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Vol. 8 Issue 23…Dedicated
to the Dialogue on Race…June 10, 2005
Intuit’s Vibe
The Times They Are A
'Changin'
By Bob Dylan
Come gather 'round, people,
wherever you roam,
And admit that the waters
around you have grown.
And accept it that soon
you'll be drenched to the bone.
If your time to you is
worth savin'
Then you better start
swimming or you'll sink like a stone
For the times they are a
changin'.
Come writers and critics
who prophesize with your pen,
And keep your eyes wide-
the chance won't come again.
And don't speak too soon
for the wheel’s still in spin.
And there's no tellin' who
that it's namin'.
For the loser now will be
later to win,
For the times they are a changin'.
Come senators, congressmen,
please heed the call-
Don't stand in the doorway,
don't block up the hall.
For he that gets hurt will
be he who has stalled.
The battle outside ragin'
Will soon shake your
windows and rattle your walls
For the times they are a
changin'
Come mothers and fathers
throughout the land,
And don't criticize what
you can't understand.
Your sons and your
daughters are beyond your command.
Your old road is rapidly
agin'.
Please get out of the new
one if you can't lend your hand,
For the times they are a
changin'.
The line it is drawn, the
curse it is cast-
The slow one now will later
be fast.
As the present now will
later be past.
The order is rapidly
fadin'.
And the first one now will
later be last,
For the times they are a changin'.
The Dance of Fatherhood
A tribute to its successful 2004 debut, The Dance of
Fatherhood is back by popular demand. Janean "Lady J" Hightower
and Dilated Souls proudly present this grassroots play, which looks at fatherhood
from a uniquely black perspective. At the height of US chattel slavery, blacks
were bred like bovine to provide slaves for Southern plantations. Satisfying
the labor needs of this inhumane institution created disconnects between sowing
seeds for survival of the specie and the caring personal responsibility of
fatherhood.
The Dance explores the range of black male attitudes
about fatherhood from embracing it with relish to avoiding responsibility at
all costs. Centered on a group of young black men, its cast consists of some of
the most talented poets and actors in the metro Atlanta area. Representing
avoidance of fatherhood and personal responsibility, Yohannes Sharriff plays
Rayquan, "The Dawg," whose attitudes toward women and fatherhood are
poignantly expressed in poetic soliloquies that beautifully flesh out his
character. In fact, the play cleverly uses soliloquies to add depth to some
otherwise shadowy characters.
Other cast members include Shane (Rodney Wilburn), who is torn between running with
the pack and taking care of his children, Paul (Aston Greene), who is still
sexually involved with his estranged wife, and David (Eddie Oliver), who hears
the music of fatherhood but cannot commit to the dance, D. Norris, Belinda
D'Pree, Demeeka Mhoon, Prieska Outland, Paige Compton, N. Darlene Moore and
Erikka Smith.
Just in time for Father's Day, The Dance runs June 18-19, 2005 at the
Neighborhood Theatre, which is located at 430 W. Trinity Avenue in Decatur,
Georgia. Reserve your tickets at 404-373-5311. For more information, visit www.lady-j68.com.
Bit
of History
Richard Milhous Nixon
(1913-1994)
Richard Milhous Nixon was born into a Quaker family on January 9, 1913
in Yorba Linda, California. Trained at Whittier College and Duke University Law
School, Nixon served as a naval lieutenant in the Pacific during World War II.
Elected to congress (1946), he gained national prominence as a Republican
member of the House's Un-American Activities Committee.
Elected to the Senate (1950), he became the 1952 Republican
vice-presidential nominee. A two-term vice president under Dwight D. Eisenhower
(1953-61), he played prominent roles in domestic and foreign affairs.
The Republican presidential nominee in 1960, he lost to John F.
Kennedy. After his 1962 unsuccessful race for California governor, Nixon
announced his retirement from politics. Far from retiring, he won the
Republican Party's 1968 presidential nomination. With running-mate Spiro T.
Agnew, Nixon defeated Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey and third-party
candidate George C. Wallace. By a large majority, Nixon won re-election in
1972.
With the US divided over race and war, Nixon stated reconciliation
as a presidential goal and proceeded to further divide the nation. He promised
to withdraw US troops from Indochina, but escalated the war by ordering the
invasions of Cambodia and Laos and the saturation bombing of North Vietnam. A
cruel confirmation of the inhumane act, a June 8, 1972 UPI photograph captured
frightened children fleeing the napalmed village of Trang Ban. War protests
increased. In 1973, a cease-fire agreement was reached, ending US fighting in
Viet Nam.
Nixon's other foreign relations accomplishments include
arms-limitation talks with the USSR (1969); he was the first US president to
visit Moscow (1972) and Beijing. He reopened contact with Mainland China for
the first time in more than 20 years. In 1974, Secretary of State, Henry
Kissinger, negotiated disengagement agreements between Israel, Egypt and Syria.
"New Federalism" defined Nixon's domestic policy. A
major component, revenue sharing returned federal tax money to states as block
grants to be used as states saw fit. Nixon imposed wage and price controls to
combat recession and inflation, ended the draft, signed new anti-crime
legislation and began a broad environmental program. As promised, he appointed
strict construction justices to the Supreme Court.
