Obama isa  "100 percent supporter of Israel" said John Kerry on Monday.

Iraq and the NYT

Race Politics

This is a brilliant column. Thank you Ralph Nader for making race an issue, because Obama certainly wasn't going to do it.

What's a matter with Kansas?

Is Islamophobia one of Obama's "values straight from the Kansas heartland"? 

If John McCain were to drop dead of a heart attack (at the ripe old age of 71), and the Republicans were to draft Condi as a replacement, would this constitute progress in American race relations? Or do you need more than skin color to qualify as a progressive candidate? (there are still some people out there that demand that a political actor shares their interests and ideology before they offer them any form of  support- but those people are "way out there" in the sense of being nowhere near the center of American political society, or the levers of American power. The American Power-Elite has a very specific vetting process before it allows anyone near said levers, the first stop: AIPAC. We know where it goes from there...). 

But not to worry, I'm sure that Iraqis feel much better knowing that it was Collin Powell (instead of a White Man) who sold the American war against their country to the UN.  Don't forget Colored Folk can carry the White Man's Burden as well as anyone. 

Melanie McAllister, in her book Epic Encounters seems a bit flummoxed by these kinds of phenomena. In her chapter, "Military Multiculturalism" she can't quite figure out how militarism and imperialism can co-exist in the same cultural space as  multiculturalism (aren't these two things polar opposites??). General Powell, and the dark skinned troops he commanded represent the broadening of American identity, but these same forces perpetrated the Highway of Death.[1] McAllister can't quite figure out how this could be so.

David Harvey in The New Imperialism suffers no such confusion. For him, militarism and imperialism are all too eager to incorporate  ethnic minorities and gender majorities into the complex of Captial and Empire- as this facade  of inclusion  (reality in some cases) performs an essential legitimating function. Its no mistake that Bush 41 sent Clarence Thomas up there, or that Bush 43 put Condi and Collin in key positions. Malcolm X used to have a term for these kinds of people.  It looks like the Dems have finally figured out to game the system (after 40 years in the Wilderness).

Drawing on the Malcom X - David Harvey tradition of political analysis, one might think in terms of "Multicultural Militarism" instead of  "Military Multiculturalism." 

[1] Interesting footnote on Gulf War II (1991) and American "racial inclusivity": At the time of the War, African Americans represented 13% of the total US population, but 20% of the American armed forces, and 25% percent of American combat troops. Who needs a draft when you have structural racism and a permanent underclass? Structural racism, now there a term you won't here in an American presidential campaign. If we listen to Obama the problem is African-Americans' culture of irresponsibility (oh, if only they would work hard enough to go to Harvard or Stanford they might be able to develop an ethic of responsibility... Where'd Obama's dad go to school again, oh yeah, it was Harvard...). Or as he likes to say, the Government can't sit down with your child and teach them how to read or speak the Queens' English (but it can bomb countries half way around the globe, and throw people in jail for growing marijuana...). He's not proposing policy solutions to the problems of exploitation and underdevelopment (what Harvey calls "uneven geographical development"). Heaven forbid we actually use the levers of American power to alter the balance of class forces in American society... 

A couple concrete things on structural racism and the Obama campaign: 

1. The Drug War

2. The Death Penalty

3. Discrimintion in labor, housing, and credit markets

4. Geographically uneven school funding 

5. The de-industrialization of America (African Americans' traditional avenue for social mobility-- think NAFTA and Free Trade)

6. Health care and life expectancy rates (Universal health care anyone?)

7. American Military Engagements

I'm sure the list could go on. But this should suffice, as on each of these concrete points, Obama and McCain are on one side, and I am on another. 

Obama: Finally! Someone with the courage to stand up to the power of the Left

Obama stands with McCain and Justice Scalia in opposing gun control and and supporting the Death Penalty.

Olbermann salutes Obama for having the "courage" to "stand up to the Left" on FISA .

Beyond the Spectacle: Palestine

In the world beyond the spectacle, the colonization of Palestine and the dispossession Palestinians continues. Jonathan Cook analyzes the two founding principles of Zionism: Separation and Transfer, and Saree Makdisi analyzes the everyday processes of dispossession here.

The Emerald Triangle in the NYT: 

Principles? who needs principles when you have money, lots of it!!

The Daily Show's brilliant montage of Democrats trying to explain away Obama's stand of campaign financing. No one ever said Democrats weren't morally flexible (this might be what you'd call the yoga of ethics). Hell, not having core principles has worked so far, why change now?

FISA

Pop quiz: Which one is Bush, and which one is Obama:

"Given the legitimate threats we face, providing effective intelligence collection tools with appropriate safeguards is too important to delay." 

"[The bill] allows our intelligence professionals to quickly and effectively monitor the plans of terrorists abroad, while protecting the liberties of Americans here at home." 

Click here for answer.

Senator Russ Feingold begs to differ with both.

Go Green or Go Home

The case for Nader '08

VeepStakes

I'm no fan of Obama, but if he were to give either of these individual the VP slot I'd at least take a second look: Jim Webb or Chuck Hagel. (Somehow,  I don't think Obama's holding his breath to see which way I'm leaning). 

Oil and Occupation

In the world beyond the spectacle ExxonMobil gets back into Iraq after a 36 year hiatus. 

