Curious Carl's Corner: March 2017

Friday, March 31, 2017

Re: [blind-democracy] Re: Billionaires vs. Billionaires: How TrumpCare's Defeat Was Actually a Victory for the Koch Brothers

Hi Miriam,
The article was a good one. I just went off the rails on a tangent.
Tangents are good to go off on when you don't really want to plow
through with a long tirade on the fore mentioned article.
But it does tie in with our discussion about Capitalism. In my
opinion, there is no such a thing as a good Capitalist. Cancer is
Cancer, whether you have just a little Cancer or a great amount of it.
Cancer is not normal. It is an aberration.
So we know folks who practice Capitalism. Probably at some point in
our lives we might have done so, too. Since it is the System we live
under, practicing Capitalism, in and of itself, does not turn us into
monsters. It is the accepted method of maintaining our place in
society.
But without strong checks and balances Capitalism nearly always seeks
to suffocate competition. Take a nice guy who opens a little store.
Say his name is Walton. Let's give him his due, believing that an
underlying motive, beyond wanting a better life for his family, was to
provide products at a reduced cost for his neighbors. He seems to
have found the combination to success. He opens a second store,
equally successful. Mister Walton is still the "nice friendly" guy
next door...except "next door" is now a mansion on the hill behind
gates. Does this once friendly fellow ever stop to assess whether his
philosophy of providing folks with cheap products might be harmful to
other businesses, or to the "Associates" he is now finding he must pay
low wages and few benefits to, in order to stay ahead of his
competition?
What has happened, assuming that Walton really did begin with an eye
to helping his town, is that he has forgotten his original desire, and
is now caught up in a different fight.
Capitalism must depend upon expansion to survive. That friendly small
grocer down on the corner will soon be pushed out of business by the
big corporate Safeway store if he can't find the backing to expand his
store into a supermarket.
Bill Boeing, a nice guy wandering around the Pacific Northwest, opened
a small airplane factory on the shores of Lake Washington. George
Westinghouse, Tom Edison, Henry Ford, and more recently, Bill Gates.
All of these men began in a business that was going to make life
better for us all. Did they succeed? Well it sure worked for them.
But at whose expense? Did they really deserve the unbelievable riches
they gathered into their personal off-shore banks? If a little
Capitalism works, how come it doesn't improve the lives of those who
labor each day to bring in the profits? How come the folks in town
have to tax themselves more in order to provide the food banks, the
free clinics, the day care and other basic services that these workers
cannot afford? Like cleaning up the messes left behind.
When those first oil wells sprang up in "back yards" in Pennsylvania
and Oklahoma, and then in Texas, making regular poor folks into
millionaires...back when it meant something to be a millionaire, could
anyone possibly believe that such good luck would lead to Drones
blowing the dreams of thousands of people into fragments of flesh and
bone? People struggling to exist from day to day, never having the
where with all to open that little corner store...or even a Roach
Coach.
No, there is no such thing as a little Capitalism. Human nature being
what it has become, Greed is constantly entering into the mix, erasing
the bottom line that called for helping neighbors, and instead turning
those neighbors into indentured servants.
But we keep trying to tweak Capitalism, as if we can keep it small and
make it do good. So far, looking around at those warring
international corporations, the score is, Capitalism 1 billion, and
the People, Zero.

