But why should any country listen to this advice when the people advocating it refuse to abide by it? With banks collapsing in the past weeks, we have seen the Bush Administration act in a very Keynesian manner. Sure, they haven’t increased spending on welfare, but they have poured large sums of money into Wall Street to prop up a failing model. The government has taken a large role in business. What does this say to those nations which have been pushed into following the opposite model, that of tightening spending in economic downturns? I think the best quote on this came from the leader of the Congressional Sandinista (FSLN) majority in Nicaragua, Edwin Castro, who stated that “We think the Bush administration should follow the same policies that they and the International Monetary Fund have always told us to follow when we have economic problems - a structural adjustment that requires cutting government spending and reducing the role of government.” We have seen a government which has been the dominating voice for structural readjustment in this form engage in “socialism for the wealthy” in the past few weeks. Indeed, the hypocrisy is obvious and would be laughable if the result of all of this wasn’t so dire.

Sadly, all this money they are spending has gone straight to those who can handle the collapse the best. We haven’t seen the sort of actions that countries used (with some success) during the late 90s crisis in Asia, that being increasing benefits for the unemployed and impoverished. If we have 700 billion to pay to banks, and billions more to fight an endless war, surely we have a few billion for emergency welfare. It’s time for those who advocate a more just world to maturely and forcefully support an end to the dangerous and hypocritical policies associated with the Washington Consensus. I applaud the Latin American nations who have already neglected the advice forced on them in the past and look forward to models like the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas and the Banco del Sur which build on respect for governmental interests in welfare to provide mutual aid in a number of sectors It is my dream that we see this become the model for international development for our generation.

Three trade unionists Richard Gallardo, Luis Hernández and Carlos Requena, leaders of the pro-revolution National Union of Workers (UNT) and also members of the United Socialist Left party were shot dead late Thursday night in Aragua state, Venezuela.

The union leaders were gunned down by an armed assassin on a motorbike as they made their way home after participating that day in a labor dispute with the Colombian-owned Alpina food processing company.

There is speculation that the attack was carried out by paramilitaries hired by the Colombian company, which is reported to have utilized paramilitaries in similar disputes in its home country. Patricia Rivas writing for YKVE Mundial on November 28 pointed out that the attacks resembled a method of assassination commonly used against unionists and social movement activists in Colombia, known as sicariato, whereby hired gunmen on motorbikes carry out drive-by shootings.

However, the day before, the unionists had also been attacked by the Aragua state police aligned with outgoing opposition governor Didalco Bolivar. Bolivar, who was previously an ally of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez but defected to the right-wing opposition in the lead up to the Constitutional reform referendum in Venezuela in 2007, has previously deployed the state police against workers in labor disputes.

In a press conference on November 27 Hernández had denounced that 400 Alpina workers had been brutally repressed by the police, “The workers were inside the factory demanding from the company that they pay, in full and quickly, the money owing, when the police unexpectedly entered the premises and in a brutal manner began to kick out the workers.”

We immediately contacted workers in the rest of the area and “in a matter of minutes the company was surrounded by workers affiliated to the National Union of Workers. Thanks to this act of solidarity we managed to recuperate control of the factory and the workers have occupied it again,” Hernandez had told the media.

Hernández, Gallardo and Requena were known as, “implacable fighters” for workers’ rights who “never bowed down in the face of constant threats by bosses, union bureaucrats and elements of the public force that are enemies of the workers,” a statement by the United Socialist Left said.

“We render tribute to our murdered comrades who showed us, by their example and behaviour, that the rights of workers must be respected. The comrades offered their life for the principle of the defence of the interests of the working class and of socialism.”

“In their name and with their example we will continue the battle for the socialist revolution, expropriating from the bosses, breaking definitively with imperialism and building a government of the workers and the people,” the statement continued.

The workers are calling for the incoming governor of Aragua Mario Isea, a member of Chavez’s United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) and the national government to immediately carry out a full investigation.

The Attorney General’s Office responded that it has launched an investigation and assigned national public prosecutor Orlando Villamizar and Aragua state prosecutor Elas Pérez, to head up investigations.

The incident highlights the growing class conflict that has erupted across Venezuela in the aftermath of the November 23 regional elections. Numerous reports have surfaced of Venezuela’s elite, US-backed opposition launching a campaign of violence and intimidation against trade unionists, grass roots community organisations and pro-revolution social movements, particularly in the areas where they won.

In a statement in solidarity with the workers in Aragua, the Carabobo section of the UNT said the incidents are not isolated and that many cases of sicariato have occurred across the country, particularly in the construction sector, against unions in the private sector and against peasant leaders fighting for land reform in the countryside.

The statement argued that there had been no serious investigations into the many cases of sicariato and that the governmental bodies such as the police and the Attorney General’s Office had been incapable of responding to such incidents.

