13.12.07
Why the Democrats Could Lose in 2008
By Robert Parry, Consortium News. AlterNet, December 12, 2007.
Democrats think the public is just interested in new social programs, but voters are looking for something more inspirational.
National Democrats are upbeat about their chances in Election 2008, citing George W. Bush’s unpopularity and the weirdness of top Republican presidential candidates bogged down in squabbles over who has the right religious outlook or who is the most hostile to illegal immigrants.
But the smug Democratic hierarchy may be inviting defeat, again, by ignoring the fact that many Americans want leadership that appeals to them on the higher plane of principle. Instead, Democrats often treat Americans more like consumers than citizens, selling them new social programs rather than articulating an uplifting national cause.
Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York summed up this consumer-over-citizen approach when she announced her health care plan on Sept. 17:
"We can talk all we want about freedom and opportunity, about life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, but what does all that mean to a mother or father who can't take a sick child to the doctor?"
Perhaps a different question might be: why would a presidential candidate see the founding principles of the United States as somehow at odds with the desire of parents to want health care for their children?
With her dubious dichotomy, Sen. Clinton suggests that it’s an either-or situation -- and that the founding principles must take a backseat to health-care policy.
One outgrowth of this pragmatism-not-principle approach is that national Democrats have shied away from rallying the American people around the ideals of the Republic, even when they have been under assault by Bush and his administration.
These Democratic leaders don’t seem to think that ephemeral notions -- like checks and balances, the rule of law, and inalienable rights -- matter that much to the average Joe. In this view, health insurance and other social benefits should trump all.
Iraq War Sellout
Congressional Democrats have operated in a similar fashion, teasing the American public with promises to stop the Iraq War but then treating the issue as just another bargaining chip, albeit one covered in the blood of nearly 3,900 American soldiers and hundreds of thousands of Iraqis.
While many Americans oppose the Iraq War on grounds of morality or as a matter of legal principle, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Maryland, told the Washington Post that Democratic leaders were ready to drop their promise to deny Bush any more blank checks for the war if they can get another $11 billion for domestic programs.
“Everybody knows he [Bush] has no intention of signing anything without money for Iraq, unfettered without constraints,” Hoyer said. “I think that’s ultimately going to be the result.”
Ironically, however, the Republicans are now so accustomed to the Democrats caving in on Iraq War funding that the White House is signaling that it has no intention of giving the Democrats anything extra for their predictable collapse. Bush seems prepared to veto the domestic spending -- and pocket another Iraq War blank check.
In contrast to this ever-waffling Democratic leadership, the Republicans do understand the political value of appealing to Americans on a higher plane.
The GOP -- the party of tax cuts for the rich -- has convinced millions of average Americans to vote against their own financial interests in order to advance their principles, from protecting gun rights to outlawing abortion to breaking down the barriers between church and state.
The Republican CNN/YouTube debate on Nov. 28 was dominated by questions and answers that emphasized right-wing goals over programmatic details. Though one may disagree with those priorities, they do go beyond the voter’s pocketbook and address a larger purpose for the nation.
Fear of Flying
National Democrats have been reluctant to engage on this higher plane for many years, beyond occasional feel-good speeches stressing non-controversial values like community and inclusiveness.
The Democrats shy away from standing up for constitutional principles, possibly because they see these concepts as too abstract for common citizens.
Democrats have been weak, too, in understanding the value of truth in a democracy. Even when a Republican administration is on the hot seat, the Democrats have shown a proclivity to trade away a difficult showdown over accountability for some votes on domestic programs.
In 1993, the incoming Clinton administration and the Democratic majorities in the House and Senate helped Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush sweep under the rug the full story about national security scandals, such as the Iran-Contra Affair and the Iraq-gate scandal, both involving secret military shipments to the Middle East.
President Bill Clinton later explained that he felt it was more important to build goodwill with Republicans whose help he needed on domestic programs than to pursue the truth about those historical issues. [For details, see Robert Parry’s Secrecy & Privilege.]
As it turned out, Clinton got no help from the Republicans on his domestic agenda and no reciprocity when it came to Clinton’s own scandals. The Republicans won control of Congress in 1994 by rallying their base around the issue of Clinton’s immorality.
In 1998, Clinton was impeached by the Republican-controlled House for lying about a sexual relationship and -- although acquitted by the Senate -- his reputation was forever tarred. As Republicans hammered away at Clinton’s ethical lapses, the Democratic counter-argument boiled down to: Gee, look at the booming economy.
But that pocketbook self-interest wasn’t enough to save the Democrats in Campaign 2000. Texas Gov. George W. Bush managed to overcome public doubts about his competence by stressing his supposed commitment to restore “honor and decency” to the Oval Office.
That pledge -- along with fond memories of the elder George Bush and some artificial scandals about Al Gore’s integrity -- got Bush close enough to snatch the White House, while Republicans also continued to dominate Congress through 2006. [For details,see Robert Parry’s book, Neck Deep.]
Public Outrage
Finally, in Campaign 2006, the Democrats started giving voice to the public’s outrage over the lies that had justified the U.S. invasion of Iraq. Millions of Americans also were alarmed by how brazenly Bush was trampling the nation’s constitutional liberties by asserting his “plenary” or unlimited powers as Commander in Chief.
Trying to salvage the congressional Republican majorities, Bush played the fear card again and again on the campaign trail, essentially arguing that he would keep Americans safe so they could comfortably go shopping at the mall.
In effect, the principle v. self-interest balance tilted toward the Democrats. They were the ones with the more idealistic vision of the United States as a brave nation that would not surrender its Constitution in the face of fear.
The election result was a surprising victory for the Democrats as they won back control of the House and the Senate.
Rank-and-file Democratic activists began demanding that their new majorities stand tough against Bush’s open-ended war in Iraq and seek his impeachment if he continued his arrogation of constitutional powers.
But the Inside-the-Beltway Democratic consultants quickly began to reassert their influence over the national party. They called on the leaders to shelve proposals for curtailing the Iraq War and throw out any notion of impeachment, instead pushing for “kitchen-table” issues like raising the minimum wage.
"People are not looking to their individual members of Congress to solve the Iraq War," said Democratic pollster Celinda Lake. "For the House to be focused on it now would look like partisan bickering rather than getting on with the people's business."
Lake’s view of the Iraq War as a diversion was shared by several leading Democrats in Congress, including Hoyer and Rep. Rahm Emanuel of Illinois.
Referring to Bush’s Iraq War “surge” and the need to focus on the Democratic domestic agenda, Emanuel said, "I know where support for more troops is, and I know where support is for the minimum-wage increase.”
But Democratic grassroots outrage forced the congressional leadership at least to pay lip service to stopping the war. So, the Democrats conducted what amounted to a phony legislative battle, putting up some symbolic anti-war resolutions and trying to attach timelines to war funding bills.
When faced with Republican filibusters or a Bush veto, however, the Democrats ran up the white flag. Instead of conducting their own filibuster to block another blank check for the war, the Democrats surrendered.
On the constitutional front, not only did they keep impeachment “off the table,” as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi had said, the Democrats failed to mount any sustained investigations of Bush’s high-handed abuse of his powers.
Rather than launch Fulbright-style investigations of the disastrous Iraq War, Sen. Joe Biden, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, chose to make an unlikely run for President. Other committee chairmen held some scattershot hearings but nothing sustained and comprehensive.
Even with the new revelations that Bush’s CIA destroyed videotapes of alleged torture of terror suspects, the Demhttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gifocrats have mostly confined themselves to calls for the Bush administration to investigate itself.
To put it mildly, the Democratic behavior over the past year has not been inspirational.
Edgy Base
Now, the Democratic leaders are acting as if they’ll be guaranteed more seats in Congress and a return to the White House if they don’t offend anybody over the next 11 months.
But the Democratic base is edgy. They’ve seen this wishful thinking before -- and it usually ends up with another muddled Democratic campaign and another Republican victory.
Since Hillary Clinton is seen as a chief practitioner of this politics of principle-avoidance, many rank-and-file Democrats are turning against her.
Some would have preferred Al Gore, who combines a depth of experience on key issues like the environment with the foresight to have opposed Bush on the Iraq War and his assault on the Constitution. But Gore has opted for a life as an acclaimed private citizen.
That has caused many Democrats who are uncomfortable with Sen. Clinton’s obsessive pragmatism to shift toward Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois, despite his limited experience and his own tendency toward conciliation over conflict.
While Obama received high marks for his eloquent keynote address to the Democratic convention in 2004, it was striking, too, in its failure to criticize Bush by name or to articulate why the country should fire its sitting President.
As other Democrats joined Obama in pulling their punches, John Kerry emerged from the convention with an extraordinary zero bounce.
Still, a growing number of rank-and-file Democrats appear ready to gamble now on what they hope will be an uplifting Obama candidacy, over the prospect of a grim-and-grinding Hillary Clinton campaign.
More than anything, many in the Democratic base want to send a message to the Democratic leadership that –regardless of what the professional pollsters might say -- principles do matter to Americans.
Robert Parry's new book is Secrecy & Privilege: Rise of the Bush Dynasty from Watergate to Iraq."
Democrats think the public is just interested in new social programs, but voters are looking for something more inspirational.
National Democrats are upbeat about their chances in Election 2008, citing George W. Bush’s unpopularity and the weirdness of top Republican presidential candidates bogged down in squabbles over who has the right religious outlook or who is the most hostile to illegal immigrants.
But the smug Democratic hierarchy may be inviting defeat, again, by ignoring the fact that many Americans want leadership that appeals to them on the higher plane of principle. Instead, Democrats often treat Americans more like consumers than citizens, selling them new social programs rather than articulating an uplifting national cause.
Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York summed up this consumer-over-citizen approach when she announced her health care plan on Sept. 17:
"We can talk all we want about freedom and opportunity, about life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, but what does all that mean to a mother or father who can't take a sick child to the doctor?"
Perhaps a different question might be: why would a presidential candidate see the founding principles of the United States as somehow at odds with the desire of parents to want health care for their children?
With her dubious dichotomy, Sen. Clinton suggests that it’s an either-or situation -- and that the founding principles must take a backseat to health-care policy.
One outgrowth of this pragmatism-not-principle approach is that national Democrats have shied away from rallying the American people around the ideals of the Republic, even when they have been under assault by Bush and his administration.
These Democratic leaders don’t seem to think that ephemeral notions -- like checks and balances, the rule of law, and inalienable rights -- matter that much to the average Joe. In this view, health insurance and other social benefits should trump all.
Iraq War Sellout
Congressional Democrats have operated in a similar fashion, teasing the American public with promises to stop the Iraq War but then treating the issue as just another bargaining chip, albeit one covered in the blood of nearly 3,900 American soldiers and hundreds of thousands of Iraqis.
While many Americans oppose the Iraq War on grounds of morality or as a matter of legal principle, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Maryland, told the Washington Post that Democratic leaders were ready to drop their promise to deny Bush any more blank checks for the war if they can get another $11 billion for domestic programs.
“Everybody knows he [Bush] has no intention of signing anything without money for Iraq, unfettered without constraints,” Hoyer said. “I think that’s ultimately going to be the result.”
Ironically, however, the Republicans are now so accustomed to the Democrats caving in on Iraq War funding that the White House is signaling that it has no intention of giving the Democrats anything extra for their predictable collapse. Bush seems prepared to veto the domestic spending -- and pocket another Iraq War blank check.
In contrast to this ever-waffling Democratic leadership, the Republicans do understand the political value of appealing to Americans on a higher plane.
The GOP -- the party of tax cuts for the rich -- has convinced millions of average Americans to vote against their own financial interests in order to advance their principles, from protecting gun rights to outlawing abortion to breaking down the barriers between church and state.
