Starting 2019 with our demands
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Saturday, December 29, 2018
Starting 2019 with our demands The Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival
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A View From The Local Left (Boston)- WARS ABROAD, WARS AT HOME
WARS ABROAD, WARS AT HOME
How will it survive on $750 billion?
OUR POOR, STRUGGLING MILITARY-INDUSTRIAL COMPLEX
The prospect of a cut to the military elicited a storm of condemnation across the media landscape. The National Review wrote that “cutting the resources available to the Pentagon is a bad idea,” noting that, “for decades, America 
has short-changed defense” meaning “America’s ability to defend its allies, its partners, and its own vital interests is increasingly in doubt.” In a Wall Street Journal article headlined “Don’t Cut Military Spending Mr. President,” Senate and House Armed Services committee chairs James Inhofe and Mac Thornberry claimed the military is in “crisis” after “inadequate budgets for nearly a decade,” and that “any cut in the Defense budget would be a senseless step backward.” More centrist outlets concurred. Forbes Magazine began its article with the words, “The security and well-being of the United States are at greater risk than at any time in decades,” recommending a “sensible and consistent increase” to the budget. Bloombergrecommended a consistent increase in military spending of 3 percent above inflation for five to 10 years, while Reuters noted the increased “risk” of a lower military budget. More
has short-changed defense” meaning “America’s ability to defend its allies, its partners, and its own vital interests is increasingly in doubt.” In a Wall Street Journal article headlined “Don’t Cut Military Spending Mr. President,” Senate and House Armed Services committee chairs James Inhofe and Mac Thornberry claimed the military is in “crisis” after “inadequate budgets for nearly a decade,” and that “any cut in the Defense budget would be a senseless step backward.” More centrist outlets concurred. Forbes Magazine began its article with the words, “The security and well-being of the United States are at greater risk than at any time in decades,” recommending a “sensible and consistent increase” to the budget. Bloombergrecommended a consistent increase in military spending of 3 percent above inflation for five to 10 years, while Reuters noted the increased “risk” of a lower military budget. More
STOP WASTING MONEY ON THE PENTAGON
Nearly 30 years ago, Congress asked the Pentagon to complete an audit that could show military leaders knew where our money was going. This year, the Pentagon finally delivered a result: After waiting nearly 30 years, the Pentagon failed its first-ever audit. Even more disturbing is that Pentagon leaders aren’t the least bit disturbed about this. Deputy Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan, the number two official at the Pentagon, told reporters, “We failed the audit, but we never expected to pass it.” There’s every reason for Pentagon leaders from Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis on down to be ashamed of this result. Every other major government agency has completed and passed an audit during that time, often many times. If the Pentagon doesn’t know where its money is going, how can they assure us it’s being put to good use? With a Pentagon budget of $647 billion this year — not even counting war costs — the potential for waste and fraud is sky-high… If we keep going this way, we’re going to waste precious resources that could be used any number of other ways: creating jobs, fighting the opioid epidemic, building a health care system that works for all of us, fixing our crumbling roads and bridges, etc.
Until they can show they know what they’re doing, the Pentagon should be cut off from further increases so we can focus resources elsewhere. More
The Man from Boeing Now Running the Pentagon
CNN noted in a headline reviewing the president’s decision that: “Trump’s acting secretary of defense will step into the role with no foreign policy, military experience.” So what experience does Shanahan have? He is, literally and figuratively, the embodiment of the military-industrial complex about which former President Dwight Eisenhower warned Americans at the close of his presidency in 1961.... [Under Mattis] Shanahan was tapped to oversee defense policy, the budget and, um, acquisition teams at the Pentagon. “Shanahan, 54, has no military or political experience,” noted the Seattle Times when the selection was announced in March (of 2017). “He is, however, familiar with defense procurement from the business side.” …Shanahan worked for many years as the vice president and general manager of Boeing Missile Defense Systems, and before that he was general manager for Rotorcraft Systems and U.S. Army Aviation programs. In other words, if there was a living, breathing embodiment of the military-industrial complex, it was Patrick Shanahan, a 31-year Boeing employee, member of the Boeing Executive Council and now the guy who will be helping the Pentagon with procurement issues. More
Trump Voters Would Be Hit Hardest by GOP’s Food Stamp Work Rules
A House Republican plan to set stricter work rules for food stamp recipients would disproportionately affect low-income residents in states that supported Donald Trump for president and may imperil passage of farm legislation. House Agriculture Committee Chairman Michael Conaway, a Texas Republican, said after a White House meeting with Trump on Thursday that the president "is keen on work requirements being a part" of the bill and offered to help pass a plan. "The president wants to deliver a farm bill this year," White House legislative affairs director Marc Short said Thursday. "He also has a strong belief in the work requirements." The plan so far doesn’t have enough Republican votes to pass the House, according to Mark Meadows, a North Carolina Republican who is chairman of the conservative Freedom Caucus, which wants even stricter work requirements. House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy said the chamber plans to consider the legislation next week. More
Where Government Is a Dirty Word, but Its Checks Pay the Bills
