CAN IT BE HAPPENING HERE?

An American fascist caucus has formed within the US Congress.

John Boehner and Kevin McCarthy are too weak to satisfy the Ted Cruz cohort. Don’t underestimate the caucus. It has a constituency and the support of the Koch and Adelson fortunes. Worse, what distinguishes it from Boehner, McCarthy and nearly all GOP presidential hopefuls is strictly tactical: boldness versus some caution regarding the most practical route to presidential power. The raw political power of the extreme right is now a clear and present danger to our country and to the world.

Is this over the top? I admit to being old enough to have my thoughts scarred by bitter memories of a previous century. But I do remember how long it took most of the world to recognize the face of fascism. I do remember that the way was paved by disbelief and disunity, even mockery, as democratic institutions cracked and finally crumbled.

There is no easy political answer. Only the American people can turn things around. The response to Bernie Sanders is hopeful. His message is rallying millions to organize and fight for economic and social equality. For her part, Hillary Clinton has moved over to oppose the pro-corporate Trans-Pacific Trade Pact, but remains distinctly hawkish on foreign and military policy.

But the most important moment is now, not a year from now. In addition to so many urgent issues progressives are acting on, nothing  is more important than to arouse people to anger over the spectacle now enfolding in Congress. There is a wrecking crew at work. It is taking aim at everything worthwhile in the country, hell-bent on replacing democracy with oligarchy. It is spearheading total commitment to military confrontation and war.

It’s time, maybe past time, to put aside rose colored glasses, time to turn the tide.

RECALLING FSM — AGAIN

Note: I'm reposting this piece in an attempt to escape the clutches of an invasive marketing system. First posted 9/19/2014, it has apparently been sent out without my permission to thousands of bloggers seeking to find advertising outlets for for their entrepreneurial web sites,  many touting diet fads, "get rich" schemes, or pornography. As I result, my blog has been flooded with thousands of "hits" that overwhelm  any statistical information I might find useful. Between big corporations and government spying, nothing remains of truly free speech and rights of privacy.

This post is my article in a book published in observance of the 50th Anniversary of the Free Speech Movement:
FiftyYears of Free Speech: Perspectives on the Movement that Revolutionized Berkeley, with editors Meg Elison, Gina Cova, Chloe Hunt and Alex Berryhill, published by The Daily Californian and Independent Berkeley Student publishing company, (Berkeley, CA)

WHAT ONE PROFESSOR REMEMBERS

Fifty years.

Most students who experienced FSM are alive to tell the tale. Probably most members of the faculty of 1964 are not. They would surely be astonished to see “what time hath wrought”, how warmly UC has come to embrace the unruly band that refused to abide by institutional “norms” in 1964.

Image change over time is not uncommon, though it can be quite spectacular. When we celebrate Martin Luther King’s birthday as a national holiday, the conventional narrative overlooks how he was vilified for opposing the Vietnam War, how much the entire civil rights movement was hounded by the FBI and considered by successive presidents of the United States to be a thorn in the side.

So we might well remember how hard the authorities fought against the free speech demands. The UC administration and the Regents resisted stubbornly; campus protesters were confronted by police and, over the next few years, by a hostile governor who ordered in the National Guard.

I was almost 43 when FSM burst on to the Berkeley campus, having joined the faculty only two months earlier.

FSM took us, the faculty, on a very bumpy ride. A few got on board when students surrounded the police car in Sproul Plaza. Most were unresponsive, a few annoyed and hostile, most assuming the disturbance would soon blow over. The mass arrests at Sproul Hall on December 2^nd changed the mood, a majority shocked by the use of such force at the behest of campus administrators.

