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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on March 25, 2016 at 12:04 am
In September, 2013, President Barack Obama and Senate Democrats refused to knuckle under to yet another Republican extortion threat: Defund the Affordable Care Act (ACA) or we’ll shut down the government.
Republicans claimed it was Obama and Senate Democrats who refused to see reason and negotiate.
But then a Republican accidentally gave away the real reason for the shutdown.
“We’re not going to be disrespected,” Rep. Marlin Stutzman (R-Ind.) told the Washington Examiner. “We have to get something out of this. And I don’t know what that even is.”
Marlin Stutzman
In short, Republicans–as admitted by Martlin Stutzman–were out to get “respect.” A member of the Crips or Bloods couldn’t have said it better.
The shutdown began on October 1, 2013–and ended 16 days later with even Republicans admitting it had been a failure.
President Obama, a former attorney, denounced House Republicans as guilty of “extortion” and “blackmail.” Had the President acted to prosecute such criminal conduct, the results would have been:
- Facing lengthy prison terms, those indicted Republicans would been forced to lawyer-up. That in itself would have been no small thing, since good criminal lawyers cost big bucks.
- Obsessed with their own personal survival, they would have found little time for engaging in the same thuggish behavior that got them indicted. In fact, doing so would have only made their conviction more likely.
- Those Republicans who hadn’t been indicted would have realized: “I could be next.” This would have produced a chilling effect on their willingness to engage in further acts of subversion and/or extortion.
- The effect on Right-wing Republicans would have been the same as that of President Ronald Reagan’s firing of striking air traffic controllers: “You cross me and threaten the security of this Nation at your own peril.”
True, some prosecuted Republicans might have beaten the rap. But first they would have been forced to spend huge amounts of time and money on their defense.
And with 75% of Americans voicing disgust with Congress, most of those prosecuted might well have been convicted.
It would have been a long time before Republicans again dared to engage in such behavior.
The ancient Greeks believed: “A man’s character is his fate.” It is Obama’s character–and America’s fate–that he is more inclined to conciliation than confrontation.
Richard Wolffe chronicled Obama’s winning of the White House in his book Renegade: The Making of a President. He noted that Obama was always more comfortable when responding to Republican attacks on his character than he was in making attacks of his own.
Obama came into office determined to find common ground with Republicans. But they quickly made it clear to him that they only wanted his political destruction.
At that point, he should have put aside his hopes for a “Kumbaya moment” and applied what Niccolo Machiavelli famously said in The Prince on the matter of love versus fear:
Niccolo Machiavelli
From this arises the question whether it is better to be loved than feared, or feared more than loved. The reply is, that one ought to be both feared and loved, but as it is difficult for the two to go together, it is much safer to be feared than loved.
For it may be said of men in general that they are ungrateful, voluble, dissemblers, anxious to avoid danger and covetous of gain.
As long as you benefit them, they are entirely yours: they offer you their blood, their goods, their life and their children, when the necessity is remote. But when it approaches, they revolt….
And men have less scruple in offending one who makes himself loved than one who makes himself feared; for love is held by a chain of obligations which, men being selfish, is broken whenever it serves their purpose; but fear is maintained by a dread of punishment which never fails.
By refusing to vigorously prosecute acts of Republican extortion, President Obama has unleashed twin disasters upon himself and the United States:
First, Republicans have been encouraged to intensify their acts of aggression against him.
Their most recent act: Refusing to meet with federal appeals court judge Merrick Garland. Obama’s designated nominee to the Supreme Court after the February 13 death of Justice Antonin Scalia.
Kentucky United States Senator Mitch McConnell has flatly stated: There will be no Supreme Court hearings–not during regular business or a post-election lame-duck session.
Had Obama proceeded with indictments against Republican extortion in 2011 or 2013, McConnell–who supported the extortion attempts of those years–would now be desperately meeting with his lawyers.
Second, Republicans have unleashed their tactics of extortion against one another.
Donald Trump, their front-running Presidential candidate, has openly threatened to aim violence at Republican delegates who do not accept him as their nominee.
As Philip Klein, the managing editor of the Washington Examiner, recently wrote:
“Political commentators now routinely talk about the riots that would break out in Cleveland if Trump were denied the nomination, about how his supporters have guns and all hell could break loose, that they would burn everything to the ground. It works to Trump’s advantage to not try too hard to dispel these notions.”
Thus, those who submit to the aggression of criminals only encourage contempt–and increased aggression–from those same criminals.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on March 24, 2016 at 12:30 am
On July 9, 2011, Republican extortionists threatened the Nation with financial ruin and international disgrace unless their demands were met.
President Barack Obama could have countered that danger with the Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act. Among the crimes it authorizes for prosecution: Extortion.
Extortion is defined as “a criminal offense which occurs when a person unlawfully obtains either money, property or services from a person(s), entity, or institution, through coercion.”
And if President Obama had believed that RICO was not sufficient to deal with extortionate behavior, he could have relied on the USA Patriot Act of 2001, passed in the wake of 9/11.
President George W. Bush signs the USA Patriot Act into law – October 26, 2001
In Section 802, the Act defines domestic terrorism. Among the behavior that is defined as criminal:
“Activities that…appear to be intended…to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion [and]…occur primarily within the territorial jurisdiction of the United States.”
The remedies for punishing such criminal behavior were legally in place. President Obama needed only to direct the Justice Department to apply them.
Prosecuting members of Congress would not have violated the separation-of-powers principle. Congressmen have in the past been investigated, indicted and convicted for various criminal offenses.
Such prosecutions–and especially convictions–would have served notice on current and future members of Congress that the lives and fortunes of American citizens may not be held hostage as part of a negotiated settlement.
On August 1, Chris Matthews, host of MSNBC’s “Hardball,” wrapped up his program with a search for “options” to avoid another round of Republican extortion tactics.
Chris Matthews
“I want to know what steps the president ‘could’ have taken to avoid this hostage-taking.
“…Is there another way than either buckling to the Republicans or letting the government and the country crash?
“How does he use the power of the presidency, the logic, emotion and basic patriotism of the people, to thwart those willing to threaten, disrupt, even possibly destroy to get their way?”
