Well, I guess I'm not capable of writing without it being labeled a 'rant?' And this troubles me a bit because it seems kind of dismissive or marginalizaing. But on the other hand, it may be accurate because I am angry at all the injustices being committed by the masters. This is a piece on my overview of justice or 'law and order.' And it really sickens me to hear not only the so-called conservatives but also some on the 'Left' speak so solemnly of how America is based on 'law and order' when almost daily we learn of Bush & Co.'s utter contempt for it.
Justice, American Style!
We hear frequently how America is a nation founded on the principles of ‘Law and Order,’ and we have seen over the past couple of decades, the rapid construction of new prisons. We now have the dubious distinction of having more citizens per capita behind bars than any other nation. But consider who make up the vast majority of those locked up in our prisons.
Roughly 50% of those incarcerated, are there because of possession of relatively harmless drugs such as marijuana. These are victim-less crimes. And the overwhelming majority of our citizens who are locked up, are the poor and illiterate white, Black, & Hispanic Americans. This is not mere coincidence nor is it because this segment of our population is intrinsically ‘evil.’ No, this tragic statistic is a prime example or is representative of the war on the poor or the war on the American people.
Think about it. In the 1950s when I was born, we were taught from elementary school on, that the communists were a sinister force seeking to destroy America. But I submit that the true reason our ‘leaders’ hated communism so vehemently was because it represented a serious threat to capitalism. Of course, the Russians didn’t practice true communism just as America doesn’t practice true capitalism i.e. free trade, free market, etc.
George Orwell warned us of totalitarianism and many readers of his book 1984, believe it was an indictment of Stalinist Russia, but in fact, Orwell was detailing the techniques of suppression that could be used in any country. And one doesn’t have to look very hard to see evidence of the suppression, oppression, & manipulation of both the British and the American peoples.
In addition, let’s not forget the warning that President Eisenhower gave us shortly before leaving office i.e. beware the military/industrial complex. What Eisenhower was forewarning us of so many years ago, has become a harsh reality. In short, the U.S. government, the Pentagon’s top military elite, & the manufacturers of the weapons of war, have formed an unholy triumvirate. And in order to keep the tax dollars coming in so that the corporate robber barons can continue profiting, it is necessary to keep the public scared. With the willing cooperation of the U.S. corporate media elite, the powers that be have succeeded magnificently.
Furthermore, when communism collapsed because of its internal contradictions, the status quo was forced to scramble for another enemy, another ‘evil force’ seeking to destroy America. And they decided on a ‘War on Drugs.’ And again, this was a pretext used to persecute & prosecute the poor and the disenfranchised of not only America but also of the poor countries which happened to have large quantities of natural resources that the corporate cockroaches were salivating over.
Reflect also on the historical fact that throughout history, the vast majority of those who wrote & spoke against those in power and how they oppressed their citizens, came from the poor & the working classes. And as the war against communism was played out here in America, the main targets for persecution were the artists & intellectuals. These were the groups primarily hounded by the witch hunts conducted by Senator McCarthy. Of course, most of these artists & intellectuals were not the working poor but were of middle class backgrounds. But the key point is that they were exercising their rights of freedom of speech & this was seen as a threat to the status quo. Because these artists & intellectuals, through their work, contradicted the state propaganda that the public was fed via the mainstream media & this undermined the ‘architects of fear’ who must have a frightened populace to keep the federal treasury money flowing into their pockets.
And today, with the horrific events of September 11th, the Bush cabal has cynically & shamelessly manipulated this national tragedy by playing on the public’s feelings in order to wage their never-ending & no holds barred ‘War on Terror.’ In addition, this nebulous ‘war,’ is enriching the Bush junta’s cronies e.g. Haliburton, Bechtel, Lockheed, etc., and at the same time, they are suppressing dissent of their policies & practices. One of the most sacrosanct pillars of American jurisprudence i.e. habeas corpus, has been suspended along with the right to a speedy trial, the right to know what you are accused of, the right to a lawyer, etc., have all been trashed & ignored. This is chillingly reminiscent of Stalin’s infamous purges.
The ‘Patriot Act,’ and the ‘Homeland Security Bill,’ have effectively gutted our Bill of Rights & we now resemble that totalitarian nightmare world that George Orwell described, more than the land of the free & home of the brave that we were taught about in elementary school. President Bush, the party-boy, who pretends he’s from Texas but who in fact, was the product of the very East coast elite that he now accuses of undermining America’s values, proclaims himself the champion of ‘law & order.’ Yet he was arrested for drunk-driving a couple of times, convicted of cocaine possession, etc. but never spent a day in jail & the records of his crimes have mysteriously disappeared. Moreover, the Bush-whacker’s record of being AWOL from the Texas Air National Guard for several months have also vanished. This is the ‘born-again Christian,’ who has basically declared on several occasions that he, as president of the United States, is above the law. He has given his underlings the okay to spy on American citizens without warrants from the special F.I.S.A. court established to oversee domestic surveillance searches & seizures. He has spied on the U.N. Security Council before the crucial vote on whether the U.S. had the right to invade Iraq. He recently said that he doesn’t care if Congress refuses to further fund the war in Iraq because he will continue to prosecute the war no matter what. I could go on ad nauseam listing Bush’s violations of both domestic & international law, but it’s unnecessary because I believe my point has been made. And it’s not surprising that George ‘Dubya’ Bush has so little respect for the law because his father didn’t respect the law either.
