source: New York Times
The British economy contracted in the first quarter by the most in more than 50 years, official figures showed Tuesday, while data from Brussels showed prices falling for the first time ever in the euro zone.
Gross domestic product fell 2.4 percent in the first quarter from the fourth quarter of 2008, the Office for National Statistics said, the most since 1958 and below the initial estimate of a 1.9 percent decline. From a year earlier, the economy contracted 4.9 percent, the largest annual decline ever.
Michael Saunders, an economist at Citigroup in London, said the second quarter, ending Tuesday, would also likely show a contraction, though not as bad as the first quarter. The recession should be nearing its end soon, he added.
Nonetheless, he said, “I don’t think recovery will be strong in U.K., and the U.K. will have problems earlier than other countries.”
In Brussels, meanwhile, the European statistics agency, Eurostat, said its initial reading showed that prices in the euro zone fell 0.1 percent in June from a year earlier. Prices in May were unchanged from a year earlier.
Daniele Antonucci, who covers Europe at Capital Economics in London, wrote in a research note that while commodity price developments could alter the inflation outlook, “there are plenty of reasons” to believe that the annual decline marked the beginning of a downward trend.
“At this stage, we expect negative inflation rates for the next six months or so,” Mr. Antonucci wrote. “With factory gate prices falling, wage growth likely to slow sharply and a big amount of spare capacity in the economy, core inflation will decelerate considerably.” He also warned that the euro zone, “with a more timid policy response than elsewhere,” runs a risk of “a more prolonged and damaging period of deflation.”
Oil prices, though, are currently working against that possibility. Nymex oil futures for August delivery were trading Tuesday morning at $72.03 a barrel, giving them a gain for the year of more than 44 percent for the year.
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Sunday, June 28, 2009
Japan attacks Citigroup standards
Source: democracyandclassstruggle
Citigroup was hit hard by the crisis and is partly owned by the US government Japan has punished US bank Citigroup for what it called lax policies to protect against money laundering.The Financial Services Agency (FSA) ordered Citigroup to suspend sale promotions for one month at the 35 branches of its Japanese retail bank.
The Japanese regulator previously shut down Citigroup's private banking business in the country in 2004 for the same reasons. Citigroup is in the process of selling some of its Japanese units. Previous troubleThe FSA said the lack of compliance showed Citigroup executives "lack an understanding of the rules applied in Japan". It said the bank had not developed proper systems to detect "suspicious transactions", such as money laundering. "We are determined to take necessary measures on the issues," Citigroup Japan said in a statement, and apologised to its clients for the suspension.
The regulator's previous investigation of Citigroup in 2004 resulted in former chief Charles "Chuck" Prince flying to Japan to make a public apology in the form of a public bow. While Citigroup will not be allowed to advertise its products, customers can still buy products from Citigroup Japan. The ban applies from 15 July to 14 August. Citigroup agreed last month to sell its Japanese brokerage and investment banking assets to Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group for about $5.9bn, and wants to get rid of Nikko Asset Management as well.
Citigroup was hit hard by the crisis and is partly owned by the US government Japan has punished US bank Citigroup for what it called lax policies to protect against money laundering.The Financial Services Agency (FSA) ordered Citigroup to suspend sale promotions for one month at the 35 branches of its Japanese retail bank.
The Japanese regulator previously shut down Citigroup's private banking business in the country in 2004 for the same reasons. Citigroup is in the process of selling some of its Japanese units. Previous troubleThe FSA said the lack of compliance showed Citigroup executives "lack an understanding of the rules applied in Japan". It said the bank had not developed proper systems to detect "suspicious transactions", such as money laundering. "We are determined to take necessary measures on the issues," Citigroup Japan said in a statement, and apologised to its clients for the suspension.
The regulator's previous investigation of Citigroup in 2004 resulted in former chief Charles "Chuck" Prince flying to Japan to make a public apology in the form of a public bow. While Citigroup will not be allowed to advertise its products, customers can still buy products from Citigroup Japan. The ban applies from 15 July to 14 August. Citigroup agreed last month to sell its Japanese brokerage and investment banking assets to Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group for about $5.9bn, and wants to get rid of Nikko Asset Management as well.
"We will smash the state of siege!"
Source: A World to Win News Service
The intensity of fighting in the streets and alleys of central Tehran tonight, and the number of women and men who, with their lives in their hands, stood firm in the front lines and drove back the armed herds of violent thugs, was unprecedented. If you want to see how weak and desperate the regime is, look at the only thing it can rely on: its security forces. That's all! Illusions have evaporated. Cunning religious preaching and the myth of the Imam Zaman [the Shia messiah] can no longer fool the angry people. The lies of the national media can no longer put the masses to sleep. Instead it increases their anger and hatred a hundred-fold. So the only thing left for the murderous ruling gang is guns, batons, teargas, chains, and herds of anti-riot and law and order forces, Basijis and finally the army.
This afternoon's brutal attack against scattered but numerous crowds did not end the demonstration—instead, it spread it to other areas of Tehran. The Basij units and anti-riot police used the tactic of dividing the crowd into smaller groups and then encircling and beating up each group. It worked at first, but before long the scattered masses regrouped in the streets and alleys in the surrounding area, this time with a spirit and methods totally different from that of the demonstrations of the last couple of weeks. This time the slogans directly targeted the Islamic Republic and its leader. There was not much room for"God is great!" A young person wrote in blue spray paint on a street corner, "Even Shah heard the cry of my revolution! [and resigned]. Jamaran [the Leader's headquarters] is deaf! "...
Tonight, from east to west, from the north to south of Tehran, there is a state of siege. Tonight many eyes will stay open. Many people are thinking about tomorrow, the road forward, the methods that need to be taken up to advance the uprising of the masses and lead it to victory. Today, in the short moments that were found for discussion, there was talk of the need for a widespread general strike. Some said nothing can be done without weapons.
One thing is clear: We still have a long way to go on what we've started. People should prepare themselves for days and months ahead, to remain in the streets in different forms. The slogans of the uprising should become clearer and deeper, and the level of struggle raised so that it can seize victory.
The intensity of fighting in the streets and alleys of central Tehran tonight, and the number of women and men who, with their lives in their hands, stood firm in the front lines and drove back the armed herds of violent thugs, was unprecedented. If you want to see how weak and desperate the regime is, look at the only thing it can rely on: its security forces. That's all! Illusions have evaporated. Cunning religious preaching and the myth of the Imam Zaman [the Shia messiah] can no longer fool the angry people. The lies of the national media can no longer put the masses to sleep. Instead it increases their anger and hatred a hundred-fold. So the only thing left for the murderous ruling gang is guns, batons, teargas, chains, and herds of anti-riot and law and order forces, Basijis and finally the army.
This afternoon's brutal attack against scattered but numerous crowds did not end the demonstration—instead, it spread it to other areas of Tehran. The Basij units and anti-riot police used the tactic of dividing the crowd into smaller groups and then encircling and beating up each group. It worked at first, but before long the scattered masses regrouped in the streets and alleys in the surrounding area, this time with a spirit and methods totally different from that of the demonstrations of the last couple of weeks. This time the slogans directly targeted the Islamic Republic and its leader. There was not much room for"God is great!" A young person wrote in blue spray paint on a street corner, "Even Shah heard the cry of my revolution! [and resigned]. Jamaran [the Leader's headquarters] is deaf! "...
Tonight, from east to west, from the north to south of Tehran, there is a state of siege. Tonight many eyes will stay open. Many people are thinking about tomorrow, the road forward, the methods that need to be taken up to advance the uprising of the masses and lead it to victory. Today, in the short moments that were found for discussion, there was talk of the need for a widespread general strike. Some said nothing can be done without weapons.
One thing is clear: We still have a long way to go on what we've started. People should prepare themselves for days and months ahead, to remain in the streets in different forms. The slogans of the uprising should become clearer and deeper, and the level of struggle raised so that it can seize victory.
Iran—a power structure cracked but far from swept away
source: A World to Win News Service
At Friday prayer services on June 19, "Supreme Leader" Ayatollah Ali Khamenei firmly took the side of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in his electoral dispute with the opposition and announced that any attempt to repeat the week-long protests would be crushed. Nevertheless, thousands of youth and others came out into the streets the next day, knowing very well that they would face batons, teargas, and gunfire.
The security forces tried to create an atmosphere of terror around the area between Tehran's Azadi (Freedom) and Enghelab (Revolution) squares. Nobody was allowed to gather. People of all ages were beaten indiscriminately. Then the security forces closed the cross streets to prevent those in one area from joining those in another. Some people, feeling powerless and discouraged, chose to go home. But thousands of youth had the courage and ingenuity to get around the obstacles. They gathered and marched toward Azadi Square. More people joined them and the crowd—tens of thousands according to some reports, hundreds of thousands according to others—began marching together from there. That was not the end of it. The protesters had to confront the forces of reaction blocking the way. Clashes continued throughout the day and until midnight. Some people who couldn't get to the main crowd joined another large march in Forsate Shirazi Street or smaller ones in various Tehran neighborhoods.
People also protested in other cities, particularly Shiraz, Isfahan, and Rasht, as well as others where confrontations with the security forces were reported. They faced special anti-riot police wearing body armor and the vicious club-wielding two-man motorcycle teams of the Basij, a volunteer vigilante corps led, trained and armed by the regime's elite Revolutionary Guards. The regime presents the Basij as representatives of the masses of people, especially the poor.
Protestors shouted, "Death to dictators, Death to Khamenei, Death to this deceitful regime!" During moments when the reactionary forces were preparing to attack and moments when the protestors decided to break through the lines of the reactionary forces, they boosted their own spirits and the spirits of their comrades by chanting, "Fear nothing, we're all together, fear nothing…."
