Next, you can expect that they will be telling us that this is no time to retreat.  They will say that this is the perfect time to display the old stiff upper lip and stand strong on drilling. Of course it will be hard to do otherwise since Republicans try to block any attempt at ending our dependence on petroleum even though every president for the last 40 years has listed that as a primary goal of the U.S. Aren’t there any prominent conservatives willing to embrace legislation to mandate a gradual weening-off oil?

Sarah Palin surely isn’t such a conservative judging from her writings on ‘that there Twitter box.’ Maybe someone could distract her with fishing and shotguns or offer her a position as Dr. Evil’s new sidekick since she was one of his all-time best students.

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Candy Crowley asked an excellent question however, which I have been wondering for quite some time. She asked if it had not been true that the techniques they used first were the ones they thought most likely to work and therefore each subsequent technique that they try has an even lower chance of success than the last.

Several important things were said once again in this interview, which were previously said by other BP executives. Mr. Dudley said we have to remember that these techniques are “new.” Really??? Check this out:

I think it is important to understand that oil companies make a huge profit extracting this resource from the Earth. They pay a lot of money to politicians to look out for their interests. When you hear the likes of Sarah Palin using catchy phrases like “drill baby drill” in order to influence the national dialog about energy policy, remember that she doesn’t know any more than you do.

In the 2008 campaign and thereafter, Sarah Palin talked about oil drilling technology as if she was an expert. She said it was safe to do off-shore drilling because the technology we have today makes it safe. Executives of not only the oil industry but also bank CEO’s, the health insurance industry, and a host other corporate entities induce people that are influential or trusted in various communities to make unsubstantiated statements favorable to their respective industries. They count on the credibility of those people to make their supporters fall in line without too much difficulty. Thus, when people who trusted Sarah Palin heard her saying that oil drilling safety had advanced so much technologically, they believed her. Why are those people not outraged now that it is obvious she was lying?

It’s not just her. People give the same blind trust to Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, and if you’re honest, Fox News itself, which will give air time to anyone who is rides the conservative party line. And let’s face it, conservatives love big business, especially oil executives.

We need to remember this when it’s time to vote again.  I think that the worst thing that can happen to Republicans is that they gain ground in 2010.  This will reward them for lying to the electorate the last year and encourage them to continue.  If they are disappointed, perhaps it will encourage them to prioritize integrity in the future.  It will take a strong government by strong individuals to manage big corporations, which have clearly run amok and are quite literally, destroying the ecosystem that we depend on to live.

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Immigration reform is another of the complex, emotional issues we are currently dealing with in our national dialog.  As in most cases, it is not the complexity of the issue that is particularly vexing.  The biggest problem once again, is the emotion that prevents people from looking at the issue objectively.  Objectivity is always necessary if we are to implement intelligent solutions.  This is obvious from first glance.

The reason it still needs to be said is that hopefully, when you remind people of their own tendency to praise America’s immigrant past and to revere the Ellis Island legacy, it might—as unlikely as it may seem—remind people of the principles for which they stood when America was seen as a beacon of hope for all.  Nowadays, when you remind people that our founding fathers also immigrated to the Americas from Europe, it seems to fall on deaf ears.  It also seems to fall on deaf ears when you remind people that for generations, they and their ancestors proudly quoted Emma Lazarus who said, “Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free.”  This provocative statement extols the virtues of faith, charity, and empathy (the latter of which, you will note is now a particularly filthy word according to Republicans).  These virtues are diametrically opposed to the recently codified, racial profiling mandate signed into law by the Governor of Arizona.

Governor Jan Brewer signed Immigration Bill SB 1070 into law, although she acknowledged during the same press conference, that she has no idea how one can visually differentiate an illegal immigrant from a legal one or even from American Citizens.  One would think that if the Governor, by her own admission, had no idea how such a law could be implemented without violating individual rights, that a veto of the bill would be a matter of common sense.  Apparently, the people of Arizona are not all that fond of “huddled masses.” Who could blame them?  Since it is likely the masses are only huddling to hide things that they have stolen, right Governor Brewer?

