Wrong Way On A One-Way Street

“I think Trump will be a neofascist catastrophe and Clinton will be a neoliberal disaster.” Dr. Cornel West

Fiesta time again on the Platinum Coast. Later tonight, when the festivities officially kick off, the streets will be crowded with tourists; white people who know little about Spanish colonialism will holler Viva la Fiesta! at the top of their lungs. Tourists in search of the Old Mission, the County Courthouse, and De La Guerra plaza will become lost and drive their rental cars the wrong way on one-way streets. Locals will say they have seen it all before.

The Solstice parade, 4th of July fireworks, and Fiesta make up the holy trinity of Santa Barbara’s summer. Many locals are indifferent to these spectacles and hunker down as far away from them as possible, happy to let the city preen, revel in its unique beauty, and emerge only when the last drunk has stumbled home.

For a local boy like me Fiesta is a nuisance but this year it will help distract me from the circus that is our presidential election. Trump or Clinton – the choice that isn’t a choice at all. The political duopoly, Democrats and Republicans, still rule the roost, make the rules, and keep third parties marginalized.

Tweedledee and Tweedledum, same as always. Democracy as farce.

The clips of the Democratic Convention that I saw were depressing, not because Hillary spoke from both sides of her mouth – I expected that – but because Democrats have enthusiastically embraced War and Imperialism and blind Patriotism. Hillary said the US has the most powerful military force in the world, which is true, and we should, given that over half of the federal budget is devoted to our military. No other nation is as devoted to its military as the United States. We fawn over retired generals and pay constant lip service to our brave men and women in uniform. But if we are so powerful why are we still in Afghanistan after 15 years of military operations? Why are we once again bombing Libya? These questions are lost in the chants of USA! USA! USA!

We wage war on a tactic and wonder why we can’t win. Or perhaps the truth is that we know we can’t win, ever, nor can we stand down, so we keep doing the same things and getting the same results. That’s the definition of insanity, right?

So neither party represents the interests of working stiffs, environmentalists, or folks who want the US to stop bombing other countries. Trump and Pence will most likely implode between now and Election Day, leaving us with neoliberal Hillary and her puppet, Tim Kaine. What a pathetic state of affairs. Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy to see a woman earn the nomination, it’s high time that barrier be broken, but Clinton is the wrong woman; she’s not nearly as competent as corporate media make her out to be, and I don’t see her doing much beyond maintaining the status quo, which is great for Wall Street banks, defense and intelligence contractors, resource extractors, polluters, and income inequality.

And I’m almost positive that Hillary will get us into an ugly confrontation with Russia.

Hillary’s only appeal, beyond her gender, is that she’s not Donald Trump. Many voters will cast a vote for Clinton for this reason alone, a vote against rather than a vote for.

But hey, America is still the greatest country on earth, isn’t it? Generous, kind, fair, just, trustworthy, resolute, and steadfast. We believe our own BS. When we bomb you it’s because we are righteous.

Tone Deaf

“The prevailing quality of life in America -- by any accepted methods of measuring -- was inarguably freer and more politically open under Nixon than it is today…” Hunter S. Thompson, 2002.

Where to begin? Like the scene in Chicago, the area around the site of the Democratic National Convention in Philadelphia is awash in temporary fencing, barricades, and police, all dedicated to keeping thousands of protesters from injecting a dose of reality into this week of political fantasy. How Orwellian when peaceful protesters are penned in blocks away from the convention hall in what are called “ free speech zones.” Free speech that the powerful do not have to hear or see or respond to.

Looks like Bernie Sanders was right all along -- the Democratic National Committee was actively sabotaging his upstart campaign from the get-go, using the sort of tricks that are normally reserved for the opposition party. The revelations (thank you Wikileaks) show a few things. First, Debbie Wasserman Schultz is a hack who would do anything for her pal Hillary Clinton. Second, the big-shots in the DNC obviously knew that Hillary would not win a contest played on a level field; cheating and foul play were necessary to push Hillary over the top, because her campaign sure as hell failed to generate much organic enthusiasm.

But even with all the DNC’s shenanigans on Clinton’s behalf, the Sanders campaign made Clinton work. What does this tell us? That there is a reason Donald Trump is today leading in the polls. Now, Clinton will get the usual jump coming out of the Convention, but even so, voters east, west, north and south will still view her unfavorably, as a prevaricator and liar, and one who, like the fictional Mafioso Don Corleone, rewards loyalty. Instead of kicking Wasserman Schultz to the curb, Clinton makes Wasserman Schultz the honorary chair of her campaign.  

Talk about tone deaf and oblivious to voter perceptions. But we knew that when Clinton tapped Tim Kaine to be her sidekick; that was like flipping the bird to Bernie supporters with one of those oversized foam fingers. Clinton chose a nice, safe corporate clone who believes in the fairy tale of “free” trade and “clean” coal. Talk about one step up and two back. Clinton is so insulated in her DC/NYC bubble among the political and financial elites that she really has no clue what her actions look like to those of us out here in the real world.