Harlan County is the nation’s fifth most dependent on federal programs, according to the government’s Bureau of Economic Analysis. In 2016 some 54 percent of the income of the county’s roughly 26,000 residents came from programs like Social Security and Medicaid, food stamps — formally known as SNAP, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program — and the earned-income tax credit. That is up from 28 percent in 1990. Surrounding counties are similarly dependent. Part of a coal-mining region in long, inexorable decline, this pocket of the nation exemplifies a political paradox: Why are so many American voters hostile to the government hand that feeds them? “The SNAP card works every month; the kids eat two meals a day, but people don’t think about where the food comes from and go vote for Republicans,” said Larry King, a Kentucky farmer who is chairman of the Democratic Party in McCreary County, whose residents get 55 percent of their income from federal transfers. More
SOME ARTICLES LOOKING AT CLASS AND RACE:
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NEW WARS / OLD WARS – What Could Possibly Go Wrong
A YEAR OF FOREVER WAR IN REVIEW: The World According to the "Adults in the Room"
As Donald Trump wraps up his second year in the Oval Office, despite sudden moves in Syria and Afghanistan, the United States remains entrenched in a set of military interventions across significant parts of the world. Worse yet, what those adults guided the president toward was yet more bombing, the establishment of yet more bases, and the funding of yet more oversized Pentagon budgets. And here was the truly odd thing: every time The Donald tweeted negatively about any of those wars or uttered an offhand remark in opposition to the warfare state or the Pentagon budget, that triumvirate of generals and good old Rex went to work steering him back onto the well-worn track of Bush-Obama-style forever wars… Why those nearly two years of bowing to the long-stale foreign policy thinking that had infused the Bush-Obama years, the very thing he had been theoretically running against? Well, pin it on those adults in the room, especially the three generals. More
BRING THE TROOPS HOME, BUT ALSO STOP THE BOMBING
As our nation debates the merits of President Trump’s call for withdrawing U.S. troops from Syria and Afghanistan, absent from the debate is the more pernicious aspect of U.S. military involvement overseas: its air wars. Trump’s announcement and General Mattis’ resignation should unleash a national discussion about U.S. involvement in overseas conflicts, but no evaluation can be meaningful without a clear understanding of the violence that U.S. air wars have unleashed on the rest of the world for the past 17 years. By our calculations, in this “war on terror,” the U.S. and its allies have dropped a staggering 291,880 bombs and missiles on other countries—and that is just a minimum number of confirmed strikes. More
Of course, it should be “Left” and “Right”. . .
Trump Unites Left and Right Against Troop Withdrawal Plans, but Puts Off Debate on War Aims
President Trump managed to do something remarkable with his abrupt order last week to withdraw all American troops from Syria and half from Afghanistan: unite the left and right against a plan to extract the United States from two long, costly and increasingly futile conflicts.
So chaotic was Mr. Trump’s decision-making process; so transparent his appeal to his political base; and so lacking in a cogent explanation to allies or the public that the president’s move short-circuited what many say is a much-needed national debate about the future of America’s wars… “It’s been getting increasingly harder to explain to European publics why we need to stay there,” said Tomas Valasek, a former NATO ambassador from Slovakia who is the director of Carnegie Europe. More
Trump Critics of Syria Withdrawal Fueled Rise of ISIS
How ISIS overran large swaths of territory in northeastern Syria and established its de facto capital Raqqa is scarcely understood, let alone discussed by Western media. That is partly because the real story is so inconvenient to the established narrative of the Syrian conflict, which blames Assad for every atrocity that has ever occurred in his country, and for some horrors that may not have ever taken place. Echoing the Bush administration’s discredited attempts to link Saddam Hussein to Al Qaeda, some neoconservative pundits hatched a conspiracy theorythat accused Assad of covertly orchestrating the rise of ISIS in order to curry support from the West. But the documented evidence firmly established the success of ISIS as a byproduct of the semi-covert American program to arm Assad’s supposedly moderate opposition. More
Of course, the Israel Lobby is also a key component of the Washington War Party. . .
Pro-Israel groups turn their backs on Trump for the first time over Syria withdrawal
U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw all the American forces from Syria has, for the first time since he entered the White House, led him to face strong criticism from leading pro-Israel groups in Washington. The shift comes after two years in which these same groups mostly endorsed his administration’s Middle East policies, with some even claiming that his support for Israel was important enough to justify ignoring aspects of his presidency deemed less than palatable by many in the American Jewish community… AIPAC took to Twitter to retweet a number of senators – both Democrats and Republicans – who severely criticized Trump’s decision on Syria. One tweet, by Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, described the withdrawal as a “huge mistake.” Another by Democratic Senator Jeane Shaheen called the decision “ill-informed and hasty,” and warned that it will “breathe new life into ISIS and other terrorist groups.” It was the first time that AIPAC even tacitly endorsed such strong-worded criticism against Trump since he became president in January 2017. More
Two Fantastic Events at the CME | Sunday, December 30 Center for Marxist Education
Two Fantastic Events at the CME | Sunday, December 30
*Sunday, December 30 | 2:00 - 4:00 PM*
*A Discussion with Yu Weihai*
Yu Weihai leads a center in China studying the political movement of the
working class worldwide. Join us for a discussion of how the center arose,
what it has learned, and its current work.
