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Contents
US Imperial
History
Grandin,
Preparation in Latin America , Documents
Myths Feeding
US Imperialism
Lawlessness
Rise of
Imperial Presidency
US War Crimes
John Yoo
Abusing Intellect, Justifying Crime for President Bush
Greenwald, With Liberty
Monbiot: Obama
and Drones
--Kinzer,
Stephen. Overthrow: America ’s Century of Regime Change from Hawaii to Iraq American Way Washington
is a war capital…the norm for us is to be at war.” Also: Engelhardt,
The United States
Teaching Empire’s
Workshop: DOCUMENTS
 |
Empire’s Workshop: Latin America, the
By Greg Grandin
Published
by Metropolitan Books
paperback | 304 pages 5/1/2007 | US$17.00 ISBN: 0805083235 |
Teaching
Empire’s Workshop
Chapter
1 – How Latin America Saved the United States from Itself
Chapter 2 – The Most Important Place in the World
Chapter 3 – Going Primitive
Chapter 4 – Bringing it All Back Home
Chapter 5 – The Third Conquest of Latin America
Chapter 2 – The Most Important Place in the World
Chapter 3 – Going Primitive
Chapter 4 – Bringing it All Back Home
Chapter 5 – The Third Conquest of Latin America
“Latin America
doesn’t matter,” Richard Nixon once said, “people don’t give one shit” about
the place. Not quite. Ever since the very first report from Jamestown settlers
to London in 1607 warned of the “devouringe
Spaniard,” British
colonists and then US elites defined themselves in relation to their Spanish-
(and Portuguese-) speaking neighbors to the south. The following selection of
documents, most of which are referenced in the first chapter of Empire’s
Workshop, illustrates this preoccupation across the centuries. They
start with a diary entry from the Puritan Samuel Sewall, a Salem
witch trial judge, hoping that a passing comet would strike Mexico City Mexico ,” he
wrote, “that God would open the Mexican fountain” – one of the first examples
of the Shock Doctrine in the Americas
Documents and Resources:
The Eighteenth Century – Opening the
Fountain
The Nineteenth Century – A War For
Humanity
The Twentieth Century – Completing
The Revolution
In the 1970s, with the United States reeling from cascading crises – Watergate , Vietnam ,
dissent and skepticism at home, résistance to its authority abroad, and the
longest recession since the Great Depression – the New Right, as illustrated by
the following documents, turned to Latin America
to regroup. In particular, it used Reagan’s Central American wars to revive
militarism and free-market absolutism, infusing that revival with moral
righteousness. This fusion — militarism
and market absolutism sanctioned by moralism — is, I argue in Empire’s
Workshop, not just the foundation of the modern conservative
movement but the successor to the New Deal consensus, accepted by US political
elites across the spectrum.
Documents and Resources:
A cornerstone of the emerging New Right consensus was a rehabilitation
of counterinsurgent warfare, which
had become discredited after Vietnam Baghdad (and the Bush Doctrine)
passed through Nicaragua
Documents and Resources:
Reagan’s Central American policy allowed the first generation of
neoconservatives (who went on to play a dominant role in shaping George W. Bush’s post 9/11 diplomacy) a
way of circumventing domestic dissent and drive a war forward over majority
opposition. This is what the Iran-Contra
scandal was about, a notoriously confusing crime that was less a conspiracy
than the foreign-policy debut of the New Right, bringing together for the first
time in purposeful activity all the major constituencies that continue to
dominate US politics: neoconservatives, the Religious Right, free-marketeers,
and militarists.
The following documents are divided into two sets: the first
provide examples of how Iran-Contra
allowed New Right activists opportunities to contain dissent at home, to bypass
moderates in the CIA and the State Department, discredit critics in Congress,
slander skeptical reporters, and feed disinformation to the general public – in
effect to run, via the Office of Public Diplomacy, what a congressional inquiry
described as a covert psychological operation on domestic soil.
My favorite illustration of Iran-Contra, which I don’t discuss in
the book, is this You Tube clip of Colonel Oliver North silently listening
to the sermonizing of Democratic Senator George Mitchell. It
perfectly captures the self-assured ascendancy
of the New Right and the rambling recession of the New Deal, so anxious it
can’t stop talking, accepting the basic premise of Reagan’s (and North’s)
foreign policy – that the Sandinistas are a threat that the US has the duty and
right to respond to – but disagreeing with the procedure. Call it “Ollie
Shrugs.”
