"The latest local example occurred Monday night in Marlboro, when Tea Party members shouted down Democratic Rep. Rush Holt to try to steer the discussion toward their complaints about health reform and job creation, among other things.

"While the Tea Party movement has an undeniable conservative bent, it's most of all an anti-establishment group sick of just about anything and everything government does.

"But at some point all this bellowing and bluster has to turn into more thoughtful discussion about actual solutions, or the Tea Party is destined to become nothing more than a footnote — a tiny one at that — in the political history books.

"In short, the 'outrage' schtick and the labeling of all Democrats as evil socialists has become terribly stale. If members are serious about making a meaningful difference, it's time for them to grow up a little.

"The underlying Tea Party concerns about their pet issues are in many cases valid ones. It is certainly fair, for instance, to question the cost and management of health reform or the proper use of stimulus funding.

"But in keeping with standard political discourse, circa 2010, these reasonable ideas too often manifest themselves in petty insults and manufactured anger that creates more division and hardens the positions of those they criticize.

"To address the specific charges:

"1. 'Yelling loudly.' Yes, some members show the frustration we all feel when the people we elect to represent us are not listening to us. Their elitist attitude is that they know what's good for us and we are the stupid, unwashed masses.

"2. 'Outrageous claims.' Outrageous? I think not. We see what's going on in Washington, the back-room deals, buying votes, the Marxist Czar Van Jones and others in Obama's 'court.'

"3. 'Marlboro shouting down Rush Holt.'- See Item 1 above.

"4. 'Anti-establishment.' Not true. We want our representatives, who are supposed to work for us, to be men of honor and integrity. We want them to follow the Constitution, the law of our land.

"5. 'All Democrats are socialists.' True. Progressives want unlimited government and the Constitution is ignored. If others are not socialists, why don't they say so and not back the party programs.

"6. 'Petty insults.' That goes both ways. We have been labeled 'Astroturf', a 'swastika-carrying mob' and worse.

"7. 'Manufactured anger.' There's nothing manufactured about how we feel.

"We don't want trillions in debt, an unconstitutional mandate forcing us to have a health insurance package rammed down our throats, cap and tax, government takeovers, bailouts and more failed 'stimulus' bills, redistribution of wealth or class warfare between the rich and poor.

This is a reply to Doris Cauda’s 2/13 letter “Teed off by editorial on Tea Party Members,” which addressed “7 specific charges“ in the Press 1/29 editorial, “Tea-ing off not enough.” But before discussing these points, Cauda revealed all we need to know about her perspective when she claimed the editorial proved its “left-wing ‘progressive’ bias.” This alone reveals just how right wing and politically disoriented Cauda is. The Press is neither left wing nor progressive. It is a conservative Republican publication, evidenced by its enthusiastic support of conservative Republican governor Christie’s draconian budget that slashes social services.

“1. Yelling loudly./3. Marlboro shouting down Rush Holt.”

The anger and frustration is understandable. You’re being shafted by a tiny clique of Wall Street billionaires. One day a revolutionary workers movement in the US will win over significant layers of the ruined middle classes with a resolute anticapitalist program and will abolish this unrepresentative capitalist government that puts profits before needs and replace it with a workers government that does the opposite. In the meantime, supporters of this working class perspective are all for debates and a genuine exchange of ideas. We want to take on apologists for big business—particularly when recent events are showing that the profit system isn’t working very well for the people. Unfortunately, in justifying the shouting down of Rep. Holt, Cauder is defending totalitarian and mob rule tactics. She’s also carrying out the harassment strategy leaked in a memo by Bob MacGuffie, who works with the FreedomWorks website, “Tea Party Patriot”: "be disruptive early and often; try to rattle him to avoid an intelligent debate."

“2. Outrageous claims.” Sorry Doris, calling Obama a socialist, communist, and fascist who is Muslim and not an American citizen qualifies as outrageous. Channeling Glenn Beck’s rhetoric about “Marxist Czar Van Jones” is a McCarthyite smear that will not win you political credibility and won’t work as it did 60 years ago.

“4. Anti-establishment.”

Not true, Doris replies. Tea Baggers just want their elected representatives to work for them, to be “men of honor and integrity.” This is the 21^st century. That would be “men and women,” Ms. Cauda. This antiquated, historically obsolete outlook can be explained by her very next statement: “We want them to follow the Constitution, the law of our land.”

