather than in the direction that the so called elites have been taking us. As of right now I don’t see that and a majority of the rest of the people in the country don’t either.
Lobo Gris
Nader I don’t blame you for Bush’s election. I blame both the American public falling into the two party trap, and the Dems for not actually being a party we can believe in in the first place.
My only hope is that you work harder to get the Greens endorsement if you run this time. I feel the need to support the party I am a part of, and to build on their message and cause.
I ran with the help of the Greens for my college board in ‘04 with only $200 and almost won. I was 21. If I could do it, we all can do it. Let’s not just vote Green or Independent, let’s all run for office.
Look at your local elections, and see what is going uncontested, and then run. For a lot of races, you don’t even need a party affiliation. Come on, there is no excuse for uncontested races. We are asleep at the wheel here.
There’s more you can do than just vote… I encourage DragonSlayer to quit with the blame game, accept responsibility, and have the same kind of courage Nader has to run for office.
My last post appears to have been deleted, so I’ll try it again (some venue for free speech we have here).
I don’t think electing a Democrat is the answer because the Federal Government is too corrupt. The bigger the Federal Government, the less power we have. That’s why I think Ron Paul is right when he says we need to return the power to the states.
Ralph Nader himself pointed out that Hilary is on the Defense Committee, so if she really wanted to lower help poor children she would cut defense spending, but she doesn’t.
Barack Obama has talked about going into Pakistan and increasing foreign spending by 50 Billion. I can see going into Pakistan right after 911, but it’s kind of late to go invading that country now.
Ron Paul wants to down size the Federal Government and give all the power to the states. That would give the people more control, and put a check on the military industrial complex.
See “Why We Fight” preview at whywefight.com
Go to youtube.com and check out Ron Paul in the Fox Debates. No one is more out spoken against the war than Ron Paul. Do a search on “Ron Paul Calls for End to Drug War”
Check out the Ron Paul Posts on Digg com and be sure to search on ” How our financial system really works” This explains how the corrupt baking system actually works.