Since social change revolves around questioning wuzhatnin in the world and whether society’s response is appropriate or not, asking such questions is a core function of Wuzhatnin.com.  That’s right, I’ve just decided that.  So my question is, what has changed in the last hundred or so years to make the very thought of downtrodden, huddled masses seeking their fortunes in America such a wretched and despised idea among certain members of American  society?  Could it be that the grand exoduses of Italians, Irishmen, and other Europeans are over?  After all, the European currency is far more valuable than the US Dollar.  Europeans have an excellent standard of living, good wages, long vacations (4-6 weeks paid), life-long health care and pension funds, and very little crime by comparison to the United States.  European immigration to the United States is down to a trickle today.  Is it immigrants that Americans don’t like or is it the demographic make up of modern immigrants?

A short time ago, I lived with a Dutch woman in Northern California.  She related a conversation to me after work one day, that we both found amusing but a little sad.  She was speaking with a colleague at work who was complaining about immigrants taking American jobs and how the government should revoke all green cards and boot “those people” from the country so that there would be more jobs for Americans.  Being slightly put off by this remark she asked, “So what’s your beef with me?  You want me thrown out of the country?”  Her colleague replied, “No of course not.  I only mean people with green cards.  You don’t have a green card.”  She said, “Uh…yea I do.  I’m from Holland remember?”  After observing the confused look from her colleague she continued, “That makes me a foreigner.  Foreigners need green cards to work here.”  Then her colleague said the most telling thing of all, “But you’re white!“ She was serious.

My friend could only sit there dumbfounded at such ignorance.  After recovering she said, “Well all un-naturalized foreigners have to have a green card to work in the U.S., that includes white foreigners.”  Her colleague cocked her head and said, “Wow, I never considered that.  I thought only Hispanics and Haitians and people like that had to have green cards so we could control how many of them came here.”

I KID YOU NOT.  This conversation happened.

As time went by, we would find this to be an entirely un-unique experience.  She had that same conversation with several people who were unable see the mild European accent, white skin, and blond hair as foreign and who found it entirely incredulous that she could possibly fit the same category and need the same documents as Hispanics and Haitians.

Immigrants arriving at Ellis Island

Here is a poll I’d like to see:  I’d like to know the percentage of Arizonans who would like to see immigration changes retroactive to 1892?  How about we take away the citizenship of everyone whose ancestors passed through Ellis Island and give them green cards instead?  I mean you have to admit, to favor immigration until all of YOUR people, who want to come to the U.S. have arrived and then to turn vehemently against it for all those still seeking the American dream would make one a hypocrite, would it not?

To oppose legal immigration for all but white immigrants as in the example above would make one a bigot, would it not?

I don’t want to misrepresent my position as ultimately liberal in the spirit of those extremists who oppose any form of border or immigration  control.  I think orderly execution of a comprehensive solution to our immigration problems is in the interest of both U.S. citizens and potential immigrants alike.  We are too quick to accept  these ill-conceived, narrow-minded, either/or propositions that hard-line conservatives tend to gravitate toward.  As in nearly all cases, the best answer is somewhere in-between.

Intelligently implemented immigration policy would provide incentives for foreigners with needed skill sets to come to the U.S. and ensure that their applications are expedited.  There should also be consideration for family reunification.  If it takes a community to raise a child, let’s start each child’s community with as much of his extended family as is practical to accommodate.  Work permits for people looking to cross the border to find work should be easier to get for people with a track record of following the rules and respecting local laws.

There should also  be a greater effort to identify foreigners with the least likelihood of having difficulty assimilating into society and becoming self-sufficient.  In the short term, this will make me seem to contradict my point about bigotry in that such a system would be preferential to certain nationalities.  It is not a contradiction though, just a simple matter of efficiency.  For example, I see no reason why a Canadian who wants to tackle Hollywood should need a green card to work in L.A. for a year to try his luck.  I think countries like Canada, Great Britain, Germany, Australia should sign mutual residence treaties that allow people from one country to live in the other with little or no paperwork, provided all other rules are followed and the person agrees not to place a burden on public resources unless and until they have contributed significantly beforehand.  Alternatively, we could have a pact like the European Union where each country agrees to a quota allowing citizens of member states to move freely while costs are shared communally by each country.  The best advantage of such a system is that people with the most critical skills could easily move where the highest wages could be found, which would typically be where ever business/community needs dictated.  It would also provide relief to overtaxed and understaffed immigration bureaucracies in all these countries, which means that immigration officers could concentrate their attentions where most needed, rather than wasting their time, money, and energy asking why a guy from Toronto wants to move to Detroit.  (Then again, why would he?  Probably to steal our hockey secrets.)