Recall the fact that George Bush Sr. was the director of the C.I.A., one of the most corrupt & illegal of America’s intelligence agencies. In addition, remember that Bush Sr. was never prosecuted for his role in the Iran/Contra Scandal. No, sadly, the song remains the same i.e. the corporate C.E.O.s who routinely break the law & who’s crimes ruin families, cause millions of deaths through poisoning of our environment, steal workers’ pensions, etc., may occasionally get a slap on the wrist. But the fines that the government occasionally levies on the corporate behemoths, is so small relative to the illegal profits they make by violating our laws, that the corporations routinely ignore the laws & consider the fines a part of their costs in doing business. And on even rarer occasions, these ‘white-collar’ criminals are sent to a federal, country club prison for a few months. What really outrages me and at the same time amazes me, is the fact that so few of us make the connection that in terms of the harm done, these corporate crocodiles with their Cheshire cat grin like Dick Cheney, cause far greater pain, misery, death, & destruction, than the vast majority of American prisoners caged like sub-humans for years & sometimes decades, in prisons far less comfortable than those corporate crooks enjoy!
So, when I hear these venal, cold-blooded, misanthropes declaring their respect for the sanctity of ‘Law & Order,’ it’s all I can do to keep from vomiting! Once again, the true war being waged around the globe, primarily by the leader of the wolf pack, the U.S. corporate gang-bangers, and the other members of the G-8 e.g. Britain, France, Germany, Japan, etc., is the war against the workers of the world. It’s the hidden agenda of the power elite. They will do anything to maintain their power & as a result, over two-thirds of the world’s population subsist on less than $2 a day. And the majority of the world’s poor don’t even have access to water or water that isn’t disease-ridden.
In conclusion, it’s obvious that the reptiles ruling the world, behind the scenes, in the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, & the World Trade Organization, don’t give a damn about ‘Law & Order.’ To illustrate, John Perkins who wrote Confessions of An Economic Hit-Man, detailed how he & many others would first try to seduce the leaders of countries with bribes & exotic mistresses but if that didn’t work, they would threaten their lives. Why would they do this? Because transnational corporations who had their eyes on a country’s natural resources, devised the scheme of sucking nations’ leaders into accepting grossly inflated loans from the WTO, IMF, & the World Bank to launch major infrastructure projects such as hydroelectric plants & the contracts would be given to corporations like Halliburton, Bechtel, Lockheed, G.E., etc. knowing all the while that the countries who accepted these ‘loans,’ would never be able to repay them. And the primary purpose behind this grand scheme was that when the countries went into default on their ‘loans,’ the IMF, WTO, & World Bank could then demand that the countries’ leader allow their water systems, electrical systems, gas industry, etc. to be ‘privatized’ or taken over by the multinational corporations like those listed above. Then the foreign, mafia loan sharks jack the prices for water, gas, electricity, etc. sky high and the poor are forced to choose between heating their homes or putting food on their tables. Yes, this is their idea of ‘Law & Order,’ but their definition of ‘order’ is keeping the rabble in line by any means necessary e.g. character assassination, jailing of dissenters, murder, or whatever it takes for them to subjugate the world’s poor!
Noam Chomsky, who has been called the world’s greatest living intellectual by the New York Times amongst others, along with other noted luminaries like Michael Parenti, James Petras, etc., have pointed out that the real war is the war between Capitalism & Democracy. How strange and surrealistic a world we find ourselves living in where our soldiers are fighting & dying in a foreign land supposedly to bring ‘democracy & freedom’ to them but they are unwittingly fighting a proxy way for the corporate lords of war who are, de facto, destroying democracy & freedom around the world in order to protect & expand their robbing of the world’s poor! Therefore, for our young to fight, be maimed physically or psychologically, and to possibly die to bring ‘democracy’ to Iraq is a total farce & a cruel hoax played on the working poor & the middle class who often ‘join’ the military because they have very few options in corporate America where companies are given tax breaks to ‘outsource’ jobs to foreign countries.
Appeals to nationalism or people’s love of their countries were responsible for the deaths of millions in the wars of the 20th century and the manipulation of people’s feelings of ‘patriotism,’ is still used to whip up war fever when the corporate pigs set their sights on a nation’s resources. These corporate swine have shown us consistently that they don’t have one ounce of loyalty to the countries they have their corporate headquarters in. Their only loyalty is to the never-ending pursuit of individual power and profit for themselves. No, my friend, ‘Law and Order’ is the smokescreen behind which the power elite hide their true agenda of ‘Divide & Conquer.’ And this strategy is as old as history itself & has been used against the citizens of every empire that has ever existed. Nevertheless, there is hope for humanity because as Napoleon Bonaparte said, "there are but two powers in the world, the sword & the mind, and in the end, the mind always conquers!" Finally, if you think it’s too hopeless or that ‘they’ are just too powerful, consider this. I am a simple, working class stiff and it took me 14 years to earn my Bachelor of Arts in English Literature but because of my curiosity and distrust of the rich & the politicians and my Irish stubbornness, I have uncovered what I have shared with you here and much more. If I can do it, you can do it! You simply have to ask yourself whether you are content to go through life blind & vulnerable to those seemingly invisible forces that affect your job, whether you will hold on to your house, your pension plan, your family’s health insurance, etc., or whether you are going to roll up your sleeves & take back your natural rights to freedom & dignity as a human being?
---Rob DeLoss, January 23, 2007