Thursday, November 06, 2008
Wednesday, November 05, 2008
The Speech
It was as sober as I expected. This President-elect clearly understands that progress, real progress, will require the service and sacrifice of all Americans. This was a bottom up campaign, and it is my expectation that, like Kennedy, Obama will ask a lot of those he now serves:
Full text:
PRESIDENT-ELECT BARACK OBAMA: If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible; who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time; who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer.
Its the answer told by lines that stretched around schools and churches in numbers this nation has never seen; by people who waited three hours and four hours, many for the very first time in their lives, because they believed that this time must be different; that their voice could be that difference.
Its the answer spoken by young and old, rich and poor, Democrat and Republican, black, white, Latino, Asian, Native American, gay, straight, disabled and not disabled - Americans who sent a message to the world that we have never been a collection of Red States and Blue States: we are, and always will be, the United States of America.
Its the answer that led those who have been told for so long by so many to be cynical, and fearful, and doubtful of what we can achieve to put their hands on the arc of history and bend it once more toward the hope of a better day.
Its been a long time coming, but tonight, because of what we did on this day, in this election, at this defining moment, change has come to America.
I just received a very gracious call from Senator McCain. He fought long and hard in this campaign, and hes fought even longer and harder for the country he loves. He has endured sacrifices for America that most of us cannot begin to imagine, and we are better off for the service rendered by this brave and selfless leader. I congratulate him and Governor Palin for all they have achieved, and I look forward to working with them to renew this nations promise in the months ahead.
I want to thank my partner in this journey, a man who campaigned from his heart and spoke for the men and women he grew up with on the streets of Scranton and rode with on that train home to Delaware, the Vice President-elect of the United States, Joe Biden.
I would not be standing here tonight without the unyielding support of my best friend for the last sixteen years, the rock of our family and the love of my life, our nations next First Lady, Michelle Obama. Sasha and Malia, I love you both so much, and you have earned the new puppy thats coming with us to the White House. And while shes no longer with us, I know my grandmother is watching, along with the family that made me who I am. I miss them tonight, and know that my debt to them is beyond measure.
To my campaign manager David Plouffe, my chief strategist David Axelrod, and the best campaign team ever assembled in the history of politics - you made this happen, and I am forever grateful for what youve sacrificed to get it done.
But above all, I will never forget who this victory truly belongs to - it belongs to you.
I was never the likeliest candidate for this office. We didnt start with much money or many endorsements. Our campaign was not hatched in the halls of Washington - it began in the backyards of Des Moines and the living rooms of Concord and the front porches of Charleston.
It was built by working men and women who dug into what little savings they had to give five dollars and ten dollars and twenty dollars to this cause. It grew strength from the young people who rejected the myth of their generations apathy; who left their homes and their families for jobs that offered little pay and less sleep; from the not-so-young people who braved the bitter cold and scorching heat to knock on the doors of perfect strangers; from the millions of Americans who volunteered, and organized, and proved that more than two centuries later, a government of the people, by the people and for the people has not perished from this Earth. This is your victory.
I know you didnt do this just to win an election and I know you didnt do it for me. You did it because you understand the enormity of the task that lies ahead. For even as we celebrate tonight, we know the challenges that tomorrow will bring are the greatest of our lifetime - two wars, a planet in peril, the worst financial crisis in a century. Even as we stand here tonight, we know there are brave Americans waking up in the deserts of Iraq and the mountains of Afghanistan to risk their lives for us. There are mothers and fathers who will lie awake after their children fall asleep and wonder how theyll make the mortgage, or pay their doctors bills, or save enough for college. There is new energy to harness and new jobs to be created; new schools to build and threats to meet and alliances to repair.
The road ahead will be long. Our climb will be steep. We may not get there in one year or even one term, but America - I have never been more hopeful than I am tonight that we will get there. I promise you - we as a people will get there.
There will be setbacks and false starts. There are many who wont agree with every decision or policy I make as President, and we know that government cant solve every problem. But I will always be honest with you about the challenges we face. I will listen to you, especially when we disagree. And above all, I will ask you join in the work of remaking this nation the only way its been done in America for two-hundred and twenty-one years - block by block, brick by brick, calloused hand by calloused hand.
What began twenty-one months ago in the depths of winter must not end on this autumn night. This victory alone is not the change we seek - it is only the chance for us to make that change. And that cannot happen if we go back to the way things were. It cannot happen without you.
So let us summon a new spirit of patriotism; of service and responsibility where each of us resolves to pitch in and work harder and look after not only ourselves, but each other. Let us remember that if this financial crisis taught us anything, its that we cannot have a thriving Wall Street while Main Street suffers - in this country, we rise or fall as one nation; as one people.
Let us resist the temptation to fall back on the same partisanship and pettiness and immaturity that has poisoned our politics for so long. Let us remember that it was a man from this state who first carried the banner of the Republican Party to the White House - a party founded on the values of self-reliance, individual liberty, and national unity. Those are values we all share, and while the Democratic Party has won a great victory tonight, we do so with a measure of humility and determination to heal the divides that have held back our progress. As Lincoln said to a nation far more divided than ours, We are not enemies, but friends...though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection. And to those Americans whose support I have yet to earn - I may not have won your vote, but I hear your voices, I need your help, and I will be your President too.
And to all those watching tonight from beyond our shores, from parliaments and palaces to those who are huddled around radios in the forgotten corners of our world - our stories are singular, but our destiny is shared, and a new dawn of American leadership is at hand. To those who would tear this world down - we will defeat you. To those who seek peace and security - we support you. And to all those who have wondered if Americas beacon still burns as bright - tonight we proved once more that the true strength of our nation comes not from our the might of our arms or the scale of our wealth, but from the enduring power of our ideals: democracy, liberty, opportunity, and unyielding hope.
For that is the true genius of America - that America can change. Our union can be perfected. And what we have already achieved gives us hope for what we can and must achieve tomorrow.
This election had many firsts and many stories that will be told for generations. But one thats on my mind tonight is about a woman who cast her ballot in Atlanta. Shes a lot like the millions of others who stood in line to make their voice heard in this election except for one thing - Ann Nixon Cooper is 106 years old.
She was born just a generation past slavery; a time when there were no cars on the road or planes in the sky; when someone like her couldnt vote for two reasons - because she was a woman and because of the color of her skin.
And tonight, I think about all that shes seen throughout her century in America - the heartache and the hope; the struggle and the progress; the times we were told that we cant, and the people who pressed on with that American creed: Yes we can.
At a time when womens voices were silenced and their hopes dismissed, she lived to see them stand up and speak out and reach for the ballot. Yes we can.
When there was despair in the dust bowl and depression across the land, she saw a nation conquer fear itself with a New Deal, new jobs and a new sense of common purpose. Yes we can.
When the bombs fell on our harbor and tyranny threatened the world, she was there to witness a generation rise to greatness and a democracy was saved. Yes we can.
