military coup reframed...

A Very American Coup: Coming Soon to a Hometown Near You

The wars in distant lands were always going to come home, but not this way.

It's September 2016, year 15 of America's "Long War" against terror. As weary troops return to the homeland, a bitter reality assails them: despite their sacrifices, America is losing.

Iraq is increasingly hostile to remaining occupation forces. Afghanistan is a riddle that remains unsolved: its army and police forces are untrustworthy, its government corrupt, and its tribal leaders unsympathetic to the vagaries of U.S. intervention. Since the Obama surge of 2010, a trillion more dollars have been devoted to Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, and other countries in the vast shatter zone that is central Asia, without measurable returns; nothing, that is, except the prolongation of America's Great Recession, now entering its tenth year without a sustained recovery in sight.

Disillusioned veterans are unable to find decent jobs in a crumbling economy. Scarred by the physical and psychological violence of war, fed up with the happy talk of duplicitous politicians who only speak of shared sacrifices, they begin to organize. Their motto: take America back.

Meanwhile, a lame duck presidency, choking on foreign policy failures, finds itself attacked even for its putative successes. Health-care reform is now seen to have combined the inefficiency and inconsistency of government with the naked greed and exploitative talents of corporations. Medical rationing is a fact of life confronting anyone on the high side of 50. Presidential rhetoric that offered hope and change has lost all resonance. Mainstream media outlets are discredited and disintegrating, resulting in new levels of information anarchy.

Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.

This world in arms in not spending money alone.

It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children.

The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick school in more than 30 cities.

It is two electric power plants, each serving a town of 60,000 population.

It is two fine, fully equipped hospitals.

It is some 50 miles of concrete highway.

We pay for a single fighter with a half million bushels of wheat.

We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than 8,000 people.

This, I repeat, is the best way of life to be found on the road the world has been taking.

This is not a way of life at all, in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron.

 What's facing us in 2010?

Perspective and tasks...

1.World capitalism enters the second decade of the 21st century in the midst of a deepening economic and geopolitical crisis. In January 2009, in the aftermath of the financial meltdown that had begun in September 2008, the Socialist Equality Party explained that the economic crisis signaled a turning point in the protracted decline in the global position of American capitalism. The SEP warned that economic restabilization on a capitalist basis could “be achieved only through … a catastrophic lowering of the living standards of the working class....” We insisted that there could be no “socially neutral” resolution to the crisis, and that “the improvisational responses of the American ruling class to the economic upheaval will solve nothing.” On the eve of the inauguration of Barack Obama, the SEP predicted that he would seek a “solution to the crisis that does not touch the foundations of capitalism and the interests of the financial elite.”

2. This evaluation has proven correct. None of the fundamental causes of the crisis have been addressed. The contrast between the scale of the disaster that struck in September 2008 and the feckless character of the Obama administration’s response could not be more striking. Despite the criminally reckless speculation that wreaked havoc on the lives of millions of workers within the United States and billions of people internationally, Obama avoided any action that impinged on the wealth and interests of Wall Street. The first priority of the Obama administration was to reassure the financial elite that their wealth would be protected, and that there would be no re-imposition of “New Deal”-style restraints on Wall Street gambling. In fact, the opposite has taken place. The massive infusion of cash into the world financial system has led, predictably, to a new round of reckless speculation on Wall Street. Share values have soared, enriching rich speculators while the government does nothing to address the deep distress of the overwhelming majority of the working population.

3. The conditions confronting the global working class are dire. A substantial portion of the world’s population lives in desperate poverty. The January 12 earthquake in Haiti, which killed 200,000 people, has shocked the entire world. But the suffering of the Haitian people is unique only in the suddenness of the catastrophe. Countless thousands die each day of malnutrition, disease and the myriad consequences of global poverty. Moreover, the staggering dimensions of the Haitian tragedy are rooted in economic and political conditions created by nearly a century of brutal exploitation by American corporations. Now, the American government views the catastrophe as an opportunity to send in the military and restructure the Haitian economy even more directly in the interests of American capitalism. The US has blocked desperately needed aid while preventing refugees from fleeing to the United States. As a result, tens of thousands more Haitians have needlessly died. As was the case with Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and the Asian tsunami of 2004, the earthquake in Haiti has revealed the ugly reality of capitalism.

