Behind Mumbai?

Al Qaeda, al Qaeda wannabes, Pakistan-based Islamic extremists or disgruntled Indian Islamists?

CNN’s Chief International Correspondent Christiane Amanpour, on “Larry King Live” last night, discussed the possible motives behind the terrorist attacks in Mumbai, India:

LARRY KING, host: Christiane, with the limited information we have, as an educated guess, what are the possible motives?

AMANPOUR: Well, this is what's confusing everybody. I think it's really interesting because many, many people are trying - are saying that there's a Pakistani connection. Others are saying maybe it has some of the hallmarks of al Qaeda or at least al Qaeda and its numerous spin-offs and clones.

But, this Deccan Mujahedeen - the name is really interesting, because it comes from this southern plateau Hyderabad area (in India). And, it comes from a time when, in fact, it was Muslim rule in that part of India - many, many, many years ago.

So, this suggests a deliberate indigenous claim. And also, there has been talk about links to a so-called Indian Mujahedeen.

And remember, this is the fifth attack in India this year - attacks that have taken about 150 lives or more before this attack just two days ago. And, these have been claimed by Indian Mujahedeen or at least blamed on indigenous Islamists.

So, this is a very, very difficult thing to sort out at the moment. Many are calling it highly coordinated, highly disciplined. On the other hand, there are eyewitnesses talking about indiscriminate firing of AK-47s, for instance, at the train station. People are talking about deliberately targeting Westerners and, obviously, going to the Jewish Nariman House - the Jewish targets there. On the other hand, killing Muslims and perhaps Hindus, as well, at the station and other places.

So, there's no direct line that you can really pin down right now.

(…)

AMANPOUR: Well, you (King) were talking about motives. First of all, Pakistan has denied having anything to do with it, and the president has sent over the head of the Pakistani ISI, military intelligence, to go and talk to the Indian prime minister and try to obviously see if they can sort something out there.

But, in terms of motive, Deepak (Chopra) was talking about the sort of global Islamic movement. … Certainly, many of these groups, if it's al Qaeda, they're just nihilists who are bent on a power struggle to kill either what they call infidels who may be Western or even within the whole Muslim group itself.

But, in India, it is very important to note, there are 150 million or so Muslims in India. It is the world's largest Muslim minority, bigger than most countries. An Indian government-ordered commission, about 2006, talked about the Indian minority there and really saw that they were, in terms of jobs, income, education, thoroughly disadvantaged compared to the Hindu majority.

This Indian Mujahedeen has spoken about those grievances before. Then, there's the other issue of Kashmir, all these groups have talked about Kashmir as well, which is an ongoing and festering sore. That is the Indian-administered, Muslim- majority province up there near the Himalayas. So, that's an open, festering sore as well.

And obviously, you know, you talked about, isn't it in both countries' interests to warm up? Well, yes, except there are very powerful elements on both sides that don't want relations to be warmed up. So, that's going to be a test, also, of whether there can be determined and courageous leadership to try to keep this warming up of relations on track.

READ MORE OF THIS DISCUSSION HERE.

Are you blessed?

I wanted to catch you, dear reader, while your thoughts have turned to thanksgiving. During this special holiday season, we all can think of ways we are blessed.

Here are two which stopped me short, taken from the blog of my beloved great-nephew Phillip Hill:

“If you have food in your refrigerator, clothes on your back, a roof over your head and a place to sleep, you are richer than 75 percent of this world’s people.”

“If you have money in the bank, in your wallet, and spare change in a dish, you are among the top 8 percent of the world's wealthy.”

***

At 3 ET this morning, I finally caught the two-hour special, “CNN Heroes: An All-Star Tribute,” hosted by Anderson Cooper.

The value of this special tribute exceeds the celebrity lineup: the good deeds of the 10 honored heroes leaves the viewer humbled and wondering what he or she can do for others.

There are heroes all around us; several grace my life. We don’t have to move the world to make a difference – a simple helping hand can mean so much:

Help an elderly neighbor change light bulbs and smoke detector batteries.

Clean out your kitchen shelves or pantry and take those foodstuffs which get pushed to the back to a lneighborhood cupboard.

Give a little of your time to one of those local organizations doing good things for those in need.

Organize a neighborhood “calling circle” to check on elderly neighbors.

Give a restaurant gift certificate to a working, single mom. (She will love you for it.)

Give a kid a book.

A simple helping hand. Extend yours today.

***

The CNN special will re-air tonight at 10 ET/9 CT/7 PT.

The news around the world and here in America is dire and distressing. Recapture the spirit of this holiday season and reassure yourself there is good in the world, by tuning in.

The special tribute closes with these words from “If You’re Out There,” sung by John Legend:

“The future started yesterday, and we’re already late.” (LISTEN TO THIS SONG ON YOUTUBE)

A Thanksgiving remembrance

“ … just think what a precious day this was for her.”

***

In 2000, to mark a new century and a new millennium, I edited a monthly family newsletter, “The Page Turner.” That November, my niece Kimberly Paige Turner Runyan – “Kim” – daughter of Isaac and Glo Turner, wrote about a Thanksgiving Day in our family’s past.

Here is Kim’s memory, in her own words:

“ … And I Gave Thanks”

by Kim Turner Runyan

Thanksgiving has always been my favorite holiday of the year. My family and I always spent this special day with my paternal grandparents, Lee and Marie Turner. They had moved from their longtime home in Jackson, Miss., and their small mobile home, located in Carrollton, Miss., was always filled with food, family and loads of fun. I guess I never really thought of Thanksgiving as a time of worship and praise, but more of a mini-vacation where I would get spoiled rotten.

All this changed in 1987 when Granddaddy died. Grandmother sold their home and moved back to Jackson to live with my Aunt Mary Bell. Needless to say, my Thanksgiving tradition changed quite a lot. In November 1989, my cousin Ladd Frazier called to ask my older brother Van and me to join him for a trip to Anderson, S.C., to spend Thanksgiving with his mom, my dear Aunt Betty Jean (B.J.). I was thrilled! Aunt Betty and I had always been very close, and any opportunity I got to spend time with her was a special treat.

As we prepared to leave, Ladd told us we had to stop by Aunt Mary’s to pick up a package Grandmama wanted to send to Aunt Betty. That was a highlight of the day. I loved any excuse to get to see Grandmama. Thanksgiving was her favorite holiday, too. I might not be able to see her Thanksgiving Day, but the day before Thanksgiving was close enough to perfect for me.

When we arrived at Aunt Mary’s house, Grandmama was in the bathroom getting dressed for the day. I went in, talked to her for a few minutes, told her I loved her, retrieved the package, wished her a “Happy Thanksgiving,” and left for an incredible Thanksgiving, or so I thought.

Our trip to South Carolina was fairly uneventful. Upon arrival we were greeted by a wonderful roast beef dinner and some little gifts from Aunt B.J. After dinner, Aunt B.J., Uncle Mark, Van and Ladd decided to watch a movie. I went to bed, anticipating the next day. I had only been asleep an hour when Aunt B.J. was gently patting my arm, “Kim, honey, wake up. Grandmama has had a heart attack, and she’s gone.”

After shock wore off, the anger set in: “Thanks a lot, God, you just took one of the most precious people in my life away, and on the night before Thanksgiving, too. It was her favorite holiday, God. How could you do this to us?”

The next day, Thanksgiving Day, my favoritie holiday of the year, was spent driving back to Mississippi. My Thanksgiving dinner was a cold ham sandwich eaten at a cold concrete table at a dreary roadside park somewhere in Alabama. As Uncle Mark blessed the food, I thought to myself, “What does he think we have to be thankful for! There is no turkey and dressing. It is cold and drizzling rain. And, most of all my Grandmama has gone from my life forever.” I was about as grateful as a pig at a hog slaughter. The rest of the long trip was miserable. We finally arrived home around 11 p.m. I was totally exhausted, totally depressed and totally mad at God. Mama met us at the door. I cried my heart out as she held me close. “Kim, just think what a precious day this was for her,” Mama whispered in my ear.

“Excuse me for not jumping for joy or throwing a party!” I lashed out at Mama. “I don’t feel much like celebrating.” I stomped out and went to bed. I didn’t sleep at all that night. Memories flooded my 15-year-old mind. I remembered all the summers my brothers and I had spent with her. I remembered all the butter beans and peas we had picked out of her garden, and then shelled sitting in her living room, listening to stories of days gone by. I thought of all the times we were eaten alive by redbugs while we were picking blackberries. It was nothing “a Clorox bath and a bowl of good, hot cobbler” couldn’t heal. I remembered catching a 10-pound catfish out of Aunt Bernice’s (Bernice Montgomery) back pond, and how Grandmama cut her hands pulling the line to get it in. My mind raced to Mount Pisgah Baptist Church where she and Granddaddy had taken us so many times. How we loved those ice-cream suppers and Bible School nights! I thought of all the times she took us shopping for school clothes, and how we always disagreed over the latest fashions. The memories of her reading to us from her Bible and teaching us about her Lord would always be dear to me.

Grandmama was such a strong woman. She was strong-willed, strong-hearted and a woman of strong, simple faith; a faith that had taken her through 61 years of marriage; the death of a son; of a grandson, Michael Ralph Frazier, and of her lifelong soulmate, my Granddaddy. It was her faith that allowed her to rear five children, work hard every day of her life, and still have her whole family pressed, dressed and looking their best on Sunday mornings.

As we prepared for the funeral the next day, I felt God speaking to my heart. I sat almost numb through a very sweet, special funeral service. At the graveside, as I watched them lower her body into the earth, God touched me and my Mama’s words made sense.