She was there for the buses in Montgomery, the hoses in Birmingham, a bridge in Selma, and a preacher from Atlanta who told a people that We Shall Overcome. Yes we can.
A man touched down on the moon, a wall came down in Berlin, a world was connected by our own science and imagination. And this year, in this election, she touched her finger to a screen, and cast her vote, because after 106 years in America, through the best of times and the darkest of hours, she knows how America can change. Yes we can.
America, we have come so far. We have seen so much. But there is so much more to do. So tonight, let us ask ourselves - if our children should live to see the next century; if my daughters should be so lucky to live as long as Ann Nixon Cooper, what change will they see? What progress will we have made?
This is our chance to answer that call. This is our moment. This is our time - to put our people back to work and open doors of opportunity for our kids; to restore prosperity and promote the cause of peace; to reclaim the American Dream and reaffirm that fundamental truth - that out of many, we are one; that while we breathe, we hope, and where we are met with cynicism, and doubt, and those who tell us that we cant, we will respond with that timeless creed that sums up the spirit of a people:
Yes We Can. Thank you, God bless you, and may God Bless the United States of America.
Full text:
PRESIDENT-ELECT BARACK OBAMA: If there is anyone out there who still doubts that America is a place where all things are possible; who still wonders if the dream of our founders is alive in our time; who still questions the power of our democracy, tonight is your answer.
Its the answer told by lines that stretched around schools and churches in numbers this nation has never seen; by people who waited three hours and four hours, many for the very first time in their lives, because they believed that this time must be different; that their voice could be that difference.
Its the answer spoken by young and old, rich and poor, Democrat and Republican, black, white, Latino, Asian, Native American, gay, straight, disabled and not disabled - Americans who sent a message to the world that we have never been a collection of Red States and Blue States: we are, and always will be, the United States of America.
Its the answer that led those who have been told for so long by so many to be cynical, and fearful, and doubtful of what we can achieve to put their hands on the arc of history and bend it once more toward the hope of a better day.
Its been a long time coming, but tonight, because of what we did on this day, in this election, at this defining moment, change has come to America.
I just received a very gracious call from Senator McCain. He fought long and hard in this campaign, and hes fought even longer and harder for the country he loves. He has endured sacrifices for America that most of us cannot begin to imagine, and we are better off for the service rendered by this brave and selfless leader. I congratulate him and Governor Palin for all they have achieved, and I look forward to working with them to renew this nations promise in the months ahead.
I want to thank my partner in this journey, a man who campaigned from his heart and spoke for the men and women he grew up with on the streets of Scranton and rode with on that train home to Delaware, the Vice President-elect of the United States, Joe Biden.
I would not be standing here tonight without the unyielding support of my best friend for the last sixteen years, the rock of our family and the love of my life, our nations next First Lady, Michelle Obama. Sasha and Malia, I love you both so much, and you have earned the new puppy thats coming with us to the White House. And while shes no longer with us, I know my grandmother is watching, along with the family that made me who I am. I miss them tonight, and know that my debt to them is beyond measure.
To my campaign manager David Plouffe, my chief strategist David Axelrod, and the best campaign team ever assembled in the history of politics - you made this happen, and I am forever grateful for what youve sacrificed to get it done.
But above all, I will never forget who this victory truly belongs to - it belongs to you.
I was never the likeliest candidate for this office. We didnt start with much money or many endorsements. Our campaign was not hatched in the halls of Washington - it began in the backyards of Des Moines and the living rooms of Concord and the front porches of Charleston.
It was built by working men and women who dug into what little savings they had to give five dollars and ten dollars and twenty dollars to this cause. It grew strength from the young people who rejected the myth of their generations apathy; who left their homes and their families for jobs that offered little pay and less sleep; from the not-so-young people who braved the bitter cold and scorching heat to knock on the doors of perfect strangers; from the millions of Americans who volunteered, and organized, and proved that more than two centuries later, a government of the people, by the people and for the people has not perished from this Earth. This is your victory.
I know you didnt do this just to win an election and I know you didnt do it for me. You did it because you understand the enormity of the task that lies ahead. For even as we celebrate tonight, we know the challenges that tomorrow will bring are the greatest of our lifetime - two wars, a planet in peril, the worst financial crisis in a century. Even as we stand here tonight, we know there are brave Americans waking up in the deserts of Iraq and the mountains of Afghanistan to risk their lives for us. There are mothers and fathers who will lie awake after their children fall asleep and wonder how theyll make the mortgage, or pay their doctors bills, or save enough for college. There is new energy to harness and new jobs to be created; new schools to build and threats to meet and alliances to repair.
The road ahead will be long. Our climb will be steep. We may not get there in one year or even one term, but America - I have never been more hopeful than I am tonight that we will get there. I promise you - we as a people will get there.
There will be setbacks and false starts. There are many who wont agree with every decision or policy I make as President, and we know that government cant solve every problem. But I will always be honest with you about the challenges we face. I will listen to you, especially when we disagree. And above all, I will ask you join in the work of remaking this nation the only way its been done in America for two-hundred and twenty-one years - block by block, brick by brick, calloused hand by calloused hand.
What began twenty-one months ago in the depths of winter must not end on this autumn night. This victory alone is not the change we seek - it is only the chance for us to make that change. And that cannot happen if we go back to the way things were. It cannot happen without you.
So let us summon a new spirit of patriotism; of service and responsibility where each of us resolves to pitch in and work harder and look after not only ourselves, but each other. Let us remember that if this financial crisis taught us anything, its that we cannot have a thriving Wall Street while Main Street suffers - in this country, we rise or fall as one nation; as one people.
Let us resist the temptation to fall back on the same partisanship and pettiness and immaturity that has poisoned our politics for so long. Let us remember that it was a man from this state who first carried the banner of the Republican Party to the White House - a party founded on the values of self-reliance, individual liberty, and national unity. Those are values we all share, and while the Democratic Party has won a great victory tonight, we do so with a measure of humility and determination to heal the divides that have held back our progress. As Lincoln said to a nation far more divided than ours, We are not enemies, but friends...though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection. And to those Americans whose support I have yet to earn - I may not have won your vote, but I hear your voices, I need your help, and I will be your President too.
And to all those watching tonight from beyond our shores, from parliaments and palaces to those who are huddled around radios in the forgotten corners of our world - our stories are singular, but our destiny is shared, and a new dawn of American leadership is at hand. To those who would tear this world down - we will defeat you. To those who seek peace and security - we support you. And to all those who have wondered if Americas beacon still burns as bright - tonight we proved once more that the true strength of our nation comes not from our the might of our arms or the scale of our wealth, but from the enduring power of our ideals: democracy, liberty, opportunity, and unyielding hope.
For that is the true genius of America - that America can change. Our union can be perfected. And what we have already achieved gives us hope for what we can and must achieve tomorrow.
This election had many firsts and many stories that will be told for generations. But one thats on my mind tonight is about a woman who cast her ballot in Atlanta. Shes a lot like the millions of others who stood in line to make their voice heard in this election except for one thing - Ann Nixon Cooper is 106 years old.
