Will the once high-flying American wealth machine continue to produce the vast inequalities of the past?

Only two years ago, Steve Forbes, CEO of Forbes magazine, declared 2007 “the richest year ever in human history.” During eight years of the Bush Administration, the 400 richest Americans, who now own more than the bottom 150 million Americans, increased their net worth by $700 billion. In 2005, the top one percent claimed 22 percent of the national income, while the top ten percent took half of the total income, the largest share since 1928.

In June 2009, the Merrill Lynch Global Wealth Report estimated the number of the world’s wealthiest people declined by 15 percent, the steepest decline in the report’s 13-year history. The number of millionaires in the U.S. fell by 19 percent to 2.5 million people.

Analysts tell us the economy is being restructured, but how will the disparities in wealth between the rich and the poor play out?

“The source of wealth has changed over the past thirty years; corporations have become the engine of inequality in the U.S.,” says Sam Pizzigati, associate fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies in Washington D.C. “In the past, wealth came from ownership: Today it comes increasingly from income.”

The highest incomes come from executive pay at top corporations. In 2007, the ratio of CEO pay to the average paycheck was 344 to one, lower than the record 525 to one ratio set in 2001, but substantial. This year’s ratio is estimated to decrease to 317 to one. In the 60s, 70s and 80s, the average ratio fluctuated between 30 and 40 to 1.

Over 40 percent of GNP comes from Fortune 500 companies. According to the World Institute for Development Economics Research, the 500 largest conglomerates in the U.S. “control over two-thirds of the business resources, employ two-thirds of the industrial workers, account for 60 percent of the sales, and collect over 70 percent of the profits.”

Corporations systematically created a wealth gap over the last 30 years. In 1955, IRS records indicated the 400 richest people in the country were worth an average $12.6 million, adjusted for inflation. In 2006, the 400 richest increased their average to $263 million, representing an epochal shift of wealth upward in the U.S.

In 1955, the richest tier paid an average 51.2 percent of their income in taxes under a progressive federal income tax that included loopholes. By 2006, the richest paid only 17.2 percent of their income in taxes. In 1955, the proportion of federal income from corporate taxes was 33 percent; by 2003, it decreased to 7.4 percent. Today, the top taxpayers pay the same percentage of their incomes in taxes as those making $50,000 to $75,000, although they doubled their share of total U.S. income.

“Over the past 30 years, the income of the top one percent, adjusted for inflation, doubled: the top one-tenth of one percent tripled, and the one-one-hundredth quadrupled,” says Pizzigati. “Meanwhile, the average income of the bottom 90 percent has gone down slightly. This is a stunning transformation.”

Meanwhile, wages for most Americans didn’t improve from 1979 to 1998, and the median male wage in 2000 was below the 1979 level, despite productivity increases of 44.5 percent. Between 2002 and 2004, inflation-adjusted median household income declined $1669 a year. To make up for lost income, credit card debt soared 315 percent between 1989 and 2006, representing 138 percent of disposable income in 2007.

According to Pizzigati, the wealth disparity is the result of corporations squeezing more profits from workers.

“In the past corporations laid off workers because business was bad,” Pizzigati says. “But over the past few decades, downsizing has been a corporate wealth generating strategy. Today, CEOs don’t spend their time making trying to make better products: they maneuver to take over other companies, steal their customers and fire their workers.”

Progressive taxation used to prevent the rich from capturing a disproportionate share of national compensation, and the labor movement, which represented 35 percent of private sector employees and today represents 8 percent, once served as a political force to limit excessive executive pay. The Reagan backlash cut the top income tax rates, and saw the creation of right-wing think tanks that spent $30 billion over the past 30 years, propagandizing for deregulation, privatization, and wealth worship.

Bubble economies over the past 30 years helped CEOs pump up their income, and efforts to corral their pay are weak and ineffective. CEO pay may fall during these economic hard times, but disparity isn’t going away. Without a strong movement for change, the wealth gap will only increase in this downturn.

“There won’t be a restructuring of the economy unless we take on executive compensation,” concludes Pizzigati. “Outrageously large rewards give executives an incentive to behave outrageously. If we allow these incentives to continue, we will just see more of the reckless behavior that has driven the global economy into the ditch.”

The fear is so great that state authorities estimate that last month 120,000 Arkansas churchgoers purchased handguns, rifles, automatic rifles and even used Soviet tanks and an aircraft carrier to protect themselves from crazed worshipers, who take the Bible injunction, “an eye for an eye,” literally. The FBI expects shootings in churches to rise 800 percent this year as unemployed executives fight for control of church coffers.

Currently Arkansas only excludes concealed weapons from churches and bars. Common wisdom in the state is: “Beware a man who owns one gun-he probably knows how to use it.” The average man in Arkansas owns 35 guns, a requirement of citizenship.

The National Center for Disease Control estimates that 30,000 deaths a year result from disputes over religious superiority. Under former President George Bush, Justice Department officials estimated that allowing concealed weapons in bars under a new Drunks Can’t Shoot Straight program, could cut yearly deaths from firearms in half.

Urged on by the Southern Baptist Church, Witness for the Dead Christ, the NRA and a plethora of Pentecostal denominations, voters flooded the state capital in Little Rock with petitions to allow concealed weapons during worship services. A political battle ensued-many legislators carry concealed weapons during debates in the state legislature, but no gunfire erupted during the session-and the Senate rejected imposing state authority over churches.

