The Coalition of the Swilling

The appalling part is that government bureaucracies in Mexico have signed on to this thing. I say that we boycott Mexican goods and services on Tuesday. Nobody picks up Mexican labor outside of Home Depot, nothing. No Wal-Mart pinatas. No avocados.

I say this as someone who's lived in Mexico and who is very fond of Mexicans, their culture, their cuisine, music, etc. The idea that Mexican government workers in social services support the strike really, really angers me.

Dan, it's a huge part of their economies. The amount of money that is repatriated back to their economies from the illegals working here is staggering.

And it's money that evades our taxes, yet we have to pay all the social service costs.

To truly illustrate their economic impact, we'd have to deport them all. Sure, their buying power, etc. may help the economy, but what about their drain on welfare and other government programs. In magic land, I'd send them home.

I absolutely agree that we need to first secure the border. Then we can better deal with the illegal immigrants here.

I am sick and tired of the "human rights" rhetoric that these guys are using. It honestly makes me sick to my stomach.

And Bing, what you said ties perfectly in to my first point. I think the argument could be made, if someone collected all the figures, that their drain on our economy is far worse than whatever gains they claim.

Here's a great post on the subject, written by Rob Port, and posted at WILLisms on April 6.

Doggone pending moderation ... Bing, I set a post with a link that is caught in the SPAM Guard.

Sorry Cullen; I published it.

That old 1-URL max rule ;)

Yes, Bingley, I know. I'm just saying that as insane as it is for the California senate to back this demonstration, at least they ought to have some say, howsoever stupid and self-serving, on issues pertaining to domestic politics. How government agencies in Mexico get off backing demonstrations on the part of their illegals in the US, when it is manifestly against their own law for people legally in their country as guests to engage in any political activity, including demonstrations of this kind, is just beyond me.

Secure the border, let Mexico know that any assistance to crossing it by them would be considered an act of war, then start deporting every single illegal alien that is caught. We could deport them as we find them, and in the end get all 1.1 million back where they came from. It would take time, but it could be done.

Ah, I see your point Dan.

"The Mexican Senate wholeheartedly endorses the free expression of mexican workers...outside of Mexico!"

heh.

Gee - guess noone here has family that came from somewhere else. Aren't ALL AMERICANS former immigrants? Where is the compassion? Oh yeah, YOUR PEOPLE got here FIRST? Come on!

"Hierarchies make some people dependent on others, blame the dependent for their dependency, and then use that dependency as a justification for further exercise of authority" : Martha Ackelsberg

Yes Aeon, my ancestors immigrated to this country. They didn't sneak across the border though, most of them came in through Ellis Island. They were invited. Get the difference?

Illegal immigrents or Legal immagrents? I have both in my background - a legal Swede and a wetback Englishman, BFD, and who the hell cares what rhetoric Martha spews.

Oh hell, Aeon, we're Irish, so WTF do you think? Got here later than most. I've got a Panamanian mother-in-law on top of that AND was born in Japan myself, while my husband was born in the Canal Zone. So there's the set-up for the "D'oh!!" on your part.

Now ~ the difference? LEGALLY. No late night desert crossing, sneaking in like snakes under a fence.

LEGALLY. Waited on a boat to get to Ellis Island, married U.S. citizen and waited for immigration clearence, children of U.S. citizens born abroad...WAITED TO IMMIGRATE LEGALLY...you get the picture.

Well, hopefully you do.

These "illegals" were also invited...by corporations who are addicted to cheap labor.

Sending them back is impossible.
How easy was it to send back Elian Gonzalez?
Now multiply that by 11 million.

I'm a little more concerned about the actual topic of the post - a state legislature just endorsed a mass protest and boycott of American goods by a huge group of known lawbreakers. How can you govern after that?

A warm swill welcome, robert!