Carl Jarvis

On 3/31/17, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@optonline.net> wrote:
> Carl,
>
> When I read this article, I immediately thought of you because it's a clear
> explanation of how the elites run the show, even as they fight each other
> for power.
>
> Miriam
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: blind-democracy-bounce@freelists.org
> [mailto:blind-democracy-bounce@freelists.org] On Behalf Of Carl Jarvis
> Sent: Thursday, March 30, 2017 11:28 PM
> To: blind-democracy@freelists.org
> Subject: [blind-democracy] Re: Billionaires vs. Billionaires: How
> TrumpCare's Defeat Was Actually a Victory for the Koch Brothers
>
> Dirty Oil? Not to worry. Donald Trump has promised us "Clean Coal...I mean
> really clean."
> If washing the outside of coal makes it "clean", then can we make dirty oil
> clean by running it through clean pipelines? I had a buddy in high school
> who showered in the morning and again at night. "My hair gets too greasy,
> so I might as well wash all of me while I'm washing my hair", he told me.
> But as clean as his hair was, he still had the dirtiest mind in the twelfth
> grade.
> And that got me to thinking. Donald Trump seems to spend a great deal of
> time primping his hair. Probably washes it every day, too. And yet...well,
> maybe his mother should have used the old Ivory soap treatment for his dirty
> mouth.
> Of course even Ivory soap will only clean the surface of the hands, while
> doing absolutely nothing for where and when the hands go groping. But what
> the Heck, wash the coal and call it clean.
>
> Carl Jarvis
>
>
>
>
> On 3/30/17, Mike Edwards <mike@ultraemail.us> wrote:
>>
>>
>> Sent from my iPhone
>>
>>> On Mar 30, 2017, at 6:00 PM, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@optonline.net>
>>> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> David and Charles Koch. (photo: Getty)
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Billionaires vs. Billionaires: How TrumpCare's Defeat Was Actually a
>>> Victory for the Koch Brothers
>>>
>>> By Greg Palast, OpEd News
>>>
>>> 30 March 17
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> When RyanCare-TrumpCare finally ended up face-down in the swimming
>>> pool, triumphalist Democrats whooped and partied and congratulated
>>> themselves on defeating the Trump-Ryan monstrosity.
>>>
>>> But deep in their counting house, counting their gold, three brothers
>>> cackled with private jubilation.
>>>
>>> David and Charles Koch knew the day was theirs.
>>>
>>> Joining them in the celebration was Brother Billy, William Koch, who
>>> will share in their $21 billion windfall that the President arranged
>>> for them only hours before TrumpCare crashed--when Trump announced
>>> his State Department had formally approved the Keystone XL Pipeline.
>>>
>>> Let's start with that $21 billion.
>>>
>>> The XL Keystone Pipeline would take the world's heaviest, filthiest
>>> crude from Canada's tar sands, and snake with it all the way down to
>>> Texas.
>>>
>>> [Watch this clip from The Best Democracy Money Can Buy.]
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Now here's a question I never hear from our sleep-walking media:
>>> Exactly why are we sending oil all the way across the United States
>>> to Texas. I mean, doesn't Texas already have a little oil?
>>>
>>> In fact, Texas is drowning in oil, choking in it. But the Kochs'
>>> Texas refinery can't use much local crude. The Koch Industries Flint
>>> Hills refinery on the Texas Gulf Coast was designed specifically to
>>> crack only the world's "heaviest" (i.e. filthiest) crude.
>>>
>>> Texas crude ain't heavy enough, ain't dirty enough, for the Kochs'
>>> Gulf Coast operation, originally designed for imports for the world's
>>> major source of heavy crude: Venezuela. The price the Kochs paid for
>>> Venezuela's oil was set by its President Hugo Chavez, and now, by
>>> Chavez' chosen successor, Nicolas Maduro.
>>>
>>> Chavez and Maduro both told me they'd squeeze the Kochs by their
>>> tankers.
>>> They have.
>>>
>>> Enter the Mounties: Canadians sell their super-heavy crude at a $12
>>> to $30 a barrel discount to the Venezuelan price. If the XL Pipeline
>>> is complete, the Kochs can suck down Canada's cheap cruddy crude for
>>> a minimum savings of
>>> $1.27 billion in a single year.
>>>
>>> The Kochs pocket billions while we fry: burning the Canadian tar
>>> sands reserve will, all by itself, raise the temperature of the
>>> entire planet by
>>> 0.7 degrees Fahrenheit.
>>>
>>> Over the life of the XL Keystone Pipeline, the various Koch
>>> operations will put at minimum, $21 billion in Koch family pockets.
>>> Because we have to add in not only Charles' and David's gains, but
>>> Brother Billy's windfall as well"
>>>
>>> Brother Billy's Filth Factory
>>>
>>> The third, lesser-known Koch is Brother William, now principal of
>>> Oxbow Carbon. The name itself gives environmentalists the
>>> heebee-jeebies.
>>>
>>> To keep the tar sands gunk flowing through the Keystone pipeline, the
>>> worst of the tar must be extracted and processed as "petcoke," stuff
>>> so filthy and toxic it is illegal to burn in the USA. So Billy Koch
>>> sells the compressed filth to China and Mexico.
>>>
>>> And Billy's bro's have joined the "petcoke" game too. David and Charles'
>>> subsidiary, Koch Carbon, already pulls the gunk from the current
>>> Keystone pipe where in Detroit it's accumulating in piles bigger than
>>> the pyramids.
>>> Here's a photo of Koch's coke wafting over Detroit's city parks.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Which explains why the Koch's political front operation, Americans
>>> for Prosperity, named approval of the XL Pipeline the number one
>>> priority for the Trump presidency.
>>>
>>> KochDon'tCare
>>>
>>> When TrumpCare breathed its last, the President blamed Democrats for
>>> its untimely demise.
>>>
>>> A stunned by-stander, Democratic Minority leader Nancy Pelosi, went
>>> for
>>> it:
>>> "We'll take credit for that."
>>>
>>> Sorry, Nancy, you can't.
>>>
>>> Because it was the Kochs' brownshirts, the self-styled "Freedom Caucus,"
>>> that, in a bestial assault, crushed a sitting President and their own
>>> leader of Congress, Paul Ryan. The thugs' secret weapon: heavy bags
>>> of cash, Koch cash.
>>>
>>> Kochs front groups, including Americans for Prosperity (the XL
>>> promoter, promised unlimited funds to any far-right Congressman who
>>> would vote against the bill. The Kochs' Freedom Partners Executive
>>> Director told members of the uber-right Congressional Freedom Caucus,
>>> "We will stand with lawmakers who keep their promise and oppose this
>>> legislation" with a "seven-figure" war chest. In the old days, that
>>> was called "bribery." But today it's called, "Koch."
>>>
>>> Blow-hard Trump threatened them, but Koch's money protected them.
>>>
>>> The Kochs don't want ObamaCare, TrumpCare, nor any care at all for
>>> Americans that add to their tax bill. Call it KochDon'tCare.
>>>
>>> Billionaires versus Billionaires
>>>
>>> But keen observers of TrumpCare would note that it was not really a
>>> health care bill, but a tax bill--specifically, a tax cut of some
>>> $157 billion that has been charged to the richest Americans to fund
>>> ObamaCare through a 3.75% tax on passive investment income--that is,
>>> money earned, not by working, but by speculating.
>>>
>>> Because behind the public creator of the bill, Speaker Paul Ryan,
>>> stood Ryan's number one funder, a billionaire known as The Vulture.
>>> The Vulture, aka Paul Singer, makes all his money by nasty methods
>>> excoriated even in the Wall Street Journal.
>>>
>>> In Trump's weird psycho-babbling press conference last month, he
>>> said, "So I want to thank Paul Singer for being here and for coming
>>> up to the office."
>>> Reporters scratched their head, not knowing who this "Singer" is nor
>>> why Trump brought it up.
>>>
>>> Now, you know what that was about.
>>>
>>> Singer makes all his money from speculation income. The Ryan-Trump
>>> "healthcare" bill was first and foremost a tax cut for Singer, likely
>>> worth billions to The Vulture (and more to his cohort including
>>> Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin).
>>>
>>> But to the Kochs, this tax break is nearly worthless. So, behind the
>>> curtain, this was a fight of billionaires versus billionaires.
>>>
>>> The Kochs, having built up their army of useful idiots--the
>>> Koch-funded Tea Party and Freedom Caucus, won this one. (Hey, no hard
>>> feelings. The Vulture still dines with the Kochs in Vail and donates
>>> to their super-PACs.)
>>>
>>> Sure, let's breathe a sigh of relief that, with ObamaCare momentarily
>>> saved, we won't have more amputees begging in the subway, meth
>>> addicts croaking in New Hampshire and my bank account emptied for my
>>> next heart surgery.
>>>
>>> It's not Trump's victory that portends fascism--it is the bending of
>>> Trump by the hands of the poisonously greedy Brothers Koch that
>>> brings the fascist corporatist state one day closer.
>>>
>>> And that is nothing to celebrate.
>>>
>>> e-max.it: your social media marketing partner
>>>
>>>
>>> Love Gregg Palast. Still need to get to his book, Best Democracy
>>> Money Can buy. It is waiting in my cue.
>>
>>
>>
>
>
>
>