That’s where Cauda and her Tea Bagger friends want to take this country—200 plus years backwards, to the time when slavery was legal and  Blacks were considered to be 3/5ths of a person, when there were no expensive entitlements like Social Security and Medicare that might cut  into the profits of the rich propertied classes. Cauda’s Tea Baggers are “strict constructionists”, that is, they think the Constitution is a dogma whose every word was meant to be strictly followed for eternity, much like the Bible is a dogma to many of these same folks, whose every word is  meant to be literally interpreted.

Except the Constitution was never meant to be a strictly construed dogma two centuries later. It is and always has been a living, breathing document that reflects the progress and change generated by real life struggles and the evolving relationship of class forces.

Cauda, like Tea Bag convention speaker Tom Tancredo, no doubt longs to return to the days of literacy tests and poll taxes, unconstitutional measures used for years to deny Black the right to vote in the South.

Further, the sudden reverence for the Constitution rings hollow coming from Tea Baggers, who never said boo when George W. Bush was trampling on the  Constitution by illegally invading Iraq, ordering the torture of illegally held detainees, and illegally wiretapping millions of Americans.

And if you’re looking for honor and integrity in the  Congress, I refer you to Mark Twain, because you’re barking up the wrong tree: “There is no native criminal class except Congress.” The truth is both parties are owned by the corporate elite.

“5. All Democrats are socialists.” Tea Baggers keep making asinine, ahistorical  remarks like this and then wonder why they are ridiculed. I’m not an elitist looking down on you, Doris. I just think  you’re seriously misguided and don’t understand American or world history, so you don’t have the right to shut down anyone, even a rotten capitalist politician.

 The Democrats are a capitalist party. Democrat Max Baucus prevented doctors supporting a single payer system of health insurance from testifying at a congressional meeting. A socialist would not do that. Obama has forked over trillions to Wall Street bankers. A socialist would nationalize the banks, run them as public utilities, and confiscate the money they’ve stolen from the people to fund jobs, health care and education for all. Obama’s health care plan is totally beholden to the profits of the insurance companies and drug industry. A socialist wouldn’t do that, Doris.

Many Democrats are themselves millionaires; some, the so-called “blue dogs,” are universally recognized as conservative  Democrats who frequently vote with the Republicans.

“6. Petty insults.” Doris doesn’t think that people carrying swastikas are insulting anyone. But the Nazi signs have been pervasive at every Tea Bagger mobilization. Calling Obama a Nazi is more than a petty insult. So are signs depicting Obama as a witch doctor with a bone in his nose; or those that say Obama is for enslaving whites.

“7. Manufactured anger.”

I agree the anger is real. The question is where you direct that anger. Cauder claims she’s not anti-establishment, but everything about the Tea Baggers’ politics indicates their anger is directed against only one part of the corporate establishment—the liberal Democratic establishment. While the anger is not manufactured, the orchestration of that anger into the Tea Bagger camp was largely a creation of the right wing media led by FOX, conservative leaders and operatives such as Dick Armey, Newt Gingrich,  racist ex-CongressmanTom Tancredo, Texas governor Rick Perry, former UPS and FedEx executive Mark Skoda

Cauder is being manipulated by big business operatives to misdirect her anger away from the corporate elite and toward the weak sister political party of that elite—the Democrats, along with immigrant workers and Blacks.

Cauder concludes: “We don’t want trillions in debt…”

She’s right, but is admitting that capitalism is bankrupt; tax the rich, abolish the war budget, and cancel the debt to the rich bondholders is the answer, but Cauder’s affinity for the profit system eliminates those solutions.

“…an unconstitutional mandate forcing us to have a health insurance package rammed down our throats…”

I agree; Obama’s plan is part of the ruling rich’s attack on workers’ living standards; the answer is a single payer plan, financed by the government by taxing the rich, not workers or the middle classes;  no need to force anyone—free, universal health care available for all.

“…cap and tax…”

A reactionary plan because it relies on the “free market”, designed to put the profits of the energy companies before the safety of the people, again proving Obama is not a socialist!

“…government takeovers…”

That is what’s needed for the benefit of the people; Obama’s plan is a boon for the private insurance companies; again the confusion and disorientation.

