But until now America at least wanted to pretend we were above barbarity, that we were the good guys. Nowadays, it's just might makes right. At least in the recallable past, the government and pols, our business leaders and role models tried, at least to appear, to be in favor of protecting the weak from the brutish. Now they are all so bald-faced about it.
Take any day from last month's Democracy Now headlines and one can weave the tale of how the bullies shape our lives. 10/11 sounds good. You can trace the tales of the bullies from story to story: Now that it is coming out that, not only did our beloved financial institutions fraudulently raise housing prices so high everyone went broke, then bust, then they bilked us out of billions in bailouts; and then took homes away from four million families. Not only that. Now it turns out that too, that the mass foreclosures they have used to throw our citizens into the streets in pursuit of their corporate profits are also based on fraud. Foreclosures were robo-processed with rewards for the agents who could forge due process the fastest.
As of yet we don't know how many families were falsely thrown into the street, but instances have shown up in several states and all fifty are currently investigating. Meanwhile the head of Countrywide agrees to paying millions in fines for his misbehavior and joins the long list of banks and big businesses quietly agreeing to fines. Like we needed their permission to hold them accountable for screwing us after having been caught again, caught red-handed bullying the American public. And we have to let them do it because that's what keeps free enterprise free: the right of the rich to rape the poor.
These are the banks we were told were too precious to our country to risk collapse. These are the banks we loaned money to like a friend. Screwing us over all over again. Defrauding America at every single juncture in this sorry sequence of events. Several state governments have intervened and around the country, folks are calling for a national moratorium on foreclosures. But the federal government says, 'no, can't risk hurting our precious banks' precious bank profits.' Translation: because the banks are bullies and we don't want the bully to get mad. Wall Street's a bear when you piss off the bull.
Meanwhile another 95,000 lost their jobs. As the rich consolidate their capital, there is not enough left for paychecks it seems. And the list of bullies bloodying the public just goes on. Remember, these are just the stories from a single day.
Next up, NY gubernatorial candidate and bestiality fan, Carl Paladino, joined the right wing wannabe-governors' gay-basher band wagon with the aid of some Jewish religious leaders, who who wrote Paladino an anti-gay script, which not only read but has defended in separate interviews. Paladino might simply be throwing red meat to his red state fans; but the rabbis were declaring precious principles of their faith. Once again, the supposed god of love apparently hates fags. Odd that those Jewish religious leaders must've never heard that it was wrong to persecute people for being different.
Speaking of oppressions Paladino's rabbis might've heard of, how about that Ohio GOP congressional candidate Rich Iott, who out and out unmasks all pretenses of right wing pretensions about their intentions and simply dresses the part of a Nazi Waffen SS officer, the guys who operated the camps. His website recounts their exploits so lovingly it is hard to tell whether he's recruiting re-enactors or promoting their resurgence.
This is of course followed by a bit on the fact Israel is now demanding loyalty oaths as their next step towards a final solution for their Palestinian problem. Then two stories of US foreign follies of bully-dom with a Syrian man mistakenly imprisoned for seven years in Guantanamo Bay and the latest faux pas of one of our Latin American graduates of the School of the Americas, the aborted coup attempt in Ecuador.
Then was the story of Glenn Beck disciple, Byron Williams, who went out to shoot up the Tides Foundation to teach us all a lesson and ignite his revolution. Instead he just shot up the California State Police cars in his effort to rid the world of the bad guys. Way to train 'em, Glenn!
Stuck somewhere in the middle was this shocker of an item: " In what's been described as the world's biggest day of climate action, over 7,000 rallies and events were held Sunday in 188 Countries. The "10/10/10 Global Work Party" was organized by 350.org to urge people across the globe to do something in their city or community that will help deal with global warming." Which is the only time i ever heard about any of that. Why is this the only new source talking about an international event so massive it makes the idea of a Tea Party party, even one as lavish as Beck's big bash at the Lincoln Memorial, seem paltry?
Well, the truth is we won't hear about it in the mainstream because you aren't supposed to be interested. As an American news story that topic's officially DOA. Climate Change deniers have won the day on that one. American rich won't give up the profits and the rest of us intend to stay too damn comfortable to ever willingly give that up for the rest of the peasants around the world. They have to do what we say anyway. After all, we are the bully.
The last story of that night was about a dead John Lennon and some awards in his name on what would have been his 70th birthday, if he hadn't been shot down by a bully.
Of course, you can go through most any day and find stories of the bullies getting ever more brazen: Alaska reporter handcuffed by GOP candidates private guards who had to be rescued by the police. Rand Paul's boys stomp on MoveOn.org. And Stephen Broden, a GOP Congressional candidate in Texas, who says the GOP should just hold a violent revolution if they don't get what they want through election. On tape, in a sermon. That's right, this guy's a minister. If that guy is the example of the folks spreading the word, it's small wonder they know neither right from wrong, nor the true spirit of the god of love that they say that they love. Perhaps their god isn't meant to be man's friend but his shield.
Welcome to the Jungle. "Kill Teams" collecting fingers for trophies in Afghanistan, Wikileaks revealing our own recounting of torture and mass massacre in Iraq. America is no longer among the 20 least corrupt countries of the world in Transparency International's annual index. Now we're 22nd and the countries we've been destroying and/or mismanaging for the last couple of decades, Afghanistan and Iraq in particular, are among the absolute worst.
Or for me the story with the with the scariest bully face, the GOP candidate who most exemplifies what appears to be the new face of the GOP, former marine and admitted murderer, Ilario Pantano. While some will say Amy Goodman's good liberal authorship can spin some stories, you couldn't possibly distort the facts in this case to make them more hideous. They are bad enough as they are; and no one is disputing them.
" A Tea Party-backed congressional candidate in North Carolina is facing scrutiny for having killed two unarmed Iraqis while serving in Iraq. The candidate, Ilario Pantano, has said he has no regrets about fatally shooting the two at point blank range after detaining them near Fallujah in April 2004. Prosecutors later alleged that Pantano intended to make an example of the men by shooting them sixty times and hanging a sign over their corpses that read "No better friend, no worse enemy." Pantano did not deny hanging the sign or shooting the men repeatedly after stopping their vehicle at a checkpoint. He admitted to emptying one magazine of bullets into the Iraqis, then reloading and firing thirty more rounds. Despite his admission, the military cleared Pantano of wrongdoing in 2005. He's now in a tight race with Democrat Mike McIntyre in North Carolina's 7th Congressional District."
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
