Americans, Our Work Is Cut Out For Us In 2011

2010. What was that all about?

It is the end of another year, and quite a year it was. This time of year, this time of reflection, can bring joy, sorrow and pain all in one big dosage.

These days, I feel acutely aware of the tremendous suffering people are experiencing in this country today. And I'm astounded by the callousness and indifference of politicians who have the power to change things, yet pretend everything is just fine, that it is business as usual. Those of you who follow my writings know that I'm always trying to make sense of the political world. I follow trends in society, interpret my findings and attempt to give solutions. But now I'm just stumped. Stumped, because the problem seems so simple and straightforward, yet the prescription remains elusive. And while optimism usually tempers my stinging critique of the world's injustice, I don't know how optimistic I can be, or should be, about the future of this country.

The problem is that the United States is falling apart. It has become a Third World country. Record numbers of people are unemployed. About 44 million are in poverty in America--14.3 percent of the population--and one in three working families is near poverty. Food stamp usage has increased to 42.2 million this Thanksgiving, up 15 million from the start of the recession in December 2007. Millions have lost their homes, with 2.8 million foreclosures in 2009 alone, and an estimated 7.4 million between 2010 and 2012. Those who have lots never had so much of it, and those who have little never had it so bad. Most of all, there is no sense that things will improve, or that there is the political will to change it. And while we can talk about recessions and economic downturns, there is a sense that things are different this time around, that there will be no recovery in the traditional sense.

Nothing short of a massive mobilization of government will bring jobs to the millions of unemployed and underemployed, at wages that will enable them to support themselves and their families. After all, capitalism is being propped up now, and it cannot and will not supply the jobs. The fortunes of Wall Street and corporate America are not tied to Main Street, except to the extent that their prosperity seems to depend on everyone else's misery.

And yet, where is the will among our so-called public servants? U.S. democracy has been thoroughly bought out by wealthy interests, and the federal legislature is broken, that is, unless you're getting what you paid for. The Republicans are 100 percent owned by corporations, an unsavory amalgam of wingnuts, the greedy, segregationists, and Christian nationalists. Along with fear of their own shadow, Democrats' allegiances to moneyed interests often prevent them from doing the right thing, and compel them to water down the good into the mediocre.

In the White House today sits perhaps one of the most brilliant individuals to ever grace the office, if only he appreciated his power. His accomplishments already are greater than many of his predecessors. But then again, the wave of populism that swept him in power came with it great expectations, however unrealistic. This president has failed to harness that populist energy to its full potential. He keeps his progressive base at arm's length. He is non-confrontational, caves in too early on, capitulates, and doesn't put up a fight. There's not enough passion there, and too many status-quo, banker types at the table. And he prefers incrementalism when the times demand the bold change the people said they wanted.

Martin Luther King, a great leader often invoked by the president, dismissed those who urged him to not take direct action, and who counseled him against moving too fast: "The nations of Asia and Africa are moving with jetlike speed toward gaining political independence, but we still creep at horse and buggy pace toward gaining a cup of coffee at a lunch counter," King said in Letter from Birmingham Jail. Today, other nations, developing and advanced alike, are investing heavily in new technologies, high-speed rail and green energy. The U.S. wastes its money on wars it cannot afford, more army than the rest of the planet combined, and tax cuts for the wealthy it really, really cannot afford. This, as most of its people suffer and its infrastructure crumbles into dust.

But at least, as a friend jokingly reminded me recently, "we have guns and extra value meals and thousands of channels."

It is unrealistic to assume that one person, even the most powerful leader in the world, can solve the nation's problems in two years. Years of bad policy from Bush and neoliberal Dems brought us to where we are today. What concerns me is the lack of a sense of urgency from this White House-- that is, unless the administration is setting a trap for their adversaries, engaged in some multi-layered chess game that goes above my head and beyond my pay scale.

Called the negotiator-in-chief, the mediator-in-chief, even the half-stepper-in-chief, he apparently would compromise with people who would have his head, and they've told him as much. President Obama's quixotic search for bipartisanship paid off for him at a rather steep price: a tax cut bill that represents the worst of politics and policy, a GOP utopia. How unconscionable to give millionaires and billionaires a holiday present when a multitude cannot afford to put food on the table! Americans need help now, yesterday even, and they have little time to wait and see how this apparent Clinton 2.0 triangulation strategy works out for the 2012 presidential campaign.

