Underhanded Malice

So the big news inside the Beltway is the new Obama tell-all and its juiciest bit: the lavish Tim Burton Alice in Wonderland-themed Halloween party the president hosted in 2009.

Corporate Media World has the typical gripes:

We weren't invited. W-a-a-a-h.  It cost the taxpayers a bundle in the middle of a recession.  It was too glitzy.  Duh.... we were still enamored of all things Obama and didn't care.

But here are some criticisms I haven't heard yet.  The refreshments included fake blood served in vials, and among the attendees were military families. Did anybody stop to think how this trendy visual libation would affect the guests, many of whom have already experienced enough blood and gore to last a lifetime? The rates of PTSD in these people (and their kids) who have served in endless deployments is through the roof.  And was it really smart for Johnny Depp to show up in eye makeup straight out of A Clockwork Orange for a kids' party? 

How about we just criticize this soiree and the outrage it has spawned for its sheer kitschiness? 

Oh, and the movie itself reeked. It was a bleak, dark, sometimes-violent, high tech mess that had little if anything to do with Lewis Carroll.  Tim Burton, the party's host and designer, bombed in a big way with his psychotic take on Alice. His Jabberwocky is transformed into a computerized Godzilla who tries to kill Alice. Rotten Tomatoes gives it a 51% (Obama's approximate approval rating after the bin Laden brag-a-thon ).  The reviews -- mixed at best --  sound like they could be describing the Obama presidency itself.  Just substitute the allegedly real characters for the fictional ones. Compare "Underland" with the current Administration. Let your imagination run wild.


"A visually imaginative fairy tale that suffers slightly from its predictable course but still manages to wow at all the crucial moments".... Detroit News

"The feeling, in this movie, is always that of being frantically rushed to the next thing....Thanks to the Burton-Depp-Elfman brand, and to Disney's unrelenting marketing campaign, a favor Burton returns in the movie, making both the Red and White Queens' castles look like mockups of the iconic Disney one), this Alice in Wonderland will likely pull huge audiences down its rabbit hole".... Slate.

I wouldn’t have minded if Burton used Carroll as the merest of jumping-off points for his own nightmarish visions. What we have instead is a hybrid: Carroll’s hallucinatory wit crossed with Burton’s rank unseemliness rolled into Disney 'wholesomeness.' In the end, “Alice in Wonderland” doesn’t work either as visionary entertainment or as plain old family entertainment....Christian Science Monitor.

 Despite stunning visuals and fine performances Alice in Wonderland never really goes anywhere. Or rather it goes somewhere we've all been before....Joshua Stern, Coming Soon. (the most succinct summary of the O Regime, imho).

The imposition of a fairytale quest structure turns the surrealist wanderings (and wonderings) of a free-associating dreamer into a brusque crash-zoom, as Alice hurtles towards her appointment on the good-versus-evil battlefield.... Lisa Mullen, Sight and Sound.

Hmm... do you get all these Barry/Alice connections same as I do?  Or am I being too mean to Tim Burton?

Rejecting the Duopoly

Here is some encouraging news from a just-released Gallup poll: a record number of Americans are refusing membership in either one of the major two corrupt political parties currently smothering what's left of our democracy.The proportion of self-identified independents in 2011, when the poll was conducted, is the largest in 60 years.

Democrats maintain a slight edge over Republicans, but among those surveyed, an equal amount merely "lean" toward identifying with either party.

According to Gallup, here are the implications:  

Increased independent identification is not uncommon in the year before a presidential election year, but the sluggish economy, record levels of distrust in government, and unfavorable views of both parties helped to create an environment that fostered political independence more than in any other pre-election year.
As Americans' attention turns to choosing a president for the next four years and they line up behind President Obama or his Republican challenger, the percentage of independent identifiers is likely to fall this year. However, if national conditions and the political environment do not change appreciably over the course of this year, independent identification -- even if it declines -- will probably remain on the higher end of what Gallup has measured historically.

The unlimited money flowing into campaign SuperPac advertising is already having an unintended consequence, at least among the Republican contenders.  The Citizens United decision, which gave the right of free and anonymous political speech to corporations, has done more than give personhood to big business. It has spawned a cancer on the host.  Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney, to name just two of the "beneficiaries", are busily engaged in mutual annihilation in their dueling attack ads.... and upcoming full-length negative infomercials.
  