When Grandmama woke that Thanksgiving morning, she awoke in Heaven, greeted by the Savior she cherished so dearly. She was reunited with Granddaddy. She probably held the little baby boy, Jesse Lloyd, God had taken from her arms so long ago. She held her grandson, Aunt B.J.’s son Michael, close and reassured him of her love for him. What a beautiful sight it must have been! What a glorious, precious Thanksgiving Day it must have been for her! How shamed I was for being so selfish.

As Uncle Mark held my hand and led me away from the graveside, I gave thanks: “Thank you, God, for this precious, wonderful, loving woman. Thank you for her life and what she meant to me. Thank you for the family she begat. Because of her, Father, I have a wonderful daddy, a great uncle, three precious aunts and a passel of cousins. Thank you for her strength and her wisdom and her loving, tender spirit. Thank you for the opportunity you gave us to learn and study about you. Thank you for taking her quickly, for not allowing her to suffer. Thank you for allowing her to come home to you on her favorite holiday of the year. Thank you, Father, for the time I had with her. And, dear God, I thank you most for her salvation and for mine and for her never-ending, undying faith!”

Thanksgiving is still my favorite holiday, but for different reasons. I know its true meaning, and I try to live each day with a thankful heart. I count my blessings more closely and praise God for each one.

Oh, and the little box we took to Aunt B.J. that day came back to me a few years later. A couple of weeks before my wedding, I received the little box in the mail. Inside were some dishtowels and a note explaining the significance and origin of the gift. Of all the presents I received that was truly the most precious and most cherished.

Dear sweet family, I hope your Thanksgiving is filled with food, fun, family and, most of all, a thankful heart! My love to you all!

- Kim Turner Runyan

***

Thank you again, Kim, for these words written eight years ago about a Thanksgiving 19 years ago. and for all the wonderful childhood memories you’ve shared about my mother. Your granddad and grandmother would be as proud of you as ever - of your beautiful family and that you are a schoolteacher!

And, thank you, dear reader, for taking the time.

PHOTO: Kim Turner Runyan, holding her nephew Ty Turner; with her son Blake, adopted son Quentin, son Bryce, husband Dean and son Brandon. (Photo by Debra Sims Patton)

Old portraits

Or, Why I read Charles Dickens.

Growing up I spent summer weeks with aunts and uncles and cousins. In the old country home of Uncle Mack, Aunt Myra and my cousins Kay and Lanny, the walls were hung with those old ancestral portraits in large oval frames.

The stern looks of women dressed in 19th and early 20th Century costume and bearded gentlemen with right hands tucked inside their vests were at once intriguing and intimidating to a child.

My first night there I was lying in a back bedroom with two of these faces staring down at me. As I pulled the quilt up to my chin, a ghostly light played upon the portraits, then disappeared. I froze, breathless in the dark. Once more the faces were eerily illuminated.

I caught my breath, then woke the house with a blood curdling scream.

The ghostly apparitions faded back into their frames, and I into my feather bed as Uncle Mack closed the drapery and explained.

He raised pheasants out back in cages where naked light bulbs hung on cords. As the pheasants jumped to catch the bugs around the lights, the cords swung, momentarily casting a light into the bedroom window and bringing long dead kin to life.

Now, listen as Charles Dickens, in “Bleak House,” describes old portraits hanging on the walls of Chesney Wold:

“Through some of the fiery windows, beautiful from without, and set, at this sunset hour, not in dull-grey stone but in a glorious house of gold, the light excluded at other windows pours in, rich, lavish, overflowing like the summer plenty in the land. Then, do the frozen Dedlocks thaw. Strange movements come upon their features as the shadows of leaves play there. A dense Justice in a corner is beguiled into a wink. A staring Baronet, with a truncheon, gets a dimple in his chin. Down into the bosom of a stony shepherdess there steals a fleck of light and warmth that would have done it good, a hundred years ago. One ancestress of Volumnia, in high-heeled shoes, very like her — casting the shadow of that virgin event before her full two centuries — shoots out into a halo and becomes a saint. A maid of honour of the court of Charles the Second, with large round eyes (and other charms to correspond), seems to bathe in glowing water, and it ripples as it glows.

“But, the fire of the sun is dying. Even now the floor is dusky, and shadow slowly mounts the walls, bringing the Dedlocks down like age and death. And now, upon my Lady’s picture over the great chimney-piece, a weird shade falls from some old tree, that turns it pale, and flutters it, and looks as if a great arm held a veil or hood, watching an opportunity to draw it over her. Higher and darker rises shadow on the wall — now a red gloom on the ceiling — now the fire is out.”

That’s why Dickens’ words are immortal, and I’m writing a two-bit blog.

PHOTO: My great-grandmother Sarah Allie Castle Lindsey Holman, affectionately my mother's "Grandma Holman," 1898.

Prediction

Prediction: Soon, the far left will be as critical of President-elect Barack Obama as the far right.

Just 13 days after Obama’s victory, Clinton administration arch-critic du jour Chris Matthews was foaming at the mouth over Obama’s transition team and appointees to date. Talk about a “180.” “Where is the change? Where is the change?” Matthews repeatedly asked his guests.

My friend Airth wrote me about hearing a CNN discussion last night regarding Obama’s selection of “Clintonites” and how that does not represent the change he promised. “Well,” Airth said, “change is more about ideas than people. And 'Clintonites' have always had ideas that have led to change.”

Let me stop here, dear reader, and declare what follows is not a defense of the Clinton administration. I am defending President-elect Obama against those on the left and the right who are beginning to question his judgment.

Some of the strongest Obama supporters I know expressed concern over the influence Bill Clinton would have on a Hillary presidency. What then of the influence the former president’s administration appears to be having on Obama?

On Monday, I published a very important post, however lengthy, which discussed influences on Obama’s thinking as well as a very positive and progressive “blueprint” which has been proposed for him and for America. Unfortunately, few bothered to take note of the post, “A plan for the 44th president.”

Obama’s first cabinet appointment – Eric Holder as attorney general – might survive a confirmation hearing drilling on Bill Clinton’s pardon of Marc Rich, but will it survive questions about Ira Magaziner?

Hot on the heels of the Associated Press news flash about Holder came a statement from the National Legal and Policy Center (NLPC) criticizing Obama’s AG pick. NLPC, which promotes ethics in public life and sponsors the Government Integrity Project, is still ticked off over Holder’s involvement in what they deemed a “cover-up” by Magaziner. Read the story HERE. Be prepared for buzz about Magaziner’s chairmanship of the William Jefferson Clinton Foundation advisory board.

At the time, I concluded the charges against Magaziner were a Republican witch hunt (there was a helluva lot of that going around). Holder, Attorney General Janet Reno and President Clinton called them "unfair and unsupported by the facts." A 1995 criminal investigation into the so-called “cover up” ended without charges against Magaziner.

But, that won’t stop a regurgitation of anything that will shed bad light on the Clintons – and by inference, on Obama.

Kudos to Pat Buchanan who pointed out on “Hardball with Chris Matthews” last night that guests’ discussion of the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) suggested “corruption.”

The anti-Clinton forces who are chapped over Obama’s consideration of Hillary for secretary of state - including those on MSNBC - would have you believe there are some nefarious goings-on which should prevent her appointment.

The CGI mission is clear on its Web site: “The Clinton Global Initiative is a non-partisan catalyst for action, bringing together a community of global leaders to devise and implement innovative solutions to some of the world’s most pressing challenges.”

To see a list of all the amazing 10-year commitments made by CGI members: LINK

Then there is Joe Lieberman. I personally find Sen. Lieberman (I-CT) a despicable, self-serving opportunist who has not always put his country before his own political ambitions.

You can bet the far left is not too happy with Obama’s “pardon” of Lieberman and the Democratic Caucus’ willingness to overlook his support of John McCain.

Barack Obama is keeping his word. Throughout his campaign he promised to do all in his power to unite the people of this country. In the 2004 keynote address which catapulted him into the national spotlight, he said, “We are not blue states. We are not red states. We are the United States of America.”

In the College of Public Opinion, Obama might be flunking his first big test. In MY opinion, he is willing to put into place persons he deems best suited to salvaging what’s left of this country. The burden upon him is great – one few of us would welcome – and if he succeeds, he will leave the White House with highest honors.

The political factions of this country must put away pettiness and meet each other face to face, to paraphrase Mary Stewart’s “Collect.” We cannot let Obama – or our country - fail.

A plan for the 44th president

During the last year I listened to Bill Clinton’s autobiography, “My Life,” which served as a first-person refresher course on the eight years of his administration.

So, as President-elect Barack Obama began to name his transition team, it was easy to recognize that many team members, including its leader John Podesta and Obama’s chief of staff-in-waiting Raum Emanuel, were holdovers from the Clinton White House.

Friday night on MSNBC, Chris Matthews reported that 31 of the 47 persons named either to Obama’s transition team or staff have Clinton administraton ties. These include all but one of the persons on Obama’s 12-member Transition Advisory Board and both of his White House staff choices.

Did these 31 persons leave the Clinton administration with the bad taste of sour grapes? Hardly.

John Podesta, who was Clinton’s chief of staff from October 1998 to January 2001, after serving in other administrative positions, is described on his official biography site (LINK) as:

“ … known for his straight talk, acerbic wit and fierce defense of the Clinton Administration.”

PODESTA’S INFLUENCE

Podesta, it turns out, might just be the most influential person occupying Obama’s thoughts as he prepares to move this nation, finally, into the 21st Century. Let me explain.

On 6 November 2008, CQPolitics – Congressional Quarterly – reported:

“President-elect Obama has announced the leaders of his transition team, and it's a mix of longtime Senate aides, friends and top officials at the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank that has been a major influence on Obama’s policy proposals.” (LINK)

John Podesta is president and chief executive officer of the Center for American Progress (CAP), currently on leave of absence while he heads up Obama’s team. He is the author of numerous books and articles promoting the Center’s progressive agenda.

So, just how influential are Podesta and CAP on Obama’s thinking?