Looking ahead to 2011, the Democratic base needs to help President Obama out. They need to "make him" do certain things. They need to provide the cover that F.D.R.'s base provided him 70 years ago to enact the New Deal. Most of all, this administration needs a narrative, a communications strategy with clearly defined enemies. It has to be about the Wall Street vs. Main Street, corporate excess vs. the franks and beans of everyday hardworking people. "I ask you to judge me by the enemies I have made," Roosevelt proclaimed. He said this of capitalistic greed and excess:

Primarily this is because rulers of the exchange of mankind's goods have failed through their own stubbornness and their own incompetence, have admitted their failure, and have abdicated. Practices of the unscrupulous money changers stand indicted in the court of public opinion, rejected by the hearts and minds of men. True they have tried, but their efforts have been cast in the pattern of an outworn tradition. Faced by failure of credit they have proposed only the lending of more money. Stripped of the lure of profit by which to induce our people to follow their false leadership, they have resorted to exhortations, pleading tearfully for restored confidence....The money changers have fled from their high seats in the temple of our civilization. We may now restore that temple to the ancient truths. The measure of the restoration lies in the extent to which we apply social values more noble than mere monetary profit.

Now that's what I'm talking about! But more importantly, this is not about President Obama, whose fate will be sealed in the ballot box, depending on how much or little his team will deliver. This is about a sustainable progressive movement that speaks to bread and butter issues, and will carry on regardless of who is president. 2011 must be about institution building--not an infrastructure for a presidential campaign, but a game plan for how we want this country to be, irrespective of party affiliation.

"A nation or civilization that continues to produce soft-minded men purchases its own spiritual death on the installment plan," King said. Let's not die, let's harden our minds, make it right, and get it done.

GOP Strives To Make Hate Groups Look Respectable

For good or for bad, you're judged by the company you keep, and that goes for the Republican Party and anyone else. But when the GOP is accused of cozying up to hate groups, they don't seem to distance themselves from the alleged affiliations, they embrace them. Sometimes Republicans go out of their way to demonstrate their approval of racist and homophobic organizations that we should all find objectionable.

Case in point: Haley Barbour, the Governor of Mississippi. Of the civil rights era, he said "I just don't remember it as being that bad," he told the Weekly Standard. "I remember Martin Luther King came to town, in '62. He spoke out at the old fairground and it was full of people, black and white." In Barbour's world, the races lived side by side during Jim Crow segregation, and the White Citizens' Council--known to many as the white collar Klan-- was a force for good in his hometown of Yazoo City:

You heard of the Citizens Councils? Up north they think it was like the KKK. Where I come from it was an organization of town leaders. In Yazoo City they passed a resolution that said anybody who started a chapter of the Klan would get their ass run out of town. If you had a job, you'd lose it. If you had a store, they'd see nobody shopped there. We didn't have a problem with the Klan in Yazoo City.

The reality of these councils was far different, as neo-confederate expert Edward Sebesta documents in his Citizens' Council newspaper historical website. The councils were established as a direct response to the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision, to resist desegregation and maintain white supremacy in the South. An article in the October 1955 edition of The Citizens' Council entitled, "Mississippi Citizens' Councils Are Protecting Both Races" had this to say:

Citizens' Councils, 60,000 strong and growing fast, are mobilizing Mississippi to guard both whites and Negroes.


Their aim is to preserve separation of the races against assaults form the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, in alliance with the federal government. At the same time, they are dedicated to protect the rank and file of Negroes from the wrath of ruffian white people who may resort to violence.

And in an article called "Texans Will Fight To Preserve Segregation":

There's a rainbow of hope in the dark "integration" sky in Texas.


The courageous spirit of manhood which had been somewhat dulled by more than twenty years of imported propaganda, brought into this country by way of Washington, is re-asserting itself and definite steps are being taken to counter the worst blow directed against the South since the Civil War.

Following the Supreme Court's ruling, which applied only to certain Negro children in Virginia, South Carolina, Delaware, Kansas and the District of Columbia, the NAACP, composed partly of Negroes but mostly of rich white trash, saw a chance to put a fast one over. They gave the South the rush act, with their attorneys and representatives spilling out into each State and insisting that de-segregation was now the law of the land. They were about to get by with it when the people of Texas, as well as its officials waked up and went into action. ...

The people of Texas, like those of the Deep South, have always been extremely fond of good Negroes....But in the final analysis and when the chips are down, they just don't go much for arrogant Mullatoes who come barging into the State from out of the East making threats...before rolling away in long black Cadillacs....

While the matter is far from settled, it is now clear that Texas, along with other States in the South, will exhaust every legal resource available in resisting the attempt of a Marxist-conscious Supreme Court to bring about mongrelization of the white race by judicial ruling.