You seem to be all over the board here. I think if you gleaned anything from your visit, you'd see we're all in agreement you can't round them up and repatriate them, nor do we think we should. As I stated in the post above, secure the borders FIRST, ENFORCE the immigration laws we have on the books. That means when illegals are apprehended, they don't get a immigration COURT date, they get sent BACK. More secure borders will help ensure they're not back HERE in a week. If said illegal was apprehended in a place of employment, or such employment can be verified, then you ALSO hammer said employer.

I think Bingley also speaks for us all when addressing the cost issue.

So there you have it from us. Do you have any suggestions to share?

And you're right, Diptera. The "California Republic"? I guess we're off the hook paying for the next earthquake then, huh?

I think the real answer is one which most are preferring to avoid hearing.

It's to address the global inequality of wealth, to reduce poverty.

Most Americans are unaware of the extent to which our wealth is built on the poverty of others.

However, that poverty threatens many or most Americans as well (those at the very top benefit).

It's a drag down on the middle class wages towards a return to sustinence wages. As China an India continue to graduate ten times as many engineers and Ph.D's as the US, where do Americans think the trend is headed for them to be able to preserve their advantage in coming decades?

Perhaps they just don't care, since the media and government say little about such issues.

If we move towards an economy less reliant on the poor, and other poor nations are further developed to become wealthier, the need for people to come here and work slave wages will be reduced.

It's hard, but it's a real solution, as opposed to the half-baked options without it, ranging from continuing the status quo with over ten million illegals and increasing and the drag down on wages, or the 'enforcement' of the immigration laws which would, if possible, have a big and negative impact on our economy as prices rose (with some increase in wages as well).

And it has the benefit of being an especially moral solution.

Now, the 'how' to do it is an important discussion, and the discussion on immigration issues has been so unfortunately misguided that people don't even know where to start on the real issue. A big education is needed to just get started on understanding the options.

It requires understanding how international financing has been abused and harmed developing countries, the dependancies, the effects of 'dumping' by the developed world on the undeveloped, and how things the developed world does which holds back the poor can be ended.

It's understood by the 'experts' - remember the Marshall plan - but not by the public much. One source of information for those interested is the Kennedy administration: he had some real interest in the third world becoming improved, well-functioning countries.

Take a look at his recommendation - little-known now - on how the financial issues should be addressed, from credit to addressing the terrible concentrations of wealth in those countries.

But it's likely the debate will not deal with this 'real solution', and will instead become yet another war between the two usual sides over the two half-baked solutions, each partly right, accomplishing little good.

A comment on the "poor" countries. Billions have been spent in these developing nations and what has been the result? A bunch of rich despots and ever poorer people. Mexico just loves sending their poor here so they don't have to deal with them. Look at Nigeria, floating in oil and ready to implode at any moment. We can't be everywhere to hold each countrie's hand but I agree that the financial dealing have been crooked. The whole point of this discussion is that immigrants, legal or illegal should not be influencing the politics of a nation not their own and certainly not by threatening actions. I'm the one born in Panama by the way and I have no sympathy for them, learn the language, learn the culture be an American or leave.

Beat me to it MD, but well stated.

"A comment on the "poor" countries. Billions have been spent in these developing nations and what has been the result? A bunch of rich despots and ever poorer people."

Exactly - this is why I do not call for more of the past, but for a major education on what's been done wrong, and what can be and should now be done right.

Until you understand the difference, you cannot help but lump all efforts to improve the economies of other nations under one label, which contains all the wrongs of the past.

"We can't be everywhere to hold each countrie's hand but I agree that the financial dealing have been crooked."

And I don't want us to have to be anywhere holding people's hands. That's not needed for long. What is needed is for planning to be done which is not based on our corporations' interests, but on legitimate attempts to, first, stop the harm to others' economies.

When our own wealth is less dependant on their poverty, the doors open for them to do better.

But what if the 'harm' is coming from their own entrenched leadership?

I think that it would be great to buttress the economies of our Latin neighbors, but Boosh has already said that he won't invade Venezuela. From what I've seen of the police in Mexico (which really is quite a lot, since I knew a few Federales personally), we would need to wipe out a great deal of their dysfunctional and dysfunctionally integrated government and military. That would mean invasion and occupation.