I remember standing with Professor Howard Schachman at Sproul Hall right after the students were dragged out and arrested. We decided to enlist our colleagues to convene an ad hoc meeting of faculty that evening. That meeting in the old Life Sciences Building formed the Committee of 200, which rallied a large majority of the faculty to the side of free speech, culminating in the historic Academic Senate vote of December 8^th. Of course that landslide vote marking the FSM’s victory was guaranteed in advance when campus police tried (and failed) forcibly to keep Mario Savio from speaking at the Greek Theater convocation.

We listen in awe today to the remarkably thoughtful, poetic and inspired speeches of Mario Savio, but I’m reminded that some administrators were so blinded by rage that they could say, as one did to me: “he speaks the language of the gutter”.  I’ve told the story elsewhere (a chapter in the Zelnik and Cohn book about FSM) of my being asked for advice at high levels of the UC administration, advice that was rejected because it was supportive of the students. Moreover, adding injury to insult, a record of that “confidential” encounter was passed on to the FBI and appeared in my FBI file obtained under the Freedom of Information Act.

FSM gave something very important to faculty who came to its support. It gave (or evoked) courage and a sense of community with the students.

Soon after the FSM prevailed, students and much of the faculty used their “free speech” to protest the Vietnam War. Governor Reagan, who had conspired with J. Edgar Hoover to oust UC President Clark Kerr as too liberal, felt that speech shouldn’t be free after all. When students and faculty decided to hold a “Vietnam Commencement” supporting graduating seniors who had pledged not to fight in Vietnam, Reagan and the Regents banned the event. But it took place anyway, thousands filling Sproul Plaza, and 300 faculty standing together on the steps of Sproul Hall in direct defiance of the ban. Threatened punishment failed to materialize.

Later still, during the Regents’ effort to eliminate People’s Park, Governor Reagan ordered the National Guard to the Berkeley campus, unleashing tear gas indiscriminately from swooping helicopters. A delegation of faculty went to Sacramento to plead for sanity. When the Governor called them in for a tongue lashing in front of massed news cameras, the faculty delegation took him on and actually achieved remarkably favorable coverage by the media.

So FSM wasn’t the end of the fight for free speech. For some, it continued in support of efforts for affirmative action and establishment of ethnic studies. For many more, it carried on to divestment of UC’s holdings in apartheid South Africa. And that didn’t come easily either.

FSM turned out to be an important part of many lives, my own included. We have every reason to be proud of what happened at UC, of the spirit that added to the University’s greatness.

Among other things, those years gave me some of the most valued friendships of a lifetime. There were Mario Savio, Bettina Aptheker and Jack Kurzweil; Conn Hallinan and Brian O’Brien, who helped form the union of graduate assistants; and many more who were students back then. Among faculty, my dearest memories are of Reggie Zelnik and Larry Levine, young assistant professors in 1964 who risked their careers without hesitation to stand for free speech before most of the faculty was ready to pay attention. Like Mario, they died much too soon. So did Pat St. Lawrence, another good friend who in 1964 was the only woman among tenured faculty in biology.

Then there are Howard Schachman, Charlie Sellers, and a few other nonagenarians like me, still rolling along with no regrets that our part in UC’s story is more than academic.

I’m still using my free speech. You are invited to share your views with me: leonsoped.blogspot.com  

HALLELUJAH!

After much deliberation, our Jesuit governor has signed “death with dignity” into California law. That’s good news and I take it personally. I seem to be in pretty good shape “for my age”, but this is an option I may or may not soon need. It’s something one thinks about when a 94^th birthday is coming up.

The new California law is more evidence that progress at the level of public opinion and cultural advancement goes on even when governmental institutions are stagnant and/or reactionary. When will that reality register in the battle to curtail gun violence? And when will it bring about abolition of the death penalty?

FALTERING STEPS AHEAD AT THE UN

At the latest UN General Assembly, we saw some of  ‘the good, the bad and the ugly’ in the present unsteady state of international relations.