The second set indicates how the fight against Latin American liberation theology allowed for the
ideological fortification and unification of the New Right, bringing together
for the first time secular neoconservatives and the conservative religious
activists. In other words, progressive Catholic humanism was the first
“political religion” that united modern conservative activists, before they
turned to Islam. Documents include analysis of liberation theology by
influential religious-right theologians and the mission statement of the
“mainline” Institute on Democracy and Religion, affiliated with the American
Enterprise Institute.
Also included is a column by David
Brooks on the 2010 Haitian earthquake as an example of how ideas that today
justify extreme global inequality harmonize with the Religious Right’s attacks
in the 1980s on liberation theology: compare Brooks’ essay with the section
extracted from David Chilton’s Productive Christians in an Age of
Guilt-Manipulators, titled here as “Remoralizing Markets and
Controlling Heathens;” Or with Pat Robertson’s remark that
Haitians suffered their earthquake because they were “cursed” for a “pact with
the devil”. Call this vulgar Weberianism, available in either
secular or religious varieties.
Documents and Resources:
Iran-Contra as Domestic Covert Ops
Targeting Grassroots Dissent,
Building Grassroots Consent
Working The Press
The Greatest Threat to Christianity
in 2000 Years — Liberation Theology as First Political Religion that Unites the
New Right
Even before the Central American wars
were brought to a close with the end of the Cold War, Latin America, as the
following documents illustrate, became the place where neoliberalism – an
extreme version of what would be called Reaganomics – would be put into place,
first in Chile and then the rest of Latin America (and eventually most of the
world). The “Chile Chile
Documents and Resources:
Amazon.com
BarnesandNoble.com
Indiebound.org (local booksellers)
Borders.com
BarnesandNoble.com
Indiebound.org (local booksellers)
Borders.com
DELUSIONAL NATIONAL MYTHS LEADING TO IMPERIAL DREAMS
Related: Books by Andrew Bacevich. The New American Militarism: How Americans
Are Seduced by War. Oxford , 2005. The
Limits of Power: The End of American Exceptionalism. Metropolitan, 2008. Washington
Rules: America Bloomsbury , 2010.
Lawlessness of US Empire
--Davies, Nicholas. Blood on Our Hands: The American Invasion and Destruction ofIraq US
violations of Nuremberg Principles and Geneva
Conventions. ( John Rule). Related:
--Tirman, John. The
Deaths of Others: The Fate of Civilians in America Oxford America Seymour America
--Davies, Nicholas. Blood on Our Hands: The American Invasion and Destruction of
Rise of Imperial Presidency
--Swanson,
David. Daybreak: Undoing the
Imperial Presidency and Forming a More Perfect Union . Seven Stories P, 2009. Related: Garry Wills, Bomb
Power: The Modern Presidency and the National
Security State
Domestic Harms (vs. Democracy and Liberty )
of US National Security State
--Herman, Susan. Taking
Liberties: The War on Terror and
the Erosion of American Democracy. Oxford UP, 2011. Related:
Jane Mayer. The Dark Side: The Inside Story of How the War on Terror Turned into a
War on American Ideals. Doubleday,
2008. Cole, David and James
Dempsey. Terrorism and the Constitution: Sacrificing Civil Liberties in the Name
of National Security. New Press,
2002. FBI and 1996 and 2001
Anti-Terrorism Acts. Priest, Dana and William Arkin. Top
Secret America : The Rise of
the New American Security State
US War Crimes: Kennedy,
Kissinger, et al.
Noam Chomsky, “Anniversaries From ‘Unhistory’”
Op-Ed,
NationofChange, Feb. 7, 2012: George Orwell coined the useful term “unperson”
for creatures denied personhood because they don’t abide by state doctrine. We
may add the term “unhistory” to refer to the fate of unpersons, expunged from
history on similar grounds. The unhistory of unpersons is illuminated by the
fate of anniversaries. Important ones are usually commemorated, with due
solemnity when appropriate: Pearl Harbor , for
example. Some are not, and we can learn a lot about ourselves by extricating
them from unhistory. READ | DISCUSS
| SHARE http://www.nationofchange.org/anniversaries-unhistory-1328625093
See OMNI’s Newsletter on Torture.