Stalin Perez Borges, a national coordinator of the UNT argued “President Chavez and the national government must carry out an investigation to the ultimate consequences and with mobilization we must defeat impunity.”

Perez Borges added that workers could not simply rely on the “ordinary justice” system because it often sided with the right-wing opposition and bosses against workers and instead called for the formation of a special commission comprised of workers organisations whose investigations “have the force of the law.”

“For this reason, at the same time, we convoke the immediate organisation of popular workers self-defence. The government must grant all the resources for the training and armed defence of the workers and their leaders. It will not be the corrupt police, in many cases the direct assassins, who will prevent these crimes. It will be us, the workers. We propose…our own self-defence against fascism,” he said.

Similarly, in a speech on Thursday highlighting a number of opposition attacks against Cuban doctors, education and health missions and community organisations Chavez, who described himself as a “subversive” in Miraflores presidential palace called for the “permanent mobilization” of the Venezuelan people to defend the Bolivarian revolution.

8:30am – Registration with light breakfast – Atrium lobby

10:00am - Panel I- Leftist critique of the Republican and Democratic parties - Shea Auditorium

Dr. Joseph Schwartz, Chair of the Department of Political Science at Temple University, author of
The Future of Democratic Equality.
Dr. Michael Thompson, professor of political science at William Paterson University, author of Confronting the New
Conservatism: The Rise of the Right in America and The Politics of Inequality: A Political History of the Idea of Economic Inequality in America, and Founder and Editor of Logos: A Journal of Modern Society & Culture

11:45am – workshops – Hunkiker Hall

Racial Issues (rm 109), Feminist Rights (rm 110), LGBT Issues (rm 201), Environmental Sustainability (rm 202)
Lunch – 12:30pm - Multi-Purpose Room (Student Center) -
Includes short talks by several speakers including Stuart Hutchison of Impeach Them and a representative
from Rutgers Tent State/SDS

2:30pm – Panel II - US foreign military and economic policy – Shea Auditorium

Greg Palast, investigative journalist who broke the story of how Jeb Bush purged thousands of Black Florida citizens from
voter roles before the 2000 election and New York Times bestselling author of Armed Madhouse
and The Best Democracy Money Can Buy

John Perkins, author of the New York Times bestseller Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, which has been published in 25 languages. His new New York Times bestseller, The Secret History of the American Empire, details the clandestine operations that created the world’s first truly global empire and provides a compassionate plan for crafting a world that future generations will be proud to inherit.

4:00pm – book signing with John Perkins and Greg Palast – Shea Auditorium lobby

4:45pm – workshops – Hunkizer Hall

Immigration (rm 109), Education (rm 110), Militarism and Foreign Policy (rm 201), Democratic Socialism (rm 202),
Human Trafficking (rm 209)

5:45pm – Closing – Multipurpose Room (Student Center)

Dr. Christine Kelly, professor of Political Science at William Paterson University and serves on the Editorial Boards of two
peer-reviewed journals — New Political Science: A journal of politics and culture and Labor and Social Policy. She is an Editorial Board member of the book series Contemporary Issues and American Political Theory with the University Press of Kentucky.
*Moderators for the workshops include: Madelyn Hoffman, Executive Director of New Jersey Peace Action; Dave Watson-Hallowell, President of Sustainable West Milford; President Stafford X; Professor Carole Sheffield; Professor Karie Gubbins; Professor John Mason

For any questions email: wpu-yds@hotmail.com
To RSVP go to http://www.idealist.org/if/i/en/av/Event/108866-167
For directions visit http://ww2.wpunj.edu/aboutus/directions.cfm
*NJ Transit Available to Campus
______________________________________________________________________________________
Sponsored by:
*Young Democratic Socialists (YDS) *Brothers For Awareness (BFA)
*Feminist Collective *Organization of Lat in American Students (OLAS)

an excerpt from a larger Democracy Now interview

AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about just this latest news that came out last night—of course, not the official announcement, but Eric Holder, the former deputy attorney general under President Clinton, being tapped as the next attorney general, if confirmed?

CORNEL WEST: Well, two things. First, on a personal level, I know Brother Eric Holder. I’ve spent good time with him in meetings and so on. He’s a brilliant lawyer. He’s a very decent human being. I know he was very upset about Clinton’s attitude toward crime. We know during the Clinton administration we got the tightening of the mandatory sentences that’s had devastating effects on poor communities, especially disproportionately black and brown poor communities. And Eric took a strong stand in that regard. I appreciate that, because there’s a sense that we kind of whitewash the Clinton administration—welfare bill, crime, deregulation and so forth. We’ve got to be honest about some of the flaws during the age of Reagan and the Clinton moments during the age of Reagan. And Eric did take a stand.

