Recently in History Remembered Category

That's what William C. Ibershof said in his letter to the editors in the New York Times responding to their article on Obama and Ayers which highlights the minimal contact the two had on very legitimate and well-regarded non-profit ventures in the Chicago area, one of which was financed by the foundation of well-known Republican publisher, ambassador and Nixon/Reagan pal, Walter Annenberg.

As the lead federal prosecutor of the Weathermen in the 1970s ... I am amazed and outraged that Senator Barack Obama is being linked to William Ayers's terrorist activities 40 years ago when Mr. Obama was, as he has noted, just a child. [...]

Because Senator Obama recently served on a board of a charitable organization with Mr. Ayers cannot possibly link the senator to acts perpetrated by Mr. Ayers so many years ago.

He does mention one other item that just confirms that Republican behavior patterns have remained much the same over the past 40 years.

I do take issue with the statement in your news article that the Weathermen indictment was dismissed because of "prosecutorial misconduct." It was dismissed because of illegal activities, including wiretaps, break-ins and mail interceptions, initiated by John N. Mitchell, attorney general at that time, and W. Mark Felt, an F.B.I. assistant director.

Imagine that. Illegal activities including wiretaps by the Attorney General and his assistant director. Sound like anyone else you know?

[via]

Sometimes you find nuggets in the most unexpected places. The genesis of this particular nugget is a thoughtful and important op-ed by Brent Staples in the New York Times titled Barack Obama, John McCain and the Language of Race. In it he discusses the word "uppity" and its use in our nation's history and politics.

Deoliver47 at Daily Kos took the opportunity to add some historical background to Staples' essay in a most viscerally powerful diary about the destruction of the "black Wall Street", Greenwood in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1921. Deoliver47 is an African-American woman of either late 40's or early 50's age (she's said - I just can't remember which) who has been a powerful contributor to the Daily Kos community ever since she joined. I've learned to watch for her posts.

As she points out in her post, the Tulsa riots were likely the most deadly set of race riots that we've ever had in this country but they're not even listed when historians recount the list of race riots. The video that accompanies her diary is remarkable. And it adds such poignancy to her conclusion.

There are times here at Dkos when I want to cry out to you, that you don't understand why Barack cannot ever slip out of control, why he walks so carefully and speaks so thoughtfully.  He knows the history.  He has studied it, and has run up against it, even if he did not live through those times.  He knows.  I know.  We as black people know.  The penalty for uppity is often death - even today. You who rant at him to become more fierce, to get more tough, know not what you are asking.  This is a subtle dance we dance as black folks.  

Staples concurs in his conclusion:

Mr. Obama seems to understand that he is always an utterance away from a statement -- or a phrase -- that could transform him in a campaign ad from the affable, rational and racially ambiguous candidate into the archetypical angry black man who scares off the white vote. His caution is evident from the way he sifts and searches the language as he speaks, stepping around words that might push him into the danger zone.

These maneuvers are often painful to watch. The troubling part is that they are necessary.

So on a day that we watch more headlines about Wall Street and Main Street, the election, Barack Obama and John McCain - please remember the history of Black Wall Street.

Those who forget are often doomed to repeat.

I trust that we will build a different future, for all of us - black, white, brown, yellow, and red.  A future where "uppity" will no longer be a call to violence.

It sheds a whole new light on Obama's path and his accomplishment. I must admit that I was ignorant of Greenwood and the Tulsa riots. I add my wish to build a different future to Deoliver47's wish.

Do go read both the NYT essay and Deoliver47's diary. You'll find them time well spent in learning something that probably didn't show up in your history book yet has relevance to today's world.

Roger Cohen writes a column unlike any I've seen. It's powerful, especially for those who spent many hours in Sunday School and church listening to the scripture from the King James version.

And in the seventh year after the fall, the dust and debris of the towers cleared. And it became plain at last what had been wrought.

For the wreckage begat greed; and it came to pass that while America's young men and women fought, other Americans enriched themselves. Beguiling the innocent, they did backdate options, and they did package toxic mortgage securities and they did reprice risk on the basis that it no more existed than famine in a fertile land.

Thereby did the masters of the universe prosper, with gold, with silver shekels, with land rich in cattle and fowl, with illegal manservants and maids, with jewels and silk, and with Gulfstream V business jets; yet the whole land did not prosper with them. And it came to pass, when the housing bubble burst, that Main Street had to pay for the Wall Street party.

