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THE U.S. CONSERVATIVE “DIVINE PRINCE” APPEARS
The younger Bush, the “enfant
terrible”, prep-school
cheerleader, Yale Skull and Bones
member, draft-dodging dress-up-fighter-pilot, failed oilman,
drugstore cowboy, and conveniently Born Again Christian; had never
held any political office, or real job, before he was miraculously
elected to be Governor of Texas. The Texas Observer reported that
Bush Jr. had made $15 million off a Crony-Capitalism Texas Rangers
deal, with the help of $135 million in Corporate welfare, from
Arlington, Texas taxpayers. He then took $4.5 million from business
interests clamoring for tort reform and rewarded them with laws that
make it harder to sue irresponsible businesses; and he invited oil
industry executives to develop a do-nothing public relations response
to the grandfathered air pollution problem in Texas. It was clear
from the beginning that Mr. Bush’s constituents were not to be
the people of Texas.
Aristocrats
Rule:
“For
in every city these two opposite parties are to be found (one
attained by popular favour, and one attained by the favour of the
Aristocracy), arising from the desire of the populace to avoid the
oppression of the great, and the desire of the great to command and
oppress the people. And from these two opposing interests arises in
the city one of three effects; either absolute government, liberty,
or license….for when the nobility see that they are unable to
resist the people, they unite in exalting one of their number and
creating him Prince, so as to be able to carry out their own designs
under the shadow of his authority.”
Niccolo
Machiavelli, “The Prince,” published in 1532
The miracle of the meteoric rise
of this unread, unknown, and unaccomplished, Radical Conservative
Prince
of the Bush dynasty, to the highest office in the land, may
eventually generate a raft of conspiracy theory books, to include the
manipulations of; the Council
on Foreign Relations (3800 members), and its Globalist
agenda, or the Trilateral
Commission (180 members), and its parent New
World Order, or the world ruling elite called the
Bilderberg Group
(120 members), the Illuminati,
the Yale Skull and
Bones Fraternity, or even the secretive Catholic
organization called the Opus
Dei. The real story is similar to the rise of another
rapacious and dynastic ruler in the 15th Century.
“Either
Caesar or Nothing”
Motto
of Cesare Borgia, (1476-1507), Bastard son of Pope Alexander VI
Like Bush junior and his
consiglieri Karl Rove, Cesare
Borgia was a fan of Niccolo Machiavelli, and Machiavelli
rewarded his patronage with the fawning treatise on corrupt
government called “The
Prince.” Bush junior is a lot like this
Florentine warlord, who as the Captain-General
(15th Century CINC)
of the army of the Holy Roman Church. Borgia brutally attempted to
expand the Papal States for his Father and himself, by continuous war
and mayhem in Northern Italy. Borgia was a murderer of his
competitors, and confiscated, extorted, and pillaged Northern Italy
without constraint or Christian mercy. He was only stopped after his
patron Papa Pope Alexander VI died.
THE UNHOLY TRINITY
One thing is certain and in
the public record. Bush’s selection to be the ruler of the new
Holy American Empire, on behalf of the Neo-Conservative
power elite, has been engineered by the evil forces of an Unholy
Trinity of; Radical Neo-Conservative Propagandists,
Corporate Kingmakers and influence peddlers, and Fanatical
Christian-Nationalists.
The
Radical Neo-Conservative Propagandists
“Beware
of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but
inwardly are ravenous wolves”
Jesus Christ, The
King James Bible, Matthew 7:15
The Neo-Conservative extremists
that have gained control of all branches of the U.S. government;
patiently built their case for the Conservative
Revolution over a period of four decades. These
Neo-Conservative
Republicans were aided in gaining power by an ideological propaganda
effort, very similar to that of the first Fascists.
“Propaganda
as Hitler envisioned it, consisted of making a few points exclusively
for mass consumption and then endlessly repeating them. The masses,
as Hitler and Goebbels, his most gifted assistant, saw it, were slow
and lazy; their memories were weak, and they reacted only to the
thousandfold repetition of the simplest ideas. Furthermore, they were
‘feminine’ in their activities and thought and were
motivated by emotion rather than by reason. Propaganda had to be
positive or negative, based on love or hatred. There could be no
right or wrong; and so the ability to see two sides of a question was
the very antithesis of propaganda.”
“Fascism,
Past-Present-Future,” by Walter Laqueur
The
Demo-Liberal Phase is Over:
“ There
are Socialists tired of the socialism which had been mummified by
Marxist dogma…In the same way there are Democrats who no longer want
to have anything to do with democracy, and Liberals who believe the
Demo-Liberal phase of Western States is over.”
Benito
Mussolini, U.S. Journal of Universal
Service, August 22, 1933
First came the articulation of a
set of far right pseudo-philosophical ideals; cleverly wrapped in the
principles of traditional-conservatism and populism; but at their
core; radical prejudices, including; Anti-Black, Anti-Women,
Anti-Immigrant, Anti-Semitic, Anti-Homosexual, Anti-Liberal,
Anti-Modernism, Anti-Popular Culture, Anti-Tax, Anti-Poor,
Anti-Commonwealth, Pseudo-Populist, etc. These were easy to describe
as they had already been elaborated during the first Fascist
movements.
The
Fascist State Followed Extreme Conservative Principles:
“Fascism
transcends Democracy and Liberalism. Its regenerating action is based
on granite foundations; the concept of Hierarchy, the participation
of the whole people in the life of the Sate, Social Justice through
the equitable distribution of rights and duties, the injection of
morality into public life, the prestige of the family, the moral
interpretation of the ideas of Order, Authority, and Freedom.”
Asvero
Gravelli, Fascist Polemicist, “Toward a Fascist Europe,” May
2, 1930
Then came the building of a cadre
of young Turks, that would faithfully serve as their army of true
believers. Over 36,000
NFC Operatives have been indoctrinated, and trained to
preach the party line; and demonize their perceived and manufactured
enemies on the left.
During the Barry Goldwater campaign, over 200 right wing groups were
formed on the college campuses, to serve as a Counterkulture
to their great enemy Liberalism.
Many of the Neo-Conservatives in positions of government power today
got their initial training in the extreme New
Right politics of that time, and at the NFC
Leadership Institute.
Then over a period of decades,
more than 80 ideological propaganda factories were founded and grew
in influence; permitting wide publication of their foreign and
perverted ideas, to their most extreme followers and Corporate
financial supporters. Their ideas gradually also began to take hold
among traditional-conservatives, and by the 1990s had become virtual
Gospel
for the Republican Party:
Annihilation
of “Demo-Liberalism:
“The
undeniable fact is that the actions and innovations undertaken by
both (Italy and German Fascist Sates) are taking place outside any
sort of Demo-Liberal conception of things, and that both have
annihilated Demo-Liberal forces” “There are no longer any
parties, but a single party. A sole (party) will silence dissenting
voices. This has nothing to do with any Demo-Liberal conception of
things”
Benito Mussolini, U.S. Journal of Universal
Service, August 22, 1933
These so called Non-Profit
spin factories
have been engaged in vomiting their venomous beliefs to the American
public to facilitate the conversion of public opinion to their
extreme far right version of conservatism; conducive to an
authoritarian state. Over the past 40 years, there has been a
phenomenal growth of these Hate
Speech Institutes, including; the Heritage Foundation, the
Federalist Society, the CATO Institute, the Hoover Institution, the
Free Congress Foundation, The Club For Growth, the American
Enterprise Institute, the Hudson Institute, the Rutherford Institute,
The Occidental Quarterly, Commentary, Policy Review, The American
Spectator, The New Republic, National Review, the Weekly Standard,
and the Fox Channel.