Our wealth isn't dependent on their poverty. Certainly, the Mexican government would like for the people to think so: "Mexico: so far from God, so close to the United States." They promote that idea, because it excuses their abuses and it validates the envy that they promote. Salinas was just out the last time I lived there for any length of time. I imagine that he must have been the US's fault, but I can't really see how.

The material wealth of Veracruz state is simply astonishing. I travelled often to Oaxaca as well, and it has a lot to offer. I spent a lot of time in the sleepy village of Frontera in Tabasco, which is blessed with oil deposits, fish, a semi-tropical forest with a wealth of valuable plants and trees.

The fundamental problem is that there is no social trust. People will accept a small immediate pay-out rather than gamble on something that requires a long-term investment. Talk is cheap where capital doesn't flow. Someone will pay you back when someone else pays them back who's owed by someone else who's kind of disappeared. They've been abused, but it hasn't been by the United States.

Henry Adams thought that it was inevitable that his country would swallow up both Mexico and Canada. Make all the arguments you want about economic hegemony. It's a pile of mierda.

"But what if the 'harm' is coming from their own entrenched leadership?"

It often is, in part. But, what do you do next?

There are solutions, and I'm saying we need to do more than what we're doing now.

You can't simply look at one small part of the picture. To take a simplistic example, say there are several dozens clothing manufacturers in Zaire. Over some years, the huge excesses in the western world lead the citizens to donate their used clothing to charity (good cause). The charities raise money by selling the clothes in huge loads to entrepenurial middle-men from India. They resell it to retailers in Zaire. Because the cost is based on zero - the original donation - it's so low-priced that the local clothing manufacturers cannot compete against this influx of dumped goods, and all the manufacturers shut down.

Who's "the bad guy"? There isn't one; what there is, is a lack of leadership and focus on how to solve problems - the agenda, by default, is driven by the major corporations who have interests in exploitive practicies, not because they're evil, but because absent government regulation, competition forces a 'race to the bottom' where they have to do such things.

I probably shouldn't digress to such a detailed, small part of the picture, but want to just give an example that the issues are not simplistic, and all the battles on the wrong issues are preventing attention on the real solution.

I don't see how to post a 'solution to global poverty' in a thread, not that I have the details of one - the point is not to do that but to point out the harm of the wrong things getting attention, the emotional hot button issues.

Dan Collins, sadly, falls into the 'enough information to be dangerous' category. I've no doubt he has the experiences he mentions and that his specific facts are correct as far as they go, but they lead him into a corner that goes nowhere, of useless cynicism, when it's unneeded.

The thing is, simply put:

Our society is failing to look at the 'big picture' advantages of Mexico doing better, and policy is being driven by short-sighted selfish interests, with the predictable results.

If we as citizens accept that it'll continue and we'll get our panties in a bunch over immigrants.

If we are more responsible and demand a longer term policy, we'll get that.

The thing is, how many in the public know enough about the political and economic issues to know there are better solutions than the simple choices the media prints between 'amnesty' and 'wall building' and the flavors between? Few.

This is why we need 'real leadership' who can let the experts who can do better have more to say. They're needed to educate the public why they should stand up to the coporations and push better solutions. Even the corporations would win, I think.

Here's a little secret: corporations are often unable to pursue the 'good' policies they'd like to, for competitive reasons. For illustration, Assume for a moment that global warming is heavily influenced by corporate pollution, and that corporations can see that disaster is coming for them too as a result. Further imagine that any one corporation who abandons the pollution, and has to raise prices as a result, goes out of business. At that point, the corporations simply continue to pollute. We've seen this sort of thing throughout human history.

The thing is, when corporations go from building up right-wing propaganda industries first to oppose excessive regulation, that soon slips to the propaganda opposing reasonable regulation, and finally to underming essential regulation, as their 'shareholder interests' compel the behavior.