ONE OF THE LEGAL RATIONALIZERS: JOHN YOO
A
Bush Justice Dept. attorney who wrote memoranda justifying harsh interrogations
of terrorism suspects, and in August 2002 was the principal author of a
memorandum sent to the CIA authorizing “waterboarding.”
On
May 2, 2012 a federal appeals court dismissed the lawsuit against Yoo by Jose
Padilla claiming Yoo was responsible for violating his constitutional rights
when Padilla was detained for three years as an “enemy combatant{ and tortured: “Immunity Stands in Detainee Suit.” ADG May
3, 2012).
Book excerpt: With Liberty and Justice for Some
How Ford's pardon of Nixon launched a new era of elite immunity -- and pervasive, limitless corruption
Following is an excerpt from Glenn Greenwald’s new book, With Liberty and Justice for Some: How Law is Used to Destroy Equality and Protect the Powerful; this is from the section of the book examining how the Ford pardon of Nixon entrenched the corrupt precepts of modern elite immunity:
As multiple episodes demonstrate, a belief that elite
immunity is both necessary and justified became the prevailing ethos in the
nation’s most influential circles. In countless instances over recent
years, prominent political and media figures have insisted that serious
crimes by the most powerful should be overlooked— either in the
name of the common good, or in the name of a warped conception
of fairness according to which those with the greatest power are the
most entitled to deference and understanding.
This is what makes the contemporary form of American lawlessness new
and unprecedented. It is now perfectly common, and perfectly acceptable,
to openly advocate elite immunity. And this advocacy has had its intended
effect: the If the threat of real punishment for criminality is removed, for many rational people there will be little incentive to abide by the law and much incentive to break it. Alexander Hamilton, in Federalist 15, explained why.
It is essential to the idea of a law, that it be attended with a sanction; or, in other words, a penalty or punishment for disobedience. If there be no penalty annexed to disobedience, the resolutions or commands which pretend to be laws will, in fact, amount to nothing more than advice or recommendation.
For the nation’s most powerful elites, the law has indeed been whittled down to “nothing more than advice or recommendation.” Although there have been episodes of unpunished elite malfeasance throughout American history, the explicit, systematic embrace of the notion that such malfeasance should be shielded from legal consequences begins with the Watergate scandal— one of the clearest cases of widespread, deliberate criminality at the highest level of the U.S. government.
By the scandal’s conclusion, few contested that not only Nixon’s top aides but Nixon himself had committed serious felonies— either in authorizing the break-in and related illegalities, or in obstructing the ensuing investigation. Nonetheless, Nixon was ultimately shielded from all legal consequences thanks to the pardon granted by his handpicked vice president, Gerald Ford— who, it was widely believed, secured his appointment by agreeing to protect Nixon from prosecution.
Ford first explained his decision to pardon Nixon in a speech to the nation on September 8, 1974. The new president began by paying lip service to the rule of law: “I deeply believe in equal justice for all Americans, what ever their station or former station. The law, whether human or divine, is no respecter of persons; but”— and here he tacked on a newly concocted amendment designed to gut that phrase’s meaning—“the law is a respecter of reality.” Ford then proceeded to recite what have by now become the standard clichés our political class uses to justify immunity. Watergate, he intoned,
is an American tragedy in which we all have played a part. It could go on and on and on, or someone must write the end to it. I have concluded that only I can do that, and if I can, I must. . . .
The facts, as I see them, are that a former President of the United States, instead of enjoying equal treatment with any other citizen accused of violating the law, would be cruelly and excessively penalized either in preserving the presumption of his innocence or in obtaining a speedy determination of his guilt in order to repay a legal debt to society.
During this long period of delay and potential litigation, ugly passions would again be aroused. And our people would again be polarized in their opinions. And the credibility of our free institutions of government would again be challenged at home and abroad. . . .
My conscience tells me clearly and certainly that I cannot prolong the bad dreams that continue to reopen a chapter that is closed. My conscience tells me that only I, as President, have the constitutional power to firmly shut and seal this book. My conscience tells me it is my duty, not merely to proclaim domestic tranquility but to use every means that I have to insure it.
