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July 26, 2002
Walt Brasch
Ashcroft's War on Bookstores
July 25, 2002
Norman Madarasz
Paul
Krugman's Howl:
Populism, War and
the Melting Economy
Gavin Keeney
Van Morrison: In September
Rep. Cynthia McKinney
War
on Terrorism or
Police State?
July 24, 2002
Gary Leupp
An Islam Primer
July 23, 2002
Jeffrey St. Clair
The Battle
for Zuni Salt Lake
Ansar Ahmed
Am I with You, George?
Bill Christison
The
Disastrous Foreign Policies of the US: Oppression Abroad Means
Repression at Home
July 22, 2002
Rick Giombetti
Glaxo Raises White Flag
in Paxil Case
Wayne Madsen
Forbidden
Truth
The Press, Bush, Oil
and the Taliban
July 21. 2002
Francis A. Boyle
The Rogue Elephant
Jennifer Harbury
Why are
the FBI & CIA Targeting Me?
Joan Claybrook
Time
for a Special Prosceutor
for Thomas White
Gloria Bergen
The Struggle
of Workers
in Palestine
Dave Marsh
Mr. Big Stuff:
Alan Lomax, Great White Fraud
James T. Phillips
"I'll
Tell You No Lies"
The Human Rubble of War
July 20, 2002
Gavin Keeney
The Grave
New Urbanism
World Trade Center Burlesque
Jacob Levich
"I
Was Schooled in Hate"
Confessions of a
Summer Camp Terror Tot
Thomas Croft
Augusta,
GA
Growing Up in the Deep South
Alexander Cockburn
The
Market Hogwallow:
Popgun Populism Isn't Enough
July 19, 2002
Abe Bonowitz / SueZann
Bosler
A Discussion
with Jeb Bush on the Death Penalty
Jonathan Power
No Need
for War Against Iraq
Rick Giombetti
Qwest
Death Watch
Kurt Nimmo
Of Mice,
Bullets & Bombs
M. Shahid Alam
Through
Racist Eyes:
Is Eurocentrism Unique?
July 18, 2002
Mokhiber / Weissman
Business
As Usual
Jerre Skog
I Spy: Now
Let's be Fair,
the USA Ain't East Germany
Ralph Nader
The CEO
Crimewave:
Corporate Socialism
Mahbubul Karim (Sohel)
The Rising Tensions
Between Spain and Morocco
Alexander Cockburn
Drivel
and Squawk:
Can the Times' Jeff Gerth
Save the White House?
July 17, 2002
Philip Farruggio
The
New Role Model:
Remember Jesus, George?
Zara Gelsey
Who's
Reading Over
Your Shoulder?
Behzad Yaghmaian
9/11 and
Fotress Europe:
the Drama of the New
Moslem Diaspora
Mike Ferner
War, Incorporated
Gary Leupp
Bush, Burqas
and the Oppression of Afghan Women
July 16, 2002
Pierre Tristam
Faith--based
Capitalism in
the Ruins of the Market
Kurt Nimmo
How My
35mm Camera Almost Became a Tool of Treason
Robert Fisk
The Kashmir
Distraction
Salam al--Marayati
When
is Terrorism
Not Defined as Terrorism?
Kathleen Christison
The
Image Problem:
Anti--Palestinian Bias
from Wilson to Bush
July 15, 2002
Gavin Keeney
In One
of Safire's Ears,
Out the Other
CounterPunch Wire
Nader in
Cuba
Ralph Nader
The Secret
World of Banking
Dave Marsh
Vincible:
Michael Jackson, Racism and the Music Cartel
Rahul Mahajan
Justice
for Bhopal
Jeffrey St. Clair
Seduced
by a Legend
The Return of Jimmy T99 Nelson
July 14, 2002
Bill Christison
The
DOA (Poem)
David Vest
I'll Never
Get Out of This Band Alive
July 13, 2002
M. Junaid Alam
A Process
of Dehumanization
Gavin Keeney
Go Tell
Karl Rove!
Matt Vidal
Corporate
"Ethics" Red Herrings
Ed Whitfield
Lessons
from Independence Day
Resources:
100s of Links
About 9/11
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Five
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Shook The World:
Seattle and Beyond
By Alexander
Cockburn
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How the CIA's Backing of the Mujahideen Created the World's Most
Robust Heroin Market and Helped to Finance the Rise of the Taliban
and Osama bin Laden
Whiteout:
CIA, Drugs & the
Press
by Alexander
Cockburn
and Jeffrey St. Clair
The Memphis Blues Again:
Six Decades of Memphis Music Photographs
Photos by Ernest Withers
Text by Daniel Wolff
The New Intifada:
Resisting Israel's Apartheid
Edited by Roane Carey
A Pocket Guide to
Environmental Bad Guys
by James Ridgeway
and Jeffrey St. Clair
The
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by Douglas Valentine
Al Gore:
A User's Manual
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July
26, 2002
Lies, Big and Small
by Philip Farruggio
Ironically, it was Herr Schickelgruber who stated
it most succinctly: "the bigger the lie, the more they believe"
(and follow). And follow they did, through a path laden with
death, destruction and repression.
Just re-watched the excellent film "A
Civil Action" for the third time (as usual, the book was
even better). Go see it --go
read it! Talk about "big lies"! This is the poster
child for what corporations have been getting away with for centuries.
These "big lies" wind up killing tens of thousands
of Americans (and millions overseas), through diseases and injuries
that could easily have been averted if not for the need for higher
and higher profits, and lower and lower accountability.
