Is Obama Really a Democrat or Why Healthcare Reform is a Sham

It had been ten years since the United Kingdom held a general election. Winston Churchill had steered the nation through the most difficult war in Britain’s history. Churchill himself was popular with the electorate so it was widely believed the Conservative Party would sweep to a big victory in the election held on July 5, 1945. To everyone’s surprise the Tories were nearly wiped out losing 190 seats in the House of Commons while the Labour Party gained 239 seats. The Conservative loss was due in part, according to Joe Conason writing in Salon, “...because British voters didn’t trust the Tories to implement the Beveridge report” (which called for a National Health Service).

Later that same year Pamela Beryl Digby Churchill filed for divorce from Randolph Churchill, the son of Winston Churchill. Some people speculated that the marriage broke up because Randolph had lost his parliamentary seat that year. Others said while Randolph was doing military service in Cairo during the war, Pamela had an affair with United States Ambassador to the Soviet Union, W. Averell Harriman. W. Averell was nearly 30 years older than Pamela. W. Averell returned to the United States in early 1946 after breaking off his relationship with Pamela. Later he would be honored with the title of Mr. Democrat because of his huge influence (read largesse) on the Democratic Party.

In 1909 Harriman inherited a fortune from his father, E.H. Harriman, who owned the Union Pacific Railroad, Wells Fargo, and a slew of other valuable properties. In 1922 W. Averell established the W.A. Harriman & Company bank. Later the bank’s name was changed to Harriman Brothers & Company and later still the bank changed it’s name again to Brown Brothers & Harriman & Co. George Herbert Walker, the great grandfather of President George Bush was president of Harriman & Co. Prescott Bush, President George Bush’s other great grandfather, was a senior partner at Harriman & Co.

Pamela Churchill, after divorcing Randolph (remember him?) went on to have numerous affairs with men of prominence and wealth. In 1971, a day after Pamela’s second husband died, she began a second affair with W. Averell. Six months later W. Averell and Pamela were married. From their marriage forward Pamela, like her wealthy Wall Street husband, became immersed in Democratic Party politics. In 1986 William Averell Harriman died at the ripe old age of 95 years and Pamela inherited 75 million dollars.

Meanwhile, during the 1980’s, the Democratic Party was getting clobbered at the hands of the Republican Party in national election after national election. According to Godfrey Hodgson in his book titled More Equal Than Others: America from Nixon to the New Century, “By the 1980’s influential leaders in the Democratic Party...especially in the South were coming to accept...the Democrats could never hope to recapture power nationally unless they changed their spots. “ These Democratic Party leaders advocated taking the party to the right. By adopting right-wing positions on policy issues, particularly pro-corporate neoliberal economic policies, these southern and midwestern Democrats believed they could attract more corporate money. “The key group in selling this idea was the (newly formed) Democratic Leadership Council (DLC).”

Aside from a stable of upstart and conservative establishment southern and midwestern Democrats “...the DLC had another valuable asset: the substantial fortune of Pamela Harriman....Mrs. Harriman raised a reported $12 million (during the 1980’s). The considerable influence that (fund raising) brought her, in a party strapped for cash, was thrown toward the DLC. She liked Bill Clinton and helped him to emerge as the leading candidate for 1992.” After Clinton’s victory in the 1992 national election, Pamela Churchill Harriman was appointed United States Ambassador to France. She died in 1997 after suffering a stroke while swimming at the Paris Ritz Hotel.

Dialing forward to the present: The impasse over health care reform within the Senate Democratic Caucus is a direct reflection of the split between the “progressives” who are mainly loyal members of the Democratic National Committee, the DNC, and the pro-corporate DLC. In 2005 Howard Dean was elected Chairman of the DNC. Dean once described the DLC as the "Republican wing of the Democratic Party. DLC leaders were outraged at Dean’s characterization. In 2003 then Senator Barack Obama opposed the DLC stating his support for universal healthcare were at odds with the DLC, "...That is why I am not currently, nor have I ever been, a member of the DLC." After becoming President and appointing more than 50% of his cabinet from the DLC, in May of 2009, President Obama declared to the House New Democrat Coalition (DLC Caucus), "I am a New Democrat." In 2009 (at the direction of President Obama) Howard Dean was succeeded as chairman of the DNC by Tim Kaine, the current Governor of Virginia and leading member of the DLC. Obama also pointedly refused to appoint Dean to any position in his government.

Leading members of the DLC in the Senate, who can now be referred to as “Clintonites,” are Joe Lieberman, Evan Bayh, Kent Conrad, Mary Landrieu, Blanche Lincoln, Ben Nelson, and Max Baucus all major players who are responsible for killing Single Payer, The Public Option, and Medicare Buy-in. All these corporate Democrats support the continued corporate monopoly over health care.