The global financial institutions which have done so much harm have begun to acknowledge that fact.

It's pretty simple: are the American people now capable of learning about 'real solutions' and forcing their leaders to follow them? Odds seem low, but we can do what we can to encourage it, like posting on a message board.

"If I have to cut my own grass or pay a little more for a sandwich to be delivered from the deli then I will."

Somehow, I doubt you will. Do you really expect us to believe that you will be mowing your own grass any time soon? When was the last time you fired up your lawn mower, anyway?

Do you really expect us to believe that you will be mowing your own grass any time soon? When was the last time you fired up your lawn mower, anyway?

From the Bangla-cola contingent, answer is: every single time! With an environmentally friendly mulching mower. VA-rooooom.

Somehow, I doubt you will.

That's quite an ASSumption for an aptly named visitor. Bingley has never done anything BUT mow his own lawn. Did you mean to sound so cranky?

You can't simply look at one small part of the picture. To take a simplistic example, say there are several dozens clothing manufacturers in Zaire. Over some years, the huge excesses in the western world lead the citizens to donate their used clothing to charity (good cause). The charities raise money by selling the clothes in huge loads to entrepenurial middle-men from India. They resell it to retailers in Zaire. Because the cost is based on zero - the original donation - it's so low-priced that the local clothing manufacturers cannot compete against this influx of dumped goods, and all the manufacturers shut down.

Who's "the bad guy"? There isn't one; what there is, is a lack of leadership and focus on how to solve problems - the agenda, by default, is driven by the major corporations who have interests in exploitive practicies, not because they're evil, but because absent government regulation, competition forces a 'race to the bottom' where they have to do such things.

Eee-ville major corporations do not lop people's heads off or hang them or destroy villages or burn fields or force native populations into massive flight trying to outrun genocide. EXXON did not cause Darfur and GE is not responsible for Serbia. You are being entirely ingenuous when you dismiss "entrenched leadership" and offer only platitudes from Coca-Cola commercials as a SOLUTION. Tell me your specifics to remove a Mugabe, for instance, and what to DO in the meantime.

As far as useless, cynical Dan, at least he's shared WHERE and through what EXPERIENCE his views spring. Your views seem well thought out and earnest, but you've yet to share the personal experiences that give you the knowledge to dismiss others (with first hand knowledge) out of hand.

I don't feel that my views are cynical. I am telling you that from living there, there are great problems, the first of which is that people are psychologically scarred by their history. Second, as was the case for many generations in Ireland, that the most ambitious leave to come here, and that their contributions back home tend to become a familial welfare, rather than invested in ways that would really make a difference. Having done business in Mexico several times, I can say from direct experience that the kinds of "regulation" enforced by the government really are much more harmful than helpful to enterpreneurship.

Like the Irish Republic, Mexico may change and adapt and become the vibrant economy that it ought to be (BTW, the Irish played a peculiar part in the war over Texas). It's just that it's going to take time. Meanwhile, government abuses and coddling of the kleptocrats retard progress, as does the idea that proximity to the United States is the problem, or American corporations. I can guarantee you that workers in maquiladores run by American corporations feel that they are better treated than those who work for Mexican companies. Those practices will eventually become more common.

How did the Irish finally become a European success story? Well, for one thing, they valued education. For another, they became heavily influenced by the US model. For another, their taxes are out of sync with those in the EU--much to the EU wonks' dismay. I know that you're going to groan when you hear me say that that liberates initiative, but that's been my observation.

Once I was out at a bar in Coyoacan, in the DF, with a friend of mine, John. He grew up in Madison, WI, my home state. He and I both had a great admiration for Shakespeare, and we were talking about the Sonnets at "El Hijo del Cuervo." Some local Mexicans approached us, upset that we were using English. I explained to them, in Spanish, that that was only natural, considering that we were talking about Shakespeare. They grew threatening, insisting that English was a "rascist language." Where did they get this idea? Well, there were young people who peddled pamphlets for some Esperanto advocacy outfit at the gazebo on the plaza outside, making this very argument. I asked them how it could be then, that the language of the Conquistadores wasn't rascist as well (as you know, Spanish provides the basis for Esperanto). On the way out, they tried to jump John, who is all of 5'4". I ended up throwing one of them over a hedge. He told me that he was going to follow me to my house and "cortarle a pequenas piezas."

