Civil War--Kanye, Freakonomics and the Rise of Fascism

(Blog written and submitted for publishing 03/31/2015)

Driving along Interstate-20 in the deep-south, one of my much favored songs by Guns and Roses--Civil War--piqued my attention given the current state of our American transition. I have been considering a question my history students used to ask: How did people allow fascism to come to power?

SETTING THE STAGE OF ACCEPTANCE

Kanye West
(photo: www.projectcasting.com)

To the backdrop of all the other political noise and just days before intently listening to the lyrics of this song, I heard a BBC interview on Kanye West's enlightening speech at Oxford University. It was pleasant to hear something positive about him. Given the continued demeaning of his character from media personalities throughout our nation, I had not realized that it had been six years since his enigmatic actions at the MTV Video Music Awards: Kanye abruptly burst onto stage and stole the limelight of the upcoming young vocalist Taylor Swift at the 2009 VMA. The world was aghast. I was aghast! We all wondered 'why'? Though I eventually understood his reasoning, it was highly misplaced and not at all kosher. So, as international equity and Middle East politics are passions of mine, I found it quite interesting that Kanye eventually shared the same fate as former Arch Bishop Makarios of Cyprus. Like Makarios, Kanye, was banished from his country, albeit only a year. Nevertheless, after Kayne's tail-tucked dismissal and return, he is still bad-mouthed nationwide and globally and ridiculed as not being so smart (as though rudeness is a measure of intelligence--which brings me to the re-elected Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu. Maybe we should ask him to answer questions of whether unharnessed egotism is a sign of intelligence).

Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu
(photo: nbcnews.com)

It is terribly perplexing how the actions of a singer affronting another singer--both whom are entertainers--garners more disdain than the current slow-boiling coup d'etat of President Obama, his appointees and his cabinet members by those who so boldly invited Mr. Netanyahu to override our President. He and his appointed officials go through the unrelenting use of tax-payer dollars on Congressional hearings, private-sector media conjectures that are dressed in daily acts of verbal stone-throwing, and the organized rallying of national and foreign officials to obstruct his facilitator-style of leadership. Yet, their rudeness seems to be overwhelmingly admired. Right-wing rudeness is the new black. As long as the president fails to choose raw aggression as a means of policy-making, this intentional insolence seems to be the desired art-of-behavior in the world of politics. The media is fawning over well-educated new comers to the table of disrespect. Yet, while Kayne's proposed appearance at the upcoming Glastonbury Music Festival is reveling major protest, gaining signatures of opposition in the hundred thousands, Netanyahu--whose most recent actions of snubbing our President and lying to his own people--received primetime attention and very little resistance from the mainstream public or media. The media appears to be increasing its efforts to give platform to those who are bullying their way into positions of power.

The previous week, the airwaves were abuzz with an older quote from Senator Cotton, who has suggested that all terrorists (whether proven guilty or not) rot in prison at Guantanamo. As a Harvard educated man, he was praised as intelligent and an upcoming young star. Yet, he too, was guilty of behaving like Kanye at the 2009 VMA. In drafting his letter to Iran and going over the President's head, he received little public censuring--possibly in violation of the Logan Act, but nothing near to what Kanye received. Cotton is still in America.

The same questionable sentiment towards humanity was later echoed by Netanyahu's disdainful re-election ploy over the non-acceptance of his Palestinian countrymen to operate their own nation-state. Amazingly, the same media that has limited time to praise President Obama's historical acts of diplomacy, had plenty of time to interview Netanyahu on his fears of Iranian aggression (try simply acknowledging the Palestinian right to freely exist in the country that become home to European Jews after Cyprus, Uganda and the Philippines were not accepted as an ideal home, then Iran's aggression might amazingly disappear).

Nonetheless, President Obama's actions were somehow deemed unimportant compared to the business of our $3.4 billion dollar welfare state of Israel and the $174,000 annual salary of the tax-payer funded actions of Senator Cotton. While "everybody's fightin' for their promised land," Netanyahu has somehow forgotten that a united Cyprus is still a viable alternative for a strategic Mideast partnership. A fact that has not been missed by the Russian leader Putin. Thus, it might behoove Americans, who do not support this Kanye-style disrespect or bullying, to reconsider how we spend our tax-dollars on our largest welfare recipient state--particularly since our joint clan of bullies falsely believes that their own American people, regardless of complexions, have little need for governmental assistance for something as basic as food--proposing a cut of $8.4 million for nearly 1 million of the 46 million Americans living under the poverty line. The smaller more palatable number is about $90/month from poor families' food stock--when one is poor, this is a humongous cut in self-sustainability. Such an austerity measure serves as a grand opportunity to see an increase in crime (thus, justifying the need for more crack-downs on the poor) and a decrease in the health of the lower class--but of course, lacking health is an increased opportunity for corporate insurances to capitalize on healthcare rather than needed social investments as clearly detailed in the Economic Policy Institute's report on international poverty.