“Let’em make up their own minds if’en they want to carry guns in church,” said Robert E. Lee XIV, director of the Concealed Big Bore Association. Lee pointed out that 42 states in the U.S. allow churches to decide whether worshipers should carry firearms. “Churches don’t no longer cotton to none a them idears of layin’ down with no lambs,” Lee said. “Today we’re all preachin’ musclear Christianity. Member the Crusades!”

After defeating the bill by asserting freedom of churches to decide whether to arm worshipers, the National Rifle Association pledged support for church members who feel naked in church without their handguns. The NRA’s “Never Enough Guns” program, in conjunction with the Charlton Heston Dead White Guys Rule Foundation, provided free gift certificates for “a gun of your choice” to “white males over the age of 50.”

“People like them big guns and thar takin’em off the shelves fastern I can put’em up,” said Joe Joe Wiggins, owner of Joe’s Pool Hall, Beer Joint, Dance Hall and Used Gun Emporium in Mayhem, Arkansas. “They’re coming from all around here. We even fixed up the basement to look like a church so they can get’em some target practice.”

While there are almost no restrictions on firearms in Arkansas, ex-Nazis, skinheads, KKK-members and other Aryans with arrest records will receive “get out of jail free” cards provided by the NRA and the Pacific Foundation for Legal Fabrication. “We are honored that Mr. Heston can still fight for our freedom from the grave,” said Ray Gun Young, president.

The opposition defeated the measure because Southerners traditionally object to government forcing moral decisions on religious institutions. “Sometimes shootin’ someone is okay accordin’ to the church,” said Billy Wing Wright III, president of Southerners for the Old Rugged Cross.” The state cannot take away church control.”

Nevertheless, security remains an issue. Some churches are resorting to placing machine guns in strategic locations in case church members become unruly during services.

“A lot of them teenagers ain’t recognizin’ the authority of their church elders no more,” said Reverend Yahoo Johnny Johnson, minister of McDonald’s Airport Salvation Church in Halfwitt, Arkansas. “Why my flock is supportin’ the deacons, vice ministers and other faithful carrin’ guns to keep’em in line.”

To help roll back the sexual revolution of the 1970s, the Bush administration spent over $1 billion on abstinence-only programs. Thousands of sermons, workshops and other propaganda reinforced the message. Under the pithy slogan ABC (Abstain, Be faithful, use Condoms), ultra-conservative religious groups, such as Focus on the Family, American Family Association and Concerned Women for America, promote marriage as a solution to everything from suicide to poverty and self-worth issues.

“How could an aggressive minority successfully push the most grotesque message of abstinence, and why are 95 percent of Americans who claim to have had premarital sex unable to admit it publicly?” asks Dagmar Herzog, a professor of history at the City University of New York.

She became interested in the topic from her studies in European history that revealed: Far from discouraging sex, the Nazis promoted it among both married and unmarried Aryans. At the same time, they targeted Jews, who supposedly engaged in “dirty sex,” and “immoral” supporters of the Weimar Republic, and enlisted German Protestants and Catholics to clean up the “sex mess.”

“The conservative evangelical sexual politics of the 1990s and early 21st century are totally new,” Herzog says. “Premarital sex was perfectly normal in the South when I grew up. The churches weren’t hung up on sex back then so I knew that this new sexual repression was recent.”

In Sex in Crisis: The New Sexual Revolution and the Future of American Politics (Basic Books), Herzog shows how the origins of today’s anti-tax, anti-government movement began during the Civil Rights era when the government revoked the tax-exempt status of the religious-oriented Bob Jones University that first denied admission to African Americans and then banned interracial dating. The “cultural war” strategy also coincided with the AIDs epidemic and gays and lesbians coming out of the closet.

Far from being anti-sexual, today’s evangelicals push “a hyper-sexualized” message, complete with Christian pornography and bragging about having great sex. Evangelical sex advice books emphasize the dangers of sex outside marriage, but revel in titillating sexual details. Even if they aren’t interested, Christian wives are told to be “available” to their husbands at all times, especially for “quickies.”

“Although the evangelical movement is contradictory and hypocritical, it’s important to understand that it’s pro-sex,” says Herzog. “The evangelicals promise physiological orgasms, called ‘soulgasms’, which combine psychological orgasms, a close emotional connection with the spouse, and the blessing presence of God in the bedroom. At the same time, they’re homophobic and hostile to all sex outside marriage.”

To develop a strategy to focus on state and local legislation that would target homosexuals and gay rights, leaders of Focus on the Family, the Eagle Forum, Traditional Values Coalition, the National Legal Foundation and other Christian political groups met in Colorado in 1994. Most importantly, they decided to shift their tactics away from strictly religious messages to adopt the secular language of fermenting fear and disgust of disease. Subsequently, religious conservatives turned their attention to pushing abstinence. Their message would adapt to the new age and human potential movements with talk of self-help, individual empowerment, self-improvement and personal perfection.

Playing on increased primal sexual anxieties that include confusion about the relationship between sex and love, and doubts about one’s own attractiveness to one’s partner, doubts that increased with exposure to Internet porn and Viagra, evangelicals promoted a relentless no-sex-outside-marriage program.

In 2006, the Department of Health and Human Services issued sex-education guidelines that mandate teaching about “the potential psychological side effects” of sex, such as drinking, disease, depression and suicide. Money for abstinence education discouraged sex among unmarried Americans between the ages of 19 and 29.

This assault on sexuality doesn’t work. According to surveys conducted by evangelicals, 95 percent of adults admit to having premarital sex. Half of all Christian men claim to be addicted to Internet porn, along with 20 percent of Christian women. Adolescents who take the abstinence pledge wait 18 months longer to have sex, but girls are much more likely to become pregnant when they do have sex.