Thursday, March 23, 2017

Re: [blind-democracy] James Bamford | The Multibillion-Dollar US Spy Agency You Haven't Heard Of

Today's airing of Democracy Now is an eye opener for those who believe
that impeaching Trump will solve our problems. Trump is merely the
scab covering a pus pocket. Pull him off and the only change will be
that everything will be instantly covered, and we will have no idea
where to turn.
We keep making the same mistakes. We focus on one individual, when
the cause of our up coming destruction is an entire anti American
Movement. The Movement is dedicated to reducing our government to
"pimple" size. The driving force in this fast growing movement is
only interested in the freedom to do as they please. We keep trotting
out heart rendering tales of starving children, rat infested slums,
crumbling schools and roads and bridges, and single mothers burning
their second hand furniture in order to keep some heat for their
children. Because most of us have a sense of compassion, and care for
those less fortunate than ourselves, we think that the Ruling Class
have the same compassion. When will we learn that the Ruling Class is
held captive by Greed and His lieutenants Lust and Envy? They have no
time in their grubbing lives for compassion. Compassion is a sign of
weakness, to them. We, the People, are held in contempt. Even as
these professional pirates smile and tell us what we want to hear, in
their private conversations they sneer and spit upon us and our
beliefs. It's all a big game to them. Winner take all. And we think
we can discuss issues and talk sense into these alien minds? We try
to believe we can compromise with them, even as the only outcome in
their minds is to conquer us. Some of our leaders say we need to
listen to all sides. But how do we listen to all sides when one side
is hiding behind lies and misconception? Take the time today to go
to:
democracynow.org

Listen to who owns Trump, and much of America. These snickering,
sneering privateers are not role models. They are the real Terrorists
in our midst. They are monsters. They have no ability to show
compassion. It is not in their genes.
Am I coming through yet?

