Paul Soglin: Waxing America

Barack Obama, William Ayers, and Me

Till now I followed the William Ayers connection to Barack Obama with both mild amusement and mild concern.

Obama's connection to the sixties radical is so small and so distant when compared to his entire body of work as a citizen, a politician, and candidate for president. It makes little sense for McCain, his hit-woman, Sarah Palin, and his allies to invest significants amount of time or money into establishing a link.

At the same time I know enough about the swift-boating of John Kerry and the tactics of the McCarthyites to have some concern that the American tradition of guilt by association going back to the Palmer Raids of the 1920's might take hold before November 4. 

Sunday morning in the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, self-styled  right-wing guy, Patrick McIlheran linked Pete Seeger, Ayers, and me in the same paragraph.

...The 1960s radical" seems to be the trope I'm hearing a lot in newscasts lately. Which Ayers was. And more. Pete Seeger was a 1960s radical. Paul Soglin was.

Ayers was something more, as well, a 1960s bomb-maker and terrorist...

There is much to be said for judging people by the company they keep. Unfortunately such a simple statement does not do service to the complicated nature of our lives, the growth and evolution of people, or providing a sense of proportion to our judgments.

I have my own serious problems with Ayers. When I read his biography, Fugitive Days, I found it self-serving and of little value. At the same time his more recent books, on education To Teach and Teaching Toward Freedom are serious thoughtful works, that might be labeled 'radical' by some, but do not reflect the thinking of a domestic terrorist.

Over the years I worked with some interesting people on public issues. There was a minister, as right-wing as they come, repressive to the core when it came to censorship on matters he found 'pornographic.' We worked together on civil liberties and civil rights for people of all colors and gender and sexual orientation.

There was the business leader, homophobic as they come. We worked to build Monona Terrace. There was more than one banker who embraced Newt Gingrich's Contract on America, the blueprint for deregulating the banks and today's financial meltdown.

Hopefully, my work will be judged by what I have done.

Hopefully McIlheran and every American would do the same in evaluating Obama or Bill Ayers.

 

Reflections Before the Election

Before I enrolled as an undergraduate at the University of Wisconsin in 1962 I knew something of the state's political lore. My parents subscribed to The Progressive magazine. I knew of McCarthyism, I knew that Governor Nelson now served in the United State Senate along with a maverick William Proxmire.

This state underwent many transformations. The most significant and long lasting began early in the twentieth century by Robert La Follette.  Fighting Bob's domination of state politics  was so strong that even the FDR elections in the 1930's left the Democrats without any influence until after World War II.

Finally, the efforts to revitalize the Democratic Party  lead to the elections of Nelson, Proxmire, Governor Lucey, and thousands of others from the city halls to the state legislature.  In the meantime, the Republican Party produced elected officials as varied as Warren Knowles and Tommy Thompson, and Ody Fish and John Walter Chilsen.

Wisconsin politics charged in the 1990's. The undercurrent was previously there, but the nasty forces that worked into organizations like Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce  (WMC) were unleashed in the new century when Governor Thompson went to Washington and the extreme right-wing took over the Republican Party and its front organizations. And where there were no clandestine operations, they created new ones.

We know the outcome. The readers of Waxing America need only go through previous posts to see the documentation of sinister groups that lie and ruin the reputations of people and institutions in their effort to destroy government and create a corporate socialism that sucks the life out of public education, city hall, and the courthouse.

I do not know what will happen in Tuesday's election but I am sure of this: Wisconsin knows WMC.

Lions for Lambs: Reflecting on Sixty Years of Lying Our Way into Wars

We saw Lions for Lambs Saturday. I spent most of the time watching the film thinking less about the war in Iraq, and more about the last sixty years of treachery, deceit, and treason by Republicans like Bush.

