I’m From the Government and I’m Here to Help

The Reagan era in American politics is about to end, and we have George W. Bush to thank for its demise.

In this respect, it doesn’t matter who wins the Democratic nomination or even who wins the general election in the fall. I was going to try to write this column without using the word paradigm, but already I’ve failed: Regardless of who takes the oath of office in January, the paradigm that reigned for nearly three decades-the notion that government is useless, if not inherently evil-is no longer operative.

All three of the remaining presidential candidates propose a far more activist role for government. Even John McCain, who tells conservatives he’s a Reagan disciple, proposes far-reaching government action on issues such as climate change, high energy prices and the mortgage crisis — problems that are supposedly better left to the cruel genius of free markets, according to the old paradigm that Bush has pushed to absurd extremes.

It took a leader of the Decider’s uncommon gifts to kill the philosophy he worships. To be fair, there is one area in which he has been the most proactive of presidents, to our nation’s lasting discredit: violating the basic rights of citizens and noncitizens alike in the name of his “war on terrorism.”

Otherwise, he has interpreted Reagan’s small-government mandate as an excuse — or an instruction — to abdicate government’s most fundamental responsibilities. Anyone who wants to argue this point need simply remember the “heck of a job” our government did in handling the devastation from Hurricane Katrina.

Almost every day, there’s more evidence that 2008 is turning into one of those watershed years in American politics — 1980, say, or 1968, or even 1932. You can start with the fact that the Democrats are poised to nominate the first African-American major-party candidate for president.

Even more telling, though, are the polls showing that soaring numbers of Americans believe the country is heading in the wrong direction — more than eight out of 10, according to a new Washington Post/ABC News poll — and that Bush’s popularity has fallen to historic lows.

The grinding occupation of Iraq is only partly responsible for the nation’s discontent. Decades of government inattention have allowed chronic problems to grow and fester and putrefy and … well, we’ll abandon that metaphor lest it turn into something that no one wants to read over breakfast, but you get the idea.

It turns out that Americans don’t want their leaders to simply shrug, as George Bush shrugs, at the fact that 47 million citizens do not have health insurance. It turns out that Americans don’t want their leaders to simply tsk-tsk, as George Bush tsk-tsks, at the wrenching economic dislocations that stem from globalization.

It turns out that if government declines to adequately regulate or even monitor the financial system, unfettered markets can make catastrophic blunders. When Joseph Schumpeter wrote admiringly of how capitalism was buffeted by the “perennial gale of creative destruction,” I doubt he was talking about exotic mortgage-backed securities so complicated that nobody really understood how much risk was being undertaken, or by whom. I also doubt that families facing foreclosure are much comforted by being told that they’re playing an essential role — that of loser — in classical free-market theory.

Evidence suggests that Americans are tired of a government that is slavishly beholden to a rigid do-nothing ideology — and that they’re ready to punish the president’s party for its ineptitude and lassitude. Republicans have gone 0 for 3 in special elections this year for House seats, most recently losing a Mississippi district that gave Bush a 62 percent landslide margin in 2004. What a difference four years can make.

Throughout the year, the Democratic primaries have drawn far more voters than the Republican contests. Democratic coffers are brimming and the party is bringing in millions of new voters. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are glamorous and exciting candidates, but this Democratic surge isn’t all about them. It’s also about the Republican Party’s utter exhaustion. Since Ronald Reagan’s first term, Republicans have set the nation’s ideological agenda. This was true even during the Clinton years. But it’s not true now.

Party leaders speak of the need to refurbish the “Republican brand.” The problem goes far beyond packaging, though. It’s not that the box needs to be more colorful, it’s that the ideas inside have long since gone stale.

–Eugene Robinson

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27 Comments so far

willybill May 16th, 2008 12:53 pm

Bullcrap..It’s not that we want MORE government. We want HONEST government and do not want government where it DOES NOT BELONG. DO not shove this crap down out throats!

ppeters May 16th, 2008 1:48 pm

The general feeling is that the government of Myanmar is the most evil on this planet because they refuse help from the US for their countless thousands of cyclone victims. But pause for moment and ask what you would do if you were offered assistance from the same government that entered Iraq to help the Iraqi people. I’ll bet you would do anything to keep them out. Then consider that this same benevolent gift giver is the same group that managed the aid to Katrina. Your response is most likely to be: “anyone but them”.
I understand that Brownie has offered his personal assistance to the military hunta.

since1492 May 16th, 2008 2:39 pm

If we had honest government it would naturally shrink itself. But since we have political whores instead of statesmen we have a government that feeds the corporations instead of its people. And to make it worse the government makes the people pay for the feeding of the corporations. What a country.
Hoa binh

LeeAnnG May 16th, 2008 2:41 pm

Actually, we do need more government in some areas and less in others. We need more government involvement in building roads; fixing our decaying infrastructures; ensuring that all Americans have access to affordable, quality health care; reestablishing the safety net for our most vulnerable citizens; ensuring that old people get the care they need; helping with housing for the poor and indigent; regulating basic services and utilities; supporting our troops after they have served their country; and a host of other areas geared toward a better and more egalitarian life for all our citizens. We need government regulations that prevent the powerful and wealthy from sucking even more money and power from regular working people.

What we don’t need is government interference with personal choices made by real people. We don’t need a government so small it fits in our bedrooms. We don’t need excessive government handouts to large multinational corporations or tax breaks for the wealthy. We don’t need a drug war or war on terror. You really can’t have a war on a noun.

We need safety measures for our borders, better police and fire protections, higher quality schools and day care. There are many, many areas in which the government can play a positive role. Yes, we need more honest government and way more accountability. We also need a president who is a representative of the people - not because he’s a guy you imagine you could have a beer with, but because he is accountable to the voters.

A recent article in Harpers deals with the way in which the president in America is treated like royalty compared to the prime minister of the UK. Just one simple example is that all Americans are expected to address the president as “Mr. President,” while he is free to address even the most seasoned, dignified reporter as “Helen” or “Sam.” This as opposed to a reporter’s response to Tony Blair to the effect of, “Hey, Tony. That’s bull and you know it.” There’s something wrong with a president who expects total subjugation of the citizens in a democracy.

Government is not the enemy. It can be a force that benefits its citizens or it can be a force that damages. Unfortunately, the Republican-run government of the US has been in damage mode for a long, long time. It would be a grand thing if that could change.

hamster May 16th, 2008 3:45 pm

Lee Ann
Beautifully said. Another thing to add to your list of what government should be doing is energy policy: encouraging and fostering growth in safe, renewable energy and conservation, and kickstarting the green economy.

willybill May 16th, 2008 4:36 pm

My apologies for the use of “our” in my first post. “My” would have been a better choice. I have no right/need to speak for the group on CD.

My point being that if we used the government offices that are already in existence with integrity and efficiency, we would need LESS governmental bureauracy to accopmplish all of our needs. The taxpayers money that has been squandered during this administration has been astronomical and obscene. Keep government out of MY private life and being.

balakirev May 16th, 2008 5:20 pm

There are two hands to every government.

