Choice America Network

The cry of many Christians today is a cry to return to the teachings of the Bible and to have a society which is righteous. I am in total support of a righteous society and have tried to imagine what it would be like. One of the first changes we would need to make is at the foundation, our banking system. Exodus 22 says that if you lend money to poor people you can not extort money from them in the form of interest. In Proverbs 28:8 the message is very clear, He says that getting rich by charging interest is wrong and that God will take his wealth and give it to the poor. Psalms 15 says that Yahweh will dwell with those who are righteous and do not charge interest on their loans. In Deuteronomy 15 it describes how all debts are forgiven every 7 years in the year of Jubilee. There are 22 times in the Old Testament which speak of the sin of charging interest on a loan. The sweat of one's brow is to be the measure of one's wage.

Jesus talked almost constantly about power and wealth and how the righteous are to relate to the poor. He explained that you can not serve God and mammon because you will love one and hate the other (Matthew 6:24. He made it clear that it will be very hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven (Matthew 19: 23-24). Then there is the prayer which he taught us to pray where we ask for our debts to be forgiven in the same way we have forgiven other's debts (Matthew 6:12). The recent issue of the ten commandments being displayed in court rooms was interesting but as Jesus said there is no law against the fruits of the spirit of Christ which are Love, Joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness and self-control. I doubt anyone would object to any member of our government living out the ten commandments and no one would ever legislate against the first and greatest commandment which is to love the lord your god with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength and love your neighbor as yourself.

I am surprised that so many Christians who are fighting to keep the commandments on the wall are not fighting as hard to have them implemented. It takes a lot of searching to find scriptures which relate to homosexuality and abortion but one can hardly turn a page without reading about how to be a blessing to those in need. Today's rich young rulers preach about the advantages of usury and exploitation. While they give lip service to moral issues they are preaching from the prophets of the free market. Upon reading about their social views, it seems that Ayn Rand and Milton Friedman are the messianic visionaries who they believe will redeem the world. Self interest and compound interest are the way to salvation according to them. From Friedman, Pastor Ted says he learned that everything, including spirituality, can be understood as a commodity. And unregulated trade, he concluded, was the key to achieving worldly freedom. Is spirituality a commodity to be bought or traded? I thought that God's love was free and his grace is unmerited favor.

What ever happened to the words and example of Jesus? How can these Christians belong to the CNP and the CFR and secret societies all of which are dedicated to wealth and power. The Christian leaders of today live in multimillion dollar homes, have questionable financial dealings in other countries and extort money from the well meaning people who watch their television programs. They preach the "name it and claim it "gospel of exponential growth and reciprocity to itching ears. They explain to their followers that if they are righteous, God will reward them with riches. Interestingly many gurus of the new age movement also promise wealth and power as evidence that the "Universe" is on their side. Both are proponents of the new religion of privatization.

As a prominent preacher of privatization, William Garvey, stated "non-profit organizations and the private sector might render the cumbersome machinery of representative government obsolete." This is what he wrote to Ronald Reagan as he expressed his gratitude for turning the public lands over to ranchers. This letter was published in a media promotion for an international conference on Family choice and Educational vouchers . The speakers for this were all members of the Council of National Policy (CNP) - James Dobson, Tim LaHaye, Phyllis Schlafly and Milton Friedman and then secretary of education William Bennett. The brochure promoted the conference as "Where the Future Begins."

From many other sources and membership lists it is clear that the neo-Christians who are driving our national policies are championing privatization both here and abroad. These same people are all in lock step with the Zionist movement. They preach that they know the meaning of The Revelation and preach a very literal ideology of the rebuilding of the temple in Jerusalem and the return of Christ for his church. Current events are slammed into the revelation mosaic often by manipulation. Recently Arthur Blessett, who carried 12 ft cross around the globe has just completed his mission with his last countries being Iraq and North Korea. Upon completion he carved a small cross from it and sent it into space so that one more prophesy can be fulfilled…"and the sign of the son of man shall be over all nations." (you can go to his website and see when you are under the sign of the cross and read about how he led George Bush to Christ in Midland TX in the 70's) Indecently there is not one word about helping the poor or not dropping bombs which kill families, but plenty about a $1000 a plate fundraiser he attended so he could reconnect with George W. Bush.

God will not be mocked! His ways are not our ways! (Isaiah 55:8) we can not manipulate him into returning by fulfilling the prophesies ourselves at the direction of political think tanks. It seems that the free-market Christians are seeking to hire the masons to complete the temple. The bulldozers will crush whomever gets in the way. The water from Babylon will soon be surging through the privatized pipelines through Iran and Syria right into the promised land. The land, the air, the water and the labor will be in the hands of the ruling elite. The rich will determine how much uranium and radiation is enough. The rich will determine how gray the sky can be. The rich will determine who gets water and the rich will be the ones to discover the magical wage which allows for a laborer's maximum productivity just this side of starvation.

