MURDER, POLITICS, AND THE END OF THE JAZZ AGE
by Michael Wolraich
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MURDER, POLITICS, AND THE END OF THE JAZZ AGE by Michael Wolraich Order today at Barnes & Noble / Amazon / Books-A-Million / Bookshop |
Beneath the Spin * Eric L. Wattree
The current leadership of the GOP is the most dangerous threat to America in the history of this country. Hyperbole? I wish it were. But the evidence clearly demonstrates that the GOP has mounted a concerted effort to circumvent the American people and install a modern-day feudalism that effectively abolishes the will of the people and their elected officials to allow our cities and states to be run by corporate-like CEOs - and there’s no telling where it will go from there.
In spite of the GOP claim that they believe in limited government, The Michigan Messenger has reported that newly elected Republican governor, Rick Snyder is poised to sign an emergency management bill that will hand total control of local governments over to "emergency managers" appointed by the government.
The Messenger reports:
"In a party line vote, and despite impassioned speeches of protest by the body’s Democratic minority, the Michigan Senate approved legislation that threatens to take over and even dissolve local governments that refuse to balance their budgets by breaking labor contracts.
"According to the law, which has already been approved in the House, the governor will be able to declare "financial emergency" in towns or school districts and appoint someone to fire local elected officials, break contracts, seize and sell assets, and eliminate services."
According to the Messenger, in a last ditch effort to protect the rights of the citizens, Democrats tried to add an amendment that would require "Emergency Managers" to hold monthly public accountability meetings to inform the citizens of how they are governing, but the amendment was voted down by the Republican senate.
Mark Gaffney, president of the Michigan state AFL-CIO is quoted as saying,
"It takes every decision in a city or school district and puts it in the hands of the manager, from when the streets get plowed to who plows them and how much they are paid. In schools, the manager would decide academics or if you have athletics. This is a takeover by the right wing and it’s an assault on democracy like I’ve never seen."
Thus, the GOP, this party of "limited government," intends to completely take over the local governments under their jurisdiction, rescind the will of the voting public, and thumb their noses at any amendment that will require public accountability. And this power-grab is also taking place in other Republican-led states around the country.
This action and what’s going on in Wisconsin and other Republican-led states clearly demonstrates that the leaders of the modern GOP are without limits. To put it bluntly, these people are un-American. They are fundamentally opposed to our way of life, and greatly prefer a dictatorial form of government. George W. Bush let the cat out of the bag by admitting it when he said, "If this were a dictatorship, it'd be a heck of a lot easier…just as long as I'm the dictator."
Americans need to wake up and connect the dots. The GOP now claims that they are so concerned about the deficit that they must suspend the United States Constitution, yet, they weren’t concerned enough about it to suspend giving the top 2% of the population a tax cut that will add $4 Trillion to the deficit over the next ten years. And neither were they concerned enough about the deficit to discontinue taxpayer subsidies to Exxon, one of the riches corporations in the world, nor to prevent the political class in congress from giving themselves an extra $93,000 in "petty cash."
And while they claim to love our troops, they rushed them into battle in Iraq without the necessary gear to protect their lives. They awarded Dick Cheney’s former corporation, Halliburton (KBR), a no-bid contract to provide the troops with contaminated water, and do such shoddy contracting work that at least 18 of our troops were electrocuted while in the shower. The Department of the Army classified their deaths as "negligent homicide." Then, if that wasn’t enough, the GOP fought tooth and nail against giving the troops any additional benefits when they left the service.
The GOP has demonstrated over the past forty years that they are conniving, lack limits, and have little or no respect for the rule of law. Richard Nixon was involved in the plot to burglarize the DNC in theWatergate Scandal. There’s evidence that strongly suggests that Ronald Reagan was in collusion with the Iranians to hold American hostages until after he won the election (The hostages were released immediately after he took the oath of office). Reagan also traded arms with his newfound friends during the Iran/Contra scandal. In addition, he flooded American inner cities with drugs to support his illegal war in Nicaragua, then told inner city children to "just say no."