Clinton’s arrogance is breathtaking, and it’s that total disdain for ordinary citizens that is giving Trump buoyancy. As filmmaker Michael Moore recently wrote, a lot of people in this country are fed up with politicians of both parties, fed up with the influence of bankers and hedge fund managers and resource extractors, fed up with the way the middle class is being ground to dust. Now, rich, white, demagogic Donald Trump is a strange champion for the downtrodden middle class -- but when Trump hammers bankers and free traders and pols, he’s speaking a language struggling people relate to; all the promises of the Bush’s, the Obama’s and the Clinton’s haven’t amounted to shit, so why not take a ride on the Trump express and lob a Molotov cocktail at the elites?

Hillary Clinton is damn lucky the election isn’t tomorrow. You can bet she will not receive the same reception on Thursday night that Bernie got on Monday. When the camera panned to where Bill Clinton was sitting you could see that he understood this, too. Hillary doesn’t engender the love that Bernie does -- she wants it, terribly, but it’s not who she is.

The American Shit Show

I refuse to watch the Republican National Convention. Masochism isn’t my thing. Neither is stupidity on a massive scale. I understand that Trump is the nominee, but personally, I can’t take the Great Buffoon, his wife, his children, and any person who speaks on his behalf seriously. I just can’t. The rise of Trump to the top of the cesspool that is the modern Republican party is more confirmation that America -- though an economic power on paper and a military power that cannot win an undeclared war -- has become a certified banana republic.

A fair number of people outside the US read this humble blog (thank you) and I wonder how we look to you? Does the US appear as stupid and ridiculous and dangerous as I think we do? If America is the last best hope of mankind, well, we are totally fucked, no two ways about it.

I’ve said it before, but it bears repeating: maybe, just maybe, the US deserves a tinhorn dictator like Donald Trump. Absent leaders -- and citizens -- blessed with courage, wisdom, judgment and moderation, why should we expect better? Perhaps a disastrous Trump presidency is the only thing that can slap this nation upside its head and bring it to its senses. Perhaps then, as we are crawling through the ashes left in Trump’s wake, we will understand the error of our ways, the incredible hubris and ignorance that governs our behavior around the world. Perhaps Trump is the bone-rattling wake up call the US desperately needs.

Republicans say a vote for Trump is a vote against Hillary; Democrats say a vote for Hillary is a vote against Trump. This is our choice? How about giving us something to vote FOR rather than AGAINST? Is that too much to ask? I’d rather eat a box of drywall nails than vote for Trump, and don’t even get me started about Hillary Clinton. That woman causes my sphincter to contract and spasm.

Robert Scheer and Thomas Frank, political writers and thinkers I admire, say that vice presidential nominee Mike Pence might ameliorate voter fears about Trump; Pence is bland, relatively unknown outside of Indiana, meets the Christian litmus test, is conservative as hell, pro, pro, pro-life, virulently anti-gay, and could function as Trump’s Dick Cheney, the steady, authoritarian hand on the tiller. Frightening thought. The buffoon and his henchman. The last time the nation tried this we invaded a country on false pretenses and destabilized an entire region. Out of naked fear we traded our civil liberties for a false sense of security.

Almost any Democratic nominee other than Hillary Clinton would wipe the floor with Trump and Pence. Alas, once again corporate Democrats have shot themselves in the foot. Hey fuckers, you got the candidate you gamed the system for, and, instead of cruising to a landslide victory, she may only eek out a win in November.

Hubris and complacency carry a steep price tag.

Welcome to the American Shit Show.

Vote Mickey

“The votes that matter are the votes on the street. Either Trump or Clinton will provoke mass upheaval. The key contribution of the Sanders campaign has been to lay bare for idealistic youth the magnitude of the rot in the system itself…”  Gary Leupp

I wrote on this blog a few months ago that Bernie Sanders would cave and urge his supporters to get behind Hillary Clinton. As predicted, it has happened, and Sanders was as craven as I feared. So much for the “revolution.” I don’t feel terrific about being right: any rookie political handicapper could have predicted that Sanders’ quest to reform the Democratic Party from within was doomed.

As Gary Leupp noted in an article for Counterpunch, Sanders did succeed in one respect: his campaign demonstrated, particularly for younger Americans, how utterly corrupt the American political system has become. No matter how often the mainstream media tells us our voices and votes matter, millions now understand that they matter not at all. The corrupt system has puked up Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, two people despised by wide swaths of potential voters. This is a curse, not a choice.

I will give the Clintons credit for their unparalleled skill at fixing the game, using their government positions to enrich themselves, and the nimble way they skirt the law. Bill and Hillary dance in the gray and never get caught; that they are crooked is not in doubt, but catching them out is another story. How many scandals has this detestable duo dodged over the past three decades? It tells me they know exactly what they are doing, that everything they do is calculated, thought out in advance. The Clintons are masters of corruption.

