Showing posts with label lobbying. Show all posts
Showing posts with label lobbying. Show all posts

20220526

America's War on Prevention

If America keeps failing with gun violence, that's fundamentally because she's waging war on prevention, and because the forces that feed upon these failures have faced impunity for too long.

Worse: constant mass shootings are only one of the nation's most obvious self inflicted traumas. At least, there, everybody knows the rules of the game: 

  • more people die of guns in the US than anywhere else, and not just because 332M Americans own 400M of them
  • implementing basic gun control laws (e.g. background checks) have always showed spectacular results, including in the States between the moment Bill Clinton signed the last batch and the moment Republicans blocked its prolongation
  • even if a vast majority of Americans (including within Republicans) support these laws, the NRA and the GOP keep distorting the 2nd Amendment to push even harder against any kind of oversight or accountability. 
  • the situation keeps worsening: Republicans are likely to sweep the Middterms, and the Supreme Court they reshaped against the will of the people is likely to dismantle the few remaining safeguards. This self-proclaimed 'pro-life' crew prefers to protect guns to protecting the lives of kids or pregnant teens.

America is not just sick, she doesn't want to heal.  

And that's exactly the same story with health in general. Even before the pandemic, America spent one third more per capita on healthcare than any other developed country, and yet saw her life expectancy plummet, the average health of her citizens being more worthy of a laggard.

Like with guns, there's a lot of money involved, but here, at least two families of lobbies are working in sinc to sink the boat: where everywhere else the focus is on prevention, Big Pharma and Big Food make sure that prevention is withdrawn from all policies, and that only the 'cures' they propose are considered. Because they couldn't gain more shares of stomachs, Big Food had the genius idea of supersizing our stomachs, and Big Pharma certainly can't complain because they make more money selling drugs that no one needs when they follow just a normal diet. And don't count on health associations to defend consumers: most of them are bankrolled by the same lobbies, and promote the very behaviors they're supposed to fight against.

The prevention of gun violence, obesity or heart diseases are national causes everywhere except in the US, where they would mean the end of the party for lobbies who need America to keep getting sicker instead of healing.

If these lobbies reach across the aisle, they've always worked in symbiosis with the Republican Party. But that party itself has given up all restraints, any ambition for common ground or common sense. And it's now waging war at all levels. 

Solutions to major problems are no-brainers? Let's dumb everybody further down, let's ban books, let's reject facts, truth, reason, and science. We want you to feel stupid, victimized, angry, we want you to replace critical thinking with systematic, blind criticism, we want you to forget about moderation and to live on a permanent conflictual mode.

The GOP not only stopped fighting racism, it's deliberately fueling it now, crushing voting rights for minorities, promoting voices that fuel hatred (exhibit A: Tucker Carson spreading the Great Replacement fallacy). The big tent has turned into a dangerous tin foil hat under which thrive the worst of the worst (Holocaust deniers and white supremacists are more welcome than ever).

Even if they know better, these guys will tell you with a straight face that the Earth is flat, that Trump won in 2020, and that arming teachers is the solution when even a squad of trained police officers are scared to face a teenager carrying assault weapons.

Pew Research on bipartisan support for gun control
NB: more data on Brady Campaign's website: bradyunited.org/resources



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20180226

Some light at the end of the barrel?

Will this time be different, or will Parkland just be one more line in the endless list of mass shootings silenced by Amerika's almighty gun lobby?

What's most different so far, beyond the powerful voices of Millenials (from The Gunshine State*, of all places!) is the fact that heavyweight household names Delta Airlines and American Airlines stopped their NRA group travel discounts. We've entered #metoo-like, it-s-gonna-hurt-my-bottomline territory, and there's a momentum to sustain early enough before the mid-term elections to prevent the usual cover ups.

The NRA's role is not to defend Americans, but to sell more guns. And all their 'solutions' reach the same goal. If even trained cops cowers away from school shootings, tell me what would arming teachers with weapons achieve, beyond securing new streams of revenues for them, and funded by taxpayers?

History will look back at lawmakers who today broadcast NRA's corrupt narratives the way people look today at those who defended Big Tobacco and helped them cause hundreds of thousands of deaths that should have been prevented.