• If the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) was still around, there would be an investigation. In light of the Hollywood Blacklist and what was done to so many writers, directors and producers, Robert Redford must be given credit for telling this story.
• Tom Cruise was despicable as Republican Senator Jasper Irving from Illinois. I wonder how much of that was acting and how much if that was my general distaste for him in recent years.
• As we learned in reading David Maraniss's They Marched Into Sunlight, the story of the soldiers risking their lives is far more compelling than that of those opposing war.
• The weakest of the three story lines was Professor Malley and student Todd Hayes' discussion.
• The film was O.K. but it should have been about Janine Roth (Meryl Streep). That is the compelling story. That was the most relevant in terms of figuring out how we keep getting manipulated and maneuvered into buying the crap the George W. Bush recycled from Lyndon B. Johnson and Richard Nixon.
• I keep thinking about the trash-talking-right-wing-bobble-heads from Limbaugh on the national level to Belling on the local level who keep feeding us lines like, "Well, the Democrats are as responsible for this war as Bush. They supported it from the beginning." As though the Bush lies that manipulated and deceived are not to be factored into evaluating responsibility for this impossible disaster.

Georgia Thompson: The Real Story - Honor and Courage

The more I read about the Georgia Thompson case, the more I realize that the real story is Georgia Thompson. In this week's Isthmus, Bill Lueders writes:

Biskupic tried to 'squeeze' Georgia Thompson

The federal prosecutors who put Georgia Thompson in prison, on charges later overturned by an appeals court as lacking in merit, repeatedly offered to go easy on her if she were to implicate others in the administration of Wisconsin Gov. Jim Doyle...

... Did they specifically name Doyle?

"We knew what they were talking about," says Hurley, making his first public comments on the conduct of prosecutors in the Thompson case, which in recent weeks has become the subject of national media attention and congressional inquiry.

This is the Spanish Inquisition*, the Salem Witch Trials** and the Abusive HUAC***, all rolled into one. A lonely dedicated public employee, promised mercy if she will name names. Finger innocent people. Threatened with prison unless she implicated politicians.

In a Kafkaesque nightmare, Thompson stood fast, placing honor and justice before self-interest. She refused to name innocent people, though offered leniency if she lied.

That her prosecutors may have honestly believed that others were involved in a crime that never existed is irrelevant. They pursued and hounded her out of a job, into financial ruin and prison. An erroneous conviction does not absolve the federal government of its abusive power.

The irony is that Thompson and the real target of the Inquisitors, Governor Jim Doyle, never met, never discussed the matter of the travel contract, directly or through intermediaries.

The Governor's silence was mistakenly interpreted that he allowed Thompson to take the fall. But upon reflection, any contact, initiated by Thompson or Governor Doyle, during the period of the Travel Inquisition and the appeal would be interpreted by the prosecutors as a conspiracy and an attempted coverup. 

That is what an Inquisition can do. It silences free and honest people in a democratic society. It intimidates and it prevents us from arriving at the truth - neither justice or public protection are served.

Some noted that other prosecutors, Democrats, approved the handling of the case. That is the refuge of children, their honesty compromised, who explain that everyone else did it.

Georgia Thompson and the Governor of Wisconsin deserve our respect and an apology. An apology that comes from the prosecutors, but also from the rest of us, for Georgia Thompson choose the truth, courage, honor, and - prison.

*The promise of benevolence was effective, and many voluntarily presented themselves to the Inquisition. But self-incrimination was not sufficient, one also had to accuse all one's accomplices. As a result, the Inquisition had an unending supply of informants.

**By the time the witchhunt ended, nineteen convicted witches were executed, at least four accused witches had died in prison, and one man, Giles Corey, had been pressed to death. About one to two hundred other persons were arrested and imprisoned on witchcraft charges. Two dogs were executed as suspected accomplices of witches.

***During the communist witchhunts of the 1950 s, the House UnAmerican Activities Committee used informants in a similar manner:  to oppress an unpopular minority under the guise of law enforcement, which is not the same as using them to aid a legitimate criminal investigation. Thus, just as the almost reflexive sense of revulsion that informing generates obscures the divergent objectives that loyalty serves, it also overlooks the different sets of circumstances under which informants can be employed.

The Death of the First American Republic -Mark A LeVine

Some posts do not need any improvement, only the greatest exposure possible. The Death of the First American Republic by Mark A. LeVine from truthout.

The American Republic died last week. At least the first one.