When I’m not completely pissed off about this dismal state of affairs, or frightened about what it portends, I marvel at how completely the Clintons manage media perceptions. Again and again Hillary is described as capable and experienced and exceptionally qualified to hold the highest office in the land, but peel back the gilded cover and you find a record of mediocrity or outright failure. What did she accomplish as a senator? Squat. What harm did she cause as Secretary of State? Plenty. Honduras and Libya come to mind. Trump scares me because he’s a buffoon; but Clinton scares me many times more because she has the potential to plunge the country into another undeclared war, exacerbate an already staggering level of wealth inequality, and to render our government even more subservient to financial elites.

If partisan politics hampered the Obama government, imagine what the gridlock will be like when Hillary moves into the Oval Office. Even though she’s practically a Republican, the GOP leaders are unlikely to give her much leeway, meaning that the critical problems facing this country will not be addressed.

What did Sanders get for his capitulation? I’ve read in various places that Sanders forced Clinton to move in a more progressive direction, and that the party platform reflects this, but honestly, who cares about the platform? It’s not binding on Clinton, and after the convention will largely be forgotten. And anyway, who’s going to hold Clinton accountable? Remember, she was for the TPP corporate trade giveaway before she was against it, or was she against it before she was for it?

Writing on the Truthout website, William Rivers Pitt summed it up: “Hillary Clinton is a fully owned corporate entity with a faux-populist message drafted on the back of a cocktail napkin at a Goldman Sachs convention. Donald Trump is a punchline who speaks in befuddled half-sentences and who wouldn't know a policy position if it squatted on his face and farted up his nose. These are our alleged options now, a choice between Wall Street and reality TV.”

There is no way I will vote for Hillary Clinton come November. I’ll write in Mickey Mouse before I tick the bubble next to Hillary’s name.

Lock & Load

Black lives matter. White lives matter. Brown lives matter. Jewish lives matter. Muslim lives matter. Christian lives matter. Pagan lives matter.

In many places in our world life is cheap and people, once they have been exploited, are expendable.

My country has been at war continuously since 2001, and the list of nations where US military forces are active is too long to mention.

Before Bush and Cheney it was possible to believe -- even if history proved otherwise -- that US military forces were deployed for legitimate humanitarian or security purposes.

For the US, the entire planet is a battlefield.

In most US cities, the police look like soldiers.

If the political and economic elites allowed it, we could provide universal medical care, free college tuition at public universities, decent housing, and liveable wages. No kid would graduate with a BA and a $50 grand debt collar; no family would declare bankruptcy because someone had the misfortune to become sick.

Our real God is the dollar. Repeat that. Our real God is the dollar. Everything must be price tagged, branded, hawked, sold.

“Free market” is an oxymoron. American corporations want monopolies, not competition. Our government gives it to them under the ruse that doing so benefits us, the people. The people know better, but what we know doesn’t matter.

All governments lie. All governments cover-up their misdeeds. All governments suppress dissent.

Capitalism is destroying the planet.

The senior citizen from Vermont has capitulated as we knew he would. His race is run and his usefulness is no more. The neoliberal queen will be crowned. Faux unity prevails.

We are in trouble.

When mass shootings happen, President Obama appears and makes a solemn speech. Mass shootings continue just the same. It’s only a matter of time and place.  

When the Veil Falls

“Hillary Clinton is too important to be treated the same as everyone else under the law.” Glenn Greenwald

Chase Palm Park on Cabrillo Boulevard resembles a refugee camp at midday on the 4th of July. Tents of blue and green, pop up shades of white, and tarps strung between the palms. Shirtless men surround a BBQ grill that sends white smoke skyward; the smell of charred meat is heavy on the breeze. The fireworks show won’t start for another eight hours. A football arcs over the tents and into the arms of a boy with sunburned skin. Mexican music plays from unseen speakers. The sun is high and shimmers on the water.

The Solstice Parade, 4th of July, and Fiesta are the big summertime markers here in Santa Barbara, the American Riviera, jewel of the central coast. For months I’ve read how European countries are broke or on the verge of being broke, trapped by austerity schemes designed to suck every drop of wealth that can be had in order to satisfy bankers and bondholders, hard times in Greece and Portugal, Spain and Ireland, and yet our streets and bars and restaurants are teeming with European tourists; I can’t afford to take my family there, but they seem to have no problem coming here.

On the 4th we talk of independence and freedom against a backdrop of baseball games and hotdog eating contests, patriotic parades complete with fife and drums, impressive flyovers by fighter jets, and, once night falls, fireworks that rise majestically into the sky and fall back to earth in fiery glory. We talk of a monarch on a distant throne who pushed his subjects too far, we talk of Jefferson and Madison, Hamilton and Washington, the rights of men to self-determination and self-government. On this fruited plain we are raised to believe that the inspired, majestic words of the Declaration of Independence are meant to include all men, but, if we are decently educated, eventually we understand that freedom in America was meant for property holders of pale complexion, not the grubby rabble or females or Negroes. Our white founders had a general fear of democracy, the unpredictable passions of the masses, and so democracy was from the beginning limited.

