May 05, 2011: Media conservatives are insisting that George W. Bush deserves as much credit as President Obama for the death of Osama Bin Laden, if not more. However, making this argument means ignoring what the Bush administration itself reportedly called its “gravest error” — not capturing bin Laden at Tora Bora in 2001 — and Bush’s 2002 statement that he was “not concerned” about bin Laden. [ READ MORE ]
This is also in stark contrast to their usual attacks that Obama is responsible for things that are happening during his presidency, including those tied to Bush-era policies like the Gulf oil spill, the weak economy, and the nation’s deficit problems. [ READ MORE ]
Dishonest Crook Sean Hannity Says Bush Not Obama Deserves Credit For Bin Laden Killing!
Hannity: We Got Osama Bin Laden “Thanks To George Bush“
Brent Bozell: Bush Gets All The Credit, None Of The Blame
Donald ‘Birther’ Trump: Obama is Getting Too Much Credit on Osama Bin Laden
Obama To GOP ‘Appeasement‘ Critics: ‘Ask Osama Bin Laden’
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Osama Bin Laden: Obama Reminds GOP He Won’t Be Underestimated
——————————————————– Other Lies, Distortions, Mis-information and Outright Racism From Fox and Other Right-Wing Political Whore Houses [ WorldNetDaily: Obama "Wants To Import Homosexuals" ]
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Fox Sees “Black Reparations” In UN Climate Deal in Durban, South Africa
“Fuzzy Math“: Fox’s Latest Attempt To Obscure The Current Unemployment Figures — Ever since the Department of Labor released the November unemployment numbers, which showed that the unemployment rate had dropped to 8.6 percent from 9 percent, Fox News has had trouble accurately presenting the data. [ READ MORE ] [ DISHONEST FOX NEWS CHARTS ]
Debating Government Involvement In Health Care, O’Reilly Tries To Claim The Military Is Not Government-Controlled
Limbaugh Plays “First Family Early Kwanzaa Celebration” Parody That Features Jeremiah Wright
Limbaugh Congratulates Himself For Hoping Obama Fails
Limbaugh: Obama “Sabotaged” And “Tried To Undermine” The Iraq War
Limbaugh: Democrats “Can’t Win Unless There Is Vote Fraud” And “Signature Fraud“
Anyone Convinced that Depleted Uranium Is Safe Should Read This
What follows summarizes one article, already produced, and synopsizes another narrative, forthcoming in a few days. The rationale for giving folks a summary and a preview is twofold.
In the first place, these are extremely complicated issues, a full understanding of which inevitably involves digging pretty deeply into background, technical data, and divergent perspectives about the evidence and how to analyze it. Under such circumstance, many people prefer to know ‘the skinny’ or ‘executive summary’ and leave the heavy-lifting for nerds and policy wonks.
In the second place, even if someone shoulders the responsibility to plow through the intricacies of such problems, she might not have time right now. He might markedly prefer to receive a briefing, with appropriate coordinates to find the more complete account, so as to be able to have a sense of context going in, choosing the moment to try to take in the bigger picture, as it were.
In any case, here readers see a short queue. The first place tells of a piece posted a couple of weeks ago. The second stop proffers the essence of an upcoming installment.
A RECAP
In the initial article of this partnered pair, the narrative introduced the fiery clash that has occurred over the impacts of Depleted Uranium munitions. Given such deep-seated differences of opinion, a widespread, grassroots dialog and policy consideration might serve purposes both scientific and political. An increase in knowledge almost always attends such processes; popular decision-making is impossible without the necessary understanding and nexus of participation.
A contextualization of DU followed, in which the general historical omnipresence of class oppression and imperial-industrial growth arguably went hand-in-hand. What Jeremiah Wright called a ‘theology of liberation’ has acted as a counterpoise to this central tendency of domination by propertied elites.
Taking DU as a plausible expression of both ruling-class self-interest and imperial hegemony, last week’s text focused on a particular effort of the Manhattan Project’s S-I Uranium Committee. A subcommittee of that body, so vital to the success of the race for atomic weapons, examined with some care the question of creating lethal instruments from fission, creating ‘dirty bombs’ out of waste and by-products of the inherent work of trying to construct an atomic explosive.
