Saturday: People before Profit vs. Pseudo-Pragmatism
Posted: January 29, 2011 Filed under: morning reads | Tags: 2011: days of revolt, Education Reform, Egypt, middle east, modern-day slavery, oppression of want, Palestine Papers, people over profit, SOTU, Women's and children's health 45 Comments
My favorite moment from the night of the SOTU address: Hillary, Sonia, and Elana
Good morning, news junkies! It’s been a helluva week in current events. Grab a cuppa whatever gets you up and warm this morning and let’s dig in.
Restate of the Union
For the source on that, see VL’s latest webcomic: “Restate of the Union“? Once again, Vast Left hits it out of the park. And, Glen Ford at BAR hits it back out there again (emphasis in bold is mine): “The Obama/GOP Consensus… With whole communities in a state of economic dislocation, Obama burns the rescue boats and poisons the water, all the while promising that the necessary budgetary savings will not be achieved ‘on the backs of our most vulnerable citizens’ – as if Wall Street’s bankers will shield the helpless with their well-bonused bodies… No dollar signs to give meaning to the president’s mystical and misleading rhetoric on jobs, which will somehow be made to appear through a uniquely American process of ‘innovation’ and ‘self-invention’ inaccessible to lesser peoples. This aspect of exceptionalism will out-‘green’ China and overtake South Korean Internet speeds, without costing the Treasury an extra dime. ‘Thousands’ of jobs will result, to take the place of the hundreds of thousands that will be lost in the public sector, alone, as government implodes at all levels. ”
Also: Bostonboomer came up with an excellent list of words that were missing from the president’s address (see last section of this post for my list), and over at the CSM Global News Blog, Stephen Kurczy has a roundup of “World reactions to Obama’s 2011 State of the Union address.”
Power to the People: Tunisia, Lebanon, Egypt, Yemen, and the Palestine Papers
The REAL story this week is the one going on in the Middle East. I collected more links and excerpts than I could fit here, so I’ve put up a separate Saturday reads just for the Middle East at my place. Please click on the link above or the image to the left to get the scoop! To the left, description by Mona Eltahawy: “..a photo of a man and a woman standing in Mahalla, posted on the citizen journalists’ Web site Rassd News Network, instantly conveys why Egyptians have taken to the streets. The woman holds a loaf of bread and a Tunisian flag. The man next to her holds a loaf of bread and a sign that reads ‘Yesterday Tunisia. Today Egypt. Jan. 25 the day we began to take our rights back.’”
Modern-Day Slavery Continues Right Before Our Eyes
In South Florida, via the Miami Herald: “Modern-day slaves’ story repeats daily in plain sight… The case of dozens of Filipino workers held captive spotlights a widespread human- trafficking problem.” And, from Nikki Junker at RH Reality Check: “Moldova, A Hot Bed for Human Trafficking… So when I think of Human Trafficking, I think of the places where poverty is most rampant and in the European Union, the poorest country is little Moldova whose people are bought and sold as commodities to be used by the richer nations of the world.”
Sept. 2010: Hillary at the UN attending the "Every Woman, Every Child" event.
This Saturday in Women’s and Children’s Health
For the extended version, please click here or on the image to the left. Topics covered: Breakthroughs, Cancer Research, January: Cervical Health Awareness, February 4: Official Wear Red Day, Abortion Rights Awareness Month?, Obstetric Fistula, Chemicals and the Rise in Childhood Cancers, Demography trends in India, Stupakistan: An Interactive Map, Anti-Abortion Myths, Catholic hospitals, Abortion showdown in Texas, Stem Cell Research, Siddhartha Mukherjee’s The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer.