On the left hand is located human services, welfare, consumer and worker protection, protection of the rights of citizens, education, health and protection from corporate power and protection of our shared natural environment.

On the right hand is located the national security state, military, spies, prisons, police, invasion of privacy in order to control the lower orders, protection of corporate rights over workers’ rights, executive rights over the rights of individual citizens, corporate rights over consumer rights, the profits of a few rather than protect of the environment ..

In other words, the right hand protects the interests of the economically and politically powerful over the rights of the economically and politically powerless. Last, this hand advocates corruption through privatization and deregulation.

Through privatization and deregulation, the right hand of the state works against and diminishes the left hand.

Interestingly, the left hand is as aggressive against the right.

The right hand of our government has expanded exponentially as compared to its dimishing left hand.

Thus the US has become a lopsided monster that can barely stand upright.

And because the right hand is so enormous, it is increasingly activated to solve problems that normally the left hand deals with. Of course, it fails.

For example, instead of actually developing the inner-city’s infrastructure by using trained local citizens, the right hand attempts to solve the inner-city’s problems by use of police, surveillence, prisons and the military.

It doesn’t work.

anon a mouse May 16th, 2008 6:06 pm

balakirev said: For example, instead of actually developing the inner-city’s infrastructure by using trained local citizens, the right hand attempts to solve the inner-city’s problems by use of police, surveillence, prisons and the military.

I say, when the only tool you know how to use is a hammer, sooner or later everything starts to look like a nail.

rebelnow May 16th, 2008 6:56 pm

It’s incorrect to assume that the Bush administration represents small government, free market thinking. He has expanded the government many, many times over previous administrations,(I don’t have exact figures and I’m too tired to look them up). He and his cohorts have usurped the government, bankrupted it into staggering debt, fed his corporate buddies billions upon billions of tax dollars, bailed out inept financial, and other, corporations, expanded the role of the military, as well as funded, with tax dollars, private armies, and continues to coerce the congress for more and more money to feed his gluttonous regime.

Sorry, that is not free market policy or small government. It’s government for the wealthy, by the wealthy, and its size is staggering!

Samson May 16th, 2008 7:30 pm

If you read the documents from the time of the approval of this constitution, you’d see a great deal of effort in trying to limit what you call the ‘right hand’ of government.

Even the supporters of the Constitution, in what today we see as the ‘Federalist Papers’ took this position. And, if you dig a little deeper than what your teachers and the corporate media tell you, you’ll find there’s another collection of papers called the ‘anti-Federalist papers’. These are from the contemporary opponents of the Constitution who didn’t want to create a new central government so soon after just having fought a long and bitter struggle to get free of the last one.

One key point is that they deliberately tried to create a central government that was as weak as they thought they could make it and still have it serve its role. They deliberately tried to create the office of President as a weak executive (no matter what Dick Cheney’s weird anti-american thoughts say). They deliberately tried to avoid the even the creation of a standing army, as they viewed any permanent military as a threat to freedom. There was no such thing as a federal police force or any sort of federal law enforcement.

That is America. That is America as it was intended to be, a land of the free.

To me, the people who are anti-american are the ones who are creating and using that right hand of government that you describe. One thing I think we need to do is to start calling them that. I personally am starting to like the idea of describing America as this original vision and throwing at those who want a police state the old line ‘if you don’t like America, then leave’.

Samson May 16th, 2008 7:40 pm

Its funny, but addressing the President as “Mr. President” was once a sign of democracy and equality.

The story goes that when George Washington became the first President, there were discussions as to how he should be addressed. Since the world was rather short on republics, people were debating discussing the President as ‘His Excelency’, ‘His Highness’, etc.

It was supposedly George Washington that insisted that as the leader of a nation of free people, that the President should only be addressed as “Mr. President”.

Of course, George Washington would have had the courtesy to refer to the people he addressed as “Mrs. Thomas” or “Mr. Jennings” etc.

SallyUUKent May 16th, 2008 7:42 pm

I am the beneficiary of government that works for the people. My father served in WWII, got the GI Bill to attend college and was just shy of finishing his Ph.D in sociology when he died in a car accident in 1961, leaving my widowed mother pregnant with my brother and we three girls with a single parent to support us.

Without government assistance, having lost our main breadwinner, we would have been out on the streets in no time. Instead, we received government survivor’s pensions to keep a roof over our heads, food on our table and clothes on our backs. All four of us went to college that was paid for by our father’s Social Security and Veteran’s Administration survivor’s benefits. I still wear my Kent State University Class of 1979 ring to remind myself of the gift my father left me, the ability to attend and graduate from college debt free.

Without those government benefits, college might have been out of reach for me and my siblings. My mom can proudly say that she has four college educated children who finished their education debt free. How many widowed mothers can say that in this day and age, with college tuition being so high that few can afford to attend anymore and those who do are saddled with lifelong debt?

Yes, government can and should work for the people. It just hasn’t in too long a time. Look at the FDR administration. That is when government truly worked for the people. It can again, and we need to demand that it does. For too long now, government has worked against the people and only for corporations and the super rich at the expense of the rest of us. Well, I’m tired of scrimping and pinching and worrying about how to survive pay to pay. I’m tired of being up to my eyeballs in medical debt that seems unsurmountable. I’m tired of the sticker shock every time I go to the grocery store or the gas station. I’m tired of spending nights up mentally counting every penny and hoping that I will have enough money to get through to the next payday and wondering if I ought to just consider taking a second job to make ends meet like everyone else I know is doing.

I wonder if I have enough stamina to be able to work 60-80 hours a week just to pay bills and eat. I’m exhausted as it is after my full time day job and I can’t imagine working another 20-40 hours a week on top of that, but it’s looking more and more like I will not be left with any choice but to do just that. Everyone else I know is doing it and hates it, but the higher prices go, the more people are having to take on second and third jobs just to eat and pay bills.

Government is the problem. As in, a do-nothing, sit on its hands and suck money from lobbyists to raise re-election money government. A government that cares more about enriching the super-rich who don’t need anymore help and leaves the rest of us to starve and live in daily fear of how we’re going to make it. The wealth discrepancy is larger now than in any time in history. More wealth is concentrated in fewer hands than any other time. And we the people sit by and let this happen to us because we’re too afraid to challenge the government and call for accountability.

Well, it’s time to stop the madness. If we don’t act now, who knows how bad things will get before election day. We could be paying over $5 a gallon for gas by Labor Day. Food will become so expensive that even soup kitchens and food banks will have to close. No one will be buying big ticket items, meaning the economy will tank even further, and I can already tell you that no one I know is going to use their “economic stimulus” check to do anything more than pay bills. That’s all mine’s going for.