We may have moved a bit past the time when our foreign policy largely ignored the UN except when coopting it to serve as a cover for a US-led military adventure. The recent multi-nation agreement with Iran, along with the calamitous consequences of US military intervention in the Middle East, challenge frozen notions that have dominated US foreign policy. That at least should open the door to new approaches based on more realistic assessments.

Despite the posturing and jousting between Putin and Obama, their cold handshake and private meeting was a reluctant acknowledgement of mutual concerns. There are critical problems, including the spread of ISIS, in which the United States, Russia, Iran — and the UN — have to recognize a need to cooperate. But there is a very rocky road to travel, as reaction to today’s news of Russian military action in Syria demonstrates. There are shared national interests that merge with the common global interest of averting catastrophe from war and environmental crises. But there is always the powerful negative impact of deep-seated great power rivalries, competing for dominance and markets, clashing wherever spheres of influence are at stake.

Renewed attention to the importance of the UN General Assembly is itself a good thing. Beyond the multitude of speeches, one could sense the diminished influence of the superpower model of dealing with problems of “world order”.  That’s good for countries whose people have been victimized by bombings, blockades and/or occupation in violation of international law.

The gap between world opinion and the present political climate in our country was on display during the Assembly sessions. John McCain castigated Obama for even talking with Putin; Marco Rubio and his bizarre cohorts couldn’t abide Obama’s warm handshake with Raoul Castro. But the gap was underscored all the more by the visit of Pope Francis to the United States overlapping the UN gathering: he spoke for peace and international cooperation, for the common good against a system of greed and aggressive militarism.

It is a realizable goal to register majority opinion in the United States for a more realistic foreign policy, one that is open to necessary international cooperation. That calls for a renewed appreciation of the UN. The world sorely needs a more influential and effective UN General Assembly.

Added October 1, 2015:   

DANGEROUS STUFF

The Russians want to save the Syrian government and fight ISIS. The US government wants a commitment for "regime change" in Syria. The bombs are flying and the danger of deadly miscalculation is rising. 

Bombs per se can't bring sanity and peace to the Middle East. Cooperation with Russia, Iran and Iraq — coordinated through the UN — could be a more constructive and hopeful approach over time. Maybe there's a lesson in the Iran-P+1 achievement, although that problem was nowhere near as difficult. Worth a try.... and the vast majority of people, who want no repeat of the 20th Century's debacles, have to demand it!

WHAT OBAMA’S PRESIDENCY HAS TO TELL US

Not long ago, a couple of writers in the left magazine, Jacobin, opined that Barack Obama was the worst President since Warren Harding. Rightist bigots attack him as the worst of all time.

I think Obama is the best occupant of the office since the end of the Second World War. We’re unlikely to elect anyone of his quality in 2016.

Like all presidents post World War II, Obama has presided over the world’s most (super) powerful empire.  Boasting “American exceptionalism” and flouting superior military and economic might, the empire systematically generates negative consequences for peace and the human condition at home and worldwide.

Disappointments in the ‘State of the Union’, about domestic and foreign affairs, are many and profound. I’m not about to argue that Obama should be absolved of responsibility for an interventionist foreign policy, for widespread acts of war, for commitment to the vast surveillance program and the “security state”, or for the influence of his Wall Street advisors over economic policy.

How then can one view Obama favorably? What should one make of the obvious contradictions in Obama and his presidency? And why does it matter?

The simple observation by Fidel Castro when Obama was first elected turns out to be spot on: ‘he’s a good guy, but the system is stronger than he is’. However, the fuller truth is much more complicated. Certainly the system can’t be overcome by an individual no matter how high his office. But it’s a deeply stressed system, unable to control events, far from immune to resistance and change.

There is much to learn from Obama’s two terms now almost over — about the man and, most important, about our society.

About Obama, there is another side to the coin of his limitations and loyalty to the basic character of an oppressive system. There is no mistaking that he holds dear many humane and democratic values that are actually in conflict with the essential nature of the system, values that are connected to the historic struggle to expand freedom in our country. Nor should one underestimate his achievement in winning majority support twice as the first African-American president — this despite a terrible history of racism that remains fiercely alive today.