On the other hand, of course, I’m sure I have some disagreements with him. But I am a little suspicious, in fact, highly suspicious, of the degree to which my dear Brother Barack Obama seems to be recycling all of these Clintonites. I’m looking for an age of everyday people, not a Clintonite recycling in this new period. And so, I’m a little bit suspicious of this, though I think Eric Holder is much better than many of the other Clintonites that’s being recycled.

AMY GOODMAN: Well, let me ask you about this comment of Mario Murillo, who’s a professor at Hofstra, talking about Eric Holder. You know, he worked as a partner at the D.C. law firm of Covington & Burling.

CORNEL WEST: Yeah.

AMY GOODMAN: His clients included Chiquita.

CORNEL WEST: Yes, I heard that.

AMY GOODMAN: Last week, we reached Mario in Colombia, and he talked about Holder’s representation of Chiquita.

MARIO MURILLO: There’s been talk about a close ally and friend of Obama as a potential Attorney General for the United States, Eric Holder, who is currently defending Chiquita Brands International in its defense against dozens of plaintiffs here in Colombia, working families who were targeted by paramilitaries who were funded to the tune of $1.7 million over the last several years. It’s a major scandal. And if this guy becomes the Attorney General under an Obama administration, then it’s going to be really hard to find justice in this case coming from the United States.

AMY GOODMAN: That was Mario Murillo in Colombia. Professor Cornel West?

CORNEL WEST: Yeah, no, again, this is one of the reasons why we love the work that you do, Sister Amy. This is the first that I’ve heard of this. I would want to hear from my dear Brother Eric and see what he has to say. Now, we know, of course, so many of these corporate firms, they defend all kind of different elites in various parts of the world, and we want to know the degree to which Eric Holder personally and politically and ideologically supports the kind of things going on, as opposed to the kind of role that one plays within a legal firm. Oftentimes, these firms take stances that are not in agreement with the individual lawyers themselves. You know that lawyers take a variety of different cases. It could be criminals and a whole host of others. Lawyers tend to go where they are told. But I would want to hear what Brother Eric Holder has to say about this. This is very interesting, actually.

Be careful what you wish for because you just might get it. Elders teach this saying to generations of children. My father taught me a story from his political activism to ingrain this concept into my mind. During Salvador Allende’s Popular Unity (UP) government in Chile, my dad told a fellow UP supporter that he would rather see a military government than the Christian Democrats in power. The older radical reminded my papa that he had never experienced a military dictatorship and may regret those words; and he did as a political prisoner and exile.

I fear Peter Frase’s piece “Should We Welcome the Republican Party’s Descent Into Insanity?” treads along the flawed logic of my sire in his youth. Frase is not wrong to hope for a creation of a new progressive political formation. We may be in trouble, however, if this new left-wing party is caused by an exodus of the liberal-left from the Democratic Party if moderate Republicans enter the party. The last thing we want is a major right-wing populist party to exist in the United States. Even if it regional at first, it could easily become a major national political force. I also believe that if the Republicans lost their moderates and libertarians, then their populist wing could morph into a bi-racial reactionary movement.

The foundation of my fears has two facets. The first are the dangers of right-wing populism and the Republican Party leaders who feed into it. The second fear is that the Left still solely associates the ultra-right in this country with racist white Americans and fascists. I don’t think the right-wing populism of the 21st century will fall into the old molds of segregationist Storm Thurmond and American Nazi George Lincoln Rockwell that the Left historically battled.

On the first point, the defeat of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin for GOP VP was just as important as the victory of Illinois Senator Barack Obama for president. Palin’s campaign rhetoric reached out to the worst elements of American jingoism, racism, and cultural conservatism. Her presence rallied a base that viewed the election of black man as unacceptable and who saw Obama as unpatriotic and dangerous for America. Georgian congressional representative and civil rights leader John Lewis should never have had to apologize for drawing a comparison to the anti-integrationist presidential candidate George Wallace and the McCain-Palin ticket. As one-time DSA member Rick Perlstein reminded his readers in the book Nixonland that Wallace staff had to deal with voters who were unsure of voting for Wallace because he wasn’t for shooting blacks. I try to remind my left-wing friends who are wary about a centrist Obama is that the candidate can be less important than the more radical elements they empower with a victory.

Secondly, I am worried that people underestimate the ability of the Right to change to meet new social and political conditions. There has been a lot of talk that the GOP is living in the past as a party for (or at least dominated by) white males. Moreover, progressives happily point to the coming demographic shifts that will make America less white and will favor the Democrats. These two facts ignore efforts in places such as the anti-immigrant movement to become multiracial (or at least comprised of both white and black Americans).