 Last nation standing wins?

Collapse Gap Revisited

In the past Richard has done his best to nudge governments in the right direction, especially with regard to adjusting to fossil fuel depletion, whereas I have always felt that they can go and nudge themselves. You see, from my point of view, only a fool would want to go a-nudging the Central Committee of the Politburo toward adopting better policies. Here, perhaps once there was hope; and now it's gone. Unfortunately, many people continue to believe in the miraculous properties of national politics and policy. However, Richard is no longer one of them, and this makes me a bit more hopeful for the rest of us.

Silly me. Here I had thought that world leaders would want to keep their nations from collapsing. They must be working hard to prevent currency collapse, financial system collapse, food system collapse, social collapse, environmental collapse, and the onset of general, overwhelming misery—right? But no, that's not what the evidence suggests. Increasingly I am forced to conclude that the object of the game that world leaders are actually playing is not to avoid collapse; it's simply to postpone it a while so as to be the last nation to go down, so yours can have the chance to pick the others' carcasses before it meets the same fate.

I know, that sounds unbearably cynical. And in fact it may not accurately describe the conscious attitudes of leaders of some smaller nations. But for the U.S. and China, arguably the countries most likely to lead the way for the rest of the world, actions speak louder than words....

For these two nations, avoiding collapse would require solving a range of enormous problems, of which at least four are non-negotiable: climate change; peak fossil fuels (in effect, stagnating and, soon, declining energy supplies); the inherent instability of growth-based financial systems; and the vulnerability of food systems to factors like fresh water scarcity and soil erosion (in addition to global warming and fuel scarcity). If they fail to address any one of these, societal collapse is inevitable—in a few decades certainly, but perhaps in just the next few years.

That leaves finding a new source of supply. Many oil-producing nations are today quite hostile to the United States, and are far away…except Canada. All are also vulnerable to internal rebellions and terrorist attacks…except Canada, the home of the world’s second-largest remaining reserves. Will an American government really be able to resist internal pressures when Canada is just waiting to be pressured into supplying more? If Americans are freezing in their dark McMansions, unable to get to Wal-Mart or their jobs (which increasingly are at Wal-Mart), no U.S. President or Congress is going to say, “Too bad.”

Every pipeline from the tar sands currently leads south, and I have to believe there would be massive pressure on Canada to ramp up tar mining very quickly if the U.S. found itself running short. And if Canada resisted for whatever reason – CO2 emissions, perhaps, or not wanting to completely pollute the water supply for Alberta and Saskatchewan, or not wanting to use up our last reserves of natural gas to extract oil from the tar sands, or wanting to save some for ourselves – pressure would be applied.

And if American pressure was resisted, who knows where things would go. As mentioned earlier, this is a nation that has routinely protected oil supplies by overthrowing governments and even invasion. Will they allow Canada to keep ‘our’ oil, which surely will be considered a U.S. ‘national interest‘ under NAFTA?

 "The senator from Wal-Mart now has the floor." (Joe Bageant)

Supreme Court Ruling Spurs Corporation Run for Congress

Following the recent Supreme Court ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission to allow unlimited corporate funding of federal campaigns, Murray Hill Inc. today announced it is filing to run for U.S. Congress. "Until now," Murray Hill Inc. said in a statement, "corporate interests had to rely on campaign contributions and influence-peddling to achieve their goals in Washington. But thanks to an enlightened Supreme Court, now we can eliminate the middle-man and run for office ourselves." Murray Hill Inc. is believed to be the first "corporate person" to exercise its constitutional right to run for office.

