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Tide of Anger
Watching the crowds in Iceland banging pots and pans until their government fell reminded me of a chant popular in anti-capitalist circles in 2002: "You are Enron. We are Argentina."
Its message was simple enough. You--politicians and CEOs huddled at some trade summit--are like the reckless scamming execs at Enron (of course, we didn't know the half of it). We--the rabble outside--are like the people of Argentina, who, in the midst of an economic crisis eerily similar to our own, took to the street banging pots and pans. They shouted, "¡Que se vayan todos!" ("All of them must go!") and forced out a procession of four presidents in less than three weeks. What made Argentina's 2001-02 uprising unique was that it wasn't directed at a particular political party or even at corruption in the abstract. The target was the dominant economic model--this was the first national revolt against contemporary deregulated capitalism.It's taken a while, but from Iceland to Latvia, South Korea to Greece, the rest of the world is finally having its ¡Que se vayan todos! moment.
The stoic Icelandic matriarchs beating their pots flat even as their kids ransack the fridge for projectiles (eggs, sure, but yogurt?) echo the tactics made famous in Buenos Aires. So does the collective rage at elites who trashed a once thriving country and thought they could get away with it. As Gudrun Jonsdottir, a 36-year-old Icelandic office worker, put it: "I've just had enough of this whole thing. I don't trust the government, I don't trust the banks, I don't trust the political parties and I don't trust the IMF. We had a good country, and they ruined it."
Another echo: in Reykjavik, the protesters clearly won't be bought off by a mere change of face at the top (even if the new PM is a lesbian). They want aid for people, not just banks; criminal investigations into the debacle; and deep electoral reform.
Similar demands can be heard these days in Latvia, whose economy has contracted more sharply than any country in the EU, and where the government is teetering on the brink. For weeks the capital has been rocked by protests, including a full-blown, cobblestone-hurling riot on January 13. As in Iceland, Latvians are appalled by their leaders' refusal to take any responsibility for the mess. Asked by Bloomberg TV what caused the crisis, Latvia's finance minister shrugged: "Nothing special."
But Latvia's troubles are indeed special: the very policies that allowed the "Baltic Tiger" to grow at a rate of 12 percent in 2006 are also causing it to contract violently by a projected 10 percent this year: money, freed of all barriers, flows out as quickly as it flows in, with plenty being diverted to political pockets. (It is no coincidence that many of today's basket cases are yesterday's "miracles": Ireland, Estonia, Iceland, Latvia.)
Something else Argentina-esque is in the air. In 2001 Argentina's leaders responded to the crisis with a brutal International Monetary Fund-prescribed austerity package: $9 billion in spending cuts, much of it hitting health and education. This proved to be a fatal mistake. Unions staged a general strike, teachers moved their classes to the streets and the protests never stopped.
This same bottom-up refusal to bear the brunt of the crisis unites many of today's protests. In Latvia, much of the popular rage has focused on government austerity measures--mass layoffs, reduced social services and slashed public sector salaries--all to qualify for an IMF emergency loan (no, nothing has changed). In Greece, December's riots followed a police shooting of a 15-year-old. But what's kept them going, with farmers taking the lead from students, is widespread rage at the government's crisis response: banks got a $36 billion bailout while workers got their pensions cut and farmers received next to nothing. Despite the inconvenience caused by tractors blocking roads, 78 percent of Greeks say the farmers' demands are reasonable. Similarly, in France the recent general strike--triggered in part by President Sarkozy's plans to reduce the number of teachers dramatically--inspired the support of 70 percent of the population.
Perhaps the sturdiest thread connecting this global backlash is a rejection of the logic of "extraordinary politics"--the phrase coined by Polish politician Leszek Balcerowicz to describe how, in a crisis, politicians can ignore legislative rules and rush through unpopular "reforms." That trick is getting tired, as South Korea's government recently discovered. In December, the ruling party tried to use the crisis to ram through a highly controversial free trade agreement with the United States. Taking closed-door politics to new extremes, legislators locked themselves in the chamber so they could vote in private, barricading the door with desks, chairs and couches.