Nationalist politics always needs an “other.” In the U.S. politics that role has historically been filled by blacks, Jews, and immigrants (especially Catholics). One of the few good things about McCain was that his moderate mainstream stance on immigration reform pitted him against the more right-wing populist Republicans. But just because we did not see heavy anti-immigrant attacks during the Presidential campaign does not mean the fault lines are not real. In addition, groups like the vigilante border patrol groups such as the Minute Men have made outreaches to African-Americans. African-Americans and immigrants have long been social adversaries in the job market in capitalism’s race to the bottom. Exploiting racial divisions to divide the working-class to lower wages is a tried and true tactic of employers. Often, undocumented workers will labor for lower wages than citizens. This directly puts blacks at a disadvantage against both more privileged whites and desperate immigrants. Anti-immigrant feelings and a faltering economy could lead a good portion of the black community under a well-pitched right-wing populist fold.

My concern grew after taking a bus through Harlem in New York City. I saw a young African-American male praise an older black woman for the victories of the civil rights movement and then turn around to viciously attack two South Asian immigrants for not speaking English. His self-serving view of social justice increased my fear that some African-Americans might find a space in reinvented right-wing nationalism. Remember, quasi-fascist French presidential candidate Jean-Marie Le Pen called upon Frenchmen of all religions to battle “immigration” (a not-so-subtle code word for Muslims). This was seen as move to push French Jews – not your typical base for fascism – to feel safe in voting for Le Pen. Don’t think the American Right wont’ use similar rhetoric to win over African-Americans as well. Even Lincoln Rockwell made overtures to Malcolm X to have a discussion on racial separation.

The American Left should be very worried about and vigilant against growing right-wing populism. We must push for a progressive and smart dialogue which shows that “divide-and-conquer” tactics have not ended and are self-defeating for workers of all colors. I hope that the immigrant rights movement and liberal leaders of the black community can work to heal old wounds. But what we must not do is wish for the death of moderate Republicanism. The only time my maternal grandfather ever voted for a Republican was for pro-Civil Rights and pro-Medicare Kenneth Keating against Bobby Kennedy for U.S. Senate. When my mother asked why, my grandfather replied that we did not want to see the end of Nelson Rockefeller (i.e. liberal) Republicans.

Today, for all intents and purposes, liberal Republicans are no more. Their demise has not created a more progressive Democratic Party on economic issues. Thirty years later, do we really want moderate Republicans to become extinct? I doubt it, but only time will tell.

I suggest people read Bill Fletcher Jr.’s “Right-Wing Populism and the Economic Crisis” for more insight.

Kerry’s defeat reinforced the sense of dread that had been the defining aspect of my political life since Bush took office in 2001. At the time, we had already experienced the trauma of the 9/11 attacks and the invasion of Iraq. I could scarcely believe at the time that things could be any worse, but less than a year later New Orleans was drowned by a hurricane and Republican incompetence. And this year, the bottom finally dropped out on an economy characterized by unsustainable debt and financial chicanery.

But as the saying goes, I suppose it’s always darkest before the dawn. The election of Barack Obama potentially marks the beginning of a new political era, something that was inconceivable just four short years ago. All throughout the Democratic primaries and the general election fight, I had been somewhat cool toward Obama. After all, he’s not one of us. He is a relatively centrist Democrat who has already floated the possibility of appointing Clinton-era neoliberal technocrat Larry Summers to the position of Treasury secretary. He offers the prospect of a wider war in Afghanistan and possibly Pakistan, and he certainly does not have any intentions of beginning to dismantle the foundations of U.S. imperial power.

But as I saw on the line stretching around my polling station and the delirious celebrations raging on the streets of New York last night, something’s starting to happen here. Obama has generated hopes and raised expectations among massive portions of the population. Considering the fact that the Democrats have gained large majorities in Congress and in state legislatures around the country, they will probably be able to push through some reasonably progressive legislation to deal with the economic crisis and institute limited redistributive programs. But they will inevitably disappoint those throngs of people who are expecting more than what we will likely get. The energy that the Obama campaign generated isn’t going to disappear, and people will demand that the administration go even further. Because of the crisis, the country will be receptive to a progressive agenda that points in the direction of a sustainable and just future. This is a once in a generation opportunity, and we can’t squander it.

But for the next few days, I just want to enjoy the fact that the sense of dread that has hovered over me for the last eight years has dissipated. I want to savor the fact that for the first time in a long time, I feel good about my country. And I want the collective joy that gripped my city, our country, and the world yesterday to be transformed into a political force that cannot be stopped. Obama isn’t going to do that alone. In fact, we will find ourselves fighting numerous battles against him over the course of the next four years. We have to build the movements that will make that transformation ourselves. There’s no other way.

If this happens, what should the left think about it? By “the left”, I mean all of us who have a politics that is well to the left of the Democratic Party mainstream, even if we may pragmatically work for or with Democrats. Is it good or bad for our political project if the Republicans retreat into a hermetically sealed cocoon of right wing nuttery?