She was born just a generation past slavery; a time when there were no cars on the road or planes in the sky; when someone like her couldnt vote for two reasons - because she was a woman and because of the color of her skin.
And tonight, I think about all that shes seen throughout her century in America - the heartache and the hope; the struggle and the progress; the times we were told that we cant, and the people who pressed on with that American creed: Yes we can.
At a time when womens voices were silenced and their hopes dismissed, she lived to see them stand up and speak out and reach for the ballot. Yes we can.
When there was despair in the dust bowl and depression across the land, she saw a nation conquer fear itself with a New Deal, new jobs and a new sense of common purpose. Yes we can.
When the bombs fell on our harbor and tyranny threatened the world, she was there to witness a generation rise to greatness and a democracy was saved. Yes we can.
She was there for the buses in Montgomery, the hoses in Birmingham, a bridge in Selma, and a preacher from Atlanta who told a people that We Shall Overcome. Yes we can.
A man touched down on the moon, a wall came down in Berlin, a world was connected by our own science and imagination. And this year, in this election, she touched her finger to a screen, and cast her vote, because after 106 years in America, through the best of times and the darkest of hours, she knows how America can change. Yes we can.
America, we have come so far. We have seen so much. But there is so much more to do. So tonight, let us ask ourselves - if our children should live to see the next century; if my daughters should be so lucky to live as long as Ann Nixon Cooper, what change will they see? What progress will we have made?
This is our chance to answer that call. This is our moment. This is our time - to put our people back to work and open doors of opportunity for our kids; to restore prosperity and promote the cause of peace; to reclaim the American Dream and reaffirm that fundamental truth - that out of many, we are one; that while we breathe, we hope, and where we are met with cynicism, and doubt, and those who tell us that we cant, we will respond with that timeless creed that sums up the spirit of a people:
Yes We Can. Thank you, God bless you, and may God Bless the United States of America.
The welcoming breeze of adult supervision
I'm actually still speechless, but I do want to point out that I, like Michelle Obama, have never been prouder to be an American than I am today. The United States will continue to carry the rotten core of our historical racism despite Obama's victory, and this will not end any time soon. But it now appears, at least on the surface, that the servants of our "dirty little secret" have finally dwindled enough for reason to prevail. It is my sincere hope that a national resurgence in the recognition of the value of education ushered in by this new President will help vanquish the ignorance that has allowed this infestation to flourish as long as it has.
God bless America.
God bless America.
Monday, November 03, 2008
Monday morning political jambalaya
I was watching Keith Olbermann interview John Cusick (from several months ago) when D laughed and said, "such kindred spirits - they are so radical." I stopped and looked at her - what do you mean, I asked pointedly. Is it what they are saying or how they are saying it? I didn't really get a good answer to that as my manner - agressively pre-caffinated - created an awkward moment that continues at this writing. Aside from the (my) observation that the interview was measured low on the bombastic richter scale, it was the use of "radical" that got my hackles in a bunch. I can be a bitch, but I worry that people that talk about the "radical" idea of returning democracy - transparent governance by and for the good of the people and not by the corporations who have, in my view, taken ownership of the republic since the end of the second world war (see "Why We Fight" the next time you have 90 minutes for a historical perspective on the last 45 years or so). Is it now radical to suggest, as Naomi Klein did in The Shock Doctrine, that disaster has been leveraged by our leaders - and the corporations they serve - to establish a very different set of rules than those set out by our constitution. I could go on and one, but I think John does a pretty good job in a recent entry found on Huffington.
So my morning goes on, in an admittadly awkward silence, and I stumble across an article about the Bush team preparing for their end of term "scorched earth" executive rule priorities. This is one of those funny American things - like signing statements and executive pardons - where the executive branch gets the opportunity to establish a bunch of "rules" covering an incredibly broad range of areas that become defacto law. I'm not sure where the constitution covers this type of action - pretty sure a strict constitutional constructionalist would find them abhorant. And I'm thinking - because it is safer in the morning than speaking - WTF. Is there no end of it - haven't they done enough already? Really. Really.
Anyway, then I stumble on something that made me feel a little better, so that is where I will end it today. An old interview with Studs, talking in the run-up to the expansion of the war into Iraq.
Studs Terkel: He'll Never Be Silenced
Louis "Studs" Terkel was many things - oral historian, radio host, agitator, Bronx-born icon of Chicago, the "great listener" who was hard of hearing, Pulitzer Prize winner. But most of all he was an inspiration. He inspired every younger activist or independent journalist who ever met him. And who among us wasn't younger than Studs?
The self-described "guerilla journalist" died Friday at 96. He was almost 70 when I first met him, more than twice my age. But I couldn't keep up.
Whenever I did catch up with him, he never turned down a request for help - whether he was sick, under a book deadline, or in mourning over the death of his beloved wife Ida. If it was an issue of social justice or muckraking journalism, he (along with Ida) was ready to sign up and help out.
In 1986, when I launched the media watch group FAIR, Studs became a charter member of our advisory board. Along with I.F. Stone (whom he called "the north star of independent journalists"), Studs signed FAIR's first protest statement ever: a telegram to ABC News criticizing its exclusion of progressives.
Studs received generally favorable treatment from mainstream media. The respect was not mutual. He decried the elite media's coziness with the powerful, the timidity that subverted public television, and the censorial ways of corporate media bosses. He was outraged when GE/MSNBC muzzled Phil Donahue for questioning the Iraq invasion.
Studs wrote the following in his 1997 introduction to "Wizards of Media Oz," (a book by Norman Solomon and myself):
When I was young and easy, an old Wobbly rewarded me with a tattered copy of "The Brass Check" by Upton Sinclair. The title referred to the coin that young brothel women were handed by their tricks; they, in turn, cashed them in with their madam at the end of their day's labors.
Sinclair's game, however, was not the kept women; it was the kept press. The former recognized her work as demeaning; the latter served their publishers, if not tremulously, gladly. And righteously. Need we mention William Randolph Hearst and his derring-do reporters covering - or, in the words of San Simeon's master, furnishing - the Spanish-American War?
A century later, our press, especially the Respectables, have gone Hearst one better. They helped make the Gulf War yellow ribbon time. It was glory, glory all the way. Our most prestigious journals found the horrors visited by our smart bombs upon Iraqi women and kids news not fit to print. It is no secret that our media - TV and radio, owned by the same Big Boys, compounding the obscenity - played the role of bat boys to the sluggers of the Pentagon.
With his legacy of best-selling books and historic recorded interviews, Studs will no more be silenced by death than Wobbly songwriter Joe Hill was by a Utah firing squad. If Howard Zinn wrote "A People's History," Studs developed "A People's Journalism" - bringing the wisdom and stories of poor and working-class Americans to tape and the printed page.
In 1992, when South Central Los Angeles erupted in riot after white cops were acquitted in the videotaped beating of Rodney King, no one was caught more off-guard than mainstream media - who (as with Hurricane Katrina years later) suddenly discovered millions of desperate inner-city Americans. But Studs was not caught by surprise. Days before the riot, his quite prophetic book - "Race: How Blacks and Whites Think and Feel About the American Obsession" - was hitting the stores.
