Month: October 2021

Glenn Greenwald: Civil Liberties Are Being Trampled by Exploiting “Insurrection” Fears. Congress’s 1/6 Committee May Be the Worst Abuse Yet.

Glenn Greenwald has published a lengthy, detailed analysis of the many ways in which the Democratic party is currently exploiting the Capitol Hill riot on January 6 to implement drastic government overreach and the curtailment of American civil liberties.

The mechanism for this overreach is the House Select Committee currently  investigating the January 6 riot.

I have excerpted the heart of Greenwald’s conclusions below. However, I encourage you to read the entire article at Greenwald’s substack space. It is truly impressive and deeply disturbing.

The article is entitled “Civil Liberties Are Being Trampled by Exploiting ‘Insurrection’ Fears. Congress’s 1/6 Committee May Be the Worst Abuse Yet.”

Below is the excerpt:

Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA), Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-MD), Rep. Liz Cheney (R-WY) and Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-IL) arrive for the House Select Committee hearing investigating the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol on July 27, 2021 at the Cannon House Office Building in Washington, DC. (Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

This congressional committee is designed to be cathartic theater for liberals, and a political drama for the rest of the country. They know Republicans will object to their deliberately unconstitutional inquisitions, and they intend to exploit those objections to darkly insinuate to the country that Republicans are driven by a desire to protect the violent traitors so that they can deploy them as an insurrectionary army for future coups. They have staffed the committee with their most flamboyant and dishonest drama queens, knowing that Adam Schiff will spend most of his days on CNN with Chris Cuomo comparing 1/6 to Pearl Harbor and the Holocaust; Liz Cheney will equate Republicans with Al Qaeda and the Capitol riot to the destruction of the World Trade Center; and Adam Kinzinger will cry on cue as he reminds everyone over and over that he served in the U.S. military only to find himself distraught and traumatized that the real terrorists are not those he was sent to fight overseas but those at home, in his own party.

But the manipulative political design of this spectacle should not obscure how threatening it nonetheless is to core civil liberties. Democrats in politics and media have whipped themselves into such a manic frenzy ever since 1/6 — indeed, they have been doing little else ever since Trump descended the Trump Tower escalator in 2015 — that they have become the worst kinds of fanatics: the ones who really believe their own lies. Many genuinely believe that they are on the front lines of an epic historical battle against the New Hitler (Trump) and his band of deplorable fascist followers bent on a coup against the democratic order. In their cable-and-Twitter-stimulated imaginations, shortly following this right-wing coup will be the installation of every crypto-fascist bell and whistle from concentration camps for racial and ethnic minorities to death or prison for courageous #Resistance dissidents. At some point, the line between actually believing this and being paid to pretend to believe it, or feeling coerced by cultural and friendship circles to feign belief in it, erodes, fostering actual collective conviction and mania.

And when fanatics convince themselves that their cause is not only indisputably just but an imperative for survival, then any doubts or questions about methods and weapons can no longer be acknowledged. The war they are fighting is of such overarching importance and righteousness that there is no such thing as unjust or excessive means to achieve it. Just a cursory examination of liberal discourse is enough to see that they have long ago arrived at and flew past this point of sectarian zealotry. And that is what explains their overwhelming support for state and corporate censorship of the internet, increasing reverence for security state agencies such as the CIA and FBI, love for and trust in corporate media, and a belief that no punishment or level of suffering is excessive when it comes to retaliation against their political enemies, including but not only those who participated in any way in the 1/6 protests.

This is, after all, a movement that has long opposed the death penalty and whose more left-wing factions spent 2020 rioting in cities to protest police violence and chanting “Defund the Police!,” yet their only lament about Ashli Babbitt seems to be that she was the only pro-Trump “fascist” shot and killed by noble police officers on that day. They have pranced around for decades as criminal justice reformists, denouncing harsh prosecutorial strategies and judicial punishments, yet are indignant that people who put their feet on Nancy Pelosi’s sacred desk or vandalized the sacred halls of American power with their dirty and deplorable presence are not spending decades in a cage. They spent 2020 depicting police officers as racist savages, only to valorize the Capitol Police as benevolent public servants whom only barbarians would want to harm, then gave them an additional $2 billion to intensify their surveillance capabilities and augment their stockpile of weapons. Their fury that Trump officials did not end up spending decades in cages due to vague associations with Russians is exceeded only by their rage that pro-Trump protesters at the Capitol are being sentenced to months rather than years or decades in prison.

A political movement that operates from the premise that its cause is too important to be constrained is one that inevitably becomes authoritarian. That such authoritarianism is the defining feature of American liberalism has been evident for several years. And an investigative congressional committee that they control, aimed squarely at their political enemies, accompanied by demands that anyone resisting it be imprisoned, can only lead to very dark and dangerous destinations.