There’s a certain school of thought on the liberal left that sees this development as a bad thing. The general line of argument is that there will always be an opposition party, and the prospects for progressive policy are better if the opposition is made up of reasonable moderates rather than ideological extremists. And indeed, all things considered it would preferable not to have to do battle with a crypto-fascist mass movement made up of anti-intellectual religious fanatics, which seems to be the direction the GOP is going. And I will note in passing that one very real and scary consequence of this turn is going to be a revival of right-wing domestic terrorism, as we saw in the 1990’s.

But I nvertheless think that the pious liberal wish for a better and more responsible Republican Party is shortsighted. I take a broader view: the way American politics moves to the left is not by having the Republicans become more moderate, but by having the Republican party disintegrate entirely.

Let me elaborate. The desire for “good Republicans” rests on the premise that the existence of the current two-party setup is a permanent and unchangeable feature of American politics. And it’s true that given the way the American political system is set up, there’s a very strong bias toward having only two major parties. However, that doesn’t mean it has to be these two parties. Before the civil war, after all, the two parties were the Democrats and the Whigs. And what happened to the Whigs? Their party disintegrated after it became impossible to reconcile the ideological tensions between different factions. Out of that implosion came the modern Republican party. And the end of the Whigs also set the stage for the most momentous progressive advance in American history: the end of slavery.

Could the Republicans really go the way of the Whigs? For some speculation along those lines, see here. The idea that the Republican party could actually collapse is, admittedly, pretty far-fetched–but then, making socialist politics a plausible orientation is also pretty implausible, as we saw in the absurd waning days of the Presidential campaign.

My dream for the next few years of American politics goes something like this. First, the Republicans continue to Palinize themselves and commit to an increasingly absurd and unpopular right wing politics. This leads to further isolation and electoral losses, as Obama wins a second term and eventually commands a filibuster-proof supermajority in the Senate. Seeing that the GOP is doomed, the remaining moderates jump ship for the Democratic Party, leaving the Republicans as a shrunken rump, a Know-nothing party whose shrinking base is primarily among evangelical Christians and southern Whites.

This would produce a situation where the US was essentially a one-party democracy at the national level. Such an equilibrium is inherently unstable, however, and you would soon see major battles between the left, Bernie Sanders-Russ Feingold-Barbara Lee-etc. wing of the party and the pro-business “Blue Dog” right wing of the party. Which, in my dream, ultimately causes the Democratic party to split apart as well, leading to a new status quo in which the two parties are a social democratic “Progressive” party and a center right party of Blue Dogs and moderate conservatives. In this scenario, the far right that currently dominates the Republican Party would be relegated to something like the same status leftists have now: marginal to electoral politics, and forced to support a party that they find ideologically objectionable.

As I said, this is a far-fetched scenario. But I don’t think it’s impossible, and it seems to me that this is the only way to realize Michael Harrington’s old dream of left-wing “realignment” in the Democratic Party. So I would propose this as a vision of what we as leftists should be aiming for at the level of electoral politics, a vision of where we want to go in the medium- to long-term.

But I am not really a scholar of American Politics, so there are probably good reasons why this imagined future is totally impossible. I look forward to hearing those reasons in the comments.

Diana Buttu, Palestinian Canadian lawyer. She used to work with the Negotiations Support Unit of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, or PLO.

Rev. Edwin Makue, General Secretary of the South African Council of Churches.
—–

JUAN GONZALEZ: The United Nations refugee agency, which distributes food to half of Gaza’s 1.5 million people, has warned that it will run out of food in a day if Israel’s blockade of the Gaza Strip does not stop. It called the blockade “a physical as well as a mental punishment.”

Israel is now allowing limited amounts of fuel after Gaza’s sole power plant came to a halt Monday, plunging the area into darkness. But Israel is still blocking food deliveries, and aid agencies estimate the new supply of fuel will run out within a day and a half.

An Egyptian-brokered ceasefire that began in June has been disrupted following the imposition of the blockade, and Israel’s foreign ministry has accused Hamas of exploiting the situation for political gain. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said Tuesday that a violent confrontation with Hamas was inevitable.

PRIME MINISTER EHUD OLMERT: [translated] We’re in no hurry, but we know very well that the moment of confrontation will eventually come. The question is not whether there will be a confrontation, but when it will take place, under what circumstances, and who will control these circumstances, who will dictate them, and who will know to exploit the time from the beginning of the ceasefire until the moment of confrontation in the best possible way.

AMY GOODMAN: The Bush administration has strongly backed Israel’s stranglehold on Gaza. It’s unclear whether the policy will change under an Obama White House. Obama’s first major appointment was to select Congress member Rahm Emanuel as his chief of staff. On foreign policy, Emanuel is thought to represent the right wing of the Democratic Party, vocally backed Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza and its 2006 attack on Lebanon.