The election is still ten months away, and the complicit corporate media monsters are greedily extending their claws for the millions and billions of ad revenue coming their way courtesy of the Supremes. They too have not appeared to ponder the law of unintended consequences. They're like Bush & Co invading Iraq and being utterly befuddled by the lack of enthusiasm of the natives.  How many independent voters/viewers are going to remain paying cable customers just to be invaded and tortured by nonstop political commercials?  Trust me -- since the money is relentless, so too will be the election year waterboarding of the body politic.

One more reason to cut the cord that binds and gags us.  Read a book, read a blog, or write your own. But above all -- Occupy!

A Decade of Gitmo

A human chain will encircle The White House this Wednesday (1/11) to mark the tenth anniversary of the detention center for so-called "enemy combatants" at the U.S. Naval Base at Guantánamo Bay.  Amnesty International is seeking 2700 volunteers -- approximately the same number of detainees currently being held at both Gitmo and the Bagram internment facility in Afghanistan -- to join the protest. The event will also be a demonstration against the recently-signed National Defense Appropriation Act (NDAA), which provides for the indefinite detention of anyone, anywhere, without charge and without trial. 


President Obama, who made shutting down Gitmo a priority during his campaign and who actually signed the order for closure immediately upon taking office, quickly backed away from the plan. His apologists have blamed Congress for tying the hands of his administration. But guess what? The rest of the world is not enmeshed in American political bickering. The rest of the world watches with dismay as Obama obediently continues the policy of the military-industrial-terror American shadow government. According to Amnesty,  

Under international law, domestic law and politics may not be invoked to justify failure to comply with treaty obligations. It is an inadequate response for one branch of government to blame another for a country's human rights failure. International law demands that solutions be found, not excuses. The US administration is currently telling the world, in effect, "we will resolve that Guantanamo detentions when the domestic political climate is right. The USA has not been willing to accept such excuses from other governments seeking to justify their systemic human rights failures, and it should not be accepted when it is put forward by the USA.. 

AI's "Decade of Damage to Human Rights" report, published just last month, continues:

The roots of the problem lie further back, in the longstanding reluctance of the USA to apply to itself international human rights standards it so often says it expects of others. A pick and choose approach to international law by the USA long preceded the Bush Administration, but was built upon in that administration's policy responses to the attacks of 11 September 2001. This included its decision to concoct a global 'war' framework for its counter-terrorism policies under which the applicability of international human rights law was wholly denied. This global war theory -- under which the Guantanamo detentions were but one outcome, though perhaps its best-known and enduring symbol -- continues to infect the body politic in the USA, to the detriment of respect for both human rights both by the USA and more generally. 

Lakhdar Boumediene writes a harrowing account of his own long confinement in Gitmo in today's New York Times. He remained a prisoner, without charge or trial, for more than seven years. Even though the U.S. Supreme Court ruled his confinement unconstitutional in 2008,  he still had to wait until the following year to be actually freed. He writes:

About 90 prisoners have been cleared for transfer out of Guantánamo. Some of them are from countries like Syria or China — where they would face torture if sent home — or Yemen, which the United States considers unstable. And so they sit as captives, with no end in sight — not because they are dangerous, not because they attacked America, but because the stigma of Guantánamo means they have no place to go, and America will not give a home to even one of them.

You can sign the Amnesty International petition demanding the closure of this illegal prison here.

Recess Time

So President Obama finally recess-appointed a director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and filled three vacancies at the National Labor Relations Board.  Democratic partisans are in ecstasy because Barry finally got his mojo back, grew a spine, showed he is a true progressive after all and has emerged as grand born-again champion of the middle class.

Of course I am very, very happy that the self-interest of a politician and the greater public good happened to nicely coincide for a change.  But not so fast, liberals! Cynic that I am, let me suggest that the recess appointments were done not only to strengthen his poll numbers -- but mainly to circumvent attempted criminal sedition by the obstructionist Republicans.  Had the president not made the appointments (and remember, he went right down to the wire on them) he theoretically could have been a criminal enabler himself.  Can-kicking and procrastination can be legal no-nos sometimes, as well as bad and cowardly public policy all the time.

It wasn't the qualifications or the personality of Richard Cordray that had the GOP nihilists balking at his confirmation. It was the agency itself -- an agency that was formed by an Act of Congress.  Republicans were actually attempting to illegally nullify a federal agency.  Ditto for the NLRB: their aim was to destroy the whole office.  Very, very illegal.  Here is how Thomas Mann of the Brookings Institution describes the ongoing Republican obstructionism:

In the case of the Consumer Protection Board, Senate Republicans have said they would not confirm anyone who does not agree to restructure the leadership of the agency from a single person to a multi-member body. They insist that a legitimately passed law be changed before allowing it to function with a director – a modern-day form of nullification. Same with the director of the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services. There is nothing normal or routine about this. The Senate policing of non-cabinet appointments is sometimes more aggressive but the current practice goes well beyond that, more like pre-Civil War days than 20th century practice.