Race to the Truth
I wrote this back in November, but after hearing Obama’s SOTU remarks on education, I thought I would revisit it. It’s chock full of links–I basically recorded everything of interest I could dig up on the charter school debate. If you want to read the entire piece, click on the link/image or bookmark for later. Otherwise, here are the three must-read links you ought to familiarize yourself with if nothing else:
1. Ravitch’s “The Myth of Charter Schools” 2. CREDO 3. Harvard study
Bringing it altogether: Populism vs. the Pseudo-Pragmatism of Barack Obama
The president’s speech on Tuesday failed to put people first and then added insult to injury by championing the false pragmatism of “[spending] cuts to things I care deeply about, like community action programs.” Talk about “suckered into stupid” !
Remember O’s “Dumb” war comment? “I don’t oppose all wars…what I am opposed to is a dumb war.” Well, I’m not against all budgetary cuts. I’m just against the stuck-on-stupid ones that would further erode underfunded social safety nets that I care deeply about–especially at precisely the moment where the margins of society need those social safety nets the most. By all means, cut back spending on unnecessary things. I don’t know about you, but war+untruth and military aid toward a sham peace process all sound pretty darn unnecessary to me.
The president paid lipservice to “ordinary people” before he closed, but here are some more words missing from Obama’s speech: Egypt, the Palestine Papers, Citizens United ruling, Modern day slavery, Mental health, Childhood cancer, Hexavalent chromium, NASA privatization/layoffs (though Obama sure Sputnik’d us in a way that is a most unfortunate turn of that phrase), Atheist (yet for no discernible reason, he tacked Christian, Jewish, Hindu, and Muslim in front of his two-second mention of the DADT repeal), Texas School Board of Education and textbooks, CREDO study on charter schools, Peterson/Lastra-Anadón (their study gave Race to the Top winners poor marks), Smith-Lipinski, Paycheck Fairness Act (not the same thing as the Lilly Ledbetter Act), Income inequality, Rise in Multi-generational American households due to unemployment and foreclosure, Food stamps, Stem cell research, Dickey-Wicker, Public option/Medicare for All, Elizabeth Edwards.
I miss Elizabeth’s voice (from an August 2007 interview): “It’s the continuing inequity. We still have a middle class that lives on a razor blade. So sometimes when you say poverty, you neglect a large portion of the population about whom he’s deeply concerned. It’s the two-income trap. It’s more likely in America that your parents will file for bankruptcy than divorce. We think of divorce as so prevalent, but we all know that happens because somebody moves out of the house. But when bankruptcy happens, they stay there, they close up, and you don’t feel what’s going on. But what that means is we have all these families under stress, constantly. And then we have the people who are trying to get out of dire distress. You hear that thirty-seven million people in this country live in poverty, and fifteen million people—fifteen million— live in deep poverty, which is $7,800 for a family of three.”
Now, that’s a State-of-the-Union-as-inherited-from-Bush-and-the-GOP speech!
I miss so many voices on the domestic policy front. Like Bobby Kennedy: “It is not realistic or hardheaded to solve problems and take action unguided by ultimate moral aims and values, although we all know some who claim that it is so. In my judgment, it is thoughtless folly. For it ignores the realities of human faith and of passion and of belief — forces ultimately more powerful than all of the calculations of our economists or of our generals.”
We are witnessing the power of those forces in the Middle East. Not in a glossy Shepard Fairey poster, but out in the streets. Genuine conviction. Genuine passion. The hope of a people demanding policies that put the interests of the public trust ahead of the pseudo-pragmatic. As Hillary said in her 2009 Human Rights speech at Georgetown: “Of course, people must be free from the oppression of tyranny, from torture, from discrimination, from the fear of leaders who will imprison or ‘disappear’ them. But they also must be free from the oppression of want – want of food, want of health, want of education, and want of equality in law and in fact.“
There is nothing more pragmatic or more “innovative” than a domestic and foreign policy agenda driven by a human rights agenda to free people from the oppression not just of tyranny but also of want. It is the only agenda that pays lasting progress forward.
We need a freeze on the idiocracy that suggests otherwise.
So, what stories are you following today? And, what’s on *your* list of words missing from the SOTU? Have at it in the comments!