Let it not be followers of Christ who usher in these abuses. How far will the charlatans go to deceive. Perhaps they will project a hologram of Christ returning in the clouds to rally the Christian soldiers. Certainly the technology exists. In the last days we are told that many will be deceived. (II Tim. 3:13) There will be signs and wonders and they will do miracles in the name of Christ, but the love of Christ is not in them. I suspect many Christians are being used by the powers and principalities in high places to obtain massive resources for the rulers of an empire. So while the neo-Christians talk about decorations in our courthouses, the sexual identity of cartoon characters, and preach the good news of the free market. Let us pray that Christ will tarry until the church is no longer holding the banner of privatization and riding the beast of the free-market into the New World Order.

Now is the day for repentance.

Karen Horst Cobb wrote No Longer a Christian and No Longer a Christian - Part II published by CommonDreams.org in the fall of 2004. She is a mother and a grandmother, and with God's grace, tries to follow the example of Christ as she speaks Christ's message to the world that there is no Government Issue Jesus (GI-Joe Jesus. ) contact: cairnhcobb@msn.com

Karen Horst Cobb

Choice America Network

At 12:03 am on July 28th, the House of Representatives approved the Central America-Dominican Republic-United States Free Trade Agreement, CAFTA. CAFTA, which would expand NAFTA to Central America and the Dominican Republic, would devastate farmers, privatize essential public services, and accelerate the race to the bottom on wages in the US and all over Central America.

At the end of the allotted 15 minutes of voting time the count was 180 to 175 against CAFTA, so the Republican leadership kept the vote open over an hour, in order to bully legislators into approving the bill. In the final tally, which was 217 to 215, a full 15 Democrats voted in favor of big business by supporting CAFTA, while 25 Republicans defied the Bush Administration and voted against it. Democrats deserving of punishment include Representatives Bean (D-IL), Cooper (D-TN), Dicks (D-WA), Cuellar (D-WA), Hinojosa (D-TX), Jefferson (D-LA), Matheson (D-UT), Meeks (D-NY), Moore (D-KS), Moran (D-VA), Ortiz (D-TX), Skelton (D-MO), Snyder (D-AR), Tanner (D-TN), and Towns (D-NY). The full roll call vote is available at http://clerk.house.gov/cgi-bin/vote.asp?year=2005&rollnumber=443.

The Republicans who refrained from voting were known CAFTA opponents who evidently caved into hard-core bullying from their leadership. Yet stiff criticism also goes to the Democrats who could have prevented handing Bush a win on a silver platter by sticking to labor and their environment rather than corporate interests.

It seems that some Representatives have not reviewed the record of the massive failure of NAFTA, the agreement that cost a million US jobs and increased poverty in Mexico. NAFTA also caused the loss of 38,000 US family farms, while pushing 1.5 million Mexican farmers off their land. Yet others, like Hilda Solis (D-CA), the only Representative from Nicaragua, gave a passionate and compelling argument against CAFTA.

CAFTA was approved, and that will be the bottom line for communities in Central America and the US who will face years of decreasing living standards, falling wages, eroding environmental protection, and losing family farms because of CAFTA - not to mention the 275,000 HIV positive Central Americans who will be cut off from life-saving generic medicines because of the extremist patent monopolies embodied in the treaty.

In tonight's vote, money values of big corporate interests trumped human values of worker's rights, fair trade, and environmental protection. Once again, the people of the US – and the Democratic Party – lost an opportunity to deliver a crushing blow to the Bush Administration. Yet House Majority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) predicted that Bush's win on CAFTA "will be a Pyrrhic victory for him, because we will take our message to the American people that we are the ones looking out for them."

Twisting Arms Until They Break into a Thousand Pieces

Since CAFTA was so damaging to American workers, the environment, and Central Americans, it wasn't able to pass on its own merits. CAFTA's passage was bought by an outrageous amount of pork barrel politics, and fake side deals that don't amount to a hill of beans. Earlier this month, Republican leaders – in no secret maneuver – casually linked transportation and energy bill giveaways to support for CAFTA.

A report issued earlier this month by Public Citizens demonstrated that 89% of side deals negotiated to gain votes for previous trade deals have been broken. The side deals on sugar, labor, and textiles have all been exposed as band-aids that hardly cover the festering wounds of job loss that CAFTA will cause. And the China-punishing legislation hastily approved to buy another couple of votes was shown by the AFL-CIO to contain less protections for American jobs that other China legislation already in committee.

