Mn-prog-events Mailing List: Progressive Calendar 08.28.06

[David Shove (shove001]

             P R O G R E S S I V E   C A L E N D A R    08.28.06

1. Pentel/gov/GP       8.28 7pm
2. AI Augustana        8.28 7pm

3. KFAI/climate crisis 8.29 11am
4. Stadium vote        8.29 1:30pm
5. Urban wild/salon    8.29 6:30pm
6. Risser GP debates   8.29 7pm

7. Erwin Marquit  - NST China Study Tour filling up
8. Mark Lause     - Derailing third parties
9. Paul C Roberts - What we know and don't know about 9/11
10. ed            - My honors (list)

--------1 of 10--------

From: Wyn Douglas <wyn_douglas [at] yahoo.com>
Subject: Pentel/gov/GP 8.28 7pm

Pentel/Provencher campaign supporters,    

Our Monday night meeting for August 28th will be held at a new location - 
at Bryant Square, 3101 Bryant Ave. S. in Minneapolis from 7-9pm.  The
following Monday, on Labor Day, we will all be busy at the State Fair and
the campaign committee will not meet. 

Come join us and bring your ideas to energize our campaign.  We are still
attempting to meet the $35,000 fundraising threshold by the end of August
to acquire state funding.  Let everyone know they can now donate online at
the www.kenpentel.org website.  Volunteer opportunities include: 
assigning point people for fundraising/houseparties, volunteer coordinator
and outer state coordinators to organize in their region for the
campaign.  Ken will be busy after the State Fair traveling around the
state on his bike.  He is the only state wide candidate of any party thus
far doing outreach to people outside of the metro area. 

Our campaign is about healing our communities and state through getting
big money out of politics and replacing it with the voices of MN
residents, sane energy policies including renewable energy, conservation,
reduced consumption and pushing the issue of single payer universal
healthcare for all.  In addition, I will be addressing the stadium tax
issue (no corporate welfare), violence against women and children and
recommending conflict resolution courses in all classrooms. 
 
Contact Tori Johnston, Pentel/Provencher Campaign Coordinator at
612-824-8492 or tori_j [at] msn.com  

Peace, Social and Economic Justice, Ecological Wisdom  Grassroots
Democracy,   Danene Provencher Green Party of MN Lt. Governor candidate


--------2 of 10--------

From: Gabe Ormsby <gabeo [at] bitstream.net>
Subject: AI Augustana 8.28 7pm

Amnesty International Augustana Homes Seniors Group meets on Monday,
August 28th, from 7:00 to 8:00 p.m. in the party room of the 1020
Building, 1020 E 17th Street, Minneapolis. For more information contact
Ardes Johnson at 612/378-1166 or johns779 [at] tc.umn.edu.


--------3 of 10--------

From: Lydia Howell <lhowell [at] visi.com>
Subject: KFAI/climate crisis 8.29 11am

Tune into "Catalyst"  Tues Aug 29, 11am on KFAI Radio hear from members of
the Climate Crisis Coalition making the links of addressing global warming
with labor concerns. You have a chance to see what CUBA has done to
address Peak Oil - petroleum running out - and global warming in the film
"Power of Community: How Cuba Survived Peak Oil" Thurs.Aug.31, 7pm, May
Day Books.301 Cedar Ave.S,West Bank,Mpls 333-4719

"Catalyst" is hosted by Lydia Howell,broaadcast every Tuesday,11am on
KFAI, 90.1 fm Mpls 106.7fm St Paul All shows archived for 2 weeks after
broadcast at www.kfai.org


--------4 of 10---------

From: Dave Bicking <dave [at] colorstudy.com>
Subject: Stadium vote 8.29 1:30pm

The stadium public hearings are over, and the final vote on the stadium
tax is coming up this Tuesday (tomorrow!) at the County Board meeting.

Tuesday, August 29, 1:30pm, regular meeting of the Hennepin County Board,
at the Hennepin County Government Center, Room A2400.  (downtown Mpls,
right next to LRT stop on 5th St., between 3rd and 4th Aves. S.)