------------------------------
*Sunday, December 30 | 6:00 - 8:00 PM*
*Film Screening: The Black Panthers, Vanguard of the Revolution *
In the turbulent 1960s, change was coming to America and the fault lines
could no longer be ignored — cities were burning, Vietnam was exploding,
and disputes raged over equality and civil rights. A new revolutionary
culture was emerging and it sought to drastically transform the system. The
Black Panther Party for Self-Defense would, for a short time, put itself at
the vanguard of that change. *The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the
Revolution* is the first feature-length documentary to explore the Black
Panther Party, its significance to the broader American culture, its
cultural and political awakening for black people, and the painful lessons
wrought when a movement derails.
Master documentarian Stanley Nelson goes straight to the source, weaving a
treasure trove of rare archival footage with the diverse group of voices of
the people who were there: police, FBI informants, journalists, white
supporters and detractors, and Black Panthers who remained loyal to the
party and those who left it.
Featuring Kathleen Cleaver, Jamal Joseph, Ericka Huggins, and dozens of
others, as well as archival footage of the late Huey P. Newton and Eldridge
Cleaver, *The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution* tells the story
of a pivotal movement that gave rise to a new revolutionary culture in
America.
______________________________
Act-MA mailing list
Act-MA@act-ma.org
http://act-ma.org/mailman/listinfo/act-ma_act-ma.org
To set options or unsubscribe
http://act-ma.org/mailman/options/act-ma_act-ma.org
*A Discussion with Yu Weihai*
Yu Weihai leads a center in China studying the political movement of the
working class worldwide. Join us for a discussion of how the center arose,
what it has learned, and its current work.
------------------------------
*Sunday, December 30 | 6:00 - 8:00 PM*
*Film Screening: The Black Panthers, Vanguard of the Revolution *
In the turbulent 1960s, change was coming to America and the fault lines
could no longer be ignored — cities were burning, Vietnam was exploding,
and disputes raged over equality and civil rights. A new revolutionary
culture was emerging and it sought to drastically transform the system. The
Black Panther Party for Self-Defense would, for a short time, put itself at
the vanguard of that change. *The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the
Revolution* is the first feature-length documentary to explore the Black
Panther Party, its significance to the broader American culture, its
cultural and political awakening for black people, and the painful lessons
wrought when a movement derails.
Master documentarian Stanley Nelson goes straight to the source, weaving a
treasure trove of rare archival footage with the diverse group of voices of
the people who were there: police, FBI informants, journalists, white
supporters and detractors, and Black Panthers who remained loyal to the
party and those who left it.
Featuring Kathleen Cleaver, Jamal Joseph, Ericka Huggins, and dozens of
others, as well as archival footage of the late Huey P. Newton and Eldridge
Cleaver, *The Black Panthers: Vanguard of the Revolution* tells the story
of a pivotal movement that gave rise to a new revolutionary culture in
America.
______________________________
Act-MA mailing list
Act-MA@act-ma.org
http://act-ma.org/mailman/listinfo/act-ma_act-ma.org
To set options or unsubscribe
http://act-ma.org/mailman/options/act-ma_act-ma.org
Not Ready For Prime Time But Ready For Some Freaking Kind Of Review Film Reviews To Keep The Writers Busy And Not Plotting Cabals Against The Site Manager-Introduction To The New Short Film Review Series
Not Ready For Prime Time But Ready For Some Freaking Kind Of Review Film Reviews To Keep The Writers Busy And Not Plotting Cabals Against The Site Manager-Introduction To The New Short Film Review Series
Recently I wrote a short, well maybe not short when the thing got finished, summary of my “take” on this American Left History publication that I have been the site manager of since the fall of 2017. Took over full time after the variously called “purge,” “exile”, “retirement,” forced or otherwise of the previous site manager Allan Jackson who had actually hired me to run the day to day operations before the “internal rebellion” of the younger writers against his regime knocked him out of the box. I stood on the side-lines then since taking sides would have hurt my chances of taking full command and also I didn’t have an opinion one way or the other although I cringed when Seth Garth who I respect started talking about Stalinist purges, Siberia and written out of history photographs like this was the second coming of the Leon Trotsky-Joe Stalin fight back in ancient history early Soviet Union days.
