Friday Cat Blogging from the Left Paw Society

All-time-stupid web-feature award (a rant)

Is it "Foreign policy for idiots" or "Foreign Policy: For Idiots"? Take a look at this "web feature" over at Foreign Policy and see what you think?They even tell us how! Wow! I'm floored! What insights! What depth! (No more !'s, sorry.)

I've always known that FP wasn't the world's most serious "serious" magazine, but this? Just when I begin think the mindless, brain-washed Washington crowd can't go any lower in my esteem, they give me a present like this. I know, America needs a policy magazine that even its senators can understand, but do we have to insult everybody in the process. Honestly, this looks more like psy-ops to condition 14-year-olds for Porter Goss' next target, and perhaps it is. Or, just as likely, these are these the flash cards they use to prep Bush.

But let's allow FP to tell their own story:

Founded in 1970 by Samuel Huntington and Warren Demian Manshel, and now published by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, D.C., FOREIGN POLICY is the premier, award-winning magazine of global politics, economics, and ideas. Our mission is to explain how the world works—in particular, how the process of global integration is reshaping nations, institutions, cultures, and, more fundamentally, our daily lives.

And they go on to say about themselves:

What You WON'T Find in FP

• Cliché sound bites masquerading as reportage
• Predictable, read-them-a-hundred-times analyses of examined-to-death global stories
• Polite essays that fail to challenge your assumptions, excite your passions, or raise your ire

Well, I'm really glad they put up this assassination web feature. FP really avoided the sound bites and facile assumptions this time.

In case you didn't know it, Samuel Huntington, still the editor at FP, has penned such racist and xenophobic classics as Clash of Civilizations and Who Are We?. He is a Harvard professor (parents beware--there's still time for your kids to apply elsewhere) who gets a lot of money for penning theories that justify American belligerence. There's also Moises Naím. According to Wikipedia:

Dr. Naím served as Venezuela’s minister of trade and industry and played a central role in the initial launching of major economic reforms in the early 1990s. Prior to his ministerial position, he was professor and dean at Instituto de Estudios Superiores de Administración, in Caracas. He was also the director of the projects on economic reforms and on Latin America at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Dr. Naím was also associated with the World Bank on two occasions, first as an executive director and later as a senior advisor to the president.

He is currently one of six members of Time magazine's board of international economists and is also the Chairman of the Group of Fifty, an organization of the CEO’s of Latin America’s largest corporations.

World Bank, Caracas, Group of Fifty.... Interesting that we find Hugo Chavez in this list of most-likely targets. But, hey, these are our foreign policy leaders!

Anyway, that's my rant du jour. You'll have to go do some more digging if you want to find out more about Huntington's dubious scholarship. You can start here at the Left Coaster, if you want. As for me, I would love to come to some brilliant conclusion here. Unfortunately, my brilliant conclusion is that the people informing our foreign policy and teaching "our best and brightest," as the saying goes, are simply not that brilliant.

Google Earth Photo Tour

Well, I've just finished my Google Earth photo tour of Tijuana. (Note: you need to download Google Earth before this is of any use to you...). The pictures are part of an essay about the trip, about the economics of exploitation, about NAFTA...

You can download the kml file by clicking here:

http://bbs.keyhole.com/ubb/download.php?Number=401334


And here's a link to the bbs posting:
http://bbs.keyhole.com/ubb/showthreaded.php?Cat=0&Number=401334&page=0&vc=#Post401334

Death of the American Dream, Long Live the Dream

(x-listed a dKos.)

A few months ago I wrote about a Honduran woman I met trying to cross the border. In Mexico, she had fallen off a train, had her leg crushed and been thrown in the bushes to die. She was found, given medical care and a prosthesis, then shipped back to Honduras where the local company manager said she was too "f**ked up" to get a job. Her alcoholic step-father said about the same. So here she was in Tijuana telling me she was going to try to cross again and make her way to Boston. She was young, tough, seemed smart, but--I couldn't help thinking--also a little delusional. Eventually it occured to me (this was at the time of the mine tragedies earlier this year) that most Americans harbor similar illusions about America, particularly about class mobility here. Today a new Reuter's story explains this:"America may still think of itself as the land of opportunity, but the chances of living a rags-to-riches life are a lot lower than elsewhere in the world, according to a new study published on Wednesday".

There is both hope and sadness in the fact that people, like hard-working fifth-generation miners, still cling to the American Dream, believing that sucess is unrelated to social connections, that hard work and grit alone will move you ahead. The hope, in my opinion, is not just American, but human. It's the belief, perhaps faith, that things can get better. The sadness is the empty promise our economy holds out to most of those who have the dream. And the hollowness of the Horatio Alger ideal has become especially true under the the Bush Administration, where the dream has descended to the point of cynical propaganda:

The likelihood that a child born into a poor family will make it into the top five percent is just one percent, according to "Understanding Mobility in America", a study by economist Tom Hertz from American University.

By contrast, a child born rich had a 22 percent chance of being rich as an adult, he said.



"In other words, the chances of getting rich are about 20 times higher if you are born rich than if you are born in a low-income family," he told an audience at the Center for American Progress, a liberal think-tank sponsoring the work.


He also found the United States had one of the lowest levels of inter-generational mobility in the wealthy world, on a par with Britain but way behind most of Europe.[Reuters]

While all of this will sound like America bashing. That is not my intent. I have travelled a lot and there are many things I love about my country, and, yes, the American psyche. But a true accounting of the economic reality is necessary if we are to move ourselves and others forward and out from under the economic lies of trickle-down and finance-for-finance's-sake markets. (Indeed, the Financial Times has yet another article on the dangerous levels pure finance has reached (it's behind the firewall). Meanwhile, over at European Tribune, the inimitable Jérôme à Paris has posted this graph on income inequality:

No wonder the wealthiest aristocrats in America are seeking to end the estate tax.

Democrats for too long have shied away from discussing economic difference. Democrats have been losing a lot of elections too. An honest discussion of the economy is a vital step, not only in confronting the prejudices of our own economy, but in sponsoring a more democratic political sphere.

Multi-Millionaires and billionaires band together to form lobbying to repeal the estate tax. Millionaires and Billionaires stay at the same hotels, play golf at the same country clubs, sit on each other's corporate boards. Yet these same people fight unionization and local coalitions. Millionaires pay for representation in congress, but they do not want to let people leave work to vote.

James Galbraith, in this month's Mother Jones says, in his own words, that what passes for modern economics is a broken theory. He goes on to note how, in theory and practice, current economics fails us:

In a predatory economy, the rules imagined by the law and economics crowd don't apply. There's no market discipline. Predators compete not by following the rules but by breaking them. They take the business-school view of law: Rules are not designed to guide behavior but laid down to define the limits of unpunished conduct. Once one gets close to the line, stepping over it is easy. A predatory economy is criminogenic: It fosters and rewards criminal behavior.

Why don't markets provide the discipline? Why don't "reputation effects" secure good behavior? Economists have been slow to answer these questions, but now we have a full-blown theory in a book by my colleague William K. Black, The Best Way to Rob a Bank Is to Own One. Black was the lawyer/whistle-blower in the Savings and Loan and Keating Five scandals; he later took a degree in criminology. His theory of "control fraud" addresses the situation in which the leader of an organization uses his company as a "weapon" of fraud and a "shield" against prosecution--a situation with which law and economics cannot cope[http://www.motherjones.com/... ]

In other words, Galbraith's words, America has become a predator state, not only to Iraq or Central America, but to its own citizens.

