Our Government is Broken

Published in the Oregonian: Thursday, September 30, 2010, 8:00 AM    

Guest Columnist

By Charlie Phillips

The political struggles of our modern times are illusions. Democrats vs. Republicans, tea partiers vs. socialists -- all are false divisions maintained and propagated by the corporate media and the powers that be in order to polarize, anger, frustrate and distract -- anything to keep us from focusing on the sad truth that our government, that our democratic system of government, is broken. It's been overrun by corporate interests and big money and has long since morphed into corporatism -- a form of fascism. Our system of government is broken, and few in the mainstream are talking about it.

OK. So what? Capitalism is at the heart of our heritage, so isn't this just it's natural extension?

Well, here's the so what. We face far-reaching problems such as global warming that threaten our entire planet. Problems that will require decades of cooperative international effort to solve. Problems that require commitment to something other than profit and consumption. Corporatism has no mechanisms to address such problems. We desperately need a way to overcome the ever-growing influence of corporate and extreme ideological concerns that threaten the world's economy, international relations and peace, the environment, the very ability of our system of government to function as it was meant to with checks and balances and meaningful debate. And no one is talking about it.

We're at a crossroads in this country. In its essence, it's corporatism vs. democracy – greed, short-sightedness and eventual self-destruction vs. prosperity and sustainability through responsible government and balanced empowerment of all. And no one is talking about it.

Our government is broken. Fixing it should be Job One. And no one is talking about it.

Charlie Phillips lives in Southwest Portland.

God's Speed

I fought pretty hard for this patient. Day and night, I tried to help him in his fight for his life. After 5 days and 5 nights he died. He died as I withdrew care from him when we finally, sadly, realized we were only prolonging death.

He was 10 years younger than myself. I watched the last of life leave him, his young wife gently kissing him goodbye. Incredibly - the end of an entire lifetime.

As I wrote his death note I wrote that he died quietly with his family by his bedside. And as I have come to do I signed it – God’s speed. 

God’s speed means safe journey. It has no special religious meaning. Good since I am an agnostic. 

I think concerning death, we as care givers can relax the shackles of absolute political correctness and introduce at least a little humanity. At least that was my intent.

I'm quite certain that in the beginning political correctness was meant to heighten self-awareness and increase sensitivity and fairness. It has long since morphed into a form of mind control and it more often than not robs us of part of our humanity. Experiencing each other as we are - faults, edges, smells and stumbles can only result in deeper more meaningful human interaction. Experiencing each other behind the cold walls of extreme political correctness leaves us hollow, more isolated, and less human.

He and his wife touched me deeply. I will carry them in my heart all my life.

Gods Speed John

Sarah Palin for President

Published in The Oregonian: Sunday, September 19, 2010, 8:05 PM

Judging by the quality of some of the tea party-backed Republicans who are winning in their congressional primaries, I'm starting to think that the tea party may be the best thing to happen to the Democratic Party in a long time.

Islam Is Not Spelled With a T

Timothy McVeigh was a Christian. 
Mohamed Mohamed el-Amir Awad el-Sayed Atta was one of the masterminds of 9/11 and a terrorist pilot on American Airlines flight 11 that flew into the north tower of the world trade center - he was a Muslim.
Timothy McVeigh was angry at the federal government - fearful of government "take-over" of our civil liberties. Atta was angered by U.S. policy toward the Middle East, particularly the Oslo Accords and the first Gulf War. He did not hate us 'for our freedom' as  the conservative right are so fond of saying.
Islam does not call for acts of terrorism, war or even violence. It is not 'in their religion' for Muslims to fly planes into buildings anymore than it is Christian to bomb federal buildings in Oklahoma City.
Radicalism is an individual interpretation - not an indictment of culture, race, or religion.
So what does burning Korans have to do with Islamic centers in New York?
If we're going to go to war with the entire Islamic world  because some terrorists call themselves Muslims then we must also go to war with the entire Christian world  as McVeigh called himself a Christian.

One World

My mother, as a representative of southern republican thinking, would call the statement below extreme. She might even go so far as to use her favorite word - weird. She would dismiss it as the ramblings of the extreme left, while denying the existence of global warming, and along with my father, scoff. Never-mind that neither of them have really done their homework as regards global warming, and neither have come to grips with the idea that nationalism, war, oppression and us against them mentality is obsolete - made so by our ever growing international interdependence and the destructive potential of our technology. Yes both my parents would scoff as would the millions of like-minded conservatives they represent - world unity, world peace indeed - until that is - hopefully - they realized who composed and signed this statement.  Here it is.

The most profound danger to world peace in the coming years will stem not from the irrational acts of states or individuals but from the legitimate demands of the world's dispossessed. Of these poor and disenfranchised, the majority live a marginal existence in equatorial climates. Global warming, not of their making but originating with the wealthy few, will affect their fragile ecologies most. Their situation will be desperate and manifestly unjust.
It cannot be expected, therefore, that in all cases they will be content to await the beneficence of the rich. If then we permit the devastating power of modern weaponry to spread through this combustible human landscape, we invite a conflagration that can engulf both rich and poor. The only hope for the future lies in co-operative international action, legitimized by democracy.
It is time to turn our backs on the unilateral search for security, in which we seek to shelter behind walls. Instead, we must persist in the quest for united action to counter both global warming and a weaponized world.
These twin goals will constitute vital components of stability as we move toward the wider degree of social justice that alone gives hope of peace.
Some of the needed legal instruments are already at hand, such as the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, the Convention on Climate Change, the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaties and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. As concerned citizens, we urge all governments to commit to these goals that constitute steps on the way to replacement of war by law.
To survive in the world we have transformed, we must learn to think in a new way. As never before, the future of each depends on the good of all.

This was written in 2001 and signed by 100 Nobel laureates.

The SIGNATORIES can be found here

Perputual War is a Trillion Dollar Industry (so far)

Can someone please tell me what the HELL we're doing in Afghanistan? I truly do not know - can't even understand the reasons given.
We have now spent over 1 trillion dollars on Iraq and Afghanistan.
What does that mean exactly?
Well in part it means that we have redistributed wealth from the average taxpayer to the 'average' defense contractor. I mean the money goes somewhere - right?
Subtract payroll to the average military grunt and it's still hundreds of billions handed over to people and corporations making money off perpetual war.
Is that why we are still in Afghanistan?