For Bush ruled over the whole nation and so sure was he of his righteousness that he did neglect husbandry.

And he took his nation into desert wars and mountain wars, but, lo, he thought not to impose taxation, not one heifer nor sheep nor ox did Bush demand of the rich. And it came to pass that the nation fell into debt as boundless as the wickedness of Sodom. For everyone, Lehman not least, was maxed out. [...]

For Bush ruled over the whole nation and so sure was he of his righteousness that he did foster division until it raged like a plague. Each tribe sent pestilence on the other.

And in the seventh year after the fall, the dust and debris of the towers cleared. And it became plain at last what had been wrought -- but not how the damage would be undone.

Do go read the whole piece. It's powerful. You may also appreciate TeacherKen's thoughts on the column.

What have we wrought?

After a call for nomination by acclamation made by Sen. Clinton, the Democratic party has nominated Barack Obama for the office of the president of the United States. It's official. Lots of cheers and tears.

Rep. John Lewis brought the historic perspective... reflecting on how they fought to even be able to vote and to see this today is amazing. He said he'd cried earlier and didn't think he had any more tears left in him. An historic moment indeed.

I saw Jim Leach's speech on Monday night and despite his very low key style, it really hit home. I knew right then that I wanted to find a transcript and reread his words. As I recall, the chattering heads were saying that no one really hit back at the Republicans on Monday evening. Well, they think that because they were all busy talking over Jim Leach and didn't hear him say this:

The party that once emphasized individual rights has gravitated in recent years toward regulating values. The party of military responsibility has taken us to war with a country that did not attack us. The party that formerly led the world in arms control has moved to undercut treaties crucial to the defense of the earth. The party that prides itself on conservation has abdicated its responsibilities in the face of global warming. And the party historically anchored in fiscal restraint has nearly doubled the national debt, squandering our precious resources in an undisciplined and unprecedented effort to finance a war with tax cuts.

Re-read that paragraph. That's why Republicans for Obama exists. Rep. Leach continued on, not pulling any punches.

America has seldom faced more critical choices: whether we should maintain an occupational force for decades in a country and region that resents western intervention or elect a leader who, in a carefully structured way, will bring our troops home from Iraq as the heroes they are. Whether it is wise to continue to project power largely alone with flickering support around the world or elect a leader who will follow the model of General Eisenhower and this president's father and lead in concert with allies.

Whether it is prudent to borrow from future generations to pay for today's reckless fiscal policies or elect a leader who will shore up our budgets and return to a strong dollar. Whether it is preferable to continue the policies that have weakened our position in the world, deepened our debt and widened social divisions or elect a leader who will emulate John F. Kennedy and relight a lamp of fairness at home and reassert an energizing mix of realism and idealism abroad.

The portfolio of challenges passed on to the next president will be as daunting as any since the Great Depression and World War II. This is not a time for politics as usual or for run-of-the-mill politicians. Little is riskier to the national interest than more of the same. America needs new ideas, new energy and a new generation of leadership.

Hence, I stand before you proud of my party's contributions to American history but, as a citizen, proud as well of the good judgment of good people in this good party, in nominating a transcending candidate, an individual whom I am convinced will recapture the American dream and be a truly great president: the senator from Abraham Lincoln's state-Barack Obama.

As the Boston Globe noted today:   [via]

The best way to watch a political convention is on C-Span. That way Americans can make their own judgments unfiltered, without being told what to think by the nattering nabobs of TV commentary. [...]

Had the commentators not been so busy filling airspace and paid closer attention to what was happening on the podium, they might have had a different take. On Monday a speech by former Representative Jim Leach, an Iowa Republican, ably set the framework for his own party's failings, besides delivering a bipartisan endorsement of Barack Obama. His address wasn't electrifying TV, but it was a more articulate critique of the Republicans - and from a former loyalist, too - than many Democrats have mustered.

They read my mind.

The complete transcript and video clip are below the fold.

NCJan raised an interesting point of discussion today about Barack Obama's appearance in Rick Warren's Saddleback Forum.

Did Obama pull a Colbert?

As far as the Saddleback thing goes, couldn't Obama have pulled a Stephen Colbert/Press Club thing that night?

By that I mean, while McCain was speaking to the audience in front of him and ignoring the fact that the nation was watching, Obama was speaking to all of us.

I remember when Colbert's first reviews came out, everybody in the traditional media thought he had bombed. That's because they were taking their cues from the people in the room. ... And sure enough, days and even weeks later, Colbert's performance was upgraded to brilliant. It is still remembered. It is memorable.