The Republican CNN/YouTube debate on Nov. 28 was dominated by questions and answers that emphasized right-wing goals over programmatic details. Though one may disagree with those priorities, they do go beyond the voter’s pocketbook and address a larger purpose for the nation.
Fear of Flying
National Democrats have been reluctant to engage on this higher plane for many years, beyond occasional feel-good speeches stressing non-controversial values like community and inclusiveness.
The Democrats shy away from standing up for constitutional principles, possibly because they see these concepts as too abstract for common citizens.
Democrats have been weak, too, in understanding the value of truth in a democracy. Even when a Republican administration is on the hot seat, the Democrats have shown a proclivity to trade away a difficult showdown over accountability for some votes on domestic programs.
In 1993, the incoming Clinton administration and the Democratic majorities in the House and Senate helped Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush sweep under the rug the full story about national security scandals, such as the Iran-Contra Affair and the Iraq-gate scandal, both involving secret military shipments to the Middle East.
President Bill Clinton later explained that he felt it was more important to build goodwill with Republicans whose help he needed on domestic programs than to pursue the truth about those historical issues. [For details, see Robert Parry’s Secrecy & Privilege.]
As it turned out, Clinton got no help from the Republicans on his domestic agenda and no reciprocity when it came to Clinton’s own scandals. The Republicans won control of Congress in 1994 by rallying their base around the issue of Clinton’s immorality.
In 1998, Clinton was impeached by the Republican-controlled House for lying about a sexual relationship and -- although acquitted by the Senate -- his reputation was forever tarred. As Republicans hammered away at Clinton’s ethical lapses, the Democratic counter-argument boiled down to: Gee, look at the booming economy.
But that pocketbook self-interest wasn’t enough to save the Democrats in Campaign 2000. Texas Gov. George W. Bush managed to overcome public doubts about his competence by stressing his supposed commitment to restore “honor and decency” to the Oval Office.
That pledge -- along with fond memories of the elder George Bush and some artificial scandals about Al Gore’s integrity -- got Bush close enough to snatch the White House, while Republicans also continued to dominate Congress through 2006. [For details,see Robert Parry’s book, Neck Deep.]
Public Outrage
Finally, in Campaign 2006, the Democrats started giving voice to the public’s outrage over the lies that had justified the U.S. invasion of Iraq. Millions of Americans also were alarmed by how brazenly Bush was trampling the nation’s constitutional liberties by asserting his “plenary” or unlimited powers as Commander in Chief.
Trying to salvage the congressional Republican majorities, Bush played the fear card again and again on the campaign trail, essentially arguing that he would keep Americans safe so they could comfortably go shopping at the mall.
In effect, the principle v. self-interest balance tilted toward the Democrats. They were the ones with the more idealistic vision of the United States as a brave nation that would not surrender its Constitution in the face of fear.
The election result was a surprising victory for the Democrats as they won back control of the House and the Senate.
Rank-and-file Democratic activists began demanding that their new majorities stand tough against Bush’s open-ended war in Iraq and seek his impeachment if he continued his arrogation of constitutional powers.
But the Inside-the-Beltway Democratic consultants quickly began to reassert their influence over the national party. They called on the leaders to shelve proposals for curtailing the Iraq War and throw out any notion of impeachment, instead pushing for “kitchen-table” issues like raising the minimum wage.
"People are not looking to their individual members of Congress to solve the Iraq War," said Democratic pollster Celinda Lake. "For the House to be focused on it now would look like partisan bickering rather than getting on with the people's business."
Lake’s view of the Iraq War as a diversion was shared by several leading Democrats in Congress, including Hoyer and Rep. Rahm Emanuel of Illinois.
Referring to Bush’s Iraq War “surge” and the need to focus on the Democratic domestic agenda, Emanuel said, "I know where support for more troops is, and I know where support is for the minimum-wage increase.”
But Democratic grassroots outrage forced the congressional leadership at least to pay lip service to stopping the war. So, the Democrats conducted what amounted to a phony legislative battle, putting up some symbolic anti-war resolutions and trying to attach timelines to war funding bills.
When faced with Republican filibusters or a Bush veto, however, the Democrats ran up the white flag. Instead of conducting their own filibuster to block another blank check for the war, the Democrats surrendered.
On the constitutional front, not only did they keep impeachment “off the table,” as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi had said, the Democrats failed to mount any sustained investigations of Bush’s high-handed abuse of his powers.
Rather than launch Fulbright-style investigations of the disastrous Iraq War, Sen. Joe Biden, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, chose to make an unlikely run for President. Other committee chairmen held some scattershot hearings but nothing sustained and comprehensive.
Even with the new revelations that Bush’s CIA destroyed videotapes of alleged torture of terror suspects, the Demhttp://www.blogger.com/img/gl.link.gifocrats have mostly confined themselves to calls for the Bush administration to investigate itself.
To put it mildly, the Democratic behavior over the past year has not been inspirational.
Edgy Base
Now, the Democratic leaders are acting as if they’ll be guaranteed more seats in Congress and a return to the White House if they don’t offend anybody over the next 11 months.
But the Democratic base is edgy. They’ve seen this wishful thinking before -- and it usually ends up with another muddled Democratic campaign and another Republican victory.
Since Hillary Clinton is seen as a chief practitioner of this politics of principle-avoidance, many rank-and-file Democrats are turning against her.
Some would have preferred Al Gore, who combines a depth of experience on key issues like the environment with the foresight to have opposed Bush on the Iraq War and his assault on the Constitution. But Gore has opted for a life as an acclaimed private citizen.
That has caused many Democrats who are uncomfortable with Sen. Clinton’s obsessive pragmatism to shift toward Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois, despite his limited experience and his own tendency toward conciliation over conflict.
While Obama received high marks for his eloquent keynote address to the Democratic convention in 2004, it was striking, too, in its failure to criticize Bush by name or to articulate why the country should fire its sitting President.
As other Democrats joined Obama in pulling their punches, John Kerry emerged from the convention with an extraordinary zero bounce.
Still, a growing number of rank-and-file Democrats appear ready to gamble now on what they hope will be an uplifting Obama candidacy, over the prospect of a grim-and-grinding Hillary Clinton campaign.
More than anything, many in the Democratic base want to send a message to the Democratic leadership that –regardless of what the professional pollsters might say -- principles do matter to Americans.
Robert Parry's new book is Secrecy & Privilege: Rise of the Bush Dynasty from Watergate to Iraq."
10.12.07
The Perfect Storm of Campaign 2008
By Steve Fraser, Tomdispatch.com. AlterNet, December 10, 2007.
War, economic collapse, and the political implosion of the Republican Party will make 2008 a year to remember.
Will the presidential election of 2008 mark a turning point in American political history? Will it terminate with extreme prejudice the conservative ascendancy that has dominated the country for the last generation? No matter the haplessness of the Democratic opposition, the answer is yes.
With Richard Nixon's victory in the 1968 presidential election, a new political order first triumphed over New Deal liberalism. It was an historic victory that one-time Republican strategist and now political critic Kevin Phillips memorably anointed the "emerging Republican majority." Now, that Republican "majority" finds itself in a systemic crisis from which there is no escape.
Only at moments of profound shock to the old order of things -- the Great Depression of the 1930s or the coming together of imperial war, racial confrontation, and de-industrialization in the late 1960s and 1970s -- does this kind of upheaval become possible in a political universe renowned for its stability, banality, and extraordinary capacity to duck things that matter. The trauma must be real and it must be perceived by people as traumatic. Both conditions now apply.
War, economic collapse, and the political implosion of the Republican Party will make 2008 a year to remember.
The Politics of Fear in Reverse
Iraq is an albatross that, all by itself, could sink the ship of state. At this point, there's no need to rehearse the polling numbers that register the no-looking-back abandonment of this colossal misadventure by most Americans. No cosmetic fix, like the "surge," can, in the end, make a difference -- because large majorities decided long ago that the invasion was a fiasco, and because the geopolitical and geo-economic objectives of the Bush administration leave no room for a genuine Iraqi nationalism which would be the only way out of this mess.
The fatal impact of the President's adventure in Iraq, however, runs far deeper than that. It has undermined the politics of fear which, above all else, had sustained the Bush administration. According to the latest polls, the Democrats who rate national security a key concern has shrunk to a percentage bordering on the statistically irrelevant. Independents display a similar "been there, done that" attitude. Republicans do express significantly greater levels of alarm, but far lower than a year or two ago.
In fact, the politics of fear may now be operating in reverse. The chronic belligerence of the Bush administration, especially in the last year with respect to Iran, and the cartoonish saber-rattling of Republican presidential candidates (whether genuine or because they believe themselves captives of the Bush legacy) is scary. Its only promise seems to be endless war for purposes few understand or are ready to salute. To paraphrase Franklin Delano Roosevelt, for many people now, the only thing to fear is the politics of fear itself.
And then there is the war on the Constitution. Randolph Bourne, a public intellectual writing around the time of World War I, is remembered today for one trenchant observation: that war is the health of the state. Mobilizing for war invites the cancerous growth of the bureaucratic state apparatus and its power over everyday life. Like some over-ripe fruit this kind of war-borne "healthiness" is today visibly morphing into its opposite -- what we might call the "sickness of the state."
The constitutional transgressions of the executive branch and its abrogation of the powers reserved to the other two branches of government are, by now, reasonably well known. Most of this aggressive over-reaching has been encouraged by the imperial hubris exemplified by the invasion of Iraq. It would be short-sighted to think that this only disturbs the equanimity of a small circle of civil libertarians. There is a long-lived and robust tradition in American political life always resentful of this kind of statism. In part, this helps account for wholesale defections from the Republican Party by those who believe it has been kidnapped by political elites masquerading as down-home, "live free or die" conservatives.
Now, add potential economic collapse to this witches brew. Even the soberest economy watchers, pundits with PhDs -- whose dismal record in predicting anything tempts me not to mention this -- are prophesying dark times ahead. Depression -- or a slump so deep it's not worth quibbling about the difference -- is evidently on the way; indeed is already underway. The economics of militarism have been a mainstay of business stability for more than half century; but now, as in the Vietnam era, deficits incurred to finance invasion only exacerbate a much more embracing dilemma.
Start with the confidence game being run out of Wall Street; after all, the subprime mortgage debacle now occupies newspaper front pages day after outrageous day. Certainly, these tales of greed and financial malfeasance are numbingly familiar. Yet, precisely that sense of déjà vu all over again, of Enron revisited, of an endless cascade of scandalous, irrational behavior affecting the central financial institutions of our world suggests just how dire things have become.
Enronization as Normal Life
Once upon a time, all through the nineteenth century, financial panics -- often precipitating more widespread economic slumps -- were a commonly accepted, if dreaded, part of "normal" economic life. Then the Crash of 1929, followed by the New Deal Keynesian regulatory state called into being to prevent its recurrence, made these cyclical extremes rare.
Beginning with the stock market crash of 1987, however, they have become ever more common again, most notoriously -- until now, that is -- with the dot.com implosion of 2000 and the Enronization that followed. Enron seems like only yesterday because, in fact, it was only yesterday, which strongly suggests that the financial sector is now increasingly out of control. At least three factors lurk behind this new reality.
Thanks to the Reagan counterrevolution, there is precious little left of the regulatory state -- and what remains is effectively run by those who most need to be regulated. (Despite bitter complaints in the business community, the Sarbanes-Oxley bill, passed after the dot.com bubble burst, has proven weak tea indeed when it comes to preventing financial high jinks, as the current financial meltdown indicates.)
More significantly, for at least the last quarter-century, the whole U.S. economic system has lived off the speculations generated by the financial sector -- sometimes given the acronym FIRE for finance, insurance, and real estate). It has grown exponentially while, in the country's industrial heartland in particular, much of the rest of the economy has withered away. FIRE carries enormous weight and the capacity to do great harm. Its growth, moreover, has fed a proliferation of financial activities and assets so complex and arcane that even their designers don't fully understand how they operate.
