Contrary Notions

by Michael Parenti

  We need protection against attempts by local authorities to suppress or intimidate voters, as was done by Republican officials in several states during the stolen presidential elections of 2000 and 2004 and repeated with additional measures in 2006. As of now, in each state, elections are presided over by the secretaries of state, who often are active party partisans, as was the case in Florida and Ohio. In the 2006 gubernatorial election in Ohio, the state’s secretary of state J. Kenneth Blackwell was making decisions about who could vote, while himself running as the GOP candidate for governor. He worked hard to shut down voter registration drives and purged registration lists in areas of heavily concentrated Democratic votes, just as he had done in 2004. Worse still, he presided over the counting of the ballots. What we need is a federal nonpartisan commission of professional civil servants to preside over the electoral process to insure that people are not being falsely challenged or arbitrarily removed from voter rolls. As an additional safeguard, teams of foreign observers, perhaps from the United Nations, using exit polls, should monitor election proceedings and testify as to their fairness and honesty.

  Also needed are more accessible polling and registration sites in low-income areas, and an election that is held on an entire weekend instead of a work day (usually Tuesday) so that persons who must commute far and work long hours will have sufficient opportunity to get to the polls. Most important, we need paper ballots whose results can be immediately and honestly recorded in place of the touchscreen machines that so easily lead to fraudulent counts.

  The District of Columbia should be granted statehood. As of now its 607,000 citizens are denied self-rule and full representation in Congress. They elect a mayor and city council but Congress and the president retain the power to overrule all the city’s laws and budgets. Washington, D.C., remains one of the nation’s internal colonies.

  EMPLOYMENT CONDITIONS

  Americans are working harder and longer for less, often without any job security. Many important vital services are needed, yet many people have no work. Job programs, more encompassing than the ones created during the New Deal, could employ people to reclaim the environment, build affordable housing and mass transit systems, rebuild a crumbling infrastructure, and provide services for the aged and infirm and for the public in general.

  People could be put to work producing goods and services in competition with the private market, creating more income, more buying power, and a broader tax base. The New Deal’s WPA engaged in the production of goods, manufacturing clothes and mattresses for relief clients, surgical gowns for hospitals, and canned foods for the jobless poor. This kind of not-for-profit public production to meet human needs brings in revenues to the government, both in the sales of the goods and in taxes on the incomes of the new jobs created. Eliminated from the picture is private profit for those who live off the labor of others—which explains their fierce hostility toward government attempt at direct production.

  FISCAL POLICY

  The national debt is a transfer payment from taxpayers to bondholders, from labor to capital, from have-nots and have-littles to the have-it-alls. Government could end deficit spending by taxing the financial class from whom it now borrows. It must stop bribing the corporate rich with investment subsidies and other guarantees. Instead it should redirect capital investments toward not-for-profit public goals. The U.S. Treasury should create and control its own currency instead of allowing the Federal Reserve and its private bankers to pocket billions every year through its privatized money supply.

  GENDER, RACIAL, AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE

  End racial and gender-based discriminatory practices in all institutional settings. Vigorously enforce the law to protect abortion clinics from vigilante violence, women from male abuse, minorities and homosexuals from hate crimes, and children from incest rape and other forms of adult abuse, most of which occurs within the family. Release the hundreds of political dissenters who are serving long prison terms on trumped-up charges and whose major offense is their outspoken criticism of the existing system. And release the many thousands who are enduring draconian prison sentences for relatively minor drug offenses or for defending themselves against terrible abuse by violent spouses.21

  HEALTH CARE AND SAFETY

  Allow all Americans to receive coverage similar to the Medicare now enjoyed by seniors, but with coverage for alternative health treatments as well. People of working age would contribute a sliding-scale portion of the premium through payroll deductions or estimated tax payments for the self-employed, and employers would match those payments dollar for dollar. Funding can also come from the general budget as in the single-payer plan used in Canada and other countries, providing comprehensive service to all. Under single-payer health care, the billions of dollars that are now pocketed by HMO investors, executives, and advertisers would now be used for actual medical treatment.