It’s a crying shame we’ve let it come to this, folks. Truly it is. And we’ve no one but ourselves and our apathy to blame. “We have seen the enemy, and he is us.”

ppeters May 16th, 2008 7:50 pm

The analogy given by balakirev above brought an image to mind. We are the little guys in the left hand. The Bush people want to laud their great accomplishments (what are they?) and they clap their applause. guess what happens to those in the left hand. The selfishness goes back to Jan. 20, 1981. Twenty-eight years of getting smashed.

Radio_tec May 16th, 2008 8:13 pm

SallyUUKent May 16th, 2008 7:42 pm wrote: >>It’s a crying shame we’ve let it come to this, folks. Truly it is. And we’ve no one but ourselves and our apathy to blame. “We have seen the enemy, and he is us.”<<

SallyUUKent the good news is that Bush did keep one of his campaign promises after all. He united us against him and all the cronyist, corrupt shenanigans that have been going on since the time of Reagan. He has single handedly undone the philosophy that has paralyzed any attempt by government to secure the general welfare.

But look around today and you find so many people registering to vote, joining activist groups working for change and planning beyond election day to continue the struggle to make this country a decent, enjoyable and proud place to live in free of surveillance, arbitrary encarceration without due process and free of the fear of torture.

I highly recommend Jim Hightower’s book, Swim against the Current, Even a Dead Fish Can Go With the Flow. You will not see these movements on TV News either but they are there. The corporate media will pick it up after the wars have been won and will likely credit themselves for making the change but we will know in our hearts what the real story is.

AlexLawyer May 16th, 2008 11:28 pm

The Republican claim that they stand for smaller government and more freedom is demonstrably a lie. We now have more, and more intrusive, government and fewer rights. This is done under the guise of keeping us safe from terrorism, but the actual results are dubious at best. The Republicans have stoked irrational fears, told outrageous lies, subverted the constitution, flagrantly usurped power and defied Congress, violated numerous laws and manipulated public opinion with jingoism and propaganda. John McCain has been totally complicit in these crimes and offers only more of the same. Whatever Obama’s flaws might be, it is abundantly clear that he is now our only hope, and by disparaging or failing to support him we doom ourselves.

Mike Corbeil May 17th, 2008 5:12 am

” ppeters May 16th, 2008 1:48 pm

The general feeling is that the government of Myanmar is the most evil on this planet because they refuse help from the US for their countless thousands of cyclone victims. …”

WHOLLY agree with you, ppeters; however I just wish to add that not only … as you posted, but the Burmese (I believe that’s supposed to be the correct and original name) govt has not refused international aid, having read that that govt accepted offers from India, China and Thailand, f.e.

“Why the propaganda campaign for international intervention in Burma?

by Peter Symonds

Global Research, May 11, 2008
wsws.org ”

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=8946

Quote: “… The decision of the Burmese junta to selectively accept aid from sympathetic countries such as China, India and Thailand, and not the US, is hardly surprising. …”.

That article similarly addresses the concern the Burmese junta govt has with regards to so-called aid from the U.S. or simply West; including consideration of ‘The Asian tsunami’ and the ‘Strategic interests’ of Western “elites”.

They have a number of “strategic interests” there, very much including trying to gain control of or over the “Strait of Malacca — the major sea-lane linking North East Asia, including China, with the energy resources of the Middle East and Africa”; quoted from the above article.

The following article provides more thorough coverage on the topic of the Strait of Malacca.

“Myanmar’s “Saffron Revolution”: The Geopolitics behind the Protest Movement

by F. William Engdahl

Global Research, October 15, 2007″

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=7072

Engdahl doesn’t speak of only the Strait, but I believe to recall that it’s a more thorough part of the aricle.

Mike Corbeil May 17th, 2008 5:25 am

NOPE, not Burma, but Myanmar is the correct name. Quoting from the above article by Engdahl:

“Behind the recent CNN news pictures of streams of saffron-robed Buddhist Monks marching in the streets of the former capital city Rangoon (Yangon) in Myanmar — the US government still prefers to call it by the British colonial name, Burma ….”

Mike Corbeil May 17th, 2008 5:39 am

Now with respect to the article, it’s another that strikes me as fanciful.

“All three of the remaining presidential candidates propose a far more activist role for government. Even John McCain, who tells conservatives he’s a Reagan disciple, proposes far-reaching government action on issues such as climate change, high energy prices and the mortgage crisis — problems that are supposedly better left to the cruel genius of free markets, according to the old paradigm that Bush has pushed to absurd extremes.”

Sounds good, right? Good things are very easy to state and Bush Jr (among many other people, in turn among the USA’s so-called “elites”) is a living and worldwide known example of this being definitely true.

When cons tell you that you can trust them and while you don’t personally know them [very] well, then what’s the healthy reaction? To NOT trust the person, and regardless of how nice or welcome what he or she offers or proposes to you may seem to you. A lot of idiots bought into the bs words of Bush Jr when he said that his presidential (via hijacking) administration was going to bring peace, justice, democracy, and so on for Iraqis and the world, by supposedly helping Iraqis.

Based on what’s been recently published on Sen. John McCain’s PoW internment during the Vietnam War, how very talkative he was, people have to be ridiculous to believe he’s about doing good today. Sure, he may be right on some things, but he’s so far had only one voice in the Senate, so among relatively MANY people; no real political weight on or of his own. And as president, he’ll do as usual, which is to fold the way the ruling elites demand; behind closed doors, usually.

Similarly enough, for Billary.

Obama has potential, but he has some very serious waking up to do about, f.e., Hamas NOT being a ‘terrorist organization’, which is a label stamped on Hamas by the terrorist organization known as the U.S. DoS; no, not Dump our Ship (or State), but Dept of State. And he has a LOT of making up to do for all of the damn hellbent votes he’s placed as a senator on refunding of the extreme and supreme international crimes committed against Iraq, Afghanistan, Haiti (maybe?), and all other U.S. crimes of major scale that he’s voted in favour of authorizing and/or only for continued funding of these criminal enterprises or ventures of the U.S. govt and its ruling elites.

Continuing to fund crimes of serious nature when it’s worldwide known that this is indeed funding of criminality is to be worldwide perceivable as being complicitly (or stronger) criminal! Yep, Obama and the rest of the lot of fools who’ve been perpetuating the criminal GWoT wars are criminally complicit in the committance of these supreme international crimes!! So he has some VERY serious WAKING UP to do, and a good course on relevant LAWS shouldn’t hurt, as long as he’d have someone like Dr Francis A. Boyle for professor anyway.

(Plenty of articles by and mentioning Dr Boyle have been posted to www.globalresearch.ca and it’s a simple Web search to find the links to these aricles. He’s the or one of the few who are topmost experts on apparently the whole planet, and when reading what he says about the various laws and conventions that apply regarding the crimes referred to above, then it’s immediately clear or obvious that he knows what he’s talking about and that these indeed are good and needed laws. Only Obama, I read anyway, graduated in LAW and doesn’t seem to have much critical understanding of what the courses he took taught; or maybe he’s forgetful.)

Just a few thoughts off of the top of my head.

