by Editors Posted in Political | Leave a comment by Editors Posted in Political, Repubilcans | Leave a comment by Editors Posted in America, Peace In Mid East, Political, Terrorism, War, War On Terrorism | Leave a comment by Editors

	Neo-Contentions  IV   Lieberman’s Lament

 

EDITORIAL NOTE:

In this “spicy” exchange, Democrats.write.com commentator, Lenard Carrier challenges Richard Benedetto,  syndicated Washington columnist, to defend his defense of Connecticut’s Senator, Joe Lieberman…a Democrat currently struggling to defend his own defense of increasingly-unpopular Bush’s Iraq War policy.

When a Democrat defends a neo-con fascist war, he risks taking flack as a “neo-con”, and we might say, as Len does here, rightfully so.  Thanks,  Len for not being passively peaceful.  If the Democratic party (now the U.S. party of international hope) has an Achilles heel, it’s being wishy-washy in regard to our nation’s regrettable “Bush Doctrine” and resulting preemptively-declared war on Afghanistan and Iraq. Now for the stimulating exchange between neo-con (by association and acceptance) , Benedetto and our own Ashevillian (N.C.) resident philosopher and democratic ally,  Len Carrier:

 

 

Dusty,

    I thought you might be amused by the exchange I had recently with Richard Benedetto, syndicated Washington political columnist.  First, there’s my response to a column of his lamenting the troubles Joe Lieberman is having holding onto his Democratic support.  Other parts of the exchange follow separately. — Len

 

Carrier’s response to Benedetto’s column:

 

    I read your column about the troubles Joe Lieberman is having in Connecticut.  To many of us, he brought it on himself.  Three years ago I had an op-ed piece published in my local newspaper.  In it I claimed that the impending invasion of Iraq was fueled by three motivations:  (1) control of oil production in the Middle East, (2) construction of permanent military bases in Iraq, and (3) removing a thorn in the side of Israeli Zionists.  I see no reason to take back anything I said then; and Joe Lieberman, in still supporting Bush’s war, is, by implication, saddled with these motives, too. We in the anti-war movement think this is reason enough to replace Lieberman in the Senate, despite his views on other matters.

 

P.S. My cousin was active in the “No blood for oil” movement in New Rochelle, NY, and  still participates in local politics.

 

 

 

Benedetto’s response to Carrier:

 

 

   None of my [family] would ever be part of any “anti-war movement,” or any other “movement,” for that matter.   ”Movements”  these days, left or right, smack of elitism and a “we know-better-than-you” mentality.  We believe Americans can figure things out for themselves.

 

 

 Carrier’s response to Benedetto:

  

     I think you read me wrong.  I’m no elitist, and I’m not a pacifist, either.  I think Americans can figure things out for themselves if they’re given the facts. They were not given the facts about the Iraq invasion.  A movement needn’t be elitist when it’s a grass-roots movement.

  

 

Carrier’s further response to Benedetto (with family name deleted to protect the innocent):

 

    After sending my initial response to your mistaken claim that I’m an elitist, I wondered why what you said still rankled.   Now I think I know what it was.  It was your cavalier attitude toward those who disagree with you about the Iraq war.  Maybe you’re right, and that we are from different [families].  None of my [family] had anything but disdain for fascists, and none of them would have anything to do with cheer-leading for a misbegotten war that has killed countless thousands of civilians. Perhaps your years of hobnobbing with the politicians in Washington have blinded you to what really smacks of elitism:  the belief that our leaders know so much more than we do.

 

 

 

 Benedetto’s (fiery) response to Carrier:

 

 Your elitism is in your sanctimony, your absolute conviction that you are right and everyone else is wrong. I have never declared my support or opposition to the war. You have made an assumption.

 It is one thing to “disdain” fascists. It is another to put your life on the line against them, as my [family] all did as members of the U.S. Army and U.S. Marine Corps during World Wars I and II, including my Italian immigrant grandfather. Maybe yours did, too. I don’t know. Your epithet imperiously implied that my relatives were not against fascism. I would never make such an assumption or accusation about yours. Elitism again.

 I am neither a cheerleader for the war nor a blind follower of those in power. I figure things out for myself. But I never, and I mean never, assume that I am right and everyone else is wrong. I have a view, I explain it. People can agree or disagree.

 Moreover, I am not an evangelist. I am a reporter with many years of experience and some ability to analyze. I have a legitimate forum to do that.  And I learned a long time ago from a very wise professor that you know you are doing a good job of reporting when the more you look into an issue, the grayer and grayer it becomes, not blacker and whiter.

Just your choice of words suggests elitism and condescension –  ”cavalier,” “cheerleading,” “misbegotten,” “hobnobbing” and “blinded.”

 

 

 

Carrier’s response to Benedetto (who has not responded further:

    Think what you might, Richard, I just wanted to let you know why your note ticked me off, and why I thought that you were being the elitist, not me.  I’m somewhat foxed by your calling me the sanctimonious one.  Your original implication was clear that [your family] was in a more elevated position than mine because they would never be part of any “movement.”  I didn’t assume that you or your family were fascists, only that my family had always been part of any anti-fascist movement, and for any movement against waging preventive war.  My father served in the army, and I was myself a SAC officer for four years, so I hope that my patriotism isn’t being questioned.

    You should also know that I never assume I’m right, and everyone else is wrong.  I look at the empirical evidence and try to come to a rational conclusion. The fact that you said you have never declared either support or opposition to the war tells me that you haven’t yet decided whether it was a good or bad thing. Is that so?  When I decided that it wasn’t a good thing, it wasn’t based on any assumption.  It was based on taking into consideration all the evidence, pro and con.  Facts have since indicated that I was right.  Had the facts been different, I would have admitted my mistake.

    Sometimes, Richard, you’ve got to take a stand.  Hegel said that all theory is gray, but we don’t live in a world of theory.  We live in a world of fact.  As a journalist, you may think it the better part of valor to keep weighing evidence and not announce a conclusion; but, as William James said long ago, there comes a time when action becomes more appropriate than further thought.     

    I’m sorry you didn’t like the words I chose in my reply to you, but sometimes a sharp descriptive word carries more punch than a merely pedestrian one. But then, being a journalist, you knew that–otherwise you wouldn’t have chosen “epithet,” “sanctimony,” “imperiously,” “evangelist,” and “condescension” to pin on me.

 

Len Carrier May 27, 2006

 

*(Dr. Leonard Carrier received his B.A. and M.A. from the University of Miami in ’56 and ’58, respectively, and his Ph.D from Stanford in 1967.  He taught at Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia and the University of South Florida (Tampa) before spending the rest of his teaching and research career (29 years until 2000) at the University of Miami. )

Posted in Political, Repubilcans | Leave a comment

by Editors

Raise your own phony -  plant a Tony Grow your own dope,  plant a Bush A terse and charitable  look at  … and A timely quote concerning  the Bush/Blair affair  (America’s Fascist Invasion of Iraq) With Bush’s and Blair’s approval ratings in the pits, they both cling to the view that their invasion of Iraq was justified.  What could possibly fuel this view?  There were no massively destructive weapons, thousands of civilians have been killed, Iraq’s antiquities were looted, sectarian warfare has blossomed, world opinion has been increasingly negative, and a Western-style democracy in the face of a rising Islamic theocracy looks more like a pipe-dream than ever.  Without sounding too cynical, I’m waiting for the new Iraqi government to sign a Status of Forces Agreement with the United States and Great Britain that allows permanent U.S. and British bases on Iraqi soil.  But perhaps that was the goal all along. In his recent GQ Magazine interview, British MP George Galloway claimed to have been the best fighter at his school, and said he would like to go a few rounds with both Blair and Bush. “I’d take them both at once,” Galloway said. “That’s what really upsets me. They are the sort of men who are ready to fight to the last drop of other people’s blood. They couldn’t personally punch their way out of a paper bag. They send other mothers’ sons to their death, and I find them both deeply repugnant,” he said. [Editorial Note: The terse look and Galloway quotation are both provided us by*Leonard Carrier, who had nothing to do with the bumper-snicker captions with which we have headed this most recent of his right-on-target contributions.] *(Dr. Leonard Carrier received his B.A. and M.A. from the University of Miami in ’56 and ’58, respectively, and his Ph.D from Stanford in 1967.  He taught at Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia and the University of South Florida (Tampa) before spending the rest of his teaching and research career (29 years until 2000) at the University of Miami. )

