Commentary

By Reginald Johnson

Oct. 29, 2010

CONSERVATIVE CLOUT

The power of the right wing never ceases to amaze me.

I thought of this twice in recent days, first when I went into the Barnes and Noble bookstore to pick out a gift. I went to the history and current affairs section and as always, looked for Noam Chomsky, one of my favorites. In the past, you could always count on plenty Chomsky and other liberal writers in the same section at ‘B&N.’

This time was different. I did find Chomsky, but not before noticing what seemed like an avalanche of books authored by conservatives --- Glenn Beck, Bill O’Reilly, Ann Coulter, Dick Armey, Laura Ingraham, Sarah Palin, and others. They clearly outnumbered the left-of-center writers.

A lot of these right-wingers have disgracefully assumed the mantle of being “true patriots” just like the 18^th century revolutionaries who threw boxes of tea into Boston Harbor to protest British taxation. Beck’s latest tome is entitled “Glenn Beck’s Common Sense,” with the subtitle, “The Case Against an Out of Control Government, Inspired by Thomas Paine.”

Thomas Paine, of course, was the Revolutionary-era writer whose book “Common Sense,” laid out the case against the repression of the English monarchs and really did inspire many colonists to take up arms against the Crown.

That Beck has the audacity to liken himself to a great humanist like Thomas Paine, while he spews venom nightly on his TV show, expressing hate against liberals and Muslims, is unbelievable. Yet people seem to lap it up --- his ratings are high, and his books dot the shelves of the bookstore chains.

Books by Sarah Palin and Dick Armey (“Give Us Liberty” --- “A Tea Party Manifesto --- Less Government and More Individual Liberty”) also appear to be popular. This, despite the utter hypocrisy of these right-wing and Tea Party leaders. (If these people are so opposed to big government and ‘tyranny,’ then why don’t they speak out against the government’s warrantless wiretapping and torture practices? They don’t. You can be sure if Thomas Paine were around today, he would.)

A day or so after visiting the bookstore, I saw a news piece flash on the Talking Points Memo website: Republican/Tea Party candidate Sharron Angle in Nevada had just raised $14 million in contributions in one-quarter in her Senate race to defeat incumbent Harry Reid, a Democrat.

I glanced at Angle’s contributions list. Money was pouring in from all around the country. This is amazing. Here is a candidate as unqualified as you can get, blurts out the dumbest comments, and she’s raking in the money. But she’s hard right-wing – dead against immigration, supports tax cuts for the rich, wants to abolish the department of education and loosen regulations on business. So the business class --- like the multi-billionaire Koch brothers --- love her. Doesn’t matter if she runs racist ads or says other outrageous things, she pledges to cut their taxes and keep government regulators off their backs. That’s good enough for them. Keep the dollars flowing.

The dreadful decision this year by the Supreme Court to allow corporations to give unlimited amounts of money to political candidates has made the right-wing political machine even more potent. While the Democrats get a lot of corporate money too, big business knows where their bread is really buttered --- with conservatives. So Republicans and Tea Party candidates are getting big bucks this year, often from corporate front groups that don’t have to disclose their donors.

With a wealth of funds to run political ads and promoted by right-wing radio and FOX “News” shows, conservatives may win big in next week’s elections.

Angle is running neck and neck with Reid. While Reid has been no great shakes as a senator, he’s light years better than Angle.

But in Nevada, where there’s high unemployment and foreclosures all over, many alienated voters are buying the empty-headed rhetoric of the right, that “government is the problem” and all liberals must go.

Sharron Angle may be the next U.S. Senator from Nevada.

Scary.

By Reginald Johnson
Aug. 27, 2010


Bigger than 911



The backers of the mosque in lower Manhattan should stand their ground ---- and not submit to the hysterical demands of critics that they move their facility.

This issue has become much bigger than the sensitivities of those who lost loved ones at Ground Zero, when terrorists flew planes into the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001, resulting in the deaths of nearly 3,000 people.

Those attacks were horrific, and we should never forget the people who lost their lives. Ground Zero is a special place.

But there is something at stake here that is much more important than honoring the feelings of those who think that a mosque near Ground Zero is somehow wrong, since it was Muslim fanatics who were flying the hijacked planes.