“…bailouts and more failed ‘stimulus’ bills…”

Yes, it is outrageous that both political parties have allowed Wall Street to plunder the US Treasury and make the people pay for their crimes and financial manipulation.  The answer is to nationalize the banks and run them as public utilities, confiscating the wealth they stole from the people and using it to fund jobs,  health care, infrastructure, etc. But Cauder’s disorientation, love of free enterprise and hostility to socialism preclude her from supporting those measures, hence her objection to “redistribution of wealth or class warfare between the rich and poor.”

 Finally, I’ve used “Tea Bagger” instead of “Tea Party” to avoid dignifying today’s flag-waving bigots with the honorable and revolutionary legacy of the American colonists who threw the British ship’s tea into the Boston Harbor. The Tea Baggers are in the service of reaction, of capitalism in decline. The Boston Tea Party triggered the American Revolution, when the American capitalists had a historically progressive role to play. Choke on that, Glenn Beck.--February 24, 2010

You Don't Need a Tea Bagger to Know Which Way the Wind Blows

We Need to Build a Socialist Movement in the US to Constructively Channel the Growing Anger Against the IRS and the Rest of the US Capitalist Establishment (and that includes Olbermann, Maddow, Ratigan and all the other liberal, lesser-evil advocates who for all their supposed brains still don't get it)

Earth to Liberals: Stack wasn't a Tea Bagger. Try not to show your disappointment.

As long as there exists in the US this vacuum of political leadership; as long as the working class is disenfranchised; as long as workers have no voice in this political system; as long as there's no way to channel the growing anger and frustration over the rule of Wall Street and their hacks on Capitol Hill, there will be Tea Baggers and suicide pilots crashing into buildings like Joe Stack did in Austin yesterday.

Back in 1916, Russian revolutionary leader Vladimir Lenin responded to those socialists who dismissed the the 1916 Irish Easter Rebellion as a "putsch" led by petty bourgeois agrarian nationalists" with a penetrating essay entitled "The Irish Rebellion of 1916." While the context in which Lenin penned these lines is entirely different, read every word carefully and  you will be struck by the historical relevance of Lenin's analysis to the US in 2010.

The Irish Rebellion of 1916

"To imagine that social revolution is conceivable without revolts by small nations in the colonies and in Europe, without revolutionary outbursts by a section of the petty bourgeoisie with all its prejudices, without a movement of the politically non-conscious proletarian and semi-proletarian masses against oppression by the landowners, the church, and the monarchy, against national oppression, etc.--to imagine all this is to repudiate social revolution. So one army lines up in one place and says, 'We are   for socialism', and another, somewhere else and says, 'We are for imperialism', and that will be a social revolution! Only those who hold such a ridiculously pedantic view could vilify the Irish rebellion by calling it a 'putsch'.

"Whoever expects a 'pure' social revolution will never live to see it. Such a person pays lip-service to revolution without understanding what revolution is.

"The Russian Revolution of 1905 was a bourgeois-democratic revolution. It consisted of a series of battles in which all the discontented classes, groups and elements of the population participated. Among these there were masses imbued with the crudest prejudices, with the vaguest and most fantastic aims of struggle; there were small groups which accepted Japanese money, there were speculators and adventurers, etc. But objectively, the mass movement was breaking the back of tsarism and paving the way for democracy; for this reason the class-conscious workers led it.

"The socialist revolution in Europe cannot be anything other than an outburst of mass struggles on the part of all and sundry oppressed and discontented elements. Inevitably, sections of the petty bourgeoisie and of the backward workers will participate in it—without such participation, mass struggle is impossible, without it no revolution is possible—and just as inevitably will they bring into the movement their prejudices, their reactionary fantasies, their weaknesses and errors. But objectively they will attack capital, and the class-conscious vanguard of the revolution, the advanced proletariat, expressing this objective truth of a variegated and discordant, motley and outwardly fragmented, mass struggle, will be able to unite and direct it, capture power, seize the banks, expropriate the trusts which all hate (though for difficult reasons!), and introduce other dictatorial measures which in their totality will amount to the overthrow of the bourgeoisie and the victory of socialism, which, however, will by no means immediately 'purge' itself of petty-bourgeois slag." [emphasis in original]

Obviously and unfortunately, there does not yet exist in the US a class conscious revolutionary vanguard, but it is coming. Ask Glenn Beck. For all his ignorance, he knows it's coming--which is why he rails against it every day.--February 19, 2010