I think that by sticking to his guns on things like choice, Obama was "playing to the waiters" in that crowd. In this case, the waiters were all those pro-choice Republican women who were, by the very nature of patriarchal right wing religion, standing "in the back of the room" that night.

I think she's onto something there. Given the subsequent McCain campaign efforts to find out if a pro-choice Veep nomination would help or hurt him, I suspect that the McCain campaign itself recognizes that it has cut off all the Republican pro-choice women. Of course, all the pushback about choosing a pro-choice Veep nominee and how it would completely dissolve the Repub base coalition means McCain is damned if he does and damned if he doesn't.

Contrast that with what Barack Obama accomplished at Saddleback. In addition to reaching out to the Republican prochoice women, he established himself more firmly as a thoughtful Christian. I just ran across this blog post, "Obama Shows Guts", by David Brody, a reporter/blogger with the CBN network about Obama's appearance at the Saddleback Forum.

The fact that Barack Obama would show up at an Evangelical Church and take the tough questions is a credit to him. I mean he knew he was the visiting team so to speak yet he handled these questions like he has in the past: with relative ease.

Brody commented on the 'when does a baby get human rights' question and noted "But look, the guy is pro-choice so did anybody really expect him to answer it with a fervent "at conception" answer? He was kind of stuck and it showed. But let's remember for many others in the faith community who aren't as conservative an answer like that may have been just fine. Obama's main focus is not to win over the die hard conservative Evangelicals. He's trying to appeal to the broader faith community and the latest polling shows he's doing a pretty god job of it."

He concluded his assessment this way.

Overall the night was a success for Obama. He didn't get put on the spot too much with the abortion questions. He handled the "Jesus" question about his faith with ease and maybe most important he looked comfortable up there. His answers were nuanced quite a bit unlike McCain's quick direct answers. That was a big difference between the two of them. Obama sees more shades of gray. McCain sees the World a lot more black and white. That was on clear display. By watching Obama and McCain go back to back tonight, I think it offered a stark contrast on how they both approach the hot button social issues. But Obama has very little chance with die-hard pro-lifers anyway. Instead, Obama's goal is to come across as a caring family man who takes his faith and set of values very seriously. That plays to the broader audience. A forum like this only helps him in that regard.

I think that Brody's post supports the contention that Obama was looking beyond the people in the room. It certainly supports my contention that Barack did just fine at Saddleback. He did what he needed to do though he shouldn't have to do it. And that raises this question.

Why is such a religion focused discussion a part of our democratic selection of a president anyway?

I can remember discussing our Huguenot ancestry with my mother (who's a missionary) while I was growing up in Liberia and concluding that the separation of church and state was a good and proper thing. It wasn't so long ago that people were persecuted and killed for being the wrong kind of Christian by other Christians which, BTW, Obama did subtly underscore in his response about evil being perpetrated on behalf of the good and that good intentions didn't necessarily mean doing good.

Kathleen Parker commented on the separation issue today as well, asking how Thomas Jefferson would have responded to questions about his position on evil and his relationship with Jesus Christ?

What would have happened to Thomas Jefferson if he had responded as he wrote in 1781:

"It does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no God. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg."

Would the crowd at Saddleback have applauded and nodded through that one? Doubtful.

By today's new standard of pulpits in the public square, Jefferson -- the great advocate for religious freedom in America -- would have lost.

And the point that Ms. Parker makes is a sad one. Thomas Jefferson would have flunked at the Saddleback forum. All the chattering classes would now be talking about how poorly he did and out of touch he was. One of our country's most esteemed Founding Fathers wouldn't have made the grade at Saddleback or on the cable news shows. One can only imagine what the Fox Noise channel types would have had to say about him.

We, collectively and individually, owe so much to Mr. Jefferson. He fought long and hard for our rights to free practice of religion and freedom from religion which culminated in the First Amendment which, in case you need a refresher, reads:

"Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances."

What a sublime sentence. So much democracy is caught up in that one statement.

The people at religioustolerance.org remind us of the history of it.

The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution is also the first section of the Bill of Rights. It is arguably the most important part of the U.S. Constitution, as it guarantees freedoms of religion, speech, writing and publishing, peaceful assembly, and the freedom to raise grievances with the Government. In addition, it requires that a wall of separation be maintained between church and state. [...]