You see what they are taught?

By the way, I think that Bohemia is an excellent beer.

A message board only allows for so much. As I've said repeatedly, I can point in the right direction.

The reader is responsible to do the homework from there. Will you go out and read up on Kennedy's economic plans for third world nations I recommended? If so, you will have plenty of specifics; if not, you will continue to form opinions within the same limited set of facts.

I can't 'make' you do the homework, and I see it as harmful to not do the topic justice with the tiny bit I can do in a post - not to mention the fact that I don't have all the specifics, any more than Kennedy knew HOW to put a man on the moon when he said it's what we should do.

He believed it could be done, and that we could do it, if we realized it was important.

If we pay attention to global poverty, the answers will flow from the leaders who work for us, as they get the experts delivering plans. It's more important to go after the right thing than to list the details.

As for the first part of your post, you should avoid using straw men to make your point, misrepresenting what I said. You paraphrase me in your first words as saying 'evil corporations' when I went to some length to say something else.

And following that, you made an astoudingly flawed point using the logic that there are evils in the world other than ones under discussion. Because Exxon didn't cause Darfur, what they DO do wrong is not a problem in your book? What kind of terrible arguing is that?

You don't answer a wrong by saying the person didn't do some totally unrelated wrong.

You ask what to do about a Mugabe - much can be done. There's an entire book on JFK's shift from supporting the far right wing, brutal dictators in Africa to supporting the moderates - a radical change in our policy (along with his gaining huge third world loyalty by opposing colonialism).

Do you understand how much of the west's foreign policy has been centered around taking resources from Africa at the lowest possible prices, and setting up brutal regimes to facilitate this?

That's just part of the picture, but supporting real democratic regimes and reducing our measures to 'steal' the resources for too low a price is part of the direction that will pay off.

The issue is simple - if the people setting the policy are only the interests, such as those who need the minerals from Africa which supply nearly all of the world's needs for cell phones, then we'll see more of the short-sighted policies we have now.

If pro-democracy policies are pushed by we the people onto our leaders for Africa, policies which include some justice, we'll see something else. Right now, most are content not to know anything about the policies going on - and that leads to the current problems.

To come full circle to illegal Mexican immigration, we got in this mess because the American public demanded to continue to get the benefits of the illegal labor while they also demanded we do nothing constructive for Mexico - they're on their own.

They elected the leaders who would lie to them - talk tough on immigration while allowing the immigration to continue, satisfying the business demands for cheap labor, and that's what they got.

The first thing is for people to learn more about the issue.

The second thing is to elect leaders who will protect the legitimate interests of corporations, where they overalp with the public good, but who are not owned by the corporations to pursue policies bad for the society.

Unfortunately, the discussion is hard to get past describing the need, to make the issue global poverty, and to recommend reading. Sadly, too many message board posts are limited to who gets off a nice quip.

Dan, again, I'm not disagreeing with your experiences; I'm saying they're not leading to anything constructive on the issue. The problems you mention exist - we need to do something to correct them.

You make analogies with Ireland, but there are much greater differences between Ireland and Mexico. Your point about the ambitious leavig is well-taken - that one does fit. Over 10% of *all* of Mexico's population is now in the US illegally, which has a big hit on their productive workers.

But as you know there's a lot more to the story, and addressing the poverty issue would reverse that migration, allowing these people to be where they want, home with their families.

It's not just 'they copied us' in Ireland; Russia did a sort of communism to capitalism move and it was a disaster. It's not just cutting taxes that matters - did Ireland have to overcome the issues of concentration of wealth and corrupt leaders Mexico now has?

