My observation is that most Whites voted for Barack because he was at a minimum a non- threating mulatto. “Clean and articlate “to use Biden’s words. No, not like Jesse or Sharpton.

His bailout of Wall St. is the marriage of government and big business;
the classic definition of facism by Mussilini himself. The destruction of the auto industry is the destruction of the last manufacturing capacity that this country has. We must preserve tool & dye and machine tooling, otherwise would be just another undeveloped
country.

The Left must learn to embrace the concerns of every day people. The facts in their lives out weigh ideology. The left must address peolpes concerns about jobs, housing, national defense, crime, immigration and health care. Knee jerk reactions will not do.

The only way to affect Obush and his handlers is by sustained pressure from the street. Social movements must be independent of political parties and serve their core constituencies directly. People should register as independents.

Get the articles of impeachment ready!

Eric

There is nothing in this article that hasn’t been stated by Paul Street, Naomi Klein or (the “detested”) Noam Chomsky. You basically just pasted together a bunch of random points that anyone with political awareness stretching back more than a few years would already take as “common knowledge”.

You also seem to have an agenda based on Obama’s perceived “Blackness” and the fact that that perception – true or false in whatever subjective form you’re addressing – led people to see him as a “buddy” that actually cares about their interests and problems. Yes, voting for “Blackness” is just as racist and superficial and voting against it, but that says more about race relations (or the lack thereof) in this country than it does about Obama himself. Primary voters may have voted for or against Clinton based on her color and gender as well, so it cuts both ways.

In other words, “his racist voters are more significant than McCain’s” is a lame argument.

I will thank deadbeat for linking to that article on “Palestinians courting anti-Semitic Jews” that you posted elsewhere…I’d suggest anyone think they’ve found another anti-Obama “sister in arms” read her comments on the Middle East and take into account she “detests Chomsky” and calls Cynthia McKinney a “demented loose cannon”. This despite having (I’m guessing) never met either one or even looked at their arguments with any depth. Leave the childish name calling to pundits like O’Reilly and Maher. Or don’t. I couldn’t care less.

The fact that you’ve obviously got a Zionist slant in some of your writing tells me that you’ve made the mistake people on both “sides” on the narrow spectrum often fall into making: looking at the “personality” instead of the policies. If you cared about the issues instead of “nyah nyah he’s Bush III lol”, you’d be an ardent supporter of Obama and his typically slavish devotion to the Likud Lobby.

In your comment you referred to “Congress and Senate.” I read so many comments on the Internet where people write that.

The Senate is part of Congress. The Congress consists of the House and Senate. Representatives and Senators. I think you meant to say The House and Senate.

Also, Bernie Sanders is an independent (like myself). No political party affiliation.

What Causes War!
Ted Grant

Source: Socialist Fight, Vol. 3 No. 3, May 1961

http://www.tedgrant.org/archive/grant/1961/05/war.htm

Michael Foot writes in the Tribune of Friday 14th April on the question of the cause of the Second World War. He says in reviewing the book by A. J. P. Taylor: “Had the British statesmen of the thirties been capable of this exercise they could easily have stopped the Second World War by discovering what Mr. Taylor discovered: that Hitlerism right up till 1939, was the most gigantic bluff of all time.”

Thus Foot and other “left-wing” Tribunites who think like him are sufficiently gullible to believe that the Second World War was some ghastly “accident” that could have been avoided if only “British statesmen” had been clever enough to understand that Hitler was “bluffing.”

Thus the secondary episodes and accidental incidents that have precipitated war at a particular time in the past are taken out of all proportion and magnified to become the actual cause of the war. To write of history this way is to turn the whole development of mankind into the result of aimless, senseless, bloody and meaningless decisions of this or that individual.

It is true that Hitler—and the German imperialism he represented—were not solely responsible for the war. Just as the First World War was caused not by the wickedness of the Kaiser, but by the rivalry for world domination by British and German imperialism, and the impasse of the capitalist system of that time, so the Second World War was not the result of the evil intentions of even such a monster as Hitler. It was caused by the stage of development reached by Europe at that time and the struggle for markets, raw materials and colonies between Germany and Britain at that particular period. The Daily Telegraph pointed out on the eve of the war that competition between Germany and Britain on the markets of the world had reached a greater depth and pitch than on the eve of the 1914 war.

