THE DAY OF ALL DAYS HAS ARRIVED

COMMITTEE ON THE ELIMINATION OF

RACIAL DISCRIMINATION

EXAMINATION OF THE UNITED STATES 4^th, 5^th, and 6^th PERIODIC REPORTS

OF APRIL, 2007

RACIAL DISCRIMINATION AGAINST INDIGENOUS PEOPLES

IN THE UNITED STATES

CONSOLIDATED INDIGENOUS SHADOW REPORT

Submitted by Alberto Saldamando

International Indian Treaty Council

2390 Mission Street, Suite 301

San Francisco, California, 94110 USA

Tel: + (415) 641-4482

Fax: + (415) 641-1298

Email: alberto@treatycouncil.org

http://www.treatycouncil.org

Dedicated to Floyd Redcrow Westerman

American Indian Movement Statesman, Warrior,

IITC Spokesman, Leader and Guide

Who passed into the Spirit World on December 13, 2007

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

We gratefully acknowledge all of the testimonies provided by Indigenous Peoples, Nations, Organizations and individuals that, in their own words, make up the substance of this Shadow Report. Although not all could be included, all contributed to whatever richness and scope it may have. Contributions and testimonies are cited in the body of the report.

This Shadow Report is an enlargement of the US National Indigenous Shadow Report. Contributors include: Alberto Saldamando, Working Group Co-coordinator, International Indian Treaty Council; Julie Fishel, Working Group Co-coordinator, Western Shoshone Defense Project; Hope Clark, Candidate for Masters in Intercultural Service, Leadership, and Management from the School for International Training; Manuel Pino, Professor, Scottsdale Community College; Josh Clark; Jaime Arsenault; Roxanne Ornelas, University of Minnesota; Sakura Saunders, CorpWatch; and, Andrea Carmen, International Indian Treaty Council.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Executive Summary 1

Introduction – Major Concerns and the UN Declaration on the rights of Indigenous Peoples 3

The Obligation to Report on Indigenous Peoples 5

I.Omissions of the US Periodic Report 5

II.Un-recognized Indigenous Peoples 6

III.Indian Reservation Apartheid 7

A. Life Expectancy on the Indian Reservation 8

B. Unemployment and Poverty in Employment 9

C. Disproportionate Victimization, Incarceration and Sentencing 10

Racially Discriminatory Constitutional Foundations 13

I.The Marshall Trilogy: The Origins of Racist Constitutional Doctrine 13

A. The Plenary Powers Doctrine 14

B. The “Trust” Relationship 15

II.Current Application of Racist Constitutional Doctrines 16

A. The Termination of Recognized Indian Tribes 17

B. The Abrogation of Treaties between the United States and Indigenous Peoples 20

C. The Continuing “Taking” of Indian Lands 22

D. The Corruption of the “Trust” Doctrine 24

E. The Continuing Denial of the Right of Self Determination: “Criminal” Jurisdiction 26

III.The Failure of Recognition of Indigenous Peoples as Peoples 28

A. “Unrecognized” Indigenous Tribes 28

B. Alaskan Native Peoples 29

C. Native Hawai’ians 31

D. The Indigenous Peoples of Puerto Rico and Guam 32

Sacred Lands and the Right of Spiritual Practice 33

I.Sacred Lands 34

A. Recognized Tribes and Treaty Rights: The Lakota Nation and Bear Butte (Mato Paha), Black Hills, South Dakota: 36

B. Dishonored Treaty, Seeking Recognition: The Winnemmem Wintu of Northern California, McCloud River: 38

C. Indigenous but with No Recognized Rights: the Native Peoples of Hawai’i, Mauna Kea: 39

D. No recognition and no rights at all: The Taino, Native Peoples of Puerto Rico, The Sacred Caguana Ceremonial Center in Utuado, Borikén: 39

II.The Religious rights of Prison Inmates 41

Environmental Racism and its effects on Indigenous human rights 44

I.The Right to Life: The Nuclear Fuel Chain and Environmental Racism 46

II.Environmental Racism and the Right to Food 48

III.Health and Environmental Racism 49

The Denial of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms in the Political, Economic, Social, Cultural or any Other Field of Public Life 51

I.The Right to the Highest Attainable Standard of Health 51

II.Freedom from Violence - Violence against Indigenous Women 54

III.Racism in “Homeland Security” 55

A. Death along the Border: 55

B. Desecration and Denial of Access to Sacred Places: 56

C. The confiscation of Indigenous lands: 58

IV.Voting Rights 59

Racist Science and the Collective Right of Free, Prior and Informed Consent 60

I.The Indigenous Human Genome 60

II.The Wild Rice Genome: 1Manoomin and the Anishinaabeg 63

Articles 6 and 7 of the Convention 65

I.Boarding Schools 65

II.Textbooks 69

III.Racist Sports Mascots and Logos 72

United States and its Transnational Companies Violations of the Human Rights of Indigenous Peoples Abroad 73

I.US Transnationals Abroad 73

II.United States Complicity: the Manufacture and Exportation of Banned Pesticides 77

III.Direct US Government Environmental Racism Abroad: 82

IV.US military bases on Indigenous communities in the Philippines 84

Conclusion and Recommendations 84

Executive Summary

The Introduction reviews the standards by which compliance with the Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Racial Discrimination (CERD) should be measured, reviewing the recent passage of the United Nations Declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples and the lack of recognition and respect of the rights of many Indigenous Peoples and Nations within the jurisdiction of the United States (US). Many rights contained in the UN Declaration are already customary international law and recognized by the US itself but only with reference to “recognized” tribes. The Introduction also points out that the US takes the attitude that recognition of Indigenous rights, particularly political rights, are a form of “racial preference” and not a matter of rights.

The US fails in its Obligation to Report on Indigenous Peoples. We cite data on the overwhelming disparities in income, life expectancy, poverty and unemployment, as well as disproportionate victimization, incarceration and sentencing suffered by Indigenous Peoples on Indian Reservations, not reported by the United States. The data contained in this section as well as others (see, e.g., Violence Against Women, The Right to the Highest Attainable Standard of Health) reflect what can only be describe as a system of Apartheid and forced assimilation, by purpose or effect, on many if not most Indian Reservations, where Indigenous people are warehoused in poverty and neglect, their only option being to abandon their lands, families, languages and cultures to search for a better life.

The United States Racist Constitutional Foundation, Legal Structure is examined, as is the current application of racist constitutional doctrine established by the United States Supreme Court in the 1830s. Incuded in current application are the threat of termination of the Cherokee Nation, Treaty abrogation, corruption of the so-called “Trust Doctrine” and the continuing negation of Indigenous Peoples’ right of self determination.

Considerable attention is paid to Sacred Lands and the Right of Spiritual Practice, as it continues to be of paramount importance to Indigenous Peoples, whether recognized by the US or not. The Addendum, Sacred Lands, incudes Indigenous Peoples’ own testimony on the negation of religious rights in all parts of the United States. Given the disfavor in international law to the extinguishment of Aboriginal Title, and the fact that most of these Sacred Lands are owned and administered by agencies of the United States, a major recommendation of this Shadow Report is the recommendation to the United States of the return to Indigenous Peoples of these Sacred Lands, still in use by them for Spiritual and religious practice in spite of great obstacles posed by the US and its agencies. Environmental Racism and its effects on Indigenous human rights is examined as it permeates all aspects of Indigenous life, including Spiritual Practice examined above, as well as means of subsistence, health and well-being, culture and religion.

Other current and particularly discriminatory policies and practices are examined in The Denial of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms in the Political, Economic, Social, Cultural or any Other Field of Public Life, including the right to health, violence against women, so-called “Homeland Security” and the lack of protection for the right to vote.

Racist Science and the Collective Right of Free, Prior and Informed Consent describes how scientific inquiry in th United States particularly attacks Indigenous Peoples in their own human genome and identity and that which they hold Sacred.