Carl Jarvis

On 3/23/17, Miriam Vieni <miriamvieni@optonline.net> wrote:
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Have you heard of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency? (photo: U.S.
> Army Corps of Engineers Baltimore District/Getty Images/Foreign Policy)
>
>
>
>
> James Bamford | The Multibillion-Dollar US Spy Agency You Haven't Heard Of
>
> By James Bamford, Foreign Policy
>
> 22 March 17
>
>
>
> How President Trump might turn an all-seeing spy apparatus on innocent
> American citizens.
>
> In a heavily protected military base some 15 miles south of Washington,
> D.C., sits the massive headquarters of a spy agency few know exists. Even
> Barack Obama, five months into his presidency, seemed not to have
> recognized
> its name. While shaking hands at a Five Guys hamburger restaurant in
> Washington in May 2009, he asked a customer seated at a table about his
> job.
> "What do you [do]?" the president inquired. "I work at NGA, National
> Geospatial-Intelligence Agency," the man answered. Obama appeared
> dumbfounded. "So, explain to me exactly what this National Geospatial." he
> said, unable to finish the name. Eight years after that videotape aired,
> the
> NGA remains by far the most shadowy member of the Big Five spy agencies,
> which include the CIA and the National Security Agency.
>
> Despite its lack of name recognition, the NGA's headquarters is the
> third-largest building in the Washington metropolitan area, bigger than the
> CIA headquarters and the U.S. Capitol.
>
> Completed in 2011 at a cost of $1.4 billion, the main building measures
> four
> football fields long and covers as much ground as two aircraft carriers. In
> 2016, the agency purchased 99 acres in St. Louis to construct additional
> buildings at a cost of $1.75 billion to accommodate the growing workforce,
> with 3,000 employees already in the city.
>
> The NGA is to pictures what the NSA is to voices. Its principal function is
> to analyze the billions of images and miles of video captured by drones in
> the Middle East and spy satellites circling the globe. But because it has
> largely kept its ultra-high-resolution cameras pointed away from the United
> States, according to a variety of studies, the agency has never been
> involved in domestic spy scandals like its two far more famous siblings,
> the
> CIA and the NSA. However, there's reason to believe that this will change
> under President Donald Trump.
>
> Throughout the long election campaign and into his first months as
> president, Trump has pushed hard for weakening restraints on the
> intelligence agencies, spending more money for defense, and getting tough
> on
> law and order. Given the new president's overwhelming focus on domestic
> security, it's reasonable to expect that Trump will use every tool
> available
> to maintain it, including overhead vigilance.
>
> In March 2016, the Pentagon released the results of an investigation
> initiated by the Department of Defense's Office of Inspector General to
> examine military spy drones in the United States. The report, marked "For
> Official Use Only" and partially redacted, revealed that the Pentagon used
> unarmed surveillance drones over American soil on fewer than 20 occasions
> between 2006 and 2015. (Although the report doesn't identify the nature of
> the missions, another Pentagon document lists 11 domestic drone operations
> that principally involved natural disasters, search and rescue, and
> National
> Guard training.)
>
> The investigation also quoted from an Air Force law review article pointing
> out the growing concern that technology designed to spy on enemies abroad
> may soon be turned around to spy on citizens at home. "As the nation winds
> down these wars . assets become available to support other combatant
> command
> (COCOM) or U.S. agencies, the appetite to use them in the domestic
> environment to collect airborne imagery continues to grow."
>
> Although the report stated that all missions were conducted within full
> compliance of the law, it pointedly noted that as of 2015 there were no
> standardized federal statutes that "specifically address the employment of
> the capability provided by a DoD UAS (unmanned aircraft system) if
> requested
> by domestic civil authorities." Instead, there is a Pentagon policy
> governing reconnaissance drones that requires the secretary of defense to
> approve all such domestic operations. Under these regulations, drones "may
> not conduct surveillance on U.S. persons" unless permitted by law and
> approved by the secretary. The policy also bans armed drones over the
> United
> States for anything other than military training and weapons testing.
>
> In 2016, unbeknownst to many city officials, police in Baltimore began
> conducting persistent aerial surveillance using a system developed for
> military use in Iraq.
>
> Few civilians have any idea how advanced these military eye-in-the-sky
> drones have become. Among them is ARGUS-IS, the world's highest-resolution
> camera with 1.8 billion pixels. Invisible from the ground at nearly four
> miles in the air, it uses a technology known as "persistent stare" - the
> equivalent of 100 Predator drones peering down at a medium-size city at
> once
> - to track everything that moves.
>
> With the capability to watch an area of 10 or even 15 square miles at a
> time, it would take just two drones hovering over Manhattan to continuously
> observe and follow all outdoor human activity, night and day. It can zoom
> in
> on an object as small as a stick of butter on a plate and store up to 1
> million terabytes of data a day. That capacity would allow analysts to look
> back in time over days, weeks, or months. Technology is in the works to
> enable drones to remain aloft for years at a time.
>
> The Department of Homeland Security has been at these crossroads before. In
> 2007, during the presidency of George W. Bush, the department established
> an
> agency to direct domestic spy satellite stakeouts and gave it a bland name:
> the National Applications Office. But Congress, concerned about a "Big
> Brother in the Sky," cut off funding. In 2009, it was killed by the Obama
> administration.
>
> Still, unlike domestic electronic surveillance by the NSA, which has been
> closely scrutinized and subjected to legislation designed to protect civil
> liberties, domestic overhead spying has escaped the attention of both
> Congress and the public. The Trump administration may take advantage of
> that
> void.
>
> Initiating a new age of "persistent surveillance," Trump could use the spy
> world's overhead assets to target Muslims or members of Black Lives Matter.
> The president has spoken in favor of increasing the scrutiny of mosques;
> aerial assessment would allow him to track worshippers. Drones could aid in
> the mass roundup of illegal immigrants intended for deportation, and Trump
> has said he may send federal forces to Chicago to quell the violence.
> Drones
> could offer the city the unblinking eye for 24/7 vigilance.
>
> Of course, all that would require a significant expansion of the National
> Geospatial-Intelligence Agency to analyze the domestic imagery. Before that
> can happen, Trump, like Obama, has to discover there is such an agency.
>
> e-max.it: your social media marketing partner
>
>
>
>

Wednesday, March 22, 2017

Re: [acb-chat] Federal Crackdown - Going after real bad dudes -- the elderly and disabled!

Tuesday, March 21, 2017

Welcome to the ConfederateOligarchy of America!