    Is there any other way to understand the meaning of the Military Commissions Law passed by the Congress and soon to be signed by President Bush? Without any serious opposition from Democrats (twelve of whom actually voted for the bill, while none offered a serious threat to fillibuster it), President Bush has signed into a law a bill that guts the right of habeas corpus, legalizes the use of secret and coerced evidence, "clarifies" the Geneva Conventions to allow torture on the his command, prevents future war crimes prosecutions, and arrogates to himself the right to declare anyone - including American citizens - enemy combatants who can be dragged from their families, thrown in any prison he chooses, anywhere on earth, for however long he chooses.

    There have been other terrible laws and legal decisions in American history to be sure. The confinement of native Americans to reservations, Jim Crow, the Dred Scott decision, the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II - all these and more rank among the lowest points in our nation's history. But these actions were in keeping with the morality of their times. At least we, the people of the United States of America, continued to move closer toward the "truths" we've held to be self-evident since our Declaration of Independence. They remained a beacon calling Americans to a future that would be more just and democratic.

    But who can believe the future holds such a promise today? Has there been another moment in our history when we have gone so far backward, abandoned so easily ideals and values that most Americans assumed were settled long ago? Are we still living in the republic of Jefferson and Madison?

    France, for reasons never quite clear to me before today, has had five republics. The first four were undone by military defeat, dictatorship, or the inability of the existing constitution to meet the political realities of the day. (The Fourth Republic ended when military officers staged what amounted to a coup in the French colony of Algeria, and threatened to conduct a parachute assault on Paris unless Charles de Gaulle was named president. Let's hope our generals in Baghdad don't feel the need to resort to such a tactic to preserve their or the country's honor).

    Could it be that our blessed Constitution, one of the greatest documents ever penned by woman or man, is no longer capable of guaranteeing the truths that since the Declaration have been self-evident? Surely the present combination of unparalleled corporate power and greed, a messianic, divinely appointed president, and a citizenry lulled into complacency by decades of unconstrained consumption, presents among the greatest challenges ever to our Constitutional system.

    Or perhaps the situation is, as I fear, even worse than this. Perhaps we, Americans, no longer hold the truths enshrined in the Declaration of Independence - "that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness" - to be so self-evident. How else to explain the nearly complete acquiescence of our society to this new law, and to all the abuses, from the launching of a disastrous war on demonstrably false pretenses, to torture and indefinite detention, unending occupation, unconstitutional eavesdropping, and other betrayals of our founding ideals, that have led up to its passage last week?

    On Monday, the Jewish holiday of Yom Kippur, Chapters 57 and 58 of the Book of Isaiah were read in synagogues the world over. I am not a religious person, but the Prophet's words have profoundly shaped my values and world view. In this reading, or Haftorah, Isaiah reminds the Israelites that God, who dwells "on high, in holiness," also - indeed, because of His position - "dwells with the lowly and humiliated." And it is precisely from this vantage point that God chastises Israel for its arrogance and conduct toward the less fortunate in its midst: "For your sin of greed I grew angry and smashed you, I even hid My face. Yet you wander off the path as your own heart, wayward, takes you...."

    God orders Isaiah to "cry out aloud, don't hold back ... Tell My people what they are doing wrong." Israel didn't listen, and so went into exile for a second time, to Babylon. But there it took the words of Isaiah and the other prophets to heart, and so was allowed to return to the Holy Land for one more go at fulfilling the terms of its Covenant with God.

    Who will warn us today as Isaiah did Israel all those millennia ago, and will we pay more attention than did our ancestors? Do we even realize that we are quickly leaving civilization behind to wander in a wilderness far more dangerous than the threat of a host of bin Ladens? Who can lead us back from exile before it's too late? HIllary Clinton? Al Gore? John McCain?

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    The translation of Isaiah was made by Rabbi Arthur Waskow, and after checking the original Hebrew I feel it more accurately reflects its meaning that most commonly read English versions. Please go to http://www.shalomctr.org/node/673 for the complete text of these two chapters.

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    Mr. LeVine is professor of modern Middle Eastern history, culture, and Islamic studies at the University of California, Irvine, and author of the forthcoming books: Why They Don't Hate Us: Lifting the Veil on the Axis of Evil; and Overthrowing Geography: Jaffa, Tel Aviv and the Struggle for Palestine, 1880-1948. He is also a contributor, with Viggo Mortensen and Pilar Perez, to Twilight of Empire: Responses to Occupation.