It would be good to have as many stadium tax opponents as possible present
at that meeting.  Bring a sign if you're feeling creative.  We'll have
some signs available also.  (No signs on sticks allowed.)  If you can come
just a little bit early, around 1:15pm, that would be great.  We should
make our presence known, and our anger felt.

ALSO, contact your Commissioner!!!  Even if you have done it before, call
(preferable) or email your Commissioner NOW!  There should be a last
minute groundswell.  Especially contact the 4 (male) pro-stadium
Commissioners:

Mike Opat (District 1)  612-348-7881
Commissioner.Opat [at] co.hennepin.mn.us

Mark Stenglein (District 2)  612-348-7882
commissioner.stenglein [at] co.hennepin.mn.us

Peter McLaughlin (District 4)  612-348-3085
commissioner.mclaughlin [at] co.hennepin.mn.us

Randy Johnson (District 5)  612-348-7885
randy.johnson [at] co.hennepin.mn.us

If you are represented by Gail Dorfman, Linda Koblick, or Penny Steele, it
would be nice to contact them also, to thank them for their stand against
this.

So, you may be asking, why bother?  Don't these 4 guys have their minds
made up?  Probably so, they will probably continue to vote for the stadium
tax.  But they have been feeling the heat, and one or two of them may be
wavering.  We have clearly had an impact - a source at the Government
Center has called them "spooked" and "skittish".  The public hearings made
clear the depth and diversity of the opposition to their plans.  They must
be getting worried about their re-election prospects.  Let's push them
over the edge!

They should be worried.  Though this is the final vote, this is not the
end of our activism.  We have some plans to make them accountable for
this.  At the very least, we will work against their re- election - and
they must know they are vulnerable.  We are also looking at plans for
other consequences...

After this vote, the only hope to stop this 30-year tax is to get rid of
at least one of the Commissioners who voted for it.  The newly elected
Board could overturn this in January.

If nothing else, come down to the meeting tomorrow for some good theater.
Steele and Koblick are not going to make it easy for them.  (Dorfman has
been much more quiet in her opposition.)  Expect some fire and passion.
And join in solidarity with other opponents of this rip-off.

Please, come tomorrow, AND make those calls!!!  Now!
Thanks for all you have done so far,
Dave Bicking 612-276-1213


--------5 of 10--------

From: Patty Guerrero <pattypax [at] earthlink.net>
Subject: Urban wild/salon 8.29 6:30pm

Tuesday Aug 29, our guest will be Susu Jeffrey.  She will explain the
concept of Green Museum which is about preserving a living, changing piece
of land.  A landscape without artifacts inside walls or frames or boxes,
but an urban wilderness museum.  Coldwater can be such a place.  Come and
be part of an exciting plan.

Pax Salons ( http://justcomm.org/pax-salon ) are held (unless otherwise
noted in advance): Tuesdays, 6:30 to 8:30 pm. Mad Hatter's Tea House, 943
W 7th, St Paul, MN

Salons are free but donations encouraged for program and treats.
Call 651-227-3228 or 651-227-2511 for information.


--------6 of 10--------

From: Julie Risser <julie [at] voterisser4senate.com>
Subject: Risser GP debates 8.29 7pm

This Tuesday TOMORROW August 29th I will debate incumbent Senator Geoff
Michel at Centennial lakes in the Centrum Building. Clear View PAC - which
was founded by Edina resident John Swon in May.  The moderator is a
conservative writer for the Pioneer Press - senator Geoff Michel is going
to come - Andrew Borene is sending a surrogate who probably won't debate.

 - here is the story from the August 16th Edition of the Sun Current:

The Clear View Political Action Committee has announced the beginning of
its election 2006 debate schedule, starting with the legislative campaigns
in Senate District 41, covering Edina and west Bloomington, and House
District 41B, which includes southern Edina and west Bloomington.

The debates for Senate District 41 and House District 41B will be Tuesday,
Aug. 29, at the Centrum building in Centennial Lakes Park, 7499 France
Ave. S., Edina.

District 41 Sen. Geoff Michel, R-Edina, DFL challenger Andrew Borene of
Edina, and Green Party candidate Julie Risser of Edina have been invited
to participate, said John Swon, chair of Clear View PAC.