As the bullets of the reaction targeted the hearts of the precious children of the masses, this strengthened the determination of their comrades, as they shouted, "Death to Khamenei, Death to Ahmadinejad." A young woman named Neda Agha-Soltan got out of the blocked car where she was riding with her music teacher to get some fresh air and sat down on a curb. She was shot in the chest by a Basij sniper and fell to the ground. People all over the world saw a video showing the last moments of her life. She was murdered on Amirabad Shomali Avenue just north of Enghelab Square. People in the crowd that day vowed it would be renamed Neda Street.
On some of the footage that has appeared, groups of Basij militiamen can be seen firing their handguns directly into crowds—and people charge them anyway, running toward them under fire until the Basiji turn and run—and are overrun. The regime says 10 people were killed that day; others put the toll much higher. Angry protestors set fire to a Basij base facility and two petrol stations that night.
Sporadic protests continued on June 21 and the cries of "Death to dictators" echoed even louder. The next day, the Revolutionary Guards issued a threat that they would put down any further unrest themselves. Until then, the regime often tried to hide behind the phony ''civilian'' Basiji and pretend that it didn't know who was shooting protestors.
An hour later, thousands of young demonstrators gathered in Haft-e Tir Square in the more southern part of Tehran to express their determination. They shouted that they would rather die than accept being treated with contempt.
The significance of this protest stands out even more when Ayatollah Khamenei's speech after Friday prayers at Tehran University is analyzed. Many people were waiting for this speech to see how he would resolve the electoral dispute between the president and the opposition. Khamenei's speech was unprecedented, and shocked some people. He not only took Ahmadinejad's side more enthusiastically than ever, but also condemned and threatened anyone who questioned the election results. Cheating was impossible in the Islamic Republic, he said, and any suggestion otherwise represented impermissible questioning of the Islamic Republic itself.
This was aimed at opposition candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi, who has tried to keep the protest movement entirely within the framework of the Islamic Republic founded by Ayatollah Khomeini. Khamenei said that the election was a referendum on the Islamic Republic and that the 85 percent of the voters who allegedly took part were voting for the system. Then, using very strong language, he threatened protesters. He demanded that the candidates pursue their complaints through the legal system. But he also clearly said he did not recognize the legitimacy of any opposition to the Islamic Republic. He put aside the unbiased father-of-the-nation role that he had long cultivated and came out as the godfather of one faction of the Islamic Republic, claiming the right of that faction to bully the whole nation.
This Friday prayer service was a show of force, since the heads of all the military bodies, parliament, and court system were present to show their solidarity and intimidate the people. He was clearly issuing orders to the other factions to shut up and accept his decision, submit to his faction and call off all protests—or else.
Yet while the people's uprising was what had terrified the dominant faction and made the people the real target of Khamenei and his clique, there is no doubt that the internal conflicts were what triggered the whole upsurge. This speech was the sign of a new stage in the deepening crisis.
This speech could be taken as a parallel to Khomeini's speech on June 18, 1981, which marked the end of the alliance between his Islamic fundamentalists (including Khamenei and Akbar Rafsanjani, now Iran's richest man, a pillar of the Islamic regime, and a powerful backer of Mousavi) and the so-called Islamic liberals such as Abul-Hassan Banisadr, who was president at that time. Khomeini stripped Banisadr of his title as commander of the military forces and forced him out of office. Khomeini's coup d'état and the establishment of the Islamic Republic provoked mass protests. But the Islamic regime responded with extreme brutality. The arrest, imprisoning, and massacre of the communists and other revolutionaries started immediately. The reign of terror continued all through the 1980s until the Iran-Iraq war ended. Then, to try to make sure nothing of the spirit of revolution was left, in the summer of 1988 they massacred thousands (according to some accounts tens of thousands) of the communists and revolutionaries who were still in prison.
Despite the similarities, the situation today is not the same. Most importantly, a huge and growing part of the people no longer have trust or faith in the regime. People who had not yet voiced any response to the political situation clearly shouted, "Death to Khamenei," a slogan seldom if ever heard before at any protest in Iran. Others shouted, "You want a fight, let's fight—we are fighting women and men!"
But Khamenei and his clique are not the only ones trying to maintain the legitimacy of the Islamic Republic and the economic and social system this power structure serves. While fighting for the interest of his faction, Mousavi is trying hard to restore the "values of the Islamic Republic of Imam Khomeini." These are not words—the state system called Velyat-e-Faqih, the regime's foundational doctrine of "the rule of the Supreme Jurisprudent," is the apple of his eye. In a statement to his supporters he said, "We are not confronting the Basij, Revolutionary Guards or the army. The Basiji are our brothers, the Revolutionary Guards are the protectors of our revolution and our system. The army protects our borders. We are not confronting our sacred system and its legal institutions. We are confronting the wrong-doing and the lies, and we are seeking a reform that requires going back to the pure principles of the Islamic Revolution."
As the "reformist" ex-president Khatami, warned Khamenei, "When you close off the legal avenues of protest, you are in fact opening another way, and god knows where it may lead."
Because of the determination and persistence of the people's struggle, what began as a quarrel within the regime has brought Iran to a crisis of legitimacy and an institutional crisis. During the 1979 revolution, when the Shah could no longer hold onto power, the U.S. convinced him to abdicate to preserve the cohesion of the army and prevent the revolution from going any further. That's how that crisis was resolved, to the advantage of the imperialist system, and the people paid the price. The U.S. and the other imperialist powers have long done their best to determine events in Iran (invasions, coups, etc., not to mention the workings of the international market itself) and will do whatever they can to push this crisis toward a resolution that is to their relative advantage, which would certainly be to the disadvantage of the revolutionary interests of the people. Several observers have commented that American indignation about a stolen election is criminal hypocrisy coming from a power and a government that has for so long held up puppet tyrants like Egypt's Hosni Mubarak, whom Obama embraced just a few weeks earlier in Cairo. When it comes to rigged elections and torture-enforced repression, Mubarak is hard to surpass.
As the Communist Party of Iran (Marxist-Leninist-Maoist) said in one of their frequent leaflets addressed to the Iranian people during this period, "One thing is clear: We still have a long way to go on what we've started. People should prepare themselves for days and months ahead, to remain in the streets in different forms. The slogans of the uprising should become clearer and deeper, and the level of struggle raised so that it can seize victory."
At Friday prayer services on June 19, "Supreme Leader" Ayatollah Ali Khamenei firmly took the side of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in his electoral dispute with the opposition and announced that any attempt to repeat the week-long protests would be crushed. Nevertheless, thousands of youth and others came out into the streets the next day, knowing very well that they would face batons, teargas, and gunfire.
The security forces tried to create an atmosphere of terror around the area between Tehran's Azadi (Freedom) and Enghelab (Revolution) squares. Nobody was allowed to gather. People of all ages were beaten indiscriminately. Then the security forces closed the cross streets to prevent those in one area from joining those in another. Some people, feeling powerless and discouraged, chose to go home. But thousands of youth had the courage and ingenuity to get around the obstacles. They gathered and marched toward Azadi Square. More people joined them and the crowd—tens of thousands according to some reports, hundreds of thousands according to others—began marching together from there. That was not the end of it. The protesters had to confront the forces of reaction blocking the way. Clashes continued throughout the day and until midnight. Some people who couldn't get to the main crowd joined another large march in Forsate Shirazi Street or smaller ones in various Tehran neighborhoods.
People also protested in other cities, particularly Shiraz, Isfahan, and Rasht, as well as others where confrontations with the security forces were reported. They faced special anti-riot police wearing body armor and the vicious club-wielding two-man motorcycle teams of the Basij, a volunteer vigilante corps led, trained and armed by the regime's elite Revolutionary Guards. The regime presents the Basij as representatives of the masses of people, especially the poor.
Protestors shouted, "Death to dictators, Death to Khamenei, Death to this deceitful regime!" During moments when the reactionary forces were preparing to attack and moments when the protestors decided to break through the lines of the reactionary forces, they boosted their own spirits and the spirits of their comrades by chanting, "Fear nothing, we're all together, fear nothing…."
As the bullets of the reaction targeted the hearts of the precious children of the masses, this strengthened the determination of their comrades, as they shouted, "Death to Khamenei, Death to Ahmadinejad." A young woman named Neda Agha-Soltan got out of the blocked car where she was riding with her music teacher to get some fresh air and sat down on a curb. She was shot in the chest by a Basij sniper and fell to the ground. People all over the world saw a video showing the last moments of her life. She was murdered on Amirabad Shomali Avenue just north of Enghelab Square. People in the crowd that day vowed it would be renamed Neda Street.
On some of the footage that has appeared, groups of Basij militiamen can be seen firing their handguns directly into crowds—and people charge them anyway, running toward them under fire until the Basiji turn and run—and are overrun. The regime says 10 people were killed that day; others put the toll much higher. Angry protestors set fire to a Basij base facility and two petrol stations that night.
Sporadic protests continued on June 21 and the cries of "Death to dictators" echoed even louder. The next day, the Revolutionary Guards issued a threat that they would put down any further unrest themselves. Until then, the regime often tried to hide behind the phony ''civilian'' Basiji and pretend that it didn't know who was shooting protestors.
An hour later, thousands of young demonstrators gathered in Haft-e Tir Square in the more southern part of Tehran to express their determination. They shouted that they would rather die than accept being treated with contempt.
The significance of this protest stands out even more when Ayatollah Khamenei's speech after Friday prayers at Tehran University is analyzed. Many people were waiting for this speech to see how he would resolve the electoral dispute between the president and the opposition. Khamenei's speech was unprecedented, and shocked some people. He not only took Ahmadinejad's side more enthusiastically than ever, but also condemned and threatened anyone who questioned the election results. Cheating was impossible in the Islamic Republic, he said, and any suggestion otherwise represented impermissible questioning of the Islamic Republic itself.