Nevertheless, nationally, we still don't seem to be unnerved that we provide a continued stream of welfare to nation-states that need it less than our own American people. In a lovely fascist manner, we are supporting (worshiping) the market, the gains of corporations and nations who choose to be our lackeys. This disdain for the masses is a patterned seal of fascism. Thus, the increase in American fascism appears to come from a historical belief and resistance to the equitable distribution of goods and services as Christianity teaches--the purported religion of those wielding the flag of capitalism. But oops, this Christian belief in community sharing is also another more modern economic philosophy--the other 'c' word! Since we wouldn't want to satisfy a philosopher named Marx (which we are doing anyway given his grim forecast on the greed of capitalism), I guess as the song points out, we'll go on to "feed the rich and bury the poor," while we simultaneously invest more and more in localized institutions of zero-tolerance and terror--setting the stage for a rise in fascism.

THE ARREST HEARD 'ROUND THE WORLD':

Condoning a Public Gestapo:

(photo:boston.com)

The first highly visible sign of things to come reared its head upon Obama's acceptance to office. The warmly brilliant individual and Harvard Professor, Henry Louis Gates, Jr., who is Obama's personal friend and acquaintance, was arrested for defending himself upon trying to find a way into his own home after not having his key to open his own door. We should have taken a historic note of the significance of Gates' arrest--it was meant to be heard round the world. However, that incident, too, was logically excused. This opening arrest seemed all too familiar ...

So, as the Civil War song repeated, "...the way we've always done before..," I could not help but think it has been ten years, this April, since the awe-inspiring book, Freakonomics, hit the shelves. Authors Steven Levitt and Stephen Dubner carefully outlined the purpose of the Ku Klux Klan and their incentivized role in helping develop our country as the nation it is today.

Though, today, it is a frequent joke that the Republican Party has been usurped and has become the RepubliKlans. The Klan's intent was always to infiltrate the police force and the justice system and all ranks of law to make blacks--and anyone else who might decide to think, worship or behave differently -feel less than human. Yet, despite an age-old video upload on white-supremacists sites showing boys zealously dancing around and singing that they will kill blacks by joining the police force and despite the talented and sagacious work of the group Anonymous that revealed that various members of the Ferguson Police Force were members of the Klan, we and the world still react with horrifying shock at the totalitarian-like treatment that is wielded on American citizens of brown to black skin tones. Do we not get it? As dark-haired and brown-toned people, we need not wear the Star of David to be recipients of actions like those emphasized in well-articulated movie the Book Thief! The brutality we see today is the same old thing that has "always" been "done before" in America, before and since Emmitt Till. Yet, there are those who attempt to refocus our attention from tax-payer condoned murders to an issue stemming from squalid housing, poverty and failed education: black on black crime.

However, in the face of statistics that show a continued drop in violent crimes, the 'justified' killing and beating of poorer and darker skin-toned Americans by officers has increased. Excuses for arrests--besides Marijuana--are steadily being proposed and accepted. Arrests equal the loss of rights, political influence and economic stability. Voting rights and distant job opportunities are lost as licenses are absconded and public transportation and walking become the only means of commuting to jobs miles away from one's home. In various ways, the alarm has been sounded--in detail--by the world renowned author, Nobel and Pulitzer Prize winner Toni Morrison, professor Angela Davis, writer Chris Hedges, nascent author Johann Hari, radio personality Ira Glass, Frontline, NPR News, Democracy Now and even BookTV and NBC News.

But, according to a recent and repeated statement by former mayor of New York, Mr. Giuliani, America has 'the greatest police force in the world.' I often wonder how this statement is measured as the Gestapo, who terrorized German citizens of Jewish heritage, were also categorized as a superior group of officers. On one hand, I think I speak for many of us, we are not denying that we favor those officers who are actually 'great': fair and just. We can all appreciate having public officers whom we can rely upon to provide us safety and protection when needed. That is why it would be nice to hear the former mayor and others say, instead: 'We will not tolerate the use of unwarranted and racial brutality in this nation as these actions tarnish what is 'the greatest police force in the world.' Instead, Americans are regularly directed to focus on black-on-black crime statistics, while lethal force is excused for a surplus of 'logical' reasons by closed-minded intelligence. Excusing brutality among the ranks is tantamount to excusing the pedophiles within the Catholic Church, slapping them on their wrists and simply responding to the public by saying, 'There are great priests within the Catholic Church, which is the greatest church in the world and parents should be more concerned about the rampant sexual predators that exist amongst family members!'