Good wet Spring morning to all:

Maybe my choice of Confederate is not grammatically correct, but the
idea isn't so hot, either.
My point still stands. The United States of America was established
as an Oligarchy, not a Republic, as we've been taught from the ground
up. "a state in which supreme power is held by the people and their
elected representatives, and which has an elected or nominated
president rather than a monarch."
It would sound like this is "us", until we review who holds power in
today's USA, and what the original document, "our" Constitution tells
us who "The People" being protected, were.
White, Male, 21 years, Land Owners, Great personal wealth...and did I
mention, White?
Those men forced to fight to free the Colonies from the grip of wicked
King George, could never tell the difference between their former
Masters, the entrenched British Empire, or the up and coming USA.
When those who survived the war returned home, they picked up their
plow and hoe and went back to their labor without having gained a
thing. They had no Rights, because they were not covered by the
Constitution.
While the Oligarchy functioned as a Republic, and over the years
included many people formerly unprotected, they never gave up control.
For example, allowing women the right to vote, freeing Slaves,
establishing Public Education, all these and more could be permitted
so long as the control stayed with the Oligarchy, the Ruling Class.
Elections can be managed and politicians can be bribed. Education for
all can be controlled as to what is taught and for what purpose.
Freeing the Slaves meant freeing cheap labor for Northern factories.
Of course we also are confused by the existence of bickering among the
various factions within the Oligarchy. Today, the Oil Barron's' and
the entire Military Industry control the direction of the nation,
replacing the former power center of Manufacturing.
But when the Corporate Capitalism that under girds the Oligarchy is
threatened, all the powerful Interests come together to put out any
brush fires.
And along comes Donald Trump. through his actions and from his loose
lips, Trump gives notice of his intentions of conducting a mission of
dismantling the Central Government, and passing governmental power off
to the States. Controlling the sprawling Federal government has
become a real drag on the members of the Oligarchy, taking away from
their major objective of owning just about everything.
And we, "The People" are either conned or forced into supporting
Trump's short sighted plan. What we see happening is what we get when
we have the leadership of the USA taken over by a Self Anointed
Entertainment Personality and self proclaimed Billionaire, and his
troupe of "High Priests" from Goldman Sachs
And great numbers of confused people cheer and cackle whenever their
Master says, "Make America Great Again!" What is the magic key that
will put this wicked Genie back in the bottle he oozed out of?
Have we really excluded words like, Reason, Wisdom, and
Thought-Process from the English language?
Just when did we turn our collective backs on the phrase, "Of the
People, by the People and for the People"?
Even though it is misguided in the direction it is taking us, the
Oligarchy believes it is protecting the interests of its Oligarchs.
So just who is looking out for the rest of us? Why are so many of us
behaving like sycophants? Haven't we learned that the bootlicker
becomes his master's doormat? Kissing up will never open the
cherished doors to the "Wonderland" of the rich. But just like our
belief in buying the winning lottery ticket, we believe that somehow
we could be one of those few people who manage to slip through. We
simply ignore the fact that our Great America is built like a Pyramid,
needing the huge numbers on the bottom in order to hold up the very
few on top.
Of course we can always head for Church, and pray to our God to be on
our side...but that's a different rant.

Carl Jarvis

Monday, March 20, 2017

Re: [blind-democracy] Suppression of rights inevitably targets the working class

"Suppression of rights inevitably targets the working class."
This statement should be food for thought. Can it be possible that
the "Laws of the Land" were not written with the Working Class in
mind? Could it be that the Courts view "The Rights of the People" to
be those Rights practiced by only members of the American Oligarchy?
Keep in mind that the Ruling Class are given the consideration that in
a court of law, they are presumed innocent until proven guilty. The
Working Class, along with most Citizens of Color, are considered
guilty until proven guilty.
Even the "right" to defend oneself in a court of law is prohibitive
for the majority of working class citizens. Court costs and attorney
fees, and even the location of the court can make such a defense
difficult, if not impossible. For a large percentage of working class
poor, the court appointed public defenders available to defend their
cases are overworked lawyers, often generalists inexperienced in the
finer points of the law, faced by skilled specialists. This results,
not in justice, but in a contest between two performers.
And given the overload, and the skills of most public defenders, it is
a lopsided contest.
We need to always remind ourselves that this Great Land, home of the
free and land of the brave, was established as an Oligarchy. The
Landed Gentry and the Wealthy Colonists felt unfairly taxed, and given
no representation in England's Courts, they rose up. And they mounted
an army populated by Working Class People. Remember, these people
making up the fighting force of the new army were never included under
the old laws or the new ones. When the war was over they returned to
their labors, being treated no differently under the New Government
than they had been under King George. The victorious Colonists put
together a Constitution that made it very clear as to who the Nation
was created for. White, Landed, Men, over 21 years of age, or
otherwise possessing great wealth. Despite changes over the years,
this nation continues to fall back on the original intent when it
comes to whose "Rights" are in question.
We understand that the bottom line of Capitalism is Profit. But we
can't seem to get it through our minds that the bottom line of the
United States of America is the protection of the Oligarchy.
Of course as long as that constitution is the basis of the nation's
laws, it will favor the Ruling Class every time. The only meaningful
change will be through the drafting of a new, all inclusive
constitution that protects all citizen's Rights, equally.

