Bad American

Only if you also believe in Santa and the tooth fairy. . .

Deborah Jeane Palfrey

AOL News/Associated Press

TARPON SPRINGS, Fla. (May 1) - A woman police believe to be convicted Washington escort service operator Deborah Jeane Palfrey committed suicide, officials said Thursday.

Police said the body was found in a shed near Palfrey’s mother’s home Thursday morning. There was a suicide note, but police did not disclose its contents or how she killed herself.

And you may never know. Expect everything about this “suicide” to be hidden from public view like most of the names of the powerful who used her escort service:

Her trial concluded without revealing many new details about the service or its clients. Vitter was among possible witnesses, but did not take the stand.

By design of course. We know of Senator David Vitter, Harlan Ullman (Mr. “Shock and Awe”) and Randall Tobias. Can you image the others that were on the client list? Of course, the rich and powerful look out for themselves and the public be damned so we’ll never know.

This is just too convenient a ’suicide.” Palfrey was abandoned and betrayed by powerful men she naively believed would protect her. Too late she found out she was ever expendable. And, facing the clank of prison bars, she had nothing to lose by authoring a tell all from prison. So she, I believe, was silenced forever.

And she wasn’t the only one:

One of the escort service employees was former University of Maryland, Baltimore County, professor Brandy Britton, who was arrested on prostitution charges in 2006. She committed suicide in January before she was scheduled to go to trial.

Doesn’t this all seem just a little too convenient?

Bet the rest of the women will keep their mouths shut now if they know what’s good for them.

There are many ways of assassinating people and making it look like a suicide. The pros know how to do it and our government’s security services are full of them.

Some years back in Cleveland a big call girl ring was broken up too after too many loose ends started to appear. Cleveland Police at that time seized the services’ “black book” which was kept in the strictest of confidence and, throughout all the court proceedings, never ever saw the light of day.

There’s one law for you and a totally different law for the people who count. The everyday mopes nailed on such shows as “Cops” for being johns aren’t important enough to be shielded from public shame.

Five years after that lying rat-bastard in the White House had his little moment.

Eric Alterman remembers what was said then by some of the biggest shills in America:

On the fifth anniversary of Bush’s “Mission Accomplished” speech, let’s roll back the tape and recall the media’s equally impressive performance on that day. From Why We’re Liberals, there’s this:

[G.Gordon Liddy to Chris Matthews:] “After all, Al Gore had to go get some woman to tell him how to be a man. And here comes George Bush. You know, he’s in his flight suit, he’s striding across the deck, and he’s wearing his parachute harness, you know — and I’ve worn those because I parachute — and it makes the best of his manly characteristic. You go run those — run that stuff again of him walking across there with the parachute. He has just won every woman’s vote in the United States of America. You know, all those women who say size doesn’t count — they’re all liars. Check that out.”

Much of the analysis of Bush in his phony flight suit focused on related issues that were barely less juvenile, but equally telling:

• Chris Matthews: “That’s the president looking very much like a jet, you know, a high-fl ying jet star. A guy who is a jet pilot. Has been in the past when he was younger, obviously. . . . He won the war. He was an effective commander. Everybody recognizes that, I believe, except a few critics. . . . Here’s a president who’s really nonverbal. He’s like Eisenhower. He looks great in a military uniform. He looks great in that cowboy costume he wears when he goes West.”
• Chris Matthews: “We’re proud of our president. Americans love having a guy as president, a guy who has a little swagger, who’s physical, who’s not a complicated guy like Clinton or even like Dukakis or those guys, McGovern. They want a guy who’s president. Women like a guy who’s president. Check it out. The women like this war. I think we like having a hero as our president.”
• Ann Coulter to Matthews: “It’s stunning. It’s amazing. I think it’s huge. I mean, he’s landing on a boat at 150 miles per hour. It’s tremendous. It’s hard to imagine any Democrat being able to do that. And it doesn’t matter if Democrats try to ridicule it. It’s stunning, and it speaks for itself.”
• Brian Williams: “And two immutable truths about the president that the Democrats can’t change: He’s a youthful guy. He looked terrific and full of energy in a flight suit. He is a former pilot, so it’s not a foreign art form to him. Not all presidents could have pulled this scene off today.”
• Morton Kondracke: “That was great theater.”
• David Broder: The president’s “physical posture” communicated “authority and command.”
• Joe Klein: “That was probably the coolest presidential image since Bill Pullman played the jet fighter pilot in the movie Independence Day. That was the first thing that came to mind for me. And it just shows you how high a mountain these Democrats are going to have to climb.”
• Laura Ingraham: “Speaking as a woman, and listening to the women who called into my radio show, seeing President Bush get out of that plane, carrying his helmet, he is a real man. He stands by his word. That was a very powerful moment.”

And yet that 20-25 completely brain dead part of the American electorate still supports Bush. No one ever lost money underestimating the intelligence of an American. . .

