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Local News & Opinion
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01.13 Hawaii, the Unique State Books, Films, Arts & Education
01.24 Can Apple “Rescue” US Education? (Graphics) 01.23 What You (Really) Need to Know 01.22 How to Forecast Weather Infographic w/Simple Explanations Letters
Ref. : Letters to the editor Health Care & Environment
02.10 LET’S REMAKE THE WAY WE MAKE THINGS 02.09 Cancer rates triple among New York police officers who responded to 9/11 02.08 The seed emergency: The threat to food and democracy 02.07 Bill Gates backs climate scientists lobbying for large-scale geoengineering 02.04 Your Day at the Beach Could Soon Lead to a Night at the Hospital 02.03 Obama Won't Touch Climate With a 10-Foot Pole 02.03 Komen reverses decision to cut Planned Parenthood funding 02.03 Reforming EU Deep-Sea Fisheries Management 02.02 By defunding Planned Parenthood, the Susan G Komen Foundation betrays women 02.02 Ohio Tries to Escape Fate as a Dumping Ground for Fracking Fluid 01.31 Eleanor Smeal dissects Obama vs. Catholic Church controversy over birth control coverage - video 01.30 Scientists Call on Obama Administration to Use Science as Guide for Arctic 01.28 Universal health care proposal stalls in California Senate 01.27 Apple, Electronics and Environmental Ills 01.25 Solar Cheaper Than Diesel Making India’s Mittal Believer: Energy 01.24 Sounding an Alarm on Birds and Mercury 01.24 Why Don’t We Have Abundant Solar Power? Blame Financing, and Industry, not Science 01.22 The Money Traps in U.S. Health Care 01.22 Looking Inside the Twinkie Ref. Dollars for Doctors - How Industry Money Reaches Physicians Ref. 2010 Comparative Price Report Medical and Hospital Fees by Country - Graphics Ref. Health at a Glance 2011 - OECD Indicators Ref. : Why is Healthcare Absurdly Expensive in USA (Part 2) [Graphics] (Part 1 is here) Video Health Care Systems in Less Corrupt Countries “News” Media
02.07 Did Obama make the economy worse? Not according to most statistics 02.02 ABC's Iran Propaganda 02.02 The Ongoing “Foxification” of the Wall Street Journal 01.30 While temperatures rise, denialists reach lower 01.29 Fox News psychiatrist: Newt Gingrich's affairs 'mean he might make a strong president' 01.22 ‘Shocking victory’: With SOPA shelved, Markos Moulitsas on a way forward for Internet policy - video Daily The Daily Howler Justice Matters
02.05 Why the AGs Must Not Settle: Robo-signing Is Just the Tip of the Iceberg 02.04 THE CAGING OF AMERICA 02.03 Senate Votes To Ban Its Members From Insider Trading... Kind Of 01.31 Senate clears way for vote on insider-trading ban 01.25 Why all the robo-signing? Shedding light on the shadow banking system 01.25 In Iraq, Haditha case is reminder of justice denied 01.22 Still Not Clear on SOPA & PIPA? Infographic w/Simple Explanations US Politics, Policy & Culture
02.10 The Cancer in Occupy 02.10 How Opus Dei Influenced Rick Santorum 02.10 People Are Not Leaving the Labor Force 02.09 Obama, Explained 02.09 OPED: The White Underclass 02.09 EDITORIAL: A Terrible Transportation Bill 02.09 THE OBAMA MEMOS 02.06 Are Conservatives More Fearful Than Liberals? 02.04 Soaking the Poor, State by State 02.04 Reddit Co-Founder Alexis Ohanian's Rosy Outlook On The Future of Politics 02.03 SUPERBOWL XLVI: Are You Ready for Some Football??? 02.03 Buffett rules: Sheldon Whitehouse introduces the Paying a Fair Share Act - video 02.02 Secrecy Shrouds ‘Super PAC’ Funds in Latest Filings 02.01 Rich Patrons Are Major Source of Romney’s Cash 01.31 How Newt Gingrich Crippled Congress 01.30 Corporate Rule Is Not Inevitable 01.30 Clashes in Oakland: 400 Arrests, Tear Gas, Flash-Bang Grenades 01.30 A European look at the US primaries - video 01.29 Obama’s Faux Populism Sounds Like Bill Clinton 01.25 Inside Romney’s Tax Returns: A Reading Guide 01.24 ILLUSIONS: Being Led Down the Primrose Path...??? 01.24 Science Bulletins: Whales Give Dolphins a Lift - video 01.24 THE OBAMA MEMOS 01.22 Three Takeaways From South Carolina High Crimes?