Like a multitude of fellow Americans, when I first read “Dreams of My Father”, I was deeply impressed by Obama’s exceptional intelligence as well as his humanity. I’m still impressed by those qualities evident in some of his more important speeches. I can’t dismiss as “rhetoric” his address after the Charleston massacre or the recent one on the Iran agreement (although his compellingly logical argument for diplomacy was accompanied by usual misrepresentations of US policy). It isn’t necessary to watch the GOP presidential debates to see Obama as exceptional. In qualities of mind and character, few if any among those in high political office during the last half century are his equal.

Yet, during Obama’s presidency, the impact of reactionary forces on the political and economic trajectory of the country grew dangerously. The GOP moved even further to the extreme right, fought tenaciously to wreck Obama’s presidency and to sabotage the most elementary social responsibilities of government. With a huge assist from the Supreme Court majority, interference in elections and politics by oligarchs like the Koch brothers and Sandy Adelson has grown apace with soaring economic and social inequality overall. And at the heart of the assault on Obama has been open, as well as often denied, racist fury at the very idea of a black president and family in the White House.

Obama’s accomplishments have been important even if far from the original promise. Noteworthy is the major expansion of health care against a hurricane of hard-hearted resistance and greed. He tempered the war lust fostered by neocon hawks, some of them in his own administration, although he expanded “alternative” tactics of widespread drone bombings and assassinations in violation of international law.

Now, in the last stage of his presidency, the Obama “we hoped for” is more of a presence. Most important, he is putting up a fight for a more realistic and potentially peaceful approach to foreign policy, oriented to diplomacy and negotiation rather than the hubris of US superpower. There is the Iran agreement and a new attitude toward possible cooperation with Russia in Syria and with regard to ISIS. These are only a beginning of a turn toward a practical, common sense approach to international cooperation needed to cope with the problems plaguing this century. Inevitably, resistance from wealthy selfish interests and the GOP matches the hysteria mounted against “Obamacare”. Restoring diplomacy and the influence of the United Nations is also anathema to the Netanyahu government, which fears that shifting winds will undermine its apartheid colonial rule over the Palestinians.

Obama is now more assertive on domestic issues: racism, immigrant rights, the justice and prison systems, the minimum wage, women’s equality, and more. Looking back, Obama’s presidency suffered from a stubborn faith that his special powers of persuasion could bring about bipartisanship, his determination to convince Wall Street of his essential loyalty to the system, and his desire to calm racist fears that he might be “an angry black man”. As a result, he put a barrier between his presidency and the kind of citizen participation and support that might have made it transformative.

Important progressive advances during the Obama presidency have come from the grass-roots. Starting with a determined and militant movement, public opinion was transformed on gay rights and marriage equality. The institutions of government had to accept the new reality. The “Black Lives Matter” movement is also forcing a wider recognition of intolerable injustice and racist brutality. Tremors are beginning to be felt in challenges to the shameful racism that corrupts the criminal justice and prison systems.

Looking at the Obama presidency, now mostly through the rear view mirror, doesn’t tell us where we go from here. But there are some things to be taken to heart and mind.

Leaders, even presidents, may be better or worse but they cannot be saviors. What counts most is achieving a critical mass of public support for causes that sustain progress and challenge the worst evils of a destructive system. Easier said than done, but possible as experience makes clear. The process of popular struggle illuminates every democratic gain in our history. It defines democracy itself.

Our capitalist system of inequality and greed can crush people and their hopes. But it is neither invincible nor immune to change. Nor is the power establishment monolithic in the control of public policy.