Federal Judge Kicks Bush Butt

Federal Court Strikes Down NSA Warrantless Surveillance Program

Today’s ruling by U.S. District Court Judge Anna Diggs Taylor agreed with the ACLU that the NSA program violates Americans’ rights to free speech and privacy under the First and Fourth Amendments of the Constitution, and runs counter to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) passed by Congress. Judge Taylor also rejected the government’s argument that the case could not proceed because of state secrets, saying that facts about NSA wiretapping have already been conceded by the government.

Thoughts:

• This is not over until the right-wing packed United States Supreme Court hears the final appeal.
• Judge Taylor leaves no doubt that the Congress abdicated its responsibility in terms of checks and balances. The failure of the Congress to act and the acquiescing of traitors like Arlen Specter (Rep-PA) is as criminal as Bush's illegal actions.
• The full opinion is so elementary and basic to our freedoms that an elementary school student understands it.
• None of the right-wing defenders of the Bush Dictatorship are arguing the merits.  They talk in terms of national security compromised by the decision.  They are attacking Judge Taylor because she is Afro-American, a woman, and was appointed by Jimmy Carter.
• The conclusion of the decision is profound:

U.S. v. Robel, 389 U.S. 258 (1967):Id. at 264.

Plaintiffs have prevailed, and the public interest is clear in this matter. It is the upholding of our Constitution. As Justice Warren wrote in Youngstown:

Implicit in the term ‘national defense’ is the notion of defending those values and ideas which set this Nation apart. . . . It would indeed be ironic if, in the name of national defense, we would sanction the subversion of...those liberties . . . which makes the defense of the Nation worthwhile.

The Progressive Magazine: Bush Worse Than Nixon

This month's issue of the Progressive Magazine has a commentary, The Reign of Secrecy, by editor Matt Rothschild, that examines the comparative need for secrecy in the Nixon and Bush Administrations:

I was speaking with John Dean of Watergate fame a couple of months ago, and he said flat out that the Bush Administration is even more obsessed with secrecy than Nixon’s was. At the time, I thought he might have been engaging in hyperbole. But his assessment looks increasingly accurate...

On the not so secret 'secret' that the government was gathering financial information illegally:

...The New York Times, which was just doing its job in exposing the wholesale gathering of private financial data by the Bush Administration without a warrant.

The Wall Street Journal, a Bush cheerleader, also reported on this story, but Bush and his hatchet men singled out the Times because it serves their political interests to attack a liberal newspaper...

...Representative Peter King...said he would ask Attorney General Alberto Gonzales to “begin an investigation and prosecution of The New York Times—the reporters, the editors, and the publisher.” (Gonzales needs little encouragement.

I just love it.  The congressional shills go after The New York Times as 'treasonous,' but leave the Wall Street Journal alone. The great irony is that President Bush trumpeted this illegal government activity over a year ago:

But the terrorists surely know that the U.S. government has been tracking their financial transactions. Bush himself has boasted of this...

What is news is not the revelation of the activity but the documentation that it is illegal:

What the Times story revealed, though, was that the Administration may be violating the law and our privacy in the process.

The Right to Financial Privacy Act of 1978 says, “No Government authority may have access to, or obtain copies of, the information contained in the financial records of any customer from a financial institution unless the financial records are reasonably described” and “a copy of the subpoena or summons has been served upon the customer or mailed to his last known address.” The government can delay notice to the customer “by order of an appropriate court.” There is an exception for a “legitimate law enforcement inquiry respecting name, address, account number, and type of account of particular customers.”

But, according to the Times article, “Treasury officials did not seek individual court-approved warrants or subpoenas to examine specific transactions, instead relying on broad administrative subpoenas for millions of records.” Nor do any of the customers appear to have been notified, and nor does the government appear to have gone to a judge to delay that notification.

As Rothschild properly concludes:

A lot of what the Bush Administration has been doing over the past five and a half years has been “fundamentally inconsistent with American democracy.”

It’s not just up to the courts, it’s up to all of us to bring our government into line.