The corruption in the Mexican government is both a cause and an effect. Concentration of wealth is one important factor in the economic stagnation and corruption in countries south of the US.

Whatever his flaws, Venezuela's Chavez is taking some small steps on that issue, providing some increased opportunities to the poor, implementing land reforms recommended by President Kennedy, increasing his nation's share of the oil income at the expense of the oil companies.

There we go with that conflict of interest again; we try to have the elected leader removed.

We need a large plan for improving things. Just giving aid is a disaster. Just increasing their income feeds the corrupt leaders. It's needed to overcome the selfish, powerful interests from the outside (often our own corporations) and the inside (the corrupt regimes) to fix things.

It can be done, and it has benefits. There would never have been a Fidel Castro dictatorship had there not been the corrupt excesses of Batista, with our support. There need not have been a Viet Nam war had we supported their independance, rather than French colonization, etc.

It takes education of the American citizen though to see what the issues are, to get past the simplistic reaction to the immigrant story du jour (e.g., they sang our anthem in Spanish oh no!)

Let me quote someone who had an idea, who had experiences on the ground, for a taste.

Going back to the 1930's, General Smedley Butler was then the highest decorated ever Marine:

[quote]"I helped make Mexico, especially Tampico, safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefits of Wall Street. The record of racketeering is long. I helped purify Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers in 1909-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for American sugar interests in 1916. In China I helped to see to it that Standard Oil went its way unmolested."[/quote]

Again, don't confuse the need for corporations to be regulated with the idea that they're 'evil'.

They play an essential role in our economy - when well regulated.

But the quote above should give you some inkling that we have a role in the economies elsewhere, in ways that are often not widely known among the citizens.

The solution is pretty simple directly, I'll repeat it:

Elect leaders who will support the legitimate interests of corporations, but who are not owned.

Elect leaders who will pursue policies with some justice, and not only policies for a few.

Unfortunately, today, the voters are too easily manipulated, and with the takeover of the republican party completed - long gone are the days of a Teddy Roosevelt's progressive views - now the democratic party is under siege to be similarly dominated by narrow interests.

Our main hope now is that their mistakes - the incompetence of a Bush - will allow for a backlash and someone who will do right being elected, not because the people really understand what's needed, but more out of luck, much as happened with Kennedy.

Few elected Kennedy for his real, key policies; he was more a good-looking strong speaker. They didn't know he'd challenge Europe, that he'd use caution in the Cuban Missile Crisis, that he'd challenge the nation's morality on raicsm after a century of near nothing - they got lucky.

Similarly, the public may not be aware of the need to elect a president without the excessive obligations to special interests now, but they might just get lucky as they react to Bush.

I've got two names for you, Craig.

Clinton. Loral.

Where do we begin with John Kerry? He must not be beholden to big international business, right?

How about this one? Pemex. How about this one? Soros.
Do you figure it only stands to reason that Kerry will leave Theresa for George?

How do you feel about Boy Bill being part of a group that wants to purchase a bunch of papers, including the Philadelphia Inquirer? Sounds a bit Berlusconish, doesn't it?

Justice: Saddam, yes or no? Where's the UN on Darfur?

I've taught Dante's Divina Commedia a number of times. It tries to reconcile the idea of Divine Love with Divine Justice. We all have to reconcile love and justice when we get older, which is why it's the greatest poem ever written. Guess which part my liberal students always have trouble with.

Wait. Didn't Teddy Roosevelt send Admiral Perry into Tokyo to force the Japanese to trade with us? Didn't he help send the Marines into the Philippines when he was McKinley's VP? Isn't his face carved into Mount Rushmore on lands that were promised forever to the Native Americans?

BTW: Kennedy's election was more than luck in Chicago. I'm glad that it wasn't Nixon, but there you have it.

More, I find it very odd that you are so gung-ho about promoting democracy abroad (though I agree with you in principle and in practice), yet think that it will be a matter of crap-shoot luck if the benighted populace of these United States somehow manage to elect a competent President.