Nixon's second term ended in scandal. Several of his top aides
were tried and imprisoned. Unrelated scandals brought about the resignation of
Vice-President Spiro Agnew (1973). House Minority Leader Gerald R. Ford
replaced Agnew. The House Judiciary Committee recommended Nixon's impeachment.
On August 9, 1974, Nixon resigned, the first US president to do so.
Gerald Ford pardoned Nixon for any illegal acts he may have
committed while president. Barred from practicing law, Nixon wrote his memoirs
and numerous other books on his experiences in public life and foreign policy.
Nixon died on April 22, 1994 in New York, New York. (Sources: www.whitehouse.gov/history/presidents/rn37.html
and
www.watergate.info/)
After Downing Street
For some time now, there has been a small movement calling for the
impeachment and removal of George W. Bush. In Key to Impeachment (6-1-05),
Norman Solomon at www.tompaine.com
identifies three factors that have hindered this movement. (1) Republicans
control Congress. (2) Most congressional Democrats are routinely gutless. (3)
Big media outlets shun the idea that Bush might really be a war criminal.
Except for changing the Republican majority, Solomon believes the
Downing Street memo could energize the movement, since its inertia has had
nothing to do with legal standards for impeachment. Leaked by a British
citizen, the minutes from a 2002 meeting provide the most stunning evidence to
date that the Bush administration decided to militarily remove Saddam Hussein
from Iraq and "fixed" intelligence and facts around the decision to
go to war.
Solomon and others, including the ranking Democrat on the House
Judiciary Committee, Rep. John Conyers, see this as compelling evidence that
Bush "actively engaged in a conspiracy to deceive and mislead the United
States Congress and the American people about the basis for going to war
against Iraq." Every reason given for doing so has been proven wrong. This
memo and an informed public could spur congressional Democrats to act and
ignite the kind of reporting that broke the Watergate scandal wide open.
To help create the necessary grassroots groundswell to overcome
media inertia and agitate reluctant Democrats, a coalition of progressive
groups launched www.AfterDowningStreet.org.
It is calling for a formal investigation by the Judiciary Committee.
The Watergate Scandal
On June 17, 1972, burglars broke into the Democratic Party's
National Committee offices located in the Watergate Hotel, a deluxe
hotel-apartment complex in Washington, DC. Thanks to security guard Frank
Mills, these burglars that were connected to the White House-run Committee for
the Re-Election of the President (CREEP) were arrested. Facing considerable
jail time, one of the burglars, James W. McCord, Jr., a former CIA agent and a
"security coordinator" for CREEP, agreed to testify before a grand
jury.
In February 1973, political investigations into the burglary
began. Spurred on by media coverage of the Watergate incident, especially
Washington Post reports by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein with the assistant
of a government informant known only as Deep Throat, the Senate established a
special committee. Headed by North Carolina Senator Sam J. Ervin, it
investigated the burglary and uncovered White House corruption.
The televised public hearings, which included the testimony of
White House Counsel John Dean, proved sensational. The Watergate Committee
learned of a number of "dirty tricks," corrupt campaign practices and
the existence of secret White House tape recordings. The tape recordings
discovery began an historical legal and political battle between the President
and Congress.
On April 30, 1973, Nixon announced the departures of White House
Counsel John Dean, his chief of staff H.R. Haldeman and chief domestic policy
adviser John Enrlichman, who headed up the special group of White House
employees known as the "plumbers." This group tapped the telephones
of newsmen and members of Henry Kissinger's staff in an effort to "plug up
leaks" and discredit Daniel Ellsberg, the man responsible for leaking the
Pentagon Papers, a Defense Department study of the Vietnam War, which was
published in newspapers, including the New York Times.
By mid-1974, nine members of CREEP had confessed or been convicted
of Watergate-related offenses, including Erlichman. Former Attorney General
John Mitchell and Haldeman awaited trial and Nixon had been named as an
"unindicted co-conspirator" by a federal grand jury. Special
Prosecutor Leon Jaworski requested recordings of 64 White House conversations
for use as evidence in these cases. Nixon refused claiming "executive
privilege." The Supreme Court in United States v. Richard M. Nixon
unanimously decided against the President in July 1974.
Days later, the House Judiciary Committee voted to recommend three
articles of impeachment: (1) obstruction of justice in helping to cover up the
Watergate crimes, (2) misuse of federal agencies so as to violate the rights of
citizens, and (3) interference with congressional powers by refusing to turn
over tapes and other subpoenaed materials.
Imbedded Too Deep!
The recent Vanity Fair revelation that former FBI assistant
director W. Mark Felt is "Deep Throat" has ignited a firestorm of
praise and criticism of anonymous sources. It has also raised questions about
whether or not anonymous sources deserve protection, as in the case of the
source that outed CIA operative Valerie Plame, whose husband, Joseph Wilson,
refused to go along with the White House fake intelligence that claimed Iraq
attempted to purchase yellow cake from Niger. Oddly, Bob Novak, who identified Plame
in his column, has not been threatened with prison for not revealing his
source. Only reporters that did not publish this information face contempt of
court for not revealing their sources. These are strange times.
