Tuesday, December 18, 2007

The Politics of Fear in '08

"The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” – President Franklin D. Roosevelt

In the annals of great political speeches one thinks immediately of three American presidents; Abraham Lincoln, John F Kennedy and Franklin D. Roosevelt. Lincoln, the champion of black emancipation who guided the Union through a bloody and divisive Civil War, delivered what is now referred to as the Gettysburg Address in a total of just 269 words. He defined democracy as “government of the people, by the people and for the people” and the American Civil War as an opportunity for a “new birth of freedom” where all men are created and treated equally. One hundred years later John Kennedy gave hope to a new generation of Americans and evoked their patriotism and sense of public service by asking them to contemplate “not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country”.

As Adolf Hitler was coming to power in Germany, Franklin Roosevelt was elected President of a country that was in the midst of the worst depression in the country’s history. With a quarter of the workforce unemployed, two million people homeless and industrial production at less than 50% of what it had been just 4 years earlier in 1929 at the time of the Wall Street Crash, FDR called on Americans to rally themselves, their families and their country. Calling on them to recall their natural sense of optimism, fortitude and commitment to hard work, he suggested that they “had to nothing to fear but fear itself”.

As we move into a new election year in 2008, a different kind of fear is being evoked in the mind of Americans. The tragedy of 9/11 has left Americans suspicious, panicky, confused, angry and even revengeful. Unfortunately the administration of George W Bush has played on these emotions to heighten the paranoia of many Americans about the possibility of future terrorist attacks, enabling W to stream roll dodgy legislation through congress (the infamous Patriot Act) and implement illegal practices (wiretapping and unlawful detentions at Guantanamo) that undermine the civil rights of Americans and the protection of prisoners as handed down by the Geneva convention. Since 9/11, the Bush administration has continually played the fear factor for blatant political advantage and in the process severely undermined American civil liberties, the legal system and the essence of democracy.

Whatever else you can say about the co-presidency of George Bush and Dick Cheney, at least you know where they stand. We have come to expect hawkish and aggressive foreign policy, disregard and contempt for the co-equal branch of government as defined in the Constitution (the House and Senate) and an inability to accept accountability and responsibility for bad policy decisions (where do I even start). Republicans have long professed themselves to be better at protecting America in times of war than Democrats but that concept is laughable now in light of the presidency of George W Bush. You would have thought therefore that current Republican presidential candidates would be less inclined to advertise themselves at being better equipped to protect the country than their Democratic counterparts. Not likely. Not only are the Republican candidates hawkish on continuing the war in Iraq and still saber-rattling over possible conflict with Iran regardless of recent developments, they also have the gall to say that America would be less protected under a Democratic president and that the country would see a return to pre 9/11 complacency and inaction.

Step forward one Rudolph Giuliani. The self proclaimed “Mayor of America”, Giuliani has raised the blood pressure of Democrats across the country with his contention that Democrats are somehow unpatriotic and disinterested in taking the fight to the terrorists. This is an unbelievable statement from a man that it is now known did nothing as Mayor of New York to protect the city from a terrorist attack after the World Trade Centre was first targeted in 1993. Giuliani had 7 years from the time of his inauguration as mayor in 1994 to ready the city for the possibility of a future attack. In a mind boggling decision, Giuliani decided to locate the headquarters of the Office of Emergency Management (long identified as a target for a terrorist attack) INSIDE the World Trade Centre, even though that very same building had been targeted previously in 1993 and was as we found out on 9/11 the chief target for Al Qaeda in the United States.

In addition, Giuliani has received much criticism for the significant communication failures that hampered the response and recovery effort on 9/11 and the following days and weeks. The lack of working walkie-talkies, which had been an ongoing issue in the 1990’s in New York City, has led many of the 9/11 families, as well as members of the fire, police and emergency services to protest at Giuliani for President rallies. The groundswell of anti-Giuliani feeling has included the Fire-Fighters Union of America refusing to endorse Giuliani for President and they have posted an open letter on their website criticizing the former mayor for the “egregious acts he committed against our members, our fallen on 9/11 and our New York City union officers following that horrific day”. Not to mention the fact that Giuliani has reportedly earned over $20M in speaking fees since 2001 on so called leadership and the importance of winning the war on terror. Giuliani's recent performance on "Meet the Press" was a disaster, sniggering and side-stepping his way through a minefield of scandal curveballs tossed at him by Tim Russert.

The hypocrisy of candidates like Rudy Giuliani who continue to play the fear card for pure political advantage on the one hand, while being shown to be at best careless and at worst downright irresponsible in the aftermath of 9/11 on the other, underlines that if this guy is elected President we can look forward to another 4 years of Bush style policies and the continued erosion of the values that make this country great.

America needs to wake up to the divisiveness and moral corruption of candidates like Giuliani, and fast.