One might call this the sorcerer's apprentice effect. In such an environment, the likelihood and frequency of financial panics grows, so much so that they become "normal accidents" -- an oxymoron first applied to highly sophisticated technological systems like nuclear power plants by the sociologist Charles Perrow. Such systems are inherently subject to breakdowns for reasons those operating them can't fully anticipate, or correctly respond to, once they're underway. This is so precisely because they never fully understood the labyrinthine intricacies and ramifying effects of the way they worked in the first place.
Likening the current subprime implosion to such a "normal accident" is more than metaphorical. Today's Wall Street fabricators of avant-garde financial instruments are actually called "financial engineers." They got their training in "labs," much like Dr. Frankenstein's, located at Wharton, Princeton, Harvard, and Berkeley. Each time one of their confections goes south, they scratch their heads in bewilderment -- always making sure, of course, that they have financial life-rafts handy, while investors, employees, suppliers, and whole communities go down with the ship.
What makes Wall Street's latest "normal accident" so portentous, however, is the way it is interacting with, and infecting, healthier parts of the economy. When the dot.com bubble burst many innocents were hurt, not just denizens of the Street. Still, its impact turned out to be limited. Now, via the subprime mortgage meltdown, Main Street is under the gun.
It is not only a matter of mass foreclosures. It is not merely a question of collapsing home prices. It is not simply the shutting down of large portions of the construction industry (inspiring some of those doom-and-gloom prognostications). It is not just the born-again skittishness of financial institutions which have, all of sudden, gotten religion, rediscovered the word "prudence," and won't lend to anybody. It is all of this, taken together, which points ominously to a general collapse of the credit structure that has shored up consumer capitalism for decades.
Campaigning Through a Perfect Storm of Economic Disaster
The equity built up during the long housing boom has been the main resource for ordinary people financing their big-ticket-item expenses -- from college educations to consumer durables, from trading-up on the housing market to vacationing abroad. Much of that equity, that consumer wherewithal, has suddenly vanished, and more of it soon will. So, too, the life-lines of credit that allow all sorts of small and medium-sized businesses to function and hire people are drying up fast. Whole communities, industries, and regional economies are in jeopardy.
All of that might be considered enough, but there's more. Oil, of course. Here, the connection to Iraq is clear; but, arguably, the wild escalation of petroleum prices might have happened anyway. Certainly, the energy price explosion exacerbates the general economic crisis, in part by raising the costs of production all across the economy, and so abetting the forces of economic contraction. In the same way, each increase in the price of oil further contributes to what most now agree is a nearly insupportable level in the U.S. balance of payments deficit. That, in turn, is contributing to the steady withering away of the value of the dollar, a devaluation which then further ratchets up the price of oil (partially to compensate holders of those petrodollars who find themselves in possession of an increasingly worthless currency). As strategic countries in the Middle East and Asia grow increasingly more comfortable converting their holdings into euros or other more reliable -- which is to say, more profitable -- currencies, a speculative run on the dollar becomes a real, if scary, possibility for everyone.
Finally, it is vital to recall that this tsunami of bad business is about to wash over an already very sick economy. While the old regime, the Reagan-Bush counterrevolution, has lived off the heady vapors of the FIRE sector, it has left in its wake a de-industrialized nation, full of super-exploited immigrants and millions of families whose earnings have suffered steady erosion. Two wage-earners, working longer hours, are now needed to (barely) sustain a standard of living once earned by one. And that doesn't count the melting away of health insurance, pensions, and other forms of protection against the vicissitudes of the free market or natural calamities. This, too, is the enduring hallmark of a political economy about to go belly-up.
This perfect storm will be upon us just as the election season heats up. It will inevitably hasten the already well-advanced implosion of the Republican Party, which is the definitive reason 2008 will indeed qualify as a turning-point election. Reports of defections from the conservative ascendancy have been emerging from all points on the political compass. The Congressional elections of 2006 registered the first seismic shock of this change. Since then, independents and moderate Republicans continue to indicate, in growing numbers in the polls, that they are leaving the Grand Old Party. The Wall Street Journal reports on a growing loss of faith among important circles of business and finance. Hard core religious right-wingers are airing their doubts in public. Libertarians delight in the apostate candidacy of Ron Paul. Conservative populist resentment of immigration runs head on into corporate elite determination to enlarge a sizeable pool of cheap labor, while Hispanics head back to the Democratic Party in droves. Even the Republican Party's own elected officials are engaged in a mass movement to retire.
All signs are ominous. The credibility and legitimacy of the old order operate now at a steep discount. Most telling and fatal perhaps is the paralysis spreading into the inner councils at the top. Faced with dire predicaments both at home and abroad, they essentially do nothing except rattle those sabers, captives of their own now-bankrupt ideology. Anything, many will decide, is better than this.
Or will they? What if the opposition is vacillating, incoherent, and weak-willed -- labels critics have reasonably pinned on the Democrats? Bad as that undoubtedly is, I don't think it will matter, not in the short run at least.
Take the presidential campaign of 1932 as an instructive example. The crisis of the Great Depression was systemic, but the response of the Democratic Party and its candidate Franklin Delano Roosevelt -- though few remember this now -- was hardly daring. In many ways, it was not very different from that of Republican President Herbert Hoover; nor was there a great deal of militant opposition in the streets, not in 1932 anyway, hardly more than the woeful degree of organized mass resistance we see today despite all the Bush administration's provocations.
Yet the New Deal followed. And not only the New Deal, but an era of social protest, including labor, racial, and farmer insurgencies, without which there would have been no New Deal or Great Society. May something analogous happen in the years ahead? No one can know. But a door is about to open.
Steve Fraser is a writer and editor, as well as the co-founder of the American Empire Project. He is the author of Every Man a Speculator: A History of Wall Street in American Life. His latest book, Wall Street: America's Dream Palace, will be published by Yale University Press in March 2008.
War, economic collapse, and the political implosion of the Republican Party will make 2008 a year to remember.
Will the presidential election of 2008 mark a turning point in American political history? Will it terminate with extreme prejudice the conservative ascendancy that has dominated the country for the last generation? No matter the haplessness of the Democratic opposition, the answer is yes.
With Richard Nixon's victory in the 1968 presidential election, a new political order first triumphed over New Deal liberalism. It was an historic victory that one-time Republican strategist and now political critic Kevin Phillips memorably anointed the "emerging Republican majority." Now, that Republican "majority" finds itself in a systemic crisis from which there is no escape.
Only at moments of profound shock to the old order of things -- the Great Depression of the 1930s or the coming together of imperial war, racial confrontation, and de-industrialization in the late 1960s and 1970s -- does this kind of upheaval become possible in a political universe renowned for its stability, banality, and extraordinary capacity to duck things that matter. The trauma must be real and it must be perceived by people as traumatic. Both conditions now apply.
War, economic collapse, and the political implosion of the Republican Party will make 2008 a year to remember.
The Politics of Fear in Reverse
Iraq is an albatross that, all by itself, could sink the ship of state. At this point, there's no need to rehearse the polling numbers that register the no-looking-back abandonment of this colossal misadventure by most Americans. No cosmetic fix, like the "surge," can, in the end, make a difference -- because large majorities decided long ago that the invasion was a fiasco, and because the geopolitical and geo-economic objectives of the Bush administration leave no room for a genuine Iraqi nationalism which would be the only way out of this mess.
The fatal impact of the President's adventure in Iraq, however, runs far deeper than that. It has undermined the politics of fear which, above all else, had sustained the Bush administration. According to the latest polls, the Democrats who rate national security a key concern has shrunk to a percentage bordering on the statistically irrelevant. Independents display a similar "been there, done that" attitude. Republicans do express significantly greater levels of alarm, but far lower than a year or two ago.
In fact, the politics of fear may now be operating in reverse. The chronic belligerence of the Bush administration, especially in the last year with respect to Iran, and the cartoonish saber-rattling of Republican presidential candidates (whether genuine or because they believe themselves captives of the Bush legacy) is scary. Its only promise seems to be endless war for purposes few understand or are ready to salute. To paraphrase Franklin Delano Roosevelt, for many people now, the only thing to fear is the politics of fear itself.
And then there is the war on the Constitution. Randolph Bourne, a public intellectual writing around the time of World War I, is remembered today for one trenchant observation: that war is the health of the state. Mobilizing for war invites the cancerous growth of the bureaucratic state apparatus and its power over everyday life. Like some over-ripe fruit this kind of war-borne "healthiness" is today visibly morphing into its opposite -- what we might call the "sickness of the state."
The constitutional transgressions of the executive branch and its abrogation of the powers reserved to the other two branches of government are, by now, reasonably well known. Most of this aggressive over-reaching has been encouraged by the imperial hubris exemplified by the invasion of Iraq. It would be short-sighted to think that this only disturbs the equanimity of a small circle of civil libertarians. There is a long-lived and robust tradition in American political life always resentful of this kind of statism. In part, this helps account for wholesale defections from the Republican Party by those who believe it has been kidnapped by political elites masquerading as down-home, "live free or die" conservatives.
Now, add potential economic collapse to this witches brew. Even the soberest economy watchers, pundits with PhDs -- whose dismal record in predicting anything tempts me not to mention this -- are prophesying dark times ahead. Depression -- or a slump so deep it's not worth quibbling about the difference -- is evidently on the way; indeed is already underway. The economics of militarism have been a mainstay of business stability for more than half century; but now, as in the Vietnam era, deficits incurred to finance invasion only exacerbate a much more embracing dilemma.
Start with the confidence game being run out of Wall Street; after all, the subprime mortgage debacle now occupies newspaper front pages day after outrageous day. Certainly, these tales of greed and financial malfeasance are numbingly familiar. Yet, precisely that sense of déjà vu all over again, of Enron revisited, of an endless cascade of scandalous, irrational behavior affecting the central financial institutions of our world suggests just how dire things have become.
Enronization as Normal Life
Once upon a time, all through the nineteenth century, financial panics -- often precipitating more widespread economic slumps -- were a commonly accepted, if dreaded, part of "normal" economic life. Then the Crash of 1929, followed by the New Deal Keynesian regulatory state called into being to prevent its recurrence, made these cyclical extremes rare.
Beginning with the stock market crash of 1987, however, they have become ever more common again, most notoriously -- until now, that is -- with the dot.com implosion of 2000 and the Enronization that followed. Enron seems like only yesterday because, in fact, it was only yesterday, which strongly suggests that the financial sector is now increasingly out of control. At least three factors lurk behind this new reality.
Thanks to the Reagan counterrevolution, there is precious little left of the regulatory state -- and what remains is effectively run by those who most need to be regulated. (Despite bitter complaints in the business community, the Sarbanes-Oxley bill, passed after the dot.com bubble burst, has proven weak tea indeed when it comes to preventing financial high jinks, as the current financial meltdown indicates.)
More significantly, for at least the last quarter-century, the whole U.S. economic system has lived off the speculations generated by the financial sector -- sometimes given the acronym FIRE for finance, insurance, and real estate). It has grown exponentially while, in the country's industrial heartland in particular, much of the rest of the economy has withered away. FIRE carries enormous weight and the capacity to do great harm. Its growth, moreover, has fed a proliferation of financial activities and assets so complex and arcane that even their designers don't fully understand how they operate.
One might call this the sorcerer's apprentice effect. In such an environment, the likelihood and frequency of financial panics grows, so much so that they become "normal accidents" -- an oxymoron first applied to highly sophisticated technological systems like nuclear power plants by the sociologist Charles Perrow. Such systems are inherently subject to breakdowns for reasons those operating them can't fully anticipate, or correctly respond to, once they're underway. This is so precisely because they never fully understood the labyrinthine intricacies and ramifying effects of the way they worked in the first place.