What follows is reading for persons dead serious about the “changes” Obama has promised and where they will take this country – persons with a natural curiosity about the forces which might influence these changes.

It has been my experience that 99 percent of blog visitors never click on provided source links, so I am publishing here, in its entirety, a three-part series of articles (LINK) from CAP’s “The Progress Report.” (See “Fair Use Notice” in left sidebar.)

The articles, which might occupy a half hour of your time, are self-explanatory and present a “progressive blueprint” for the future of the United States of America:

‘CHANGE FOR AMERICA: A PROGRESSIVE BLUEPRINT FOR THE 44TH PRESIDENT’

ARTICLE ONE OF THREE:

November 12, 2008

by Faiz Shakir, Amanda Terkel, Satyam Khanna, Matt Corley, Benjamin Armbruster, Ali Frick, Ryan Powers, and Matt Duss

NATIONAL SECURITY
A New Progressive Direction

Editor's Note: This is the first in our three-part series on "Change for America: A Progressive Blueprint for the 44th President."

The disastrous foreign policies of the Bush years have created an opening for the new administration to show that progressive ideas are better able to secure and protect America in the 21st Century. A joint project of the Center for American Progress Action Fund, the New Democracy Project released a new book titled Change for America: A Progressive Blueprint for the 44th President, which contains a series of innovative and necessary proposals to change direction on a range of policy issues confronting the United States. The section dealing with national security suggests ways in which we can better secure our homeland and frustrate the efforts of America's enemies abroad. It also re-conceptualizes national security to include issues such as global poverty and development, noting that radical ideologies often take root in environments of insecurity and deprivation. Importantly, it recognizes that developing and implementing these new policies will require repairing America's image in the world, reestablishing American leadership seven years after President Bush arrogantly declared "either you're with us, or you're with the terrorists."

CONTAINING THE IRAQ FALLOUT: The invasion of Iraq was an attempt to deal with a 21st Century problem -- amorphous networks of transnational terrorists -- using 20th Century methods such as "shock and awe." The cost in lives and treasure as well as to America's reputation has been enormous. In one chapter of Change for America titled “Containing The Terrorist Threat,” Jessica Stern, a former director at the National Security Council, writes that "the new president will inherit a system still oriented toward meeting threats that emerge from...static national powers, rather than transnational groups." Stern notes that an unfortunate side-effect of the Iraq war is "the excellent training the insurgents have received...against the best equipped military in the world." Stern proposes working with Iraq's neighboring states "to prepare a strategy for dealing with the inevitable 'blowback' from the Iraq war," such as foreign fighters returning to establish networks in their home countries. "Efforts should be put in place now to monitor the movement of insurgents who leave Iraq," Stern writes. "This will require both bilateral and multilateral intelligence efforts, with special emphasis on inevitable efforts by the Islamist extremists to set up virtual training camps on the Internet and seek financing and recruits online."

SUSTAINABLE SECURITY: Confronting future threats before they emerge requires more than the relentless application of military force, it requires addressing the economic and humanitarian issues that create the conditions from which threats arise. In the chapter “Reducing Global Poverty Is A Moral And Security Imperative,” Gayle Smith, a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress Action Fund, notes that "the risk of war increases in direct proportion to the levels of poverty." Smith proposes creating "a new U.S. Global Economic Development Agency -- an independent, cabinet-level agency focused on global poverty alleviation goals...building capable states [and] creating the conditions under which social entrepreneurship and open societies can thrive." Smith also suggests that the president look for ways to coordinate private and public sector activities, to "use U.S. assistance to seed innovation, and to leverage U.S. aid in support of new development models...The new president can use a variety of policy tools and resources to encourage greater innovation and experimentation, as well as foster cross-sector partnerships between social enterprises, corporations, philanthropists, and government."

RE-ESTABLISHING AMERICAN LEADERSHIP: Because the partnership of the international community is essential for global security, the United States must seek to repair its image and restore its leadership role in the world. This means more than simply doing better public relations; it means developing better policies that don't alienate America's friends, or needlessly provoke America's foes. But better public diplomacy is key to bringing about the international cooperation that is required to manage shared global security concerns. In the chapter, “Public Diplomacy Can Help Restore Lost U.S. Credibility,” Doug Wilson, a former senior adviser at the United States Information Agency, writes that "to be effective, public diplomacy must help U.S. policymakers communicate U.S. values and motives to shape foreign policy understanding and then integrate foreign public opinion into the policymaking process in order to help realize our national security and foreign policy goals." The new administration should "determine how best to build upon historically successful approaches -- such as educational and cultural exchange programs -- with 21st-century strategies and communication tools."

ARTICLE TWO OF THREE:

November 13, 2008

by Faiz Shakir, Amanda Terkel, Satyam Khanna, Matt Corley, Benjamin Armbruster, Ali Frick, and Ryan Powers

ADMINISTRATION
Reorganizing Government For The 21st Century

Editor's Note: This is the second in our three-part series on "Change for America: A Progressive Blueprint for the 44th President." See part 1 here; part 3 will appear tomorrow.

In 1997, President Bill Clinton vowed to start building "a bridge" to the 21st Century. President Bush's White House, however, has moved backwards in time, operating on a 20th Century model. Yesterday, the Center for American Progress Action Fund (CAPAF), with the New Democracy Project, released a new book called “Change for America: A Progressive Blueprint for the 44th President.” The book outlines new ideas for governing in the 21st Century, updating the White House to reflect this century's priorities. John Podesta, president and CEO of CAPAF, and Sarah Wartell, executive vice president for management of CAPAF, explain that creating new White House offices and retooling existing ones "ensure[s] that a limited set of key objectives receive ongoing heightened attention" and allows the new president to make his priorities clear and begin setting his agenda from Day One."

URBAN POLICY: President-elect Barack Obama's Chicago background means that he will bring a fresh, pro-city perspective to a position that has not seen an urban face in decades."To find a nominee with as strong a city pedigree as Obama's, you have to go back to New York Gov. Al Smith, the Democratic candidate in 1928, or even further, to Grover Cleveland, who had been mayor of Buffalo," the Washington Post wrote. Obama has already indicated he will create a White House Office of Urban Policy, a move Bruce Katz, vice president and founding director of the Metropolitan Policy Program at Brookings, and Henry Cisneros, former Housing and Urban Development secretary, endorse in their chapter on revitalizing and updating the department. Metropolitan areas, they note, "have become the engines of national prosperity;" as such, federal policy "needs to shift from an outdated focus on 'urban policy' to an expansive, asset-driven perspective of 'metro policy.'" The Office of Metropolitan Policy would work with key cabinet agencies, such as the Transportation Department, and "would actively engage the true metropolitan experts -- local corporate, civic, and government leaders -- in the design and implementation of new, cutting-edge policies."

TECH POLICY: Science and technology "are the engines of our economic growth," writes Neal Lane, the director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) under President Clinton, but "we risk falling rapidly behind many other parts of the world" in discovery and applied technology. The OSTP should play a central role in the next administration, and should serve in the National Security Council, the National Economic Council, and the National Energy Council. "After eight years of political interference by the Bush White House" into science, Lane writes, the 44th president must ensure that policy decisions "will be informed by the best scientific evidence and analysis." Lane recommends issuing an executive order within the first week of the next administration that emphasizes his commitment to relying on the best scientific evidence. Obama has already proposed creating a "chief technical officer" and wants to aggressively expand rural broadband connection. He has indicated he would move swiftly to overturn Bush's ban on embryonic stem cell research, which Lane says should be done within the first week of his term.

ENERGY COUNCIL: CAPAF Senior Fellow Todd Stern and former Deputy Interior Secretary David Hayes write, "Transforming the energy base of the economy will demand top-level participation across the executive branch." The National Energy Council should thus include the secretaries of most cabinet agencies. We cannot transition to a low-carbon economy without enormous technological innovation," the president should also create an interagency Energy Innovation Council "to develop an integrated, multiyear national energy research, development, and deployment strategy." Stern and Hayes urge the next president to pledge to introduce energy and climate change legislation within his first 100 days. "The scope of this challenge is huge," Stern and Hayes acknowledge; climate scientists warn the world will face catastrophe if it doesn't immediately and seriously confront climate change. "Along with finding the right people to staff his Administration," Time's Joe Klein writes, "Barack Obama's most important job now is to find the right words to inspire the nation to undertake this next great cause."

SOCIAL ENTREPRENEURSHIP: At the start of his campaign, Obama pledged to create "a new Social Entrepreneur Agency to make sure that small non-profits have the same kind of support that we give small businesses." He has promised to expand programs like AmeriCorps and Peace Corps and to create a new Classroom Corps, Health Corps, Clean Energy Corps, and Veterans Corps. Michele Jolin, a CAP Senior Fellow and the former chief of staff of the Council of Economic Advisers, advises the 44th president to create a new White House Office of Social Entrepreneurship to spur "greater innovation, creativity, and success in the non-profit sector." The "non-profit sector can be a source of innovation and experimentation," a testing ground for new government solutions. Jolin warns against creating a bulky bureaucracy or picking specific "winners;" instead, the government should "invest in a range of solutions designed to meet national goals." "In short, the new president needs to focus on creating a policy environment that...fosters new entrepreneurship, improves nonprofits' access to growth capital, and removes outdated tax and regulatory barriers to innovation." The new White House office should create an annual multimillion dollar prize "for developing the most creative, sustainable, and high-impact solution to a defined social challenge," Jolin suggests.

ARTICLE THREE OF THREE:

November 14, 2008

by Faiz Shakir, Amanda Terkel, Satyam Khanna, Matt Corley, Benjamin Armbruster, Ali Frick, Ryan Powers, and Pat Garofalo

ECONOMY
A Pro-Growth, Progressive Economic Agenda

Editor's Note: This is the third in our three-part series on "Change for America: A Progressive Blueprint for the 44th President."

