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TechnoratiAs we gird ourselves for the masturbatory, chest-thumping spectacle of the nominating conventions and the election slugfest that is sure to follow, both the word and concept of patriotism will be bandied about in a most unpatriotic, not to mention nauseating, fashion. Unfathomable amounts of media real estate will be spent discussing who is wearing a flag pin, which minister said what and the first lady-ness of the candidates' wives will be analyzed based on such matters of urgent national importance as hemline and hairdo.
What will be discussed as little as possible are the issues, you know -- health care, gas prices, housing, spying on citizens, global warming and those pesky skirmishes in Iraq and Afghanistan. And WTF is up with Congress -- where are the hearings on gas prices? Why the continued rubber-stamping of Pentagon funding when pretty much everyone but our elected officials has figured out that these wars are a disaster and the level of waste and corruption is way past not okay? Long story short, what the heck is in the Koolaid that they drink in DC?
And while you were feeling stupefied by all this political bankruptcy -- anyone happen to notice that 35 Articles of Impeachment have been introduced against the President by Rep. Dennis Kucinich, apparently one of the few DC inmates who gets that flag decals are not, with apologies to John Prine, a free pass to heaven. And not a one of those Articles has a damned thing to do with sex. Space does not permit a full recitation, but here are a few of the highlights:
Article I
Creating a Secret Propaganda Campaign to Manufacture a False Case for War Against Iraq
Article II
Falsely, Systematically, and with Criminal Intent Conflating the Attacks of September 11, 2001, With Misrepresentation of Iraq as a Security Threat as Part of Fraudulent Justification for a War of Aggression
Article V
Article IX
Failing to Provide Troops With Body Armor and Vehicle Armor
Article XIV
Misprision of a Felony, Misuse and Exposure of Classified Information And Obstruction of Justice in the Matter of Valerie Plame Wilson, Clandestine Agent of the Central Intelligence Agency
Article XV
Providing Immunity from Prosecution for Criminal Contractors in Iraq
Article XVIII
Torture: Secretly Authorizing, and Encouraging the Use of Torture Against Captives in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Other Places, as a Matter of Official Policy
Article XXIV
Spying on American Citizens, Without a Court-Ordered Warrant, in Violation of the Law and the Fourth Amendment
Article XXVI
Announcing the Intent to Violate Laws with Signing Statements
Article XXXI
Katrina: Failure to Plan for the Predicted Disaster of Hurricane Katrina, Failure to Respond to a Civil Emergency
Article XXXII
Misleading Congress and the American People, Systematically Undermining Efforts to Address Global Climate Change
Now the Democratic leadership will tell you that impeachment is a waste of time, will drive away voters and it is off the table. Sadly, they have not taken heed of former U.S. Representative Elizabeth Holtzman who has repeatedly and correctly pointed out that impeachment is a crucial tool in defending the integrity of the Constitution and that allowing a lawless President to remain in office is a deathblow to democracy.
Yes you say, but Bush and Cheney will be out of office in a few months anyhow. True, and clearly ending the reign of terror that this man has wrought at an earlier point would have been far more patriotic, but nonetheless, impeaching even at this late date would be a significant step in beginning the monumental task of healing that needs to take place in this country.
Lucinda Marshall is a feminist artist, writer and activist. She is the Founder of the Feminist Peace Network, www.feministpeacenetwork.org. Her work has been published in numerous publications in the U.S. and abroad. She also blogs at WIMN Online and writes a monthly column for the Louisville Eccentric Observer.
23 Comments so far
Show AllThe problem is there is nothing wromng with nationalism. And if you are not nationalistic, the merchantilists will swallow you up.
Similar to unilaterally disarming.
Oh, yep, I'm Patriotic.
Bayyywoollfff,
Did that make you feel better... maligning pissantnobody, with your misplaced self-righteous indignity. I even agree with you on many of your finer points, yet there is a certainty lost, perhaps go back and re-read Beowolf. You sound like a wounded sheep, not a wolf.
Little Brother July 3rd, 2008 2:37 pm
"Hmmm, at first I mistook the reference to "masturbatory, chest-thumping spectacle" as prefatory to the argument that we might as well re-name Independence Day "Whacking Day".
You're getting better! That was great!!
God Bless America and all who serve her. Have a happy and safe 4th!
"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security."
Both the potus and the veep have to go or one will pardon the other and all the other conspirators. Otherwise wait, he can't pardon after he leaves office.
Pissant Nobody:
Trust me, with such clear sighted perception as expounded in your statement above, you are .... SOMEBODY.
It has by now at this late stage, become painfully obvious to the vast majority, (at last) that you are not represented and you are not relevant.
You exist to keep the criminal machine running.
Your children are not relevant.
Your parents are not relevant.
Your humanity is not relevant.
Your life is not relevant.
We are ruled, temporarily, by a corporate oligarch whose representatives squat in the halls of our Congress and con every single one of us daily.
The only REAL answer to our GLOBAL predicament as a species, as a civilization, must lie in the deliberate engagement and removal of the enemy to human brotherhood.
Did dialogue work with any of the other Hitlerian psychopaths?
If you study the historic trail of our development, don´t you think it might just be possible that you are living through a period in time in which, thanks in large part to digital technologies, it has become obvious to the vast majority of humanity that there is in fact only one "country";
the planet
that there is in fact only one "race";
human beings
As for the concept of a "third party", get over it.
How, exactly do you think such an entity would get it´s message across? Through the corporate mouthpiece the MSM? Make me laugh at your woeful naiveté.
Many of you do make me feel better because I read that you also have realized that nationalism, patriotism, the "us and them" paradigm, is a lie from the outset.