Likening the current subprime implosion to such a "normal accident" is more than metaphorical. Today's Wall Street fabricators of avant-garde financial instruments are actually called "financial engineers." They got their training in "labs," much like Dr. Frankenstein's, located at Wharton, Princeton, Harvard, and Berkeley. Each time one of their confections goes south, they scratch their heads in bewilderment -- always making sure, of course, that they have financial life-rafts handy, while investors, employees, suppliers, and whole communities go down with the ship.
What makes Wall Street's latest "normal accident" so portentous, however, is the way it is interacting with, and infecting, healthier parts of the economy. When the dot.com bubble burst many innocents were hurt, not just denizens of the Street. Still, its impact turned out to be limited. Now, via the subprime mortgage meltdown, Main Street is under the gun.
It is not only a matter of mass foreclosures. It is not merely a question of collapsing home prices. It is not simply the shutting down of large portions of the construction industry (inspiring some of those doom-and-gloom prognostications). It is not just the born-again skittishness of financial institutions which have, all of sudden, gotten religion, rediscovered the word "prudence," and won't lend to anybody. It is all of this, taken together, which points ominously to a general collapse of the credit structure that has shored up consumer capitalism for decades.
Campaigning Through a Perfect Storm of Economic Disaster
The equity built up during the long housing boom has been the main resource for ordinary people financing their big-ticket-item expenses -- from college educations to consumer durables, from trading-up on the housing market to vacationing abroad. Much of that equity, that consumer wherewithal, has suddenly vanished, and more of it soon will. So, too, the life-lines of credit that allow all sorts of small and medium-sized businesses to function and hire people are drying up fast. Whole communities, industries, and regional economies are in jeopardy.
All of that might be considered enough, but there's more. Oil, of course. Here, the connection to Iraq is clear; but, arguably, the wild escalation of petroleum prices might have happened anyway. Certainly, the energy price explosion exacerbates the general economic crisis, in part by raising the costs of production all across the economy, and so abetting the forces of economic contraction. In the same way, each increase in the price of oil further contributes to what most now agree is a nearly insupportable level in the U.S. balance of payments deficit. That, in turn, is contributing to the steady withering away of the value of the dollar, a devaluation which then further ratchets up the price of oil (partially to compensate holders of those petrodollars who find themselves in possession of an increasingly worthless currency). As strategic countries in the Middle East and Asia grow increasingly more comfortable converting their holdings into euros or other more reliable -- which is to say, more profitable -- currencies, a speculative run on the dollar becomes a real, if scary, possibility for everyone.
Finally, it is vital to recall that this tsunami of bad business is about to wash over an already very sick economy. While the old regime, the Reagan-Bush counterrevolution, has lived off the heady vapors of the FIRE sector, it has left in its wake a de-industrialized nation, full of super-exploited immigrants and millions of families whose earnings have suffered steady erosion. Two wage-earners, working longer hours, are now needed to (barely) sustain a standard of living once earned by one. And that doesn't count the melting away of health insurance, pensions, and other forms of protection against the vicissitudes of the free market or natural calamities. This, too, is the enduring hallmark of a political economy about to go belly-up.
This perfect storm will be upon us just as the election season heats up. It will inevitably hasten the already well-advanced implosion of the Republican Party, which is the definitive reason 2008 will indeed qualify as a turning-point election. Reports of defections from the conservative ascendancy have been emerging from all points on the political compass. The Congressional elections of 2006 registered the first seismic shock of this change. Since then, independents and moderate Republicans continue to indicate, in growing numbers in the polls, that they are leaving the Grand Old Party. The Wall Street Journal reports on a growing loss of faith among important circles of business and finance. Hard core religious right-wingers are airing their doubts in public. Libertarians delight in the apostate candidacy of Ron Paul. Conservative populist resentment of immigration runs head on into corporate elite determination to enlarge a sizeable pool of cheap labor, while Hispanics head back to the Democratic Party in droves. Even the Republican Party's own elected officials are engaged in a mass movement to retire.
All signs are ominous. The credibility and legitimacy of the old order operate now at a steep discount. Most telling and fatal perhaps is the paralysis spreading into the inner councils at the top. Faced with dire predicaments both at home and abroad, they essentially do nothing except rattle those sabers, captives of their own now-bankrupt ideology. Anything, many will decide, is better than this.
Or will they? What if the opposition is vacillating, incoherent, and weak-willed -- labels critics have reasonably pinned on the Democrats? Bad as that undoubtedly is, I don't think it will matter, not in the short run at least.
Take the presidential campaign of 1932 as an instructive example. The crisis of the Great Depression was systemic, but the response of the Democratic Party and its candidate Franklin Delano Roosevelt -- though few remember this now -- was hardly daring. In many ways, it was not very different from that of Republican President Herbert Hoover; nor was there a great deal of militant opposition in the streets, not in 1932 anyway, hardly more than the woeful degree of organized mass resistance we see today despite all the Bush administration's provocations.
Yet the New Deal followed. And not only the New Deal, but an era of social protest, including labor, racial, and farmer insurgencies, without which there would have been no New Deal or Great Society. May something analogous happen in the years ahead? No one can know. But a door is about to open.
Steve Fraser is a writer and editor, as well as the co-founder of the American Empire Project. He is the author of Every Man a Speculator: A History of Wall Street in American Life. His latest book, Wall Street: America's Dream Palace, will be published by Yale University Press in March 2008.
7.12.07
Hillary Clinton Might Be the Least Electable Democrat
By Guy T. Saperstein, AlterNet. Posted December 7, 2007.
While Hillary Clinton maintains her lead in national polling among Democrats, in direct match-ups against Republicans, she consistently trails her competitors.
Last Sunday's New York Times contained an op-ed by Frank Rich ("Who's Afraid of Barack Obama," Dec. 2) suggesting that, for a variety of reasons, Barack Obama is the Democrat the Republicans fear most. While Rich emphasized Obama's authenticity, his early and unequivocal opposition to the Iraq war and his cross-over appeal to independents and Republicans, missing from his otherwise excellent article were polling results confirming why Republicans fear an Obama presidential candidacy and why they would prefer to run against Hillary Clinton.
While Clinton maintains her lead in national polling among Democrats, in direct matchups against Republican presidential candidates, she consistently runs behind both Barack Obama and John Edwards. In the recent national Zogby Poll (Nov. 26, 2007), every major Republican presidential candidate beats Clinton: McCain beats her 42 percent to 38 percent; Giuliani beats her 43 percent to 40 percent; Romney beats her 43 percent to 40 percent; Huckabee beats her 44 percent to 39 percent; and Thompson beats her 44 percent to 40 percent, despite the fact Thompson barely appears to be awake most of the time.
By contrast, Obama beats every major Republican candidate: He beats McCain 45 percent to 38 percent; Guiliani 46 percent to 41 percent; Romney 46 percent to 40 percent; Huckabee 46 percent to 40 percent; and, Thompson 47 percent to 40 percent. In other words, Obama consistently runs 8 to 11 percent stronger than Clinton when matched against Republicans. To state the obvious: The Democratic presidential candidate will have to run against a Republican.
Clinton's inherent weakness as a candidate shows up in other ways. In direct matchups for congressional seats, Democrats currently are running 10 percent to 15 percent ahead of Republicans, depending on the poll, while Clinton runs 3 percent to 7 percent behind -- a net deficit ranging from 13 to 22 percent. No candidate in presidential polling history ever has run so far behind his or her party.
To look at Clinton's candidacy another way, Clinton runs well behind generic polling for the presidency: In the NBC News/Wall Street Journal Poll conducted Nov. 1-5, 2007, voters were asked, "Putting aside for a moment the question of who each party's nominee might be, what is your preference for the outcome of the 2008 presidential election -- that a Democrat be elected president or that a Republican be elected president?" By 50 percent to 35 percent, voters chose "Democrat" -- a 15-point edge. Thus, Clinton is running 10 to 15 percent, or more, behind the generic Democratic candidate. This is not a promising metric nor the numbers of a strong candidate.
Look at Iowa: It is neck-and-neck, with Obama, Clinton and Edwards running close among the first tier of Democratic candidates. But Clinton is the only woman running against seven men, yet polls only around 25 percent. When you have been in the public eye for 15 years and are well-known, when your husband was a popular president and remains perhaps the most popular Democrat in America, when you are the only female candidate in a race against seven men, but you are polling just 25 percent, you are not a strong candidate.
I had occasion last week to speak for an hour and a half with a Democratic candidate for the U.S. Senate in a battleground state. Without revealing who I favored in the Democratic primary, I asked, "Who would help you the most at the top of the Democratic ticket in November 2008?" Without hesitation, the candidate [who cannot take a public position in the presidential primary] responded: "I can tell you who would hurt me the most -- Hillary Clinton. She has 30-40 percent of voters in my state who never would vote for her under any circumstances, and she is no one's second choice. Her support is lukewarm, at best."
In a recent article in the New Republic, Thomas F. Schaller quoted two Midwestern politicians about the negative effect of having Clinton lead the Democratic ticket in 2008. Missouri House Minority Whip Connie Johnson warned, "If Hillary comes to the state of Missouri, we can write it off." Democratic state Rep. Dave Crooks of Indiana stated, "I'm not sure it (Clinton candidacy) would be fatal in Indiana, but she would be a drag."
Karl Rove recently commented on Hillary's candidacy, observing that she had the highest "unfavorable" ratings of any presidential candidate in modern polling history. In the USA/Gallup Poll, over the past two years, Clinton's "unfavorable" ratings have ranged from 40 percent to 52 percent and currently are running 45 percent -- far higher than any other Democratic or Republican presidential hopeful and higher than any presidential candidate at this stage in polling history. Hillary Clinton may be the most well-known, recognizable candidate, but that is proving to be as much a burden as a benefit.
Another factor to consider is the power of Clinton to unify the opposition. While the field of Republican candidates is uninspiring, if not grim, Clinton is a galvanizing force for conservatives. While Clinton-hatred may be unfair (I happen to think it is), the intensity of animosity conservatives have reserved for the Clintons is unprecedented. They want to run against her not only because she may be the weakest candidate, but also because they hate her and what they think she stands for. I am not endorsing this hatred, which I consider irrational and destructive, but Democrats need to consider that her candidacy, more than any other Democratic candidate, has the potential to motivate and activate the opposition.
To be fair, it should be noted that not all polls find Clinton on the short end of polling disparities, and some have found her polling at parity, or sometimes even slightly ahead, of Republicans (generally, within the margin of polling error). But this should not obscure the main point: By every measure, Clinton's support runs well behind congressional Democrats, well behind generic Democrats and, generally, behind her Democratic presidential rivals in matchups with Republicans.
Bill: When will the other shoe drop?
Every presidential candidate inspires humor. In the case of Bill and Hillary, it is an avalanche, including the "Hillary Spanking Bill Clinton Whipping Magnet" for refrigerators across America. But what about Bill's proven 30-year history of womanizing? Should we assume these patterns have disappeared? Or should we assume there may be more revelations about Bill's continuing liaisons with women that Republicans will produce during the general election, taking voters back to memories of Paula Jones, Gennifer Flowers and Monica Lewinsky, with Hillary playing the role of Bill's enabler? Given Bill's past conduct, wouldn't it be prudent for Democratic voters to assume this is an additional liability a Clinton candidacy might have to carry in the general election?
When the beginning point for Clinton is at or behind her Republican opponent, and 10 to 15 points behind the Democratic Party, how many liabilities can her candidacy sustain? Even if there is less than a 50 percent chance of more revelations about Bill, is it wise for Democratic voters to ignore this risk, roll the dice and take that chance when the presidency is at stake?