• Prisoner threatened with power drill, gun (Gangsters seem to like the power drill; no doubt the CIA punk was inspired by the Colombian thugs in Scarface)
• CIA threatened to kill Khalid Sheikh Mohammed's children
• A detainee was informed that CIA agents would rape his mother in front of him
• Agent repeatedly pinched neck of prisoner, causing unconsciousness
  

On “US airstrikes kill scores of civilians in Afghanistan”

This is nothing but disaster. I am sometimes so disheartened by the escalating violence and ferocity of expanding militarism that I become physically sick to my stomach. Of course, that is a minor affliction compared with the certain death and maiming of thousands at the hands of the US military, led by the demented financial elite and vicious military-intelligence who violate humanity on a daily basis for the purpose of making the rich richer and seeking to make manifest the sick power fantasies of a certain political type: the equivalent of the “mad doctor” in a particularly lurid science fiction story.

This, then, is the world becoming inhospitable for human life. This, then, is the culmination of perverted dreams of power and ruthless slaughter as the means of attaining it. This, then, is the endgame proposed enthusiastically by the scions of capitalism. It is bleak and filled with horror.

Remember the famous “War Prayer” of Mark Twain:

“O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with little children to wander unfriended the wastes of their desolated land in rags and hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames of summer and the icy winds of winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring Thee for the refuge of the grave and denied it—for our sakes who adore Thee, Lord, blast their hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimage, make heavy their steps, water their way with their tears, stain the white snow with the blood of their wounded feet!”

"When asked when the U.S. economy would collapse, Panarin said: 'It is already collapsing. Due to the financial crisis, three of the largest and oldest five banks on Wall Street have already ceased to exist, and two are barely surviving. Their losses are the biggest in history. Now what we will see is a change in the regulatory system on a global financial scale: America will no longer be the world's financial regulator.'

"When asked who would replace the U.S. in regulating world markets, he said: 'Two countries could assume this role: China, with its vast reserves, and Russia, which could play the role of a regulator in Eurasia.'

"Asked why he expected the U.S. to break up into separate parts, he said: 'A whole range of reasons. Firstly, the financial problems in the U.S. will get worse. Millions of citizens there have lost their savings. Prices and unemployment are on the rise. General Motors and Ford are on the verge of collapse, and this means that whole cities will be left without work. Governors are already insistently demanding money from the federal center. Dissatisfaction is growing, and at the moment it is only being held back by the elections and the hope that Obama can work miracles. But by spring, it will be clear that there are no miracles.'

"He also cited the 'vulnerable political setup', 'lack of unified national laws', and 'divisions among the elite, which have become clear in these crisis conditions.'" [emphasis added]

The Deepening Economic Crisis

By Margaret Kimberley

The American economy continues its slide to new depths of brokenness and dysfunction. January 2009 was the worst January ever for the benchmark S&P 500 Index. In the last week of that same month, major corporations announced the layoffs of more than 100,000 workers. The state of New York is borrowing funds in order to pay benefits to an ever growing number of unemployed. The state of California can't pay anyone anything, sending IOUs in lieu of tax refund checks. The other 48 states are in similarly dire straits. The federal government is broke, yet the new president is about to turn over the next round of bailout money to the financial services industry without any demand that working Americans benefit from the continued public largesse.

While Americans focus on nonsense, the worldwide economic crisis strengthens its grip. Fortunately, citizens of other countries are not going quietly into the night. The usually peaceful people of Iceland threw out their government after international banksters destroyed their economy. The French, never shy about protesting, took to the streets to show their government that they wouldn't be silent as unemployment rises and wages fall. The rest of the world may make demands on their political leadership, but Americans are stuck in a morass of apathy and ignorance brought about by corporate media disinformation.

If the millions of Americans who voted for Barack Obama were to make demands on the system, there might be some hope for the nation. Unfortunately they are singularly unprepared to do anything they should do in order to save themselves. They ought to demand true health care reform. A system guaranteeing access for all would help individuals and also businesses such as the auto industry that are going bankrupt in part because of the cost of health care. Citizens ought to demand drastic cuts in military spending for the nation that spends more on defense than the rest of the world combined. Instead they are foolishly impressed when Obama puts on a show and pretends to be concerned about corporate jets and billion dollar bonuses on Wall Street.

Obama could have had an anti bonus provision in the TARP bail out bill if he had wanted one. As his party's nominee for president, he gave TARP his full blessing. He said nothing that his banker backers didn't like and now pretends that he is shocked, shocked, to find out that his fund raisers like to make and take as much money as possible.

