North Bay Bohemian — Jan. 26, 2011

By Norman Solomon

"Sure you want to jump into that cesspool?"

I've heard countless variations of the same question in recent months, as the possibility of running for Congress has become more real. With all the big-money hit pieces and mud fights that pass for "politics" these days, no wonder so many people see election campaigns as little more than depravity masquerading as democracy.

But there are lives in the balance, near and far, from the North Bay to Afghanistan. A list of what's at stake would be endless: the rights of workers, the ecology of rivers and the injustices of a healthcare system largely run for corporate profit.And with the U.S. military now spending more than $2 billion every day, grim results of what Martin Luther King Jr. called "the madness of military" are all around us. Public schools hold bake sales while Pentagon spending continues to go through the roof.

At a time when budget cuts are having dire effects on our own communities, I think of the distorted priorities that I saw in 2009 during a visit to Afghanistan, one of the poorest countries in the world. That nation, in desperate need, does not need Uncle Sam to escalate warfare.

Here at home, an upsurge of hope peaked a couple of years ago with the inauguration of President Obama. Since then, we've come back to earth—which, in the long run, is where we should be—with feet on the ground and eyes on the horizon. Pragmatism and idealism can be a very good match.

To read complete article, click here.

     I've just formed an exploratory committee for Congress. To read the announcement, please click here. 

     I want to thank everyone who has encouraged me to take this step. The expressions of support that I've received from hundreds of people have been deeply gratifying.

     With so much at stake — in the midst of perpetual war, a destructive economy, unchecked global warming and so many other dire realities — our challenge is to create the kind of future that we want to leave for the next generations.

     For a sampling of my statements on policy issues in recent months, please click here. 

     For a summary of my background, click here. 

     You'll find a lot more — including video, photos and articles — on the Norman Solomon for Congress Exploratory Committee website.

     I'm very much looking forward to what comes next with this exploratory committee — house parties, issue forums, listening tours, public debates and more — an ongoing swirl of activity across the North Bay.

     And I want to invite you to be part of it all.

     To sign up for news on what's upcoming, take a minute to fill out "Get Email Updates" at the top of the exploratory committee website. 

     If you'd like to host a house party where I can speak, hear people's concerns and respond to questions, please send me an email at NormanSolomonNorthBay@gmail.com and put "House Party" in the subject line.

     If you'd like to contribute to this effort, please click here.

     Going forward, there's no better keynote than these words from Senator Paul Wellstone: "In the last analysis, politics is not predictions and politics is not observations. Politics is what we do. Politics is what we do, politics is what we create, by what we work for, by what we hope for and what we dare to imagine."

Best wishes,

Norman

P.S.  — I'd appreciate it if you forward this email to people you know. It would also be a big help if you post some of the links on websites, listservs, Facebook and Twitter. And please suggest that people visit the website, www.NormanSolomonExploratory.com.

A live interview with Norman Solomon

KQED Television, Channel 9, San Francisco
January 7, 2011

To watch this six-minute interview, click here.

Wednesday, January 26 — 7:30 p.m.

Santa Rosa Democratic Club

Veterans Memorial Building, 1351 Maple Ave., Santa Rosa (95404)

Norman Solomon speaking on the future for progressives, the Democratic Party and our country

Program will be preceded by hors d'oeuvre hour starting at 6 p.m. and optional dinner at 7 p.m.

For details or to make a dinner reservation, click here: More info

To read Norman Solomon's article on the implications of the so-called "compromise" tax-cut bill signed by President Obama, click here.

     Last week, soon after President Obama made his stunning tax deal with Republican leaders, Congresswoman Lynn Woolsey told the Marin Independent Journal: “I think when you hold unemployment and the needs of the poorest and most desperate people hostage, that it is blackmail, and I don’t think we should give in to blackmail, ever.”

     In the same article, I made a comment that’s often heard among progressives: “This is not what we worked for.”

     A New York Times story quoted a somber assessment from me: “By giving away the store on such a momentous tax issue, he has now done huge damage to a large portion of the progressive base that helped to make him president.”

     For progressives, already reeling from the grim midterm elections, the last couple of weeks have been disheartening — all the more so because the huge giveaway deal for the rich came just after the president went to Afghanistan to reaffirm the escalation of war.

     But activists can put up a fight!