Freedom of religion, one of the cornerstones of the American constitutional system, is on the line. The framers who drew up the Constitution and Bill of Rights, knew all too well the injustice of a society where one could not practice the religion of one’s choice. Their parents and grandparents had come to the New World to escape religious persecution in England.

With the First Amendment’s provision that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,” the framers made clear that the United States would be a place where people would be free to practice the religion of their choice.

The backers of the mosque, which will be part of a larger Islamic community center called Cordoba House, purchased the property for their project and obtained all the needed land-use approvals from the city. They now have a right to build the facility the same way Christians might want to build a YMCA or Jews a community center.

To say the community center backers are somehow tainted because they share the same faith as the 911 attackers is grossly unfair and cruel. This smears all Muslims. There were 19 hijackers; there are 1.6 billion Muslims in the world.

While some of the people criticizing the plan for the mosque are local people who are having an emotional reaction because they lost loved ones on 911, it’s clear there are many opponents who live far from New York and just don’t like Muslims, period. They’re using the center controversy to whip up Islamophobia and spread hate.

In fact, there appears to be a campaign going on nationwide to smear and persecute Muslims.

There are cases all around the country where people are trying to block the construction of mosques or engaging in acts of harassment and even violence against Muslims. In two other locations in New York City, opposition has sprung up against proposed mosques. Protests against mosques have also arisen in Tennessee, Illinois, Wisconsin and California.

Right-wing politicians, including Republicans and Tea Party members, are jumping into the act, demagogically pandering to opponents. A candidate for governor in Tennessee said Islam was not a religion and Muslims shouldn’t have First Amendment rights.

In Florida, a Christian pastor denounced Islam and said he would hold a Koran book-burning at his church.

Right here in Bridgeport, a group of Christian zealots recently picketed a local mosque, shouting “Islam is a lie” and yelling verbal abuse at worshippers entering the building. Two children were called “murderers.”

And in New York this week, a cab driver was slashed with a knife by an enraged passenger after the driver told him he was a Muslim.

The wave of Islamophobia is an ominous development. It harkens back to the anti-Semitism whipped up by the Nazis in Germany in the 1920s and 1930s.

The hate directed at Muslims is part of a surge of Christian nationalism. The bigotry has to be denounced and stopped in its tracks. If the trend is not stopped, the First Amendment's protection of both religious freedom and freedom of expression will be destroyed.

We’ll be that much closer to a Christian fascist state in America.

Commentary

A Threat to New Journalism


By Reginald Johnson
August 22, 2010



Hopes for building a new, vibrant form of on-line journalism could be dealt a serious blow if big communications companies like Google and Verizon have their way.

The two firms recently agreed to a “policy framework” for how they think the Internet should be run. The changes they propose will pretty much end the current free state of the Web, where any person, non-profit or company can post anything they want, do so without interference, and without incurring more costs over and above what they pay their Internet Service Provider for basic service.

Today, everyone who posts on the Internet --- whether you’re CNN or Joe Smith the blogger in small-town USA --- gets treated equally. For the most part, there’s no weeding or filtering out of content.

This is known as net neutrality.

Under the Verizon-Google deal, net neutrality goes out the window.

With wireless connections to the Internet, such as over a cell phone, the companies want to reserve the right to prevent certain kinds of the content from being posted and block access to websites. It’s expected that in the coming years, more and more people will be accessing the Internet on a wireless application, so this potential censorship is very significant.

Also, the two firms want to set up a two-tiered system for Internet users --- one a fast “private” lane and the other a slow “public” lane. To be in the fast lane, where will be rapid connections on the best broadband, a blogger or producer of an audio or video show would have to pay an extra charge. It’ll be like paying more to your cable TV company to get premium channels. Everyone else will be on the public Internet, which over the years will become much slower than the private Internet, since the companies will invest all their development/infrastructure money in the more lucrative private side.

Should this deal get finalized, it will undermine the growth of the new journalism that has been mushrooming on the Web in recent years.

In the past 15 years, hundreds, if not thousands of websites have sprung up, offering free-wheeling commentary and in some cases original reporting about communities all across the United States. While some of the blogging falls short good, professional writing that you’ll find in newspapers and magazines, a good number of the sites are well-done and offer journalism that does a better job than the traditional publications.