On Election Day, 60 percent of voters said that the state of the economy is "the most important issue facing the nation." With a resounding progressive victory, the new administration has the opportunity to implement pro-growth, progressive economic policies to get the economy back on track. This week, the Center for American Progress Action Fund, along with the New Democracy Project, released a book called “Change for America: A Progressive Blueprint for the 44th President.” The book outlines new ideas for governing in the 21st Century, and offers suggestions on how to make the economy work for everyone, rather than catering to the richest Americans and largest corporations as has been the policy for the last eight years. In the book, Center for American Progress Action Fund Senior Fellow Gene Sperling explains that "the 44th president must work with both sides of the political spectrum to design policies that boost shared prosperity by strengthening and growing the middle class, not policies that just focus on growth or on equity alone." "Strong and dynamic growth," Sperling writes, "is critical to ensuring the United States always makes room for anyone from anywhere who is willing to work hard and play by the rules without having to force existing groups to settle for less."

MOBILITY AND EQUITY: In their chapter on equality and mobility, Peter Edelman of Georgetown University and Angela Glover Blackwell of PolicyLink ask if America is headed towards a "new gilded age," pointing out that "the American Dream -- that we can all move up the economic ladder -- is far from reality for many people today." Currently, income inequality in the United States is at its highest level since 1928, and only "7 percent of children born to parents in the bottom wealth quintile make it to the top quintile in adulthood," while "36 percent of children born to parents in the bottom wealth quintile remain in the bottom as adults." And, U.S. tax policy exacerbates this disparity. "Out of the more than $200 billion in tax incentives offered each year for savings, only about 5 percent goes to the bottom 50 percent of Americans." Edelman and Blackwell write, "The first step is to restore a progressive U.S. tax system in the wake of the Bush administration's tax cuts, which poured hundreds of billions of dollars into the hands of the wealthiest Americans and corporations." The next step is to ensure that all Americans have both living-wage incomes -- through a minimum wage indexed to inflation -- and adequate savings to fall back on. Finally, the next administration must expand educational opportunities through a national commitment to pre-kindergarten, as well as expansion of after-school and out-of-school programs as well as programs that reach at-risk and disconnected youth.

A GREEN RECOVERY: As CAP Vice President for Economic Policy Michael Ettlinger notes, "No source of jobs is poised to be generated by the unaided private market to replace the jobs lost in home construction, the financial sector and the other areas dramatically affected by the current recession." Therefore, a set of policies aimed at creating jobs is essential to jumpstarting the economy. In her chapter on global competitiveness and trade, CAP Senior Fellow Laura Tyson argues the next administration should invest in a green recovery, creating jobs while simultaneously moving America towards a low-carbon economy. She writes, "Policies to accelerate the development of clean energy alternatives will help create green-collar jobs and build U.S. competitiveness in what promises to be one of the fastest-growing areas of the world economy over the next half-century." CAP reports that a $100 billion investment over two years in a green recovery program would create 2 million new jobs. "We identified $50 billion in programs that are ready to go immediately," says Bracken Hendricks of CAP. "The package would create 2 million jobs across the skill spectrum, from blue collar to high tech, and in almost every area of the country. There was huge congressional appetite for this even before the economic crisis hit."

LONG-TERM PROGRESSIVE GROWTH: True long-term economic success requires both "a growing middle class and rising living standards." As Ettlinger points out, "The economic weakness of recent years was papered over by personal debt underpinned by artificially high valuation of homes and other assets. ... A lesson to be learned from this period is that economic growth that is not buttressed by growing middle-class incomes is illusory -- a house of cards bound to collapse." Thus, CAP has released a Progressive Growth plan aimed at creating long-term opportunity through green recovery, implementing health care reform and labor law reform, as well as enabling all Americans access to a quality education. Sperling writes that the new economic agenda "must focus on policies that both raise the economic tide and lift all boats -- boosting productivity and our gross national product while fostering the shared prosperity that defines our nation's values." But, these efforts must also be "paired with a serious commitment to long-term fiscal discipline" through a willingness to confront ineffective domestic and military spending. Implementing the policies outlined here -- as well as many others -- can lead to an economy that excludes no one, to the benefit of everyone. (End of three-part series.)

IN CONCLUSION:

A few months ago I listened to an unabridged copy of Doris Kearns Goodwin’s “Team of Rivals,” a record of President Lincoln’s campaign and cabinet. Goodwin’s book is now much associated with Barack Obama as he plans for his administration.

As a Hillary Rodham Clinton supporter who voted for Barack Obama, it is encouraging that the president-elect has the good sense to tap resources from the most successful Democratic presidency since FDR’s.

Bill Clinton hoped his presidency would be America’s “bridge to the 21st Century.”

With the devastating effects of 9/11 and an eight-year Bush administration that bridge became an open drawbridge from which plummeted America’s image, achievements and aspirations – into dark waters of despair.

Can America now meet the aforementioned daunting challenges and emerge a better beacon for the world?

Yes, it can. But only if Americans are willing.

Bushisms, what Bushisms?

Some of you might remember the 15 minutes of fame grabbed by the lawyers who run the right-wing Web site, Powerlineblog.com. The story they broke made them the darlings of the far right.

An astute observer there discovered the superscript type in a document and derailed CBS’ and Dan Rather’s attempts at getting to the truth behind George W. Bush’s National Guard record.

At Powerline Blog (LINK), which lists as favorite sources Michelle Malkin, Town Hall, The Weekly Standard, American Spectator and Commentary, one of the three contributors said something this week that was at once incomprehensible and hilarious.

John Hinderaker has earned a nomination for DemWit’s “Dimwit of the Year” award. Pegging his post on what some cable news folks called Barack Obama’s “First Gaffe” – talk of Nancy Reagan and séances for which the president-elect apologized – Hinderaker wrote:

“Obama thinks he is a good talker, but he is often undisciplined when he speaks. He needs to understand that as president, his words will be scrutinized and will have impact whether he intends it or not. In this regard, President Bush is an excellent model; Obama should take a lesson from his example. Bush never gets sloppy when he is speaking publicly. He chooses his words with care and precision, which is why his style sometimes seems halting. In the eight years he has been president, it is remarkable how few gaffes or verbal blunders he has committed. If Obama doesn't raise his standards, he will exceed Bush's total before he is inaugurated.”

Close your mouth, dear reader!

***

Leave your own nomination for “Dimwit of the Year” in the comments zone. A winner and two runners-up will be announced at year’s end.

Isaac and the Nubian goat

My “kid brother” Isaac, 63, and his wife Glo had the great good fortune of rearing their children in a bucolic setting.

At a recent family get-together in Mississippi, Isaac regaled us with stories of their farm animals, and I don’t think I’ve ever laughed so hard.

Son Van has returned to work at the D-Day Museum complex in New Orleans. When his and wife Anna’s St. Bernard Parish home was left under water in Katrina’s wake, they moved to Alabama, where Van worked for the State Archives. They are very happy to be starting over in the city they love. Daughter Kim teaches school. She and Dean have three boys and have adopted a fourth. Brad, the youngest, owns a successful business. He and Jessie have baby Ty.

A whole family of animal lovers! Brad looks to his daddy to board and tend his farm animals, and Isaac, though almost blind, has managed quite well, caring for them and keeping the fish pond stocked. Let’s say he managed quite well until Brad brought over a pair of Nubian goats – Billy Bob and Sally.

Nubian goats originated in the Middle East, Russia and northern Africa and were cross-bred with English goats to become the Anglo-Nubian strain. Noted for a sleek, elongated body; bell-shaped, floppy ears and a Roman nose, the Nubian is, by nature, a sociable animal. Most of them.

Shortly after their arrival, it became clear that no pen could hold Billy Bob, who preferred Sally’s enclosure to his own. One day while working in the barn, Isaac was caught unawares by the charging buck, who butted him four feet into the air. “I picked up a two-by-four and hid in a stall. ‘Come on, you SOB,’ I muttered under my breath. I heard him coming, cloppety clop, and just as he rounded the stall, I let him have it!”

Glo, always soft-spoken and calm, “came out to see what all the commotion was, and there laid Billy Bob, out cold on the floor. ‘Isaac, you’ve killed the goat!’ No such luck. He got up and took off.”

“After that, it was war.”

Nubians, like most dairy goats, are “disbudded” in infancy, a process which leaves them hornless. Not so with Billy Bob, who, sensing he could sneak up on him, targeted Isaac as the butt of his jokes..

Isaac and Brad built a new pen of solid wooden boards and seven feet high, the height Billy Bob could rise to while rearing up.

The next morning Isaac went out to the pen. “I told myself: ‘I’m not believing what I’m seeing!’ The damn goat was dismantling the pen, board by board, by hooking his horns under each and prying it loose. I took off for the house.”

“One day I decided to replace the window screens across the front of the house,” Isaac continued the saga. “I worked all morning. Then, I headed out to the road to get the mail. I turned around, taking a minute to get my bearings, and here came that SOB straight toward me, with a screen on each horn! I held out the mail, thinking he might stop and eat it.”

Airborne again.

After this latest confrontation, the goats were loaded into a trailer and taken to the sale barn in nearby Brookhaven, Mississippi. Sally romped down the ramp, but Billy Bob balked. The sale barn handler, with electric prod in hand, started up the ramp. “You’d better be careful,” Isaac told him. “I ain’t afraid of no goat,” the handler said as he disappeared into the trailer.

Out came the handler with Billy Bob in hot pursuit. “Prod went one way and handler went the other,” Isaac said. The guy jumped a nearby fence, gasping, “You weren’t lying about that goat, Mr. Isaac!”

I love you, Bro! Thanks for the laughs! We’ll save the tale of the fish pond trespassers, popping their beer cans in the middle of the night, for another day.