The answer to his questions–then and now–is: Replace the law of fear with the rule of law.
But there was another way Obama could have stood up to Republican extortionists: By urging his fellow Americans to rally to him in a moment of supreme national danger.
President John F. Kennedy did just that–successfully–during the most dangerous crisis of his administration.
Addressing the Nation on October 22, 1962, Kennedy shocked his fellow citizens by revealing that the Soviet Union had installed offensive nuclear missiles in Cuba.
John F. Kennedy
After outlining a series of steps he had taken to end the crisis, Kennedy sought to reassure and inspire his audience. His words are worth remembering today:
“The path we have chosen for the present is full of hazards, as all paths are, but it is the one most consistent with our character and courage as a nation and our commitments around the world.
“The cost of freedom is always high, but Americans have always paid it. And one path we shall never choose, and that is the path of surrender or submission.”
President Obama could have sent that same message to the extortionists of the Republican Party.
Yet this was another option he failed to exploit. And he and the Nation have continued to pay the price for it.
In the fall of 2013, Republicans once again threatened to shut down the Federal Government unless the President agreed to defund the Affordable Care Act (ACA), better known as “Obamacare.
They were enraged that millions of uninsured Americans might receive medical care on a par with that given members of the House and Senate.
So on September 20, the House voted on a short-term government funding bill that included a provision to defund Obamacare.
That provision was a no-go for Senate Democrats and President Obama. If the House and Senate couldn’t reach a compromise, many functions of the federal government would be shut down indefinitely on October 1.
The official reason given by Republicans: They wanted to save the country from bankruptcy–although the Congressional Budget Office stated that the ACA would lower future deficits and Medicare spending.
After passing the House and Senate, the ACA had been signed into law by President Obama on March 23, 2010.
On June 28, 2012, the United States Supreme Court–whose Chief Justice, John Roberts, is a Republican–had upheld the constitutionality of the ACA.
Yet House Republicans continued searching for a way to stop the law from taking effect. By September, 2013, they had voted 42 times to repeal “Obamacare.”
But their efforts had failed; the Democratic-led Senate made it clear it would never go along with such legislation.
Finally, unable to legally overturn the Act or to legislatively repeal it, House Republicans fell back on something much simpler: Threats and fear.
Threats–of voting to shut down salaries paid to most Federal employees. Most, because they themselves would continue to draw hefty salaries while denying them to FBI agents, air traffic controllers and members of the military, among others.
And fear–that would be generated throughout the Federal government, the United States and America’s international allies.
On October 1, 2013, House Republicans made good on their threat. They “shut down the government.”
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on March 23, 2016 at 12:01 am
On July 9, 2011, Republican extortionists threatened the Nation with financial ruin and international disgrace unless their demands were met. They refused to raise the debt ceiling unless Democrats agreed to massively cut social programs for the elderly, poor and disabled.
If Congress failed to raise the borrowing limit of the federal government by August 2, the date when the U.S. reached the limit of its borrowing abilities, it would begin defaulting on its loans.
As Warren Buffett, CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, explained the looming economic catastrophe: “If you don’t send out Social Security checks, I would hate to think about the credit meeting at S&P and Moody’s the next morning.
“If you’re not paying millions and millions and millions of people that range in age from 65 on up, money you promised them, you’re not a AAA,” said Buffett.
Warren Buffett
A triple-A credit rating is the highest possible rating that can be received.
And while Republicans demanded that the disadvantaged tighten their belts, they rejected any raising of taxes on their foremost constituency–the wealthiest 1%.
To raise taxes on the wealthy, they insisted, would be a “jobs-killer.” It would “discourage” corporate CEOs from creating tens of thousands of jobs they “want” to create.
Republicans knew this argument was a lie. And so did the editors of Time. The difference between them: The editors of Time were willing to reveal the truth.
In its June 20, 2011 cover-story on “What U.S. Economic Recovery? Five Destructive Myths,” Rana Foroohar, the magazine’s assistant managing editor in charge of economics and business, delivered this warning: Profit-seeking corporations can’t be relied on to ”make it all better.”
Wrote Foroohar:
“There is a fundamental disconnect between the fortunes of American companies, which are doing quite well, and American workers, most of whom are earning a lower hourly wage now than they did during the recession.
“The thing is, companies make plenty of money; they just don’t spend it on workers here.
“There may be $2 trillion sitting on the balance sheets of American corporations globally, but firms show no signs of wanting to spend it in order to hire workers at home.”
As the calendar moved ever closer to the fateful date of August 2, Republican leaders continued to insist: Any deal that includes taxes “can’t pass the House.”
One senior Republican said talks would go right up to–and maybe beyond–the brink of default.
“I think we’ll be here in August,” said Republican Rep. Pete Sessions, of Texas. “We are not going to leave town until a proper deal gets done.”
President Obama had previously insisted on extending the debt ceiling through 2012. But in mid-July, he simply asked congressional leaders to review three options with their members:
- The “Grand Bargain” choice—favored by Obama–would cut deficits by about $4 trillion, including spending cuts and new tax revenues.
- A medium-range plan would aim to reduce the deficit by about $2 trillion.
- The smallest option would cut between $1 trillion and $1.5 trillion, without increased tax revenue or any Medicare and Medicaid cuts.
And the Republican response?
Said Rep. Darrell Issa, chairman of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee: “Quite frankly, [Republican] members of Congress are getting tired of what the president won’t do and what the president wants.”
Noted political analyst Chris Matthews summed up the sheer criminality of what happened within the House of Representatives.
Speaking on MSNBC’s “Hardball,” on July 28–five days before Congress reached its August 2 deadline to raise the debt-ceiling–Matthews noted:
“The first people to bow to the demands of those threatening to blow up the economy were the Republicans in the House, the leaders. The leaders did what the followers told them to do: meet the demands, hold up the country to get their way.
Chris Matthews
“Those followers didn’t win the Senate, or the Presidency, just the House. But by using the House they were able to hold up the entire United States government. They threatened to blow things up economically and it worked.
“They said they were willing to do that–just to get their way–not by persuasion, not by politics, not by democratic government, but by threatening the destruction of the country’s finances.