And a pamphlet from the Association of Citizens' Councils titled "Why Does Your Community Need a Citizens' Council?" referred to the NAACP as the "National Association for the Agitation of Colored People." "We will not be integrated. We are proud of our white blood and our white heritage of sixty centuries," said the pamphlet. "We are certainly not ashamed of our traditions, our conservative beliefs, nor our segregated way of life."

Barbour seemed to backtrack from his comments praising the racist group, which is akin to getting a bucket of water after you just committed arson. After praising the Councils, he said the groups were "indefensible" and called segregation "a difficult and painful era for Mississippi."

Meanwhile, the GOP standard-bearers are taking sides in the latest battle between the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Family Research Council. The SPLC, a civil rights group based in Montgomery, Alabama, released a report called 18 Anti-Gay Groups and Their Propaganda. One of the groups named in the report is the Family Research Council, which is described by SPLC as a font of anti-gay propaganda that calls for the criminalization of homosexuality, and pushes false accusations linking gays to pedophilia. Tony Perkins, a former Louisiana state representative and the head of FRC, once paid $82,500 to use the mailing list of former Klan chieftain David Duke. Moreover, in 2001 Perkins gave a speech to the Council of Conservative Citizens, a white supremacist group that is the ideological heir to the White Citizens Councils of the 1950s and 1960s.

FRC is fighting back with a "Start Debating, Stop Hating" campaign. Not surprisingly, the Republican Party leaders are siding with the hate group. In a full-page ad in Politico and the Washington Examiner, FRC calls SPLC a "liberal fundraising machine." The ad also accuses the civil rights group of character assassination, and attacking groups that "uphold Judeo-Christian moral views, including marriage as the union of a man and a woman." Among the 150 conservative leaders--including 22 members of Congress-- who signed the letter are Rep. Eric Cantor (R-VA), Rep. Steve King (R-IA), Rep. John Boehner (R-OH), Rep. Michelle Bachmann (R-MN), Sen, Jim DeMint (R-SC), Gov. Bobby Jindal (R-LA), Rep. Steve King (R-IA), and Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli. "It was a remarkable performance, given that it was precisely the maligning of entire groups of people -- gays, lesbians, bisexuals and transgendered people -- that caused the SPLC to list groups like the FRC," SPLC responded on its blog.

This comes as civil rights groups push for a federal review of curriculum changes made by the Republican-owned Texas Board of Education, including the removal of people of color in the textbooks, the watering down of the civil rights movement, and teaching slavery, Jefferson Davis and the Confederacy in a positive light. The groups claim the board is discriminating against black and Latino students, and failing to provide equal educational opportunities to these students.

Here's the deal: The GOP cannot have it both ways. They cannot take a stand in favor of hate groups--white supremacists, neo-confederates, and homophobes-- and take offense when their critics call them out for it. Moreover, they cannot rewrite history and attack civil rights. Since the Goldwater presidential campaign and Nixon's Southern Strategy, the Republicans made a deal with the Devil. And the Devil's in the details. Appealing to disaffected Southern whites on states' rights and skin-color solidarity, the GOP became the Dixiecrats. Tax cuts became code word for the N-word, because it was understood that blacks would get hurt worse than whites, as Southern Strategy architect Lee Atwater bluntly noted.

On one level, the Republican Party would whitewash the image of their base, not to mention America's racially-charged past and their role in it. And yet, on another level, they are so extreme that they embrace their intolerance with no shame. The GOP embraces the white-Christian-nationalist spirit of the White Citizens' Councils. They present themselves as the protectors of society from the enemy, the "other" who threatens to destroy white Christian values--whether Latino immigrants, Muslims, or gay marriage. We saw this in George H.W. Bush's Willie Horton ad, and we saw this in Sharron Angle's anti-immigration ads.

For now, in this bad economy, the GOP is living on borrowed time and scapegoats. But the clock is ticking and the nation is browning, and hate will not grow their base.

Wage Theft: Thou Shalt Not Steal From Your Workers

As we enter this holiday season, Americans are reminded of the massive suffering that millions of people are experiencing right now, with unemployment, foreclosures, poverty, hunger and homelessness. But Wall Street, which is celebrating a year of record profits, never had it so good. Surely, their bonus checks overfloweth this season, with vast sums of money that no one could possibly believe they deserve. In contrast, the common folk never had it so bad, at least not since the first Great Depression, as what Americans are living through surely must be the second.

To make things worse, as the wealthy bankers are propped up and subsidized by the government, everyday working people who have little as it is are robbed daily - by their employers. Now is a better time than most to discuss the crisis of wage theft in the United States.