Posted in Bush Lies, Political, War On Terrorism | Leave a comment by Editors

Democratswrite.com extends an admiring welcome to its youngest contributor to the present date:  Mr. Ryan Kampert, soon to be 16 years of age is the grandson of Dr. Lenard Carrier, who has contributed generously to our website, and in fact several commentaries in this same Border Wars series. 

 

It was in response to Dr. Carrier’s sharing this series with his grandson that young Ryan’s composed his passionate and informed responses, which will, because of their frank and self-explanatory content and context, shall be printed verbatim hereinafter.  

 

Featured first will be Ryan’s comments to Len in counterpoint with views earlier expressed by our foreign policy editor, Dusty Schoch (in Border Wars I through VI). Next will be Schoch’s letter of response transmitted via grandfather Carrier, and finally will come Ryan’s final eloquent words on the topic, all of which we sincerely hope our readers will find (as we did) both informative and enjoyable.

 

I deny altogether any intent or mood of patronization when I say to you that the term “precocious” falls short of capturing this young thinker’s levels of thought , verbal expression and passionate concern with issues affecting our country’s welfare.  Welcome, Mr. Kampert, to our humble forum here  at Democratswrite.com, and we hope you will continue to visit and contribute to us as time permits in the future.

 

Dusty Schoch 5/25/06

 

 

RYAN’S LETTER TO LEN:

 

—– Original Message —–

From: Ryan K

To: Leonard Carrier

Sent: Saturday, May 20, 2006 3:08 PM

Subject: Re: Border wars

 

Hey Grandpa.

    I thought I’d add my two cents about one of the most aggravating arguments used in our current immigration “crisis” .  Very good argument, by the way.

    I do a lot of research on languages, and this current idea that everyone (including your Mr. Schoch there) has that bilingualism divides a country and gives rise to cultural animosity doesn’t hold water.  The rhetoric-spewing advocates of that theory, that offer Canada (e.g. Quebec), Sri Lanka (e.g. the Tamils and Sinhala), and others as examples, conveniently forget that, in these instances, multiple aspects of culture are opposed; and with Quebec as the rare exception, one of those cultures has been repressing or antagonizing the other.  This causes the repressed culture to lash back at the oppressors.  Bilingualism is very rarely the cause of internal dissent in a country.  For instance, the Chinese were never closer to having massive revolts than during their “cultural revolution” of the ’60′s.  Since the government of that nation has recently (mid-’90′s) opened up and allowed the use of minority languages (the Tibetans speaking Tibetan, the Yi speaking Yi, the Manchu’s speaking Manchu,  Inner Mongolians speaking Mongolian – complete with the classical Uyghur-esque script, etc.) the Chinese have experienced worlds-better complacency and cooperation in minority peoples.  I heard a reporter just yesterday on MSNBC point out an example of “mono-lingualism-in-a-nation-breeds-unity” thinking by referencing England and their abolishment of the Irish language upon taking them over in the Middle Ages.  Where did that get them?  Ireland is now independent, and reinstating the Gaelic language along with English.  Or look at the Isle of Man.  England still firmly holds that island, and the people are happy, like British dominion, do not cause conflict with the rest of the UK, and are currently trying to bring back the Manx language in everyday affairs.  Declaring Inuktitut (with the syllabary) an official language of Nunavut in Canada has gained the Canadians increased peace with the Inuit peoples of their northern regions.  Even in the US, bilingualism is helpful in areas.  Look at Hawaii.  In Hawaii, Hawaiian is an official language, and is a mandatory course in public schools.  Last time I checked, we’re not currently battling the Hawaiians within our borders.  There are also plenty of regions in this world where a lack of official bilingualism is causing a conflict.  France has seen this with their homogenizing of France under one language, where they now can’t deal with minorities (i.e. the Muslims) who don’t speak that language.  Spain and the Basque country are cases-in-point.  Language is the greatest tool in cultural identity.  Spain’s attempted eradications of the Basque language in the past is then also a stamping out the Basque culture, which is where we again find the repressed and antagonized scenario mentioned earlier, and minorities become hostile.   The same fate awaits the US if we try to make English the official language. We will see minorities across our nation — the various Native American tribes, the legal and illegal Mexicans, the aforementioned Hawaiians, the Inuit of Alaska — take offense and rise against it.  In conclusion, having English as a lingua franca is great, requiring it as a language of most businesses if fine.  But to try to stamp out all languages but English is a Pandora’s Box waiting to be opened.

 

Ryan

 

P.S. Can you tell this issue really irritates me?? ;-)

 

 

DUSTY’S RESPONSE TO RYAN (VIA LEN)

 

 

Dear Ryan,

 

Your grandfather (and my friend), Len Carrier shared your reaction to our “Border Wars” exchange, and I struggle to find words sufficient to express how much I admired your thinking, your analysis, and your extremely prodigious (I don’t want to patronize you by calling it “precocious”) writing skills.  It seems our educational institutions aren’t failing us in America altogether. 

 

With your permission, I would like to post your thoughtful criticism of my previously-expressed views advocating a monolingual America, in regard to immigrating Mexicans, alien and otherwise.  In responding to you I may conclude, when I finish, that I’ve composed something worth sharing with our web readership; I’ve already concluded that your thoughts warrant publication.  We have created Democratswrite.com to serve us as a clearinghouse and on-line “think tank” for the exchanging of ideas on matters of domestic and foreign policy.

 

So here’s my reaction to your offering:  You are obviously a serious student of history and social order. I am not motivated even to  question your statements regarding the things you say about efforts in other countries and times to bi-lingualize peoples. History is a great teacher, and that’s one reason learned folks admonish us to either study it or risk its repetition.

 

But some cultural phenomena become skewed when you consider them as “transplantable” templates.   For axiomatic example:  We Americans love our dogs and include them in our families as beloved, if  inarticulate, members.  In Hong Kong, dogs are “cao” and frequently serve as coveted entrees at the family dinner table. (I made the mistake of accepting  a cruel quantity of precious canine flesh a few years back and will never forget the aftertaste and memory when the joke on me was disclosed.)

 

Ryan, America is not Canada; it is not the Balkans. We (unlike they) were once a united and very prosperous and powerful mono-lingual country.

 

We have dysfunction wherever we have language dividing us. Our colleges teach in English; we enjoy our movies in English; we read our news in English; we write one another…as now…in English.

 

 Honorable native Americans never in fact “sold” Manhattan to our early European settlers.  Those noble savages came to the bargaining table and accepted gifts of valuable specie in return for the “purchase” of that now invaluable real estate when, in their language at the time, there was no known word for “ownership” in reference to land.  The noble savages who inhabited and hunted Manhattan and neighboring islands felt themselves to be a part of the land.  If there had been a shared language among American aborigine and European immigrants, a mass slaughter and myriad tragic “Indian wars” and inhumane forced genocidal migrations might have been avoided.  But our forefathers “didn’t have time” to master the language of America’s original inhabitants and hence dealt with them accordingly (savagely).  