“Right. So what’s next? The power grid? Will they next time threaten to close down the country’s electricity and communications systems?”
With the United States teetering on the brink of national bankruptcy, President Obama faced three choices:
- Counter Republican extortion attempts via RICO–the Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations Act.
- Make a “Cuban Missile Crisis”-style address to the American people, seeking to rally them against a criminal threat to the financial security of the Nation.
- Cave in to Republican demands.
Unfortunately for Obama and the Nation, he chose Number Three.
But he could have countered that danger via the Racketeer Influenced Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act.
In 1970, Congress passed RICO, Title 18, United States Code, Sections 1961-1968. Its goal: Destroy the Mafia.
U.S. Department of Justice
RICO opens with a series of definitions of “racketeering activity” which can be prosecuted by Justice Department attorneys. Among those crimes: Extortion.
Extortion is defined as “a criminal offense which occurs when a person unlawfully obtains either money, property or services from a person(s), entity, or institution, through coercion.”
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on March 22, 2016 at 12:01 am
On March 16, Donald Trump, the front-runner for the Republican Presidential nomination, issued a warning to his fellow Right-wingers: If he didn’t win the GOP nomination at the convention in July, his supporters would literally riot.
“I think we’ll win before getting to the convention. But I can tell you if we didn’t, if we’re 20 votes short or if we’re 100 short and we’re at 1,100 and somebody else is at 500 or 400…I don’t think you can say that we don’t get it automatically. I think you’d have riots.
“I think you would see problems like you’ve never seen before. I think bad things would happen. I really do. I wouldn’t lead it, but I think bad things would happen.”
Donald Trump
An NBC reporter summed it up as follows: “As Trump indicated, there is a very real possibility he might lose the nomination if he wins only a plurality of delegates thanks to party rules that allow delegates to support different candidates after the initial ballot.
“In that context, the message to Republicans was clear on [March 16]: Nice convention you got there, shame if something happened to it.”
Anyone who’s ever watched a Mafia movie has heard similar threats: “You really ought to think about paying that protection money. Nice family you got–it would be a shame if anything happened to ’em.”
Paul Ryan, Republican Speaker of the House of Representatives, was quick to respond.
On March 17, he said that it was “unacceptable” for Trump to suggest there would be rioting if he was not chosen as the Republican nominee.
“Nobody should say such things in my opinion because to even address or hint to violence is unacceptable.”
Paul Ryan
And Ohio governor and Republican presidential candidate John Kasich chinned in. “Leaders don’t imply violence,” Kasich told “Face the Nation” on March 20.
“When he says that there could be riots, that’s inappropriate. I think you understand that, okay? Secondly, while we have our differences and disagreements, we’re Americans. Americans don’t say, ‘Let’s take to the streets and have violence.’
John Kasich
“I don’t even want to use the word ‘riots’ or ‘violence.’ That’s inappropriate. Our kids are watching. Now…that doesn’t mean I’m not running a positive campaign, but those kind of comments are way out of bounds. Frankly, they’re outrageous,” said Kasich.”
Yet, for all their public outrage, Republicans are no strangers to the uses of extortion and threats. Their tactics are straight out of the playbook of Adolf Hitler.
Robert Payne, author of the bestselling biography, The Life and Death of Adolf Hitler (1973), described the “negotiating” style of the Nazi dictator thus:
“Although Hitler prized his own talents as a negotiator, a man always capable of striking a good bargain, he was totally lacking in finesse. He was incapable of bargaining. He was like a man who goes up to a fruit peddler and threatens to blow his brains out if he does not sell his applies at the lowest possible price.”
In 1994, Newt Gingrich, then Speaker of the House of Representatives, shut down the Federal Government. Officially, the reason was a budget impasse with President Bill Clinton.
Unofficially–and in reality–the reason was altogether different: Clinton had forced him to sit in the back of Air Force One on a trip to Israel for the funeral of former prime minister Yitzhak Rabin.
“This is petty,” Gingrich confessed to startled reporters. “I’m going to say up front it’s petty, But I think it’s human.
“When you land at Andrews [Air Force Base, in Washington, D.C.] and you’ve been on the plane for 25 hours and nobody has talked to you and they ask you to get off by the back ramp….You just wonder, where is their sense of manners, where is their sense of courtesy?”
Gingrich’s childish verbal tirade was a public relations disaster for the Republicans. “Cry Baby,” screamed the New York Daily News, next to a picture of Gingrich in a diaper.
When House Democrats brought a poster-sized image of the cartoon onto the floor, the Republican majority forced them to remove it.
But the damage was done, and Republicans paid a fearful price at the polls for the shutdown and Gingrich’s candor about the reason for it, losing heavily in the House and Senate.
Still, the Republicans continued their policy of my-way-or-else.
In April, 2011, the United States government almost shut down over Republican demands about subsidized pap smears.
During a late-night White House meeting with President Barack Obama and key Congressional leaders, Republican House Speaker John Boehner made this threat:
His conference would not approve funding for the government if any money were allowed to flow to Planned Parenthood through Title X legislation.
Facing an April 8 deadline, negotiators worked day and night to strike a compromise–and finally reached one.
Three months later–on July 9–Republican extortionists again threatened the Nation with financial ruin and international disgrace unless their demands were met.
Sign of The Black Hand
President Obama had offered to make historic cuts in the federal government and the social safety net–on which millions of Americans depend for their most basic needs.
But House Speaker John Boehner rejected that offer. He would not agree to the tax increases that Democrats wanted to impose on the wealthiest 1% as part of the bargain.
John Boehner
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In Bureaucracy, Entertainment, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on March 21, 2016 at 12:01 am
“Bridge of Spies” vividly recaptures a now-forgotten time in American history.
It was the time of “the Cold War.” A time when:
- America was almost universally seen as “The Good Guy,” in contrast to “The Bad Guy” of the Soviet Union;
- The United States and the Soviet Union held each other at bay with arsenals of nuclear weapons;
- Wisconsin Senator Joseph R. McCarthy terrorized the nation, accusing anyone who disagreed with him of being a Communist–and leaving ruined lives in his wake;
- American TVs blared commercials warning that Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev had boasted: “We will bury you”; and
- Children and teenagers were taught in school that they could survive a nuclear attack through “duck and cover” drills. They were instructed to keep their bathtubs filled with water for safe drinking, in the event of a Soviet nuclear strike.
