Vermont Says -- NO!

In Vermont, a Town-Meeting revolt over Iraq war

On Tuesday, one-fifth of Vermont towns will consider what role the state's National Guard should play in the war. By Sara B. Miller

http://www.csmonitor.com/2005/0228/p01s04-uspo.html?s=hns

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Those without Vermont roots -- mine are half there and half from upstate NY -- will not likely know that Vermont traditionally has been the renegade state, unwilling to get along/go along. My middle name is Allen and one of my alleged collateral roots ancestors, Ethan Allen, not only fought the battle of Ticonderoga, but also wrote one of the first American atheist tracts. Vermonters have always been proud of their practice of judging and valuing people as individuals, not as members of groups -- favored or disfavored. My Vermont childhood playmates there were descendants of native Americans, as was my oldest and dearest friend, Dan Huden, whose father, John Huden, was an expert both on native American affairs and education at UVM before he became the president of a Vermont teachers college and a sort of second father to me as well as Dan's. He early on spotted formal academic testing as a fraudulent device for favoring the well off and putting down children whose educations had been deprived of the necessities for them to compete on anything like an equal basis.

Howard Dean, as the governor of Vermont, carried on with the Vermont traditions respecting equal opportunity. I pay taxes there which are higher because Vermont reassigns property tax revenues from wealthier to poorer communities to achieve per pupil parity, and, thus, equal opportunity from the starting point of a child's education. I have high hopes that Dean will nudge the Democratic party back towards its root concerns with liberty and justice FOR ALL and away from the brutality of the Republican plutocracy in the making, which too many Democrats have been emulating as Republicans lite! We are watching the early stages of neo fascism here in Amerika -- and abroad where we would impose the worst aspects of American 'ownership' on developing nations. This is nothing new by the way, as we have been been supporting corrupt regimes out there in the interests of our corporations 'owning' the resources of others for more than a century -- United Fruit to our oil companies funding juntas here, there and elsewhere and sanctioning the murders of human rights and democratic activists (e.g. in Nigeria) who got in way of our grabbing their national resources -- now Iraq and next Iran?

Incidentally, as one trained in political as well as legal philosophy, I am increasingly appalled by the brutality of the neocons who are more than willing to send the children of THEM off to do their dirty work. Their neo-Hobbist-via-Leo-Strauss mentality is extremely dangerous:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leo_Strauss

http://home.earthlink.net/~karljahn/Strauss.htm

The frontispiece of the original text of the Leviathan portrayed a prince whose armor on close inspection was made up of leaves of mail portraying little soldiers presumably to be sacrificed while protecting their Sovereign -- who in the Hobbesian version would "pretermit" them only those liberties that he deemed suitable -- for sheep -- eating and providing for their shepherd whatever he deigned to be in his sovereign interest. Hobbes despised the pending doctrines of natural rights of his times and pretended no sense of any equal worth of persons as commanded by their shepherd peace-keeper. Sound familiar? We are watching the evolution in the U.S. of a class/caste system that condemns the poor to underpaid labor (WalMarted, if not Enroned) and to early deaths (Bush's proposed sabotage of Medicaid, Medicare, and Social Security) so as to benefit our massively wealthy CEOs and stock holders with lowered taxes? Corporate America has no more to do with democracy than did Nazi Germany's I.G. Farben!

http://webletter.net/cybrary/Facts.aft.perp.igpact.html

The neocon ideology dominating Bush, Inc. is purely self-interested well paid elitism run amuck with contemptuous word tampering comparable to that pioneered by Joseph Goebbels and regurgitated upon the public by our Murdocked media: http://www.alternet.org/story/18242

We are going to democratize our disfavored regimes of this world? So was Hitler -- he called his program national socialism. "Shock and Awe" has a hauntingly similar ring to "Blitzkrieg!" And then there are our American gulags -- or should one now say Koncentration Kamps?

http://www.apfn.org/apfn/camps.htm

Comments?

The Attack on American Democracy -- by the Bush Gang!