You can read the entire piece here.

Why Guy Saperstein is Leaving America, And Why I Often Consider It Myself

First a short biography of Mr. Saperstein:

In 1972, he founded a law firm in Oakland which became the largest plaintiffs civil rights law firm in America, in the process successfully prosecuting the largest race, sex and age discrimination class actions in American history. Guy also prosecuted False Claims Act cases against Lockheed Missiles & Space Co. regarding satellite surveillance systems, and against Raytheon, Boeing and TRW regarding the sham National Missile Defense Program. A former president of the Sierra Club Foundation once described by Bill O’Reilly as “a member of the nefarious Left-Wing Mafia,” he is the author of “Civil Warrior: Memoirs of a Civil Rights Attorney.”

Below is an excerpt of his article entitled “Why I Am Leaving America“:

After six decades fighting for social justice and enjoying the embodiment of the American Dream, this couple are moving on from a lost nation.

My wife and I have spent sixty years fighting for social justice in America and trying to be good citizens, me as a civil-rights lawyer who litigated — and won — the largest race, age, and disability employment discrimination cases in American history, and my wife as a teacher, social worker, healthcare activist and philanthropist. I retired at fifty-one, having built an enormously lucrative practice, never losing a case as I pursued legal restitution on behalf of clients who had gotten the short end of the stick.

I was the very embodiment of the American Dream. But over the decades, I’ve become convinced that America is in terminal decline and that the battle for justice and equity is hopeless. The reasons are multiple. 

America once led the world in innovation. No more. We don’t even have one mile of high-speed rail, unless you count Disneyland. China has 30,000, and counting. Which country do you think is prepared to prosper in the next century?

We can’t even keep our roads repaired. America’s roads are a mess, many as bad as any Third World country. In fact, that is what America is becoming — a Third World country.

The battle is lost. America is in terminal decline and nearly 75 million Americans seem to be willing to pull it down further. How can it be that so many millions voted for a man who failed in everything he ever tried—a man who started more than a score of businesses and every one failed, who cheated repeatedly on three wives before each marriage failed, who is despised by even members of his own family, who went out of his way nearly every day to show that he is a racist and a sexist, a man who has been caught, according to the Washington Post, in more than 30,000 lies in just the four years he was president, who cheated at nearly everything, including golf, how is it that such a man is held up as a paragon of virtue by nearly half of the electorate? Something has gone seriously off the rails. 

I can no longer bear the chest-thumping triumphalism of the No-Nothing Party. I can’t stand the self-congratulatory promotion of the hoary notion of American exceptionalism. People who think America is the greatest in all things are people who simply have never been anywhere else. America is not now — and has never been — a representative democracy and won’t be in my lifetime and probably not in yours, either. Biden won by 7.3 million votes — a smashing win, right? — but if just 43,000 votes in a few states had switched, Donald Trump would still be president today. In California, Governor Gavin Newsom could have received 49% of the vote in the recall election and have lost and some Republican hack could have received 18% and won. And because each state has two senators, 18% of the electorate elects 51% of senators. Explain that to Cleisthenes.

We now have an active right-wing attack on voting itself, much of it racially motivated, but imperiling us all. And then, alas, we have the filibuster, which has almost made America ungovernable.

I want out. I’m tired of waking up to some crackpot ranting that COVID is a hoax, or vaccines don’t work, or masks are an assault on freedom, or that the 2020 election was stolen and Joe Biden is not really President, or that January 6 was just a peaceful gathering of fun-loving people.

While Trump has been diminished, we are surrounded by his supporters — Americans who voted for one of the most despicable men who ever strut upon the American stage, most of his supporters continue to believe — with no evidence — that he won. Most prefer superstition to science, many would apparently rather die than wear a mask or take a vaccine, and tens of millions believe cockamamie conspiracies. These people are not going away.

This woebegone predicament is likely to get worse. Moreover, our priorities as a nation seem perilously upside down. We spend more than twice the amount for healthcare as any developed nation and get the crappiest healthcare system in the world because the medical Establishment — mainly the drug companies — has Washington in its pocket. And that includes Biden. 

We have among the worst economic disparities in the world — which are getting worse — a hollowed-out middle class, money overwhelming politics, and even the Democrats unable to do anything about any of this. . .

You can read the rest of the article here.

I’ve got to tell you, Mr. Saperstein is my kind of guy.

America needs many, many more principled, morally astute, courageous fighters for equality, justice, and peace like Mr. Saperstein. His pending emigration will be a great loss to this country.