I also cringed when the younger writers who obviously had never known privation or hard times started taking Allan to task for glorifying his hometown high school junkie corner boy, a guy called the Scribe, who got himself killed for some stupid reason down in Mexico over a busted drug deal. Hated Allan’s incessant nostalgia for the 1960s, especially the Summer of Love, 1967 which they knew nothing about, didn’t want to write about and could have given a fuck about except to placate him (and move up the food chain which some did even in opposition). I now, now that the dust has settled, and I have taken firm control of the operations do have an opinion that indeed Allan was unceremoniously purged and found himself in exile although not to Ata Alma or deep Siberia but sunny California, via a short stop in Utah. Needless to say the same fate will not await me as long as I can keep young and old writers too busy to waste time plotting around the office water cooler.
(Needless to say I have in the back of my mind thought many times that I should just get rid of the damn water cooler and let the employees find their own water sources just like in most offices. Maybe I am making a mistake putting this in print will be seen by somebody who will then get all protective and defend keeping the thing as some democratic right or something grandfathered in since it was here before I was but so be it. My real problem is that this illustrious water cooler is the place where many a plot against recently exiled Allan Jackson were hatched and where, according to Sam Lowell’s own words, he “got religion” about the need to “pass the torch” and along the way put the knife deeply into the misbegotten body of his oldest friend by casting the decisive vote for Allan’s ouster. So you can see where things stand with these wild cowboys and the cohort of women writers I have brought in, or in the case of Leslie Dumont brought back spend even more time there so who knows what they are talking about).
Yeah, Allan took it on the chin, didn’t see it coming when the younger writers led by Will Bradley who when not conniving with others who harbor some kind of grievous hurts from those in charge, whoever is in charge, is an up and coming writer who now has courtesy of my good offices a by-line, if he can keep it, took a vote of no confidence and Allan took the sack, hit the skids. Some of his detractors wanted him escorted from the office under guard like they do in the high tech and finance fields throwing his boxes of stuff out the window or something like that but cooler heads prevails. Meaning this silly Editorial Board which needs to rubber stamp my decisions-nixed the idea since maybe he still had some friends from the old days who might take umbrage at the idea-and come in and do bodily harm to whoever proposed the crazy idea. Worse of all his longtime old-time high school corner boy Sam Lowell under the guise of passing the torch gave him the coup de grace giving the kids the deciding “no” vote. With friends like that I said at the time although not to Sam who now heads the Ed Board and is technically my “boss” who needs enemies. Sam I am sure in true hard-ass Acre neighborhood form will say all is fair in love and war and that Allan had done much worse to him over the years including sleeping with his, Sam’s, third wife.
Adding insult to injury the conspirators, Sam in good corner boy form included at first before he got elevated to the Ed Board and so had to be “neutral” or nice I forget which he claimed he was doing to back out of the battle, to slander and libel Allan when he was down, kicked him in the metaphorical groin. Maybe not court-worthy, not money damages worthy but it made it extremely hard for him to find work on the East Coast, in New York City particularly. Put the hex on him like he had been some kind of monomaniacal tyrant when they put the kiss of death “hard to work with,” tag which gets your resume to the shedder faster than you can walk there. Publishers who a few years ago would have paid big money to Allan just to sit in the office when important advertisers came by now wouldn’t offer him a cup of coffee, would make him wait all day in the foyer and then tell the front office that the big boys had gone home for the day and could you come back tomorrow like he was just out of journalism school.
Those young writers as if to bury the dead deeply or perform some exotic exorcism to insure that Allan would not come back zombie-like from the dead like you see in the current wave of dystopic films or if you are old enough or have access to a Netflix account some films from the heyday of zombie films-the 1950s spread the rumors far and wide. As far as I can tell they made the stuff up. Or they had so-called “third parties” do their dirty work a trick I too learned long ago when you wanted to rake somebody over the coals but wanted to pretend you were just reporting some facts you had picked up along the way. Either way they had a field day once Allan left the office, left without giving a forwarding address (although Seth Garth his main old-time hometown neighborhood supporter knew where he was part of the time, knew at least that when he tapped out in New York that he headed West, not just any West but purely West Coast California west, to get clean, to get washed over by some fresh Pacific breeze in along the Pacific Coast Highway near Todo el Mundo scene of many early fresh breathes when he and that crowd were young and filled to the brim with Summer of Love, 1967 dreams and visions).
Some of the stuff really was unbelievable although as long as it didn’t impinge on the operations here or diminish my authority starting out trying to fill some pretty big shoes in the industry after Allan’s demise, I tucked my head in. A couple of things I tried to check out, stuff like he was selling encyclopedias door to door out in Westchester County when Readers Digest turned him down for an office boy’s job. (Does anybody still use a hard copy set of encyclopedias in the age of Internet anyway which is what made the story seem fishy to me.) Was working in a fish factory for wages down in North Carolina. Nothing to it. Had gotten a job as a bellhop at the Ritz. (Maybe but I could never get anybody to follow up on the story). Had been washing dishes when the Ritz had banquets and needed extra day labor help. Nothing.
