One key to understanding Barack's beliefs: we are beyond nations, they are crude, barbaric things.

Civilization no longer means belonging to the right nation, it's about moving fluidly through world communities, having the ability to operate effectively across cultural platforms (languages, religions, customs habits).

Samuel Johnson famously wrote in 1775 that "Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel." In The Devil’s Dictionary, Ambrose Bierce made the appropriate correction: "With all due respect to an enlightened but inferior lexicographer I beg to submit that it is the first."

The past eight years proves Bierce’s thesis once and for all.  

The remorseless gangsters currently in charge of the executive branch aren’t the first American leaders to falsely define patriotism to include torturing, racketeering, warmongering, privatizing, fraud, fecklessness, betrayal, incompetence, injustice, absolutism, corporatism, cronyism and horses’ assism. They aren’t the first to wave the red-white-and-blue while committing sedition against the nation’s citizens by lying them into a war. Nor the first to spy on dissidents of that war. Nor to treat the veterans of that war with public accolades simultaneous to budgetary disdain.

Nor, it must never be forgotten, the first to commit war crimes under a patriotic banner.

But these particular scoundrels have managed one new audacity: cramming the full roster of such behavior into two presidential terms. For this Herculean effort, the cabal of grifters who took over seven-and-a-half years ago surely deserve medals.

To be fair, Bierce had a 135-year advantage over Johnson. He could look back at the history of a particular brand of patriotism – the American kind – which, like everything else American, our modern flag-wavers will explain to us benighted, is exceptional, unlike European patriotism, to them a lesser and ignoble kind. Jonah Goldberg told us just that in his Tuesday screed attacking Barack Obama’s patriotic bona fides. Goldberg himself is not exceptional. Most right-wing intellectuals are purveyors of what makes a true patriot and what does not in terms Il Duce would have loved, equating aggressive nationalism with patriotism, dissidence with treason, love of country with love of leaders. Such upsidedownism is a hallmark of right-think (liberals are fascists, according to Goldberg’s book and blog), so the attack on Obama – achieved by the most tendentious parsing of the Senator’s campaign speeches – is no surprise.

However, as Larisa Alexandrovna points out in her fine deconstruction of Goldberg’s essay, what he and fellow propagandists are about is not merely challenging a candidate’s love for country but rather demanding adherence of us all to Big Brother’s brand of patriotism, complete with spiffed-up Two Minutes Hate:

Make no mistake, this is a coordinated effort to deliberately replace substance with its symbol, meaning with an emblem, and essentially strip language down to nothing but trinkets. ...

For a people to be controlled, they must first be robbed of honest discourse and open debate. Distorting language and stripping it of real and honest meaning is the first tool and the best mechanism for transforming a democracy into an authoritarian state. An informed populace is a dangerous populace.

Symbols, however, and false-definitions can provide the appearance of information without the truth of it. Ideas, substance and meaning – all things for which a symbol is simply a representation and a word simply a type of symbol – are far more difficult to control. There is nuance in individual ideas. There are shades of agreement and disagreement and a whole spectrum of understanding and believing. Such a complex system cannot be controlled, and therefore, must be reduced to only its symbol and then distorted.

Symbols and words-as-slogans can be mass produced, mass delivered, and altered from their original meaning, until the symbol becomes its own thing and the substance on which it is based is entirely lost. ...

Patriotism is the word that authoritarians most like to distort and Goldberg demonstrates -- once again -- just how this distortion is created.

The distortion was clear when Goldberg plopped the phrase "patriotism problem" into his first sentence. Not just Obama’s problem, mind you. As putative nominee, the Senator is, of course, a real target, but he is also the right-wingers’ surrogate for citizens who dare claim that the United States needs more than a little tweaking around the edges. Citizens who deeply love their country, but recognize that, historically and now, it is a composite of the good, the bad, and the ugly. Who refuse to reiterate the latest version of my-country-right-or-wrong. Who acknowledge with condemnation that a jingoistic, exclusionary, authoritarian patriotism was in large part what helped make the United States "great" in the worst sense of the word. Who believe dissent to be the paramount patriotic behavior.

Who object to the idolatrous intermingling of militaristic nationalism with patriotism.

I can hear the hisses of those who – in the words of George Washington – practice the "impostures of pretend patriotism" and try at every opportunity to stifle dissent and fill the silence with propaganda. It’s the Fourth of July! How dare I disrespect patriotism on the very anniversary of the day 56 men signed what could have been their death warrant, the Declaration of Independence. Can’t there be just one day when we critics shut up, stand up and salute? Thus do the Goldbergians and other pretend patriots do as they have done throughout American history – confuse dissent with disrespect, critics with renegades, patriotism with obedience.