I lived through WW2 and was terrified as a child by the attacks on our nation and democracy around the world by Nazi Germany across the Atlantic and the Japanese imperialists in the Pacific. I was preparing (NROTC) to fight in the Korean war when Eisenhower ended it. At first I was supportive of our war in Viet Nam until it became obvious that it was both pointless and wildly murderous. I gradually became aware of our American economic (corporate) abuses of nations both to the South of us -- Chile, Bolivia, Cuba prior to Castro, Guatemala, Honduras, Argentina, Brazil, Peru, and other places (e.g. Iran) -- where we repeatedly destroyed incipient democracies, imposed corrupt and compliant regimes, assassinated democratic leaders, and as a last resort sent in our troops to suppress resistance. I have watched with horror as we have allowed our neocons both to steal a national presidency (in Florida) and implement their unjust, destructive, and pre-planned war in Iraq.

I am now hearing the increasing rumble of neo McCarthyism -- bold faced lying by political officials and our media, suppression of truth telling both by intimidation firings and threats of imprisonment of journalists, crude violations of privacy of any and all, brutal imprisonment and torture of innocents -- both here and abroad. I now see the appointment of an Attorney General (Gonzales) who apparently sanctioned the torture that has made us despised as a nation (!) and a head of national security who looks to have been implicated in high crimes -- death squads -- while negotiating illegal actions (attacks on Nicaragua) as former ambassador to Honduras and G-d knows what other devious activities that put him somewhere to the right of Henry Kissinger with whom he broke for being too moderate at one point (See NY Review account of Negroponte below).

All of the above and the workplan responses urged thereto by such as Anthony Romero for the ACLU (below) must not be taken lightly.

The one saving grace in this ugly situation is that Bush's cohorts (Rumsfeld, Condi, et al) seem to be as simple minded and incompetent as Bush himself. As the New York Times editorial below points out this administration has done virtually nothing to secure our nation from terrorist attacks, despite all its bullying of innocent persons. One wonders whether it might welcome a major terrorist attack on our homeland as an excuse for more of its abuses?

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TODAY'S EDITORIALS
Our Unnecessary Insecurity
"Sept. 11 changed everything," the saying goes. It is
striking, however, how much has not changed after nearly
3,000 people were killed on American soil.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/20/opinion/20sun1.html?th

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If this administration plans to resume its attacks on democratic nations in South America -- Columbia where we are dumping a billion a year in support of militias involved in dealing drugs and killing indigenous peoples, Bolivia which is trying to reclaim its public resources (natural gas) from corporate interests, or some misbegotten attack again on Chavez in Venezuela, there are plenty of us left to speak out in protest.

Sadly under this administration we have been converted in the eyes of the world from the nation brutally victimized on 9/11 to global bullies -- (once again) "ugly Americans." May we do better before we do worse! EAK

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Q. Who is John Negroponte?

A. John Negroponte is Our Man in Honduras. Remember?

The New York Review of Books
September 20, 2001
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/14485?email

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**************************************************
American Civil Liberties Union
For 2005, How Will We Answer the Big Questions?
**************************************************

Dear Friend,

As the ACLU looks ahead to the challenges of the coming year, I'm writing to tell you about our 2005 Workplan. I urge you to consider the fundamental questions below, to inform yourself by reviewing our plans, and join the ACLU to help carry this work forward:
https://www.aclu.org/contribute/contribute.cfm?orgid=EA021705C&cid=1&slp=y&orgid=EA021705C&MX=1916&H=0

I also urge you to tell your families and your colleagues about this important work:
https://www.aclu.org/team/tell.cfm?orgid=EA021705C&action=112&MX=1916&H=0

You and I will face new threats to our freedom in the coming year, but we also have new opportunities to ask ourselves what freedom means to each of us. America will have to face some fundamental questions in 2005, and it is the job of the ACLU to be the voice of liberty and reason as we decide as a nation how those questions will be answered.

* Should we make permanent Patriot Act provisions that give the U.S. attorney general the power to issue administrative subpoenas and launch privacy-threatening investigations of anyone in America without probable cause?
Workplan: Learn about our strategy for this year of decision:
http://www.aclu.org/campaigns/campaignslist.cfm?c=308#PatriotAct

* Do we want to amend the Bill of Rights for the first time in history so that it can become a vehicle for discriminating against people based on their sexual preferences?
Workplan: We're standing up for equal rights -- learn how you can help:
http://www.aclu.org/campaigns/campaignslist.cfm?orgid=EA021705C&c=308.html#Equality

* Should we support expanding "faith-based initiatives" that blur the lines between church and state and put taxpayer dollars to work funding religious discrimination?
Workplan: Learn about our plans for defending religious liberty:
http://www.aclu.org/campaigns/campaignslist.cfm?orgid=EA021705C&c=308.html#Religious