The likely formulation of such deadly machines would have been as poison gas bombs of some sort. From this demonstrable fact, various opponents of contemporary DU weaponry have concluded that this ‘Groves-Memorandum’ acted as the inception of the United States’ pathway toward the present deployment of DU as a devastating component of bullets and cannon shells and bombs of various sizes.
Stentorian and frequent and derisive critique of these arguments has emanated from the ranks of Health Physics experts and from former members of the military who dismiss any contention of significant dangers flowing from DU weapons. Such disputants hammer on the otherwise accurate summation that nowhere in either the summary memo or the original report’s easily available text do the authors–Conant, Compton, and Urey–make any mention of Uranium.
Instead of engaging in a dialog about this interpretation, however, these voluble naysayers condemned the anti-DU proponents of this position as frauds and charlatans. In fact, quite the opposite is, reasonably, a much more legitimate conclusion.
The horrific toxicity of Uranium is well-established. The USG inclination to develop weapons of indiscriminate effect, putting poison by-products to ‘productive’ use, is incontrovertible. Mass murder repeatedly happened at the behest of the U.S. Government, through the technology of fission weapons and their aftermath. Moreover, the USG approached these matters as opportunities for human experiment.
As well, Leuren Moret, whose analysis led the way in linking DU with the Manhattan Project, offers testimony from Manhattan-Engineering District participants that scientists and bureaucrats involved with the S-1 subcommittee did in fact intend to include Uranium in the lethal stew that this small group was contemplating. In no obvious way do the supposed scholars so busily casting aspersions refute Moret’s directly pertinent rebuttal.
Thus, any wholesale rejection of the notion that 1940′s experts imagined the possibility of weaponizing Uranium is at best one plausible assertion. In fact, such a view goes against both analytical and evidentiary elements of this case.
However, rather than merely proposing that the DU decriers have clearly won this battle of wits, this humble correspondent proceeded to call for a Peoples Congress on this particular issue, and on the wider questions associated with the employment of DU ordnance and the insistence that a ‘renaissance’ of the Nuclear Fool Cycle is in the best interest, here or elsewhere, of citizens and soldiers and civilians. Without going into devilish details, THC does insist that such a community-led conversation may be the only way to achieve anything akin to justice or consensus on DU.
The present pages provide further background useful to the creation of such a forum. The nature of this explication is the articulation, development, and defense of a thesis that might account for the attendant facts of DU and the dogfights which it has engendered.
A BRIEF PREFACE
In the first portion of this duo, readers may easily have gained adequate background to begin to speak, ask questions about, and generally learn more regarding the origins of ‘atomic energy,’ which, of course, started out exclusively as a modality for creating ‘gadgets’ that killed tens of thousands in one fell swoop. The data and background that these articles and the many other resources about DU provide permit at least a general discussion of the nuclear genie to move forward.
The present narrative installment seeks to accomplish one basic task, which is to proffer a hypothesis as to why such a toxic metal, in the context of ongoing doubts and fears about its safety, would end up the default choice of the USG and its military branches. This premise is fairly easy to state. Something like the following would fit the bill necessary to develop the argument here.
‘The development of nuclear weaponry, and all the attendant events and processes related to them–such as the so-called Nuclear Fuel Cycle of the both weapons and power based on fission or fusion; such as the problem of atomic wastes and such opportunistic ‘solutions’ to that problem as the manufacture and use of DU ordnance; such as the policy choices to pursue a ‘Nuclear Renaissance;’ and so forth–not only emanate from and serve both the dominance of capitalism, but they also represent the primary, and some would say the only, focus or methodology that financial Plutocrats, who have come to predominate the entire system, will accept to resolve capitalism’s inherent and ever-recurring crises.‘
Readers should note that this leaves aside all judgments about the viability of these glowing, radioactive choices. It completely ignores the opinions, more or less informed, that the Fuel-Cycle is in fact a ‘Fool-Cycle’ that guarantees human mayhem, dissolution, and decline as the best possible outcome. Of course, such beliefs are typical of this humble correspondent and many wiser than he.
