The legendary M.I.T. Professor Noam Chomsky raised some eyebrows and endured some derision for his comments that today’s Republican Party may be the most dangerous and lethal political party in human history. Noam based his reasoned assertion on the collective and unanimous position the Republicans have taken regarding global warming and the human-caused great 6th extinction that we are all in the midst of now. If anything, Noam underscored the damning reality that the Republicans embrace and adhere to that threatens all life on earth. I have heard people laughingly refer to the Republicans as a modern Flat Earth Society, where the mockery of science and reason is openly celebrated. This comparison does the Flat Earth Society a grave disservice. The Flat Earth Society never threatened human survival or took collective actions that will insure planetary destruction unless radical measures and remedies are taken. The Flat Earth society members never pursued policies and practices that insured optimum environmental destruction while maximizing profit at the expense of humanity and all life.
Sea levels are rising and the polar ice caps are disappearing at rates that have stunned climate scientists. Over 30 species of animals are going extinct daily and this tragic reality is in fact accelerating. The planet may be entering it’s death throes and in the year 2016 the US corporate media mentioned the words “Global Warming” and discussed it for literally 96 minutes. Ninety-six minutes coverage awarded to a imminent problem that threatens human civilization.
And there is absolutely no coverage or concern or light cast on the unimaginable refugee crisis that will be one of the end results of climate change. Rome is burning and we are controlled by a Republican party whose only allegiance is to unrestricted and unregulated corporate power and oligarchy. Science, reason, the welfare of the planet, the hopes for future generations, these are trifling issues that matter not when contrasted to corporate fealty and service.
Future historians, if there are any, will both marvel and be aghast at what had been allowed to transpire in the United States. Deregulated corporate power had and has bought the soul outright of the Republican Party and with intent and precision and guile created a party whose sole priority is consolidating power and maximizing profit. The scope of their damage is impossible to quantify or comprehend.
The stark and irrefutable truth is that the Republican Party indeed eclipses by far the most odious and dangerous political factions in world history. Theirs is not a threat to a particular people or country. Theirs is an unrelenting commitment to global destruction and ruin on a scale that is impossible to fathom. Noam Chomsky if anything underscored the danger and reality of those we call modern Republicans.
JIM SAWYER, Edmonds, Wash.
In her fine letter, “More Clowns Needed” (7/1-15/18 TPP), P. Ann White celebrates the many contemporary media figures functioning in ways similar to Native American sacred clowns against the cruelties of the Trump administration. She makes this request: “I want to see sacred clowns in my church.”
The historic Christian tradition includes sacred clowns! They are often called fools for Christ or holy fools. Grounded in the biblical witness to a God whose gracious folly exceeds human wisdom, they have appeared in many places and centuries, especially but not exclusively in Eastern Orthodoxy.
St. Basil the Blessed, probably the best known holy fool, led a wandering and ascetic life in the 16th century Moscow. He would go to the marketplace and destroy the wares of merchants who were dishonest. On several occasions, he accused Czar Ivan the Terrible of wrongdoing, something that few people had the courage—or the foolhardiness—to do. Basil was canonized by the Russian Church in 1588, not long after his death. By popular demand, the church where he was buried, part of the Kremlin, was renamed the Cathedral of St. Basil the Blessed. Perhaps a contemporary holy fool will arise within Russian Christianity today to challenge Vladimir Putin’s repressive regime.
What holy foolishness practices can be brought back from obscurity and adapted to our times? A Christian ceremony called “Sic transit gloria mundi” is one candidate. From 1409 to 1963, it was an accepted part of the now-obsolete papal coronation.
As the newly elected pope was carried to the altar on a portable throne, the procession stopped three times. On each occasion, a papal official fell to his knees near a metal reed topped by a brazier in which flax was burning. As the flax burned, the official, addressing the pope in a loud and mournful voice, chanted “Sancte Pater, sic transit gloria mundi!” (Holy Father, so passes worldly glory!)
A version of this ceremony could become part of the inauguration of presidents, governors, and mayors and used also when other public officials take their oaths of office. The burning flax could appear at the annual meetings of huge corporations where the triple warning would be directed to CEOs. “Sic transit gloria mundi!” could sound forth at international assemblies and wherever influential people are found.
Christianity, Native American religions, and other wisdom traditions have their respective sacred clowns and holy foolishness practices. These spiritual resources can be helpful in delegitimizing cruelty, greed and the misuse of power, an essential task in our time.