No matter his age, Studs always seemed a step ahead of everyone else. He was a premature anti-fascist in his youth. He was a premature, unrepentant anti-McCarthyite in 1950: "I was blacklisted - I signed many petitions that were for unfashionable causes and never retracted." With mainstream media largely enthralled by Ronald Reagan's "Morning in America" propaganda in 1986, he neatly sized up the era: "The only thing trickling down from the top is meanness."
My most treasured memory of Studs was the day we flew him from Chicago to New Jersey to be a special guest on the (short-lived) primetime MSNBC Phil Donahue show in mid-2002 - at a time the show was getting heat from MSNBC management not to appear liberal. I was a Donahue senior producer. This was years before Rachel Maddow and way before Olbermann began his dissent. With little critical journalism, Bush's approval rating stood at 70 percent.
Shedding his normal coat and tie, Phil decided to imitate his guest's fashion sense and wore the traditional Studs garb: red-and-white check shirt and red socks. The two looked like bookends in a "Saturday Night Live" skit - but, with Studs as the solo full-hour guest, it was not all fun and games.
"What have I got to lose? I'm 90 years old." Studs declared, in taking off after Bush. "We have a mindless boy right now with the most powerful job in the world. And that is perilous. We have an attorney general [Ashcroft] who is like the guy Arthur Miller described in "The Crucible" in Salem, Massachusetts, 300 years ago, who urges people to spy on other people, witchcraft and all."
As for the Democratic leadership in Congress. it "will be renowned for its gutlessness and its lack of principle and its cravenness."
As for corporate media, he proudly described his 1950s blacklisting over civil rights advocacy, how he refused to sign a loyalty oath for CBS, how the black gospel star Mahalia Jackson strongly defended him. "The cards are stacked. We know who runs the networks," he announced on a GE-owned news channel. "NBC is owned by General Electric. If Tom Brokaw said something about General Electric, he'd be out."
With Enron and corporate scandals in the news, Studs recalled the 1930s Depression: "Things don't repeat themselves exactly. But we've learned nothing from it. Unregulated, free, untrammeled, what's it called, 'free market,' fell on its ass again, as it did then. We've learned nothing."
The end of the show turned to the end of life, with Studs saying: "I've had a pretty good run of it. And so if I kick off at this moment, I do OK."
When Phil asked about busloads of fans coming to grieve, Studs responded: "I don't want them to grieve. I want them to celebrate."
PHIL: You won't slow down. You're going to be tap dancing all the way to the end, right? That's your plan?
STUDS: My plan - my epitaph is "Curiosity did not kill this cat."
So my morning goes on, in an admittadly awkward silence, and I stumble across an article about the Bush team preparing for their end of term "scorched earth" executive rule priorities. This is one of those funny American things - like signing statements and executive pardons - where the executive branch gets the opportunity to establish a bunch of "rules" covering an incredibly broad range of areas that become defacto law. I'm not sure where the constitution covers this type of action - pretty sure a strict constitutional constructionalist would find them abhorant. And I'm thinking - because it is safer in the morning than speaking - WTF. Is there no end of it - haven't they done enough already? Really. Really.
Anyway, then I stumble on something that made me feel a little better, so that is where I will end it today. An old interview with Studs, talking in the run-up to the expansion of the war into Iraq.
Studs Terkel: He'll Never Be Silenced
Louis "Studs" Terkel was many things - oral historian, radio host, agitator, Bronx-born icon of Chicago, the "great listener" who was hard of hearing, Pulitzer Prize winner. But most of all he was an inspiration. He inspired every younger activist or independent journalist who ever met him. And who among us wasn't younger than Studs?
The self-described "guerilla journalist" died Friday at 96. He was almost 70 when I first met him, more than twice my age. But I couldn't keep up.
Whenever I did catch up with him, he never turned down a request for help - whether he was sick, under a book deadline, or in mourning over the death of his beloved wife Ida. If it was an issue of social justice or muckraking journalism, he (along with Ida) was ready to sign up and help out.
In 1986, when I launched the media watch group FAIR, Studs became a charter member of our advisory board. Along with I.F. Stone (whom he called "the north star of independent journalists"), Studs signed FAIR's first protest statement ever: a telegram to ABC News criticizing its exclusion of progressives.
Studs received generally favorable treatment from mainstream media. The respect was not mutual. He decried the elite media's coziness with the powerful, the timidity that subverted public television, and the censorial ways of corporate media bosses. He was outraged when GE/MSNBC muzzled Phil Donahue for questioning the Iraq invasion.
Studs wrote the following in his 1997 introduction to "Wizards of Media Oz," (a book by Norman Solomon and myself):
When I was young and easy, an old Wobbly rewarded me with a tattered copy of "The Brass Check" by Upton Sinclair. The title referred to the coin that young brothel women were handed by their tricks; they, in turn, cashed them in with their madam at the end of their day's labors.
Sinclair's game, however, was not the kept women; it was the kept press. The former recognized her work as demeaning; the latter served their publishers, if not tremulously, gladly. And righteously. Need we mention William Randolph Hearst and his derring-do reporters covering - or, in the words of San Simeon's master, furnishing - the Spanish-American War?
A century later, our press, especially the Respectables, have gone Hearst one better. They helped make the Gulf War yellow ribbon time. It was glory, glory all the way. Our most prestigious journals found the horrors visited by our smart bombs upon Iraqi women and kids news not fit to print. It is no secret that our media - TV and radio, owned by the same Big Boys, compounding the obscenity - played the role of bat boys to the sluggers of the Pentagon.
With his legacy of best-selling books and historic recorded interviews, Studs will no more be silenced by death than Wobbly songwriter Joe Hill was by a Utah firing squad. If Howard Zinn wrote "A People's History," Studs developed "A People's Journalism" - bringing the wisdom and stories of poor and working-class Americans to tape and the printed page.
In 1992, when South Central Los Angeles erupted in riot after white cops were acquitted in the videotaped beating of Rodney King, no one was caught more off-guard than mainstream media - who (as with Hurricane Katrina years later) suddenly discovered millions of desperate inner-city Americans. But Studs was not caught by surprise. Days before the riot, his quite prophetic book - "Race: How Blacks and Whites Think and Feel About the American Obsession" - was hitting the stores.
No matter his age, Studs always seemed a step ahead of everyone else. He was a premature anti-fascist in his youth. He was a premature, unrepentant anti-McCarthyite in 1950: "I was blacklisted - I signed many petitions that were for unfashionable causes and never retracted." With mainstream media largely enthralled by Ronald Reagan's "Morning in America" propaganda in 1986, he neatly sized up the era: "The only thing trickling down from the top is meanness."
