The Dems have been up to no good for longer than we like to think

Chalmers Johnson (don't read him if you aren't into self-questioning) has a piece at TomDispatch.com today which sits well with this former, fervent Democrat who has now moved away from the party as it has moved shamelessly towards the right.  If you want an example of that rightward move, you only have to look at the actions of the Democratic majority in the House and the slim majority in the Senate.  What you may not want to do is look back at the Clinton administration's enthusiastic embrace of corporatism.  It handed the Republicans not only the White House but gave them license to turn much of the government over to corporations, continuing a tradition which, like it or not, began during the FDR presidency when the purpose of building a huge defense industry was to end hard economic times.

Then it got to be a habit -- deeply entrenched, as Eisenhower warned.  Let's start with a quotation from investigative journalist, Tim Shorrock:

"Bill Clinton… picked up the cudgel where the conservative Ronald Reagan left off and… took it deep into services once considered inherently governmental, including high-risk military operations and intelligence functions once reserved only for government agencies. By the end of [Clinton's first] term, more than 100,000 Pentagon jobs had been transferred to companies in the private sector -- among them thousands of jobs in intelligence… By the end of [his second] term in 2001, the administration had cut 360,000 jobs from the federal payroll and the government was spending 44 percent more on contractors than it had in 1993."

In his essay for TomDispatch.com, Chalmers Johnson is cataloging the gradual handover of intelligence and military work from government to private contractors.  He writes:

"The end result is what we see today: a government hollowed out in terms of military and intelligence functions. The KBR Corporation, for example, supplies food, laundry, and other personal services to our troops in Iraq based on extremely lucrative no-bid contracts, while Blackwater Worldwide supplies security and analytical services to the CIA and the State Department in Baghdad. (Among other things, its armed mercenaries opened fire on, and killed, 17 unarmed civilians in Nisour Square, Baghdad, on September 16, 2007, without any provocation, according to U.S. military reports.) The costs -- both financial and personal -- of privatization in the armed services and the intelligence community far exceed any alleged savings, and some of the consequences for democratic governance may prove irreparable.

"These consequences include: the sacrifice of professionalism within our intelligence services; the readiness of private contractors to engage in illegal activities without compunction and with impunity; the inability of Congress or citizens to carry out effective oversight of privately-managed intelligence activities because of the wall of secrecy that surrounds them; and, perhaps most serious of all, the loss of the most valuable asset any intelligence organization possesses -- its institutional memory."

Johnson warns -- and we'd do well to listen -- that we have put ourselves at much greater risk than ever.

..."The current situation represents the worst of all possible worlds. Successive administrations and Congresses have made no effort to alter the CIA's role as the president's private army, even as we have increased its incompetence by turning over many of its functions to the private sector. We have thereby heightened the risks of war by accident, or by presidential whim, as well as of surprise attack because our government is no longer capable of accurately assessing what is going on in the world and because its intelligence agencies are so open to pressure, penetration, and manipulation of every kind."

War by accident.  Even as I was typing this, a Pakistani political analyst and author, Shuja Nawaz, speaking on the phone from Rawalpindi, spoke about yesterday's CIA drone+missile strike and the collateral damage it has done.  Nawaz reported that a fellow journalist had had a conversation about this just nowwith rebel leader Massoud who put numbers to the number of recruits the rebel movement gets normally versus the numbers immediately following an American attack which causes civilian deaths.  The recruits are lining up as a result of the CIA's attack. 

Presidential whim?  War by accident or war on purpose?  We're looking at a growing appetite for endless war over which the American voter has lost all control.

Comments

[JL]

".. but gave [the GOP] license to turn much of the government over to corporations, continuing a tradition which, like it or not, began during the FDR presidency when the purpose of building a huge defense industry was to end hard economic times".

Events controlled FDR, not the other way around. What was his first order of business after winning re-election in '36? I'll tell you what: he attempted to overthrow a reactionary Supreme Court. Hardly the action of a corporatista (sic). Talk about a lead foot on a a left pedal...

FDR had bigger fish to fry in 1942...

[JL]

Incidentally, Harry Truman backed FDR in the "Court Packing" gambit.

[Diane]

The Democrats?
Please, you have to be joking!
Since 1960 approx. 20 years have been spent with a Democrat for President out of 48.
Kennedy, LBJ, Carter, Clinton.
So who has destroyed this country and given corporations that much power in this country?
The answer is REPUBLICANS!
They started this war on lies, and corporate greed fueled the fire.
The president and the Republican Congress did this.
Please do not re write history. Read it!!!

[PW]

Diane -- it doesn't help Dems to see themselves as saints and all the rest as sinners. The collaboration between Democrats and Republicans is written all over recent history. Our side isn't going to win until we figure this out, question our own choices, and stop it. And no, nobody's joking.

[The Oracle]

The collaboration between Republicans and Democrats actually involves a collaboration between over 90 percent of the hardcore conservative Republicans and the Democratic Leadership Council bloc in the Democratic Party (DLC).

This DLC bloc began sabotaging the liberal, progressive wing of the Democratic Party in the mid-1980s, with the DLC bloc-heads, actually stealth Republicans, claiming that to confront Reaganism, the Democratic Party had to move toward the "center," that is abandon liberal, progressive principles and move to the right.

This is how we've ended up with a Speaker of the House who won't even consider impeaching a criminal Republican president and vice-president...and no doubt will not let Rove's contempt of Congress charges be addressed by the full House.

Yes, there have been some accomplishments during the last seventeen months of Democratic "control" of Congress (minimum wage increase, etc.), but attempts to hold the criminals in the Bush/Cheney administration accountable have been repeatedly blocked by the stealth Republican DLCers...while at the same time they got the abhorrent FISA/retroactive immunity for telecoms bill passed...which Nancy Pelosi, as Speaker, could have blocked, but didn't.

So, "Houston, we have a problem." The culture of corruption Republicans with their fascist drive for a "permanent Republican majority" and a stealth Republican DLC bloc inside the Democratic Party which believes that compromising with un-American, un-patriotic criminals is good for our nation. Not.

[Tony]

'When is this going to stop. It has been clear that the Republican's agenda is linked to their corporate supporters. We need to take a lesson from the French and adopt their attitude of not tolerating no BS from the government. Sure they have their share of scandals but they don't have their government all in their private lives. When their government does something that is out of line, there is a change and life resumes. This is why there has been negative comments about them because the status quo does not want you to know anything about their culture and their politics. We need to expand the political process and include the other parties like the Libertarian, Green Party and others. Look how long it took to gain acceptance for the Independent Party. Allowing corporations to gain control of our government is untolerable and if there are any politician who is up for re-election that supportx their agenda, they need to voted out so we can return this country to the people. This 2 and 1/2 party system is not working and IMO we should adopt a Parlimentary system similar to Canada, France and our close ally Great Britain. This way the intent of those parties will be crystal clear and will give the electorate more choices instead of the ones they prop up in front of us.

[PW]

Oracle: DLC: yup. You're right. I can't remember when it was made easier to ditch the party.But I agree with Jane Mayer when she says that the biggest reason for Pelosi et al bending over is that they didn't get the political support they needed. We progressives nearly drowned her in support but it wasn't enough. Most voters are consumers, not supporters. I think Ira Chernus's first two paragraphs here have nailed the problem.

So Tony: the thing about not tolerating no BS is first you have to know enough about the BS to be fed up. Think about how and where most Americans get their info about the government and (most important) the amount of time they're willing to give to being informed citizens. I don't disagree with you in the least, but it's wishful thinking at this point.