In contrast, Europe teens are taught that sex is natural, healthy and pleasurable. They get free contraceptives, medical care and counseling. Despite what Americans would call a permissive society, some would say sinful, American teenage girls are three times more likely to get pregnant than those in Sweden and four times more likely than those in Germany. American teens are 70 times more likely to get gonorrhea than those in France or the Netherlands.

Presenting premarital sex as “risky behavior” hides an intrusive and insidious attack on sexuality. Far healthier would be to recognize human autonomy and self-determination of sexual expression. America needs comprehensive sex education, contraceptive distribution and counseling to overcome the destructive social and personal effects of sexually repressive religious morality.

“Reproductive rights and sexual self-determination are human rights,” Herzog says. “We need to affirm humans’ rights to sexual expression, sexual pleasure, and the freely chosen formation of intimate relationships.”

This abstract ideology is having a practical impact across California and the nation. In the face of a budget crisis, Governor Schwarzenegger ordered massive layoffs and unpaid furloughs of state workers. Over 238,000 employees are being forced to take off two unpaid days a month, beginning in February. Over 10,000 were fired this year and thousands more could lose their jobs.

The city of Watsonville closed its offices until January 5 in an effort to save $561,000. Many city services, such as the public library, will simply lock their doors, while so-called essential services-police, water and garbage-will continue to operate.

California suspended $4 billion in highway, school and other infrastructure construction projects. Nationwide over 5,000 transportation projects are being put on hold. These cuts only worsen national and state unemployment. California’s joblessness jumped to 8.2 percent, the third highest in the U.S., and reached 9.5 percent in L.A., threatening a long and deep recession.

The California Republican minority adamantly opposes raising taxes to provide state services and urges deep cuts in education and social programs, such as mental health and children’s funds. They advocated cutting legislative pay 5 percent but welfare payments 10 percent. GOP minority leader Mike Villines of Clovis, denounced efforts to begin what he calls “an illegal tax increase package that is a blatant attempt to silence California voters.”

Such thinking is typical. A recent letter to the New York Times calls government schools, roads, hospitals, research, loans and housing “excesses.” The writer denounces, “a gigantic, bloated government,” and calls for a return to “America’s founding principles: individual rights, property rights and the pursuit of happiness, with government only in the form of military, police and courts.”
The GOP’s 2008 Platform declares, “government should tax only to raise money for its essential functions” and not “as a tool for social engineering.” Their goals include making permanent Bush’s tax cuts for the rich, passed in 2001 and 2003, and ending federal income taxes. Social services and charities are left to “the vital role of religious organizations,” which are also chartered to promote “patriotism.”

Facing the worst financial crisis-which many economists blame on the Bush Administration-since the Great Depression, Congress and the incoming president are calling for a massive financial stimulus. Even Bush demanded the hasty signing of a $700 billion bailout for over-leveraged banks. The basic problem of balancing budgets stretches across 44 states and the federal government and, while presidents and their parties are not always in agreement, GOP party stalwarts appear to be on a path to destroy all government.

Eliminating social services for the most needy and monies for California schools, which already rank near the bottom nationally for funding per pupil, is not only shortsighted, it’s cruel and inhumane. Elected in reaction to high budgets of the Davis Administration, Schwarzenegger failed to control the GOP legislature and primarily cut funding to balance the budget.

This scenario is playing out across the country, although Republicans, stymied in cutting necessary social services, are inventing a new way to finance government–selling off or leasing state assets. Across the country, states are selling or leasing the public domain so politically friendly private businesses can profit. Minnesota is contemplating selling the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport and the state lottery, to bring in $3 billion. Massachusetts may put the Massachusetts Turnpike up for sale, and New York is considering putting the Tappan Zee Bridge, the lottery, toll roads, and public golf courses, parks and beaches up for sale.

Where will this trend end? Indiana leased its toll road to an Australian-Spanish partnership for 75 years. Chicago wants to lease the Midway Airport and the Chicago Skyway toll road, parking ramps and parking meters to private business. Pennsylvania leased its turnpike and Texas is proposing a private toll road system. Water, sewers, libraries, schools, unused properties and other public assets are also being considered for privatization. By selling off or leasing assets, states will allow private companies to cut employees, raise prices and increase profits, providing the states with one-time revenue while raising the costs for citizens.

Similar to the bank bailout plan, privatizing public property socializes risk and privatizes profit. Decisions about expansion, hours of operation, staffing and maintenance will be left to for-profit businesses–the very opposite of publicly owned, controlled and operated facilities. Business argues that they can operate more efficiently but anyone who subscribes to cable TV knows the power of a business monopoly.

The only way to stop the destruction of government appears to be to defeat Republicans who march in lockstep as solidly as the Nazi or Communist parties in America’s former enemy states. The old mantra of “no taxes, small government” is frayed, out-of-date and cavalier when applied to public services. This is a time to rededicate America’s future to cooperation, problem solving and controlling private greed for the benefit of the public.

America is an exceptional country.
– Sarah Palin

I do believe in American exceptionalism.
– John McCain

When I return from a trip abroad, my friends invariably want to know how people elsewhere view America. It’s different from how we view ourselves.

What’s called “American exceptionalism” claims there is something inherently unique and different about America because we were a younger nation 200 years ago. We are more religious than others, separated from the world due to two oceans, are richer and practice an unusual form of democracy.

“American exceptionalism” believes that our behavior isn’t determined by ordinary rules, morals or judgments that determine the behavior of other counties and people.