US compliance with Articles 6 and 7 of the Convention is examined particularly with regard to the lack of any reparation or apology for Indian Boarding Schools (the kidnapping of children in order to “kill the Indian and save the man), as well as texbooks in public schools and the use of racist logos and mascots by US sports teams.

United States Racial Discrimination against Indigenous Peoples Abroad describes racism in the conduct of US foreign policy negatively affecting the human rights of Indigenous Peoples abroad. Domestic US policy, the allowing of the manufacture for export of pesticides banned in the United States affecting the life, health and well being of Indigenous Peoples abroad is also documented. The conduct of US transnational Corporations is examined, with another major recommendation that the US be held accountable for its own behavior as well as the behavior of its corporations, as they affect the rights of Indigenous Peoples abroad.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Executive Summary 1

Introduction – Major Concerns and the UN Declaration on the rights of Indigenous Peoples 3

The Obligation to Report on Indigenous Peoples 5

I.Omissions of the US Periodic Report 5

II.Un-recognized Indigenous Peoples 6

III.Indian Reservation Apartheid 7

A. Life Expectancy on the Indian Reservation 8

B. Unemployment and Poverty in Employment 9

C. Disproportionate Victimization, Incarceration and Sentencing 10

Racially Discriminatory Constitutional Foundations 13

I.The Marshall Trilogy: The Origins of Racist Constitutional Doctrine 13

A. The Plenary Powers Doctrine 14

B. The “Trust” Relationship 15

II.Current Application of Racist Constitutional Doctrines 16

A. The Termination of Recognized Indian Tribes 17

B. The Abrogation of Treaties between the United States and Indigenous Peoples 20

C. The Continuing “Taking” of Indian Lands 22

D. The Corruption of the “Trust” Doctrine 24

E. The Continuing Denial of the Right of Self Determination: “Criminal” Jurisdiction 26

III.The Failure of Recognition of Indigenous Peoples as Peoples 28

A. “Unrecognized” Indigenous Tribes 28

B. Alaskan Native Peoples 29

C. Native Hawai’ians 31

D. The Indigenous Peoples of Puerto Rico and Guam 32

Sacred Lands and the Right of Spiritual Practice 33

I.Sacred Lands 34

A. Recognized Tribes and Treaty Rights: The Lakota Nation and Bear Butte (Mato Paha), Black Hills, South Dakota: 36

B. Dishonored Treaty, Seeking Recognition: The Winnemmem Wintu of Northern California, McCloud River: 38

C. Indigenous but with No Recognized Rights: the Native Peoples of Hawai’i, Mauna Kea: 39

D. No recognition and no rights at all: The Taino, Native Peoples of Puerto Rico, The Sacred Caguana Ceremonial Center in Utuado, Borikén: 39

II.The Religious rights of Prison Inmates 41

Environmental Racism and its effects on Indigenous human rights 44

I.The Right to Life: The Nuclear Fuel Chain and Environmental Racism 46

II.Environmental Racism and the Right to Food 48

III.Health and Environmental Racism 49

The Denial of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms in the Political, Economic, Social, Cultural or any Other Field of Public Life 51

I.The Right to the Highest Attainable Standard of Health 51

II.Freedom from Violence - Violence against Indigenous Women 54

III.Racism in “Homeland Security” 55

A. Death along the Border: 55

B. Desecration and Denial of Access to Sacred Places: 56

C. The confiscation of Indigenous lands: 58

IV.Voting Rights 59

Racist Science and the Collective Right of Free, Prior and Informed Consent 60

I.The Indigenous Human Genome 60

II.The Wild Rice Genome: 1Manoomin and the Anishinaabeg 63

Articles 6 and 7 of the Convention 65

I.Boarding Schools 65

II.Textbooks 69

III.Racist Sports Mascots and Logos 72

United States and its Transnational Companies Violations of the Human Rights of Indigenous Peoples Abroad 73

I.US Transnationals Abroad 73

II.United States Complicity: the Manufacture and Exportation of Banned Pesticides 77

III.Direct US Government Environmental Racism Abroad: 82

IV.US military bases on Indigenous communities in the Philippines 84

Conclusion and Recommendations 84

Executive Summary

The Introduction reviews the standards by which compliance with the Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Racial Discrimination (CERD) should be measured, reviewing the recent passage of the United Nations Declaration on the rights of indigenous peoples and the lack of recognition and respect of the rights of many Indigenous Peoples and Nations within the jurisdiction of the United States (US). Many rights contained in the UN Declaration are already customary international law and recognized by the US itself but only with reference to “recognized” tribes. The Introduction also points out that the US takes the attitude that recognition of Indigenous rights, particularly political rights, are a form of “racial preference” and not a matter of rights.

The US fails in its Obligation to Report on Indigenous Peoples. We cite data on the overwhelming disparities in income, life expectancy, poverty and unemployment, as well as disproportionate victimization, incarceration and sentencing suffered by Indigenous Peoples on Indian Reservations, not reported by the United States. The data contained in this section as well as others (see, e.g., Violence Against Women, The Right to the Highest Attainable Standard of Health) reflect what can only be describe as a system of Apartheid and forced assimilation, by purpose or effect, on many if not most Indian Reservations, where Indigenous people are warehoused in poverty and neglect, their only option being to abandon their lands, families, languages and cultures to search for a better life.

The United States Racist Constitutional Foundation, Legal Structure is examined, as is the current application of racist constitutional doctrine established by the United States Supreme Court in the 1830s. Incuded in current application are the threat of termination of the Cherokee Nation, Treaty abrogation, corruption of the so-called “Trust Doctrine” and the continuing negation of Indigenous Peoples’ right of self determination.

Considerable attention is paid to Sacred Lands and the Right of Spiritual Practice, as it continues to be of paramount importance to Indigenous Peoples, whether recognized by the US or not. The Addendum, Sacred Lands, incudes Indigenous Peoples’ own testimony on the negation of religious rights in all parts of the United States. Given the disfavor in international law to the extinguishment of Aboriginal Title, and the fact that most of these Sacred Lands are owned and administered by agencies of the United States, a major recommendation of this Shadow Report is the recommendation to the United States of the return to Indigenous Peoples of these Sacred Lands, still in use by them for Spiritual and religious practice in spite of great obstacles posed by the US and its agencies. Environmental Racism and its effects on Indigenous human rights is examined as it permeates all aspects of Indigenous life, including Spiritual Practice examined above, as well as means of subsistence, health and well-being, culture and religion.

Other current and particularly discriminatory policies and practices are examined in The Denial of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms in the Political, Economic, Social, Cultural or any Other Field of Public Life, including the right to health, violence against women, so-called “Homeland Security” and the lack of protection for the right to vote.

Racist Science and the Collective Right of Free, Prior and Informed Consent describes how scientific inquiry in th United States particularly attacks Indigenous Peoples in their own human genome and identity and that which they hold Sacred.

US compliance with Articles 6 and 7 of the Convention is examined particularly with regard to the lack of any reparation or apology for Indian Boarding Schools (the kidnapping of children in order to “kill the Indian and save the man), as well as texbooks in public schools and the use of racist logos and mascots by US sports teams.

United States Racial Discrimination against Indigenous Peoples Abroad describes racism in the conduct of US foreign policy negatively affecting the human rights of Indigenous Peoples abroad. Domestic US policy, the allowing of the manufacture for export of pesticides banned in the United States affecting the life, health and well being of Indigenous Peoples abroad is also documented. The conduct of US transnational Corporations is examined, with another major recommendation that the US be held accountable for its own behavior as well as the behavior of its corporations, as they affect the rights of Indigenous Peoples abroad.

MEGWEETCH.

Now will you PLEASE Let Leonard Peltier out of jail.

We all need to walk in dignity after all these decades.