Fortunately, 15 years after the Declaration was signed, the Bill of Rights was adopted and, in its First Amendment, freedom of speech was enshrined. Allowing us all, so far, usually, to say what we want. In a disrespectful voice if we so desire.

That amendment is one reason I love my country and am a patriot.

I’ll admit, that’s damned hard for someone whose Seminole ancestors were killed in three wars by soldiers flying the stars and stripes, with amends and apologies yet to be made. But I call myself a patriot because patriots are rebels. That is not a cry for overthrow and the guillotine. It is an optimism that patriots can and must remake the United States, just as in the past it was repeatedly remade by dissidents who rejected slavery, women’s second-class status, workers’ impotence, racism’s reign. There is, it goes without saying, much left to achieve.

Nothing, of course, offends right-wingers more, seems more disrespectful and disloyal, than when we dissenters, our criticisms barely escaped from our lips, claim ourselves to be patriots. They go apoplectic when we say it’s not patriotism that we  disrespect but rather the pretenders who have made a fetish of it, twisted it and commodified it. These idolaters love the idea of dissent, the iconography of it, but jeer its reality. To them, patriots must be bootlickers. In extreme cases, jackboots. Proof, if more were needed, that even the word itself, "patriot," must be recaptured from those who have hijacked it.

They are not unlike Jersey City Mayor Frank Hague, who, in January 1938, said: "We hear about constitutional rights, free speech and the free press. Every time I hear these words I say to myself, ‘That man is a Red, that man is a Communist.’ You never hear a real American talk like that."

Chinese and Russian capitalism have cost the accusation "Red" its punch, but even in the age of the millennial generation, the "real American" canard carries weight. We’ll continue to hear variations on that theme against Senator Obama right up until November 4.

Nevertheless, Obama is a lucky guy. His patriotism, he said on Monday, was challenged "for the first time" when he began his presidential campaign. The first time? Many citizens didn’t make it past their 20s before they were called unAmerican by the pretend patriots.    

As Goldberg makes clear, much of what the idolaters and fetishists heard in Senator Obama’s speech in Independence, Mo., was an abomination, especially:

Now, we may hope that our leaders and our government stand up for our ideals, stand up for what's right, and there are many times in our history when that's occurred. But when our laws, when our leaders or our government are out of alignment with those ideals, then the dissent of ordinary Americans may prove to be one of the truest expressions of patriotism.

If you hear echoes of the Declaration in those lines, you’d not be alone. Music to the ears of those of us for whom the Declaration and Constitution are the flawed start, not the end of American ideals.

But while Obama struck many sweet notes Monday, he also seemed compelled not to be discordant in the arena which most epitomizes today’s pretend patriots, an empire fueled by the military-industrial-congressional complex. Whether he is not ideologically inclined or merely not yet ready to offer even an indirect challenge on this score will have to wait for his swearing-in. His proffered addition of 92,000 new troops – as Bob Gates has sought for 19 months, at an additional cost of $11 billion annually – is not a good omen.

In terms of elections, it’s understandable. Who can contest the patriotism of someone who says he will expand the military? Even the military of a country that spends more money on its armed forces than all the world's other countries put together? Why feed the age-old Democrats are weak on defense theme - itself a way to say Democrats are unpatriotic – by raising uncomfortable questions about the 118,000 U.S. military men and women in Japan, Korea and Germany? Will the day come when a president or presidential candidate divorces militarism from patriotism? Or will the pretenders always hold sway?

Sixty-odd years ago, George Orwell taught us how words are transformed to con the citizenry into accepting meanings which often are the opposite of their real meanings. In Notes on Nationalism, written in May 1945, he said that patriotism is "devotion to a particular place and a particular way of life, which one believes to be the best in the world but has no wish to force upon other people."

Nationalism, however, is something else, he said, presciently zeroing on the pretend patriots of then and our own time:

All nationalists have the power of not seeing resemblances between similar sets of facts.

... Actions are held to be good or bad, not on their own merits, but according to who does them, and there is almost no kind of outrage – torture, the use of hostages, forced labour, mass deportations, imprisonment without trial, forgery, assassination, the bombing of civilians – which does not change its moral colour when it is committed by "our" side. ...

The nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, but he has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them. ...

In nationalist thought there are facts which are both true and untrue, known and unknown. A known fact may be so unbearable that it is habitually pushed aside and not allowed to enter into logical processes, or on the other hand it may enter into every calculation and yet never be admitted as a fact, even in one's own mind.

A patriot will defend what s/he loves without hatred or any notion of superiority. But nationalism demands a belief that others are inferior, which makes it aggressive by nature, the enemy of peace, and thus the enemy of patriotism. Nationalism frames everything in "us" vs. "them" terms.