* Is it time to weaken First Amendment protections of free speech and free expression, questioning the patriotism of anyone who criticizes the government, chilling freedom of the press and permitting the FBI and local law enforcement to open investigations of people whose only "crime" is to oppose the government's policies?
Workplan: Find out how the ACLU is working to uphold these fundamental freedoms:
http://www.aclu.org/campaigns/campaignslist.cfm?orgid=EA021705C&c=308.html#FreeSpeech

* Is it right for politicians to interfere with a woman's most private medical decisions, including whether or when to bear children?
Workplan: Read how we can fight back in defense of privacy and reproductive rights:
http://www.aclu.org/campaigns/campaignslist.cfm?orgid=EA021705C&c=308.html#Reproductive

* Should our government continue to ignore universal human rights principles and should our political leaders turn a blind eye to our own government's mounting record of human rights abuses?
Workplan: Learn how the ACLU is striving to preserve America's commitment to human dignity:
http://www.aclu.org/campaigns/campaignslist.cfm?orgid=EA021705C&c=308.html#HumanRights

Freedom's future lies in the answers to these questions. One thing is certain: we are up against powerful, well-organized opponents who are ready to answer each and every one of these questions in the affirmative. That is why it has never been more critical for the ACLU and our members to be a voice of liberty and reason.

The ACLU's task is to rise to the challenges ahead with commitment, energy and smart strategies, to use every ounce of tenacity, imagination and wisdom we can muster to stand up for freedom's cause. Our Workplan addresses each of these vital questions and the ACLU's specific plans for addressing each and every one of them. You can read our Workplan here:
http://www.aclu.org/campaigns/campaignslist.cfm?orgid=EA021705C&c=308&MX=1916&H=0

In a very real sense, the future of our fundamental freedoms and the very vibrancy of our democracy are in your hands and those of more than 400,000 ACLU members.

We need you to do all that you can to support the ACLU at this critical moment. Please review the full Workplan, share it with others and remember to join the ACLU to defend those freedoms I know you hold as dearly as we do:
https://www.aclu.org/contribute/contribute.cfm?orgid=EA021705C&cid=1&slp=y&orgid=EA021705C&MX=1916&H=0

I assure you that we will use every dollar you send to wage a vigorous and spirited fight for liberty that will make you proud to be a card-carrying member of the ACLU.

Sincerely,

Anthony D. Romero
Executive Director, ACLU

P.S. To read the ACLU 2005 Workplan, please click here:
http://www.aclu.org/campaigns/campaignslist.cfm?orgid=EA021705C&c=308&MX=1916&H=0

We Are the Murderers!

One of my daughters happens to be a classmate (from the Horace Mann School) of our soldier who has been charged with murder in Iraq for firing into a car that was approaching him at a check point and shooting and killing two civilians.

My daughter is incensed by this charge. Had it not been by the great good fortune that she decided not to carry on medical training in the military, but rather had resigned prior to 9/11, she would most likely be one of those mom's saying good-bye to her children to serve in this illegal war which makes all Americans war criminals. She is infinitely relieved that she is not involved in this criminal war -- her sense of the proper role of the American military was that it assist people in need and keep the peace wherever needed.

My daughter's sense, having known the person charged for five school years, is that this soldier was facing the same pressures and reacting in the same ways that many others of our troops are undoubtedly -- and particularly did when they devastated Falluja, i.e. shooting in self defense to halt potential threats to their existence in the heat of the moment when indecision may prove fatal.

Personally I would read this case as yet another attempt to distract attention from the war crimes being committed by Bush, Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Perle, the Kristols, and all the rest of the neocons who plotted this military maneuver to control the Middle East and its oil supplies. High crimes and misdemeanors merit impeachment -- not scapegoat trials of those whose lives are being put on the line and sacrificed by this power happy, greedy gang of criminals.

On the Differences of Women?

Furor Lingers as Harvard Chief Gives Details of Talk on
Women
By SARA RIMER and PATRICK D. HEALY
Lawrence H. Summers released a transcript of his
contentious remarks about the shortage of women in the
sciences.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/18/education/18harvard.html?th

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My personal experience with the education of women goes back quite some time. I started my own teaching in a woman's college, Vassar, continued on in what had traditionally been the CUNY woman's college (Hunter), did a visiting year at Barnard, had had close experience with Sarah Lawrence College in the 1950s, which was my home away from home when I was in college, participated in a CUNY faculty seminar (Balancing the Curriculum) which had evolved from a woman's rights seminar and included me as its only lasting male member).