We see discussions day after day about immigration reform.  For some reason, we keep tap dancing around the real issue.  Immigration is not the  problem.  Illegal immigration is also not the problem.  Generally speaking, people who hate immigrants only hate the non-white variety.  Do you know how many Irishmen I know (since I’ve spent a lot of time in Ireland and worked in an Irish pub overseas) who fly back home every 6 months to reset their passports but are working illegally in the U.S.?  They tell me that no one has ever asked them about their legal status.  If they want to start work on a job where they are not paid “under the table,” they provide a friend’s SSN but are never asked for a passport, ID, or what their legal status is.  People just assume they belong because they don’t “look like” illegals.  One friend said as we were slamming pints in a pub, “You know, if I was Hispanic and could pass for white, I’d practice sounding Irish.”  This received a hardy round of laughter.

Please, do not dismiss this idea.  In the U.S., most people are still just waking to these concepts.  Knowing a large number of Europeans who live or have lived in the United States because of my international contacts, I would speculate that nearly every European living in America today who is not a U.S. citizen could probably relate stories like these to you if you asked them.  The conclusion is obvious.  As a country, we have fallen out of love with the whole huddled-masses-seeking-their-fortunes concept.  Our tradition of charity and philanthropy is under siege by people who can see no farther than demographic projections in several states that show Hispanic majorities emerging in as little as 10 years.

In Arizona, it is more basic than that.  I would not be so offended personally, if they had said that EVERYONE was required to show proof of legal residence with every traffic stop or at checkpoints.  Allowing police officers to single out certain people based purely on personal speculation is THEE  definitive fact that differentiates a bill whose goal is security, from a bill whose goal is establishing what a proper American is supposed to look like.

The Arizona bill represents the worst kind of politics.  The Bill of Rights is designed to prevent the enactment of emotionally reactive laws that infringe on the personal rights of individuals.  As such, I fully expect this law will be short-lived.  It says something about our government that so many politicians are willing to use these dark emotions to conduct fund raising drives and to pump up their poll numbers.  It says something about us that so many of us tolerate it.  That is the only way things like this can happen in a democracy, which makes me think that the Arizona politicians who supported this draconian, legislative monstrosity are nothing more than pimps of pessimism. We will have to wait and see if this will cost them in November.

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For all the right-wing radicals demanding their country back at Tea Party rallies and elsewhere—who we are now being told are the exception and not the rule among Tea Party supporters—Mitch McConnell is the face of what you are asking for. Could it be any more clear that he has sold out to big bank interests??? To explain why he went to Wall Street to ask big banks for money to fight finance reform, he did a tap dance on CNN that would have made Fred Astaire blush. Observe:

Now to be clear, I knew from the first moment that I saw McConnell’s response to the finance reform proposal that his stance was nonsensical. When the President says he will prevent a future bailout and McConnell says that the proposal will guarantee future bailouts, these two positions are diametrically opposed and are not compatible enough to exist within the same conversation. When this happens, it is obviously not a misunderstanding or a slight misinterpretation. One of the two individuals must be flat out lying.

If the Tea Party supporters mean what they say; if they are not racists but concerned patriots, then they will in fact be willing to sit down, take an objective look at the proposal, and decide who is lying based on what is actually in the bill rather than judging by how the bill is being characterized by either of its two principals. If I see some sign that Tea Party supporters are capable of fairness on any issue, then I may have to reevaluate my previous posts about their being filled with racist cretins and morons venting unfocused anger and frustration indiscriminately. Lately, I have seen several taking my advice about disassociating themselves from radicals—a very positive step.

In all cases, it is important to try to see all sides of an issue before acting hastily.  If you contrast the stances of McConnell and Obama, and if you are objective, I think the truth is plain to see. If you know better, then educate me.

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Fox News View Of Oprah Winfrey: All Powerful Emperor of media

Fox News has outdone itself this time.  Coming off of their successful beheading of battered and bruised ACORN, Fox News is taking the next logical step in assaulting anyone whose support was essential to the success of Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign.  Now, they have set their sights on Oprah Winfrey.  I don’t know anyone who was not touched by election night coverage where we got to see not only the victorious celebrations of the Obama and Biden families but also the highly emotional outpourings of Oprah Winfrey and Civil Rights activist Jesse Jackson, both of whom wept rivers of tears.  No matter one’s political affiliation, every American could relate to the cathartic nature of this emotional release and how it fulfilled many life-long pursuits of making the American dream a reality for every U.S. citizen, regardless their race, creed, national origin, etcetera, etcetera.