"The strength of America," Murray Hill Inc. said, "is in the boardrooms, country clubs and Lear jets of America's great corporations. We're saying to Wal-Mart, AIG and Pfizer, if not you, who? If not now, when?" Murray Hill Inc. added: "It's our democracy. We bought it, we paid for it, and we're going to keep it." Murray Hill Inc., a diversifying corporation in the Washington, D.C. area, has long held an interest in politics and sees corporate candidacy as an "emerging new market."

The campaign's "designated human," Eric Hensal, will help the corporation conform to "antiquated, human only" procedures and sign the necessary voter registration and candidacy paperwork. Hensal is excited by this new opportunity: "We want to get in on the ground floor of the democracy market before the whole store is bought by China." Murray Hill Inc. plans on filing to run in the Republican primary in Maryland's 8th Congressional District.

Clearly operating on the premise that the Supreme Court last week changed the entire legal landscape for money in politics, the D.C. Circuit Court appeared on Wednesday to be leaning strongly toward giving even more freedom to campaign groups that are set up to operate independently of candidates and parties. From the opening moment of the 65-minute hearing, most of the nine judges on the en banc Court treated the Supreme Court’s ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission as the beginning, not the end, of expansion of those freedoms. When an FEC lawyer tried to bring up, and rely on, older precedents, he was reminded repeatedly that those came before Citizens United.

Chief Judge David B. Sentelle, in the first words spoken during the argument session, said to an independent group’s lawyer, ready to open his argument: “What do you have to add to Justice Kennedy?” — Anthony M. Kennedy was Citizen United’s author. And when that lawyer started making his case for more freedom, Judges Sentelle and Douglas H. Ginsburg suggested that he postpone his thoughts on that until after the FEC’s lawyer (arguing second) had a chance to deal with Citizens United. The tone of skepticism toward the FEC then continued throughout. Judge after judge pressed for justifications of government regulation, and seemed unpersuaded by the responses.


The en banc Court heard two consolidated cases (the lead case is SpeechNow.org v. FEC, 08-5223) in the first federal court hearing to explore how far the Supreme Court had gone last Thursday toward liberating independent political operators. It was abundantly clear that each of the nine judges was thoroughly familiar with every detail of the Citizens United decision. And one of the most important developments of the hearing was the degree to which the circuit judges were questioning the government’s ability to justify any restraints on independent groups based on a fear that they might corrupt politics

For over a century, the US has slowly put some limits - too few, too feeble - on how much corporations can bribe, bully or intimidate politicians. On Tuesday, they were burned away in one whoosh. The Supreme Court ruled that corporations can suddenly run political adverts during an election campaign - and there is absolutely no limit on how many, or how much they can spend. So if you anger Goldman Sachs by supporting legislation to break up the too-big-to-fail banks, you will smack into a wall of 24/7 ads exposing your every flaw. If you displease Exxon-Mobil by supporting legislation to deal with global warming, you will now be hit by a tsunami of advertising saying you are opposed to jobs and The American Way. If you rile the defence contractors by opposing the gargantuan war budget, you will face a smear-campaign calling you Soft on Terror.

Representative Alan Grayson says: "It basically institutionalizes and legalizes bribery on the largest scale imaginable. Corporations will now be able to reward the politicians that play ball with them - and beat to death the politicians that don't... You won't even hear any more about the Senator from Kansas. It'll be the Senator from General Electric or the Senator from Microsoft." In 2008, Exxon Mobil made profits of $85bn. So if they dedicated just 10 percent to backing a President who would serve their interests, they would have $8.5bn to spend - more than every candidate for President and every candidate for Senate spent at the last election. And that's just one corporation.

To understand the impact this will have, you need to grasp how smaller sums of corporate money have already hijacked American democracy. Let's look at a case that is simple and immediate and every American can see in front of them: healthcare. The United States is the only major industrialized democracy that doesn't guarantee healthcare for all its citizens. The result is that, according to a detailed study by Harvard University, some 45,000 Americans die needlessly every year. That's equivalent to 15 9/11s every year, or two Haitian earthquakes every decade.