Republican, George W. Bush then went on to lie us into a war with Iraq, costing more than a million lives, including the killing and maiming of thousands of Americans. Then the administration spied on American citizens, Cheney committed treason by outing a CIA agent, they committed war crimes that included torturing prisoners, and they purposely ravaged the national treasury. Now they’re using the excuse of a depleted treasury to claim "a national emergency" in order to mount yet another assault on the Constitution. And in the meantime, Republicans in congress are demonizing an entire religion as "Islamofascists" to spread hatred and fear and to distract our attention.
Doesn’t that feel just the least bit like deja vu? If it doesn't it's probably because you're a victim of the GOP assault on our educational system. They have a vested interest in keeping you uninformed. They don't want you to realize that while you may be on their side, they're not on yours. They think of the American people as stupid, and they want to keep us that way.
"Fascism: A radical, authoritarian nationalist political ideology. Fascists seek to organize a nation according to corporatist perspectives, values, and systems, including the political system and the economy." - Wikipedia
Eric L. Wattree
http://wattree.blogspot.com/
[email protected]
Citizens Against Reckless Middle-Class Abuse (CARMA)
Religious bigotry: It's not that I hate everyone who doesn't look, think, and act like me - it's just that God does.
Comments
This is a concerted conspiracy on the part of the repubs and the very definition of fascism.
I think this fits right into Ramona's blog on Michigan today.
Scream about the Federal dictatorship and set up 50 dictatorships all run by the corporations!
by Richard Day on Tue, 03/15/2011 - 3:28pm
Okay, Eric, now you've got my blood boiling! (Again) Great post. You know, when you put it all out there like that, it makes sense that the GOP is not ever going to let us get the upper hand. They're terrified that if we got powerful enough, those of us with a keen sense of justice might actually be able to make a Federal case out of their nefarious activities.
I'll believe we're on the right track when I see at least some of those people on trial. Instead, they get to go on national TV and give their opinions on how destructive the present administration is to our economy and--wait for it--to our reputation. They get to pretend they've authored books and they recieve huge advances and royalty checks. They get to stay rich while the entire country suffers because of what they've done.
How we as a country let this happen is still a mystery to me, but we don't have time to look back with regret. They've pushed us about as far as we can go, which is what it seems to take in order for a movement to finally start moving.
by Ramona on Tue, 03/15/2011 - 3:31pm
Republicans are the gangster party, the party that, like the Mafia, has its own rules of conduct. One rule is to mess up the government so bad, cut taxes, lie us into wars, deregulate Wall Street and then raid the Treasury to pay them off, skim money from every patronage scheme you can imagine, pack the courts with the likes of Scalia, Thomas and Roberts as a protection racket, run black ops like the anthrax letters to Democrats Leahy and Daschle, encourage your ignorant mobs to a raging froth, gun waving, threats of violence against scapegoats and political opponents, tell lies and more lies, claim your opponents want to kill you in death panels and take your freedoms, do this and more so that no sane person of quality would want to enter politics to try to clean it up.
GOP objective: Drown in a bathtub of taxpayer cash at their disposal when they control the wheels of power. Like ship hijackers in Somalia they do not want any law enforced against them, they thrive in the crisis they created, and claim only they can save you and the country, while their only goal is to make things worse. The Bush administration response to hurricane Katrina was an example of Republican concern and capabilities. A city flooded over in a hurricane forecasted in advance to wreak havoc, days afterward there is no plan, no aid, just desperate people, and bodies floating in the city as MRE's for alligators, college kids from Maryland arriving with aid for NO residents before the feds showed up, Bush's horse show lawyer head of FEMA with no disaster experience and his head up his ass, and Bush doing photo ops saying 'Heckuva job, Brownie", and the world and America amazed at the incompetence of it all.
