It slams the Right for mocking our most revered principles through its support of torture, its reliance on thugs and mercenaries, its sacking of civil liberties, its gutting of universal health care, and its inability to understand that complex problems like those surrounding immigration cannot be solved simply by constructing a wall or enacting deportation laws.
Who are the thugs and mercenaries? If you call them thugs, which I normally define as criminals, name them and the violations of USC that they have committed, please. If mercenaries, name the foreign troops that are serving in the US military, please. What civil liberties have been suspended, precisely? Health care is not a right. Earn your pay, and buy it! And, immigration is not a right, it is a privilege that must be earned.
Semper fi
Exposing the Wrong Side of Right
"Has the United States been usurped by subversives?" a woman asked at a recent talk I gave in Massachusetts.
"Yes," I answered, adding, "If you want the whole story, I suggest you read Arianna Huffington's new book Right is Wrong."
I give this advice often these days.
Huffington has walked among those she chastises, the hallmark of the most believable of critics. Few in the U.S. are more qualified than she to lay bare the sad facts around the betrayal of the United States by its leaders -- in the Republican Party and with the corroboration of both the Democrats and the mainstream media.
Her assessment of the current hijacking of a nation that emerged from World War II as the hero of freedom and the defender of democracy is insightful, eloquent, and shockingly informative. Most of the world -- outside the United States -- understands that the corporatocracy (those who run our biggest corporations and, through them, control the majority of our politicians) have not only emasculated us, but have sent us spinning toward global environmental disaster.
Unfortunately, few who live within the empire's borders are as enlightened as those who are subjugated by it. Huffington is determined to change that.
As a past servant to the corporatocracy, I am deeply moved by the honesty of this self-avowed "former right-winger". Like her, I have witnessed first-hand the clandestine nature of the Right's strategies and also the temptation on the part of the citizenry to accept the Right's lies that what they do is done to serve the nation's best interests, rather than to promote their own greed for more money and power.
Right is Wrong exposes the underbelly of a beast whose claws have shredded our most sacred documents. It slams the Right for mocking our most revered principles through its support of torture, its reliance on thugs and mercenaries, its sacking of civil liberties, its gutting of universal health care, and its inability to understand that complex problems like those surrounding immigration cannot be solved simply by constructing a wall or enacting deportation laws. (Reading Huntington's comments on this last subject, I was reminded of a conversation I recently had with a top official in the Nicaraguan government. "Your immigration problems," she said "are the result of flawed Washington-driven 'free' trade agreements. When you destroy a country's economy, you must see that its people have no choice but to find work among you, the ones who stole their jobs.")
Perhaps Huffington's most devastating indictment is her conclusion regarding the callous manner in which the tragedy of 9/11 was used as a vehicle for consolidating power:
The Right's hijacking of America would not have been possible without its masterful use of fear to sway a nation terrified by the 9/11 attacks. It's a symptom of just how sick the radical Right is that their immediate response to 9/11 was to look for opportunities to push their agenda.
Huffington's analysis inevitably leads to a conclusion that more and more people are reaching. If we are to pass a planet on to our children that they will want to inherit, we must rise out of our adolescent colonizing worldview. We must evolve into a mature recognition that we are a highly interdependent species. We must see that the environmental and social problems confronting us today are forcing us to unite, to recognize that old ideas of nation-hood have gone the way of the nation-state concepts of yesteryear. Our very survival depends on our ability to comprehend the simple fact that we live on a small, tightly knit planet.
Not long ago I spent an afternoon with an ex-CIA officer, a man who had risen to the top as an agent-in-the-field. He confided in me his concern that the Right refuses to admit to the damage it has wrought. He fears that its strategists will trigger another 9/11 type event before the next election. "If that happens," he said, "the majority will vote for the fighter pilot, McCain."
Books like Arianna Huffington's latest offer us our best protection against such an occurrence. Her masterful exposure of a Right that is capable of provoking an ex-CIA agent to even entertain such thoughts is a gift to us and our progeny.
John Perkins is the author of The New York Times bestsellers, Confessions of an Economic Hit Man and The Secret History of the American Empire.
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Who are the thugs and mercenaries? Well let's see, I'll call bush himself a thug, the very man who is causing (indirectly, I'll grant you) all of these problems. As far as mercenaries, have you ever heard of a little company called Blackwater????