My American dream is to see more Americans coming together to fight (like they do a dKos) for their rights and for a fairer economy. It is to see a real discussion of our real economy and all of its many, many shortcomings. Indeed, what is far more inspiring than simple faith in some abstract "American Dream" that does not hold up to scrutiny is actually looking at all the crap that goes on, from Enron to Katrina to Iraq, and saying you've had enough of it and that you are going to fight. Luckily, a few "heterodox"(unorthodox) or "post-autistic" economists are looking at their own field with skepticism too.

I don't know where we'll be 10 years from now, and I'm a realist about how long it will take to repair the damage (social and economic) of the past, but I do have one hope: the American Dream is dead, long live the American dream (you know, the democratic, egalitarian one).

Wednesday Eco-Blogging for Haiti

I've been a Google Earth traveller for quite some time now. Man, it's addictive. So as I've been pursuing some work about Haiti, I thought I would share this with you. It is what it looks like: a screen shot of the border between Haiti and the Dominican Republic, which share the same Island of Hispanola.
Even a cursory glance at the image reveals the significant color difference between Haiti on the left and the Dominican Republic on the right. This is due to deforestation, not climate or topography. Haiti, the world's' second oldest democracy is also one of the poorest countries on earth. Deforestation is the result of woodcutting for fuel, which, in turn, is the result of an highly imbalanced economy in which monetary and energy distribution are heavily tilted towards the ruling class. Now, trapped in a cycle of ecological poverty (cutting trees leads to erosion which leads to less fertility which leads to further deforestation, etc.) it will take a major effort to bring any sort of balance back to the system. Of course,"balance" here should not just mean ecological balance, but social welfare and a smart energy policy to make better use of the island's resources. Hugo Chavez is pledging to work with Préval, and that is truly a sign of hope. Not that I agree completely with the president of Venezuela, but the U.S. continues to undermine and pillage (through the IMF, USAID, etc.) the country, most recently pushing for a despotic privatization movement. As a result of slavery here, it took the U.S. some 6 decades to even recognize Haiti as a country. Perhaps our government should now show some benign neglect and let Haitians choose their leaders and the countries that give them aid. It would be the first benign thing the U.S. has ever done for Haiti.

That's my eco-thought for the day.

Whistle Blowing, American Style

"You know how to whistle, don't you?
You just put your lips together and blow."
Lauran Bacall to Humphrey Bogart in To Have and Have Not

Whistleblowing may sometimes be illegal, but it is not always immoral. With that in mind, and in the wake of the whistleblowing episode over the CIA's secret prisons, I thought it would be a good time to talk a little more about moral agency and righteousness in an era of corruption. To do so, let's get away from the King and his courtiers within the beltway, and take a short look at the extraordinary courage of average workers in the face of an increasingly oppressive government in the hands of Republican-party operatives. Did you know, for example, that 1 in 14 government workers has been harassed for reporting waste, fraud or other improprieties?

Part I: The Corruption
Indeed,

"According to government surveys taken since 1992, one in fourteen federal employees reported being retaliated against in the previous two years for making disclosures concerning health and safety dangers, unlawful behavior, and/or fraud, waste, and abuse. Other surveys suggest that many public employees simply do not report problems because they think efforts to expose the problems will not lead to improvements." [PEER]

While much whistleblowing may deal with accounting and fraud, there are perhaps graver matters to contend with. The non-partisan Project On Government on Government Oversight reports that:

Security guards at only one of four nuclear power plants are confident their plant could defeat a terrorist attack, according to interviews conducted by POGO for this report. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) regulates the utilities operating nuclear power plants. The utilities generally subcontract with private guard companies for security services. The security guards say morale is currently very low and that they are under-manned, under-equipped, under-trained, and underpaid." POGO Report

Or read this, about non-disclosure agreements at DHS:

"Security guards at the Department of Homeland Security were forced last month to sign agreements not to disclose information the agency deems sensitive — an attempt, according to several current guards, to silence them after recent high-profile revelations of security breaches at DHS. The guards, employed by Wackenhut Services Inc., were told to sign pledges, called “non-disclosure agreements,” on March 10, the day after former guard Derrick Daniels appeared on NBC Nightly News alleging security lapses at the agency’s Nebraska Ave. complex headquarters in Washington, D.C. The timing raises questions about whether DHS and Wackenhut misused the agreements and ignored whistleblower protections in an effort to prevent the guards from disclosing additional information about security lapses at DHS headquarters. According to one guard, Wackenhut supervisors threatened to fire employees who did not sign the non-disclosure agreements. Wackenhut recently lost out on bidding for a new security contract at DHS to Virginia-based Paragon Systems LLC. Nevertheless, Wackenhut guards will continue to provide security at DHS headquarters for the next few months, according to a department spokesman."[Pogo blog]

Part II: The Takeover
While some folks may see all of the above as simply further indication that our government is a wasteful organism, something much more sinister is afoot. As the previous quote illustrates, the government is demanding silence and is taking advantage of the legal no-man's land between the government and its contractors to ensure that whistleblowing and non-favorable publicity remain low-level and low-intensity. More disturbing than that, the Republican propaganda machine is imposing its media model on low-level employees, doing things like distributing "new 'talking points' ...to all park superintendents to urge them to begin 'honest and forthright' discussions with the public about smaller budgets, reduced visitor services and increased fees" [Secret Plan].

Read Chris Mooney's blog and you can see a litany of political agendas superimposed upon the science community. It is very disturbing and represents yet more evidence that the Republican model is being carried further and further down the ladder of government. It is not just Brownie that Americans need to worry about, it is about the institutionalization of the Republican model. The model that has, in effect, seized control of our media during the last 15 years or so is now re-shaping our government in its image: the CIA under Goss, the federal judiciary, the Supreme Court, mid-level administrators in DOI, DHS, State and many other agencies. The list is long, and, make no mistake, while many of these people will be hard-workin career people, many others are politically motivated. Glenn Greenwald, in a diary about his new book How Would a Patriot Act?, reiterates how the Bush administration has used every tool in the book to push its takeover agenda:

A substantial portion of the book is devoted to highlighting the ways in which the administration has used rank fear-mongering and an endless exploitation of the terrorist threat to attempt to obscure and justify these abuses. Those manipulative tactics have not only enabled them to embrace these most un-American powers right out in the open, but they are also threatening to alter, perhaps irreversibly, our national character.

Perhaps most importantly, the book documents the fact that even when all other intended checks on government excesses fail -- when the media, the Congress and the courts are co-opted or are otherwise neutralized -- Americans always have the ability, inherent in our system of government, to put a stop to abuses and excesses, provided they choose to exercise that power. But to do so, it is necessary that it first be understood just how radical and dangerous our government has become under this administration, and making the case that we have arrived at exactly that point is the primary purpose of the book.[Pre-order the book here.]