The roots of the First Amendment can be traced to a bill written by Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) in 1777 and proposed to the Virginia Legislature in 1779. It guaranteed freedom of (and from) religion. After an impassioned speech by James Madison, and after some amendments, it became law on 1786-JAN-16.

In the spring of 1778, the Constitutional Convention was held in Philadelphia, PA. They resolved three main religious controversies. They:

• Decided that there would be no religious test, oath or other requirement for any federal elected office
• Allowed Quakers and others to affirm (rather than swear) their oaths of office
• Refrained from recognizing the religion of Christianity, or one of its denominations, as an established, state church.

But there was no specific guarantee of religious freedom.

Jefferson was pleased with the constitution, but felt it was incomplete. He pushed for legislation that would guarantee individual rights, including what he felt was the prime guarantee: freedom of and from religion. Madison promised to promote such a bill, in order to gain support for the ratification of the constitution by the State of Virginia.

In 1789, the first of ten amendments were written to the constitution; they have since been known as the Bill of Rights. [...]

Shortly after Thomas Jefferson was elected president, some Baptists from Connecticut asked that he declare a national day of fasting in order to help the country recover from a bitterly fought presidential campaign. He disagreed, feeling that the Federal government should not recognize a day set aside for religious reasons. In his reply of 1802-JAN-1, he stated:

"Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God, that he owes to none other for his faith or his worship, that the legislative powers of government reach actions only, and not opinions, I contemplate with solemn reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should 'make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof,' thus building a wall of separation between Church and State."

What a brilliant idea. Thanks, Mr. President.

Now we just need to start teaching the First Amendment and what it means to all of us because somewhere along the way, there's a lot of people who seem to have forgotten it.

Greg Djerejian has posted another must-read analysis which takes apart the predictable neo-con, McCain response to the Georgia-Russia conflict.

Witness this incredibly poor reasoning by McCain, jaw-dropping even by the standards of the mammoth policy ineptitude we've become accustomed to during the reign of Bush 43 and his motley crew of national security miscreants. Here is McCain:

Mr. McCain urged NATO to begin discussions on "the deployment of an international peacekeeping force to South Ossetia,'' called on the United Nations to condemn "Russian aggression,'' and said that the secretary of state should travel to Europe "to establish a common Euro-Atlantic position aimed at ending the war and supporting the independence of Georgia.''

And he said the NATO should reconsider its previous decision and set Georgia - which he called "one of the world's first nations to adopt Christianity as an official religion'' -- on the path to becoming a member. "NATO's decision to withhold a membership action plan for Georgia might have been viewed as a green light by Russia for its attacks on Georgia, and I urge the NATO allies to revisit the decision,'' he said. [my emphasis]

First, what does it matter in this context that Georgia was "one of the world's first nations to adopt Christianity as an official religion"? If it had been the first to adopt Islam, or Judaism, or Buddhism, would the situation be different? Perhaps this might get assorted Christianists in an excited tizzy or such, which come to think of it, might be why some clueless aide to McCain, fresh from a Google sortie, decided to plug this little factoid into his statement. But what is really mind-boggling here is that McCain would have us double-down, and cheer-lead having NATO "revisit" the decision not to extend membership to Georgia! It is precisely this type of profoundly flawed thinking ... that has gotten Georgia into this bloody mess.

There's more, said in the way Djerejian only can do so along with some references to more authoritative, informed views such as those of George Kennan as well as some recent comments by Henry Kissinger.

Then he produces this bit:

So here is where matters stand. Rather than talk and obsess about what we should do, it is the Russians, sad to say, who will determine the fate of Georgia in the coming days and weeks, and so we might take a moment or two and stop and think about what their next moves are likely to be. Will they stop at Gori (just south of Ossetia) as well as a bit to the east of Abkhazia (a similar 'exclusion zone'), or have they now decided to march into Tbilisi and unseat this Government whole stop (I think it's a closer call which way Russia will go than many of us realize at this hour, but won't hazard to make a call just yet. UPDATE: The latest Russian moves would appear to indicate the former). As a Georgian civilian put it more pithily: "The border is where the Russians say it is. It could be here, or it could be Gori". Or, indeed, it could be Tbilisi, as I say.

Meantime, a Georgian soldier tells a U.S. reporter in the same piece: "Write exactly what I say. Over the past few years, I lived in a democratic society. I was happy. And now America and the European Union are spitting on us." They are, aren't they? They had no business making the cheap promises and representations that were made. No business on practical policy grounds. No business on strategic grounds (though I guess it got Rummy another flag, near the Salvadorans, say, for the Mesopotamian "coalition of the willing"). And now our promises are unraveling and nakedly revealed for the sorry lies and crap policy they are, with the emperor revealed to have no clothes, yet again. This is what our foreign policy mandarins masquerade about as they play policy-making, in their Washington work-stations. It's, yes, worse than a crime, rather a sad, pitiable blunder.