Change must also come within the NRA, which evolved into a dangerous caricature of itself, like Billy Graham's movement under his son's helm (now a fundamentalist program fueling hatred against other religions). That's possible because there will be more money to make in the pedagogy around guns than in their sales.


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* a.k.a. Florida, see "Red blogule to the Gunshine State - shootfirstlaw.org Hammered down by the NRA"

20130320

Invasion of Iraq: The Bush Legacy in 3 Impostures

It's been 10 years since the invasion of Iraq, and I won't repeat my usual rant. In case you missed the previous episodes, here are 3 messages you should remember:
 

***


1) The invasion of Iraq was meant to spread fundamentalism worldwide, not democracy in Iraq:

Always keep this in mind: "George W. Bush didn't act as a President of The United States of America in the interest of his country. And George W. Bush didn't even act as a Republican in the interest of his party. George W. Bush acted as a fundamentalist in the interest of fundamentalism."

I wrote the "Universal Declaration of Independence from Fundamentalism" to expose the imposture of fundamentalism (a totalitarian, political program advertised as a universal, religious program), the way it undermines both democracy and religion, and the ways to defuse the sick ping pong between supposedly opposed extremists.

As I posted for the 5th anniversay of this masquerade ("Iraq - 5 years of success for fundamentalists"), the invasion of Iraq was a triumph: as expected, it boosted fundamentalism and terror worldwide. "Mission accomplished".

And we should consider ourselves lucky these lunatics didn't go all the way (see "Iran : who wants war and why").


***


2) Oil was the means of corruption, not the aim of the game, and the undermining of US democracy was not just collateral damage:

To make it short: theocons set the agenda with the help of neocons (what better duet than Bush-Cheney to achieve this?), and sold the war to paleocons*.

In other words: the aim of the game was to undermine democracy (the theocon - fascist purpose), and the official cause an intervention to free a country from its dictator (typical neocon stuff), but in order to launch the war, the blessing from the oil and defense lobbies was needed (enter the paleocons).

The only thing missing was an alibi for immediate action. A clear and immediate danger. The outrageous lies and forged cases about WMDs or Saddam-al Qaeda ties did the trick.

Of course, there was always the risk of nosy reporters doing their jobs, of citizens exercising their rights to transparency.

The Patriot Act became effective more than one year before the invasion. The trickier part was the media, and the Bush Administration offered a deal to US majors: don't get at us until after the 2004 elections** and we'll help you consolidate your power. At the head of the FCC, the son of Colin Powell did his best to alter competition laws, and was instrumental in the concentration that followed at a critical moment in the history of traditional press, broadcasting, and internet. Michael Powell went as far as organizing a phony forum to settle the case just weeks ahead of the invasion. He later joined the RAND Corporation.

In general, the Bush administration more or less successfully tried to undermine the separation of powers at the root of democracy:
. executive? too far (right) reaching, and totally unaccountable.
. legislative? corrupt, and producing anti-democratic laws
. judicial? promoting torture and the negation of all rights
. media? at best embedded, at worst accomplice
. netizens? brainwashed by pervasive propaganda, monitored by a dystopian state
. ....
. and, of course, the theocons' priority: destroying secularism, the pilar of democracy. Again, mixing religion with politics, education, science... is the best way to attack democracy and religion at the same time (see "France, secularism and burqa : a political issue, not a religious one")

Yes, a lot of money was at stake. For the religious lobbies that pushed against the separation of church and state as well as for the military and oil lobbies. And the mass plundering of Iraqi resources is only one side of a scheme that turned record surplusses into record deficits (among other vital rescue missions: saving private Halliburton... a charity movement that continued in another Gulf, following Kathrina - see "Red blogule to Halliburton and the 40 thieves").

But the corruption reached much deeper, to the very fundamentals of democracy.
 

***


3) The Arab Spring owes nothing to the Iraq War, to the contrary:

 
George W. Bush and his fan club try to sell us the Arab Spring as the consequence of his invasion of Iraq, a "liberation war" that "spread democracy across the region", but this imposture is totally unacceptable.
 
First, Bush's crusade contributed to silencing moderates, and strengthening radical islamists as the only political force capable of taking power.
 