As newspapers decline due to years of bad management, the recession and other factors, it was hoped that this new on-line journalism --- aided perhaps by foundation or government funding --- could really take off and fill the void left by papers.

But if the Google-Verizon deal becomes the framework for how much of the Web operates, then the growth of on-line journalism would be stunted. For one, the presence of a content block would be devastating for new websites trying to make their mark. Supposing reporters at some website had just put together a hard-hitting piece with new evidence of torture by U.S. authorities in military prisons. Will a censor at Verizon say, “this is a little too controversial,” and refuse to put it up? That kind of thing could well happen. It would have a chilling effect on all Internet writers.

And start-up news operations will certainly be hurt if a two-tiered, pay-to-play Internet emerges. They’ll be at a competitive disadvantage with the bigger, corporate news sites if they can’t pay to be on the private, fast lane. Given that many on-line news publications and news shows run on shoe-string budgets already, many small operations won’t get on the fast lane, and will see their written and audio reports relegated to the slower, public lane.

This ugly scenario on the Internet may not come about if the Federal Communications would step up and do their job. The Google-Verizon deal is not set in stone yet, and the FCC could move to prevent it from becoming reality, by taking on new regulatory power. That would mean going through a process called “reclassification” whereby the FCC would reclassify the Internet and put it in the same category as TV or radio and subject to the same kind of oversight regulations.

With that kind of authority, the FCC could tell Google and Verizon their plan will not work, it’s not in the public interest and the Internet has to stay open.

The FCC has been dithering on this issue, and time is wasting. Industry lobbyists are hard at work to have their concept of a privatized, pay-to-play Internet go through. They’re bending the ear of the FCC and Congress to get their way.

Fortunately, ever since the Google-Verizon plan was announced, there’s been an uproar from the public, and people have been pressuring the FCC to do the right thing. There’s also been protests outside Google headquarters, with people imporing the company to live up to its original motto, which is “Don’t be Evil.”

Let yourself be heard. Call or write the FCC and members of Congress, demanding that they not allow the Internet to be corporatized.

Go to the website, www.savetheinternet.com and sign a letter to FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski, urging him to reject the Google-Verizon deal, set up regulatory control of the Internet, and insure net neutrality.

Only massive public pressure will force the government to do the right thing and keep the Internet open.

Commentary

Living Dangerously


Reginald Johnson
July 27, 2010



The disastrous effects of global warming are becoming more and more evident.

As I write from my home in Bridgeport, a city in southern Connecticut, this area has been battered by a succession of violent rainstorms and tornadoes. A heavy storm last week knocked over trees throughout the region and left thousands without power.

In June, Bridgeport was hit without warning by a twister that tore the roofs off some buildings and toppled dozens of trees.

In March, a combined tornado and heavy rainstorm devastated the towns of New Canaan, Greenwich and Stamford --- with massive trees uprooted, power poles knocked over and homes flooded. Many residential areas were without power for over a week. Entire school districts were shut down for more than a week.

This is all very unnerving. In Connecticut, we’re used to a good amount of rainfall and the occasional nor'easter, but rainstorms seem to be getting more powerful and more frequent. And tornadoes? Forget it. I always thought twisters happened largely in the Midwest and South, not New England.

Well, things apparently are changing --- we have to be ready for tornadoes now.

Another thing we have to get used to: having lots of very hot, unpleasant days in the summer.

It looks like you can stop counting on many 75-degree days in June and days with low to mid-80s in July. We’ve had a spate of days in June and July with 90 degrees or better in the northeast. Washington, D.C., had the hottest June in history, with records going back to 1872. New York City is on course to have the hottest July on record.

Meanwhile, you hear reports from around the country of other harsh weather --- rain deluges in some areas and drought conditions in others.

Any debate over what causes this extreme weather is absurd at this point. It’s global warming. Yes, I know the experts point out that the high temperatures this year are in part due to the El Nino ocean currents. But when you look at the overall pattern, of increasingly hot weather over a number of years and more and more violent storms, that’s global warming caused by the greenhouse effect. Man-made emissions of carbon dioxide are settling in the atmosphere, capping the globe, and trapping the heat. And messing up the weather big-time.

What’s truly frustrating is that as the weather gets worse and worse, and it’s so obvious what the problem is, absolutely nothing is being done by our political leaders. This is a looming catastrophe, and the folks in Washington (or at least a majority of them) are sitting on their hands.