Of course, Donald Berwick, the recently departed director of Medicare and Medicaid Services, resigned when the Congressional minority vowed to block his nomination. He had unforgivably expressed an admiration for the British system of single payer health care.  And Obama never fought for Berwick, who has been replaced by a government bureaucrat who will presumably not discuss any socialist tendencies. 

 Too bad Obama hasn't actually called Mitch McConnell and his cohort out as traitors or coup d'etat villains on their hijacking of democracy. He found himself some mo, but forgot the jo. Very, very tepid.

And he made very, very sure to get the legal advice that if the Republicans do happen to sue him over the appointments, they will not have a leg to stand on.  If he wasn't sure of being the winner going in, I doubt he would have attempted the appointments.  This, being an election year, was also a good time to throw the base some bigger chunks of bread instead of the usual crumbs.

The NLRB recess appointments may have even more to with presidential politics than the CFPB, although had the vacancies remained unfilled, this longstanding federal agency would have literally died too.  Labor journalist Mike Elk lays it out:

President Obama's rapid fix to the NLRB's problem stands in stark contrast to the beginning of his term in January 2009, when the board was also inoperable. Obama waited 14 months to make recess appointments to fill those slots. 
The speed in making the appointments may be a move by the White House to gain the support of the AFL-CIO, which has yet to endorse Obama, unlike other major unions like AFSCME, NEA, UFCW and SEIU. It’s unclear as well if the AFL-CIO's delay in endorsing Obama, or AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka’s recent call for greater political independence for organized labor played any role in pressuring the White House to quickly make the recess appointments to both the CFPB and NLRB.

 Trumka wasted no time in lavishing praise on Obama's appointment, thus presumably giving himelf the needed cover to endorse his candidacy.  Trumka, it should be remembered, is also a member of Obama's in-house corporate CEO lobby, laughably known as the White House Council on Jobs and Competitiveness.

When it comes to right-to-work (anti-union) states, Obama has remained his usual passive-aggressive tepid (arch-conservative) self. He infamously called off his Organizing for America campaign arm from direct involvement in the Wisconsin collective bargaining demonstrations last winter.  He has yet to take a stand on upcoming anti-labor legislation in Indiana.  And several trade unions are planning to boycott the Democratic National Convention in North Carolina -- another high unemployment, anti-union state. But conveniently home to Fort Bragg and all those returning troops.

The Semantics of Terror

The arsonist who terrorized Los Angeles last week in a string of more than 50 firebombings is not actually being called a terrorist by the media or the police.  His nationality (German) does jibe with the Homeland Security definition of terrorist.  He is not an Islamic jihadist. He is not an Al Qaeda sympathizer. No matter that whole neighborhoods were literally terror-stricken for days on end, not knowing if they and their property would be incinerated while they slept.  Officials preferred to say the L.A. citizenry were "unnerved", only later deigning to upgrade the emotion to "terrorized." The suspect was characterized by the media as pale and befuddled and weak -- obviously it was mental illness, not politics, that caused his rampage.  He is a white European.  He was arrested not by Homeland Security, not by the FBI, but by a deputized volunteer. He had not been on a national terrorism watch list, even though he'd publicly railed against the United States in a courthouse just before he began his rampage. The judge set bail at $2.85 million.

On New Years Day, five New York City buildings were firebombed in quick succession.  They included a mosque, a Hindu temple and a Spanish bodega.  A suspect was quickly arrested, and authorities hastened to characterize the attacks as "personal, not political" -- even though the alleged bomber had issued a blanket anti-Muslim manifesto. Muslims can qualify as bias crime victims, apparently, but are not permitted to be on the receiving end of terrorism. That seems to be a privilege restricted to true-blue Americans: preferably white and middle class.  The suspect, a New Yorker, has not been renditioned to Gitmo.  He is, however, undergoing a psychiatric evaluation at Bellevue.

