home / subscribe / donate / tower / books / archives / search / links / feedback / events / faq
|
Why Hillary Clinton Has Always Been a Republican In the first of a series of profiles, Alexander Cockburn and Jeffrey St. Clair chart the formative years of Hillary Clinton. Watch her as she zigzags from Nixon campaigner and vote-fraud investigator in 1960 to Goldwater Girl and President of Young Republicans at Wellesley to her internship for Gerald Ford and campaigner for Nelson Rockefeller. Witness her reaction to the student protests at Yale and the demonstrations at Grant Park during the Democratic Convention in 1968. Learn how she and Bill vowed to "remake" the Democratic Party--using the Nixon model HRC learned about as a member of the House impeachment staff. And much more! Plus: David Price on anthropologist Andre Gunder Frank, the FBI and the Bureaucratic Exile of a Critical Mind.
|
|
Today's Stories July 16, 2007 Ellen
Cantarow Allan
J. Lichtman July 14 / 15. 2007 Alexander
Cockburn Andy
Worthington Ralph
Nader Robert
Fantina Ron
Jacobs Joshua
Frank Conn
Hallinan Dr.
Susan Rosenthal, MD John
Ross Fred
Gardner Rannie
Amiri Charles
Modiano Anthony
DiMaggio China
Hand Missy
Comley Beattie Dr.
James J. Murtagh, Jr. Kenneth
Rexroth Poets'
Basement Website
of the Weekend
July 13, 2007 Patrick
Cockburn Winslow
T. Wheeler Imran
Khan Todd
Chretien Sam
Husseini Dr.
Herman Mindshaftgap Anthony
Papa D.
K. Wilson David
Michael Green Website
of the Day
July 12, 2007 Paul
Craig Roberts Robert Jensen Dr. Susan Block Joshua Frank John Chuckman Corporate Crime
Reporter Mike Whitney Nicola Nasser Richard Rhames William S.
Lind Website of the Day
July 11, 2007 Patrick
Cockburn Richard
Neville Debra
McNutt John
V. Walsh Scott
Liebertz George
C. Wilson James
McEnteer Philip
Rizk Johnny
Hazard Dave
Lindorff Website
of the Day
July 10, 2007 James
Ridgeway Tariq
Ali Javed
Hussein William
Blum Ralph
Nader Jay
Arena Anthony
DiMaggio Eva
Liddell Jerry
Kroth Alice
Woodward Nikolas
Kozloff Paul
Shannon Website
of the Day
July 9, 2007 Fidel
Castro Diana
Johnstone John
Walsh Uri
Avnery Ramzy
Baroud John
Ripton Stephen
Lendman Bruce
Jackson Michael
Donnelly Doug
Giebel Website
of the Day
Saul
Landau Ismael
Hossein-zadeh Fawzia
Afzal-Khan John
Ross Pat
Williams Rannie
Amiri Farzana
Versey Bart
Gruzalski Paul
Rockwell Reza
Fiyouzat Monica
Benderman Kenneth
Couesbouc Dave
Lindorff Charles
Modiano Missy
Beattie Dal
LaMagna Jean
Gerard Anne
Dachel Ron
Jacobs Poets'
Basement Website
of the Day
Daniel
Ellsberg Gary
Leupp Harvey
Wasserman Omer
Subhani Marjorie
Cohn Christopher
Brauchli David
Michael Green China
Hand Renee
Saucedo Corporate
Crime Reporter Website
of the Day
July 5, 2007 Andy
Worthington Mike
Stark Norman
Solomon Michael
Schwartz Susie
Day Jacob
Hornberger Bill
Hatch Don
Fitz John
Wright Website
of the Day
July 4, 2007 St.
Clair / Frank Vijay
Prashad Carl
G. Estabrook Ron
Jacobs David
R. Dow Claudia
Johnson William
S. Lind Gregory
Afghani Paul
Edwards D.
K. Wilson Niranjan
Ramakrishnan Thomas
Jefferson Cindy
Sheehan Website
of the Day
Bill
Quigley Gary
Leupp Lynda
Brayer Richard
Thieme Helen
Redmond David
Swanson Jacob
Hornberger Ayesha
Ijaz Khan Franklin
Lamb Ray
McGovern Kevin
Zeese Dave
Lindorff Website
of the Day
Andy
Worthington Nina
Serrano Jack
Hirschman Paul
Craig Roberts Bill
Williams Anthony
Papa Sonja
Karkar Louay
Safi Anthony
Gregory Monica
Benderman Website
of the Day
June 30 / July 1, 2007 John
Ross Alan
Farago Peter
Quinn Christopher
Brauchli Robert
Fisk Uri
Avnery Judith
Siers-Poisson Saul
Landau Abbas
Zaidi Ron
Jacobs Ralph
Nader Donald
Worster Mike
Whitney Jacob
Hill Kenneth
Couesbouc Missy
Beattie Mohammad
Kamaali Ramzy
Baroud Leonard
Peltier Phyllis
Pollack Poets'
Basement Website
of the Weekend
June 29, 2007 St.