Often this notion of exceptionalism manifests itself in a nationalistic love of country, expressed in bumper stickers that read, “God Bless America,” “Proud to be an American,” “Support Our Troops,” and “These Colors Never Fade,” which display an American flag invariably bleached white by the sun. The true nature of these themes go a step farther to reveal an uglier underlying sentiment: “And Just Why in the Hell Do I Have to Press 1 for English,” “Support our Troops: Shoot the Media,” and “America: Bailing out our critics since WWI.”

First used by Alexis de Tocqueville, a Frenchman who visited the U.S. in the early 1830s, American “exceptionalism” now has a long history that derives from the United States’ “special role” in the world. Basic concepts developed through historic claims such as Manifest Destiny, the U.S. destiny to rule the continent; “Speak softly and carry a big stick,” Theodore Roosevelt’s policy of threatening European powers who might intervene in South America; and the “American Dream,” the entitlement of every American to own a house and become wealthy or at least well off.

Neocons reverently trumpet the notion that the U.S. can “go it alone.” We have both the right and the duty to operate unilaterally, taking any action in the world that we want with no regard for other countries or the consequences. It sounds nutty in today’s inter-connected world, but after eight years of rule by a fanatical right-wing ideologue, the government swarms with people who share these views.

The U.S. overturned international treaties, denounced the U.N. and international cooperation, except when it’s to our advantage, and our courts now declare noncompliance with legal views routinely accepted around the world. Neocons claim for the U.S. it’s own set of rules and judgments, and special treatment based on national advantage in every field.

Pointing out differences in the historic development of the U.S. is one thing, but using it as a foreign policy doesn’t work. Today the concept of “exceptionalism” is being used to justify a hyper-nationalism that denies a common humanity with the rest of the world, undercuts cooperation and reveals an arrogant disregard for international opinion.

I bring up the concept of American exceptionalism to emphasize one of the main lessons gained from travel-learning about myself, including my culture, politics, values and practices. Once we reach maturity and become responsible for ourselves, it’s time to explore the world and determine fact from fiction. I find that one of the most difficult things about traveling is learning that the way I do things isn’t necessarily the best and it doesn’t work for everyone. This includes politics.

Is it any wonder that two major Republican figures had not traveled outside the U.S. until they ran for office? George Bush and Sarah Palin believe in American exceptionalism, partly because they never traveled and never engaged other cultures on an equal basis. No wonder they espouse culturally myopic views.

There is much to learn from other cultures, including how they care for their citizens. My wife received free or low-cost medical care in other countries where health care is a right, not a profitable business. We discovered that Europeans live to eat, while Americans eat to live, gobbling food in a rush to accomplish more. Europeans work to live and enjoy life, family and friendship, while we live to work and buy things. Europeans judge people by their attitudes and outlooks, while we judge people by their accumulated wealth.

Europeans realize they depend upon each other and must act in a concerted effort.
Are our attitudes a result of a poverty of imagination or a lack of travel? One of our foremost myths is that we lack a class system. How can we ignore our system that’s set up to favor the wealthy and powerful? Or believe in myths that pacify us and perpetuate the status quo? Why do we nominate people like Bush and Palin to govern us?

Obviously, I cannot answer these questions. But traveling allows me to see how others live and govern themselves. While they may have just as many problems, they are often far more advanced and humane in their solutions. One thing is for sure-human values, morality, and characteristics are similar everywhere.

The U.S. is an exceptionally arrogant bully on the world stage today. Voting for McCain and Palin will only perpetuate this kind of exceptionalism; with Obama, it might begin to change.

The difference between the two candidates was glaring. Senator Biden has participated in many momentous decisions since entering Congress in 1972. Being mayor of a town of 6300 at the remote edge of the U.S. and the governor of Alaska for 20 months pales in comparison.

“My experience as mayor will be of great use to the country,” Sarah said, before she gushed excitedly over meeting Biden at the end of the debate. Agree or disagree with his positions, Biden was elegant in his arguments. Sarah was a Lulu.

Hearing the debate on the radio missed Sarah’s winks and frozen smiles, but focused on what was said. Sarah sounded like a bright, if immature, 19-year-old on the college debate team. She avoided questions, changed or evaded the subject, delivered well-rehearsed statements, and went off on totally unrelated subjects. She avoided details and gave vast platitudes about “victory,” “mavericks,” “greed,” “U.S. exceptionalism,” and “energy independence.”

With John McCain refusing to release his medical records that include malignant melanoma, Sarah Palin could be a malignant mole away from the White House. Americans must ask themselves, “Should this woman become president?” Even the staunchly conservative William Buckley publication, National Review, urged her to resign as a candidate because “Palin is a problem.”

She wooed voters with folksy language and mentioned the “Talibani.” Is this a nickname for a terrorist organization in insular Alaska? I liked her pledge for total “victory,” especially, “McCain knows how to win a war!” Wow, did he learn in Vietnam?

A more thoughtful and experienced person would look at the cost of victory and ask whether the sacrifice was worth it. Unfortunately, there’s no way to achieve victory in Iraq or Afghanistan. They want to rule themselves and bombing them won’t change that.

Sarah upheld McCain’s position of refusing to talk to leaders of countries that we have conflicts with. Most of us resolve conflicts by understanding differences and reaching an agreement. Can we agree on a settlement? McCain’s policy of never talking to someone you disagree with is like getting divorced, “and never speaking to the ‘SOB’ again.” Not productive if your well being depends upon ending the conflict.