Mike Corbeil May 17th, 2008 6:11 am

A correction on my second post, above; wherein I wrote, “A lot of idiots bought into the bs words of Bush Jr when he said that his presidential (via hijacking) administration was going to bring peace, justice, democracy, and so on for Iraqis and the world, by supposedly helping Iraqis”, this should have instead said the following:

“A lot of naive and malicious people bought into ….”

‘Idiot’ should not be used when referring to everyone who unfortunately sided with the Bush-Cheney cabal’s BS words, which were strongly obvious to me and many or most people on Earth, but clearly not for everyone in the USA; far from nearly everyone, there.

‘Naive’ and ‘gullible’ (and ‘negligent’) are more correct or accurate for most of the non-maliciously minded people who sided with the Bush-Cheney cabal’s BS; while the rest were either idiots or blatantly malicious.

Mike Corbeil May 17th, 2008 6:26 am

Eugene Robinson additionally wrote the following.

“Even more telling, though, are the polls showing that soaring numbers of Americans believe the country is heading in the wrong direction — more than eight out of 10, according to a new Washington Post/ABC News poll — and that Bush’s popularity has fallen to historic lows.”

That should mean good news for candidates like Cynthia McKinney, Ralph Nader, and Mike Gravel, if he’s still running and has either switched to a different party or will be able to minimally make sure that his name is on the ballots in November regardless of not being the person nominated to be the DP candidate in Nov. Why someone like Mike Gravel would want to bother sticking with this VERY corrupt Dem. Party is beyond my present understanding, but he may have a good reason as Kucinich has had and which is to be able to work on REFORMING the corrupt DP. But I guess or expect that Cynthia McKinney and Ralph Nader will garner more votes than Mike Gravel will, if he’ll have his name on the ballots in Nov., that is.

But will these 80% of Americans wake up enough to realise that the USA needs real regime change and that it’s unlikely to happen with the three main candidates of the RP and DP? Most likely NOT, and that’s if these 80% of the population are all eligible to vote in the federal election, first of all.

I don’t know if these types of polls or surveys are done with only people who are eligible to vote, or if names (and tel. numbers) are taken out of telephone books, f.e. So I am clueless as to what proportion of that 80% consists of people eligible to vote in the USA in Nov.

Mike Corbeil May 17th, 2008 6:46 am

And I do wonder why CD keeps posting articles that present NO real information on the people running to be president of the U.S.; this also applying with other topics, but while they don’t pertain to the topic of this page, so I won’t list any of them now.

CD would do better to qualitatively select from such articles and then slack off before posting more from other people who have NOTHING worthwhile to add. And the truly worthwhile articles will NOT neglect consideration for Ralph Nader and Cynthia McKinney, and their supporters.

Given these faux pas or manières ( http://fr.thefreedictionary.com/mani%C3%A8re , for ‘ways’ or ‘manners’) of CD’s doing and choosing, it gives CD a questionable image, for it’s NOT being [un]-biased, but too biased, instead. Either that, or there’s a lack of manpower behind CD, leaving that there’s a lack of time to be able to do the sort of qualitative selection I’m speaking of.

Articles by BETTER analysts than too many people whose articles are posted at CD would or should do CD a lot of good; to replace redundant worthlessness, and too often-times garbage-worthiness, with [qualitative] content. I’m not saying that all analytical people who have had articles posted at CD and who’ll have more in the future fit what I’m otherwise saying, but it does apply with too many.

A real critical thinker is someone who is ALSO HONEST, and such people would not unfairly omit mentioning and even promoting the campaigns of Cynthia McKinney and Ralph Nader, as well as other good candidates.

(No law prevents us from being able to promote more than one candidate, and they don’t all have to be of the same political party; neither being forbidden by any laws whatsoever. And it’s always important to develop and maintain a healthy or fair way of being, socially and politically.)

CD should NOT be DP-biased, but critically and fairly objective, and that objectivity needs to include respect for the principle of democracy that is poorly represented with MOST political campaign articles posted here as well as at many other websites. Being copy-cat’s fine and even good, for it’s just a question of learning, although being good is only when what’s copied is good, which OFTEN is not the case.

I’ve not seen Dr Francis A. Boyle mentioned in any articles I’ve read here and this is very questionable omission; definitely. But maybe most people with articles posted here don’t know of Dr Boyle; and whoever that applies to definitely should make a point of searching for articles by and about him, there being a number of these at www.globalresearch.ca , f.e.

dougnwagner May 17th, 2008 8:16 am

1932.

“For too many of us the political equality we once had won was meaningless in the face of economic inequality. A small group had concentrated into their own hands an almost complete control over other people’s property, other people’s money, other people’s labor — other people’s lives. For too many of us life was no longer free; liberty no longer real; men could no longer follow the pursuit of happiness. Against economic tyranny such as this, the American citizen could appeal only to the organized power of government. The collapse of 1929 showed up the despotism for what it was. The election of 1932 was the people’s mandate to end it. Under that mandate it is being ended.”

- Franklin D. Roosevelt speaking at the Democratic National Convention in 1936

“Everyone knows, for instance, that rebellions, or even strong ferment, among the slaves in ancient times at once revealed the fact that the ancient state was essentially a dictatorship of the slaveowners. Did this dictatorship abolish democracy among, and for, the slaveowners? Everybody knows that it did not.”

- V.I. Lenin ‘On the Paris Commune’

“The feudal barons of the Middle Ages, the economic predecessors of the capitalists of our day, declared all wars. And their miserable serfs fought all the battles. The poor, ignorant serfs had been taught to revere their masters; to believe that when their masters declared war upon one another, it was their patriotic duty to fall upon one another and to cut one another’s throats for the profit and glory of the lords and barons who held them in contempt. And that is war in a nutshell. The master class has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles. The master class has had all to gain and nothing to lose, while the subject class has had nothing to gain and all to lose — especially their lives. They have always taught and trained you to believe it to be your patriotic duty to go to war and to have yourselves slaughtered at their command. But in all the history of the world you, the people, have never had a voice in declaring war, and strange as it certainly appears, no war by any nation in any age has ever been declared by the people….If war is right let it be declared by the people. You who have your lives to lose, you certainly above all others have the right to decide the momentous issue of war or peace.”

- Eugene V. Debs, Anti-War Speech at Canton, Ohio, 1918

Gail May 17th, 2008 11:05 am

“Riots and the threat of public violence keep emerging world politicos focused on growth, while G7 politicos focus on the next public fleecing benefiting their special interest supporters.” -T.Andros

The fleecing of American citizens made its debut in 1886 when the Supreme Court ruled that a private coprporation was a “natural person”: see Santa Clara County vs. Southern Pacific Railroad. This decision essentially increased the powers of corporations over average citizens because they had more money to hire lobbyists and influence government legistlation.

And then along came the Federal Reserve Act of 1913 which placed the future economics of this country in the hands of a few private bankers. You’ll find plenty of info on this scam at Google.