Bert the Turtle teaches schoolchildren to “Duck and Cover”
Yet even in this poisonous atmosphere of fear and denunciation, some men stood out as heroes–simply by holding fast to their consciences.
One of these was a New York insurance attorney named James B. Donovan (played by Tom Hanks). Asked by the Justice Department to defend arrested Soviet spy Rudolph Abel (Mark Rylance) Donovan did what no one expected.
He gave Abel a truly vigorous defense, arguing that the evidence used to convict him was the legally-tainted product of an invalid search warrant.
Upon Abel’s conviction and sentencing to 45 years’ imprisonment, Donovan again shocked the political and legal communities by appealing the case to the Supreme Court.
Donovan argued that Constitutional protections should apply to everyone–including non-Americans–tried in American courts. To do less made a mockery of the very freedoms we claimed to champion.
He lost by a vote of 5-4. But the arguments he made would resurface 50 years later when al-Qaeda suspects were hauled into American courts.
James B. Donovan
In 1961, Donovan was again called upon to render service by a Federal agency–this time the CIA. It wanted his help in negotiating the release of its spy, Francis Gary Powers, shot down over the Soviet Union in 1960 while flying a high-altitude U-2 spy plane.
Throughout “Bridge of Spies,” audiences learn some unsettling truths about how the American government–and governments generally– actually operate.
The first three of these were outlined in Part one of this series:
Truth #1: Appearance counts for more than reality.
Truth #2: Individual conscience can wreck the best-laid plans of government.
Truth #3: High-ranking government officials will ask citizens to take risks they themselves refuse to take.
Now for the remaining truths revealed in this movie.
Truth #4: Appeals to fear often prevail when appeals to humanity are ignored.
After crossing into East Germany, Donovan enters into negotiations with Wolfgang Vogel, a lawyer representing the East German government.
Vogel offers to exchange Frederic Pryor, an American economics graduate student seized by the East German secret police, for Abel. Donovan replies this is a deal-breaker; the United States (which is never mentioned during the negotiations) wants Powers, not Pryor.
Nevertheless, Donovan is equally concerned for Pryor, and adds him to the list of hostages to be released in return for Abel.
Then a new complication arises: The East German government that holds Pryor threatens to pull out. claiming to be insulted because Donovan did not inform them that the USSR was a party to the negotiation.
His reasoned, legal arguments having failed, Donovan resorts to a threat. He conveys a warning to the president of East Germany:
Abel has not yet revealed any Soviet secrets. But if this deal fails, he may well do so to earn favors from the United States government. And, in that case, the Soviets will blame you–Erich Honecker, the president of East Germany–for the resulting damage.
Where arguments based on humanity have failed, this one–based on fear–works. A prisoner-exchange is arranged.
Truth #5: Personal loyalty can supersede bureaucratic inventions.
On February 10, 1962, Donovan, Abel and several CIA agents arrive at the Glienicke Bridge, which connects East and West Germany. The Soviets have Powers, but not Pryor–who is to be released at Checkpoint Charlie, a crossing point between East and West Berlin.
Glienicke Bridge, the “Bridge of Spies”
The CIA agent in charge of the American delegation tells Abel he can cross into East Germany, even though Pryor has not been released.
But Abel has learned that Donovan has negotiated the release of not only Powers but Pryor. Out of loyalty to the man who has vigorously defended him, he waits on his side of the bridge until word arrives that Pryor has been released.
Then Abel crosses into East Germany while Powers crosses into the Western sector.
Donovan returns home. Before flying off to West Germany, he had told his wife he was going on a fishing trip in Scotland.
His wife and children learn the truth about the risks he ran and the success he attained only when a television newscast breaks the news:
Francis Gary Powers has been returned to the United States. And the man responsible is James Donovan, once the most reviled man in America for having defended a notorious Soviet spy.
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In Bureaucracy, Entertainment, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Military, Politics, Social commentary on March 18, 2016 at 12:01 am
Steven Spielberg’s new movie, “Bridge of Spies,” is that rarity among films: An intelligent mixture of history and drama, stripped of gratuitous sex and violence.
It’s also a film that accurately reveals unsettling truths about how government intelligence agencies really operate.
Truth #1: Appearance counts for more than reality.
The movie opens with the FBI’s arrest of KGB spy Rudolph Abel (Mark Rylance). The evidence against him is overwhelming. This–plus the “Red Scare” climate of 1957–will guarantee his conviction.
But the Eisenhower administration doesn’t want the upcoming trial to be seen as a hangman’s court. It must have the appearance of a fair proceeding.
So the Justice Department (through the Brooklyn Bar Association) asks a New York insurance attorney named James B. Donovan (Tom Hanks) to take on Abel’s defense. He’s expected to make a reasonably competent effort but not go all out on behalf of his client.
Truth #2: Individual conscience can wreck the best-laid plans of government.
Donovan has never handled a spy case before. And he has no delusions that Abel isn’t the spy he’s charged with being. But he’s determined to give Abel the same committed defense he would give to any other client.
Rudolph Abel (Mark Rylance) and James Donovan (Tom Hanks) in court
This comes as a shock to the prosecutors, the judge, his law firm and even his family.
A CIA agent approaches Donovan in a nearly deserted restaurant and asks him to reveal any secrets that might help win Abel’s conviction.
Donovan replies: “This conversation isn’t happening.”
“No, of course not,” replies the CIA agent, assuming Donovan is agreeing to keep the overture secret.
“No, I mean this conversation isn’t happening,” angrily says Donovan, who leaves the agent fuming.
Donovan becomes a pariah; his mailbox is stuffed with hate mail and one night a would-be drive-by killer riddles his house with bullets.
Abel is convicted and sentenced to 45 years’ imprisonment. But Donovan–again shocking everyone he knows–pursues an appeal up to the Supreme Court.