First Puppy and rare breeds

Much attention is being given to the choice of the new First Puppy. I would advise the new First Daddy to stay away from rare breeds and maybe go with what we used to call a “Heinz 57,” denoting an offspring of “57 varieties.”

The most beautiful dog among my many pets was a Hungarian Vizsla named “Pete.” On his official AKC papers he had six names which would have befitted a Transylvanian count. A most impressive pedigree noted for hunting skills.

My then husband, an avid bird hunter, couldn’t wait for a field trial. As he put it, when he fired the first shot, Pete “took off like Lindbergh.” Two days later, a farmer in a small town 10 miles away called to say he had Pete and demanded pay for the chickens he had killed. The pedigree came home with a backside filled with birdshot.

No amount of begging convinced the hunter that a gun-shy bird dog who couldn’t “earn his keep” could stay around as a pet. So, Pete, after vet care, was adopted for his beauty and not his instinctive “skills.”

We had lost our precious fox terrier “Peppy,” and I insisted our boys – Michael and Ladd – needed another pet. I had read them a book, “Goodbye, My Lady,” about a boy who found a rare dog. So, when the hunter got word one was available, off he went to Natchez, Mississippi, for an African basenji. Her papers proclaiming she was “Cleopatra of the Nile.” Cleo’s mother had been bred with a Texas chainsaw.

An African basenji is a beautiful little barkless dog with a corkscrew tail, a deeply wrinkled forehead and a very strange quirk. If left alone, a basenji will destroy anything in sight.

Not knowing about this trait, we left her as a puppy in our carport storeroom, where, 20 minutes later, we discovered she had chewed our freezer’s cord in half and obliterated the sheetrock flanking the door.

The pedestal of my round wooden dining table still bears deep teeth marks where Cleo chewed away chunks after being unknowingly left in the house alone.

If there’s any terror worse than an African basenji left alone, it’s an African basenji left alone while in heat. The hunter had her bred with a registered male, then built a special cage to keep her away from the amorous advances of our neighbors’ half-pit, half-English bulldog, “Patton.” Awakened by a terrible commotion, the hunter found Patton firing his artillery after Cleo had chewed a hole through the cage’s wooden floor.

None of the puppies bore any resemblance to this interloper. My best friend took one and named him “Wrinkles.” “Don’t leave him locked up alone,” I warned. Shortly thereafter, she called, “You’ve got to get over here. Stanley will be home any minute, and Wrinkles has destroyed his greenhouse!” Nothing left but dirt six inches deep on the greenhouse floor and bits of broken clay pots and greenery sticking out here and there.

Sadly, a neighbor’s daughter sent a newspaper clipping from Nebraska about an African basenji, who, left alone with an infant on a blanket, had killed the baby.

Wrinkles acquired a new metal outdoor pen. Cleo, with ample warnings, went to live with a man who had begged for her.

I acquired an interest in and a subsequent love for cats.

I keep thinking what damage Cleo would have done in the White House.

Of pedestals and prostitutes

A grey-haired editor once told me, “Journalism is a whore riding a black horse.” The black horse, he explained, is newspaper ink. I was a college senior, a journalism major, caught up in the nobility of the Fourth Estate, and I suppose he intended to tamp down my enthusiasm. Now, almost 30 years later, I still want to believe in my chosen profession and the noble pedestal on which it perches.

So, when it comes to journalism, there’s nothing like a little hypocrisy to get my hackles up. Saturday morning MSNBC’s Amy Robach asked guest Armstrong Williams about “the center-right myth” - the latest conservative mantra.

When Robach suggested this was a way to keep the word “right” in the electoral equation after an Obama victory, Williams explained that America is at “center-right,” because Americans still cherish “moral values.” (The implication, of course, is that Americans on the left have no moral values.)

I almost fell out of my chair! Armstrong Williams talking about moral values is more than I can stomach. This from a man, a professional broadcast journalist, who prostituted himself by taking money to promote one of George W. Bush’s pet projects.

In 2004 Williams, an African-American, signed a $240,000 contract with the Department of Education to promote Bush’s “No Child Left Behind” program among black Americans – to peddle propaganda masked as straight news. He was subsequently issued a citation by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and stiff fines were imposed against his employers, Sonshine Family Television and the Sinclair Broadcast Group.

Funny how persons who have made Faustian deals end up on cable news. Fox News’ lineup is full of them. And, now comes word that CNN has hired Stephen Hayes as “Part of the Best Political Team on Television.” Neocon Hayes has for the last eight years been a trumpeter for Bush’s “war on terror,” continuously lying about a Saddam Hussein-al Qaeda connection.

Perhaps that grey-haired editor was right, after all.

Dirt, denial & double-speak

Rush Limbaugh knows his audience. Caught a soundbite yesterday where the radio guru used the right-wing’s favorite Obama slur, “Raum Emanuel is a dirty Chicago street thug, just like Barack Obama is dirty Chircago street thug.” Rush loves the “name-calling device,” appeals to listeners with a collective IQ of a garden slug.

***

Have you noticed the right’s post-election talking points? Last night Brit Hume and “The Fox All-Stars” – Mort Kondrake, Charles Krauthammer and Mara Liasson – continued the argument that the United States is now “center-right.” Everyone from Joe Scarborough to Bill O’Reilly is using this mantra to thwart any suggestion Obama’s victory indicates a move left of center. “Center-right.” Listen for it.

***

And, how about a little double-speak?

From The Progress Report, Center for American Progress, 6 November 2008 (LINK):

“Pundits also are claiming that Obama's margin of victory does not give him a mandate for progressive change. Columnist Robert Novak wrote yesterday that Obama ‘neither received a broad mandate from the public nor the needed large congressional majorities.’ But in 2004, as Bush crowed about his ‘political capital,’ Novak argued that Bush's narrow victory was ‘of course’ proof of a conservative mandate. Winning 52.4 percent to McCain's 46.3 percent, Obama's popular vote margin stands at 7,401,289 -- more than twice Bush's 2004 vote margin -- and he netted 63 more electoral votes than Bush. Novak also dismissed the 57-seat Democratic Senate majority (with two more seats potentially up for grabs). But conservativism's so-called 2004 ‘mandate’ netted only four new seats, for a total of 55.”

***

10:42 a.m. EST, Nov 7 '08 – Obama: 349 electoral votes, 53% of the popular vote, 65,000,916; McCain, 163 electoral votes, 46% of the popular vote, 57,140,394.

FOR LATEST VOTE RESULTS AND A GREAT U.S. MAP: LINK

Hey, that's my team!

From CQPolitics – Congressional Quarterly - today:

“President-elect Obama has announced the leaders of his transition team, and it's a mix of longtime Senate aides, friends, and top officials at the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank that has been a major influence on Obama’s policy proposals.” (LINK)

***

Only one political newsletter is allowed into my inbox daily, In my opinion, it is the most thorough, well-written and meticulously documented newsletter out there. Many times throughout these past several years I have encouraged my readers to subscribe.

No spin. No BS. Source links out the ying-yang!

The newsletter examines one main issue daily, but it is in the links on its right sidebar – not to be missed – where its real value lies – a wealth of information presented in BRIEFS – a one-stop plethora of news which will keep you in the know.

The Progress Report, prepared by the Center for American Progress. I love it! And, I owe it a lot.

Yes, THAT Center for American Progress now part of Barack Obama’s transition team. The Center’s John Podesta (BIOGRAPHY) has been named to lead the team.

Outstanding!

***

To subscribe to The Progress Report, click on the link under "faves" in my left sidebar. When the site opens, scroll down the right side of the page to find the subscription link. And, don’t forget all those great sidebar features including “Under the Radar,” “Think Fast,” “State Watch” and “Blog Watch.”

The promise of tomorrow

Restored vision – first my own and now my country’s. I don’t know how many miracles I can take in one month.

3 a.m. and Newsweek’s Jonathan Alter is describing his evening at Chicago’s Grant Park to MSNBC’s Chris Jansing while I am trying to collect my thoughts, to focus on where I want to go with this.

There is so much to express.

I am thinking of an onion or those little Russian babushka nesting dolls. Eight years of a Bush presidency, and one would have to peel away layer upon layer or reveal one inside the other to fully reveal the scandals, the hypocrisy, the incompetence which have held us in their grip for so long. I do not want to go there tonight.

We have just been spared a packing of the Supreme Court of the United States which would have led our nation along a narrow path for decades to come after abolishing so much attained by generations past.

Thoughts enter my mind of Sarah Palin whipping crowds into frenetic nationalism with silly slurs against the opposition. I tell myself these people are Americans who love their country and, after all, only want for it what I do. I pray we can pull together.

I picture Atlas with the world upon his shoulders and hope our new president has the strength to hold up under such a burden and the wisdom to know where to start the healing.

Tonight when Barack Obama was declared the victor in this interminable presidential bid – at 11 p.m. ET – I stepped quietly onto my front porch and heard the cheering and the clapping and the crying of my African-American neighbors next door and up and down the way. Their collective passion swelled within me, and for one brief moment I could almost feel what they were feeling.

Maybe a year and a half ago I asked an African-American friend here if he knew the name Barack Obama. “He’s a black man,” I explained, “and he’s probably going to be your next president.” I had to call that friend tonight, and all I could think to say is, “Congratulations, Charlie, it’s been a long, hard fight.”

I don’t even know if I was talking about his generations past or the political activism which brought us to this moment, or both. I just knew I had to call him.

A few emails rolled in. Friends who just had to say something about this win. That they would reach out at such a significant moment touched me and seemed to validate in some small way my finite part of a bigger struggle. These thoughts subside.

As I sit here in the middle of the night, I am touched by images of the young, single mother in Apt. A, tucking her little girl into bed and the grandmother in Apt. C helping her two little granddaughters say their nighttime prayers. I try to feel what they must have felt and hear what they must have said on this night to these sweet little girls.