The three that did keep coming up and which had an aura of possibility since he had been seen in the West (which is how we were able to discount the North Carolina fish factory story since he was in either Utah or California by then confirmed by Seth) are worth noting. Let me put it this way I hope the next generation that rebels, assumed to be against me, will just shoot me and get it over with rather than run my reputation into the ground.
According to the most prevalent rumors Allan had variously been “seen” running a high-end West Coast whorehouse with his old flame Madame LaRue, acting as stage manager for the famous Miss Judy Garland “drag queen” Queen of the notorious KitKat Club in San Francisco or more improbably “selling out “ to the Mormons via attempting to get a press agent’s job during Mitt’s now successful U.S. Senate campaign out in the wilds of Utah. The first one was totally wrong although Allan did stay at Madame’s place, not the whorehouse, on Luna Bay for a while and who knows what they did or did not do together but it was not running the whorehouse since Madame according to Seth was very touchy about anybody running her place since she dealt almost exclusively with rich Asian businessmen with a taste for the wild side. Still even spreading such a rumor was just another nail in Allan’s coffin in a profession where things at least had to look aboveboard.
The KitKat Club rumor was really a vicious one and I was kind shocked when young Sarah Lemoyne, who was hired by me after the Allan dust-up so had no reason to seek some silly revenge, told me in all good faith and naivete that Allan had come out of some “closet” and was MC-ing the nightly shows at that establishment in full drag regalia. When I asked Seth about it, actually ordered him to find out what was happening, he laughed and said that yes Allan was out in Frisco town, all these older writers love to call it Frisco town like they were just slumming wherever else they landed in life. What the younger writers didn’t know, maybe couldn’t know, or didn’t give a damn about just so they could throw some mud was that Miss Judy Garland, the owner of the club and the Queen of the “drag” set out there was none other than their old-time corner boy Timmy Riley who after years in the closet, after years of being abused, mentally and physically by everybody in their old home town from immediate family to some Acre young toughs had drifted West to a friendlier environment. The real deal was that Allan had staked Timmy to the money to buy the club and so was only staying in one of the apartments above the club (which Timmy also owned) while in town to see if he could catch on in the publishing industry out there far from the East where he really had tapped out. End of story.
I would not ordinarily in a publication dedicated to the left side of society, politically and every other way although some of the writers, especially the younger ones, are either pretty wide-world politically indifferent or just slightly to the left of say the Democratic Party, give two words to the Romney slur. But maybe, just maybe although none of this ever surfaced in any piece submitted to me except maybe a vague reference in a film review about Utah, whoever surfaced this one will learn a small political lesson, or at least get the facts right before running to the water cooler all heated up. What that rumor did not recognize was that Allan had skewered Mitt Romney for years when he was governor of Massachusetts all the way to his failed Republican Party presidential bid in 2012. Had particularly honed in on counting his inadequacies as a executive against his Mormon pioneer great-grandfather who had five wives in the days when that religion went in for polygamy. The guys here from what I have been told had great admiration for the old man. Nevertheless no way was Allan going to get any job with the long-memory Mormons hovering around Romney, or even anything in the whole state of Utah for that matter. End of story although I hope not end of lesson.
I noted above that I had been looking over the on-line archives since this publication went to a totally on-line format in 2006 and offered some observations about what way the winds were blowing and which way they should blow in the future. (See From The Archives Of “American Left History”-An Analysis And A Summing Up After His First Year By Site Manager Greg Green, date November 18, 2018) One key observation, especially since I was brought over from American Film Gazette by Allan Jackson (who by the way now writes an occasional contributing editor piece here belying all those rumors mentioned above except as I have also mentioned that he did wind in Frisco will old friend Miss Judy Garland when he was broke and needed a place to stay before heading back East) where I had spent many years editing some 40,000 film reviews of varying lengths and by everybody with any pretentions to film reviewing expertise from long time film editor Sam Lowell of this publication to the legendary Janie Dove and Jack Cummings was the yearly decline in the number of film, book and music reviews.
I wondered why given the sparse political environment, the general decline of street politics which animated a lot of the early work and decline in end-around cultural and social material to report on, to spent money sending people to cover. I have since his return talked to Allan, we have exchanged e-mails since he is now up in Maine, about the matter and gotten some other feedback. Allan had insisted that each review had to be full-blown “think piece” style contribution or else forget it apparently. (He denied this originally when he resurfaced to edit a rock and roll anthology which I thought needed his touch, but most senior older writers have testified under oath and a couple before God for balance that anything less than three thousand words and worthy of print in some academic cinematic journal went into the ashcan and I accept their takes on this.) Frankly, many of the films that I have seen come to my desk or have reviewed personally are not worth more than about three or five hundred words, maybe less, maybe just a thumb up or down is plenty.