How happy, then, to learn that a handful of our leaders in Washington took bold and forceful action last week to lift another group of downtrodden Americans from the pits of injustice, helping them gain more political and governmental power. I refer, of course, to corporations.

Say what? Corporations should get more power over our elected officials?

"Free the corporate money," cried the movement's leaders, demanding that America sever the few legal restraints that remain on corporate efforts to buy our elections. "Si, se puede," chanted these assertive champions of corporate supremacy -- "Yes, we can!"

So, they did. "They" being the five doctrinaire corporatists who now form the majority on the U.S. Supreme Court. Let's remember their names: Sam Alito, Anthony Kennedy, John Roberts, Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas. These five men, on their own whim, have executed a black-robed coup against the American people's democratic authority.

 oil money: company profit v. citizen profit...

Uganda oil contracts give little cause for optimism

The Katine project is providing a compelling case study in the complexity of sustainable development. Genuine progress - when possible within the constraints of a liberal capitalist model - comes from solutions that are local, evidence-based and democratically accountable. There are few quick fixes and no magic wands.

But the exploration and imminent production of oil in western Uganda is being seen as just that - an easy answer to complex problems. Both government and the oil companies involved have been busy painting a roseate picture of bumper revenues and a country transformed. Forget the intricacies of agricultural reform, social ownership and political liberalisation; Uganda, we are told, will be turned into a middle-income country by $2bn a year in hard cash.

But the problems facing Uganda - and Katine - are almost certain to be exacerbated rather than solved by oil. Last month, the campaigning group PLATFORM published three of the production sharing agreements (PSAs) the government has spent years keeping a closely guarded secret. The deals point towards a resource extraction programme designed for profit, not development, and contain a series of provisions that undermine any hope of changing course.

At the moment it seems like everyone wants a piece of Angola. The queue of prominent visitors is long with the USA’s Secretary of State Hillary Clinton at its head. Where it smells of oil one can also find China and they mention that China is thought to have contributed $5 billion in loans to develop Angola’s infrastructure. The investment is necessary after 25 years of civil war. The repayment will, presumably, be made in the form of oil.

The first oil was found in 1955 in the Kwanza valley but it was when they found oil offshore at the end of the 1960s that it became important for Angola. In 1973, crude oil was Angola’s most important export, and today it is 90%. (Their second largest export is diamonds.) The really large oil finds were first made when they began to explore in deep water. OPEC reports that Angola has reserves of 9.5 billion barrels but the nation’s own news sources assert that reserves are 13.1 billion barrels and there are estimates where they believe that there can exist as much as 19 billion barrels in the ocean outside Angola. From a global perspective where we consume 30 billion barrels per year, Angola’s reserves are not so large and are less than what remains in Norway....

In recent years production has been around 1.9 million barrels per day (Mb/d) of which they have exported 1.8 Mb/d. The projects that are planned can increase production by 1.2 Mb/d which would raise Angola’s production to about 3 Mb/d. This is the same level that Norway had as their Peak Oil production. If one considers that Angola’s reserves are clearly smaller than Norway’s you can understand how aggressive the oil production that the international oil companies are conducting is. One can justifiably say that this is plunder of Africa’s oil and, once again, Africa is being exploited. Angola and Africa would have fared much better if they had had a different oil production profile.

It is difficult to determine how Venezuela has been spending its oil windfall, given the lack of government transparency (the country ranks 162 out of 179 countries ranked on Transparency International's corruption index). However, from the few official figures the government has released and its stated pledges of aid to foreign countries, it is possible to glean a picture of billions of dollars dispersed on activities not directly related to PDVSA's core business. Analysts express frustration that these reports lack detail, and efforts by news organization to obtain further information from government agencies have been rebuffed (NYT).

PDVSA has transferred billions of dollars to Fonden, the off-budget investment fund many experts say is financing Chavez's social projects. According to International Oil Daily, an energy trade publication, PDVSA spent $14.4 billion on social programs in 2007 (as compared to $6.9 billion in 2005). These programs include projects such as medical clinics providing free health care, discounted food and household goods centers in poor neighborhoods, indigenous land-titling, job creation programs outside of the oil business, and university and education programs.