We are taught to believe that all Americans stand equally before the law, but here, again, the truth is that the hand of the law is extended to some as an ally and protector, and to others as a fist. This truth, one of the hardest to swallow, is illustrated by the FBI’s decision not to recommend that Hillary Clinton be indicted for mishandling classified information while she served as Secretary of State. Less politically potent people such as Thomas Drake, John Kiriakou and Edward Snowden were ruined for leaking classified information, treated as criminals, hounded by the arm of the law. Powerful folks, like Hillary Clinton and David Petraeus, get a pass. Same as it ever was. On several well-documented occasions, Hillary flat out lied about her e-mail machinations.

From a legal perspective, the FBI’s decision makes sense; intent is difficult to prove. Perhaps Hillary Clinton and all her enablers are guilty of nothing more than gross arrogance. What strikes me is how the scent of scandal follows Bill and Hillary Clinton the way the smell of death follows a mortician. Whitewater, TravelGate, Vince Foster, Bill’s women, Monica Lewinsky, and Bill’s pardon, just as he was departing the White House for the final time, of Marc Rich. Roll up all of these and you have the reason Hillary Clinton is mistrusted by millions of voters. Add Hillary’s grotesque sense of entitlement and her naked ambition and you have a political figure people love to hate.

Not that public mistrust or outright hatred of Hillary Clinton will keep her from the White House.

There Will Be More Blood

“Men’s memories are uncertain and the past that was differs little from the past that was not.” Cormac McCarthy

I don’t know what to make of the Orlando mass shooting, the latest rampage to occur in this country of guns and gun violence. When the news broke I was sad and disheartened, but also curiously numb; the shooting happened thousands of miles from where I live my life, and none of the victims were known to me or my small circle of family and friends. I did think of the victims, their kin, their friends and co-workers, their acquaintances, and how their lives would be altered from here on. A life can never be the same after a random act of violence. I don’t know why civilians in America are allowed to purchase assault-style weapons. Like other sacred texts, we have perverted the 2nd Amendment of the Constitution beyond recognition.

When I read the news the novel Blood Meridian by Cormac McCarthy came to mind, one of the strangest and most violent novels I’ve ever read, a story where blood is spilled on nearly every page; I don’t profess to understand the allegorical aspects of Blood Meridian, though it seems to suggest that extreme violence is deeply rooted in the American psyche and our first, most abiding option when dealing with Others is to kill them.

The mainstream media and all its jabbering servants fixated on the radical Islam angle, linking the shooter to ISIS, claiming he self-radicalized via the Internet, and was so incensed about US military actions in the Muslim world that he selected a target – a gay nightclub – to make his final statement. If the man’s intent was to protest US foreign policy wouldn’t it make more of a statement to attack a government building, military base or some other symbol of US power, like a bank? It seems to me that the man was wrestling with other demons and that the ISIS angle is a convenient peg to hang motive on, not to mention a handy justification for the ongoing wars against the Muslim world and for maintaining a massive, unprecedented system of mass surveillance in this country.

Fear strangles liberty.

The morning I read about the Orlando killing, I also read – and saw some videos – of the mayhem in Marseilles caused by what was reported to be Russian and English soccer fans. This was straight mob violence, people running amok, kicking and punching anyone who got in their path; I saw one man get blindsided by a punch, and another hit over the head with a chair. It was horrifying. That morning the seething world felt like it had finally toppled from its axis.

Like all the other mass shootings on this fruited plain, Orlando will slip into memory. Columbine. Newtown. Aurora. San Bernardino. Legislative proposals will be made to curb sales of assault weapons but almost all will fail once the NRA bribes pliant legislators. Money speaks louder than blood and sorrow, so the killing will continue, no matter who the victims are, young, elderly, gay, straight, white, black or brown. White mass killers will be determined to suffer from mental illness; black, brown, Asian, or Muslim shooters will be labeled terrorists or suspected terrorists.

US bombs fall on Syria, US drones swoop over targets in Afghanistan and Pakistan and Yemen. Turning points are reached, benchmarks achieved, milestones eclipsed, but still the wars continue; they are immune to reason and experience; they are self-perpetuating; and they are futile. Imperial nations must always have an implacable enemy, and if one doesn’t present itself, the imperial power creates one, either by design or happenstance.   

A Dream Dies in Houston

There was plenty of media hype ahead of the US Men’s semi-final soccer match against perennial world power Argentina, lots of rah-rah USA that I found comical. Not that the US didn’t deserve to be in the semi-finals, after all, they beat Costa Rica, Paraguay and Ecuador, but none of those teams are in the same class as Argentina, a lesson the US learned with a vengeance on Tuesday night in Houston.

The way the “experts” on Fox Sports were talking prior to the match, the vapid Alexi Lalas chief among them, you would have thought that American players like Clint Dempsey, Bobby Wood, Michael Bradley, and Alejandro Bedoya were World Class, first-rate, top shelf guys, able to compete against any team in the world. Now, it’s true that Wood, Bedoya and Jermaine Jones were all suspended for the semi-final, but even if that trio had been in the starting eleven it would have made little to no difference.