And one McCain would have us compound, I stress, again! An honorable man who served his country well, it is clear his time has past and his grasp on the most basic foreign policy calls we'll need to make in the coming years is very tentative indeed. He'll be surrounded by second-tier 'yes-man' realists and residual neo-con swill, few with any ideas worth pursuing if we mean to take the national interest seriously with sobriety and freshness of perspective. So let us help him exit off-stage gracefully, as he served his country with dignity when called upon, but let us not sacrifice our children's future to ignorants with deludely romantic notions of empire. Been there, done that. Indeed, we have a President who has announced a pre-emptive doctrine which allows us to, willy-nilly, instigate regime change when and where we deem appropriate. Who are we to lecture Putin now? What standing do we have to do so? And what parochial and self-satisfied myopia has us indignantly thinking we are some unimpeachable arbitrer of right and wrong in the international system after the disastrous missteps of the past eight sordid years?

If we mean to help the Georgians escape an even worse fate, we must summon up the intelligence and humility to have a dialogue with Putin, Medvedev, Sergie Lavrov, Vitaly Churkin and the rest of them based on straight talk (not of the McCain variety, and if we can somehow find a messenger of the stature and talent to deliver the message in the right way, hard these days), to wit: we screwed up overly propping this guy up and he got too big for his britches, we understand, but for the sake of going forward strategic cooperation (and don't mention Iran here, at least not as the first example)--as well as stopping further civilian loss of life--agree to work with us in good faith towards a status quo ante as much as possible, don't enter Tbilisi, and throw show-boats Sarkozy/Kouchner a bone with some possible talk of a going forward EU peacekeeping role (if non-binding, for the time being). This is roughly what we should be saying/doing now, not having the President step up to the White House mike fresh back from the sand volleyball courts of Beijing to gravely declare Russia's actions are "unacceptable in the 21st century." Such talk will get us nowhere, instead, it might just fan the flames more (as will Cheney's threats of "serious consequences", apparently a favorite sound-bite of his, but this time mentioned only in the context of the U.S.-Russian relationship). Let us be clear: these men's credibility is a sad joke, and Putin knows it only too well. So let's get real. Before it's too late, and more facts are created on the ground, mostly on the backs of innocent civilians throughout Georgia's various regions.

Amen.

John Cole did a Sunday morning round up on the situation between Georgia and Russia. It's a good introductory summary including a link to Greg Djerejian at The Belgravia Dispatch who has apparently come out of semi-retirement from his blog to comment on this situation. John also references Daniel Larison at Eunomia. If you want the short version on background, John's post gives you a start.

Greg Djerejian's post is worth reading in its entirety in that it adds some perspective and knowledge that you won't find in the US press coverage. It certainly hasn't been evident in the NPR coverage.

Steve Clemons who also gave Djerejian's post a nod has his own background summary of the Georgia-Russia clash.

Dimitri Simes, President of the Nixon Center, was one of the leading foreign policy experts in Washington to predict some kind of hot clash between the former Soviet state of Georgia and Russia involving the autonomous provinces of South Ossetia and Abkhazia at the time Kosovo declared its independence. [...]

... Simes convinces me in his important Foreign Affairs essay, "Losing Russia," that much of what we are seeing unfold between Russia and Georgia involves a high quotient of American culpability.

But it's Daniel Larison at Eunomia who's been discussing this intelligently for a long time and continues to do so in these posts. (He also gives Djerejian a nod.)

• Dashed Expectations - 8-10-2008
• Even Fools Are Responsible For What They Do - 8-10-2008
• Anti-Russian Bias - 8-9-2008
• Georgia And Russia - 8-9-2008
• Georgia - 8-8-2008
• Against Saakashvili, Not Georgia - 4-29-2008
• Our Man In Tbilisi - 11-9-2007
• Not What He's Cracked Up To Be - 9-4-2007
• The Suffering Georgian Land - 8-11-2004

He covers McCain's reaction with a nod to John Cole's summary on it in this one: McCain's Georgia Obsession. And in this one: Reflexive Hostility Has Its Advantages.