Fear of revolution
But the rise of Hitler in Germany was caused by the crisis of capitalism in Germany. Let us never forget that Hitler had the backing of all the main imperialist powers, including Britain, America and France. The ruling class of these countries fearing the socialist revolution in Germany, reluctantly backed the Nazis. This explains the refusal of the British and French imperialists to take action at the time of the Nazi occupation of the Rhineland, and of German rearmament. They were afraid of social revolution in Germany. They also believed that they could use Hitler for war against the Soviet Union in order to destroy “Bolshevism”—i.e. in this context the restoration of capitalism in the Soviet Union by means of armed intervention.

It is impossible to understand the policies of all the powers, including the policy of Hitler or “bluff”, without understanding the class basis of society. Allied imperialism backed Hitler, rearmed Hitler, supported Hitler, Mussolini and the Japanese militarists because of fear of the consequences of their downfall, it was out of fear of the downfall of the capitalist system that they “grovelled” before Hitler in Munichism, etc.

“Fairy tales”
Long before Hitler was ever heard of, when Hitler was a corporal in the armies of the Kaiser during the First World War, Marxism had predicted the inevitability of a second world war if capitalism was not overthrown. In answer to socialists like Michael Foot, who were clamouring for disarmament, a League of Nations, and an agreement between the nations to prevent war, Lenin dismissed these arguments as “fairy tales” of a very pernicious and dangerous character. If, he said, the world war would not be ended by a series of successful socialist revolutions, then there would inevitably be a second world war, to be followed by a third and so on till civilisation itself would be destroyed.

In this respect it must be admitted that Lenin’s sober estimate based on a class analysis of capitalist society has stood the test of time.

But to come to the events with which Michael Foot deals. The non-intervention of the Allied powers in the Spanish revolution was dictated by similar considerations. They feared the victory of the republicans, on the basis of the revolutionary movement developing among the Spanish workers, would lead to the socialist revolution in Spain. As Lennox-Boyd, recent colonial secretary in the Conservative government, explained at the time, the butcher Franco was a “gallant Christian gentleman” fighting the barbaric socialist hordes. It is not accidental that Churchill praised both Hitler and Mussolini as upholders of civilisation against the dangers of “communism”.

“Drive to the East”
Leon Trotsky in a pamphlet entitled “The coming world war”, predicted the outbreak of the Second World War just a few months before it occurred. The war did not take place because Hitler seized Danzig. Just a few months before the Polish imperialists had joined with the Germans to grab a slice of Czechoslovakia. The British imperialists retreated before Hitler’s seizure of Austria and Czechoslovakia because of fear of the alternatives. They wished to build up Hitler for his “drive to the East” and a war against Russia. A policy they partially carried out at the time of Hitler’s attack on Russia. Truman, then vice-president, and Moore-Brabazon, then a minister, blurted out the truth of the aims of the Anglo-American imperialists when they declared that the best result would be the destruction of both Germany and Russia. In the actual losses and scale of fighting the war turned into a Homeric struggle between Germany and Russia.

Defence of capital
In all this the real roots of the war can be seen in the class system of society. The Second World War could be seen as the inevitable result of the piling up of the contradictions of capitalist society. The narrow interests of each “national” capitalist class conflict one with the other. Probably none of the powers “wanted” war at that particular time and on those particular issues. Had the imperialists of Britain, France and America not been so short-sighted from the point of view of their own interests, and prevented Hitler from seizing Austria, and Czechoslovakia, possibly war would have been delayed for some months or years. But it is vital for the advanced workers in the labour movement to understand that this or that diplomatic deal or agreement, its arrival or breaking down, is not the cause of war. It was not the violation of Belgian neutrality that caused British capitalism to enter the First World War. It was not the seizure of Danzig—one city and a city populated by Germans at that—that caused the Second World War… That would be straining at the gnat and swallowing the camel, of the Austrian and Czech seizures, that impelled British capitalism to declare war. It was not love of democracy and hatred for fascism, but pure defence of the capitalist interests of the British ruling class that pushed them into their declaration of war.

