[Peace-discuss] State of the State

[C. G. Estabrook]

David--

You do a service for the rest of us by listening to this sort of stuff, so we 
don't have to.

I must say the only thing that surprises me is the pro-war "teary-eyed and 
long-winded conclusion."  Is Quinn currying favor with the national Democrats? 
Does the administration think that it's necessary to compel assent to its war 
policy from statehouses across the country, or is this specific to Illinois?

That may indicate how much more the administration intends to expand its war - 
and also perhaps how worried it is about opposition.

The Democratic party - local, state, and national - is with few exceptions down 
with the war.  That means we have to look for opposition elsewhere - 
Republicans, Greens, even tea-partiers. Certainly Rich Whitney (Green) is a 
better choice for Governor than Quinn, and our Republican congressman is one of 
the few who will vote against more funding for the Mideast war.

People are finally seeing through Obama's kill-people-and-support-the-rich
policies.  Now the question is whether an opposition can be generated that can
reverse those policies.  I don't see how it can be done without a substantial
defeat of Democrats in 2010 and 2012.

Massive public protest - a combination of a revived anti-war movement and
tea-partiers - may convince the Democrats to reverse their policies in their own
interests, but I doubt it. Encouraging resistance in the military ("Hell, no! We
won't go to the Mideast!") and economic disruptions ("We want jobs! End
foreclosures!") may help.  --CGE


David Green wrote:
> The "State of the State" speech this afternoon by Pat Quinn was long on 
> maudlin pro-war sentimentality and short on details about his proposal 
> for progressive taxation. Our state leaders (of all states) should make 
> it clear that state budget deficits are the fault of the recession, and 
> the recession is the fault of the housing bubble (and consequent stock 
> market crash), which as Dean Baker repeatedly says could have been burst 
> by the Federal Reserve long before it got big enough to do this much 
> damage. We need to stop identifying penny ante corruption and 
> "irresponsibility" of state officials with the budget crisis. They (all 
> state governors) do need to be held accountable for demanding a major 
> bailout of all states to the tune of $400 to $500 billion, as Bob 
> Herbert argued  in a recent NYT column (and calling the Wall Street 
> bailout for what it was--robbery of the working class by the rich). 
> While they're at it, they also should oppose our wars--the exact 
> opposite of Quinn's teary-eyed and  long-winded conclusion  in today's 
> speech. What the hell was he doing in Afghanistan? Does he really think 
> our army in Iraq is environmentally responsible? Unbelievable. 
> Meanwhile, he seems to have no interest in a state-level single-payer 
> plan (in spite of his relationship with Dr. Quentin Young), and says 
> nothing about how he plans to address the constitutional and legislative 
> obstacles to a progressive state tax system. I think there was some 
> reason to be mildly optimistic (or at least not completely 
> cynical) about Quinn's reform rhetoric--at least more so than in 
> relation to Phonybama. But what we get during a time of severe crisis is 
> a self-congratulatory laundry list of piecemeal reforms and prowar 
> patriotic rhetoric about "the best of the best." And of course, lazy 
> rhetoric about the value of education and brain power and our great 
> supercomputing University, which obviously has have nothing to do with 
> the creation (or disappearance) of "good jobs." Nauseating, insulting, 
> irresponsible, stupid, criminal.
> 
> 
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