Emanuel’s father, Benjamin Emanuel, was a member of the Irgun, a right-wing group that carried out attacks on Palestinians in the years leading up to Israel’s establishment as a state in 1948. [Benjamin Emanuel] recently made some controversial comments on his son’s appointment. In an interview with an Israeli newspaper last week, Rahm Emanuel’s father said, “Obviously he will influence the president to be pro-Israel. Why wouldn’t he be? What is he, an Arab? He’s not going to clean the floors of the White House.”

We’re joined now in our firehouse studio by two internationally recognized human rights advocates. Diana Buttu is a Palestinian Canadian lawyer. She used to work with the Negotiations Support Unit of the Palestine Liberation Organization, or PLO. Reverend Edwin “Eddie” Makue is General Secretary of the South African Council of Churches, involved in the anti-apartheid struggle in South Africa from 1982. In 2005, he traveled to the Palestinian territories to monitor the elections. They are both on an anti-apartheid speaking tour across this country for the next two weeks.

We welcome you both to Democracy Now! Diana Buttu, I wanted to start with you on Rahm Emanuel’s father’s comment, its significance.

DIANA BUTTU: It is. It’s a very significant comment, not just because it’s coming from his father, but the fact that Rahm Emanuel himself has not backed down from this comment. He hasn’t made any statements separating himself or distancing himself from his father’s comments. And his voting record in the past in Congress leaves a great number of Palestinians and people who are concerned about Israel’s occupation of Palestine—leaves a number of us concerned.

JUAN GONZALEZ: And the situation right now in Gaza, this latest crisis, what triggered it, and what are the prospects for being able to end it?

DIANA BUTTU: Well, very interestingly enough, last week, as people here were celebrating the election victory of Barack Obama, Israel used that opportunity to go into the Gaza Strip and kill six Palestinians and kidnap another six Palestinians. And since that time, the Egyptian-brokered ceasefire has actually come to a halt.

I think that we’re going to continue to see much more violence, primarily because of the fact that Israel is now leading up to an election. And as has been the case with every election in Israeli history, each candidate tries to use his or her strength to demonstrate just how strong they are and how much they’re going to fight the Palestinians, rather than demonstrate how much they’re going to try to bring peace to the region.

AMY GOODMAN: Now, what about Ehud Olmert, who is about to step down, but is still the prime minister, saying you’ve got to give up the land, which is remarkable, given what his position has been as prime minister? What’s the significance of this?

DIANA BUTTU: I think it’s very interesting that all of these politicians are now coming forward and saying this. You know, twenty years ago, Amy, you wouldn’t have been able to find an Israeli politician who would say that they have to get out of the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. Today, the numbers are increasing.

The question then becomes, how are they going to withdraw? Are they going to withdraw and have equality for the Palestinians being in the form of an equal state? Or is it going to be equal rights? I haven’t heard any of these politicians come forward and mention the idea of equality.

That said, I think that Olmert’s comments are very telling, but I think that any prime minister who’s going to come into power after Prime Minister Olmert is going to face the same problem, which is, the Israeli political system is driven in such a way that it ends up rewarding right-wing extremist parties. That’s the way they form coalitions. And these right-wing extremist parties end up getting a lot of money from the government in order to fund and continue to build settlements. If they don’t get the money, the coalition will break. And as been the case over the course of the past few decades, the only way that governments fall in Israel is either a corruption scandal or a failure to pass the budget. So all of these politicians know very well that the way to move forward is to keep the—to placate the right, and I fear that they’re going to continue to do so.

AMY GOODMAN: Do you see change with the Obama administration?

DIANA BUTTU: It really depends on who he’s going to put in into the administration, and I’m a little bit worried that we’re going to see the same faces that we saw under the Clinton era: Dennis Ross, Martin Indyk, so on and so forth.

AMY GOODMAN: Martin Indyk, former US ambassador to Israel.

DIANA BUTTU: Precisely. I’m concerned that there are going to be people who were formally affiliated with the pro-Israel lobby that are going to be put into place to work on the Obama administration. More importantly, I’m concerned that this is going to be item number twenty on Obama’s agenda, and because it’s so far down on the agenda, that I don’t think that we’re going to see any change anytime soon. That’s what I’m afraid of.

JUAN GONZALEZ: And the question of the relationship with Hamas? Obviously, during the Bush administration the attitude was no dealing whatsoever with those who were elected by the people. Your sense whether this will change at all?