U.S. nationalism pretending to be patriotism has led to imperialist wars, the slaughter of indigenous peoples, the repeated suppression of dissent. In times of global tension, nationalism masquerading as patriotism demolishes the capacity of people to assess the reality of threats as well as to object if they find those threats wanting.

To adopt the unconditional support the Goldbergians ask of us could never be an expression of love for our country, the core definition of patriotism. Indeed, it would be extremely unpatriotic. For who recklessly allows harm against that which s/he loves?

Fighting for a better country is what patriotic dissidents have done from the beginning of the United States. Arrayed against them and their high principles in every case were the pretend patriots, those for whom dissent was anathema, who saw attempts to expand the nation’s democracy as a violation of their rights, who labeled opposition to expansionism and imperialist war outright treason.

Despite the pretenders who engaged in naked aggression against abolitionists, suffragists, trade unionists, civil rights workers and others, these dissidents made America better. They remade America. In our time, they are lauded, but in their own, they were vilified, assaulted and even, sometimes, murdered for their audacity, for their patriotism, for their belief that the ideals in the Declaration were not pretend. We owe them. Not least to imitate their example and remake America once again.

By Jason Miller

Both George Bush and Dick Cheney have emphatically proclaimed the American Way of Life as "non-negotiable." As hard as it may be for the feeble-minded, deluded, conscienceless, or hopelessly addicted to grasp, Mother Nature and billions of human beings are going to force us to the bargaining table. We can kick, scream, stomp our feet, and hold our breath all we want, but our abhorrent mode of existence is going down.

While Americans hate bad movies, there is one thing they hate much more.

In fact, we hate this thing so much, that unlike bad movies, we refuse to even talk about it.  

Who does the the Associated Press think they're kidding??

The military buildup in Iraq is about to end.

But as the last of the five additional combat brigades now heads home, it leaves the country far safer than it was a year ago. Yet it's still not ready to stand alone.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/...

In this free audio sample, Jim Garrison discusses America's transition from republic to empire, exploring the obviously difficult implications this has for the citizens of the world, as well as the unique opportunity America has to become the very last empire in history....

Garrison Keillor's Writer's Almanac celebrates the birthday of one of my all time "heros" today:

It's the birthday of Jean-Paul Sartre, born in Paris, France (1905). His father died when he was 15 months old. When he was eight, he started writing plays, which he performed with hand puppets in the bathroom. In college, he fell in love with philosophy and literature. He kept a portrait of James Joyce on his dorm room wall. He met Simone de Beauvoir there, who became the love of his life. They promised never to tell each other lies, and also agreed that if they wanted they could take other lovers.

Sartre became a teacher. At a time when the European teaching style was lecturing from a distance, he drank with his students at local bars, played cards and ping-pong with them, and joined them for picnics on the beach. In his spare time he began to write a novel called Nausea (1938). The book was his first major success, and it made him famous. People called him the French Kafka. He went on to write Being and Nothingness (1943), about the meaning of freedom. He wrote, "Hell is other people." And, "If you are lonely when you're alone, you are in bad company."

Look beyond the break for his opinion of America.

Tune in online or on air: live at 2:30 and 7 pm Pacific time 89.9 FM in SoCal, www.KCRW.com around the world. Obama announces he won’t take public funding-- is campaign finance reform dead? Is it good news or bad news when more Americans add their dollars to elections? Would offering every voter a voucher to apply to whatever they support make Goldman Sachs’ money less influential? Should we start offshore drilling to offset the increase in oil prices? Or is that just more backward thinking, promoting further environmental ruin for not much of a difference in supply or demand? And finally, does China’s Communist-party controlled economic growth prove that America’s liberal capitalism is no longer a role model for the world’s developing powers? Tony’s just back from a trip there and shares his observations.

It has taken an abortive impeachment attempt, a couple of contentious elections, a terrorist attack on American soil, the invasion of two sovereign nations, and political intrigue that would make Niccolo Machiavelli proud, for the neocon establishment to consolidate power within the U.S. Government to the extent that the traditional system of checks and balances has, for all intents and purposes, withered beyond recognition.  Dick Cheney’s vision of a restored and empowered Executive Branch has been realized, and the notion of public accountability has gone out the window.  Wrapping themselves in the banner of patriotism and national security, this authoritarian Republican cabal has positioned itself to influence both foreign and domestic policy in ways that have deliberate, enduring consequences.  The obvious beneficiaries of this enterprise are the corporate giants that tend to flourish under imperialistic policies that favor exploitation of cheap foreign labor, unlimited natural resources, and virtual freedom from environmental regulation.