He argues that the evidence against Abel is tainted by an invalid search warrant. No American citizen could be convicted under such circumstances. And the Constitutional protections that hold true for Americans should hold equally true for non-Americans charged with crimes in American courts.
Donovan’s arguments will be heard a half-century later, when al-Qaeda suspects are hauled before American courts.
He puts on an impressive case on Abel’s behalf, but loses 5-4 at the Supreme Court.
That seems to be the end of Donovan’s relationship with Abel. But events soon dictate otherwise.
Before the judge could pronounce a death sentence on Abel, Donovan had argued that this might be a mistake. The day might come, he told the judge, when an American spy might fall into Soviet hands.
And then the United States would need to swap Abel to secure the release of its own agent.
The judge, moved by that argument, had given Abel a lengthy prison term instead.
That day comes sooner than anyone in the Pentagon expects.
On May 1, 1960, Francis Gary Powers, a former Air Force pilot, is flying a high-altitude U-2 plane above the Soviet Union for the CIA. The plane is equipped with state-of-the-art cameras, and Powers intends to photograph military sites and other important complexes.
Suddenly, a surface-to-air missile slams into the plane. Powers ejects before it crashes, but fails to commit suicide with a poison pin concealed in a phony silver dollar. He’s captured by the KGB and brutally interrogated, but maintains his silence.
At about the same time, Frederic Pryor, an American economics graduate student living in West Germany, visits his German girlfriend living in Soviet-dominated East Germany.
The Soviets are starting to build their infamous Berlin Wall, which will stop the flow of refugees from East to West. Pryor tries to bring his girlfriend and her father into West Berlin, but he’s stopped and arrested by agents of Stasi, the East German police, who accuse him of being a spy.
Meanwhile, the Soviet Union wants its spy, Abel, returned, before he can spell its secrets. In turn, the new Kennedy administration wants Powers returned, before he can be made to spill American secrets.
Truth #3: High-ranking government officials will ask citizens to take risks they themselves refuse to take.
In 1961, Donovan is once again sought out by the American government–this time by no less than CIA Director Allen Dulles.
And he’s asked to go where no official American representative can go–East Germany. His new assignment: Negotiate the exchange of Powers for Abel.
The CIA wants its spy back. And it’s willing to send Donovan into East Germany to negotiate his release. But it’s not willing to back him up if he’s arrested by Stasi, the notorious East German secret police.
The fiction must be maintained that Donovan is acting strictly on his own behalf, not that of the United States.
In such a case, Donovan could spend the rest of his life in a Communist prison cell.
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In Bureaucracy, Entertainment, History, Law, Military, Politics, Social commentary on March 17, 2016 at 12:36 pm
Steven Spielberg’s Lincoln is more than a mesmerizing history lesson.
It’s a timely reminder that racism and repression are not confined to any one period or political party.
At the heart of the film: Abraham Lincoln (Daniel Day-Lewis) wants to win ratification of what will be the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. An amendment that will forever ban slavery.
True, Lincoln, in 1862, had issued the Emancipation Proclamation. This—in theory—freed slaves held in the Confederate states that had seceded from the Union in 1861.
But Lincoln regards this as a temporary wartime measure. He fears that once the war ends, the Supreme Court may rule the Proclamation unconstitutional. This might allow Southerners to continue practicing slavery, even after losing the war.
To prevent this, Congress must pass an anti-slavery amendment.
But winning Congressional passage of such an amendment won’t be easy.
The Senate had ratified its passage in 1864. But the amendment must secure approval from the House of Representatives to become law.
And the House is filled with men–there are no women menmbers during the 19th century–who seethe with hostility.
Some are hostile to Lincoln personally. One of them dubs him a dictator–Abraham Africanus.” Another accuses him of shifting his positions for the sake of expediency.
Other members–white men all–are hostile to the idea of “equality between the races.” To them, ending slavery means opening the door to interracial marriage–especially marriage between black men and white women.
Perhaps even worse, it means possibly giving blacks–or women–the the right to vote.
In fact, the possibility that blacks might win voting rights arises early in the movie. Lincoln is speaking to a couple of black Union soldiers, and one of them is unafraid to voice his discontent. He’s upset that black soldiers are paid less than white ones–and that they’re led only by white officers.
He says that, in time, maybe this will change. Maybe, in 100 years, he guesses, blacks will get the right to vote.
(To the shame of all Americans, that’s how long it will eventually take. Not until the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 will blacks be guaranteed legal protection against discriminatory voting practices.)
To understand the Congressional debate over the Thirteenth Amendment, it’s necessary to remember this: In Lincoln’s time, the Republicans were the party of progressives.
The party was founded on an anti-slavery platform. Its members were thus reviled as “Black Republicans.” And until the 1960s, the South was solidly Democratic.
Democrats were the ones defending the status quo–slavery–and opposing freed blacks in the South of Reconstruction and long afterward.
In short, in the 18th century, Democrats in the South acted as Republicans do now. The South went Republican only after a Democratic President–Lyndon B. Johnson–rammed the Civil Rights Act of 1964 through Congress.
Watching this re-enactment of the 1865 debate in Lincoln is like watching the current Presidential campaign. The same mentalities are at work:
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Those (in this case, slave-owners) who already have a great deal want to gain even more at the expense of others.
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Those (slaves and freed blacks) who have little strive to gain more or at least hang onto what they have.
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Those who defend the privileged wealthy refuse to allow their “social inferiors” to enjoy similar privileges (such as the right to vote).
During the 2012 Presidential race, Republicans tried to bar those likely to vote for President Barack Obama from getting into the voting booth. But their bogus “voter ID” restrictions were struck down in courts across the nation.
Listening to those opposing the amendment, one is reminded of Mitt Romney’s infamous comments about the “47%”:
“Well, there are 47% of the people who will vote for the president no matter what….
“Who are dependent upon government, who believe that–that they are victims, who believe that government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they’re entitled to healthcare, to food, to housing, to you name it. But that’s–it’s an entitlement. And the government should give it to them.”
Put another way: “Who says people have a right to obtain medical care, food and housing? If they can’t inherit unearned wealth the way I did, screw them.”