Unfortunately, to me, this smacks of elitism.

Hey, let's march on Mexico City:

http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/americas/04/28/mex.immig.ap/index.html

Dan, I'm afraid that for me at least you lack much coherence.

Your first response just lacks it broadly. What does make sense, though, is the sound of the ideologue speaking in a sort of 'tongues' shorthand, as if 'two words', 'Clinton Loral' were an actual argument. Takes more for a rational comment; but shorthand is fine for those who are ideologues.

(It's analogous to how the word 'Halliburton' is an entire argument for some on the left).

As for your second post, Teddy Roosevelt did indeed practice a pretty immoral, imperialistic foreign policy in areas; it was partly the times, partly a flaw on his part. He was also pretty brilliant and insightful and progressive on some corporate issues.

Rather than try to cite a few examples of his comments, I'll remind you that his dissatisfaction with the republican party resembling the one today led him to defeat it by splitting the republican vote, giving us Wilson, for better or worse.

He had very good and very bad things. Things aren't always black and white simple you know...

As for your third response, it again displays that sort of ideological content free snarkiness inlieu of substance tone, where a shot at Kennedy and the mob in Chicago is made which is entirely inadequate as a response to the issue under discussion, a childish debate game on your part.

It's as if you posted about Bush's guest worker proposal and I wrote back 'choked on a pretzel'.

It's nonsense.

Kennedy was both a bogglingly good president, and he had some serious flaws (the mob in Chicago was his father's doing, of course - they had a relationship as the father owned the largest commercial property in Chicago...)

That old 'things aren't alwas black and white' again.

But where you really discredit yourself to me is when you fall into the worst of the parrot imitations from the right wing with the terribly hackneyed 'elitism' comment. It's nauseating (and false).

Again: I said that many of the best actions Kennedy took were ones which the public could not have anticipated from the camaign, and they got lucky that he had the good qualities he did. That's hardly elitist, it's the nature of our political system that you can only know so much about the man you elect as president before he's president (or the woman, of course, in the future). It's not elitism - the word elitism is one of those corrupted ideological hot button words you right-wing cultists overuse in lieu of rational analysis sometimes.

You do know, don't you , about the recent study which showed that partisans, like you, actually do not engage the rational part of the brain when confronted with partisan material? Zoom, the emotional part of the brain responds.

Tell me the truth - if I say Ted Kennedy, are you capable of not having "Chappaquiddick" pop into your head within 2 seconds every time you see his name? Of course not. That's the 'hot button' process.

Unfortunately, it's on high display in your post above which tries to equate any corporate activity by any democrastic leader with the larger issue of corporations in politics - it just doesn't fit. It's that childish debate game again.

Look, let me recommend an outstanding book to you, since you appear to read a decent amount - check out "unequal Protections" by Thom Hartmann. It's about the history of corporations, the 1886 ruling which accidentally gave corporations the rights of people, and the terrible ramifations since.

Read that, and let me know what you think, my e-mail is linked here.

That'll be a better discussion that the 'Clinton Loral' type talking points. I hope.

Chad--

Through Loral, the people behind Sirius satellite radio, Clinton gave China sensitive missile guidance technology. From the point of view of someone who believes that there are serious human rights problems with a regime that finds it acceptable to harvest organs from political prisoners, including Falun Gong, that seems a rather bad call.

I haven't read the book you cite, but I do think that the law you cite is BS as well. We agree there. There is no reason that I can think of that partnerships ought to be jointly and severally liable, but corporations not. We have privileged them to the extent that they make much more sense from a legal standpoint than other traditional (and more human) forms of business organization, and that naturally has a warping effect on business relations.

But do keep in mind, Craig, that like "ideology," "partisanship" is something that always belongs to someone who differs with one. Simply because you attribute it to me doesn't mean that you are immune, or that you somehow have manage to attain a lofty stratospheric detachment. Your fantasy about the reaction from GWB indicates to me that that isn't so. And simply stringing together a long post (though I admire contiguity as much as the next person) doesn't mean that you are engaging in a more valid critique than someone who quips. A good quip can be lapidary, axiomatic. For me to say that something smacks of elitism does not necessarily indicate that I'm proceeding from false premises, nor does your characterization of that as proceeding merely from emotion insulate you from my criticism.