And I still live, one day, to punch the daylights out of Chris Matthews.

Note: this piece was tacked on to the end of the Whitney/Hedges story originally. I felt it best to make it a separate post.

I had a talk with a friend in my store the other day. The subject centered around the entire mental health industry in this country and what was a reliable definition of mental illness.

Of course, many say that the definition of being looney is when you do the same thing over and over and expect different results. I think of that every time I go vote in a national election. I think I finally get it.

I told my friend that, generally, people with low intelligence and skills rarely seek mental health help unless the state forces it on them. In general terms, it seems to me that the more aware you are - of yourself, your surroundings, your history and culture - the more likely you were going to be diagnosed with some form of depression or other condition.

Think about it.

My theory is that once people have figured out that the cultural, economic and sociological facets of our society are insane, they can no longer mentally function well within it.

You keep looking for things to make sense and they stubbornly do not. Those in authority do not act morally or responsibly. The economic system doesn’t reward honest work but rewards those with the morals of snakes. Organized religion offers platitudes designed to keep you happy in your station while reliving you of extra income. A country that was founded on high-minded idealism fails to follow through throughout it’s history. Good people are cashiered while assholes are rewarded with money and fame.

And over and over again you’re told, no ordered, to worship this system as the best, fairest and most lucrative on the planet.

And if none of that works, out comes the “life isn’t fair” rationale. Yes, we all know life isn’t fair. But why does it have to be so goddamn unfair? And why do we seem to celebrate its unfairness as a moral good?

And the more intelligent and sensitive people ponder these questions, the more disturbed they become.

One of the things I used to say on my radio show on WJBC in Bloomington which no doubt endeared me to many in my audience is that to remain sane, one must give American culture the middle finger.

And six years later, I still stand by that assumption.

Why is it then that we have so many people working themselves into the ground to die with the most toys? And why do they seem to have to work so hard at convincing themselves that they are happy? And why do they treat other people like shit?

We are told, as Hedges writes in his column, that money is the way we keep score. Jesus Christ, in the words of the New Testament, said it  is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than a rich man to enter the Kingdom of God. But our churches only give the real words of Jesus lip service while they preach the prosperity gospel.

So many disconnects and contradictions in American life. One could co crazy trying to rationalize them all out.

And that’s the point with this quadrennial fallacy known as the national elections.

Hedges is right - no one gets here without passing muster with Corporate America and their house organ media. And Americans do what they’re told and believe what they’re told.

More and more online, I read of people who have found some measure in happiness by giving up watching the corporate news channels or by giving up television all together. I think it’s an excellent way to save a lot of money in these times - disconnect your cable. If you have the Internet, you can watch most of the shows you want the next day or week anyway. And you can get far more reliable news and commentary.

I think the other thing we need to realize is that as long as we’re trying to play the American Game of keeping up with the Joneses, we’ll always be unhappy. This is not a great thought - others have said the same thing for decades, but it bears repeating. Stuff doesn’t make us happy. Believe me, I know - I’ve had stuff and not had stuff and I was no more happy either way.

I think the next thing is to stop participating in our rigged and fixed national elections or at least not holding any hope at all that voting within the system will change things. Reliance on our sham democracy to bring meaningful change only keeps people looking ahead and hoping for a miracle that never occurs rather than working within our sphere of influence to make things better.

I see good people like Jill Zimon over at WLST keep banging her head against the Chris Redferns and Marc Danns of the world as if heartfelt and reasoned appeals to the better angels of our nature will force power to concede anything. I like Jill, but I think the lesson to be learned is that America, power is it’s own reward and need rarely to justify itself.

At what point will your head start feeling better when you stop banging it against the wall?

I’ve been banging my head against this wall for 30 years and nothing will change unless the American people wake up and break the back of corporate power in this country and try a different way of living. And that isn’t going to happen because the people have been taught to love their slaveowners and believe, with a fervid faith that one day, they too, can aspire to being a slaveowner if only they follow the rules and work hard enough.

And revolutions are just too messy and inconclusive. Better to just get a little for yourself, enjoy your toys and keep your head down and your mouth shut and maybe they’ll leave you alone.

What do people do?

Many lose themselves in alternative realities - everything from drugs to yoga to Scientology. Call it what you want, it’s still an understandable attempt at creating alternative semi-autonomous personal zone where we can believe in a higher power or order that will bring us peace and contentment - separate from the everyday madness of the real world.

In truth, we play a lot of mind games with ourselves. We believe that perhaps we can tap into other consciousnesses or powers that will guide us through our lives and protect us and give us the personal power that we lack in the real world.

But every April 15, reality kicks back in. We’re slaves in real life (Morpheus’s battery) - only free in our own minds. And for many of us, if that’s the best we can do, then that’s the best we can do.

But I also think that only works if you limit your mind’s exposure to all of the crazymaking that comes out of the idiot box and the other forms of popular media and popular entertainment. This is very hard for many of us.