Opposition politicians were having none of it: with sledgehammers and an electric saw, they broke in and staged a twelve-day sit-in of Parliament. The vote was delayed, allowing for more debate--a victory for a new kind of "extraordinary politics."
Here in Canada, politics is markedly less YouTube-friendly--but it has still been surprisingly eventful. In October the Conservative Party won national elections on an unambitious platform. Six weeks later, our Tory prime minister found his inner ideologue, presenting a budget bill that stripped public sector workers of the right to strike, canceled public funding for political parties and contained no economic stimulus. Opposition parties responded by forming a historic coalition that was only prevented from taking power by an abrupt suspension of Parliament. The Tories have just come back with a revised budget: the pet right-wing policies have disappeared, and it is packed with economic stimulus.
The pattern is clear: governments that respond to a crisis created by free-market ideology with an acceleration of that same discredited agenda will not survive to tell the tale. As Italy's students have taken to shouting in the streets: "We won't pay for your crisis!"
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80 Comments so far
Show AllHere in Canada the only reason the coalition came about was because of the initiative of Jack Layton the leader of the New Democratic Party (NDP). As in Argentina the socialists lead the way.
Sophie Scholl-The Final Days
But then, there's nobody stupider than a free-market ideologue.
I append this e-mail I sent last night to my absent neighbors, who have land next to mine on the edge of a soon-to-be-former state park. The meeting described was angry and futile. My feeling is that banging pots and pans, or even hanging the perps from lampposts, may help us to express our present and coming pain, but it is not going to repair the damage or cause our vanished money to reappear.
Hello neighbors
I just got back from the Community Center and a packed meeting about the proposed closure of the State Park. Most of the stuff about which fund lacked which money for which purpose went over my head as usual. Christina will no doubt batch up her notes and e-mail them to us. I will either get you on her list or forward info as it comes.
From my prescient perspective it looks like:
1. Bush has indeed driven the Bus of State straight through the guard rail into empty space, and we are approaching the first bounce (of many).
2. The State of Arizona has a huge deficit, and has passed a draconian budget bill chopping every imaginable expense, including the closure of the eight state parks which are least profitable by their measurement, i.e. profit per visitor, in our case a negative number.
3. They sent a state representative and some other officials to our meeting, to assure us that whereas the situation is dire, they are not themselves the bad guys. God knows their hearts are breaking. The state rep was reading from a crib sheet and didn't know much except to say that if we think this year's budget cuts were bloody, wait till 2010! On our behalf he has co-sponsored a bill to restore funding for state parks, HB28 I think. My impression is that the purpose of this is to give us a source of hope and a list of people to write letters to, so that we don't march on Phoenix with torches and pitchforks.
4. The bottom line is that, well, there isn't any money. Sure, they are aware that the Oracle State Park is the hub of our community activity and a major source of our social cohesion, besides being an historic location with a genuine adobe ranch house and a valuable environmental education program, but, hey, there isn't any money.
5. The decision is not officially firm. They are "analyzing" citizen input and suggestions (running the park ourselves, donating operating funds, etc.), but it sure looks like they are fixing to shut it down. The best option I heard all night was to write letters to the governor. If it makes you feel better.
6. If they close the park, the land will revert to Defenders of Wildlife. I can't imagine that Defenders of Wildlife is rolling in money about now either, but their overhead is low. Hopefully if they have to sell off the land nobody will be able to afford to buy it.
I think that in the context of the overall size of the economic tsunami the issue of the park may turn out to be a trifle. This is just the first bit of pain to make its way from bankerville and the land of regulatory dysfunction all the way up into our little mountain community to bite us in the ass. Optimism is not my strong suit, so I would say expect more hits, and worse. Stock up on pinto beans. Don't have any more children. Cultivate cheap hobbies and try to move your center of gravity into a more spiritual direction.
Nitey nite,
M
On the positive side, refried beans and tortillas make a lovely meal.
