Thought du jour - 19 October 2011

"This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they shall grow weary of the existing government, they can exercise their constitutional right of amending it, or their revolutionary right to dismember or overthrow it." - Abraham Lincoln 

Thought du jour - 14 September 2011

"I am opposing a social order in which it is possible for one man who does absolutely nothing that is useful to amass a fortune of hundreds of millions of dollars, while millions of men and women who work all the days of their lives secure barely enough for a wretched existence." - Eugene V. Debs

I consider Debs to be one of the greatest Americans of the 20th century.

Meanwhile, here is today's piece of historical trivia, that may interest only me. In 1912, Debs' running mate on the Socialist ticket for President was Emil Seidel, who had been Mayor of Milwaukee from 1910 to 1912, as a socialist (until the Republicans and Democrats combined forces to defeat him).

The trivia bit is that one of his secretaries while Mayor was a young Carl Sandburg, one of my two or three favourite poets of the 20th century. As for Seidel, a largely forgotten figure of American history, he was the first Socialist mayor of a major city in the United States, and during his administration the first public works department was established, the first fire and police commission was organized, a city park system came into being, and he cleaned the town up with strict regulation of bars and the closing of brothels and sporting parlors. He was doing a fine job... right up until the Democratic / Republican fusion put an end to it, at least for a few years. Milwaukee went on to elect socialist mayors from 1916 until 1940, and again from 1948 to 1960, with progressive and responsible administrations that served the people of Milwaukee well.

Something to think about the next time some Republican (or Democrat) tries to convince you that to vote for a socialist would be akin to voting for Satan.

Paul Kimball

Thought du jour - 12 September 2011

"If the Nuremberg laws were applied, then every post-war American president would have been hanged." - Noam Chomsky

Thought du jour - 11 September 2011

"Everybody's worried about stopping terrorism. Well, there's a really easy way: stop participating in it." - Noam Chomsky

Illusions of Managing History: The Enduring Relevance of Reinhold Niebuhr

A superb lecture by Andrew Bacevich of Boston University (author of The New American Militarism: How Americans are Seduced by War and The Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism) on the enduring importance of Reinhold Niebuhr on American political thought.

Niebuhr was very influential on Lyndon B. Johnson and many members of his administration when they were designing the Great Society, even as Niebuhr became a vocal critic of the Vietnam War. He attacked the materialism, complacency and conformity that he saw permeating post-war America in the 1950s and 1960s. The root of sin, he reminded Christians, was self-love, and the selfishness that goes along with it, both as individuals and as societies.



I think there ought to be a club in which preachers and journalists could come
together and have the sentimentalism of the one matched with the cynicism
of the other. That ought to bring them pretty close to the truth. 

-Reinhold Niebuhr 

Niebuhr was a complex man, and, as Bacevich notes, he defies easy categorization. He offered a critique of religious liberals over what he called their naive views of sin and the optimism of the Social Gospel. At the same time,  he rebuked religious conservatives for what he saw as their naive view of the Bible and their narrow definition of "true religion."

In our era of rampant and conspicous consumerism, increasing American exceptionalism (to an almost messianic level), American military adventurism in foreign affairs, and our love of self (one can only imagine what Niebuhr would have thought of "reality TV", and our growing obsession with "fame"), Niebuhr's work is more relevant than ever - a point that Professor Bacevich makes with both clarity and passion in this thought-provoking lecture.

Paul Kimball

Pop Matters: Bob Dylan, "With God On Our Side"

With more than one candidate for the Republican presidential nomination claiming that God has told them to run for President, and with American leaders constantly telling citizens that America has God on their side, this song is more timely than ever.

Paul Kimball

"Thought" du jour - 9 August 2011

''If we took away the minimum wage - if conceivably it was gone - we could potentially virtually wipe out unemployment completely because we would be able to offer jobs at whatever level.'' - Michelle Bachmann

Thus do we begin a week of choice quotes from the leading contenders for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination, just so that we can all remember who they really are, and what they really represent.

Paul Kimball

Signposts: A Taxing Problem

I took this picture in London in 2009, but given the way the economy is going in the United States, and the ever-growing problem of homelessness, I suspect we'll be seeing more and more of these signs south of the border in the months and years to come, particularly as the homeless are virtually ignored in Washington, where tax and spending cuts are all that anyone wants to discuss. 

It reminds me of a question that a professor of mine posed to the class on the first day of first year criminal law. "If there was a law," he asked, "that stated it was illegal for anyone to sleep under a bridge, would that be a fair law?" As it seemed to apply equally to everyone, all of us students seemed to think that it was indeed fair. To which the professor asked: "How many rich people have to sleep under a bridge?"

In other words, while such a law would purport to apply to everyone equally, it would in fact be applicable only to homeless people. While it might appear to be a fair, equal law in principle, it wasn't a fair law in practice. As Anatole France wrote: "La majestueuse égalité des lois, qui interdit au riche comme au pauvre de coucher sous les ponts, de mendier dans les rues et de voler du pain."

I see the same kind of reasoning applied to defend tax cuts in the United States, by people who seek to further the interests of the wealthy, at the expense of everyone else. On the surface, and in general, these cuts seem to apply to everyone (although specific cuts and exemptions obviously only apply to certain groups), and that's how they're presented to the public. But it's a sham equality, just as a law against sleeping under the bridge is a sham equality. Tax cuts disproportionately benefit the wealthiest members of society, and they have no meaningful impact whatsoever on the vast majority of people, particularly the poor. But for the wealthy and their "front men" (i.e. politicians), if a few more people wind up sleeping under bridges so that they can make even more money, c'est la vie. Besides, they can always pass a law to prohibit it, and present it as the height of fairness, just as they do with tax cuts.

And if the world goes to hell after they're gone, I'm sure they would agree with Louis XIV - "apres moi, le deluge".

Paul Kimball

New Frontier

New Frontier

Soul grifters...

time drifters -
no longer
heavy lifters,
Independence,
but no longer
independent,
Pluto towns
Jupiter frowns…
faces like the aftermath
of a nuclear weapons test.
The irradiated chickens
(half lives and half wits)
have come home
to roost
on the new frontier –
pick a channel
and watch them
cluck.

Paul Kimball

Pop Matters: Billy Bragg, "Help Save The Youth of America"

A great live version of Billy Bragg's classic "Help Save the Youth of America", which is more relevant today than ever. Politicians in the United States are always talking about creating a better future for the children, even as they use one hand to grab the cash today and the other to flush the future down the toilet. Shame on them all.

As an added bonus, whoever posted this also included "Waiting For The Great Leap Forwards", which remains my favourite Bragg tune. I've already posted it once here, but it bears repeated listenings, now more than ever.

Paul Kimball

Thought du jour - 21 July 2011

"We do not consecrate the flag by punishing its desecration, for in doing so we dilute the freedom that this cherished emblem represents." - William J. Brennan

A Thousand Words - Love Thy Neighbour

New Mexico, 2003