DIANA BUTTU: I don’t think it will change, although it should change. There is a very interesting article that came out in Haaretz, which is an Israeli paper, just two days ago. The person interviewing members of Hamas is an Israeli journalist named Amira Hass. And in the interview, Hamas came out very clearly and said that what they want to see is they want to see a two-state solution. So there is no longer the pretext there for not talking to Hamas. But, unfortunately, we continue to put our head in the sand.

AMY GOODMAN: So, Reverend Eddie Makue, how did you end up going to the Palestinian territories, to the Occupied Territories, from South Africa?

REV. EDWIN MAKUE: The leading or the majority political party in South Africa at the moment is the African National Congress, and they are also the party in government. They have had an historic relationship with the Palestinian Liberation Organization. And when Yasser Arafat passed on, there was the need to have the elections there, and the South African government felt that it’s going to be important that we also look at bringing in civil society organizations in the observation of that election process, because we know that very often election results are disputed. And it is against that background, but very importantly also that we, in terms of our faith, have an historic relationship with that particular region of the world, looking at it as the holy land. And we are very disturbed at the fact that while there’s all this talk in the world about peace, we find that we in the faith communities will preach peace, very often experiencing great difficulty in actually realizing peace for people in that important region.

JUAN GONZALEZ: And in South Africa itself, you’ve been undergoing a political crisis in recent months. There was the decision of President Mbeki to resign. And your council has raised questions as to how the ANC is handling this issue of the presidency. Can you talk about that?

REV. EDWIN MAKUE: We already started expressing our concerns towards the buildup of the ANC’s conference that happened at the end of December last year in Polokwane, where we noticed that there was a lot of name-calling, what we in theological terms prefer to call the politics of disgrace. And we are mindful that it is important that we continue to nurture a democratic culture and that we allow people to establish political parties, political formations, as they wish.

And therefore, the recalling of President Mbeki a month or so ago was something that we observed with concern, particularly in light of the fact that there is a national election that should be held around about April, May of next year. But as the faith communities and as the Council of Churches in the country, in particular, we have been engaging with various political leaders in South Africa, making sure that we do not go back to where we were in the period building up to the first democratic elections in 1994, where our country was plagued by a lot of violence and intolerance.

AMY GOODMAN: And one of the great South African anti-apartheid ambassadors, you could say, cultural ambassadors, was Miriam Makeba, died a few days ago. Her significance?

REV. EDWIN MAKUE: We are pained when we look at how we as a nation are losing people that have played a very meaningful role in the international campaign to focus attention on apartheid, as it has been experienced in South Africa at that time. And Miriam Makeba selflessly used her skills as an artist to promote the cause for justice in South Africa. And I’m sure if she could hear us now, her spirit continues to identify also with the struggle against the apartheid that we’re experiencing in Palestine.

JUAN GONZALEZ: And in the situation in Zimbabwe, your government has been very instrumental in trying to reach some kind of an accord there. Your sense of how that is going to work out in the next few months?

REV. EDWIN MAKUE: We have always expressed very grave concern at the notion of silence diplomacy, as being practiced by our former president Thabo Mbeki. We are very worried about the levels of violence and suffering and the hunger and poverty that’s escalating in Zimbabwe at the moment. And we feel that it is imperative that an urgent solution be found for the crisis in Zimbabwe, and we continue to urge the political leadership in SADC and also in the African Union to do something meaningful to bring that particular crisis to an end and are saying to the political leadership in Zimbabwe, forget about the politicking and look at the interest of the people of the land.

AMY GOODMAN: We only have a few seconds left. But, Diana Buttu, where are you going on this “Separate Is Never Equal” tour?

DIANA BUTTU: We’re going to eleven cities. We were already in Washington, D.C. and in New York. We’re going to be going tomorrow to Dearborn and then Milwaukee, onto Chicago, Denver, Los Angeles, Louisville, Atlanta. We’ll be at the School of the Americas Watch vigil on November 22nd and ending up in Sterling, Virginia.

AMY GOODMAN: I want to thank you both for being with us, Diana Buttu, Palestinian Canadian lawyer, used to work with the PLO, the Palestine Liberation Organization; and Reverend Edwin Makue, general secretary of the South African Council of Churches.

THE MOST common view of history is that it’s created by the personalities of a handful of important figures. So world events can be explained by the fact that Churchill was strong, or Henry VIII wanted a divorce, or Napoleon had a complex about being short; as if an era of revolution and war was a result of him stretching in his kitchen, grumbling: “I can’t reach the top shelf. I know, I’ll invade Italy, that’ll sort that out.”

Or that the English Civil War happened because Charles I was weak, and Parliament would have been put in its rightful place if only he’d called on Supernanny, who would quickly have taught him to set Oliver Cromwell firm boundaries, and issue punishments he was prepared to follow through on, such as sitting the New Model Army on the naughty step.
One of the flaws in this approach is that it can’t explain how the same leaders can appear strong, but then suddenly seem pathetically weak.