Just last week, the U.S. Senate shelved a bill that set up a modest program establishing carbon price controls and a cap and trade system aimed at limiting CO2 emissions. The bill was backed by the Obama administration. But Republicans lined up as usual against it, and some Democrats broke ranks, as well. Senate Democratic leaders saw they didn’t have the votes to overcome a filibuster and pulled the bill.

You can be sure that campaign contributions by the oil and coal companies ---- who don’t want carbon controls --- were a decisive factor behind the opposition.

It must be said at this point that the opponents of climate legislation are being grossly irresponsible. The overwhelming majority of climate scientists in the world say that global warming is a reality, it’s getting progressively worse, and it threatens the quality of life on the planet. Scientists are warning that unless the level of carbon in the atmosphere is brought down, whole areas of the globe will become so hot they will be uninhabitable.

But the political opponents of action on climate change don’t give a damn. They’re going to vote against something that is vital for the very survival of the planet, just to keep those contributions coming in and guarantee their continued political careers.

Other nations such as Britain and even China are taking steps to control their carbon emissions. But not the U.S. Our country, which should be in the lead on this issue, is holding up the bandwagon.

At this stage, the millions of Americans who care about the future of the earth and the yet unborn who will have to live on the planet (what about the rights of the unborn on this issue?) will have to work locally to do what they can to stop the deadly escalation of carbon in the atmosphere. Congress and even President Obama are not going to lead the way.

Fortunately, a strong grassroots movement is already underway within the states to get away from fossil fuel use (fossil fuels are the biggest source of carbon) and move towards renewable energy sources like solar and wind power.

The campaign “350.org,” developed by environmental author Bill McKibben, is leading the way in that movement. The name of the campaign is based on the goal of bringing the carbon in the atmosphere down to 350 parts per million.

Scientists say that 350 parts per million is the safe upper limit for carbon dioxide concentrations. Beyond that, there may be catastrophic consequences, they warn.

Right now the earth’s atmosphere is at a scary 392 parts per million of carbon.

350.org is working on all kinds of events in their campaign to pull us away from fossil fuel dependence and cut carbon emissions. One major event coming up is a “Global Work Party” on Oct. 10 of this year. That day will see people at the local level around the country and the world sponsoring carbon-fighting projects like fixing bikes, putting up solar panels and planting trees.

Get involved in this project, or any others to fight climate change. The health of future generations and the survival of the planet hangs in the balance.

Report

Saving the news



By Reginald Johnson
June 23, 2010



Everywhere you turn, journalism seems to be dying.

Battered by a number of factors, including the recession and years of bad management, newspapers are going out of business. Once proud papers like the Seattle Post-Intelligencer and the Rocky Mountain News, for instance, have shut their doors. The L.A. Times and Chicago Tribune have filed for bankruptcy. Others like the Boston Globe are teetering on the edge.

The papers that are still afloat are reducing staffs and cutting newsprint costs in a desperate bid to stay alive. In the process, there’s less stories being produced for readers about government, business and culture.

At the same time, the electronic media isn’t exactly jumping into the breach and offering a solid news alternative. TV and radio stations have slashed their news staffs in recent years, too, and offer almost nothing in the way of substantive reporting.

The Internet also doesn’t provide much fresh news from the many websites that have cropped up; most news on the Web comes originally from the newspapers that are still around.

So if newspapers go the way of the horse and buggy, who’s going to cover what's going on in your local and state governments? Who’s going to keep track of corporations and nonprofit organizations?

There’s no question that having an informed citizenry is absolutely critical to maintaining a healthy democracy. Without an informed populace, our system will collapse.

There’s a growing number of people out there who are trying to figure out how we save the news business or somehow create alternative vehicles for journalism.

Robert McChesney, a professor in the Department of Communication at the University of Illinois and John Nichols, the Washington correspondent for The Nation magazine, have spent a number of years studying this issue, and recently came out with a pathbreaking book, “The Death and Life of American Journalism --- The Media Revolution That Will Begin the World Again.”