Has it taken this long for the conservative think tank to devise a method of attack that they calculate will weaken Oprah little by little or have they only just now gotten around to her?  It seems to me there is little doubt that certain thinkers on the Right have adopted a long-term strategy for tilting the American political landscape in their favor prior to upcoming elections.  The first step was killing ACORN. The most disgusting thing about ACORN’s demise was finding out after the fact, that the “undercover video” that brought it down was a complete fraud (This links to a Rachel Maddow piece on Media Matters. Take note of her exit question.).  You would think that a so called “news network” that executes such a partisan attack would fall under suspicion of its own viewers, especially when it is later revealed that the attack was based on lies.  As I have said before however, you have to recalibrate your understanding of the opposition’s code of ethics when they believe that the inherent rightness of their cause shields them from any taint that unethical behavior would subject anyone else to.

There is one ray of sunshine amid all this gloom.  The GOP’s effort to humiliate Obama by forcing a “Waterloo” on him via the health care debate was a disastrous failure.  They only succeeded in making the win that much bigger, even if he didn’t get everything he wanted in the bill.  This has been followed by the success of the recent Nuclear Summit, which raised the President’s global image as a representative of good will.  Add that to stronger economic numbers and a DOW Jones average above 11,000 and we may find this to be a substantial run of good news.

Despite the good news, we have to keep a strategic eye on the November mid-term elections.  The Tea Party will definitely be a factor and will pull in one direction or the other.  As mentioned here, Republicans are now demanding that Tea Party members wind-down their own political ambitions for November and defer to Republican strategic decisions and candidates.  A second factor will be the Obama Administration’s relationship with Israel.  This part is still in the development phase and so may not be ready for full exploitation until the 2012 campaign, which will probably be kicking off around this time next year.  I have forecast in a previous post my belief that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is intentionally souring the relationship with Obama because the President’s efforts to repair the U.S. image in the Arab world has worried some Israeli officials.  I think this was the reason for the ill-timed East-Jerusalem settlement announcements.  This will make it much easier for Republicans to run on a platform of “repairing” our relationship with Israel in 2012.  “Our relationship with Israel isn’t nearly that bad,” you say?  Give it time, they are just getting started.  Remember, you heard it here first.

Oprah On Election Night 2008

Alas, expecting any kind of ethical journalism from Fox News is a lost cause.  As has been exhaustively documented here, and here, and here, (just for starters) Fox is not news.  It IS most definitely a political operation.  Now they are after Oprah.  If viewed in a strategic context, you can understand why conservatives would want to neutralize an African American who is respected by friends and foes alike, not only for her superior business acumen but also for her philanthropy, her passion for empowering women and minorities, and for proving in the 2008 election that she had real power and influence that was legitimately earned through the sweat of her brow.  If you want to target various demographic segments, neutralizing Oprah will kill 2 birds with one stone at least.  So how would one accomplish that?

Since she is in the process of building-up her new cable network, she is now more vulnerable than in the past because bad press has the potential to complicate the formation of new business relationships that will be necessary to make her new Oprah/Discovery Communications venture a long-term success.  If they can disrupt these processes they may be able to disrupt the cash flow of any new enterprises, which will in turn cause partners to pressure her to withdraw from the political scene for the sake of fiduciary obligations to stakeholders.  Failure to do so would expose Oprah to possible litigation.  Taking these factors into account, Fox News personalities seem to be trying to establish a perception of Oprah as some kind of media overlord, who has her tendrils snaked around the proverbial throats of every “mainstream media” outlet—a particularly ironic accusation, considering who they work for.  The term “mainstream” sums up the Fox News dichotomy—that the number one “news” outlet in the country decries anything it considers “mainstream.”  One must be forgiven for forgetting that being number one might by definition, make one mainstream.

This Fox News attempt at serious Oprah bashing seems a little clumsy and amateurish to me.  I don’t think they are done trying though.  Arnold is not in this clip, but I can still faintly here the implication…”I’ll be back.”