“Love of peace”
Hitler’s Germany in 1939 was faced with the alternative of “expand or die”. Hitler in the desperate struggle with Britain for declining markets had declared “export or die”. A similar grim alternative was being posed by the British ruling class. Hitler had rearmed Germany and stretched the German productive machine to its fullest extent. Had war not taken place in 1939 there would have been seven million of unemployed in Germany and the Nazi system could not have survived. Within the narrow confines of the German state, the vast productive machine built by German capitalism, big enough to supply the whole world with goods, was being stifled. The German market was too small for the needs of the German imperialists. Hence the attempt to extend it by seizing the continent of Europe. British imperialist policy on the other hand was determined by the frantic fear of the British ruling class of losing their Empire. They stood only to lose by war. Hence their desperate efforts—to preserve “peace”. They were like a satisfied burglar who, accumulating spoils, is afraid of the loot being hi-jacked by rival gangsters. There is no “love of peace” in this policy. Like the policy of Hitler it was dictated by the class needs of British capitalism.

Accidental wars?
Michael Foot and the historian he so much admires, A. J. P. Taylor, are searching merely for superficial incidents which explain nothing of the real cause of war in our epoch.

The lesson is clear. Imperialism has provoked two slaughters of the peoples. A third looms ahead for the future—unless the working class draws the lesson of these events. Wars—especially world wars—are not accidental. An accident can cause war if all the other conditions for war are present. But there is no such thing as an “accidental war”. The only way to end the possibility of such madness as fascism and war is to destroy the system which inevitably leads to these horrors.

The psychological problem with most US citizens is that they hate capitalism, but at the same time they hate Ralph Nader !!
Socialism

that’s the problem of US citizens, they hate bankers, they hate Federal Reserve, they hate high electrical bills, high medical fees, but at the same time they hate Ralph Nader, Cinthya Mckinney, The Socialist Equality Party, or anybody who could socialize the wealth of America.

US citizens are too libertarians, US citizens hate Marx and socialism. How can i help my fellow americans if they hate socialst policies like the nationalization of giant corporations under workers and state control, free medicine, free food, workers cooperatives,etc). and love The Rockefeller, The Rotshchild Family, The Bush family, The Clinton Dynasty and bankers so much.

Americans love this bullshit of Memorial Fascist Days with Wal Mart burgers, Edwards Pecan pies (Which are very fattening by the way).

Most American citizens cannot give up their Mcdonalds, their Wendies, their Duncan Hines cakes, their Pillsbury cakes, their Betty Crocker cakes, our culture and marriage with Pizza Hut, with Little Caesars, with Dominos. We have been bombarded by years of pizzas, burgers, and cakes.

Americans are like the wives who are beaten up by their oppressive husbands but at the same time love them and love their beatings and repressive treatment.

It’s a relationship of hate-love that most people in this country have with capitalism.

.

http://www.abovetopsecret.com/forum/thread465971/pg1

Maybe it’s time to think strategically about getting 9/11 justice. Proving that 9/11 was an inside job in a court of law is going to be extremely difficult. Proving that various elements of the government knew that an attack would happen and deliberately let it happen, could be much easier. Either way, it’s still treason.

My current belief in what seems to be the most likely explanation for 9/11 is that it was a foreign intelligence operation (Mossad), designed to force the US into a clash of civilizations against Israel’s enemies. If you read Webster Tarpley’s book Synthetic Terror, you’ll see that there is considerable circumstantial evidence that Bush was targeted for assassination the morning of 9/11 and threatened later in the day in a way that can’t possibly be explained by a guy in a cave with a satellite phone. I’m no fan of Bush but he does look like a deer caught in the headlights at the school when he was told about the 2nd hit to the WTC. Since there is documented evidence that the US was warned by several foreign intelligence agencies of the impending attack, and clear evidence that NORAD was ordered to stand down and undisputed acknowledgement that Dick Cheney was put in charge of US Air Defense several months before 9/11, my money is on Cheney and various neocon supporters(wolfowitz, Rumsfeld, etc.) who learned about the impending attack and decided to let it happen to achieve their political agenda as outlined in the New American Century document. Who would have benefited from Bush’s assassination? Cheney. Who was in a position to interfere with NORAD’s normal interception procedures? Cheney. Who is the dominant personality of the neocons? Cheney. Since a lot of the Neocons are also jewish, is it possible that they were actually cooperating with Mossad? Sure. But proving that will be much harder than proving that they were either criminally negligent in not stopping the attacks or that they deliberately stood back and made sure that the attacks were sucessful. My guess is that if a concerted effort were made to bring some of the lesser actors to justice, like NORAD’s Gen. Meyer, Michael Chertoff, Selikow, Silverstein, etc., that someone will spill his guts in return for immunity and that will bring the whole house of cards down. By the way, I’m not saying and I don’t believe that the jewish people as a whole should be blaimed for 9/11. The vast majority are decent, honest, law-abiding and LOYAL individuals. It’s the zionist minority that are pushing a political agenda (not a religious one). Some of the most ardent opponents of Zionism are jews including rabbis. Therefore being anti-zionist is NOT anti-semitic.