In it, McChesney and Nichols argue that the traditional model that has supported and allowed newspapers to thrive for decades no longer works. That model was based on papers devoting a large portion of their pages to commercial advertising, and in so doing bringing in solid revenue. That money in turn allowed publishers to set aside another healthy portion of the paper to news stories, which brought in circulation revenues, as well as provided a public service.

But in recent years, advertising and classified has been drifting to the Internet. Circulation has been lost in large part because big corporations --- which swallowed up papers in the 1980s and 1990s --- decided to cut costs to keep profits high and in so doing weakened their product and lost readers, particularly young readers.

McChesney and Nichols believe that there’s no way to revive the old commercial model for journalism (despite some of the brave predictions about a comeback by some newspaper owners). Instead, to really save journalism and make it grow, they say, the public sector has to step in and play a major, supporting role.

The authors maintain that journalism must be seen as a “public good” --- just like education and the military are seen as the public good. And they add that if Americans want good journalism to make our constitutional system work, “it means we need a massive public intervention to produce a public good.”

To keep good papers and magazines alive and spur the growth of new, independent and non-commercial on-line publications and programs, billions will have to be spent in public subsidies, they say.

Among the ideas McChesney and Nichols put forth are these:

· A tax credit for newspapers worth 50 percent of all the salaries paid to all journalistic employees, up to a maximum of $45,000. “This credit would result in papers hiring (and not firing) many more journalists.”
· Cut postal rates for magazines that have less than 25 percent of their space devoted to ads, to 5 cents. Many magazines, on both the left and the right, are floundering. A postal cut would help them stay alive, and cost the government $200 million a year, the authors write.
· Establish a “Journalism Division” in the AmeriCorps program, which already sees the government place people in community service programs. Young people would be paid to go work at a community radio station or other media, and go out and report on the community. “It strikes us as a win-win; we get more journalists covering our communities, and young journalists have a chance to gain valuable experience…” they write.
· While McChensey and Nichols see no commercial future for major dailies, they say it’s in the public interest to make sure at least one newspaper remain alive in every community that has traditionally had one. “To this end, the federal government must intervene to aid the transition to post-corporate ownership models for daily papers.” A federal office set up to oversee the transition of failing papers could buy the papers for a time, and then resell them to new owners, or provide low-interest loans to new ownership groups to make the deals themselves.
· Revitalize our pubic broadcasting systems, which have been woefully underfunded for years. Canada, Britain and other countries spend a lot more than the U.S. and have excellent news programs on their public systems. Right now, the U.S. spends only $409 million on PBS and NPR. If we spent as much per capita as Canada, the federal commitment would be $7.5 billion.

If all these proposals and others they mention were implemented, Nichols and McChesney write, the total tab would run around $35 billion.

The authors concede that “that’s darned near inconceivable in a nation that has battled over whether to spend a paltry $400 million on public broadcasting.”

But they also note that that $35 billion is close to what much smaller nations like Denmark and Finland spend per capita on public media.

They also point out quite aptly that the amount is just 3.5 percent of the $1 trillion America is spending on the military this year.

To many journalists (such as myself), the idea of public subsidies sends off alarm bells. Won’t there be government censorship?

McChesney and Nichols recognize this concern, and say emphatically, “Let’s be clear about this: the bedrock principle that government must not censor or interfere with the content or journalistic operations of news media is non-negotiable.”

They point out that while the First Amendment prohibits state censorship, it also does not prohibit or discourage the public from using the government to subsidize and spawn independent media.

In fact, the early press in this country, small newspapers and journals, got started in large part through postal and printing subsidies.

“It is not too much to say that without those huge subsidies, our nation would not have evolved as it did, indeed it might not have evolved at all,” they write.



(John Nichols spoke about his book recently at a pubic forum in New Haven. Audio CDs and DVDs of this event will be available in coming weeks at www.btlonline.org)

Commentary

Israel given a pass again by U.S. media


By Reginald Johnson
June 7, 2010



So ships carrying humanitarian aid to a country with desperately poor people are attacked in international waters by men firing automatic weapons. The assailants kill nine passengers and wound dozens of others.

The passengers were unarmed at the time and did nothing to provoke the violent assault.

It’s pretty clear the attackers acted in a totally illegal way, committing criminal acts. Right?

Wrong! The attackers were Israeli, so international law and accepted norms of behavior don’t apply --- at least in the eyes of the major U.S. media, not to mention American leaders.