These groups have been bankrolled
to the tune of $400 Million annually by crank
neo-Conservatives, such as Billionaire Ruppert Murdock, the Olin
family, Joseph Coors, Harry and Lynne Bradley, Richard Mellon Scaife,
and many other Super-Wealthy individuals and Corporations; that have
provided seed money, support and a forum for the hyperbolic rhetoric
of this army of radical right wing propagandists.
“You
are some of our country's best brains, so good, that my government
employs around twenty of you.”
President George W. Bush
“The
president was addressing the American Enterprise Institute in
Washington DC. He was paying homage to a think tank that is one of
the bastions of the American Neo-conservative movement. He was
saluting a school of thought that has marked his presidency, avowing
everything he owes to an intellectual stream whose influence is now
predominant. He was also acknowledging the fact of being surrounded
by Neo-conservatives, and giving them credit for the vital role they
play in his political choices.
In Washington
DC, the Neoconservatives have woven their web. Creativity is on their
side. Throughout the years, they have marginalized intellectuals from
the Democratic center and centre-left to hold a preponderant place
where the ideas that dominate the political scene are forged. Among
their foray are reviews such as the National Review, Commentary, the
New Republic, headed for a time by the young 'Straussian' Andrew
Sullivan; the Weekly Standard, once under the ownership of the
Murdoch group, whose Fox News television network takes care of
broadcasting the vulgarized version of Neoconservative thought. Under
Robert Bartley's charge, the editorial pages of the Wall Street
Journal have also fallen into Neoconservatist activism without
qualms.
Their hunting
grounds are also the research institutes and think tanks such as the
Hudson Institute, the Heritage Foundation or the American Enterprise
Institute. Families play a role as well: Irving Kristol's son, the
very urbane William Kristol runs the Weekly Standard; one of Norman
Podhoretz's sons worked for the Reagan administration; the son of
Richard Pipes--a Polish Jew who emigrated to the US in 1939 to become
a Harvard University professor and one of the major critics of Soviet
communism…
The September
11, 2001 terrorist attacks confirmed their thesis on the
vulnerability of democracies faced with tyranny's diverse forms. From
the war on Iraq, the Neocons will be tempted to draw the conclusion
that toppling ‘evil’ regimes is possible and desirable…”
(quoted from an article published in Le Monde, March 20, 2003, by
Alain Frachon and Daniel Vernet, Translated for CounterPunch by
Norman Madarasz)
“The
wisdom of an idea will be possible the sooner, the more comprehensive
propaganda has prepared people as a whole and the more exclusive,
rigid, and firm the organization which carries out the fight in
practice.”
Adolf
Hitler, Mein Kampf
These front organizations are not
real Think Tanks housing academics devoted to promoting
intelligent debate for the public good. They are simply tax-sheltered
ideology echo chambers, and Neo-Conservative propaganda machines,
advocating the politics of; World Domination, Hyper-Patriotism,
Militarism, Nationalism, Authoritarianism, Totalitarianism, and
Anti-Liberalism, using the old emotional appeals of; fear,
defamation, selfishness, prejudice, demonization of opponents, the
de-legitimization of humanitarian services FOR the People, and
the promotion of Government and Corporate control and exploitation OF
the People.
Jewish—Liberal-Democratic-Marxist-Humanitarian
Mentality:
“I
must accuse him (Strasser) of coming out with far too many arguments
which in our camp are called ‘Socialist.’ It is the
Jewish-Liberal-Democratic-Marxist-Humanitarian mentality. As long as
there is even a single minute tendril which connects our programme
with this root then it is doomed to be poisoned and hence to wither
away to a miserable death.”
Adolf Hitler, December 1925
Prominent Radical Neo-Conservative
ideologists, writers, pundits, and assorted windbags such as; William
Kristol, Norman Podhoretz, Paul Weyrich, Richard Viguerie, Wesley
Pruden, Pat Buchanan, Grover Norquist, Bob Novak, Max Boot, David
Brooks, Charles Krauthammer, Robert Kagan, Daniel Pipes, David Frum,
Michael Ladeen, Tony Perkins, and Ann Coulter, have became the
standard bearers of this purely American version of radical
Neo-Conservatism.
Their philosophy can be summed up as opposing the freedoms of
American Liberal-Democracy;
and promoting the regression of society to the enslaving effects of a
political system consisting of; one-party,
one-leader, one-ideology, or in one word: Totalitarianism!
Only
Fascism Makes Sense:
“The
words Republic, Democracy, Radicalism, Liberalism, the word Socialism
itself, have no sense any longer; they will have one tomorrow, but it
will be the one given them by the millions of “those who
returned,’ and it could be something quite different.”
Benito Mussolini, “Trenchocracy” December 15, 1917
Ann Coulter, known as the Wicked Witch of the Right by
her critics, was typical of the postmodern Neo-Conservative
flamethrowers that enriched themselves by serving as hucksters of
ideological hatred. According to a May 2005 Time magazine story,
Coulter, (who, like so many of the Conservative politicians and
propagandists, who have never tasted suffering or hard times of any
type) is a controversial liability to any media program she appears
on.
She was dismissed by MSNBC twice for being blunt, rude, and just
completely over the top, according to Stephen Lewis, a former MSNBC
producer involved in Coulter’s hiring and firing. She was
actually quoted by Time, repeating Christian-Nationalist
doctrine (See Page 156):
“We
should invade their (Muslim) countries, kill their leaders, and
convert them to Christianity.”
and by the New York Observer opining that;
“I
think we ought to nuke North Korea right now just to give the rest of
the world a warning. Boom!…They’re a major threat. I just
think it would be fun to nuke them and have it be a warning
to…the
world”
Her irresponsible, intemperate and
inflammatory remarks, and sophomoric books about grave and unfounded
charges of treason by president Clinton, and her critiques of foreign
policy issues, about which she had as much knowledge as the average
valley girl; sold to all of the true believers, in her Neanderthal
fan club. She is nevertheless, lionized for her extreme views by the
Neo-Conservative
Republicans.
These and many other paid journalistic hit men, have
engaged in a continuous pollution of the American print and
electronic media. Their steady stream of; undemocratic, racist,
moralist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic (anti-immigrant), and
militarist, right wing political pornography, has attracted the most
base pathological followers in American society.
Social
Democracy and Liberalism-Arch Enemies of Fascism:
“It
is of deep symbolic significance that the foundation of the Second
Reich took place in Versailles… Not only was the Arch-enemy
conquered, but with it the disorder spreading out since 1789 from
France as the well-spring of European anarchy…In terms of
domestic politics the victory of 1871 was a victory over the
destructive tendencies of the forces of Social Democracy and
Liberalism...”