In order to qualify as a terrorist, you have to be the marginal loner who has been sitting around in your apartment for months with some matches, Christmas lights and a few dollars' worth of Home Depot hardware.  You may even have been initially rejected as a suspect by the FBI. But if Mayor Bloomberg needs some attention, he has his private military thugs make an arrest so he can brag about thwarting a major terrorist attack. Jose Pimentel, the arrestee, (who never actually succeeded in harming persons or property) was deemed a terrorist because while he was stoned on pot, he expressed resentment to an informant about American troops in Afghanistan and sympathy toward Al Qaeda.  His prior criminal record consisted of one charge involving a stolen credit card. He was not sent to Bellevue for psychiatric examination. He is, however,  being held without bail pending trial ( and who knows, maybe even indefinite detention without trial -- he certainly qualifies under the new NDAA signed by the president). 

The Occupied Winter of Our Discontent

The only thing better than the Occupy movement refusing to go into hibernation is watching the panicked reactions of the political and media elites to this deviancy.  They are shocked, shocked at this failure of people to go dormant. The protesters simply have no respect for political caucuses and commercial events like the Rose Bowl Parade, and Lady Gaga giving tongue to Mayor Bloomberg at New Year's Rockin' Eve.  Nothing -- not police batons, not encampment breakups,  not public derision, not attempted co-optation, not pretending they just don't exist -- is making the 99% shut up and go away.


Take DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, for example-- all fired up and ready to go with her Pro-bama talking points as she arrived in Iowa.  And the first thing reporters asked was if she will meet with the protesters. She was visibly miffed at being forced off-message. "I just got here at one o'clock in the morning!" she fumed. "I mean, really!"


She grudgingly admitted that Occupiers "have a right to be frustrated."  She carefully did not add that they also have a right to protest and demonstrate, probably referring to the "die-in" at a Des Moines hotel in which 50 Occupiers lay down in protest of Obama's signing of the NDAA.  This factual event simply does not jibe with the campaign propaganda that Obama is a warrior for the middle class and not an eviscerator of the Bill of Rights. Wasserman Schultz's claim that Occupy is in Iowa to protest mainly against Republicans does not hold water, and she knows it.  So the Democratic machine is taking the "maybe if we ignore them, they will go away" route.


Not so some Republicans, just itching at the chance to do real, physical damage to the protesters. The Heartland shall not be outdone by the paramilitary thugs on the liberal coasts, by golly!  From Politico:

Iowa state Rep. Clel Baudler predicted that potential protestors at his caucus site in Adair County should expect a response that "will be swift and it will be sure."
"Since I'm not a state trooper anymore, they probably won't be handcuffed - but I have friends," Baudler said. "If an officer asks for help, I will help, believe me."
"We're just not going to tolerate in rural Iowa what's going on in the big metropolitan areas," Baudler said. "A little thump therapy never hurt anybody."

Meanwhile, if you watched yesterday's Rose Bowl Parade in Pasadena, you may not be aware that Occupy had its own floats in its own parade.That's because corporate TV network CBS chose not to include the giant vampire squid of Wall Street float in its show. (Though they made sure to include the dead stuffed horse of Dead Roy Rogers.  His name was/is Trigger. That was to subliminally remind the political class that the rentier class wants those spending cut triggers of the failed Supercommittee to be pulled, post-haste). Here is how Dave Dayen of Firedoglake described it (h/t Kate M.):

The alternative march, known as Occupy the Rose Parade, (happened) in full view of the attendees in the stands who (were) asked to remain seated as the protesters promenaded down the avenue. It’s part of a larger movement featuring remnants of the core of several Southern California occupations as well as disaffected activists, all struggling to figure out how to advance what burst onto the scene this fall and best achieve meaningful political and social change.

(Pics and video can be found here.)


And while you may have been watching coverage of the docile herds of New Year's Eve corporate-logoed zombie revelers in Times Square on TV the other night, there was no coverage of the attempted retaking of Zuccotti Park and the ensuing police brutality and crushing of press freedom we have come to expect from Bloomberg's fascist fiefdom. The cops are telling The New York Times that they have unlimited power now.  And they like it.  Like pitbulls who are born and bred to clamp down and never let go, they have developed an addictive taste for blood.  Be sure to read what Times reporter Michael Powell (one of the best writers they have, in my opinion) has to say on this frightening state of affairs, which has most people reacting with a yawning "so what?"  Here's an excerpt from his most recent "Gotham" column:

And three nights ago, at a New Year’s Eve demonstration at Zuccotti Park, a captain began pushing Colin Moynihan, a reporter covering the protest for The Times. After the reporter asked the captain to stop, another officer threatened to yank away his police press pass. “That’s a boss; you do what a boss tells you,” the officer said, adding a little later, “You got that credential you’re wearing from us, and we can take it away from you.”
Reporting and policing can be high-adrenaline jobs. . But the decade-long trajectory in New York is toward expanded police power. Officers routinely infiltrate groups engaged in lawful dissent, spy on churches and mosques, and often toss demonstrators and reporters around with impunity.
When this is challenged, the police commissioner and the mayor often shrug it off and fight court orders. The mayor even argued that to let the press watch the police retake Zuccotti Park would be to violate the privacy of protesters. “It wouldn’t be fair,” he said.