I think in some ways that Kennedy did have a good presidency. As for Teddy, Chappaquiddick was a long time ago. I'm much more focused on what he's done recently, which has been a spectacle of comically incoherent bloviation. If you think that I can't go two seconds without thinking about it ("of course not"), you are entitled to that opinion. If I did, though, I think that my attitude toward Teddy would be 'murderer' rather than 'stumblebum.' My actual feelings about Chappaquiddick are more like--geez, when I was a teenager during the Carter administration I drove around fully loaded a lot; thank God I never plunged my Nova off a bridge.

We're going to have to differ on Hugo Chavez. He's a Peronist masquerading as a Castro who's cuddled up to the Mullahs in Iraq. It's hard for me to see how anything good can come of that. Like other politicians who dispatch a strange combination of union thugs and police thugs to end peaceful demonstrations with government-issued sticks, I do have a problem with him. Just another Latin American crime syndicate masquerading as a government pretty much sums it up, I think.

But to come back to my point, justice demands that societies take responsibility for their own problems. To provide them with excuses seems to me to do positive harm, especially when those excuses are based on something like a vulgarized "phallogocentrism" of the Yankee hegemonists.

Couldn't find your email.

Oops! I mean Craig! Sorry. More fair-trade coffee.

I think it has to be looked at simply by the laws of the land.

(And forget any "well meaning" but ill advised protestors.)

Remember Jimmy Carter's magnanimous jester of taking all of Cuba's not wanted emigrants. Castro just emptied the jails and let them go.

If we move towards an economy less reliant on the poor, and other poor nations are further developed to become wealthier, the need for people to come here and work slave wages will be reduced.

It's hard, but it's a real solution...

This makes no sense what so ever. It sounds nice and wonderful, but it is completely lacking in any sort of specifics other than "drugs are baaad, mmkay? So don't use them." It sounds alot like all the "we can do better" and "I have a plan" crap we heard in the last election cycle; of course us silly voters weren't ever "nuanced' enough to actually be let in on the details of the plan, mind you.

Exactly - this is why I do not call for more of the past, but for a major education on what's been done wrong, and what can be and should now be done right.

Until you understand the difference, you cannot help but lump all efforts to improve the economies of other nations under one label, which contains all the wrongs of the past.

Does that mean you're willing to lay the large part of the blame on the people living in those countries, both the genreal populations and their leadership/oligarchies? 'Cos it sure sounds like you seem to think the weightier part of the blame lies outside their borders.

Our society is failing to look at the 'big picture' advantages of Mexico doing better, and policy is being driven by short-sighted selfish interests, with the predictable results.

But is Mexico actually doing 'beter' by this, or does this allow the entrenched corrupt hierarchies in Mexico to stay that way, much as Castro extended his power by getting rid of the criminals as GALA mentions?

I'd like to build the world a home And furnish it with love Grow apple trees and honey bees And snow-white turtle doves

I'd like to teach the world to sing
In perfect harmony
I'd like to hold it in my arms
And keep it company
(That's the song I hear)
I'd like to see the world for once
(Let the world sing today)
All standing hand in hand
And hear them echo through the hills
For peace throughout the land
That's the song I hear
(That's the song I hear)
Let the world sing today
(Let the whole wide world keep singing)
A song of peace that echoes on
And never goes away

As we all would, but Milosevic, Mugabe, Idi Amin, Fidel, Chavez, Charles Taylor, Baby Doc, Papa Doc, Saddam Hussein, Olusegun Obasanjo, Kim Jong-Il, et al (the list is long and disgusting) don't know the song. And there are no REAL solutions to any of it until they DO. Or their people rise up and find someone who DOES.