This was aimed at opposition candidate Mir Hossein Mousavi, who has tried to keep the protest movement entirely within the framework of the Islamic Republic founded by Ayatollah Khomeini. Khamenei said that the election was a referendum on the Islamic Republic and that the 85 percent of the voters who allegedly took part were voting for the system. Then, using very strong language, he threatened protesters. He demanded that the candidates pursue their complaints through the legal system. But he also clearly said he did not recognize the legitimacy of any opposition to the Islamic Republic. He put aside the unbiased father-of-the-nation role that he had long cultivated and came out as the godfather of one faction of the Islamic Republic, claiming the right of that faction to bully the whole nation.
This Friday prayer service was a show of force, since the heads of all the military bodies, parliament, and court system were present to show their solidarity and intimidate the people. He was clearly issuing orders to the other factions to shut up and accept his decision, submit to his faction and call off all protests—or else.
Yet while the people's uprising was what had terrified the dominant faction and made the people the real target of Khamenei and his clique, there is no doubt that the internal conflicts were what triggered the whole upsurge. This speech was the sign of a new stage in the deepening crisis.
This speech could be taken as a parallel to Khomeini's speech on June 18, 1981, which marked the end of the alliance between his Islamic fundamentalists (including Khamenei and Akbar Rafsanjani, now Iran's richest man, a pillar of the Islamic regime, and a powerful backer of Mousavi) and the so-called Islamic liberals such as Abul-Hassan Banisadr, who was president at that time. Khomeini stripped Banisadr of his title as commander of the military forces and forced him out of office. Khomeini's coup d'état and the establishment of the Islamic Republic provoked mass protests. But the Islamic regime responded with extreme brutality. The arrest, imprisoning, and massacre of the communists and other revolutionaries started immediately. The reign of terror continued all through the 1980s until the Iran-Iraq war ended. Then, to try to make sure nothing of the spirit of revolution was left, in the summer of 1988 they massacred thousands (according to some accounts tens of thousands) of the communists and revolutionaries who were still in prison.
Despite the similarities, the situation today is not the same. Most importantly, a huge and growing part of the people no longer have trust or faith in the regime. People who had not yet voiced any response to the political situation clearly shouted, "Death to Khamenei," a slogan seldom if ever heard before at any protest in Iran. Others shouted, "You want a fight, let's fight—we are fighting women and men!"
But Khamenei and his clique are not the only ones trying to maintain the legitimacy of the Islamic Republic and the economic and social system this power structure serves. While fighting for the interest of his faction, Mousavi is trying hard to restore the "values of the Islamic Republic of Imam Khomeini." These are not words—the state system called Velyat-e-Faqih, the regime's foundational doctrine of "the rule of the Supreme Jurisprudent," is the apple of his eye. In a statement to his supporters he said, "We are not confronting the Basij, Revolutionary Guards or the army. The Basiji are our brothers, the Revolutionary Guards are the protectors of our revolution and our system. The army protects our borders. We are not confronting our sacred system and its legal institutions. We are confronting the wrong-doing and the lies, and we are seeking a reform that requires going back to the pure principles of the Islamic Revolution."
As the "reformist" ex-president Khatami, warned Khamenei, "When you close off the legal avenues of protest, you are in fact opening another way, and god knows where it may lead."
Because of the determination and persistence of the people's struggle, what began as a quarrel within the regime has brought Iran to a crisis of legitimacy and an institutional crisis. During the 1979 revolution, when the Shah could no longer hold onto power, the U.S. convinced him to abdicate to preserve the cohesion of the army and prevent the revolution from going any further. That's how that crisis was resolved, to the advantage of the imperialist system, and the people paid the price. The U.S. and the other imperialist powers have long done their best to determine events in Iran (invasions, coups, etc., not to mention the workings of the international market itself) and will do whatever they can to push this crisis toward a resolution that is to their relative advantage, which would certainly be to the disadvantage of the revolutionary interests of the people. Several observers have commented that American indignation about a stolen election is criminal hypocrisy coming from a power and a government that has for so long held up puppet tyrants like Egypt's Hosni Mubarak, whom Obama embraced just a few weeks earlier in Cairo. When it comes to rigged elections and torture-enforced repression, Mubarak is hard to surpass.
As the Communist Party of Iran (Marxist-Leninist-Maoist) said in one of their frequent leaflets addressed to the Iranian people during this period, "One thing is clear: We still have a long way to go on what we've started. People should prepare themselves for days and months ahead, to remain in the streets in different forms. The slogans of the uprising should become clearer and deeper, and the level of struggle raised so that it can seize victory."
husband burns wife alive
A husband in Nepal has set his own wife ablaze acccusing her of not bringing dowry. The victim has been hospitalized at a local hospital.
According to police sources, Dinesh Shah ofRaj Biraj-9 sprinkled kerosone on to his wife's body and torched her wtih the help of his younger brothers at home.
Meanwhile the local police have arrested the husband and his brothers for their involvement.
In Nepal's plains, women are burnt alive for not bringing dowry during marriage.
According to police sources, Dinesh Shah ofRaj Biraj-9 sprinkled kerosone on to his wife's body and torched her wtih the help of his younger brothers at home.
Meanwhile the local police have arrested the husband and his brothers for their involvement.
In Nepal's plains, women are burnt alive for not bringing dowry during marriage.
Monday, June 22, 2009
60 Years of U.S. Intervention in Iran:
source: Revolution
1. 1953: CIA Installs a Puppet
In the early 1950s, Iran was ruled by British imperialism and its puppet, Shah (King) Mohammed Reza Pahlavi. The Anglo-Iranian Oil Company controlled Iran’s oil and reaped huge profits. Iran’s oil workers toiled for 50 cents a day and lived in polluted slums without water or electricity. Most Iranians were impoverished peasants, enslaved on the land.
A movement of millions arose that drove the hated Shah from the country. Mohammed Mossadegh, who became the prime minister, attempted to nationalize Iran’s oil. Control of Iranian oil was crucial to the Western imperialists. In 1953, the CIA and the British organized a coup that overthrew Mossadegh and returned the Shah to power, instituted a ruthless dictatorship, and crushed his opponents. Full control of Iran’s oil was returned to Western corporations.
2. 1953-1979: The Nightmare Under U.S. Domination
During this period, the U.S. was the dominant power in Iran. For the people of Iran, life under U.S. domination was a nightmare. The Shah ruled through his brutal secret police, SAVAK, which the U.S. trained and organized. SAVAK imprisoned, tortured, and murdered thousands of people who dared to oppose the regime. And, according to a former CIA analyst on Iran, Jesse J. Leaf, SAVAK was trained in torture techniques by the CIA. The U.S. rulers did not even shed crocodile tears when their puppet dictator carried out these tortures and murders. The economy was totally subservient to the West, and billions of dollars were poured into making Iran into a U.S. military outpost. Meanwhile, 60 percent of Iranians were illiterate, life expectancy was only 50 years, 139 out of every 1,000 children died in their first year, and millions lived in rural poverty or sprawling urban slums.
3. 1977-1979: Fall of Shah and Rise of the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI)
In 1978, a wave of mass revolution built across Iran against the Shah. Backed by the U.S., the Shah tried to drown the revolution in blood—for example, in September 1978, thousands of people were killed in what is known as the “Bloody Friday” massacre. When it became clear that the Shah was losing control, the U.S. switched tactics. The Shah was pushed into exile, and the U.S. helped the reactionary Islamic fundamentalist regime led by Ayatollah Khomeini consolidate power and usher in a new nightmare for Iran’s people. The U.S. rulers assessed that their best bet—rather than allowing the revolution to develop and the possibility of more radical or revolutionary forces coming to the fore—was to work through the IRI, because Iran’s theocratic rulers had no intention or ability to fully break with imperialism. And the U.S. backed the Islamic regime’s brutal repression of revolutionaries and progressives.
4. 1980-1987: U.S. Fuels Slaughter in the Persian Gulf
The Khomeini regime was intent on promoting Islamic fundamentalism and expanding its role in the region. In November 1979, Iranian students seized the U.S. Embassy in Tehran. All this crashed sharply with U.S. efforts to maintain its domination of the Middle East. In 1980, as part of a strategic approach to weakening the IRI, the U.S. gave Iraq’s Saddam Hussein a green light to invade Iran, and then worked to turn the Iran-Iraq War into an eight-year bloodbath. U.S. allies supplied Iraq with billions in weapons and material that Hussein turned into chemical weapons, which he used on Iranians as well as Iraqi Kurds. The U.S. also supplied Iran, and played both sides against each other to prevent either from winning. When the war ended, an estimated one million Iraqis and Iranians had been killed.
5. Today: U.S. Threatens More Aggression Against Iran
After 9/11, the U.S. launched a so-called “war on terror,” whose real goal is to tear up the existing economic and political structures in the Middle East that it saw as an impediment to radically restructuring the region in the U.S.’s strategic interests, and to crush or force into defeat the Islamic fundamentalist forces who pose obstacles to those imperialist interests—so that the U.S. rulers can more directly control and exploit the whole Middle East, as a key part of creating an unchallenged and unchallengeable global empire.
Under the Bush regime, the U.S. made all kinds of accusations against Iran to justify stepped-up threats. Bush invoked the danger of “World War 3” and other wild exaggerations and lies, including the possibility of nuclear attack. Now Obama has tactically modified this, but has not fundamentally altered the Bush strategic aims.