Dempsey, so effective in the matches leading to the semi-final, was a ghost against Argentina; in fact, the match was nearly eight minutes old before he got his first touch. That is but one measure of how dominant Argentina was; their midfield players stymied the US completely, forcing Bradley to make a number of errant passes. Fabian Johnson couldn’t get forward, and it took nearly 30 minutes for DeAndre Yedlin to make a run and cross a ball into the box. On the night the US managed just one shot, and it was not even on frame. Forward Chris Wondolowski, partnered with Dempsey up front, scores handfuls of goals in MLS, but against Argentina he looked as hapless as a man lost in a foreign country.

Argentina pounced on every loose ball and forced the US to chase and defend. At times it appeared that Argentina was toying with the US, just pinging the ball around the midfield, ever a step ahead of Kyle Beckerman and Michael Bradley.

The match commentary by Fox broadcasters JP Dellacamera and Landon Donovan struck a hopeful tone, even after the US conceded a goal within four minutes of kickoff, Donovan suggesting that Argentina might be tempted to sit back and relax a bit. That made me chuckle. Teams like Argentina, Chile and Germany at the national level, and Bayern Munich, Real Madrid and Barcelona at the club level, rarely lift their foot from the gas; when they get one goal they want two, and when they have two they want three, and so on, but, given the American audience, Donovan’s comment was understandable; his corporate employers would not have been pleased if he had said that the US was doomed for a very long and very frustrating night and destined for nothing more than a spot in a meaningless third place match.

The quality of soccer in the US is improving and the growth of MLS is a testament to the sport’s rising popularity across the fruited plain, but the US has a ways to travel before the national team can run with the big dogs of this hemisphere. Even the bombastic Alexi Lalas has to admit this now. The US didn’t just lose Tuesday night, it got thumped, no two ways about it.

Argentina plays football the right way and that makes them a fun team to watch. Yes, they have Lionel Messi, arguably the best player in the world, but look down the bench and you see a depth of talent. Let’s not forget that even without Angel Di Maria, Argentina didn’t miss a beat.

Pick Your Poison

“So. The presumptive nominees for the two major parties are among the most singularly despised people on the North American continent. One makes terrible decisions as a matter of course, and the other has no ideas whatsoever beyond a fictional notion of his own greatness.” 

William Rivers Pitt

“You’re gonna’ have to get over it,” my wife told me the morning after Hillary Clinton won the California primary. “I don’t want to hear you bitch for the next five months.”

I thought Bernie would do better in my home state, in fact, I thought he was going to win the primary and delay the coronation of Madam Clinton. I never believed that Sanders could overcome Clinton’s iron grip on the Democratic Party machinery and actually win the nomination -- the table was rigged from the jump. Look at the debate schedule, the one-sided media coverage, the primary rules, all of it tilted in favor of Madam Clinton. But Bernie and his supporters, millions of them young and getting their first exposure to national politics, made a contest out of what was supposed to be a stroll in the park for Hillary. God, how that must have ticked her off, the clear, unassailable fact that millions of people simply don’t trust her or like her.

The mainstream corporate media did its best to ignore Sanders, but when the man started winning states and pulling in huge crowds, the networks and elite pundits had no choice but to take notice. Clinton’s carefully managed campaign stops never approached the enthusiasm and energy of a Sanders event; Bernie’s message and connection with people -- particularly the young -- was genuine rather than manufactured.

Deep in her shriveled, money-grubbing, neoliberal, war-mongering, power hungry, and utterly corrupt heart, I’m sure Madam Clinton knows -- has to admit to herself in a quiet moment -- that Bernie Sanders would have cleaned her clock if the playing field had been level. If the fight had been fair, Clinton would have been smoked.

You can bet that all the Democratic Party honchos and heavyweights, from President Obama down, will now strongarm Sanders to abandon his quest and throw his weight and, more importantly, encourage his supporters to toss their collective weight to Madam Clinton so she can defeat the evil, atavistic Donald. The bigwigs will guilt Bernie, tell him that if his reluctance or refusal to enthusiastically support Clinton helps Trump win the White House, the fault will be his and his alone, and does he want to risk being the man responsible for placing Trump’s finger on the nuclear trigger? C’mon, Bernie, they’ll say, do it for party unity, for your country and your legacy. Clinton’s not the enemy.

Yeah, the honchos will lay it on Bernie heavy and thick.

Meanwhile, the Donald -- deluded by his own myth -- thinks he actually has a chance of enticing Bernie’s supporters into his camp. The Donald can’t seem to grasp that the views and dreams of Bernie’s people are antithetical to his. Bernie’s followers are inclusive, multicultural, tolerant of differences, and forward-thinking, in short, everything that Trump’s supporters are not.

I remind myself that America is a democracy in name only, and that our elections are tainted and fraudulent, which explains why our choice in November will be between a dangerous buffoon and a serial liar who happens to be a woman; I have no issue with the woman part, none at all. My issue is the fact that her name is Hillary Clinton, wife of Bill, the man who, as much as any single political figure, dragged the Democratic Party to the right.

This nation cannot afford a President Trump any more than it can afford another President Clinton. Pick your poison, voters, and cross your fingers.