     Just this month, progressive Democrats and allies raised enough of an outcry on Capitol Hill and elsewhere to rebuff the Simpson-Bowles deficit commission and its long-awaited recommendations that would seriously undermine Social Security and Medicare. The struggle will rage on.

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To read an interview with Norman Solomon, published in December 2010, click here. 

Last Friday [Dec. 3], in a column about economic policy, Paul Krugman focused on "moral collapse" at the White House — "a complete failure of purpose and loss of direction." Meanwhile, President Obama flew to Afghanistan, where he put on a leather bomber jacket and told U.S. troops: "You're achieving your objectives. You will succeed in your mission."

For the Obama presidency, moral collapse has taken on the appearance of craven clockwork, establishing a concentric pattern — doing immense damage to economic security at home while ratcheting up warfare overseas.

By the end of the weekend, a deal was just about wrapped up between the president and Republican congressional leaders to extend the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans.

On the spin-cycle agenda this month is yet more reframing of the president's foggy doubletalk about Afghanistan. Strip away the carefully crafted verbiage and the picture is stark — with plans for a huge U.S. war effort in that country for many years to come.

At the end of a year with massive U.S. military escalation in Afghanistan, parallels with the Johnson administration's unhinged Vietnam War are hard to miss. Conjectures about an inside-the-Democratic-Party challenge to Obama's re-nomination are now moving from shadowy whispers to open discourse.

Some critics of the Vietnam War hesitated to confront it because of President Johnson's laudable domestic record, which included the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Voting Rights Act of 1965, the founding of Medicare and the launching of other Great Society programs. In sharp contrast, what most distinguishes President Obama's domestic record is its series of major cave-ins to corporate power and income inequality.

Ostensibly battling for economic fairness, the president is flying a white flag high over the White House.

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November 30, 2010 

Dear Member of Congress,

Two months ago we wrote to you and other members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, noting that “in your district, and nationwide, the progressive base will be watching with intense concern and vigilance as you respond to the growing threat to bedrocks of the social compact in our country.”

On behalf of PDA, our letter said: “We expect you to completely follow through with pledges to defend Social Security and Medicare.” And the letter added: “While we will be working to hold the line on these profoundly successful and essential social programs, we will work just as hard to demand the end of the occupation of Afghanistan and the return of war dollars home.”

Since then, the twin crises of economic austerity and war have become more acute. The Bowles-Simpson commission is continuing to advance a pernicious agenda. And the White House has backed away from its nebulous timeframe of July 2011 for halting the momentum of U.S. military escalation in Afghanistan.

Never has principled and unwavering leadership been more needed on Capitol Hill.

We’re heartened by recent statements from CPC leaders expressing unequivocal opposition to any cuts or diminishment of Social Security. At the same time, prior experience tells us that such statements cannot be taken as the last word; they must be continually supported and reinforced.

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By Norman Solomon

      Compared to the kind of secret cables that WikiLeaks has just shared with the world, everyday public statements from government officials are exercises in make-believe. 

     In a democracy, people have a right to know what their government is actually doing. In a pseudo-democracy, a bunch of fairy tales from high places will do the trick. 

     Diplomatic facades routinely masquerade as realities. But sometimes the mask slips — for all the world to see — and that’s what just happened with the humongous leak of State Department cables. 

     “Every government is run by liars,” independent journalist I.F. Stone observed, “and nothing they say should be believed.” The extent and gravity of the lying varies from one government to another — but no pronouncements from world capitals should be taken on faith. 

     By its own account, the U.S. government has been at war for more than nine years now and there’s no end in sight. Like the Pentagon, the State Department is serving the overall priorities of the warfare state. The nation’s military and diplomacy are moving parts of the same vast war machinery. 

     Such a contraption requires a muscular bodyguard of partial truths, deceptions and outright lies. With the USA’s ongoing war efforts at full throttle, the contradictions between public rationales and hidden goals — or between lofty rhetoric and grisly human consequences — cannot stand the light of day. 

     Details of Washington’s transactional alliances with murderous dictators, corrupt tyrants, warlords and drug traffickers are among its most closely guarded quasi-secrets. Most media accounts can be blown off by officialdom, but smoking-gun diplomatic cables are harder to ignore. 

     With its massive and unending reliance on military force — with a result of more and more carnage, leaving behind immense grief and rage in Afghanistan, Pakistan and elsewhere — the U.S. government has colossal gaps to bridge between its public-relations storylines and its war-making realities.

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