See:
“The U.S. & Iran: A History of Imperialist Domination, Intrigue and Intervention”
“An Assessment of the Momentum Towards War Between the United States and Iran: Causes and Potential Ramifications; Preliminary Findings by a Working Group” “Obama in Cairo: A Speech of Lies to Enforce a SYSTEM of Oppression”
1. 1953: CIA Installs a Puppet
In the early 1950s, Iran was ruled by British imperialism and its puppet, Shah (King) Mohammed Reza Pahlavi. The Anglo-Iranian Oil Company controlled Iran’s oil and reaped huge profits. Iran’s oil workers toiled for 50 cents a day and lived in polluted slums without water or electricity. Most Iranians were impoverished peasants, enslaved on the land.
A movement of millions arose that drove the hated Shah from the country. Mohammed Mossadegh, who became the prime minister, attempted to nationalize Iran’s oil. Control of Iranian oil was crucial to the Western imperialists. In 1953, the CIA and the British organized a coup that overthrew Mossadegh and returned the Shah to power, instituted a ruthless dictatorship, and crushed his opponents. Full control of Iran’s oil was returned to Western corporations.
2. 1953-1979: The Nightmare Under U.S. Domination
During this period, the U.S. was the dominant power in Iran. For the people of Iran, life under U.S. domination was a nightmare. The Shah ruled through his brutal secret police, SAVAK, which the U.S. trained and organized. SAVAK imprisoned, tortured, and murdered thousands of people who dared to oppose the regime. And, according to a former CIA analyst on Iran, Jesse J. Leaf, SAVAK was trained in torture techniques by the CIA. The U.S. rulers did not even shed crocodile tears when their puppet dictator carried out these tortures and murders. The economy was totally subservient to the West, and billions of dollars were poured into making Iran into a U.S. military outpost. Meanwhile, 60 percent of Iranians were illiterate, life expectancy was only 50 years, 139 out of every 1,000 children died in their first year, and millions lived in rural poverty or sprawling urban slums.
3. 1977-1979: Fall of Shah and Rise of the Islamic Republic of Iran (IRI)
In 1978, a wave of mass revolution built across Iran against the Shah. Backed by the U.S., the Shah tried to drown the revolution in blood—for example, in September 1978, thousands of people were killed in what is known as the “Bloody Friday” massacre. When it became clear that the Shah was losing control, the U.S. switched tactics. The Shah was pushed into exile, and the U.S. helped the reactionary Islamic fundamentalist regime led by Ayatollah Khomeini consolidate power and usher in a new nightmare for Iran’s people. The U.S. rulers assessed that their best bet—rather than allowing the revolution to develop and the possibility of more radical or revolutionary forces coming to the fore—was to work through the IRI, because Iran’s theocratic rulers had no intention or ability to fully break with imperialism. And the U.S. backed the Islamic regime’s brutal repression of revolutionaries and progressives.
4. 1980-1987: U.S. Fuels Slaughter in the Persian Gulf
The Khomeini regime was intent on promoting Islamic fundamentalism and expanding its role in the region. In November 1979, Iranian students seized the U.S. Embassy in Tehran. All this crashed sharply with U.S. efforts to maintain its domination of the Middle East. In 1980, as part of a strategic approach to weakening the IRI, the U.S. gave Iraq’s Saddam Hussein a green light to invade Iran, and then worked to turn the Iran-Iraq War into an eight-year bloodbath. U.S. allies supplied Iraq with billions in weapons and material that Hussein turned into chemical weapons, which he used on Iranians as well as Iraqi Kurds. The U.S. also supplied Iran, and played both sides against each other to prevent either from winning. When the war ended, an estimated one million Iraqis and Iranians had been killed.
5. Today: U.S. Threatens More Aggression Against Iran
After 9/11, the U.S. launched a so-called “war on terror,” whose real goal is to tear up the existing economic and political structures in the Middle East that it saw as an impediment to radically restructuring the region in the U.S.’s strategic interests, and to crush or force into defeat the Islamic fundamentalist forces who pose obstacles to those imperialist interests—so that the U.S. rulers can more directly control and exploit the whole Middle East, as a key part of creating an unchallenged and unchallengeable global empire.
Under the Bush regime, the U.S. made all kinds of accusations against Iran to justify stepped-up threats. Bush invoked the danger of “World War 3” and other wild exaggerations and lies, including the possibility of nuclear attack. Now Obama has tactically modified this, but has not fundamentally altered the Bush strategic aims.
See:
“The U.S. & Iran: A History of Imperialist Domination, Intrigue and Intervention”
“An Assessment of the Momentum Towards War Between the United States and Iran: Causes and Potential Ramifications; Preliminary Findings by a Working Group” “Obama in Cairo: A Speech of Lies to Enforce a SYSTEM of Oppression”
Monday, June 8, 2009
Consolidating the peace process in Burundi
The government of Germany
Germany is supporting the reintegration of former rebels in Burundi. The Federal Foreign Office has made available 600,000 US dollars to the United Nations to enable more than 11,000 people to return to their homes.
Germany’s Ambassador to Burundi, Joseph Weiß, and the representative of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), Yussef Mahmoud, signed an agreement in Bujumbura. UNDP will now manage the funds and use them as envisaged.
Following the ceasefire in 2005, a process of disarmament, demobilization and reintegration (DDR) began in Burundi with the aim of reintegrating former FNL combatants and rebels into society. Germany’s contribution is intended to help ensure the complete implementation of the ceasefire and to make it possible for former combatants and others to return to their communities.
Strengthening democracy in Burundi
A rapid DDR process is crucial if the political crisis in Burundi is to end for good. The aim must be to integrate all political forces into the country’s political spectrum. This will also fulfil an important prerequisite for free and fair elections in 2010.
The international community is making available a total of around 2.8 million US dollars for these measures. Support for DDR processes is a key element in the stabilization of post-conflict states in Africa.
Burundi ex-rebel chief to head social welfare agency
AFP
Burundi’s former rebel leader Agathon Rwasa has been appointed to head the war-ravaged and impoverished nation’s social welfare agency, the government annnounced Friday.
In April, the National Liberation Forces, which had been the country’s last rebel movement, announced it was ending its armed struggle and became a political party.
"Agathon Rwasa was appointed to the helm of the INSS (national social security institute) and other FNL members were given diplomatic posts, jobs in the territorial administration and even in the president’s cabinet," government spokesman Philippe Nzobonariba.
According to an official radio station, FNL executive secretary Jonas Nshimirimana was appointed in the presidential cabinet as military adviser.
"We can’t say whether or not we are satisfied ... We consider these 33 jobs owed to the FNL only as a first step," FNL deputy chairman Alfred Bagaya.
A deal was reached late last year as part of the country’s peace process to give the former rebels 33 government positions.
Rwasa’s movement had initially rejected the offer as not comprising enough senior cabinet positions but eventually accepted it, under pressure from the international community.
Since 2006, the small central African nation has struggled to emerge from a deadly 13-year civil war. General elections are scheduled to take place in 2010.
Gabon’s Omar Bongo confirmed dead
Linel Kwatsi
His death was confirmed by Prime Minister Jean Eyeghe Ndong in a written statement.
There had been conflicting reports earlier on Monday about whether Mr Bongo, who had led Gabon since 1967, had died in a Spanish clinic. In his statement, Mr Ndong said Mr Bongo had died of a heart attack shortly before 1230 GMT.
His death was confirmed by Prime Minister Jean Eyeghe Ndong in a written statement.
There had been conflicting reports earlier on Monday about whether Mr Bongo, who had led Gabon since 1967, had died in a Spanish clinic. In his statement, Mr Ndong said Mr Bongo had died of a heart attack shortly before 1230 GMT.
He said Gabon would observe 30 days of mourning, and called on the Gabonese people to "stand together in contemplation and dignity".
The defence ministry said it was closing Gabon’s air, land and sea borders. The ministry, which is headed by Mr Bongo’s son, Ali-Ben Bongo, also said in a statement on national television that "all components of the defence forces were put in place across the territory", and that sensitive buildings were being secured.
Internet cut Under the constitution, the leader of the Senate, Rose Francine Rogombe, an ally of Mr Bongo, should take over as interim leader and organise elections within 45 days.
But opposition leaders have claimed that Ali-Ben Bongo has been lined up to take over, and question whether any election would be free and fair.
In the capital, Libreville, the BBC’s Linel Kwatsi said people had reacted to the earlier rumours of Mr Bongo’s death by stockpiling food. They feared shops would shut if it was confirmed.
The internet has been cut off since Sunday, while state television is playing religious music.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy expressed his sadness over the death of Mr Bongo. He said France was "standing by the people of Gabon and its institutions, at this difficult time".
Gabon under Mr Bongo has maintained close economic and political ties to France, the former colonial power.
Mr Bongo became vice-president, and then president, of Gabon in 1967.
He stopped work in May, and entered a clinic in Barcelona. Government officials insisted it was for a check-up, but other reports said he had cancer.
Mr Bongo faced a French inquiry into corruption allegations.
Oil earnings mean that Gabon is officially one of Africa’s richest states but analysts say that the political elite have kept most of the money for themselves. Most of the country’s 1.4 million people live in poverty.
Mr Bongo was one of three African leaders being investigated for alleged embezzlement by a French judge. The others are Denis Sassou-Nguesso of the Republic of Congo and Teodoro Obiang Nguema of Equatorial Guinea.
It is alleged that the properties owned by Mr Bongo’s family in France could not have been purchased with official salaries alone.
Mr Bongo denied any wrongdoing.
Friday, June 5, 2009
OBAMA, CHENEY, AND THE "DEBATE" OVER TORTURE
Source: www.revcom.us
Two major speeches were given on May 21, 2009. One was by Barack Obama. He defended his move to suppress thousands of photos that, according to retired Major General Antonio Taguba, depict “torture, abuse, rape and every indecency.” And Obama broke startling new ground, going even beyond what the Bush Regime formally implemented. He demanded the legal power to imprison, for as long as he wishes, without trial, people “who cannot be prosecuted yet who pose a clear danger to the American people.”