[originally posted at Let Them Listen; crossposted at Taylor Marsh and Liberal Rapture]
peej
Carissa
ecocatwoman
mablue2
peggysue22
quixote
skydancingguestblogger
Mona (aka Wonk the Vote)
Sky Dancing 
Wonk,
Thank you for remembering those that spoke up for people who were and still are having a hard time. I too miss Elizabeth Edwards’ voice and all the others and it has been good for me to hear Hillary speak of the Universal Human Rights, which all these countries signed unto when they joined the United States (UN). On CNN they finally are speaking of Hosni Mubarak as a modern pharaoh who ruled for 31 years, and who planned on passing his RULE of Egypt to his son…all while running under some party with the name ‘Democratic’!
Egypt has given us a glimpse of what an Internet Kill Switch looks like, but will we have a rogue Al Jazeera willing to keep broadcasting, as troops/police bang on the door? We have to make our voices heard, as the free flow of information and the people’s right to free speech is what keep societies truly free.
Egypt Revolution Protesters Demand Change Jan25 (Take note @:45 of what the young Generation X and Y feel … information is Liberation)
I am still reeling from reading about the Right’s next attempt to further yoke women and young girls by rewriting what constitutes rape. What a revolting group of people who make this their number one priority in governing that they would water down this assault by demanding the word “forcible” be inserted legislations that would create even more hardships against women.
In perusing the 173 names that currently appear as co-signer, I am not surprised to find the names of congressional women who have signed on to this travesty. Most represent the Right, among them Michele Bachmann who has her eye on the presidency and who is given a forum to push her obscene views and lies in front of the American public.
As long as we continue to elevate these non thinking morons we have no one to blame but ourselves. It is doubtful at present that this bill will find itself signed into law but one never knows. Maybe not today but rest assured it will come up again as long as we continue to send these “baloon heads” back to DC time and time again.
These women, enemies of women across the board, need to be villified, mocked, and scorned for assuming a role that would further subjugate women and children.
These are women who can best be described as “sexist” rather then their critics who loudly and disapprovingly call them out for the stupidity they spout.
Will this affect children too? Should we rewrite bank robbery laws too, to include ‘forcible’, as most bank robbers just pass a note…right! The logic of the GOP/Republicans is just out there and in the mean time they will chastise us for not defending Michile Bachman and giving her our support for her presidential run.
So, will the history books be next, to include that the Earth is flat?
I am sick to death of hearing people defend the likes of Palin, Bachmann, Angle, O’Donnell by suggesting that those who find them ignorant and uninformed, not to mention their anti female rhetoric, are accused of being sexist or misogynist when they do so.
These are politicians who deliberately put themselves out there and are as open to criticism as any other pol regardless of gender. More so when they attack the idea of “feminism” by proposing the evisceration of women’s rights as this bill surely does.
“Stupid is as stupid does” and these are women who seek positions that offer the title of “leader”. Ignorance should not become the hallmark of what it takes.
Pat, your comment at 8:48…Thumbs Up! Woman, you said what I could not. Thank you.
Completely agree. Plus they sign on to laws that consign GLBT to second class citizenship as well as use language that promotes hate crimes and affiliate with hate groups that hide under the label of ‘family’. We’ve taken the editorial policy here that we do not women who work against the rights of women. We’ve removed blogs from our blog list that promote the kind of apologia and rationalizations that says women that actively work against the rights of women and children should still have a voice.
I still remember all the damage Phyliss Shafly did on trying to get the ERA passed. She would have sold anything out for a place of power in the headlines.
I think there’s a way to still stand up for the womanhood of all female pols while still being able to criticize them. Not all criticism is sexist. I’ve criticized Hillary for her initial reaction to Egypt, for example. So I’m certainly not going to sit back and say nothing while Michele Bachmann and Sarah Palin and the rest make a mockery of issues I care deeply about. Yeah, I didn’t particularly care for the way all the talking heads clutched their pearls when Sarah Palin said Obama’s speech was full of WTF moments (“that’s not presidential” they all gasped!)… No duh she’s not presidential… so why do you keep covering news on her 24/7? So yeah I’ll still have my say once in awhile. But that doesn’t mean Palin should get a pass for her own awful statements and actions.