The much discussed stimulus bill is also a meaningless distraction. The "shovel ready" infrastructure projects do nothing to save homes or jobs or loosen credit. The stimulus bill is instructive only in that it demonstrates how two-faced Barack Obama has turned out to be. He added tax cut provisions to the legislation not because he thought he would get Republican support. He already knew he would not. He added those provisions because he wanted them all along, knowing full well that Democratic House members would look and feel like chumps in the deal making process. Speaker Nancy Pelosi acknowledged as much butdemurred when asked if the tax cuts provisions might be removed. "It's something that we can live with," said the House Speaker. Nancy should speak for herself.

Easily fooled Americans were glued to the television watching the Obama inauguration while simultaneous ignoring their own worsening financial situation. Who can bother to look at the fine print on multi-billion dollar deals when HISTORY is being made? Now the same zombified population ignores presidential inaction on bankruptcy "cramdown" legislation that could save their homes, explicit threats to Social Security, and back-tracking on employee free choice for labor unions.

In their delusion and despair, the only reaction left to non class conscious Americans is to turn on themselves. Murders and suicides are too often the reaction to financial disaster instead of righteous indignation directed towards a failed political and economic system. Americans are losing their minds when they might alleviate their depression by taking to the streets or at the very least giving their elected leaders a piece of their minds.

Americans never had the tools to fully understand the system that is failing them so terribly. Now they are enthralled by a man who explicitly instructs them not to confront the people and institutions that have brought them to the brink. The economic meltdown will continue for a long time and so will the individual meltdowns and disasters for millions of people who will literally not know what hit them or where they ought to turn after the crash.--February 4, 2009, in Counterpunch

“... We certainly have reason to be upset:  On the first day of the Fall 2008 semester, the CUNY budget was slashed $50.6 million.  Massive layoffs plague all our schools. We are now being told of a looming $600-per-year tuition hike and more colossal budget cuts to CUNY students and teachers, in a school that was once FREE.

We will continue this campus occupation until our demands are met. While the demands tonight are specific to The New School we will not be satisfied until the students and faculty of CUNY, NYU, all the consortium schools and beyond, have control over their universities. Education should be free, student debts should be canceled, students and workers should work together to achieve our goals, and we start here.”

"As the world economy enters the greatest economic downturn since the Great Depression, workers will have to confront a basic question—capitalism or socialism? The issue is not one of appealing to the employers for the best deal in exchange for the loss of jobs, but of taking control of the factories and the economy as a whole, and running them in the interests of social need."

The recognition that pre-revolutionary conditions are looming was expressed recently by Paul Craig Roberts, who was once Assistant Secretary of the Treasury in the Reagan administration. Said Roberts:

"The change over which Obama will preside will have no American victories. The change will come from America as a failed state, from the dollar dethroned as reserve currency, from America repudiated by its allies and paid puppets, from massive unemployment for which there is no solution, from hyperinflation that produces anarchy.

"The day might arrive when Washington is faced with revolution at home as well as abroad."

And that's where revolutionary Marxists come in.  Because we haven't gone away. We know that Lenin was right when he told the Bolsheviks in 1917: "We must patiently explain. The masses will come to us. They have no alternative."

"There is a powerful element of 'the emperor has no clothes' in the muted media response to the selection of Palin. The vice presidency has become, in the past 20 years, one of the most important offices of the capitalist state. It is obvious that Palin is, by the standards of bourgeois politics, completely unqualified for the position, and that in choosing her, McCain has called into question his own judgement as well. But there is, at least so far, an agreement not to speak this embarrassing truth, and to proceed as though McCain had simply made an interesting and unusual, but nonetheless arguable choice.

"The logic of the Palin selection is that the Republican Party must now wage a relentless and unambiguously right-wing campaign, that all talk of bipartisanship and finding common ground on divisive social and political issues must be scrapped in favor of an effort to mobilize the most frenzied and extremist elements. That such a campaign will be waged against an African-American opponent insures that there will be appeals to racial as well as Christian fundamentalist bigotry.

"The choice of Palin was depicted by some media commentators as an act of political desperation, an indication that the McCain campaign sees the November 4 election as virtually unwinnable without such a political adventure. But there is another side to the selection. Insofar as McCain’s choice of Palin potentially puts a political cipher in position to assume the presidency, it demonstrates that the president and vice-president are, in the final analysis, figureheads for the state machine.