Obama’s speech was followed by an extraordinary rebuttal. No, not by an opponent of torture. Not even by someone representing the millions who had supported Obama and were now angry at his adoption of much of the essence of the Bush program. Instead, the rebuttal came from a widely despised ex-Vice President who was given the national stage to give a fire-and-brimstone speech upholding the crimes of the Bush Regime.
What does it mean that these are the terms of the “debate” as framed in the mainstream media, and “legitimate” politics? And what are the implications, and challenges, for those who do not accept torture being carried out in their name?
Torture
First, what are we really talking about here? Speaking at a press conference called by World Can’t Wait and others at the West Hollywood, CA City Hall, attorney Michael Rapkin described the conditions under which his former client, Mohammed Kahn, was sent to Guantánamo when he was 17 years old, and has been in isolation for two years: “He exhibits signs of serious mental trauma. More recently he began smearing excrement again on his walls. He didn’t clean it up. And instead of mental health professionals coming to assist him, he was met by ten large guards in riot uniforms who came and beat him up severely. These are called the IRF troops.
They sprayed him with tear gas. He later began smashing his head again. He began bleeding at his head. He screams and mumbles incoherently. The military authorities at Guantánamo, and I am talking about what happened just a few months ago, that is going on today in Guantánamo—the authorities do not help Mohammed. He has no fresh air. He has no sunlight. He has no social interaction. He has no contact with his father. They strip him and remove his thin sleeping mat and make him sleep in his cell three days with his excrement. Gitmo has had over 800 prisoners pass through. And every prisoner there, everyone has a face, and everyone has a story to tell.”
That is going on today. Now multiply that by thousands. Go beyond Guantánamo, to Abu Ghraib, to Bagram prison in Afghanistan that by all accounts is worse than even Guantánamo and Abu Ghraib, to the secret CIA hell-hole prisons around the world—to the 98 people (at minimum) who have died in these hellholes at American hands. These are stories that must be brought to the light of day, crimes that must be prosecuted, and criminals, up to the top of the chain of command, who must be brought to justice. And this must halt.
Cheney the Sequel: Night of the Living Dead
Obama has said he will not prosecute those who gave the orders for such crimes against humanity, and he is covering up these abuses by: suppressing 2000 plus photos documenting torture; blocking a lawsuit by people who were “renditioned” (kidnapped by the CIA and sent to other countries for torture); reviving the so-called trials conducted under the Military Commissions Act, and even—now—demanding the right to imprison people, formally, and indefinitely, without trials.
And yet Cheney and still-powerful forces in the U.S. ruling class are lashing out with real vengeance at Obama. The level of contempt Cheney and those he represents have for Obama was reflected in the fact that Cheney—who after all holds no elected office—basically complained Obama had spent too long making his speech, and should just shut up and let Cheney speak (“It’s pretty clear the president served in the Senate, not the House of Representatives, because in the House we have the five minute rule”).
What is going on here? Obama has taken over the essence of the Bush program, while changing the wrapping. In a piece in the New Republic Jack Goldsmith, who took over the position of head of the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel under Bush (and overall supports Bush’s agenda), walks through one by one how this is true: from Guantánamo, to assassinations, to spying on Americans, to torture, Obama’s policies follow very closely along the lines set under Bush. Goldsmith sums up, and it is worth listening carefully to this: “The new administration has copied most of the Bush program, has expanded some of it, and has narrowed only a bit. Almost all of the Obama changes have been at the level of packaging, argumentation, symbol, and rhetoric. This does not mean that the Obama changes are unimportant. Packaging, argumentation, symbol, and rhetoric, it turns out, are vitally important to the legitimacy of terrorism policies.”
If Obama has taken over the essence of the Bush program and just changed the wrapping, why is Cheney—representing powerful sections of the ruling class—on such a ferocious counterattack?
First, Cheney represents a section of the ruling class—the neo-conservatives—who basically stand for a very overt, unbridled and aggressive assertion of U.S. military power, and domestic policies to serve that. In his speech, Cheney blasted Obama for releasing the torture memos—legal rulings by top White House lawyers authorizing torture. Cheney railed that “when they [the terrorists] see the American government caught up in arguments about interrogations, or whether foreign terrorists have constitutional rights, they don’t stand back in awe of our legal system and wonder whether they had misjudged us all along. Instead the terrorists see just what they were hoping for—our unity gone, our resolve shaken, our leaders distracted. In short, they see weakness and opportunity.”
Cheney is fighting very hard to embed the open exercise of torture, and the whole modus operandi of the Bush Regime’s “war on terror” permanently into U.S. policy and indeed the U.S. legal structure. This is part of the reason why Cheney and those in his camp are making the point in public that the Democrats have been in on and are basically continuing on that course, even if the Democrats are trying to coat those policies with a layer of invocations of constitutionality and “rule of law.” In his speech, Cheney said, “Some members of Congress are notorious for demanding they be briefed into the most sensitive intelligence programs. They support them in private, and then head for the hills at the first sign of controversy.” And he pointedly noted that “President Obama has reserved unto himself the right to order the use of enhanced interrogation should he deem it appropriate.”
Second, Cheney is positioning the section of the ruling class that he represents—the neo-conservatives—to take advantage of any major setback that the U.S. now might encounter. The forces that cohered around and were represented by the Bush Regime, especially the neo-conservatives and Christian Fascists, may be out of the Oval Office for now, but they remain unrepentant, and powerful. Cheney’s attacks, practically accusing Obama of aiding “the terrorists,” come in an atmosphere of other attacks on Obama from openly fascist forces like Rush Limbaugh. Limbaugh insists on calling Obama a “socialist” (which he is not), which serves to paint Obama as illegitimate and beyond the pale of acceptable politics. Along with this, Fox News and others orchestrated and whipped up the “tea party” demonstrations, which used the symbolism of the American revolution and “overthrowing tyranny.” And, these forces still hold many powerful positions in government, including in the CIA.
And these forces are especially entrenched in top levels of the U.S. military. An article entitled “Jesus Killed Mohammad” in the May issue of Harpers paints a picture of the U.S. military in Iraq openly flaunting Christian fascism (the title of the article comes from a message painted on a military vehicle driven by U.S. troops through Iraq), and how dominant these forces are in the military. GQ magazine recently released photos of quotes from the Bible, combined with bizarre photoshopped images that stamped triumphalist Biblical images over the military reports Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld provided to Bush for his military briefings.
These forces have never accepted any oppositional forces, even within the U.S. ruling class, as
legitimate. And they still don’t. Cheney is preparing these forces to figuratively—and literally—“keep their powder dry.” So while there is great similarity in the Bush and Obama policies, Cheney still wants the open gangster style bullying in the driver’s seat—and is rallying forces for that. As part of signaling to their followers to keep the “powder dry,” people like Newt Gingrich have in the past—and people like Glen Beck are today—openly invoking the specter of civil war. (For a strategic perspective on these and related questions, we urge readers to study The Coming Civil War and Repolarization for Revolution in the Present Era, by Bob Avakian, at revcom.us)
What Obama Represents
Speaking of Obama’s preventative detention—holding people without trial, indefinitely—a civil liberties activist told the New York Times, “We’ve known this is on the horizon for many years, but we were able to hold it off with George Bush. The idea that we might find ourselves fighting with the Obama administration over these powers is really stunning.”
What is going on here?
Leading up to the last election, ruling class commentator Andrew Sullivan, a political conservative who broke with Bush, argued that the basic agenda for the U.S. was set, regardless of who became president. That the Iraq occupation “has a momentum that will propel the occupation into the next decade.” That all presidential candidates are “committed to an open-ended deployment in Afghanistan and an unbending alliance with Israel.” But, he argued, Obama was the best “face” for both ongoing war, and domestic repression. Sullivan wrote, “ If you wanted the crudest but most effective weapon against the demonization of America that fuels Islamist ideology, Obama’s face gets close.” And, in the event the U.S. rulers felt “forced to impose more restrictions on travel, communications, and civil liberties,” that Bush (and by implication a new president associated with him) “would be unable to command the trust, let alone the support, of half the country in such a time.”
Substantial sections of the U.S. ruling class did adopt the approach of bringing in Obama to restore the domestic and international credibility of the United States. But, whatever face is put on the situation, basic underlying challenges confront the U.S. empire—which is mired down in occupation and War in the Mid East and Central Asia, and hit with a historic economic crisis.
And Obama was quite consciously supported by sections of the ruling class in part as a vehicle through which to channel the discontent and anger of broad sections of people, seething, but largely passive, into the electoral arena. These forces saw the promotion of Obama, and the approach and style he brings, as an opportunity to bring many who had begun to question the whole set-up back into the fold.
On the day Obama and Cheney gave their speeches, Charles Krauthammer, a prominent neoconservative columnist, wrote a piece that reveals much: “The genius of democracy is that the rotation of power forces the opposition to come to its senses when it takes over. When the new guys, brought to power by popular will, then adopt the policies of the old guys, a national consensus is forged and a new legitimacy established.
“That’s happening before our eyes. The Bush policies in the war on terror won’t have to await vindication by historians. Obama is doing it day by day. His denials mean nothing. Look at his deeds.” (“Obama in Bush Clothing,” May 21, Washington Post).
This, from the mouth of a ruling class operative, is something those who demand justice, and real change, need to listen to and confront.
The “Pyramid of Power”
For a framework to understand the real and sharp differences, as well as the fundamental similarity between Obama and Cheney in this “debate” over torture and other questions, it is illuminating to refer back to the “pyramid” metaphor invoked by Bob Avakian:
“At the top of this pyramid are the people that rule this society and in particular you’ve got those that are represented by the Democratic Party on the one hand and the Republican Party on the other hand. And there is struggle between them. This is very obvious, right. Think back to the 2000 election: that was the most boring election in recent memory, and all of a sudden it turned into an extremely intense and interesting thing, not because of what they said and did while they were campaigning, but because of the way the election came out (or didn’t come out). So then you could see that there is very sharp struggle among them.