 

Now we’re the natives. By hook and historic crook, times have changed.  There are now 300 million of us. We are not Canada. We are not the Balkans. We are not a nation (e.g. Iraq) composed of disparate (and naturally antithetic or warring) peoples politically composited by the fiat of foreign and remote  power politics. 

 

Until recently, the U.S. was the strongest nation on earth.  One of its strengths was its “E Pluribus Unum” popular modus operandum .  French, Irish, English, German…peoples from all over the globe swarmed in at our new-world beckoning and dived into the melting pot; parboiled themselves voluntarily in hell’s kitchens until the mongrel American emerged.  You and I. English-speaking Americans.

 

When the smoke of that cultural conflagration cleared, the masses selected English as their common language.  America evolved into what the Balkans…make that the rest of the world was not…a federation of united states where everyone could speak to everyone else. This perhaps more than any other single factor accounts for our strength and our success throughout our brief history.

 

Did this shared language end all ethnic stressors among America’s diverse population?  Of course not. But it made it possible for everyone to communicate their commonalities, their differences and their essential business matters mano a mano…and without the need (and disability) of a paid translator or  plodding resort to foreign language lexicons.

 

Ryan, you and I are having this wonderful exchange for one reason and one reason only: We are both masters of the same language. Try an imagine your task if you were trying to debate me in Spanish.

 

When I VISITED France one summer long ago, I studied the language before I went. Had I planned to reside there, my mastery would have been much greater.

 

In the Bible’s Old Testament, there’s a story of Babel’s tower.  Old stories passed through centuries carry the strongest messages. When people speak divergent  tongues, there is social/cultural/political chaos…and occasional mayhem.  

 

In your contending that the Balkans, and diverse cultures of Canada and other “Balkanized” countries survive in their respective states of lingual diversities, you are talking about the Balkans and Canada, etc. In every case you are hoisted on your own petard. If Canada was forced to go to war as a people, its linguistic diversity would be hugely counter-productive.  The fact is, most people in Canada speak English (along with their ethnically-“native” languages).

 

Your pointing to England’s separation from Ireland on the basis of language is, I’d say, less than determinative of our issue. England and Ireland’s problems are, as I’d say Canada and the Balkans,  Apples, tangerines, and grapefruits to America’s orange. America’s strength, as I see it, derives from far more than its prior, consistent mono-linguality.  But its mono-linguality I think is part of the foundation of  her success as a nation.

 

And I think you may have overlooked a part of the thesis with which you took issue. I don’t personally know of anyone (including myself) who has championed the idea of forced mono-linguality.  I think it would be just fine if Mexicans spoke fluent Spanish and English.  I simply insist that, before they become citizens, they should learn English.

 

My reasons for so insisting stem from experiences you have perhaps not yet encountered as a student.  I am a lawyer. In American courts (which I daily attend and observe) when an illegal Mexican immigrant commits a crime, it costs the State of N.C. ten times as much to arrest, try and convict him because he must be supplied a bi-lingual interpreter every step of his criminal adjudication.   Add to this the additional fact that they are committing, per capita, crime at 2 to 10 times the frequency English-speaking residents are, and you see the problem is compounded.

 

Let me offer you a few more capsules of analogical (to Balkans, Canada and other multi-lingual countries) distinction.  Illegal Mexican aliens are not “Balkanized”. They are not geographically concentrated in our country so as to constitute and manage an independent sub-cultural “micro populace”.  They live among us.  Our irresponsible dollar-driven corporations hire them in spite of their language disabilities, and as a result, their disabled language status adversely cripples their abilities to do their jobs and, as a result, competence at all levels of American society is dwindling.

 

Example: I just got back from enjoying an evening of music and dining with the Justices of the U.S. Supreme Court in our capitol.  Ruth Ginsburg got me a room at the Plaza State hotel. I arrived late (just past 12PM) but was up until 3 AM because there was, literally, no-one in the entire facility who spoke English. They made serial errors in denying my credit card account;  charging me for a parking space they could not provide; searching for a fax they could not locate because it was located in a safe in a package labeled with a transition instruction in English (to the hotel desk clerk, a foreign language). The letter was my engraved invitation (and admission) to the Supreme Court function. 

 

When an illegal alien is run over in the street, he will often die, not  from the impact, but from his inability to say “I am allergic to sulfa”, or “I have type O blood”, or “I have diabetes”.

 

Corporations now charge us increased prices for everything we purchase because everything we purchase has bi-lingual packaging and instructions.  

 

Saying that bilingualism causes little dissent in China carries no merit in the argument that bilingualism in America causes waste, confusion, and in some cases death.  Across the board it causes the antithesis of cultural assimilation and creates dysfunction on every level of social function from inability to read menus and road signs, to inability to relate vital data to healthcare and police authorities.

 

If I concede that bilingualism is not often—anywhere—“the” cause for dissent, I will never concede the reciprocal:  that shared language is not the best preventative for dissention  (all forms of social dysfunction among foreign—only–language speaking immigrants and their indigenous hosts).

 

This could go on forever, because, as most “social issues”, the layers of complexity are onion-like.  You can peel downward to new layers seemingly forever.  Intelligent reference and allusion to similar (but not exact) problems in other countries and times can skew our thinking. 

 

When there are many complex angles and possible solutions presenting themselves in regard to a given problem, I like to bring out Occam’s razor…. “The simplest  solution is probably the best.”   Here I believe Occam’s razor cuts our ignorance down to the core admonition:  “When in Rome, do as the Romans.”

 

When you come to America to live, learn the language…before you come. Up until a very few years ago, most immigrants felt so fortunate to be allowed through our gates they considered learning English a privilege.  We still offer free lessons to willing illegal aliens in most state-run trade schools.  They don’t want to bother. They want to protest being threatened with deportation when they have entered in violation of our laws. They want to march in our streets under the protection of our Constitutional rights to due process of law and free speech, and they want to sing our national anthem on such riotous occasions in Spanish while waving the flag of Mexico, a foreign country.

 

Please. Give me a frigging break.  “Spanglish” is a fairly enjoyable movie, but in reality, we are an English-speaking country.  If you want to become part of our great country and culture, learn the language and knock politely on the front door.  We’re the natives and you (Mexican aliens) are the new-coming would-be settlers.  We’re not going to sell you Manhattan—or even Texas- for a few pesos…not even a dozen Taccos Bellagrandes.

 

A parting thought, Ryan. Picture yourself three years from now. You’ve decided to take a sabbatical from college and see what the working world is like. You get a job hanging steel on the Freedom Building…replacing the old Twin Towers.  You like it up top where the view and inherent risks are  thrilling and the pay is double because of the risk.  Your job is riveting the major I-beams on the top floor as it rises to the sky (like Babel’s tower).  Behind you, as you work is a guy running a crane which swings the new beams over your head as you sit, facing the other way with torch and hammer in hand.

 

One sunny day the guy in the crane hasn’t hoisted his 12-ton load of swinging bars over the level of your head, and pendulous death is on its way towards making final contact with your plastic-hated cranium.  The guy watching your back says to you, “Esquivar, Ryan!”  Instead of ducking, you turn to ask your friend Pedro what the hell “Esquivar” means. 

 

Now you know why God gave us that potent little parable about Babel’s multilingual tower.  I personally think there may be something far scarier and more dangerous even than the terrorists who took down our Twin Towers in Manhattan in 2001 screaming “Allah Achbar!”   That would be the man running a steel-loading derrick on the construction site where they’re replacing the felled towers screaming “ Esquivar, Ryan!”