Candidates for the District 41B seat in the state House of Representatives
also have been invited. They include incumbent Rep. Neil Peterson,
R-Bloomington, and his Republican Party primary election opponent, Mark
Chamberlain of Edina. The DFL candidate in District 41B is Paul Rosenthal
of Edina.

The doors will open at 6:30 p.m. and the hour-long debate between the
candidates for state Senate will begin at 7 p.m.

After an intermission, the candidates for House District 41B will convene
at 8:30 p.m.

St. Paul Pioneer Press columnist Craig Westover will moderate both
debates.

"We're extremely excited to be able to allow voters in these
attention-grabbing races to meet the candidates and hear their issues well
before the general election," said John Swon, chairman of Clear View PAC.
"All ... promise to be informative, lively debates and we hope to add even
more to our schedule before the end of the campaign season."

Clear View PAC describes itself as a non-partisan political advocacy
organization that seeks to promote fiscally sound governmental reforms and
increase the transparency of information on Minnesota issues and
candidates, providing a basic source of information to help voters make
better, more-informed choices.

Information: www.clearviewpac.org.


--------7 of 10--------

From: Erwin Marquit <marqu002 [at] tc.umn.edu>
Subject: NST China Study Tour filling up

Less than half of the tour places remain for the two-week NST China Study
Tour in June 2007.  We will be doing a large conference/tour promotional
mailing this week and a half-page announcemnent will appear in the issue
of The Nation that will be mailed to subscribers on Aug. 31. We expect to
fill all available places for the tour within a month. If you have been
planning to join the tour, you should secure your place by sending the
$200 deposit (refundable until Februrary 1, 2007) without delay. When you
send your payment, please also send me an e-mail that you have done so,
and your priority will be establshed.

If you are planning to attend the June 2-4 conference only in Beijing,
there is no urgency since no limit has been set on the number of
conference participants.

For updated conference/tour information and complete tour itinerary see
http://umn.edu/home/marqu002/china2007

Conference/tour description (without itinerary) is also available in
French at http://umn.edu/home/marqu002/china2007fr
and German at http://umn.edu/home/marqu002/china2007de

Erwin Marquit, editor Nature, Society, and Thought Univ. of Minnesota 116
Church Street SE Minneapolis, MN 55455-0112   marqu002 [at] umn.edu
612-922-7993


--------8 of 10--------

DERAILING THIRD PARTIES
by Mark Lause

The Republicans seemed to have a stranglehold upon power although recent
scandals had shaken much of public confidence in the party of Lincoln.
Much of the country referred to the previous presidential race as "the
Stolen Election," in which the GOP seized power in spite of its loss at
the polls. Many blamed both parties for the corruption, the arrogance of
corporate monopoly, and the systematic betrayal of the interests of
African-Americans, women, and working people.

In response to these concerns, a broad third party formed and nominated a
candidate long and loudly praised by leaders of both parties for his
incorruptibility, his honesty, and his straightforward dedication to
representative government and social change. As a result, the media was
rather entertained. A third party candidate added spice to the story they
were covering. Although various third parties had done extremely well in
local elections, nobody actually expected this to translate into serious
support in a presidential year.

Based on this assumption, commentators on the campaign saw every
indication of third party strength as a sign that it was not really a
third party.

Such assumptions fueled the fears of Democrats, eager to retake the White
House. They fretted that the third party movement might deny them just
enough votes to keep the Republicans in power. From their perspective, the
independent effort objectively aided the Republicans and they began
leaking information to the press that it was, in fact, funded directly by
the Republicans and run in the interests of the Republicans.

The fact is that for many years both Democrats and Republicans had
benefited at times from the presence of a third party and had maneuvered
for the best position with no interest in or cooperation from that third
party. The leaders of both parties knew this and charges that the other
was engaged in duplicitous maneuvers became part of the campaign.

The particulars of the case ranged from irrelevant to implausible to
impossible, but the constant parade of factoids seemed to make proof
superfluous. They asserted Republican involvement in efforts to assist in
the election of the third party presidential electors, and the exchange of
implausibly vast amounts of money without anyone having sufficient
documentation to demonstrate anything.

