Thursday, July 31, 2008

So Long, And Thanks for all the Fish!



So were the final words of the dolphins as they left a doomed Earth in Douglas Adam's Hitchiker's Guide to the Galaxy. And that's pretty much what the Bush administration will be telling all of us come January 2009. The White House Budget Office has estimated the government's deficit will surge past a half-trillion dollars next year--amounting to a staggering $482 billion.

Oh but it gets better...

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Wednesday, July 30, 2008

Conservative Think Tank Suggests "War on Terror" is Flawed



Just last week, US Attorney General Michael Mukasey urged that Congress should explicitly declare a state of armed conflict with al Qaeda to make clear the United States can detain suspected members as long as the war on terrorism lasts. "Any legislation should acknowledge again and explicitly that this nation remains engaged in an armed conflict with al Qaeda, the Taliban and associated organizations, who have already proclaimed themselves at war with us," Mukasey said. "Congress should reaffirm that for the duration of the conflict the United States may detain as enemy combatants those who have engaged in hostilities or purposefully supported al Qaeda, the Taliban and associated organizations."

Yet a recently released report by the US funded RAND Corporation--a conservative think tank--undermines the attorney general's rationale, and calls into question the way in which the fight against terrorism is being waged. The report found the idea of a "war on terror" to not only be misguided but counterproductive. Furthermore, it suggested the US should rethink its entire strategy of militarism as a way to combat terrorism. In fact, it pointed out nations like Britain and Australia have long stopped using the phrase "war on terror" to describe strategy against al Qaeda and other terror groups, treating them instead as criminal organizations that are best stopped through intelligence gathering and policing.

Gee. Kind of puts a damper on that whole indefinite war with no end thing the Bush administration has been pushing huh...

In New Jersey, Vice President Dick Cheney called Mr. Kerry's view of terrorism "naïve and dangerous." In a conference call with reporters arranged by the Bush campaign, Rudolph W. Giuliani, the former mayor of New York, mocked Mr. Kerry for comparing terrorism to gambling and prostitution. "The idea that you can have an acceptable level of terrorism is frightening," Mr. Giuliani said.


As noted by MediaMatters at the time, conservative pundits joined in on the pile-on:

PAT BUCHANAN (MSNBC analyst, as guest host of MSNBC's Scarborough Country): Kerry seems to have this -- obviously they try to portray him as a girlie man at the Republican Convention. But he seems to play into this with the phrase about sensitive war, and global test, and now terrorism is a nuisance. [MSNBC, Scarborough Country, 10/11]

SEAN HANNITY (FOX News Channel host and ABC Radio Networks host): He [Kerry] is saying, these are his words, this is his little debate he's had with himself, and the fact that 3,000 of our fellow citizens were slaughtered on 9-11 -- and here we are -- we're supposed to believe that these terrorists are only a mere nuisance -- just a nuisance. [ABC Radio Networks, The Sean Hannity Show, 10/11]

HANNITY: You know that nuisance that John Kerry was talking about? We're going to win the war on terror so that American cities and American malls and the American people are going to be safe. That's what the war has always been about. [FOX News Channel, Hannity & Colmes, 10/11]

TONY SNOW (FOX News Channel host and FOX News Radio host, as guest host of FOX News Channel's The O'Reilly Factor): But first, our top story tonight, the political heat is on as we count down to November 2. President Bush and Senator Kerry are back on the campaign trail, pounding away at each other, verbally, of course. This morning, the president pounced on a quote in Sunday's New York Times Magazine where Senator Kerry called terrorists a nuisance. [FOX News Channel, The O'Reilly Factor, 10/11]

GARY BAUER (chairman of the conservative political action committee Campaign for Working Families and a former Republican presidential candidate, sitting in for CNN Crossfire co-host Tucker Carlson): Listen up, Senator Kerry. We're fighting Jihadists, Islamofascists, not just a nuisance or law enforcement problem. [CNN, Crossfire, 10/12]

JACK KEMP (former Republican vice presidential candidate): What John Kerry did is take it and call it a soon-to-be nuisance, which is not correct. [FOX News Channel, Hannity & Colmes, 10/12]


Unfortunately, Sen. Kerry--giving into fear of pressing the issue with a seemingly indifferent or hostile media--simply stated that the Republicans were taking his words out of context. Much more plain spoken had been earlier Democratic foreign-policy wonks.

''We're not in a war on terror, in the literal sense,'' said Clinton-era diplomat Richard Holbrooke. ''The war on terror is like saying 'the war on poverty.' It's just a metaphor. What we're really talking about is winning the ideological struggle so that people stop turning themselves into suicide bombers.''


It will be interesting to see what the 2008 presidential candidates--one who thinks a hundred year occupation of Iraq is part of a "global war on terror" and another who intends on ramping up the Afghan war and is on record for unilateral military strikes into a sovereign nation (Pakistan) as a way to "fight terror"--will make of this report. Will they utilize it? Or is their tough talking rhetoric simply seen as more useful during a campaign?