Throw in some rice as a good source of protein.
It's my understanding that beans and corn, mixed together, give complete protein.
If memory serves, you need all three- beans, rice and corn (or was that beans, rice and cheese?) to make a complete protein (but this is making me hungry).
Beans and corn (or rice). Indigenous peoples in the Americas used corn (maize) while Asians used rice.
http://www.csmngt.com/amino_acids.htm
Almost every traditional culture has a grain and legume combo at the core of their diet. But the grains should be whole grains.
I thought you people were my friends. You've turned my righteous indignation into a hippie recipe book!
Indeed, cultures universally rely upon a single staple dish that meets all nutritional requirements; from considerable personal experience with this tribe, I can report that indigenous aboriginal Philadelphians developed the cheese steak sandwich with fried onions (condiments & extras vary by individual taste) for this purpose.
· Yr Obd't Servant
That's funny vox, I was scrolling thinking, WTF? then I read your comment and had a good laugh, thanks.
Cheese is a complete protein on its own.
Rice is not a good source of protein.
rfloh wrote:
Cheese is a complete protein on its own.
Rice is not a good source of protein.
ADVOCATE:
Rice, whole brown rice, is a good source of protein when coupled with a legume. There are eight essential amino acids and rice is lacking two of them, legumes such as soybeans and some seeds such as sesame add the two missing amino acids to make a complete protein. Thus brown rice and soy or sesame are complementary protein sources that together make a complete protein.
Cheese is not a complete protein and is not a particularly healthy food. There are nearly three times the calories of usable protein per gram from rice and sesame seeds and more than twice as much from rice and soy, than there are per gram of usable protein from beans and milk or milk product: ie cheese. Then, with cheese, there is the saturated fat, cholesterol, poor digestibility, and lactose intolerance in some people that make cheese less than perfect. Cows milk is good for cows, not so much for humans.
Cassandra has it right: whole grains and legumes.
Sioux Rose
VOX: I wonder if this would not be one of those issues that unites left with right as lots of right "types" love to fish and hunt, and many have a positive admiration for nature (if in their own wild ways).
To think that tax cuts were given to the rich, that stupid senseless wars were funded, so that the Grover Norquist dream of bankrupting government could be realized is an obscenity greater than that which most sensitive souls can bear. That it actually was allowed to progress, that the democrats rolled over, is a treason; and in the instance of closure to the precious state parks (we will need those pitchforks if they start selling our most SACRED real estate, that which belongs to tomorrow's children, to foreign cronies thanks to the fiscal pickle Bush put us in) a sin against things sane and decent.
Can't the Hollywood gliteratti with their mega checks step in to stop the financial bleeding? Where's Bill Gates or the other billionaires, the Steve Forbes club of blue blooded rich kids on this one? Where's THEIR patrotism? Or are only weapons the idols they cherish in the name of patriotism?
no matter what -- a person such as you Voxclamantis is an example of a CIVIC MINDED citizen who deserves great honor. would it that more americans are like you...then this world would have been much better.
Thanks for the post, Vox. As always, I agree with everything Naomi Klein says. People need to mobilize and make their voices heard. Every new announcement coming out of the new Obama administration is cause for disappointment and alarm (such as this recent blackmail of the UK over torture info). They need to know that this will not be accepted.
clovis: I was with Naomi Klein 100% unti she praised the Canadian stimulus. We need to rebuild economic systems from the bottom up and should not be borrowing money to get out of debt. The problems are not a "weak economy" but a structural failure. They have been stealing from us for decades and we have allowed them to destroy our local and regional economies. There is no way to keep this from getting ugly but if we focus on development at the local/small business level we'd be better off. And the gov't needs to repeal laws that stand in the way. And change the constitution to get corporations out of politics.
And I hope you're not one of the folks that thought Obama would mean real change. If so, you should prepare for real disappointment. Yes, I voted for him, but under no illusions. However, the Geithner appointment makes me sorry I voted for him.
cassandra wrote:
The problems are not a "weak economy" but a structural failure.
