by Don Hynes
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| Vantage Point | Culture and Politics by Don Hynes |
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"No man is prejudiced in favor of a thing, knowing it to be wrong.
He is attached to it on the belief of its being right; and when he sees it is not so,
the prejudice will be gone." - Tom Paine
January 06, 2004 Freedom’s Just Another Word Freedom and democracy provide the call to arms whenever and wherever a question arises as to the authenticity and importance of United States policies. President Bush finds these two words in just about every speech written for him and intones them as if they were uncontestable truisms for any but the unenlightened, continually linking freedom and democracy to their cornerstone in the new world trinity, our way of life. What the President and the interests he represents mean by freedom and democracy are an established ethic that has characterized one face of the U.S. since its inception, an individualism that posits a freedom to get whatever one has the power to take whether that be seizing indigenous lands, indenture slave labor for production, strip natural resources from the public trust, monopolize large scale economic activities including food production, in fact any activity that fits within the “rule of law” as conjured up by a legislature largely influenced by the money its mandate is to control. Democracy is the declared form of government that supports this freedom, although Americans were reminded in the 2000 election that we are not a democracy, when the popularly elected president was kept out of office and another appointed through state electoral manipulation supported by the Supreme Court. The hope of democracy that inspires the world is one man, one vote, and although President Bush attained 47% of the 50.7% who went to the polls with tens of thousands of voters disenfranchised in Florida alone, he trumpets the cause of spreading democracy to the world, even to the consternation of the conservative right, while the imperative of his false idealism is now being challenged in the cultural mainstream. The real question isn’t about buzzwords, but what values we actually uphold. If democracy means the tyranny of the individual and/or corporation why trumpet its worth? If freedom means the destruction of the earth and the fostering of militarism around the globe for natural resources why idealize it? The way of life President Bush refers to is the one he’s enjoyed, where a privileged few control the decisions of government and commerce and the majority live off the table scraps with a tv remote and recliner to comfort their ignorance. The way of life we are eager to export is destroying the environment, yet the government actively promotes wider industrialization in the third world, mining and resource extraction in countries with little or no environmental control, and shipping U.S. jobs to China, all of which will only increase the impact of global warming. These words of Queen Beatrix from the ICH website inspire a clearer vision: “Desire for vengeance against deeds of hatred offers no solution. An eye for an eye makes the world blind. If we wish to choose the other path, we will have to search for ways to break the spiral of animosity. To fight evil one must also recognize one’s own responsibility. The values for which we stand must be expressed in the way we think of, and how we deal with, our fellow humans.” In other words it’s not rhetoric that establishes the quality of our culture but the reality of compassion and degree of wisdom in action. We could begin by considering liberty as different from the independence from accountability we mistake as freedom. Liberty could imagine an interdependence that promotes a genuinely better way of life for all people and the planet, that values the trust we’ve been given of great natural resource and wealth and conspires that the inheritance we bequeath will be one of well being not only for the next generation, which we are denying with our indebtedness, violent militarism and shortsighted educational policies, but a genuine promise for seven generations to come. Business as Usual All the pols mouth support for the troops but here’s claim vs. fact on the current treatment of veterans. The troops that manage to return unscathed are elated but changed. Eric Alterman writes on the B Team that engineered the invade Iraq policy. The CIA is planning a new secret police in Iraq. Tom Engelhardt connects the dots on the hassle of getting empire insurance. Talking Points Memo outlines the all-politics-and-no-policy fault lines in the President’s brewing budget proposal. The Center for American Progress reports on the failure of key Administration policies, John Halprin offers a progressive agenda to bridge the divide between liberals and conservatives, and Sen. Bill Bradley endorses Howard Dean’s candidacy for President describing Dean as “one of the best things to happen to American democracy in decades." Between the slams Dean is taking, and those supporting him, I’m starting to like the guy. Michael Ruppert writes about who’s really trapped by the “capture” of Saddam (make sure to scroll down and check out the time disconnect revealed by wire service photos of the “captors”). Riverbend writes poignantly on the new year in Baghdad and Occupation Watch reports on the mounting numbers of incarcerated Iraqis. From the Wilderness links the upsurge on Wall Street with the doubling of the poppy crop in Afghanistan. Media Beat announces the PU-litzer prizes for 2003. Common Cause outs Tom Delay’s latest scam to launder money for the RNC, and lastly, though Al Qaeda operatives certainly hijacked the planes that downed the World Trade Center, Chaim Kupferberg provides exhaustive research on the money trail that leads to Lt. Gen. Mahmud Ahmad, former director of Pakistani Intelligence who was breakfasting in Washington with Sen. Bob Graham on the morning of September 11. Ways to Help Take action to limit the destruction of mountaintop removal for mining. Click on the Hunger Site and help feed the impoverished. Give to Mercy Corps a very well run non-profit with one of the highest percentage of dollars received going to those in need. Support those in Israel who have the Courage to Refuse. The Old House by Don Hynes The old house on the island floats out beyond the tether of everything common and worn, across the wind blown channel and deep northerly currents, guarded by the occasional silkie or wren; from that house with its wood stove and broad windows looking out over miles of water everything is distant and clear; when the pitch knots in the firebox explode they announce nowhere to go (but up) even in the face of the beckoning sea and far fetched horizon. Peace. *** |
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