Unpacking the Rhetoric

A central tenet of Republican arguments rests on a projected theory that free trade delivers economic prosperity, ergo CAFTA will deliver development. Had the situation not been so tragic, it would have been comic to view Republicans repeatedly claiming that CAFTA would help poor Central Americans develop because they would have increased access to US imports. The problem with the theory, is, well, the results of the theory when applied.

After 25 years of following free-trade doctrine (opening markets, privatizing basic services, deregulating industry, lowering tariffs, orienting their production for export, and consecrating intellectual property) Latin Americans have achieved the lowest rate of economic growth in their history – less than .5% a year in the last 25 years, compared with a total of 80% during the previous 20 years. The main issue here is that so-called "free trade" doesn't actual deliver the promised benefits – because it really has little to do with free trade, but much to do with transferring wealth and decision making power from the public to private, unaccountable elites known as multinational corporations. Until we have a sea change in what the US public understands by the phrase "free trade" we will continue to see our democracy turned into a political system of corporate rule.

Specter of 9/11

The US Trade Representative Robert Portman was joined by Vice President Dick Cheney in working the House floor tonight to secure votes. President Bush made a highly rare appearance in the House, mostly framing CAFTA as a security issue. As Bush's polling numbers fall, support for the war in Iraq recedes, and his top advisor Karl Rove is embroiled in a political scandal, Bush pushed hard for a "policy win" to attempt to demonstrate that he wasn't a lame duck.

Bush's primary argument centered around the outrageous argument that CAFTA would increase our national security. The phrase "fledgling democracy" was used so many times to refer to Central American countries that you'd think they had hatched last month, with the help of mother hen USA. Tom Delay has evidently taken up permanent residence in never-never land to be able to make arguments like, "It is good for our national security in supporting these fledgling democracies at our back door. It is good for our effort against illegal immigration. It is good for our economy."

House Majority leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) pushed back hard against the ridiculous Bush hypothesis that CAFTA would increase national security. "Trade alone, devoid of basic living and working standards, has not, and will not, promote security, nor will it lift developing nations out of poverty," she said. "Our national security will not be improved by exploiting workers in Central America."

Republicans have been much more adept than progressives at linking issues of security with trade. We in the global economic justice movement must learn adapt our rhetoric and strategies to the political changes our country has undergone post-9/11, and make the argument that fair trade, not corporate globalization, will increase security. But we also need more collaboration with the movements for civil liberties and peace to link the issues, including from our progressive media, who barely covered CAFTA before it passed.

Vision for the Hemisphere

Republicans actually acknowledged that poverty – and a lack of hope for future economic opportunity – breed insecurity. But they have the math backwards. CAFTA will not eradicate poverty, but will greatly increase it The biggest impact of CAFTA, according to the think tank the Center for Economic and Policy Research, will be to push down wages. And the Administration continue to frame the issue of free trade and democracy as two sides of the same coin, rather than acknowledging that one is an economic platform that a well-functioning democracy may choose not to pursue.

CAFTA proponents repeatedly baited voters with the specter of an imminent takeover of Central America by alleged communist forces, harkening back to the wars and instability of the 1980s. "We can send free trade to Central America today, or we will be sending troops tomorrow" was a frequent refrain. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and Cuba's Castro were constantly invoked as being ready to "fill the ideological void" if the Congress "turned their backs on Central America." It was as if Central America was an empty vessel, waiting for US leadership to fill. It was the first time the subject of ALBA, the Venezuelan's Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas, was raised on the House floor – yet it was portrayed as a radical attack on America rather than a political and economic program that embodies a different vision for the future of the Americas based on a better vision of economic integration among the peoples of Latin America.

Stepping Stone to the FTAA Crumbles

The passage of CAFTA is a serious blow to our movement for global justice. But the vote also seals the fate of the future of NAFTA expansion. If CAFTA, a deal with the tiniest economies in the region and the least economic impact on the US possible, squeaked by with only a razor-thin 2-vote margin, the possibility that the Administration could get a deal approved with economies that would actually impact the US doesn't pass the laugh test. The Bush dream of a Free Trade Area of the Americas is even farther away than before the CAFTA vote. The "stepping stone to the FTAA" has crumbled under their feet.

