Sunday Roundup December 28, 2014 - Closing Time

"There is no way to peace. Peace is the way."

- A.J. Muste

This is the last post at The Left Bank Café.  For those of you who've stopped by over the years, thank you.

I started this blog in November 2010 - outraged at the distortions of truth and at the right-wing propaganda that led to the Republican victories that year. Since the blog's inception, I've tried to separate fiction from fact in the events of the day and, from time to time, to share my thoughts and passions on non-political topics.

Three hundred posts and four years later, it's now closing time at The Left Bank Café.  

Here are some thoughts, inspirations and sentiments that have informed this blog.

The universe is a wondrous, vast place.  The Earth is home to the only known intelligent life in that universe.  This is an awesome responsibility.  As the Native American proverb has it: "Treat the earth well.  It was not given to you by your parents.  It was loaned to you by your children."

The peoples of the world are our brothers and sisters.  The children of the world are our children.  Let's always remember that.  "I wonder how foreign policies would look if we thought of all children everywhere as our own. Then we could never wage war anywhere, because wars, especially in our time, are always wars against children, indeed our children." - Howard Zinn, A People's History of the United States

Government has a responsibility to develop just policies and provide for the common good. Given the complexity and scale of today's issues, government plays a vital and necessary role. To say that the richest nation on Earth cannot afford the common good, that it cannot provide for the vulnerable in our society, is a lie.

Racism, militarism, and all forms of oppression must be protested and resisted at every turn. Pacifist and activist A.J. Muste spoke of a "revolutionary pacifism" that confronts the injustice that lays at the heart of wars: "We cannot have peace if we are only concerned with peace. War is not an accident. It is the logical outcome of a certain way of life. If we want to attack war, we have to attack that way of life."  A pacifist, Muste was, of course, speaking figuratively.  Without justice, there is no true peace.  We must address, resist, and correct the causes of injustice built into the system.

Violence and force of arms are the easy but soul-damaging means to achieve certain ends. Diplomacy is more difficult but, in the end, produces more lasting and more satisfying results.

The distorted "exceptionalism" that places our nation above international law and in violation of our own democratic principles is a repudiation of our values. Our country, if it chooses, can play an "exceptional" role in making the world a better place. What nation is better equipped to address the poverty, disease, and hunger that plague so many?

The American experiment in democracy is in danger - not from any external threat or from foreign terrorists but from within. Racism, militarism, and a distorted concept of American exceptionalism pose, each in its own way, a threat to America's highest ideals. Political spending, given corporate "personhood" and an unlimited ability to influence elections by the Supreme Court, provides an amplifier for the voices of the powerful while muting the voices of the less advantaged. Special interest groups influence domestic laws as well as foreign policy. Legislation for the common good is blocked by right-wing extremists. Laws protecting the rights of all are dismantled by an ideological judiciary, and the essential right of democracy, the right to vote, has been subverted. Such is the state of affairs and such is the degree of disillusionment that, in our last elections, two out of three voters chose not to exercise their most basic democratic right.

Until money is removed from the political system, until the concept of the Other is banished, and until, in the words of President Kennedy, "the conscientious objector enjoys the same reputation and prestige that the warrior does today", inequality, injustice and war will be with us. That should not stop us from trying or caring or working for peace and justice. We need to take our victories when and where we can.

As the outlook for action at the national level becomes bleak, activism and initiatives at the state and community levels become necessary. Already we are seeing the effect of some of the successful state ballot initiatives from the November 4 elections.  For example, just two days after a successful California ballot initiative reclassified some non-violent offenses from felonies to misdemeanors, people were being released from detention.

Where do we go from here?  There is now a website that contains references and resources for the topics covered in the blog - where to go for further information, if you want to become active in an area, etc. The website also has The Left Bank Café posts indexed by topic, which I hope will be helpful.  I'll periodically update the website as new information becomes available. The address of the website is https://sites.google.com/site/leftbankresources/ .

Peace.

(The most recent update of The Left Bank website was on January 19, 2018.For more recent news, comments, and articles please visit the What in the World? website.) 

Imagining a Better 2014

2013 is winding down.  We've already posted the best news of the year, so let's imagine what 2014 might look like if peace and justice somehow overwhelmed the nations of the world.

The late Howard Zinn wrote in A People's History of the United States that the world would be a better place if  the United States chose to be a humanitarian, rather than a military, superpower - using "this wealth to improve the living conditions of Americans and people in other parts of the world."  This seems like a good place to start.  Can you imagine what the world would be like if the US military budget since the end of the Cold War was used for humanitarian purposes?  Since 1989, the United States has spent more than $13 trillion on its military budget.  The impact that this sum might have had on education, disease eradication, agricultural improvements and poverty reduction is staggering.  As Zinn notes "it was estimated by the World Health Organization that a small portion of the American military budget, if given to the treatment of tuberculosis in the world, could save millions of lives."

By implementing policies that advance the world's well-being, we would take a giant step towards reducing some of the traditional causes of unrest and war.  And in securing our own safety.  It's a myth that terrorists hate us because of our freedoms.  They hate us because of our policies.  Empire has a cost that there is no need to bear any longer.  Peacefully supporting the right to self-determination would show that our concept of democracy extends to all people.

Stopping the flow of arms and military aid would reduce tensions and the possibility of war.  Here at home, removing weapons from the streets and keeping them from the hands of felons and the mentally unstable would make our own country a safer place.  Finally, the United States and other countries with atomic weapons could provide the world with a real example of non-proliferation by dismantling its nuclear arsenals.

Pope Francis has it right.  As the dominant global economic system, capitalism should be regulated so that its benefits accrue to all, not just to a small percentage.  Economic inequality can be overcome by a just system of taxation and regulation.  Or as Nelson Mandela said, "Poverty is not an accident.  Like slavery and apartheid, it is man-made and can be removed by the actions of human beings."

That leads us to a final consideration.  What do we do about racism, sectarian violence and tribal and nationalistic hatreds?   It all comes down to fear and demonization of "the other".  In October  Pope Francis stressed the need to fight "all forms of racism, intolerance and anti-Semitism" and noted that "every time a minority is persecuted and marginalised because of his religious beliefs or ethnicity, the good of the whole society is in danger”.  [Catholic Herald] But what to do about it?  Here's Nelson Mandela again: "No one is born hating another person because of the color of his skin, or his background, or his religion.  People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite." 

Maybe peace and justice on earth in 2014 are too much to hope for.  But we can at least make a step forward in our own lives and behavior.  And we can recognize for what they are, those damaging and divisive ideologies and policies that move us away from a better world.