Economics, Gov't. & Business
02.10 This is no bailout for Main Street America 02.10 Why the Foreclosure Deal May Not Be So Hot After All 02.10 Matt Taibbi assesses the $26 billion settlement designed to aid victims of foreclosure fraud - video 02.10 Foreclosure Deal to Spur U.S. Home Seizures 02.08 Banks Paying Homeowners to Avoid Foreclosures 02.07 App Stores Create 500,000 U.S. Jobs 02.07 The Payroll Tax Fight 02.07 Obama super PAC decision: President blesses fundraising for Priorities USA Action 02.06 How Privatizing Government Shovels Cash to Parasitic Corporations and Undermines Democracy 02.05 We’re More Unequal Than You Think – Graphic: Unequal rise in income 02.03 PRIVATE INEQUITY 02.02 The New American Divide 02.02 American Airlines proposes to end all four pension plans 02.01 Economics 101 01.30 New Strategy, Old Pentagon Budget 01.30 Where Did All the Workers Go? 60 Years of Economic Change in 1 Graph 01.29 The Apple Boycott: People Are Spouting Nonsense about Chinese Manufacturing 01.29 Made in the World 01.28 Sugar daddy Adelson could save $500 million in taxes if his boy Gingrich wins - video 01.28 How Swedes and Norwegians broke the power of the ‘1 percent’ 01.27 Unemployment in Spain Rises to 22.9% 01.27 Chinese Company Continues Plan To Replace Workforce With 500,000 Robots 01.27 Details Emerge of New Financial Fraud Unit 01.27 Not all jobs are equal 01.27 The Shift from Manufacturing to Service Economy - Graphic 01.25 Billionaires Occupy Davos as 0.01% Bemoan Inequality 01.24 Germany has the economic strengths America once boasted 01.23 State Capitalism: The visible hand 01.22 How Big Money Bought Our Democracy, Corrupted Both Parties, and Set Us Up for Another Financial Crisis - video 01.22 How U.S. lost out on Apple's iPhone work International
02.03 What the Occupy movement must learn from Sundance 02.02 US plans to halt Afghan combat role early surprise Kabul 01.31 TABLE TALK 01.30 With its deadly drones, the US is fighting a coward's war 01.30 UN panel aims for 'a future worth choosing' 01.26 Iran is ready to return to nuclear talks 01.24 Reagan’s Hand in Guatemala’s Genocide We are a non-profit Internet-only newspaper publication founded in 1973. Your donation is essential to our survival.
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COMMENTARY:Some democracy, AmericaThe American President is selling a product that America does not have.it is now plain for all to see that misrepresentative government and corporatism has oppressed American citizenry to the extent that their democracy has become nothing more than a corporate theocracy, a fascist feudal state in which “the serfs” serve the corporate state as voiceless workers, voracious consumers, submissive citizens and pliant subjects.
President Bush is in Europe flaunting, in a hard sell pitch, his brand of democracy to the world at large and to Russia in particular. He is known to have said: “We believe that the voice of the people ought to be determining policy, because we believe in democracy.”That, ladies and gentlemen, is as fallacious a statement as any that the President of United States has been giving since he took over the reins of his great country. Fallacious too because the American President is selling a product that America does not have.