With the man General Patton referred
to as "that paperchangin son of a bitch" still in memory,
check out Charles Higham's book "Trading
With The Enemy". Talk about corporate greed and
national shame! As the cream of America's youth were being blown
to pieces, and the relatives of our American Jews were being
either gassed or worked to death, Higham lists the American corporations
who were trading ("traitoring") and profiting from
our very enemy. How come those facts are not in the American
history books our high schools distribute?
Our founding (step) fathers, on a more
cerebral level, used a "big lie" pattern as well. They
sold us on the premise that ours was to be a truly democratic
Republic --and it was, if you were wealthy, owned land, and had
many workers or slaves. In historian Howard Zinn's excellent
book "A
People's History of the U.S." one views America's
glass from the perspective of being "half empty". The
revisionist spin has always been "half full" --pushed
by our text books, mainstream media, and through the countless
"talking heads". One can easily walk the latter path
and see all those beautiful flowers: freedom of speech &
religion, the Bill of Rights, our Constitution, the fall of slavery,
woman's suffrage, democratic electoral politics (one person,
one vote), rights of assembly, and on and on.
In Zinn's book, one looks through a different
glass. Our founders, the "rich guys club", made sure
how this new democratic republic would be run. If you didn't
own land, you didn't vote, or hold office. Certainly, as a nation
we have progressed these 200 some odd years. Today, anyone can
hold office --that is anyone who can raise a) tens of millions
to be elected into the Senate or House b) hundreds of thousands
to be elected into the State legislature or large urban city
council and c) tens of thousands for some small town office.
Therefore, if one is a) not wealthy or b) does not have wealthy
"patrons", one simply does not hold office. Sure, the
talking heads will exemplify some populist "one of the people"
who conquered the system through sheer determination and countless
$10 and $20 donations (shades of "It's A Wonderful Life").
This writer suggests that, in this day and age, 200+ years after
the fact, certain scenarios play better in the movies!
You turn the radio dial to some local
yokel talk show (usually with a host from the neo conservative
perspective) and when the subject moves to forthcoming local
or state elections, the talk centers on "how much is so
and so raising --can so and so raise enough money to be heard?"
What happened to the issues?!
Now, you can move that dial on your boob
tube for all eternity --you'll never ever see debate on probably
the single most important issue facing this nation: should we
eliminate the influence of money in electoral politics? Think
about it for a minute, as you view your current financial portfolio
(if you're lucky enough to even afford one). Don't you realize
that the financial losses many of us are currently experiencing
are directly connected to money influencing elections? What if
the fat cats, the elites, couldn't spend one thin dime on any
political candidate? Do you think just maybe that we could get
people in office, in power, who owed nothing to anybody --except
the voters? Perhaps then politicians could vote simply on conscience?
Then, as Twain stated "the purpose of government to protect
us from the crooks and scoundrels" would finally start to
kick in. The Enron gang and all the rest of the "private
interests" would not be invited to secret government energy
policy meetings (would the hen house owner invite the fox to
discuss hen house security?). Perhaps these politicians would
become 'lawmakers" as opposed to "political peacemakers".
Alas, our founders lied to us. They simply
did not trust "the rabble" so they lied to us. Called
this a democratic Republic and it really was not. It was 5% of
the populace deciding what the other 95% had to do. FDR, some
150+ years later, saw the proverbial "handwriting on the
wall". He made bold and innovative moves because the only
alternative was an "insurrection of the hungry and homeless"
millions whose numbers grew each day. FDR, simply put, saved
capitalism for the capitalists. Think about it. Who profited
from the Depression? Who remained wealthy enough to go in and
buy back stocks at a fraction of their old price? Who owned the
companies that were hired by FDR's new "Big government"
to get our nation on recovery road? As a tradeoff, the elites,
the "5%", allowed FDR to push through Social Security
and labor protection bills, etc. --in lieu of riots and bloody,
bloody strikes (which occurred rather often anyway). Instead
of Marie's "Let them eat cake" these men were astute
enough to say "lets give them some bread but just enough
to get by". And they called FDR a communist, a socialist.
Without him, today we'd either all be wearing brownshirts or
red armbands.
Yet, what if, during those terrible economic
times (for the 95%, mind you), what if we already had taken money
totally out of politics? I dare say, in that scenario a) we would
never have had a depression anywhere near that scale b) if things
did get rough, we could have passed enough new laws so that no
person would ever be able to control that much wealth, and no
person would ever have to work so hard for so little. Communism?
No. Socialism? A bit here and there, but not really enough to
threaten true capitalist ideals. Rather, a free enterprise system
that would yield to community control over energy, health care,
transportation, security. That's what eliminating money from
electoral politics could would and should accomplish. And that's
why those who "pull the strings" will do their upmost
to a) keep the public ignorant and b) keep their bought and paid
for people in office to never let it occur.
The time for big lies and little lies
must end. We all must think and act so ever diligently, following
that wise man's adage: "The truth shall set you free!"
And it will.
Philip Farruggio,
son of a longshoreman, is "Blue Collar Brooklyn" born,
raised and educated (Brooklyn College, Class of '74). A former
progressive talk show host, Philip runs a mfg. rep. business
and writes for many publications. He lives in Port Orange, FL.
You can contact Mr. Farruggio at e-mail: brooklynphilly@aol.com.
Today's Features
Walt Brasch
Ashcroft's War on Bookstores
Norman Madarasz
Paul
Krugman's Howl:
Populism, War and
the Melting Economy
Gavin Keeney
Van Morrison: In September
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