Some further points from the Rand report:


*A transition to the political process is the most common way most terrorist groups end. But the process, found in 43 percent cases examined, is said to be unlikely with al-Qaida, because of its broad, sweeping agenda.

*The second most common way that terrorist groups end, seen in about 40 percent of the cases, is through police and intelligence services. Police are particularly effective because their permanent presence in cities helps them gather information.

*Military force, as currently being used in Iraq and Afghanistan, was effective in only 7 percent of the cases.

*Even where we found some success against al-Qaida, in Pakistan and Iraq, the military played a background or surrogate role. The bulk of the action was taken by intelligence, police and, in some cases, local forces.

*Religious terrorist groups take longer to eliminate than other groups but none has achieved victory in the 38 years covered by the study.

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Tuesday, July 29, 2008

CNN's "Black in America"- A Review by Dr. Boyce Watkins




On July 23rd and 24th, CNN presented its documentary “Black in America” a six-hour look at the role race plays in the lives of many black Americans. Hosted by Soledad O'Brien, it came in two parts, Black in America: The Black Man and Black in America: Black Women & Family.

In full disclosure, I didn't watch it. I was told about it repeatedly. I saw the advertisments. I got the emails. There were even people here in the city handing out free backpacks and other paraphernalia. But, much like Professor Watkins (whose article I post below), I just wasn't interested. I couldn't conceive that the network that has been trending towards FAUX News for ratings since the late 90s, that sent us sensationalist drivel like that of Nancy Grace, that beams out conservative racist noise boxes like Glenn Beck and allows Lou "I Hate Mexicans" Dobbs to spin himself off as a "populist," was going to give black America anything worthy and ultimately redeeming of previous media portrayals. Whatever respect I had for CNN went out the window a long time ago.

Sure I know, folks will say it was wrong of me to pre-judge something I hadn't seen, that I should have watched it first and then given it a chance. Maybe they're right. But when it comes to the corporate television media, I kind of have an idea who I'm dealing with. Ain't like they don't have a track record. So I'll leave the following perspective by Dr. Boyce Watkins, because it speaks to the inherent flaws in expecting anything out of such a documentary, and much more.

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Monday, July 28, 2008

Oh Where Have all the White Heroes Gone ?




Actor Matthew Mcconaughey as attorney Roger Baldwin in Spielberg's Amistad.

Actor and activist Danny Glover is steadily working on a biopic about the Haitian independence hero Toussaint-Louverture. But it's with no thanks to Hollywood. Glover said he "slaved" to raise funds for the film because financiers refused to back it. "I couldn't get the money here," Glover told the AFP. "I couldn't get the money in Britain. I went to everybody. You wouldn't believe the number of producers based in Europe, and in the States, that I went to." And what was the reasoning given by those who hold the purses? According to Glover, the monied interests in the movie industry complained there were no white heroes. "Producers said 'It's a nice project, a great project..." Glover recounted. "'Where are the white heroes?'"

Pay attention everyone, this is how whiteness works.

At one pitch meeting, Mario recounts, it was suggested the movie would be more desirably ''mainstream'' if its story were told through the eyes of a white student radical, preferably one played by a Tom Cruise or a Brad Pitt. At another, it was suggested that since Jane Fonda had once supported the Panthers, it would be great if a role were written for her niece Bridget Fonda.

Rather than take the money and insert a fictional white character, the Peebles settled for a small budget that barely afforded them money to market the film. And in an ironic twist, they created a black fictional character through which to tell the tale of the Panthers--an act that was probably no less controversial than what the studios execs had in mind.

Seeming to realize the game, black director John Singleton's 1997 film Rosewood, a depiction of the black Florida town destroyed by a murderous white mob, came ready-packaged to Hollywood with a white hero in the form of Mr. Wright played by actor Jon Voight. Mr. Wright, based on John Wright, was a real historical figure who was reported to have let several blacks hide in his home. Wright is portrayed by Singleton as a conflicted soul caught up in the midst of the racial massacre. Yet the story is not told solely from his perspective. Instead, the key figure in the movie is a Mr. Mann--a fictional gun-wielding black superman played by actor Ving Rhames. In Singleton's inversion, this invented black hero acts as a force upon Wright, pushing the reluctant and morally questionable white hero into action.

If recent cinema history however is anything to go by, the white hero figure--although now a bit convuluted--still occupies a place in Hollywood storytelling. In the highly praised 2006 film The Last King of Scotland, the story of Ida Amin's brutal dictatorship is told from the perspective of white actor James McAvoy, who plays Scottish doctor Nicholas Garrigan. The movie is based on the book of the same name by author Giles Foden, whose Garrigan is a fictional character believed to be loosely (very loosely) based on former British soldier and colonial officer Robert Astles. In the film Garrigan is portrayed as a corruptible white young physician whose sexual appetites for African women and a lavish lifestyle, causes him to turn a blind eye to Amin's atrocities. Unlike Astles, who spent over six years in a Ugandan prison for his role in the regime, Garrigan finds redemption and escapes with his life. Though African-American actor Forest Whittaker received an Oscar as best male lead for his portrayal of Amin, more than a few black critics noted with irony that even the story of a black villain seemed to require a central white male presence.