In the end, it’s Abraham Lincoln who has the final word–and leaves his nation the better for it. Through diplomacy and backroom dealings (trading political offices for votes) he wins passage of the anti-slavery amendment.
The ownership of human chattel is finally an ugly memory of the American past.
The movie closes with a historically-correct tribute to Lincoln’s generosity toward those who opposed him–in Congress and on the battlefield. It occurs during Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address:
“With malice toward none, with charity for all….To bind up the nation’s wounds. To care for him who shall have bourne the battle, and for his widow and his orphan….”
This ending presents a vivid philosophical contrast with the increasingly mean-spirited rhetoric and policies of 2016’s Republican candidates for President–especially those of Donald Trump.
Watching Lincoln, you realize how incredibly lucky America was as a nation to have had such leadership when it was most urgently needed.
.
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In Bureaucracy, Business, History, Politics, Social commentary on March 16, 2016 at 2:53 am
Politicians can lie to voters. And voters can lie to themselves. But Nature can never be fooled.
By 2100, more than 13 million Americans living along the coast could be displaced by rising sea levels. And these, in turn, are the result of melting polar ice caps–courtesy of a Republican-denied event called climate change.
At Ground Zero of this oncoming catastrophe lies Florida, Its densely populated coastal locales could see up to 6.06 million residents displaced if sea levels rise six feet.
“As the sea level rises, coastal parts of Florida will be inundated,” warns University of Georgia geography professor Deepak Mishra. “Sea level rise is the phenomenon that makes climate change a reality for millions of people worldwide. The sheer volume of people at risk of displacement and becoming climate refugees is the main threat.”
Mishra was one of several researchers for the United States National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) who assessed sea level change scenarios by 2100 for coastal states along with population growth trends and projections in high-risk areas.
The number of people who could be displaced might be three times larger than previous estimates.
“These results suggest that the absence of protective measures could lead to U.S. population movements of a magnitude similar to the 20th century Great Migration of southern African-Americans,” the researchers wrote in the journal Nature Climate Change.
This referred to the exodus of more than six million blacks from the rural South to cities of the North, Midwest and West from 1910 until 1970.
More than a quarter of residents of major urban centers such as Miami and New Orleans could face coastal flooding. Three counties could see the displacement of 80 percent of their population:
- Florida’s Monroe County, site of the Florida Keys;
- Hyde County, North Carolina; and
- Tyrrell County, North Carolina.
In Florida, climate change reality is about to slam into Right-wing denial and censorship.
Rick Scott, its Republican Governor, doesn’t believe in “climate change’ or “global warming.” Asked by a reporter for his views on the subject, he fobbed off the question with, “Well, I’m not a scientist.”
Smiling at the coming apocalypse: Rick Scott
Accordingly, he has ordered members of the Florida Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) to stop using those terms “global warming” and “climate change” in official correspondence.
DEP has a $1.4 billion budget and 3,200 employees, but is forbidden to speak openly about perhaps the foremost danger now facing Floridians.
According to the Florida Center for Investigative Reporting (FCIR) the policy is “unwritten” and was “distributed verbally statewide.”
Just as the Nazis passed down many of their orders verbally, to ensure deniability, so has Scott.
Accordingly, John Tupps, Scott’s spokesman, told The Washington Post: “There is no policy in existence. … Allegations and claims made in the [Florida investigative article] are not true. This policy, it doesn’t exist.”
But FCIR has no reservations about exposing the issue that threatens the very existence of the state.
“The irony is clearly apparent,” said Tristam Korten, one of FCIR’s writers. “Florida is a peninsula with 1,200 miles of coastline, and when it comes to climate change, we’re the canary in the coalmine. And we’re relying on the state government to protect us and to plan for these changes.”
Rising sea levels threaten Miami–and the rest of Florida
Further proof of the governor’s censorship decree comes from statements of former DEP employees. One of these, Kristina Trotta, was told during a 2014 meeting that she couldn’t employ terms such as “climate change” and “global warming.”
“We were told that we were not allowed to discuss anything that was not a true fact. The regional administrator told us that we are the governor’s agency; this is the message from the governor’s office. And that is the message we will portray.”
Many Americans believe climate change-denying politicians are simply ignorant of the truth: “If they knew, surely they would do something.”
While some politicians may genuinely believe that climate change is a hoax, others have self-interested reasons for denying its reality.
Among these is Rick Scott, whose 2014 financial disclosure records revealed that he was heavily invested in more than two dozen oil and gas ventures.
One was Spectra Energy, now working with Florida Power & Light to build the $3 billion Sabal Trail pipeline in North Florida.
Scott and his appointees at the Public Service Commission backed construction of Sabal Trail despite state ethics laws that generally forbid public officials from owning stock in businesses subject to their regulation.
Another entity in which Scott shares an interest is Regency Energy Partners, LP. In 2014, the governor valued his Regency units at $194,000. He also reported a $206,600 state in PRV Partners LP, which was acquired by Regency.
Scott’s oil and gas assets include 18 publicly traded master limited partnerships, some with significant ties to GE Energy Financial Services.
So while Scott and many other Right-wing politicians expect to handsomely profit from the coming onslaught of Nature, those at its epicenter will be its foremost victims.
Ironically, their victimization will result from their unswerving support for greed-addicted, Right-wing politicians, whose denial of climate change makes such catastrophes inevitable.
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In Bureaucracy, Business, Entertainment, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on March 15, 2016 at 12:55 am
In 1964, Thomas Becket, archbishop of Canterbury, once again struggled against King Henry II for power over English citizens.
This time, the conflict was fought across thousands of movie screens, with Richard Burton as Becket and Peter O’Toole as Henry, as portrayed in Jean Anouilh’s 1959 play.
A quick summary:
Becket, a brilliant Saxon noble, is the favorite friend of Henry. They hunt, fight and bed women together. Henry even appoints him as Chancellor, the highest law enforcement officer in the country.
But there is a storm on the horizon: The power of the Catholic Church is steadily rising, and Henry needs a highly-placed ally against its power. When the Archbishop of Canterbury dies, Henry appoints Becket in his place.