The Democratic Party plays an indispensable role in society’s political machinery. This doesn’t mean it has any power, in terms of controlling the state or setting policy. It means that without the existence of the Dem Party, the US could no longer maintain the pretense that it’s a “democracy.” If the Dem Party disintegrated, the US would be revealed for what it really is — a one-party state ruled by a narrow alliance of business interests.

In terms of defending the general population against the depredations of this business consortium, the Dem Party gave up the ghost in the mid-1960’s. Their threadbare act as the “Party of the People” serves not to defend the well-being of the population, but merely to persuade ordinary citizens that within the official political system’s framework, there’s at least some faint hope for eventual progressive change. Their focus is not so much being on our side, as convincing us that they’re on our side — without the slightest serious examination of what that might entail.

The party’s true function is thus largely theatrical. It doesn’t exist to fight for change, but only to pose as a force which one fine distant day might possibly bestir itself to fight for change. Thus the whole magic of the Dem Party — the essential service it renders to the US power structure — lies not in what it does, but in its mere existence: by simply existing, and doing nothing, it pretends to be something it’s not; and this is enough to relieve despair & to let the system portray itself as a “democracy.”

As long as the Dem Party exists, most Americans will believe we have a “democracy” and a “choice” in how we are ruled. They will not despair, and will not revolt, as long as they have this hope for “change within the system.” From the system’s point of view, this mechanism serves as the ultimate safety valve — it insures against a despairing populace, thus eliminates the threat of rebellion; yet guarantees that no serious change to the system will be mounted, because the Dems weren’t designed to play that role in the first place.

Aren’t the Dems The Lesser Evil?

The Democrats are not the “lesser evil;” they are an auxiliary subdivision of the same evil. To understand the political system, one must step back and regard its operation as an integrated whole. The system can’t be properly understood if one’s study of it begins with an uncritical acceptance of the 2-party system, and the conventional characterizations of the two parties. (Indeed, the fact that society encourages one to view it in this latter way, is perhaps a warning that this perspective should not be trusted.)

Any given piece of reactionary legislation is invariably supported by a higher percentage of Republicans than Democrats. Does this show that the Democrats are “less evil?” If one focuses on the noble efforts of the few outspoken dissenters, it’s easy to feel that the Democrats are somewhat less evil. But in the larger picture, Democrats invariably submit to what Republicans more ardently promulgate, & the entire range of official opinion thereby shifts to the right. Thus the overall function of Democrats is not so much to fight, as to quasi-passively participate in this ever-rightward-moving process. Just as the Harlem Globetrotters need their Washington Generals to make their basketball games properly entertaining, Republicans need the Democrats for effective staging of the political show.

The Democrats are permitted to exist because their vague hint of eventual progressive change keeps large numbers of people from bolting the political system altogether. Emma Goldman once said, “If voting made a difference, it would be illegal.” Similarly, if the Democrats potentially threatened any sort of serious change, they would be banned. The fact that they are fully accepted by the corporations and political establishment tells us at once that their ultimate function must be wholly in line with the interests of those ruling groups.

Doesn’t the presence of the Dennis Kuciniches, Cynthia McKinneys, et al “prove” that the Democrats are progressive? No. The Kuciniches and McKinneys are indeed significantly different from the Hillary types — but there are compelling reasons not to get too excited about them, either. First, they are used by the party as a “Left decoration,” simply to keep potential left defectors in tow. Secondly, the party power brokers will NEVER in a million years let the Kucinich-McKinney faction have any real power.