HIs commentary on traditional news media and columnists' pronouncements and editorials is interesting. I suspect he wouldn't like hearing this but it wouldn't look all that out of place on Daily Kos.

• The Washington Post: More Than One Can Play This Game
• The Wall Street Journal: Overstretched
• The Times (UK) and the NY Post: The March Of The Apologists
• The Guardian: A Not So Cunning Plan
• On Anne Applebaum: So Very Predictable

If you skim through those and their associated links, you'll have the equivalent of a crash course on the history of Georgia, Russian and their satellites.

One more thing to be noted and that is that Randy Scheunemann, McCain's chief policy advisor in this area, is neck-deep in lobbying conflicts of interest. Lindsay Beyerstein at Majikthise has an exclusive scoop on just how deep he is and with what dubious (Chalabi) partners. Given what we now know, the prospectus descriptions of what his organization will do for potential clients just scream 'culture of corruption'. TPMMuckraker expanded on his history in Iraq in "McCain Adviser's Horrifying Iraq Track Record: Will the Press Notice?"

Today is a day to remember the 7th anniversary of the PDB delivered to President Bush. The one he received with the comment:

"All right. You've covered your ass now."

The one about which Condoleezza Rice, National Security Advisor, said:

"I don't think anybody could have predicted that these people would take an airplane and slam it into the World Trade Center, take another one and slam it into the Pentagon; that they would try to use an airplane as a missile, a hijacked airplane as a missile."

The day after he received the memo the Washington Post noted, "Bush seemed carefree as he spoke about the books he was reading, the work he was doing on his nearby ranch, his love of hot-weather jogging, his golf game and his 55th birthday" .

Per ThinkProgress,

Here's how the administration reacted, according to the 9/11 Commission report:

-- [President Bush] did not recall discussing the August 6 report with the Attorney General or whether Rice had done so. [p. 260]

-- We have found no indication of any further discussion before September 11 among the President and his top advisers of the possibility of a threat of an al Qaeda attack in the United States. DCI Tenet visited President Bush in Crawford, Texas, on August 17 and participated in the PDB briefings of the President between August 31 (after the President had returned to Washington) and September 10. But Tenet does not recall any discussions with the President of the domestic threat during this period. [p. 262]

Today -- 2,557 days later -- Bin Laden still remains free and "determined to strike in U.S."

Tell me now.

How is it that Republican administrations keep us safer?

How is it that invading Iraq made us safer?

Don't give this administration a 3rd term.

Photo credit:       mock, paper, scissors

----

For more information, please check GWU's The National Security Archive.

H/T to ek hornbeck, the smoking gun, ThinkProgress, and Crooks and Liars.

Cross-posted with permission from KerryVIsion

Happy Fourth!

What a great holiday -- when Americans celebrate the immutable bond between patriotism and dissent -- when the founders declared that the United States would no longer tolerate the tyranny of King George, and spoke out about the injustice. They listed out the reasons in detail and and declared our sovereignty in a document that affirms that the States would no longer tolerate living under the oppressive rule of the King.

With this document, the United States declared our Independence, and it is that dissent we celebrate today.

In CONGRESS, July 4, 1776

The unanimous Declaration of the
thirteen united States of America

When in the course of human Events, it becomes necessary for one People to dissolve the Political Bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the Powers of the Earth, the separate and equal Station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent Respect to the Opinions of Mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the Separation.

We hold these Truths to be self-evident, that all Men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.

That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just Powers from the Consent of the Governed.

That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these Ends, it is in the Right of the People to alter or abolish it, and to institute a new Government, laying its Foundation on such Principles, and organizing its Powers in such Form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient Causes; and accordingly all Experience hath shewn, that Mankind are more disposed to suffer, while Evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the Forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long Train of Abuses and Usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object, evinces a Design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their Right, it is their Duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future Security.

Such has been the patient Sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the Necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The History of the Present King of Great-Britain is a History of repeated Injuries and Usurpations, all having in direct Object the Establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let the Facts be submitted to a candid World.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public Good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing Importance, unless suspended in their Operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the Accommodation of large Districts of People; unless those People would relinquish the Right of Representation in the Legislature, a Right inestimable to them, and formidable to Tyrants only.

He has called together Legislative Bodies at Places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the Depository of their public Records, for the sole Purpose of fatiguing them into Compliance with his Measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly Firmness his Invasions on the Rights of the People.

