Introduction
Greetings USED KARMA readers - and those of you who access this column through John Derrickson's PsyPlan(tm) site (www.psyplan.com)! The new moon in Cancer is an excellent time to focus on family and domestic issues. On a mundane level, new moon in Cancer is a good time to evaluate our nation's external persona, the Cancerian chart derived from the July 4, 1776 signing of the Declaration of Independence. [NOTE: Our nation's true Sun sign is Scorpio, which explains much of the devious behavior carried out by our leaders in the people's name. USED KARMA publisher Tony Dickey has written extensively on this subject.]
Election Hype
Although the next US presidential election is nearly a year and a half away, and despite the fact that polls show that two-thirds of the American people are not interested in all the hype about it at this juncture, the media continues to bombard us with images of the favored candidates, almost to the complete exclusion of everyone else. The New World Order/multinational corporation-controlled major media are behaving as if it is a foregone conclusion that Al Gore will nail the Democratic primary nomination and George W. Bush, the candidate who hedges on every issue (except for his 1994 proclamation that only people who have accepted Jesus as their personal savior can get into heaven), will win the Republican nomination.
Not only are there other candidates in both races (Elizabeth Dole, Lamar Alexander, John McCain, Pat Buchanan and a few others getting passing mention on the Republican front, while Bill Bradley gets an occasional mainstream media photo opportunity), but a year and a half is a long time in US electoral politics. There are many unpalatable truths about all candidates (with the possible exception of Bill Bradley who, although he may have cast some senatorial votes that progressives disagree with, appears for all intents and purposes to be a true "Mr. Clean") that have yet to emerge in the major media (although the alternative press digs them up all the time).
Let's look at some specifics. Elizabeth Dole has spent her entire professional career pandering to the extreme right. Although she is a woman, no one could be farther away from meaningful positions for the advancement of women. Liddy (she hates that name, which is why the press is so fond of using it) cringes at the mere mention of the word "feminist." She was extremely vocal in her opposition to the Equal Rights Amendment back in the 70s, and maintains a firm anti-abortion stance.
In her defense, Elizabeth Dole showed courage in going to New Hampshire in June and taking on the National Rifle Association on gun control. However, one is left to wonder whether this stance emanated from heartfelt conviction or from political opportunism in the wake of the Littleton massacre. It does not exactly strain credulity to think that the only reason Elizabeth Dole is standing up to the NRA is because public opinion has recently swung very heavily in favor of gun control.
Then there is Al Gore. Although he has spent most of his life inside the Beltway, where he was raised by his Senator father in exclusive hotels and attended even more exclusive schools, Al has been running around the country telling people he knows how to shovel hog shit and plant crops. Oh sure, Al's a real farm boy. Does he really think Americans are stupid enough to buy this line? He's also sucking up to the Christian right by going on and on about how he is a Christian, and how he lives by Christian values.
Let's deconstruct that idea. Wasn't it Al Gore who, in the aftermath of the Columbine High School shootings in Littleton, got on television to express his shock and horror that children have access to the same kinds of video games that the marines use to train for combat. In that charade, Gore said it was all right for the military to use those videos because killing people is "their job." Well if Al Gore is so Christian, how come he missed reading one of the Ten Commandments - "Thou shalt not kill" (which actually should be translated as "Thou shalt not murder" - an obvious injunction against the intentional taking of a life.) How can a supposedly educated and intelligent person such as Al Gore not see that the only way to stop youth violence is to stop adult violence? If acting out killing is not okay for children, it's not okay for adults either, because when adults do so they are implying that this kind of behavior is acceptable for children to model.
Not only did the Christ spirit through the prophet Jesus emphasize reading the Old Testament and observing traditional Jewish teachings (including Jewish mysticism), of which the Ten Commandments are merely a part, but most of the Christ spirit's work was to explain the laws of karma, emphasizing unconditional love and acceptance for all of God's creation, including one's fellow humans and all beings in nature. This is the true meaning of Christianity. The unfortunate reality is that these truths are often all but totally lost on those branding themselves "Christians," - the people Al Gore is trying too hard to suck up to. Yes these so-called Christians, who so vehemently hate and preach hatred against homosexuals, who claim that God's arms are open only to them and that only those who have accepted Jesus as their personal savior are going to heaven (think George W. Bush), are in fact manifestations of the anti-Christ. Just as the Christ spirit is a state of consciousness, so is the anti-Christ a state of consciousness.
How is this anti-Christ working through Al Gore? Having taken large campaign contributions from the nations major drug companies, Al has been campaigning vigorously against compulsory licensing of anti-AIDS drugs outside of the US. Compulsory licensing is a legal way of allowing prescription drugs to be manufactured generically outside of the US and sold at much lower prices. While the US drug manufacturers (who are already extremely wealthy) suffer somewhat reduced profits, millions of people dying of AIDS in Africa and around the globe would have their lives either saved or greatly ameliorated by this practice.