The media asked absolutely no questions and repeated such charges, citing
each other's publications, if anything. The accusations certainly provided
a cheap and simple way to cover a third party campaign while actually
ignoring the substantive issues the campaign itself sought to raise. They
also provided an implicit excuse to stop covering the independent
campaign, as being important only in relation to the rivalry of the major
parties.

Another function of these accusations was to provide a convenient excuse
for those who had been previously identified with the third party
movement.

Leaders of some of the largest and oldest organizations now had an
explanation for their willingness to make their peace with the two party
system. They bitterly denounced those who resisted the pressures to
conform as egotistical and dangerous.

A historical analogy

Some years ago, I began researching, documenting and writing about these
events in The Civil War's Last Campaign. At the time, I suspected that
James B. Weaver's 1880 presidential bid might offer some lessons worth
considering for the present. Others may have thought so as well, since it
did not see print until 2001. Frankly, I had no illusions that my academic
peers shared these concerns. In fact, when I presented some of my findings
in November 2000 at the "Conference on Eugene V. Debs and the Politics of
Dissent in Modern America" at Terre Haute, I already found myself nearly
alone among other participants in not supporting Al Gore. Yet, I doubt
that anyone could have anticipated some of the peculiar turns of the 2004
presidential campaign.

The party that nominated Weaver convened at Chicago's Exposition Hall. It
brought together one of the broadest, most united radical electoral
movements in history. Socialists, woman suffragists, and even a few
pioneering environmentalists turned up, as did a number of black delegates
urging the third party to take up the cause of serious Reconstruction.
Unlike his predecessors, Weaver promised the convention to go directly to
the people and ask for their votes.  There would be no gentleman's front
porch campaign for a people's candidate.

The campaign hit several snags almost immediately. The large Union
Greenback clubs, expected to line up behind an independent effort, favored
"fusion" slates in which Greenbackers and Democrats would vote together
for a common slate of presidential electors. Weaver opposed this:

We have in this country two organized parties: first, the Greenbackers;
second, the hard money party, which is really divided into the Republican
and Democratic Party. This last party should really be called the
Demo-Republican party.  He insisted upon "an open, straight fight against
the Democratic and Republican wings of the Money Power, and have no choice
between them.  If you have, take your choice and go where you belong."
Over time, the club leaders did just that, quietly drifting off piecemeal
to the more "realistic" and lucrative Democratic campaign.

What was worse, Weaver opened his campaign by going south where state
elections were being held early and where he saw that Republican
abandonment of the former slaves to the Democratic former slaveholders
seemed to offer a clear opening. Stumping his way across Alabama, he was
horrified with the stories of black disenfranchisement. When Democratic
thugs attacked a racially mixed opposition meeting at Mobile, Weaver
postponed his plans for leaving the state until he could personally attend
a rally there.

As Weaver continued on his campaign tour, he began making the abandonment
of Reconstruction and the demand for a free and fair ballot a key issue in
the campaign. He bitterly denounced the Democrats in the South for an
attempt to deprive the freed people of their rights and the Republicans
for failing to use the federal authority to prevent it. He rightly warned
that the denial of voting rights to any citizen made a mockery of the idea
of republicanism among all.

Suddenly, the established press couldn't treat Weaver as just an
interesting oddity any more. When he entered the Midwest states, an
Alabama editor, W. M. Edwardy, published a stunning exposé in the
stridently white supremacist Cincinnati Enquirer. Edwardy charged that the
Republican campaign was secretly funding Weaver to draw off votes from the
Democrats, and that Weaver was only running to hurt the Democrats. Edwardy
claimed to blow the lid off the secret Republican funding of the third
party campaign.

The numbers, the payments, the scenarios ranged from implausible to
impossible, and Weaver's much-lauded reputation before the campaign
mattered for naught. Democratic papers across the country reprinted each
others' articles and ignored anything more about the Greenback- Labor
campaign, some saying that they were only going to cover one Republican
presidential campaign.

Inspired by the reception of this story, other exposés followed, each less
plausible than its predecessor, but circulated no less eagerly without
investigation. All of this was a godsend to those in the third party
movement who preferred stomping self-righteously back to a major party
rather than skulking. Meanwhile, the Republicans were horrified that
Weaver had the audacity to attack them for betrayal of Reconstruction, so
their papers were quite happy to drop coverage of the Greenback-Labor
party as well.