And should you find this and be concerned with Canada,

please act on the behalf of Paula Sherman, Robert Lovelace and Shawn Brant

Have you done something for aboriginal peoples today?

The full report can be obtained at:

http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bo.../usa/ USHRN8.doc.

Heading towards Global Famine

In case you are new here or are wondering - NO, I don't agree with this article.

He does not understand GLOBALIZATION or the role of transnationals in the global economy . he also does not understand human NEED nor the fact that unfettered capitalism leaves only the Big Fish with an assured diet ..

Veeger

Truth is Treason in the Empire of Lies

Are we Heading Towards Global Famine?

Posted in Uncategorized by freemarketman on March 16th, 2008

I came across this interesting article by MSN Finance, Could we really run out of food?

Biofuel production, poor harvests and emerging nations’ growing appetites are emptying the world’s pantry, sending prices soaring. It’s a good time to invest in agricultural stocks.(My emphasis: See Jim Rogers on CNBC: Abolish The Federal Reserve and Bernanke)

As if a bear market, U.S. credit crunch, energy crisis and city financing emergency were not enough for one year, experts say the world is now facing down the barrel of the worst catastrophe of all: famine.

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The very idea that the modern world could run out of food seems ludicrous, but that is the flip side, or cause, of the tremendous recent increase in the cost of raw wheat, corn, rice, oats and soybeans. Food prices are not escalating because speculators have run them up for sport and profit. Food prices are escalating because accelerating demand in developing nations, biofuel production and poor harvests in some areas have made basic foodstuffs truly scarce.(My emphasis)

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In energy circles, folks who warn about the beginning of the end of cheap fossil fuels talk about “peak oil” as a point we have dangerously and expensively crossed. Likewise, you can now add “peak wheat” to your political and investment lexicon. And it’s a lot worse.

.

It’s good to see the MSM reporting some thruth. The old line always sold to people is that the “bad capitalists” are driving food prices up through speculation and just “raising prices” for a fat profit. As the author correctly points out, accelerating demand from developing nations, stupid government socialist policies for biofuel production and crop failures (which is normal) are all factors coming together that facilitate rising prices. But, it’s not the real cause.

There is one issue the author doesn’t touch on, and it is the biggest, but least visible factor. It is called Monetary Inflation. This world has been flooded with cheap money by Central Banks since the beginning of the new millenium. So what has cheap money and food shortages got to do with each other?

I’m going to try and make this as easy as possible. First, have a look at this image of the Nile Delta. Keep the window open. Now read this (from Henry Hazlitt’s, “What You Should Know About Inflation“) :

“…it is contended that the increase in commodity prices often occurs before the increase in the money supply. This is true. This is what happened immediately after the outbreak of war in Korea. Strategic raw materials began to go up in price on the fear that they were going to be scarce.

Speculators and manufacturers began to buy them to hold for profit or protective inventories. But to do this they had to borrow more money from the banks. The rise in prices was accompanied by an equally marked rise in bank loans and deposits. From May 31,1950, to May 30,1951, the loans of the country’s banks increased by $12 billion.

If these increased loans had not been made, and new money (some $6 billion by the end of January 1951) had not been issued against the loans, the rise in prices could not have been sustained. The price rise was made possible, in short, only by an increased supply of money.”

And this…

One of the most stubborn fallacies about inflation is the assumption that it is caused, not by an increase in the quantity of money, but by a “shortage of goods.”

It is true that a rise in prices (which, as we have seen,should not be identified with inflation) can be caused either by an increase in the quantity of money or by a shortage of goods—or partly by both.

Wheat, for example, may rise in price either because there is an increase in the supply of money or a failure of the wheat crop. But we seldom find, even in conditions of total war, a general rise of prices caused by a general shortage of goods.

Yet so stubborn is the fallacy that inflation is caused by a “shortage of goods,” that even in the Germany of 1923, after prices had soared hundreds of billions of times, high officials and millions of Germans were blaming the whole thing on a general “shortage of goods”—at the very moment when foreigners were coming in and buying German goods with gold or their own currencies at prices lower than those of equivalent goods at home.

And lastly, this…

Inflation, to sum up, is the increase in the volume of money and bank credit in relation to the volume of goods. It is harmful because:

• it depreciates the value of the monetary unit,
• raises everybody’s cost of living,
• imposes what is in effect a tax on the poorest (without exemptions) at as high a rate as the tax on the richest,
• wipes out the value of past savings,
• discourages future savings,
• redistributes wealth and income wantonly,
• encourages and rewards speculation and gambling at the expense of thrift and work,
• undermines confidence in the justice of a free enterprise system,
• and corrupts public and private morals.

Now let’s go back to that image of the Nile Delta. From the bottom you’ll notice the main artery flowing north, and then split up into smaller arteries before flowing towards the sea. That is the way money flows.

First, you have the major vein of money (savings) flowing towards the market (sea). However, before it can get to the market, it is allocated towards different investments by the owners of that savings, depending on the needs of the market. Under normal circumstances, the delta represents investments in agriculture, technology, capital goods, property, pharma etc., i.o.w. savings are allocated proportianally.

And this is where cheap money distorts the picture. What happens under a regime of cheap money and credit? Consumers start spending money on capital goods like plasmas, cars, furniture, more eating out, luxury goods, property speculation etc. And that is where savings/investments starts flowing to.

Thus, if you look at the delta, it would mean that the agriculture vein is busy drying up because there were little savings/investments flowing in its direction. As a result, production of agriculture declines because it can not compete with capital goods. But now we are reaching the end of the credit cycle and the markets in capital goods, property etc. is going bust because cheap credit and money has dried up.

At the same time, your paper money has devalued because of the monetary inflation. Lew Rockwell uses a very good analogy:

The monetary issue can be understood by analogy to orange juice. The more water you add, the less substance it has. If you keep adding, eventually you come to the point when you can no longer tell that it was ever orange. This is the same with money. If you print enough — literally or electronically through the credit markets — it will continue to lose value. If money grew on trees, it would be about as valuable as autumn leaves.

Remember, that an increase in the money supply doesn’t result in an immediate rise in prices. It takes time to flow through the market. We are now starting to see the results of the monetary decadence of the last 7 years.

Expect to see prices of commodities continue to rise rapidly during the next couple of years. Expect to see government idiots trying to fix prices and cause more shortages. Expect to see more money/investments starting to flow towards the commodity markets. Expect to see poor people suffering the most.

And expect the demagogues to blame free market capitalism for this mess. At least you now know the truth.

Bush administration intervenes to shield Wall Street from housing meltdown

My comment: This is a GREAT article. Very precise and lays it all out.

However, my instincts tell me that for CONgress to drop legislation securing mortgages for the vulnerable is way out of line. The Bushistas/ neocons/ Clintonistas are so good at manipulating markets I don't trust them on anything. Wallpapering over cracks is the name of one of their games.

This new ploy is just an attempt to keep the stock and currency markets from falling over the next couple of months, as most spending is during the Christmas season and DEBT is created. They want that consumer debt piling up to prop up the banks' liquidity problems. Only increased consumer debt can bail out the current market panic.

The banks' "liquidity problem" is way out of control; it can be exasperated by lack of debt being piled on through consumer purchases over the next two months - but the real underlying problem is going to come home to roost ANYWAY. There really is no way to avoid the long-term tanking out of the global financial system - the values created by the housing bubble's prop up of the global financial system are just too starkly out of line.

We can get into a discussion here of discussion of the creation of private property and the state ala Fredrick Engels, but I'll bypass that and spare you all. But the main point is, with this system of creating value, any and all NATURAL disasters wreck havoc on state and market created values of land. So, as these earthchanges proceed (and they will!) things are going to stay volatile, the banks be damned. They really are just a convenient place to stash money for those that have it. That is all. Helping them stay afloat and provide so-called liquidity is just pure rubbish to my mind, esepcially at a time when funding wars of aggresion on behalf of transnationals.