Ali

“There is never time in the future in which we will work out our salvation. The challenge is in the moment, the time is always now.” James Baldwin

Muhammad Ali has passed on and the tributes rightfully light up social media. I remember his epic battles with Joe Frazier, and how he knocked out George Foreman in 1974 in a fight few thought he could win. I admired Ali’s skill and flair, his style, that flicking left jab, the footwork, the rope-a-dope. What I find more admirable now, all these years later, is how Ali refused to be drafted, stood for his principles and beliefs, and went to jail during the prime of his career rather than compromise. His exploits in the ring were remarkable, but that act of conscience said everything about the man.

Why would an African-American man in the mid-1960’s willingly ante up his life for a government and a country that considered people of his skin tone second-class citizens? Ali recognized hypocrisy when he saw it and refused to be part of it, even if it cost his freedom.

Paris is drowning. Here on the Platinum Coast, our main water supply, Lake Cachuma, is little more than a puddle. The promise of some relief from an El Nino deluge never happened.

In the name of profit, capitalism is murdering this planet. I want to believe that we will come to our senses before it’s too late but the evidence I see all around tells me that the point of no return has already passed. Hotter winters, fierce storms, fires, flooding, melting arctic ice; the world’s oceans are full of plastic. But are the world’s capitalists turning from the abyss? No, of course not; the problem with capitalism is that it recognizes no limits, it must always have more regardless of the consequences, even if that means cannibalizing itself.

The world seems to teeter and veer out of control. Refugees from war zones drown and the world stifles a yawn. Nobody wants desperate people coming across their national borders. Meanwhile, the wars in the Middle East and North Africa go on. Can anyone other than the purveyors of armaments claim to be winning?

Political commercials on the tube, one after another, promises of change and a better day if only we elect so-and-so. The ads make so-and-so sound like a saint and a savior. I’m too cynical to believe in a savior. Two earnest young women wearing Bernie Sanders t-shirts knocked on my door and asked if I had voted or was planning to vote, and did I need a ride to my polling place. “Girls,” I said, “I’ve voted before. I know where to go and what to do, but thank you nonetheless.” After they left I wondered if they understood that it is what happens on the ground between election cycles that makes change happen; a real movement doesn’t end when the quadrennial carnival packs up and hits the highway out of town.

And Muhammad Ali is gone. The bitch about getting older is watching idols and icons -- the anchors of our memories -- pass away.

To the Right of Nixon

“I know progressives who are nostalgic for Richard Nixon.” Ralph Nader

I particularly enjoy this time of the year on California’s Platinum Coast. The light arrives early in the morning and remains until well into the evening. I usually wake to the twittering of birds; the days are fine, neither chilly or too warm. Santa Barbara is still full of itself, still entranced by its own image, a distant cry from the town I grew up in many years ago, but what the hell. So what if the foodies and the wine aficionados and yoga parlors and private wealth managers have taken over, and State Street is just a carnival for out-of-town hipsters. Let the good times keep rolling.

It’s funny what Ralph Nader said about his progressive pals who are nostalgic for Richard Nixon. Those of us who are old enough to remember Dick Nixon in all his many political guises, but in particular the Nixon of 1972 to 1974, may be hard pressed to view Nixon as a friend of anything remotely resembling a progressive position, but the point Nader is making is that the American political scene has shifted so far to the right that many policies advanced by Bill Clinton and Barack Obama actually lie to the right of Nixon. Think about that. And don’t for a moment believe that Madam Clinton will reverse the trend. Madam Clinton is the ultimate wolf in sheep’s clothing.

Fuck all New Democrats is what I say, they have bent us over and rammed it home. Barack Obama is viewed as a peace-loving leader at the same time his administration is busy provoking Russia, encircling China, selling weaponry to Vietnam, and conducting drone warfare all over the planet. Oh, and let’s not forget that Obama, the man of peace, is proposing to spend around a trillion of our tax dollars to “modernize” America’s nuclear arsenal. This modernization isn’t mentioned by Bernie Sanders or Madam Clinton.

We will be at war with someone, somewhere, forever. We will maintain a military presence in Afghanistan in the same way we have maintained one in Japan, Germany, Okinawa, and South Korea. We will occupy most of the planet militarily until the sheer expense of this empire crushes us. We are the drooling ogre with a learning disability who cannot learn the lessons of the past. We tell ourselves that our armaments are used only for noble ends, to protect our freedom or to free others from the grip of despots.

We lie to ourselves, always have, because to do otherwise is to expose the corrupt underbelly of this country. The lights are dim all over the city on the hill.

We are reassured repeatedly by our corporate propagandists that we are blessed to live in a democracy where our vote and our voice matters. This is bullshit. In the United States those that govern do not fear the governed. Why should they? Our votes are nullified by money, drowned out by money; our governors serve the money masters, gerrymander the electoral map to insure their perpetuation in office. We, the governed, pay 535 people to represent our interests, to advance policies that will provide us the most life, liberty and happiness, and they repay us with betrayal, with sell-outs, with austerity and endless war.