Increased oil revenues have also given Chavez the ability to extend assistance programs outside Venezuela’s borders. For example, he provides oil at a preferential price to many countries in the Caribbean through the Petrocaribe initiative. In 2009, a Venezuela-backed home heating program to low-income households in the United States was briefly halted, a sign that low oil prices may be forcing Chavez to reconsider (TIME) some of his social programs. In August 2007, the Associated Press calculated that Chavez had promised $8.8 billion in aid, financing, and energy funding to Latin America and the Caribbean between January and August 2007, a figure far higher than the $1.6 billion of U.S. assistance for the entire year. Though it is impossible to determine how much of that funding was actually dispersed, the difference in aid is striking. Chavez is also suspected of funneling money to the FARC, a Colombian guerrilla group, as well as providing funds to Argentine President Cristina Kirchner’s election campaign in 2007—though he denies both charges.

 swine flu and other government enabled opportunities for profit....

(Image: Lance Page / t r u t h o u t; Adapted:
MayaEvening, kevindooley, PinkMoose, *Louise**)


Swine Flu Didn't Fly

Previously, the WHO had offered scant response to allegations of corruption, but deigned to defend itself after the Council of Europe meeting was announced. At the hearing, the WHO's flu director, Dr. Fukuda, denied the accusations against the WHO. "Let me state clearly for the record - the influenza pandemic policies and responses recommended and taken by WHO were not improperly influenced by the pharmaceutical industry."

The public meeting to examine accusations against WHO was set up by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), which represents 800 million people in 47 countries. Established by various European nations in 1949 to promote human rights and the democratic rule of law, the Council's January 26 meeting involved WHO officials, European drug makers and medical experts. PACE's findings are expected to be announced January 29 and will likely be followed by an in-depth study and recommendations to European governments.

The PACE hearing is the latest in a series of investigations into the WHO's propriety, which also includes a 2009 Danish Parliamentary inspection of links between WHO expert, Albert Osterhaus, and makers of the swine flu drugs. Russian lawmaker Igor Barinov has also started an inquiry into the WHO's ties to H1N1 drug makers.

Starting in 2011, we are prepared to freeze government spending for three years.

Not the spending on our two wars mind you, or in aid to Israel, or on money to prime the bankers' pumps, and certainly not on national security programs. But you will still keep your Medicare and Medicaid, if you can afford the new charges we're adding. And naturally your Social Security, the one you paid for all your life as an insurance policy -- which continues to be pillaged by Congress -- will not be affected. Rest assured you will be paid in shrinking funny money until you croak.

We've already identified $20 billion in savings for next year.

All you folks gotta do is come up with the $20 billion so we can show it on the books.

... at a time of record deficits, we will not continue tax cuts for oil companies, investment fund managers and those making over $250,000 a year.

No further tax cuts, but they can keep the ones they enjoy now.

Now, even after paying for what we spent on my watch

Which world economists say can never be paid off anyway, so fuck it.

we will still face the massive deficit we had when I took office.

The bad bank has a dual purpose:

Firstly, its priority is to protect West European banks from defaults on billions of euros of loans—such as those recently declared by the German Bavarian State Bank—by centralizing such toxic assets and other securities in the new “bad bank.”

Secondly, banks freed from the burden of such bad loans on their balance sheets will once again be able to trade and speculate freely. The “toxic assets” will be exchanged on the basis of a decreased book value for debenture bonds. Banks with large bad loans on their balance sheets, which until now were denied fresh capital from central banks, will now be able to submit their debenture bonds with central banks as security for new credits. The whole circus of highly speculative and profitable financial speculations that led to the financial crisis in the first place can recommence, as if nothing had happened.