Part III: Fables of the Reconstruction
When Abraham Lincoln died, so died the real reconstruction of the South. Democrats, during the latter portion of the 19th-century, were able to design government bodies that reinforced the racist social model the white Elites desired. Racism, once institutionalized in the form of slavery, was now an oppressive pseudo-democratic model that would remain at least until the 1960's and which still has serious repercussions today. Of course, as I discuss here, it is the Republican Party that now carries the racist banner with surreptitious (and overt) pride.

So, indeed, what is a Patriot to do? Now what?

The Democrats must plan for their own version of a Reconstruction period. They must rebuild the government in the form that is democratic (not necessarily Democrat). To do so, they will have to, to the extent possible, separate the career civil servant from the career party operative. This will demand tearing down government agencies, renaming them, giving them a new mission. Think DHS, but done right.

I don't know to what extent the people now positioning themselves for president have thought about this, but I hope there are some think tanks out there discussing this, for "our" government (not democrat, not republican) will not be truly ours until there is some sort of purge. Democrats must not be afraid of this, they must not "forgive and forget." What is happening is far too pervasive and far too dangerous for that. Let's hope that someone is making plans.

[Updated to include G. Greenwald posting, which you should go read to see some of the AMAZING right-wing comments. Quite hilarious.]

Metaphors for America: MFA

I thought this picture at americablog was a great metaphor for America (speaking to Bush). I'm sure some others will come to me soon...

"C'est du lapinisme!" Quote from Les 400 Coups

America, the compromised

I just finished this long comment over at Digby's place. I figured I would post it here since I might as well remember what I write. Besides, I wanted to post this picture anyway:

Digby

We seem to have a little glitch in our national psyche that won't go away. It isn't just southern anymore. The misadventure of the last five years has been run by a southern dominant political party, but its architects were elite, cosmopolitan intellectuals. This is an American problem and we are going to have to get rid of it if this country is going to survive.

I couldn't agree more. We are still paying the price for the Missouri Compromise and for the failed Reconstruction period after the Civil War. This is true for race relations, as Katrina and its aftermath amply prove, and, just as importantly, it is true for class relations.

I am not a Civil War historian, but I am from the South and lived in the South for a long time before coming to L.A. One thing I know about red states is that they are a model of colonialism and extraction, seeking to suck out the fruits of natural resources and human labor where they can.

If the most efficient means of labor/resource extraction means classifying a group of people as sub-human, then that is the obvious path. If that becomes socially or politically unacceptable, then other means become necessary. The South's loss in the civil war was as much a social conversion as it was a resource failure. In fact, it is a myth to think that the South lost because it did not have industry. The South lost because people gave up. If the average Southerner in 1864 really believed in slavery and that the slave-owner society was really helping the average citizen, then the South, in 1866 or 1867, would have resembled Iraq in 2006--there would have been widespread rebellion, uprising, guerilla war. This did not happen. Why? The answer if of course complicated, but, in part, it is because many, many white people were oppressed by the upper-class land owners. These whites, while having many more benefits than slaves, obviously, understood that the system was working against them. It was not their war to begin with. How else does one explain the huge desertion rates in the Southern army? (I know, I'm generalizing.)

To get back to my point, and perhaps yours, something changed during reconstruction. As soon as Blacks had "equal" status, they could become the boogeyman for Whites. White Elites exploited this to their full advantage and began to mythologize racism and the "Golden Age of the Old South" through groups such as the KKK --and the Southern Democrats.

The racist mythology allowed poor Whites and rich Whites to find a common ground at the beginning of the 20th century, and at the present. The Republican party, as everyone knows, constantly summons this racist mythology through hint and allusion by nominating racist judges on MLK's birthday, by avoiding speaking to the NAACP, through talk radio and TV pundits. And this is where it gets dangerous, as D. Dneiwert, among others in the blogosphere, points out. The racist myth is so pervasive, so easy to tap into, and so powerful (because its fallacies seem to explain so many things), that a word here, an image there, and our Mass Media has fed into and propagated a racist creed. It is a creed that is false, but powerful because it imbues the believer with power, with an impression of superiority, and this "superiority" crosses class lines, and that is the ultimate scam.

So it isn't just Southern (it never was, it was just more so), and it isn't just race. I have lived abroad, and I will say that America is one of the most racist places I know. Racsim is a huge, huge problem. That said, I feel that it is the ability of the myth, through racism, to elide over class issues that is causing us problems today. It isn't that the "South" has taken over; it is that the extractors, those adept at mining the land and its humans, have come into power. Their belief system in 1860, like now, was exploitation (of blacks and whites), elitism, and expansion. The extractors, now as then, are constantly seeking new territories and peoples at the lowest cost. It is their way of hiding the true cost of their (and our) wealth.

They know that the weath of the here and now almost always comes at the price of people and land. They just don't care.

Look at how the Republican leadership frolics in New York and L.A., supposedly speaking for the "common man", while, in reality, the red-states they represent are among the poorest regions of the country. Though to a lesser degree, Kansas and South Dakota are to America what Africa and South America are to the "developed" world.

This is the Brand America they have created; its purveyors are Fox News and Malkin and Bush. They are all racists, they are all elitists, and they just don't care. The only hope is not it some PC version of eliminating racism, but in re-forming the instutions that purvey the racism and exploitation of Americans, namely government, big business and the media.

Whoever the next president may be, the only real hope is in "demolishing" large swaths of the federal government, and by that, I don't mean getting rid of it, but re-doing it. The Republican party has infiltrated every nook and cranny of government and will hold on to those positions no matter what. The only way to get rid of them is to litterally re-invent the departments from the ground up, removing, where possible, the revolving doors, promoting career officers, etc. Re-organize is perhaps the best term, but there will need to be some creative destruction before the demons of the Republican party, which are overwhelmingly the demons of the Civil War and the Reconstruction, are sufficiently reduced, removed, or whatever.

I do not want to absolve the Democrats in this. They carry a huge blame historically in promoting racsim and exploitation, but, presently, they are simply a weak, rudderless party. The Republicans are, and they know it, up to something far more dangerous and corrupt. It will take an earnest Reconstruction of government to repair what the Repblicans have done and continue to do and to make progress in alleviating the burdens of our national demons.

[Update: I see that other people are working on a Grand Unified Theory, all inspired by Digby's musings.]

What have I done to deserve this?

http://themodulator.org/archives/002373.html

Oh, well. Thanks for the other posts.

Philomath, etc.

I was struck by the amount of foresting, or, more properly de-foresting going on in the whole area between Athens and I-20 between Atlanta and Augusta. The size of the area with so few houses was also surprising. Eventually, I came upon Philomath, and, though I'd been several times before, I found the house with tree trunks as intriguing as ever.

Friday Cat Blogging from the Left Paw Society

And, yes, with some other critters I've captured on camera this week. Includingthe common House Finch. Of course, I didn't think this bird was common at all. In fact, when I saw its colors, I thought maybe I had seen the elusive Red-Ringed California Fly Swatter or something. Alas, it was but the humble House Finch. I wish I could have gotten closer, but
the bird was on the top wire of a telephone post. For me, it was quite a moment. As I approached, steathily moving in the shadows of the alley and snapping pictures as quickly as my nervous, trembling hands would let me, my avian friend turned away, beckoned the sound of a distant call. At that point my subject, obviously keen to respond, took a deep breath, ruffled its feathers, and spoke back. While I am loathe to translate from Common House Finch, I think the bird said "Yes, I do" and took flight. I never saw it again.