COMMENT:
Indeed. There is enough housing to house every person in the US properly. The US is capable of growing enough healthy food to feed every person in the US properly. There are enough (barely, perhaps, but enough) to give quality health care to every person in the US.
So why is anyone going to lose their homes? Why is anyone going to go without adequate and healthful nutrition? Why is anyone going to have to do without adequate medical, dental, vision, or any other health care?
Basic human needs such as housing, food, health care, schooling, do not require an "economy." Those who grow food can provide food for those that don't, and in return receive medical care from those whom they feed and health care persons who get the food get schooling for their children who get housing from those that have it or build it who also receive the food, the schooling, the medical care, and so on.
The ability of a society to fill these needs has nothing to do with "economy": any failure to meet these basic needs has everything to do with public will. So what is this thing called economy: the Dow Jones and NASDAQ, a strong or weak economy, Bull or Bear markets and all the rest?
The "economy" is something those that have capital use to extract wealth from those that have less. Or as Cassandra says "They have been stealing from us for decades."
And no, I never thought for a microsecond that Obama would mean real change. Nor did I think anyone as president would make real change. Real change, major change, can only come from the people, and the people must be really represented by Congress. Only one member of Congress voted against giving away the Constitution to GW Bush, which means the entire membership of Congress at that time that is still there, except perhaps for one, Rep Barbara Lee of Oakland CA who voted against the war powers resolution, ought to be replaced by the voters.
That's right: replace every damn one of them, including the so-called "Progressive Wing" of the Democratic Party, and replace them with people that will take the power from the capitalist class - the plutocracy that rules - and represent the majority they have been "stealing from" for...well, not just decades but since 1776.
The kind of massive, angry street protests mentioned in this article will be met in this nation by overwhelming gunfire and death from police and the military. The cupboard may be completely bare but the Repelicans and the Dumbocrats own it. Their message to the people of this country will be that even if you are on your knees you will do as you are told. Even Obama will agree to this. The strategy of killing protesters will fail. Once the government starts dishing out death, the more much of this nation will resist.
I agree Mordechai S. But I think they will confiscate our arms and destroy the second Amendment first!
Bang on. Here in Canada the Royal Canadian Murdering Police are more than delighted to put on the black shirts and make triple time and a half, pepper spraying and electrocuting the unwashed masses, at the slightest provocation.
Mordechai Shiblikov wrote:
even if you are on your knees you will do as you are told
COMMENT:
It is better to die on your feet that to live on your knees. –Emiliano Zapata
I don't believe in much, but I do believe that some humans are especially prone to greed and lack of compassion. These people, through the default of others who are not so greedy and uncompassionate, and many of whom are also very stupid and cowardly, wind up manipulating the others into giving up their means of living and happiness based upon lies and deceit. I believe that these greedy ones are truly evil. That their souls are so evil and embodied in human form leaves little choice for the meek and stupid but to eliminate evil from their midst.
I believe that an economic system driven by insatiable greed and consumption of resources needed for life and happiness must be killed, both in its ideology and in the form of humans that will continue to prey on the earth and all other life forms so long as the less-evil allow them to do so. I believe that the extermination of the greedy and destructive ones must be accomplished to sustain life for the many. Failure to do so will likely mean the end of life as we've known it, and as earth has been able to sustain for hundreds of millions of years. No need for details, we just need to get to work eliminating the sources of evil.
Very eloquent. The problem is that for roughly half of US citizens the greed and lack of compassion you call "evil" is considered a "virtue". What I call helping a poor bastard out by giving him a couple bucks, they call handing out unearned rewards for being lazy.
I think it all boils down to the eternal problem: how do you fight a bully with a gun when you don't believe in violence.