My most treasured memory of Studs was the day we flew him from Chicago to New Jersey to be a special guest on the (short-lived) primetime MSNBC Phil Donahue show in mid-2002 - at a time the show was getting heat from MSNBC management not to appear liberal. I was a Donahue senior producer. This was years before Rachel Maddow and way before Olbermann began his dissent. With little critical journalism, Bush's approval rating stood at 70 percent.
Shedding his normal coat and tie, Phil decided to imitate his guest's fashion sense and wore the traditional Studs garb: red-and-white check shirt and red socks. The two looked like bookends in a "Saturday Night Live" skit - but, with Studs as the solo full-hour guest, it was not all fun and games.
"What have I got to lose? I'm 90 years old." Studs declared, in taking off after Bush. "We have a mindless boy right now with the most powerful job in the world. And that is perilous. We have an attorney general [Ashcroft] who is like the guy Arthur Miller described in "The Crucible" in Salem, Massachusetts, 300 years ago, who urges people to spy on other people, witchcraft and all."
As for the Democratic leadership in Congress. it "will be renowned for its gutlessness and its lack of principle and its cravenness."
As for corporate media, he proudly described his 1950s blacklisting over civil rights advocacy, how he refused to sign a loyalty oath for CBS, how the black gospel star Mahalia Jackson strongly defended him. "The cards are stacked. We know who runs the networks," he announced on a GE-owned news channel. "NBC is owned by General Electric. If Tom Brokaw said something about General Electric, he'd be out."
With Enron and corporate scandals in the news, Studs recalled the 1930s Depression: "Things don't repeat themselves exactly. But we've learned nothing from it. Unregulated, free, untrammeled, what's it called, 'free market,' fell on its ass again, as it did then. We've learned nothing."
The end of the show turned to the end of life, with Studs saying: "I've had a pretty good run of it. And so if I kick off at this moment, I do OK."
When Phil asked about busloads of fans coming to grieve, Studs responded: "I don't want them to grieve. I want them to celebrate."
PHIL: You won't slow down. You're going to be tap dancing all the way to the end, right? That's your plan?
STUDS: My plan - my epitaph is "Curiosity did not kill this cat."
Saturday, November 01, 2008
And the winner of this year's Best Costume award goes to....
Amelia. She was the only one that really put much effort or thought into it. Her Joker costume started out on a piece of paper 2 months before she saw the movie (which I really to not have her see but which she claims to have loved anyway - the draw of dead, good-looking blonde actors has its own peculiar power). Her notes were extensive, and while she had some moments of uncertainity about it, everyone thought it was very effective.
Friday, October 31, 2008
Ode to Studs
Studs Terkel passed this week. In his honor, here's his final plea to the next president. It is FDR's 2nd inaugural speech:
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Second Inaugural Address
Wednesday, January 20, 1937
WHEN four years ago we met to inaugurate a President, the Republic, single-minded in anxiety, stood in spirit here. We dedicated ourselves to the fulfillment of a vision—to speed the time when there would be for all the people that security and peace essential to the pursuit of happiness. We of the Republic pledged ourselves to drive from the temple of our ancient faith those who had profaned it; to end by action, tireless and unafraid, the stagnation and despair of that day. We did those first things first. 1
Our covenant with ourselves did not stop there. Instinctively we recognized a deeper need—the need to find through government the instrument of our united purpose to solve for the individual the ever-rising problems of a complex civilization. Repeated attempts at their solution without the aid of government had left us baffled and bewildered. For, without that aid, we had been unable to create those moral controls over the services of science which are necessary to make science a useful servant instead of a ruthless master of mankind. To do this we knew that we must find practical controls over blind economic forces and blindly selfish men. 2
We of the Republic sensed the truth that democratic government has innate capacity to protect its people against disasters once considered inevitable, to solve problems once considered unsolvable. We would not admit that we could not find a way to master economic epidemics just as, after centuries of fatalistic suffering, we had found a way to master epidemics of disease. We refused to leave the problems of our common welfare to be solved by the winds of chance and the hurricanes of disaster. 3
In this we Americans were discovering no wholly new truth; we were writing a new chapter in our book of self-government. 4
This year marks the one hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the Constitutional Convention which made us a nation. At that Convention our forefathers found the way out of the chaos which followed the Revolutionary War; they created a strong government with powers of united action sufficient then and now to solve problems utterly beyond individual or local solution. A century and a half ago they established the Federal Government in order to promote the general welfare and secure the blessings of liberty to the American people. 5
Today we invoke those same powers of government to achieve the same objectives. 6
Four years of new experience have not belied our historic instinct. They hold out the clear hope that government within communities, government within the separate States, and government of the United States can do the things the times require, without yielding its democracy. Our tasks in the last four years did not force democracy to take a holiday. 7
Nearly all of us recognize that as intricacies of human relationships increase, so power to govern them also must increase—power to stop evil; power to do good. The essential democracy of our Nation and the safety of our people depend not upon the absence of power, but upon lodging it with those whom the people can change or continue at stated intervals through an honest and free system of elections. The Constitution of 1787 did not make our democracy impotent. 8
In fact, in these last four years, we have made the exercise of all power more democratic; for we have begun to bring private autocratic powers into their proper subordination to the public's government. The legend that they were invincible—above and beyond the processes of a democracy—has been shattered. They have been challenged and beaten. 9
Our progress out of the depression is obvious. But that is not all that you and I mean by the new order of things. Our pledge was not merely to do a patchwork job with secondhand materials. By using the new materials of social justice we have undertaken to erect on the old foundations a more enduring structure for the better use of future generations. 10
In that purpose we have been helped by achievements of mind and spirit. Old truths have been relearned; untruths have been unlearned. We have always known that heedless self-interest was bad morals; we know now that it is bad economics. Out of the collapse of a prosperity whose builders boasted their practicality has come the conviction that in the long run economic morality pays. We are beginning to wipe out the line that divides the practical from the ideal; and in so doing we are fashioning an instrument of unimagined power for the establishment of a morally better world. 11
This new understanding undermines the old admiration of worldly success as such. We are beginning to abandon our tolerance of the abuse of power by those who betray for profit the elementary decencies of life. 12
In this process evil things formerly accepted will not be so easily condoned. Hard-headedness will not so easily excuse hardheartedness. We are moving toward an era of good feeling. But we realize that there can be no era of good feeling save among men of good will. 13
For these reasons I am justified in believing that the greatest change we have witnessed has been the change in the moral climate of America. 14
Among men of good will, science and democracy together offer an ever-richer life and ever-larger satisfaction to the individual. With this change in our moral climate and our rediscovered ability to improve our economic order, we have set our feet upon the road of enduring progress. 15
Shall we pause now and turn our back upon the road that lies ahead? Shall we call this the promised land? Or, shall we continue on our way? For "each age is a dream that is dying, or one that is coming to birth." 16
Many voices are heard as we face a great decision. Comfort says, "Tarry a while." Opportunism says, "This is a good spot." Timidity asks, "How difficult is the road ahead?" 17
True, we have come far from the days of stagnation and despair. Vitality has been preserved. Courage and confidence have been restored. Mental and moral horizons have been extended. 18
But our present gains were won under the pressure of more than ordinary circumstances. Advance became imperative under the goad of fear and suffering. The times were on the side of progress. 19