Meanwhile, Back at the Ranch

This week, in addition to bribing CAFTA into existence, the Bush Administration has also been negotiating the expansion of NAFTA to Colombia, Peru, Ecuador, and Bolivia through the Andean Free Trade Agreement (AFTA – it, too, rhymes with NAFTA.) AFTA negotiations have stumbled over crucial chapters on agriculture and intellectual property. They have also been difficult to continue amidst the popular overthrow of governments in Ecuador and Bolivia in the midst of negotiations. A recent round of negotiations in Miami this month ended inconclusively. But most governments have been waiting to see if CAFTA was going to be approved by the US Congress. Now that the margin was so razor-thin, negotiators will likely take the hint that "free-trade" agreements under the same model are highly unpopular with the US public.

Day of Reckoning

Now that the fight is over, we pass into the stage of reward and retribution. We can, and must, display the political power to not walk of the playing field now, but to spend the extra effort necessary to back up our elected officials when they fought for us, and punish those who sold out their constituents' interests by voting them out of office.

This may be difficult during the week when the labor movement has experienced its biggest split in 50 years. It should not go unnoticed that Bush picked the moment when the labor movement, those in the US who will be most clearly affected by CAFTA, was fighting each other as much as fighting against CAFTA, notwithstanding the Herculean efforts of the rank and file – and the AFL's trade program – to organize hard to against the bill.

Where To Go From Here

There are two main agenda items for the next few days. The first is to call your legislator and reward or punish them for your vote. Let them know about the deep knot in your gut from witnessing the CAFTA defeat, and the emptiness on the tables of many workers that will follow. Check out the link above to find out how your legislator voted, and call the switchboard 866-340-9281 or 877-762-8762 with your response.

But then, we must pick ourselves up, and fight even harder next time. That means the current negotiations on the World Trade Organization, which has a key General Council meeting this week in Geneva, Switzerland. And it means stopping the expansion of NAFTA to the Andes through AFTA.

But most importantly it means getting involved more than we were this time. Bush won because they are fighting to win – whatever it takes, including unethical and undemocratic pork barrel and arm-twisting. Our side fought very, very hard to win, but we lack control of both chambers of the legislative branch, and the executive. (That makes the fight to keep the judiciary balance all the more essential, by the way.) To win on that unlevel playing field, we have to be more strategic, better funded, more organized, and get millions more people involved.

Highly strategic, savvy grassroots organizing was carried out by groups like the Citizens Trade Campaign and Public Citizen, along with key unions, environmental groups, faith communities, solidarity activists, and human rights organizations including Global Exchange. These groups are only as strong as their membership base is active. But they also need your support. So right after you get off the phone with your legislator, be sure to check out the groups listed below, and others that have supported the fight against CAFTA. Become a member, get on their email lists, and make a donation.

That way, we'll all build a stronger Fair Trade movement, and convert this legislative defeat into a long term opportunity to build a movement that will lead us to true victory against AFTA, the FTAA and the WTO the next time around.

Deborah James is the Global Economy Director at Global Exchange and is reachable at deborah@globalexchange.org.

For more information, to get involved, and to make a contribution:
www.citizen.org/trade
www.citizenstrade.org
www.globalexchange.org/campaigns/cafta
www.stopcafta.org

CHOICE AMERICA NETWORK

I remember the arrogance that accompanied the "shock and awe" bombing campaign that kicked off the war in Iraq more than two years ago. The war was supposed to be quick and easy, a cakewalk. The enemy, we were told, would fold like a dinner napkin. And then, in the neoconservative fantasies of some of the crazier folks in the Bush crowd, the military would gear up for an invasion of Iran.

In one of the great deceptions in the history of American government, President Bush insisted to a nation traumatized by the Sept. 11 attacks that the invasion of Iraq was crucial to the success of the so-called war on terror.

"Some have argued that confronting the threat from Iraq could detract from the war against terror," said Mr. Bush in a speech in the fall of 2002 that was designed to drum up support for the invasion. "To the contrary, confronting the threat posed by Iraq is crucial to winning the war on terror."

In the speech, delivered in Cincinnati, Mr. Bush said of Iraq: "It possesses and produces chemical and biological weapons. It is seeking nuclear weapons."

I've always urged politicians to be careful what they wish for. The president got the war he wanted so badly. But he never understood an essential fact that Georges Clemenceau learned nearly a century ago - that "it is easier to make war than to make peace."

So where are we, now that the real world has intervened? The military is spinning its wheels in the tragic and expensive quagmire of Iraq and there is no end to the conflict in sight. A front-page story in The Times on Sunday said the insurgents "just keep getting stronger and stronger."

As for the fight against terror, the news runs the gamut from bad to horrible. The Red Sea resort of Sharm el Sheik in Egypt was traumatized by a series of early-morning terrorist blasts on Saturday. London is trembling from the terror attacks on its public transportation system that have claimed dozens of lives.