 

Thanks Ryan for the careful thoughts and passionate communications. Words are the only tools of our amazing human intellect. A language which is foreign to us is simply…not our tool.  Every day I am grateful if and when someone gives me cause and occasion to think and to write.  Today I’m thankful for you.

 

Best regards,

 

Dusty

 

PS: Please send me your full name, address and where you attend school, so I can post it in the by-line to your fine policy essay.

 

 

 

 

RYAN’S CONDLUDING REMARKS:

(and by-line)

 

 

Mr. Schoch,

    Thank you for reading my argument, and taking the time to respond to it as well.  You may indeed post it on Democrats Write, or wherever else you’d wish to use it. For the By-Line, use:

 

Also, I would like to express my gratitude for your answering my comments in earnest, and not being condescending or half-hearted as people (adults) often are when addressing someone of my age.   And, I would like to thank you for your kind comments in the opening paragraph of your response.

    On the issue we were discussing, may I send along a response-to-your-response, if you will, which I give you full permission to publish as well (It follows the line break after this paragraph).  This was taken from a letter I sent my Grandpa, so you may wish to omit the parts that refer to him, or the parts that refer to you in the third person.

 

    I like Mr. Schoch.  He forgot one part of my argument, however, which was that English should DEFINITELY be a lingua franca for our country.  Peoples that can’t communicate at all can’t be hoped to coexist perfectly.  I just think making English “official” and thereby making the minority languages “unofficial” and therefore “not as good,” “unworthy,” and even to a certain degree “unclean” is not a good idea.  I’ve known (through school) several people who speak English as well as anyone, but whose parents do not (often because they are working on it, but it is hard to learn. Notice they made sure their kids learned, though).  I’ve also known people who speak English just fine, their parents speak it just fine, and yet they choose to speak Spanish (or, as is the case with some I know down here, Vietnamese) in their home-like and around their community.  These are both legal and illegal people I’ve known.  So to force English as official, and thereby strip these other languages of any sort of status, is unfair to people who try to learn English to become Americans but still want to hold to their ethnic roots in private life, or around their community.  It violates the “equality” our country is supposedly built on.  Going back to my China example, most of those minorities speak Mandarin along with their language. They have to to get by.  But with Chinese promoting of “official” status to their respective languages, those people no longer feeloppressed by Mandarin.  So in the end, we have similar ideas, but different approaches. I think stamping out Spanish (or Vietnamese, or whatever) is wrong.  I think giving them a lesser status is wrong.  I think, personally, it wouldn’t hurt the average American to quit thinking, egotistically, that English is THE language, and learn one or two others.  But in the end, Mr. Schoch is right.  Immigrants who come and exclusively speak Spanish are a problem.  His, and others, method of fixing it, however, leaves something to be desired.  I think the problem need not be solved in laws against the language, but in perhaps persuading business to be less willing to hire Spanish-only speaking workers.  How that can be done I only have ideas, but not being an economist, I’ll not be so pretentious as to voice them.  I just know it is possible.  In the end, I say don’t try to solve the problem (Spanish-only speaking immigrants run amok) by creating more (angering both legal and illegal Spanish speakers, as well as any other minority language in America, by denouncing their language).  Besides, there is the utmost of likelihood that, like the Basque, to use one of my other previous examples, trying to lessen the status of the language will only make those who speak it speak it more vehemently, and with less willingness to compromise.  Anyone can see that this is a bad course of action.

 

Once again, thank you for taking the time to listen to me, and for responding as well,

Ryan

 

P.S. If you find any typos, or see any place where you feel sentence structure could be improved, feel free to change them.  I would ask if you could send me any revisions you make before you publish them, though. (As much for my own enlightenment as for screening purposes)

 

 

Ryan Kampert will soon be sixteen (!).  He resides in Panama City, Florida and there  attends Rutherford High School (where he is an International Baccalaureate scholar) as a sophomore.   

 

His grandfather, Len Carrier, is understandably–and understatedly–quite proud.

Posted in Immigration, Political | Leave a comment

by Editors

“Nothing makes allies like a common enemy”… or so they say.  That rule may well ring true in the case of the issue of illegal immigration in the United States.  If we allow this issue to become a political ping pong ball for Democrats and Republicans to bat around to garner votes, we’ll all wind up losers by trying to appease our resident and voting LEGAL immigrants, who for the most part will all be endorsing some form of amnesty for resident illegals.  

Democratswrite.com grants exceptional welcome to Republican writer, Steve Bryantas we republish here with his permission his conservative views on and remedies for the problem of eleven million illegal immigrants in our midst. (Steve is a High Point businessman, guest columnist for the High Point Enterprise,  and counterpoint commentator in our website’s archived article, “Neo-Contentions – Including the Neo-Con Corporate Frankenstein Monster”, March 6,  2006) .

Ranting And Raving In Puerto Vallarta

     Anyone who remembers Richard Burton’s character in the film Night Of The Iguana,as he drove a busload of terrified tourists through the hills above Puerto Vallarta should have a reasonable idea of my appearance late in the evening of the first day of my recent vacation there.

     When I awoke the next morning, I hadn’t a clue of where I was or, how I got there. But as I held my head and felt the crusted salt around my temples, it all came crashing back to me, like the kiss on the end of a wet fist. Later that day, I was told that the owner of a restaurant where I had eaten had insisted on bringing several rounds of complementary tequila to show his appreciation for my business. This scenario was the reason that I stopped drinking liquor nearly ten years ago. You see, I found that each time I drank it, most hosts would request that I not return.

     But Puerto Vallarta turned out to be a great place to vacation. Although it wasn’t a place where folks around here would choose to live, it was full of friendly, employed people who seemed to be very happy. Everyone who I asked about any possible interest in moving to the US looked at me like I was crazy. But, 200 miles away is the city of Guadalajara with 6,000,000 inhabitants, 95% of who live in dirt floor poverty that is the result of ignorance, lack of any birth control efforts, and the rampant corruption that pervades every aspect of Mexican life. Those people are much more representative of our south of the border neighbors who are illegally entering our country, by the thousands, every day. And while there are several other happy places in Mexico like Puerto Vallarta, they are the exception, and inhabitants there give the other Mexican citizens the bum’s rush, for the same reasons that we should.

     They’re desperate, they want out and they intend to come here. This is what should be done, in order of urgency:

1-Re-evaluate the right of citizenship for simply exiting the birth canal on US soil. When our law enforcement personnel break laws while pursuing those engaged in criminal activity, then the resulting evidence is disallowed in court as “fruit from the poisoned tree”. What’s the difference here?

2-Enforce our existing laws.

3-Deploy our military to the southern border today, and stop the illegal entry of foreigners, now.

4-Arrest, and deport, ANY illegal immigrants caught breaking ANY law in this country, beginning now.

5-US businesses caught knowingly employing illegals should be fined $10,000 per occurrence, and those responsible should be sentenced to jail for a mandatory 90 days, per occurrence.

     The preceding five measures will freeze the problem where it currently stands. Then:

6-Construct a barrier along the entire border and, equally as important, provide enough personnel to patrol and secure the barrier.

7-Stop all US Government financial assistance to illegal immigrants.

8-Say NO, to amnesty and “guest worker” programs. Why reward criminals with citizenship, and give them parity with those who came here through the legal process? The FBI can’t even find those on their “most wanted” list. How will they locate the “guests” when their time is up? (Also, see suggestion #1)

     If there was ever an issue for which to vote for the candidate rather than for the party, then this is it. If you’re representatives vote to diminish your birth right in any way, then throw the bums out in November.