However, the point of the forthcoming investigation and analysis, which these paragraphs merely summarized, is to explore the rationality of the thesis. Does capital necessitate a nuclear highway? That would be the preliminary conclusion of THC, and the pages-to-come are the initial presentation of a proof about that.
This first pass, though, will not attempt a complete telling of the tale of the hypothesis-in-action, but instead will circumscribe the assessment by tending to revolve an examination of DU in the process. In part, this is the result of the alleged, and quite plausible, social damage that has accompanied the political and economic underpinnings of DU’s deployment. In part, the emphasis on DU follows from the way that this unfolding catastrophe–or, if one prefers, highly charged controversy–sheds so much light on how capital created this situation and how its manifestation illustrates the chief proposition itself.
The choice here, to make a radical excision in order to present an overview of multifaceted difficulties, may or may not end up making the other materials more digestible. But the idea seemed a worthy experiment, in the same sense that long reports and other texts often begin with such brief statements of the case.
Besides, my wife be me that this would be a good idea. I couldn’t resist the wager.
Palin is so determinedly American that, when she went into labor with Willow on the Fourth of July while kayaking on Memory Lake in Wasilla, she writes, “I so wanted a patriotic baby that I paddled as hard as I could to speed up the contractions, but she held out until the next day.” — Maureen Dowd, New York Times — Read Her Column Titled: “Rogue American Woman“
Just last week Fox’s syphilitic LIAR Sean Hannity misleadingly aired video from the 9-12 March on Washington while discussing Rep. Michele Bachmann’s (R-MN) much smaller November 5 anti-health care reform rally to claim that “twenty-thousand plus” people showed up to Bachmann’s protest. Hannity’s video switch-up — which Jon Stewart highlighted on The Daily Show — is just the latest example of Fox News hosts’ extensive history of deceptively using video and photos to advance a false or misleading story line. [ READ MORE ] [ Hannity Apologizes For Lying ]
Video Fox’s Jarrett claims is “just coming in” of “huge crowds” on Palin book tour actually 2008 campaign footage
Norah O’Donnell stumps STUPID Palin supporter by asking about Palin’s support of bailouts
On Limbaugh’s show, Palin fearmongered about “jail time as punishment” in Senate health care bill
Mark Levin to Palin: “You’re absolutely right about” “death panels“
Palin visited with ‘King of Mis-Information‘ Sean Hannity last night — during which she admitted she is was a ‘D’ student — among many other things
Palin is “all for” “profiling” in order to “save innocent American lives“
Palin cites Newsmax, the right-wing LIE Magazine as one of the sources she reads
Palin and Hannity commiserate over McCain campaign’s supposedly insufficient use of Ayers and Wright
References:
1.Sarah Palin’s ‘rogue’ Christianity — Did God plan for her to become Governor of Alaska. If so, did God plan for her to step down. Did God plan for her to run for Vice President? If so why did she and McCain lose? Did God plan for her to have a child with Down’s Syndrome? If so why did she consider an abortion? Did God plan for her to have a huge wardrobe? Then why did she apologize for it? [ READ MORE ]
By: Prof. Jonathan L. Walton … in Obama’s America, the white kids now get beat up with the black kids cheering, “Yay, right on, right on, right on, right on,” and, of course, everybody says the white kid deserved it, he was born a racist, he’s white. Newsweek magazine told us this. We know that white students are destroying civility on buses, white students destroying civility in classrooms all over America, white congressmen destroying civility in the House of Representatives. — Rush Limbaugh, Sept. 15, 2009
Ever the statesman, and often candid to a political fault, former President Jimmy Carter said recently that much of the animosity directed toward President Barack Obama is “based on the fact that he is a black man.”
A lifelong Southerner, Carter acknowledged that the inclination of racism still exists, and that “it has bubbled up to the surface because of the belief among many white people, not just in the South but around the country, that African Americans are not qualified to lead this great country.”
Though courageous, the former president’s pronouncement will surely be considered controversial to many Republicans and Democrats alike. Some will view Carter’s comments as politically inexpedient.