Enter…Richard Nixon! President “Watergate” took us off the gold standard which gave the Federal Government the OK to run their monetary printing presses at warp-speed; borrow as much as they want-ed to; increase the size of the federal government; and of course, hand the bill to the tax payers.

And thanks to Ronald “deregulation” Reagan, corporations began engineering “hostile takeovers” which encouraged “plant closings, streamling, outsourcing, wage-cutting and job exporting”. Reagan’s policies destroyed what was once considered “respectable” profit-taking and created the monsters of unlimited mergers and “profit maximization” at any cost to US citizens.

The corporate greed continued and gained strength under the green light of Bill “NAFTA” Clinton and written trade agreements of, by and for the corporations whose powers were to be further extended and abused by none other than our elitist, silver-spoon-in-mouth, George Bush II.

How much longer will the citizens of this country allow these corrupt polticians to fleece and humiliate us as they continue to divert our hard-earned money upward?

lancelotlink May 17th, 2008 12:00 pm

Government should serve the people in need, but before it can do that, it should- and must- take the Caterpillar bull-dozers that we send to Israel to bull-doze Palestinian homes, divert them to Washington with orders bull-doze the Pentagon into the Potomac River, then ship them to New York and flatten Wall Street and convert it to an animal park. That would certainly fit into the Schumpeter’s theory of creative destruction.

jsc May 17th, 2008 2:55 pm

Willybill: Honest Government is an oxymoron.

Hamster: We’ve had an “energy policy” for over 50 years. It involves using our military or CIA to assure access to world resources for American corporations. Same thing for Britain.

peaceman May 18th, 2008 1:57 am

LeeAnnG, SallyUUKent, Gail, Dougwagner,

Excellent comments and the quotes posted by Doug!

Thank you very much!

AD May 21st, 2008 8:02 pm

Actually Franklin D Roosevelt took us off the gold standard, because he got tired of those who owned the gold making all the rules.

willybill May 16th, 2008 12:53 pm

Bullcrap..It’s not that we want MORE government. We want HONEST government and do not want government where it DOES NOT BELONG. DO not shove this crap down out throats!
ppeters May 16th, 2008 1:48 pm

The general feeling is that the government of Myanmar is the most evil on this planet because they refuse help from the US for their countless thousands of cyclone victims. But pause for moment and ask what you would do if you were offered assistance from the same government that entered Iraq to help the Iraqi people. I’ll bet you would do anything to keep them out. Then consider that this same benevolent gift giver is the same group that managed the aid to Katrina. Your response is most likely to be: “anyone but them”.
I understand that Brownie has offered his personal assistance to the military hunta.
since1492 May 16th, 2008 2:39 pm

If we had honest government it would naturally shrink itself. But since we have political whores instead of statesmen we have a government that feeds the corporations instead of its people. And to make it worse the government makes the people pay for the feeding of the corporations. What a country.
Hoa binh
LeeAnnG May 16th, 2008 2:41 pm

Actually, we do need more government in some areas and less in others. We need more government involvement in building roads; fixing our decaying infrastructures; ensuring that all Americans have access to affordable, quality health care; reestablishing the safety net for our most vulnerable citizens; ensuring that old people get the care they need; helping with housing for the poor and indigent; regulating basic services and utilities; supporting our troops after they have served their country; and a host of other areas geared toward a better and more egalitarian life for all our citizens. We need government regulations that prevent the powerful and wealthy from sucking even more money and power from regular working people.

What we don’t need is government interference with personal choices made by real people. We don’t need a government so small it fits in our bedrooms. We don’t need excessive government handouts to large multinational corporations or tax breaks for the wealthy. We don’t need a drug war or war on terror. You really can’t have a war on a noun.

We need safety measures for our borders, better police and fire protections, higher quality schools and day care. There are many, many areas in which the government can play a positive role. Yes, we need more honest government and way more accountability. We also need a president who is a representative of the people - not because he’s a guy you imagine you could have a beer with, but because he is accountable to the voters.

A recent article in Harpers deals with the way in which the president in America is treated like royalty compared to the prime minister of the UK. Just one simple example is that all Americans are expected to address the president as “Mr. President,” while he is free to address even the most seasoned, dignified reporter as “Helen” or “Sam.” This as opposed to a reporter’s response to Tony Blair to the effect of, “Hey, Tony. That’s bull and you know it.” There’s something wrong with a president who expects total subjugation of the citizens in a democracy.

Government is not the enemy. It can be a force that benefits its citizens or it can be a force that damages. Unfortunately, the Republican-run government of the US has been in damage mode for a long, long time. It would be a grand thing if that could change.
hamster May 16th, 2008 3:45 pm

Lee Ann
Beautifully said. Another thing to add to your list of what government should be doing is energy policy: encouraging and fostering growth in safe, renewable energy and conservation, and kickstarting the green economy.
willybill May 16th, 2008 4:36 pm

My apologies for the use of “our” in my first post. “My” would have been a better choice. I have no right/need to speak for the group on CD.

My point being that if we used the government offices that are already in existence with integrity and efficiency, we would need LESS governmental bureauracy to accopmplish all of our needs. The taxpayers money that has been squandered during this administration has been astronomical and obscene. Keep government out of MY private life and being.
balakirev May 16th, 2008 5:20 pm

There are two hands to every government.

On the left hand is located human services, welfare, consumer and worker protection, protection of the rights of citizens, education, health and protection from corporate power and protection of our shared natural environment.

On the right hand is located the national security state, military, spies, prisons, police, invasion of privacy in order to control the lower orders, protection of corporate rights over workers’ rights, executive rights over the rights of individual citizens, corporate rights over consumer rights, the profits of a few rather than protect of the environment ..

In other words, the right hand protects the interests of the economically and politically powerful over the rights of the economically and politically powerless. Last, this hand advocates corruption through privatization and deregulation.

Through privatization and deregulation, the right hand of the state works against and diminishes the left hand.

Interestingly, the left hand is as aggressive against the right.

The right hand of our government has expanded exponentially as compared to its dimishing left hand.

Thus the US has become a lopsided monster that can barely stand upright.

And because the right hand is so enormous, it is increasingly activated to solve problems that normally the left hand deals with. Of course, it fails.

For example, instead of actually developing the inner-city’s infrastructure by using trained local citizens, the right hand attempts to solve the inner-city’s problems by use of police, surveillence, prisons and the military.

It doesn’t work.
anon a mouse May 16th, 2008 6:06 pm

balakirev said: For example, instead of actually developing the inner-city’s infrastructure by using trained local citizens, the right hand attempts to solve the inner-city’s problems by use of police, surveillence, prisons and the military.

I say, when the only tool you know how to use is a hammer, sooner or later everything starts to look like a nail.
rebelnow May 16th, 2008 6:56 pm

It’s incorrect to assume that the Bush administration represents small government, free market thinking. He has expanded the government many, many times over previous administrations,(I don’t have exact figures and I’m too tired to look them up). He and his cohorts have usurped the government, bankrupted it into staggering debt, fed his corporate buddies billions upon billions of tax dollars, bailed out inept financial, and other, corporations, expanded the role of the military, as well as funded, with tax dollars, private armies, and continues to coerce the congress for more and more money to feed his gluttonous regime.