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Dick Armey

Dick Armey, the Former House Majority Leader and Chairman of the pseudo-grassroots organization Freedomworks warned of “consequences” that will occur if Tea Party members attempt to elect their own candidates in the November mid-term elections. Obviously, Mr. Armey worries that Republican candidates will get massively Scozzafava-ed by Tea Party candidates who campaign as real Conservatives as alternatives to the traditional-to-moderate Republicans, as happened in the NY-23 race last November.  In the NY-23 race, Dede Scozzafava lost a Congressional seat she was practically guaranteed to win, after such a challenge was brought against her when far-right hardliners claimed that she was a moderate and therefore, not conservative enough.

Dede Scozzafava

It is typical that after attempting to use and manipulate Tea Party supporters since last summer to defeat health care reform, Armey and other Republicans believe they can just simply absorb them into the party as loyal members in order to redirect their focus as needed.

He had the audacity to warn of “third party politics” in this CNN article.  A few months ago, he was willing to stoke their anger using any means necessary in order to further his agenda.  Now however, he has clearly decided that the time for dissent is over.  This exactly parallels Republican ideas about patriotism.  While Republicans held the White House and the Congress, they claimed that it was the duty of any loyal patriot to support the government, especially while the country was at war.  After they lost the Congress and the White House, they suddenly reversed themselves and now tell everyone that they cannot support the government because Democrats are Socialists and will therefore destroy the “fabric of America.”  They completely contradict themselves when it is convenient and have calculated that Tea Party members are mindless sheep who will happily go where herded by GOP sheep dogs.  Are they right?  Or will Republicans get Scozzafava-ed?

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CNN and Ann Coulter provided us with this little gem to help us illustrate this point.

To be completely honest, I too have criticized the Muslim community for being slow to condemn the killing of innocents, long before 911.  I saw video clips of celebrations within Muslim communities after the Kenyan embassy bombings and found that there were few who stepped forward to say that Arab grievances did not warrant these kinds of attacks on innocent civilians.  I still believe I was right, even if this did not contend with Western duplicity and apathy to the plight of downtrodden Muslims in Palestine and other regions.  After 911, we saw this trend slowly reverse.  Now there are more Muslim cultures where the people point out that the killing of innocents is actually against the tenets of Islam and where the people regularly speak out against these killings, often at their own peril.

Given these facts, it is more important than ever that the West demonstrate good will toward the Arab world and try to acknowledge and redress past mistakes committed by Western leaders.  Even if there are still many leaders who lack the maturity to operate on this higher level, it falls to journalists to facilitate dialog and understanding through objective and comprehensive reporting.  This is why today’s pseudo-journalists are as destructive as they are because despite the expectation that they uphold some kind of fiduciary standard in their “reporting,” we see more often than not that they fly by the seat of their pants and say anything they must to get attention.

Ann Coulter understands very well that Republicans like Mitch McConnell, John Boehner, and Sarah Palin have helped to create a new political paradigm using outlets like the Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity shows on Fox News and the Rush Limbaugh show.  In this political climate, people say ever more shocking, incendiary, and divisive things to get ratings—and all with impunity.  Ann Coulter did get one thing right though.  Unlike Beck, Limbaugh, and Hannity, if you are going to insult an entire race of people, at least try to look good doing it.

Why would anyone choose to watch pundits who make blanket attacks on various ethnic groups?  As I said the last time Rush Limbaugh stepped over the racial epithet line and people erroneously thought he would be fired for it, if you think these people should be in the same situation as Don Imus when he made his infamous “nappy-headed ho” comment you really need to recalibrate your understanding of the political climate we are currently operating in.  Remember, Fox News announced they would hire Don Imus hoping to attract people to Fox News who believe that Imus is a racist (whether he is or not).  They also hired Mark Fuhrman as an analyst for the same reason after he was caught on tape saying that he wanted to see all black people bundled together and burned alive.  Fox News has slowly built-up to a place where racists can spout their hatred during its more popular shows while its viewers cheer and high five.  In a political climate like this, is it any wonder that Coulter can get away with her “flying carpet” or “camel” remarks?  And for the record, watching the whole tape confirms rather than disproves the context.  Regardless how much other dialog took place, she still meant it as an insult tailored to this particular person.  The heckling did nothing to change that fact.