Christoph Steding, “The Reich and the
Sickness of Europe”, Opus funded by a Rockefeller Grant,
impressed Reinhard Heydrich and Heinrich Himmler; provided a
rationale for the destruction of the representatives of Liberal
Democracy (Jews)
Exploiting
Mass Communications Technology
At the time of the rise of the
original Fascists mass communications was in its infancy. The novel
technology of Radio became the favorite bullhorn for promoting the
Fascist ideology throughout Europe, and throughout the world. In the
past 30 years the American Neo-Fascist
Conservatives have rediscovered and exploited the radio
bullhorn again; as the age of Political Talk Radio became a major
influence on the political stage. Modern day Radical Neo-Conservative
Propagandists are everywhere saturating the nation, using
ideologically controlled radio and television networks, and every
other possible means of mass communications including; the old
standbys of political rallies, the mails, newspapers, magazines, and
the emerging powerful medium of the Internet. Their allies in the
Christian-Nationalist movement have contributed mass
politico-religious assemblies in Big
Box political Churches capturing millions of
unsuspecting followers.
They
advocate an end to; Political
Correctness but would substitute the suffocating embrace
of Political
Righteousness.
A motor-mouth brigade of hate
filled purveyors of white hot combustible polemics, such as
Talk-radio and television agitators; Rush Limbaugh, Bill
O’Reilly,
Ollie North, Joe Scarborough, Sean Hannity, and Michael Savage; and
intolerant televangelists and bigots like; Jerry Falwell, Pat
Robertson, D. James Kennedy, Donald Wildmon, Martin Mawyer, Alan
Sears, Tim and Beverly LaHaye, Phyllis Schlafly, Tony Perkins, Paul
Cameron, David Noebel, Lou Sheldon, James Dobson, Gary Bauer, and
Ralph Reed, have become the vitriolic chorus of right wing
Cristo-Fascist
extremism, previously found only in fringe groups like
the pseudo-Christian Ku-Klux-Klan, the Christian Aryan Nations White
Supremacist movement, the Army of God, the Liberty Lobby, and of
course, the NAZI agitators of 1930s Germany.
Explanation
of Neo-Conservative Religious Fanaticism:
“The
greatness of every mighty organization embodying an idea in this
world, lies in the religious fanaticism and intolerance with which ,
fanatically convinced of its own right , it intolerantly imposes its
will against all others.”
Adolph
Hitler, Mein Kampf
Taking up where the original
Fascists left off, these perpetually angry, electronic rabble
rousers, in particular; have for decades, been reviling and
demonizing Liberal Democracy and their Liberal
political enemies. Their ideology has been polluting the hearts and
minds of the American people with a constant stream of repellent,
intolerant, self-righteous, and humorless moral absolutism, amounting
to an American version of a never ending beer garden rally, for a
growing army of loyal Brownshirts.
Victory
over the “Demo-Liberal” Regime:
“…The
political regime preceding ours, the Demo-Liberale (Liberal
Democratic) regime, ignored the masses. Later it no longer ignored
them, but abandoned them to the mercies of others who whipped them up
against the State”
Benito Mussolini, November 4,
1925
Every day the corrosive commentary of these true
believers; causes the political schism to grow wider, and more
dangerous to the internal security, Liberty and Democracy of the
American people; and the peace and stability of the world.
Overcoming
the Enlightenment, Liberalism and Democracy:
“Fascism
draws its best energies from…the rejection of
Liberalism…Even
the longing to overcome the Enlightenment and thereby both Liberalism
and Democracy is something encountered throughout the whole of the
West, if not the whole ‘civilized world’…European
Liberalism senses the danger that this represents for it, and it is
only right in being on the defensive…”
Johann
W. Mannhardt, German Social Scientist, Munich 1925
By the 1990s, they had became the
virulent vanguard of a new aggressive, revolutionary Neo-Conservative
Republican Ideology, that paralyzed the
government and the country for eight years; over outrageous
allegations of wrongdoing, and finally, the sexual indiscretions and
harmless lies of President William J. Clinton. The day after Clinton
was elected, billboards and signs demanding his impeachment, due to
everything from immorality to murder, went up all over
Neo-Conservative country, with the inflammatory encouragement of
these Goebbels type protégés.
The
Neo-Conservative Revolution—Neo-Fascism in Poor Disguise:
“The
conjunction of a cycle vision of history and belief in the permanence
of the ‘core’ of true values is the basis of the faith in
a ‘conservative dynamic’ and gives the
Neo-Conservative confidence that his values will eventually
re-emerge within all regimes to triumph over the disorder they
engender. ..If our Theory is correct it means that the study of the
problem of modernity is the key to understanding the ‘Conservative
Revolution’ and by cautious extension, what is rightly or
wrongly, generally defined as Fascism.”
Louis
Dupeux, Published in “Diorama Letterio,” one of
Italy’s
most prominent “New Right” publications associated with
the Neo-Fascist MSI Party
Like their Fascist forefathers, who were also poor
losers, they saw no evil in trying to overturn the government;
destabilize and paralyze the country; and veto the will of the
voters, twice confirmed, over the essentially harmless lies told by a
President about his sexual indiscretions.
Their tolerance for lies of
greater moment, such as those of an unjustified War, the wasteful
deaths of our precious troops, and countless innocent Iraqi men,
women, children, and infants; was infinitely more forgiving, when
told by a phony Born
Again
Neo-Conservative Republican President.
Failing to achieve their aims through the political
process and the courts, the most violent of their energized extremist
followers have frequently resorted to force or terrorism.
After of
the Fascist Murder of Giacomo Matteotti, Socialist Reformer:
“Italy,
gentlemen, wants peace, wants calm, wants a stability which allows
work to continue. This calm, this stability, we will give her with
love, and, if necessary, with force”
Benito Mussolini,
January 3, 1925
This had happened before, in
Europe in the 1920s and 1930s, and has been a routine feature of the
most dangerous American far right wing conservative and religious
hooligans; including e.g. Neo-Nazi groups such as; the
National Alliance and
the National Vanguard
which in October 2005, hosted dozens of Skinhead Gangs from eight
states at a summit in Ohio called the “Blood
and Honor Council” ; the cases of confessed
Conservative
Christian-Nationalist Terrorist, Eric
Rudolph; who committed the Atlanta Olympics bombing,
and several bombing attacks on abortion clinics; the Oklahoma City
bombing by Christian
White Supremacy Turner
Diaries devotee, and mass murderer, Timothy
McVeigh; Matt
Hale, the so called Pontifex
Maximus (Chief Priest) of the “Creativity
Movement” once known as the World
Church of the Creator, who was convicted in 2004, of
soliciting the murder of Federal Judge Joan Humphrey Lefkow; and the
Christian right’s unending campaign of Hate rhetoric against
homosexuals; which directly caused the murder of gay college student
Matthew Shepard, savagely beaten and left to die, tied to a fence in
Wyoming.
