thoughtstreaming

A negro in charge of a socialist America. Rush is about to explode and things are coincidentally getting nasty in my own, rural neighborhood. Obama signs are being torn down and replaced with "nigger lover!!" signs. Both presidential candidates are trying to rally The People by saying American workers will rescue us by WORKING HARDER! Part of our great exceptionalism, you see, is our ability to produce more for less! Yes, boss, we'll shoulder the burden PROUDLY. Fuck that, what the workers of the world ought to do is GO FISHING! Let the beast consume itself while we have pot-lucks and play frisbee for a few weeks, sweep away the ashes and fumes of sulpher and then go back to work for ourselves. The passing of the market economy "can become the beginning of an era of unprecedented freedom." Karl Polanyi

I found that quote over at leninology.blogspot.com , where Seymour presents as concise an analysis as Ive seen on the contradictions of free market ideology. He also explains beautifully Marx's "ideology criticism"and ends with this gem. "Free market ideologues "spent a great percentage of their adult lives believing that the alternative to perpetual liberalization of the markets was the restoration of serfdom. Capital and it's managers were always more pragmatic: their aim was to hegemonize the state ,to make it a powerful instrument of their interests, not to diminish it." Adorno said something like : The slaves accept ruling class ideology more than the rulers! An argument for Graemes anti-statism?

We saw a powerful presentation Tues. night by a group out to abolish the death penalty. Montana had such a bill fail last session by one vote. There were family members of murder victims as well as speakers who had been on death row for crimes for which they had been framed and finally exonerated. Heart wrenching testimony took me back to the Darryl Hunt trial and meeting a man who had spent 17 years fighting for his innocence. Retribution is another barbaric practice that must be stopped.

Finally, Stephen Zunes from Foreign Policy in Focus (see link on blogroll) is a scholar who pays attention and to whom I pay attention. Check out his story : "Aminatour Haidar, a nonviolent activist from Western Sahara and a key leader in the nations struggle against the 33 year old- US backed- occupation of her country, with this years Robert F Kennedy Human Rights Award." The situation in Morrocco is rarely covered and it took courage to give the award.

As I chortle at the CNN ticker showing the steadyDOW collapse (9250! this morning) and world markets in turmoil, my wife turns to me and reminds me that our investments are being wiped out, our children can lose their jobs and futures, my mother could end up living with us, and on and on, the REALITY of an economic depression. She has that wise womans sense. I am aware of these terrible consequences and still I celebrate because this is a moment of possibility for justice unlike any I've experienced in my lifetime. I'm not naive. It could turn to naught.But I think there is a chance this collapse will provoke a shift, a rupture, will do more than simply result in politics as usual, in empty rhetoric about change or sacrifice, or in a meaningless " progressive adjustment" of the current barbaric system. Therefore, the question becomes: Who will this mobilize?

When the smoke clears and the dust settles what sorts of questions will be asked? Will young people buy into the same fantasies and be re- sucked into the Spectacle or will this "crisis" provoke a deep examination of accepted beliefs, dogma and ideology? I remember a moment when all the lies I was being told about US involvement in Vietnam were exposed to me and my reality was upended, forcing a reappraisal of my own responsibility and allegiance. Awakening happens.

In moments like this I unfailingly turn to Rush Limbaugh for a guide through the idiocracy because much can be learned from the fear of reactionaries. Today he is in full panic mode. He senses (perhaps sub-consciously) the edifice crumbling, and intuits that soon the curtain will lift to expose his pathetic form lying prostrate before his own hollow idols, money and power. He is breaking out every possible weapon like a street fighter backed into a corner, race baiting , "class war", anti-intellectualism, misogyny, and zenophobia. He can't decide who to spew more venom on , Obama or McCain. He is forced back to his sixties nightmare and lashes out at commies and hippies and braless women, he defends wealth and privilege and every melting pillar of movement conservatism. It's all the fault of ACORN, of Bill Ayers, of Hillary and Nancy! of Brown People and Bleeding Hearts!

Russia has "suspended" trading on it's stock market. Iceland is in meltdown. Britian is nationalizing it's banks. Sonia is still drooling over Sarah Palin.

I finished my twenty second season as a trout fishing guide yesterday. I packed up my cabin and said goodbye to my comrades and the river I love and drove home through country so beautiful it made me want to cry. We saw a herd of elk, including a nice six point bull, down in the river bottom (fairly unusual), as well as deer and antelope , ospreys and eagles. The reflection of golds and rusts on the water was breathtaking. We even caught some nice fish. It's dirty and it's smelly and it really don't pay, but I'll be a trout guide till the end of my days.

Now I'll do some fishing on my own, for my own pleasure rather than money. Trout on the Bitterroot and Clark Fork, steelhead on the Salmon and Clearwater Rivers. I'll keep working on my new garden spot and take a course on ZNet called writing political literature. I'll keep working on my book and this blog. Maybe I'll make it to Bolivia.

As the DOW loses another 200 points ( 9760 at 10:50) they are ritually piloring the Evil, Corrupt and Greedy CEOs of Lehman, AIG, etc in front of Congress. They are trying to get at the TRUTH! The ECG CEOs appear heartbroken and shocked and appropriately humbled. Henry Waxman is looking for "mismanagement". The American people keep drinking the kool-aid because to face REALITY is far, far to painful. We can Win The Wars with Honor, we can become "Energy Independent" by burning Clean Coal and Drill Baby Drill and investing in New Technologies! The American People are Exceptional, the Hardest Working, Beacon on the Hill ETC ETC..ad nauseum.

