The New Confederacy

I cannot help but notice the similarities between those who fought on the side of the Confederacy to keep the institution of slavery intact to some of the new young Republicans, Tea Party members and their followers.  If you are not part of the wealthy 1% of our country who controls arguably about 40% of the wealth I cannot see how you can support policies that effect you and your family in such a negative manner.  I can only relate this to a time in history when only a small amount of people in the United States could afford to own slaves, but more than half of this country was willing to fight to keep an institution that disenfranchised themselves.  Free labor for over 400 years equates to 400 years of poverty for poor whites who lost their jobs as a result of the institution of slavery.  It is ludicrous to me that simply for the ability to be able to say that you are superior to others, you would ensure your own demise.  While over 15 million Americans are unemployed, our Government has failed to relieve the working class and the poor of carrying the burdens enforced upon them by the greed of the big banking industry, large corporations and policies that promote the wealth of the top 1% of the United States population.  With the 2012 Presidential Elections approaching, the Republican primaries have been filled with such rhetoric as "if you don't have a job and you're not rich, blame yourself" (Herman Cain), the booing of a Gay Marine when asking a televised question regarding the Don't Ask Don't Tell policy during a Republican Debate and the refusal to increase the highest income earners' taxes despite the fact that according to the Pew Poll, "67% said the more high earners income should be subject to being taxed for Social Security, and 66% support raising taxes on incomes over $250,000, and 62% support closing corporate tax loopholes." These statistics along with the fact that wages are going down or stagnating for those who are lucky enough to find a job is in stark contrast to the Conservative perspective that saving the economy has to include tax cuts for the wealthy, removal or alteration of social programs like Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security (to name a few), which they lovingly refer to as "entitlement."  The fact that the Republican/Conservative Party still even exists in today's society and has so many supporters reflects a country that has not strayed far from it's History.  Whether or not you believe that the current Administration (President Obama) has made the best decisions, if you are not part of the 1% or even close and you still support the Republicans and their Conservative views, I find it safe to say that had you lived during the Civil War, you more than likely would have fought on the side of Confederacy. What is most important to remember is that the Confederacy lost and the once Divided States became the United States...or did they?  I'll let you decide that yourself.  


In regards to the question I posed, feel free to answer within the "comments" section of this blog.  Thank you.

Columbus Day and the demise of greed

So this past week was "Columbus Day" and it was shocking to me that so many people and institutions still celebrate a day that for so many Native Americans remains in infamy.  Celebrating Columbus Day in my opinion is like celebrating the Holocaust.  The lack of clarity with which we still teach that Columbus "discovered" America seems to be deliberate.  Deliberately duping the American public has become almost a right of passage for politicians, historians, economists and anyone who will sell their moral integrity for money.  At a time when global protests are sparking up everywhere, beginning with the ousting of dictators in the Middle East to the Occupy Wall Street Movement, "ordinary" people are challenging the status quo and refusing to be duped any longer.  As a protester, I have been to Occupy Los Angeles as well as Occupy Ventura and I must say that the the "99%" who is disenfranchised, unemployed and underemployed is absolutely fed up with being lied to for the sake of greed.  On Columbus day I reflected on my 1998 Freshman year of college at the University of California, Santa Barbara and my excitement at seeing the chalk riddled pathways on campus which read "Columbus was a rapist."  I had never heard that statement in relation to Columbus but I knew that something never quite seemed right about a man discovering a land for which people already inhabited.  This type of skewed historical content is extremely one sided and blatantly questions our intelligence and ability decipher logic.  The 99% of us who are fed up, are fed up with being sent to war for economic gain, bailing out banks who destroyed our economy and face no reprise, for allowing the LGBT community to serve and die for this country but deny them the right to marry and for continuing to ignore an entire people who cultivated this land and replace their history by celebrating a man who if alive, should be tried for humanitarian violations, murder, rape, slave trading and stupidity.  I say "Stupidity" because, according to Americanindiansource.com, "the Egyptian-Greek scientist Eratosthenes already had measured the circumference and diameter of the world in the third century B.C."  Not to mention that "in the tenth century A.D., Al Maqdisi Monastery described the earth with 360 degrees of longitude and 180 degrees of latitude." (Just a little bit of real History for you). At this time in human history, all eyes are on the people of the world who demand change.  Because the United States is at the center of economic and military dominance, the catalyst for change must begin here.  As a country, we must admit that we were founded on greed, oppression and imperialist occupation.  We must admit that this system no longer has a place in this world and that if it persists, the United States as we know it, will and must fall.  The demise of a time when greed rules over morality is eminent and the people of the world are seeing to it that it does.