CHARLES HOFFACKER, Greenbelt, Md.
Paul Ryan has ample confidence that there will not be a trillion dollars shortfall due to the tax-cuts in our budget, provided there is growth in the economy.
President Trump has taken this growth story a little too far. Corporations are involved in buying back its stock — there is hardly any “trickle down effect.” First he tried to install a rule that said that “no work, no Medicaid,” when it did not catch on, as all circumstances were not adequately considered. (What about sick and disabled population? What about people with no skills? What about lack of nurseries in the work-place? etc.
Next he picked on our NAFTA partners and added tariffs on EU countries. Finally he confronted China. When they retaliated, the farm-belt is now angered. It is not so easy to get involved in international trade — “You stop goods on our International borders and soon you will have armed forces crossing our borders”.
President Trump is trying to raise our revenue to avoid the huge deficit thanks to his tax-cuts.
G.M. CHANDU, Flushing, N.Y.
Trump’s four—or was it six—bankruptcies in the 1990s scared away all the Western banks, so Trump has relied on the Putin-controlled oligarchs for his money—and has also had a brisk business of money laundering for them as well. So now, when Putin says, “Jump!” Trump says, “How high?”
It has been a long time that corporations and the ultra-rich have bankrolled all the GOP congressmen’s campaigns. The congressmen need this money to win re-election, so they do what they are told. And, anyone who decides to not follow the funders’ directives finds the funders’ backing a primary opponent and quickly getting them voted out of office. Though not so obvious, the corporatist Democrats are also swayed by this fund spigot.
This explains why the GOP-controlled Congress does so little for our citizens, but ladles out tax breaks and other benefits for corporations and the wealthy.
Lee Knohl, Evanston, Ill.
Editor’s Note: PolitiFact reported Sept. 26, 2016, that Trump companies went through bankruptcy four times in the 1990s and twice in the 2000s, for a total of six bankruptcies.
Re: “López Obrador’s Victory in Mexico Raises Hopes in Latin America” [8/1/18 TPP])
It was a happy day for me when, in 1953 at the age of 12, I arrived in this country from Mexico. Even happier, however, was the day when I became a naturalized US citizen at the age of 21.
Nevertheless, like Ulysses’ and Penelope’s wedding bed, whose foundation was the roots of a sturdy tree, my cultural roots remain deeply grounded in Mexico’s soil.
Yes, our love for the land where we drew our first breath, and which nurtured us as children, will forever remain in our hearts.
Nevertheless, for far too long already, Mexico has been considered by its rich and corrupt politicians as their private hacienda. It needs new blood.
Thus in my old age, I hope that the children of Mexico, who have endured so much, will see a new day — a day of hope in the presidency of López Obrador.
VIVA MEXICO!
DAVID QUINTERO, Monrovia, Calif.
The president of the United States capitulated beside the Russian president when asked what he said to Putin about Russian interference in our elections. Trump said he believed Putin’s denials and blathered irrelevantly on and on about Hillary’s email server. He dismissed the deep and detailed evidence compiled by our security agencies — NSA, CIA, FBI — and by the Special Council’s investigation, calling them “witch hunts,” deferring instead to Putin.
He publicly called our closest trading partners and military allies “foes” in the presence of a real foe. His wimpy performance is worse than disgusting; it is treasonous. He is weakening our alliances while supporting our adversaries.
In a democratic nation of law, impeachment is the appropriate remedy.
BRUCE JOFFE, Piedmont, Calif.
Donald Trump’s election as president demonstrates the need for our political parties to act as gatekeepers for their nominees for president and vice president. The Democratic Party could take the lead by insisting that its candidates satisfy the following conditions before being placed on the ballot as the party’s nominees:
1) A candidate must make public his or her federal income tax returns for the three most recent tax years.
2) A candidate must have or obtain the nation’s highest level security clearance.
3) A candidate must submit to the same deep background check required of nominees to cabinet positions and must not be disapproved as the party’s candidate by a special committee of the party that has reviewed the deep background check report.
Adoption of the foregoing three requirements by the Democratic party could then be used to induce the other political parties to adopt the same requirements.
JAMES VAN VLIET, Sycamore, Ill.
From The Progressive Populist, September 1, 2018
Blog | Current Issue | Back Issues | Essays | Links
About the Progressive Populist | How to Subscribe | How to Contact Us
PO Box 819, Manchaca TX 78652