The first line of defense for our freedoms is not the lowest bar set by the United States Supreme Court.  It is the highest standard demanded by a people who command their government.

Specter True To Form; Commits Treason

As was predicted last December: and March:

I am not worried about Specter.  He signaled last December that he would collapse on this one. He is a lost cause and will only do the right thing if they find the smoking gun in Bush's hand.

Senator Arlen Specter (Rep-PA) has solved the illegal Bush spying by selling out his country. When Nazis, Communists, and and other subversives failed to destroy our Constitution, Specter has managed under the guise of protecting Americans, to legalize our national nightmare; to encourage the federal government to enter our homes in the dead of night without knocking, and to search our homes without benefit of a court authorized warrant.  As noted in a Los Angeles Times editorial:

True, Sen. Arlen Specter, the Pennsylvania Republican who chairs the Judiciary Committee, has said the program is incompatible with FISA and has called for a court to determine its constitutionality. But legislation to bring the NSA spies in from the legal cold has stalled, and Specter has complicated matters by simultaneously pressing his own bill and signing on to a (superior) measure proposed by Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.). Most disappointing of all, the Senate squandered an opportunity to link the confirmation of CIA Director Michael V. Hayden, a former head of the NSA, to a fuller accounting by the administration of why it bypassed FISA and a promise to comply with the law in the future.

The Constitution is clear: to search there must be a warrant, and there must be probable cause to obtain it. Specter is prepared to lead the Congress to adopting legislation that would authorize the President to obtain warrants without probable cause.   Hopefully, there will be an opportunity to resurrect the Feinstein drafted legislation which protects what few precious liberties are left in this country.

As further noted in the LA Times editorial:

Fortunately, stirrings elsewhere on Capitol Hill offer a glimmer of hope for legislation to rein in the NSA. This week, 23 House Republicans joined 183 Democrats in supporting an amendment to a Defense appropriations bill that would have prohibited expenditures for electronic surveillance in the United States except pursuant to criminal wiretapping statutes and FISA. The amendment was cosponsored in part by Rep. Adam B. Schiff (D-Burbank) and Rep. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.), who have introduced a separate measure, the NSA Oversight Act, which would make it clear that FISA remains the sole authority for the surveillance of Americans on American soil.

Tom Reynolds - Now on Your Tiny Screen! The Complete Uncensored, Unvarnished Story!

On Tuesday, we told you about the great confrontation between Wisconsin State Senator Tom Reynolds and the public.  It turns out that Watchdog Milwaukee had the entire matter nailed down on May 10th, including the one hour podcast of Reynolds trying to shut down public discourse.

Reynolds says NO to recording his public hearings

This is great stuff. Eat your heart out Orson Wells.  Drama, plot, character development (well, not everyone), great ensemble cast. Five stars and a thumb up.

No Cameras Allowed at Wisconsin State Senator Tom Reynolds' Town Hall Meeting at the Wauwatosa Public Library

From the Spice Boys, who hit a home run:

Reynolds not ready for his close-up

It all started routinely enough. Reynolds, as he had several times in the past, reserved the Firefly Room at the Wauwatosa Public Library for a town hall meeting on May 9. A handful of people showed up, and it was business as usual - until Jennifer Morgan, a former auto mechanic, walked in with her camera.

Yikes! ...

When the freshman senator saw Morgan filming, he cut a constituent off mid-question.

..."That would not be allowed," Reynolds said. He added a moment later, "All right, we're not going to allow that here."...

...Reynolds and Morgan continued their spat as the camera rolled, with the senator repeating that he would not allow filming in the public library and Morgan charging Reynolds didn't believe in the Constitution.

,,,"I decided I would go and videotape him to see how off the wall he really was," said Morgan, a self-described lefty.

  ...He (Reynolds) was wrong, dead wrong, when he banned her from taping his public meeting.

"That's not OK - that's absolutely not OK," declared head librarian Mary Murphy. "If there is a further violation, he will not be able to use the Firefly Room."

Murphy also took Reynolds to task for claiming that he could restrict access to the public gathering.

Jennifer Morgan appears to be an ordinary citizen who innocently thought free speech was alive and well in Wauwatosa. Thanks to her, and to the Spice Boys for sharing her story.