Felt, who suffers with dementia, will not be providing in-depth
interviews on his role and motives for assisting Bernstein and Woodward.
However one characterizes Felt's motives, he has created a cottage industry as
writers of every persuasion have weighed in on his role in the Watergate scandal.
Depending on proximity to the Nixon administration's web of corruption and
political persuasion, writers and pundits have labeled Felt a hero or a traitor
for providing the inside information that helped bring down a president.
More important, his coming out has turned a much-needed spotlight
on the role of media in a free society. Some have suggested a modern-day
"Deep Throat" is needed to deliver the goods on the current White
House resident. However tepid some on the left believe the media were in
reporting on government corruption under Nixon, corporate media today muzzle
dissenting views and squash negative news about the current Republican
administration. Corporate media reporters are imbedded so deep with the
government that they cannot speak ill of their host. Given this, any potential
"Deep Throat" is dead on arrival (DOA).
Disgruntled wants to know: When the Downing Street memo broke in the British press, US media
gave the public wall-to-wall coverage of the runaway bride or some such nonsense.
If one believed US mainstream media, the world took the memo's damning
revelation in stride and nothing happened. However, the Newsweek magazine
blurb, which claimed US interrogators flushed the Koran down the toilet,
ignited anti-US riots in several Muslim countries, including Afghanistan. Like
good soldiers, despite evidence that backs up their anonymous source, Newsweek
offered an apology and retracted its story. Ironically, Newsweek has not
suffered similar stings of conscience requiring a retraction and apology for
stories it published about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, ties to the 9-11
terrorists and the other lies used by the Bush administration to justify war
against Iraq. Given US media are tightly controlled by a few white men and serve
to promote the machinations of a conservative government, where is the free and
unfettered press necessary to protect and preserve a democratic society?
Disgruntled feels: Discouraged! On Friday,
the Bush administration published the May job numbers with an upbeat assessment
on the direction of the economy. Economists, like Federal Reserve Chairman Alan
Greenspan, are known for speaking such convoluted jargon that few lay people
follow their line of reasoning. According to the May jobs report, a meager
number of jobs were created, substantially fewer than the quarter of a million
new jobs required to absorb new workforce entrants and keep the unemployment
rate steady. However, the unemployment rate fell to a low 5.1%. In addition to
this low jobless rate, the jobs created were in the relatively low wage service
sector. US manufacturing jobs continue to decline, and there is no good news on
the horizon. Former blue chip companies are reneging on pension promises,
reducing their workforce and outsourcing jobs to Third World countries. GM
recently announced massive layoffs and outsourcing plans. Understandably, US
workers are discouraged, and their state of mind does more to explain the
declining unemployment rate than any economic gibberish.
Disgruntled says: According to Internet news
accounts of his machinations, Karl Rove is Bush's brain. A spawn of Nixon-era
political dirty tricks, he is assumed to be the manipulator responsible for the
Swift Boat Veterans for Truth campaign that demolished Democratic Presidential
nominee John Kerry. Rove is also considered the mad genius behind the phony
memo that wrecked the career of CBS Evening News anchor Dan Rather, who is
viewed by the Bush White House and right-wing conservatives as a liberal. If
one takes the brain thing at face value, then Rove, a close associate of
columnist and talking head Bob Novak, is the most likely anonymous White House
source that outed CIA operative Valerie Plame. Since there is no one else to
take the blame, this criminal act is being allowed to wither on the proverbial
vine.
Mailbox: E-Mails, Faxes &
Telephone Calls
Email www.nytimes.com
The Republican chairman of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting is
aggressively pressing public television to correct what he and other
conservatives consider liberal bias, prompting some public broadcasting leaders
- including the chief executive of PBS - to object that his actions pose a
threat to editorial independence. Without the knowledge of his board, the chairman,
Kenneth Y. Tomlinson, contracted last year with an outside consultant to keep
track of the guests' political leanings on one program, "Now With Bill
Moyers."
Email www.wanttoknow.info "The FCC defends its
actions by saying that we have more media choices than ever before. But only a
few corporations decide what we can choose. That is not choice. That's like a
dictator deciding what candidates are allowed to stand for parliamentary
elections, and then claiming that the people choose their leaders. The loss of
independent operators hurts both the media business and its citizen-customers.
When they disappear, the emphasis in the media shifts from taking risks to
raking in profits. When that happens, quality suffers, local culture suffers
and democracy itself suffers." -- Ted Turner April 2005
Email www.projectcensored.org
"Media criticism does exist in America. But by and large, it is not citizen-based
criticism designed to make media a better source of information in a democracy.
Instead, it is a cynical manipulation of the discourse designed to silence even
the mildest dissent from the conservative, militantly pro-corporate dogma that
has come to pass for news in an era when "reporters" brag about the
size of their American-flag lapel pins." - Robert McChesney and John
Nichols
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