Finally, a warbler of some sort, I think. Orthinologists of the world, correct me.

This little--tiny actually--bird has been all over the garden eating aphids off the roses. Nature is reallly quite amazing if you let it be.

Secret Plans to Gut the National Park Service

(X-listed at Dkos).

Here is an issue that is vital to the public interest, has wide public support and understanding, and yet little play in the Democratic Party:


Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility has a press release detailing the latest in budget "reforms" for our National Parks. A lot of managment-talk is used, but it boils down to cutting, gutting and probably ruining some of our national treasures. While recent measures to include faith-based messagesin our parks and park commercialization may seem bad enough, cutting the budget is by far the most serious concern we should have. Indeed, the overall plan seems to be to choke the parks, then, in a few years, make the problem so big that commercialization and privatization is inevitable.(keep reading...)
According the the Bush administration, spending for the NPS is up. Of course, according the Bush Administration, Iraq is doing well too. Given their proclivity for misrepresenting the truth, it behooves us to examine more closely the actual record. To that effect, The National Park Conservation Association provides some explanation:

[T]hrough creative accounting and forecasting, some in the administration seek to take credit for providing $4.9 billion toward the maintenance backlog by fiscal year 2006. Yet only $662 million is new funding--the rest includes funding raised by national park visitors' entrance fees or money already coming to the parks for day-to-day repairs over the past four years.

The national parks' deferred maintenance backlog, now estimated at $4.1 billion to $6.8 billion, is more than double the Park Service's entire annual operating budget. It includes projects such as visitor center repairs, invasive species removal, electrical and fire-suppression system upgrades, road and bridge rehabilitation, and historic building restoration.(Source: http://www.npca.org/)

A fellow Kossack, who happens to work for the NPS, chimed in:

And I can tell you that the GAO report is spot on. The parks are being slowly starved.

If your income were raised about 2%-3% each year, while your "fixed costs" such as health insurance, rent, food, etc are going up by about 5%-10% per year, the results are predictable. First you compensate by cutting out luxuries, but that only goes so far. After a few years, you are forced to start taking short cuts. You decide to quit fixing things that are broken, hoping that your situation will improve later. After a few more years, you start doing increasingly desperate things. Eventually you get to a point where you seriously contemplate selling yourself.

That's what is happening folks. We're starving, and they get to report that "the NPS has never had so much money." It's an appalling insult.

Of course, there are scoundrels aplenty looking to tap into the vast visitor base of the NPS, and there are just as many mining corporations looking to get free or extra-cheap mineral rights (just look at some of Pombo's legislation). Given the overwhelming public support for the NPS, why aren't the Dems making a bigger issue of this? As David Sirota recently pointed out, even red-state publications like "Field and Stream" are taking offense at the Bush Administration. And, as Asdf notes: "The bureaucracy has been so thoroughly infiltrated by browns in key political apointee positions that, despite their their power base having been eroded - somewhat - the juggernaut forges on. And the judiciary, which has been instrumental in overruling executive discretion in environmental disputes, continues to be infiltrated."

In a word, the Commons, our public lands are under attack from multiple angles. It is important that we act soon, and that the Democratic party gets the message too.

Are you fired up yet? If not, read PEER's press release:

For Immediate Release: April 17, 2006

SECRET PLAN TO CUT NATIONAL PARK FUNDING BY 30% IN 5 YEARS -- Parks "Glide Path" to Impoverishment Breaks Bush Campaign Pledge


Washington, DC -- The Bush administration has directed the National Park Service to substantially decrease its reliance on tax-supported funding, according to internal documents released today by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER). In a turnabout from the last two presidential campaigns when candidate Bush promised greater funding of parks, new "talking points" distributed last week to all park superintendents urge them to begin "honest and forthright" discussions with the public about smaller budgets, reduced visitor services and increased fees.


Using a new approach called Core Operations Analysis, each park is asked to develop budgets based on a 20 to 30% reduction in appropriation support. In this exercise, park superintendents decide which visitor services or other functions can be jettisoned ("staffing and funding alternatives based on realistic funding projections," in the words of the Park Service). Whatever shortfalls in support for essential operations that remain must be made up for with fee hikes, cost shifting or increased reliance on volunteers.



Once the Core Operation Analysis is finalized, each park is then put on a "glide path" to implement the agreed upon reductions during the next five years.



In the talking points memo issued on April 11, 2006, park public affairs and budgetary staff provide coaching as to how individual parks should spin shrinking budgets and reduced visitor services, including:

* "The National Park Service, like most agencies, is tightening its belt as our nation rebuilds from Katrina, continues the war on terrorism and strives to reduce the deficit" and ...

"Our satisfaction rating is over 96 percent nationally, and has remained high for several years. That's a clear indicator that budgets have not reduced visitor enjoyment."


By contrast, prior to the 2004 election, park officials were ordered to avoid mention of cutbacks and instead use the euphemism "service level adjustments." In talking points distributed on April 7, 2004, park managers were instructed to counter charges of lower budgets by declaring "NPS has fared well under President Bush."

"Rather than being honest about planned budget cuts, the Bush administration once again makes stealth policy decisions cloaked by management reform mumbo jumbo," stated PEER Executive Director Jeff Ruch. "If our national parks are going to be reduced to performing only the bare minimum of `core operations' the public ought to be given some say as to what is considered essential."

So, Bush can be down in the polls, congressmen and lobbyist can be jailed, but the program to privatize and corporatize every inch of the American commons continues. As you can see, NPS employees are already being asked to spout the Republican talking points about the budget. What next? Our National Parks will resemble theme parks, not refuges of nature. For example, here is a picture I took at Disneyland last year:

So I'll skip my usual wordy entry, and get straight to the point: If you think this important, take action with the two groups below. Hey, write the Democratic Party too! This is a no-brainer issue. The National Park Service has huge public support. This is why even Bush has to talk all nice about it in the State of the Union and why Dems should be pointing to the Republican rape of this venerable institution every chance they get.

Take care...

Links:

• http://www.npca.org/
• http://www.peer.org/...
• http://groups.yahoo.com/group/dailykos_environmentalists/

NOTES:

Some folks asked for more numbers. Here is the non-partisan General Accounting Office discussion of the NPS budget:

All park units we visited received project-related allocations, but most of the
park units experienced declines in inflation-adjusted terms in their
allocations for daily operations. Each of the 12 park units reported their
daily operations allocations were not sufficient to address increases in
operating costs, such as salaries, and new Park Service requirements. In
response, officials reported that they either eliminated or reduced some
services or relied on other authorized sources to pay operating expenses that
have historically been paid with allocations for daily operations. Also,
implementing important Park Service policies--without additional
allocations--has placed additional demands on the park units and reduced
their flexibility. For example, the Park Service has directed its park units to
spend most of their visitor fees on deferred maintenance projects. While the
Park Service may use visitor fees to pay salaries for permanent staff who
administer projects funded with these fees, it has a policy prohibiting such
use. To alleviate the pressure on daily operations allocations, we believe it
would be appropriate to use visitor fees to pay the salaries of employees
working on visitor fee funded projects. Interior believes that, while
employment levels at individual park units may have fluctuated for many
reasons, employment servicewide was stable, including both seasonal and
permanent employees.

source: GAO report

Friday Cat Blogging, Left Paw Society

Old polaroids: I like how the film is stripped away, and development is uneven, and the colors are untrue, all of which heighten, paradoxically, the reality of memory.
Has anybody ever noticed the overuse of simile in greeting cards? I have.