Ultimately, people turn a blind eye to this kind of behavior because it is happening to a group that they do not identify with a great deal.  The danger of that stance is captured nowhere more perfectly than in this familiar quote:

First they came for the Communists but I was not a Communist so I did not speak out. Then they came for the Socialists and the Trade Unionists but I was not one of them, so I did not speak out. Then they came for the Jews but I was not Jewish so I did not speak out. And when they came for me, there was no one left to speak out for me.
-Martin Niemoeller

Now they are attacking Muslims across North America.  And according to every pundit on Fox News (who Fox tells us are opinion instead of news even though the marquee still says Fox NEWS while they are speaking), any non-Republican who is elected by the U.S. electoral process is an ungodly Socialist and maybe even the anti-Christ.  I AM SPEAKING OUT AGAINST THIS. How about you?

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This statement provided perfect clarity.  Any confusion about what “a big dose of crazy” might refer to would not have survived a 6:00 news cast last summer, when America was treated to a heaping dose of “the crazy” every night from country-wide town-hall meeting footage.  It would not have survived coverage of even a single Tea Party rally.  It would also not survive coverage of the ill-fated Health Care Summit, which consisted of Barack Obama making one last ditch effort to find compromise in a sea of  intransigence.  CNN captured perfectly the typical face of frustration evident when a rational person tries to deal with the irrational, A.K.A. “the crazy.”

To be sure, Ken was absolutely correct.  I noticed my moderation queue beginning to fill.  When I checked the messages, I saw enough profanity to make a sailor blush.  Would you like an example?  Here is one of my…um…favorites:  ‘Tom’ writes:

You are a f-ing d@chebag and get a life you f*#@ing c#k sucker. You are a disgrace to mankind and your parents should have worn a condom, because they brought a piece of sh#t d@chebag like you into the world.

Yes, there is nothing like the constructive exchange of ideas among intellectuals.  I should point out, this was an example of the typical response today.  I have noticed for some time now that analysis generally comes from the left, whereas judgment, hostility, and vitriolic personal attacks tend to come from the right.  On rare occasions I find someone on the right who can present a seemingly rational argument.  They usually can debate for a short while (like 10 minutes) after which they judge you to be too ignorant to “understand“ their point of view and they give up  trying to “enlighten” you.  I can see why. I mean, if you are certain you are right, why waste your time trying to have a dialog with someone who insists that his own opinion is as valuable as yours?  Better to simply attack him with the full weight of your righteous indignation and pronounce him, ignorant.

What is the word I need to describe this?  Oh yes, intolerance.  Many of us have tried to warn of the intolerance that is rampant within the ranks of the Tea Party Movement.  We are given simplistic answers like, “You don’t know what you are talking about.”  In my last post, I said simply that the solution is four words, “You’re not welcome here.”  As shown above, even THAT was not received well by Tea Party members.  I understand very well that not ALL Tea Party members are like that and that I am generalizing somewhat but this is to be expected if the Tea Party allows radicals to select the tone of their movement and to represent them in the news.  I also know that such personal attacks are to be expected when we employ logic, which I believe is the Republican Kryptonite.

Patty Hearst in front SLA symbol

As Nancy Pelosi tried to point out in her call for calm a few months ago (which RNC Chairman Michael Steele denounced), many of us have lived through social upheavals and thus do not view these kinds of discussions in entirely theoretical terms.  Real political turmoil can costs real lives.

When I was a child, I remember the Patty Hearst scandal being on the news every evening at a time when I still did not understand why adults were so fascinated by the news.  I still vividly remember police cars streaming past the South-Central L.A. home I grew up in one sunny day in May.  I remember it was more police cars than I had ever seen in my short life, which is saying something when you live in L.A.  They were on their way to a now infamous shootout with the Symbionese Liberation Army, which was a band of angry revolutionaries that sought the overthrow of the U.S. government, along with the usual—defying federal laws, and the end of taxes, and taking power from the rich and giving it back to THE PEOPLE, and the elevation of the people over the state, and the yada yada, and the blah blah blah.  Think of it as a kind of Tea Party Lite.  Okay, that’s not really fair but you get my point.  They were trying to foment and utilize anger against the government to achieve their objectives, which gives you an idea where these things can lead.