This is not to say that "history repeats itself." "History" doesn't do
such things. However, people who insist on repeating the same mistakes
will get some generally similar outcomes. The class-based two-party system
in the United States has evolved mechanisms for dealing with those who
challenge it. These have not changed since the days when former
slaveholders and their hired servants simply libeled and slandered their
critics, or murdered them in cold blood.

What we have been privileged to see in 2004 is a similar response by
people and institutions that resent any challenge to their power and
wealth. Now, too, those persons and parties that function by corruption,
dishonesty, and double dealing, eager to avoid debate, simply level
charges of corruption, dishonesty and double dealing.  That such charges
do not stand up to investigation means nothing.

The media is simplistically and mindlessly following a path of least
resistance, repeating what it is being told, because doing so costs
nothing and makes no powerful enemies. Institutionally, it is no more
likely to question what it's told on the elections than it did the
president's assertions about Weapons of Mass Destruction or Iraqi links
with Al Qaeda.

If it seems discouraging, remember that this is being done in order to
avoid any discussion of the substantive issues we have tried to raise for
so long. The best response is to keep hammering away on those very points
over which they want to silence us - the war, the class nature of the
bipartisan economic policies, health care, the environment,
constitutionalism, civil liberties and civil rights.

While only national electoral efforts to keep the issues of Reconstruction
before the American electorate were virtually written out of our history,
the 1880 campaign established a precedent in language and approach for
third party movements for a generation. We did, eventually, have a "Second
Reconstruction" that addressed some of these issues. Unlike the Democrats
or Republicans, what we are doing in 2004 is not about November, but about
where the political discourse goes in 2005 and thereafter.

Assertions that the American way of life is non-negotiable create no more
oil. The bipartisan nature of their insistence that Iraq become a model
republic fosters illusions no less destructive than those over Vietnam. If
those willing to restrict their options to lesser evils held sway, we
would still be part of the British Empire or trying to figure out how to
get rid of slavery.

What is really decisive will be what happens in the wake of this election.
From this perspective, the Nader-Camejo campaign was anything but
unwinnable.

Mark Lause, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor of History at the University
of Cincinnati and the author of several books including, most recently,
The Civil War's Last Campaign: James B. Weaver, the Greenback-Labor Party
& the Politics of Race & Section [Lanham, MD:  University Press of
America, 2001] and also Young America: Land, Labor, and the Republican
Community, to be released in May of 2005 by the University of Illinois
Press. This article was first published by the author at
http://www.swans.com. [2 feb 05]


--------9 of 10--------

What we know and don't know about 9/11
Roberts responds to feedback on "Gullible Americans"
By Paul Craig Roberts
Information Clearing House
Wednesday, August 16th, 2006

I received a number of intelligent responses from readers of my August 14
column, "Gullible Americans," The letters deserve a reply. Moreover, some
contain important points that should be shared with a wider audience.
Pundits such as myself are not the only people who have interesting things
to say. Considering the number of letters and the time it would require to
respond individually, I am replying instead in this column.

Most readers from whom I heard understand the difference between loyalty
to country and loyalty to a government. They understand that to support a
political party or a government that is destroying the US Constitution and
America's reputation in the world is, in fact, an act of treason.
Therefore, I did not have to read the usual drivel about how doubting "our
government" is un-American.

Among the issues raised are:

How could the complicity of the US government, or some part of it, in the
events of 9/11 be kept a secret? For the most part, this question comes
from Americans who believe the government must have been, to some extent,
complicit in the attacks on the WTC and the Pentagon.

How can we differentiate between the real facts, the 9/11 Commission's
reporting of the facts, and "conspiracy theories"?

What about the role of suicide flyers led by M. Atta?

What about the Popular Mechanics article and the TV documentary that
debunk the skeptics and support the official explanation of 9/11?

What about the role of the US media in propagandizing Americans with the
official explanation instead of examining the explanation, especially with
regard to such truncated hatchet-job interviews with 9/11 skeptics such as
the hatchet jobs presided over by Donny Deutsch on CNBC and by neocon
Tucker Carlson on MSNBC?