To hold to progress today, however, is more difficult. Dulled conscience, irresponsibility, and ruthless self-interest already reappear. Such symptoms of prosperity may become portents of disaster! Prosperity already tests the persistence of our progressive purpose. 20
Let us ask again: Have we reached the goal of our vision of that fourth day of March 1933? Have we found our happy valley? 21
I see a great nation, upon a great continent, blessed with a great wealth of natural resources. Its hundred and thirty million people are at peace among themselves; they are making their country a good neighbor among the nations. I see a United States which can demonstrate that, under democratic methods of government, national wealth can be translated into a spreading volume of human comforts hitherto unknown, and the lowest standard of living can be raised far above the level of mere subsistence. 22
But here is the challenge to our democracy: In this nation I see tens of millions of its citizens—a substantial part of its whole population—who at this very moment are denied the greater part of what the very lowest standards of today call the necessities of life. 23
I see millions of families trying to live on incomes so meager that the pall of family disaster hangs over them day by day. 24
I see millions whose daily lives in city and on farm continue under conditions labeled indecent by a so-called polite society half a century ago. 25
I see millions denied education, recreation, and the opportunity to better their lot and the lot of their children. 26
I see millions lacking the means to buy the products of farm and factory and by their poverty denying work and productiveness to many other millions. 27
I see one-third of a nation ill-housed, ill-clad, ill-nourished. 28
It is not in despair that I paint you that picture. I paint it for you in hope—because the Nation, seeing and understanding the injustice in it, proposes to paint it out. We are determined to make every American citizen the subject of his country's interest and concern; and we will never regard any faithful law-abiding group within our borders as superfluous. The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little. 29
If I know aught of the spirit and purpose of our Nation, we will not listen to Comfort, Opportunism, and Timidity. We will carry on. 30
Overwhelmingly, we of the Republic are men and women of good will; men and women who have more than warm hearts of dedication; men and women who have cool heads and willing hands of practical purpose as well. They will insist that every agency of popular government use effective instruments to carry out their will. 31
Government is competent when all who compose it work as trustees for the whole people. It can make constant progress when it keeps abreast of all the facts. It can obtain justified support and legitimate criticism when the people receive true information of all that government does. 32
If I know aught of the will of our people, they will demand that these conditions of effective government shall be created and maintained. They will demand a nation uncorrupted by cancers of injustice and, therefore, strong among the nations in its example of the will to peace. 33
Today we reconsecrate our country to long-cherished ideals in a suddenly changed civilization. In every land there are always at work forces that drive men apart and forces that draw men together. In our personal ambitions we are individualists. But in our seeking for economic and political progress as a nation, we all go up, or else we all go down, as one people. 34
To maintain a democracy of effort requires a vast amount of patience in dealing with differing methods, a vast amount of humility. But out of the confusion of many voices rises an understanding of dominant public need. Then political leadership can voice common ideals, and aid in their realization. 35
In taking again the oath of office as President of the United States, I assume the solemn obligation of leading the American people forward along the road over which they have chosen to advance. 36
While this duty rests upon me I shall do my utmost to speak their purpose and to do their will, seeking Divine guidance to help us each and every one to give light to them that sit in darkness and to guide our feet into the way of peace.
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Second Inaugural Address
Wednesday, January 20, 1937
WHEN four years ago we met to inaugurate a President, the Republic, single-minded in anxiety, stood in spirit here. We dedicated ourselves to the fulfillment of a vision—to speed the time when there would be for all the people that security and peace essential to the pursuit of happiness. We of the Republic pledged ourselves to drive from the temple of our ancient faith those who had profaned it; to end by action, tireless and unafraid, the stagnation and despair of that day. We did those first things first. 1
Our covenant with ourselves did not stop there. Instinctively we recognized a deeper need—the need to find through government the instrument of our united purpose to solve for the individual the ever-rising problems of a complex civilization. Repeated attempts at their solution without the aid of government had left us baffled and bewildered. For, without that aid, we had been unable to create those moral controls over the services of science which are necessary to make science a useful servant instead of a ruthless master of mankind. To do this we knew that we must find practical controls over blind economic forces and blindly selfish men. 2
We of the Republic sensed the truth that democratic government has innate capacity to protect its people against disasters once considered inevitable, to solve problems once considered unsolvable. We would not admit that we could not find a way to master economic epidemics just as, after centuries of fatalistic suffering, we had found a way to master epidemics of disease. We refused to leave the problems of our common welfare to be solved by the winds of chance and the hurricanes of disaster. 3
In this we Americans were discovering no wholly new truth; we were writing a new chapter in our book of self-government. 4
This year marks the one hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the Constitutional Convention which made us a nation. At that Convention our forefathers found the way out of the chaos which followed the Revolutionary War; they created a strong government with powers of united action sufficient then and now to solve problems utterly beyond individual or local solution. A century and a half ago they established the Federal Government in order to promote the general welfare and secure the blessings of liberty to the American people. 5
Today we invoke those same powers of government to achieve the same objectives. 6
Four years of new experience have not belied our historic instinct. They hold out the clear hope that government within communities, government within the separate States, and government of the United States can do the things the times require, without yielding its democracy. Our tasks in the last four years did not force democracy to take a holiday. 7
Nearly all of us recognize that as intricacies of human relationships increase, so power to govern them also must increase—power to stop evil; power to do good. The essential democracy of our Nation and the safety of our people depend not upon the absence of power, but upon lodging it with those whom the people can change or continue at stated intervals through an honest and free system of elections. The Constitution of 1787 did not make our democracy impotent. 8
In fact, in these last four years, we have made the exercise of all power more democratic; for we have begun to bring private autocratic powers into their proper subordination to the public's government. The legend that they were invincible—above and beyond the processes of a democracy—has been shattered. They have been challenged and beaten. 9
Our progress out of the depression is obvious. But that is not all that you and I mean by the new order of things. Our pledge was not merely to do a patchwork job with secondhand materials. By using the new materials of social justice we have undertaken to erect on the old foundations a more enduring structure for the better use of future generations. 10
In that purpose we have been helped by achievements of mind and spirit. Old truths have been relearned; untruths have been unlearned. We have always known that heedless self-interest was bad morals; we know now that it is bad economics. Out of the collapse of a prosperity whose builders boasted their practicality has come the conviction that in the long run economic morality pays. We are beginning to wipe out the line that divides the practical from the ideal; and in so doing we are fashioning an instrument of unimagined power for the establishment of a morally better world. 11
This new understanding undermines the old admiration of worldly success as such. We are beginning to abandon our tolerance of the abuse of power by those who betray for profit the elementary decencies of life. 12
In this process evil things formerly accepted will not be so easily condoned. Hard-headedness will not so easily excuse hardheartedness. We are moving toward an era of good feeling. But we realize that there can be no era of good feeling save among men of good will. 13