And look at our choice for the highest office in the land, the leader of our empire, two representatives of the ultra-rich who haven’t the faintest idea what it means to be an average, wage-earning person. Bernie Sanders understands, at least when it comes to economics, but the system will not let him past the velvet ropes.

Damn, what a downer. Is such pessimism warranted?

Election 2016: The Farce Continues

“And so we shall have to create leaders who embody virtues we can respect, who have moral and ethical principles we can applaud with an enthusiasm that enables us to rally support for them based on confidence and trust.” Martin Luther King Jr., 1967

The farce continues. Donald Trump will be the standard bearer of the Republican Party, whose movers and shakers must now swallow their bile and put on a display of party “unity.” Much was made of Trump’s visit to Capitol Hill last week for a meeting with Paul Ryan, the putative Party genius. It doesn’t matter that Ryan has never hatched an idea beyond the typical Party doctrine -- he’s the man whose ring must be kissed. Media reports concluded that Trump and Ryan didn’t agree on anything major. No surprise there. Trump is a wild card, totally unpredictable, and therefore uncontrollable, and most of the GOP big shots have denounced him at least once during this campaign.

Bernie Sanders won the West Virginia primary, though the mainstream media continue to write him off because the delegate math favors Hillary Clinton. The honchos in the Democratic Party call on Sanders to submit to the inevitable and call it a day, urge his supporters to tip their energy and money and votes to Queen Clinton. So far, Sanders vows to fight on, though the day of his capitulation is only a matter of the changing of the calendar.

For those of us out here in Reality Land, where the impact of neoliberal policies (low-wage, contingent jobs, student loan debt, crushing medical expenses, etc.) is felt and paid for, the choice offered us is no choice at all. Trump is a gilt-edged novelty for media moguls and pundits, but the man is a dangerous buffoon with no core beliefs other than money and celebrity. Clinton, on the other hand, is more of the same: austerity for the needy and welfare for the rich; imperial wars and domestic surveillance; lip service for the existential crisis posed by climate change; and continued privatization of the assets and services we are supposed to own in common for the good of us all.

Regardless of who wins this tarnished election, private profit will remain the primary organizing principle of the U S of A.

The whole game is rigged, of course, designed to keep the duopoly in power and limit the issues that are allowed to be discussed and the people invited to discuss them. Flip on the network shows and it’s the same faces all the time talking about the same trivial BS. Can anyone remember a period in US history when the country was involved in so many wars simultaneously, none of them formally declared or approved by Congress? I cannot. And these contemporary wars grind on and on, year after year, with no end ever coming into view. Trump claims that he will “rebuild” the US military, though one has to wonder what this might look like given the disproportionate amount of taxpayer money that is siphoned off by the military-security-intelligence apparatus. We outspend every other nation on armaments. The network pundits don’t talk about this at all.

The political system is corrupt and dysfunctional, and this year it has vomited up two presidential hopefuls who most of the voting-age public either despises or distrusts. I have been ruminating lately on the question of whether or not the country deserves Donald Trump, if his ascent is the logical end to decades of lies and disinformation, patriotic mumbo-jumbo about freedom and democracy and the American Way, enormous giveaways to plunderers and plutocrats, and deliberate attempts to anesthetize the populace. The media moguls are more than happy to gin up controversy about transgender restrooms but cannot be troubled to tell the scary truth about the economy, climate change or nuclear proliferation.

I did hear the economist Richard Wolff say something that cheered me. In a lecture about how pressure for social change often builds unseen and then explodes all at once, Wolff said, “The aristocrats never see it coming.”

Could we be at such a turning point now? I’m fairly certain that our collective survival depends on it.

5000-1

Leicester City Football Club pulled off one of the greatest feats in the history of English football, capturing the Premier League title with two matches to spare. Start with the fact that only a year ago the Foxes had to play their way out of a hole that seemed certain to see them relegated. Add the fact that at the start of the 2015-2016 season, oddsmakers set Leicester’s chances at winning the title at 5000-1. (For an American this is hard to wrap one’s head around, but I suppose it would be like a Triple A baseball team, such as the Fresno Grizzlies, winning the World Series.) What’s even more startling is Leicester’s puny team payroll of 48.2 million pounds, compared to the huge payrolls of giants like Liverpool (152 million pounds), Arsenal (192 million pounds), and Manchester City (193 million pounds). I suppose the moral is that while money can buy talent, it cannot buy heart and desire and belief.

By all that is logical and holy in football the Foxes should not be champions of the Premier League. But don’t tell them that. All season long this remarkable club played with a freedom and abandon that defied logic and was often beautiful to watch; they won with spectacular play and they won by grinding matches out; they won with Jamie Vardy leading the line -- and they won without him. Mainly, they won together, that was what made watching them so enjoyable.Their talent was complimentary and reinforcing and expertly marshalled by manager Claudio Ranieri. They won because the spine of the side, Kasper Schmeichel in goal, Robert Huth and Wes Morgan at center back, and N’Golo Kante in the holding midfielder role, was consistently better than any comparable side in the league. In fact, Kante may be the most valuable player of all. Jamie Vardy and Riyad Mahrez and Leonardo Ulloa score goals, but Kante is the constant in midfield, intercepting passes, winning challenges, and making timely tackles that frustrate the opposition and kill counterattacks. Kante never stops running -- he is perpetual and determined motion.