Yes, I agree, enough of this self professed modern day pharaoh who’s cruel rule has caused so much harm to the people of Egypt. And no they don’t need him to install his son as second pharaoh…the people of Egypt are saying ENOUGH. There are more people out in the streets today, than yesterday, despite being cut off by phone, despite having their internet cut off by a Kill Switch and despite taking Al Jazeera off the live stream.
Al Jazeera should be commended for going all the way, they have given me respect for journalists again. Thank you Al Jazeera.
The above link includes a stats map and a link to Live Stream of Al Jazeera…still going.
Yes, Al Jazeera is doing a spectacular job. Imagine what we would be stuck with if they weren’t broadcasting…
This post is awe inspiriting …..in the realm of food for thought, you provided ( again) a freaking banquet! I was just thinking this morning: the moment the dominate motivation behind providing a human service is profit, it starts on the road to Kafkaville. It has to. Because the service, the important part, then takes a waaaay back seat to profit…where before the service was running the show, with profit providing the means…not the direction. We are living in a Theater of the Absurd….like the idea of medicine being run by for profit suits?( just one example) What has the medicine Industry complex become? Todays’s US Steel? At some point people won’t/can’t leap though the ever moving, insane hoops
paperdoll, yes–theater of the absurd, indeed. I think some services just need to have a non-profit based option. It’s the only way to make sure people at the margins have any access.
Situation in Egypt is deteriorating.
I think someone needs to convince Mubarak to leave the country. The people are enraged and it’s building, different agendas will begin solidifying, control is slipping away, looting is already happening – they want him gone and I don’t see how order can be restored as long as he’s there.
or perhaps told…it’s up to us more than him .
Yes, or told.
I don’t know that it’s up to us but if it is then it’s time to take action.
Why do I feel a sense of doom?
It would be wonderful to feel that a sense of democracy may be taking seed over there but there is this nagging feeling that the fundamentalists behind much of the global unrest will have succeeded.
Overthrowing a dictator is one thing. The question lies in what takes its place.
I feel the same, Pat.
I fear the governments involved may not be up to the task.
Me too Pat and Zal…this sense of foreboding is overwhelming me at the moment.
I am seeing images of the National Museum, there is damage! I just can’t get a good video feed.
This is horrible!
It’s really bad. If you’re having troubles with the connection, you might try the BBC radio feed.
I think things were headed this way in any case , just in the orderly corporate fashion instead of the streets……..but at some point, when people see enduring the current system ( of whatever or wherever ) will not gain them anything but more of the same or worse, they naturally say : enough… The funny part is it’s always a surprise to the powers that be….who seem to fixate on the sparks that sets things off…not the fuel dump it ignites, that had been building up for years. I’m speaking of ALOT of things here around the world ….but in this case, Mubarak had 30 years to get it right…it’s either him or the Egyptian people now and not surprisingly the Egyptian people have chosen themselves
Nobody is more dangerous –or free– than those who have nothing to lose.
paperdoll @ 9:47: brilliant comment! I totally agree. And, even as they focus on the sparks instead of the fuel that’s been building for years, they avoid even talking about the biggest spark–Wikileaks really set things off in Tunisia first, before the fever spread.
I am feeling one of my much needed little “sabbaticals” coming on and no amount of Advil is able to relieve it.
What with the state of affairs here in the US, along with the global unrest that is currently occurring, it is becoming clearer to me to go ahead and shut down the “noise machine” for awhile and immerse my mind with good music, good books, good movies, and a pan of brownies to uplift my otherwise negative mood.
Since I am not one who resides in that coveted 2% league, there is no way of escaping the brutal winter and the constant onslaught of news that does nothing to elevate my sense of well being.