During the McVeigh
trial it was learned that McVeigh
and his partner, Terry
Nichols, were associated with, and had attended meetings
at the Elohim City terrorist training camp, where extreme right wing
Neo-Nazi White
Supremacy and Christian
Identity groups; such as Aryan
Republican Army, and the Neo-Nazi
Skinheads trained for terrorist attacks. Investigation
revealed that a young woman who had attended the Elohim training camp
had given the FBI and the ATF prior warning about the activities of
these right wing hate groups, and their plans to bomb the Federal
Building in Oklahoma City; but no action was taken then, and none has
ever been taken against these groups.
The FBI deliberately stopped all
investigations to locate other conspirators. Prior to McVeigh’s
execution, it was revealed that the bureau had withheld 4,000
documents from the defense. What were they protecting?
Neo-Fascism
in the U.S.
“Liberalism
had taken its toll in Europe, just as in America, and the Old Order
in most places, was a rotted out shell with only a surface semblance
of strength…The takeover came in a great Europe wide
rush…as a cleansing of change swept over the continent, clearing away in a
few months the refuse of a millennium or more of alien ideology and a
century or more of profound moral and material decadence. The blood
flowed ankle deep in the streets of many of Europe’s great
cities…”
William Pierce, author, The Turner Diaries,
the Mein Kampf of Universal National Socialism, inspired; the ‘Order’
a Neo-Nazi terrorist group that stole $4 million and killed two
people in 1983, one of them Alan Berg, a Jewish Talk Show host, and
the Oklahoma City bombers, Washington, DC, 1980
In July 2005, confessed killer
Rudolph,
was sentenced to life imprisonment after he had plead guilty to
having bombed an abortion clinic in Birmingham, Alabama. The new
York Times reported that Rudolph stood before the judge in a red jail
uniform and with shackles around his ankles, jabbed at the air and
spoke in a deep, firm voice as he compared legalized abortion to
primitive rituals of killing newborns.
“Abortion
on demand is a return to the ancient practice of infanticide.”
Eric
Rudolph.
Rudolph
said that the death of the Birmingham police officer and the grave
injuries suffered by the nurse were justified because both worked at
an abortion clinic. Abortion, he said, must be fought with "deadly
force."
Rudolph
also received life sentences in Atlanta for the 1996 Olympics bombing
that killed one woman and injured more than 100, as well as 1997
bombings at an abortion clinic and a gay bar in Atlanta. In
sentencing Rudolph to life in the federal government's Supermax
prison in Colorado, the judge compared Rudolph
to the killers of Nazi Germany and the Ku Klux Klansmen who bombed a
Birmingham church a few blocks from the courthouse, in 1963, killing
four black girls.
In the Judge’s words;
“Rudolph;
in the name of Faith; Hated enough; to
kill without remorse”.
Rudolph was simply acting out the hate filled rhetoric of the Radical
Neo-Conservative Demagogues and their
Christian-Nationalist
Crusaders.
In August 2005, NARAL-Pro-Choice
held a press conference, in Washington, DC, to raise serious
questions about the suitability of Bush Supreme Court nominee John
Roberts, by pointing out that in 1991, he had filed an Amicus Brief
with the Supreme Court, on behalf of abortion clinic ‘bombers”,
and had contributed to Bush senior Justice Department efforts to lift
injunctions against Operation
Rescue, an extreme Anti-Choice group, who used
bombings and other forms of intimidation against women, doctors, and
nurses at women’s health clinics. This Ad was criticized
because it amounted to guilt by association, very much like
traditional Conservative Republican attack Ads.
This caused a big flap, when it
was established that Roberts, while he was a Deputy Solicitor General
in the Holy Reagan
Empire, had actually filed the brief on behalf of abortion
clinic protestors. The Doctors, Nurses, and patients, who were
subjected to this organized harassment, can be excused for not seeing
the technical difference. In the previous four years, groups like
Operation Rescue
and the fanatical Army of God, had
been responsible for at least 48 bombings and
arsons in 24 states, 57 Acid attacks on clinic workers, and more
than 4,000 other acts of violence against clinic workers.
As a result of these unfair
charges, and fearful of hurting anyone’s
feelings, or poisoning the debate, the weak kneed Democratic
Leadership complained, and NARAL pulled the Ad.
The public had a right to know
what Roberts views were on a women’s basic right to choose, and
a host of other Civil and Human rights issues. The Bush Jr. regime
continued to withhold the release of all documents from Robert’s
time in the Solicitor General’s Office from 1989 to 1993, and
his closed mouth testimony at his confirmation hearings gave no
indication of his politics or his ideology. With no evidence to
disqualify him; the former clerk to Justice Rehnquist was the perfect
Stealth Candidate.
The
Corrupting Corporate Kingmakers
“Behind
the ostensible government sits enthroned an invisible government
owing no allegiance and acknowledging no responsibility to the
people.”
Theodore
Roosevelt
The Radical Conservative
propagandists were eagerly joined by two other legs of the unholy
Trinity. The second leg, was the army of the so-called K
Street Project lobbyists (Bagmen)
of the Corporate Oligarchy, financed by such theoretically
respectable groups as; the US Chamber of Commerce, the National
Association of Manufacturers, and the Business Roundtable. These
surrogates for their Multi-national Mega-corporate Robber Baron
Godfathers, have poured hundreds of millions of dollars into; the
Republican party coffers, Conservative think tanks, Far Right
publications, and media outlets, such as the Fox News Network, the
Heritage Foundation, the American Enterprise Institute, the American
Spectator, and the Washington Times* In their campaign to weaken
government regulation of business, environmental safeguards, and
corporate liability. These propaganda factories have been
instrumental in distorting the public debate and persuading the
common man that what is good for the Corporate Godfathers is good for
America.
*(The Times is a right wing rag, reportedly owned by Sun
Myung Moon’s Unification Church. Moon, reported to be the
former head of the South Korean CIA, is a favorite of the
Neo-Conservative Republicans. The leader of the Moonies has
proclaimed himself the Savior, Messiah, and King of all Humanity!)
So much
for the Republican Party’s Christian credentials!
The morally bankrupt manipulators of the corporate
world, by now, were unashamedly bankrolling all Republican propaganda
and political campaigns, with bribes, the Republican Party
mother’s
milk; in return for policy and financial kickbacks from the
sympathetic leaders of the ruling party (and some Democrats) that
would normally result in long jail terms for rank and file government
employees.
“For
the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil, for which some have
strayed from the faith in their greediness, and pierced themselves
through with many sorrows.”
The
King James Bible, Paul the Evangelist, 1 Timothy 6:10
Indians
are Idiots and Troglodytes
The Senate Indian Affairs
Committee released hundreds of e-mails between Republican lobbyist
Jack Abramoff and others, in which he refers to his Indian clients as
“Idiots”
and “Troglodytes.”
“Our
standing with the new administration promises to be solid as several
friends...will soon be taking high-ranking positions in the
Administration.”
Jack Abramoff
By mid 2005, the most infamous of
these payola
lobbyists, Washington Super-lobbyist Jack Abramoff, a
so-called elite Pioneer
fundraiser for the Bush presidential campaign, and close ally of
President Bush, and other NFC
luminaries such as Tom
DeLay of Texas, and Rick
Santorum of Pennsylvania; was being investigated by a
federal multi-agency task force, two Senate Committees, the IRS, the
Interior Department, and the FBI; concerning corrupt activities while
lobbying on behalf of Native American casinos, and influence peddling
with the congress.