Carl Jarvis

On 3/19/17, Roger Loran Bailey <dmarc-noreply@freelists.org> wrote:
> http://themilitant.com/2017/8112/811256.html
> (Education for socialists)
> The Militant (logo)
>
> Vol. 81/No. 12 March 27, 2017
>
>
> Suppression of rights inevitably targets the working class
>
> Below are excerpts from Counter-Mobilization: A Strategy to Fight
> Racist and Fascist Attacks. It contains the transcript of a 1975
> discussion led by Farrell Dobbs. Dobbs was a leader of the 1930s
> Teamster strikes; central organizer of the first Teamster campaign to
> unionize over-the-road truck drivers; and national secretary of the
> Socialist Workers Party from 1953 to 1972. Other participants excerpted
> here are Jack Barnes, national secretary of the Socialist Workers Party,
> and Steve Clark, at the time the national secretary of the Young
> Socialist Alliance. Copyright © 1976 by Pathfinder Press. Reprinted by
> permission.
> FARRELL DOBBS: Starting from our initial premise — the aim of the
> capitalists with regard to fascism — I'm trying to look at each tactic
> from the point of view of its effect. What happens if you start out with
> the premise that you're going to organize a battle to prevent the
> fascists from saying one word in public? What happens, on the other
> hand, if you operate on the basis of asserting and exercising the right
> to counterdemonstrate, to confront the fascists in this form without
> getting bogged down in the question of the fascists' right of free
> speech? The first approach is to the advantage of the ruling class. The
> second approach puts you in a more favorable position and the ruling
> class in a more difficult position for carrying out its basic aim of
> crippling the rights of the antifascists.
>
> To use a slight reformulation of that phrase of Malcolm X, the essence
> of the ruling class tactic toward oppositional movements like the
> struggle against fascism is to make the criminal appear to be the victim
> and the victim appear to be the criminal. They try that in every
> struggle, without exception. You always have to keep that in mind when
> you deal with the tactical nuances in the struggle.
>
> Remember that tactics have to serve a strategic course, and the
> strategic course has to be closely attuned to the programmatic aims.
> It's not advantageous to grab hold of a tactic because it seems
> appealing at the moment without always seeing the tactic in relation to
> the whole fundamental problem. …
>
> STEVE CLARK: The concrete incident that led Ginny Hildebrand and I to
> want this discussion occurred at San Francisco State University. A
> professor invited a Nazi onto the campus to address his speech class on
> March 10, 1975. No right-wing student or faculty group was involved. In
> fact, the professor was known to have left-liberal leanings. The way he
> conducted his class was to bring in all kinds of professional speakers —
> preachers, Communists, and in this case a Nazi.
>
> A demonstration was called with the stated aim of running this Nazi off
> campus and preventing his appearance before the class. It was called by
> the Spartacus Youth League, which describes itself as the youth section
> of the Spartacist League. The Progressive Labor Party and the
> Revolutionary Student Brigade were involved in one way or another on the
> same basic line. The real organizations with influence on campus — the
> Chicano student organization, the Black students organization, the
> women's organization, and some others that were approached — didn't want
> anything to do with the action.
>
> The Young Socialist Alliance [YSA] refused to support or endorse this
> demonstration because of the way it was projected. We were aware of some
> of the basic ideas that Farrell laid out. We had learned the dangers of
> the confrontationist approach in the antiwar movement. …
>
> We took a different tack than that proposed by Farrell on the question
> of the rights of Jensen, Shockley, the other academic racists, and, by
> implication, the fascists. We incorporated a lot of the lessons Farrell
> discussed. We opposed calling on the administration or the government to
> ban speakers. We thought we were avoiding the trap of placing the axis
> on freedom of speech, by avoiding actions like shouting the speakers
> down and other things which have led to unnecessary victimization of
> antiracists. But we said that the YSA does not believe racists and Nazis
> have the right to speak on campus. …
>
> JACK BARNES: The processes going on in society, including class
> polarization, reflect themselves on campus. Let's begin with that
> reality, and then we can fit all our strategy and tactics on campus into
> the broader strategy and tactics of the class struggle.
>
> That's why I think Farrell was right to begin where he did. We don't
> start with the Constitution, or the Bill of Rights, or the fascists. We
> start with the preparation of our class and its vanguard for the coming
> struggles. That's the axis that everything we do revolves around. …
>
> Tactically, you have to differentiate between Shockley and the Nazis.
> There is a whole spectrum of outright fascists, right-wing professors,
> right-wing students, secretly right-wing types, open racist elements,
> secretly racist elements, groups that favor a stronger role for the
> military, etc. You have to be aware of the qualitative differences
> between some of these shades as well as the breadth of the spectrum. You
> handle each type slightly differently.
>
> At the point where we are in the evolution of class consciousness in
> this country, and the state of the student movement in relation to that
> overall level of class consciousness, you cannot deal with Shockley or
> Jensen exactly as you would deal with fascists.
>
> On these questions we have the job of winning the minds not only of the
> masses but of the vanguard. Even many of the more capable students
> cannot self-confidently explain what's wrong with these theories. You've
> got to take them on at that theoretical level, as well as on the level
> of the implicit politics of what Jensen and Shockley are doing. It will
> be greatly appreciated in the Black community if forces come forward to
> rebut this racist fakery in plain language, cogently and scientifically.
> On this question, one of our weapons is science.
>
> Of course, we don't invite these people to campus, but we also know that
> they are going to be on campus. There are going to be debates and people
> are going to go to them and a lot of racists are going to look to these
> pseudoscientists for ammunition. The young militants will want to know
> how to rebut the Jensens. They really appreciate it when you give them
> ammunition, answer their questions, clarify their confusions so that
> they can answer the questions of others in their milieu.
>
>
> Related articles:
> Debate rages over attack on political rights at Middlebury
>
>
>
> Front page (for this issue) | Home | Text-version home
>
>
>
>
>