Wednesday Moon Blogging, with fungus and a cat

Propaganda from the NYT (via IHT)

I came across "Economics, French Style" when I awoke this morning, and I thought it would make for some conversation.  In typical NYT/IHT style, it glosses over reality and paints France in a backward light.

PARIS Danielle Scache tries to avoid using the term "capitalism" in her economics class because it has negative connotations in France.

Instead, she teaches her high school students about the market economy, a slightly less controversial term she started using last year after a two-month internship at the dairy giant Danone. That was an experience that did away with more than one of her own prejudices, she said.

"I was surprised to see that people actually enjoyed working in a company," said Scache, who is 59. "Some of them were more enthusiastic than many teachers I know."

"You know," she confided with a laugh, "in France we often think of companies, especially multinationals, as a place of constant conflict between employees and management."

This view of bosses and workers as engaged in an endless, antagonistic tug-of-war goes some way toward explaining the two-month rebellion against a new labor law.

In this world, beyond the political fault lines of left and right, companies and the market cannot be trusted. Any measure that benefits them necessarily hurts employees. The invisible hand in this world is the state, or the "public powers" to use the French term, whose role is to tame companies, protect workers and hold sway over economic growth with public spending.

It is a world that many people here still prefer to live in. In a 22-country survey published in January, France was the only nation disagreeing with the premise that the best system is "the free-market economy." In the poll, conducted by the University of Maryland, only 36 percent of French respondents agreed, compared with 65 percent in Germany, 66 percent in Britain, 71 percent in the United States and 74 percent in China.

The findings suggest that French reluctance to introduce flexibility into the labor market - the embattled new law makes it easier to fire young workers - goes beyond the reform fatigue and nostalgia for the post-World War II welfare state evident in some other European countries. As Finance Minister Thierry Breton put it last week: "There is a significant lack of economic culture in our country."

Hmmm, is it possible that people in France disagree with "capitalism" and "free" markets, not because they are less educated, but because they are more so, because the upsides and downsides of political and economic systems are discussed more openly?

Not surprisingly, all of this gets blamed on education:

"The question of how economics is taught in France, both at the bottom and at the top of the educational pyramid, is at the heart of the current crisis," said Jean-Pierre Boisivon, director of the Enterprise Institute, a company-financed institute that sponsors the internship program for economics teachers that Scache took part in.

"In France we are still stuck in 1970s Keynesian-style economics - we live in the world of 30 years ago," he said. "In our schools we fabricate a vision of society that is very different from the one that exists in other countries."

True enough.  As so many of Jérôme's diary have shown, quality of life and economic growth do not differ significantly in France, and though unemployment is an issue, even the numbers there do not suggest France is a radical outlier.  Economy, as taught in France, in its elite schools, does not seem to differ from the pro-globalization econ taught in so many other places like London and Chicago:

French and international economists agree that the material taught at France's top universities and elite business schools, like HEC, or Hautes Études Commerciales, and Essec, or École Superieure des Sciences Économiques et Commerciales, does not differ markedly from that taught elsewhere. Indeed, France has a long tradition of excellence in academic economics; Europe's most famous economist is Jean-Claude Trichet, the Frenchman who heads the European Central Bank.

What is interesting is that the author of the story forgot to mention the revolt that took place in France in 2000 and gave birth to "Post Autistic Economics".  This revolt did not come from the lower strata, but from the students at the very top of the grandes écoles.  Students at Harvard followed suit by protesting the intro to economics there, which has been taught in essentially the same way for 30 years.  Clearly, if this article were a true discussion of the economic thought in France it would mention all of this.  It does not, and that is revealing and it suggests that the author of the article is penning yet another "hit job" on France.  She goes on to discuss how economics is taught in high schools: "But in high schools, the "economic and social sciences" branch - one of three options that is chosen by about a third of all students - appears to dwell more on the limitations of the market and the state's task of addressing those limitations than on the market itself."

Then the author really gets to the true danger to economic "education" in France:

And then there are the textbooks. One, published by Nathan and widely used by final-year students, has this to say on p. 137: "One must analyze the salary as purchasing power that you could not cut without sparking a deflationary spiral and thus higher unemployment." Another popular textbook, published by La Découverte, asks on p. 164: "Are there still enough jobs for everyone?" It then suggests that the state subsidize jobs in the public sector: "We can seriously envisage this because our economy allows us already to support a large number of unemployed people."



These arguments were frequently used on the streets in recent weeks, where many protesters said raising salaries and subsidizing work was a better way to cut joblessness than flexibility.

Et voilà, now we understand the real culprit behind the civil disobediance--high school teachers and text books.  That's right, it's all those unreformed Soixante-huitards inculcating Maoist propaganda into French youth!

I'm not saying that the textbooks aren't simplistic or even wrong, but I would suggest a more thorough analysis of them before jumping to any conclusions.  Textbooks have been a political issue for decades now in the U.S., and the effect has been to stifle discussion of economics, slaver, class, sexuality and any number of "controversial" subjects.  If the French students are brainwashed, then the American ones are

simply robots, if textbooks are to be believed.

Anyway, that's my take on an article I found rather offensive this morning (or afternoon, depending on your location...).

Saturday Cat Blogging: Left Paw Society

California Cat Blogging on a Friday

Disney to Offer Cell Phones: Dangerous

Of Tinkerbells and Republican Values

Disney will begin marketing a nationwide wireless phone service that will enable parents to manage their children's cell phone use. Be very afraid, especially if you have a child, are a child. Be even more afraid if your child is female.

Although Disney markets itself as a trustworthy company that provides innocent, family-friendly products, in truth the Disney Corporation seeks neither to promote "family values" nor to adhere to them. It seeks to make money by the most efficient means possible.

Since its inception, Disney has been a "pioneer" in animated film because it brought the assembly line to animation production. In so doing, it has consistently sought to crush unions, or severely limit them. How else do you think they earned 32 billion dollars last year? This lack of scruples has made them one of the largest owners of media in the world, fighting every battle to keep control over copyrights and extending patents into the indefinite future. We could also mention Walt Disney's sexism and his love of Hitler serious flirtations with fascism, but that is for another time...

"Yes, but I like Disney movies. They're safe and non-threatening" you say. Well, unfortunately, Disney movies are anything but. Remember, Disney is a corporation with the power to make any film it wants, yet it continues to make films like the Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast in which female heroines are in one way or another deprived of a voice. "But Belle was smart and read a lot," you say. She may have been, but that did not stop her from being captured, forced to put up with a violent male, and ultimately find "happiness" being married to him. The subtle message is "if you are nice to a mean man, he will eventually be nice to you." If you don't believe me, listen to children say it on Mickey Mouse Monopoly.You will see that little girls learn that being nice and subservient is the way to keep a man. It's probably a great way to learn how to stay in an abusive relationship too, but is that what you want your children to do?

You want to know more? Go read about Dumbo, Song of the South, Jungle Book, Aladdin and more.