"If the McCain-Palin ticket were to be elected and the incoming president, already 72 years old and a cancer victim, does not survive his term, the Pentagon, the CIA, the NSA, the FBI and all the other repressive agencies of the American state would continue to function and carry out their program of imperialist war and internal repression under a President Palin. They have, after all, continued to carry out their filthy work through the eight-year presidency of George W. Bush, who is no more 'qualified' than Palin in any conventional sense.

"The real government of the United States is not created by the votes of the people on the first Tuesday in November. It consists of the permanent machinery of state that serves the interests of the ruling elite, regardless of the identity of the occupant of the White House, and regardless of which of the two big business parties holds office."--Patrick Martin, "McCain bows to ultra-right with Palin selection"

In July 2001, Scarborough's congressional aide was found dead in his office

Hey Joe Scarborough: What happened to Lori Klausutis, anyway?

And why do you send cease and desist letters to websites mentioning the two of you?

Lori Klausutis was the 28-year-old female aide found dead in Scarborough's congressional office under suspicious circumstances, complete with cops instantly declaring there was no foul play, then an admission there was a "scratch and a bruise", then a discredited autopsy conducted by a coroner who lost his license in two states for lying about autopsies. The official story from Michael Berkland is that Lori fainted from a previously unknown heart condition and hit her head on a desk. But that doesn't square with the massive damage to Lori's skull that was revealed only when the autopsy report was finally released due to the efforts of a local newspaper publisher.

Klausutis's death came 2 months after Scarborough suddenly announced his plans to resign from Congress. The media blacked out the story. Two years later, Scarborough is hired by MSNBC as a talk show host. Only in America.

What the F**K is Joe Scarborough doing on the air?

One thing's for sure: Bill O'Reilly's got nothing on Joe Scarborough when it comes to covering up embarrassing skeletons in the closet. And at least there wasn't a corpse involved in O'Reilly's scandal.--September 6, 2008

"....Country after country has been left vulnerable to the global commodity price surge by 'free market' policies implemented at the demands of Washington and the international financial agencies such as the IMF and World Bank over the past quarter century.

"The closer integration of the economies of the oppressed countries into the world market has been accompanied by their increasing concentration on specialized export crops, while tariff barriers have been demolished, opening the way to subsidized agricultural staples from the more advanced countries capturing local markets.

"The revolutionary implications of this crisis are beginning to dawn on elements within the ruling establishment itself. In an article published Monday, the influential US magazine Time noted: 'The idea of the starving masses driven by their desperation to take to the streets and overthrow the ancien regime has seemed impossibly quaint since capitalism triumphed so decisively in the Cold War... And yet, the headlines of the past month suggest that skyrocketing food prices are threatening the stability of a growing number of governments around the world.'"

India: Rising food prices threaten social calamity

Anger grows over rising prices in Sri Lanka

Pakistan: Textile workers’ protests convulse Multan

"Leave the highway and drive through Dubois, Pennsylvania; Blaine, Washington; Adamsville, Michigan or Kingman, Arizona, and you will draw the unmistakable conclusion that much of America already lives in Depression conditions. That millions are eking out an existence, working two or three jobs, up to their ears in debt, one pay-check from genuine hardship, finds physical expression in the peeling paint, the boarded-up houses and factories, the rusting machinery, the deserted downtown streets.

"A recent article in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch points out that small towns, defined as those with less than 40,000 inhabitants, have borne an inordinate burden in the Iraqi war. Some 46 percent of the 800 or so US soldiers killed have come from such areas, which represent only 27 percent of the American population. These are 'economic conscripts,' driven by lack of opportunity to enlist in the army. Out of these elements emerge a certain percentage capable of the crimes at Abu Ghraib.

"One of their major influences is religion, Baptist and varieties of Christian fundamentalism, whose obsessive sexual repression is turned inside out in the Iraqi prisons. Also taking its toll is the decades-long bombardment of the population by xenophobia and chauvinism, whether by right-wing demagogues or Hollywood films. Treating Iraqis as subhumans comes all too easily to some."

More on the "bitter" truth of US society

"Apparently, the Democratic senator is guilty of a double offense against the norms of contemporary American electoral politics: He allowed real-life experiences of social deprivation to affect him, and then spoke frankly in front of an audience, albeit a privileged one at a private fundraiser, of the economic realities of American society.