A rough week for the Left

In what turned out to be a pretty rough week for the Left, the "progressive candidate" followed up his embrace of a ne0-conservative foreign policy by embracing a neo-liberal economic agenda. 

Apparently Obama's time at Harvard didn't include any courses on international law. 

If ever there was a time to move a progressive agenda, I would think the time is now... though I imagine that anything that threatened to alter the a balance of class forces in American society would not go over all that well with Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, UBS, and Citigroup (4 of Obama's top 5 contributors, and let's not even begin to talk about "bundlers"... ).  Hey, when your in the pocket of Wall Street who needs public financing? You've got to love a guy with the moral courage to stand up for Wall Street... You know who would be a perfect to deal with the housing crisis... how about Robert Rubin, and Jason Furman! (See Naomi Klein's brilliant analysis of "Obama's Chicago Boys"). And if there is one person who could really put the economic screws to Iran its gotta be Madeline Albright, her record on Iraqi sanctions is pretty stellar.  

I think we're in for a rough ride...

Napoleon on the Nile

Chris Hedge's articulates why need progressive leadership at this moment. When the war drums beat, we need someone to stand up and say, this is madness. 

greg grandin on the view from latin america

Juan Cole's analysis of the race.

Scoundrel

Obama July 2004:

"There's not much of a difference between my position and George Bush's position at this stage. The difference, in my mind, is who's in a position to execute." 

My point exactly! Thank you! Finally Obama says something I agree with. 

RFK: The "Stop McCarthy" (Gene, not Joe) Candidate

RFK, the former aid to Sen Joe McCarthy, and leading Hawk in the JFK administration (particularly on IndoChina and Cuba[footnote one]), and the one who, as AG, authorized wire tapping MLK  (that dangerous subversive...). "The Real Bobby Kennedy."

In 1966 he advocates escalating the war in IndoChina:

"As far as Vietnam is concerned... I think we have a commitment in Vietnam that we have to keep...

But I think that Hanoi and the Viet Cong and the National Front and the Chineese are convinced that the United States is going to turn and run from Vietnam... that we don't have the tenacity or the will to remain...  [hey -what do you know they were right!!].

I think our greatest problem, therefore, is to prove that we're going to remain in Vietnam. Now, that war, that struggle is going to be long, is going to be much bloodier [emphasis added] than it is at the present time, and we're going to have a commitment of a great number more troops than we have at the present time. I would think that the estimate of 400,000 troops by the of the year is probably accurate and the fact that it will grow even more next year, and the casualties will be considerably higher than they are at the present time, as far as Americans."

It is worth clarifying here when RFK speaks with glee about the war IndoChina growing BLOODIER, he is not suggesting that he is is going to spill any of his own blood for said noble mission-  he is of course selflessly offering to send other people's kids (disproportionately Black, Latino, and Poor) to their death. This at a time, remember, when as AG he wouldn't send Federal Agents into the South to defend Blacks' right not to be lynched. But he doesn't seem to have a problem sending those same Black kids to die in the jungles and swamps of SE Asia... 

With heroes like this who needs villains?

footnote one: you know in some places when you try to assassinate a foreign leader its called "terrorism..." PS did you catch Obama waxing poetic to the Cuban exile last week about how great things were in Cuba under Batista...

Obama on Khalidi: With Friends like these...

Obama distances himself from past associations with prof. Rashid Khalidi (a known Palestinian). Obama admits that that he does indeed know the Palestinian from his days at Columbia, but assures his audience that he does not hold any regard for the professor's views.

Video here.

Obama and AIPAC

The American Conservative speculates that Obama might be willing to push back against the  AIPAC view that "being pro-Israel means supporting the right of the Jewish state to lord over 5 million Palestinians in conditions increasingly resembling South African apartheid." In so doing the American Conservative demonstrates that paleo-conservatives are as prone to  delusional, wishful thinking as the neo-cons. 

The Angry Arab News Service predicts that:

"If Obama is elected President, I am sure that he would order the bombing of some Arab or Muslim country in the first year of his presidency to 1) prove that he really is not a Muslim after all; 2) underline his patriotic and militaristic credentials; 3) to prepare for his second term run; and 4) to receive a standing ovation as soon as he enters AIPAC's convention hall." 

I'll take the analysis of The Angry Arab News Service over the American Conservative any day...

Obama: with friends like these...

President Carter references that fact that Israel has a nuclear arsenal of 150 missiles (presumably aimed directly at Tehran), Obama and Hillary vote to authorize $165 million in new war spending (May 22), Iraqis protest al-Malaki efforts to bi-pass the Iraqi legislature and approve permanent military bases in Iraq (and Obama says nothing...), Israel announces plans to carry out new colonial settlements in Palestinian occupied territory in the West Bank (the fourth major colonial expansion since last fall's Annapolis conference), and Obama delivers a very hard-line address to AIPAC in which he threatens that the US would go to war to stop Iran from getting nuclear weapons, and affirms Israel's exclusive right to Jerusalem, declares the peace process dead - what a week...

(Text of Obama's speech to AIPAC is here)

But were so busy pouring over red and blue maps, discussing the mechanics of the Democratic rules committee, and entertaining Hillary's pity party that none of the above is "news." That's why they call it "Spectacle."