Thanks, Steve,  for the creative and sound thinking and proposals. Just remember that if proposals like yours are to prevail, the first bum we’ll need to throw out would be Bush. Shame we can’t do it in November.

Dusty

Posted in Immigration, Political | Leave a comment

by Editors

Does “NSA” = “Nazi States of America”? Patent # 5,937,422   If we take our heads out of the sand and do the math on this NSA phone monitoring thing we’ll see it for what it is. Bush denies his NSA wiretaps and monitoring of every number you and I dial (unless Quest is your LD carrier) are “trolling” for terrorist connections.  He claims that they are not recording our conversations but only tracking every number every one of us calls.     Again, my friends he is lying. Do the math:  If the NSA is not “trolling” for terrorists, they would know who the terrorists were and would monitor them and not need to  track our calls.   If you want to know what they’re really doing, read NSA Patent number 5,937,422 Nelson , et al. August 10, 1999.  That patented technology enables the NSA to analyze speech by computers that  are programmed to “understand” the cybernetics of terrorist language.  It’s patently a robotic, terrorist-fishing (trolling) machine and, it’s obviously working now in conjunction with the dialed-numbers tracking program. We’ve clearly got computers “listening” in on—“analyzing if not recording”—our phone conversations.   Can a robot “legally violate”  our Constitutional right to due process and our legislated guarantees of privacy?   The NSA has been using this technology to snoop on foreign telecommunications for years.  They can honestly say that no NSA agents (human) are snooping on us because they probably aren’t. But a computer like 2001 Space-Odyssey’s odious “Hal” probably is, and this probably explains why Bush is so cocky when he says (but withholds the details for “national security”) his NSA boys aren’t violating the law. The law proscribes human behavior.  Federal statutes outlaw the interception and divulgence of messages sent in interstate commercial channels of communication.  Arguably, when Big Brother Bush’s “Hal” computer is automatically logging our numbers and recording our names when Hal digitally determines we’re talking terrorist trash, no “one” (implying no human being) has in fact invaded our privacy.   Here’s what I think there’s reason to believe is happening: Bush’s NSA is using its warrantless powers to tap randomly our phones, and using the Patent 59— technology is “trolling” for terrorist talk. No conversations or words are ever “recorded” or “divulged” by any human being and there is no paper trail for later criminal prosecutions. When a “hot spot” (byte on the trolling line) is sensed by the computer, it labels a given phone number/base/caller as “terrorist suspect”.  Afterwards, the “trolling computer” is put in line with the “dialed-number-data-based computer” and the suspects calling list converts the trolling line to the terrorist fishing net recently provided when our trusted phone companies handed our calling records to the NSA without our permission. (Cudos to Quest, proudly my own LD carrier,  for being the sole hold-out in this outlaw forfeiture of privacy.) The chances for compounding errors in probable-cause (legal reason to search and invade privacy) judgment are geometrically enhanced.  As suspected Al Qaeda fish become pixels accreting on NSA screens, we are left to wonder what judge is authorizing a search or phone tap of our neighbor’s house because some automatic dialing robot selling satellite TV (carrying Al Jazeera) left multiple messages on the neighbor’s digital answering machine.  Maybe yours.   Arguably a robotic computer “agent”  could ignore due process requirements for a court-ordered wiretap and supply probable cause to the NSA humans who then search our files and garages for hard copy or more incendiary evidence.  In the meantime, the main difference between the NSA agents and Hitler’s SS is that the SS agents had a heart beat.   Dusty Schoch May 13, 2006   Dusty Schoch is founder of the B.E.A., a NC-based foreign policy think tank; He is also  foreign policy editor of Democratswrite.com. For further information on NSA Patent # 5,937,422, Schoch refers the reader tohttp://www.abovetopsecret.com/pages/nsapatent.html, and the U.S. Gov. patent website at http://patft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2 (hit patent link and insert number 5,937,422).       AND WHAT’S EVEN SCARIER…   (ADDENDUM BY  DR. LEN CARRIER*)     Dusty,         I got back from my trip just in time to hear about the latest NSA snooping mission.  It seems clear from what you have learned about the NSA patent, a computerized analysis can now be made of our speech patterns.  But it then also seems clear that if the NSA can program computers to identify “terrorist language,” then they can also program them to identify “anti-Bush” language, or “anti-administration” language.  In other words, just as J. Edgar Hoover had his file on possible troublemakers, the NSA can construct a file on all those who are critical of government policies and take action against them.     What’s even worse is that the person who was in charge of this surveillance technique–General Michael Hayden–has been tapped by Bush to be Director of the CIA.  In his new capacity General Hayden will have more resources to gather intelligence on all of us.  How can Hayden and Bush say with straight faces that they are only concerned with discovering terrorists?  The answer seems obvious.  A “terrorist” for them is defined as anyone who objects to Bush’s “war on terrorism.”  After all, if you’re against that “war” then you must be “for” the “terrorists.”  With this maddening descent into Orwellian double-speak do our leaders toy with us        Best, Len Carrier   *(Dr. Leonard Carrier received his B.A. and M.A. from the University of Miami in ’56 and ’58, respectively, and his Ph.D from Stanford in 1967.  He taught at Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia and the University of South Florida (Tampa) before spending the rest of his teaching and research career (29 years until 2000) at the University of Miami. )

Posted in America, Political, Repubilcans, War On Terrorism | Leave a comment by Editors