If Clinton wins the Democratic nomination, I will support her candidacy and hope for the best, because I am not sure much of America would be left after another four to eight years of a Republican presidency. But shouldn't Democrats be thinking strategically about who comes to the table with more strengths, fewer liabilities and fewer potential game-changing surprises? I sure hope so.
Guy T. Saperstein is a Democracy Alliance partner and past president of the Sierra Club Foundation; previously, he was one of the National Law Journal’s "100 Most Influential Lawyers in America."
While Hillary Clinton maintains her lead in national polling among Democrats, in direct match-ups against Republicans, she consistently trails her competitors.
Last Sunday's New York Times contained an op-ed by Frank Rich ("Who's Afraid of Barack Obama," Dec. 2) suggesting that, for a variety of reasons, Barack Obama is the Democrat the Republicans fear most. While Rich emphasized Obama's authenticity, his early and unequivocal opposition to the Iraq war and his cross-over appeal to independents and Republicans, missing from his otherwise excellent article were polling results confirming why Republicans fear an Obama presidential candidacy and why they would prefer to run against Hillary Clinton.
While Clinton maintains her lead in national polling among Democrats, in direct matchups against Republican presidential candidates, she consistently runs behind both Barack Obama and John Edwards. In the recent national Zogby Poll (Nov. 26, 2007), every major Republican presidential candidate beats Clinton: McCain beats her 42 percent to 38 percent; Giuliani beats her 43 percent to 40 percent; Romney beats her 43 percent to 40 percent; Huckabee beats her 44 percent to 39 percent; and Thompson beats her 44 percent to 40 percent, despite the fact Thompson barely appears to be awake most of the time.
By contrast, Obama beats every major Republican candidate: He beats McCain 45 percent to 38 percent; Guiliani 46 percent to 41 percent; Romney 46 percent to 40 percent; Huckabee 46 percent to 40 percent; and, Thompson 47 percent to 40 percent. In other words, Obama consistently runs 8 to 11 percent stronger than Clinton when matched against Republicans. To state the obvious: The Democratic presidential candidate will have to run against a Republican.
Clinton's inherent weakness as a candidate shows up in other ways. In direct matchups for congressional seats, Democrats currently are running 10 percent to 15 percent ahead of Republicans, depending on the poll, while Clinton runs 3 percent to 7 percent behind -- a net deficit ranging from 13 to 22 percent. No candidate in presidential polling history ever has run so far behind his or her party.
To look at Clinton's candidacy another way, Clinton runs well behind generic polling for the presidency: In the NBC News/Wall Street Journal Poll conducted Nov. 1-5, 2007, voters were asked, "Putting aside for a moment the question of who each party's nominee might be, what is your preference for the outcome of the 2008 presidential election -- that a Democrat be elected president or that a Republican be elected president?" By 50 percent to 35 percent, voters chose "Democrat" -- a 15-point edge. Thus, Clinton is running 10 to 15 percent, or more, behind the generic Democratic candidate. This is not a promising metric nor the numbers of a strong candidate.
Look at Iowa: It is neck-and-neck, with Obama, Clinton and Edwards running close among the first tier of Democratic candidates. But Clinton is the only woman running against seven men, yet polls only around 25 percent. When you have been in the public eye for 15 years and are well-known, when your husband was a popular president and remains perhaps the most popular Democrat in America, when you are the only female candidate in a race against seven men, but you are polling just 25 percent, you are not a strong candidate.
I had occasion last week to speak for an hour and a half with a Democratic candidate for the U.S. Senate in a battleground state. Without revealing who I favored in the Democratic primary, I asked, "Who would help you the most at the top of the Democratic ticket in November 2008?" Without hesitation, the candidate [who cannot take a public position in the presidential primary] responded: "I can tell you who would hurt me the most -- Hillary Clinton. She has 30-40 percent of voters in my state who never would vote for her under any circumstances, and she is no one's second choice. Her support is lukewarm, at best."
In a recent article in the New Republic, Thomas F. Schaller quoted two Midwestern politicians about the negative effect of having Clinton lead the Democratic ticket in 2008. Missouri House Minority Whip Connie Johnson warned, "If Hillary comes to the state of Missouri, we can write it off." Democratic state Rep. Dave Crooks of Indiana stated, "I'm not sure it (Clinton candidacy) would be fatal in Indiana, but she would be a drag."
Karl Rove recently commented on Hillary's candidacy, observing that she had the highest "unfavorable" ratings of any presidential candidate in modern polling history. In the USA/Gallup Poll, over the past two years, Clinton's "unfavorable" ratings have ranged from 40 percent to 52 percent and currently are running 45 percent -- far higher than any other Democratic or Republican presidential hopeful and higher than any presidential candidate at this stage in polling history. Hillary Clinton may be the most well-known, recognizable candidate, but that is proving to be as much a burden as a benefit.
Another factor to consider is the power of Clinton to unify the opposition. While the field of Republican candidates is uninspiring, if not grim, Clinton is a galvanizing force for conservatives. While Clinton-hatred may be unfair (I happen to think it is), the intensity of animosity conservatives have reserved for the Clintons is unprecedented. They want to run against her not only because she may be the weakest candidate, but also because they hate her and what they think she stands for. I am not endorsing this hatred, which I consider irrational and destructive, but Democrats need to consider that her candidacy, more than any other Democratic candidate, has the potential to motivate and activate the opposition.
To be fair, it should be noted that not all polls find Clinton on the short end of polling disparities, and some have found her polling at parity, or sometimes even slightly ahead, of Republicans (generally, within the margin of polling error). But this should not obscure the main point: By every measure, Clinton's support runs well behind congressional Democrats, well behind generic Democrats and, generally, behind her Democratic presidential rivals in matchups with Republicans.
Bill: When will the other shoe drop?
Every presidential candidate inspires humor. In the case of Bill and Hillary, it is an avalanche, including the "Hillary Spanking Bill Clinton Whipping Magnet" for refrigerators across America. But what about Bill's proven 30-year history of womanizing? Should we assume these patterns have disappeared? Or should we assume there may be more revelations about Bill's continuing liaisons with women that Republicans will produce during the general election, taking voters back to memories of Paula Jones, Gennifer Flowers and Monica Lewinsky, with Hillary playing the role of Bill's enabler? Given Bill's past conduct, wouldn't it be prudent for Democratic voters to assume this is an additional liability a Clinton candidacy might have to carry in the general election?
When the beginning point for Clinton is at or behind her Republican opponent, and 10 to 15 points behind the Democratic Party, how many liabilities can her candidacy sustain? Even if there is less than a 50 percent chance of more revelations about Bill, is it wise for Democratic voters to ignore this risk, roll the dice and take that chance when the presidency is at stake?
If Clinton wins the Democratic nomination, I will support her candidacy and hope for the best, because I am not sure much of America would be left after another four to eight years of a Republican presidency. But shouldn't Democrats be thinking strategically about who comes to the table with more strengths, fewer liabilities and fewer potential game-changing surprises? I sure hope so.
Guy T. Saperstein is a Democracy Alliance partner and past president of the Sierra Club Foundation; previously, he was one of the National Law Journal’s "100 Most Influential Lawyers in America."
How Conservatives Manipulate People Into Voting Against Their Best Interests
By Digby,Common Sense. AlterNet, December 7, 2007.
Pseudopopulist conservatives have destroyed reason.
American right-wing populism is an interesting phenomenon that's coming to the fore once again in its usual nativist and racist form, but also as smooth misrepresentation of "tax reform"; clever, misleading public relations messaging about fair trade; and some fairly outlandish paranoia about conspiracies to erase the borders. Various permutations of these fairly common right-wing themes abound among conservative politicians and thinkers alike. But conservative populism is an oxymoron.
As Phil Agre wrote in this much discussed article about the definition of conservatism, "Conservatism is the domination of society by an aristocracy ... [it] is incompatible with democracy, prosperity and civilization in general. It is a destructive system of inequality and prejudice that is founded on deception and has no place in the modern world."
Modern conservatism's most successful strategy was to merge public relations and politics into a seamless operation in which it could use modern marketing methods to convince people to vote against their own interests. In that sense, right-wing populism is just another marketing campaign for the aristocrats. And it's working:
South Carolina has embraced foreign investment, with companies from BMW to Michelin transforming a state once dominated by the textile industry. Another aspect of the global economy hasn't gone down as well: immigration.
While an influx of money from overseas has made free trade palatable even as thousands of mill jobs have vanished, voters are growing increasingly hostile to undocumented foreign workers, polls and analysts say. As a result, illegal immigration is a top economic issue in the state's Jan. 19 Republican primary, a key test for the candidates since it's the first in the South.
"Trade is all right as long as everybody goes by the same rules," said David Robinson, 65, who recently retired from a job at a Michelin tire factory in Spartanburg and whose son works in a Hitachi Ltd. plant nearby. Illegal immigration, on the other hand, "is a big problem, and that's one you can get a handle on," he said.
South Carolina only has about a 3 percent Latino population, both illegal and legal. It isn't actually a problem at all, much less a big one. The sad truth us that no matter how much "foreign investment" comes into their state, South Carolina manufacturing workers are still on a race to the bottom and they know it. But the conservatives have successfully misdirected them away from the real culprits by stoking latent (and not so latent) racism as an explanation for their insecurity. In a time of rising income inequality, a housing and credit crisis, and the ever more obvious fact of conservative corruption of epic proportions, the Republican Party has worked their rank and file into a frenzy over very poor people who work for next to nothing in hot, dirty fields, blood-soaked poultry plants and steaming restaurant kitchen sinks. It's quite an accomplishment.
But there's more to this than simple manipulation of the racist id. As Agre points out:
The tactics of conservatism vary widely by place and time. But the most central feature of conservatism is deference: a psychologically internalized attitude on the part of the common people that the aristocracy are better people than they are. Modern-day liberals often theorize that conservatives use "social issues" as a way to mask economic objectives, but this is almost backward: the true goal of conservatism is to establish an aristocracy, which is a social and psychological condition of inequality. Economic inequality and regressive taxation, while certainly welcomed by the aristocracy, are best understood as a means to their actual goal, which is simply to be aristocrats. More generally, it is crucial to conservatism that the people must literally love the order that dominates them. Of course this notion sounds bizarre to modern ears, but it is perfectly overt in the writings of leading conservative theorists such as Burke. Democracy, for them, is not about the mechanisms of voting and office holding. In fact conservatives hold a wide variety of opinions about such secondary formal matters. For conservatives, rather, democracy is a psychological condition. People who believe that the aristocracy rightfully dominates society because of its intrinsic superiority are conservatives; democrats, by contrast, believe that they are of equal social worth. Conservatism is the antithesis of democracy. This has been true for thousands of years.
One of the ways that this modern aristocracy gets people to internalize that the aristocrats are better people is by stoking a fear that the "American Dream" is being threatened by hordes of undeserving interlopers. Who's looking out for the common man? Why, it's the conservatives, your liege lords, who want to close the borders and keep those people out!
That fellow in South Carolina thinks that trade is working for him now that foreign investment is coming to a state with low taxes and no unions to manufacture cars and other things for export. The weak dollar surely makes such things very attractive for those manufacturers at the moment, but it's not clear that this trade has been "fair" at all. South Carolina lost over 250,000 jobs since the '90s, not even close to the jobs it's gained from these plants. But conservatives truly believe that "their betters" have their best interests at heart, so they've come to believe these people are actually heroes of a sort:
Tiremaker Michelin & Cie. of France, which has invested $2.1 billion in the state since 1975 and employs almost 8,000 workers, said in August it would spend an additional $350 million over four years, generating additional jobs.
BMW North America, a unit of Bayerische Motoren Werke AG of Munich, the world's largest luxury car maker, said last month it would boost annual production of its X5 sport-utility vehicle and other cars in Spartanburg by 100,000 units by 2012. Germany's BASF AG and Japan's Fujifilm Holdings Corp. also have major facilities in the state.