In other words, the very modestly-sized progressive Dem faction is cynically used as a marketing tool by the national party. They are dangled before your eyes to make you think that the Dems are the “lesser evil” (since the Republicans offer no such Left decorations). The existence of a few decent Dems makes no real difference in the overall alignment of the party, and they will never be internally influential. They are a distraction.

Can Progressives “Take Over” the Dem Party?

The argument is often advanced by progressives that they might be able to “take over” the Dem Party just as the Republican Party was supposedly “taken over” by the Religious Right and neoconservatives. This is wishful thinking, and ignores the actual history and character of both parties.

The Republicans were always the party of Wall Street & Northern manufacturing. The Democrats were the party of the Southern slaveocracy. When the national Democrats defied southern racism by passing the Civil Rights Acts in the mid ’60’s, the southern states bolted, destroying the New Deal coalition. The Republicans profited from this by adapting to southern tastes, values, & religious/cultural conceptions.

But this was in no way out of character for the Republicans. The far right was able to take over the Republican Party because that kind of alliance was always very much in the nature of the Republican Party anyway. It was compatible with, not contradictory to, the big-business nature of the Republican party. Forming an alliance with fascists, racists & religious zealots ADVANCED the big-business agenda.

By contrast, for progressives to take over the Democrats would be an unprecedented departure from the party’s character. To understand this, one must first recognize that the sole Dem claim to being progressive is rooted almost entirely in the New Deal, itself a response to a unique crisis in American history. FDR recognized that to avert the very real threat of massive social unrest and instability, significant concessions had to be made to the working class by the ruling class. Government could act to defend the weak, and to some extent to rein in the strong, but this was all in the longterm interests of defending the existing social order.

Before FDR, the Dem Party had no progressive record whatsoever; and after FDR, though the New Deal coalition survived until the mid-1960’s, it did so with a record of achievement that was restrained compared to the 1930’s. After passing Medicare in 1965 the party reverted to its longterm pattern, and since then, there has again been no progressive record to speak of. The party’s progressive social reform was thus concentrated mostly in the 1930’s, with some residual momentum lasting until the mid 60’s. The party’s “progressive period” was thus 1) an exception to the longer term pattern; 2) a response to a unique crisis; and 3) has in any case been dead for over 40 years.

The word “progressive” refers to the commitment of a political party to defend the interests of the working class (aka the overwhelming majority of the population) against the depredations of the ruling elite. Not only is the Democratic Party unable and unwilling to engage in such a fight, it is unwilling even to pronounce the fight’s name — “class warfare.” Marx is understandably reviled by capitalists for his annoyingly accurate perception that the capitalist class and the rest of the population have a fundamental conflict of interest. Capital seeks only to maximize its return; return can certainly be enhanced by using the machinery of state to transfer costs and burdens to the weak and vulnerable; thus rule by capital is intrinsically inimical to the basic interests of the majority of the population. There is no escaping this reality.

American public discourse attempts to paper over this vexing truth with fatuous happy talk, such as, “By working together, we can make make things better for everyone!” This is a lie. When capital controls government, government is no more than a tool used by elites to enrich themselves at the expense of everyone else. This kind of arrangement cannot possibly “make all boats rise” over the long term. Only the yachts will rise. If there is no political mechanism for opposing plutocratic rule, the strong will continue to squeeze additional wealth out of the weak until a) the weak become desperate and rebel, b) the weak are crushed and become permanently enslaved, or c) the strong begin suffering more from guilty consciences, than reaping enjoyment from additional wealth — and therefore relent. (Very few instances of this last are known in recorded history.)

For the Democratic Party to even begin to serve as a vehicle for opposing the absolute rule of capital, it would at a minimum have to be capable of acknowledging the conflict that exists between the interests of capital and the rest of the population; and of expressing a principled determination to take the side of the population in this conflict.

A party whose controlling elements are millionaires, lobbyists, fund-raisers, careerist apparatchiks, consultants, and corporate lawyers; that has stood by prostrate and helpless (when not actively collaborating) in the face of stolen elections, illegal wars, torture, CIA concentration camps, lies as state policy, and one assault on the Bill of Rights after the next, is not likely to take that position.