For me, I have an almost neurotic obsession with being informed 24/7 for no other reason than I want to be prepared for whatever disaster is in the offing. So I parse the MSM like people read tea leaves, trying to read between the propaganda for the real story. It gets exasperating and often leaves me with a vague sense of nausea.

In many cases, I think those of us who believe we may have figured out that maybe it’s not us but the society that’s insane wonder if we have to live as the crew of the Nebuchadnezzar in the movie The Matrix?

I don’t have the answer to that because there isn’t one. Those of us who understand have to find their own methods of remaining sane. All I know is for myself, the longer I live the less I care about the ‘things’ of this world, what people think of me, what I own, and what I do to make a living. Perhaps that’s the way it should be. If so, it’s blasphemous in modern life.

Nothing I write here is anything new or profound. I know that. A big part of my own blogging experience is therapeutic and, in this case, it’s free therapy. Take it for what it’s worth.

This is a post in two parts. The first part is truth, the second part is we handle the truth.

When you get right down to the nitty gritty, Obama is just as much a corporate creature as Clinton and McCain. We should stop fooling ourselves as progressives.

Mike Whitney

It’s no different for Obama; and that doesn’t make him a bad man either. In fact, he would probably make a much better president than John McCain or Madame DeFarge. It just means that the system won’t allow people of integrity to reach the highest rung on the political ladder. They end up being compromised. Eventually, the level of compromise is so great that the system no longer functions properly; the economic situation deteriorates, the country is wracked with debt and corruption, the military is bogged down in unwinnable wars, and the liberties upon which the nation was built begin to crumble. Everything that’s happening right now. Obama can’t change that nor can anyone who operates within the system. That is what makes men like Reverend Wright more important historically than Obama, even if Obama becomes president. Wright represents people-powered change, “transformational change”; the change that takes place when workers organize into labor unions and shut down plants and factories. The kind of change when women form liberation movements and demand the right to vote or equal pay. The kind of change when gays demand equal protection under the law and equal opportunity at work. The kind of change when black people say “enough” and take their place at “white’s only” lunch counters or in seats at the head of the bus.

Chris Hedges

The corporate state is our shadow government. Candidates who aspire to higher office get corporate money if they promote corporate interests. They are shut out of the national debate—look at Dennis Kucinich and Ralph Nader—if they do not. Defy the corporate state and you get handed a ticket to oblivion. You become invisible. Work for it and you are showered with tens of millions of dollars and the possibility of political power.

Barack Obama’s campaign message, filled with lofty promises of change and hope, is also filled with repeated reassurances to the corporate elite. Pick up a copy of Obama’s book “The Audacity of Hope.” The subtext is clear. It is a steady reminder to corporate America, a reminder bolstered by Obama’s voting record, that corporations would have nothing to fear from an Obama presidency.

“Of course,” he writes, “there are those within the Democratic Party who tend toward similar zealotry. But those who do have never come close to possessing the power of a Rove or a DeLay, the power to take over the party, fill it with loyalists, and enshrine some of their more radical ideas into law. The prevalence of regional, ethnic, and economic differences within the party, the electoral map and the structure of the Senate, the need to raise money from economic elites to finance elections—all these things tend to prevent Democrats in office from straying too far from the center. In fact, I know very few elected Democrats who neatly fit the liberal caricature; the last I checked, John Kerry believes in maintaining the superiority of the U.S. military, Hillary Clinton believes in the virtues of capitalism, and just about every member of the Congressional Black Caucus believes Jesus Christ died for his or her sins.”

So Obama has done repudiated Pastor Wright - now here comes the reward:

WASHINGTON (AP) - A leader of the Democratic Party under Bill Clinton has switched his allegiance to Barack Obama and is encouraging fellow Democrats to “heal the rift in our party” and unite behind the Illinois senator.

Joe Andrew, who was Democratic National Committee chairman from 1999-2001, planned a news conference Thursday in his hometown of Indianapolis to urge other Hoosiers to support Obama in Tuesday’s primary, perhaps the most important contest left in the White House race. He also has written a lengthy letter explaining his decision that he plans to send to other superdelegates.

snip

Andrew said the Obama campaign never asked him to switch his support, but he decided to do so after watching Obama’s handling of two issues in recent days. He said Obama took the principled stand in opposing a summer gas tax holiday that both Clinton and McCain supported, even though it would have been easier politically to back it. And he said he was impressed with Obama’s handling of the controversy surrounding his former pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

Wright’s outspoken criticisms of the United States have threatened Obama’s candidacy. Obama initially refused to denounce his former pastor, but he did so this week after Wright suggested that Obama secretly agrees with him.

“He has shown such mettle under fire,” Andrew said in the interview. “The Jeremiah Wright controversy just reconfirmed for me, just as the gas tax controversy confirmed for me, that he is the right candidate for our party.”

See how that works kiddies? Swear total fealty to corporate America/big oil/our national mythology and you will get a big old cookie.