He has refused for a long Time, after such Dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the Dangers of Invasion from without, and Convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the Population of these States; for that Purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their Migrations hither, and raising the Conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the Tenure of their Offices, and Amount and Payment of their Salaries.

He has erected a Multitude of new Offices, and sent hither Swarms of Officers to harass our People, and eat out their Substance.

He has kept among us, in Times of Peace, Standing Armies, without the consent of our Legislature.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a Jurisdiction foreign to our Constitution, and unacknowledged by our Laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For quartering large Bodies of Armed Troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from Punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all Parts of the World:

For imposing taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us, in many Cases, of the Benefits of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond the Seas to be tried for pretended Offences:

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an arbitrary Government, and enlarging its Boundaries, so as to render it at once an Example and fit Instrument for introducing the same absolute Rule in these Colonies:

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with Powers to legislate for us in all Cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our Towns, and destroyed the Lives of our People.

He is, at this Time, transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to complete the Works of Death, Desolation, and Tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty and Perfidy, scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous Ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized Nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the Executioners of their Friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic Insurrections among us, and has endeavoured to bring on the Inhabitants of our Frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known Rule of Warfare, is an undistinguished Destruction, of all Ages, Sexes and Conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions we have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble Terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated Injury. A Prince, whose Character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the Ruler of a free People.

Nor have we been wanting in Attentions to our British Brethren. We have warned them from Time to Time of Attempts by their Legislature to extend an unwarrantable Jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the Circumstances of our Emigration and Settlement here. We have appealed to their native Justice and Magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the Ties of our common Kindred to disavow these Usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our Connections and Correspondence. They too have been deaf to the Voice of Justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the Necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of Mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace, Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the World for the Rectitude of our Intentions, do, in the Name, and by the Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly Publish and Declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be, Free and Independent States; that they are absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political Connection between them and the State of Great-Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm Reliance on the Protection of the divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.

Signed by ORDER and
in BEHALF OF THE CONGRESS
JOHN HANCOCK,
PRESIDENT.

ATTEST.
CHARLES THOMSON,
SECRETARY.

PHILADELPHIA:
PRINTED BY JOHN DUNLAP

Robert Parry of Consortiumnews highlights a story that should concern us all. It seems that the final report of the Iran-Contra investigation was missing some significant parts. And the failure to expose what happened has allowed the parties involved to continue to influence our country and our politics with no penalty for their ill conduct.

As historians ponder George W. Bush's disastrous presidency, they may wonder how Republicans perfected a propaganda system that could fool tens of millions of Americans, intimidate Democrats, and transform the vaunted Washington press corps from watchdogs to lapdogs.

To understand this extraordinary development, historians might want to look back at the 1980s and examine the Iran-Contra scandal's "lost chapter," a narrative describing how Ronald Reagan's administration brought CIA tactics to bear domestically to reshape the way Americans perceived the world.

MsJoanne posted an item at TPMCafe which pointed to a longer post that she'd done at the zoo about a new book written by Rick Shenkman: How Ignorant Are We? The Voters Choose... but on the Basis of What? Mr. Shenkman is an associate professor of history at George Mason University and the founder and editor of GMU's History News Network website

MsJoanne excerpted a few stats I think we all should know about.

These statistics come from varying studies done over the last 20 years.

• 25% of Americans cannot name more than one of the five freedoms granted by the First Amendment.
• 20% know that there are 100 senators. 25% knew a US senator's term is six years.
• 40% can correctly identify and name the three branches of government. (Ed note: the author found this encouraging!)
• Most Americans cannot name their own member of Congress or their senators.
• 34% know that it is the Congress that declares war.
• 35% know that Congress can override a presidential veto.
• 49% think the president can suspend the Constitution.
• 60% believe that he can appoint judges to the federal courts without the approval of the Senate.
• 45% believe that revolutionary speech is punishable under the Constitution.

Ok, that's politics. What about more general knowledge? Funny you should ask.

Another retired general steps forward to tell us just how the Bush administration screwed us over and in the process, screwed over our military forces as well. From Time magazine via Andrew Sullivan:

Ricardo Sanchez, the commander of U.S. Forces in Iraq in 2003-2004, has written a new memoir, Wiser in Battle: A Soldier's Story, an account of his life and his service in Iraq. Sanchez was a three-star general -- and the military's senior Hispanic officer -- when he led U.S. forces in the first year of the war. He was relieved of his command by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld in 2004 following the revelations of the abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib prison. In 2005, Marine General Peter Pace, the new chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, called him to say his career was over and he wouldn't get the promotion to a full general -- four stars -- that Sanchez says he was promised. Six months later, at Rumsfeld's request, he showed up at the Pentagon for a meeting with the defense secretary shortly before retiring. In this exclusive excerpt, Sanchez details what happened next:

I walked into Rumsfeld's office at 1:25 p.m. on April 19, 2006. He had just returned from a meeting at the White House, and the only other person present in the room was his new Chief of Staff, John Rangel.