“Border Wars”… Part V          The meXican standoff On Illegal aliens And Immigration law…concludes…   A polite and civilized, but genuinely “at-odds” dialogue between two concerned “independents” on the question and handling of the Illegal Mexican Alien issue, which is rapidly becoming the most important political hard-ball in domestic play today. In this exchange, Professor Leonard Carrier* challenges our foreign policy Editor, Dusty Schoch to defend his position that illegal Mexican Aliens (all 11 million of them) should be treated as felons.   [This article concludes the discussion. Parts I through IV may be found and reviewed in the title index to “articles”.]     PART  V     CONCLUDING BORDER FIRE       LEN CARRIER’S LAST WORDS             When two rational people who share the same values disagree about something, their disagreement turns on what the facts are.  I think that this is the case between Dusty and me.  I know that there are lots of people with a xenophobic,“Archie Bunker” mentality who find it convenient to blame illegal residents for everything they find missing in their own lives.  These are the same sort of people who in earlier years derided the “micks,” the “wops,” the “polacks,” and the “niggers” for taking away their jobs.  Deport them back to their own country, they said, just as they are now saying we must root out all the “wetbacks,” make them criminals, and send them back to Mexico where they belong.  I think that this nativist thinking lies behind much of the debate on immigration today, but it is not what divides Dusty and me.  Neither of us is xenophobic, and neither of us is guilty of nativistic thinking.  Judging from our past correspondence, I feel confident, as well, in saying that we share the same basic values.  Consequently, we must disagree about the facts of the matter.  Here’s what I think some of those factual disagreements are.             First, Dusty thinks that if we build a high enough wall, they will not come.  I think this is mistaken.  In Texas they have been talking about building such a wall, on and off, for many years.  It’s never happened.  What if we police this wall with our National Guard?  Well, aside from the fact that most of our National Guard forces are in Iraq, making such a barrier invulnerable on our entire border with Mexico would require a military draft in addition to National Guard forces.  Even with that, we have only to remember the Maginot Line and the Vietnamese boat people to see how determined or desperate people can get around obstacles.  Building a wall and policing it is a game not worth the candle, especially since it would better serve us to use our law enforcement agencies to keep out enemies like al-Qaeda, not poor Mexican workers. Second, Dusty thinks that allowing illegal residents to stay and work would put us in the same position as France, a country whose immigration policies have not worked.  But we are not France.  In France, the immigrants are mostly Muslims who have not integrated into French society.  They live in enclaves surrounding the large cities, and there are no jobs for them.  Mexicans easily assimilate into our society, as the millions of legal Mexican immigrants in our country have demonstrated.  Remember, Texas and California used to belong to Mexico.  And unlike the situation in France, there is ready employment for Mexicans who arrive here.  After all, this is why they come.             Third, Dusty thinks that the United States is overpopulated and cannot assimilate illegal Mexicans.  I would deny that this is the case. There is plenty of open land in the United States, and our low unemployment figures show that there are plenty of jobs, even with as many as twelve million illegal residents already living and working here.  Demographics show that as an industrial nation’s work force matures, the birth rate drops.  This is already the case in Europe, where the population is declining.  Our birth rates are also dropping, which is why we need immigrants to keep our economy vital.             Fourth, Dusty thinks that if one favors trying to enforce a law already on the books, as I have done, then one should favor increasing penalties under that law if it’s not working. We agree that the present immigration laws are not working. But it’s not inconsistent to favor trying to enforce existing laws until they can be changed for the better.  Dusty thinks that making illegal aliens criminals will make the law better.  I think it will make matters worse by stigmatizing people whose only offense is trying to make a living; and, as I said before, it will overstrain our law enforcement agencies and courts, in much the same manner as the prohibition against alcohol did in the 1920s.  Only the repeal of prohibition stopped bootleggers from plying their trade.  I predict that the criminalizing illegal immigrants will produce similar consequences.  I say that if you’re in a hole, the first thing to do is stop digging.             Fifth, Dusty thinks that there is presently an immigration crisis.  I don’t.  I think that the so-called crisis was the consequence of political double-think.  Here’s how it went.  The present Bush administration, in declaring its war on terror, has frightened many Americans into thinking that terrorists want to continue attacking the United States. But what better way for them to attack than to have them seep through our porous borders?  But Mexicans slip through our borders every day, so we’ve got to close those borders and not let any more in. Many who are already here are here illegally, so we might well already have terrorists in our country.  But this line of reasoning assumes that illegal Mexicans are akin to terrorists, whereas they are not.  They’re the people who cut your grass, repair your roof, mind your children, and pick vegetables and fruit for your dinner table.  They share our borders and our culture.  Once they are assimilated into our society they will do what other immigrants have done:  work hard, pay taxes, and invigorate our economy.             Sixth, Dusty thinks that illegal residents take jobs away from those who are here legally.  If this were the case, then you would think that those who emigrated here legally would be opposed to making our immigration laws more lenient.  But they’re not.  Studies have shown that an overwhelming majority of legal immigrants support the case of the illegals.  After all, most of the people crowding the streets in protest of the draconian law proposed by our House of Representatives, waving Mexican flags, were legal immigrants who want to see other Hispanics get a fair shake. Do illegals perform work that legal residents will not do?  Perhaps, but we won’t know until we document the illegals who are here.             Finally, statistics show that some two million workers now earn less than the minimum wage, and millions more work without occupational safeguards, workers’  compensation, overtime pay, and other protections offered by legal status.  The only way to right these wrongs is to bring that black market labor force out into the open and change the laws to make their status a legal one.  As Jose Millan, former labor commissioner for California has said, the legalization of undocumented workers would make us all better off.  He also said, “I am in favor of anything that brings these workers out of the shadows and into the sunlight; it’s very easy to exploit a population when they’re afraid.”  I would second what Millan has said, and I would add that we should ourselves be unafraid to acknowledge the fact that there are at least ten million undocumented workers in our midst, and to take steps to see that the necessary documentation is legally provided for them. All the best, Len DUSTY’S  LAST WORDS I’ll mention a few of Len’s arguments first to dispel some of his misperceptions of mine and thereafter concede most of what he continues to contend. Finally, I’ll do what  lawyers often do in a lawsuit:  issue a demurrer.  The “demurrer”  is essentially contending to the judge, “I agree with what my opponent says, but his own argument shows he has no case”. Now, I know Len doesn’t think I’m the “Archie Bunker” type, but I have to confess I’m a “nativist” to the extent that my loyalty is to my American tribe…that is, those who belong here because they’re citizens by either birth, or lawful naturalization. Forget the 6 decades I’ve worked, paid taxes and contributed to the perennial building and maintenance of the Country. As long as there are national boundaries, they should be used for the welfare of all. Defusing the global population bomb is the priority most integral to life on earth. I also believe that without both having laws and enforcing them, we have no social order, but rather anarchy and chaos. So (1) preservation of life and (2) rule of law are foremost in my mind when I advocate tightening the legal strictures on Mexican and all U.S. immigration. I’m not opposed to diversity.  I’m proud of my mongrel cultural heritage and DNA.  I do detest the integration of bi-linguality  and bi-culturalism  in America. The separateness sickens society. Exit Unum’s Pluribus.   Illegal Mexican  immigration in America is not  the melting pot that brewed the American spirit. It’s two separate pots on an archaic, increasingly- under-heated and under-tended, single-burner stove, each vying for space over the flame. A national, cultural hell’s kitchen.  Chinatowns are bad ideas…every time and every place. Festering places for fringe criminality and aberrant everything. Illegal aliens have broken the law upon entry and they are breaking the law in remaining here as illegal aliens.  If there were only a few of them, like Billy the Kid and his gang of cowboy vigilantes were, amnesty might be a feasible option. We are talking here about between 11 and 12 million criminals.  Some say Billy the Kid had good reason, as did Jesse James to do commit some of the criminal acts of which they were charged.  