Sioux Rose
K.J. It's about the slow and painstaking work of changing the mass consciousness, which is why education and a media that was doing its TRUE job (enlightening the masses rather than addicting them to false "th-needs" as Dr. Seuss put it) to inform and keep healthy, through constructive discourse, the public is so vital. Note that most tyrants recognize the potency of a war of words (or through language and its framing modalities), and hence either own the media as a state organ of propaganda or establish relatively the same outcome by allowing a merger of corporate media interests with those of the militarized state. How many generals were featured on CNN in the run-up to a "case fixed for" war? How many companies with fiscal ties to the MIC own major broadcast networks? These formulas are not new, only the modern apparatus has altered.
here's an ironic thing:
as americans perhaps SEE other governments being "made to march" by their people -- with vast differences in political systems and their internal problems and effects of the economic hardships rooted from the "inventions" of financial "magic" in america that it tries to export -- as americans see that...what are americans doing?
they REPRESS themselves.
where other people live under perhaps , PRESENTLY, more overtly repressive or controlling states (russia, china, turkey, etc.) - americans who bloviate about "freedom" in the USA because they can "vote" during a day that they don't even put as an OFFICIAL NON WORKING DAY in order to vote - and call this "choice" --
REPRESS THEMSELVES.
who NEEDS a repressive police state as is the incipient case in the USA when the SHEEPLE themselves
REPRESS THEMSELVES VOLUNTARILY as a matter of "choice?"
it's so tragically comical! as a body politic -- americans ARE laughable...that much is certain.
in many essential "human personal freedom" ways -- the peasants in china , peru, colombia, bolivia , the ordinary people in economies that are NOW basket cases which were just a few years ago the "miracle cases" of American-led free market capitalism - etc..the youth and farmers in greece...the poverty, disease , war-famine stricken people in africa and elsewhere --
all of them with so MUCH LESS to have in their lives
PRACTICE LIBERTY and CHOICE
FAR MORE and MORE TRUTHFULLY than americans do and EVER HAVE!
americans really ought to be ASHAMED of themselves for being such WILLING SLAVES!
It's not that we repress ourselves as much as it is that we don't want to leave our tv sets, computers and refrigerators.
true enough. lol.
Sioux Rose
TEDDY: Consider the network of agencies that socialize the child from a young age. If the church does the whole mojo thing about sex = sin, that's a BIGGIE to overcome. If lack of good jobs leads to a life of quiet desperation, there's just enough psychic juice left to get loaded, and repeat the whole scenario again tomorrow, shades of "Waiting for Godot." And if income is not groovy, and one opts for "fast food" then slow and steady weight gain makes the actual gravity of the body heavier to cart around to socially active events like protests. In short, between media hypnosis, lousy jobs (for many), "faux" food as filler devoid of nutrition, you're not staring power, intelligence, vitality or enthusiasm in the collective face. (Perhaps this explains what you call repression.)
Oh please. Have you ever been to China? Liberty and choice?
rfloh wrote:
Oh please. Have you ever been to China? Liberty and choice?
COMMENT:
Have you been to China?
I haven't, but I have non-Chinese and Chinese friends that have, and Chinese friends that came from the PRC. Some express disappointment in the US, others I've known have returned to China because they were happier there. An extensive article in a newspaper a year or so ago interviewed people who longed to return to China, hoped to or planned to, and gave a variety of reasons why.
There are many views of what liberty is and the ability to publicly speak out against the government or be a political activist against the ruling regime is just one of them. Employment, friends, community, health care, food security, are other facets of "liberty" that loom larger for many than politics - not only for Chinese, but also, if truth be told, for many Americans as well.
As for liberties, well, US citizens that wanted to travel to Cuba or anywhere else the US government didn't want you to go couldn't. I personally know a fellow who is facing a big fine for daring to take medicines to Iraq to save the lives of children during the US sanctions. And choice? I've never seen my choice for president accepted by the Democratic Party or my choice for president from a Third Party accepted by many of my fellow citizens. In any political system, some get their choice, some don't.
People that want to get rich off the labors of others are doing well in the US, and also in Russia and China now that they have gone capitalist: the exploiters get their choice of the freedom to exploit. People in Russia and China that need excellent access to health care they couldn't afford used to get it and no longer do: that is a freedom the poor no longer have.