Why are so many Americans hostile to holding the Bush regime accountable
for its obvious and documented lies, lies that have misled America to war
and gratuitously slaughtered and maimed tens of thousands of people,
including our own troops?

I will begin by stating what we know to be a solid incontrovertible
scientific fact.

We know that it is strictly impossible for any building, much less steel
columned buildings, to "pancake" at free fall speed. Therefore, it is a
non-controversial fact that the official explanation of the collapse of
the WTC buildings is false.

We also know for a fact that the Air Force somehow inexplicably failed to
intercept the alleged hijacked airliners despite the fact that the Air
Force can launch jet fighters to 29,000 feet in 2.5 minutes. We also know
that the two co-chairmen of the 9/11 Commission have just written a book
that reveals that the US military lied to the Commission about its failure
to intercept the hijacked airliners.

There are various explanations for this second fact. The military could
have lied to cover up complicity or to cover-up its incompetence. However,
no investigation has been made to ascertain the true explanation for the
failure.

This leaves us with the incontrovertible fact that buildings cannot
"pancake" at free fall speeds.

The only explanation known to science for the free fall collapse of a
building, especially into its own footprint, is engineered demolition,
which removes the supports for each floor of the building at split second
intervals so that the debris from above meets no resistance on its fall.
To call this explanation a "conspiracy theory" is to display the utmost
total ignorance. Any physicist or engineer who maintains that buildings
can "pancake" at free fall speed has obviously been bought and paid for or
is a total incompetent fool.

The WTC buildings are known to have collapsed at free fall speed into
their own footprints.

This fact does not tell us who is responsible or what purpose was served.

Since the damning incontrovertible fact has not been investigated,
speculation and "conspiracy theories" have filled the void. Some of the
speculation is based on circumstantial evidence and is plausible. Other of
the speculation is untenable, and it is used to protect the official
explanation by branding all skeptics "conspiracy theorists." I would not
be surprised if some of the most far-out "conspiracy theories" consist, in
fact, of disinformation put out by elements in the government to discredit
all skeptics. But I do not know this to be the case.

How could government complicity be kept a secret? It can be kept a secret,
because so many Americans are scientifically ignorant and emotionally
weak. They are incapable of realizing the contradiction in the
government's claim that the WTC buildings "pancaked" at free fall speed,
and they are emotionally incapable of confronting the evil of the Bush
regime. Many Christians think that Bush is "a man of God" who is
protecting American morality from homosexuals and abortionists. Others who
wear their patriotism on their sleeves think Bush is standing up for
America and innocent Israel, and that they must not let anti-American
anti-war protesters cause America to lose another war and repeat the
Vietnam experience. Americans are both ignorant and full of resentments
against the left. This makes them easily manipulated by the
neoconservatives who dominate the Bush regime and the media.

Also, many anti-war and anti-Bush online sites are scared of being called
"crazy conspiracy kooks." They protect their sites by staying away from
the 9/11 issue, just as so many Americans are scared to death of being
called "anti-semitic" and thereby do not dare criticize Israel no matter
the heinous war crimes that state routinely commits. Of all the online
subscribers to my column, only vdare.com and NewsMax had the courage to
post my column. Realizing that even antiwar sites would serve as de facto
gatekeepers for the neocons, I offered the column to ICH, whose editor
cannot be intimidated.

The Popular Mechanics article and the TV documentary are obviously false
since they both endorse the official explanation that the WTC buildings
"pancaked" at free fall speed, an obvious scientific impossibility.
Whether the false reporting by Popular Mechanics and television are due to
incompetence or to complicity in a government cover-up, I do not know.

We know nothing about alleged suicide flyers led by M. Atta except what
the government has told us, a government that has lied to us about
everything else, such as Iraq's alleged WMD and alleged links to Osama bin
Laden, and Iran's alleged nuclear weapons program, a program for which the
International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors cannot find evidence.

According to reports, the BBC has found 6 of the alleged suicide hijackers
alive and well in their home countries. I do not know if the report is
true, but I do know that the report has been ignored and there has been no
investigation. Both the US government and the US media have turned a blind
eye. We have no way of knowing if Atta and his named accomplices hijacked
the planes, or, if they did, whether they were dupes of intelligent
services that pretended to be a terrorist cell and organized the cover for
the engineered demolition.