All of the militia groups who think overthrowing the U.S. government to be such a glorious undertaking should probably study this.  I remember the LAPD streaming past our house with sirens blaring and then scant minutes later, I remember a hail of gunfire, which could be heard across the L.A. basin.  It sounded like thousands of bottle-rockets going off all at once (which I suppose is how a child would relate to something like that).  When it was done, there were images of the charred remains of dead revolutionaries on the news.

Aside from what people saw on the news nation-wide, my father had been following the Patty Hearst kidnapping and SLA quite closely and was very curious to see things first hand.  Even as initial reports were filtering onto the news, I jumped into the car with my dad to go and see the aftermath.  We could not go inside of course, but as we drove by we saw police tape and blood.  The home they had made their last stand in was still smoldering as the fires slowly burned themselves out.  It was quite graphic despite the fact that we could only drive by and that I was just a child of 10 or so.  At that age, you have no concept of the seriousness and historic nature of such a scene.  That day however, taught me how our country handled rebellion.

Self-styled revolutionaries like the Timothy McVeigh’s of the world observe the Branch Davidian incident at Waco, TX as a fine example of religious zealotry.  The lives of the people of that cult could have been saved by simply observing the lesson of the SLA.  Its members chose to throw their lives away for what?  The right to delay the feds from crossing a fence for a short time?  This accomplished what?  If you are looking to escape federal authority, do what Jim Jones did. Buy land in a country that will grant you semi-autonomous rule.  I mean voila, look how well that worked out.

Consider also, it was not the Army that dealt with the SLA revolutionaries.  It was the LAPD.  Militia types would do well to remember that military personnel will not hesitate to blow your God-damned heads off in order to protect the Constitution and our institutions of government. The SLA was well-armed and had been robbing banks for quite a while to raise cash for recruitment and weapons.  In the end, it didn’t take the Army to end their little campaign, nor were there tanks, or A-10′s.  It was the police.  In fact, not since the Civil War has the Army been used to protect the domestic peace and at that time, it wasn’t even a world class Army…yet.  If the Rusians, Germans, Japanese, or Al Qaeda could not defeat the modern-day U.S. Army, you are fools to think your pathetic little militia will fare any better.

Nevertheless we have the fools like the 9 Hutare militia members who were arrested by the FBI for plotting against the government.  We also have the idiots at the Tea Party rallies who foolishly brandish guns as if they think they are the only ones who can shoot.  I work with attack-trained killer, Iraq-War veterans every single day.  In fact, there are two soldiers drinking coffee at the opposite end of my desk at this very moment who came here from Iraq.  Make no mistake about it.  They will kill your ass, then go back and finish their cup of coffee.  From your cold, dead fingers you say?  That may sound tough to you and makes a great sound bite on 60 minutes, but to the military…your cold, dead fingers will NOT be a  PROBLEM! Believe me.  In fact, it will probably take a forensic scientist to identify your fingers.

Those who glamorize the idea of fighting the federal government and romanticize thoughts of being a warrior of the apocalypse need to understand what you are getting yourselves into.  It may sound cool when discussed in theory but the hype will not live up to the reality.  You may be able to stir up some mayhem in the short term but in the end, all it will amount to is—just another dose of the crazy.

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Anti-government radical Andrew Joseph Stack III crashes small plane into IRS building

The Tea Party Movement is making lots of waves nationally and I applaud that.  Every group interest in this country has a right to a voice and a right to try to influence the American political process.  I defended those rights in uniform for 21 years from deserts to snow-covered hilltops on four different continents.  Fox News claims to be the defender of the Tea Party (they actually just manipulate them for ratings) but while everyone else is content to dismiss all of the primal emotions that motivate Tea Party members, Fox News pointedly capitalizes on those base emotions for dramatic effect to make compelling TV.  At the same time that they foment dark emotions on the one hand, they tell the rest of us that we should not judge the entire group by the actions of the radicals who respond to their emotional message.

Consider that even today, you cannot have a discussion about Dr. Martin Luther King without someone bringing up the allegations of communist ties that he was saddled with during the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960′s.  Even though those allegations were completely debunked at every turn, they persist.  Many people say that Dr. King should have condemned the Black Panther and Nation of Islam Movements in a more vociferous manner to prove he did not support it.  They claim that by not being in the forefront of opposition to these other groups, he gave tacit approval for them.

For anyone in the Tea Party Movement who finds logic in this allegation I have four words for you.