Right now the fight over compulsory licensing is taking place in South Africa, where millions of people are either infected with HIV or are suffering with full-blown AIDS. Yet Al Gore, "good Christian" that he is, is rabidly defending the rights of US pharmaceutical companies to make outrageous profits while millions of South Africans, most of whom are black, are dying because they are unable, in a country where the average per capital income is $2,600, to afford a course of medicine that begins at $1,000. Is it Christian or Anti-Christian to take this position? You decide.
And let's not forget about George W. Bush, the multi-millionaire whose lifetime of material resources and family connections have caused him to prosper outrageously, yet he openly proclaims himself to be a self-made man. The fact that he may actually believe this fantasy is truly frightening. George has, of late, been trumpeting himself as the standard-bearer of "compassionate conservatism." What exactly does that mean? Could it be a recognition that conservatives are mean-spirited and wholly lacking in compassion? Could it be that by applying this label to himself he is telling us that he wants to be as mean-spirited and callous as other conservatives, yet pretend he's not one of them so that nice people who care about their fellow humans will be stupid enough to vote for him?
Let's see if we can find evidence of this "compassionate conservatism" in Baby George's behavior. Currently the state of Texas ranks somewhere near Afghanistan and Iraq as far as criminal defendants' rights. Although the US Constitution's Bill of Rights guarantees all criminal defendants the right to counsel (as set forth in the Sixth Amendment) even if they are indigent, Texas seems not to have understood the concept. Judges in Texas are elected, and assignment of lawyers to indigent defendants occurs on a patronage system. Since the vast majority of Texas judges are racist, white judges elected by non-compassionate Texas conservatives, there is a tremendous tendency for judges to want to incarcerate poor, minority criminal defendants, regardless of their actual guilt or innocence.
In most states, indigent defendants have a right to see counsel within 72 hours. In Texas, defendants have been locked up for as long as four years awaiting trial, and only met their attorneys at jury selection. Can you imagine being locked up for four years and only getting to meet your lawyer at jury selection? Can you imagine being innocent of any crime and being in this situation? Clearly this violates the Eighth Amendment's ban on cruel and unusual punishment, but Texas seems not to have heard of the Eighth Amendment either.
The Texas legislature has recently introduced legislation that will make extremely minor improvements to indigent criminal defendants' counsel rights. For example, the Texas legislation provides that indigent persons accused of a crime have a right to see counsel within twenty days - TWENTY DAYS - of their incarceration. This looks pretty terrible next to 72 hours, doesn't it?
One would think that a "compassionate conservative" would have no problem signing this legislation, right? Well, no actually. George W. Bush, who generally takes no position on any issue he is questioned about, has stated publicly that he intends to veto the Texas legislature designed to minimally rehabilitate the Texas laws regarding the fundamental constitutional rights of poor criminal defendants. I see the conservatism just fine (hatred against poor folks and minorities), but I am straining my perceptive faculties to find the compassion. Perhaps that's because George W. has no compassion - it's just a word he's using in his campaign rhetoric because he thinks it will attract money and votes. Frankly I think the average American is much too intelligent to fall for this, but I've been wrong before about the intelligence of the average American.
In closing, it is disturbing that George W., upset by a parody web site, publicly proclaimed "There should be limits to freedom." Does this country really want a president who not only can't take a joke, but is willing to resort to fascism to make sure no one else can? Perhaps that's why Baby George has been so chummy with New York City Mayor Rudolph Guiliani lately. The pundits have been speculating that George wants Rudy for Attorney General in a Baby Shrub administration. This would be too perfect, wouldn't it? After all, Rudy G. is already an expert fascist. This is the mayor who has had artist/activist/street vendor Robert Lederman arrested 37 times for saying unflattering but true things about the mayor, and painting posters of Guiliani as Adolph Hitler. (Robert gave me one, which I treasure greatly and visitors to my home admire with heartfelt appreciation.) This is the mayor who, in enacting savage and sociopathic workfare requirements for all New York City welfare recipients proudly proclaimed that "Work shall make you free." Did he somehow forget that these words were carved over the doors at Auschewitz???
By the way, Cathy O'Brien in her chilling exposé of US Government mind control practices Trance: Formation of America, claims that George Herbert Bush is a brutal and savage heroin-addicted pedophile, and that George W. Bush shares his look-alike father's sadistic sexual tastes and perversions. We already know that Rudy G. likes to dress in women's clothes and persecute gay people. Keep picturing the two of them in jackboots and be sure to keep yourself informed of unfolding political developments.
Copyright 1999 Marcy J. Gordon. All rights reserved. The author wants you to know you are free to copy and distribute this article for noncommercial purposes, provided you reproduce it in its entirety and credit the author. For quotation permission, please contact the author at mgordon@pipeline.com.
This article represents the author's personal views and in no way shape or form reflects upon the author's employer, although the author's employer is very cool. See http://www.ericmarder.com.
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