Having grown up a little white girl in the South, having tucked my own children into bed, having kissed them and wished them “sweet dreams,” I could not know the depth of what mother conveyed to child this night as one of their own prepared to lead a country where once the only certainty was ship’s chains and auction blocks.

One thought lingers as the night ebbs: the promise of tomorrow.

Waiting

"It was invisible, as always. They had begun to vote in the villages of New Hampshire …

“For it is the essence of the act that as it happens it is a mystery in which millions of people each fit one fragment of a total secret together, none of them knowing the shape of the whole.

“What results from the fitting together of these secrets is, of course, the most awesome transfer of power in the world - the power to marshal and mobilise, the power to send men to kill or be killed, the power to tax and destroy, the power to create and the responsibility to do so, the power to guide and the power to heal - all committed into the hands of one man ...

“The noise and the blare, the bands and the screaming, the pageantry and oratory of the long fall campaign, fade on election day. All the planning is over, all effort spent. Now the candidates must wait."

- Theodore H. White, The Making of the President, 1960. Antheneum, 1961.

Tagore's prayer

The following poem has become an Election Eve tradition on my blogs: Vocal Yokels (no longer exists), I See My Dreams (archived HERE) and now DemWit:

The poet is Rabindranath Tagore of India, Nobel Laureate in Literature, 1913. Here is the English translation of his beautiful prayer:

Where the Mind is without Fear

Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high,
Where knowledge is free,
Where the world has not been broken up into fragments
By narrow domestic walls,
Where words come out from the depth of truth,
Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection,
Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way
Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit,
Where the mind is led forward by Thee
Into ever-widening thought and action,
Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake!

The stakes

WARNING: No “expletives deleted.” This is not “a family newspaper.”

Setting the scene: Late at night. Three men are standing on the front lawn of a beautiful Washington, D.C., mansion. One is the executive editor of The Washington Post; the other two, a couple of rookie reporters named Woodward and Bernstein. The editor, Ben Bradlee, has been called outside, where the reporters tell him the Watergate coverup involves the entire intelligence community of the United States and that his house probably has been bugged.

Ben Bradlee (played by Jason Robards in “All the President’s Men”): You know the results of the latest Gallup Poll? Half the country never even heard of the word Watergate. Nobody gives a shit. You guys are probably pretty tired, right? Well, you should be. Go on home, get a nice hot bath. Rest up ... 15 minutes. Then, get your asses back in gear. We're under a lot of pressure, you know, and you put us there. Nothing's riding on this except the First Amendment to the Constitution, freedom of the press and maybe the future of the country. Not that any of that matters, but if you guys fuck up again, I'm going to get mad. Goodnight.

(Fade to black)

***

Nothing’s riding on this, except …

U.S. respect in the world.

At war in two countries.

Worldwide recession looming.

9 million Americans unemployed.

The Supreme Court and the reversal of all that’s been accomplished for decades.

Civil liberties snatched away.

40 million Americans without health insurance.

Still no viable alternative energy.

Global warming not a joke.

Bin Laden still not brought to justice.

U.S. ranks 12th in education in the world.

Nation’s infrastructure crumbing.

2007 UNICEF study ranks U.S. next to last of 21 industrialized nations in “the well-being of children” (LINK).

***

Once more, the stakes couldn’t be higher.

"And, if you guys fuck up again, I’m going to get mad."

'The Right Choice?'

Yesterday I received an emailed article which encapsulates just about every criticism thrown at Barack Obama by an increasingly desperate right wing.

I was tempted to send back a two-word response: “Double-barreled bullsh*t!”

Then, some words kept running through my head, words spoken by Michael Douglas in Rob Reiner’s “The American President:”

“We've got serious problems, and we need serious people, and if you want to talk about character, Bob, you'd better come at me … “

Here, then, is the article, followed by my response. Well, mine and those of 18 conservatives.

THE ARTICLE:

The Obama Temptation

by Mark R. Levin, right-wing radio talk show host, 25 October 2008 (LINK)

I've been thinking this for a while so I might as well air it here. I honestly never thought we'd see such a thing in our country - not yet anyway - but I sense what's occurring in this election is a recklessness and abandonment of rationality that has preceded the voluntary surrender of liberty and security in other places. I can't help but observe that even some conservatives are caught in the moment as their attempts at explaining their support for Barack Obama are unpersuasive and even illogical. And the pull appears to be rather strong. Ken Adelman, Doug Kmiec and others reach for the usual platitudes in explaining themselves but are utterly incoherent. Even non-conservatives with significant public policy and real world experiences, such as Colin Powell and Charles Fried, find Obama alluring but can't explain themselves in an intelligent way. (BJ: See Colin Powell’s explanation on my post, “What Powell said,” LINK)

There is a cult-like atmosphere around Barack Obama, which his campaign has carefully and successfully fabricated, which concerns me. The messiah complex. Fainting audience members at rallies. Special Obama flags and an Obama presidential seal. A graphic with the portrayal of the globe and Obama's name on it, which adorns everything from Obama's plane to his street literature. Young school children singing songs praising Obama. Teenagers wearing camouflage outfits and marching in military order chanting Obama's name and the professions he is going to open to them. An Obama world tour, culminating in a speech in Berlin where Obama proclaims we are all citizens of the world. I dare say, this is ominous stuff.

Even the media are drawn to the allure that is Obama. Yes, the media are liberal. Even so, it is obvious that this election is different. The media are open and brazen in their attempts to influence the outcome of this election. I've never seen anything like it. Virtually all evidence of Obama's past influences and radicalism — from Jeremiah Wright to William Ayers — have been raised by non-traditional news sources. The media's role has been to ignore it as long as possible, then mention it if they must, and finally dismiss it and those who raise it in the first place. It's as if the media use the Obama campaign's talking points — its preposterous assertions that Obama didn't hear Wright from the pulpit railing about black liberation, whites, Jews, etc., that Obama had no idea Ayers was a domestic terrorist despite their close political, social and working relationship, etc. — to protect Obama from legitimate and routine scrutiny. And because journalists have also become commentators, it is hard to miss their almost uniform admiration for Obama and excitement about an Obama presidency. So in the tank are the media for Obama that for months we've read news stories and opinion pieces insisting that if Obama is not elected president it will be due to white racism. And, of course, while experience is crucial in assessing Sarah Palin's qualifications for vice president, no such standard is applied to Obama's qualifications for president. (No longer is it acceptable to minimize the work of a community organizer.) Charles Gibson and Katie Couric sought to humiliate Palin. They would never and have never tried such an approach with Obama.

But beyond the elites and the media, my greatest concern is whether this election will show a majority of the voters susceptible to the appeal of a charismatic demagogue. This may seem a harsh term to some, and no doubt will to Obama supporters, but it is a perfectly appropriate characterization. Obama's entire campaign is built on class warfare and human envy. The "change" he peddles is not new. We've seen it before. It is change that diminishes individual liberty for the soft authoritarianism of socialism. It is a populist appeal that disguises government mandated wealth redistribution as tax cuts for the middle class, falsely blames capitalism for the social policies and government corruption (Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac) that led to the current turmoil in our financial markets, fuels contempt for commerce and trade by stigmatizing those who run successful small and large businesses, and exploits human imperfection as a justification for a massive expansion of centralized government. Obama's appeal to the middle class is an appeal to the "the proletariat," as an infamous philosopher once described it, about which a mythology has been created. Rather than pursue the American Dream, he insists that the American Dream has arbitrary limits, limits Obama would set for the rest of us — today it's $250,000 for businesses and even less for individuals. If the individual dares to succeed beyond the limits set by Obama, he is punished for he's now officially "rich." The value of his physical and intellectual labor must be confiscated in greater amounts for the good of the proletariat (the middle class). And so it is that the middle class, the birth-child of capitalism, is both celebrated and enslaved — for its own good and the greater good. The "hope" Obama represents, therefore, is not hope at all. It is the misery of his utopianism imposed on the individual.

Unlike past Democrat presidential candidates, Obama is a hardened ideologue. He's not interested in playing around the edges. He seeks "fundamental change," i.e., to remake society. And if the Democrats control Congress with super-majorities led by Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, he will get much of what he demands.

The question is whether enough Americans understand what's at stake in this election and, if they do, whether they care. Is the allure of a charismatic demagogue so strong that the usually sober American people are willing to risk an Obama presidency? After all, it ensnared Adelman, Kmiec, Powell, Fried and numerous others. And while America will certainly survive, it will do so, in many respects, as a different place. –End-

MY RESPONSE:

I just read the article you sent. This just scares you to death, doesn’t it? That is what it aims to do. That is the purpose of such propaganda. This is desperation from a political party whose own members admit has practically run this nation into the ground – financially, diplomatically and morally.

The right-wing blogosphere is permeated with this Mark R. Levin article, which, as planned, targets both the ignorant and the innocent.

The ignorant do not think for themselves, fact-check unsigned and undocumented claims or bother to keep abreast with what is going on in the government of this nation. They are happy to let Rush Limbaugh, Ann Coulter or Sean Hannity do it for them.

The innocent, unlike me, are just too busy with their own lives, their jobs, their families, to spend their waking hours just trying to keep up with the multilayered scandals manifested in the current administration. I am happy to do it for them.

Sadly, the article will find an audience. The good news is the audience it will find – and it is posted across the Web - is among the 25 percent of Americans who STILL think George W. Bush is doing a good job (Gallup, October 2008, LINK). This core constituency will vote for McCain-Palin no matter what the platforms of either party.

So, this piece of propaganda is not going to affect the outcome of this election.

This is merely a way to deflect the fact that intelligent persons who are very much aware of what is going on in America and in our government are, in great numbers, supporting Barack Obama. This includes many able members of the Republican Party and many right-wing thinkers.