Following the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Stalinist regimes in Eastern Europe two decades ago many banks in Germany, Austria, Italy, Sweden and other states awarded loans amounting to several hundred billion euros to Eastern Europe countries. These loans are now overdue. Even the loss of just one of these loans could lead to the state bankruptcy of some countries. According to the World Bank, credits of least €200 billion are under threat.

 counter terrorism ...(when the government creates the terror)

WAY: the following paragraphs, taken from the introduction to the piece below, introduce the concept of "counterterroism":

You don’t know what counterterror is? Not so surprising. The truth is, if you’re not a complete news jockey, you probably don’t know much about targeted assassinations, night raids, secret detention centers, disappearances, and other acts of counterterror (which is really terror in uniform or at least under state orders). Of course, the Afghans know well enough. For them, it’s not a secret war, particularly in the southern parts of the country, where the Taliban is strongest; it’s but one particularly frightening aspect of everyday life.

It’s just we Americans who are ignorant. Our secret war is essentially kept secret from us. Our Special Forces operatives, along with the CIA (and possibly private contractors), have long been involved in the “night raids” that Anand Gopal describes below. And regularly enough, if you’re reading closely, you’ll see news bubbling to the surface about their results -- like those eight students in grades 6-10, who were taken from their beds by “Americans” in a night raid in Kunar Province, handcuffed, and then evidently executed. (A statement from Afghan President Hamid Karzai says that they were “martyred” and the UN has confirmed that they were students.) Or consider the recent night raid in Ghazni Province that killed at least four Afghan villagers, including an 11-year-old. Both incidents led to angry protests; both resulted in denials by the U.S. military that the dead were anything but “insurgents” or “bomb-makers.”

Weeks after the raid, the family remains bitter. “Everyone in the area knew we were a family that worked for the government,” Qarar says. “Rahman couldn’t even leave the city because if the Taliban caught him in the countryside they would have killed him.”

Beyond the question of Rahman’s guilt or innocence, however, it’s how he was taken that has left such a residue of hate and anger among his family. “Did they have to kill my cousins? Did they have to destroy our house?” Qarar asks. “They knew where Rahman worked. Couldn’t they have at least tried to come with a warrant in the daytime? We would have forced Rahman to comply.”

“I used to go on TV and argue that people should support this government and the foreigners,” he adds. “But I was wrong. Why should anyone do so? I don’t care if I get fired for saying it, but that’s the truth.”

The panel was unanimous in identifying al-Qaeda as the most serious terrorist threat to the US, evidenced by the recent failed Christmas suicide bombing attempt on Northwest flight 253 over Detroit organized by al-Qaeda forces in Yemen. "Al-Qaeda remains dangerous, though damaged" by recent US strikes against it in Pakistan, said Charles Allen, Undersecretary for Intelligence, US Department of Homeland Security. The new development, the panel agreed, is that al-Qaeda's regional affiliates continue to pose a serious threat even as its core leadership in Pakistan and Afghanistan has come under siege.

The new report, authored by Professor Yonah Alexander, Director of the International Center for Terrorism Studies, highlights the growing danger posed by al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb. "If we truly want to take the fight to al-Qaeda, we must go everywhere they pose a serious threat," said Prof. Alexander. "A comprehensive US counterterrorism strategy must address the increasingly volatile terrorist breeding ground in North and West/Central Africa, where al-Qaeda and other terrorists are exploiting weak regional security cooperation and links to narco-trafficking networks in Latin America to recruit and train terrorists to carry out attacks in the region and elsewhere."

Like a bolt of sunlight breaking through a lowering cloud, Clinton's formulation floods one's brain with sudden illumination. "Killing and robbery and coercion by people who do not have state authority" – that's terrorism. Killing and robbery and coercion by people who do have state authority is, obviously, something else altogether: humanitarian intervention, perhaps, or liberation, or preservation of national security, or maintaining great-power credibility, or restoring hope, or a pre-dawn vertical insertion.

In any case, and every case, if this border-transcending activity is done by people who have state authority, then it is legitimate, it is good, it is necessary, it is noble. And even if, sometimes, on rare occasions, mistakes are made during the killing, robbing and coercing done by people who have state authority, these mistakes are only ever the result of good intentions gone awry.

