WAR ON TERRORISTS GETS GOOFIER
“In order to stop terrorists from destroying America’s democratic freedoms, we will destroy America’s democratic freedoms ourselves.”
That seems to be the official slogan of Washington’s goofy war on terrorism. Not only has George W. attacked the wrong country in his surreal war, but his administration also continues to shut down our constitutional liberties here at home. They have secretly seized everything from library records to the e-mails of innocent Americans, suppressed the right to peaceful assembly and free speech, suspended the core legal right of habeas corpus, and generally asserted an autocratic authority to rule by executive fiat.
Now comes another goofy directive from on high – this one to suppress the right to the free expression of religion. In the name of battling terrorists, the Bureau of Prisons has decreed that chaplains in every federal prison must systematically purge their chapel libraries of all religious books, CDs, videos, and other materials not on an approved list. Calling this purge the Standardized Chapel Library Project, BOP says it relied on “experts” to choose 150 books for each of 20 religions. Who are these experts? BOP won’t say.
Libraries that had thousands of religious texts have had their shelves decimated. The censorship is necessary, snapped a BOP official, in order to “assure reliable teachings.” Hello, this is government dictating religious teachings, a constitutional no-no.
Ah, the officials cluck, but we’re protecting you from prisoners who might read some inflammatory Muslim materials and be converted to terrorists. Hmmm, but BOP’s list excludes such writings as Living Positively One Day at a Time by the Rev. Robert Schuller. Are they calling that a militant text?
Perhaps the strategy of the Bushites is to show the terrorists we can be nuttier than they are. Now, that’s really scary.
AN EARLY AND EXCLUSIVE PRIMARY
The top presidential candidates of both political parties are meeting with voters in a key primary, promising to help them on the issues they care about.
Are they in Iowa? No. New Hampshire? Uh-uh. California? Nowhere near it. So, where?
Wall Street.
While regular citizens won’t start voting on the presidential contenders until January, an intensive, closed-door primary has already been taking place inside the confines of investment banks, hedge funds, and other financial institutions in Manhattan. Reporters are not allowed in, candidates don’t issue press releases about their appearances, and there is no disclosure about what the presidential wannabes pledge to these elite banking interests in order to gain their financial backing. It’s strictly a private campaign, albeit with enormous public impact.
Bear Stearns, for example, has had its own presidential tour, summoning seven major candidates to its Midtown headquarters for exclusive presentations and Q&A sessions with its managing partners. If you’re just a plain ol’ voter, you’d be lucky to get a handshake with any of these aspirants, but this financial conglomerate can command its own cozy conference with Mitt Romney, Hillary Clinton, Rudy Giuliani, Barack Obama, Fred Thompson, and others.
Business Week magazine reports that these Wall Street barons not only want to get commitments on issues like global trade and tax cuts, but they also use the private sessions to measure the candidates’ ability to “make smart decisions in times of uncertainty, a trait bankers and traders prize in themselves.”
Wait a minute! Aren’t these the same people who brought us Enron, NAFTA, offshoring, exorbitant credit-card fees, dependency on oil, pension collapses, and other “smart decisions”? Indeed, isn’t Bear Stearns itself butt-deep in the ongoing subprime mortgage disaster? Why should anyone listen to them?
This article appears in September 28 • 2007.