I wrote a diary earlier this week about the disputed killing of Pakistani soldiers by a US military air strike in Pakistani territory. At that time, we were only a day out and many conflicting versions were floating around, a few from each side.

Since then, it has become quite clear that the US has embarked on a course of military coercion if not confrontation of Pakistani forces in the Afghan border region, and Pakistan is reacting with outrage. What's more, it is become very clear that the entire frontier region, on both sides of the border, is now fighting as one against the American invasion. While Iraq continues to grab the world's attention, it will be in Afghanistan, as always, where the empire's sword is broken.

Follow me after the flip to hear more muddled tales of a cross border insurgency that knows no end and no beginning.

I have argued before, vehemently and without success, that the Democratic commitment to the continued occupation in Afghanistan, is as criminal as the Republican commitment to the occupation in Iraq. The only difference that I can see is that we had a better excuse to go into Afghanistan, and we are apparently sticking to it after 7 years of a counterproductive occupation.

Today this occupation showed signs of expanding into a cross-border war along the lines of the expansion of US operations during the Vietnam War into Laos and Cambodia. With the exception that instead of Laos, we are expanding the war into nuclear armed Pakistan.

Follow me after the fold for some Great Game fun.

im·pe·ri·al·ism (ĭm-pîr'ē-ə-lĭz'əm)  
n.

1. The policy of extending a nation's authority by territorial acquisition or by the establishment of economic and political hegemony over other nations.

2. The system, policies, or practices of such a government.

- The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 2006

The US is holding hostage some $50bn (£25bn) of Iraq's money in the Federal Reserve Bank of New York to pressure the Iraqi government into signing an agreement seen by many Iraqis as prolonging the US occupation indefinitely, according to information leaked to The Independent.

- The Independent, 6 June 2008

There comes a time when we should not be afraid of calling a spade a spade.

Two items.

First one: the long-awaited Senate Select Intelligence Committee report is out, confirming what everyone in the reality-based progressive community has known for a long time - that the Bush administration (including President Bush and V.-P. Cheney) made public statements to promote their invasion of Iraq which they knew full well were not supported by available intelligence.

(i.e. they "lied their asses off")

Crossposted (and expanded) from UNBOSSED

Any day nowJames Cuno, Director and President of the Art Institute of Chicago will publish  "Who Owns Antiquity? Museums and the Battle Over Our Ancient Heritage".  

In it, he proposes are return to "partage".  Partage is the idea that most archaeological resources excavated in Third World countries should end up in the land of the "experts".  That would be Europe or America.

I WANT GIs to get a college education as a benefit for serving. But there is a problem with this GI Bill as it is coming forward at this time. I hope I can make clear the concerns.

1. It does not seem fair at all that the GI Bill college benefits go strictly to Iraq and Afghanistan veterans only. It is preferable to deal fairly with all vets and make the GI Bill apply to ALL veterans (not just those GIs who've fought in Bush's illegal "wars" in the Middle East).

2. Senator Webb indicates that the GI Bill is intended to serve as an INDUCEMENT for recruitment to build the numbers of GIs in the military.

3. The number of GIs in the military has dwindled AND RIGHTLY SO because the citizens of the U.S. have issues/concerns with the Bush "Wars", and both how GIs are being treated in the theater of military action...

This week President George W. Bush, speaking from the Israeli parliament, accused the Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama of "appeasement." He implied that because Obama has at times called for negotiation with Iran, that Obama would therefore not wage war in the Middle East with the same viciousness and aggression that Bush has. Given where he was speaking—in the parliament of Israel, the extremely aggressive tool of the U.S. in the Middle East; and when—at a time of both the 60th anniversary of the founding of Israel and of increasing U.S. war threats against Iran; these were very heavy words.

For more see rwor.org

Many people support Senator Barack Obama for president because they see in him the hope for change from the direction that the U.S. has taken over the last seven plus years. His campaign refers to this as "change you can believe in." But looking at what Obama has actually said while on the campaign trail should dash any real "hope" of real "change."  For instance how would he change U.S. foreign policy?

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MYANMAR JUNTA HOLDS UP RELIEF EFFORTS

FOR POWER OR PROFITS, GENERALS STONEWALL

Colonial, Imperial & Corporatist Powers Rattle Their Swords

Meanwhile chaos reigns even in Yangon (Rangoon). Millions remain homeless and destitute in the coastal provinces. Whether the strategy of exaggerating the crisis, if it is exaggeration, and feigning military action, if it is just a feint, will work remains to be seen.


"US diplomat: 100,000 may have died in Myanmar cyclone"

"France urges UN to force cyclone aid on Myanmar"

"EU Expands Economic Sanctions against Junta"


compleat links to aid organizations on the ground now in burmese disaster areas: donate now online

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