Clair / Frank Brian
Cloughley Patrick
Cockburn Gilad
Atzmon Dave
Lindorff Jennifer
Matsui / Kevin
Zeese Daniel
Klimek David
Michael Green John
Chuckman Website
of the Day
June 28, 2007 Bill
Quigley Vijay
Prashad Margaret
Kimberley Winslow
T. Wheeler Philip
Rizk D.
K. Wilson Bill
Williams Mahmoud
El-Yousseph Richard
Rhames Paul
Krassner Website
of the Day
Marjorie
Cohn Dr.
Susan Rosenthal, MD Alan
Farago Carla
Blank Matthew
Abraham Sunsara
Taylor Russell
D. Hoffman Robert
Weissman Sen.
Russ Feingold Paul
Buchheit Website
of the Day
June 26, 2007 Jonathan
Cook Ralph
Nader Corporate
Crime Reporter Ron
Jacobs Martha
Rosenberg John
Chuckman Denny
Haldeman Anthony
DiMaggio Stephen
Fleischman William
S. Lind Website
of the Day
Paul
Craig Roberts Jennifer
Loewenstein Bob
Anderson Robert
Pollin Patrick
Cockburn Eva
Liddell Dan
Bacher Larry
Atkins Mark
Brenner James
Rothenberg Website
of the Day June 23 / 24, 2007 Alexander
Cockburn Jeff
Taylor Oren
Ben-Dor Gary
Leupp Robert
Fisk David
Rosen Russell
Mokhiber Alison
Weir Robert
Fantina D.
K. Wilson Nicole
Colson Stephen
Soldz, Steven Reisner and Brad Olson Dave
Lindorff Benjamin
Dangl Michael
Dickinson Poets'
Basement Website
of the Weekend
June 22, 2007 Andy
Worthington Sherwood
Ross Eliana
Monteforte Robert
Weissman Richard
Rhames Christopher
Brauchli Ramzy
Baroud Ehud
Krinis, David Shulman and Neve Gordon David
Michael Green Kathryn
Webber Website
of the Day
June 21, 2007 Peter
Linebaugh Natsu
Saito Ron
Jacobs Saree
Makdisi John
Stauber Scott
Liebertz Tom
Clifford Robert
Jensen Michael
J. Smith Jeb
Sprague Website
of the Day
Omar
Barghouti Andy
Worthington Margaret
Kimberley Robert
Weissman Russell
D. Hoffman Rannie
Amiri Stephen
Lendman Dave
Lindorff David
Swanson Anne
Dachel Website
of the Day
June 19, 2007 Ralph
Nader Dr.
Shepherd Bliss Bill
and Kathleen Christison Jeff
Leys Dave
Zirin Chris
Floyd Ben
Terrall Anthony
Papa VIPS Linda Flores Website
of the Day
John
Ross Paul
Craig Roberts Martha
Rosenberg Norman
Solomon Don
Santina Isabella
Kenfield James
Brooks Eva
Liddell Sam
Husseini Akiva
Eldar Website
of the Day
Alexander
Cockburn John
Halle Robert
Fisk Andy
Worthington Uri
Avnery Fred
Gardner Saul
Landau P.
Sainath Missy
Comley Beattie Alan
Gregory Walter
Brasch Website
of the Weekend
June 15, 2007 Alan
Farago Andy
Worthington Michael
Simmons Franklin
Lamb Gary
Leupp John
Ross Website
of the Day
June 14, 2007 Michael
Donnelly
Faisal
Kutty Harry
Browne Charles
Jonkel Steven
Higgs Bruce
Dixon Bruce
K. Gagnon
Website
of the Day June 13, 2007 Glen Ford Marjorie Cohn Bill Christison Charles Jonkel Silvia Cattori Richard Gott Firmin DeBrabander William S. Lind Keith Rosenthal Website of the Day June 12, 2007 Jeffrey St.
Clair Paul Craig
Roberts P. Sainath Ralph Nader Omar Waraich Dave Lindorff Harvey Wasserman Malini Johar
Schueller Ramzy Baroud Website of
the Day
June 11, 2007 Patrick Cockburn Paul Craig
Roberts Uri Avnery Norman Solomon Eva Liddell Rannie Amiri Rachel Voss Christopher
Brauchli D. K. Wilson Website of
the Day
![]()
![]()
Subscribe Online
|
July 16, 2007 White OwnershipProperty is RacismBy MANUEL GARCIA, Jr.