As you are aware, many greater thinkers than I will ever be have long since gauged the enemy and expressed this fact of life.
Whether you like it or not, whether you can accept it or not, a global revolution is developing out of the simple necessity to fight for survival, to maintain a world worth living in for future generations, and the enemy knows this all too well, hence the rapid development of private prisons, removal of basic rights, wiretapping, et al. Anything goes in order to halt the impetus of the movement for genuine global unity and justice at the very beginning. Through fear tactics, intimidation, torture, and inhuman treatment of ... suspects and citizens.
Assymetrical engagement works for the simple reason that the enemy cannot predispose their overbearing forces (of, might I add, willing sheeple)into an adequate defense of their criminal interests and possessions.
Personally I believe that we, all of us, wherever we are currently located or domiciled, need to work together develop the very first genuinely global "party", dedicated to the premise that all humans are equal as well as the fact that the materialist paradigm is a flat failure certain to be the death of us all.
Not to mention the fact that "nationstates" are a thing of the past that has outlived it´s usefulness to the point of being toxic to our survival and the survival of the planet as such.
That movement can act on every level, at every location, in every bogus "nation", and has no central "office" or "leadership". YOU the citizen, my brother or sister, are the leader of your own personal destiny.
You make the choices, you call the shots, and the responsibility for the outcome is, as always, yours.
The world needs citizens, not claptrap jingoist fascist sockpuppets for hire.. who currently exist in every single "nation" for the express purpose of denying equality, justice, and the rule of impartial law for the majority in order that the criminal oligarch can maintain it´s benighted concepts.
July 4th. Independence Day. We have never been, and will never be, independent until we remove the criminal at large.
Is it REALLY so hard to imagine ... the United Peoples of Earth?
"Patriotism" is glorified nationalism, and has no place in the hearts of humanitariians - which are necessarily socialist internationalists.
Guess what? Kennedy was assassinated!
How will we all feel when Barack Obama (with Democratic Congress and Senate in tow)does the attack on Iran we all fear will come from Cheney/Bushco? That will really be betrayal.
Isn't it amazing that certain of the military top brass are the only ting stalling this attrocity from taking place--or are the "powers that be" awaiting their chance to implicate the Democratic Party in the same manner as they have the
Repuiblican Party?
Whacking Day? Beat that snake!
At least The Simpsons make a lot more sense than the 3 branches of federal govt.
As long as I'm on a roll here . . .
"Nationalism is an infantile disease. It is the measles of mankind." - Albert Einstein
"Nationalism is our form of incest. It is our idolatry, and patriotism is its cult." - Erich Fromm
"Patriotism is a pernicious, psychopathic form of idiocy." - George Bernard Shaw
"Patriotism is the willingness to kill and be killed for trivial reasons." - Bertrand Russell
"Patriotism is the virtue of the vicious." - Oscar Wilde
"Democracy, too, is a religion. It is the worship of jackals by jackasses." - H.L. Mencken
Poopdeck - the Ben Johnson quote is "Patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel." Or were you being rhetorical? Either way, an important quote to remember at all times.
'Course, here's another one I saw on a bumper sticker recently . . . "Democracy is to real freedom as gang rape is to lovemaking." And with the Military-Industrial-Media Complex in charge of this "democracy", anyone else feel a bit sore in the backside?
Certainly NOT, we will have the damn false flag operation, I know much saber rattling lately, I still hold to October.
Bush and Cheney's terms expire on January 20 2009. Does that mean they will leave office?
I'm not so sure.
Within the first two weeks Congress is in session, Dennis will re-introduce, probably closer to a few days not weeks, Impeachment if no one has made movement in the Judiciary[i know, haha, movement in congress?]25 more Articles added to the original 35. I'm sorry, Kucinich is a decent human being, I could have cried when he came to the House Floor and read each Article while they more or less swept the fucking floor around him, nobody bothered to stay least of all pelosi, they had somebody acting as Speaker who I don't who. All blah, blah, lets get the fuck outta here so I can get home bullshit, at least he has the decency to try. I was lucky I had Cspan on that night to see it happen, it was lovely to see. Will anything ever come of it, No, but I am glad to see someone in Congress do SOMEthing, instead of NOthing for once.
What was it again that Ben Johnson once said about patriotism? Wasn't the word scoundrel in his statement?
Glaxia: Bush and Cheney may indeed be out of office in a few months--but their puppetmasters will still be pulling the strings.
"Yes you say, but Bush and Cheney will be out of office in a few months anyhow."
Don't be counting them chickens yet. Who would have thought those thugs would manage a coup d'etat and seize the Government? Who would have thought they'd trash the Constitution? Who'd have thought they'd attack, invade and occupy a foreign country for over 5 years and many other things? So what makes anyone think they'll abandon the office they stole in '00?
satr9prodxns said:
"we are a nation and democracy of rich, white men, for rich, white men."
While I believe that I understand his/her intent, and if so agree with it, I must take exception in one regard.
By definition a democracy means to be governed under a system of majority rule.
Last time I looked the poor and working class were undeniably the vast majority in this Nation.
However we are not now nor have we ever been ruled by a member or members of the majority.
Likewise the legal, economic and power structures of this nation favor the elite minority.
Not the majority.
Therefore, by definition, this Nation cannot possibly be a democracy.
sorry that should read Wheeee
35 imunity bills should handle this nicely. When states fail the people, there is nothing left except Whe The People...
Hmmm, at first I mistook the reference to "masturbatory, chest-thumping spectacle" as prefatory to the argument that we might as well re-name Independence Day "Whacking Day".
this article reads as though we're a nation of laws...
when, in fact, we are a nation and democracy of rich, white men, for rich, white men.