So, when those who are 'sworn' to protect our American children, instead find rational excuses to kill them; and when our assumed protectors can target citizens who might contribute less to their salaries, they cease to be a force for the people. They are against us. And by use of tax-dollars, their unified thug-like behavior becomes a socialist institution capable of inflicting terror with the protection of the law--creating, in effect, a police state approved and supported by prosecutors and judges. No community wants a force whose murderous actions can be "washed away" by their commitment to "genocide"--even if it is as insidious as slowly boiling frog. (Update: 04/29/15 - Data on police killings: Baltimore)

"Think Different": Us and Them or rather, simply, 'Americans'

As long as people of color voluntarily self-segregate and accept the daily media terms that distinguish them in the minds of others and teach new generations to follow-suit by the unconscious osmosis of racial distinction, then, like the segregated European citizens of pre-WWII--called Jews--the people the media labels 'thugs', will continue to be killed by police offers without the slightest fear of legal retaliation (many of these victims have been filmed on video after video as not even fighting back). There is something highly wrong with a system that will imprison a man for smacking his attorney on the rear, but free men of the law who fanatically murder an innocent child
(Warning: graphically sad video of child's death).


Furthermore, in a country that holds itself as the model for liberty and justice for all, we have ironically become numb to the news stating "the suspect was shot dead." Whatever happened to the 'suspect' having a trial by a jury of his peers and being a 'suspect' until 'proven guilty'? We have accepted that our country may operate as China does--which reserves the right to execute its own citizens--but even China's capital punishment is apparently more fair than that which we are seeing on our streets in America! Despite the fact that we are documenting and witnessing clear signs that don the "armband" of fascism and a revival of terrifying community 'night-rides' that result in the hanging (now shooting and choke-holding) of 'strange fruits,' "all these" things "are swept aside" in favor of praise for intelligence and overall stellar performance--Netanyahu and Cotton may flatter us, but would we be so quick to sweep their model of rudeness aside if it came from the likes of Kanye West?

A final sidebar, interestingly enough, the leadership of the Third Reich believed, if they could get the population duped to watched intellectually-void content on the newest technological creation, the TV, they could take over the world while their citizens became numb-skulls lost in the world of 'programmed' entertainment. Too bad the Radio Corporation of America (RCA) beat them to the punch line!

ACTION PLAN

(photo: freakonomics.com)

As a ten-year commemoration, we all might want to listen to Freakonomics again and ask ourselves, how far have we come since its publishing and are we guilty, as well, of just doing the same things that we've "done before"? Are we guilty of conveniently accusing pre-WWII German citizens of being 'good Germans,' while we goose-step towards the gold medal of being even 'better' Germans? If we have anything to learn from the past, it is that we have a democracy. France's Marie Antoinette, purportedly said, "Eat cake!" as a means of expressing her lack of concern for the plight of the country's hungry masses. Likewise, as our leaders abscond billions of our tax-payer dollars for the supposed betterment of nations around the world, they too, are showing us their disinterest in our national well-being. But, while millions of us muddle-about in the agony of poverty, unemployment, underemployment and deteriorating and drug-infested communities that are patrolled by the likes of the Gestapo, contrarily, we have an operating democracy. As Americans, we do not have to get to the point to sit like the mob of angered civilians on the other side of Marie Antoinette and wait to take physical pleasure in 'her' demise: the demise of an ever-growing fascist system. We have a democracy. Our democracy has teeth. It is called law.

If we are to learn anything from the treatment of Kanye West, it is that people are choosing to use their voices of democracy, the internet for democracy and show through a cacophonous wave of 'unity' that their opinion and feelings about a situation count. Marching, alone, is not doing it. Sit-ins, alone, are not doing it. Occupations, alone, are not doing it--"some men (and women) you just can't reach." Democracy needs a pen. Democracy needs a continuum of unity. Democracy needs precisely focused rapid actions--something the RepubliKlans already know. Our Constitution provides for amendments. I almost wish that Kanye's situation were around when I was teaching history and the rise of fascism--though I am not suggesting Kanye is a fascist, I am suggesting that the means of opposing his freedom to be rudely outspoken are ideally democratic and non-violent means of change. What are we waiting for? We do not have to have or incite civil wars--abroad or locally.