“Jack
Abramoff is one of my closest and dearest friends.”
Tom
DeLay (R) of Texas, Indicted for State Campaign Law Violations in
Texas
Abramoff "began his rise in
Republican power circles in the 1980's, when he was chairman of the
College Republicans National Committee. In 1994, when the Republicans
reclaimed the House after 40 years, Mr. Abramoff rose to power with
them. Abramoff was perhaps Washington's most aggressive, and, at $750
an hour, most highly compensated Pay-For-Play
deal maker, a flamboyant man who moved fluidly through the nexus of
money and power. His primary clients were casino-rich Indian tribes,
from whom he collected nearly $82
million in lobbying fees. To secure the assistance of
public officials, Abramoff showered them with lavish golfing trips,
complimentary meals at his fancy restaurant “Signatures”,
and lucrative skybox tickets to Washington sporting events.
Abramoff has been accused of
bilking the Indian tribes of more than $66 million,
and providing gifts worth tens of thousands of dollars, in illegal
travel expenses, to leading Republicans, including a 2002 golf trip,
paid for by Abramoff, which included Abramoff,
David Safavian (who was Chief of Staff in the General
Services Administration at the time), Ralph
Reed, former Christian Coalition Executive Director,
and Bush campaign official, who is now running for Lt. Governor of
Georgia, and Republican Congressman Robert
Ney of Ohio. A similar golf trip in 2002, partially
paid for by Abramoff, included Tom
DeLay, the powerful Republican majority leader
currently indicted for campaign finance crimes.
The
Indian tribe payoffs to Abramoff and other NFC bagmen were reported
to have been effected through a series of money laundering schemes,
involving the National
Center for Public Policy Research, a Conservative
Nonprofit Foundation, on whose Board Abramoff sat; by the Heritage
Foundation, another Conservative Think Tank, called;
Americans for Tax
Reform; and by Belle
Haven Consultants, an agent of the government of
Malaysia.
“What
sets this tale apart, what makes it truly extraordinary, is the
extent and degree of the apparent exploitation and deceit.”
Senator
John McCain (R) Arizona
According to news reports,
Neo-Conservative Republican activists and pals Grover
Norquist and Ralph
Reed, with close ties to the White House, got $1.1
Million in 1999 from the Choctaw Indians, one of Abramoff’s top
clients. Abramoff and Reed, then sent $850,000.of the
funds to religious conservative groups in Alabama fighting
pro-gambling efforts. In typical CNF
hypocritical chicanery, Reed, a public opponent
of gambling, had used gambling money to stop gambling, while
pocketing a tidy $250,000 for his efforts.
In another revelation involving
these Republican Bagmen; on Jan. 9, 2005, Chairman Poncho, a Chief of
the Casino rich Louisiana Coushatta tribe, admitted that he had
attended a meeting in May 2001, with (the Great White Father), the
junior Bush,
arranged by the same lobbyists. To block the gambling licenses of
other tribes, these lobbyists had received $2.5 million
in “Contributions” from Poncho and the leaders of these
other Indian tribes for their Non-Profit Corporation, the
Conservative Special Interest group called; Americans
For Tax Reform. The group was founded by Grover
Norquist, a prominent Arch-Conservative ideologue.
The New York Times reported that
Abramoff who was involved in the ethics complaints facing Texas
Representative Tom
DeLay, was indicted in Florida on August 11, 2005, on
unrelated fraud charges involving his purchase of a fleet of gambling
boats from a businessman who was slain amid bitter wrangling over the
sale. The indictment by a federal grand jury in Fort Lauderdale,
charged Mr.
Abramoff and a business partner with conspiracy and
wire fraud in the $147.5 million purchase of the
shipping line, SunCruz Casinos, in 2000.
They are accused of presenting
lenders with a counterfeit document suggesting that they had arranged
a $23 million wire transfer to the seller.
The October 2005 edition of
Newsweek reported that David
Safavian, former Bush administration political
appointee, and partner of Abramoff was arrested on September 19,
2005, in connection with the continuing investigation of fraud and
corruption in the use of political donations.
On October 6, 2005, the Justice
Department officially announced a five-count indictment against
Safavian, a former White House chief procurement officer. Safavian is
accused of lying and obstructing investigations into his 2002 golf
outing to Scotland with Abramoff, and of making similarly false
statements to the Senate and executive branch investigators about his
relationship with the lobbyist. Safavian remains the focus of a
lengthy investigation by a task force led by prosecutors at the
Justice Department and including investigators at the Internal
Revenue Service, the Interior Department and General Services
Administration." Also reportedly involved is Ohio Rep.
Republican Robert
Ney, Chairman of the House Administration Committee,
who is named as "Representative #1" in Michael
Scanlon's indictment, reportedly accepted a $100,000.
trip to Scotland to play golf in return for backing legislation to
help one of Abramoff’s clients. In November 2005, Steven
Griles, a former Interior Department Deputy was called
to testify to the Senate Indian Affairs Committee on allegations that
Abramoff had improperly influenced his work. It has also been alleged
that Sen. Conrad
Burns (R-MT) helped the Saginaw Chippewa Tribe of
Michigan, one of Abramoff's clients, win a $3 million
government award.
“The
administration of government, like a guardianship ought to be
directed to the good of those who confer, not of those who receive
the trust.”
Marcus Tullius Cicero
On September 28, 2005, Fort
Lauderdale police charged three men with the 2001 murder of
Konstantinos "Gus" Boulis, described as a "gang-land
hit," months after Boulis sold SunCruz Casinos for $147.5
million to lobbyist Jack
Abramoff and his partner Adam
Kidan. It was reported that two of the three men were
hired as consultants by Kidan, but no documents have been found
citing the consulting services provided. The murder of Boulis came
after bitter legal fighting over the SunCruz deal; at one point,
Kidan accused Boulis of attacking him with a pen. Abramoff and Kidan
were indicted the previous month by a federal grand jury on five
counts of wire fraud and one count of conspiracy related to the
purchase.
The media speculated that the
indictment would provide the Justice Department with leverage in
pressing Mr. Abramoff to cooperate in a separate grand jury
investigation, focused on his multimillion-dollar lobbying contracts
with the gambling operations of Indian tribes. There have also been
charges that the funds involved in the gambling ship operation may
have found their way into the NFC
Republican campaigns!
By October 2005, these
investigations had resulted in bank fraud charges against Abramoff,
and obstruction of justice charges against David
Safavian.
Safavian,
a former associate of Abramoff (in the same lobbying firm), became
the first government official charged in the wide ranging corruption
investigation. Safavian, a former Bush regime Procurement official,
is accused of making repeated false statements to government
officials and investigators, about the congressional golf trip with
Abramoff in 2002, and of concealing his efforts to help Abramoff
acquire federal government property in Washington, DC.