So where’s the surprise? Howard Dean had warned the Democrats. When progressive Democrats drag a hollowed out Tory Horse inside their gates, they shouldn’t expect a pleasant party that night.

December 2009

Free Speech is a Myth in America

Dear Wendy

I appreciate your faith in the constitutionally protected principle of “Free Speech.” But I have a different view. Free speech is a myth, an opiate, in America. Free speech in and of itself is meaningless without an audience. Until the internet came along access to that audience was restricted by the owners of the access (newspapers, radio, TV, magazines, movies, etc.). In principle we all have free speech but we do not have the means to distribute that free speech. Thus free speech has been reduced to a commodity to be controlled by a few property owners who own the distribution rights.

When free speech is placed into the domain of property owners, these property owners decide, based upon their own privately held property interest and based upon their particular social class interest (which they call a community interest), what should be distributed for consideration by the masses of people. Rarely will these property owners allow a point of view disseminated that will fly in the face of their own narrowly defined interest. And when they do on those rare occasions, it is because a power struggle has broken out between rival groups within the elite which requires mobilizing the masses temporally in order to prevail in resolving the immediate issue.

When Bush was beating the drums for making war on Iraq, a public discussion in all the national newspapers about American imperialism emerged . As soon as the issue was resolved (in favor of Bush and the neocons) the talk about imperialism disappeared. Another more recent example revolves around the financial melt down. Paul Krugman writing in the New York Times (9/6/09) narrowly defined the failure to predict the banking collapse within the profession of economics as due to the ascendancy of the "Freshwater School of Economics" centered around the University of Chicago. But Krugman also pointed out that the "Saltwater Schools" located within east and west coast elite universities also failed to predict the coming disaster. He concluded that “...economists need to abandon the neat but wrong solution of assuming that everyone is rational and markets work perfectly.” The problem with Krugman’s analysis is his failure to spotlight schools of economics that had predicted the meltdown (e.g. Stagnation Theory centered around Monthly Review Magazine).

The overall long term effect of a small elite controlling the free speech distribution rights is to narrow the public debate. Issues are framed according to what is responsible debate and what lies outside the mainstream. Once an issue has been narrowly framed and widely distributed seeping down to every level in society, anyone attempting to open up and widen the debate within social institutions and at any institutional level are automatically, in a knee jerk fashion, looked upon with suspicion and quickly marginalized. Thus when you wanted to write an anti-Vietnam war piece for the Neff High School newspaper, the pro war/anti war debate had already been resolved in favor of war and the new debate concerned itself with what strategies should be implemented in order to win the war. By 1967 your antiwar views were considered irresponsible.

With the rise of the internet, an avalanche of free speech outlets circumventing the distribution privileges of private owners has emerged. People are able to speak to each other and do it in a wide variety of venues thereby opening up and widening the debate over the issues of the day. Since I don't know enough about how internet information is accessed and distributed I don't know how important the internet really is. Should the internet become a major player in debating important issues uncontrolled by the distribution elites then that would be a victory for real free speech. How long this will be allowed to continue? I suspect, should it become a threat to those elites, controls will be put in place and free speech will again become a controlled commodity, a myth in America.


November 2009

The DLC Again

Hi from Munich

Yes, I have to agree, we had a very interesting evening discussing American politics with you folks. Looking back, however, I realized that I talked too much and I never got to hear about Dutch politics. Most Americans, myself included, know very little about Holland except that one can buy drugs in Amsterdam at places named "Coffee House!" Now I know why I know so little about Holland!!

To underline some of the things I said that evening, The Democratic Leadership Council (DLC: http://www.dlc.org/) represents the right wing of the Democratic Party (Democratic National Committee DNC: http://www.democrats.org/). The DLC was founded in the 1980's in order to deliver the Democratic Party into the arms of the biggest corporations in the United States. The list of Chairmen of the DLC reads like a Who's Who of right-wing Democrats:

Rep. Dick Gephardt of Missouri (1985 - 1986)
Gov. Chuck Robb of Virginia (1986 - 1988)
Sen. Sam Nunn of Georgia (1988 - 1990)
Gov. Bill Clinton of Arkansas (1990 - 1991)
Sen. John Breaux of Louisiana (1991 - 1993)
Rep. Dave McCurdy of Oklahoma (1993 - 1995)
Sen. Joe Lieberman of Connecticut (1995 - 2001)
Sen. Evan Bayh of Indiana (2001 - 2005)
Gov. Tom Vilsack of Iowa (2005 - 2007)
Former Rep. Harold Ford of Tennessee (2007 - present)

(Note: Joe Lieberman who ran as Al Gore's Vice President nominee in 2004 was a former DLC chairman. Lieberman is going to leave the Democratic Party and will become a Republican).