My overall observation is that women are fully able to do anything but the most strenuous physical jobs, given the opportunity and encouragement to do so. I watched Sarah Lawrence students -- will not name drop -- go out into the world and do whatever. That college particularly distinguished itself by advising students with comments on their work rather than giving them grades so that they did not categorize themselves by letter grades. In contrast I had the experience of meeting one of the Vassar grads whose name in widely known now for her distinctive contributions to worthy causes who introduced herself to me -- "I was only a 'C' student when I was at Vassar." My wife and I while serving as Mellon House fellows at Vassar encouraged our students to do the things that women were not then allowed to do, e.g. become lawyers. Many did and now include judges and whatever. One became the co-chair of the Women's Rights Project at the ACLU (probably just after Ruth Bader Ginsburg undertook that role when no other jobs were available to her).

To jump over a number of my women students from the early days who have become distinguished philosophers (women were not welcomed in philosophy then), I recall a telling moment in our CUNY faculty seminar when it emerged that our two women mathematicians had BOTH had gender segregated educations! One of my few disputes with Norman Siegel was over his opposition to a women-only public school established in East Harlem which similarly was designed to free young women from the social pressures that hit them with puberty and get in the way of learning.

My only social observation on the differences in approaches to learning between women and men was stimulated by one of our faculty seminars at Brooklyn College on our introductory core program in which we faculty were asked to play the role of students in a typical class. I noticed that the women took careful notes during the lecture whereas the men did not. Thereafter the men participants offered 90% of the questions and comments on what had transpired. At the risk of over generalization I suspect that our educational systems put more pressures on women and, perhaps, generate more anxiety about getting things right and thus make women more cautious about innovating or breaking loose from the pack? And -- men may be more aggressive by nature whereas women are more caring and compassionate? Frankly, if this is an accurate insight, all power to our women before we end up destroying the human race! EAK

Put Your Money . . . .

The National Jobs for All Coalition (made up of mainly religious and non-governmental agencies) http://www.njfac.org/ reports in a current mailing that roughly 40% of our tax dollars now are being directed into present (and past expenses for) military activities. As their figures are based on sources prior to the latest Bush expenditures for Iraq and cutbacks in essentials for the working poor, children, battered women, students, and other 'non' essentials, I imagine that this proportion will grow:

http://www.nationalpriorities.org/TaxDay2004/pdf/us.pdf

And where are we now? It looks as though our military is bogged down in Iraq where we discovered no WMD, but are busily bringing democracy (or civil war?) to those beleaguered people who were dominated by a brutal dictator who was our guy -- until he got out of line and we did not need him any more. In the meantime it looks as though North Korea is boasting of its nuclear weapons and Iran is insisting that it has the same rights to nuclear power as the bulk of the developed nations -- as oil is a limited resource that they wish to maintain for their benefit for as long as possible.

Something here drastically does not compute. It looks to me as though it is our current national policies. Somewhere along the line I think I recall being taught that the ancient Greeks and Romans also bankrupted themselves with a combination of wars, military budgets, and aggressive pursuit of empires not found to be sustainable. There may be barbarians at our gates, but given all our violations of human rights of late, I suspect that the barbarians are already here -- having taken over both the White House and the Congress. Have you seen the casualty counts for Iraq? Didn't we keep daily tallies of those for Viet Nam?

http://www.antiwar.com/casualties/

http://www.iraqbodycount.net/

Beware the Ides of March!

On Teaching American Philosophy

I honestly don't pay much attention to such things, but I gather that an order has come down from on high from our CUNY board members (mainly right wing Pataki/Giuliani political castoffs having little or no knowledge about higher education or, apparently, fund-raising capacity on behalf of our City University of NY now being starved for funding by the Pataki vetoes of legislatively authorized public funds) that we shall be obliged to teach some American philosophy in each of our introductory philosophy classes. This will not be difficult to do as most of us are American philosophers.

But I wonder whether these characters realize that our best known classical American philosophers -- Dewey, William James and such -- were LIBERALS!!! James for his part maintained a sort of modified utilitarianism to the effect that the right thing to do would consist of satisfying the maximum possible number of people's "claims and demands." Yes, downright revolutionary stuff like that. And Dewey believed that all children had a touch of genius of one sort or another to be discovered, unlocked, and promoted. He did not suggest that 'standards must be maintained' that exclude this or that category of student willing to learn and do the work as do our trustees.