Abramoff is also accused of
playing a role with Bush White House Chief of Staff, Karl
Rove, in the demotion of a federal prosecutor in Guam,
in 2002; after the prosecutor started investigating a lobbying deal
between Abramoff and Guam Court officials. Karl
Rove and Bush
himself are thought to have been involved in this abuse of power for
corrupt purposes.
This suspect list was listed in the media coverage;
Rep
Tom DeLay (R) Texas…Already Under State Indictment
for Campaign Violations, He and his staff connected to Abramoff
corruption, including; Tony
Rudy, Ed Buckham, Michael Scanlon……………Former
DeLay Press Secy, Partner with Abramoff, took $82 million from
12 American Indian Tribes from 2001-2003, has refused to testify.
David
Safavian………… Arrested
September 19, 2005, Five Count Indictment October 6, 2005
Rep.
Bob Ney (R)………….Subpoenaed by
Federal Grand Jury re Kickbacks from Abramoff
Ralph
Reed (R)………………….Former
Executive Director, Christian Coalition; Candidate for Georgia Lt.
Governor; paid by a Louisiana tribe, to rally Christian opposition
against competing tribal casinos.
Grover
Norquist……………..President
of the Anti-Tax group “Americans
for Tax Reform” Subpoenaed to testify re. money
laundering for Abramoff.
Adam
Kidan………………….Disbarred
lawyer, partner of Abramoff to buy SunCruz Casino, a Fla, gambling
empire from Gus Boulis. Boulis murdered. Kidan indicted with Abramoff
on charges of mail and wire fraud in the $147 million
deal.
Anthony
Moscatiello…………Charged with
conspiracy to murder Boulis, Friend of Kidan, paid $145,000 by
Kidan and Abramoff for unknown services!
Also under scrutiny were:
Sen.
Conrad Burns (R) Montana, who received $150,000 from
Abramoff
Rep. John
Little (R) California, whose wife and former asst. have worked
for Abramoff.
Steven
Griles, Bush Deputy Interior Secretary, who assisted Abramoff
with his tribal lobbying efforts.
Dennis
Hastert, (R)
Speaker of the House; who was a top recipient of Abramoff
cash. ($67,000)
By November 2005, 35 year old
Scanlon, a former DeLay congressional
staffer who became a top partner to Abramoff; pleaded guilty to
conspiring to bribe a congressman and other public officials and
agreed to pay back more than $19.7 million he
fraudulently charged Indian tribal clients.
The plea agreement between
prosecutors and Scanlon provided fresh detail about the alleged
bribes. The document also indicated the nature of testimony Scanlon
is prepared to offer against a congressman it calls "Representative
#1" who has been identified by attorneys in the case as Rep.
Robert W. Ney (R)Ohio).
By late December, 2005, Abramoff
had also agreed to plead guilty to three felony counts
setting the stage for the biggest congressional scandal in decades,
and since the Republicans took over Congress 10 years ago, pledging
clean government.
In exchange for his guilty pleas, in both the Washington
case and a separate Florida case in which he was indicted last year,
Mr. Abramoff agreed to cooperate with federal prosecutors
investigating members of Congress, Capitol Hill aides, and other
lobbyists. Political players with ties to Abramoff and his network,
who knew the lobbyist was preparing to cut a deal, have been sweating
for months.
Investigators are looking at half
a dozen members of Congress, current and former senior
Hill aides, a former deputy secretary of the Interior, and Abramoff's
former lobbying colleagues, according to sources familiar with the
probe who spoke on the condition of anonymity. Because of their
central role in much of the criminal activity, Abramoff
and Scanlon will be key witnesses in the trials that will
arise from the case later in 2006.
The plea agreement lists gifts Ney
was offered or received, including a golf trip to Scotland in 2002,
$4,000 to his campaign committee, $10,000
to the National Republican Campaign Committee made with credit to
Ney,
regular meals and drinks at Abramoff's
“Signatures” restaurant, sports tickets, and frequent
golf and related expenses at courses in the Washington area.
The document states that the gifts
were "in
exchange for a series of official acts."
These included providing legislation, agreeing to put
statements into the Congressional Record, contacting federal
officials to influence decisions, meeting with Abramoff's clients and
endorsing a wireless telecommunications company that wanted to
install antennas in House office buildings.
According to the plea agreement,
Ney made the Congressional Record statements in support of Abramoff's
efforts to buy a fleet of Florida casino ships "calculated
to pressure the then-owner to sell on terms favorable to Lobbyist
Abramoff and his partners."
Another all-expenses-paid trip
mentioned in the documents was a 2000 visit to the Commonwealth of
the Northern Mariana Islands, an Abramoff client. A source with
knowledge of the trip said that senior
members of Ney's and DeLay's staff went along.
Bush
Deeply Involved With Abramoff
In 2003, Abramoff
asked for and received $9 million from the president
of Gabon to secure a meeting with President Bush. In May 2004,
Gabon's President then met with Bush.
In 2002, Abramoff
was the target of a grand jury investigation in Guam. On
November 18, 2002, U.S. Atty. Frederick A. Black issued a grand jury
subpoena seeking records involving a highly unusual contract between
Abramoff
and the Superior Court in Guam. Apparently, Superior Court officials
in Guam paid Abramoff
over $324,000
-- funneled through a Laguna Beach attorney Howard Hills; to lobby
against a bill in Congress that gave the Guam Supreme Court authority
over the Superior Court. The Los Angeles Times reported in August
2005, that the day after Black issued the subpoena;
"President
Bush removed the supervising federal prosecutor [Black] and the
inquiry ended soon after.” Black had "served as acting
U.S. attorney for Guam and the Northern Mariana islands since 1991."
He was replaced by Leonardo Rapadas, the man that the
Guam Republican Party recommended to Karl Rove be given the job.
The White House has refused to
reveal exactly who Jack
Abramoff met with in the White House during his more than
200 contacts in the
first ten months of the Bush administration.
Abramoff
and his political insider friends at the top of the NFC
Republican money machine were all big players in the
Conservative
Revolution that took over Congress, the White House,
and the lobbying industry, claiming they were dedicated to ethics and
honesty in Government, They are now becoming the Republican
Party’s
biggest ethics nightmare.
Coins of
the Realm in Ohio
In another Ohio scandal, Tom
Noe, a gregarious businessman and Republican Party
leader in northwest Ohio, had been entrusted with $50 million
in state money to invest in rare coins, with the bad idea of winning
fat returns for the workers' compensation fund. Gov.
Bob Taft (R), heir to the state's most famous
Republican party political names, pleaded no contest in August to
accepting secret freebies from Noe and others, and was fined $4,000.
Members of his staff admitted borrowing money from Noe or
using his Florida Keys vacation home. Millions
in state funds proved to be missing from Noe's accounts!
As Republicans raced to distance
themselves from Noe, a federal grand jury in Toledo indicted him last
month on charges that he illegally funneled $45,400 in
campaign contributions to President
Bush's reelection campaign. Prosecutors said he
circumvented the $2,000 limit on individual
contributions by getting 24 friends and associates to make the
contributions, and reimbursing them.