The topic of race in general, and charges of racism in particular, is political dynamite that typically explodes in the hands of the accuser — just ask [Harvard] Professor Skip Gates, [New York] Gov. David Paterson, or Obama (whom I will return to momentarily).
Unless someone is wearing a Klan hood while yelling, “Nigger, Go Back to Africa,” the charge of racism seems to offend the accused these days more than the actual victims.
This is true, in part, due to the most prevalent view of the problem of race and racism in this country. In the eyes of many, the responsibility of moving beyond racial conflict in America is placed at the feet of minority communities of color, as opposed to the dominant society.
We’ve all heard it. America will move beyond race to a colorblind society only when minority groups cease dwelling on difference. Such a view permeates the melting pot ideal of American folklore, the myth of meritocracy and even the “post-racial” dimension of electoral politics.
Thus, for Carter to call out this segment of the white community, he is disrupting the conspiracy of silence concerning racial injustice that demands the allegiance of politicians on the national scene.
Think about it. Is this not the racial bargain that Obama accepted to become the nation’s first African American president? Matters pertaining to race have been avoided unless absolutely necessary (cough, cough, the Rev. [Jeremiah] Wright).
And in terms of policy, obstacles faced by any particular group, like disproportionate unemployment among communities of color, for example, are obfuscated by anemic and ineffectual broad-based prescriptions. Rising tides lift all boats, right?
Yet Obama’s enormous success in life, whether as a highly educated community organizer or as America’s commander in chief, exposes the paradox this sort of faux post-racialism presents.
It’s a one-sided deal for people of color; as “post-racial” in effect means post-black, post-brown, post-red and post-yellow, while leaving the normative racial framework of whiteness intact. Race is the challenge people of color must confront and, dare I say, “get over.”
But a post-racial America does not demand the same of those who identify with, and claim the social construction of, whiteness and perceived privileges and cultural superiority therein.
This is why, it would seem, Obama’s body standing behind the American presidential seal has a critical segment of America losing its hold on reality — a reality, I would argue, few have ever been forced to acknowledge up to this point.
Whether it’s the birthers, tea-baggers, deathers, indoctrinators, or “You lie!”-ers, they have neither veiled their racial animus nor cloaked their white nationalism. The prevalence of racist images of Obama brandished by protesters juxtaposed with calls of “taking our country back” are reminiscent of D.W. Griffith’s fictional America as depicted in the film Birth of a Nation.
Herein lies Carter’s perceptive point. Obama can’t win with these folks, because they are blinded not just by his race but also by an uncritical devotion to their own. His pigmentation rather than his policies cut against the grain of what these persons wrongly consider “natural” or “American.”
More specifically, his very being is a haunting rejoinder to such white Americans of what they are not — indeed what they have never been. This African American man with an Arabic name has dared to usurp all of the cultural and cognitive tropes that white supremacy has historically claimed for itself. He is calm in the face of their unrestrained emotion. The more illogical they act, the more rational he comes across. And, of course, the more eloquent and erudite he presents himself, the more he provokes the Joe Wilsons of the world to mindlessly blurt out, “You lie!”
In the process, Obama has transformed such opponents into the racial other, an uneducated and uncultured blob of white (and largely Southern) backwardness that is beyond the pale of social redemption or acculturation. Wilson and the remaining Sons of Confederate Veterans have, in effect, become this “black man’s burden.”
Maybe this helps explain Glenn Beck’s ridiculous yet probably heartfelt assertion that the president has a “deep-seated hatred for white people.”
Beck: Obama has “exposed himself as a guy” with “a deep seated hatred for white people“
The president reminds Beck, along with those who identify with Beck’s form of white neo-nationalism, of the lie of their own professed superiority — a place of comfort and privilege in America that was neither deserved nor ever attained, yet still claimed based on the pinkness of their skin and straightness of hair. Obama’s apparent success only further dismantles this lie and pours salt in socially insecure wounds.
Similar can be said of those who need the president to be Adolf Hitler. If Obama is Hitler, that means protestors can liken themselves unto the Jews; only this time it’s a victimized-yet-devout group of white Anglo-Saxon Protestants who want nothing more than to restore a nation that God, or more appropriately, Jefferson Davis, decreed as divinely their own.