The Israeli military can do whatever it wants, whenever it wants. And no matter how outrageous their actions, the Israelis are always in the right, and they are always the victims.

Proof of this dictum has been laid out over the past few days with the pro-Israel coverage by U.S. media outlets, concerning the deadly attack on the flotilla the morning of May 31. The ships were bringing aid to the beleaguered land known as the Gaza Strip, part of Palestine.

The flotilla of six ships, carrying 10,000 tons of emergency food and building materials as well as 700 activists and representatives of 40 nations, was attempting to break the illegal Israeli blockade of Gaza. The siege by Israel has been underway for three years and barely any supplies are being allowed in.

The shortage of food and other necessities has been growing more and more acute in Gaza, particularly since the brutal invasion of the territory by Israel in January of 2009, an attack that gutted Gaza’s infrastructure and caused 1,400 mostly civilian deaths.

The flotilla had been warned by the Israelis not to try to enter Gaza. Israel had maintained that the ships could be Trojan horses, secretly carrying weapons to the Hamas leaders who govern Gaza, and who Israel considers terrorists. In response, the flotilla organizers offered to have a neutral third party check the boats to guarantee the absence of weapons. But Israel did not agree to this, and the flotilla proceeded.

Around 4 a.m. on May 31, the Israeli navy surrounded the flotilla, which was 70 miles off the Israeli coast. Helicopters hovered over the lead ship, a Turkish vessel, the Mavi Marmara. Soldiers rappelled down ropes onto the ship and began firing their guns at close range. This continued even after a white flag was raised. Some passengers did try to fight back, using sticks and metal bars.

The Israeli forces took control of all the passengers, forced the boats to an Israeli port and put them all in detention, prior to deportation.

Immediately, there was world-wide criticism of the Israeli action, and demands at the UN for an official condemnation.

President Barack Obama and U.S. officials simply expressed concern, but worked to block an official UN condemnation.

And mainstream U.S. news outlets, from the get-go, soft-pedalled the Israeli atrocity and took sides with Israel. The first report I heard was on News Radio 88 (CBS) in New York Monday afternoon. After describing the attack, the reporter quickly noted that there were “two sides” to the story, and then gave the Israeli view, that their soldiers shot only in self-defense at violent passengers.

Later Monday, NBC’s evening news with Katie Couric did not directly quote any eyewitnesses or officials of aid organizations, who had gotten reports back from passengers. Instead she gave direct audio clips from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and another high Israeli official, who both said the soldiers had acted in self-defense, since passengers had attacked them with clubs. They also alleged that there were pro-Hamas terrorists among the passengers.

The report was very-one sided and begging for a rebuttal. But since Couric apparently didn’t try to get the other side, none was given.

The Washington Post was outrageous with its knee-jerk defense of Israel, saying in a June 1 editorial: “We have no sympathy for the motives of the participants in the flotilla --- a motley collection that included European sympathizers with the Palestinian cause, Israeli Arab leaders and Turkish Islamic activists.”

Cable TV pundits, even those considered moderate, were also biased in their comments on the Israeli attack on the ship. MSNBC’s Chris Matthews, apparently upset with the widespread criticism of Israel, said he felt that Israel was being hit with “a bad rap” or something to that effect.

It was also upsetting that liberal talk-show hosts Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow did not deal with the Israeli ship attack on their shows last week, at least what I saw.

So there you have it. Even the liberals of mainstream journalism won’t touch the issue of Israeli conduct with respect to Palestine and its allies. It is the sine qua non of American mainstream journalism. Don’t go there. But in my view, if you don’t go there, you’re not being a journalist.

It was left to the alternative media on radio and on the Internet to pursue the truth. The same night that NBC and others were running their one sided reports, Scott Harris of the Between the Lines radio newsmagazine interviewed Ramzi Kysia, an organizer with the Free Gaza Movement, one of the groups that sponsored the flotilla.

Kysia said international journalists were on board the ship and they reported via a satellite feed at the time of the attack that Israeli soldiers had killed people by firing their guns as soon as they landed. There was no indication of provocations from the other side. He also said officials in different ports had checked the ships during the trip, and found no weapons, putting the lie to the claim that the ships were secretly carrying arms to Hamas.