The US no longer has aid to families with dependent children, AFDC, Clinton killed it. The US does have many, many thousands of people who are homeless, an extraordinary number of people who are food insecure every month, many whose lives will be sharply shortened because of lack of access to health care. Your choice of freedom may mean nothing to someone else. One of the most basic of all freedoms is freedom from want, and that is a freedom many of the world's people, including many in the US do not have.
Liberty? Choice? I refer you to something Anatole France said:
"How noble the law, in its majestic equality, that both the rich and poor are equally prohibited from peeing in the streets, sleeping under bridges, and stealing bread!"
They are called "conservatives". But along with the Bushite fascists, Stalinists, Repugs, Zionists, Xtians, Mullahs and Blue Dog Democrats, they often include the nice little old lady next door and your own parents. Extermination is not the answer. Just don't vote for them or place them in positions of power.
Sioux Rose
EZE; Nice response...
Gracias Sioux Rose.
correct == especially "they include the nice little old lady and your own mother".......because this is after all a "continuum" -- every generation brings a mentality forward and it is that "conservative" mentality that says:
:"let's not rock the boat...know your place and everything will be alright"......
until of course everytime they TEACH that to the next generation -- they "conserve" nothing but a DWINDLING amount of their own rights and liberties AND what is LEFT of it FOR the future generation..and THAT"s the "gift" and legacy they leave to their own children -- and all of it because of their FEAR of "losing" something that they thought they owned or had or will always have -- by behaving LIKE conservatives.
sand flea wrote:
These people, through the default of others ... and many of whom are also very stupid and cowardly, wind up manipulating the others into giving up their means....
COMMENT:
How could anyone possibly argue with this?
But, just how can those who default their civic duty, especially those that are very stupid, and most especially those that are cowardly be changed into citizens who rule their government instead of being ruled by their government?
The real reasons we're not seeing mass protests here in the USA are: 1) we've learned that protests accomplish nothing here (remember how the two biggest protests in history failed to impact the decision to illegally invade Iraq even one iota?) 2) there's nothing to protest (can't protest "bailouts," since the money's already gone; can't demand jobs be created out of thin air; can't demand our corrupt 'leaders' step down, cause all potential replacements are members of the same club); 3) We The Rabble have no solid, identifiable protest 'leaders'; and, 4) we've become the fattest, laziest and dumbest population on Earth.
Nope - we're nothing but a bunch of spectators sitting in the stands helplessly watching the Super Bowl of Greed, cheap beer in one hand and a Big Mac in the other, well aware that, no matter who 'wins,' we're totally f**ked...
actually protests do accomplish something.
if that were NOT so -- such POWERFUL repressive governments as in china would not stand in FEAR of their own people which is why china is gearing towards dealing with the loss of export-oriented jobs to tens of millions of chinese that originally were from the countryside and went back to find no jobs with a MASSIVE domestic jobs program - quickly, mind you - learning that they can NOT completely depend for economic expansion on export-orientation only -- but that they now have to use their savings and sovereign credit to prompt DOMESTIC consumption -- and in other words prioritize THEIR people as consumers and producers rather than prioritize americans as consumers of their cheap products.
in a sense this is a good development over-all that the root cause of global economic disaster from america has arrived at this stage - to wake up governments such as china's, iceland, ireland, the baltic republics like latvia and estonia to just how CORROSIVE oftheir own economies the US model or "globalization and free trade" really has been.
so -- with all these countries one by one having their populations showing , in NO UNCERTAIN TERMS , to their governments regardless of what political systems they have - that their governments ARE answerable to the people -- what will happen if this goes on as it PROBABLY WILL expand?
THE USA will be LEFT ISOLATED as the country whose people can not even shed their SHEEPLIKE attitudes..until the day comes when - with governments and countries having DEVELOPED NEW alliances in trade and found NEW sources of moving their economies forward -- the USA will be LEFT without too many "allies" to sell or buy from.
in the end -- people WILL rise against the USA leaders - just the same..........
except of course -- they shall do so against a FASCIST system that will eventually be swept away anyway...
but then -- what will show up is:
The Sheeplike Americans were the "ones that were left behind" -- long after other nations's people had already done the RIGHT thing : MAKE their governments pay attention to their wishes.