For these reasons I am justified in believing that the greatest change we have witnessed has been the change in the moral climate of America. 14
Among men of good will, science and democracy together offer an ever-richer life and ever-larger satisfaction to the individual. With this change in our moral climate and our rediscovered ability to improve our economic order, we have set our feet upon the road of enduring progress. 15
Shall we pause now and turn our back upon the road that lies ahead? Shall we call this the promised land? Or, shall we continue on our way? For "each age is a dream that is dying, or one that is coming to birth." 16
Many voices are heard as we face a great decision. Comfort says, "Tarry a while." Opportunism says, "This is a good spot." Timidity asks, "How difficult is the road ahead?" 17
True, we have come far from the days of stagnation and despair. Vitality has been preserved. Courage and confidence have been restored. Mental and moral horizons have been extended. 18
But our present gains were won under the pressure of more than ordinary circumstances. Advance became imperative under the goad of fear and suffering. The times were on the side of progress. 19
To hold to progress today, however, is more difficult. Dulled conscience, irresponsibility, and ruthless self-interest already reappear. Such symptoms of prosperity may become portents of disaster! Prosperity already tests the persistence of our progressive purpose. 20
Let us ask again: Have we reached the goal of our vision of that fourth day of March 1933? Have we found our happy valley? 21
I see a great nation, upon a great continent, blessed with a great wealth of natural resources. Its hundred and thirty million people are at peace among themselves; they are making their country a good neighbor among the nations. I see a United States which can demonstrate that, under democratic methods of government, national wealth can be translated into a spreading volume of human comforts hitherto unknown, and the lowest standard of living can be raised far above the level of mere subsistence. 22
But here is the challenge to our democracy: In this nation I see tens of millions of its citizens—a substantial part of its whole population—who at this very moment are denied the greater part of what the very lowest standards of today call the necessities of life. 23
I see millions of families trying to live on incomes so meager that the pall of family disaster hangs over them day by day. 24
I see millions whose daily lives in city and on farm continue under conditions labeled indecent by a so-called polite society half a century ago. 25
I see millions denied education, recreation, and the opportunity to better their lot and the lot of their children. 26
I see millions lacking the means to buy the products of farm and factory and by their poverty denying work and productiveness to many other millions. 27
I see one-third of a nation ill-housed, ill-clad, ill-nourished. 28
It is not in despair that I paint you that picture. I paint it for you in hope—because the Nation, seeing and understanding the injustice in it, proposes to paint it out. We are determined to make every American citizen the subject of his country's interest and concern; and we will never regard any faithful law-abiding group within our borders as superfluous. The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little. 29
If I know aught of the spirit and purpose of our Nation, we will not listen to Comfort, Opportunism, and Timidity. We will carry on. 30
Overwhelmingly, we of the Republic are men and women of good will; men and women who have more than warm hearts of dedication; men and women who have cool heads and willing hands of practical purpose as well. They will insist that every agency of popular government use effective instruments to carry out their will. 31
Government is competent when all who compose it work as trustees for the whole people. It can make constant progress when it keeps abreast of all the facts. It can obtain justified support and legitimate criticism when the people receive true information of all that government does. 32
If I know aught of the will of our people, they will demand that these conditions of effective government shall be created and maintained. They will demand a nation uncorrupted by cancers of injustice and, therefore, strong among the nations in its example of the will to peace. 33
Today we reconsecrate our country to long-cherished ideals in a suddenly changed civilization. In every land there are always at work forces that drive men apart and forces that draw men together. In our personal ambitions we are individualists. But in our seeking for economic and political progress as a nation, we all go up, or else we all go down, as one people. 34
To maintain a democracy of effort requires a vast amount of patience in dealing with differing methods, a vast amount of humility. But out of the confusion of many voices rises an understanding of dominant public need. Then political leadership can voice common ideals, and aid in their realization. 35
In taking again the oath of office as President of the United States, I assume the solemn obligation of leading the American people forward along the road over which they have chosen to advance. 36
While this duty rests upon me I shall do my utmost to speak their purpose and to do their will, seeking Divine guidance to help us each and every one to give light to them that sit in darkness and to guide our feet into the way of peace.
Sunday, October 26, 2008
FISA - A new book on our Constitutional Government in Peril
From Bruce Fein, on how cowardice has set a knife at the throat of our democracy. He's just published a book that expands on this theme.
Originally published 09:25 p.m., December 27, 2005, updated 12:00 a.m., December 28, 2005
. . . or outside the law?
President Bush secretly ordered the National Security Agency (NSA) to eavesdrop on the international communications of U.S. citizens in violation of the warrant requirement of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001, abominations.
The eavesdropping continued for four years, long after fears of imminent September 11 repetitions had lapsed, before the disclosure by the New York Times this month.
Mr. Bush has continued the NSA spying without congressional authorization or ratification of the earlier interceptions. (In sharp contrast, Abraham Lincoln obtained congressional ratification for the emergency measures taken in the wake of Fort Sumter, including suspending the writ of habeas corpus).
Mr. Bush has adamantly refused to acknowledge any constitutional limitations on his power to wage war indefinitely against international terrorism, other than an unelaborated assertion he is not a dictator. Claims to inherent authority to break and enter homes, to intercept purely domestic communications, or to herd citizens into concentration camps reminiscent of World War II, for example, have not been ruled out if the commander in chief believes the measures would help defeat al Qaeda or sister terrorist threats.
Volumes of war powers nonsense have been assembled to defend Mr. Bush's defiance of the legislative branch and claim of wartime omnipotence so long as terrorism persists, i.e., in perpetuity. Congress should undertake a national inquest into his conduct and claims to determine whether impeachable usurpations are at hand. As Alexander Hamilton explained in Federalist 65, impeachment lies for "abuse or violation of some public trust," misbehaviors that "relate chiefly to injuries done immediately to the society itself."
The Founding Fathers confined presidential war powers to avoid the oppressions of kings. Despite championing a muscular and energetic chief executive, Hamilton in Federalist 69 accepted that the president must generally bow to congressional directions even in times of war: "The president is to be commander in chief of the Army and Navy of the United States. In this respect, his authority would be nominally the same with that of the king of Great Britain, but in substance much inferior to it. It would amount to nothing more than the supreme command and direction of the military and naval forces; while that of the British king extends to declaring war and to the raising and regulating of fleets and armies -- all which, by the Constitution under consideration, would appertain to the legislature."
President Bush's claim of inherent authority to flout congressional limitations in warring against international terrorism thus stumbles on the original meaning of the commander in chief provision in Article II, section 2.
The claim is not established by the fact that many of Mr. Bush's predecessors have made comparable assertions. In Youngstown Sheet & Tube v. Sawyer (1952), the U.S. Supreme Court rejected President Truman's claim of inherent power to seize a steel mill to settle a labor dispute during the Korean War in reliance on previous seizures of private businesses by other presidents. Writing for a 6-3 majority, Justice Hugo Black amplified: "But even if this be true, Congress has not thereby lost its exclusive constitutional authority to make laws necessary and proper to carry out the powers vested in the Constitution in the Government of the United States."