Kysia said that the attack was “an attempt to frighten off future
humanitarian aid efforts for Gaza.”

Other shows like Democracy Now! and articles on sites like Common Dreams also presented viewpoints on the attack from people other than “the usual suspects” (Israeli and American officials) to get a fuller account of what happened to the flotilla.

The lack of courage by the mainstream media to report candidly on the brutal policies and actions of the Israeli government --- as well as the American policy of condoning the actions --- is a chief reason why there continues to be no resolution to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and why the Palestinians, such as those who live in Gaza, remain oppressed and living in abject poverty.

Commentary

President Obama: Leadership Please!


By Reginald Johnson



Remember back in 2005, when Hurricane Katrina was leveling whole sections of New Orleans, and hundreds of people were being killed?

Remember the picture of former President George Bush, peering out the window of a plane, looking down at the devastation? We all criticized Bush for that, saying it was symbolic of Bush’s woeful and uncaring response to the tragedy that befell New Orleans.

The president should have headed straight down to where the flooding was and talked with the people of New Orleans face to face, showing his compassion. Don’t just sit in a plane and peer out the window, we said.

That lack of empathy and concern for what’s going on during a disaster is being repeated right now by President Barack Obama. The Gulf of Mexico oil spill is a catastrophic event, which in the long run may turn out more devastating and more costly than Katrina. Hundreds if not thousands of jobs are being wiped out, as Gulf-based industries such as fishing, boating and tourism are being ruined by the massive BP oil spill. Entire eco-systems along the Gulf coast, including shore birds, shellfish and plant life are being destroyed as the unending gusher of oil now seeps into tidal wetlands.

This environmental devastation will spread over to the Florida coast and then possibly up the Atlantic coast, as the oil is pushed by ocean currents.

It’s estimated more than 36 million gallons of oil have now spilled into the Gulf of Mexico.

We’re talking hundreds of billions, if not trillions of dollars of shoreline and environmental damage that will eventually be caused by this disaster, by the time it is over (if the oil leak is ever stopped!). Countless numbers of people will have their lives ruined by the loss of jobs and property.

Yet while all this is going on, Barack Obama doesn’t seem particularly excited. He sits unruffled, as always, analyzing the situation ----- back at the White House. While he did fly to Louisiana earlier in the month to survey the situation, he didn’t stay long, and spent no time talking with residents along the coast. He should have spent a couple of days there, listening to people and showing understanding for their concerns.

Obama, an eloquent and at times passionate speaker, has shown little passion in condemning BP for this spill and demanding corrective action. Where’s the fire? Where’s the outrage?

Obama also hasn’t done a good job in getting his administration to develop a comprehensive response to the spill. He’s retained Ken Salazar has his Interior Secretary, despite Salazar’s chummy relationship with oil companies, and the secretary’s decision to give companies like BP a waiver on performing environmental reviews on drilling plans, as a precondition for obtaining drilling permits from the government. One of those waivers was for the Deep Horizon rig, which exploded April 20, triggering the massive spill.

Obama should have fired Salazar immediately and replaced him with a real environmentalist.

Also at this stage, the government should step in and take over the efforts to plug the leak and do the clean-up --- with BP performing much of the work and of course paying for it. BP has been in charge of the operation so far, and still the leak is going on. More experts need to be brought in, more countries need to be brought in, and only the government can facilitate this. Obama needs to show leadership and do this.

Apparently both Russia and China have expertise in deep water drilling operations and can help. Their assistance should be requested. Also, two Dutch companies have the know-how to “skim” the oil off the top of the sea and recover it. They need to be brought in. The EPA reportedly rejected the skimming idea, because of some possible pollution side effects. At this stage, given the enormity of the spill, EPA concerns have to be put aside. We’re talking about hundreds of miles of coastline that may be ruined if the oil slick isn’t contained.

Any legal constraints on preventing the government from stepping in and taking over after a corporate-generated oil spill also have to be lifted, pronto. Congress can do this. If the Patriot Act can be passed overnight, then this needed legislation can be passed quickly, too.


I hope, I certainly hope, that BP’s considerable financial help for Barack Obama’s presidential campaign isn’t a factor in Obama’s lack of outrage over this spill and his poor response.

For the sake of the people on the Gulf and for the sake of our precious national environment, we need more, a lot more, from this president.