You're right, healthcare is not a right, but LIFE, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are. Since part of life is LIVING, I'm gonna say that healthcare should certainly be looked at as a right, just like they looked at a public defender in criminal cases if a person couldn't afford it. Further, do you have ANY idea how difficult it is nowadays to find an employer who provides healthcare AND enough pay to afford it???? I'm guessing not!
And speaking of life, LIBERTY and the pursuit of happiness, you ask what liberties have been infringed upon. Have you ever heard of a little thing called the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America??? I'm guessing not, since you don't think that it's wrong for the government OF the people, BY the people, and FOR the people to be spying on whomever they decide to without a warrant.
And one more thing. You've never answered this question before, but I must ask it again: How can you claim to be allowed to use the term Semper fi while being so obviously anti-American???
There are many of us who are not at all in favor of universal health care. You act as if the government is thwarting the will of the people in this case.
Mr. Perkins I think you used the word "corroboration" when you meant "collaberation." It totally changes the meaning of the sentence:
"... the betrayal of the United States by its leaders -- in the Republican Party and with the corroboration of both the Democrats and the mainstream media."
"It's a symptom of just how sick the radical Right is that their immediate response to 9/11 was to look for opportunities to push their agenda."
===============================================================================
May we please stop EUPHEMIZING??!!
They are not "sick", they are not "mistaken" or "misguided".
They are EVIL.
Spell it out: E-V-I-L.
Say it: EVIL!!!
Lying, cheating, starting wars on false pretenses, stealing elections
and Billion$ of dollar$ of taxpayer money is CRIMINAL, EVIL AND
probably even TREASONOUS.
It's empirical, folks.
There's no getting around it.
More & more people are waking up every day and realizing
AMERICA HAS BEEN TAKEN OVER BY CROOKS AND THUGS.
Any country that openly allows legislation to be purchased can't survive for long. In the USA it is quite possible to pay a Senator or Representative to put forth legislation that is injurious to the citizenry and to never be punished for it.
The return on the bribe tends to be minimally at least 1,000 to 1. You need merely call the bribe a campaign contribution and make sure it appears to come from several individuals.
There is no way that Big Pharma did not pay someone to insert the "no medicine price negotiation" section in the healthcare bill. No politician nor low level functionary would do such a thing without some monetary reward. There is ideology in existence that would claim it is a right and proper action benefiting the American Public. The refusal of the GOP to overturn it bespeaks even more bribes.
Even more interesting is the refusal to investigate and uncover the people involved. How much did that cost? I know it cost the citizenry several billion dollars but I bet it cost Big Pharama well under $1 million.
You could apply this many transactions and groups. It really all started with FDR's trashing of the constitution. SS, medicare and welfare are all unconstitutional functions of government. Once these things were put into law without a constitutional amendment what was to stop anything from being made into law. Once the populace realizes that it can vote itself benefits from the public treasury you are going downt he path to ruin.
I don't see Dems or Reps stopping it.
You mention Big Pharma because they are seen as villians. But many groups "bribe" government officials. Trial Lawyers, public employee unions, latinos, teachers, police, firefighters, etc. Everyone is trying to feed at the trough of big government.
I have been saying evil about them for 20 years. They must be weeded from the garden. Pulling weeds from my garden is so goooooood.
weeds are not evil.
They are persistent but unwanted visitors who come and stay because the environment is hospitable.
If I follow through with your analogy, it makes more sense to change the environment than pull the weeds -- they'll only come back again. But taking the analogy further, your garden is the interloper in nature, and the weeds are the rightful natives.
Yes, weak analogy. Right-wingers are not weeds. Nor are they evil, IMHO. I don't think it's appropriate to call any people "evil" (even Hitler and Stalin); their deeds may be evil, but I think there's hope for redemption in everyone.
Calling people "evil" feels good, in the vent-your-outrage sense, but I don't think it is actually helpful in mitigating evil actions and preventing more of them in the future. It diminishes us (the namecallers) as well, and, by giving full reign to our anger, enables and promotes lapses in judgment like those that followed GWB's denunciation of the "Axis of Evil".
I think "sick" is the better word.
I am not being insincere when I say that nothing opened my eyes more widely as to how our "great" nation operates under the surface than John Perkins' book "Confessions of an Economic Hitman".