I am not swayed by such propaganda. Don’t you think after eight years of dedicated research and objective thinking, of examining the performance of the current administration and the path the Republican Party has taken, I am capable of deciding the leadership which is best for this country?

Let me scare you. Ask yourself if you really are a conservative, for the path the Republican Party has taken over the last eight years has absolutely nothing to do with traditional conservatism.

I do not always agree with that most outspoken conservative Pat Buchanan, but I respect his strength of conviction and his love for this country. Buchanan, in his The American Conservative magazine, has this to say about conservatism as it has evolved in the Republican Party:

"The conservative movement has been hijacked and turned into a globalist interventionist, open-borders ideology, which is not the conservative movement I grew up with."

Buchanan is joined by an ever-growing cadre of conservatives who are disenchanted with the Republican Party and our current president, particularly in the area of fiscal responsibility.

The cover story in the November 3, 2008, issue of Buchanan’s The American Conservative magazine is titled “The Right Choice?” (LINK) Quoting the “lede” of the story:

“Traditional conservatives have no clear favorite in the November election. Is there a lesser evil? Should we vote third party? Would we be better off just staying home? TAC asked 18 conservatives, libertarians and independent thinkers how they plan to vote and why.”

I have read the 18 responders’ statements – they are both brief and enlightening - and if you want a true picture of what’s at stake in this election, I recommend you read them, too. What is an hour of your time when it comes to making “The Right Choice?” (LINK TO STATEMENTS)

Of the 18 persons:

6 will vote “third party.”
4 say they will not vote.
3 will vote for John McCain.
5 will vote for Barack Obama.

All 18 right-wing contributors hold in disdain both the Bush administration and John McCain. Most said Barack Obama is “the lesser of two evils.”

Of the three who are voting for John McCain, here’s what two had to say about their vote:

“An exercise in futility.”

“A better writer said of a charmless woman that rousing any affection for her would be like ‘smoking an unlit cigar, walking a dead dog, swimming in an empty pool, or listening to the radio when it is off.’ The same goes for the Republican nominee. When John McCain appears on screen, all vacant grin and Eeyore cadence, I reach for the mute button. I hate his wars. I don’t trust his maverick pose. When he says ‘my friends,’ he doesn’t mean me. But, I am voting for him.” This woman calls her vote “damage control” against what she believes will be a sweeping victory for Democrats in Congress.

Of the four who say they will not vote on Nov. 4, one quoted a character from Richard Linklater’s “Slacker:”

“Withdrawing in disgust is not the same thing as apathy.”

In conclusion, if the article you sent me scares you, let me frighten the hell out you. The article is the product of right-wing desperation: the inability to stand on its merits.

In the eight years of the Bush presidency – six of which saw a Republican majority in both the House and Senate – this country has been in a downward spiral – a far cry from the country you grew up in, or the country you expect your grandchildren to grow up in. A vote for McCain-Palin is a guarantee that the policies which brought about this decline will continue.

That is why Barack Obama’s message of “change” is resonating across America, and that is why the core right-wing, Palin and McCain are fighting him nail and tooth with all they have to offer – an unprecedented smear campaign.

Just a few days ago I posted an essay, “How to Detect Propaganda.” (LINK) It is important to point out here that the devices of propaganda are not only rampant in the above article, but appeared throughout Obama’s 30-minute TV appeal last night. Propaganda, in and of itself, is not a bad thing. It is the “predetermined ends” it seeks to accomplish, which should be examined, and those ends can be either good or evil. The essay equips you to know the difference.

In my opinion, Obama’s message for this country appeals to our better selves.

Will the smears against Obama stick? Maybe, if voters do not take the time to fact-check them.

But, don’t take my word for it. Your vote is your American birthright. It is both a duty and a privilege. Some time in the remaining days before you vote, spend an hour or so reading what 18 of your fellow right-wing Americans have to say about the McCain-Palin ticket: LINK

'The Spooniad'

Outside the first chilling temps of fall and a lulling rain marked the moment I finished Edgar Lee Masters’ “Spoon River Anthology.” The same pervasive and palatable atmosphere hung over “The Hill” as I stepped away from the graves there.

From that Spoon River, Illinois, cemetery Masters’ 244 townsfolk had spoken their epitaphs, and I left the souls there to rest in peace.

In them, I had seen myself and so many others.

This singular work won Masters highest praise in the poetry genre. More than poetry, this series of simple tales, spoken by the dead and woven together, capture from another era small-town life and morals, or the lack thereof.

In the book’s finale, “The Spooniad,“ Masters cleverly allows his fictional character Jonathan Swift Somers, to leave behind “a fragment” of what was intended to be a 24-volume epic showing that the entangled lives of simple folk can reach Homeric heights.

One of the themes from beyond the veil of death was the greed and deception which led to the collapse of the town’s bank.

In “The Spooniad,” the fictional Somers writes:

“ … and the fall Of Rhodes, bank that brought unnumbered woes and loss to many, with engendered hate
that flamed into the torch in Anarch hands to burn the courthouse, on whose blackened wreck a fairer temple rose and Progress stood.”

Greed, deception, bank collapse. Unnumbered woes and loss.

The tales are timeless. That’s what makes a classic a classic.

***

Happy Birthday, Frodo, hobbit, lover of words, Keeper of the Ring!

'To making it count!'

On my archived blog, “I See My Dreams,” I ran a feature atop my left sidebar titled “daily brief.” Three times in 18 months, I posed in that feature this question:

“What issue always makes headlines a couple of weeks before a general election, then as soon as the polls close goes away?”

Not once did readers of that blog attempt, in comments, to answer that question or even inquire about it.

Well, it’s happened again, and it’s probably the one pre-election story which ticks me off the most.

In the 1960s the Warren Court ruled on a series of cases dealing with "reapportionment," decisions which required electoral districts to have equal populations. In writing the opinion of the Court in Reynolds v. Sims (1964), Chief Justice Earl Warren set forth the principle, “One man, one vote.”

To a younger generation of voters coming along, that principle might seem today “a no-brainer.” But, is it?

Yes, once more, two weeks before Election Day, there are suddenly stories across the nation involving early voting snafus, voting machine foul-ups, long lines where people on lunch breaks are “disenfranchised” because they have to give up and return to work before voting. Machines still not equipped to yield voter-verified paper ballots. Ad nauseam.

These problems might better be dealt with if the media would focus on them at the beginning of an election cycle rather than at its end.

No citizen should leave a polling place wondering, “Did my vote count?”

As my mother used to say, “It’s enough to make a preacher cuss!”

The greatest nation

“America didn’t become the greatest nation on earth by using your money to spread the wealth around.” – John McCain, campaign speeches, October 2008.

YES, IT DID!

That’s exactly how it became the greatest nation on earth, and that’s how it will remain the greatest nation on earth.

“We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”

That’s how we got the name “United States.” And, that’s where your money goes. And, we all share in the wealth.

THINK ABOUT IT!

Detecting propaganda

When I was a young mother in the mid-60s, I stumbled across something in a book of essays which has since profoundly affected my perception.

In fact, the essay would find itself on my list when one of those questionnaires asks what three things I’ve read have had the most impact on my life.

In 1946, the essay writer, Clyde Raymond Miller, wrote the bible on propaganda and its detection. Miller’s book, The Process of Persuasion, Crown Publishers, New York City, continues to be used today as the definitive work on the subject.

Let me stop here and say that “propaganda” is often uniquely associated with Josef Goebbels, Adolph Hitler and the Third Reich. That is a mistake. Propanda has universal usage and can bring about outcomes good or bad.

The essay Miller wrote, which so profoundly affected my thinking, follows. I have made no attempt to update his 1946 perspective. Just for fun, as you read through his “seven devices of propaganda,” make a list of current labels, situations and events which come to mind.

Aside from 1940s references, the essay itself is timeless and should be essential reading for every American.

I give you Clyde Raymond Miller:

HOW TO DETECT PROPAGANDA

Clyde Raymond Miller

If American citizens are to have clear understanding of present-day conditions and what to do about them, they must be able to recognize propaganda, to analyze it, and to appraise it.

But, what is propaganda?

As generally understood, propaganda is expression of opinion or action by individuals or groups deliberately designed to influence opinions or actions of other individuals or groups with reference to predetermined ends.

Thus, propaganda differs from scientific analysis. The propagandist is trying to “put something across,” good or bad, whereas the scientist is trying to discover truth and fact. Often, the propagandist does not want careful scrutiny and criticism; he wants to bring about a specific action. Because the action may be socially beneficial or socially harmful to millions of people, it is necessary to focus upon the propagandist and his activities the searchlight of scientific scrutiny. Socially desirable propaganda will not suffer from such examination, but the opposite type will be detected and revealed for what it is.

We are fooled by propaganda chiefly because we don’t recognize it when we see it. It may be fun to be fooled but, as the cigarette ads used to say, it is more fun to know. We can more easily recognize propaganda when we see it if we are familiar with the seven common propaganda devices. These are:


1. The Name Calling Device
2. The Glittering Generalities Device
3. The Transfer Device
4. The Testimonial Device
5. The Plain Folks Device
6. The Card Stacking Device
7. The Band Wagon Device

Why are we fooled by these devices? Because they appeal to our emotions rather than to our reason. They make us believe and do something we would not believe or do if we thought about it calmly, dispassionately. In examining these devices, note that they work most effectively at those times when we are too lazy to think for ourselves; also, they tie into emotions which sway us to be “for” or “against” nations, races, religions, ideals, economic and political policies and practices, and so on through automobiles, cigarettes, radios, toothpastes, presidents, and wars. With our emotions stirred, it may be fun and infinitely more to our own interests to know how they work.

Lincoln must have had in mind citizens who could balance their emotions with intelligence when he made his remark: “… but you can’t fool all of the people all of the time.”