Sarah’s pandering to the Jewish vote – she’s against “a second holocaust” – were melodramatic, especially after Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert resigned days after he admitted taking hundreds of thousands of dollars from an American political supporter. Olmert said Israel should withdraw from “almost all” of the land it seized in a 1967 war if it wants peace with Syria and the Palestinians. Sarah didn’t even mention peace.

Sarah’s insistence on escaping the past and only looking to the future ignores the possibility of learning from our mistakes. It also overlooks criminal malfeasance in Bush’s deregulation machinery. Claiming she’s different from Bush and harping on ignoring the past and forging blindly ahead, doesn’t speak well for determining what went wrong and fixing it. Nor bring justice to those wronged.

Biden’s insistence that McCain doesn’t disagree with any significant polices of the Bush Administration stumped Sarah. She changed the subject; she couldn’t think of any differences. You had to love her “dog-gone-it” moment, evidently a folksy Christian curse in her Wasilla Assembly of God Church. Lucky for her, the moderator didn’t ask her to describe her belief in “The Rapture,” which she promotes in the Third Wave / New Apostolic Reformation movement.

Her pleas to increase the power of the vice president echoes Dick Cheney’s creation of secret domestic and foreign military operations, torture, spying on Americans and lying to Congress. Biden, who has long called for firing Cheney, pointed out the evil of Cheney’s tenure. Sarah, on the other hand, would give Cheney even more power. Does she foresee more power for herself under an aging McCain?

Biden devastated McCain’s claim to “maverick,” by pointing out “McCain has been no maverick on what matters to people’s lives,” including voting for Bush’s debt-burdened budgets, as well as supporting his war in Iraq and voting against healthcare, education, and programs for the poor.

Carefully protected from press interviews, Palin sports a pregnant teenage daughter while advocating parental responsibility, no birth control, no abortion and abstinence. She has a mentally retarded baby yet her husband takes off to race snowmobiles while she hits the campaign trail. She’s against “earmarks,” but leads all states in the U.S. for earmark dollars per citizen. She “knows foreign policy” because some people in her state can see Russia on the horizon. She hadn’t left the U.S. until last year, visited New York once, and was recently introduced to Henry Kissinger. She’s ready to become president?

Americans are notorious for being anti-intellectual, opposing reasoned arguments and relying on faith and intuition. They loved Bush because they would rather have a beer with him than his opponent. They need to reconsider.

If Americans elect Sarah to be next in line to become president, we are in serious trouble. Her nomination already makes us the laughing stock of the world.

While a debate raged between school board members to offer classes during summer Bible School or to make it part of the regular school curriculum, the board decided that “kids need straighten’ out,” and courses would be offered year around. The rules are the latest in a drama that began when the Texas State Legislature passed a law authorizing Bible classes “as long as there’s hain’t too much arm wavin’, dancin’ around and carryin’ on.”

Claiming that Texas is tired of “takin’ the back seat” to states like Georgia and Tennessee, Johnny Boy Snozbob of the Alamo Conservative Market Foundation in Bumfalk, Texas said, “Our students need the Bible more than most and we ain’t no longer playin’ second fiddle to no one. Our football team has got God on our side and Arkansas will never beat us again.” (A rivalry, which according to Texas Biblical scholars, goes back to the Garden of Eden and is, perhaps, the most important political issue in Texas.)

While some states raise the issue of the separation of church and state, Texas meshes the two on the local level. Many school districts already teach the Bible, adding their own interpretation to read, “God created Texas, and then Heaven.” Most small towns require school administrators to serve as Sunday School Superintendents, to pray before daily classes begin, and to lead cross-burnings.

“If our dumbass kids are goner win them games, they better know the Bible,” said State Attorney General Georgie-Bob Addict. “As long as we ain’t allowin’ no women preachin’, gays marryin’ or aliens practicin’ other ridiculous religions, thars nothin’ in the Texas Constitution to prevent it from happenin’.”

Leaders in the Double Fundamentalist Baptist Church oppose teaching the Bible in public schools due to a general suspicion of education. Terry Sue Brownnose, a leading Republican on the State Board of Education, noted that when she was a girl, people didn’t need no education. “We got along just fine without all them high flutin’ ideas,” she said. “Things is simpler in Bible pitcher books. We know we’re bettern’ any other’n, whoever you may be, that evolution is flat out evil, and we vote for God’s party. We don’t need no forein’ ideas!”

Many share Brownnose’s sentiments. Southern Baptists, Church of Baptists, Assembly of Baptists, Conservative Baptists, American Baptists and other Texas Baptists, complain that evolution will undermine moral standards and “brainwash” children with science. Science might lead children to no longer obey their parents and the church, and to begin to think for themselves. Other religious devotees claim teaching Bible classes will give students a firm foundation to reject “foreign” ideas such as Judaism, global warming, and mixed marriage. A few worry about Bible classes leading to a revival of long-time religious rivalries in the state, which have, in the past, led to slander, adultery and murder.

Afraid of being branded disloyal, few Texans objected to teaching the Bible in public schools. And most Texans agree that teenagers are so undisciplined that teaching it in school must reinforce studying the Bible in church. Rep. Emily Lou Switchbottom, 79, from Shady Past, Texas, proposed a law requiring Bible reading on public transportation, at banks and in grocery store lines. Opponents pointed out that Shady Past already has three-dozen round-the-clock Christian radio stations for a population of 176, but Switchbottom remained unrelenting, almost killing the legislation.

“There’s more and more ways to sin these days,” she said, “and you cain’t get too much religion.”