“And if you look at this kind of pyramid thing, on the top of this pyramid is the ruling class and its different political representatives, which (even though it may be a bit oversimplified) we can look at as the Democrats on one side and the Republicans on the other. And for decades now these people who are grouped around Bush and the kind of people that they represent have been working and preparing a whole thing in society—a whole infrastructure you might call it—a whole structure within the society itself that could move this society in a whole different way towards a fascistic kind of thing when things come to that.” (“The Pyramid of Power: And the Struggle to Turn This Whole Thing Upside Down,” by Bob Avakian, available at revcom.us).
Later in this same piece, Avakian makes the following point: “On the other hand, here are the Democrats at the top of this pyramid (on the so-called “left”). Who are the people that they try to appeal to—not that the Democrats represent their interests, but who are the people that the Democrats try to appeal to at the base, on the other side of this pyramid, so to speak? All the people who stand for progressive kinds of things, all the people who are oppressed in this society. For the Democrats, a big part of their role is to keep all those people confined within the bourgeois, the mainstream, electoral process...and to get them back into it when they have drifted away from—or broken out of—that framework. Because those people at the base are always alienated and angry at what happens with the elections, for the reason I was talking about earlier: they are always betrayed by the Democratic Party, which talks about ‘the little man’ and poor people and the people who are discriminated against, and so on. And at times they’ll even use the word oppression. But then they just sell out these people every time—because they don’t represent their interests. They represent the interests of the system and of its ruling class. But they have a certain role of always trying to get people who are oppressed, alienated and angry back into the elections.”
This is the role Barack Obama is playing. By nature of the fact that this is Obama imposing draconian repression and declaring torture will go unpunished (and, by default, reserving the right to do it again), a “bi-partisan consensus” is also being imposed, resetting the terms of what is supposed to be allowable discourse further and further to the right.
In a sense, the “Cheney vs. Obama” debate, while representing some real differences, also works to provide cover for Obama, who, it can be endlessly argued, is just a little bit better than Cheney—meanwhile the whole agenda of war and repression rolls on and deepens.
Doing The Right Thing Now
What does all this mean, now?
It means people must be honest with themselves. If torture, Guantánamo, endless war for empire, and shredding of civil liberties were wrong under Bush, covering these things up, and continuing them, is still wrong under Obama!
It means some serious soul-searching about what kind of world you want to live in. It is not in the fundamental interests of the vast majority of people in this country to enter into a devil’s bargain of trading your ability to live high on the imperialist food chain in return for terror and repression against people all over the world, as well as seriously diminished rights for people within the U.S. You understood that this was fucked up under Bush; it is not better under Obama.
And it means that there are storms still brewing; that the sights of millions cannot be confined in this situation to how best to “work within” a system to patch it up. Instead, people can come to see that there is something far better that is possible—both in the sense that a different system with a far more radical vision of freedom is possible; and that the very faultlines that find expression in the rantings of a Cheney and the attempted deceptions of an Obama could also open up the possibilities for millions of people to actively consider a whole different system, and the revolution that could bring it into being, as things develop—and for thousands more to take this vision and orientation up today.
And all this speaks to the need for more and more determined political opposition to the whole direction this country is on—and politically breaking out of the straightjacket of the terms of the Obama—Cheney “debate.”
Two major speeches were given on May 21, 2009. One was by Barack Obama. He defended his move to suppress thousands of photos that, according to retired Major General Antonio Taguba, depict “torture, abuse, rape and every indecency.” And Obama broke startling new ground, going even beyond what the Bush Regime formally implemented. He demanded the legal power to imprison, for as long as he wishes, without trial, people “who cannot be prosecuted yet who pose a clear danger to the American people.”
Obama’s speech was followed by an extraordinary rebuttal. No, not by an opponent of torture. Not even by someone representing the millions who had supported Obama and were now angry at his adoption of much of the essence of the Bush program. Instead, the rebuttal came from a widely despised ex-Vice President who was given the national stage to give a fire-and-brimstone speech upholding the crimes of the Bush Regime.
What does it mean that these are the terms of the “debate” as framed in the mainstream media, and “legitimate” politics? And what are the implications, and challenges, for those who do not accept torture being carried out in their name?
Torture
First, what are we really talking about here? Speaking at a press conference called by World Can’t Wait and others at the West Hollywood, CA City Hall, attorney Michael Rapkin described the conditions under which his former client, Mohammed Kahn, was sent to Guantánamo when he was 17 years old, and has been in isolation for two years: “He exhibits signs of serious mental trauma. More recently he began smearing excrement again on his walls. He didn’t clean it up. And instead of mental health professionals coming to assist him, he was met by ten large guards in riot uniforms who came and beat him up severely. These are called the IRF troops.
They sprayed him with tear gas. He later began smashing his head again. He began bleeding at his head. He screams and mumbles incoherently. The military authorities at Guantánamo, and I am talking about what happened just a few months ago, that is going on today in Guantánamo—the authorities do not help Mohammed. He has no fresh air. He has no sunlight. He has no social interaction. He has no contact with his father. They strip him and remove his thin sleeping mat and make him sleep in his cell three days with his excrement. Gitmo has had over 800 prisoners pass through. And every prisoner there, everyone has a face, and everyone has a story to tell.”
That is going on today. Now multiply that by thousands. Go beyond Guantánamo, to Abu Ghraib, to Bagram prison in Afghanistan that by all accounts is worse than even Guantánamo and Abu Ghraib, to the secret CIA hell-hole prisons around the world—to the 98 people (at minimum) who have died in these hellholes at American hands. These are stories that must be brought to the light of day, crimes that must be prosecuted, and criminals, up to the top of the chain of command, who must be brought to justice. And this must halt.
Cheney the Sequel: Night of the Living Dead
Obama has said he will not prosecute those who gave the orders for such crimes against humanity, and he is covering up these abuses by: suppressing 2000 plus photos documenting torture; blocking a lawsuit by people who were “renditioned” (kidnapped by the CIA and sent to other countries for torture); reviving the so-called trials conducted under the Military Commissions Act, and even—now—demanding the right to imprison people, formally, and indefinitely, without trials.
And yet Cheney and still-powerful forces in the U.S. ruling class are lashing out with real vengeance at Obama. The level of contempt Cheney and those he represents have for Obama was reflected in the fact that Cheney—who after all holds no elected office—basically complained Obama had spent too long making his speech, and should just shut up and let Cheney speak (“It’s pretty clear the president served in the Senate, not the House of Representatives, because in the House we have the five minute rule”).
What is going on here? Obama has taken over the essence of the Bush program, while changing the wrapping. In a piece in the New Republic Jack Goldsmith, who took over the position of head of the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel under Bush (and overall supports Bush’s agenda), walks through one by one how this is true: from Guantánamo, to assassinations, to spying on Americans, to torture, Obama’s policies follow very closely along the lines set under Bush. Goldsmith sums up, and it is worth listening carefully to this: “The new administration has copied most of the Bush program, has expanded some of it, and has narrowed only a bit. Almost all of the Obama changes have been at the level of packaging, argumentation, symbol, and rhetoric. This does not mean that the Obama changes are unimportant. Packaging, argumentation, symbol, and rhetoric, it turns out, are vitally important to the legitimacy of terrorism policies.”
If Obama has taken over the essence of the Bush program and just changed the wrapping, why is Cheney—representing powerful sections of the ruling class—on such a ferocious counterattack?
First, Cheney represents a section of the ruling class—the neo-conservatives—who basically stand for a very overt, unbridled and aggressive assertion of U.S. military power, and domestic policies to serve that. In his speech, Cheney blasted Obama for releasing the torture memos—legal rulings by top White House lawyers authorizing torture. Cheney railed that “when they [the terrorists] see the American government caught up in arguments about interrogations, or whether foreign terrorists have constitutional rights, they don’t stand back in awe of our legal system and wonder whether they had misjudged us all along. Instead the terrorists see just what they were hoping for—our unity gone, our resolve shaken, our leaders distracted. In short, they see weakness and opportunity.”
Cheney is fighting very hard to embed the open exercise of torture, and the whole modus operandi of the Bush Regime’s “war on terror” permanently into U.S. policy and indeed the U.S. legal structure. This is part of the reason why Cheney and those in his camp are making the point in public that the Democrats have been in on and are basically continuing on that course, even if the Democrats are trying to coat those policies with a layer of invocations of constitutionality and “rule of law.” In his speech, Cheney said, “Some members of Congress are notorious for demanding they be briefed into the most sensitive intelligence programs. They support them in private, and then head for the hills at the first sign of controversy.” And he pointedly noted that “President Obama has reserved unto himself the right to order the use of enhanced interrogation should he deem it appropriate.”
Second, Cheney is positioning the section of the ruling class that he represents—the neo-conservatives—to take advantage of any major setback that the U.S. now might encounter. The forces that cohered around and were represented by the Bush Regime, especially the neo-conservatives and Christian Fascists, may be out of the Oval Office for now, but they remain unrepentant, and powerful. Cheney’s attacks, practically accusing Obama of aiding “the terrorists,” come in an atmosphere of other attacks on Obama from openly fascist forces like Rush Limbaugh. Limbaugh insists on calling Obama a “socialist” (which he is not), which serves to paint Obama as illegitimate and beyond the pale of acceptable politics. Along with this, Fox News and others orchestrated and whipped up the “tea party” demonstrations, which used the symbolism of the American revolution and “overthrowing tyranny.” And, these forces still hold many powerful positions in government, including in the CIA.