Show that their governments and institutions SHOULD be afraid of the people!
well...americans ARE fat and lazy -- and intellectually impotent...that's why. it takes a while and a lot MORE for them to ....."get moving". after all -- that IS why wall street had to implode first ...and other things, isn't that so?.......
credit that to americans' lack of interest or detachment...but --in a way -- they DO deserve what they get.
it's their own doing really. not JUST the governments' or corporations.
you can't isolate these things from one another.
see there is something the Bolivian peasants and countryfolk - unsophisticated by modern standards, generations-long suffering, always being at the sidelines "looking in" as they were divested of their rights and lands and livelihoods - but what did they do about possible shenanigans before they voted morales into power? with all the state apparatus against them?....it is summed up in the words of on peasant:
"They are powerful -- but WE are MANY...what can they REALLY do? it is our will they are against".
just like it was in the philippines when they en masse overthrew the dictator and US lackey Marcos after 25 years of Martial Law -- that was an example of True "people's power"..and what could the oppressors do? all they could is remain in their houses and gated communities and -- in their TURN --
WATCH as the properties they STOLE were taken away from them ONCE the people woke up and had enough of them. PERIOD!
Exactly right. And "bi-partisanship" in Washington means all Senators & Congressmen wink & grin at each other because they know that even in a crippling depression, their pay & benefits won't stop. Protests will be crushed with violence. We all love Naomi, and she makes sense...but signifies nothing.
Ugh. I think this site should be renamed "Common Nightmares." The more informed, the less inspired, the more deeply, darkly cynical I become about believing that change can be ignited for the common good. It's all becoming one massive remake: Voyage of the Damned.
Or maybe "Commmon Dreams?" question mark included.
One of the main purposes of this site is to bitch. If we complain enough the elites will condescend to throw us the occasional bone. Or to put it another way, small changes occur every now and then, but they never occur without citizen complaints. If you think about it, a tremendous amount of good change has happened over the decades and centuries. Get angry and complain. You're doing it for the good of humanity.
re: what gets right wing backlash can be instructive
One measure of what kinds of action challenge the US right is the right wing response. Judging from this thread, it appears that the US right is not at present threatened by the possibility that the world might save the U.S. from itself.
On the other hand, Amy Goodman's piece on Congresswoman Kaptur's (D, OH) call for victims of foreclosure to squat brought right wing asslicks, goons and apologists out of the CD closet. Potential threats to corporate property set off their petit bourgeois ruling-class-identifying instincts fast.
For eight years, THEY fed us FEAR. Now, they are feeding us HOPE. All BS. All LIES. Want results? Stop consuming. The bottom line..it's all that means anything to them. Can't even do that? Then, bend over and continue to be sodomized.
Here's the change so far read it and weep comrades. The bankers ( PIGS) get 700 Billion the rest of us lose our jobs, 401K's , homes etc. Whose being rewarded for what here? What's has happened to Capitalism's vaunted invisible hand that rewards those that make right decisions and punishes those that don't? It's BS folks, the invisible hand is the hand of a pick pocket, go ahead check to see if your wallet is still in your back pocket! GOTCHA SUCKERS! Talk about laughing all the way to the bank! Boy, is that an understatement!
Nothing can focus the attention of the American public like an economic downturn because we are a money-obsessed people like no other at any place or time. We monetize every minute of the day and calculate the returns on a friendly gesture.
But nobody likes to be this way. It's no way to be. The DJIA numbers shouldn't make or break a mood. Still, it's our fault. Naomi doesn't say it's the Icelander's fault. She says the Icelander's beat on pots and protest what's being done to them. Their attention has been focused. There is anger building. Hopefully it will build here, too, and when it does, I hope we realize it's our fault that we have come to this unpleasant moment.