Second, his illegal invasion for anti-democratic purposes cannot be compared to self determination movements aiming at genuine freedom and democracy. The only nation Bush ever tried to build was a theocracy: he may be an inspiration for islamists, certainly not for actual freedom fighters.
 
Third, the Bush administration did serve as an example in the region, but not in the arab world (see "Israel accepted as true the choice between its security and its ideals").


 
***

Justice has yet to be done, and I guess the last words of Tomas Young (in "The Last Letter") are worth remembering:
"A Message to George W. Bush and Dick Cheney From a Dying Veteran": "I hope you will be put on trial. But mostly I hope, for your sakes, that you find the moral courage to face what you have done to me and to many, many others who deserved to live. I hope that before your time on earth ends, as mine is now ending, you will find the strength of character to stand before the American public and the world, and in particular the Iraqi people, and beg for forgiveness.".

And as always, we should expose and denounce the impostures, and blow the whistle each time a government tries to alter the separation of powers or to play with the fundamentals of democracy.


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* ... and if the "anticons" were not yet in the picture, they're not a model for democracy either: "the Tea Party is not just an alternative to the Republican or the Democratic parties, but the very negation of the republic, the very negation of democracy" (see "Grand Old Parting - enter the anticons")
** Heck, even until the 2008 elections for most of them (see "The Silence of the Lambs (War in Iraq and US networks)"). How dare collaborators give lessons after such a disgrace (see "What Fareed Zakaria got wrong")?

20090619

Scoop : Karl Rove is Pro Choice

According to Karl Rove, "The GOP Can Stop ObamaCare" (see WSJ 20090618).

Beyond the negative title, the idea is to prove that the GOP cares, and that the Party of NO can make proposals.

Karl himself becomes pro choice. Well... in favor of "Patients' Choice Act", at least.

To understand a proposal, you have to understand who's pushing it. Karl named four names :
- Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK). Yes, that's Tom "But what if I want to drive a gas guzzler ?" Coburn
- Senator Richard Burr (R-NC). Famous these days for promoting R.J. Reynolds' highly controversial "tobacco lollipops".
- Representative Paul Ryan (R-WI). This man is in favor of universal coverage but make no mistake : his dream has always been to serve his generous sponsors and to offer to private funds the possibility to manage SS money
- Representative Devin Nunes (R-CA).
Citizens Against Government Waste elected him "Porker of the Month" in February 2008 for "attempting to impede the recovery of hundreds of millions in over-payments to Medicare providers in the state of California" (thanks to SourceWatch / CMD for that gem)

This compassionate dream team comes up with a very innovative proposal : vote John McCain, and socialize the losses of companies.

Health insurance portability sounds nice, but it's mainly a scheme to clean up big corp balance sheets. Transferring the tax reductions for health care from the companies to individuals, that's a way of taking the burden off corporate shoulders, empowering private financial advisors, and weakening the collective power of employees.

Karl keeps going : "another proposal is to pass medical liability reforms that will reduce costly junk lawsuits." OK, but what is a "junk" lawsuit ? "A charge on big tobacco", would answer Senator Burr.
Overall, a pervasive system designed to weaken individuals vs big companies, to scatter about all counter-powers.

The GOP set up a Health Care Solutions Group, a one stop shopping joint to facilitate the job for lobbyists.

The GOP does care, after all. For his generous donators.

20080815

What Fareed Zakaria got wrong

If one reads Fareed Zakaria's latest attempt to save his own face, "What Bush Got Right" was actually to stop being Bush*.

What Fareed Zakaria got wrong was to stop being the Fareed Zakaria that brilliantly denounced the lack of understanding by the American people of what was going on after 9/11.

That Fareed Zakaria was carefully taken care of by the hawks that sold the invasion of Iraq : an invitation at the prestigious 2003 Bilderberg Meeting, a briefing by top White House figures, and a promotion as Editor of Newsweek International.

Zakaria spent the following months justifying the invasion of Iraq, and the following years trying to clumsily justify himself.

And yes, Bush got something right : everything. But as a fundamentalist, not as the POTUS.

* Newsweek August 18-25, 2008 issue.

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