DesperatelyObvious.com

Around this time of year American politicians, both liberal and conservative, love to invoke the name of Martin Luther King Jr.  These politicians are forced to ignore the the politically inconvenient parts of King’s message such as his outspoken opposition to war, poverty, and exploitation, and the link between these injustices and racism.  This excellent article articulates the apparent co-optation of King’s message by the presidential candidates:

The most recent electoral banter around King takes place within the collective amnesia about his views, especially his later views focusing on issues dogging us to this day: racism and poverty, prisoners and war. To the detriment of our political process, we forget that King’s views came about at least in part as a response to a black political milieu defined not just by white racism, but by the wealth of spirited action and the intellectual perspective provided by millions of people, thousands of organizations and other, less-requited political stars – Angela Davis, the Black Panthers and their combination of service and calls to militancy; Malcolm X and the Nation of Islam and their own brand of self-determination; Stokely Carmichael and the more militant students of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. These and many others influenced and pressured King and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in the 1960s.

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This climate has benefited Barack Obama, who speaks more skillfully than any other candidate to a still mostly white electorate that is largely unwilling to deal collectively with issues of race and racism beyond the platitudes one hears during official celebrations of King. Obama’s King-like cadences and charisma give us that semi-religious feeling that goes with being part of a social change movement -only without a social change movement.

I take it for granted that readers agree that the Iraq war, as well as all aggressive wars are illegal and immoral and should be stopped immediately. Yes, we all know by now that the war was about oil. And we all know by now that the media led a propaganda campaign to try and convince the public that invading Iraq was the right thing to do. Most realize that the media continues to support occupation all while lamenting how the war was such a costly mistake.

Even though a majority is now against the war, most of us are still left out or alienated from the anti-war movement. War is an issue that affects everyone, and working people pay the biggest price. How then can we build an inclusive movement that is accessible by working people?

What do we want instead of endless war, and how do we plan to get there? How can we build a movement that empower individuals instead of asking folks to follow marching orders?

I don’t want another good-intentioned person to hand me a flyer that details the Bush regime’s war crimes–I know these by heart now. I don’t want to go to another anti-war meeting that makes me feel like I’m in high school all over again–where I have to be quiet while the leader tells us what to think and do. I don’t want to go to another demonstration that treats it’s participants as just additional bodies to hold signs and in the end leaves us feeling more isolated and alone. I know this isn’t everyone’s experience with the anti-war movement, but I have a feeling that I am not alone.

It is clear that the peace movement is falling way short of what it could and what it must accomplish. I think we need honest discussion on how we can build a movement that can really end this war, and not just that but discussion on how to build a movement that can go further and start to address peoples needs by winning change in all aspects of life.

Just as the national movement for a universal health care system in the United States seems to be growing to new heights (though public sentiment has been in favor of universal health care for a while now), the state of Georgia is attempting to roll back what little public care is available. The state is withholding funding for Grady Hospital, the internationaly renowned hospital, which is known, at least in Atlanta, for treating the poor and uninsured.

State bureaucrats don’t want Grady to close, but instead they want to transfer the board from public hands to a non-profit. Of course, they promise that Grady will still continue to serve the uninsured.

Activists groups, like Jobs with Justice and the Rainbow Coalition, are working hard to keep Grady public. Whether they, along with other concerned citizens are able to stop this takeover will likely determine whether the uninsured in Atlanta will continue to receive emergency care (without accumulating unsurmountable debt), but just the fact that residents are forced to struggle to have a say in this decision is indicative of the state of democracy in this society. If Grady is a public hospital, funded and controlled by public resources, shouldn’t it be up to citizens to decide what happens to Grady? If there are a significant number of citizens in Atlanta or Georgia that were interested in privatizing Grady, then perhaps a referendum would be in order.

That’s not how democracy functions in the United States. Instead, government and corporate beauracts set an agenda that pleases corporate interests. Democracy happens when outraged citizens organize and take to the streets in protest, and sometimes they win a measure of control over decisions. When protest is the only option, institutional democracy is broken. Everyone knows it’s broken though.

Viewing Grady as a crisis in democracy may give activists the best shot of saving the public hospital. Activists in favor of keeping Grady public seem to focus their battle over the issue of whether or not Grady should be kept public (they argue that we must fight to keep it public). But this stance actually pretends that citizens have a say in the decision.

Perhaps the more important question to raise is who should decide what to do with Grady? Should it be the people who have used and might at one point use Grady, the the people who work there, and the taxpayers that fund this hospital? Or, should the fate of the hospital be decided in a “secret meeting” by “the Grady board, the Fulton County Commission, the offices of the governor and lieutenant governor, the religious community and the corporate world.”