  Thousands of additional federal inspectors are needed by the various agencies responsible for enforcement of occupational safety and consumer protection laws. “Where are we going to get the money to pay for all this?” one hears. The question is never asked in regard to the gargantuan defense budget or enormous corporate subsidies. As already noted, we can get the additional funds from a more progressive tax system and from major cuts in big business subsidies and military spending.

  LABOR LAW

  Abolish anti-labor laws and provide government protections to workers who now run the risk of losing their jobs because they try to organize a union in their workplace. Prohibit management’s use of permanent replacement scabs for striking workers. Penalize employers who refuse to negotiate a contract after certification has been won. Repeal the restrictive “right to work” and “open shop” laws that undermine collective bargaining. Lift the minimum wage to a livable level. In California, Minnesota, and several other states, there are “living wage movements” that seek to deny contracts and public subsidies to companies that do not pay their workers a decent income.22

  Repeal all “free trade” agreements; they place a country’s democratic sovereignty in the hands of nonelective, secretive, international tribunals that undermine local economies and the lawful regulatory powers of signatory nations, while diminishing living standards throughout the world.

  MILITARY SPENDING

  The military spending binge of the last two decades has created a crushing tax burden, and has transformed the United States from the world’s biggest creditor nation into the world’s biggest debtor nation. To save hundreds of billions of dollars each year, we should clamp down on the widespread corruption and waste in military spending. We can reduce the bloated “defense” budget by two-thirds over a period of a few years—without any risk to our national security. The Pentagon now maintains a massive nuclear arsenal and other strike forces designed to fight a total war against the Soviet Union, a superpower that no longer exists. To save additional billions each year and reduce the damage done to the environment, the United States should stop all nuclear tests, including underground ones, and wage a diplomatic offensive for the eventual elimination of all nuclear weaponry in the world, including elimination of this country’s arsenal. With no loss to our “national security,” Washington also could save tens of billions of dollars if it stopped pursuing armed foreign interventions and dropped its Star Wars antimissile missile program.

  The loss of jobs and depressive economic effects of ridding ourselves of a war economy could be mitigated by embarking upon a massive conversion to a peacetime economy, putting the monies saved from the military budget into environmental protection, human services, and other domestic needs. The shift away from war spending would greatly improve our quality of life and lead to a healthier overall economy, while bringing serious losses to profiteering defense contractors.

  NATIONAL SECURITY STATE

  Prohibit covert actions by intelligence agencies against anticapitalist social movements at home and abroad. End U.S.-sponsored counterinsurgency wars against the poor of the
world. Eliminate all foreign aid to regimes engaged in oppressing their own peoples. The billions of U.S. tax dollars that flow into the Swiss bank accounts of foreign autocrats, militarists, and drug cartels could be better spent on human services at home. Lift the trade sanctions imposed on Cuba and other countries that have dared to deviate from the freemarket orthodoxy.

  The Freedom of Information Act should be enforced instead of undermined by those up high who say they have nothing to hide, then try to hide almost everything they do.

  NEWS MEDIA

  The airwaves are the property of the people of the United States. As part of their public-service licensing requirements, television and radio stations should be required to give—free of charge—public air time to all political viewpoints, including dissident and radical ones. The media should be required to give equal time to all candidates, not just Democrats and Republicans. Free air time, say, an hour a week for each party in the month before election day, as was done in Nicaragua, helps level the playing field and greatly diminishes the need to raise large sums to buy air time. In campaign debates, the candidates should be questioned by representatives from labor, peace, consumer, environmental, feminist, civil rights, and gay rights groups, instead of just fatuous media pundits who are dedicated to limiting the universe of discourse so as not to give offense to their corporate employers and sponsors.