Here in New York, where the police have begun random searches of the backpacks and packages of subway riders, there is an odd feeling of resignation mixed with periodic bouts of dread, as transit riders struggle with the belief that some kind of attack is bound to happen here.

Interviews over the past few days have shown that subway riders in New York almost instinctively understand what the president does not - that the war in Iraq is not making us safer here at home.

"No, in fact I think it makes us less safe here," said Edmond Lee, a salesman who lives on Manhattan's Upper West Side. "We went over there with no real plan. No real thinking about what we'd be able to do."

He said he was concerned that "what happened in the London Underground might happen here."

Memories of the destruction of the World Trade Center are still etched, as if with acid, in the minds of New Yorkers. Very few people are dovish when it comes to the war on terror. But Mr. Bush's war in Iraq is another matter.

"Our soldiers being over there make it worse here," said Michael Springfield, a 32-year-old engineer from Brooklyn.

One of the people encountered in the subway was Andy Dommen, a musician from Germany who was pushing a shopping cart filled with luggage. He made the fundamental distinction between Iraq and Al Qaeda and said the war in Iraq was a distraction that "was taking the public eye off" other important problems, namely the fight against terror.

"Messing up other countries," said Mr. Dommen, "doesn't make the world or America safer."

There is still no indication that the Bush administration recognizes the utter folly of its war in Iraq, which has been like a constant spray of gasoline on the fire of global terrorism. What was required in the aftermath of Sept. 11 was an intense, laserlike focus by America and its allies on Al Qaeda-type terrorism.

Instead, the Bush crowd saw its long dreamed of opportunity to impose its will on Iraq, which had nothing to do with the great tragedy of Sept. 11. Many thousands have paid a fearful price for that bit of ideological madness.

© 2005 New York Times

CHOICE AMERICA NETWORK

Most importantly, this one has a federal special prosecutor (Patrick Fitzgerald) working on it. And Fitzgerald seems serious -- he probably wouldn't have sent a New York Times reporter to jail for refusing to testify, if he were about to announce that nobody broke the law.

The investigation stems from a leak to the press that Valerie Wilson, the wife of former National Security Council Senior Director for African Affairs Joseph Wilson, was a C.I.A. operative. Wilson angered the Bush Administration two years ago by telling the press and then the public that -- on the basis of his fact-finding mission to Niger -- the Administration's claim that Saddam Hussein "recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa" was false.

We now know that the White House's emphatic public denials over the last two years that Karl Rove had anything to do with the leak were false. Time magazine's reporter Matt Cooper has stated that it was from Mr. Rove that he first learned that Valerie Wilson worked for the C.I.A. Cooper has also stated that I. Lewis Libby, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, confirmed Ms. Plame's identity. And Rove also confirmed her identity to columnist Robert Novak, who was the first to write about her in July 2003, identifying her by her maiden name, Valerie Plame.

At the time, a senior White House official told the Washington Post that the leaks were "meant purely and simply for revenge" and that they were "wrong and a huge miscalculation, because they were irrelevant and did nothing to diminish Wilson's credibility."

Rove may not have broken a specific 1982 law prohibiting disclosure of the identity of a covert C.I.A. operative. But there are other laws against U.S. officials leaking classified information. And although lying to the public is legal, lying under oath to a grand jury is a crime. If there was a White House effort to discredit and/or punish Joseph Wilson -- as the White House official and other sources cited by the Washington Post have claimed -- then there's a good chance that efforts to cover this up ran afoul of the law: with perjury, obstruction of justice, or other violations.

Based on what we already know, the logical next question is: what did President Bush and Vice President Cheney know and when did they know it?

Of course, the much bigger issue is the one from which Rove's troubles were born: a president and his advisors led us into a war based on false information. There was no attempted Iraqi purchase of uranium from Africa, nor could Iraq "launch a biological or chemical attack 45 minutes after the order is given," as the Bush Administration claimed. Nor was Saddam Hussein in league with Al Qaeda, as the majority of Americans were led to believe. In a war that now appears to have been completely unnecessary, more than 1,760 U.S. soldiers have been killed and many thousands more have been disabled; tens of thousands of Iraqis have also perished.

In May 2005, a memo summarizing a British Prime Minister's meeting of July 2002 was leaked, with the head of British intelligence reporting from meetings in Washington that the Bush Administration had already decided to invade Iraq, and that "the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy." More than 140 Members of Congress have written to President Bush demanding an explanation of the "Downing Street Memo."

Karl Rove's actions against Valerie and Joseph Wilson were just one small part of the Bush Administration's effort to deceive the public and make the case for war. But for now, this is the only part that is subject to legal scrutiny. And it's not going away anytime soon.

Mark Weisbrot is co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research

Choice America Network