I have maintained since reading it that it should be required reading in all high schools. This is obviously a pipe dream because the book is so threatening to the corporatocracy in America that they could never allow these truths to be that widely exposed.
If you know anything about John Perkins, his whole life since he stopped doing the corporatocracy's dirty work has to been to raise the level of awareness within these very same corporations as to their culpability in the serious problems that are besetting the earth, the environment and the billions and billions of organisms that are so closely connected to each other.
So John Perkins' recommendation of Arianna's new book is high praise indeed. And when you're done reading "Right is Wrong", I'd highly recommend "Confessions of an Economic Hitman" and his followup book, "The Secret History of the American Empire".
I could say that about Charles Murray's Book, "Losing Ground....". It is about the failure of the welfare state. But I bet the government bureaucracy has seen to it that it does not reach the hands of the students in the public school system.
Was the "Great American Experiment" in fact a failure?
The United States of America was never militarily defeated from without, but it seems to be worse-than militarily defeated from within. Rome fell in just the same way.
When a nation is strutting around the globe demanding that World War III be started, and when it makes no secret of the fact that it has thousands of nuclear weapons and is anxious to use them, there is a "clear and present danger" to the world community. One way to address that is, of course, to give the war-hawks what they so earnestly want: war. The other is to drop that nation's economy into such a dark hole that the people of that country rebel before any shots are fired. I believe that this struggle is being played-out before our eyes, or rather that it would be if our eyes were not bound-up and our ears stuffed.
We know ... we have always known ... that "World War Episode III" is overdue. We also know that each Episode begins where the last one left off. So we're looking at nuclear war, but with a twist: the aggressor is not Russia, is not Germany, is none other than ... the United States.
The time to interdict this fate is ... right now.
Ready to impeach? Do you yet comprehend the calamity that may befall you if you DON'T?
This is classic liberalism. We are so bad. We are so selfish. Blah, Blah. That's why after about two years of democratic hand wringing and weeping and depression the voters usually backlash in favor of the less popular but more realistic and pragmatic republicans. Who then go about screwing up a slam dunk.
When the great american public sees a problem and begins to correct it thats a sign of strength, not weakness. I'm a republican and even I know that it's time for a change. The politics of our system is beginning to correct the excesses of the neocons [thats "neocons", not conservatives]. American conservatism and liberalism are now fighting over idealistic, economic and political issues. It has happened before and will happen again. But, if democrats insist on demonizing the american public like they have 60% of democratic voters in West Virginia your party will be in for a long cold winter in the wilderness.
Poppy cock! the downfall of america due to fear mongering and greed is no way for this great land to fall. So we shall persist, we are good people not afraid of the monsters among us unlike the german people during Hitlers reign.
And yet when we ARE, in fact, strutting around the world attempting to say how everyone should bow down to us because we can destroy them all militarily.......
Wake up Republican.....the coffee is brewing and the world is watching. Read more about the world and the impact that the USA has had on it. Go forth into the world and ask them why they hate us. Go and state proudly that you are an American and check out the looks in their eyes. Thrust your chest out and watch the sneers.
To rebuild America back to what it was before you, proud Republicans, got your greedy mits on it, we will have to somehow change how the rest of the world we live in views us. Heal ourselves from within and without.
Your best comment was Blah Blah Blah....that is what the right says to the left. You think that covers the argument. Go get a cup of the coffee you brewed.
Good morning.
This is classic liberalism. We are so bad. We are so selfish. Blah, Blah. That's why after about two years of democratic hand wringing and weeping and depression the voters usually backlash in favor of the less popular but more realistic and pragmatic republicans. Who then go about screwing up a slam dunk.
When the great american public sees a problem and begins to correct it thats a sign of strength, not weakness. I'm a republican and even I know that it's time for a change. The politics of our system is beginning to correct the excesses of the neocons [thats "neocons", not conservatives]. American conservatism and liberalism are now fighting over idealistic, economic and political issues. It has happened before and will happen again. But, if democrats insist on demonizing the american public like they have 60% of democratic voters in West Virginia your party will be in for a long cold winter in the wilderness.
in answer to your second comment:
Wake up Republican.....the coffee is brewing and the world is watching. Read more about the world and the impact that the USA has had on it. Go forth into the world and ask them why they hate us. Go and state proudly that you are an American and check out the looks in their eyes. Thrust your chest out and watch the sneers.