To bring more balance, to get better into the film review business which is what many people who don’t have time to read endless reviews expect of a publication like ours I have started this new series of short movie reviews which has the dual purposes of giving today’s busy world a quick but incisive opinion. And keep these monstrous writers who are hanging around the “water cooler” plotting against the “boss,” me, occupied. Greg Green]
Friday, December 28, 2018
Looking for a few good… people who want to defend the American Republic against the Greed-heads and Con Men-You have allies-Vietnam Veterans Seth Garth And Ralph Morris Are Afraid For The Fate Of The Republic And If They Are I Am Too-Count Us In
Looking for a few good… people who want to defend the American Republic against the Greed-heads and Con Men-You have allies-Vietnam Veterans Seth Garth And Ralph Morris Are Afraid For The Fate Of The Republic And If They Are I Am Too-Count Us In
By Frank Jackman
Politics and our relatively new site manager Greg Green are hard task-masters. The politics part is simple or relatively simple since the Republic is in some danger these days starting right at the top with the POTUS, his hangers-on and his assorted lackeys and enablers which I will go into detail more below. But first to the “why” of why I am I am writing this screed at this time a couple of years before the 2020 Presidential elections (if it was merely the Congress that was the problem, which it is, then we could comfortably wait until 2020 but these are urgent times so now is the time to wade into this mess). Recently Greg wrote a short, well maybe not short if you had to read the damn thing, piece in this publication summing up his take on what had happened after the first year of his regime. (See From The Archives Of “American Left History”-An Analysis And A Summing Up After His First Year By Site Manager Greg Green, dated November 18, 2018) In that piece Greg noted that he had perused the publication archives since 2006, since the operation went totally on-line for financial reasons after many years as a hard copy then hard copy and on-line combined.
After spending some time on the mistakes he had made, notably his hare-brained attempt to draw a younger demographic by catering to film, book, music reviews lite, he drew two major conclusions about the drift of the on-line publication under long-time former site manager Allan Jackson. The first was the joined tendencies to move away from film, book and music reviews that had animated the early days of the operation and rely more on what Greg called “nostalgia” pieces about coming of age in the 1950s and 1960s by the older writers, Allan’s contemporaries, and some of the younger writers called “prison” since they were either too young had not even been born when all of this happened and when they dragooned into the work they had to ask parents, grandparents and those older writers about what had happened back then. Under the old regime I had the official designation “political commentator” since abolished so l rarely delved into reviews except when some political angle came up and it made sense for me to put my two cents in.
The second major comment, which very much concerned me, was his surprise that since 2006 the amount of primary political commentary, meaning original articles and not material grabbed “off the wire” as we call it from other sources making us more of a clearing house for generally progressive and left-wing groups and individual views. He particularly noted the still-born series that I had started in about 2007 as I was getting ready to comment on the forces gathering for the 2008 presidential elections. (See Rolling The Rock Up Just To Have It Come Tumbling Down-Prometheus Chained, dated March 8, 2008) I had assumed since 2008, like 2016 and unlike the upcoming 2016 elections that with no incumbent that the fireworks would be worthy of serious commentary. And for a while it was until early 2008 when, despite a heated contest between Hillary Clinton and the successful Barack Obama and a fistful of candidates on the Republican side, particularly one Mitt Romney who I has skewered endlessly when he was Massachusetts governor and more after when he became “Mr. Flip-flop” when he got the fire in the belly to be POSTUS, tweet speak if you must know, and realized he was out of step with the reactionaries in the Republican Party that the whole thing evaporated in thin air. That any time spent on the ins and out of what I call, and more and more others do as well, bourgeois politics was so much wasted space, so much as some young radicals would say back in the 1960s when the idea of voting only meant encouragement to those evil forces that what they said had meaning.
Greg cornered me at the water cooler one day and mentioned that he thought the series had even if truncated been some of the best , and funniest, political writing he had seen from me and wished me to take another stab at it for 2020 since a big part of what is coming up will be who will wind up facing the wicked witch of the West, the senile old hag Trump if he goes the distance and is not wearing some form of prison garb for high crimes and high misdemeanors come that November. I gave him several very valid reasons for not doing so from that old-time theory of not feeding the animals, trolls in modern speak, not encouraging what will be by any standard, any modern standard an undignified street fight. If I wanted that I would have long ago continued on my youthful dream of being a power before the throne after the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy threw me for a loop rather than move away, way away with my nose covered from that kind of politics. (The being dragooned into the Vietnam War against people I had no quarrel with also helped in that decision no question.) So for a while I was able to hold Greg off on any commitment to the kind of reportage that ruined Theodore White and subsequently Doctor Hunter S Thompson’s careers when they got catch in the whirlwind trap of every four years having to debase themselves by giving, for serious pay granted as against the pittance received here, their pithy remarks about the progress of such vapid campaigns.