We are going to see a DEPRESSION, we are going to see folks have to come together in order to survive .. and if we aren't CAREFUL in the extreme, the woman and children are going to suffer even more than before as the values currently held in society are so messed up.

But this is a good "Read" of the current state of play, the hijinks of the Plunge Protection Team and the hysteria afloat. But to give Bush credit? Give me a break!! That's why I think people like Paul Krugman are the most awful deceivers of all.

What is actually happening is an attempt to bail out investors in banks so that the crisis is not so apparent; if they sell in mass, the market tanks ala 1987 and 1929. This has little to do with "being nice to homeowner X". Here's a number: So far BuZh and Ben Helicopter Bernake and Hank have bailed out only 80,000 mortgage holders with federal guarantees on their mortgages and ONLY those who never defaulted on their payments. this is as we say "diddly squat". So how many more are ACTUALLY going to get bailed out this round? Let's WATCH.

At least the economic discussions are going mainstream and that's the best I can say at this point. People are waking up.

Plan to freeze some subprime mortgage rates

Bush administration intervenes to shield Wall Street from housing meltdown

By Barry Grey
3 December 2007

Use this version to print | Send this link by email | Email the author

The Bush administration is seeking to obtain the agreement of major US banks, mortgage lenders and servicers, and financial institutions holding subprime mortgage-backed securities to freeze the interest rates on some subprime loans that are scheduled to reset at higher rates in the coming months.

As first reported in the November 30 Wall Street Journal, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, officials of the Federal Reserve Board and other US financial regulators met last Thursday with top Wall Street and home mortgage executives as well as housing counselors to discuss the plan. The newspaper said Paulson might speak publicly about the scheme at a housing conference today.

Calling itself the “Hope Now Alliance,” the government-Wall Street consortium is casting its deliberations as an altruistic effort to rescue homeowners overwhelmed by mortgage debt from foreclosure when their adjustable-rate loans reset upwards by as much as 30 percent. However, press reports make clear that, should the plan come to fruition, only a minority of the 2 million families whose subprime mortgages will reset over the next 18 months would get temporary relief in the form of a rate freeze or some other mortgage restructuring arrangement.

The motivation behind the discussions is the growing alarm on Wall Street and in Washington over the potentially catastrophic financial implications of the accelerating housing slump and related crisis on credit markets. The proposals under discussion are calibrated to avert—at the least possible cost to the banks and big investors—a collapse of major US banks and other financial institutions that could be triggered by spiraling home foreclosures and the implosion of hundreds of billions of dollars in speculative investments tied to the subprime housing boom of previous years.

In essence, the scheme is aimed at containing the home foreclosure epidemic sufficiently to shield the major financial institutions from the full consequences of years of rampant speculation, accompanied by accounting manipulations that concealed the immense levels of risk behind the soaring profits and gargantuan salaries reaped by Wall Street executives.

Were the plan implemented, it would allow holders of mortgage-backed securities to put off marking down their assets.

Most of those who stand to lose their homes —after having been lured into high-interest rate mortgages by predatory lenders, including some of the biggest US banks, when their “teaser” rates expire and their monthly payments shoot up by hundreds of dollars— will not benefit from the plans being thrashed out between the administration and Wall Street.

Among those involved in the negotiations are Citigroup, JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Washington Mutual and Countrywide Financial (the country’s largest home mortgage lender). Also at Thursday’s Washington meeting were representatives of the American Securitization Forum, whose members issue, buy and rate securities backed by bundles of mortgages.

According to the Wall Street Journal, key aspects of the plan have yet to be agreed upon, and some press reports suggest that the entire project could founder, primarily because some big holders of securities backed by subprime loans object to foregoing the increased profits they anticipate once the higher mortgage rates take effect. However, according to the Journal, the American Securitization Forum has come around to the position that the potential losses from foreclosed homes would be far greater than the losses from an interest rate freeze on some subprime loans.

Citigroup, the largest US bank, Wells Fargo, Washington Mutual and Countrywide Financial all face potentially disastrous losses from the accelerating housing and foreclosure crisis. Citigroup has already announced $13 billion in write-offs of securities linked to subprime mortgages, and may be forced to absorb another $65 billion in losses from off-balance-sheet speculative investments that are crashing.

Just last week Moody’s Investors Service announced it had downgraded or put on review $119 billion in debt issued by so-called “structured investment vehicles” (SIVs). This includes $64.9 billion in debt issued by six SIV’s set up by Citigroup.

According to some estimates, between $400 and $500 billion in assets of international banks, investment houses, insurance companies and hedge funds will be wiped out by the collapse of the US housing market and resulting credit crunch.

Among the issues still under discussion between the administration and financial houses, according to press reports, are the length of any temporary freeze on subprime interest rates and the criteria for deciding which subprime borrowers would be eligible.

The Journal wrote on Friday: “Treasury officials say financial institutions are likely to set criteria that divide up subprime borrowers into three groups: those who can continues to make their payments even if rates rise, those who can’t afford their mortgages even if rates stay steady, and those who could keep their homes if the maturity date of their mortgages were extended or the interest rates remained at the teaser rates. Only the third group would be eligible for help.”

The newspaper added that creditors would take into account whether the borrowers had equity in their homes, despite falling house prices, and whether their incomes were steady. Because of the precipitous decline in house prices, many subprime borrowers now owe more than the market value of their homes.

The criteria outlined above make it clear that the most distressed homeowners would be excluded from a temporary interest rate freeze and left to be thrown onto the street.

Harvey L. Pitt, a former chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, who is now working for some hedge funds with a stake in the negotiations on a possible subprime rate freeze, said that even a generous freeze would help only a minority of subprime borrowers. He said a freeze would do nothing to help people who took out a “no documentation” loan, overstated their incomes and borrowed more than they could repay. Nor would a freeze help those whose mortgage is higher than the market value of their homes.

The increasingly desperate state of the US financial system and the precarious position of some of the biggest banks, has led the administration to shift its previous position of a hands-off approach, aside from urging mortgage lenders to provide relief to mortgage borrowers on a one-by-one basis.

It is estimated that there are $1 trillion in US subprime loans. Interest rates are scheduled to reset next year on $362 billion worth of adjustable-rate subprime mortgages, and another $85 billion in these mortgages is resetting in the course of the current quarter. These include loans that are bundled into so-called “collateralized debt obligations” that are held in the portfolios of banks, hedge funds, mutual funds and insurance companies.

In recent months, the foreclosure rate on subprime loans has soared to 10 percent, and top Treasury officials fear that unless some relief is provided, the foreclosure rate could spiral even higher.

The announcement of the subprime negotiations was the second major step taken last week by government and finance officials to reassure the stock market and financial institutions in response to a raft of reports showing a deepening credit crunch, rapidly falling home sales and prices, soaring foreclosure rates, declining durable goods orders, rising unemployment claims and sagging personal incomes and consumer spending—all pointing to a sharp contraction in economic growth in the current quarter and the likelihood of a full-scale recession in 2008.

The vice chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, Donald L. Kohn, and the chairman, Ben Bernanke, both delivered speeches broadly hinting at a further interest rate cut when Fed policy makers meet again on December 11. Financial interests are clamoring for a cut of at least 0.25 percent—the third since last August—to further open the credit spigot and forestall catastrophic losses on Wall Street.

The Fed officials’ remarks helped spark a two-day rally of 546 points Tuesday and Wednesday in the Dow Jones Industrial Average and similar sharp gains in the other major stock indexes, and further, more modest gains, on Thursday and Friday. Reports of the subprime negotiations led to large gains for the stocks of financial companies involved in the talks in Friday trading on the New York Stock Exchange. Shares in Citigroup rose 3.1 percent, Countrywide Financial shot up 16 percent, and Wells Fargo rose 6 percent.