The fact that he has come to the conclusion that America is hopelessly circling the drain; that our democracy is doomed; that the future looks increasingly bleak; that far from being a shining city on a hill, America has devolved into a neo-fascist corporate state, addicted to endless entertainment, violence, and self-gratification; that any and all efforts to slow our national decomposition — if not reverse it altogether — are a hopeless waste of energy doomed to failure presents us with the tragic lessons learned by a man who has spent his entire adult life fighting in the trenches on behalf of the poor, the marginalized, and the dispossessed.

I happen to agree with his conclusions. And I often think about moving to another country myself.

However, unlike Mr. Saperstein, I have never expected to see substantial outbreaks of justice and equity in my lifetime. Perhaps I am too much of a cynic. Or maybe I just take the Christian doctrine of original sin too seriously.

Nevertheless, apparent failure here and now can, indeed, become extremely depressing. Even to cynical believers in human sinfulness like me.

But I cannot allow such disappointments to become debilitating; they never provide a reason for throwing in the towel.

Because I am always, first and foremost, a citizen of the kingdom of God. That is where my loyalty lies, not in the US of A.

I have been placed in this country as a witness to God’s kingdom even as I, along with Mr. Saperstein, watch America’s rampant, rampaging imperialism, militarism, and economic exploitation ravage its citizens together with everyone else in the world who happens to possess something that America wants for itself.

And I do see small glimpses of the righteousness of God’s kingdom here and there, flashing narrow, intermittent shafts of eternal light into very dark, otherwise hopeless, places.

So, even though part of me wants to flee with Mr. Saperstein, I can’t.

I will continue to wait and to work and to “fight the good fight” in the land where Jesus’ placed me as I wait for His return.

I pray that you will, too.

Is There a Connection Between Evangelical ‘Conversion’ Stories and the Right-Wing Emphasis on Personal Freedom?

Rebecca L. David, history professor at the University of Delaware and author of the new book, Public Confessions: The Religious Conversions that Changed American Politics thinks the answer is Yes.

Her recent article in History News Network is entitled “How Evangelical Conversion Narratives Feed the ‘Free Choice’ Rhetoric at Your School Board Meeting.”

I have excerpted the article below:

. . . Religious conversion, an especially transformative sort of personal decision, is fundamental to these politics of “freedom” and “choice.” White evangelical Protestants, in particular, have crafted an argument for conversion as the paramount choice or decision, creating an identity that determines an individual’s spiritual as well as political beliefs. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, evangelical Protestantism was a still-marginal movement on the cusp of greater popularity and power. Evangelical leaders realized that born-again conversions could meld the ideas of being saved, privileging whiteness, and opposing LGBTQ rights.

This history of born-again conversion and American politics helps explain why a surprising number of public comments against school mask mandates include tirades against LGBTQ-inclusive curricula.

Many of the individuals and groups organizing in opposition to mask and vaccination mandates are tied to conservative evangelical and Christian nationalist groups. Taught that they are defending American values and fighting a tyrannical, coercive mandate by un-Christian authorities, they rise to defend what they believe is their Constitutional right to disobey public health policies. . .

. . . The particular mix of born-again conversion, anti-gay animus, and the defense of American “freedoms” emerged in the 1960s and 1970s. The overwhelmingly white leaders of conservative evangelical organizations widely criticized the social movements of the era, from Black civil rights to women’s and gay liberation. Looking for ways to exert greater influence over American politics, they landed on a narrative that merged the idea of choosing Christ and defending freedom.

White evangelical leaders recognized that one way they could gain legitimacy was by showcasing the startling conversions of ex-cons and iconoclasts. A fast-growing evangelical media industry celebrated these converts and promoted their stories. Christian publishers and broadcasters plugged the California hippies who became Jesus People and the conversions of notorious political operatives such as Charles (“Chuck”) Colson, the convicted former aide to President Richard Nixon. Prominent born-again conversions were upheld as proof of evangelicalism’s legitimacy.

Evangelical leaders leaned on the concept of choice to distance themselves from contemporaneous expressions of religious fervor in new religious movements. The International Society for Krishna Consciousness, for one, found youthful followers among many of the same seekers who flocked to mass baptisms in the Pacific Ocean. Evangelicals stressed the profound differences between being “brainwashed” into a “cult” and being born again. One experience was the result of coercion; the other, of choice. . .

You can read the entire article here.

Yes, Children Can Be Infected with Covid, Including the “Long Haul” Variety

Ido Efrati has an important article about “long haul covid” in young children in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz.

Please, don’t listen to the anti-vaxers and anti-mask folks who continue to spread dangerous misinformation about young children being immune, or only susceptible to a very mild form of covid-19.

It’s not true. It has never been true.

Efrati’s article is entitled “The New Frontier: Israeli Hospitals Contend with ‘Long Covid’ in Children.”