The
Texas Hammer got Nailed
In another high profile corruption
investigation, the Austin American-Statesman reported on Wednesday,
September 28, 2005, that a Travis County grand jury had indicted
Majority leader DeLay
on one count of criminal conspiracy, in an elaborate scheme to
launder corporate contributions by corporate donors, to state
campaigns in Texas, through the Republican Party National Committee.
DeLay attorney Steve Brittain,
said DeLay
was accused of a criminal conspiracy along with two associates,
John Colyandro,
former executive director of a Texas political action committee,
formed by DeLay, and Jim
Ellis, who heads DeLay's national political committee.
The indictment forced the prominent Bush ally to give up his
leadership post in Congress.
“I
have notified (House Speaker Dennis Hastert) that I will temporarily
step aside from my position as majority leader pursuant to rules of
the House Republican Conference and the actions of the Travis County
district attorney today.”
Rep. Tom DeLay (R) TX
DeLay
vehemently accused the Travis county Prosecutor of a political
prosecution; but within a few days an entirely new Grand jury
indicted DeLay
on two additional more serious charges of conspiracy and
money laundering. DeLay
and his hired fans released an unprecedented personal attack on the
prosecutor, in television commercials released the day after he was
indicted for the second time.
In a cascading series of
corruption revelations, within one day after he was selected to
replace DeLay as
the Republican House Majority leader, it was revealed that Republican
Congressman Roy Blount had paid $94,000.in
fees, since 2003, to James
Ellis, one of the political consultants that were
indicted along with Delay!
The DeLay
charges, both state law jail felonies, punishable by up to two
years incarceration, stem from DeLay’s political action
committee, Texans
for a Republican Majority (TRMPAC), a
now-defunct organization, that already had been indicted on charges
of illegally using corporate money during the 2002 legislative
elections.
Texas State law generally bars corporate money from
campaign-related activity.
The indictments were another stark
reminder that Republicans have constructed a lucrative
money-for-influence sleaze machine that will do anything, including
breaking the law, to funnel corporate and special interest money into
their party in huge amounts. DeLay
challenged the Judge and the venue in his case, and was able to get a
new Judge and a change of venue to friendly Fort Bend County; where
the prosecutors will have a hard time persuading the jury to convict
their favorite son.
On December 5, 2005, Texas State
Judge, Pat Priest of San Antonio dismissed charges of conspiracy to
violate the Texas Election code by Tom DeLay and his co-defendants,
but left standing charges of money laundering and conspiracy to
launder money against all three, but the Prosecutor has appealed this
decision. The decision could have expedited the trial for Mr.
DeLay and his co-defendants, the Republican
fund-raisers John
D. Colyandro and James W. Ellis;
perhaps as soon as January, on felony charges that carry long
prison terms and fines. Now the trial will slip to later in 2006,
killing DeLay’s chances of retaking his Majority Leader
position, had he been found innocent. The charges involve $190,000
that the state says was collected from corporate donors in 2002 and,
in violation of Texas election and money laundering laws, routed
through Republican political action committees to seven Republicans
running for the Texas House.
DeLay’s
outlaw antics continued to plague him and the NFC
Republicans. On December 13, 2005 the Supreme Court
agreed to consider the legality of the 2003 Texas Congressional
redistricting plan, which was engineered by then-House Majority
Leader DeLay,
and which helped cement NFC
control of the House. The court will hear challenges from Democrats
and minority groups who say that the mid-decade redistricting
unlawfully diluted the strength of minority voters, injected undue
partisanship into the congressional map and violated the concept of
one person, one vote by drawing district lines with outdated census
data.
The
Wrong Stuff by the Top Gun
Rep.
Randy "Duke" Cunningham (R)Calif.)
resigned from Congress on November 28, 2005, after confessing to
evading more than $1 Million in taxes and conspiring to
pocket $2.4 million in bribes, including a Rolls-Royce,
a yacht and a 19th-century Louis-Philippe commode. The money involved
makes Cunningham's the largest bribery case since several members of
Congress were convicted of the crime in the early 1980s.
Prosecutors said Cunningham,
an eight-term House member, "demanded,
sought and received" illicit payments in
the form of cash, home payments, furnishings, cars and vacations from
four co-conspirators, including two defense contractors, over
the past five years. This cost his Office and a meritorious prison term.
The Justice Department inquiry into Abramoff's
activities has been broadened to include at least half a dozen
lawmakers. Scanlon and Cunningham have agreed to cooperate with
federal prosecutors as their investigations continue.
The
Neo-Conservative Republican controlled DOJ has reorganized and is
expected to attempt to kill any federal investigation that gets too
close to the Republican National committee or the White House, and no
action will be taken by the Neo-Conservative Republican controlled
Congress, until after the 2008 elections.
The objectives of these Bagmen
lobbyists is clearly to bribe the members of Congress with campaign
contributions, in order to subvert the public good and secure biased
regulations and legislation that promote the special Vested
Interests of Super-rich individuals and powerful
Corporations.
“And
you shall take no bribe, for a bribe blinds the discerning and
perverts the words of the righteous.”
Exodus
23:8
Culture
of Corruption:
“We
must usher in a new era of integrity in corporate America.”
President
G.W. Bush Jr. July 9, 2002
The Republicans campaign on restoring ethics to
government, but since they have gained majority power, it is clear
that all ethics have been abandoned. Offenses range from high level
conspiracy to low level criminal graft.
For example, in August 2005,
Ohio’s Republican
Governor Bob Taft became the first sitting
governor of Ohio to face criminal charges; the charges stem from 52
gifts, paid for by lobbyists and others; that he failed to
disclose. Taft has the lowest approval rating (17 percent) of any
governor in the nation.
In August 2005, the watchdog
group, Public Citizen, issued a report titled “Congressional
Revolving Doors- The Journey from Congress to K Street”
This report reveals that 43%
of lawmakers who have left congress since 1998 have become
lobbyists! Lobbying has now become the top second career choice for
departing members of Congress, whose access to the Capitol allow them
to cash in big on influence peddling with their former colleagues.
DeLay was credited with inventing the so-called “K-Street
Project’ by which lobbying firms were required to hire
former Republican members of Congress and political allies of the
ruling majority, if they expected to get access to the Republican
decision makers. The lobbying profession then grew like topsy.
Between 1998 and 2004, the Washington lobbying industry nearly
doubled its spending from $1.42
BILLION to $2.1 BILLION!
Neo-Conservative
Republicans are currently leading the pack of Corporate
Bag-Men, but some Democrats are just as guilty of selling out the
public trust.
It should by now be painfully obvious to even the most
naive and gullible American, that these investments in political
corruption are being handsomely rewarded with a raft of anti-labor,
anti-middle class, anti-environment, and anti-consumer legislation.
They
have taken the term “Quid Pro Quo”, to a new low
meaning.