Another factor driving the administration’s subprime initiative is a desire to preempt legislation being introduced by Democrats in the House of Representatives and the Senate to halt predatory lending and restrict some practices that are widespread among subprime lenders. Some Democrats are also seeking to pass a bill that would allow bankruptcy judges to change the terms of mortgages to help people retain their homes.

The initial response of prominent Democrats to news of the government-led negotiations indicates that they are more than willing to seize on the plan to drop any serious legislation to curb mortgage lending abuses. The liberal New York Times columnist Paul Krugman offered “kudos to the Bush administration” on his blog, and House Financial Services Chairman Barney Frank said he was “encouraged by reports of progress” in efforts to help borrowers facing foreclosure.

See Also:
Credit crisis reveals widespread accounting manipulation by top US banks
[27 November 2007]
US recession fears grow as bank losses mount
[21 November 2007]
Near-panic atmosphere as US Federal Reserve chairman testifies before Congress
[9 November 2007]
Citigroup ousts CEO, warns of billions more in subprime losses
[6 November 2007]
Stock market gyrations fueled by credit, housing market crisis
[3 November 2007]

Top of page The WSWS invites your comments.

Plan to freeze some subprime mortgage rates

Bush administration intervenes to shield Wall Street from housing meltdown

By Barry Grey
3 December 2007

Use this version to print | Send this link by email | Email the author

The Bush administration is seeking to obtain the agreement of major US banks, mortgage lenders and servicers, and financial institutions holding subprime mortgage-backed securities to freeze the interest rates on some subprime loans that are scheduled to reset at higher rates in the coming months.

As first reported in the November 30 Wall Street Journal, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, officials of the Federal Reserve Board and other US financial regulators met last Thursday with top Wall Street and home mortgage executives as well as housing counselors to discuss the plan. The newspaper said Paulson might speak publicly about the scheme at a housing conference today.

Calling itself the “Hope Now Alliance,” the government-Wall Street consortium is casting its deliberations as an altruistic effort to rescue homeowners overwhelmed by mortgage debt from foreclosure when their adjustable-rate loans reset upwards by as much as 30 percent. However, press reports make clear that, should the plan come to fruition, only a minority of the 2 million families whose subprime mortgages will reset over the next 18 months would get temporary relief in the form of a rate freeze or some other mortgage restructuring arrangement.

The motivation behind the discussions is the growing alarm on Wall Street and in Washington over the potentially catastrophic financial implications of the accelerating housing slump and related crisis on credit markets. The proposals under discussion are calibrated to avert—at the least possible cost to the banks and big investors—a collapse of major US banks and other financial institutions that could be triggered by spiraling home foreclosures and the implosion of hundreds of billions of dollars in speculative investments tied to the subprime housing boom of previous years.

In essence, the scheme is aimed at containing the home foreclosure epidemic sufficiently to shield the major financial institutions from the full consequences of years of rampant speculation, accompanied by accounting manipulations that concealed the immense levels of risk behind the soaring profits and gargantuan salaries reaped by Wall Street executives.

Were the plan implemented, it would allow holders of mortgage-backed securities to put off marking down their assets.

Most of those who stand to lose their homes —after having been lured into high-interest rate mortgages by predatory lenders, including some of the biggest US banks, when their “teaser” rates expire and their monthly payments shoot up by hundreds of dollars— will not benefit from the plans being thrashed out between the administration and Wall Street.

Among those involved in the negotiations are Citigroup, JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Washington Mutual and Countrywide Financial (the country’s largest home mortgage lender). Also at Thursday’s Washington meeting were representatives of the American Securitization Forum, whose members issue, buy and rate securities backed by bundles of mortgages.

According to the Wall Street Journal, key aspects of the plan have yet to be agreed upon, and some press reports suggest that the entire project could founder, primarily because some big holders of securities backed by subprime loans object to foregoing the increased profits they anticipate once the higher mortgage rates take effect. However, according to the Journal, the American Securitization Forum has come around to the position that the potential losses from foreclosed homes would be far greater than the losses from an interest rate freeze on some subprime loans.

Citigroup, the largest US bank, Wells Fargo, Washington Mutual and Countrywide Financial all face potentially disastrous losses from the accelerating housing and foreclosure crisis. Citigroup has already announced $13 billion in write-offs of securities linked to subprime mortgages, and may be forced to absorb another $65 billion in losses from off-balance-sheet speculative investments that are crashing.

Just last week Moody’s Investors Service announced it had downgraded or put on review $119 billion in debt issued by so-called “structured investment vehicles” (SIVs). This includes $64.9 billion in debt issued by six SIV’s set up by Citigroup.

According to some estimates, between $400 and $500 billion in assets of international banks, investment houses, insurance companies and hedge funds will be wiped out by the collapse of the US housing market and resulting credit crunch.

Among the issues still under discussion between the administration and financial houses, according to press reports, are the length of any temporary freeze on subprime interest rates and the criteria for deciding which subprime borrowers would be eligible.

The Journal wrote on Friday: “Treasury officials say financial institutions are likely to set criteria that divide up subprime borrowers into three groups: those who can continues to make their payments even if rates rise, those who can’t afford their mortgages even if rates stay steady, and those who could keep their homes if the maturity date of their mortgages were extended or the interest rates remained at the teaser rates. Only the third group would be eligible for help.”

The newspaper added that creditors would take into account whether the borrowers had equity in their homes, despite falling house prices, and whether their incomes were steady. Because of the precipitous decline in house prices, many subprime borrowers now owe more than the market value of their homes.

The criteria outlined above make it clear that the most distressed homeowners would be excluded from a temporary interest rate freeze and left to be thrown onto the street.

Harvey L. Pitt, a former chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, who is now working for some hedge funds with a stake in the negotiations on a possible subprime rate freeze, said that even a generous freeze would help only a minority of subprime borrowers. He said a freeze would do nothing to help people who took out a “no documentation” loan, overstated their incomes and borrowed more than they could repay. Nor would a freeze help those whose mortgage is higher than the market value of their homes.

The increasingly desperate state of the US financial system and the precarious position of some of the biggest banks, has led the administration to shift its previous position of a hands-off approach, aside from urging mortgage lenders to provide relief to mortgage borrowers on a one-by-one basis.

It is estimated that there are $1 trillion in US subprime loans. Interest rates are scheduled to reset next year on $362 billion worth of adjustable-rate subprime mortgages, and another $85 billion in these mortgages is resetting in the course of the current quarter. These include loans that are bundled into so-called “collateralized debt obligations” that are held in the portfolios of banks, hedge funds, mutual funds and insurance companies.

In recent months, the foreclosure rate on subprime loans has soared to 10 percent, and top Treasury officials fear that unless some relief is provided, the foreclosure rate could spiral even higher.

The announcement of the subprime negotiations was the second major step taken last week by government and finance officials to reassure the stock market and financial institutions in response to a raft of reports showing a deepening credit crunch, rapidly falling home sales and prices, soaring foreclosure rates, declining durable goods orders, rising unemployment claims and sagging personal incomes and consumer spending—all pointing to a sharp contraction in economic growth in the current quarter and the likelihood of a full-scale recession in 2008.

The vice chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, Donald L. Kohn, and the chairman, Ben Bernanke, both delivered speeches broadly hinting at a further interest rate cut when Fed policy makers meet again on December 11. Financial interests are clamoring for a cut of at least 0.25 percent—the third since last August—to further open the credit spigot and forestall catastrophic losses on Wall Street.

The Fed officials’ remarks helped spark a two-day rally of 546 points Tuesday and Wednesday in the Dow Jones Industrial Average and similar sharp gains in the other major stock indexes, and further, more modest gains, on Thursday and Friday. Reports of the subprime negotiations led to large gains for the stocks of financial companies involved in the talks in Friday trading on the New York Stock Exchange. Shares in Citigroup rose 3.1 percent, Countrywide Financial shot up 16 percent, and Wells Fargo rose 6 percent.

