Blog

There was an interesting op-e in yesterday’s times by NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF His basic premise is that the main mode for seeking a more liberal agenda should be the democratic process, not the undemocratic courts.

I agree. The Left’s dependence on preserving Roe v. Wade, and the windy speeches on the subject given by Democrats every time a new Supreme Court nominee comes before the Senate, have distracted the Democrats from the real work of channeling mainstream America’s pro-choice support into legislative action. Democrats in state legislatures and Congress should immediately introduce laws directed at preserving legal abortion. While the Republicans in Congress would certainly vote down such measures, it would force them to reveal their hand to the vast of Americans who support safe and legal abortions. Eventually we might elect legislators who will do what most Americans want and legislate this right.

I received the following email from Bill Kirchner, the jazz saxophonist and historian.

In his always interesting weblog
(http://www.artsjournal.com/rifftides/), journalist and jazz critic Doug Ramsey (who was a TV newscaster in New Orleans in the late
1960s) pointed out an eerily prophetic article that ran in National Geographic magazine almost a year ago:

http://www3.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0410/feature5/

Read the article. It is heart-breaking.

Leader of Federal Effort Feels the Heat (from the Times)

This article lays out the history of FEMA, started by Jimmy Carter in 1979, elevated to a cabinet position under Clinton in 1993, and dismantled by Bush starting in 2001.

Like Condoleeza Rice, who had zero National Security experience when appointed as NSA chief in the first Bush term (resulting in a complete lack of preparedness for 9/11), Michael D. Brown, the head of FEMA, is yet another Bush appointee with no experience in the area he is appointed to, resulting in the death and suffering now occurring in New Orleans. To Bush and his cronies, the federal government exists purely to increase their own wealth and power by granting political favors, not to serve the citizenry.

As I type this I am listening to the late night re-broadcast of the Brian Lehrer show of Friday Sept. 2. The two guests were Katrina Vanden Heuvel of the Nation and James Carafano of the Heritage foundation. The false sanctimony of Carafano, who twisted the meaning of everything Katrina Vanden Heuvel said, was sickening.

What was even more disgusting was the mealy-mouthed, hesitant, barely articulate commentary by Vanden Heuvel. Who chose this woman to discuss Bush’s responsibility for this disaster? Carafano, a right wing Bush apologist with no shame, ran rough-shod over her. If people are going to wake up from their TV-induced brain-washed stupor and realize what a disaster the Bush presidency has been for this country we need to do better than this. I am so angry. Was this woman paid off by the right to blow it? Brian, I am a huge fan of your show. In the interest of fairness and balance, PLEASE don’t let Katrina Vanden Heuvel on again. She is an incompetent debater, and certainly no match for the Goering-esque PR skills of Carafano.

Click here to help the victims of the flooding in New Orleans. If we all do what we can, however modest, it will add up.

I received the following email today:

By the way, none of my business, but as a suggestion, I would not “tie” your blog into your musical activities. (Not all of your fans are going to share your politics and may be putt off by some of your comments.)

If all my readers (all two of you as far as I know) shared my politics what would be the point of the blog?

In case some of us haven’t noticed, there’s a war going on. Seems to me a couple of lost CD sales pales in comparison with the carnage taking place every week that we remain in Iraq. When/if this war ends, I will consider moving my political blog to a separate location. For now it stays here.

See here: https://robertajazz.com/blog/?p=8

Under mounting pressure to justify the disaster he created in Iraq, Bush says we should stay in Iraq in order to honor the 1800 soldiers who have been killed in Iraq. Let’s put aside for the moment the obvious fact that this criterion for continuing to send our sons and daughters to slaughter has nothing to do with whether we can actually accomplish anything useful by being there, and ponder the following: if the logic of this dangerous statement were followed consistantly throughout history, no war would ever end!

Yet the president who is responsible for the deaths of these servicemen and women makes this hypocritical and perverse utterance almost daily.

Recently, in a piece on the Roberts Supreme Court nomination, I heard an NPR reporter refer to prochoice and antichoice (my words, and a most objective description, surely both sides would have to acknowledge) advocates as “left wing and right wing groups”. I recognize that NPR must be terrified of being attacked against by the fascists in Congress who are not content to control merely the private corporate airwaves, but is it really balanced reporting to refer to those trying to preserve 30 years of case law as “left wing?” Especially when the other side bases their position on their vision of a religious fundamentalist theocracy, how is it possible to justify this “left wing/right wing” paradigm?

It is unfortunate that NPR and the rest of the media cannot or will not be intellectually honest enough to admit that, for all intents and purposes, there is no “left wing” left in America. There is a liberal or progressive wing; there is a moderately liberal (and in the current crisis quite useless) wing; there is a conservative wing (although their voice in the GOP has been shut down because they can’t raise as much cash as the rlght wing); and then there are those whose goal is to destroy the separation of church and state enshrined in the Constitution, an extreme right wing position if ever there was one.

There’s a great bit by Lenny Bruce explaining separation of church and state. Everyone should hear it. I’ll try to find out the name of the bit. I probably cannot post it here due to copyright considerations.