"The individual, though condemned to the passive acceptance of an alien everyday reality, is thus driven into a form of madness in which, by resorting to magical devices, he entertains the illusion that he is reacting to his fate. The recognition and consumption of commodities are at the core of this psuedo-response to a communication to which no response is possible."

Guy Dedord from Society of the Spectacle

We must end the commodification of life, interrupt the "passive acceptance" and concieve a response. Soon.

Ten months ago I predicted the DOW would hit ten thousand. Today I am right. How do I do it? I don't know! Lucky , brilliant, hard working American fishing guide. Now I will predict Bird Flu hits Asia in next twenty years!

From Pablo Nerudas poem El Pueblo:

Yo creo que en el trono debe estar

este hombre, bien calzado y coronado

Creo que los que hicieron tantas cosas

deben ser duenos de las cosas

Y los que hacen el pan deben comer!

Y deben tener luz los de la mina!

I believe that heaven must encompass

this man, properly shod and crowned

I think that those who made so many things

ought to be owners of everything

That those who made bread ought to eat

That those in the mine should have light

Soon it seems the citizens of the US will be owners of shares in home mortgages. 700 billion worth. (worth?) Perhaps they will begin to desire a democracy so they can have a say in how their shares are managed. If this takes root they may demand "shares" in many more aspects of the productive economy, including nationalized banks , power companies, factories and distibution networks. They may see how they,the workers, have been played for fools by the ruling elite who always convinced them that only THEY should own and manage, THEY should do the investing, THEY would allow wealth to trickle down.

Some are seeing the crisis as an opportunity for a social democracy to assert itself, as a step on the path to socialism. I remain skeptical of this market approach. Nerudas poem comes from a collection titled Fully Empowered. In the introduction, Alastair Reid writes:
"The word pueblo invokes in Spanish much more than either a place or the people who inhabitit: it humanizes a place as a state of being,as a set of values and allegiances."

This begs the question as to whether Americans could consider themselves "el pueblo".This unity unravels so quickly when faced with core issues and only presents itself when we are attacked. 159,000 more jobs were lost in September. Can unity arise from shared misfortune?

Conservatives in the House took a bold approach defeating the bailout and standing firmly in support of Market Principles and against creeping socialism. Conservative talk show hosts riled conservatives up to call their conservative representatives in Congress and demand "No Bailout!" Until it hit their pocketbook, upon which they acted like true conservatives and said the hell with principles!

"I started hearing from a lot of people who lost money on their investments thanks to the big drop on Wall Street yesterday" said Rep. Steven C La Tourette, Republican of Ohio, who voted against the plan. The switchboards are lighting up with calls from Really Stupid People who had a very sudden change of heart. This is hypocricy "so absolute that it becomes a kind of sincerity."

As credit continues to tighten Beakerkin acknowledges that derivitives are very complex financial instruments but I don't think this addressed the real problem. Over-accumulation and the decreasing rate of profit continues to be the underlying crisis facing capitalism and financialization is but a symptom of a much broader malaise. This is not a "bump" or "mere correction".

Was Pres. Bush terrified, bored, drugged, what? Is he standing up for "Core Conservative Principles?" ( Thats a joke, ha ha) Is this a "step down the path to socialism"? (quote from House Republican) ( not a joke) Rush Limbaugh wants the free market to prevail and is willing to let the "sucker go down". I'm certainly willing.
Mr. Fishman ( I like the name, he is Washington Mutuals chief EXECUTIVE) "who has been on the job less than three weeks is eligible for $11.6 million in cash severance and will get to keep his $7.5 million signing bonus", is also willing because he can now ride it out in the Caymans.

the "total value of the worlds stocks and bonds is 100 trillion dollars. The derivitives market is somewhere around 500 trillion." Except their value is ephemeral, a mirage, and depends on emotions such as optimism and pessimism. Be very afraid. Our economy is still growing. What to believe?

"The forger of history does not work in a vacuum: the scope he can give himself and the insolence he can afford depend on how large and heavy is the oblivion which time, indifference and previous falsification have already cast on men and events." Issac Duetcher

A great intellectual/activist who struggled to resist that "oblivion" was Eqbal Ahmad who passed in 1999. I just finished Confronting Empire which is the transcription of a series of interviews he gave and am amazed at his grasp of the history of all the worlds great civilizations. He also studied the politics of memory and we sorely miss his insight today as the NY Times reports that "Pakistani troops fire at US helicopters." It is a burlesque , blundering , beligerence dragging us through the empires periphery and the show is coming to a bloody, tragic end.

Vice Presidential wanna be Palin told Katie Couric that to her it was "clear who are the good guys and who are the bad guys." I'm guessing she had not read Eqbal Ahmed. She also said we would not "second guess" Israels actions! " Hard-core right-wing settlers have responded to limited army operations in recent weeks by blocking roads, rioting spontaneously, throwing stones at Palestinians vehicles and burning Palestinian orchards and fields all over the West Bank." NY Times Like Bolivian Right Wing, they worship at the temple of violence and racial superiority. Palin has read the Bible and westerns.