The President’s statement is fallacious because corporate corruption of American politicians and government has shredded to bits whatever semblance of democracy America was left with. Fallacious too because instead of having democracy in the decision making institutions of America it is rather the fine art of corporate corruption that now stands democratized and institutionalized with all now having a chance at equal opportunity corruption. All it takes is money. Corporate corruption in America is now at a stage where it has become a bipartisan, open, and legal practice with Americans finally coming to accept it as a status quo, an integral part of a dollar-driven, cheating culture. The American President is selling a product that America does not have. The President’s statement is fallacious because it is now plain for all to see that misrepresentative government and corporatism has oppressed American citizenry to the extent that their democracy has become nothing more than a corporate theocracy, a fascist feudal state in which “the serfs” serve the corporate state as voiceless workers, voracious consumers, submissive citizens and pliant subjects. The American President is selling a product that America does not have. The President’s statement is fallacious because the immoral alliance that he and his predecessors have been having with dictators the world over runs exactly counter to the false pledges of democracy to their subjects. Fallacious too because those who cosset ruling tyrants cannot advocate for themselves the exclusive privilege of bringing democracy to the oppressed. The American President is selling a product that America does not have. The President’s statement is fallacious because despite the fact that for all his internal and foreign misadventures, from social issues to Iraq war, the support of American masses having decidedly moved from a trusting to a distrusting majority, he presses on stubbornly. Fallacious because while clinging doggedly to his disastrous policies, he is known to have called himself ‘the decider’ on more than one occasion. Fallacious too because despite the aforementioned fact, there is not one single institution in that ‘mother of all democracies’ that can help loosen the death like grip of the yellow fangs of his administration from the jugular of its unfortunate victims. The American President is selling a product that America does not have. The President’s statement is fallacious because contrary to its democratic plumage, his own party’s strategy is now out in the open. And that is a Republican Party that permanently runs the United States and a United States that permanently runs the world. Fallacious too because the severely mauled, but still breathing, democratic opposition has so far miserably failed to nip in the bud this wicked vision of a one-party global empire. The American President is selling a product that America does not have. The President’s statement is fallacious because he has had real laws passed at home that have torn bomb-size holes in the Bill of Rights, set into motion an actual shift of American judiciary toward the radical right and has so fused his government with corporations, the military, portions of the media and a hugely expanded secret police apparatus that now it scares the living daylights out of common Americans. The American President is selling a product that America does not have. The President’s statement is fallacious because the world can see his quisling lackeys overseeing his experiments in Afghanistan and Iraq about to roll in dust and his ally in Pakistan looking with stunning disbelief at the shifting sands of national opinion beneath his feet. Fallacious too because had his vision of democracy bore even a scrap of resemblance to the original idea, his friends in these countries would have been elevated to prophet hood by the innocent masses of these countries. The American President is selling a product that America does not have. The President’s statement is fallacious because we the world can see that for us at least, American democracy has boiled down to nothing more than that of a lynch mob who vote on the fate of their victims even as the rope is being readied to carry out the inevitable verdict. The American President is selling a product that America does not have. The President’s statement is fallacious because American democracy is not only not a democracy; it is in fact the exact opposite...a ‘minocracy’. He is trying to sell to the world a system in which if only 60% of the people bother to cast their vote, in a majority system with two parties, 31% of the electorate can impose its will on the remaining 69%; and with three parties competing, 21% of the people could rule a country through an appointed elite. The American President is selling a product that America does not have. The President’s statement is fallacious because American democracy has actually translated itself into vesting the incredible amount of the power of the President of United States into a mediocrity like the incumbent President with disastrous results for America and the world at large. Fallacious because mediocrity has now become the rule and unlimited irresponsibility one of the privileges associated with his kind of totalitarian democracy. Fallacious too because with the justification of a popular mandate, a third-rate politician has been given the licence to squander resources and bringing chaos into the world without the fear of being held accountable for it. The American President is selling a product that America does not have. Some democracy, America. Copyright 2007 by Anwaar Hussain. The writer, a former officer of the Pakistan Air Force, is now based in the United Arab Emirates. This story is published in the Chronicle with permission of the author. Mr. Hussain may be reached by email at eagleeye@emirates.net.ae.
Copyright © 2007 The Baltimore Chronicle. All rights reserved. Republication or redistribution of Baltimore Chronicle content is expressly prohibited without their prior written consent. This story was published on June 6, 2007. |
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