Sorry, that is not free market policy or small government. It’s government for the wealthy, by the wealthy, and its size is staggering!
Samson May 16th, 2008 7:30 pm

If you read the documents from the time of the approval of this constitution, you’d see a great deal of effort in trying to limit what you call the ‘right hand’ of government.

Even the supporters of the Constitution, in what today we see as the ‘Federalist Papers’ took this position. And, if you dig a little deeper than what your teachers and the corporate media tell you, you’ll find there’s another collection of papers called the ‘anti-Federalist papers’. These are from the contemporary opponents of the Constitution who didn’t want to create a new central government so soon after just having fought a long and bitter struggle to get free of the last one.

One key point is that they deliberately tried to create a central government that was as weak as they thought they could make it and still have it serve its role. They deliberately tried to create the office of President as a weak executive (no matter what Dick Cheney’s weird anti-american thoughts say). They deliberately tried to avoid the even the creation of a standing army, as they viewed any permanent military as a threat to freedom. There was no such thing as a federal police force or any sort of federal law enforcement.

That is America. That is America as it was intended to be, a land of the free.

To me, the people who are anti-american are the ones who are creating and using that right hand of government that you describe. One thing I think we need to do is to start calling them that. I personally am starting to like the idea of describing America as this original vision and throwing at those who want a police state the old line ‘if you don’t like America, then leave’.
Samson May 16th, 2008 7:40 pm

Its funny, but addressing the President as “Mr. President” was once a sign of democracy and equality.

The story goes that when George Washington became the first President, there were discussions as to how he should be addressed. Since the world was rather short on republics, people were debating discussing the President as ‘His Excelency’, ‘His Highness’, etc.

It was supposedly George Washington that insisted that as the leader of a nation of free people, that the President should only be addressed as “Mr. President”.

Of course, George Washington would have had the courtesy to refer to the people he addressed as “Mrs. Thomas” or “Mr. Jennings” etc.
SallyUUKent May 16th, 2008 7:42 pm

I am the beneficiary of government that works for the people. My father served in WWII, got the GI Bill to attend college and was just shy of finishing his Ph.D in sociology when he died in a car accident in 1961, leaving my widowed mother pregnant with my brother and we three girls with a single parent to support us.

Without government assistance, having lost our main breadwinner, we would have been out on the streets in no time. Instead, we received government survivor’s pensions to keep a roof over our heads, food on our table and clothes on our backs. All four of us went to college that was paid for by our father’s Social Security and Veteran’s Administration survivor’s benefits. I still wear my Kent State University Class of 1979 ring to remind myself of the gift my father left me, the ability to attend and graduate from college debt free.

Without those government benefits, college might have been out of reach for me and my siblings. My mom can proudly say that she has four college educated children who finished their education debt free. How many widowed mothers can say that in this day and age, with college tuition being so high that few can afford to attend anymore and those who do are saddled with lifelong debt?

Yes, government can and should work for the people. It just hasn’t in too long a time. Look at the FDR administration. That is when government truly worked for the people. It can again, and we need to demand that it does. For too long now, government has worked against the people and only for corporations and the super rich at the expense of the rest of us. Well, I’m tired of scrimping and pinching and worrying about how to survive pay to pay. I’m tired of being up to my eyeballs in medical debt that seems unsurmountable. I’m tired of the sticker shock every time I go to the grocery store or the gas station. I’m tired of spending nights up mentally counting every penny and hoping that I will have enough money to get through to the next payday and wondering if I ought to just consider taking a second job to make ends meet like everyone else I know is doing.

I wonder if I have enough stamina to be able to work 60-80 hours a week just to pay bills and eat. I’m exhausted as it is after my full time day job and I can’t imagine working another 20-40 hours a week on top of that, but it’s looking more and more like I will not be left with any choice but to do just that. Everyone else I know is doing it and hates it, but the higher prices go, the more people are having to take on second and third jobs just to eat and pay bills.

Government is the problem. As in, a do-nothing, sit on its hands and suck money from lobbyists to raise re-election money government. A government that cares more about enriching the super-rich who don’t need anymore help and leaves the rest of us to starve and live in daily fear of how we’re going to make it. The wealth discrepancy is larger now than in any time in history. More wealth is concentrated in fewer hands than any other time. And we the people sit by and let this happen to us because we’re too afraid to challenge the government and call for accountability.

Well, it’s time to stop the madness. If we don’t act now, who knows how bad things will get before election day. We could be paying over $5 a gallon for gas by Labor Day. Food will become so expensive that even soup kitchens and food banks will have to close. No one will be buying big ticket items, meaning the economy will tank even further, and I can already tell you that no one I know is going to use their “economic stimulus” check to do anything more than pay bills. That’s all mine’s going for.

It’s a crying shame we’ve let it come to this, folks. Truly it is. And we’ve no one but ourselves and our apathy to blame. “We have seen the enemy, and he is us.”
ppeters May 16th, 2008 7:50 pm

The analogy given by balakirev above brought an image to mind. We are the little guys in the left hand. The Bush people want to laud their great accomplishments (what are they?) and they clap their applause. guess what happens to those in the left hand. The selfishness goes back to Jan. 20, 1981. Twenty-eight years of getting smashed.
Radio_tec May 16th, 2008 8:13 pm

SallyUUKent May 16th, 2008 7:42 pm wrote: >>It’s a crying shame we’ve let it come to this, folks. Truly it is. And we’ve no one but ourselves and our apathy to blame. “We have seen the enemy, and he is us.”<<

SallyUUKent the good news is that Bush did keep one of his campaign promises after all. He united us against him and all the cronyist, corrupt shenanigans that have been going on since the time of Reagan. He has single handedly undone the philosophy that has paralyzed any attempt by government to secure the general welfare.

But look around today and you find so many people registering to vote, joining activist groups working for change and planning beyond election day to continue the struggle to make this country a decent, enjoyable and proud place to live in free of surveillance, arbitrary encarceration without due process and free of the fear of torture.

I highly recommend Jim Hightower’s book, Swim against the Current, Even a Dead Fish Can Go With the Flow. You will not see these movements on TV News either but they are there. The corporate media will pick it up after the wars have been won and will likely credit themselves for making the change but we will know in our hearts what the real story is.
AlexLawyer May 16th, 2008 11:28 pm

The Republican claim that they stand for smaller government and more freedom is demonstrably a lie. We now have more, and more intrusive, government and fewer rights. This is done under the guise of keeping us safe from terrorism, but the actual results are dubious at best. The Republicans have stoked irrational fears, told outrageous lies, subverted the constitution, flagrantly usurped power and defied Congress, violated numerous laws and manipulated public opinion with jingoism and propaganda. John McCain has been totally complicit in these crimes and offers only more of the same. Whatever Obama’s flaws might be, it is abundantly clear that he is now our only hope, and by disparaging or failing to support him we doom ourselves.
Mike Corbeil May 17th, 2008 5:12 am

” ppeters May 16th, 2008 1:48 pm

The general feeling is that the government of Myanmar is the most evil on this planet because they refuse help from the US for their countless thousands of cyclone victims. …”

WHOLLY agree with you, ppeters; however I just wish to add that not only … as you posted, but the Burmese (I believe that’s supposed to be the correct and original name) govt has not refused international aid, having read that that govt accepted offers from India, China and Thailand, f.e.

