| by Ron Jacobs
( December 29, 2012, Virginia, Sri
Lanka Guardian) Each year seems to go quicker than the last. This phenomenon is
partially related to the shrinking proportion of my life each year represents.
It is is also due to the ever-increasing volume of events that seem to occur
every annum and our expanding awareness of them. The latter is because of media
over-saturation, more than any other reason. Anyhow, here we are again; year's
end and time to think about how things stand from.
Of course, for US residents the
election was one of the bigger events. The never-ending mainstream media
coverage of the candidates and their campaigns ranged from the ridiculous to
the idiotic. The ultra-right wing elements of the US polity were given much
more airplay than their numbers merit. One assumes this is because of the noise
they make, but more importantly because of the media they own and control.
Foremost among that media, of course, is FoxNews. Although their viewership
rarely changes, the fact that it is steady and makes a lot of money for Rupert
Murdoch and his minions creates a scenario where other corporate media tends to
imitate FoxNews' shallow approach, unbalanced coverage, and its catering to the
most racist and sexist elements of the US population.
It's not that NBC, CBS, ABC, etc.
are proto-fascist like FoxNews. However, the ultra-right politics of Fox have
pulled every other news corporation to the right as they compete for what seems
to be a sure profit margin. This reasoning does not excuse the general tendency
of corporate news to support the state and the corporations it serves; nor does
it ignore the fact that the owners of most major news agencies and broadcasters
are closely connected to the ownership of the defense industry, big Pharma, the
financial industry and other segments of corporate America.
Back to the election. It ended the
way I figured it would. Mitt Romney never really had a chance, despite what the
media wanted the public to believe. His aloofness, religion, and overall lack
of understanding of how life is for most voters guaranteed that the only way he
was going to win on November 6th was if the GOP stole the election. They may
have considered this, but the numbers made it impossible to carry out. Barack
Obama has yet to genuinely uphold the expectations of most people who voted for
him. How he acts during the ongoing debate over Social Security, Medicare and
other social programs will reveal whether he ever will uphold those
expectations. If I were a betting man, my money would not be on him doing so.
When it comes to other aspects of
sitting in the imperial office however, Mr. Obama will do what all too many of
his supporters want him to do. He will continue sending armed drones to kill
brown skinned men and women, whether those murdered are actually the intended
targets or merely their family and friends. This element of Obama's policy was
a selling point of his campaign. Except for those that identify as antiwar for
pacifist or anti-imperialist reasons, most US residents seem to have very few
problems with this approach to maintaining the Empire. As long as few or no
Americans die, war is okay. Richard Nixon understood this in 1970 (after the
hubbub surrounding his invasion of Cambodia died down.) Bill Clinton finessed
this approach with his cruise missile attacks and the 1999 bombing of
Yugoslavia. Obama's drones, after all is considered, are really nothing more
than sophisticated cruise missiles. One of the challenges for what remains of
the antiwar movement is how to get people to care that this heartless murder
continues, bankrupting not only any moral cache they believe the US still has,
but also the nation's economic future.
Let me step away from the most
immediate concerns of the American people and look across the oceans. Israel
continues its transition to an ever more militarist and authoritarian state
whose policies draw the condemnation of more and more governments, NGOs,
international bodies and individuals around the world. Yet, there is no
indication of any moves away from the ongoing murder, persecution, torture and
basic denial of human rights to the Palestinians. The refusal of Washington to
challenge Tel Aviv in any meaningful way provides Netanyahu and most other
Israeli politicians with all of the justification they need. Whether or not
Washington's failure will end up with US and Israeli forces engaged in battle
with Iran in 2013 remains a genuine concern.
This brings the conversation around
to Syria. What began as a protest against the brutal excesses of the Assad
regime broadened into a movement against the effects of neoliberalism in that
country. Like every state capitalist economy, the onslaught of neoliberal
capitalism created a situation where the ruling clique grew rich by selling off
state-owned properties while the rest of the nation suffered from the ending of
subsidies and other forms of economic aid. When the aforementioned protests
were met with brutal repression, the protesters turned to guns. This encouraged
other groups with their own motives--religious, economic and political--to pick
up arms and enjoin the battle. In addition, outside agencies, including the
monarchies of Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, various salafist and other
fundamentalist political Islamists, and NATO governments, are all fighting for
whatever remains after Assad is finally unseated. There does not seem to be a
good ending to the tragedy that Syria has become, unless your name happens to
be Hecate.
The year ended in the United States
(more or less) with another massacre of innocents at school. The usual
responses occurred. Tears of all kinds, genuine and crocodile. Demands that all
guns be banned opposed by calls for more guns to be put in the hands of most
Americans (except for those named or looking like Trayvon Martin, of course).
It seems that the white nation built on blood has yet to get its fill, even
when it is their children whose blood is being shed.
The tea party is not over. I am not
optimistic how it will end.
The struggle continues.
Ron Jacobs is
the author of The Way the Wind Blew: a History of the Weather Underground and
Short Order Frame Up and a regular contributor with the Sri Lanka Guardian. His
collection of essays and other musings titled Tripping Through the American
Night is now available and his new novel is The Co-Conspirator’s Tale. He is a
contributor to Hopeless: Barack Obama and the Politics of Illusion, published
by AK Press . He can be reached at:
ronj1955@gmail.com.
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