NAME CALLING

“Name Calling” is a device to make us form a judgment without examining the evidence on which it should be based. Here the propagandist appeals to our hate and fear. He does this by giving “bad names” to those individuals, groups, nations, races, policies, practices, beliefs, and ideals which he would have us condemn and reject. For centuries the name “heretic” was bad. Thousands were oppressed, tortured, or put to death as heretics. Anybody who dissented from popular or group belief or practice was in danger of being called a heretic. In the light of today’s knowledge, some heresies were bad and some were good. Many of the pioneers of modern science were called heretics; witness the cases of Copernicus, Galileo, Bruno. Today’s bad names include: Fascist, demagogue, dictator, Red, financial oligarchy, Communist, muckraker, alien, outside agitator, economic royalist, Utopian, rabble-rouser, trouble-maker, Tory, Constitution wrecker.

“Al” Smith called (Franklin D.) Roosevelt a Communist by implication when he said in his Liberty League speech, “There can only be one capital, Washington or Moscow.” When “Al” Smith was running for the presidency many called him a tool of the pope, saying in effect, “We must choose between Washington and Rome.” That implied that Mr. Smith, if elected president, would take his orders from the pope. Likewise, Mr. Justice Hugo Black has been associated with a bad name, Ku Klux Klan. In these cases some propagandists have tried to make us form judgments without examining essential evidence and implications. “Al Smith is a Catholic. He must never be president.” “Roosevelt is a Red. Defeat his program.” “Hugo Black is or was a Klansman. Take him out of the Supreme Court.”

Use of “bad names” without presentation of their essential meaning, without all their pertinent implications, comprises perhaps the most common of all propaganda devices. Those who want to maintain the status quo apply bad names to those who would change it. For example, the (William Randolph) Hearst press applies bad names to Communists and Socialists. Those who want to change the status quo apply bad names to those who would maintain it. For example, the Daily Worker and the American Guardian apply bad names to conservative Republicans and Democrats.

GLITTERING GENERALITIES

“Glittering Generalities” is a device by which the propagandist identifies his program with virtue by use of “virtue words.” Here, he appeals to our emotions of love, generosity, and brotherhood. He uses words like truth, freedom, honor, liberty, social justice, public service, the right to work, loyalty, progress, democracy, the American way, Constitution defender. These words suggest shining ideals. All persons of good will believe in these ideals. Hence, the propagandist, by identifying his individual group, nation, race, policy, practice, or belief with such ideals, seeks to win us to his cause. As Name Calling is a device to make us form a judgment to reject and condemn, without examining the evidence, Glittering Generalities is a device to make us accept and approve, without examining the evidence.

For example, use of the phrases, “the right to work” and “social justice,” may be a device to make us accept programs for meeting the labor-capital problem which, if we examined them critically, we would not accept at all.

In the Name Calling and Glittering Generalities devices, words are used to stir up our emotions and to befog our thinking. In one device “bad words” are used to make us mad; in the other, “good words” are used to make us glad.

The propagandist is most effective in the use of these devices when his words make us create devils to fight or gods to adore. By his use of the “bad words,” we personify as a “devil” some nation, race, group, individual, policy, practice, or ideal; we are made fighting mad to destroy it. By use of “good words,” we personify as a godlike idol some nation, race, group, etc. Words which are “bad” to some are “good” to others, or may be made so. Thus, to some the New Deal is “a prophecy of social salvation” while to others it is “an omen of social disaster.”

From consideration of names, “bad” and “good,” we pass to institutions and symbols, also “bad” and “good.” We see these in the next device.

TRANSFER

“Transfer” is a device by which the propagandist carries over the authority, sanction, and prestige of something we respect and revere to something he would have us accept. For example, most of us respect and revere our church and our nation. If the propagandist succeeds in getting church or nation to approve a campaign in behalf of some program, he thereby transfers its authority, sanction, and prestige to that program. Thus, we may accept something which otherwise we might reject.

In the Transfer device, symbols are constantly used. The cross represents the Christian Church. The flag represents the nation. Cartoons like Uncle Sam represent a consensus of public opinion. These symbols stir emotions. At their very sight, with the speed of light, is aroused the whole complex of feelings we have with respect to church or nation. A cartoonist by having Uncle Sam disapprove a budget for unemployment relief would have us feel that the whole United States disapproves relief costs. By drawing an Uncle Sam who approves the same budget, the cartoonist would have us feel that the American people approve it. Thus, the Transfer device is used both for and against causes and ideas.

TESTIMONIAL

The “Testimonial” is a device to make us accept anything from a patent medicine or a cigarette to a program of national policy. In this device the propagandist makes use of testimonials. “When I feel tired, I smoke a Camel and get the grandest ‘lift.’” “We believe the John L. Lewis plan of labor organization is splendid; the CIO should be supported.” This device works in reverse also; counter-testimonials may be employed. Seldom are these used against commercial products like patent medicines and cigarettes, but they are constantly employed in social, economic, and political issues. “We believe that the John L. Lewis plan of labor organization is bad; the CIO should not be supported.” (BJ: I would only note here that famous people are often used in the testimonial device, like actress Sally Field selling us bone-strengthening medicine.)

PLAIN FOLKS

“Plain Folks” is a device used by politicians, labor leaders, businessmen, and even by ministers and educators to win our confidence by appearing to be people like ourselves – “just plain folks among the neighbors.” In election years especially do candidates show their devotion to little children and the common, homey things of life. They have front porch campaigns. For the newspaper men, they raid the kitchen cupboard, finding there some of the good wife’s apple pie. They go to country picnics; they attend service at the old frame church; they pitch hay and go fishing; they show their belief in home and mother. In short, they would win our votes by showing that they’re just as common as the rest of us – “just plain folks,” – and therefore, wise and good. Business men often are “plain folks” with the factory hands. Even distillers use the device. “It’s our family’s whiskey, neighbor; and neighbor, it’s your price.”

CARD STACKING

“Card Stacking” is a device in which the propagandist employs all the arts of deception to win our support for himself, his group, nation, race, policy, practice, belief, or ideal. He stacks the cards against the truth. He uses under-emphasis and over-emphasis to dodge issues and evade facts. He resorts to lies, censorship, and distortion. He omits facts. He offers false testimony. He creates a smoke screen of clamor by raising a new issue when he wants an embarrassing matter forgotten. He draws a “red herring” across the trail to confuse and divert those in quest of facts he does not want revealed. He makes the unreal appear real and the real appear unreal. He lets half-truth masquerade as truth. By the Card Stacking device, a mediocre candidate, through the “build-up,” is made to appear an intellectual titan; an ordinary prize fighter a probable world champion; a worthless patent medicine a beneficent cure. By means of this device propagandists would convince us that a ruthless war of aggression is a crusade for righteousness. Some member nations of the Non-Intervention Committee send their troops to intervene in Spain. Card Stacking employs sham, hypocrisy, effrontery. (BJ: “The Big Lie” falls into this category: if you tell a lie often enough people will believe it. The release of falsified documents is included in “The Big Lie.”)

THE BAND WAGON

The “Band Wagon” is a device to make us follow the crowd, to accept the propagandist’s program en masse. Here his theme is: “Everybody’s doing it.” His techniques range from those of medicine show to dramatic spectacle. He hires a hall, fills a great stadium, marches a million men in parade. He employs symbols, colors, music, movement, all the dramatic arts. He appeals to the desire, common to most of us, to “follow the crowd.” Because he wants us to “follow the crowd” in masses, he directs his appeal to groups held together by common ties of nationality, religion, race, environment, sex, vocation. Thus, propagandists campaigning for or against a program will appeal to us as Catholics, Protestants or Jews; as members of the Nordic race or as Negroes; as farmers or as school teachers; as housewives or as miners. All the artifices of flattery are used to harness the fears and hatreds, prejudices and biases, convictions and ideals common to the group; thus, emotion is made to push and pull the group on to the Band Wagon. In newspaper articles and in the spoken word this device is also found. “Don’t throw your vote away. Vote for our candidate. He’s sure to win.” Nearly every candidate wins in every election – before the votes are in. (BJ: It is my fervent prayer that “one day a lemming will fly.”)

PROPAGANDA AND EMOTION

Observe that in all these devices our emotion is the stuff with which propagandists work. Without it, they are helpless; with it, harnessing it to their purposes, they can make us glow with pride or burn with hatred, they can make us zealots in behalf of the program they espouse. As we said at the beginning, propaganda as generally understood is expression of opinion or action by individuals or groups with reference to predetermined ends. Without the appeal to our emotion – to our fears and to our courage, to our selfishness and unselfishness, to our loves and to our hates – propagandists would influence few opinions and few actions.

To say this is not to condemn emotion, an essential part of life, or to assert that all predetermined ends of propagandists are “bad.” What we mean is that the intelligent citizen does not want propagandists to utilize his emotions, even to the attainment of “good” ends, without knowing what is going on. He does not want to be “used” in the attainment of ends he may later consider “bad.” He does not want to be gullible. He does not want to be fooled. He does not want to be duped, even in a “good” cause. He wants to know the facts and among these is included the fact of the utilization of his emotions.

Keeping in mind the seven common propaganda devices, turn to today’s newspapers and almost immediately you can spot examples of them all. At election time or during any campaign, Plain Folks and Band Wagon are common. Card Stacking is hardest to detect, because it is adroitly executed or because we lack the information necessary to nail the lie. A little practice with the daily newspapers in detecting these propaganda devices soon enables us to detect them elsewhere – in radio, newsreels, books, magazines, and in expression of labor unions, business groups, churches, schools, political parties. (BJ: Written before television, the Internet and email.)

***

Great thanks to my friend Shari Nevels, who typed the essay onto my computer, error-free, while visiting this summer.