"He compounded this political sin with the suggestion that religion, gun rights, economic protectionism and anti-immigrant agitation were used to divert working people from the economic oppression they face....

"Nothing that Obama said was a surprise to the media pundits or his political rivals. If anything, he understated the level of bitterness in rural and small-town America, since he left out one of the most important factors in fueling popular anger—the war in Iraq, which has taken a disproportionate toll in these communities, where a far higher percentage of young people volunteer for the military than in urban or suburban areas.

"Republican political strategists have relied for years on appeals to religious sentiments—'God, gays and guns,' in the parlance of political consultants—to win support among voters whose jobs and living standards have been devastated by the decline of American industry and the unrestrained “free market” policies of successive Republican and Democratic administrations.

"Thomas Frank wrote a best-selling book four years ago (What’s the Matter with Kansas?), which examined this process in his home state, and his conclusions about the use of coded appeals to religion to induce voters to ignore their own economic interests have become conventional wisdom in ruling class political and media circles.

"While Frank’s book had certain insights into American culture and politics, he ignored the most fundamental factor enabling the Republican appeals to prejudice and backwardness to produce electoral successes—the drastic shift by the Democratic Party to the right and its abandonment of any policies to alleviate economic inequality or improve living conditions for working people....

"The near-unanimous consensus that Obama has committed a huge blunder by referring to working class bitterness and resentment has two sources: the enormous social distance of the millionaire pundits and politicians from the real lives of working people, and the fear that under conditions of convulsions in the financial markets and the onset of a deep recession, any discussion of the underlying social antagonisms in America has potentially explosive consequences."

"The other question that deserves careful consideration is the way in which the Spitzer affair reflects the immense growth of government surveillance over every aspect of life in America. The kind of information that flowed from the New York governor’s bank into the hands of federal investigators is regularly collected through the monitoring of financial transactions of millions upon millions of Americans, along with their emails, telephone calls and travel information under the domestic spying operation run by the secretive National Security Agency." ("Politically directed dragnet snares New York Governor Spitzer," Bill Van Auken, World Socialist Web Site, March 12, 2008)

Pigs gone wild: LA's worst attack May Day immigrant protesters

“Without warning, cops descended into a park full of families, homeless and handicapped individuals and street cart vendors. They were merciless. 

“For the next 30 minutes, hundreds of activists and bystanders were shot, beaten by night sticks and run out of the park. The police had no intention of entertaining requests from people who were not able to move quickly enough. They were forcefully hit on the legs until they were immobile. 

“The cops didn't only move people out of the perimeters of the park, they chased through the park firing at anyone who might have been an obstacle. I witnessed many people who were shot at from the back. Children and entire families were being violently pushed or beaten. An elderly woman cried out for help but few were willing to run back in the face of fast-approaching SWAT police."--Ernest Arce, ANSWER Coalition organizer and eyewitness to cop riot.

The specifics for Clinton’s "peace plan"? A) Stopping more troops to Iraq; B) capping troop levels at January’s figures; C) protecting troops by ensuring they are properly trained and equipped; D) ending the "blank check" for the Iraqi government; convening an international conference on Iraq; E) a phased redeployment out of Iraq in 90 days.

Translation: Clinton’s first two points are an attempt to cut US losses and salvage some gains from the strategic disaster Washington’s aggression in Iraq has caused for US imperialism. "Protecting troops by ensuring they are properly trained and equipped" means helping an imperialist occupying force kill more Iraqis on behalf of US banks, oil companies and corporations. "Ending the ‘blank check’ for the puppet Iraqi government parrots Bush’s policy of pressuring the stooge Malaki to slaughter on behalf of his masters in Washington. A "phased redeployment out of Iraq in 90 days" is Democratic dust-in-our-eyes doubletalk that sounds "antiwar" but only means withdrawing forces to Kuwait and other nearby strategic bases until they need to be sent back to kill and die again for Big Oil and the rest of the US capitalists.

Clinton’s "antiwar" stance also includes sending more US troops to subjugate Afghanistan and attacking Bush from the right on Iran, again echoing Bush’s line that "no options should be taken off the table" with Iran, including the use of nuclear weapons.

Hillary Clinton is every bit as committed as George W. Bush to sending US soldiers to kill and die to protect corporate profits and US hegemony in the energy rich Middle East and Central Asia. That’s what is behind her refusal to renounce her 2002 vote to authorize Bush to invade Iraq.