The present struggle over health care in the U.S. centers on whether there should be government health insurance offered as an alternative to private health insurance (the so-called public option). Private health insurance in the United States is a very, very profitable economic oligopoly. The following list of Senators are DLC members who mostly oppose the public option:

Mark Pryor: Arkansas
Diane Feinstein: California
Thomas Carper: Delaware
Bill Nelson: Florida
Evan Bayh: Indiana
Mary Landrieu: Louisiana
Barbara Mikulski: Maryland
Max Baucus: Montana
Ben Nelson: Nebraska
Kent Conrad: North Dakota
Tim Johnson: South Dakota
John Rockefeller: West Virginia
Herbert Kohl: Wisconsin
Joseph Lieberman: Connecticut

(Note: The following is a story from the Huffington Post demonstrating the convergence of Republicans and DLC members on the issue of narrowing political rights known as FISA: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bruce-wilson/875-of-family-dlc-affilia_b_112878.html).

Here is what then Illinois State Senator Obama told the Bruce Dixon, editor of "Black Commentator," about the DLC back in 2003: "I am not currently, nor have I ever been, a member of the DLC,” said Obama. “It does appear that, without my knowledge, the DLC…listed me in their ‘New Democrat’ directory,” Obama continued. “Because I agree that such a directory implies membership, I will be calling the DLC to have my name removed, and appreciate your having brought this fact to my attention.” (http://www.blackcommentator.com/48/48_cover.html).

In addition to the DLC Senators listed above, The House of Representatives also has right-wing Democrats. The House right-wingers are known collectively as the "Blue Dog" Democrats (http://ndc.crowley.house.gov/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=62&Itemid=54) and the DLC Caucus (http://ndc.crowley.house.gov/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=62&Itemid=54). If you cross check the list you will find many Blue Dogs are also DLCers.

Finally, there are reports that 50% of Obama's government appointments are DLC members including Hillary Clinton, Rahm Emmanuel, Obama's Chief of Staff in the White House, and Ken Salazar, Secretary of the Interior. (Obama also has Republicans in his government including the Defense Secretary and the Transportation Secretary). There are some people who will argue that Obama needs to keep his coalition together therefore DLC appointments are necessary. But what most people outside of the U.S. do not know is that the Democratic Party is not a unified political party but consists of factions (progressive and corporate) and thus a coalition of these factions control and carry on intrigues against each other within the government of the United States.

All-in-all when you add the Republic Party which is openly a political party representing corporate interest, plus the DLC, which also represents corporate interest, you can easily see that a tiny minority of very wealthy people overwhelmingly control the United States government. As for the remaining 95% of the American people, well, we are side-lined forced to be spectators watching the power struggles between powerful people as they argue the best way to get more wealthy and more powerful at the expense of the 95% who have no say whats-so-ever. As for Obama, I think the rest of the world should lower their expectations. Obama is not the "savior" most of the world believes him to be. Obama is no different then any other American president. He will pursue the best interest of Corporate America anywhere and everywhere in the world.

What Republicans Want

I’ve been trying to figure out what Republicans want. Inspired by a local businessman I decided to make friends with a Republican. So I jumped on the bus and went down to the Chamber of Commerce but they wouldn’t talk to me because I just got off the bus and I wasn’t wearing a gray pinstriped suit. Then I decided to go to the City Hall. No one would talk to me at City Hall because I wasn’t a contractor bearing gifts. Disappointed, I decided to take one last shot at making friends with a Republican so I hot-footed down to the local bar.

Just as I arrived a big burly guy riding a Harley hog pulled up. On his right shoulder was a tattoo of the American flag with a white cross in place of the stars. He was wearing a world war two style German helmet. I walked over to the guy and asked him if he lived in a mansion or a trailer park. He asked me why and I told him I was looking for a Republican to make friends with. He replied that he was a red- state-red-meat Republican through and through.

I offered to buy him a domestic beer if he would tell me what Republicans want. He agreed to my request and said: For the Republicans a smaller government consist of the Pentagon with a trillion dollar budget, the Department of Homeland Security with a trillion dollar budget, and a trillion dollar yearly payment on the interest only portion of the national debt. Voila! A smaller government that sucks up the entire yearly national budget. Everything is deregulated and privatized for profit because the interest on the national debt crowds out all social spending. The rest of the world wont go along? A trillion dollar Pentagon will solve that problem. Pitch forks, torches, and barricades in the streets because there are no social services? Switch on the Patriot Act and send in Homeland Security!