We do, however, have something to learn and things to do--beyond complaining (which is a good start). Using your pen to quell the rise of fascism--add your signatures and comments:

 • Use the 'Twitter Technique': 140 characters--many 140 character notes may be more impactful than one long essay
 • Fill out a 'contact' form on media stations and let them know your preferences; let them know that 'American' victims of brutality are 'American children,' a 'woman' and 'man' - stop the subtle psychological distinction of that happens to 'them'; stats show our country is trailing in its social support of ALL Americans
• Donate funds to local non-profit stations to keep them out of the pockets of those interested in controlling all the mindsets of the masses and creating numb-skulls via, seemingly, all media outlets
• Write to your congressional leaders online letting him know your thoughts--using the Twitter Technique!
• Violation of the Logan Act--add your digital signature
• Support for continuing to feed and shelter our nation's poorest--add your digital signature
• Join voices that support 'truth' - Codepink and others 
• Through-off the 'Party' identifiers--blinders--as 'right and wrong' exist irrespective of party-line politics.
• Partner to create a Pac-of judges, legislators and officers who actually uphold 'liberty and justice' for all. One such organization: National Police Accountability Project
• Honor 'wisdom' over 'intelligence'! Commend police departments and judges who "Do the Right Thing!(hear judge's review).

Finally, as I continue my daily hum-drum of driving along our nation's highways and thinking of all the obstruction of justice that pervades this nation, I almost wish I were an opposing congressional member. But sadly, the rest is up to you (the readers), because at this point, much like the words in Axle Rose's Civil War song from 25 years ago, besides letter writing and blogging, there isn't much more I can do as an under-employed truck-driver. "My hands are tied."

(Note: Since this writing, I have left the road temporarily and will attempt to take a more active roll in finding solutions.) 

President Obama's Minority Report

(Click on photo as video embed is no longer available)

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The initial draft of this blog was created September 4th, 2013, while global tensions were building around the Syrian crisis. NOT EVER, do I believe, that children should be included in the world’s nonsensical games of power finagling, unfortunately they always are!!! Subsequently, I don’t believe that we should let their use blind our ability to question critically what is presented to us as 'fact'. As rubric cubes have more than one side, so, too, do events of fortune and misfortune.
Side note: The above video aired on 60 minutes on September 15th, 2013. Provided for contextualization.

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The Minority Report, the Game of Risk and More Questions than Answers:

If micro-scale behaviors and solutions can be used to strategize and correlate outcomes on a macro-scale then two questions are to be asked with the Syrian events at our doorstep:

• Could there be a minority report?
• Are we suggesting that the use of conventional weaponry is an acceptable means of killing internal populations?

In our personal interactions we know that most people will not speak up if their commentary is not supported by the majority. We know that sharing a minority observation or suggestion is often detrimental to one’s own well-being despite the outcome potentially being better for the masses. This reality leaves me wondering about the current example of military support we are choosing to give the ‘moderate opposition’ forces inside Syria. They, themselves, have been noted for using chemical weapons and have been noted as a rouge group of potential bullies. So, “at the end of the day,” could it be that there is a minority report to the August 21st Syrian tragedy? In the light of a 99.9% certainty of usage, the .1% possibility might be worth assessing. In essence, does the presence of generals at the site of a major soft-target strike of chemical weapons mean that they were necessarily the ones to use the chemical weapons? In our own country we expect national official to show up and investigate major national disasters—their presence and investigation does not seal their guilt in carryout the disasters. Could there be a minority report?

If there is, then our choice to deter a sovereign government (albeit it a dictatorial dynasty) and make it accountable for potentially individual or rouge activities will not deter them from using extreme force against their internal population in the future. Nor, will it deter observing governments, particularly, since it has been stated and confirmed that the sovereign Assad government is seeking to rid its nation-state of externally funded opposing players—that would be us. Which leads us to the next question: Even if we remove the future threat of using chemical weapons, but continue to fund opposing forces in Syria does this mean that other forms of brutal force directed against the opposition faction will be ignored—ignored as long as they are using conventional weaponry?

Micro-scale situations tell us that when a determined authoritarian wants to enforce their believed ‘rights’ that they will lean towards more decisive and brutal measures unless there is a larger benefit or gain not to. On an international scale, similar internal acts of brutality (Myanmar, Nepal, Congo, Chile) all too often go uninterrupted by the international communities—simply because these acts do not entail the use of chemical weapons? Thus, are we suggesting that torture, disappearances, machetes, machine guns, burning of villages are acceptable choices of opposition control?

Well, while I agree that we have moral responsibilities to prevent the deaths of children worldwide whatever form of weapons, will ridding Syria of chemical weapons really change the mind-set or goal of the Assad regime to maintain power and to annihilate dissenting rebels within its borders? Or will it simply change the choice of violent force? In the game of Risk, one can sit for hours building his army while appearing to be of little or no threat and yet, make a decisive comeback with a different strategy and throw the leading players for a loop. Will we react then? And on a broader scale, given that Europe is known for having two sets of 100 year wars right up to the time when the remainder of their wars went off-continent, civil wars probably don’t have a great end-time in sight—kind of like the game of Risk, inexorably, they can go on forever. So, how long are we willing to back a historical opposition force and play tit for tat, while the reigning regime seeks other strategies to disable our play?

I found an interesting Quorum Feed on November 17th.