Indeed, no unconstitutional usurpation is saved by longevity. For 50 years, Congress claimed power to thwart executive decisions through "legislative vetoes." The Supreme Court, nevertheless, held the practice void in Immigration and Naturalization Service v. Chadha (1983). Approximately 200 laws were set aside. Similarly, the high court declared in Erie Railroad v. Tompkins (1938) that federal courts for a century since Swift v. Tyson (1842) had unconstitutionally exceeded their adjudicative powers in fashioning a federal common law to decide disputes between citizens of different states.
President Bush preposterously argues the Sept. 14, 2001, congressional resolution authorizing "all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations or persons [the president] determines" were implicated in the September 11 attacks provided legal sanction for the indefinite NSA eavesdropping outside the aegis of FISA. But the FISA statute expressly limits emergency surveillances of citizens during wartime to 15 days, unless the president obtains congressional approval for an extension: "[T]he president, through the attorney general, may authorize electronic surveillance without a court order... to acquire foreign intelligence information for a period not to exceed 15 calendar days following a declaration of war by the Congress."
A cardinal canon of statutory interpretation teaches that a specific statute like FISA trumps a general statute like the congressional war resolution. Neither the resolution's language nor legislative history even hints that Congress intended a repeal of FISA. Moreover, the White House has maintained Congress was not asked for a law authorizing the NSA eavesdropping because the legislature would have balked, not because the statute would have duplicated the war resolution.
As Youngstown Sheet & Tube instructs, the war powers of the president are at their nadir where, as with the NSA eavesdropping, he acts contrary to a federal statute. Further, that case invalidated a seizure of private property (with just compensation) a vastly less troublesome invasion of civil liberties than the NSA's indefinite interception of international conversations on Mr. Bush's say so alone.
Congress should insist the president cease the spying unless or until a proper statute is enacted or face possible impeachment. The Constitution's separation of powers is too important to be discarded in the name of expediency.
Bruce Fein is a constitutional lawyer and international consultant with Bruce Fein & Associates and the Lichfield Group.
Originally published 09:25 p.m., December 27, 2005, updated 12:00 a.m., December 28, 2005
. . . or outside the law?
President Bush secretly ordered the National Security Agency (NSA) to eavesdrop on the international communications of U.S. citizens in violation of the warrant requirement of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) in the aftermath of the September 11, 2001, abominations.
The eavesdropping continued for four years, long after fears of imminent September 11 repetitions had lapsed, before the disclosure by the New York Times this month.
Mr. Bush has continued the NSA spying without congressional authorization or ratification of the earlier interceptions. (In sharp contrast, Abraham Lincoln obtained congressional ratification for the emergency measures taken in the wake of Fort Sumter, including suspending the writ of habeas corpus).
Mr. Bush has adamantly refused to acknowledge any constitutional limitations on his power to wage war indefinitely against international terrorism, other than an unelaborated assertion he is not a dictator. Claims to inherent authority to break and enter homes, to intercept purely domestic communications, or to herd citizens into concentration camps reminiscent of World War II, for example, have not been ruled out if the commander in chief believes the measures would help defeat al Qaeda or sister terrorist threats.
Volumes of war powers nonsense have been assembled to defend Mr. Bush's defiance of the legislative branch and claim of wartime omnipotence so long as terrorism persists, i.e., in perpetuity. Congress should undertake a national inquest into his conduct and claims to determine whether impeachable usurpations are at hand. As Alexander Hamilton explained in Federalist 65, impeachment lies for "abuse or violation of some public trust," misbehaviors that "relate chiefly to injuries done immediately to the society itself."
The Founding Fathers confined presidential war powers to avoid the oppressions of kings. Despite championing a muscular and energetic chief executive, Hamilton in Federalist 69 accepted that the president must generally bow to congressional directions even in times of war: "The president is to be commander in chief of the Army and Navy of the United States. In this respect, his authority would be nominally the same with that of the king of Great Britain, but in substance much inferior to it. It would amount to nothing more than the supreme command and direction of the military and naval forces; while that of the British king extends to declaring war and to the raising and regulating of fleets and armies -- all which, by the Constitution under consideration, would appertain to the legislature."
President Bush's claim of inherent authority to flout congressional limitations in warring against international terrorism thus stumbles on the original meaning of the commander in chief provision in Article II, section 2.
The claim is not established by the fact that many of Mr. Bush's predecessors have made comparable assertions. In Youngstown Sheet & Tube v. Sawyer (1952), the U.S. Supreme Court rejected President Truman's claim of inherent power to seize a steel mill to settle a labor dispute during the Korean War in reliance on previous seizures of private businesses by other presidents. Writing for a 6-3 majority, Justice Hugo Black amplified: "But even if this be true, Congress has not thereby lost its exclusive constitutional authority to make laws necessary and proper to carry out the powers vested in the Constitution in the Government of the United States."
Indeed, no unconstitutional usurpation is saved by longevity. For 50 years, Congress claimed power to thwart executive decisions through "legislative vetoes." The Supreme Court, nevertheless, held the practice void in Immigration and Naturalization Service v. Chadha (1983). Approximately 200 laws were set aside. Similarly, the high court declared in Erie Railroad v. Tompkins (1938) that federal courts for a century since Swift v. Tyson (1842) had unconstitutionally exceeded their adjudicative powers in fashioning a federal common law to decide disputes between citizens of different states.
President Bush preposterously argues the Sept. 14, 2001, congressional resolution authorizing "all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations or persons [the president] determines" were implicated in the September 11 attacks provided legal sanction for the indefinite NSA eavesdropping outside the aegis of FISA. But the FISA statute expressly limits emergency surveillances of citizens during wartime to 15 days, unless the president obtains congressional approval for an extension: "[T]he president, through the attorney general, may authorize electronic surveillance without a court order... to acquire foreign intelligence information for a period not to exceed 15 calendar days following a declaration of war by the Congress."
A cardinal canon of statutory interpretation teaches that a specific statute like FISA trumps a general statute like the congressional war resolution. Neither the resolution's language nor legislative history even hints that Congress intended a repeal of FISA. Moreover, the White House has maintained Congress was not asked for a law authorizing the NSA eavesdropping because the legislature would have balked, not because the statute would have duplicated the war resolution.
As Youngstown Sheet & Tube instructs, the war powers of the president are at their nadir where, as with the NSA eavesdropping, he acts contrary to a federal statute. Further, that case invalidated a seizure of private property (with just compensation) a vastly less troublesome invasion of civil liberties than the NSA's indefinite interception of international conversations on Mr. Bush's say so alone.
Congress should insist the president cease the spying unless or until a proper statute is enacted or face possible impeachment. The Constitution's separation of powers is too important to be discarded in the name of expediency.
Bruce Fein is a constitutional lawyer and international consultant with Bruce Fein & Associates and the Lichfield Group.
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