I have excerpted the article below:

At the “long COVID” clinic at Schneider Children’s Medical Center in Petah Tikva, about 150 children are being treated, but several hundred more are on a waiting list. “Demand is high and the wait is more than half a year, because we monitor and test everything for each patient,” says Dr. Liat Ashkenazi-Hoffnung, an infectious-disease specialist.

The clinic began operating in November, several months after similar clinics were opened for adults. The symptoms the doctors see are varied, from shortness of breath (the most common complaint), muscle pain, headaches, fatigue, disordered sleep, chest pain, hair loss, and digestive disorders, to the loss of taste and smell, weight loss, difficulty concentrating, memory loss and the exacerbation of tics in children who suffered from them previously. About 60 percent report reduced daily functioning because of the symptoms.

“What’s interesting, is that in some of the children, it really appears as a direct continuation of severe illness but in very many of the children, there is a severe illness, followed by a lull of several months and only then do the symptoms of long COVID begin,” says Ashkenazi-Hoffnung.

According to her, the persistence of the symptoms varies. “There are children for whom it takes half a year or more. For example, we had a boy here who was a competitive swimmer and came down with long COVID and was very anxious and in pain. After half a year he went back to swimming and even broke a personal record.”

However, she also says that there are “a few children here who, a year after the illness, haven’t recovered, and they have symptoms that are affecting their day-to-day functioning. There are cases in which it lasts for more than a year.”

. . . Another phenomenon, which was first reported in April of 2020 is multisystem inflammatory syndrome in children, of which about 100 cases have been reported in Israel. The syndrome usually appears eight to ten weeks after the illness, even among children who had light cases. It starts out as stomach aches, a rash and a fever and can develop into life-threatening damage to the heart. It requires hospitalization, and in most cases cardiac damage remains after recovery. . . 

You can read the entire article here.

Tell Your Senators That You Do Not Want to Pay $1 Billion for Israel’s “Iron Dome”

The US provides Israel with $10.5 million per day in military aid.

Yep, Israeli military might is primarily the product of US arms sales and foreign aid. We hand over approximately $3.5 billion to Israel every year. That’s more assistance than we give to any other country in the world, including the entire continent of Africa.

On Monday the Senate will vote on whether we should give Israel an additional $1 billion for its Iron Dome project. (Yep, that’s another billion on top of the $3.8 billion they already received in 2020!)

Rockets from Gaza and Iron Dome anti-missile rockets from Israel

Israel’s so-called Iron Dome is a “defensive” anti-missile system developed with US funding and expertise.  The record is conflicted over how effective it really is, but it figures prominently into Israel’s public messaging about its need to defend itself against rockets shot into Israel from Gaza.

How often do we hear this message: Israel has a right to defend itself!

But there are many problems with this picture.

First, let Israel spend its own money “defending” itself. Why not? The US has spent $300 million each day over the past 20 years on our foolish, destructive ventures in Afghanistan. More war mongering overseas is the last thing I want my tax dollars going to.

Let the Israelis pay for their weapons systems by themselves. They can afford it.

Second, yes, you read me correctly. I did write war mongering. The Iron Dome may be called a “defensive” weapons system. But a good many western visitors to Gaza have come away describing it as the largest open air prison in the world. In fact, others like the Jewish historian Norman Finkelstein have even compared it to a concentration camp.

I fully agree with folks like Dr. Finkelstein, in which case the Israeli military must be seen as the largest collection of concentration camp guards in the world.

So, here is my question: Do concentration camp guards have the right to defend themselves against prisoners who resist their abuse?

Think about it.

Would the guards at Auschwitz have had the right to shoot and kill the emaciated, dehumanized, Jewish prisoners starving to death around them had those prisoners revolted against their imprisonment?

The answer is, No.

Today we celebrate the stubborn, Jewish prisoners who revolted against their
German guards in the Warsaw ghetto. They are seen as heroes.

So, what makes Jewish concentration camp guards today any different from those German concentration camp guards in the past?

Nothing, my friends. Absolutely nothing.

Why, then, are American politicians asking US tax payers to finance the superior weaponry used by Israeli guards against the dehumanized and embattled people imprisoned within the Gaza concentration camp?

According to International Law, the Palestinians in Gaza have every right to resist their inhumane subjugation and strike back, even when that resistance includes rocket fire.

The truth of the matter is that the people of Gaza should have the US construct a Palestinian Iron Dome to intercept the innumerable rockets, bombs, missiles, and fighter jets that Israel launches against them on a regular basis.

Naturally, there is much more to be said about this situation. But I have already given reason enough for you and me both to call our senators in D.C. (either today or Monday morning) and insist that they NOT APPROVE another $1 billion for Israeli weapons systems.

Please click here and respond. The Palestinian prisoners will thank you.

Thanks.