Friday, March 17, 2017

Re: [blind-democracy] Trump Proposes Federal Budget With Massive Cuts to the Arts, Science, and the Poor

Trial Balloons!
As we read this budget proposal, and listen to the Fallout it causes,
it is important to think through what is being done. Trump's proposed
budget is just that, "proposed". Congress will hammer out the final
budget. What is most likely to happen is that elected officials on
both sides of the Aisle will come under severe pressure from their
constituents effected by the proposed cuts. What will probably occur
is a softening of these proposals. Congress will then assure voters
that they have been heard, and their Programs have been "protected to
the best of our ability, under existing conditions". But hang onto
this Trump Budget. Tuck it away for later reference. What has been
presented represents the Trump administration's ultimate goal.
Additional conversation by Ralph Nader can be heard on:
democracynow.org

It is also important to remember that President Donald Trump is a
product of Corporate Capitalism. He has also considerable experience
as an Entertainment Personality. Selling the customer what you tell
them they want, is a skill already well demonstrated by Trump. Bait
and switch, another trick practiced by Wall Street and Madison Avenue,
is being applied. Note that Mexico is no longer being billed for that
wall Trump promised to build in order to keep us "safe". Along with
cuts in programs such as Head Start, Meals on Wheels, and
environmental Programs, the budget would reduce funds to our Coast
Guard. Cut funds to our Coast Guard? Doesn't the Coast Guard...guard
our Coast? Build a Wall between us and Mexico, while opening our
Coasts to anyone with a boat? Is that Wall another distraction, like
the Bomb Shelters during our fear of Communist invasion back in the
50's? Or perhaps it is a reflection of that perceived invasion by
Japanese during the Second World War. Before we allow ourselves to be
stampeded like a herd of Sheep, we need to sort out what is real and
what is smoke and mirrors.
Also, as much as I have complained about the NPR's slide to the Right,
think of what it means to the Media if funds are cut. Already the
only "reporter" allowed to officially travel with the Secretary of
State on his Asian Tour, was a Right Wing representative.
Through threats of being shut out, the Media will most likely soften
and become compliant. Sadly, our nation's journalists have come under
the spell caste by Greed. The pressure to sell product, to please
wealthy supporters, and to simply hang onto their jobs, has colored
the so called News.
One positive bit of news is that town meetings are growing in
attendance, and when congress comes home, they are met with crowds of
very unhappy voters. Remember, we working class Americans hold the
power to either send our representatives back to Washington D.C. with
new instructions, or if they can't cut the strings that connect them
to Wall Street, then we can replace them with people who know who
their real bosses are.

Carl Jarvis

Sent on 3/16/17:
some hard facts about Trump's proposed budget.