And these forces are especially entrenched in top levels of the U.S. military. An article entitled “Jesus Killed Mohammad” in the May issue of Harpers paints a picture of the U.S. military in Iraq openly flaunting Christian fascism (the title of the article comes from a message painted on a military vehicle driven by U.S. troops through Iraq), and how dominant these forces are in the military. GQ magazine recently released photos of quotes from the Bible, combined with bizarre photoshopped images that stamped triumphalist Biblical images over the military reports Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld provided to Bush for his military briefings.
These forces have never accepted any oppositional forces, even within the U.S. ruling class, as
legitimate. And they still don’t. Cheney is preparing these forces to figuratively—and literally—“keep their powder dry.” So while there is great similarity in the Bush and Obama policies, Cheney still wants the open gangster style bullying in the driver’s seat—and is rallying forces for that. As part of signaling to their followers to keep the “powder dry,” people like Newt Gingrich have in the past—and people like Glen Beck are today—openly invoking the specter of civil war. (For a strategic perspective on these and related questions, we urge readers to study The Coming Civil War and Repolarization for Revolution in the Present Era, by Bob Avakian, at revcom.us)
What Obama Represents
Speaking of Obama’s preventative detention—holding people without trial, indefinitely—a civil liberties activist told the New York Times, “We’ve known this is on the horizon for many years, but we were able to hold it off with George Bush. The idea that we might find ourselves fighting with the Obama administration over these powers is really stunning.”
What is going on here?
Leading up to the last election, ruling class commentator Andrew Sullivan, a political conservative who broke with Bush, argued that the basic agenda for the U.S. was set, regardless of who became president. That the Iraq occupation “has a momentum that will propel the occupation into the next decade.” That all presidential candidates are “committed to an open-ended deployment in Afghanistan and an unbending alliance with Israel.” But, he argued, Obama was the best “face” for both ongoing war, and domestic repression. Sullivan wrote, “ If you wanted the crudest but most effective weapon against the demonization of America that fuels Islamist ideology, Obama’s face gets close.” And, in the event the U.S. rulers felt “forced to impose more restrictions on travel, communications, and civil liberties,” that Bush (and by implication a new president associated with him) “would be unable to command the trust, let alone the support, of half the country in such a time.”
Substantial sections of the U.S. ruling class did adopt the approach of bringing in Obama to restore the domestic and international credibility of the United States. But, whatever face is put on the situation, basic underlying challenges confront the U.S. empire—which is mired down in occupation and War in the Mid East and Central Asia, and hit with a historic economic crisis.
And Obama was quite consciously supported by sections of the ruling class in part as a vehicle through which to channel the discontent and anger of broad sections of people, seething, but largely passive, into the electoral arena. These forces saw the promotion of Obama, and the approach and style he brings, as an opportunity to bring many who had begun to question the whole set-up back into the fold.
On the day Obama and Cheney gave their speeches, Charles Krauthammer, a prominent neoconservative columnist, wrote a piece that reveals much: “The genius of democracy is that the rotation of power forces the opposition to come to its senses when it takes over. When the new guys, brought to power by popular will, then adopt the policies of the old guys, a national consensus is forged and a new legitimacy established.
“That’s happening before our eyes. The Bush policies in the war on terror won’t have to await vindication by historians. Obama is doing it day by day. His denials mean nothing. Look at his deeds.” (“Obama in Bush Clothing,” May 21, Washington Post).
This, from the mouth of a ruling class operative, is something those who demand justice, and real change, need to listen to and confront.
The “Pyramid of Power”
For a framework to understand the real and sharp differences, as well as the fundamental similarity between Obama and Cheney in this “debate” over torture and other questions, it is illuminating to refer back to the “pyramid” metaphor invoked by Bob Avakian:
“At the top of this pyramid are the people that rule this society and in particular you’ve got those that are represented by the Democratic Party on the one hand and the Republican Party on the other hand. And there is struggle between them. This is very obvious, right. Think back to the 2000 election: that was the most boring election in recent memory, and all of a sudden it turned into an extremely intense and interesting thing, not because of what they said and did while they were campaigning, but because of the way the election came out (or didn’t come out). So then you could see that there is very sharp struggle among them.
“And if you look at this kind of pyramid thing, on the top of this pyramid is the ruling class and its different political representatives, which (even though it may be a bit oversimplified) we can look at as the Democrats on one side and the Republicans on the other. And for decades now these people who are grouped around Bush and the kind of people that they represent have been working and preparing a whole thing in society—a whole infrastructure you might call it—a whole structure within the society itself that could move this society in a whole different way towards a fascistic kind of thing when things come to that.” (“The Pyramid of Power: And the Struggle to Turn This Whole Thing Upside Down,” by Bob Avakian, available at revcom.us).
Later in this same piece, Avakian makes the following point: “On the other hand, here are the Democrats at the top of this pyramid (on the so-called “left”). Who are the people that they try to appeal to—not that the Democrats represent their interests, but who are the people that the Democrats try to appeal to at the base, on the other side of this pyramid, so to speak? All the people who stand for progressive kinds of things, all the people who are oppressed in this society. For the Democrats, a big part of their role is to keep all those people confined within the bourgeois, the mainstream, electoral process...and to get them back into it when they have drifted away from—or broken out of—that framework. Because those people at the base are always alienated and angry at what happens with the elections, for the reason I was talking about earlier: they are always betrayed by the Democratic Party, which talks about ‘the little man’ and poor people and the people who are discriminated against, and so on. And at times they’ll even use the word oppression. But then they just sell out these people every time—because they don’t represent their interests. They represent the interests of the system and of its ruling class. But they have a certain role of always trying to get people who are oppressed, alienated and angry back into the elections.”
This is the role Barack Obama is playing. By nature of the fact that this is Obama imposing draconian repression and declaring torture will go unpunished (and, by default, reserving the right to do it again), a “bi-partisan consensus” is also being imposed, resetting the terms of what is supposed to be allowable discourse further and further to the right.
In a sense, the “Cheney vs. Obama” debate, while representing some real differences, also works to provide cover for Obama, who, it can be endlessly argued, is just a little bit better than Cheney—meanwhile the whole agenda of war and repression rolls on and deepens.
Doing The Right Thing Now
What does all this mean, now?
It means people must be honest with themselves. If torture, Guantánamo, endless war for empire, and shredding of civil liberties were wrong under Bush, covering these things up, and continuing them, is still wrong under Obama!
It means some serious soul-searching about what kind of world you want to live in. It is not in the fundamental interests of the vast majority of people in this country to enter into a devil’s bargain of trading your ability to live high on the imperialist food chain in return for terror and repression against people all over the world, as well as seriously diminished rights for people within the U.S. You understood that this was fucked up under Bush; it is not better under Obama.
And it means that there are storms still brewing; that the sights of millions cannot be confined in this situation to how best to “work within” a system to patch it up. Instead, people can come to see that there is something far better that is possible—both in the sense that a different system with a far more radical vision of freedom is possible; and that the very faultlines that find expression in the rantings of a Cheney and the attempted deceptions of an Obama could also open up the possibilities for millions of people to actively consider a whole different system, and the revolution that could bring it into being, as things develop—and for thousands more to take this vision and orientation up today.
And all this speaks to the need for more and more determined political opposition to the whole direction this country is on—and politically breaking out of the straightjacket of the terms of the Obama—Cheney “debate.”
“Common Ground” Is a Deadly Illusion; Abortion On Demand and Without Apology!
By Sunsara Taylor (revcom.us)
By Sunsara Taylor
The killing of Dr. George Tiller, the courageous abortion provider from Kansas, has thrown down a moral and a practical challenge to every human being in this country.
History has been punctuated. The future will pivot one way or the other depending on what we do.
Either this killing will succeed in creating a climate where abortion providers cannot do their work and no one else joins them in that work, or it will be answered by growing numbers of people waking up, coming off the sidelines, defending our doctors and our clinics, and reversing the whole dynamic that has led to this situation where not only abortion, but birth control too, is imperiled.
Between these two possibilities, there really is no lasting neutral “middle ground.”
Two weeks ago, Notre Dame became a flash point in the struggle for women's right to abortion when Obama was invited to give the graduation commencement address. It provides a concentrated expression of why we keep losing ground and losing clinics and losing doctors and losing hearts and minds, especially of young people who have grown up in a time of complete moral confusion around abortion. And, in many ways, the events surrounding Obama's Notre Dame appearance set the stage for this most recent killing.
When anti-abortion leaders learned of Obama's invitation to Notre Dame, they put their movement on an emergency footing. They crowed about how Obama is the most “radical pro-choice” president ever. Christian fascist lunatic women-haters like Randall Terry (who is all over the media now exclaiming he has no sympathy for Dr. Tiller and calling him a “mass murderer”) were joined by zombie-like fundamentalist foot-soldiers to descend on the campus. They screamed bloody murder, trespassed and got arrested, projected their rhetoric all over the national media, and incited their fanatical base across the country.
On the other side, there were no pro-choice organizations. That's right, zero. It seems that, just like under the Clinton years when abortion access was dramatically restricted, the pro-choice movement was asleep at the wheel because a “pro-choice” Democrat is in the White House.
I went to Notre Dame together with a half dozen other supporters of the Revolutionary Communist Party. Several handfuls of students and community members who came out on their own joined us in raising a banner, “Abortion on Demand and Without Apology!” and signs that read, “Women Are Not Incubators! Fetuses Are Not Babies! Abortion Is Not Murder!”
Meanwhile, Obama was inside the graduation hall pumping out the deadly illusion of “common ground.” He suggested that every woman feels morally heart-wrenched by abortion. He suggested that we find “common ground” in reducing the number of abortions and the number of unintended pregnancies. Obama said we should find “common ground” around the need to “care and support for women who do carry their child to term.”
As I analyzed more fully here, Obama's speech gave more moral legitimacy and political initiative to the movement that wants to force women to bear children against their will.