United States of the Homeland circa 2012



Weimar Republic, circa 1931



Same Old New Year

You might think, from reading the newspapers and watching the talk shows today, that the only story worth telling is the countdown to Iowa and how Obama is reframing his re-election message.  Mitt Romney does not blame Obama for the demise of Pop Rocks.  Michele Bachmann predicts a come-from-behind miracle. POTUS is playing golf in Hawaii, although he did just manage to squeeze in the signing of the NDAA,  allowing for indefinite detention of American citizens.  As we pretty much expected, he dumped the Bill of Rights right in the toilet in a New Years Eve news dump.  But, in a deeply cynical signing statement, he promised not to flush! Because our shit is so very, very important to him.

Meanwhile, even if you are too hung over or depressed to care, please read Gretchen Morgenson's short piece on the "Me First" crowd in today's New York Times. (h/t James Traynor).  My only quibble is that she neglected to name the guilty. (except for Jon Corzine). For instance, why hide the identity of Can-Kicker-in-Chief?: 

Another unfortunate lesson we keep learning over and over is that policy makers always put off tough decisions for another day. Kicking the can down the road is so much more fun and profitable, especially for politicians worried about re-election.

Morgenson has taken a lot of unfair heat lately because the Republican contenders have co-opted her criticism of Fannie and Freddie as outlined in her recent book (Reckless Endangerment) and twisted it into the talking point that the two Fs were the sole cause of the whole financial crisis. (along with, of course, those greedy undeserving deadbeat homeowners).  Her legitimate criticism of the recently canonized Barney Frank, who exercised tepid at best oversight of the banking system, pre-collapse (and lent his name to the equally tepid Dodd-Frank financial reform) has also come under fire.

But as she points out in her essay today, it was the outrageously-paid bankster-enabling executives of Fannie and Freddie -- not the agencies themselves -- who deserve a whole bunch of blame. They retired with huge bonuses and nary an indictment.  And not only that, guess who is paying for this over-hyped can-kicker of a payroll tax holiday?  Not the millionaires, as Obama originally pretended to insist upon.  No.... the people who will be paying are the poor slobs who actually had decent enough credit scores to buy their own homes!  Morgenson writes:

Washington politicians can usually be relied upon to educate the citizenry — again and again. Last year was no exception. One telling moment came late in the year, when Democrats and Republicans agreed to extend an existing payroll tax cut for two months. Helping to defray the cost was $36 billion generated through an increase in mortgage guarantee fees charged by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. 

That $36 billion will come out of borrowers’ hides, of course. But using Fannie and Freddie as a money spigot sent a powerful message: Never mind that losses at these mortgage giants have cost taxpayers $150 billion so far. Or that many Americans would prefer these toxic twins to go out of business sooner rather than later. As long as Fannie and Freddie are viewed as piggy banks, there is little chance that Congress will dissolve them. It looks as if these taxpayer-owned zombies, which did so much damage to our economy, are poised to live on and on.

Among the well-remunerated zombie spawn is one Thomas Donilon, who is reanimated as Obama's trusted national security adviser!  Donilon was at Fannie Mae for six years, until 2005, before doing the usual revolving door routine to go to work as a lobbyist.  Obama then plucked him from influence-peddling duties to join his transition team,  at the very same time Fannie was being seized by federal regulators in the wake of the meltdown. The choice raised a few eyebrows at the time.  But not too many.

Donilon, who has no prior military experience, now presumably advises Obama on drone strikes and homeland security and Afghanistan.  But according to the LA Times, he is more of an enforcer for the president than a strategist.  He has a very low profile, which is perhaps why you never heard of him.  He functions as a glorified secretary with an iron fist. His wife is Second Lady Jill Biden's chief of staff, and his brother-in-law serves as counselor to Joe Biden.  Ain't the meritocracy grand?  And here you thought there was no direct relationship between Wall Street and the Military Industrial Complex!  What an incestuous cozy cocoon has been spun inside the opaque Beltway Bubble. 

Happy first day of 2012. Have another drink.