This is the question progressives need to answer. They will be met by clever Democrats telling them to just keep quiet and things will work out.”

——————————-

The Obamabots are rather silent and I don’t understand that. I mean, all during the campaign they were chanting how they were going to “hold his feet to the fire.” Well, one can’t hold feet to fire by being SILENT, you Obamabot Suckers. Duh. Also, all during the campaign I told the Obamabots that he wouldn’t give a damn what they thought. He listens to his corporate/Military Industrial Complex owners, which are not the Obamabots.

I don’t see the Obamabots doing anything but either making excuses for their lord and savior War Criminal Obushma or they are being silent. Granted, a few have come out of their stupor/Denial, but not many from what I can tell. But most people have gone back to sleep until 2012, and don’t have a clue what their messiah is doing. Even if it hit them in the face, they wouldn’t know it!

“The article is a narcissistic rant against the voters or shall I say RUBES who had no choice in the 2008 election other than to vote for the Democrats.”

—————————–

That’s a LIE. That’s BS. That’s propaganda. One might not like the choices for whatever reason, but there were choices. The voters did indeed have choices. My ballot in the major city where I live consisted of many choices, including Nader and McKinney. If Nader and McKinney’s names were not on people’s ballots, the people could have WRITTEN THEM IN.

Also, of the “third party” candidates, Nader/Gonzalez got the most votes nationally. Not McKinney. So if anyone should have been joining with anybody else, it should have been McKinney endorsing Nader.

Of all the people I talked with during the campaign, nearly every person told me, “I like Nader and Gonzalez and their platform, but I’m not going to vote for them because they are not Democrats. I only vote for Democrats.”

When I asked, “why?”

Response: “I come from a very Democratic family. We always vote for Democrats.”

When I asked, “Even when the Democrat is really a Republican?”

Response: “Well, uh, uh, uh, uh, you see, uh, …” (They couldn’t answer the question and most of them turned red and said “thank you” and left).

This is exactly what I was talking about recently: D and R party-line indoctrination in most people is a major factor in all of this, along with the corporate media only providing coverage to the corporate/pro-war one-party system candidates. Party-line indoctrination in most people is no different than religious indoctrination in most people. That stuff is not de-programmed very easily at all.

It is long past due that the so-called “Dems” and their cheerleaders/defenders take responsibility and ownership for their own party’s miserable failures since 2000 especially. Most “Dem” supporters are unwilling to do that. Instead they want to point blame at other people (Nader and McKinney, for example) for their own party’s incompetence, Bush-enabling and failures. Nader did not force the so-called “Dems” in congress to vote “YES” repeatedly for Bush/Cheney’s agenda for 8 years. The so-called “Dems” willingly did that all on their own by their yes votes, their complicity and their silence. Period.

A true alternative party does not look like the corporate party.

If the Bush-accomplice Democratic Party had provided The People with a credible, viable, truly progressive candidate for 2008 (such as Kucinich, whom most of them run from), we wouldn’t be stuck with Bush-accomplice messiah Obushma today who is NOT “liberal, “Left” or progressive by any means, nor has he ever claimed to be. He is continuing the Bush agenda and some of us Nader and McKinney voters suspected he would. But the Democratic Party had no interest in putting up anybody but what they did (and will continue to do so) as they move farther and farther to the “right.”

While in this piece she has written is completely void of such discussion, I can see why you jumped on this.

Your position is that such people find particular “progressive/left” positions; get a “fan” base and then when the time is “right” make this plea for Israel or why we need to intervene in Darfur or some “Zionist cause”. Perhaps you are right in this case. But again the piece can be read, sans the author’s background on its own merit. No?

The article is a narcissistic rant against the voters or shall I say RUBES who had no choice in the 2008 election other than to vote for the Democrats. It is unfair to the EXTREME and it is very anti-intellectual not to analysis the Left and its role in the 2008 election and very myopic not to analysis the failure of the Left to build a solid alternative to the Democrats and then to think that workers will AUTOMATICALLY vote against them.

The article is primarily about the authors ELITIST agenda wrapped up in her narcissistic priority about the “environment”. Like you Max she has a misanthropic strain about HUMANS who inhabit the planet Earth.