There can be no “common ground” over reducing the number of abortions. At a time when 87% of counties do not have abortion access, when doctors are being hunted, and women have to run a gauntlet of obstacles (parental notification laws, mandatory waiting periods, the thousands of anti-abortion “pregnancy crises centers,” and financial and travel burdens), the tremendous need is to expand abortion access, not to reduce the number of abortions!
There can be no “common ground” on reducing unintended pregnancies. It would be truly wonderful if all young people received frank and scientific education about their bodies, their sexuality, and how to form healthy and mutually respectful emotional and physical relationships. It would be truly wonderful if birth control were widely available and its use was popularized. However, this is not something that the “pro-life” movement will agree to. The same biblical scripture that drives them to insist women carry every pregnancy to term, also drives them to oppose birth control. There is not a single “pro-life” organization that supports birth control.
When it comes to abortion, there is only one moral question: will women have control over their own lives and reproduction, or will we be forced to breed against our will and subjugated to male patriarchal authority?
If we want to save the right to abortion, which is essential for women to be free, we must take on the notion that there is anything wrong with abortion. We must not be pacified by a president who calls himself “pro-choice” in one breath but refers to a fetus as a “child” in the next, thereby legitimating the view that “abortion is murder.” We must go out to the new generation that has never heard people speak positively about abortion and tell them the truth: abortion saves lives and enriches the lives of women who are able to choose it free from stigma, shame, coercion or obstacles.
We must seize back the moral high ground and yes, repolarize things. Everyone seems convinced these days that polarization is a bad thing. Not so. The current polarization is very, very bad. The one where anti-woman fascists are unleashed and allowed to claim the moral high ground and pro-choice people are relying on the mealy mouthed “common ground” of Obama is deadly and getting worse.
But a different polarization, one where people had to decide if they were for forcing women to bear children against their will or if they were for women's full emancipation, would be very good.
If people don't understand that they have to pick between women's subjugation or women's liberation, then we have to clarify that for them. The more people see this for what it really is, the more people will have the chance – which they don't have as long as pro-choice people fail to take the moral and political offensive – to stand on the side of women and of humanity as a whole.
I believe – and have seen in practice over and over again – that when people get clear on the stakes, they will in their great numbers side with women. Even those who today feel conflicted or even negatively towards abortion can be won to change their views – but only if we challenge them.
I am a living example of this. I was 15 years old and living in a small city in Minnesota when the first abortion doctor was killed. At the time I was Christian and hanging out with members of the Young Life club. Although I considered myself pro-choice and knew most of my friends were “pro-life,” I never really thought it mattered. Then I heard my friends empathizing with the man who had killed the doctor. “Not that I approve of violence,” they'd say, “But I can understand his motivation. He did stop babies from getting killed.” All of a sudden, I had to decide whether or not I could be passive as doctors were hunted and people sympathized with this.
This is what is going on in millions of minds right now – over dinner tables, in classrooms, and on late-night textfests between teenage friends.
For myself, I was lucky to run into people who were clear about abortion. They helped me understand scientifically why a fetus is a subordinate part of a woman's body, not a “child.” They gave me a positive way to express the outrage I was feeling. They had posted up signs calling on people to join them in defending the last abortion clinic in North Dakota when it was under siege by Christian fascists. I signed up. I learned a great deal. I have never been the same since.
Right now, people who thought they didn't have to concern themselves with the “abortion wars” are being forced to tune in. What voices, what clarity, what challenge will they hear?
We must raise our voices now to demand the full emancipation of women. That includes the right to abortion on demand and without apology. It is possible to discern already that relying on Obama and seeking “common ground” will lead only to further disaster. It is time for the people, ourselves, to stand up and fight for the world we want to live in.
By Sunsara Taylor
The killing of Dr. George Tiller, the courageous abortion provider from Kansas, has thrown down a moral and a practical challenge to every human being in this country.
History has been punctuated. The future will pivot one way or the other depending on what we do.
Either this killing will succeed in creating a climate where abortion providers cannot do their work and no one else joins them in that work, or it will be answered by growing numbers of people waking up, coming off the sidelines, defending our doctors and our clinics, and reversing the whole dynamic that has led to this situation where not only abortion, but birth control too, is imperiled.
Between these two possibilities, there really is no lasting neutral “middle ground.”
Two weeks ago, Notre Dame became a flash point in the struggle for women's right to abortion when Obama was invited to give the graduation commencement address. It provides a concentrated expression of why we keep losing ground and losing clinics and losing doctors and losing hearts and minds, especially of young people who have grown up in a time of complete moral confusion around abortion. And, in many ways, the events surrounding Obama's Notre Dame appearance set the stage for this most recent killing.
When anti-abortion leaders learned of Obama's invitation to Notre Dame, they put their movement on an emergency footing. They crowed about how Obama is the most “radical pro-choice” president ever. Christian fascist lunatic women-haters like Randall Terry (who is all over the media now exclaiming he has no sympathy for Dr. Tiller and calling him a “mass murderer”) were joined by zombie-like fundamentalist foot-soldiers to descend on the campus. They screamed bloody murder, trespassed and got arrested, projected their rhetoric all over the national media, and incited their fanatical base across the country.
On the other side, there were no pro-choice organizations. That's right, zero. It seems that, just like under the Clinton years when abortion access was dramatically restricted, the pro-choice movement was asleep at the wheel because a “pro-choice” Democrat is in the White House.
I went to Notre Dame together with a half dozen other supporters of the Revolutionary Communist Party. Several handfuls of students and community members who came out on their own joined us in raising a banner, “Abortion on Demand and Without Apology!” and signs that read, “Women Are Not Incubators! Fetuses Are Not Babies! Abortion Is Not Murder!”
Meanwhile, Obama was inside the graduation hall pumping out the deadly illusion of “common ground.” He suggested that every woman feels morally heart-wrenched by abortion. He suggested that we find “common ground” in reducing the number of abortions and the number of unintended pregnancies. Obama said we should find “common ground” around the need to “care and support for women who do carry their child to term.”
As I analyzed more fully here, Obama's speech gave more moral legitimacy and political initiative to the movement that wants to force women to bear children against their will.
There can be no “common ground” over reducing the number of abortions. At a time when 87% of counties do not have abortion access, when doctors are being hunted, and women have to run a gauntlet of obstacles (parental notification laws, mandatory waiting periods, the thousands of anti-abortion “pregnancy crises centers,” and financial and travel burdens), the tremendous need is to expand abortion access, not to reduce the number of abortions!
There can be no “common ground” on reducing unintended pregnancies. It would be truly wonderful if all young people received frank and scientific education about their bodies, their sexuality, and how to form healthy and mutually respectful emotional and physical relationships. It would be truly wonderful if birth control were widely available and its use was popularized. However, this is not something that the “pro-life” movement will agree to. The same biblical scripture that drives them to insist women carry every pregnancy to term, also drives them to oppose birth control. There is not a single “pro-life” organization that supports birth control.
When it comes to abortion, there is only one moral question: will women have control over their own lives and reproduction, or will we be forced to breed against our will and subjugated to male patriarchal authority?
If we want to save the right to abortion, which is essential for women to be free, we must take on the notion that there is anything wrong with abortion. We must not be pacified by a president who calls himself “pro-choice” in one breath but refers to a fetus as a “child” in the next, thereby legitimating the view that “abortion is murder.” We must go out to the new generation that has never heard people speak positively about abortion and tell them the truth: abortion saves lives and enriches the lives of women who are able to choose it free from stigma, shame, coercion or obstacles.
We must seize back the moral high ground and yes, repolarize things. Everyone seems convinced these days that polarization is a bad thing. Not so. The current polarization is very, very bad. The one where anti-woman fascists are unleashed and allowed to claim the moral high ground and pro-choice people are relying on the mealy mouthed “common ground” of Obama is deadly and getting worse.
But a different polarization, one where people had to decide if they were for forcing women to bear children against their will or if they were for women's full emancipation, would be very good.
If people don't understand that they have to pick between women's subjugation or women's liberation, then we have to clarify that for them. The more people see this for what it really is, the more people will have the chance – which they don't have as long as pro-choice people fail to take the moral and political offensive – to stand on the side of women and of humanity as a whole.
I believe – and have seen in practice over and over again – that when people get clear on the stakes, they will in their great numbers side with women. Even those who today feel conflicted or even negatively towards abortion can be won to change their views – but only if we challenge them.
I am a living example of this. I was 15 years old and living in a small city in Minnesota when the first abortion doctor was killed. At the time I was Christian and hanging out with members of the Young Life club. Although I considered myself pro-choice and knew most of my friends were “pro-life,” I never really thought it mattered. Then I heard my friends empathizing with the man who had killed the doctor. “Not that I approve of violence,” they'd say, “But I can understand his motivation. He did stop babies from getting killed.” All of a sudden, I had to decide whether or not I could be passive as doctors were hunted and people sympathized with this.
This is what is going on in millions of minds right now – over dinner tables, in classrooms, and on late-night textfests between teenage friends.
For myself, I was lucky to run into people who were clear about abortion. They helped me understand scientifically why a fetus is a subordinate part of a woman's body, not a “child.” They gave me a positive way to express the outrage I was feeling. They had posted up signs calling on people to join them in defending the last abortion clinic in North Dakota when it was under siege by Christian fascists. I signed up. I learned a great deal. I have never been the same since.
Right now, people who thought they didn't have to concern themselves with the “abortion wars” are being forced to tune in. What voices, what clarity, what challenge will they hear?
We must raise our voices now to demand the full emancipation of women. That includes the right to abortion on demand and without apology. It is possible to discern already that relying on Obama and seeking “common ground” will lead only to further disaster. It is time for the people, ourselves, to stand up and fight for the world we want to live in.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)