It's our fault that we permit the IRS to force us to keep records and save receipts and monetize, monetize, monetize! This is no way to live, but it's the way we live due to a certain fatalistic outlook that begins to develop when we give away control over our own lives and accept the inevitability and necessity of being controlled.
Money is the most effective tool for control that one can imagine. You control your kids by rewarding or denying them with money in just the same way that a government controls the people through taxation.
It is commonly said we live in a "democracy". Naomi thinks that the uprising of people in these distressed countries is an expression of democracy. It is just the opposite. The people rise up because there is no democracy. They have no control over the most crucial elements of their lives: the most important of these crucial elements being their own money. They give away what used to be called the "money power" to private interests. They are convinced to privatize their money creation and delivery system. Their governments that are theoretically supposed to operate in their interest, are, like the people themselves held in thrall to a privately owned system of central banks that exercise the money power in the interest of a small elite group of very wealthy people.
We do not control our own money. It is controlled by a system of private banks. These banks exercise control over government and society by rewarding or denying money. The people are not free to manage their own financial system. They have the freedom to get angry when the private owners of the banking interests reward themselves and punish the people with unimaginable debt. But that is the only freedom they have in their so-called democracy.
There is no democracy without financial democracy. Money defines every move we make and whether we are happy or sad. Why do we give the money power to private interests? Why, Naomi?
Why do we tolerate the illusion of democracy? And when we finally get angry and focused will we realize that we the people can have a financial system operated by own own government in the name of the general welfare?
Will we be able to make the distinction between public control of credit and a private free market? Will we be able to understand that a nationalized banking system can support a private sector free market economy?
We do not have to surrender our national sovereignty to an international central banking system owned and operated by new class of global aristocrats. The failure of the private banking system we now experience is also a failure of you and I to own our own lives. If we owned the money power, we would no longer be forced to monetize every minute of the day. We would not rise or fall with the DJIA.
It is so simple and yet so difficult to communicate to those who live in a fog of propaganda created by private capital.
Sioux Rose
CRUX: Excellent post. I think that the distance between the symbol of the dollar and what it will soon represent is about to stretch to the breaking point. As a result the insights you related above will become clearer to many many people. We've been living in a state of cognitive dissonance, presuming so long as the money gave us shelter, the once a year vacation, some form of health care, food on our supermarket shelves (truly an embarassment of riches when compared with markets in other lands)... that the pursuit of happiness was ours for the taking. America provided a good life. Sure, you got your check and gave Caesar his true or otherwise forced due, but the benefits generally outweighed the risks. Until now. As home prices fall, as supermarket prices rise, as one wonders about the viability not only of their job, but of their life savings, the ENTIRE paradigm feels like a kid on a tricycle the first time those training wheels suddenly get popped off.
I have talked to three investment planners/stock brokers, a sister who's been very successful in business, friends, even a few psychics. Few can or are willing to see where all logistics appear to be leading. I hope the astrology is wrong on this one; but like others who post here, I've "downsized my life" to as close to subsistence as one (in America) can get. And I am ready to learn to grow food. Maybe I'm inside my own shadow today (full moon in my sign, and Obama's in 2 days)... but persons living in Pompeii, or the islands off shore to Krakatoa, or those purported to have lived in Atlantis, went about their daily affairs not knowing things were about to change in a manner that would never be reversed. Things would not return to what they had been. As the Buddhists teach, this is a life of impermanence; but how many of us take seriously what that aspect of mortality means? Even empires are temporal configurations. Nothing on the physical plane lasts in its present form... what America was and what it will be are apt to be diametrically opposed. As least through the time of transition. It IS the end of an era.
Psychics? No such things exists. Conjurers, and inflated delusional egos, perhaps, but psychics, no. Astrology? Come on. Give us a break. This poppy cock has nothing to offer. "...purported to live in Atlantis"?! Oh please. As for the "Buddhists teach, this is a life of impermanence", duh, some surprise, eh? Full moon in my sign? I'm sorry, but this is the friggin' 21th century.