Democratic Sen. Bobby Ray Hairball, 97, the bill’s sponsor, argued that the Bible retarded every area of human development, which was good for social conformity. “Otherwise,” Hairball told the Legislature, “we would have all that socialist free medical care, high wages, and time off. Work is the only true salvation for idle minds that make more sin.”

“Our tax spoungin’ government teachers may not know how to preach the Bible, but they can learn,” said Hairball as he posed to have his photograph taken with Karate action doll hero Chuckie Nogood, leader of the Kill for Christ Bible Teaching Materials, Ltd. Nogood’s company stands to make $986 million by placing Bibles in every schoolroom in Texas.

Several organizations protested the lack of standards but proponents of the bill contended they couldn’t find experts to explain important Biblical issues such as immersion baptism, the Holy Ghost and the virgin birth. A simplified version for teaching the Bible, one that’s not too rigorous and will include comic books, films and peep shows, was finally agreed upon by the Legislature. Nogood’s Christian company is slated to win the $24 billion no-bid contract for such materials.

“Texas ain’t never been keen on academic rigore,” said Texas governor Jimmy Dick Parry. “But as good Texans we remain open to all faiths, as long as they’re Christian.”

With disquieting wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, plunging paychecks, increasing debt, and lost jobs, cultural issues such as abortion, gay marriage, and racial politics-critical issues in national elections since Ronald Reagan-are losing their allure with voters anxious about real threats to their existence.

“Political coalitions get old just as people do,” says Morris Fiorina, senior fellow at the Hoover Institution and author of the upcoming book, The Great Disconnect in American Politics. “The political structure is ossified, stuck in the controversies of the 1960s, and Republicans are in trouble because issues like race and abortion do not resonate as strongly with a new generation of voters.”

Obama represents change, which accounts for his appeal among young voters. In a poll conducted before the national Super Tuesday presidential primary at Stanford University, 53 percent supported Obama, 24 percent supported Clinton and 5 percent supported McCain. And the youth vote could make a difference in the upcoming election.

Daniel Wirls, professor of politics at UCSC and author of The Invention of the United States Senate, predicts that this election could bring a major turnout of young voters with a new perspective: They don’t view issues in the same way as older voters do. Comparing the candidates leaves Obama with many advantages, but young voters need to turn out where they will make a difference, in states such as Ohio, Pennsylvania, Florida and Michigan.

“This is the clearest example in modern times of a presidency defined by one thing and one thing alone-the war on terror,” says Wirls. “Bush’s popularity rose to 90 percent after 9/11 as people rallied around the flag. But the war ground on with little progress and began to be seen as a mistake by more and more people-even the economy didn’t become an issue until the past six months-and he continued to slide in public opinion polls.”

Americans are unhappy with the way things are going, but they are also extremely cautious. People want change but don’t want to upset the status quo; they want an end to the war but fear significant changes. They want economic change but are unsure about what a president can do to change the economy. And, although Americans want to hear something different, the candidates are moving toward the center to avoid frightening voters. Wirls wonders whether Obama’s moderation of his message will lead to a loss of the enthusiasm he created in the primaries.

“If Obama continues to pull his punches and moderate his positions, young voters will wonder about him,” says Wirls. “He only looks different in comparison to his competitor: McCain allows him to look different no matter what.”

While discontent is an issue in the presidential campaign, the war and the economy are in the forefront of voters’ concerns. Sheldon Kamieniecki, dean of social sciences at UCSC and author of Corporate America and Environmental Policy: How Often Does Business Get Its Way?, sees the economy as a more important issue in some states than the war. The energy crisis is tied to the economy and spills into environmental issues, as Republicans push for opening public lands and areas off shore to oil exploration. Health care, also tied to economic concerns, and education will also be important campaign issues.

McCain got off on the wrong foot by proposing offshore drilling and nuclear power, two unpopular issues many states including California and Florida. McCain’s campaign also appears confused. Instead of running as a maverick and a populist, his advisors are attempting to repackage him as a conservative, which doesn’t work. His supporters are not enthusiastic. Nationally, support for Bob Barr, the libertarian candidate, could siphon conservative Republican votes away from McCain. Will core conservatives stick with McCain and will Obama discourage youthful enthusiasts as he moves to the middle?

“We may be entering an era where both liberals and conservatives have extra room to change their positions on issues and not worry so much about their base,” says Kamieniecki. “Both sides may be more willing to move to the center in this election with less fear of losing their base. McCain started with a problem of his conservative base, but Obama’s main challenge is to broaden the base of traditional liberal support to reach business people and the white working class-the Reagan Democrats.”

After his successful visit to Europe and the Middle East, Obama appears to have many advantages; but the dynamic flow of a campaign can take unexpected turns. Few would have predicted that a Swift Boat Campaign would have derailed John Kerry, a seasoned veteran facing a president who went AWOL during the Vietnam War. Successful negative attacks by McCain, the bombing of Iran or other unforeseen circumstances could radically alter the campaign before November. Daniel Wirls warns, “Don’t think things are as they seem because there’s a good chance they won’t be.”

If the story hasn’t yet reached your newspaper, Op Ed section or TV station, there’s a good reason; media outlets were duped or turned a blind eye on Bush propaganda, and most highly respected military commentators are implicated.

Called “sycophants” by the Pentagon, these expert, sober news voices merely mouthed Bush “talking points” on Fox News, NBC, CNN, CBS and ABC, on radio programs, or were read or quoted in news articles and op-eds. These military experts, such as Lt. Col. Tim Eads, Major Bob Bevelacqua, Lt. Col. Bill Cowan, Capt. Chuck Nash, Brig. Gen. James Marks, Generals William Nash, Wayne Downing and Joe Rayleton, and dozens of others, appeared in the media hundreds of times to gain public support of Bush’s war, without admitting they are profiting from the death of American troops.