Remarkably, Ford explicitly pointed to Nixon’s lofty status as a reason to exempt him from the accountability applied to ordinary Americans— a complete reversal and rejection of the central covenant of the American founding. Ford’s signature line—“Our long national nightmare is over”— put a heroic spin on the betrayal of the rule of law: we end the “nightmare” of high-level criminality by sweeping it under the rug, protecting the wrongdoers, and pretending their crimes never happened.
Upon Ford’s death in December 2006, prominent figures rushed forth to consecrate his pardon of Nixon as an act of great nobility, magnanimity, and self- sacrifice, and thus to glorify its underlying premises. Leading the charge, not surprisingly, was Dick Cheney, Ford’s former chief of staff and the then-vice president. By 2006, Cheney himself had been accused of involvement in a wide variety of illegal acts, from establishing a worldwide torture regime and spying on Americans without warrants to outing a covert CIA agent and obstructing the resulting investigation.
Cheney’s own interests were thus clearly served by exploiting Ford’s death to bolster the propagandistic notion that elite immunity is dispensed not for the benefit of the powerful but rather in patriotic ser vice of the common good. At Ford’s funeral, Cheney eulogized his former boss by heralding the pardon as an act of national salvation. . . .
In fairness to Dick Cheney, we heard the same message from others, almost note for note. The Washington Post’s David Broder— the so-called dean of the Washington press corps— spoke for many journalists, past and present, when asked what would have happened had Nixon not been immunized.
My guess is that there would have been strong public pressure for prosecution of Richard Nixon, since several of his White House associates were already facing criminal charges. A lengthy trial would have been a difficult ordeal for the country, something President Ford wanted to spare Americans.
The actual beneficiary of the pardon, of course, was not “Americans” but Richard Nixon. Thanks to Ford’s act, Nixon himself was shielded from the kind of punishment that, as a “law-and-order” Republican, he had devoted his career to imposing on ordinary Americans when they broke the law, no matter how petty the offense. Yet this grant of immunity to the nation’s most powerful figure was endlessly cast as a generous gift to the American public, which—we were repeatedly told— had been spared the agony, acrimony, and shame of seeing their leader held accountable for his crimes as any other citizen would be.
The Nixon pardon, and the way it was sold to the country, became the template for justifying elite immunity. Nowadays, with only rare exceptions, each time top members of the nation’s political class are caught committing a crime, the same reasons are hauled out to get them off the hook. Prosecuting public officials mires us in a “divisive” past when we should be looking forward. It is wrong to “criminalize policy disputes”— meaning crimes committed with the use of political power. Political elites who commit crimes in carrying out their duties are “well-intentioned” and so do not deserve to be treated as if they were common criminals; moreover, politicians who are forced out of office and have their reputations damaged already “suffer enough.” To prosecute them would only engender a cycle of retribution. Political harmony thus trumps the need to enforce the rule of law.
Of course, all criminal prosecutions are, by definition, exercises in looking to the past rather than the future. All prosecutions impose substantial burdens on the accused, cost enormous amounts of time and money to resolve, and are plagued by numerous imperfections. The nation always faces pressing challenges and urgent problems from which headline-grabbing prosecutions will distract attention. All individuals accused of serious crimes suffer in multiple ways long before—and completely independent of— any actual punishment. And while it is true that criminal proceedings involving politicians who commit crimes in office inevitably engender partisan divisions and undermine political harmony, citing these circumstances as just cause for legal immunity is, by definition, creating a license to break the law. . . .
That dynamic expresses the underlying motive of the political and media classes’ general defense of elite immunity: by protecting the lawbreaking license for other powerful individuals, they strengthen a custom of which they might avail themselves if they too break the law and get caught. It is class-based, self- interested advocacy. That is why belief in this prerogative and the devotion to protecting it transcend political ideology, partisan affiliation, the supposed wall between political and media figures, and every other pretense of division within elite classes. It is in the interest of every member of the privileged political and financial class, regardless of role or position, to maintain the vitality of this immunity. And what we have seen over the last decade is the inevitable by-product of elite immunity: pervasive, limitless elite corruption and criminality. . . .For more on the book, see here. Continue Reading
OBAMA AND DRONES
From: George Monbiot <news@monbiot.com>
Date: December 18, 2012 1:10:29 AM CST To: robertjmca1@gmail.com Subject: Monbiot.com
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