Examples of Legislation for Corporate sponsored
kickbacks include:
-the
redefinition and curtailment of overtime pay
-the virtual
elimination of income taxes on corporations (down from 30% of total
taxes paid to 9%)
-a measure to provide $75 Billion in kickbacks
to the pharmaceutical industry,
-a new law preventing class action
lawsuits
-a new individual bankruptcy nullification act
-a
campaign to overturn an agreement to settle claims of asbestos
victims
-laws increasing water and air pollution
-a law opening
all 155 National forests to logging
-a law allowing treatment
plants to dump virtually untreated sewage into the nation’s
waterways
-a law increasing the allowable levels of dangerous
Mercury pollution from coal power plants
-the Medical Liability
Shield Act, which will place unfair limits on damages that can be
recovered by the patients who are most seriously harmed by negligent
doctors, nursing home operators, pharmaceutical companies and HMOs
–
some of the biggest donors to congressional campaigns.
-efforts to
dismantle Social Security, using Ponzi type
privatization schemes -legitimizing and subsidizing the outsourcing
of millions of American middle class manufacturing and technical jobs
overseas
- a new law shielding gun manufacturers from civil
liability lawsuits
-a frozen low minimum wage that guarantees
poverty
-huge tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans, in the
midst of a shooting war, and the biggest deficits in history.
When Newt Gingrich, and his ethics
police, took over the U.S. House, they criticized the Democratic
leadership for their corrupt method of running the House Bank. Some
not so wealthy Democrats had been regularly overdrawing their
checking accounts, based on the allotment of their paychecks to the
bank. This is a practice which has become common to banking all over
the country, as the overdraw becomes a loan against future deposits;
but the Arch-Conservative Gingrich Republicans cried unethical,
and the Democrats were shamed into doing penance—but none were
ever prosecuted for criminal violations.
The
Neo-Conservative Political Base
Bush and his Neo-Conservative
Republicans have completely abandoned middle class
Americans and unashamedly proclaimed their allegiance, as the
handmaidens of the Super-rich and the powerful Mega-Corporate elites:
“This
is an impressive crowd, some people call you the ‘Haves’
and the ‘Have Mores,’ some people call you ‘the
elite’…I call you my base”
President
George W. Bush, Fahrenheit 911
Since the Neo-Conservative
Republicans have taken over the White House and both
Houses of Congress, we have witnessed an unparalleled Gomorrah
of Corruption of public policy, worse
than any in the history of the country. Instead of Equality of
Opportunity there has been a blatant rape of the public treasury by
the “have
more” Equal Opportunists of Crony capitalism.
Orwell’s famous phrase that forever exposes and
deflates the conservative demagogues pseudo-populist claptrap about
equality, seems prophetic;
The
Seven Commandments of Animalism; (#7)
“All
Animals Are Equal, But Some Animals Are More Equal Than Others”
George Orwell, “Animal Farm”, 1946
Owing Your Soul to the Company Store
None of the sellouts are more
destructive to the commonwealth of the American people than that of
the sellout to the Financial Services and Credit Card Industry.
Credit Card companies prey on elderly and college students to get
them hooked on the use of Credit Cards. It is not unusual for these
companies to charge interest rates of 21% and higher.
With Late fees and penalties, the actual rate can and does top
30%. or more. Such interest rates would have been considered
criminally usurious several decades ago. If a
cardholder makes minimum payments at these rates, they will literally
never pay off their accounts, and that is exactly what the Credit
Card companies are counting on.
We’re
talking Big Money Here!
Cardweb.com reported in August
2005, that U.S. Credit Card holders paid fees of $24
Billion in 2004, including $15
Billion in late fees and penalties. It was reported
that 40%
of Credit Card companies impose penalty rates for a single late
payment!
“If
you lend money to any of my people who are poor among you, you shall
not be like a moneylender to him; you shall not charge him
interest.”
The
King James Bible, Exodus 22:25
The
Christian Moral Majority is nowhere in sight on this Biblical
proscription!
The Credit Card companies also provide in the fine print
of their Contracts, that the cardholder is subject to binding
arbitration, which insures that lawsuits over abusive treatment will
never be heard by juries.
“One
of the greatest disservices you can do a man is lend him money that
he can’t pay back.”
Jesse
H. Jones, Noted Houston Business Leader, Chairman of the
Reconstruction Finance Corporation, 1939
Politicians of both parties receive huge campaign
contributions from the Financial Services Industry and they cooperate
in obstructing regulatory controls, allowing this criminal abuse of
the people to continue, leading to most of the bankruptcies of this
country. To solve this problem which they created, the Credit Card
companies and their friends in Congress have now made Bankruptcy
virtually impossible. This will lead to Sheriff’s Sales of
people’s real and personal possessions, evictions, and a form
of bonded servitude.
The new Bankruptcy law was
characterized by Rep. Nancy Pelosi, Minority Leader in the House, as
the new “Indentured
Servant Act”, however this did not stop 73
Democrats from crossing the aisle and voting with the Neocon
Republicans on this anti-consumer bill, and other similar bills,
against the interests of their own constituents. The country is being
returned to the Robber Baron policies of the 19th Century.
“Congress
has a responsibility to stop credit card companies from ripping off
the middle class…”
Rep. Bernard Sanders (I),
Vermont
To combat this rip-off, Democrats,
like Liberal Senator Christopher Dodd, and Independent Congressman
Bernard Sanders, have introduced “The Consumer Credit
Card Protection Act” of 2005.
There is
fat chance of it passing while the Corporate Godfathers have their
Neo-Conservative Republican agents in power.
The
Doctors are Quitting over Malpractice Rates Myth
Another myth circulated by the NFC Republicans on behalf
of their Corporate Insurance donors, is that medical malpractice
lawsuits are driving malpractice rates up, and driving doctors out of
the profession. This has been proven to be false, time and again, but
the Corrupt NFC Republicans in the House pushed through legislation
to correct this imaginary problem, to the detriment of patients and
good doctors.
In July 2005, Public Citizen
reported that the House had voted (230-194) to shield
the medical industry from accountability for negligence, in an
abhorrent abuse of federal power; that shifts costs from wealthy
corporate interests to patients, who are severely injured by
defective drugs, medical devices or poor medical care.
Physicians who supported this
legislation, H.R. 5, are being scammed, because it would do little or
nothing to bring down their high medical malpractice insurance rates.
Study after study has shown that the driving forces behind rising
malpractice premiums are the economic cycle and the business
decisions made by insurers. The so-called crisis of
patients lawsuits is pure fiction. In fact, both the number and the
total value of malpractice payouts to patients has remained flat
since 1991, and has significantly declined since 2001, when adjusted
for medical inflation.
Rather than punishing innocent
victims by arbitrarily capping malpractice payments, Congress should
seek to reduce medical mistakes and scrutinize the practices of
malpractice insurers, who are taking advantage of captive clients,
weak competition and lax regulation, to more than make up for
disappointing investment returns.
From 2000 to 2004, the top 15
malpractice insurers, on average, raised their rates by 120 percent
while payouts increased only 5 percent!
The last and most dangerous leg of
this Unholy Trinity, are the Christian-
Nationalist
Fundamentalist (CNF) Crusaders, whose
politico-ministers
have fraudulently persuaded millions of their misguided followers,
that the Neo-Conservative
Republicans are the only people of Faith; and their
loathful Liberal Democratic
opponents are Apostates, and the enemies of Christ and the faithful.
That will be the subject of the next essay.
PUBLIUS
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