"People around here are beginning to connect the dots that this area is increasingly tied to trade and exports," said Greenville's Mayor White, an immigration lawyer, adding that there's been little job displacement due to undocumented workers.
According to this chart from the Department of Labor, however, manufacturing isn't adding jobs to the economy at all. In fact, it's been losing them for years. The losses have been slightly less catastrophic in the last couple of years, but they are losses nonetheless. (The biggest job provider in the state is actually government, which is somewhat ironic considering what a rock-ribbed conservative state it is.)
So these people, like most working Americans, are genuinely threatened, over a long period of time, by economic forces that are making a lot of people rich -- but not them. They are, however, inexplicably quite content with that state of affairs, but are upset by an extremely small population of foreigners who are doing dirty work for low wages. How does this happen?
Phil Agre:
Conservatism has opposed rational thought for thousands of years. What most people know nowadays as conservatism is basically a public relations campaign aimed at persuading them to lay down their capacity for rational thought ...
Conservatism has used a wide variety of methods to destroy reason throughout history. Fortunately, many of these methods, such as the suppression of popular literacy, are incompatible with a modern economy. Once the common people started becoming educated, more sophisticated methods of domination were required. Thus the invention of public relations, which is a kind of rationalized irrationality. The great innovation of conservatism in recent decades has been the systematic reinvention of politics using the technology of public relations.
The main idea of public relations is the distinction between "messages" and "facts." Messages are the things you want people to believe. A message should be vague enough that it is difficult to refute by rational means. (People in politics refer to messages as "strategies" and people who devise strategies as "strategists." The Democrats have strategists too, and it is not at all clear that they should, but they scarcely compare with the vast public relations machinery of the right.) It is useful to think of each message as a kind of pipeline: a steady stream of facts is selected (or twisted, or fabricated) to fit the message. Contrary facts are of course ignored. The goal is what the professionals call "message repetition." This provides activists with something to do: Come up with new facts to fit the conservative authorities' chosen messages.
It is no accident that illegal immigration has emerged as a theme at a time of epic corruption among the conservative aristocrats in business and government. Someone must be blamed for the fallout, and it isn't going to be them. This may seem counterintuitive, considering that business also likes cheap labor, but that's just commerce, and commerce is only a tool of the true conservative mission -- preserving the aristocracy.
Aristocracy is, by definition, un-American. The question is how many Americans will be "messaged" into believing they are doing the patriotic thing by behaving like subjects and hunting down the foreign invader on behalf of their betters.
Pseudopopulist conservatives have destroyed reason.
American right-wing populism is an interesting phenomenon that's coming to the fore once again in its usual nativist and racist form, but also as smooth misrepresentation of "tax reform"; clever, misleading public relations messaging about fair trade; and some fairly outlandish paranoia about conspiracies to erase the borders. Various permutations of these fairly common right-wing themes abound among conservative politicians and thinkers alike. But conservative populism is an oxymoron.
As Phil Agre wrote in this much discussed article about the definition of conservatism, "Conservatism is the domination of society by an aristocracy ... [it] is incompatible with democracy, prosperity and civilization in general. It is a destructive system of inequality and prejudice that is founded on deception and has no place in the modern world."
Modern conservatism's most successful strategy was to merge public relations and politics into a seamless operation in which it could use modern marketing methods to convince people to vote against their own interests. In that sense, right-wing populism is just another marketing campaign for the aristocrats. And it's working:
South Carolina has embraced foreign investment, with companies from BMW to Michelin transforming a state once dominated by the textile industry. Another aspect of the global economy hasn't gone down as well: immigration.
While an influx of money from overseas has made free trade palatable even as thousands of mill jobs have vanished, voters are growing increasingly hostile to undocumented foreign workers, polls and analysts say. As a result, illegal immigration is a top economic issue in the state's Jan. 19 Republican primary, a key test for the candidates since it's the first in the South.
"Trade is all right as long as everybody goes by the same rules," said David Robinson, 65, who recently retired from a job at a Michelin tire factory in Spartanburg and whose son works in a Hitachi Ltd. plant nearby. Illegal immigration, on the other hand, "is a big problem, and that's one you can get a handle on," he said.
South Carolina only has about a 3 percent Latino population, both illegal and legal. It isn't actually a problem at all, much less a big one. The sad truth us that no matter how much "foreign investment" comes into their state, South Carolina manufacturing workers are still on a race to the bottom and they know it. But the conservatives have successfully misdirected them away from the real culprits by stoking latent (and not so latent) racism as an explanation for their insecurity. In a time of rising income inequality, a housing and credit crisis, and the ever more obvious fact of conservative corruption of epic proportions, the Republican Party has worked their rank and file into a frenzy over very poor people who work for next to nothing in hot, dirty fields, blood-soaked poultry plants and steaming restaurant kitchen sinks. It's quite an accomplishment.
But there's more to this than simple manipulation of the racist id. As Agre points out:
The tactics of conservatism vary widely by place and time. But the most central feature of conservatism is deference: a psychologically internalized attitude on the part of the common people that the aristocracy are better people than they are. Modern-day liberals often theorize that conservatives use "social issues" as a way to mask economic objectives, but this is almost backward: the true goal of conservatism is to establish an aristocracy, which is a social and psychological condition of inequality. Economic inequality and regressive taxation, while certainly welcomed by the aristocracy, are best understood as a means to their actual goal, which is simply to be aristocrats. More generally, it is crucial to conservatism that the people must literally love the order that dominates them. Of course this notion sounds bizarre to modern ears, but it is perfectly overt in the writings of leading conservative theorists such as Burke. Democracy, for them, is not about the mechanisms of voting and office holding. In fact conservatives hold a wide variety of opinions about such secondary formal matters. For conservatives, rather, democracy is a psychological condition. People who believe that the aristocracy rightfully dominates society because of its intrinsic superiority are conservatives; democrats, by contrast, believe that they are of equal social worth. Conservatism is the antithesis of democracy. This has been true for thousands of years.
One of the ways that this modern aristocracy gets people to internalize that the aristocrats are better people is by stoking a fear that the "American Dream" is being threatened by hordes of undeserving interlopers. Who's looking out for the common man? Why, it's the conservatives, your liege lords, who want to close the borders and keep those people out!
That fellow in South Carolina thinks that trade is working for him now that foreign investment is coming to a state with low taxes and no unions to manufacture cars and other things for export. The weak dollar surely makes such things very attractive for those manufacturers at the moment, but it's not clear that this trade has been "fair" at all. South Carolina lost over 250,000 jobs since the '90s, not even close to the jobs it's gained from these plants. But conservatives truly believe that "their betters" have their best interests at heart, so they've come to believe these people are actually heroes of a sort:
Tiremaker Michelin & Cie. of France, which has invested $2.1 billion in the state since 1975 and employs almost 8,000 workers, said in August it would spend an additional $350 million over four years, generating additional jobs.
BMW North America, a unit of Bayerische Motoren Werke AG of Munich, the world's largest luxury car maker, said last month it would boost annual production of its X5 sport-utility vehicle and other cars in Spartanburg by 100,000 units by 2012. Germany's BASF AG and Japan's Fujifilm Holdings Corp. also have major facilities in the state.
"People around here are beginning to connect the dots that this area is increasingly tied to trade and exports," said Greenville's Mayor White, an immigration lawyer, adding that there's been little job displacement due to undocumented workers.
According to this chart from the Department of Labor, however, manufacturing isn't adding jobs to the economy at all. In fact, it's been losing them for years. The losses have been slightly less catastrophic in the last couple of years, but they are losses nonetheless. (The biggest job provider in the state is actually government, which is somewhat ironic considering what a rock-ribbed conservative state it is.)
So these people, like most working Americans, are genuinely threatened, over a long period of time, by economic forces that are making a lot of people rich -- but not them. They are, however, inexplicably quite content with that state of affairs, but are upset by an extremely small population of foreigners who are doing dirty work for low wages. How does this happen?
Phil Agre:
Conservatism has opposed rational thought for thousands of years. What most people know nowadays as conservatism is basically a public relations campaign aimed at persuading them to lay down their capacity for rational thought ...
Conservatism has used a wide variety of methods to destroy reason throughout history. Fortunately, many of these methods, such as the suppression of popular literacy, are incompatible with a modern economy. Once the common people started becoming educated, more sophisticated methods of domination were required. Thus the invention of public relations, which is a kind of rationalized irrationality. The great innovation of conservatism in recent decades has been the systematic reinvention of politics using the technology of public relations.
The main idea of public relations is the distinction between "messages" and "facts." Messages are the things you want people to believe. A message should be vague enough that it is difficult to refute by rational means. (People in politics refer to messages as "strategies" and people who devise strategies as "strategists." The Democrats have strategists too, and it is not at all clear that they should, but they scarcely compare with the vast public relations machinery of the right.) It is useful to think of each message as a kind of pipeline: a steady stream of facts is selected (or twisted, or fabricated) to fit the message. Contrary facts are of course ignored. The goal is what the professionals call "message repetition." This provides activists with something to do: Come up with new facts to fit the conservative authorities' chosen messages.
It is no accident that illegal immigration has emerged as a theme at a time of epic corruption among the conservative aristocrats in business and government. Someone must be blamed for the fallout, and it isn't going to be them. This may seem counterintuitive, considering that business also likes cheap labor, but that's just commerce, and commerce is only a tool of the true conservative mission -- preserving the aristocracy.
Aristocracy is, by definition, un-American. The question is how many Americans will be "messaged" into believing they are doing the patriotic thing by behaving like subjects and hunting down the foreign invader on behalf of their betters.
3.12.07
Il comandante delle pietre
di Moni Ovadia
(tratto da l'Unità del 1/12/2007)
In questi ultimi giorni ad Annapolis si tiene una conferenza di pace fra israeliani e palestinesi con il premier israeliano Olmert e il presidente palestinese Abu Mazen patrocinata da George W. Bush, l’uomo più potente del mondo, alla presenza di alte autorità del mondo arabo in uno schieramento che non conosce precedenti. Quasi simultaneamente, a Roma, all’Auditorium Parco della Musica, viene messo in scena un oratorio di testimonianza dal titolo Al Kamandjati. A questa rappresentazione ideata da Guido Barbieri ed Oscar Pizzo, prendono parte fra gli altri, un attore e un musicista palestinese, una scrittrice-giornalista israeliana e un raccontastorie ebreo, il sottoscritto. Fra i due eventi non c’è nessuna relazione di causa-effetto ma solo una consonanza tematica. La conferenza di Annapolis è l’ennesimo tentativo di risolvere il dramma mediorientale con gli strumenti della diplomazia e della politica. Su questo summit spira una brezza di ottimismo. Voci autorevoli, riportate dal nostro quotidiano come quella di Hanna Sinora, direttore del giornale palestinese Jerusalem Times, considerano questo incontro un’occasione storica. Hamas, il grande escluso, considera Annapolis un’inutile messa in scena, una trappola degli Usa ordita di concerto con Israele ai danni della causa palestinese. Personalmente ritengo non fuori luogo un’acuta sensazione di scetticismo riguardo alla vera efficacia di un processo che esclude uno degli «attori» principali, in un contesto così drammaticamente complesso e compromesso. Ma Al Kamandjati, il nostro racconto con musica, immagini e un concertato di lingue (arabo, ebraico, inglese e italiano), affronta la questione da un punto di vista remoto rispetto a quello della grande conferenza che si tiene nel Maryland. Il testo straordinario di Amira Hass, la scrittrice e giornalista israeliana che è la più lucida ed implacabile testimone del suo paese riguardo del dramma palestinese, racconta la storia di Ramzi Aburedwan, una storia positiva, una gemmazione poetica, atipica e fortunata che tuttavia rivela la profondità umana del dramma palestinese. Ramzi è un grande violista, fa parte della Diwan Orchestra diretta da Daniel Barenboim e ha appena finito di registrare un disco con la «Mozart» diretta da Claudio Abbado, ma Ramzi è anche il «comandante delle pietre», il bimbo che a otto anni diede avvio all’Intifada delle pietre diventandone l’icona immortalata da una fotografia che fece il giro del mondo. Ramzi è riuscito nel miracolo di fare una sintesi luminosa dei suoi due titoli. Dopo il diploma di violista a Lione è tornato a Ramallah dove ha aperto la scuola di Al Kamndjati il cui scopo è la formazione musicale dei bambini dei campi profughi. Al Kamandjati in un paio d’anni è diventata un network di cinque scuole ad insegnamento totalmente gratuito anche grazie ai riconoscimenti e ai sostegni internazionali che si è conquistata. Ramzi, da grande comandante quale è, ha scelto delle armi più efficaci per vincere la sua battaglia. Quarant’anni di occupazione militare israeliana, di colonizzazione arbitraria violenta e ininterrotta, di sradicamento di ulivi, di demolizione delle topografie esistenziali palestinesi, hanno sconvolto l’identità culturale e tradizionale del popolo palestinese. La musica è uno strumento potente per resistere e avviare la ricostruzione, Ramzi lo sa. Forse ad Annapolis verrà gettato un primo seme diplomatico per un qualche negoziato ma, come spiega lucidamente Amira Hass, la pace necessita di ben altro. È indispensabile un radicale cambiamento di orizzonte nella cultura dell’estabilishment di potere israeliano. È urgente stabilire una sintonia con la lezione che viene dai Ramzi e dalle loro storie. La vera sicurezza si ottiene solo con la pace e la pace si conquista con il pieno riconoscimento dell’altro, con l’accoglienza del suo volto.