Another factor driving the administration’s subprime initiative is a desire to preempt legislation being introduced by Democrats in the House of Representatives and the Senate to halt predatory lending and restrict some practices that are widespread among subprime lenders. Some Democrats are also seeking to pass a bill that would allow bankruptcy judges to change the terms of mortgages to help people retain their homes.

The initial response of prominent Democrats to news of the government-led negotiations indicates that they are more than willing to seize on the plan to drop any serious legislation to curb mortgage lending abuses. The liberal New York Times columnist Paul Krugman offered “kudos to the Bush administration” on his blog, and House Financial Services Chairman Barney Frank said he was “encouraged by reports of progress” in efforts to help borrowers facing foreclosure.

See Also:
Credit crisis reveals widespread accounting manipulation by top US banks
[27 November 2007]
US recession fears grow as bank losses mount
[21 November 2007]
Near-panic atmosphere as US Federal Reserve chairman testifies before Congress
[9 November 2007]
Citigroup ousts CEO, warns of billions more in subprime losses
[6 November 2007]
Stock market gyrations fueled by credit, housing market crisis
[3 November 2007]

Top of page The WSWS invites your comments.

plus see the blog for latest videos and posts ... busy, busy.Please DIGG IT!!

Tag(s): Blackwater; Change; Empire; Freedom; Government; Iran; Iraq; Media; Peace; Peace; People; People; Political Parties ; Truth; World
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October 5, 2007 at 18:08:22 FROM FASCISM TO FREEDOM: Stirring the Winds of Political Climate Change by Steve Bhaerman Page 1 of 3 page(s) http://www.opednews.com

There is a poignant passage in Kurt Vonnegut's book Slaughterhouse Five where he imagines a devastating bombing scene as a movie being run backward on a projector. The fires on the ground disappear as the bombs are sucked up into the bombers, which fly backward and land on a military base. There, the bombs are removed from the planes and taken to a factory, where they are dismantled. Perhaps this wishful fantasy was inspired by Vonnegut's own experience watching the fire bombing of Dresden.

If and when our bombs begin falling on Iran, given our current limitations in navigating space and time, we will not be able to run the movie backward. The dead will still be dead, the destroyed will still be destroyed, and among the casualties will be our own open society. The damage will be irreversible, and in fact will have reversed 230 years of forward progress towards a just society, and a sane world.

But there is something we can and must "run backward" at this time. We must stand together to face the dark forces that have taken us from freedom to fascism, and reverse the momentum back to sanity and freedom.

There are two common impulses at a crisis time like this. The first is, "Don't just stand there. Do something!" The other is, "Don't do something. Just stand there." So instead of futilely flailing about or hopelessly resigning, it makes sense to take a deep breath and fully assess the situation. The first piece of good news is, there are at least 50 million of us in accord that the reins of power have gotten out of our hands, and this illegitimate power must be reined in.

Three situations that have been in the news in recent weeks -- the tasering of the student by police in Florida and the "tasering" of MoveOn by the U.S. Senate; the momentum toward attacking Iran that the Democratic misleadership seems to have fallen in line with; the further exposure of Blackwater as "contractors" in the Mafia sense of "contract" -- have focused a sense of urgency. That's a good thing.

Perhaps finally those hundred thousand organizations Paul Hawken talks about as working for a healthier world can stop what they are doing and address the huge elephant in the living room -- the American empire that promotes torture and assassination abroad and fascism at home. We must face the obstacle right in front of us that stands in the way of all of the good things that are possible in this world. In other words, there will be no action on climate change until there is political climate change, and to have political climate change requires focus. As the Swami says, "If we want the political winds to change, we must all blow in the same direction at the same time."

Whoa Cowboy -- A Two-Step Plan to Rein in Illegitimate Power

We don't want to be wasting precious energy blowing against the wind or rowing against the flow, so it makes sense to look for the open channels that can flow us toward a concerted and effective movement. So first of all, let's establish two short-term intentions. If we accomplish these, we will be able to demonstrate to our "leaders," to ourselves and to the world that we are on our way to restoring legitimate rule to America. These are:

1. Preempt and prevent an attack on Iran.

2. Reverse the trend of fascism at home.

There are specific implications of these, including coming up with a workable Middle East strategy for peace, restoring habeas corpus and repealing the so-called Patriot Act, disempowering private fascist armies such as Blackwater, and launching a people's impeachment and truth and reconciliation movement. (I'd personally like to call the organization Citizens for Impeaching the Administration, CIA for short, but that's a conversation for later. We will earn that next level by mastering this one first.)

So let's look at our leverage points right now and see how we can begin applying that leverage. What do we have going for us?

1. The Ongoing Up-Wising. There is a growing awareness on the part of progressive left and libertarian right -- not to mention millions of other Americans -- that neither the neoconservatives nor the neoliberals have the interests of we the people at heart. As Ron Paul continues to gather support on the Republican side from disenfranchised conservative voters, more and more people on all sides are waking up to the sad truth that politics as usual means the usual lies. There is a great deal of emotional energy that is being aroused here, and so our task is to find a highly-effective way to focus it.

2. "Generally" Speaking, There is Unprecedented Opposition to War Policies. Those who are bearing the more immediate cost of empire, members of our military, are waking up as well. A recent article indicates that twenty recently-retired generals are speaking out against the Iraq War and the proposed attack on Iran. This includes the former U.S. Commander in Iraq, Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez. The implications of this are huge. According to the aforementioned article ten days ago in the San Diego Union-Tribune (in the heart of military country), "What might be called The Revolt of the Generals has rarely happened in the nation's history. In op-ed pieces, interviews and TV ads, more than 20 retired U.S. generals have broken ranks with the culture of salute and keep it in the family. Instead, they are criticizing the commander in chief and other top civilian leaders who led the nation into what the generals believe is a misbegotten and tragic war."

Along those same lines comes the speculation that the recent transport of nuclear weapons from Minot Air Force Base -- and the leaking of that information -- could have been an attempt on the part of a faction in the military to thwart a nuclear attack on Iran.

Pay No Attention to the (Wo)Man IN FRONT of the Curtain

In spite of the fact that both the progressive left and the non-neocon right are waking up to this lowjacking of America, there has been virtually no transpartisan concerted action. From a contextual standpoint, our mission now is to remove our focus from the political puppet show of candidates telling the usual lies. (Swami's new slogan is "Pay no attention to the (wo)man IN FRONT OF the curtain".) Instead, we need to focus our attention and financial resources on the three truth-telling candidates: Dennis Kucinich, Mike Gravel and Ron Paul. What's important is that these three represent the functional wings of both left and right that need to come front and center for us to win. Show them you support truth and send them money. Send the "front-running" candidates empty envelopes with photo copies of your checks to the other three candidates to indicate you are no longer willing to fund lies. Seriously. This is an important discipline right now, particularly for those who identify as Democrats.

Think of the Democrats as the flawed lover who tells us they are going to leave their "spouse" (i.e., the powers of the American empire) but never do. When they need something from us, they tell us how much they love us -- but they always go home to the Empire. So ... now we have to be strong. We have to tell them we are no longer willing to get into bed with them without a commitment. It's either the empire or us! In other words, will they respect us the day after Election Day? The best way to make sure is to make them respect us now.

Speaking of Dempublicrats, the reason why they've painted themselves into such a pathetic corner is because they have failed to contextualize the war in Iraq for what it is -- a war for empire. What Chalmers Johnson said in his recent book, Nemesis: The Last Days of the American Republic is something wise patriots on both the left and the right have understood: Empire abroad is incompatible with freedom at home. Just as surely as the American Revolutionaries were up against the British Empire 230 years ago, American Evolutionaries today must understand today's challenge is the American Empire, a leviathan bigger than either King George.