But suddenly the entirely secular Becket undergoes a religious conversion–and an unexpected change in allegiance. He insists that priests accused of criminal offenses be tried only in the church’s own courts–thus making them immune from Henry’s secular ones.
As a moviegoer, it’s easy to root for conscience-stricken Becket, as played by the charming Burton. Henry, as played by O’Toole, is a brutish adolescent, alternately fearful and enraged at his own incompetence.
But in rooting for Becket/Burton, the audience can overlook the significance of allowing religious doctrine to trump secular law.
The consequences of this are now becoming clear in Indiana.
On March 26, 2015, its governor, Mike Pence, signed into law the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. This will allow any individual or corporation to cite its religious beliefs as a defense when sued by a private party.
Mike Pence
Officially, its intent is to prevent the government from forcing business owners to act in ways contrary to strongly held religious beliefs. Unofficially, its intent is to appease the hatred of gays and lesbians by the religious Right, a key constituency of the Republican party.
In short, a bakery that doesn’t want to make a cake to be used at a gay wedding or a restaurant that doesn’t want to serve lesbian patrons will have the legal right to refuse to do so.
The same applies for a hospital that doesn’t want to provide care to a gay or lesbian patient.
The bill was passed overwhelmingly by both chambers of the Republican-controlled state legislature. And signed into law by a Republican governor.
“Today I signed the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, because I support the freedom of religion for every Hoosier of every faith,” Mike Pence said in a statement on the day he signed the bill.
“The Constitution of the United States and the Indiana Constitution both provide strong recognition of the freedom of religion but today, many people of faith feel their religious liberty is under attack by government action.”
Bill-signing ceremonies are usually highly public events. Governors–and presidents–normally want their constituents to see them creating new legislation.
Yet for all his praise for the bill, Pence signed it in a ceremony closed to the public and the press. The media were asked to leave even the waiting area of the governor’s office.
It’s almost as if Pence sensed that he was about to push open a door into a danger-filled room. And this may well be the case.
Through that door may soon march the First Church of Cannabis. The day after Pence signed the Act, church founder Bill Levin announced on his Facebook page that he had filed paperwork with the office of the Indiana Secretary of State.
Its registration had been approved–and Levin was ecstatic: “Now we begin to accomplish our goals of Love, Understanding, and Good Health.
“Donate $100 or more and become a GREEN ANGEL. Donate $500 or more and become a GOLD ANGEL. Donate $1000 or more and become a CHURCH POOHBA.”
And Levin had a personal comment for the governor who had made it all possible:
“Dear Mikey Pence…
“DUDE!.. keep crapping all over the state.. and I will plant a seed of LOVE, UNDERSTANDING and COMPASSION in each pile you leave.. and it will grow into a big skunky cannabis tree. Crap away Mikey.. Crap Away…”
No doubt many Indiana legislators are furious that their effort to attack gays may have brought legal marijuana to their highly conservative state. But worse may be to come.
Since 9/11, Right-wingers such as Rush Limbaugh and Sean Hannity have warned that Muslims are trying to impose Sharia (Islamic law) on America. And now Indiana’s legislators, in elevating religion above the law, may have laid the legal foundations for making that possible.
Ironically, this may not be so far removed from the goals of the Republican party as many think. Both the party and adherents of Sharia agree:
- Women should have fewer rights than men.
- Abortion should be illegal.
- There should be no separation between church and state.
- Religion should be taught in school.
- Religious doctrine trumps science.
- Government should be based on religious doctrine.
- Homosexuality should be outlawed.
What will happen when some Muslims in Indiana claim their right–guaranteed in Islamic religious law–to have as many as four wives?
And when they claim that the Religious Freedom Restoration Act protects that right?
Fasten your seatbelts, it’s going to be a bumpy nightmare.
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In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Medical, Politics, Social commentary on March 14, 2016 at 3:41 pm
Ernest Hemingway knew his Fascists. He fought against them in 1930s Spain, where Right-wing general Francisco Franco–aided by Adolf Hitler–ultimately overthrew the Spanish Republic in 1939.
And he fought against them in France after American forces landed in Normandy. He was one of the first Americans to reach Paris and help “liberate” the bar of the Ritz Hotel.
In the 1950s, he opposed the growing plague of anti-Red hysteria as represented by Wisconsin U.S. Senator Joseph R. McCarthy.
Addressing a 1937 Writers Congress in a rare public speech, Hemingway said: “There is only one form of government that cannot produce good writers, and that system is fascism. For fascism is a lie told by bullies. A writer who will not lie cannot live and work under fascism.”
Ernest Hemingway
It’s thus clear what the Nobel-Prize winning author would think of a Missouri state senator’s efforts at censorship.
Lindsay Ruhr, a graduate student in the School of Social Work at the University of Missouri, chose to write her doctoral dissertation on the effects of the state’s recently imposed 72-hour waiting period for abortions.
Lindsay Ruhr
And this has drawn the ire of Missouri State Senator Kurt Schaefer, a Republican from Columbia, Missouri, who chairs the Missouri state senate’s interim Committee on the Sanctity of Life.
In late October, Schaefer sent a letter to the University of Missouri calling Ruhr’s dissertation “a marketing aid for Planned Parenthood — one that is funded, in part or in whole, by taxpayer dollars.”
Kurt Schaefer
Schaefer demanded that the university hand over documents regarding the project’s approval and said that, because the University of Missouri is a public university, it should not fund research that he said would promote elective abortions.
Missouri law prohibits the use of public funds to promote non-life-saving abortions.
In September, 2014, Missouri enacted a 72-hour wait for abortions. Reproductive rights advocates believed this is an effort to deny women access to legal abortion as established by the Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade decision in 1973.
Other Missouri legal restrictions require women seeking an abortion to undergo an ultrasound scan and receive informational material that aims to persuade them from obtaining an abortion.
Lindsay Ruhr wants to find out “how this policy [the 72-hour waiting limit] affects women. Whether this policy is having a harmful or beneficial effect, we don’t know.”
Schaefer claims that Ruhr is biased in favor of abortions because her adviser is affiliated with Planned Parenthood of Kansas.