Thursday, December 6, 2007

"Immigration is the sincerest form of flattery...."(Jack Paar 1918-2004)

"There is nothing less to our credit than our neglect of the foreigner and his children; unless it be the arrogance most of us betray when we set out to ‘Americanize’ him” – Charles Horton Cooley 1864-1929 – American sociologist

I recently sat down to see a movie that I had eagerly anticipated watching for quite a while called “The Good Shepherd”. Directed by one of my favorite actors, Robert De Niro; who also plays a small but significant part in the film, the storyline is based around the formation in the early 1940’s of the U.S. Office of Strategic Services, the OSS. A wartime intelligence and counter intelligence agency, it was the predecessor to the infamous CI.A. Late on in the film there is a scene between the chief character played by Matt Damon, and Joe Pesci, who plays famous crime boss Joseph Palmi. A discussion ensues where both men are discussing the fact that America is a melting pot of mixed nationalities and cultures, a nation essentially of immigrants.

Pesci speaks about many of the chief immigrant nationalities in America and what it is that is important and dear to each of their cultures. For example, and to paraphrase Pesci, the Italians have family and the Church, the Irish have the homeland and the Jews have their tradition. Pesci then turns to Damon and asks him what Americans have, to which he responds that Americans have America and that “…you are all just visiting”, a reference to the dozens of immigrant cultures represented in American society.

This comment resonated with me at the time because it summed up in one sentence the way I am sure many Americans feel about the level of immigration into their country. While the issue of immigration, illegal or otherwise, has been an ongoing topic of debate in this country for decades; it periodically raises its head every 10 or 20 years or so and consumes the national debate almost to saturation point.

Over twenty years ago, Ronald Reagan granted what was essentially amnesty to the illegal immigrant population of the United States, wiping clean the slate and allowing hard working immigrants to come out of the woodwork and the shadows and become legitimate. The Morrison and Donnelly visa lotteries helped the Irish, both here in the U.S. and in Ireland, to fully participate in the American dream. I have yet to meet an Irish person here in the United States who has failed to prosper. For sure, many still miss home and because of their still as yet unresolved status can’t return home, they still thrive and have a reasonable to good standard of living. Here in San Francisco, which became a haven for Irish people in the 1990’s after the city declared itself a city of sanctuary for illegal immigrants in 1989, there is a thriving Irish sub culture where people from home come together to socialize, participate in sport and network at business events where we give each other business, all while fully participating in the American way of life.

In the last couple of years, the issue of immigration has monopolized the national agenda here. In the wake of 9/11 and the need to secure America’s borders against potential terrorist attacks, many see the wave of ongoing illegal immigration as a security threat, not to mention the so called financial drain on the existing American middle class. Here in California the issue is very real, what with the consistent flow of illegal immigrants from Mexico and other Latin American countries that come into the United States through the Mexican border. It is now estimated that there is somewhere in the region of between 12 and 20 million illegal immigrants living in the United States, 6 million of which live in California.

While illegal immigrants come from many nations, and included in that is a healthy number of Irish, it is fair to say that the immigration debate centers on the Latino and South East Asian communities. The fact that a huge percentage of Mexican and/or Asian immigrants don’t speak English and are slow to embrace the concept of learning English and fully immersing themselves in the American way of life, has not helped their cause. In addition, the continued hemorrhaging of people across the U.S. southern border has given rise to huge concern over national security.

Earlier this summer, the outlook was reasonably good for the passage of the Kennedy/Kyl Secure Borders, Economic Opportunity and Immigration Reform Act of 2007. With the backing of President Bush, this new bill proposed creating a new classification of visa, entitled a “Z” visa, which would legitimize anyone that had entered the United States illegally prior to January 1st 2007, subject to them paying a $5,000 fine and agreeing to return to their homeland (and return) sometime in the next 8 years. The debate was furious, the detractors of the bill considering it to be blatant amnesty, its supporters calling it a mechanism to legitimize millions of workers. After weeks of debate in congress and a number of votes, the bill was defeated. The defeat was a crushing blow to the domestic agenda of President Bush and in particular to the hopes of millions of illegal immigrants in the U.S.

I am one of the lucky ones. I married an American citizen this year and while my naturalization process involved a lot of paperwork, a couple of nervous interviews, and a few thousand dollars (hey, it’s still America and capitalism lives!) my green card was approved with little fuss in July this year. While I was able to celebrate, I know that there are many Irish here in San Francisco, including a number of Ennis people, who will be bitterly disappointed that the immigration bill didn’t pass congress. Political commentators predict that because the first presidential primaries are due to be held next January, and 2008 being a Presidential election year, the immigration initiative is dead at least until the new President, hopefully a Democrat; is inaugurated in January 2009. It then remains to be seen how high a priority the immigration issue will be for the 44th President.