I thanked my new Republican friend for his insights. Before I left I asked my new friend if he knew Sarah Palin. He said he never heard of her.

March 2009

Is Barack Obama Nuts?

The writer Rita Mae Brown once wrote, “Insanity is doing the same thing, over and over again, expecting different results.” In 1963 the laissez-faire economist Milton Friedman and Anna Schwartz publish a hugely influential book titled, “Monetary History of the United States 1867-1960.” The ideas presented by Friedman and Schwartz came to be known as “monetarism” because they argued that the supply of money circulating through the economy had a direct effect on the amount of spending (demand). Print more money, people will buy more stuff. Slow down the printing presses and people will buy less stuff.

In the late 1970’s a crisis known as stagflation was gripping the economy. The economy was not growing, more and more people were losing their jobs, but the price of stuff kept rising. Spooked by this contradiction, President Jimmy Carter appointed the “monetarist” and Friedman disciple Paul Volcker to head the Federal Reserve Bank. Volcker slowed the printing of money, threw the economy into a severe recession, and stopped the weird increases in the price of stuff thereby ending stagflation. Monetarist became the darlings of Washington. When Volcker’s term ended, President Ronald Reagan appointed uber- monetarist and Ayn Rand fan Alan Greenspan to head the Fed. Greenspan was reappointed by Presidents George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush. Presently monetarist Ben Bernanke chairs the Fed.

So what happened to the economy under the direction of the monetarist over the last 30 years? The recession of the early 1980’s has already been mentioned. The national debt increased by 1000%. There was the Garn-St. Germain Act that deregulated and busted the savings and loan industry. That cost the tax payers 900 billion dollars. The stock market crashed in 1987. Next came the recession of 1990-92. In 2000 the “dot-com” boom turned into another bust. Meanwhile monetarist Senator Phil Gramm (his wife sat on the board of ENRON) and Representative James Leach with the help of Clinton’s monetarist Treasury Secretaries Robert Rubin and Lawrence Summers repealed Glass-Steagall in 1999. That, in-turn, retarded banking industry regulation causing another boom-bust cycle costing so far more than a trillion dollars.

President Barack Obama has surrounded himself with monetarist Volcker, Bernanke, Christina Romer, Summers, Rubin, and Timothy Geithner among others. Therefore I have a question for Progressives and Liberals: Is Barack Obama nuts?

February 2009

Thinking Out of the Box Republican Party Style

Andrew Mellon, Secretary of the Treasury from 1921 through 1932 put forward this solution to the Great Depression “Liquidate labor, liquidate stocks, liquidate the farmers, liquidate real estate. Purge the rottenness out of the system. High costs of living and high living will come down. People will work harder, live a more moral life. Values will be adjusted and enterprising people will pick up the wrecks from less competent people.” That’s the spirit Andy! Make everyone pay dearly for the greedy excesses of the “investor class.” Republican Party analysis, such as it is, can be loosely characterized as classical economic thinking. Republicans want to lay off large numbers of government workers and make private sector workers take a 10% pay cut. They tells us that the down turn in local business activity is due to overbearing local regulations. What’s their solution? Why lets all start “thinking out of the box” and deregulate business.

Like the 1930’s the present economic crisis cannot be solved by outdated and simplistic economic strategies. In this era of Reaganomics the financial system has grown exponentially in comparison to the real economy. As a result the financial meltdown is now overwhelming the real economy because the financial system took on too much debt. For example Goldman Sachs leveraged $40 billion of equity to $1.1 trillion. Merrill Lynch leveraged $30 billion into $1 trillion. What the investor class did was to create a mass amount of fictitious capital that could no longer be “valued” after the meltdown.

The looming fear today is that the economy may be sliding into a deflationary-spiral. According to the economist Irving Fisher writing in 1932, “deflation caused by the debt reacts on the debt. Each dollar of debt still unpaid becomes a bigger dollar, and if the over-indebtedness with which we started was great enough, the liquidation of debt cannot keep up with the fall of prices which it caused....prices fall as debtors sell assets to pay their debts, and as prices fall the remaining debts must be repaid in dollars more valuable than the ones borrowed, causing more default, leading to yet lower prices and thus a deflationary-spiral” ....aka Depression!

Stick it to labor and give free rein to management; i.e. unleashing class warfare as original thinking. Boy-oh-boy old Andy Mellon must be cheering from his gold plated casket!

January 2009