Enter Ralph Morris, of the famed Ralph and Sam Stories which were recently given an encore presentation by Greg with introductory remarks by the slightly “rehabilitated” back from Siberian exile, Babylonian captivity or whatever you would like to call his purge and its aftermath former site manager Allan Jackson as editor. Ralph, a much-decorated fellow Vietnam War veteran who like me went over to the anti-war side as a result of what he did, what he saw others do and most importantly what his government made him do to those benighted people in Southeast Asia. Ralph along with Sam Eaton are both members of the “street cred” wise Veterans for Peace organization and men ready at the drop of a dime to march against war and any number of social justice issues cornered me one day at Jimmy’s Grille in downtown Boston and asked me whether it was true or not that I had turned down Greg’s idea of starting up another series on the election campaigns. I said yes. He came storming back first saying hey the 2020 campaign had already started the night the midterms were over, maybe before for some like Elizabeth Warren who already had “the fire in her belly” for a while and was just pacing the floor for now. Started telling me to get in on the ground floor of what will be something not seen in this country since the time of blessed Robert F. Kennedy and his vision-and bag of dirty tricks which is why I loved the guy when the deal went down in 1968 even if that Irish poet bastard McCarthy from Minnesota led the fight before Bobbie got his courage up.
More importantly, and in this Ralph, Sam, me, and maybe everybody east of the Mississippi and not a few west of that tidal pool as well know we are living in the secular version of end times these days. The times of cold civil war ready at the drop of a hat, ready at will be some seemingly obscure event, ready to turn hot and nasty like the brothers and cousins war of the 1860s. This is the way Ralph put the matter to me, with Sam backing him up which surprised me a bit because of the pair Sam always seemed a little more radical, a little readier to bring fire and brimstone down on any sitting government in Washington. Ralph said that he too was as ready on any given day to call for bringing the sitting government down as not and gave the classic example of that first effort on May Day, 1971 to end the Vietnam by attempting, unsuccessfully attempting to bring the Nixon government down. Now, 2018 now, after two years and more of flame-throwing by those who would close the door on the Republic he was fearful, as fearful as he, they had been back in 1971 when the Republic was in the balance that once again that awful end time kind of thing was in the wind. Practically that meant that he was ready to unite with anybody, including the devil, Jimmy Higgins, Johnny King and whoever else was ready, to defend the Republic. By any means necessary even jumping into some presidential campaign like I had back in 1968. Whee!
Thus who am I to say as I did in 2008 a pox on both, on all, of your houses and will for Ralph and Sam’s sake try to revive that commentary which I had begged off of from Greg. Enough said.
Soldiers, you are not alone! a message from Veterans For Peace You are not alone if you are thinking WTF am I doing on the U.S. border with Mexico?
Soldiers, you are not alone!
a message from Veterans For Peace
a message from Veterans For Peace
You are not alone if you are thinking WTF am I doing on the U.S. border with Mexico?
You are not alone if you are thinking WTF am I doing on the U.S. border with Mexico?
You are not alone if you are asking if this is some kind of political stunt.
You are not alone if you wonder what all this concertina wire is for.
Is it even legal to deploy troops on U.S. soil? Against desperate asylum seekers?
You are not alone if you are re-thinking your role in the U.S. military.
No, you are not alone. Many people, in and out of the military, have these very same concerns.
Veterans For Peace certainly does. We believe the deployment of U.S. troops to the border is an illegitimate use of the U.S. military. We believe the Central America caravan poses no threat whatsoever to anyone.
Veterans For Peace certainly does. We believe the deployment of U.S. troops to the border is an illegitimate use of the U.S. military. We believe the Central America caravan poses no threat whatsoever to anyone.
This is no “invasion.” The asylum seekers are traveling in a caravan for their safety from criminal gangs. With their babies and young children, they are fleeing from extreme violence and poverty. They are desperate to keep their families alive. They have every right under both U.S. and international law to seek asylum in the U.S. In fact, we have a special responsibility to help them. For decades the U.S. has been supporting corrupt dictators throughout Latin America, creating the conditions from which these poor people are fleeing. We should be meeting the asylum seekers at the border with open arms, not with concertina wire.
If you decide to follow your conscience and refuse to obey orders that you believe are illegal or immoral, you will not be alone. Veterans For Peace will support you, along with other organizations who have legal resources and know how to organize political support. See below.
If you decide it is time for you to get out of the military, we can put you in touch with counselors who can help you to be honorably discharged.
Most of all, as veterans of multiple wars, we strongly advise you not to do anything that you might regret for the rest of your life, just because you were “following orders.” It is much better to follow your conscience, and do what you know deep down is right.
Veterans For Peace is responsible for this message. The other organizations listed are valuable resources.
COURAGE TO RESIST
www.couragetoresist.org
www.couragetoresist.org
GI RIGHTS HOTLINE, 877-447-4487
Veterans For Peace works to educate the public about the true costs of war. We want peace at home and peace abroad. We are committed to acting nonviolently. We welcome active duty members.