“This is a concerning revelation considering the University’s recent troubling connections to Planned Parenthood,” wrote Schaefer in a letter to University of Missouri officials.
Schaefer argued that Ruhr is illegally using public funds to conduct her dissertation research.
“It is difficult to understand how a research study approved by the University, conducted by a University student, and overseen by the Director of the School of Social Work at the University can be perceived as anything but an expenditure of public funds to aid Planned Parenthood.”
Under Missouri law, it is illegal for public employees and facilities to use state money towards “encouraging or counseling” a woman to have an abortion not necessary to save her life.
Even though Ruhr is seeking a PhD at the university, she is employed by Planned Parenthood and the university is not paying for her research.
Abortions in Missouri aren’t the only scientific subject that Republicans have made it forbidden to study. Among these:
- A federal ban on studying gun-related deaths and the results of gun control. This followed aggressive efforts by the National Rifle Association to stop finding data that contradicted its “more guns are better” narrative. It’s prevented crucial research into how best to combat mass shootings and prevent gun accidents in the home.
- Harassment of climate scientists. Republicans have increasingly sought to cut funding to scientists studying the Earth’s climate because they keep finding more data to suggest the planet is actually warming. If the public demands an end to the use of fossil fuels–which are responsible for the warming–this will threaten Republicans’ ties to–and funding from–the oil and gas industries.
- The House Science Committee has demanded climate scientists working for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration turn over all emails and documents–personal and professional–they wrote on this subject during the last seven years.
- Preventing scientists from studying Right-wing terrorism in the United States. The foremost expert on this subject–Daryl Johnson, a counter-terrorism analyst working at the Department of Homeland Security–was forced out of his job.
- Johnson had spent six years with the agency amassing a wealth of data on far-Right extremist groups–like the Ku Klux Klan and militia movement–that threaten the safety of American citizens. Republicans’ objection: The facts his research was finding on their constituents made conservatives look bad.
As Harrison E. Salisbury, former New York Times bureau chief in Moscow, observed: “…The message was always the same: Shut up! Don’t rock the boat. Keep those unpleasant truths to yourself. The truth, I was ultimately to learn, is the most dangerous thing. There are no ends to which men of power will not go to put out its eyes.”
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REPUBLICANS: EXTORTION IS US: PART FOUR (END)
In Bureaucracy, History, Law, Law Enforcement, Politics, Social commentary on March 25, 2016 at 12:04 amIn September, 2013, President Barack Obama and Senate Democrats refused to knuckle under to yet another Republican extortion threat: Defund the Affordable Care Act (ACA) or we’ll shut down the government.
Republicans claimed it was Obama and Senate Democrats who refused to see reason and negotiate.
But then a Republican accidentally gave away the real reason for the shutdown.
“We’re not going to be disrespected,” Rep. Marlin Stutzman (R-Ind.) told the Washington Examiner. “We have to get something out of this. And I don’t know what that even is.”
Marlin Stutzman
In short, Republicans–as admitted by Martlin Stutzman–were out to get “respect.” A member of the Crips or Bloods couldn’t have said it better.
The shutdown began on October 1, 2013–and ended 16 days later with even Republicans admitting it had been a failure.
President Obama, a former attorney, denounced House Republicans as guilty of “extortion” and “blackmail.” Had the President acted to prosecute such criminal conduct, the results would have been:
True, some prosecuted Republicans might have beaten the rap. But first they would have been forced to spend huge amounts of time and money on their defense.
And with 75% of Americans voicing disgust with Congress, most of those prosecuted might well have been convicted.
It would have been a long time before Republicans again dared to engage in such behavior.
The ancient Greeks believed: “A man’s character is his fate.” It is Obama’s character–and America’s fate–that he is more inclined to conciliation than confrontation.
Richard Wolffe chronicled Obama’s winning of the White House in his book Renegade: The Making of a President. He noted that Obama was always more comfortable when responding to Republican attacks on his character than he was in making attacks of his own.
Obama came into office determined to find common ground with Republicans. But they quickly made it clear to him that they only wanted his political destruction.
At that point, he should have put aside his hopes for a “Kumbaya moment” and applied what Niccolo Machiavelli famously said in The Prince on the matter of love versus fear:
Niccolo Machiavelli
From this arises the question whether it is better to be loved than feared, or feared more than loved. The reply is, that one ought to be both feared and loved, but as it is difficult for the two to go together, it is much safer to be feared than loved.
For it may be said of men in general that they are ungrateful, voluble, dissemblers, anxious to avoid danger and covetous of gain.
As long as you benefit them, they are entirely yours: they offer you their blood, their goods, their life and their children, when the necessity is remote. But when it approaches, they revolt….
And men have less scruple in offending one who makes himself loved than one who makes himself feared; for love is held by a chain of obligations which, men being selfish, is broken whenever it serves their purpose; but fear is maintained by a dread of punishment which never fails.
By refusing to vigorously prosecute acts of Republican extortion, President Obama has unleashed twin disasters upon himself and the United States:
First, Republicans have been encouraged to intensify their acts of aggression against him.
Their most recent act: Refusing to meet with federal appeals court judge Merrick Garland. Obama’s designated nominee to the Supreme Court after the February 13 death of Justice Antonin Scalia.
Kentucky United States Senator Mitch McConnell has flatly stated: There will be no Supreme Court hearings–not during regular business or a post-election lame-duck session.
Had Obama proceeded with indictments against Republican extortion in 2011 or 2013, McConnell–who supported the extortion attempts of those years–would now be desperately meeting with his lawyers.
Second, Republicans have unleashed their tactics of extortion against one another.
Donald Trump, their front-running Presidential candidate, has openly threatened to aim violence at Republican delegates who do not accept him as their nominee.
As Philip Klein, the managing editor of the Washington Examiner, recently wrote:
“Political commentators now routinely talk about the riots that would break out in Cleveland if Trump were denied the nomination, about how his supporters have guns and all hell could break loose, that they would burn everything to the ground. It works to Trump’s advantage to not try too hard to dispel these notions.”
Thus, those who submit to the aggression of criminals only encourage contempt–and increased aggression–from those same criminals.
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