And what is wrong with Descartes anyway, whom most of us teach in our introductory core philosophy course -- is it that he is part of the old Europe? Ah me! Such is life when one's powers that be seem to be somewhat illiterate and in need of a bit of adult education themselves.

Growl! Ed Kent

P.S. Will be sending out blind copies of this to some of my former students, including a recent Rhodes and a Beinecke Scholar who are among the advisors to my student group list. Certainly wish we had such as these as our CUNY trustees. Any trustees are welcomed to attend at least any of my classes for an upgrade on what they learned in days of yore or to sign into my Student Concerns list.

Corruption of the Religious Right

Many years ago, as a recently graduated seminary student, I encountered the corruption of the religious right plunk in the middle of NYC. The late fifties were the days when civil rights had become a part of the mission of caring Christians. The Commission on Race and Religion of the National Council of Churches had included some of our closest friends of that time. It was natural, then, when in seeking a summer job with the National Council of Churches located at 475 Riverside Drive, that I should be diverted, when one was not available there, to the Protestant Council of the City of NY, which was located in the same building and which, I wrongly assumed, would be a local version of same, just as the NYCLU is of the national ACLU.

How wrong I was. I soon discovered that the city version was a completely corrupt operation working simply to raise money to pay its staff and director, Dan Potter, salaries and to carry out the programs of out-of-town fundamentalist (right wing) directors who had been put together by one of the Billy Graham crusades. In fact the Council was working:

1) to sabotage civil rights -- see the Columbia political science dissertation of that period by Henry Pratt who was one of our neighbors in Grant Houses.

2) to prevent the ending of the Sabbath closing law that discriminated against practicing Jews. This law was finally scotched by Mayor John Lindsay who simply ordered that it not be enforced.

3) to cover for fraudulent groups claiming to be religious, which used inclusion in its directory, which I was assigned to update, as cover for a variety of money scams.

All of the above was quite obvious and, as I was to discover, well known to our major Protestant denominations supposedly represented by this organization. I tried my best to expose what was going on and went to the then director of the Federation of NYC Protestant Welfare Agencies -- who not only confirmed what I was reporting, but admitted that such was well known. The Presbyterians and Episcopalians were refusing to contribute monies to this outfit, while nevertheless sending in the details on their churches to be included in its directory and not blowing its cover. In fairness, one of the borough offices, Brooklyn, was honest and outraged by the above and tried to do what it could about it -- but with not much effect.

I left the place in disgust. Dan Potter, a notorious Albany slumlord who was murdered by one of his tenants several years ago, asked me, as I told him I was resigning, whether my immediate boss had tried to hit on me? A bit of a pain that guy was, but I could reassure Potter that I had not been hit upon -- our desks were located about 15 feet from Potter's office. Potter used to take Mondays off to play golf with the trustees somewhere in Westchester.

And so I left institutional Protestantism with a sense that it was dying -- which had been pretty obvious, as I studied with the last of the great Protestant theologians -- Reinhold Niebuhr and such here -- and fine equivalents at Oxford where I spent my middle seminary year as an exchange student.

The bottom line here: my seminary days put me in touch with the best of our 3 major faiths of those days -- Protestant, Catholic, Jewish. Many friends remain from same. But one could see that our religious institutions were falling on hard times and would be fading away much as had the Olympians of ancient Greece and many a previous world religion that had reigned for a time merely to wither away to a wisp of values embedded in the cultures that they had helped form, e.g. the vengeful "eye for an eye" lex talionis of the cruel ancient Babylonian gods:

http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/~tonya/spring/cap/pro4.htm

Let me add that the present NYC Council of Churches is an entirely different beastie, headed by a fine retired clergyman, John Hiemstra, with whom I discussed all of the above over a pleasant lunch at 475 and to whom a copy of this will go. It has an office in 475 and had a staff of 3 when I visited last year. It does good things now. I assume that it would never claim to represent 1,000 NYC churches or anything on the basis of a few hundred post cards sent out to churches with a few returned with mixed responses. A good number of those 'churches' had phone numbers that answered in local bars when I called to confirm them back then while revising that directory -- outreach ministries perhaps Ed Kent