DoD Instruction 1325.06 allows GI’s to read and keep one copy of the leaflet.
From The Veterans For Peace- The Twelve Days, Maybe More, Of ......The Struggle Against The Endless American Wars
From The Veterans For Peace- The Twelve Days, Maybe More, Of ......The Struggle Against The Endless American Wars
Happy Birthday Keith Richards -*Stonesmania- The Rolling Stones When The Earth Was Young- "Some Girls”
Click on title to link to YouTube's film clip of The Rolling Stones performing "Beast Of Burden".
CD Review
Some Girls, The Rolling Stones, 1978
Hey, in 2009 no one, including this reviewer, NEEDS to comment on the fact that The Rolling Stones, pound for pound, have over forty plus years earned their place as the number one band in the rock `n' roll pantheon. Still, it is interesting to listen once again to the guys when they were at the height of their musical powers (and as high, most of the time, as Georgia pines). This album from the tale end of their most creative period , moreover, unlike let us say Bob Dylan who has produced more creative work for longer, is the `golden era" of the Stone Age. While this CD has a fistful of "greatest hits" from this period some of the songs are distinctly anti-women, intentionally or not, at least the lyrics would not then, and do not today, stand the test for “political correctness”. That includes “Some Girls” and “Beast Of Burden” ( a little). Nevertheless this stuff holds up pretty well, especially “The Girl With Far Away Eye”.
"Beast of Burden"
Ill never be your beast of burden
My back is broad but its a hurting
All I want is for you to make love to me
Ill never be your beast of burden
Ive walked for miles my feet are hurting
All I want is for you to make love to me
Am I hard enough
Am I rough enough
Am I rich enough
Im not too blind to see
Ill never be your beast of burden
So lets go home and draw the curtains
Music on the radio
Come on baby make sweet love to me
Am I hard enough
Am I rough enough
Am I rich enough
Im not too blind to see
Oh little sister
Pretty, pretty, pretty, pretty, girl
Youre a pretty, pretty, pretty, pretty, pretty, pretty girl
Pretty, pretty
Such a pretty, pretty, pretty girl
Come on baby please, please, please
Ill tell ya
You can put me out
On the street
Put me out
With no shoes on my feet
But, put me out, put me out
Put me out of misery
Yeah, all your sickness
I can suck it up
Throw it all at me
I can shrug it off
Theres one thing baby
That I dont understand
You keep on telling me
I aint your kind of man
Aint I rough enough, ooh baby
Aint I tough enough
Aint I rich enough, in love enough
Ooh! ooh! please
Ill never be your beast of burden
Ill never be your beast of burden
Never, never, never, never, never, never, never be
I dont need no beast of burden
I need no fussing
I need no nursing
Never, never, never, never, never, never, never be
CD Review
Some Girls, The Rolling Stones, 1978
Hey, in 2009 no one, including this reviewer, NEEDS to comment on the fact that The Rolling Stones, pound for pound, have over forty plus years earned their place as the number one band in the rock `n' roll pantheon. Still, it is interesting to listen once again to the guys when they were at the height of their musical powers (and as high, most of the time, as Georgia pines). This album from the tale end of their most creative period , moreover, unlike let us say Bob Dylan who has produced more creative work for longer, is the `golden era" of the Stone Age. While this CD has a fistful of "greatest hits" from this period some of the songs are distinctly anti-women, intentionally or not, at least the lyrics would not then, and do not today, stand the test for “political correctness”. That includes “Some Girls” and “Beast Of Burden” ( a little). Nevertheless this stuff holds up pretty well, especially “The Girl With Far Away Eye”.
"Beast of Burden"
Ill never be your beast of burden
My back is broad but its a hurting
All I want is for you to make love to me
Ill never be your beast of burden
Ive walked for miles my feet are hurting
All I want is for you to make love to me
Am I hard enough
Am I rough enough
Am I rich enough
Im not too blind to see
Ill never be your beast of burden
So lets go home and draw the curtains
Music on the radio
Come on baby make sweet love to me
Am I hard enough
Am I rough enough
Am I rich enough
Im not too blind to see
Oh little sister
Pretty, pretty, pretty, pretty, girl
Youre a pretty, pretty, pretty, pretty, pretty, pretty girl
Pretty, pretty
Such a pretty, pretty, pretty girl
Come on baby please, please, please
Ill tell ya
You can put me out
On the street
Put me out
With no shoes on my feet
But, put me out, put me out
Put me out of misery
Yeah, all your sickness
I can suck it up
Throw it all at me
I can shrug it off
Theres one thing baby
That I dont understand
You keep on telling me
I aint your kind of man
Aint I rough enough, ooh baby
Aint I tough enough
Aint I rich enough, in love enough
Ooh! ooh! please
Ill never be your beast of burden
Ill never be your beast of burden
Never, never, never, never, never, never, never be
I dont need no beast of burden
I need no fussing
I need no nursing
Never, never, never, never, never, never, never be
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