Only when Americans vote out the snake oil/flimflam artists who comprise 98% of the GOP, who more often than not cannot manage their own lives and the lives of their families in a safe or honorable fashion, and have no capacity to do anything good for this country, will this nation have the ability to select the right people for government to meet the challenges it faces.
by NCD on Wed, 03/16/2011 - 1:20am
Removing elected officials by decree? And why is this NOT fascism? How does this NOT resemble the rise of the Nazi's?
The remnants of the Communist and Socialist parties and members of the trade unions resisted the Nazi regime. Especially in the early years of the Third Reich, political prisoners were a significant portion of the concentration camp inmates. At the end of July 1933, about 27,000 political prisoners were being held in concentration camps in "protective custody." During its twelve year existence, Dachau was always a camp for political prisoners.
Also, "Intelligentsia, consisting of teachers, physicians, clergy, business owners, attorneys, engineers, landowners, and writers, were imprisoned in concentration camps or publicly executed."
Source: A Teacher's Guide to the Holocaust http://fcit.usf.edu/HOLOCAUST/people/victims.html
These are not new tactics the GOP is employing. They are right out of the nazi playbook and that's not hyperbole. I'm not talking the later years of the Rise of the Third Reich. I'm simply talking about the early years. I am not anxious to see what this could become. I would rather we disassembled it right now.
by Gregor Zap on Wed, 03/16/2011 - 1:49am
Kinda sounds like Hitler appointing Goreing and Himler to manage Germany. If people have not seen this coming, starting with Richard Nixon their either blind or just don't want to know. Yes we are headed toward Facism, with the Right using the old tactic of Divide and Conquer. Just listen to the devisive banter of the Right Wing through the pundiffs on Fox. They find anything they want to change to their liking and that has a controversial flavor to it, draw the line in the sand, and goad us into crossing it, discrediting each others believes. Simple; get us at each other and we don't take the time to examing the ramifactions of the proposals, or to look to the real problems, which is them. Agenda is the word. Whose agenda's ? Who do you think, the rich using the power and organizational powers of the corperations. Look to the essay's of Thomas Jefferson and a Frenchman I believe named D'Toquville written at the end of the 17th century. They stated in short; beware the corperations, or the trades as they were called then, they will steal you freedoms. The above video pointing to this kind of legistraion is a prime example of there practices. As Hitler villified the Jews to united Germany to back his insanity, so the Right uses bigitroy, discrimmanaiton, hatred, fear and now the spector of terror to gain control of our rights. Turn a blind eye if you will, but don't complain when there's nothing left to see !
by Tommy Holmes on Wed, 03/16/2011 - 2:09am
oy
by Bruce Levine on Wed, 03/16/2011 - 7:24am
viva la corporations!
The Jews are getting a free ride this time; Hispanics and African-Americans and anything of the Muslim bent are the targets now!
And this is all done in the name of Jesus Christ!
by Richard Day on Wed, 03/16/2011 - 9:18am
Take them to court !
If the state's constitution is like the US constitution, then each branch, Legislature, Executive and Judiciary, check and balance each other. So if the legislature and governor are putting party politics before the interests of the public then let the courts do their job and check and balance the excesses of the other two. Just because the legislature creates a law and the governor signs it doesn't necessarily mean the public hasn't the ability to exercise other legal options to protest their actions. The courts need to be in the middle of it to ensure the rights of the public aren't being trampled over to push forward a political agenda that puts the public interest in jeopardy.
Just hope the state constitution isn't written too loosely to be wide open for individual interpretation as to meaning and intent.
by Beetlejuice on Wed, 03/16/2011 - 7:12am
Just one point regarding the rhethoric - in your blog you mention regarding the power seize, the "GOP, this party of "limited government."" I don't think I hear that as much as "this party of small government." In the case of Michigan, what you're getting is the logic of 'if you want small government, then you have to give over some less limited power to a few who can make that small government a reality."
by Elusive Trope on Wed, 03/16/2011 - 11:37am
That graphic is a little bit off the rails, in my view. Fascism wasn't an anti-intellectual exercise. Quite the contrary. Fascism and German National Socialism took off where alot of academic eugenicists started.
by Orion on Fri, 03/18/2011 - 8:05am