So ... coming from that context, and recognizing the American people have to recapture the political conversation before we recapture our government, what do we do? The answer is ... I don't have the answer. But working together on the twofold intention of preventing the next war (and in the process, ending the current one) and restoring freedom in this country, I have complete confidence that we WILL prevail. What we have been lacking until now has been a unifying, drop-everything-else mission that proactively takes us forward. If fifty million of us blow in the same direction at once, there is no doubt we can bring down the wall of lies just as surely as the Berlin Wall came down.

Where There's a Willingness, There's a Way

The way has not showed up as yet because there hasn't been the collective, focused will. First the will, then the way. The will requires a willingness to stand and keep standing, understanding that standing is easier when we are standing together. Next comes the intention, the prize we have our eyes on. What does it look like and feel like to no longer have to be afraid of your own government, and know the world is in less danger because of it? What will we see in the world that will tell us we have momentum towards peace? That we've won back precious freedoms at home? That we are on our way to working together instead of being manipulated into fighting one another?

Once we have that focused intention -- and know it is shared by tens of millions of Americans, with more awakening every day -- and are strengthened in our willingness, the ways will be obvious and many. The nature of leadership in this context is that it will come from everywhere, and above all the shared intention and the willingness to persevere. As for what kinds of structures and campaigns will be needed, here are some ideas:

1. A High Profile Front and Center Movement. It's inevitable, and will hopefully happen sooner and not later. We need a high-profile, celebrity-laden, transpartisan council of well-known, well-respected, influential individuals and organizations to finally draw the line and JUST SAY NO to fascism at home and preemptive, undeclared warfare abroad. That means repeal of the Patriot Act, restoration of habeas corpus, repudiation of police state tactics and the end of the dictatorship by unitary executive.

Tactically, we are seeking to recapture the media, and at the same time -- just to make sure --put the media in its place. This means we need to launch a massive non-media campaign. We need to communicate outside the mainstream media, and preempt the media by speaking to people in the community directly -- by the each or by the bunch. Each of us holding this holistic context is an educator.

We use car banners, truck banners and if we can afford it, billboards. We wear arm bands. In so doing, we constantly remind ourselves of how many of us there are out there. Above all, we must go way beyond the obsolete distinctions of "Democrat" and "Republican." Clear-thinking and goodhearted people on both sides have been hoodwinked into gravitating to the neoliberal and neoconservative camps -- two-sides of the same worthless coin. The greatest political awakening of this new century will be this: Supporters of Ron Paul and Dennis Kucinich have more in common with each other than with the leaders of their respective political parties. The heart and soul of these campaigns are in the same place, even if the details and approaches (more government vs. less government) are different. As we allow ourselves to be politically educated -- i.e., as the patriot left and the patriot right compare notes -- those with their hearts in the right place will work together to develop creative policies that are impossible under the thumb of empire.

2. Massive Snail Mail Campaigns to March for Us, Even When We Stay Home. Meanwhile, we strategically use snail mail in great numbers focused on specific entities, to make it clear to politicians, media moguls, and newspeople that we're hip to the scam, and we're not buying it anymore. There's a lot of power in handwritten snail mail. First of all, the powers that be in power respect the numbers. Each piece of mail they receive represents thousands of e-mails, they figure. Secondly, it's an opportunity to "get personal," not in an insulting way but in a poignant way.

What could happen if those in power were repeatedly exposed to heartfelt messages from clear and courageous Americans, not angry but firm? With photos. That would mean a website where people could post their letters before sending, so even if Senators and media moguls didn't read them, everyone else would. It's easy to imagine people getting together with their twenty best friends and having an evening gathering to write letters together -- using art to appropriately focus emotion. It might even become habit-forming.

Meanwhile, the letters to news media can be focused and staggered -- one week for Fox, one for CNN, CBS, NBC, ABC and MSNBC. Some should specifically cultivate and support allies like Keith Olbermann and Bill Moyers, offering story ideas. The letters should focus on the media failing America and how to make up for it by balancing the coverage and putting those dissenting generals on the news shows. If not, then not putting them on becomes the issue, and the pressure intensifies. Various members of our board of notables begin making phone calls to the CEOs of these companies, and if nothing else, that gets in the papers.

3. A General Strike, or Something Even Better. There is even the suggestion in Harpers Magazine of using election day this year to declare a General Strike. This is an intriguing idea, but the Swami says, "Let's throw them a curve, and have a general ball instead!" In other words, instead of acting like we are a protesting minority, understand that we are in the majority, and use the day to celebrate awakened citizens from across the political spectrum coming together to proclaim government of, by and for the people where the government does our bidding, not the bidding of the highest bidder. We need to gather at every city hall and local public meeting place on this day and declare together that we the people are no longer willing to be divided and conquered by our misleaders.

Is this possible? Can we do it? We humans are usually pretty good responding to an emergency once we realize there is one. We've been shamelessly and shamefully manipulated into responding to the wrong emergency, and now we must "emerge 'n see" the truth that united we stand, and divided we fall. This means Americans with different opinions coming together to declare their support for rule by law, peace when possible, and freedom at home. These are the core values 75% to 90% of us stand for, and if we can't stand together and hold our own government to that -- well, maybe we humans deserve to flunk third dimension.

To reiterate what I think is the most important point, intention strengthens will, and will finds a way. If we can stop "politics as usual" long enough to gather "under one big intent" the organizations and structures needed will make themselves known. Believe me, this is in the works. Meanwhile, begin to hold the dual intentions of freedom at home and peace abroad, and add your energy and momentum to anything that moves that agenda along. For example, there is now a petition circulating -- inspired by a similar letter by retired air force Captain Robert Bowman. Afterdowningstreet.org now has a letter signed by various luminaries from Thom Hartmann to Willie Nelson "instructing" our troops not to participate in an attack against Iran. At the very, very least we can get behind this move and make sure it hits the major news outlets.

So ... your feedback and ideas are welcome. If there is a way you would like to participate, if there is an organization you have that would get behind this, please let me know. This is not a time to hang back and hope that a political savior will save us next November. We have met the savior, and it is us. The best way to insure retaking the country is to do it before the 2008 election. Right now, the powers that be in power have control over the two lame choices we get. It's up to us to let them know we're not buying those choices, and we have a different agenda, one that represents the true and awakening heart and soul of America.

www.wakeuplaughing.com

Steve Bhaerman is a writer, humorist and uncommontator who's been posing as cosmic comic Swami Beyondananda for the past 20 years. As the Swami, Steve is the author of four books including his latest, Swami for Precedent: A 7-Step Plan to Heal the Body Politic and Cure Electile Dysfunction. His website is www.wakeuplaughing.com.