Everyone knows it’s the latter group that will make the important decisions. It is no surprise then that the AJC reports that “consensus is growing for the idea of putting daily Grady operations under the auspices of a non-profit corporation.” This statement is true if you disregard Atlanta citizens and just look at the relevant opinions, that is the opinions of the decision makers.

Advocates of keeping Grady public should not just defend the hospital’s current structure, but instead should organize around the idea that we can win real democratic institutions that give people authentic control over resources like Grady. It’s not enough to just fight the corporate takeover, we need to replace the system that would encourage such a takeover.

State senator Kasim Reed explains the situation a little more succinctly, “Everyone understands that he who pays the piper calls the tune.” Of course, Reed has no problem with this situation as the AJC explains thats he thinks “seats on the board should be distributed, proportionately, among the institutions that end up financing the new Grady.” Therein lies the true essence of American democracy: one dollar, one vote.

Cheney announced that Bush will veto the Employee Free Choice Act if it is passed. This act would make it easier for workers to organize.

First off, the resolution makes it easier for unions to get started. The legislation will change current law so that workers need only to get a majority to request union representation. Currently, an employer can require a secret election even in the case that a majority of workers request a union.

Also, the act will further protect workers from being fired or otherwise mistreated for organizing. The resolution adds some enforcement measures to the protection already instituted by the National Labor Relations Act.

The National Labor Relations Board cited that over 20,000 workers per year from 1993-2003 were “illegally fired, demoted, laid off, suspended without pay, or denied work by their employers as a result of the workers’ union activity.” These actions do more than suppress the organizing activities of 20,000 workers. The real value is in the intimidation factor that sends a powerful message to countless other workers who might be interested in protecting their rights. Organize and you will pay for it.

There is no need to repeat here the dire state of unions in America and the resulting effects this low union membership has on wages, benefits, human rights, and other indicators. These observations have already been well documented elsewhere.

Unions are the worst enemy of big business, and Bush is sure to score points with the corporate crowd for resisting this legislation.

This legislation, or the veto of this legislation, will have real effects on workers and all Americans. Those who care about workers rights will be sure to push for the passage of this act, as part of a larger struggle to win real change for workers everywhere.

Tuesday, the New York Times reported Lebanon civilians suffered a terrorist attack from internal forces. They report that the attack “was the first such attack — directed at ordinary civilians, not public figures — since the end of Lebanon’s 15-year civil war.”

The Times’ emphasis on this attack being the first in years rewrites the record of recent events from last summer when Israel directly attacked hundreds of civilians. These attacks include the types of crimes that the Times reported on August 3, 2006:

On a mountain road just south of here, a convoy of Lebanese villagers was fleeing north shortly after the war began. They had heard Israeli soldiers telling them to evacuate. Suddenly, a rocket struck a pickup truck full of people. Twenty-one people were killed, more than half of them children.

The Times goes on to explain that “Israel said it believed the convoy was transporting rockets.” Apparently Israel’s admission of a belief is sufficient evidence for these journalists as the title of the article, “Civilians Lose As Fighters Slip Into Fog of War,” reveals which party the Times thinks is really to blame.

According to the same report, Israel’s attacks were not limited to rural villages: “In Beirut…the scale of destruction in the southern Shiite suburbs is breathtaking.” In the suburbs of Beirut, the United Nations estimated that at least 2,500 housing units were destroyed and twice as many damaged. The damage against Beirut and the rest of the country is too extensive to discuss here, but several human rights organizations have begun to assess the destruction.

To say that the recent attacks in Beirut were the first directed against civilians in 15 years is a brazen lie that defies countless pages of evidence documented by human rights organizations over the past year. Including the fact that at least a third of the civilians Israel killed in Lebanon last summer, were caused by bombs dropped in areas where there was no evidence of Hezbollah forces.

The New York Times and the rest of the corporate media refuses to see attacks carried out by the United States and our allies as acts of terrorism. The Times understands that America and Israel may slip up, and sometimes there is collateral damage, but viewing our attacks in the same light as those we label terrorists is simply unthinkable. Although the thought is never seriously entertained, they quickly dismiss any notion of such an idea in favor of repeating rhetoric that explains the true intentions of our attacks.

Hitler, as well as virtually every other state criminal, professed nothing but good intentions as he carried out the most hideous crimes in history. Americans, who already recognize that politics is a game played between elites in their own interests, will do well to look past the meaningless rhetoric of our leaders and take an honest look at their actions.