The ability to make such ludicrous claims on conservative radio, Fox News, and on Capitol Hill, however, represents the kind of power that they unduly still possess. As tasteless as Wilson’s heckling of the president was, it still takes an immense level of privilege to be a jerk on the floor of Congress.
My point here is simply that the problem of race in America has never been solely or predominantly a minority issue. It is first and foremost, as Carter said, a problem of whiteness.
Just as racial segregation in Wilson’s fond memories of idyllic South Carolina was less about black people but a matter of white phobia, the lie of whiteness projects its fears upon minority bodies like the president’s in hopes of maintaining its own unhealthy and unrealistic sense of being in charge.
This is why James Baldwin rightly suggested years ago that “the vast amount of the energy that goes into what we call the ‘Negro problem‘ is produced by the white man’s profound desire not to be judged by those who are not white.”
I believe this applies to our current president and his most vocal critics. If he is framed as the foreigner, incarnate evil and indoctrinating Nazi, many won’t have to acknowledge that he may just be smart, sophisticated and a devout patriot. God forbid.
About The Author: Jonathan L. Walton is assistant professor of religious studies at the University of California, Riverside. He teaches courses in African American religion; religion, media and culture; and religion and political discourse. His new book is, Watch This! The Ethics and Aesthetics of Black Religious Broadcasting (New York University Press). Visit his site at: http://www.jonathanlwalton.com/
MediaMatters: On his radio program, Fox News’ Sean Hannity claimed that The Washington Post is trying to “smear, besmirch, [and] demonize” Virginia gubernatorial candidate Robert McDonnell (R) by going through “the great effort to dig up a graduate school thesis that he wrote,” adding that a thesis “by design is supposed to be provocative” and that McDonnell wrote his “20 years ago.” But during the 2008 presidential campaign, Hannity aggressively attacked Michelle Obama and Hillary Clinton for college theses they wrote more than 20 years ago.
Hannity was referring to an August 30 Post article about controversial views McDonnell expressed in his 1989 master’s thesis at CBN University, which was founded by Pat Robertson and named after his evangelical Christian Broadcasting Network; the university has since been renamed Regent University. [ READ MORE ]
Here is Sean Hannity Smearing Michelle Obama During The 2008 Elections: In several broadcasts of Fox News’ Hannity & Colmes, Sean Hannity repeatedly distorted a passage from Michelle Obama’s 1985 Princeton senior thesis to suggest that Obama was asserting her own views when she wrote that “[i]t is possible that Black individuals either chose to or felt pressure to come together with other Blacks on campus because of the belief that Blacks must join in solidarity to combat a White oppressor.” [ READ MORE ]
The Fox is Always Wrong!
…..and these diabolical G.O.P. attacks on Michelle Obama NEVER WORKED!Michelle Obama’s detractors had very thin gruel to fuel their outrage: a happy remark in Wisconsin in February that “for the first time in my adult life, I am really proud of my country;” a relatively downbeat primary-season stump speech that stressed the struggles of working-class and middle-class Americans; her imputed blame for the past and recent antics of the Obama’s long-time pastor, Jeremiah Wright; and a Princeton senior thesis written more than two decades ago that was been ignorantly described as an endorsement of racial separatism.
But this limited material generated endless hostile conservative blog posts, a series of tirades by pundits ranging from Bill O’Reilly to Christopher Hitchens, a cover article for National Review calling her “Mrs. Grievance,” and a racially tinged internet ad sponsored by the Tennessee Republican Party.
And where there was no “evidence” to distort of Michelle Obama’s supposed anti-American bitterness, radicalism, and racialism, was invented, as shown by the viral rumor, completely unfounded, that there was some video floating around showing her ranting about “whitey“–in some versions, in the company of Louis Farrakhan. [ More on Why The Blistering G.O.P. Attacks On Michelle Obama Never Worked ]
Reference: Media Matters offered an admirably comprehensive look at Fox News dog-man Sean Hannity’s most wet-brained (but creative!) Obama smears of the entire 2008 campaign. Here are the five cleverest