(tratto da l'Unità del 1/12/2007)
In questi ultimi giorni ad Annapolis si tiene una conferenza di pace fra israeliani e palestinesi con il premier israeliano Olmert e il presidente palestinese Abu Mazen patrocinata da George W. Bush, l’uomo più potente del mondo, alla presenza di alte autorità del mondo arabo in uno schieramento che non conosce precedenti. Quasi simultaneamente, a Roma, all’Auditorium Parco della Musica, viene messo in scena un oratorio di testimonianza dal titolo Al Kamandjati. A questa rappresentazione ideata da Guido Barbieri ed Oscar Pizzo, prendono parte fra gli altri, un attore e un musicista palestinese, una scrittrice-giornalista israeliana e un raccontastorie ebreo, il sottoscritto. Fra i due eventi non c’è nessuna relazione di causa-effetto ma solo una consonanza tematica. La conferenza di Annapolis è l’ennesimo tentativo di risolvere il dramma mediorientale con gli strumenti della diplomazia e della politica. Su questo summit spira una brezza di ottimismo. Voci autorevoli, riportate dal nostro quotidiano come quella di Hanna Sinora, direttore del giornale palestinese Jerusalem Times, considerano questo incontro un’occasione storica. Hamas, il grande escluso, considera Annapolis un’inutile messa in scena, una trappola degli Usa ordita di concerto con Israele ai danni della causa palestinese. Personalmente ritengo non fuori luogo un’acuta sensazione di scetticismo riguardo alla vera efficacia di un processo che esclude uno degli «attori» principali, in un contesto così drammaticamente complesso e compromesso. Ma Al Kamandjati, il nostro racconto con musica, immagini e un concertato di lingue (arabo, ebraico, inglese e italiano), affronta la questione da un punto di vista remoto rispetto a quello della grande conferenza che si tiene nel Maryland. Il testo straordinario di Amira Hass, la scrittrice e giornalista israeliana che è la più lucida ed implacabile testimone del suo paese riguardo del dramma palestinese, racconta la storia di Ramzi Aburedwan, una storia positiva, una gemmazione poetica, atipica e fortunata che tuttavia rivela la profondità umana del dramma palestinese. Ramzi è un grande violista, fa parte della Diwan Orchestra diretta da Daniel Barenboim e ha appena finito di registrare un disco con la «Mozart» diretta da Claudio Abbado, ma Ramzi è anche il «comandante delle pietre», il bimbo che a otto anni diede avvio all’Intifada delle pietre diventandone l’icona immortalata da una fotografia che fece il giro del mondo. Ramzi è riuscito nel miracolo di fare una sintesi luminosa dei suoi due titoli. Dopo il diploma di violista a Lione è tornato a Ramallah dove ha aperto la scuola di Al Kamndjati il cui scopo è la formazione musicale dei bambini dei campi profughi. Al Kamandjati in un paio d’anni è diventata un network di cinque scuole ad insegnamento totalmente gratuito anche grazie ai riconoscimenti e ai sostegni internazionali che si è conquistata. Ramzi, da grande comandante quale è, ha scelto delle armi più efficaci per vincere la sua battaglia. Quarant’anni di occupazione militare israeliana, di colonizzazione arbitraria violenta e ininterrotta, di sradicamento di ulivi, di demolizione delle topografie esistenziali palestinesi, hanno sconvolto l’identità culturale e tradizionale del popolo palestinese. La musica è uno strumento potente per resistere e avviare la ricostruzione, Ramzi lo sa. Forse ad Annapolis verrà gettato un primo seme diplomatico per un qualche negoziato ma, come spiega lucidamente Amira Hass, la pace necessita di ben altro. È indispensabile un radicale cambiamento di orizzonte nella cultura dell’estabilishment di potere israeliano. È urgente stabilire una sintonia con la lezione che viene dai Ramzi e dalle loro storie. La vera sicurezza si ottiene solo con la pace e la pace si conquista con il pieno riconoscimento dell’altro, con l’accoglienza del suo volto.
L'onda inarrestabile dell'acqua pubblica
di Cinzia Gubbini
Sono arrivati in migliaia nella capitale: vogliono che l'acqua sia pubblica e che le società private si tolgano di mezzo. Tra bollette triplicate, rubinetti ormai a secco, lavoratori minacciati e ancora voglia di politica
«Forza Aprilia!» grida l'uomo in fascia tricolore. E si presenta ai cittadini del comitato apriliano, la città dove da più di due anni il 50% della popolazione non paga più le bollette dell'acqua, triplicate da quando la gestione è finita in mano alla società pubblico-privata Acqualatina: «Sono il sindaco di Rotonda, provincia di Potenza. Lottiamo contro l'Acquedotto lucano». Sono pacche sulle spalle e applausi reciproci: «Finalmente un vero sindaco, mica come il nostro!». Potrebbe sembrare una scampagnata a guardare le facce di quelli che ieri pomeriggio hanno camminato per le strade di Roma, con striscioni raramente raffinati e ricercati. Tutto fatto in casa. Uno era lungo non più di cinquanta centimetri e era retto da quattro orgogliose persone: «Comitato per l'acqua pubblica di Ferrara». E' questo il volto più autentico del movimento che ieri è sceso in piazza per la prima manifestazione nazionale in difesa del bene comune primario: l'acqua. I promotori - che hanno già dato una bella prova raccogliendo 400 mila firma per una legge di iniziativa popolare che renda di nuovi gli acquedotti pubblici - sprizzavano gioia. Non si aspettavano una tale riuscita: almeno trentamila persone, praticamente tutte arrivate in modo autorganizzato. Non perché le forze politiche non appoggino il movimento. Alla manifestazione ha partecipato persino il ministro dell'Ambiente, Alfonso Pecoraro Scanio, annunciando di aver inviato una circolare a tutti gli amministratori regionali e provinciali ricordando la recente moratoria di 12 mesi sulle privatizzazioni degli acquedotti appena approvata nel decreto fiscale. Rifondazione in gran spolvero, con il capogruppo alla camera Gennaro Migliore, il parlamentare europeo Roberto Musacchio e la viceministro degli Esteri Patrizia Sentinelli. Per non parlare della schiera di gonfaloni scelti come testa della manifestazione. Ma la sensazione era proprio quella che dovrebbe dare un movimento autonomo: i partiti ci sono, in appoggio. Il cuore della mobilitazione sta nel cuore dei territori. Persone di ogni età che si sono messe in testa di averla vinta: vogliono che il Comune o la Regione facciano marcia indietro e caccino via le società che gestiscono l'acqua. Quando va meglio, vogliono invece evitare a tutti i costi che ciò accada. «Più società, meno s.p.a.», recitava lo striscione di Attac.
Una fotografia del paese, intessuta di piccola Comuni - Fimodrone, Nocera Umbra, Castellammare - fino ai più grandi - Roma super-presente, e poi Firenze, Bergamo, Napoli, Siracusa - senza scordare la Sardegna e il suo striscione contro il prossimo G8. Una fotografia vivace - finalmente si sente cantare a un manifestazione nazionale - ma a tratti anche agghiacciante. Perché racconta un'emergenza nazionale che non buca il video. «Da noi la Rocchetta chiede una nuova concessione - racconta Sandro Vitale del comitato per la difesa del Rio Fergia (Umbria) - ma le fonti ormai sono a secco: noi tutti viviamo con l'acqua razionata. Sette o otto ore al giorno, e a volte è talmente poca che neanche serve per far andare i termosifoni». A volte ci si imbatte in drammi personali, come quello del signor Alfredo Proietti Ferretti di Norma - un altro piccolo Comune la cui acqua è gestita da Acqualatina - pensionato, che chiede di esporsi «in prima persona» per denunciare la persecuzione che subisce dalla società: gli devono 360 euro per una bolletta sbagliata e per le solite strane trafile risulta essere in debito di 95 euro. Per lui è inconcepibile. Altre volte si profilano futuri drammi nazionali, come in Campania dove di recente è stata tirata in ballo la Vesuviana Srl, formata da un cartello di società di cui alcune sono già in fallimento. Oppure ci si scontra con un film già visto, quello dell'arroganza del capitale che si pensava in soffitta a prendere polvere. Come a Firenze - città di centrosinistra, of course - dove i lavoratori della società Publiacqua denunciano di essere vessati, trasferiti continuamente a causa delle loro denunce contro una gestione che considerano scellerata: «Le bollette sono raddoppiate ma le analisi sanitarie sull'acqua sono dimezzate», denuncia ancora, e senza avere paura «finché il movimento è con noi» Luciano D'Antonio (per sostenerli www.acquabenecomune.org). Fino a arrivare oltre confine: con i kurdi che protestano contro le dighe che rischiano di distruggere la storica città di Hasankeyf, e con l'associazione «A sud», che lungo tutto il corteo ricorda i tanti posti nel mondo in cui l'Italia mette lo zampino nella privatizzazione dell'acqua. Ma la manifestazione di ieri, ricorda Marco Bersani della Campagna nazionale per l'acqua, è solo l'inizio di un nuovo ciclo: «Quello con cui lavoreremo, a partire dai territori, per far approvare la legge di iniziativa popolare. L'onda dell'acqua pubblica è partita, e nessuno la può più fermare».