“Why the propaganda campaign for international intervention in Burma?

by Peter Symonds

Global Research, May 11, 2008
wsws.org ”

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=8946

Quote: “… The decision of the Burmese junta to selectively accept aid from sympathetic countries such as China, India and Thailand, and not the US, is hardly surprising. …”.

That article similarly addresses the concern the Burmese junta govt has with regards to so-called aid from the U.S. or simply West; including consideration of ‘The Asian tsunami’ and the ‘Strategic interests’ of Western “elites”.

They have a number of “strategic interests” there, very much including trying to gain control of or over the “Strait of Malacca — the major sea-lane linking North East Asia, including China, with the energy resources of the Middle East and Africa”; quoted from the above article.

The following article provides more thorough coverage on the topic of the Strait of Malacca.

“Myanmar’s “Saffron Revolution”: The Geopolitics behind the Protest Movement

by F. William Engdahl

Global Research, October 15, 2007″

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=7072

Engdahl doesn’t speak of only the Strait, but I believe to recall that it’s a more thorough part of the aricle.
Mike Corbeil May 17th, 2008 5:25 am

NOPE, not Burma, but Myanmar is the correct name. Quoting from the above article by Engdahl:

“Behind the recent CNN news pictures of streams of saffron-robed Buddhist Monks marching in the streets of the former capital city Rangoon (Yangon) in Myanmar — the US government still prefers to call it by the British colonial name, Burma ….”
Mike Corbeil May 17th, 2008 5:39 am

Now with respect to the article, it’s another that strikes me as fanciful.

“All three of the remaining presidential candidates propose a far more activist role for government. Even John McCain, who tells conservatives he’s a Reagan disciple, proposes far-reaching government action on issues such as climate change, high energy prices and the mortgage crisis — problems that are supposedly better left to the cruel genius of free markets, according to the old paradigm that Bush has pushed to absurd extremes.”

Sounds good, right? Good things are very easy to state and Bush Jr (among many other people, in turn among the USA’s so-called “elites”) is a living and worldwide known example of this being definitely true.

When cons tell you that you can trust them and while you don’t personally know them [very] well, then what’s the healthy reaction? To NOT trust the person, and regardless of how nice or welcome what he or she offers or proposes to you may seem to you. A lot of idiots bought into the bs words of Bush Jr when he said that his presidential (via hijacking) administration was going to bring peace, justice, democracy, and so on for Iraqis and the world, by supposedly helping Iraqis.

Based on what’s been recently published on Sen. John McCain’s PoW internment during the Vietnam War, how very talkative he was, people have to be ridiculous to believe he’s about doing good today. Sure, he may be right on some things, but he’s so far had only one voice in the Senate, so among relatively MANY people; no real political weight on or of his own. And as president, he’ll do as usual, which is to fold the way the ruling elites demand; behind closed doors, usually.

Similarly enough, for Billary.

Obama has potential, but he has some very serious waking up to do about, f.e., Hamas NOT being a ‘terrorist organization’, which is a label stamped on Hamas by the terrorist organization known as the U.S. DoS; no, not Dump our Ship (or State), but Dept of State. And he has a LOT of making up to do for all of the damn hellbent votes he’s placed as a senator on refunding of the extreme and supreme international crimes committed against Iraq, Afghanistan, Haiti (maybe?), and all other U.S. crimes of major scale that he’s voted in favour of authorizing and/or only for continued funding of these criminal enterprises or ventures of the U.S. govt and its ruling elites.

Continuing to fund crimes of serious nature when it’s worldwide known that this is indeed funding of criminality is to be worldwide perceivable as being complicitly (or stronger) criminal! Yep, Obama and the rest of the lot of fools who’ve been perpetuating the criminal GWoT wars are criminally complicit in the committance of these supreme international crimes!! So he has some VERY serious WAKING UP to do, and a good course on relevant LAWS shouldn’t hurt, as long as he’d have someone like Dr Francis A. Boyle for professor anyway.

(Plenty of articles by and mentioning Dr Boyle have been posted to www.globalresearch.ca and it’s a simple Web search to find the links to these aricles. He’s the or one of the few who are topmost experts on apparently the whole planet, and when reading what he says about the various laws and conventions that apply regarding the crimes referred to above, then it’s immediately clear or obvious that he knows what he’s talking about and that these indeed are good and needed laws. Only Obama, I read anyway, graduated in LAW and doesn’t seem to have much critical understanding of what the courses he took taught; or maybe he’s forgetful.)

Just a few thoughts off of the top of my head.
Mike Corbeil May 17th, 2008 6:11 am

A correction on my second post, above; wherein I wrote, “A lot of idiots bought into the bs words of Bush Jr when he said that his presidential (via hijacking) administration was going to bring peace, justice, democracy, and so on for Iraqis and the world, by supposedly helping Iraqis”, this should have instead said the following:

“A lot of naive and malicious people bought into ….”

‘Idiot’ should not be used when referring to everyone who unfortunately sided with the Bush-Cheney cabal’s BS words, which were strongly obvious to me and many or most people on Earth, but clearly not for everyone in the USA; far from nearly everyone, there.

‘Naive’ and ‘gullible’ (and ‘negligent’) are more correct or accurate for most of the non-maliciously minded people who sided with the Bush-Cheney cabal’s BS; while the rest were either idiots or blatantly malicious.
Mike Corbeil May 17th, 2008 6:26 am

Eugene Robinson additionally wrote the following.

“Even more telling, though, are the polls showing that soaring numbers of Americans believe the country is heading in the wrong direction — more than eight out of 10, according to a new Washington Post/ABC News poll — and that Bush’s popularity has fallen to historic lows.”

That should mean good news for candidates like Cynthia McKinney, Ralph Nader, and Mike Gravel, if he’s still running and has either switched to a different party or will be able to minimally make sure that his name is on the ballots in November regardless of not being the person nominated to be the DP candidate in Nov. Why someone like Mike Gravel would want to bother sticking with this VERY corrupt Dem. Party is beyond my present understanding, but he may have a good reason as Kucinich has had and which is to be able to work on REFORMING the corrupt DP. But I guess or expect that Cynthia McKinney and Ralph Nader will garner more votes than Mike Gravel will, if he’ll have his name on the ballots in Nov., that is.

But will these 80% of Americans wake up enough to realise that the USA needs real regime change and that it’s unlikely to happen with the three main candidates of the RP and DP? Most likely NOT, and that’s if these 80% of the population are all eligible to vote in the federal election, first of all.