So there you have it: what terrorism is depends on who does it. Naturally, there are nuances and complexities that Mr. Clinton did not go into here; it was an interview, after all, not a scholarly monograph. Obviously, the legitimacy of killing, robbing and coercing by people who have state authority is entirely dependent on the state from which that authority derives. Only those states which by their cheerful acceptance of America's benevolent guidance and abiding friendship have proven themselves worthy can legitimately exercise their authority to kill, rob and coerce. All others must forbear – or else be branded "rogue states," purveyors of "state terror," which in turn makes them eligible for "the path of action."

 State of the Union: pep rally with Obama as coach?

The Annotated Obama

Obama's opener was predictable enough, the obligatory patriotic reference for the blood and balls crowd:

... when the Union was turned back at Bull Run and the Allies first landed at Omaha Beach ...

Then came the hearkening back section, in this case to 1965, a time when blacks had hope and liberals had a few guts:

... and civil rights marchers were beaten on Bloody Sunday ...

More than half of Americans were not yet born in 1965, and four fifths surely have never heard of Bloody Sunday at Selma. But what the hell, it's a speech, right?

And again, we must answer history's call ...

Along with millions of other cranky old lefties, I wanted to scream back, Then pick up the fucking phone, damn ya!

And of course there were references to heartland towns, to show he can at least name a few:

... in places like Elkhart, Indiana and Galesburg, Illinois.

And he reminded us of the many nights he spends in the Lincoln room crying over the mail:

... letters I read each night. The toughest to read are those written by children ...

And, as always, the American people are resilient, industrious folks living in Norman Rockwell's world:

... they remain busy building cars and teaching kids, starting businesses and going back to school. They're coaching Little League and helping their neighbors. ... I have never been more hopeful about America's future than I am tonight.

Are we living in the same country here, guy? But shsssh! At last! He's talking the economy. My man is gonna get down and grit with the peeps. Talk some real meat here.

In his State of the Union speech Wednesday night, President Barack Obama avoided any direct and concrete presentation of the actual state of US society. Given the enormity of the economic crisis and its destructive impact on tens of millions of Americans, Obama’s recourse to evasions and platitudes was all the more extraordinary.

Obama spoke in vague generalities about the crisis, but he cited virtually no facts. He deployed a variety of rhetorical devices to make a show of sympathy for the plight of ordinary Americans, but his speech only revealed the chasm of insularity and indifference that separates not only himself, but the entire political establishment, from the broad masses of people.

He began by defending the “aggressive” measures he took to rescue the financial system, asserting that “one year later, the worst of the storm has passed.” Really? Precisely for whom has the storm passed?

President Obama gives a good speech. He's smooth, unruffled by audience response, good at a timely ad-lib remark, and knows how to win over a tough crowd--all skills that were in evidence at last night's State of the Union address. But he's also good at telling whoppers.

Here are a few.

Talking about health care, and the stalled bills in House and Senate which have become so encrusted with pro-industry amendments that the whole process should be referred to as the Health Industry Enrichment Act, Obama said at one point, addressing the doubts many in Congress and among the broader public have about those bills, "If anyone from either party has a better approach that will bring down premiums, bring down the deficit, cover the uninsured, strengthen Medicare for seniors and stop insurance company abuses, let me know. Let me know. Let me know. I'm eager to see it."

Hm-m-m. Actually, he has not been eager to see other ideas at all. John Conyers has had another idea: extending Medicare to cover everyone. He had it in the form of a bill, HR 676, but at the urging of the White House, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi kept that bill from even getting a hearing. Earlier, almost a year ago, Obama held a conference at the White House to hear ideas about health care reform, but he excluded from that conference any advocates of what is called "single-payer"--shorthand for a Canadian-style health system in which the government insures everyone, and sets the reimbursement amounts for doctors and hospitals, medical services of all kinds, and drugs.