Speaking of depriving females of a voice and objectifying them at a young age, did you hear about the guy in Homeland Security who was trying to find an opportunity to sexually assault a minor? Well, Disney is a major player in an entertainment industry that sexualizes young chilldren. Here is a good example. It's a photo I took at Disneyland last year.

Notice where the image leads your eyes. How is that for innocent? Think about this. Disney plans their marketing meticulously and they choose to portray women and children in derogatory ways.

The sexualization of young females is bad enough, but it also leads to their objectification and thus exploitation by men like Doyle. I suppose it also leads to men like Lewis Libby, who says, in The Apprentice: "At age ten the madam put the child in a cage with a bear trained to couple with young girls so the girls would be frigid and not fall in love with their patrons. They fed her through the bars and aroused the bear with a stick when it seemed to lose interest." What is in your popcorn?

Those are Republican family values for you, and these are corporate values that sell.

But let's get back to Disney.

What embodies the transition to innocent whore better than the mouseketeers? Nothing. Let's take a look at one of the most famous graduates from the mouseketeers, Britney Spears:

Note the childlike pose, but the woman-like attitude "Do it one more time." A rather provocative juxtaposition if there ever was one.

Is it any surprise that she also sings "Slave 4 U":

What is important here is that Brittney is not only a Disney product, but a product of Disney.

Disney is interested in capturing a youth audience that spends billions and Britney is the perfect example of a transitional product--transitional in the sense that young girls, whose parents had been making purchases for them, will be attracted to the (pseudo)"independence" of a Britney and want to emulate her and buy her products as they move from dependent child to "independent" teen. The downside is that they learn to be "slaves" and sexual objects in the process. Thus, independence is only perceptual because they are learning subservience to men, and to the corporation. Disney could change this, but easy profits seem to dictate otherwise.

Disney has the power to change its theme parks too. But it doesn't. Here is a picture from the jungle safari.

If you are a minority, you probably know exactly what this means. What you see here is not a funny representation of history, however, but a reinforcement of social hierarchy that some people happen find funny. The black men are portrayed as scared and are made to look stupid. The while male is scared too--but who do you think most visitors to Disney laugh at, the white man or the black men? Racism is pervasive in their films too (Jungle Story, Song of the South, Lady and the Tramp, etc.), but I won't go into that here.

Beyond the cultural cues Disney instills in young people, there are other reasons not to trust Disney. According to Information Week,

"Parent-friendly features in Disney Mobile include being able to set spending allowances and track usage for voice minutes, text messaging, picture messaging and downloadable content...In addition, parents can decide on the hours of the day and days of the week kids can use their phones, program restricted and always-on phone numbers, prioritize family messages and locate kids' phones through their global positioning systems. The controls will be accessible via the Disney Mobile website.

Disney has already violated the right to on-line privacy for children. By signing up for the phone service, my guess is that you will also sign away many rights to information about your child. You will also be subjecting them to the Disney advertising machine every time they open up their phone. Let me repeat: Disney is neither harmless nor innocent. Every time you go online to Disney to control your child's phone access, you are inadvertently giving information about your own morals and ideas, and an insight into your child's. Do you think Disney will use this information to protect your child, or do you think they will use it to find even more subtle ways to communicate to them? I would err on the side of caution and suspect the latter.

In a word, by avoiding a Disney cell phone service, you will avoid having to compete with Disney for parenting rights for your child. Indeed, one of the fundamental ideas of freedom is not only the freedom to do something, it is the freedom to be free from something. Unfortunately, in a world where the average child sees 40000 advertisements per year, it is now a luxury to be free from advertisement. There is "no space," as Naomi Klein says, children need a place where they can simply be without being forced to see themselves through the lens of advertisement and commodities. Henry Giroux states it well:

Intent on defining itself as a purveyor of ideas rather than commodities, Disney is aggressively developing its image as a public service industry. For example, in what can be seen as an extraordinary venture, Disney plans to construct in the next few years a prototype school that one of its brochures proclaims will "serve as a model for education into the next century." The school will be part of 5,000 acre residential development, which according to Disney executives, will be designed after "the main streets of small-town America and reminiscent of Norman Rockwell images."[H. Giroux]

It is important for parents to understand, as Disney does, that in today's economy ideas are a commodity, and perhaps we should not buy them all, for they can be deleterious to the family. Indeed, when Americans think that to be a good parent they need to conform to the ideas Disney presents, then it is time to ask questions. Why should Disney be an intermediary between ourselves and our parenting goals? Why should I give important information about me and/or my children to Disney who will then have the power to use it in advertising research? Why should I trust a company that portrays young women as subservient, sexualized and objectified beings? Why should I subject myself or my child to more advertisements? Why should I buy a phone from Disney when many of the features offered are offered by other providers, just in a different package? Ask yourself these questions.

In classes I teach, I have noticed that students will often defend Disney and other corporations as if they were a member of the family. In fact, students will often find nothing wrong with Disney but will speak for hours about how terrible their parents were. This represents a fundamental misunderstanding of corporate behavior and the role of parents. Unfortunately, childrens' perception of what a company is and what a parent should be are often formed by listening to TV, and to Disney. Parents' voices are drowned out by the corporate noise. So, again, just one more reason not to buy the latest product from Disney.

If all my shouting and preaching hasn't convinced you yet, then I have just one more picture of Disney's philosophy, the one they want to instill in you anyway. You can find it on the trash cans at Disneyland:

[Note: Updated and edited for spelling, formatting and clarity.]

Paris-Los Angeles: Walks on the wild side

Today in L.A., protesters will flood the streets in an attempt to be heard on immigration "reform." Yesterday, protests, accompanied by some violence, came back to the streets of Paris, and, indeed, all of France yesterday, the NYTimes reported.

On the surface, the French are fighting against changes in laws that make firing young workers easier. On the surface, we are told (by the Minutemen and Lou Dobbs), that the protesters in L.A. are fighting to keep "lax" immigration laws and enforcement and that it "patriotic" to build an even bigger fence (I wonder who will make the profits at an expected 1.7 million per mile) and to let border crossers starve by making it illegal to even give crossers food or water.

Dig a little deeper and you will find common strands that tie Paris, Marseille, Chicago, L.A., Tijuana and Ciudad Juarez. Dig a little deeper and you will find that border fences built in the name of patriotism, are really just pork. And while you are digging there, ask yourself why this is becoming a hot-button issue all of a sudden and which "side" (Republican or Democrat) will win the political battle once "real Americans" are enflammed by the patriotic rhetoric. Also, ask yourself why journalists and politicians rarely point out that NAFTA has hurt Mexico and is thus a driving force behind illegal immigration. Expand NAFTA to a global level and you get the WTO, which is a driving force behind job insecurity in France, the U.S., Mexico, and all over the world.

Now, do you really trust CNN and FOX News to guide us through this discussion? Are you going to let them push your buttons? Are you going to allow corporations to hire cheap labor here, exploit workers abroad, and reap the benefits of tax breaks at "home" in the U.S.?