In a blockbuster investigative article on April 20, the New York Times revealed that the Pentagon recruited over 75 retired military officers, many of them working for and profiting from more than 150 military contractors, in what a Fox News analyst called a “Mind War” to “strengthen our national will to victory.” The report is based on over 8,000 pages of email messages, transcripts and records released to the public after a successful lawsuit against the Defense Department.

Polls show that Americans trust the military three times more than the president and five times more than Congress, so it’s no wonder that the Pentagon rounded up military “experts” to orchestrate a propaganda campaign to twist the facts to meet the Bush Administration’s demands: Anyone who disagreed was banned from the group.

Operating through a special Pentagon office of public affairs with the goal of achieving “information dominance,” the Pentagon groomed the group of military commentators to sell its plans for invading Iraq, even though Iraq had no connection with 9/11. These carefully selected and vetted experts that the Times calls a “media Trojan horse,” were spoon-fed information through special briefings, orchestrated interviews, talking points, and VIP tours. Bush insiders participated, including Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Alberto Gonzales, General Petraeus, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and national security advisors.

Operating under the condition that they not reveal their special relationship with these new propaganda committees, the military contractors fanned out to the news media to convince the American people that Iraq was developing nuclear weapons to attack the U.S. and had a stockpile of secret chemical and biological weapons. The attempt was so successful–with military commentators reproducing “talking points” often verbatim–that they were employed again when Bush pushed for $87 billion in extra-budget financing for the occupation of Iraq. Every time a critical news story came out on Iraq, the commentators were rallied to convince the American public, through the media and their supposedly unbiased views, that the opposite was true.

After distorting the facts, the Pentagon brags that it has become a master at “the management of perceptions” by using psychological warfare. The Iraqi rebellion against the occupation was attributed to Al-Queda, as was the civil war in Iraq. After revelations of torture and mistreatment of prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, military commentators were flown to Cuba, the first of six times, and given what the Times calls “a carefully orchestrated tour.” Immediately afterwards, these experts filled the airwaves with the Pentagon’s transcript, claiming the story of prisoner abuse was false. Extrapolating from the Times report, there are no military commentators that can be trusted: they all have backdoor deals.

Such sweetheart deals are lucrative. In addition to $500 to $1,000 for each media appearance, military commentators work for over 150 military contractors and personally benefit from their promotion of Bush’s “War on Terror,” which distributes hundreds of billions of dollars to loyal war interests. These military experts are even given access to military contracting officers in the Pentagon as a reward for their faithful service to Bush’s policies.

Will this report result in a public outrage? How will those who should be the most outraged, the manipulated Fox News viewers, respond? Or can anyone be surprised by revelations that Bush pays Iraqi news for favorable stories, releases staged propaganda shows to TV stations, appoints propaganda ministers to control government agencies, and secretly hires propagandists to support his policies?

On the other hand, one must wonder if the word, traitor, applies. Supposedly in synch with Bush’s military occupation of Iraq, these military men lie about their secret access to the Pentagon and their personal profit from U.S. military operations. They play a vital role in duping the American public into supporting a deadly and costly military misadventure. When does subterfuge, withholding of information and lying about personal profit from public policies become criminal?

One would hope that Americans still have ideals and value honesty and that every one of these military commentators will be imprisoned or at a minimum, hounded off the networks, out of their jobs and forced into hiding.

September 11, the opening day of the local fair, saw a burst of patriotism. The first 1,000 fair visitors received commemorative “Remember 9/11″ pins and American flags flew everywhere, from concessions to stages, baby strollers to T-shirts, booths to bunting. Apple pie judging was underway and, as the sun descended, parents with children poured in through the gates.

Patriotism filled the air and people wore buttons supporting “our troops” and urging a vote for various Republican presidential candidates. Others thanked the military recruiters for “their sacrifice.” I questioned a number of these people.

Responses indicated that Saddam Hussein was responsible for the destruction of the WTC and that the U.S. has to fight the terrorists in Iraq or “we will have to fight them here.” The U.S. can’t leave Iraq because “Muslims will follow us home.” Even the military recruiters who served in Iraq claimed that the U.S. occupation of Iraq is necessary because of the 9/11 attacks.

Where do these people get their information? A news article in the local paper on the same day found that six years after 9/11 one-third of the American public — 40 percent of Republicans and 27 percent of Democrats-believe Saddam Hussein was “personally involved” in the 9/11 attacks and was sheltering al Qaida. Unable to find a logical basis for such a belief, the article speculated that this “is a reflection of what people want to believe” and that President Bush promotes this belief to justify the military occupation of Iraq.

That this assertion has been thoroughly investigated and repudiated in the news innumerable times-as has the assertion of Iraq’s “weapons of mass destruction”-does little to sway those who support the U.S. occupation of Iraq. When I attempted to relate facts from government investigations to fairgoers, I was met with disbelief and defiance. They fervently believe that the U.S. must protect itself from terrorists by staying in Iraq.

The notion that “they will follow us home” and “attack us here” is simply bizarre. They did not come here. The U.S. went around the world to attack a country that had no “weapons of mass destruction” and nothing to do with 9/11 (Saddam Hussein and al Qaida were sworn enemies at the time). Iraqis are attacking us because we are occupying their country and they don’t want us there. If we weren’t there, they wouldn’t be attacking us. Duh! Nevertheless, military recruiters, Republican volunteers and random GOPers believe we must continue down a disastrous path chosen by an increasingly unpopular president.