The operation of capitalism over the last five hundred years has yielded the result that the greatest share of the world's wealth, and the firmest grip on the control levers of the world's economy and politics, are held by the white race. Any group photograph of the leaders of the G8 nations will give you a clear idea of the current ethnometrics of the bounty of the Garden of Eden. The domestic scene in the United States reflects the global situation: whites own and control, non-whites scramble for work and life's necessities. We are speaking here in generalities, not absolutes (social absolutes are rationally impossible). To see the racial-tribal pith of capitalism we only have to list the many names it has taken over time: the exploration for trade routes in the 15th century led to the North and South American "conquests" during the 16th century (the destruction of Native American civilizations), the "mercantilism" of the 17th century (e.g., the Dutch East India Company, the African slave trade), the "colonialism" of the 18th century (e.g., the British Empire), and the "imperialism" of the 19th and early 20th centuries (e.g., the Opium War and Chinese concessions, the annexation of Hawaii, the Spanish-American and Philippine Wars). When the "eminence grise" of the United States, Dick Cheney, speaks about a "clash of civilizations" he is using white tribal language for the war against Islam, which is today's primary impediment to the ambition for global control by white tribal leaders. It is the mania for control, rather then merely religious bigotry or fanatical avarice, that fuels the drive for white supremacy. The Iraq War of 2003 to the present is just the latest incident in a millennium-long drive for white tribal control that probably started with the European Christian Crusades and the Spanish war against Islam from about the 11th century. In national and world societies where wealth -- property -- is racially and ethnically concentrated, the defense of property is the defense of racial preference in favor of the dominant tribe; and the primacy of property (e.g., corporations, "capital") over individuals, in the administration of government, laws and "justice", is the protection of white supremacy. Recent decisions by the US Supreme Court under Chief Justice Roberts have unambiguously reaffirmed the basic principles of the United States as a white supremacy state. The Roberts court ruled that universities cannot use race in making preferential decisions for admission, and in another case that child-care workers do not have the right to organize unions and thus seek benefits and claim "property rights" in their jobs; rights such as overtime pay (and presumably rights of due process and to grievance proceedings before neutral arbitrators), long recognized for many other types of laborers. The court decisions are startlingly clear: any impediment to white ambition is illegal. This devolved from an argument about educational opportunities, but it seems improbable not to be taken in general. Such illegal impediments include any "redistributive" or guilt-induced "social leveling" legislation and administrative procedures devised in the 20th century as a result of the Civil Rights struggles. "Affirmative action", racial preferences for non-white university students to compensate for historical (inter-tribal) injustices, is an impediment to the ambitions of the type of people who can now afford to get into and through college, and so must be dropped. Those who can't afford to locate themselves in well-funded school districts for their primary and secondary education shouldn't suddenly expect a "helping hand" when it comes time for college. "Stay in your place," how much clearer can the message get? This brings to mind Anatole France (1894), "The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets and to steal bread." Remember that: "majestic equality." Families in all income classes need child-care. At the top, this may take the form of nannies, tutors and selective (expensive) group facilities. For lower income classes, child-care is provided by a mix of public and private group facilities (licensed or not, with more children per attendant adult as costs decrease), and a haphazard network of babysitting for fees, or labor exchange. Child care workers are primarily women, and in many cases they are also non-white (racially and/or ethnically). In the United States, people of wealth can claim an impressive tax deduction for child-care expenses by means of a "dependent care account". One pays (by payroll deduction) into an tax-sheltered account held by a third party (like an insurance company), and you subsequently make claims against this account for your expenses with licensed child-care providers. Naturally, there is a great deal of paperwork that accompanies the circuitous movement (dare I say laundering?) of your child-care dollars, but it is all worth it in the end because the income you report for tax purposes has been reduced to noticeable effect. This is by far the most lucrative child-care break available through the US Tax Code. Dependent care accounts are a benefit offered by some employers to their "permanent" employees. People of modest means can also claim one or more of the direct child-care deductions and credit offered by the US Tax Code. However, the circumstances allowing this are that modest incomes (a "low" upper limit for eligibility is set by the tax code) have had to support relatively large child-care expenses. For people in such circumstances, it is usually a much better idea to preserve the family's cash by relying on relatives to baby-sit, or to engage neighborhood (officially "black market" if not licensed) babysitting providers, and participate in labor exchanges (barter). This is the real child-care system of many inner city neighborhoods. Imagine the expansion of the "dependent care" system to all incomes levels, a national child-care benefit, call it "single-payer child-care." That is what the Roberts court is firmly set to prevent. If child-care workers are recognized as a "unit" or "type" in the labor market with unionization rights, then the likely explosion of child-care labor costs (to boost child-care worker pay to living-wage standards, pay for health and pension benefits, and also fund overtime and vacation pay, as well as paid sick leave -- and maternity leave) would directly raise the price of child-care. Because of the broad need for child-care, a radical increase in costs would immediately result in popular political pressure for relief. Tax relief on such a scale -- and over all income levels -- would necessarily cut into the "lion's share" (from Aesop's fable) of government subsidy enjoyed by the military, the "corporate sector", and the fat cats lapping up Bush's "tax cut". The Roberts court knows who it serves and it remains true to this principle: property is superior to people. The unionization of child-care workers would be a vast expansion of unionization in the fastest growing sector of the labor market, the "service sector", which can be thought of as the post Civil War replacement of slavery. It would simply not do for "property" to have to contend with increased labor costs for domestic services. The decrease of tax revenues for military projects, and the slackening of corporate dividend yields due to the funding of didy-changing for the children of the nation's workforce by unionized nannies is just too much to seriously contemplate. An ancillary problem with the unionization of child-care workers (and the subsequent nationalization of child-care expenses) is that it would boost the economics of a large segment of the non-white population: besides elevating the situation of child-care workers, the parents using these services would be freed of child-care worries and thus able to compete for higher-level jobs (more time away from home), and many "minority" child-care "businesses" would see greater profitability. The possibility of any such social leveling must be nipped in the bud, and it has been. Again, the message is clear, "stay in your place, the flattening of the class distribution is not acceptable." In the USAmerican Raj, the selection of an "affordable" nanny from Mexico, Guatemala, Belize, Jamaica, Haiti, Nigeria, Somalia, Tibet and Black America must not be imperiled by the imposition of "unionism" and all its attendant costs and legalities (e.g., workman's compensation, egads!). The supply of reliable, quiet, inexpensive and trustworthy servants must not be corrupted by thoughts of equal opportunity. The Roberts court today is just as dedicated to the cause of "property" as was the Taney court during the Buchanan administration (just prior to Lincoln's). In 1857, the Taney court determined that Dred Scott, a black slave who had made his way to a "free" (slavery illegal) state, was property, and that such a designation overrode any considerations of him as a man, a human being, even a person (which would theoretically imply he was endowed with "inalienable rights" to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness"). Then as now, the masters were not to be encumbered by the aspirations of the servants. A century and a half ago, USAmerican servants were often slaves and thus property to be used at the discretion of their masters, the "owners". Today, USAmerican servants are technically free and officially human beings, even persons, but they are tribally inferior, and an expense property-owners seek to minimize. So, our slavery is "outsourced" to a domestic "service sector", which must be kept in check as the Roberts court well knows; and "off-shored" to globalization sweatshops. The most pressing "servant problem" facing the white supremacy states today is the difficulty of disembodying foreign labor prior to its importation and consumption, this is called "immigration." Here in the U.S., the problem is generally seen as: how do you bring in Mexican labor while excluding Mexican laborers? The object is to supply low-cost labor to profitable (and subsidized) corporate agriculture (and for other jobs of hard labor), without diluting the white population fraction and weakening its cultural control. We want to import the work of millions, and yet deport the human costs and needs on which the generation of that labor energy depends. We want slaves, and that wanting "we" is the racist core of our white supremacy economic states. "Man is born free, and everywhere he is in chains." -- Jean Jacques Rousseau (1762) But, I remember about the Bastille. Manuel Garcia, Jr. is a recently retired physicist from a US Department of Energy laboratory. He is presently on holiday, and his technical interests involve fluids, electricity, heat flow and energy. His non-technical interests are varied, one being the social responsibility of scientists, another being the social dimensions of choices for the energy technologies that power a community. He can be reached at mango@idiom.com.
![]()
|
CounterPunch Books of the Crossroads: HOW THE IRISH INVENTED SLANG By Daniel Cassidy ![]() Click Here to Buy! How the Press Failed The Gang's All Here: Judy Miller, Bob Woodward, Rupert Murdoch, Bill O'Reilly...End Times Leaves No Reputation Unstained! ![]() Buy End Times Now! CounterPunch Books! Saul Landau's Bush and Botox World with a Foreword by Gore Vidal ![]() Click Here to Order! ![]() Michael Neumann's Devastating Rebuttal of Alan Dershowitz Grand Theft Pentagon: Tales of Greed and Profiteering in the War on Terror by Jeffrey St. Clair ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() The Occupation by Patrick Cockburn ![]() ![]() Humanitarian Imperialism By Jean Bricmont ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() CITY BEAUTIFUL By Tennessee Reed ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() Bruce Springsteen On Tour By Dave Marsh ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() |