Read the following paragraph and think about the U.S.:

...Philippe Robert found out that starting from the early years of the twentieth century (that is, by more than sheer coincidence, from the early years of the social state), fears of crime began to subside. They went on diminishing until the middle of the 1970s, when a sudden eruption of 'personal safety' panic focused...on the crime apparently brewing in the [poor neighborhoods] where immigrant settlers were concentrated. What erupted was however, in Robert's view, but a 'delayed action bomb': explosice security concerns had already been stored up by the slow yet steady phasing out of the collective insurance that the social state used to offer and by the rapid deregulation of the labour market. Recast as a 'danger to safety', the immigrants offered a convenient alternative focus for the apprehensions born of the sudden shakiness and vulnerability of social positions, and so they were a relatively safe outlet for the discharge of anxiety and anger which such apprehensions could not but cause. [Zygmunt Bauman in Wasted Lives p. 55]

Though Robert is referring to the 1970s in France, you can easily see the similarities between then and now, and there and here.

I would argue, then, that rising economic insecurity is not the result of immigration; immigration is the result of rising economic insecurity.

Indeed (getting back to France for a minute), before you go thinking "Oh those spoiled French workers," go read this post by Jérôme à Paris (Why the fight in France is the same as in the U.S.). While there, check out his diary for other posts about blatant media bias in these matters and interesting stats that reveal, among other things, that unionization rates are actually lower in France than here. So, at the risk of repeating some of what Jérôme has said, but with the hope of enlarging the discussion, why are young French people revolting, and why is it important?

You see a lot of background and fundamentals over at Jérôme's diary, but a good summary of Friday's events and the situation were written by someone Emmanuel refers to--Eric Chaney (a leftist) at Morgan Stanley:

The fundamental reason why attempts to reform the labour market in France have failed so far lies in what several economists, ranging from Prof. Gilles Saint-Paul of the University of Toulouse to Prof. Olivier Blanchard from the MIT, have named the “insider disease” — which I denounced back in 1995 (see ‘The Inside Worker Disease’, Inside the French Economy, December 1995). In short, the French labour market is a two-tiered market with, on the one hand, highly protected workers (civil servants and holders of permanent contracts, mostly in large companies) and, on the other, highly flexible jobs (internships, short-term contracts, temporary jobs) for new entrants, immigrants and, more generally, unskilled workers. The reason why college and high-school students are demonstrating, sometimes violently, is obvious: they strongly resent this situation as unfair — why would they accept reforms while nobody is questioning the privileges of the insiders?

Chaney concludes by noting : "Piecemeal reforms that do not question the status of insiders are doomed to fail, in my view, because they are opposed by insiders, who fear that they may be the next on the list, and outsiders, who consider them as discriminatory and continue to dream of becoming themselves inside." [His emphasis.] Of course, I would extend insider status to many groups, including an ever richer and smaller bourgoisie, to corporations on their way to becoming global monpolies, to the Western world. Les bourgeois, c'est comme des cochons, to quote Brel.

According to Chaney (and Emmanuel over at AFOE), then, the true root of the problem is large unfairness of the job market, not only in salaries but also (especially) in job stability. This inequality is even greater in the U.S. because we tie health benefits to jobs.

Of course, how to deal with this inequality is largely what has defined left-right politics for a long time. A discussion of left-right could take up a million pages, so let's not get into that here. I will say however, that the neo-liberal policies of large-scale supposedly free-markets seems to have been a series of of failures--NAFTA is just one example--and the promises of trickle-down economics, tax cuts for the upper classes, and privatization have been shown to be, at worst, enormous failures, and, at best, middling successes. Poverty and inequality have grown worse all over the planet, and they are growing ever worse in the U.S. and Europe, though much, much faster here than there. Moreover, during this time, the social network has been eroded, especially in the U.S., and, perhaps more importantly, the voices for reinforcing the social network have disappeared from the public sphere. Voices for the left have also dissapeared from Socialist (Europe) and Democratic (U.S.) parties. This explains why Robert's ideas are so appropriate to French workers, U.S. workers and immigrants: "Recast as a 'danger to safety', the immigrants offered a convenient alternative focus for the apprehensions born of the sudden shakiness and vulnerability of social positions"

What remains to be said, then, and what is more important to me is that French workers, like workers here and all over the planet are suffering from a crisis of representation. There is no more representation in government, we have weak unions and a media that has no desire to bring these voices to the table. Emmanuel hints at this when he writes: "The first thing to keep in mind is that the French parliament is inherently weak: when the government really wants a law to be passed, it always gets its way." Yes, the French parliament is inherently weak; in the U.S., it has become so. And if a strong executive and week legislative sound familiar, well, then you know why an ignited Paris is important and why voices are searching for recognition in L.A., Chicago...everywhere.

In France, they have taken it upon themselves to make their voice heard. They want representation, they want a voice. But the social contract is broken. What this means is that, while the government may see some valid (from a left-wing point of view) economic reasons for the reforming the laws in France, the crisis in representation means that the government can no longer be trusted to enact any reforms, even good ones. (Note: I'm not saying the new contract law is necessarily good.) Mistrust of the government is as much a reason for the protests as the issues in the reform law itself.

The United States is not to this point yet. In spite of the fact that our government has been overtly undermining the social contract for at least 25 decades; in spite of Katrina; in spite of the war; in spite of no-bid contracts; in spite of horrendous gutting of environmental laws; in spite of Abramoff;in spite of the takeover of the fourth estate; in spite of everything georgia10 said the other day, we are still asleep.

Sure, in our beds, be they soft or hard, we kick, we roll over, we are uncomfortable, we are prodded with nightmares of immigration by the media and simultaneously lulled to sleep by their platitudes.

So we still sleep.

One thing that we do not have that the Europeans do is a press that (a little) more accurately represents the views of its constituents. Europeans therefore have an social and economic vocabulary to discuss their situation, to find motivation or, at least, vent frustration. They have, to some degree, a vocabulary that allows them to think about the future and reflect on the present. Have you noticed how little we talk about the future in the U.S.? Have you noticed how young people here have begun to assume that they will not do better than their parents? Have you noticed the statistics of youth and young adults are living longer and longer at home and have worse and worse jobs? Have you noticed that the only national vocabulary we have to talk about it is "tax cuts"? Have you noticed how the talk of outsourcing always turns to "secure borders" and "bad foreigners" rather than improving labor laws and land reform all over the world so that people don't have to leave home? (For people do not cross borders for fun. I repeat: people do not cross borders for fun.)

All of the above is the result of a lacking or lackluster vocabulary for explaining our situation. It is the symptom of the financial tools (GDP, unemployment) we choose to use to measure our success and our failure, tools, which are at best incomplete because they do not give a full accounting of our lives or of the costs (and worth) of our lives. Thus, lacking representation, we need a voice. More importantly, we must begin to act quickly, and we must look to the poorest for leadership, for their voices and ours have more more in common than the media leads us to beleive.

In France it sometimes helps to take to the streets. I hate to end on a questions, but what does it take here? Blogs? Really--what will shake us out of our sleep? Soon we will be among the superfluous:

Superfluous people are in a no-win situation. If they attempt to fall in line with currently lauded ways of life, they are immediately accused of sinful arrogance, false pretences and the cheek of claiming unearned bonuses [How dare American children get a free education in our schools! Why should my tax dollars go to a welfare recipient in West Virginia! I'm not paying for universal health care!]...If they [the Superfluous] openly resent and refuse to honour those ways which may be savoured by the haves but are more like poison for themselves, the have-nots, this is promptly taken as proof of what 'public opinion' (more correctly, its elected or self-appointed spokespersons) 'told you all along'--that the superfluous are not just an alien body, but a cancerous growth gnawing at the healthy tissues of society and sworn enemies of 'our way of life' and 'what we stand for'. [Bauman, p. 41]

Have a nice Saturday.