For example, four years ago, the commanders of the Project for the New American Century seemed invincible. They’d had their invasion of Iraq and won a second election, and it felt as if Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld were sat on a settee flicking through travel brochures, trying to decide where to obliterate next, with Wolfowitz peering over Bush’s shoulder to say: “Iran looks nice,” while Richard Perle would add: “Then, if all goes well we can have an extra short-break family weekend bombing Syria.”
Now, they’re all discredited and disgraced, to the extent that the next time we see Donald Rumsfeld, he’ll probably be making his comeback on Celebrity Big Brother playing blind man’s buff with Kerry Katona. George Bush will be presenting a late night phone-in quiz show on ITV, and Dick Cheney will commit suicide after discovering no one picked him out as the ex-vice president in the line-up on Never Mind the Buzzcocks.

But this transformation, culminating in the election of a president who made a virtue out of not supporting the war, can’t just be due to a sudden collapse in self-esteem among the warmongers. Maybe it’s a result of an entirely different atmosphere, created by millions of tiny invaluable actions by countless people.
From mass marches to letters in local papers, poetry nights against the war to statements from soldiers and their relatives, a feeling has been created globally that means anyone associated with the war in Iraq has been damaged beyond repair.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
BUT FOR those who are old enough to remember the civil rights movement, Barack Obama’s election must be even more extraordinary. Malcolm X wrote that one of the moments that shaped him was when he told his teacher he wanted to be a lawyer, and was told he was being ridiculous because “no nigger can become a lawyer.” If he was still around, he’d probably regret not saying: “Alright then, I’ll have to take my second choice and become president.”
Just as it seemed at times that the antiwar protests were having no effect, there must have been times in the 1960s when to imagine there would ever be an end to segregation seemed hopelessly utopian. But it happened, not just because of a strong or charismatic leader, but because millions of people, with tiny and apparently futile actions, defied that logic.
Maybe that’s why, in a reversal of most American elections, the poorer and blacker that people were, the more enthusiasm they crackled with as they queued to vote. Those who see history as conducted by a handful of the powerful are obsessed now with the actions of Obama himself. But just as important is the excitement and vigor created by the millions who now believe, at least a little bit, that their actions can change the world.

For the final battle in the American Civil War, Abraham Lincoln insisted the slave-dealing town of Charleston, S.C., was occupied by a Black regiment. In Richmond, Va., Lincoln marched alongside the Black soldiers, and it was reported that a freed slave knelt before him to give his thanks, to which Lincoln replied: “No. You must stand up. Your days of kneeling are over.”

Similarly, it’s the actions of those who are usually denied a place in history that have made this week possible, and they should recognize their potential, whatever sort of president Obama turns out to be.

First published in the Independent.

The count has been called and Barack Hussein Obama, Jr. has become the 44th President of the United States of America.

But, in truth, history will record him as #1 - the first African-American president.

It is undeniable that this is a singular political achievement, a work of impressive political skill, and (we must admit) a gift of the political gods.

Among friends, in the privacy of a prison visiting room I’ve often made the following half-joke. Obama wins handsomely, and in his acceptance speech, flush with victory, loaded with ‘political capital’, he would open by saying, “My fellow Americans — first and foremost, I want to thank the one person who made my election possible (if not inevitable): George W. Bush!”

I always got a laugh, for like all good jokes the truth makes it happen.

And the truth is, without the blunders of Bush, Obama would’ve been an also-ran. His fundamental issue, which set him apart from the rest of the Democratic pack, was his early opposition to the Iraq War. That gave him a wind that carried him far and long beyond his competitors, who were, for the most part, half-hearted war supporters — or worse, people who supported the war only because to not do so, would’ve harmed their political careers (or so they thought).

That wind carried him to the Oval Office, the grandest prize in U.S. politics.

But what does it mean?

We cannot deny its symbolic value. In millions of Black homes, his picture will be placed on walls, beside Martin, John F. Kennedy, and a pale painting of Jesus. I’d bet that quite a few African homes (especially in Kenya) will also boast his smiling visage.

But beyond symbol is substance, and substantively, some scholars have defined Obama as little different from his predecessors. Political scientist Clarence Lusane, writing in a recent issue of The Black Scholar pointed to the money men behind both Obama and the Democratic Party, and noted the following:

The promotion of U.S. hegemony, expansion of markets for U.S. corporations, security-based multilateral relations, protectionist trade policies, and a focus on terrorism will likely be key
priorities demanded by the major political and financial backers of the Democratic Party. In other words, in a number of key areas, an Obama administration would echo the policies of both George H.W. Bush and Bill Clinton.

Yet, symbols are powerful things. Sometimes, they have a life all their own. They may come to mean something more than first intended.

History has been made.

We shall see exactly what kind of history it will be.