This was a title 132 years in the making and I for one hope Leicester supporters enjoy every minute of their turn in the winner’s circle.  

I’ve been thinking about Leicester’s accomplishment since Monday night when my beloved Chelsea (huge payroll, disinterested players, dismal season) erased a two goal deficit to earn a draw against Tottenham, the result of which tipped the title to Leicester. It was a match marred by cheap fouls and bad behavior. Twelve yellow cards were issued, nine against Tottenham. At the end of the match, Guus Hiddink, Chelsea’s 69-year-old interim manager, was knocked to the ground. Ugly stuff. But that wasn’t the focus of my rumination; I was thinking about Leicester in relation to American politics and the rise of Donald Trump, and wondering if there is any possibility that Trump will pull off a political miracle as unfathomable as Leicester’s footballing miracle.

I don’t know if the odds of Trump’s winning are 5000-1, but I assume they are long. It’s one thing to win primaries, another to prevail in a general election. Will Trump’s atavistic message resonate with a wider electorate, particularly women and Latinos? Doubtful. Trump is the candidate of fearful, resentful, and spiteful white men who yearn for the days when women and minorities knew their place, and America built stuff. Those days are long gone. It’s like yearning for the days when Great Britain ruled the Indian subcontinent and a mediocre white bloke could pretend he was a royal. Ian Masters, host of Background Briefing, has a theory that Trump doesn’t want to be president as much as he wants to win the presidency. Five minutes after his inauguration I think Trump would be asking himself, “OK, now what?” It’s not that Trump is anyone’s puppet -- his ego is too massive for that -- but I think his temperament is completely ill-suited for high political office. Emperor maybe, president never.

Leicester’s march to the Premier League crown was full of passion and joy; by contrast, the American general election in November will be full of lies and bombast. Whether the winner is Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton, millions of people will have a foul taste in their mouths the day after.

Torches and Pitchforks

It’s almost reality, the presidential matchup the corporate media has been salivating for, Trump versus Clinton. The major commercial networks will use the public airwaves, for which they pay nothing, to earn buckets of cash carrying Trump and Clinton campaign ads, and the inevitable debates. It will be great for the corporate bottom line, wonderful fodder for the pundit class, and downright terrible for the nation. This is where we are. The oligarchy is alive and still in control.

Despair is an easy option. Watching the Republican Party reap the reward it has sowed for years alleviates some, but not anywhere close to all, my despair. The party strategists and bigwigs have blown the dog whistle for decades and what finally came home to them is the atavistic Donald Trump. Bummer.

What bothers me is the other party, the Democrats, the one that is supposed to be all-inclusive, champion of working people and the environment, women, equality and social justice. We know this isn’t the case any longer. As Thomas Frank points out in his new book, Listen, Liberal, the Democrats have been sprinting away from their traditional constituencies since the early 1970’s. As a result, the Party apparatus was hijacked by the Clintons and others of their ilk, so called New Democrats (Barack Obama included, which explains his energetic support of the Trans Pacific Partnership secret trade agreement) who embrace a savage neoliberal agenda that has devastated the middle class.

Our democracy is weak, the game rigged to produce preordained results. This is nothing new in American history -- we’ve traveled this rutted sideroad before. The wealthy and powerful always do everything they possibly can to limit direct democracy simply because they can’t control it. They talk about the “will of the people” and all that blather, but what they really mean is the will of their kind of people. So, we see arcane nominating rules and outright efforts to deny people their right to cast a ballot; we see how potential third parties are ignored and marginalized by the media, prevented from participating in debates and candidate forums.

The political duopoly serves its masters and makes serfs and slaves of the rest of us. As Robert McChesney and John Nichols note in their book, People Get Ready, “Unemployment, inequality, and poverty are best understood not, in the end, as economic problems, but instead as political problems. They require political solutions.” McChesney and Nichols go on to say that the level of corruption in contemporary American politics -- the blatant buying of politicians from both parties -- would make Gilded Age icons blush. The wealthy have never had it so good; 40-plus years of propaganda and scheming and manipulation has put them in the catbird seat.

But cracks are appearing in the foundation of this deeply entrenched oligarchy. The economic pain has become so widespread and pervasive that people are once again receptive to New Deal-style solutions. Bernie Sanders never had a prayer of winning the Democratic nomination -- the whole Party edifice was arrayed against him -- but he has succeeded in dragging bedrock middle class issues like income inequality back into the light. And when movements like Black Lives Matter, the Fight for $15, climate justice, humane immigration reform and voting rights, to name a few, coalesce with the understanding that their separate struggles are in reality one overarching struggle, the cracks will become fissures.

It has happened before. It will happen again. The People know the current arrangement is not only inequitable but unsustainable. Hell, the oligarchs themselves know this is true, which is why they are so desperate to delay the day of reckoning.

Tick, tock, torches and pitchforks.