(il manifesto, 2 dicembre 2007)
Sono arrivati in migliaia nella capitale: vogliono che l'acqua sia pubblica e che le società private si tolgano di mezzo. Tra bollette triplicate, rubinetti ormai a secco, lavoratori minacciati e ancora voglia di politica
«Forza Aprilia!» grida l'uomo in fascia tricolore. E si presenta ai cittadini del comitato apriliano, la città dove da più di due anni il 50% della popolazione non paga più le bollette dell'acqua, triplicate da quando la gestione è finita in mano alla società pubblico-privata Acqualatina: «Sono il sindaco di Rotonda, provincia di Potenza. Lottiamo contro l'Acquedotto lucano». Sono pacche sulle spalle e applausi reciproci: «Finalmente un vero sindaco, mica come il nostro!». Potrebbe sembrare una scampagnata a guardare le facce di quelli che ieri pomeriggio hanno camminato per le strade di Roma, con striscioni raramente raffinati e ricercati. Tutto fatto in casa. Uno era lungo non più di cinquanta centimetri e era retto da quattro orgogliose persone: «Comitato per l'acqua pubblica di Ferrara». E' questo il volto più autentico del movimento che ieri è sceso in piazza per la prima manifestazione nazionale in difesa del bene comune primario: l'acqua. I promotori - che hanno già dato una bella prova raccogliendo 400 mila firma per una legge di iniziativa popolare che renda di nuovi gli acquedotti pubblici - sprizzavano gioia. Non si aspettavano una tale riuscita: almeno trentamila persone, praticamente tutte arrivate in modo autorganizzato. Non perché le forze politiche non appoggino il movimento. Alla manifestazione ha partecipato persino il ministro dell'Ambiente, Alfonso Pecoraro Scanio, annunciando di aver inviato una circolare a tutti gli amministratori regionali e provinciali ricordando la recente moratoria di 12 mesi sulle privatizzazioni degli acquedotti appena approvata nel decreto fiscale. Rifondazione in gran spolvero, con il capogruppo alla camera Gennaro Migliore, il parlamentare europeo Roberto Musacchio e la viceministro degli Esteri Patrizia Sentinelli. Per non parlare della schiera di gonfaloni scelti come testa della manifestazione. Ma la sensazione era proprio quella che dovrebbe dare un movimento autonomo: i partiti ci sono, in appoggio. Il cuore della mobilitazione sta nel cuore dei territori. Persone di ogni età che si sono messe in testa di averla vinta: vogliono che il Comune o la Regione facciano marcia indietro e caccino via le società che gestiscono l'acqua. Quando va meglio, vogliono invece evitare a tutti i costi che ciò accada. «Più società, meno s.p.a.», recitava lo striscione di Attac.
Una fotografia del paese, intessuta di piccola Comuni - Fimodrone, Nocera Umbra, Castellammare - fino ai più grandi - Roma super-presente, e poi Firenze, Bergamo, Napoli, Siracusa - senza scordare la Sardegna e il suo striscione contro il prossimo G8. Una fotografia vivace - finalmente si sente cantare a un manifestazione nazionale - ma a tratti anche agghiacciante. Perché racconta un'emergenza nazionale che non buca il video. «Da noi la Rocchetta chiede una nuova concessione - racconta Sandro Vitale del comitato per la difesa del Rio Fergia (Umbria) - ma le fonti ormai sono a secco: noi tutti viviamo con l'acqua razionata. Sette o otto ore al giorno, e a volte è talmente poca che neanche serve per far andare i termosifoni». A volte ci si imbatte in drammi personali, come quello del signor Alfredo Proietti Ferretti di Norma - un altro piccolo Comune la cui acqua è gestita da Acqualatina - pensionato, che chiede di esporsi «in prima persona» per denunciare la persecuzione che subisce dalla società: gli devono 360 euro per una bolletta sbagliata e per le solite strane trafile risulta essere in debito di 95 euro. Per lui è inconcepibile. Altre volte si profilano futuri drammi nazionali, come in Campania dove di recente è stata tirata in ballo la Vesuviana Srl, formata da un cartello di società di cui alcune sono già in fallimento. Oppure ci si scontra con un film già visto, quello dell'arroganza del capitale che si pensava in soffitta a prendere polvere. Come a Firenze - città di centrosinistra, of course - dove i lavoratori della società Publiacqua denunciano di essere vessati, trasferiti continuamente a causa delle loro denunce contro una gestione che considerano scellerata: «Le bollette sono raddoppiate ma le analisi sanitarie sull'acqua sono dimezzate», denuncia ancora, e senza avere paura «finché il movimento è con noi» Luciano D'Antonio (per sostenerli www.acquabenecomune.org). Fino a arrivare oltre confine: con i kurdi che protestano contro le dighe che rischiano di distruggere la storica città di Hasankeyf, e con l'associazione «A sud», che lungo tutto il corteo ricorda i tanti posti nel mondo in cui l'Italia mette lo zampino nella privatizzazione dell'acqua. Ma la manifestazione di ieri, ricorda Marco Bersani della Campagna nazionale per l'acqua, è solo l'inizio di un nuovo ciclo: «Quello con cui lavoreremo, a partire dai territori, per far approvare la legge di iniziativa popolare. L'onda dell'acqua pubblica è partita, e nessuno la può più fermare».
(il manifesto, 2 dicembre 2007)
2.12.07
"L'acqua è un bene pubblico". In marcia contro la privatizzazione
Quarantamila a Roma. La manifestazione organizzata dal Forum delle acque
Il ministro Ferrero: "Questo sarà uno dei temi della verifica di gennaio"
ROMA - In marcia per difendere l'acqua, "un bene comune che non va privatizzato". Quarantamila persone, donne e uomini appartenenti a comitati territoriali e associazioni, forze culturali e religiose, sindacali e politiche per sostenere una legge di iniziativa popolare (già 400 mila le firme raccolte) per la tutela, il governo e la gestione pubblica dell'acqua.
Tra le tante manifestazioni, le più svariate, che Roma è abituata a ospitare quella di oggi in nome del diritto all'acqua che "non è una merce" è stata sicuramente tra le più insolite. E quella che al momento incassa anche un successo quasi immediato e quasi tangibile. Il ministro per la Solidarietà sociale Paolo Ferrero promette infatti che la "ripubblicizzazione dell'acqua sarà uno dei punti della verifica di governo a gennaio".
Il corteo, animato e colorato con tante gocce d'acqua di cartone, è stato organizzato dal Forum Italiano dei movimenti per l'acqua che raggruppa 70 associazioni e reti nazionali e circa mille comitati territoriali. Un arcipelago che ha sintetizzato in quattro punti le cose da fare subito: moratoria contro tutte le privatizzazioni; immediata approvazione della legge d'iniziativa popolare; ristrutturare la rete idrica nazionale che tra perdite e infiltrazioni aiuta il mercato delle privatizzazioni, "una grande opera pubblica" recita un cartello sarcastico. Infine la gestione pubblica e partecipata dai lavoratori e dalle comunità locali (www.acquabenecomune.org).
Nel corteo bandiere di diverse sigle. Tra le altre, quelle di Verdi, Prc, Sd, Pdci, Cobas, Cgil, Wwf e gonfaloni di alcuni comuni, come Gualdo Tadino. Fra i manifestanti anche i volontari dei "grilliromani", nati dal blog di Beppe Grillo.
"Senza beni comuni come l'aria e l'acqua non possiamo vivere: sono diritti fondamentali degli esseri umani fin dalla nascita e non si possono ridurre a merce" ha affermato il missionario comboniano Alex Zanotelli, uno dei personaggi simbolo della battaglia per la ripubblicizzazione del sistema idrico in Italia. Con lui ha sfilato anche il leader dei Verdi e ministro dell'Ambiente Alfonso Pecoraro Scanio che ha sottolineato come "bisogna evitare che ci sia un tentativo di privatizzazione, che ci porterebbe - anche nel mondo - a vere e proprie guerra per l' acqua: noi non vogliamo correre questo rischio".
Il ministro Ferrero ha appoggiato la manifestazione perché - ha scritto in un comunicato destinato al Forum delle acque - "l'acqua costituisce un bene di prima necessità che non può essere mercificato né, tantomeno, monopolizzato da qualche multinazionale". Una realtà, scrive il ministro, "ancora più vera in un momento in cui i cambiamenti climatici in corso stanno rendendo la scarsità delle risorse idriche un problema ancora maggiore rispetto al recente passato". Considerare perciò l'acqua come un bene pubblico è una strategia di salvaguardia per il futuro di tutti i cittadini.
Il decreto fiscale appena approvato ha bloccato per un anno la privatizzazione dei servizi idrici. E' qualcosa, ma ancora troppo poco. "E' necessario - aggiunge il ministro - arrivare al più presto a una legge che conduca alla ripubblicizzazione integrale dell'acqua". E questo deve essere uno dei punti della verifica di gennaio.
(Repubblica.it, 1 dicembre 2007)
Il ministro Ferrero: "Questo sarà uno dei temi della verifica di gennaio"
ROMA - In marcia per difendere l'acqua, "un bene comune che non va privatizzato". Quarantamila persone, donne e uomini appartenenti a comitati territoriali e associazioni, forze culturali e religiose, sindacali e politiche per sostenere una legge di iniziativa popolare (già 400 mila le firme raccolte) per la tutela, il governo e la gestione pubblica dell'acqua.
Tra le tante manifestazioni, le più svariate, che Roma è abituata a ospitare quella di oggi in nome del diritto all'acqua che "non è una merce" è stata sicuramente tra le più insolite. E quella che al momento incassa anche un successo quasi immediato e quasi tangibile. Il ministro per la Solidarietà sociale Paolo Ferrero promette infatti che la "ripubblicizzazione dell'acqua sarà uno dei punti della verifica di governo a gennaio".
Il corteo, animato e colorato con tante gocce d'acqua di cartone, è stato organizzato dal Forum Italiano dei movimenti per l'acqua che raggruppa 70 associazioni e reti nazionali e circa mille comitati territoriali. Un arcipelago che ha sintetizzato in quattro punti le cose da fare subito: moratoria contro tutte le privatizzazioni; immediata approvazione della legge d'iniziativa popolare; ristrutturare la rete idrica nazionale che tra perdite e infiltrazioni aiuta il mercato delle privatizzazioni, "una grande opera pubblica" recita un cartello sarcastico. Infine la gestione pubblica e partecipata dai lavoratori e dalle comunità locali (www.acquabenecomune.org).
Nel corteo bandiere di diverse sigle. Tra le altre, quelle di Verdi, Prc, Sd, Pdci, Cobas, Cgil, Wwf e gonfaloni di alcuni comuni, come Gualdo Tadino. Fra i manifestanti anche i volontari dei "grilliromani", nati dal blog di Beppe Grillo.
"Senza beni comuni come l'aria e l'acqua non possiamo vivere: sono diritti fondamentali degli esseri umani fin dalla nascita e non si possono ridurre a merce" ha affermato il missionario comboniano Alex Zanotelli, uno dei personaggi simbolo della battaglia per la ripubblicizzazione del sistema idrico in Italia. Con lui ha sfilato anche il leader dei Verdi e ministro dell'Ambiente Alfonso Pecoraro Scanio che ha sottolineato come "bisogna evitare che ci sia un tentativo di privatizzazione, che ci porterebbe - anche nel mondo - a vere e proprie guerra per l' acqua: noi non vogliamo correre questo rischio".
Il ministro Ferrero ha appoggiato la manifestazione perché - ha scritto in un comunicato destinato al Forum delle acque - "l'acqua costituisce un bene di prima necessità che non può essere mercificato né, tantomeno, monopolizzato da qualche multinazionale". Una realtà, scrive il ministro, "ancora più vera in un momento in cui i cambiamenti climatici in corso stanno rendendo la scarsità delle risorse idriche un problema ancora maggiore rispetto al recente passato". Considerare perciò l'acqua come un bene pubblico è una strategia di salvaguardia per il futuro di tutti i cittadini.
Il decreto fiscale appena approvato ha bloccato per un anno la privatizzazione dei servizi idrici. E' qualcosa, ma ancora troppo poco. "E' necessario - aggiunge il ministro - arrivare al più presto a una legge che conduca alla ripubblicizzazione integrale dell'acqua". E questo deve essere uno dei punti della verifica di gennaio.
(Repubblica.it, 1 dicembre 2007)