I don’t know if these types of polls or surveys are done with only people who are eligible to vote, or if names (and tel. numbers) are taken out of telephone books, f.e. So I am clueless as to what proportion of that 80% consists of people eligible to vote in the USA in Nov.
Mike Corbeil May 17th, 2008 6:46 am

And I do wonder why CD keeps posting articles that present NO real information on the people running to be president of the U.S.; this also applying with other topics, but while they don’t pertain to the topic of this page, so I won’t list any of them now.

CD would do better to qualitatively select from such articles and then slack off before posting more from other people who have NOTHING worthwhile to add. And the truly worthwhile articles will NOT neglect consideration for Ralph Nader and Cynthia McKinney, and their supporters.

Given these faux pas or manières ( http://fr.thefreedictionary.com/mani%C3%A8re , for ‘ways’ or ‘manners’) of CD’s doing and choosing, it gives CD a questionable image, for it’s NOT being [un]-biased, but too biased, instead. Either that, or there’s a lack of manpower behind CD, leaving that there’s a lack of time to be able to do the sort of qualitative selection I’m speaking of.

Articles by BETTER analysts than too many people whose articles are posted at CD would or should do CD a lot of good; to replace redundant worthlessness, and too often-times garbage-worthiness, with [qualitative] content. I’m not saying that all analytical people who have had articles posted at CD and who’ll have more in the future fit what I’m otherwise saying, but it does apply with too many.

A real critical thinker is someone who is ALSO HONEST, and such people would not unfairly omit mentioning and even promoting the campaigns of Cynthia McKinney and Ralph Nader, as well as other good candidates.

(No law prevents us from being able to promote more than one candidate, and they don’t all have to be of the same political party; neither being forbidden by any laws whatsoever. And it’s always important to develop and maintain a healthy or fair way of being, socially and politically.)

CD should NOT be DP-biased, but critically and fairly objective, and that objectivity needs to include respect for the principle of democracy that is poorly represented with MOST political campaign articles posted here as well as at many other websites. Being copy-cat’s fine and even good, for it’s just a question of learning, although being good is only when what’s copied is good, which OFTEN is not the case.

I’ve not seen Dr Francis A. Boyle mentioned in any articles I’ve read here and this is very questionable omission; definitely. But maybe most people with articles posted here don’t know of Dr Boyle; and whoever that applies to definitely should make a point of searching for articles by and about him, there being a number of these at www.globalresearch.ca , f.e.
dougnwagner May 17th, 2008 8:16 am

1932.

“For too many of us the political equality we once had won was meaningless in the face of economic inequality. A small group had concentrated into their own hands an almost complete control over other people’s property, other people’s money, other people’s labor — other people’s lives. For too many of us life was no longer free; liberty no longer real; men could no longer follow the pursuit of happiness. Against economic tyranny such as this, the American citizen could appeal only to the organized power of government. The collapse of 1929 showed up the despotism for what it was. The election of 1932 was the people’s mandate to end it. Under that mandate it is being ended.”

- Franklin D. Roosevelt speaking at the Democratic National Convention in 1936

“Everyone knows, for instance, that rebellions, or even strong ferment, among the slaves in ancient times at once revealed the fact that the ancient state was essentially a dictatorship of the slaveowners. Did this dictatorship abolish democracy among, and for, the slaveowners? Everybody knows that it did not.”

- V.I. Lenin ‘On the Paris Commune’

“The feudal barons of the Middle Ages, the economic predecessors of the capitalists of our day, declared all wars. And their miserable serfs fought all the battles. The poor, ignorant serfs had been taught to revere their masters; to believe that when their masters declared war upon one another, it was their patriotic duty to fall upon one another and to cut one another’s throats for the profit and glory of the lords and barons who held them in contempt. And that is war in a nutshell. The master class has always declared the wars; the subject class has always fought the battles. The master class has had all to gain and nothing to lose, while the subject class has had nothing to gain and all to lose — especially their lives. They have always taught and trained you to believe it to be your patriotic duty to go to war and to have yourselves slaughtered at their command. But in all the history of the world you, the people, have never had a voice in declaring war, and strange as it certainly appears, no war by any nation in any age has ever been declared by the people….If war is right let it be declared by the people. You who have your lives to lose, you certainly above all others have the right to decide the momentous issue of war or peace.”

- Eugene V. Debs, Anti-War Speech at Canton, Ohio, 1918
Gail May 17th, 2008 11:05 am

“Riots and the threat of public violence keep emerging world politicos focused on growth, while G7 politicos focus on the next public fleecing benefiting their special interest supporters.” -T.Andros

The fleecing of American citizens made its debut in 1886 when the Supreme Court ruled that a private coprporation was a “natural person”: see Santa Clara County vs. Southern Pacific Railroad. This decision essentially increased the powers of corporations over average citizens because they had more money to hire lobbyists and influence government legistlation.

And then along came the Federal Reserve Act of 1913 which placed the future economics of this country in the hands of a few private bankers. You’ll find plenty of info on this scam at Google.

Enter…Richard Nixon! President “Watergate” took us off the gold standard which gave the Federal Government the OK to run their monetary printing presses at warp-speed; borrow as much as they want-ed to; increase the size of the federal government; and of course, hand the bill to the tax payers.

And thanks to Ronald “deregulation” Reagan, corporations began engineering “hostile takeovers” which encouraged “plant closings, streamling, outsourcing, wage-cutting and job exporting”. Reagan’s policies destroyed what was once considered “respectable” profit-taking and created the monsters of unlimited mergers and “profit maximization” at any cost to US citizens.

The corporate greed continued and gained strength under the green light of Bill “NAFTA” Clinton and written trade agreements of, by and for the corporations whose powers were to be further extended and abused by none other than our elitist, silver-spoon-in-mouth, George Bush II.

How much longer will the citizens of this country allow these corrupt polticians to fleece and humiliate us as they continue to divert our hard-earned money upward?
lancelotlink May 17th, 2008 12:00 pm

Government should serve the people in need, but before it can do that, it should- and must- take the Caterpillar bull-dozers that we send to Israel to bull-doze Palestinian homes, divert them to Washington with orders bull-doze the Pentagon into the Potomac River, then ship them to New York and flatten Wall Street and convert it to an animal park. That would certainly fit into the Schumpeter’s theory of creative destruction.
jsc May 17th, 2008 2:55 pm

Willybill: Honest Government is an oxymoron.

Hamster: We’ve had an “energy policy” for over 50 years. It involves using our military or CIA to assure access to world resources for American corporations. Same thing for Britain.
peaceman May 18th, 2008 1:57 am

LeeAnnG, SallyUUKent, Gail, Dougwagner,

Excellent comments and the quotes posted by Doug!

Thank you very much!
AD May 21st, 2008 8:02 pm

Actually Franklin D Roosevelt took us off the gold standard, because he got tired of those who owned the gold making all the rules.

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