  SOCIAL SECURITY

  Reform Social Security in a progressive way by cutting 2 percent from the current 12.4 percent Social Security flat tax rate, and offset that lost revenue by eliminating or raising the cap on how much income can be taxed. At present, earnings of more than $97,500 are exempt from FICA withholding tax. This change would give an average working family a $700 tax relief and would reverse the trend that has been raising FICA payroll taxes for low- and middle-income people while reducing taxes for the wealthy.

  It is no mystery why these sensible and urgently needed reforms are not carried out. Those who have the desire for such changes have not the power. And those who have the power most certainly have not the desire, being disinclined to commit class suicide. It is not in their interest to initiate really substantive democratic reforms in the existing politico-economic system. They can be counted on to resist our efforts at just about every turn.

  NOTES

  1. For these various irregularities, see New York Times, 30 November 2000 and 15 July 2001; Boston Globe, 30 November 2000 and 10 March 2001. A relevant documentary is Unprecedented: The 2000 Presidential Election, L.A. Independent Media Center Film, 2004.

  2. New York Times, 15 September 2002; the investigators were from California Institute of Technology and Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

  3. Mark Crispin Miller, Fooled Again: How the Right Stole the 2004 Election and Why They’ll Steal the Next One Too (Basic Books, 2005), 7–31, 262, and passim.

  4. All the various instances that follow—with the exception of the Rick Garves and Gregory Elich testimonials—are from Miller, Fooled Again, passim; Bob Fitrakis and Harvey Wasserman, How the GOP Stole America’s 2004 Election and Is Rigging 2008 (CICJ Books/www.Freepress.org, 2005); Anita Miller (ed.), What Went Wrong in Ohio: The Conyers Report on the 2004 Presidential Election (Academy Chicago Publishers, 2005); Andy Dunn, “Hook & Crook,” Z Magazine, March 2005; Greg Palast, “Kerry Won: Here Are the Facts,” Observer, 5 November 2004; Steven F. Freeman (with Joel Bleifus), Was the 2004 Presidential Election Stolen? (Seven Stories, 2006).

  5. Jonathan Simon and Ron Baiman, “The 2004 Presidential Election: Who Won the Popular Vote? An Examination of the Comparative Validity of Exit Polls and Vote Count Data,” Freepress.org, 2 January 2004; Freeman, Was the 2004 Presidential Election Stolen? 99–134 and passim; Fitrakis and Wasserman, How the GOP Stole America’s 2004 Election, 51, 55–57.

  6. New York Times, 9 November 2006.

  7. “Good Morning America,” 1 September 2005

  8. New York Times, 5 September 2005.

  9. Fran Pavley and Jason Barbose, “Roadblock to Cleaner Cars,” 30 October 2006.

  10. See the report by Susan Saulny and Gary Rivlin, New York Times, 17 September 2006.

  11. Jill Pletcher, email, 17 September 2006.

  12. Paul Gewirtz and Chad Golder, “So Who Are the Activists?” New York Times op-ed, 6 July 2005.

  13. “Activism Is in the Eye of the Ideologist,” New York Times editorial, 11 September 2006. The Kentucky study was done by Professor Lori Ringhand.

  14. “Activism Is in the Eye of the Ideologist.”

  15. Survey by the National Law Journal, reported in People’s Daily World, 12 September 1986.

  16. See the documentary Who Killed the Electric Car? (Sony Pictures Classics, 2006).

  17. Karl Grossman, “Three Mile Island,” Extra!, July/August 1993.

  18. “Nuclear Power 2010,” Public Citizen, March 2004.

  19. See the documentary film, Who Killed the Electric Car (2006).

  20. For extended discussion of this point and other things in this selection, see Michael Parenti, Democracy for the Few, 8th ed. (Wadsworth/Thomson, 2007).

  21. For data and particulars, see Parenti, Democracy for the Few, chapters 10 and 11.

  22. James Ridgeway, “Mondo Washington,” Village Voice, 27 June 2000.

  III.