On 9/11/07, another story in the local paper — directly below the one mentioned above — found that 47 percent of Iraqis want the U.S. out of their country; 57 percent of Iraqis consider attacks against the U.S. justified, and 60 percent of Iraqis don’t want their country split up, which appears to be the direction of U.S. policy. Only a minority of Iraqis supports the U.S. puppet, al-Maliki, and has confidence in the U.S. and British occupying forces.

Iraqis don’t want us and the occupation doesn’t make us any safer. Even Bush’s mouthpiece in Iraq, General Petraeus, when asked by Congress if the U.S. occupation of Iraq makes the U.S. any safer, replied, “Sir, I don’t know, actually.”

That a president who has flip-flopped and changed strategies more often than he’s changed commanders can retain any loyalty whatsoever is astonishing. Why do these defenders of the Iraqi occupation fiercely reject facts and ignore the damage Bush is doing to the U.S. military and the reputation of the U.S. around the world?

On the positive side, many of these people are taking responsibility for invading Iraq and piling up deficits never before seen in American history. Americans wanted to “kick some ass” and take revenge for 9/11. We couldn’t attack Britain, which accounted for 90 percent of the highjackers’ phone calls, or Saudi Arabia, home of almost all of the highjackers, so Afghanistan and Iraq had to do.

Many chest-thumping patriots are discovering that conquering a country isn’t as easy as they thought. They feel remorse and want to withdraw after committing terrible atrocities, unleashing the militias, creating a civil war, displacing millions, and destroying the infrastructure and the economy of Iraq. By every measure, Iraq is worse off now than before the U.S. invaded.

Why does anyone follow a self-deluded president who lives in a fantasy world and uses the war to push unfettered “presidential power?” Or believe a carefully planned publicity campaign to convince Americans, yet again, that victory is just around the corner?

On the other hand, why can’t we enjoy a county fair, let the kids enjoy the pig races and rides rather than push the agenda of America as an imperial power? For myself, I’d rather eat the apple pie.

Spencer agreed to meet the captains of American industry, but his appearance was a disaster. Spencer told the assembly they didn’t understand his ideas, for he disapproved of American capitalism. Americans, he claimed, are pathologically obsessed with work.

Overwork risks their mental and physical health and they need a “revised ideal of life” that includes relaxation. “Life is not for learning, nor is life for working,” said Spencer, “but learning and working are for life.”

Almost 125 years later, Americans still haven’t gotten the message. Compared to people in other developed countries, Americans don’t ask for more vacation time, don’t take all the vacation time their employers give them, and continue to work while they are on vacation.

There are a number of theories about why Americans don’t demand more vacation time: fear of leaving work that will pile up in their absence; fear that other employees will show more devotion to the job and get promoted above them; a distaste for relating to a mate and children outside of their tightly structured lives; and they’ve been convinced that economic success depends on subservience to employers who control their work lives. Consider that:

* Some 88 percent of Americans carry electronic devices while on vacation to communicate with work, and 40 percent log-on to check their work email.

* A third of all Americans don’t take their allotted vacation and 37 percent never take more than a week at a time.

Many employees have no choice because they are at the bottom of the pay scale and are forced to work to make ends meet. A third of all women and a quarter of all men receive no paid vacation. We’ve been globalized, downsized and privatized until we are little more than production units.

The U.S. remains the only industrialized country in the world that has no legally mandated annual leave. France leads the world with 30 days off a year. Employees in Britain, German, Australia, Spain and Sweden have 20 or more days off a year, and Canada and Japan have 10 days off, about the same as some American corporations allow their workers. Even the Chinese get three weeks off a year, and this is only the legally mandated vacation time. Many employees in other countries take six or more weeks off a year (the French average 39 days and the English 24).

Meanwhile, those who profit from our labor amass wealth. For the fifth consecutive year in a row-a Bush record-the average American’s income remained below what it was in 2000. Those making over $1 million a year (less than a quarter of one percent of all taxpayers) increased their income 26 percent, and 62 percent of that increase came from Bush tax cuts on investments: capital gains and dividends.

Our mythology claims the work ethic makes America great, but does it?
We have the highest productivity in the world because we work more overtime-40 percent of Americans work 50 hours a week and some workweeks typically run 60 to 70 hours.

Workers in France, Ireland, Norway and Holland are more productive than American workers: Germany and Britain lag slightly behind, and all of them have more vacation time than we do.

It’s not like we don’t need vacations. One in three American workers are chronically overworked and report job stress. We are working longer hours, our jobs are more demanding, and we have more tasks to perform. Forty percent of parents with teenage children report high stress levels, and those making over $50,000 a year report the highest levels of stress.

We can’t expect to wait until retirement to have more time off, either. For the first time in history-another Bush record-four generations of Americans are now working. After decades of decline, the number of workers 55 and over has increased. Today 6.4 percent of those 75 and older work. The number of those receiving pensions decreased by half since 1980 and the age to receive full Social Security benefits increased to 67. Over 60 percent of those between 55 and 64 in California are working, an increase of 7.4 percent since 1980.

Whether it’s greed, an ingrained protestant work ethic, economic necessity or some other reason, there’s no excuse for not having mandated vacation time.

No one is ever taken advantage of without their agreement, so perhaps Americans live to work. If not, it’s time for Americans to take Herbert Spencer’s advice, demand more vacation time, relax and enjoy your life.