To rebuild America back to what it was before you, proud Republicans, got your greedy mits on it, we will have to somehow change how the rest of the world we live in views us. Heal ourselves from within and without.
Your best comment was Blah Blah Blah....that is what the right says to the left. You think that covers the argument. Go get a cup of the coffee you brewed.
Good morning.
Here's a bit of news for you, Brownshirt. The American public has already backlashed. It happened in 2000 and again in 2004. These days, the Dems need not only a majority but a great majority to overcome the "Diebold election correction".
And why haven't the "true conservatives" booted the Neocons from their ranks. Are you guys just as whimpy as you say Dems are or are they just too busy enjoying the ride?
Bitter much?
And don't forget to kiss your tightly-clutched gun.
LOL!!
Call me paranoid if you must, but I'm getting scared. This morning's headline on Drudge: 'Bush intends to attack Iran before the end of his term'. I've said for many, many months that I doubt he'll leave. The neocons are becoming visible as the lunatics that they are. I no longer discount the nuts who supported the 9/11 conspiracy theory. And I no longer think this administration is beyond ANYTHING to keep power.
Lord help us.
Iran will be the great dewbacle, the military will not go for it believe me on that one. 76 percent of the armed forces hold bush in distain and along with MCain. Let hi try to hit Iran. He will be impeach and held in detention.
"Conspiracy Theorist" is a label given to those who tend to speak truth to power.....or, at the very least, who recognize the truth even when it's buried beneath the madness.
He may try to not leave, but do you honestly think that will matter? If he attempts to stay in power, he needs the military on his side. Not only will they not stand with him (since the military is VERY good about training the people who fight for them to respect the constitution!!!!) but they WILL stand with the rightful president! And don't worry about blackwater, the military (even with all the troops out in other countries) outnumbers and outguns them by several times!!!
Thank you for no longer discounting me, one of the "nuts."
I doubt if there are any levels the neocons won't sink to. They're sociopathic, if not psychopathic.
You use "corrobaration" for "collaboration".
We haven't stolen jobs from Nicaragua. Your entire take on Nafta is confused.
nicaragua isn't in north america... also, last i checked, there was more than one "free trade" agreement.
"Not long ago I spent an afternoon with an ex-CIA officer, a man who had risen to the top as an agent-in-the-field. He confided in me his concern that the Right refuses to admit to the damage it has wrought. He fears that its strategists will trigger another 9/11 type event before the next election. "If that happens," he said, "the majority will vote for the fighter pilot, McCain.""
Maybe it was the same guy that told me about the mind-controlling aliens that landed in Roswell back in the fifties.
Again, corporations are the bad guys......you know, the ones providing jobs, straining under the yoke of incredibly stilting taxes. And again, the socialist hack nipping at the knees of success as if profit is evil. One has to wonder exactly what caused the wonderful high standard of living attained by Americans if not the ultimate good in them. Whatever, it was not socialism calling for capitalism's destruction during brown-nosing tributes from colleague authors.
profit at the expense of *all* else IS evil. a high standard of living has nothing to do with being a good person. it has to do with being a self-serving person. corporations pay almost nothing in taxes. they also seem to be firing more people then they are hiring. corporations get their money from the little guys they shit all over. if they suck them dry their profits will dry up along with them.
And that's why we need regulation of industry. Since corporations CAN'T look at the long term, since it almost always costs them money in the short term, we need a non-profit organization to inform them of what they MUST do to CREATE a long term strategy! Since the govt is the organization with the outreach and law making abilities, this role falls to the govt by default, unless someone like bush or raygun specifically FORCES the govt to ignore its duties!
No, he never said corporations are the bad guys. He said that unchecked power in ANY way is bad, and that corporations currently have an unchecked power, much like bush does!
As far as profit being bad, nobody has EVER said that. All that we said is that, since corporations are looking ONLY for profit, we need some non-profit organization to ensure that they perform the tasks which NEED to be performed to allow for good products AND good profits!
And please tell me that you aren't dumb enough to think that we weren't regulating business in the middle of the 20th century, when we had that major expansion you are being so bubbly about!!!
Posted May 19, 2008 | 10:39 PM (EST)