French Racists and the 10 Condiments!

Note: This is an essay covering topics of geopolitical import. Please read it carefully, for it explains in intricate detail how, starting with the Bryant Gumble Revolution, America overcame its demons. Because of a poll that was recently conducted, the essay begins with France, a country that has failed miserably because it lacks the ability to act upon its introspection. This leads the essay to a thoughtful examination of the crucial period of the early 80's. I then develop and conclude with a significant insight into what historians will call the Condi Rice Era.

The essayist apologizes for following the strict structure of the essay form. (Essay comes from the French word "essai," which can be loosely translated as "trial," "attempt" or "experiment." And this essay is just that. It is a trial, an attempt at understanding the present and predicting the future. So, dear Reader, your patience is appreciated, as is your open mind.)


Part I: The French Problem
I was shocked to find out today that French people are racists. And this news doesn’t come from a Bush administration official, PNAC or the Wall Street Journal, but from the French themselves. Indeed, a recent poll indicated that 30% (or something like that) of the population (of that former Roman territory) considers itself racist.

You know, while living there, I kind of suspected this. There were the tell-tale signs: I saw mostly white folks stores like the Bon Marché, yet there were just a few chez Tati. I also noticed that even in France's capital city there are poor, non-white people living in sub-standard conditions. (Now, to be fair, they do provide the poor with health care and numerous childcare options, but that doesn’t make things alright with me. I don't care how much you help people--it's the thought that counts. So, even if French people are helping poor African immigrants, it doesn't matter because their heart is in the wrong place, as the survey says.)

Part 2: A New Age Dawns
Television news has always been a progressive reflection of society, so a lot can be learned looking at how France and America® do things. For example, when I was in France, another thing I noticed was that French TV hosts are almost always white. That’s a problem because TV hosts can and do change the world. Luckily for us, America solved its racism problems a long time ago. This was known as the Bryant Gumble Revolution. This was when all Americans quit being racist because we finally understood that people with colored skin were not always like Richard Pryor or Malcolm X. Rather, they were just like us! Since then, we've had people like Barack Obama. He transcends race, as do most people who don't talk about it much.

But let's leave Barack aside a moment, for I do believe we are at a crossroads: America (and the world) are currently in what serious historians will probably call the Condi Rice era. It is an age of glory, truth and justice for all creeds and colors. History is over and race is an afterthought. What proof do I have of this? Well, though we are still awaiting the arrival of the Ten Condiments, we do still know that the present era represents a profound change. How profound? Well, for the first time, the Senate heard a black woman’s testimony without challenging her veracity.

Getting back to France and the poll that shows they are racist... I think this poll represents an important step in American journalism: the AP did, for once, report what a French person thinks rather than what an American person thinks a French person thinks. Really, this is important, so I checked with my contacts at CJR, FAIR and Media Matters and they agree. (Does that make me a reporter now, like Ben Domenech, and not just a blogger? Gosh, I hope so!)

This new pollalso really just confirms what those car burnings were all about. Now, you think I’m going to say "because racism exists in France, that ’s why those disaffected youth took to the street to protest that (as well as the sinister forms of institutional racism that frame their lives.)" Well, this time you’re right. Racism--and class difference--exist in France, that ’s why those disaffected youth took to the street to protest. What do you expect, France is still socialist and now the people are revolting against the sinister forms of institutional racism that frame their lives. Luckily, in America, we no longer have to worry about government repression because neoliberalism and capitalism have brought us all the freedoms we need.

You may also remember that last weekend one million (1,000,000) French youth marched peacefully to protest a new law that allows employers to fire young people pretty much at will. While the car fires showed how disorderly French youth could be, this protest shows how spoiled and utopian the French are. Fighting for your rights is so passé, and now it may get you fired! (“You’re fired!” That’s so classic!)

Part 3: Confronting Our Demons
Now, you’re thinking: “what about Katrina?” I’m here to report that there was, kind of like for Karballah and Fallujah, a lot--a lot!--of false reporting. For example, all those reports about violence in the SuperDome, they were false. Really--even Voice of America says so! Those people, mostly African American it appeared to me, were not as disorderly and violent as it might have seemed. It was just an impression, thank goodness, and that really reminds me of why the Bryant Gumble Revolution was so important to our country and why Condi Rice is proof of the absence of racism in America. It’s all very logical if you think about it and that is why the 10 Condiments (whenever they come and whatever they say) will be so very revolutionary.

In conclusion, I think I understand why the French are racist and, more importantly for today’s news, why they consider themselves such. France has prosecuted numerous territorial, imperialistic wars. Think Napoleon, South-East Asia, North Africa, West Africa, Canada, and a dastardly (and successful) pre-emptive strike on Wallis and Futuna. This did not just come from the blue (or should I say Le Grand Bleu), but from a deep-seated belief that they were not just equal to, but better. The Best. The Best. They have HUGE egos.

Now me, I'm a huge--HUGE!--Lee Greenwood fan (I own “God Bless the USA/Proud to be an American”--I even have the American Idol version of the song that came out after, well, you know). Anyway, I think that Lee and I agree that there is a difference between pride and thinking you’re the best. I really don’t think he is trying to say America is “The Greatest.” He’s just saying we’re great, really great, but not necessarily The Greatest.

And that’s why Condi Rice is such an important figure in this essay and, dare I say, in the whole world. She’s now our Secretary of State and has John Bolton (he happens to be white so she’s not racist either) working for her at the United Nations. Since America is a land of equality and opportunity, we will be able to convey those and other ideals (democracy and freedom, for example, and our greatest gift, representative capitalism) to the world. Maybe we can spread a little humility, culture and tolerance for other races too, because, obviously they need it! In fact, I suspect that one or several of the 10 Condiments will focus on this and they will actually replace the UN Charter. Furthermore, they will be written in English Only, and French will no longer be one of the official diplomatic languages, precisely because the French are racist.

Part 4: The Final Countdown
In a final conclusion, I feel compelled to address those critics who say I'm leaving out our own history when I don't mention Native Americans, Latinos, Asians and other people whose skin is not white. My point is that things have changed and that Americans need to have a different mindset. Back in the day, we used to send people of color away. For example, we sent Josephine Baker and James Baldwin to Paris not because they weren't welcom here, but to show how amazing these black folk could be. And though the Liberal Left will say they were fleeing oppression here, that's just not true. They were sent to the even more racist country of France as punishment and show them how life was actually pretty darn good here. This recent poll just proves my point again. Furthermore, if any residual racism lingers here after the pronouncement of the 10 Condiments, it will no doubt dissapear quickly. (My concern is that the Condiments will not appear until the burning Bush. I know that this may be as worrisome to you as to me, but rest assured: anonymous sources tell me that Barbara's hair spontaneously combusted several weeks ago.)

So, in my last conclusion, , I will say, without equivocation, that France is racist and the age of the 10 Condiments lies just around the corner. This will be much better than the Teresa Heinz 57 (so verbose that Kerry clan) or heavy racist French fare such as the Hollandaise 11, the Dijonnaise 24 and Beurre Blanc for Dummies .