The divisions in our society, including at the top, are a very important part of the policy equation. The rise of extreme reaction in most branches of government, fueled by a clique of ultra-right oligarchs, is an immediate and existential threat to the nation and to the world. The face of Carly Fiorina may or may not be “beautiful”, but her prescriptions for the future sound like an American “Mein Kampf”. And most of her stage mates are just as violent whether it comes to war-mongering or lying about Planned Parenthood. That crowd has already “elected” most governors, controls most state legislatures, has a lasting Supreme Court majority, and at least temporary control of the Senate and the House. What a dangerous world this is! It would be crazy to ignore how much worse it could get if the ultra-right is in full control.

The dilemma is that one can’t rely on Clinton-Schumer Democrats not to succumb to rightwing pressure and hawk hysterics. The very limited steps by Obama toward a realistic and less warlike foreign policy might be aborted.

There is no easy answer, but an answer nevertheless. Despite howls from the GOP and their friend Netanyahu, despite 30 million AIPAC dollars, there is enough support to sustain the Iran agreement — and that includes a majority of American Jews who underwent the fiercest badgering. Hopefully that can be replicated and expanded in efforts to get the most out of the Democratic primaries.

It has never been harder to predict the future and maybe it’s pointless after all. I think the only real answer is in expanding public awareness, in struggles and support for movements determined to turn the tide on climate change, the search for peace, and each issue of justice and equality. Above all, the tide has to be turned, and soon, against those who would plunge America and the world into a rerun of the horrors of World War II.

Obama fell short of being the transformative leader he hoped to be. Still he deserves honorable recognition as one of our most significant presidents. Maybe in the course of events, a transformative popular movement can be the source of inspiring leaders that the country surely needs. 

REFUGEES AND WARS

There is no stronger indictment of war than the refugee catastrophe that, finally, is shocking the conscience of the world.

While Europe flounders, compelled at last to begin seeking short term measures of humane response, our shameless war hawks hide from blame: it’s Assad’s doing, Obama’s “weakness” in failing to bomb Syria and intervene militarily early on.

There is blame aplenty historically for the Middle East tragedy that is spilling over into Europe and for other refugee crises affecting all continents. Anti-immigrant racists rant, build walls, and terrorize millions of parents and children desperate for survival. But the major culprit is WAR.

The refugee disaster is the legacy of the war makers, those who authored the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan and the military misadventure in Libya. It is a living legacy of policies aimed at forcing “regime change”, a preference for superpower might and war over negotiations and diplomacy based on adherence to United Nations' principles. The enormous damage that has been done is a legacy that our hawks share with both designated foes and presumed allies: there is the rise of ISIL and its horrors, the “unintended consequence” of our failed wars; remember also the Congressional cheers for Netanyahu as he unleashed the massive destruction of war on Gaza.

Why talk about blame when the moment cries out for emergency refugee relief? Because the human tragedy has given no pause to the architects of disaster.

They are doing everything in their power to derail the negotiated agreement between Iran and the USA, Russia, Britain, France, China and Germany, which is the first real signal that a turn toward international cooperation for peace is possible.  They are still addicted to war, another war after twelve years of war without end.

Human decency requires emergency cooperation by the United States, Europe, all governments and their people, to relieve the misery and hopelessness of millions seeking asylum. It further demands a basic shift away from the politics and economics of war. No more than temporary remedies are possible without big changes in priorities and investment. If refugees’ lives matter, there has to be a huge shift in public funding from making war to meeting vital social needs.

When you think about it, every problem we confront at home and abroad becomes a matter of human decency. Either we care about each other, about the human condition and human dignity, or the monsters turn us all into bystanders or brutes. Then again, it’s a matter of human survival, of peace not war.

IRAN AGREEMENT

YES to negotiations, NO to war! Against continuing bitter opposition and sabotage, the international agreement with Iran is a significant step forward. As to progress toward ending the nuclear arms race and achieving nuclear disarmament, it's hardly a baby step. How about applying to all the nuclear powers the kind of scrutiny and restrictions agreed to with Iran? That would be doomsday for war hawks everywhere.