The fact that we do not know any of these things, and the fact that the
9/11 Commission co-chairmen now tell us that their report is flawed, are
good indications that we have no documented information of who was behind
the plot, why it occurred, or how it operated.

With regard to the role of the US media, if it is indeed a media rather
than a propaganda ministry, one reader cited remarks by the distinguished
investigative reporter, John Pilger, made in an address at Columbia
University on 14 April 2006:

"During the Cold War, a group of Russian journalists toured the United
States. On the final day of their visit, they were asked by their hosts
for their impressions. 'I have to tell you,' said their spokesman, 'that
we were astonished to find after reading all the newspapers and watching
TV, that all the opinions on all the vital issues were by and large, the
same. To get that result in our country, we imprison people, we tear out
their fingernails. Here, you don't have that. What's the secret? How do
you do it?'"

This quote is probably apocryphal, but it is well used to make a valid
point. The answer to the Russian's question is that during the cold war
the American public viewed the Soviet Union as a dangerous adversary and
were amenable to reports to that effect. The fact that the Soviets were a
potentially dangerous adversary made Americans blind to the roles of the
US military-industrial complex, which benefited financially from
cultivating the adversary relationship, and the US government, which
benefited politically from cultivating the adversary relationship, in
keeping the adversarial relationship alive.

The uniformity of the US media has become much more complete since the
days of the cold war. During the 1990s, the US government permitted an
unconscionable concentration of print and broadcast media that terminated
the independence of the media. Today the US media is owned by 5 giant
companies in which pro-Zionist Jews have disproportionate influence. More
importantly, the values of the conglomerates reside in the broadcast
licenses, which are granted by the government, and the corporations are
run by corporate executives--not by journalists--whose eyes are on
advertising revenues and the avoidance of controversy that might produce
boycotts or upset advertisers and subscribers. Americans who rely on the
totally corrupt corporate media have no idea what is happening anywhere on
earth, much less at home.

Despite the dark days in which we live, some readers find optimism in
recent polls that show more than one-third of the US public now disbelieve
the official account of 9/11 despite the Bush regime's propaganda
faithfully trumpeted by the US media. Bush's own rock-bottom polls show
that Americans, like the Russians of the Soviet era, can read between the
lines of the propagandistic US media. Many Americans can still spot a liar
and a cheat when they see one.

                               ***

Who is Paul Craig Roberts?

* Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Economic Policy under Ronald
Reagan (awarded the Treasury Department's Meritorious Service Award for
"his outstanding contributions to the formulation of United States
economic policy.")

* Senior Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University,
and Research Fellow at the Independent Institute.

* Former editor and columnist for The Wall Street Journal and columnist
for Business Week and the Scripps Howard News Service

* Held the William E. Simon Chair in Political Economy at the Center for
Strategic and International Studies (1982 -1993)

* Distinguished Fellow at the Cato Institute from 1993 to 1996

* Olin Fellow at the Institute for Political Economy

* Nationally syndicated columnist for Investor's Business Daily

* Winner of the 1992 Warren Brookes Award for Excellence in Journalism

* Ranked "One of the top seven journalists" by the Forbes Media Guide
(1993)

* Author of, The Tyranny of Good Intentions, and Marx's Theory of
Exchange, Alienation and Crisis

Dr. Roberts was educated at the Georgia Institute of Technology (B.S.),
the University of Virginia (Ph.D.), the University of California at
Berkeley and Oxford University where he was a member of Merton College. He
is listed in Who's Who in America, Who's Who in the World, The Dictionary
of International Biography, Outstanding People of the Twentieth Century,
and 1000 Leaders of World Influence.


--------10 of 10--------

[Mr Roberts (see paragraph above) has many honors, which he lists. You
must be wondering about mine... -ed]


My Honors:

Listed in
Who's Who in My Livingroom
Who's Who in My Kitchen
Who's Who in My Bedroom
Who's Who in My Bathroom
Who's Who in My Car
Outstanding People Inhabiting My Body
Dictionary of Immediate Personal Space Biography


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   - David Shove             shove001 [at] tc.umn.edu
   rhymes with clove         Progressive Calendar
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