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2 comments

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delia

a 50-million-strong blow-job? Or maybe if enough people blew in the opposite direction, the ruling class would sit up and take notice. Imagine if 50 million ''observers'' showed up at this convention: Second North American Secessionist Convention 3-4 October 2007 Chattanooga, Tennessee 16 Organizations, numerous observers registered as of 9/4/07 by delia (0 articles, 43 comments) on Saturday, October 6, 2007 at 3:40:37 PM

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ladybroadoak

GLOBAL movement, more grassrootz, more creative, more info Inclusive versus exclusive, creative versus same old, same old ... We are the change in the world we want to see!! "I'm crazy, you're crazy, they're crazier .." Simeon Toko One thing that has bothered me since the new "movement"'s inception is lack of GLOBAL focus - a movement is needed that is not so AMERICOCENTRIC, as that is part and parcel of the old meme. This does not mean going in and finding some token front person. Too much of the movement has been dedicated (and perhaps subconsciously) to handing over our power to organizations that are personality dominated. Hence it is easy to say that "leaders" are mic hogs or attention whores .. or whatever .. as the inevitable backlash comes back and then precious energy gets wasted propping up said leaders instead of broadening the base of support for our organizations. I think it is HIGH time for some of the leaders to step away from the mic .. it's holding people BACK. Instead, focus on creating new forms of media - OpEd News is certainly one of a new form of media, but we need radio stations, even a TV station beaming back REAL news from around the Globe, 24/7. In organizing terms, the energy has gone towards building what is know as "technocracies" - groups rallied around so-called experts. Ex CIA people, scholars (!!!), mothers of dead soldiers who devote full time attention to the "movement" has been The Movement's wont rather than focussing on grassroots methods of organizing that have been shown to work over time; these grasssrootz organizations cannot be shredded as easily. To a certain extent, the reason we are so fond of OpEd News is that this nearly as close to a grassroots organization as has arisen .... but the CONTENT is AMERICOCENTRIC continually. I know good hearted people who do nothing all day but read the Oh! Woe is me! opeds that crop up on the internet, never once pausing to read material being generating in a HOST of other countries. This is so totally imbalanced and impolitic these days. The more global types of organizations have faltered and fallen in my opinion for at least two identifiable reasons. First, they tend to be male dominated and women are regularly silenced or not taken seriously. Whenever I get some points made in a group, OUT I GO so that Mr. "enlightened" liberal stays ON TOP. (and that is why I continue to love Rob Kall and will support what he does; I am GRATEFUL. He is truly a GROWING individual. He has a lot to teach the HACKS out there, who are legion.) Two, they tend to be new agey and don't appeal to the main stream person who has other spiritual ideas. This is not ALWAYS the case, but then the exceptions tend to go back to the Americocentric model. We live in a world of TRANSNATIONALS, and a rapid concentration of capital "assets" ripped off indigneous peoples. These ripped off people's have PLENTY to say about fighting back and yet people tend to ignore what they have to show and teach us. The most excellent paper I have read during the last three years was written by Dr. Michael Yellowbird at the University of Kansas, a discussion paper to say native peoples should cease and desist from fighting in wars. I managed through a network to get this paper disseminated in Australia and New Zealand to every single major aborinal communities, WARRIOR communities as well as get it into the hands of every Parliamentarian in OZ and NZ. At the time I did, I wondered would anyone else do that? Make sure it didn't stay with America's shores? Our organizations stay only as healthy as WE ourselves focus on true service, service undertaken for the good of ALL so we can rise above pettiness and status considerations, which I see just rife in the groups I am in or have left. Anyone who reads OpEd News for a period of time knows that I push the use of art and creativity continually. That's what WE have and the choke hold of the fascists lacks. That's why we waste our efforts on things like debating Hilary Clinton's campaign, choosing between the lesser of evils!! (I don't, but other people who claim to be Ghadhi-ites do ..) We COULD be out there doing one little creative act a day, with dedication, until it just all mounts up -- that's what American Indian Injustice group does! And it WORKS. There are 700 individuals who get involved when an active alert is sounded. IMHO, we must reach out higher and FURTHER .. and include every brother and sister in our organizations. I am on one news group made up of Canada, US and Ontario citizens and I love the discussions because there is way more depth to them. The Canadian and UK contingents are more diverse (and I've asked at least one of them to come to OpEd and post his fantastic views, to share his unique insights.) For myself, the one single unifying issue is the use of low level radiation issue. It affects us ALL. The information on its effects is being SUPRESSED!! Last year the Low Level Radiation campaign released a minority report from a major study that is totally SHOCKING!! without this information NO ONE NO WHERE is operating from an informed position. So I put together a long (but not THAT long) chain letter and asked people to circulate it an important document to show others. One friend of mine put together important youtube videos on aspects of low level radiation that are MUST SEE and included them in my posting. Anyone reading this I implore you to take this information and put it in other people's hands!! Read it and have your feelings and get to work!! by then passing it on in anyway you can. Here's a postcard Eileen Danemann put out. I am personally hacking away every day on my blog which has a GLOBAL focus, and I also am building a website for earthlings anonymous. I live on disability and running a yahoo research group, doing my blog, writing for OpEd News (although I did some posts in New Zealand this year on interventionISM and recovery from trauma) and getting enough people together to start an INTERNATIONAL website is all I can personally do. But it is what I do ... My blog has over 1400 items devoted to planetary healing we are ALL suffering PTSD and TRAUMA. I cannot run the large a list of tags, so it must be accessed by putting topics in the blog search box - I direct my 5th chakra energies (100%!) into a daily effort and I Invite people to use at a resource continually - it gets read by right wingers constantly and I am aware of that and write accordingly. Spy agencies, foreign governments, the military - they ALL read it! But the progressives? Forget it! They don't want to re-educate themselves yet seems to me, because it takes finding what we all have in common, rather than focussing on our differences and getting with a DAILY Program of Recovery ... we've all been done in by counterintel pro, psyops, agitprop ... The focus must move to RECOVERY !! My blog is my attempt to create a HUGE POSTER for recovery .. and I still have another 3000 items to put on it!! The problem is, as it is for many thinking outside "the box" is I don't have resources to take things ever further and get some HELP! I think I have a plan .. I set up a google group to start a beehive of dialogue on the use of art to catapault the use of OUR propoganda. I announced it here at OpEd News. No one came! No one. I can say that I am "wrong" or I can say the time was NOT right, or . but I still think that massive GLOBAL art demos are the wave of the future . ones that bypass appealing to a deaf, insane, bought off, over lobbied CONGress. Target dates to do mass GLOBAL mails into DC are possible; days to make noise everywhere on the planet can be set. The old methods are truly the best - shout, scream, make noise, the things man did before Big Pharma and the deliberate creation of dysfunction and diseases ... Our PRESENCE must be felt and the best way to do this is to be totally present each and every single day, beaming our intentions and then DOING what we must do. But it AIN'T gonna change by creating a network of only "this" woman should be listened to, or only "That" guy has credentials to know what he is talking about ... and we must start paying attention to what indigenous people trying to leader us to .. a more fair society for ALL. Here's a link to inspiration from Evo Morales ... Now if we could just truly start thinking of ourselves as EARTHLNGS, living in a Milleium of the Living, we wouldn't be so easy to divide and conquer, although we must bear in mind the only way to achieve human rights/social justice is through national sovereigny . and the FASCISTS truly do want to take that away. Join up and start working against the North American Alliance ( NAU ), right now referred to as the Security and Prosperity Partnership (SPP ). They"'ll keep changing the letters as it suits them ... In North America the front lines are at Lake Sharbot and in Nevada .... and I hope at least ONE PERSON will read this, decide to sign up and help people stand the ground of sanity. Consider - More recently, Douglas Valentine, author of THE PHOENIX PROGRAM (CIA torture and assassination program in Vietnam), explained on Radio Liberty on October 18, 2006: "Democracy has been hijacked from us. It's been hijacked by these very powerful industrialists for whom the CIA really works. They don't work for you. They don't work for me. They don't work for the middle class. They don't work for the lower class. They work for a very elite group of Americans who control the wealth in this country. And their job is, through whatever means possible... to preserve the priviliges of this ruling one or two or three percent of the industrialists in this country. And, frankly, they do a very, very, very good job of it. and this is from my first OpEd News piece: The Information Age has been a useful tool for the gathering of the female tribes. Fed up with "finding themselves", women want to find a way to help others and themselves. Life has suddenly taken on new meaning and purpose. We no longer move down the streets in isolation. There is no "glass ceiling" in the streets. We are all equal. All voices are heard. All banners are read and celebrated. We can vote with our feet to say that "Enough is enough." And we know the angels are at our side. We move fearless and forward to a day when we wake up unafraid. "Non-violence leads to the highest ethics, which is the goal of all evolution. Until we stop harming all other living beings, we are still savages." - Thomas Edison -