Unfortunately, the problem is common and widespread, and affects millions of workers each year. According to the organization Interfaith Worker Justice (IWJ), the average low wage worker loses $2,600 per year in unpaid wages. Further, three-quarters of low wage workers who work more than 40 hours a week are not paid the overtime the law requires. And millions of people are wrongly classified as independent contractors so businesses can avoid paying minimum wage, overtime and FICA tax - which amounts to stealing from workers as well as robbing the government. Wage theft forces its victims to choose between paying rent and buying food, and forces the government to cut important services. Righteous employers who play by the rules are placed at a competitive disadvantage.

On November 18, IWJ kicked off a campaign to tackle the issue, with a National Day of Action Against Wage Theft. Over 35 groups across the country held rallies and events as part of the day of action. As the participants in this movement can attest, wage theft is as old as the scriptures, and the world’s religions have long ago spoken out against the unethical, illegal and immoral practice. “Unfortunately, stealing wages from workers is nothing new. The Hebrew prophet Malachi in chapter 3, verse 5 proclaimed that God will be quick to testify against those who defraud laborers of their wages,” said Kim Bobo, IWJ executive director. “Stealing wages was wrong then and it is wrong today.”

Rev. Daniel Klawitter, chairperson of the Interfaith Committee for Worker Justice of Colorado, also addressed the biblical mandate against wage theft. He noted that in Deuteronomy 24:14-15, it states “you shall not withhold the wages of poor and needy laborers whether other Israelites or aliens who reside in your lands or in one of your towns. You shall pay them their wages daily before sunset because they are poor and their livelihood depends on them. Otherwise they might cry to the lord against you and you would incur guilt.”

Rev. Klawitter - who believes it is imperative that communities of faith address wage theft - noted that nearly half of day laborers are victims of the practice. We are trying to minister to folks in our congregations and our communities during a time of great economic turmoil and uncertainty,” said Klawitter. “And we have to be clear as faith leaders that the practice of wage theft is a moral outrage and that it’s our duty to care for our neighbors.” He even recalled a heartwrenching story of a Denver man who was found abandoned in the streets. The worker had fallen from a roof and became seriously brain damaged. His employer, who had picked him up on a street corner, dropped him off in the dark to avoid taking responsibility for his well-being.

Rabbi Renée Bauer, Director of the Interfaith Coalition for Worker Justice of South Central Wisconsin, decries the lack of enforcement and prosecution of wage theft cases by the government. She calls the fight against wage theft not merely a political, legal and economic issue, but a religious mandate. “Jewish tradition is clear that not paying workers what they are due in a timely fashion is a crime,” Rabbi Bauer noted. “The Torah considers the lack or the delay of payment a form of theft and abuse, and the Talmud teaches that one who withholds an employee's wages is as though he deprived the worker of his life.”

And wage theft is inextricably linked with the poor state of the economy and widespread deprivation. According to Bobo, while the religious community gives out turkeys to needy families every Thanksgiving, millions of poor families could actually afford to buy their own turkeys if they were paid the wages due to them under the law. That’s food for thought for a nation struggling to find ways to jumpstart a troubled economy. “What better way to stimulate the economy, put more money back into neighborhood businesses than to actually ensure that workers are paid all their wages,” she said.

There are efforts afoot to get a Stop Wage Theft Bill through Congress. Further, Rep. George Miller (D-IL) introduced HR 3303, the Wage Theft Prevention Act. The legislation would amend the Fair Labor Standards Act and give the Department of Labor more power to protect workers. It would let workers file private lawsuits while the federal government is investigating a claim. And the Act would also eliminate the statute of limitations that forces the feds to resolve a wage complaint in two years.

Meanwhile, thanks to bad economic times, voter disillusionment and the buying of elections, the House of Representatives is about to be taken over by the Tea Party-infused Republican Party. Scrooge arrived just in time for the holidays, with Social Darwinism, bootstraps, slashing and cutting as a prescription for all our woes. And no doubt there will be an abundance of moralizing and self-righteous indignation in the lower chamber of our federal legislature, along with corporate greed and a shortage of caring for the needs of the least among us, much less solutions to make the poor whole. They would extend tax cuts to the wealthy as they preach fiscal responsibility. And they would cut healthcare and jobless benefits, and label even any noncontroversial attempts at restorative justice as communism, socialism and fascism.

Yet the struggle against this massive payroll robbery in America continues. This is part of a larger fight against the dramatic upward redistribution of wealth in recent decades, in which labor continually gets short shrift, and business seems to hold all the cards. But it is up to the people to make it right.