  LIFESTYLES AND OTHER PEOPLE

  12 RACIST RULE, THEN AND NOW

  There is a horrific side to American history, seldom acknowledged and rarely taught. It has to do with the countless murderous assaults perpetrated against Native Americans, Asian Americans, Mexican Americans, African Americans, immigrants, and other ethnic minorities. The period between 1835 and 1848, for instance, saw a series of aggressive incursions and then a war waged against Mexico, resulting in the U.S. takeover of approximately half of Mexico—what is now Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, Utah, a slice of Colorado, and all of California. In the decades after 1848, 473 out of every 100,000 Mexicans in the Southwest were victims of lynchings. As Luis Angel Toro of the University of Dayton put it, “The Anglos who poured into Texas and the rest of the Southwest brought their apparatus of racial terror, developed to hold the African American people in bondage, to the newly conquered territories. Mexicans became frequent victims of beatings and lynching.”1

  There are other examples of ethnic violence almost too grim to contemplate: the four hundred years of massacres and land grabs inflicted upon indigenous Americans (“Indians”), which included the extermination of entire tribes, and the centuries of slavery inflicted upon African Americans, followed by a century of segregation. African Americans compose the ethnic group that has been most persistently assaulted by Caucasian lynch-mob violence, extending from the earliest colonial days right into the second half of the twentieth century. Let us give that terrible issue some attention (since the history textbooks seldom do), focusing on New Orleans and a few other locales at the turn of the century.

  In 1900 Ida Wells-Barnett, an African-American woman of no small courage, wrote a vivid exposé of the mob atrocities that were being perpetrated against members of her race in New Orleans. To read her reports today is to peer directly into an ugly and horrific history.2 The scenes she describes in succinct but telling detail were replicated throughout the South and in some parts of the North. To pick one of many incidents, we read that in 1899 in Maysville, Kentucky, a Black man named William Coleman—against whom there was absolutely no evidence of any crime—was slowly roasted to death by an eager crowd, “first one foot and then the other, and dragged out of the fire so that the torture might be prolonged.” Describing several other autos-da-fé, Wells-Barnett remarks with bitter irony that the “ordinary procedures of hanging and shooting have been improved upon during the past ten years.” Sometimes thousands of people congregated to witness the burnings.

  She also provides descriptions of the more “ordinary” lynchings, shootings, and mob beatings. In most of these incidents the police either proved unable or unwilling to maintain order; occasionally th
ey even contributed to the disorder. The hideous descriptions of racist mob madness are enough to make one ask what manner of species are humans that they would inflict such horrors upon other living beings.

  If Wells-Barnett focuses on a central character, it is Robert Charles, an African American whose only crime was to resist a police beating, flee, and then fight for his life in successive gun battles. Charles was branded a “desperado” and “archfiend,” capable of “diabolical coolness” in his ability to shoot back with deadly accuracy at those who tried to hunt him down. He was repeatedly described as a hardened criminal, even though he had no criminal record and seems never to have committed a crime.

  Charles made a desperate last stand, single-handedly, in a small building encircled by a furious armed mob numbering in the thousands. Even as the besiegers set fire to the building, he continued exchanging gunfire with his assailants, killing five attackers and seriously wounding nine others. Finally, Wells-Barnett reports, when fire and smoke became too much to endure, Charles “appeared in the door, rifle in hand, to charge the countless guns that were drawn upon him. With a courage which was indescribable, he raised his gun to fire again, but this time it failed, for a hundred shots riddled his body and he fell dead, face fronting the mob.”

  In a posthumous examination of his personal effects, the police found that Charles possessed “negro periodicals and other ‘race’ propaganda.” He was what we would today call a Black Nationalist, active in the back-to-Africa movement. Instantly he devolved from a fiendish criminal to something even worse, an “agitator” and “fanatic,” a Black militant given to “wild tirades.” The literature he possessed was denounced because it “attacked the White race in unstinted language and asserted the equal rights of the Negro,” one report said.