> President Donald Trump. (photo: Getty)
>
> Trump Proposes Federal Budget With Massive Cuts to the Arts, Science, and
> the Poor
>
> By Damian Paletta and Steven Mufson, The Washington Post
>
> 16 March 17
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> resident Trump on Thursday will unveil a budget plan that calls for a sharp
> increase in military spending and stark cuts across much of the rest of the
> government including the elimination of dozens of long-standing federal
> programs that assist the poor, fund scientific research and aid America's
> allies abroad.
>
> Trump's first budget proposal, which he named "America First: A Budget
> Blueprint to Make America Great Again," would increase defense spending by
> $54 billion and then offset that by stripping money from more than 18 other
> agencies. Some would be hit particularly hard, with reductions of more than
> 20 percent at the Agriculture, Labor and State departments and of more than
> 30 percent at the Environmental Protection Agency.
>
> It would also propose eliminating future federal support for the National
> Endowment for the Arts, the National Endowment for the Humanities and the
> Corporation for Public Broadcasting. Within EPA alone, 50 programs and
> 3,200
> positions would be eliminated.
>
> The cuts could represent the widest swath of reductions in federal programs
> since the drawdown after World War II, probably leading to a sizable
> cutback
> in the federal non-military workforce, something White House officials said
> was one of their goals.
>
> "You can't drain the swamp and leave all the people in it," White House
> Office of Management and Budget Director Mick Mulvaney told reporters.
>
>
> (photo: The Washington Post)
>
>
>
> Many of Trump's budget proposals are likely to run into stiff resistance
> from lawmakers on Capitol Hill, even from Republicans, whose support is
> crucial because they must vote to authorize government appropriations.
> Republicans have objected, for example, to the large cuts in foreign aid
> and
> diplomacy that Trump has foreshadowed, and his budget whacks foreign aid
> programs run by the Education, State and Treasury departments, among
> others.
>
> "The administration's budget isn't going to be the budget," said Sen. Marco
> Rubio (R-Fla.). "We do the budget here. The administration makes
> recommendations, but Congress does budgets."
>
> Trump's budget would not take effect until the new fiscal year on Oct. 1,
> but the president must still reach a separate agreement with Congress by
> the
> end of April, when a temporary funding bill expires. If they can't reach an
> agreement, and if Trump's new budget plan widens fault lines, then the
> chances would increase for a partial government shutdown starting on April
> 29.
>
> The president and Congress must also raise the debt ceiling, which has
> become a politically fraught ritual. Although the ceiling was extended
> until
> March 15, budget experts say the government should be able to continue
> borrowing money by suspending or stretching out payments through August or
> September.
>
> White House budget proposals are often changed by lawmakers, but they serve
> as a marker for how the president plans to govern and as an opening bid on
> budget talks. Mulvaney said the White House was open to negotiation, but he
> was unapologetic about the size and scope of the reductions.
>
> "This budget represents a president who is beholden to nobody but the
> voters," Mulvaney said. "He is following through on his promises. We did
> not
> consult with special interests on how to write this budget. We did not
> consult with lobbyists on how to write this budget. The president's team
> wrote this budget and that's what you'll see in the numbers."
>
> The 53-page budget plan offers the clearest snapshot yet of Trump's
> priorities. Yet it is also far shorter and vaguer than White House budget
> plans normally are. One of the missing details is precisely where and how
> many jobs would be eliminated across the federal government.
>
> Parts of the budget proposal also appear to contradict Trump's agenda.
> Trump
> has said he wants to eliminate all disease, but the budget chops funding
> for
> the National Institutes of Health by $5.8 billion, or close to 20 percent.
> He has said he wants to create a $1 trillion infrastructure program, but
> the
> proposal would eliminate a Transportation Department program that funds
> nearly $500 million in road projects. It does not include new funding
> amounts or a tax mechanism for Trump's infrastructure program, postponing
> those decisions.
>
> And the Trump administration proposed to eliminate a number of other
> programs, particularly those that serve low-income Americans and
> minorities,
> because it questioned their effectiveness. This included the Low-Income
> Home
> Energy Assistance Program, which disburses more than $3 billion annually to
> help heat homes in the winter. It also proposed abolishing the Community
> Development Block Grant program, which provides roughly $3 billion for
> targeted projects related to affordable housing, community development and
> homelessness programs, among other things.
>
> The budget was stuffed with other cuts and reductions. It calls for
> privatizing the Federal Aviation Administration's air traffic control
> function, cutting all funding for long-distance Amtrak train services and
> eliminating EPA funding for the restoration of Chesapeake Bay. Job training
> programs would also be cut, pushing more responsibility for this onto the
> states and employers.
>
> Many Republicans have criticized these programs in the past as wasteful and
> ineffective, but supporters have said the programs are vital for
> communities
> in need.
>
> The proposed budget extensively targets Obama programs and investments
> focused on climate change, seeking to eliminate payments to the United
> Nations' Green Climate Fund - one key component of the U.S. commitment to
> the Paris climate agreement - and to slash research funding for climate,
> ocean and earth science programs at agencies such as NASA and the National
> Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. At the same time, clean-energy
> research, heavily privileged by the Obama administration, would suffer
> greatly under the budget with the elimination of the ARPA-E program
> (Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy) at the Energy Department and an
> unspecified cut to the agency's Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable
> Energy.
>
> "I think one of the reasons they're proposing them [big spending cuts] is
> that they know they won't ever get through Congress," said Sen. Patrick J.
> Leahy (D-Vt.). "They know they'd be a disaster for their own party if they
> did. It makes for a great talking point. It actually fits on a tweet."
>
> There were several areas in which Trump proposed increasing spending. He
> proposed, for example, $168 million for charter school programs and $250
> million for a new private-school choice program, which would probably
> provide tuition assistance for families who opt to send their children to
> private schools.
>
> The biggest increase in spending would be directed at the Pentagon, but the
> budget plan does not make clear where the new $54 billion would go. The
> budget plan would boost funding for the Army, Navy, Marine Corps and Air
> Force. It would, among other things, acquire new F-35 Joint Strike Fighters
> and rebuild what it says are depleted munitions inventories. But it stops
> short of saying how these new funds would support new tactics to combat the
> Islamic State.
>
> The bump in defense spending was a marked contrast to the cuts Trump
> proposed in diplomatic and international programs. He proposed cutting
> combined spending for the State Department and the U.S. Agency for
> International Development by $10.1 billion, or nearly 29 percent. It would
> cut an unspecified amount of funding from U.N. peacekeeping efforts. It
> would also cut spending for Treasury International Programs, foreign
> assistance programs that have been supported by Republican and Democratic
> administrations, by $803 million, or 35 percent.
>
> Trump directed funding to meet several of his campaign pledges as well.
>
> He proposed new money to hire border security agents and immigration
> judges.
>
> And he requested $1.7 billion in new funding this year and an additional
> $2.6 billion in new funding in 2018 to begin construction of a wall along
> the border with Mexico. Trump proposed creating this wall during his
> campaign and had said Mexico would pay for it. A number of congressional
> Republicans appear to be cooling on the idea.
>
> The federal government is expected to spend more than $4 trillion in the
> fiscal year that begins in October, and Trump's budget proposal would deal
> with slightly more than 25 percent of this funding. The government is
> expected to spend $487 billion more than it brings in through revenue
> during
> the next fiscal year, and to avoid widening the deficit, Trump proposed
> steep cuts across the budget to compensate for the new defense spending.
>
> Trump will propose a more comprehensive budget plan in May, which could
> include changes to programs such as Medicaid and also offer economic
> forecasts. But that proposal will come after the deadline for reaching an
> agreement to avoid a partial shutdown. So Thursday's budget proposal from
> Trump will factor squarely into those negotiations.
>
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Curious Carl's Corner