I’m virtually certain every illegal Mexican alien in the U.S. has a litany of good reasons he chose to  slip in past our border guards, but the fact remains, he chose to sneak by instead of enter legally. He chose to violate the law.  Unless we visit him with consequences, others will take our acquiescence as license. As precedent. Bill Tildon (great American tennis champion) said the first rule of tennis and life is the same:  When you’re playing a losing game, change. If we grant amnesty to the 11 Million aliens we have, what will keep the next 11 million from coming in the same door?  Amnesty is precedent. It’s time to change our clearly losing tactics in the immigration game. The logical answer is to require the ones who came in the back door, to confess, comply with the law, leave and come back this time through the front. Let the “amnesty” be merely a stay of execution on their arrest and deportation. If they have a job skill and a job prospect in the U.S., apply for a work visa, and ultimately citizenship. Will it be easy, or will it be cheap?  No and no.  Like most of the mistakes America is making now, exporting jobs to China and waging ruinous theocratic wars, the solutions are going to cost us dearly. What other “immigrants” should we be concerned with?  How about all the Islamic youth of France who are unemployed and rioting over there?  Would we like to have more Islamics illegally enter our borders at the present time to join the 3 million we already have? How about Islamics who, as many Mexican aliens, don’t know the first word of English and get all their truth through Al Jazeera TV?  For that matter, have you noticed lately the number of Spanish-only stations on your cable or dish?  You’re paying for them just as you’re paying for the increased price of dual-language packaging and instructions on every item sold in America. What’s the last thing you learned or enjoyed on those Spanish-speaking channels? Right now Colorado’s Dish Network supplies Al Jazzera TV to up to 150,000 resident Islamic households for $23/mth, solely in Arabic as  cable networks sell several Spanish-only stations to millions of Mexican Immigrants. The same corporations making money out of shipping jobs to China are making money shipping foreign culture into our Islamic and Mexican immigrant subcultures, keeping both  subcultural, ignorant and separate. Alien.  But Mexicans are no longer rioting in the streets (as the L.A. 13 did in March 1968 ) to be granted equal privileges to study English and other college-prep courses.   They are rioting in the streets with indignation at being asked to obey American Immigration Law most of them can’t read—immigration law which is every nation’s bulwark of stability and security. Professor Carrier argues that it’s futile to think we can build a wall high enough to keep aliens out; that it’s a proposal impossible to police.  If he’s right, we’re doomed, and it’s just a matter of time before Al Qaeda operatives, already planning to enter and by various means destroy us, consummate their dreams and America is no more.  I say, Australia–more completely surrounded by water than us–has little or no immigration problems because they have prudently and consistently enforced their immigration laws and never fallen asleep on their bastions as we have. Len says the Muslim problem in France is not like the problem with Mexican aliens in the U.S.  I agree.  Most Mexicans over here are gainfully employed and are not scary religious fundamentalists whose lunatic fringe wants to kill everyone who doesn’t pray to their god 6 times a day. But while I agree, I again demurrer: Len completely misses the point of my contentions concerning population control.  First he is wrong, egregiously wrong when he says America is not overpopulated. “Overpopulation” is a relative term.  If the U.S. were a third-world country, 300 million would be relatively…innocuous  from the environmental standpoint. But Americans, both from the individual residential and corporate industrial standpoints are the number-one consumer culture in the world, and each person in the U.S. consumes and pollutes, respectively,  40 times the resources and wastes (including global-warming Co2) that undeveloped nations do per capita. This means America has a globally-warming and polluting population of 40 times 300 or closer to 12 billion people in terms of exerting toxic effects on our unitary global society.  Contrarily,  the corresponding millions on the continents of Africa and South America are much less environmentally greedy and toxic to the earth’s finite and integral ecosystem, and their millions in that milieu translate to  thousands on the American scales of consumption and environmental attrition. And Mexicans don’t steal their ways past our border guards to become third-world natives. They come to emulated, replicate and wallow with us ugly Americans in our internationally-infamous game of greed, consumption and waste, a game led now by the prince of ecological darkness who has unilaterally thumbed his oily nose at Kyoto, and told International Law and the Hague to take a hike. America owes it to the rest of the world to limit its numbers. With only 300 million of us on our share of the continent, we’ve managed to kill every viable river with industrial and agricultural runoff.   To be safe, we must all now drink water from a bottle. One of four of our children has asthma now because our air, from auto and industrial exhaust is unsafe to breathe. We are the greatest per-capita contributors to global warming on the globe.  Mexicans remaining in primarily agrarian Mexico are environmentally, third-world innocuous.  We have too many people in the U.S. now, Dr. Carrier. We are clearly and certainly overpopulated. Our overpopulation–with our habits of energy and other consumption–adds to the urgency of our closing our gates to barbarians aspiring to become worse…American-Class Consumer barbarians.  Forget the legal vs illegal issue. I demurrer.  We need to close the gates to all but those who can help save us from us…German scientists perhaps who might help rehabilitate our GM-EXXON mentality with wind-powered energetics or again challenge us to Manhattan Project ourselves again to world peace…this time with a formula for creating hydrogen as our primary energy supply.  As long as we “adopt” the bastard refugee children of over-populating nations, those nations will continue to over-populate, under-develop and under-conserve.  We’re a support system (enablers) for the addiction (unguarded sex) that’s killing the world.Unfettered human sperm is the doomsday WMD.  Plutonium can’t hold a candle.   There is no environmental problem that does not have as its essential primary cause, human overpopulation. Even nuclear arsenals and waste have at their roots men’s struggles over limited earthly territory and resources.   Australia …even China of all places are doing positive things about it. Immigration is an ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUE FIRST. When it’s suggested, as Len did, that we need Mexican immigrants to give us the population growth necessary to “keep our economy vital”,  I can only cite the misguided polemic to the fallacy in the rule to which that assertion is an infected corollary :  The prime fallacy in all capitalism is that “economies are capable of infinite expansion”.Economies become more “vital” when we enhance the quality and quantum of our GNP and foreign trade balances.  If we  adopt  population expansion as the engine for GNP expansion, we’ll convert our Mexican standoff to an ecological OK Corral, and we’ll be the McLaury’s. In winding down, I can agree with a lot of what Len says and with the  compassion he obviously feels for the Mexicans we have permitted, so far, to violate our immigration laws. I can concede for the sake of argument that their ancestors had adobe digs in California and Texas before Daniel Boone, and they are all well-intending, hard-working, Cheech-charming  and beautiful people. I am not singling them out. They simply, on a 100-to-one count, comprise most all our illegal aliens. My basic tenet for preservation of life on earth is that we re-establish borders not simply as a barrier  for Mexicans, but rather to overpopulation. When a given territory starts losing human lives (thru starvation, disease contagion and emigration) because humans have reproduced themselves to a point their space can’t sustain them, that’s a problem that warrants quarantining as if it were  the most virulent  disease contagion/pandemic in earth’s history…because it is. When a tsunami hits, send volunteers.  When a people begin to starve because there are too many of them eating from the same garden on the island, send them a life raft.  Drop the raft from an F-16 jet airplane at high altitude in a position to drift to the shore of the island. Fill the raft with a generation’s supply of contraceptives. And when the beautiful native girls run out onto the beach, wearing grass skirts and no tops beckoning you to land…hit the afterburner…and fly for (our) life. When you get home, run out to and enjoy your own sandy beach.  Bathe in the sun, swim in the water.  And guard the shore. Enjoyed our dialogue, Len, even as it occasionally drifted toward debate. Hope you learned as much as I did. Dusty 4/5/06 *(Dr. Leonard Carrier received his B.A. and M.A. from the University of Miami in ’56 and ’58, respectively, and his Ph.D from Stanford in 1967.  He taught at Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia and the University of South Florida (Tampa) before spending the rest of his teaching and research career (29 years until 2000) at the University of Miami. ) Robert R. (Dusty) Schoch is an attorney, inventor and writer (novels, essays, screenplays) living in High Point.  BA (English) degree, UNC Chapel Hill,  JD (law) U. of Ala., Tuscaloosa.  Dusty is founder and scribe of the B.E.A. (“Barristers et al”) a N.C.-based, politically-independent foreign policy think tank. He is also co-editor (foreign policy) of Democratswrite.com through the contact link of which readers are invited to correspond with him.