Well said Pat Johnson. I recently found Dakinikat’s blog here and am enjoying it immensely. I remember your comments from early on in Puma Land over at The Confluence. I’ve always enjoyed your writing and comments. After your sabbatical, please return to us with your brilliant mind.
Pat’s writing at the Widdershins again. Thanks for coming! I’d also like to mention that while this used to be my ‘file cabinet’, it’s now very much a community effort and is no longer ‘my blog’. I think once you open a place up to commenters and to other voices, it becomes a community. There’s an admin team, a team of front pagers and a team of commenters here . This blog belongs to the community and is very much a team blog.
Mubarak names intelligence chief and close confidant Omar Suleiman as Vice President. (A position unfilled for 30 years.)
Our Assistant Secretary of State PJ Crowley’s twitter response: “The #Egyptian government can’t reshuffle the deck and then stand pat. President #Mubarak’s words pledging reform must be followed by action.”
Why does anyone think Obama should be given more, and more power. Giving him the power to disconnect the internet is wrong, and we must not the silent about this. I’m on the phone to Boxer, and Fienstein.
Thanks for all the links Wonk, and I am glad you linked to that post you did in November.
Thanks Minx… I needed to include all those links to put together my list of missing words (as inspired by BB). It’s incredibly sad and sobering when you look at all that was left unsaid in that state of the union. He really was giving a speech that was fit for an 80s sitcom version of a president.
His portion on parents children read like the Cosby show or Growing Pains to me:
I mean yeah…great. This is great advice for someone sitting in the middle of generic suburbia whose biggest problem is that their kids watch too much tv. But what does this really have to do with the year 2011 and the plethora of problems that kids and parents are facing today? Even in the suburbs, this really isn’t the biggest problem. What about the bullying epidemic? Another word missing from O’s speech.
Egypt’s military in a quandary – Middle East – Al Jazeera English
I was just watching scenes of looting at the National Museum and vandalism on AJ It’s so sad. The police have disappeared.
Military reinforcements are reportedly on their way.
Elbaradei is on the radio calling for Mubarak to quit. He’s calling for the end of the “pharaohic” regime and calling for a new government. He’s asking the military to protect egypt’s people and the treasures and assets of the country.
Hey Dak, from yesterday: Egyptians form chain to protect King Tut | Herald Sun
I am so glad you put a new live blog post up. That is the only place where I can get a real picture of what is going on. Thank you, it is appreciated.
AJ is reporting that some private citizens in rich areas have caught some of these looters and that they are carrying ids from the Mubarak’s secret police. They’re NDP thugs out to create havoc.
I was afraid this would happen, often does in situations like this.
Okay, can anyone tell me if there is a way to just listen to the broadcast on Al Jazeera? I keep trying to watch the broadcast and live feed, but it keeps cutting off. I have looked into the other places that AJ has on their website to view the feed, but no luck with those.
I’m having the same sort of trouble, Minx. If anyone has a solution, let me know. I’m mostly following Blogs of War’s live tweets and youtube and my rss feeds. I can’t stand CNN’s coverage, I had to turn it off yesterday. I tried flipping it on again today, but it still seemed obnoxious from the bits I caught.
What Happens When a Billionaire Right-Winger Who Hates Social Security Spends Million$ to Undermine It?: http://wp.me/p32GF-3KO
Frank Rich:
Frankly, I wish we would do the small things–like feed and clothe people.
Unless we get the extreme right back in the box, I don’t know how this country will do anything for any one other than the plutocrats. I just hope what’s going on in Egypt makes people realize what’s going on here. Our state serves very few.
Perhaps the extreme right being out of the box is eventually the only thing that will get some people to wake up–the masses fell for it when the social darwinism was packaged in a postpartisan postracial myth in 2008–but unfortunately all of us have to suffer for having them out there. They’re a convenient foil for Obama to make it look like he’s the reasonable one and what he is doing is really very moderate, when that’s not the case.
Yeah, that worries me too. I think that’s the purpose of him wrapping himself up in the magic Reagan cloak. People need to forget the myth of Reagan and look at the reality.