YOU’RE NOT WELCOME HERE!

These four words are all you have to say to people who show up to your rallies with assault rifles, racists signs, and who advocate overthrow of the U.S. government.  By allowing them to participate in your events, are you not giving tacit approval as well?

How often have John Boehner, Eric Cantor, or Sarah Palin been asked if they think radicals are welcome to join the voices of the right only to have them refuse to say that there is any fringe element that is unwelcome in their opinions.  Here is Bill O’Reilly trying to pin down Sarah Palin about the birthers:

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In the previous clip, Sarah Palin goes to great lengths to avoid setting a standard of the kind of negativism that should not be condoned within their movement.  Why are the rest of us so critical of the Tea Party Movement? Because most of us have seen at lease SOME of the images in this racist and very inflammatory video:

Janeane Garofalo confronts Tea Party members below and their circular logic.  She clearly feels the same exasperation that I feel when trying to get people to look at these issues in clearly logical terms.  Anger for anger’s sake is nonconstructive.  The pattern over the last 30 years has been the same.  Spending and deficits decrease under Democrats.  Deficits have exploded under every single Republican administration.  (Don’t take my word for it, look it up.)  Yet no one wants to take their country back under Republicans.  Why is that?

Let’s  be honest, we all thought in the back of our minds that Andrew Joseph Stack III, who crashed his small plane into the IRS building depicted in the picture above, was motivated by all of the anti-government anger being promoted by Fox News, Sarah Palin, and the Tea Party. I’m sure it was the first thing most people thought about when the 9 militia whackos were arrested by the FBI yesterday.

How long until we stop denying that anti-government whack jobs are responding to anti-government rhetoric?   No one is more unpatriotic than a person who does not respect our democracy.  Even if you believe that President Obama is a Marxist, Communist, or Socialist the one thing you cannot dispute is that he was elected by our electoral process as laid out by the Constitution.  Even if he is the anti-Christ (as 29% of Republicans so pathetically believe) then he is the duly elected anti-Christ of the United States and we are all obligated by law to afford him the same respect we gave our other Presidents.  Failure to do this is not only hypocritical but also unpatriotic, not just by my opinion but by the law of the land.

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The best example of this that I can think of is Lt. Dan Choi, who just 60 days into the Obama presidency decided he was already tired of waiting for the promised repeal of the Don’t Ask Don’t Tell policy.  So he decided to FORCE the issue by violating his oath of loyalty to his military hierarchy, coming-out on the Rachel Maddow show, and publicly denouncing his Commander in Chief for not living up to HIS expectations. 

Anyone who has ever worn the uniform (like I did for 21 years) will tell you it is both arrogant and disgraceful for a military member to PUSH the President to act on YOUR timetable, especially when that president has already committed himself to acting in a manner that suits your interests.  To say, “Okay times up!” after just 60 days was outrageous and strengthened the President’s political enemies, which made it THAT much more difficult for him to act.  Case in point, this was quickly followed with a Fox News medley of pessimism about impatience of at least a dozen special interest groups from (but not limited to) the Hispanic community getting impatient about administration cabinet appointments, to economists getting impatient that the affect of the stimulus was not instantaneous, and to impatience by oompa loompas that there was still no national Chocolate Day.  All of this—AFTER SIXTY DAYS! It began to look like the Democrats were going to implode and grasp defeat from the jaws of victory yet again.

Eying this change of fortunes, Republicans doubled-down with the “summer of shame” by fomenting irrational fear and anger where ever possible.  They slandered the President in every way they could get away with, stifled the national debate in any way they could, and accused Democrats of “destroying the fabric of America.”  After all of that, what has John Boehner, the chief architect of the failed strategy of NO, accomplished?  I will tell you.  He has taught the Democrats how to unite around a common goal.  FINALLY! John Boehner has given Democrats something mildly resembling unity.

The Republican strategy of NO has resulted in THE GREATEST POLITICAL BITCHSLAP IN HISTORY!

Now, a question: With Congressmen being threatened by angry mobs for doing their jobs, AND with far-right nut jobs denouncing majority rule in Congress and in some cases flying small planes into federal buildings, AND with states with Republican governors threatening to secede from the union, WHO exactly is destroying the fabric of America?  Though in their defense I guess I can say, no one likes getting bitchslapped.

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