"Ric, it's been a long time," Rumsfeld said, greeting me in a friendly manner. "I'm really sorry that your promotion didn't work out. We just couldn't make it work politically. Sending a nomination to the Senate would not be good for you, the Army, or the department."

"I understand, sir," I replied.

Then we walked over to his small conference table. "Have a seat," he said. "Now, Ric, what are your timelines?"

"Well, sir, my transition leave will start in September with retirement the first week of November."

[...]

Secretary Rumsfeld then pulled out a two-page memo and handed it to me. "I wrote this after a promotion interview about two weeks ago," he explained. "The officer told me that one of the biggest mistakes we made after the war was to allow CENTCOM and CFLCC to leave the Iraq theater immediately after the fighting stopped -- and that left you and V Corps with the entire mission."

"Yes, that's right," I said.

"Well, how could we have done that?" he said in an agitated, but adamant, tone. "I knew nothing about it. Now, I'd like you to read this memo and give me any corrections."

In the memo, Rumsfeld stated that one of the biggest strategic mistakes of the war was ordering the major redeployment of forces and allowing the departure of the CENTCOM and CFLCC staffs in May - June 2003.

"This left General Sanchez in charge of operations in Iraq with a staff that had been focused at the operational and tactical level, but was not trained to operate at the strategic/operational level." He went on to write that neither he nor anyone higher in the Administration knew these orders had been issued, and that he was dumbfounded when he learned that Gen. McKiernan was out of the country and in Kuwait, and that the forces would be drawn down to a level of about 30,000 by September. "I did not know that Sanchez was in charge," he wrote.

I stopped reading after I read that last statement, because I knew it was total BS. After a deep breath, I said, "Well, Mr. Secretary, the problem as you've stated it is generally accurate, but your memo does not accurately capture the magnitude of the problem. Furthermore, I just can't believe you didn't know that Franks's and McKiernan's staffs had pulled out and that the orders had been issued to redeploy the forces."

I just watched Obama's speech in Philadelphia and I am so struck by it. He understands our psyche, America, and he understands the goals. What an extraordinary time to be an American.

He didn't shy away from expressing hard truths. He said them and then he said we can do better and we will do better and now is the time to make the choice to do better.

And in understanding how he views many of problems America confronts, it also explains his statement that now is the right time for him to run -- that waiting is not a choice. We do not continue to grow toward our potential as a country if we ignore or push aside this discussion.

We need this man as President of the United States.

UPDATE: Ben Smith has the full transcript of the prepared remarks posted over at Politico.

Cross-posted from Dwahzon's Village

One of the most respected diarists and front-pager at Daily Kos, Meteor Blades, has a diary today discussing his work registering black voters during Freedom Summer and some reflection on how the work done that summer fed yesterday's voting in Mississippi. It is a remarkable diary and representative of some of the best that daily kos has to offer.

The vote today in Mississippi had special resonance for me. It was 44 years ago this month that I decided to participate in Freedom Summer in the Magnolia State, registering black voters. After training at the Summer Project in Ohio, I traveled by bus to Jackson, arriving with a handful of others the fourth week of June.

Four days earlier three young men had gone missing - James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner. Goodman and Schwerner were New York Jews. Chaney was from the deepest shadows of the segregationist South, a black Mississippian. I might have shaken hands with one of them at our training. But if somebody had asked me to pick them out of a crowd on that early summer day in 1964, I couldn't have. A few days later, everybody knew who they were. Six weeks later, as a result of an intense federally coordinated manhunt that must have had FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover grinding his molars into dust, authorities pulled the three men's bodies from an earthen berm.

You can read the rest here. One of the commenters included this youtube embed of the relatively recent prosecution of the men who killed the 3 civil rights volunteers, Goodman, Chaney and Schwerner. If you're unfamiliar with the details, it's a good refresher.



Yesterday's win by Barack Obama is a direct result of the brave men and women who fought for the right to vote back then. It's good to see their work rewarded.

Cross-posted from Dwahzon's Village