Counterpunch, February 1, 2016 In Iowa, as across the nation, lots of people work during the early to middle evening, after the traditional dinner hour. Tow-truck drivers. Nurses’ aides. Nurses. Resident emergency room doctors. EMTs. Hotel receptionists. Cops. Security guards. Second-shift production workers. Custodians. Retail clerks. Waitresses. Dishwashers. Butchers at the grocery store. Chicken-shacklers at [...]
Counterpunch, January 29, 2016 Hillary Clinton says the damnedest things, some more truthful than others. Below I run through some of my favorite Hillary quotes, adding some critical commentary and a concluding refection “lesser evil” voting. “Neither Easily Defined” (1992) Mrs. Clinton said something reliably factual at her high school alma mater in Park Ridge, [...]
Counterpunch, January 22, 2016 “Nothing Real Will Happen” I happened, purely by accident (while looking for a basketball game), upon the fourth and final Democratic presidential debate in South Carolina last Sunday. I didn’t expect to stay with it, but I did. When I tuned in, Bernie Sanders was doing a decent job of helping [...]
Counterpunch, January 20, 2016 In an interview with his longtime friend Neil Drumming on National Public Radio’s “This American Life” last November, the celebrated Black American author Ta-Nehisi Coates talked about his new life in Paris, where he enjoys fine food and experiences personal training at “a really nice gym.” Coates described himself as “a [...]
ZNet, January 2016 If We are to Achieve Real Equality” Two summers ago, I happened upon a neat find in a used bookstore. I discovered an original edition of Martin Luther King’s posthumously published book The Trumpet of Conscience (New York: Harper & Row, 1968) – a compilation of five lectures King gave over the Canadian Broadcasting [...]
Counterpunch, January 14, 2016 When Feelings Reflect Reality Introduced in George Orwell’s dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty Four, the word “doublethink” refers to the ability to hold two contradictory ideas in your mind at the same time and to believe both of them. I don’t know about the belief part (see note 2, below), but Barack [...]
Counterpunch, January 8, 2016 It is by now standard for U.S. liberals and Democrats to blame former Republican United States president George W. Bush and the top 9/11-exploiting neocon champions of aggressive, regime-changing American imperialism (Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and Paul Wolfowitz et al.) for the rise of the barbaric Islamic State (IS) and the [...]
teleSur English, January 2, 2016 It’s been a happy holiday season for the American Empire’s next commander-in-chief Hillary Clinton. Her gifts have been remarkable. I am not referring to any special talent for inspiring voters and articulating a vision for democratic change. Mrs. Clinton is still a wooden and uninspiring campaigner. She remains an abject, [...]
teleSur English, December 26, 2015 A recent Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll notes a recent development in the opinion and focus of the United States electorate: “Heightened fear of terrorism is rippling through the electorate, thrusting national-security issues to the center of the 2016 presidential campaign…, Some 40% of those polled say national security and [...]
Street will speak on and against the 2016 presidential electoral extravaganza at San Diego State University: San Diego State University, Arts and Letters, 101 Thursday, April 28, 2016, 7:00-8:30 pm. "The 2016 presidential election has taken the form of a predictable and debasing spectacle. Although a rhetorical nod is made to soaring income inequality, neither the [...]