A similar formula would be worked out for Blood Diamond, as Djimon Hounsou was cast in the role of a noble African fisherman opposite a rougish arms dealer (Leonardo DiCaprio) who manages to find his conscience in the end and become the life sacrificing great white savior for all of Africa.

As noted, some of the afore-mentioned films are historical, so the white characters in question may exist. Some are semi-historical, composites or loose interpretations of reality. Others are pure fiction. But the accuracy of the films isn't the issue I'm raising here. Rather, the question is, why do movies about black historical figures or events--namely tales dealing with racism or oppression--need to be told from either the perspective of a white hero or with whites in key roles? What is the basis of this formula?

After all, one can *choose* to tell the story of Steven Biko from his perspective--and not his white journalist friend. The story of Medgar Evers or Cinque can focus on these black figures as individuals in their own right, rather than the white lawyers out to secure their justice. Tales of Africa's blood diamonds don't *need* white interlopers that serve as centerpieces of the story. So what gives?

Perhaps it's a simple matter of money. Hollywood execs seem to fear that white audiences will not accept any film dealing with black people, oppression or racism without a white mediator to guide them--someone they can identify with or to help assuage any possible "white guilt." Perhaps the fear is that white movie-goers will assume that any film with an overwhelming and centralized black cast is a "black film," and will not reciprocate the courteous patronage blacks give to "white films" on a daily basis.

Whatever the case, it seems though Hollywood is far from ready for a black-centered movie on the Haitian Revolution, which struck fear in the slave regimes of the West, humbled Napoleon's France and helped alter the course of human bondage, it will nevertheless have to contend with Danny Glover's long awaited biopic. Funded from varied sources, including $18 million from Venezuela through the friendship of its leader Hugo Chavez, the film will feature a black cast as diverse as Don Cheadle, Angela Basset and Mos Def. Hopefully white movie-goers will prove Hollywood wrong, find interest in a movie in which they must accept their diminished roles and thus tell the gatekeepers of popular cinema to stop handling their "oh-so-fragile" white psyches with kid gloves.


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Tuesday, July 22, 2008

Run Jesse Run




If we only spoke well of others, we'd need never whisper.--proverb, anonymous

I was at a lounge when someone passed me a mobile phone, and I read the news of Jesse Jackson's now infamous comments about Barack Obama. I stared at it dumbfounded for a while, thinking--hoping--I was reading something from The Onion. Then I found out the source was FOX News. Aha! I was certain then it wasn't true. Faux News tell the truth? Yeah right! I went to bed confident I'd wake up in the morning and learn the whole thing was cooked up by Bill O'Reilly during a midnight loofah run. But alas, the new day came, and the craziness was there--with a youtube video to boot. Jesse Jackson, social activist, stalwart of the Civil Rights Movement, international peace negotiator, had claimed he wanted to castrate another black man. I remarked that day the only way things could be worse, was if on that recording Jesse had called somebody a "N---a." That would be the coup de grace. One week later... Sigh. Sometimes I hate being right.

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Wednesday, July 16, 2008

White & Black & Obama



"Poll Finds Obama Isn’t Closing Divide on Race." So read today's NY Times headline. In the latest New York Times/CBS News poll, it was found that while there is excitement over the prospects of America's first black president, its meaning is viewed quite differently depending on one's "racial" lens. While whites polled believed this historic event would signal a watershed in race relations, blacks polled--while enthusiastic about Sen. Obama--shared no delusions that an Obama presidency would herald a new age of racial harmony. In fact, many believed things to be the same or worse today than just four years or a decade prior. As the Times put it, "Black and white Americans agree that America is ready to elect a black president, but disagree on almost every other question about race in the poll."

Yeah, tell me something I don't know...

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Friday, July 4, 2008

Patriotism Revisited




Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps' pollution. No refuge could save the hireling and slave from the terror of flight or the gloom of the grave.

So reads an excerpt from Francis Scott Key's poem, inspired by the British bombardment of Baltimore in 1814, which would be set to song and become known as "The Star Spangled Banner." By the time it was made the national anthem of the United States of America, the poem had undergone numerous revisions and the above lines from the third verse were removed. And no wonder. Those words were an uncomfortable reminder of a troublesome past. Key had been a slave holder. And when British forces during the War of 1812 enticed slaves to fight for their side in exchange for freedom, Key and other slaveholders were outraged--not seeming to understand that those held in bondage were patriotic not to flags, forefathers or nation-states, but to the liberty denied them. This dichotomous existence has been part of what it means to be black in America, and why Frederick Douglas would ask "What to the slave is the Fourth of July?" Back in 2002 I wrote an article exploring these dilemmas. I repost it here today, mostly unedited as I want it to reflect my thinking of that time, for consumption once again.

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