Posted in Immigration, Political | Leave a comment by Editors

Neo-Contentions III VANITY FAIR’S ENCORE: Saving our Warming Globe   Talking about “Out of the mouths of babes”… Now, for the second time, Vanity Fair Magazine—generally perceived to be the place where the rich and shallow ponder, parade and pursue their affluence, trivial pursuits and…babes, has provided us a virtual fountain of truth.    In July 2003, VF Editor, Sam Tanehuaus researched and recounted the story of the neo-con’s covert coup of the Pentagon giving us the Bush Doctrine of “preemptive war” on nations “harboring terrorists” (see “Bush’s Brain Trust, Vanity Fair, No. 515, July 2003, pp. 114-119, 164/169).  This article continues to be the definitive authority on how the Zionist-run A.E.I. seized the coinciding opportunities of 9/11 and an incumbent imbecile in the White House to execute a war of Zionist ambition on false pretenses, and using other peoples money…and soldiers.    If you don’t have this article, don’t look for it on line; It’s only in two places: (1) In your public library, (2)  In a word file available to the B.E.A. (Barristers et al.), the foreign-policy think tank founded by Democratswrite editor, Dusty Schoch.   Amazingly enough, Vanity Fair has this month produced for us another keeper:  In its April issue, VF has published a thirty-page article which is today’s noblest memorial of environmental movers and shakers—the world’s avante-guarde revolutionaries in the war to “green” (save) our warming planet.   A few days ago, I sent a local neo-con Republican (who remains nameless to spare me the reputation of publicly debating “informationally-challenged” men) copies of environmental articles on this site (“Bush Lies…We Die”, and “The Warning Canary of Global Warming”) along with the suggestion that he buy a copy of April’s Vanity Fair, to educate himself on how relatively vital this global warming issue–rather this global warming reality-is.   Typical of his neo-con ilk, my correspondent wrote back words to the effect that I was—once again—simply indulging myself in “Bush bashing”.    It occurred to me that what I wrote him in response, I need to share with everyone whose attention I can muster.  It occurred to me that, considering all the political issues out there that will bear significantly on the next election, there is another issue which is in a class all by itself.  And I’m not talking about Mexican or other immigration; in fact, that problem to me has significance mainly because of another issue of indisputable primacy – global warming.   It won’t matter a hoot whether Hispanics outnumber Anglo- and/or Afro-Americans at next century’s turning if within the next 10 years we have failed successfully to institute and consummate a Manhattan project to reduce CO2 emissions and end our dependence on fossil  fuel.    Finally it occurred to me that the issues/problems of (1) immigration and (2) global warming were but secondary manifestations of the core problem at the base of all forthcoming catastrophe and calamity:  8 billion people.  Overpopulation.    No one talks about it.   So I will.    What he (the no-named neo-con)  actually said  to prompt my little rant to follow was :   “I think you might get more lights turned on during your environmental midnight ride if you would just give out what Sgt. Joe Friday asked for and leave off the ‘Bush dunit’  BS.”   To the Neo-Con, I replied:   “Maybe, but the truth is Bush did do what I said he did: He CHANGED NASA’S REPORT ON GLOBAL WARMING. This (my opinion) is the most egregious act of bio-terrorism since he withdrew the U.S. from Kyoto’s protocol in violation of that international law we sponsored and drafted. ”   The Neo-Con then said to me:        “ I’m just getting my feet wet on the environmental thing so cut me a little slack while I catch up but, it seems to me that what we have here is the good, the bad and the ugly. The bad part seems to be that due to a virtually smaller world from globalization, the negative impact of environmental turmoil in relatively remote areas can have a major influence on the world as a whole.      The good part is that, also through globalization, we should get the benefits of quickly learning of our mistakes as they occur, and we also have a historical record from past developments. …..if we have the intelligence, or care, to act on it.      The ugly? Well, I think Vanity Fair has dealt with that for this month.      And, if you don’t mind, how about sharing some info on your 10 year plan of urgency. Believe it, or not, I do try to be a good steward of the earth and I promise not to try and take your credit for saving the planet. Big Al will do that for you.”   My response to the  Nameless Neo-Con and the finale to my present essay is this: “Some valid points and thinking.  But we don’t have time for nice polemics in this environmental thing. The situation is desperate.  Civil disobedience (on a large scale) will certainly be necessary.   Corporations run all nations and corporations are vampiric.  Not just parasitic;  vampiric. Ten years probably to tipping and the neocons likely have 3 more.  That leaves 7 with no head-way in the first 3. The global weather will come to cataclysm faster than the twin towers collapsed.  Not as fast as in the movie—“Day After Tomorrow” maybe, but in less than a decade.  The “day after tomorrow” scenario is probably around 2100.   The worst-case scenario is a humanly-induced ice age. The world has survived them before.  But this one will kill 10 to 20 billion souls.  It’s not , to me at least, a thinkable thing.  And that’s just the human suffering. Thousands of species have already died and under the existing NASA and international scientists’ model, most all (saving lobsters and roaches) will die unless we can generate revolutionary change, and within the course of the next decade.    The problem is totally globalized. You’re right. The good thing is that even with most of the neocons, we’re through the denial period. Bush is covering up the science to further dumb-down the red states and salvage just one more election for the Republicans. The cat will soon leap out of the bag. Katrina was a faint  meow next to what’s next. Arial photos show 24 percent of the frozen Arctic gone in the past 5 years.    When huge, continental-size chunks of glacial ice break away and float into warm currents, we’ll learn the meaning of  mayhem.  Humans have never seen momma nature truly pissed.  NY and all coastal cities will become stalagmites in the sea. Twin Towers times 10,000.    The angst-fueling element is that there is still probably time to hit reverse.  I think America, under Democratic steerage, might  well heed the warning. Then we’ll face the insurmountable problem of trying to get China and Russia to follow suit.  That’ll probably be the showdown facing the next Democratic majority. But I can spy no Democrats alive and on deck capable of the diplomatic machinations that situation will call for.    China and Russia are already conducting military maneuvers together.  Russia can’t afford and China won’t consider implementing environmental changes that retard their pursuit of American opulence.  The irony is that while we’re wising up,  China and Russia will be busy replacing us as plunderers of the globe, and global warming accordingly looks more inevitable than ever.  China’s flattening population means nothing. When three previously third-world billion humans become addicted to   American consumption levels, there’s nothing the U.S will be able to do short of preemptive nuking that’ll stave off  the testing of the NASA doomsday model.  Sure hope they’re wrong.   The U.S. has got to make itself again the “model” for global environmental citizenship and stewardship.   70 MPG cars; reversing urban sprawl;  98% insulated houses; Manhattan project for producing cheap hydrogen;  Manhattan project for nuclear fusion;  closing all borders to all immigration; making all the above look right, noble  and “fun”.  Make movies about environmental leadership that make us the envy of the world for reasons other than exercising totally unfettered rights to rock, roll, hyperbase, steroidize, American idolize and survivor-screw, suck, sodomize and porn ourselves into narcissistic hedonist heaven.   The ecology of the world is dying because of the way we humans are living and replicating ourselves.  Start your studies, Mr. Neo-con,  why don’t you by just Googling the word “gaia”.   When you understand the gaia concept (reality of earth’s unitary ecosystem), you’ll see that there is only one real ecological problem to which all others are derivative.  Just one. It ain’t  America’s love of SUV’s, or CO2 emissions, or dumping mercury in the rivers and seas, or having too-big houses with  thermostats turned up too high.   There’s nothing our gaia globe couldn’t endure if it weren’t for one thing:  The world has cancer.  Part of its tissue is growing at a rate it’s consuming the vital and finite resources of the macro-body.  Sperm.  Human sperm.  7.5 billion too many humans.    Follow Kyoto, develop wind and solar and hydrogen hybrids and the world’s still going to hell in a handbasket if we have 8 and then 16 billion people.  Make 8 into sub-one and there are no critical ecological problems.  Man would be no more a lethal threat to the gaia than the that irksome fungus that no  doctor on the globe can rid my left big toenail of.   Do yourself a favor, Mr. Neo-con: Re-read July, 2003 Vanity Fair, and then go out and buy April’s VF while it’s still on the shelf.  The story of the neo-cons’  rise to power (2003 VF) is only the second scariest story ever told.  April’s Vanity Fair outlines the enemy that will make the neo-con fascists seem puny by comparison.   Human overpopulation is the prime mover of every geo-political problem facing, and now threatening the continuity of our global existence—our mysterious and wonderful—and possibly solitary and unique—trip through eternity on our spaceship… earth.   Dusty Schoch April 27, 2006

Posted in Bush Lies, Corporations, Environmental, Global Warming, Political, War On Terrorism | Leave a comment ← Older posts Newer posts →