Many of you are politically
engaged people who are
deeply concerned about
the direction that history
is taking in our time. One would
have imagined that in 2004 we would
have had fewer wars, less obscurantism
ruining the human mind, less prejudice
and less hatred. Precisely the opposite
is true. Everywhere
we care to look we find enormous examples of moral backwardness and institutionalized
injustice in power, or simply rampant irrationality among the masses. Conservatives,
as usual, will gloat on this, since it confirms their low opinion of “human
nature,” and especially its putative immutability, to which they have contributed
so much.
This is not the place to try your patience with a long tirade on what’s
really wrong (and why) in the US. But let me sum up one possible one-size-fits-all
diagnosis for the problem: American society is suffering from the gradual but
real death of its democracy.
Never mind that this country was never as perfect a democracy as our self-inflicted
propaganda and mythologies would have us believe. Democracy is an ideal that
requires a constant journey, increasing participation, and is therefore never
truly fulfilled 100 percent. Still, what we see today is more than just alarming,
it is obscene. This country is rapidly becoming what its underlying economic
logic compels it to be: a callous, global plutocracy wrapped in democratic symbols
to attain its unpopular goals.
In this context, periodical elections—flawed by design—mean very
little as the choices are controlled from above. Edward Herman, author
of a volume on the fraudulent elections conducted in Third World countries only
to impress the American people back home with “the evolution of these US
client states toward democracy,” calls them “demonstration elections.” They
have only one goal: to “demonstrate” to the American taxpayers that
our millions invested in propping up these criminal oligarchies are actually
well spent. The US media, of course, can then be relied on to carry the story
back to the unsuspecting US publics without much contextual criticism or verification.
A similar imposture is and has been taking place for some time right under our
noses. In a nation that, alone among major powers, and practically throughout
its history, has had no major party representing even nominally the interests
of workers, and I mean by that those who must work for a living, it is
not surprising that this should be happening. Now, however, in the age of Reagan,
Clinton, Bush, and who knows who else later, the situation has become critical:
the fact that American elections are grotesquely costly, highly managed events,
offering little substantive in the manner of true choices, is no longer just
a scandal we can humor by retreating to our gardens, a la Voltaire, it is a growing
cancer in our midst menacing our very freedoms and prospects as citizens with
an elementary right to peace, a stable livelihood, and effective representation,
the core of our social compact.
All of the above are rapidly being eviscerated by
the Right, which has no use for real democracy anywhere, let alone an expansion of
democracy. The
Right believes in just one thing: privilege. The privilege of self-perpetuating
elites, elites born out of brute power, chicanery and luck, not the consent of
the masses. Hypocritical posturings aside, the Right’s core value and ultimate
goal is not a democracy of equals but a huge pecking order, a hierarchy of different
powers with eternal, murderous jockeying for position, a hellish social Darwinist
order closer to that of animals in the jungle than a true civilization.
If things continue deteriorating like this, if the Right is not challenged, defeated
and stopped, hopefully in a decisive way, we will all witness a rapid descent
into corporate feudalism. I hate to tell you this, but there’s hardly
any hyperbole in this. That is precisely the term for the kind of society
we’ll all end up inhabiting. Unless we act. Unless we move decisively while
we can to gain control of this nation.
I don’t think I have to draw you a picture of how ugly it will get if the
US, with all its power, continues down the road controlled by a combination of
cynical wealth addicts—what else are we to call these new corporate royalists
for whom no fortune is large enough--and millions upon millions of religiously-inspired
cretins, super-patriots, and an assortment of deeply misguided people who regard
Bush and the establishment he represents as the “better choice.”
The problem of the media
In this situation, the real Left urgently needs to communicate
its ideas, its visions to our fellow citizens. We need to “deprogram” and
re-educate millions and millions to form a broad coalition, a broad populist
front capable of dislodging the current usurpers, because, make no mistake about
it friends, that’s exactly what these cynical elites are all about: usurpation
of power. Our power. And
there’s nothing nice about usurpation because usurpation is theft.
But no movement for the liberation and reconstruction of American democracy is
likely to succeed until we break free from the
mental stranglehold of the mainstream media. For the system is all of a piece,
and it follows its DNA blueprint into each and every single organ, and the media
is a very important organ indeed, essential to the system’s first-line
of defense and survival. That’s why just like we have a highly deficient,
largely phony democracy, so it is with the American media—these self-appointed
gatekeepers of what is and isn't "acceptable" to transmit to the American
people. Thus the main obstacle on the road to authentic American democracy
today is the media as presently constituted, as presently controlled, by plutocracies
with not an ounce of interest in advancing a truly democratic agenda.
The recent election and events since 9/11 provide a good object lesson.
You saw what they did to Howard Dean; what they did to Dennis Kucinich; what
they have done, all along, to Ralph Nader--in short to anyone who was even slightly
to the left of the sacred “respectable
center.” And
you saw how they turned Ronald Reagan, demonstrably one of the most contemptible
and criminal politicians in decades, into practically a saint. What’s
more, when the drums of war started beating for the assault on Iraq, the media
fell almost in unison to its preferred position: on its knees to power. Is
that the position for an independent information system in charge of guiding
the most powerful nation on earth?
The center won’t hold
Some continue to pin their hopes on a resurrected “liberalism” and
on a "reformed" Democratic Party. They continue to be mesmerized by the stuff
that folks like Clinton, Mondale, Lieberman, Gore, and before them LBJ, JFK,
Humphrey and the rest of the lot have been mouthing for decades. Well,
guess what, the “respectable
center” is
useless to stop the crypto-fascist horde currently on the move. The
Right is in the saddle: they got the foot soldiers (courtesy of the Christian
fundamentalist legions); they got the money; and they got a terrific steering
mechanism: the cynical GOP, a party which, considering its poisonous agenda,
in a better educated and more enlightened society should long ago been relegated
to the dustbin of history. Liberals
and "polite moderates” are
no match for these maniacs. Just like it happened in every country where
this political picture arose, they’ll be smashed, if--a big if--they choose
to stand up and be counted, which I bet they won’t.
Our only defense at this point is serious political work, as if our lives
depended on it, because in many ways they do. The chickens are finally coming
home to roost. Can you imagine the kind of hysteria that might grip this
country if bin Laden pulls off another 9/11, several 9/11s? If
the Constitution is already under siege, can anyone guarantee the Bill of Rights
under those circumstances? Can anyone foresee what the corporate foreign policy
will be, given the jingoist furor likely to ensue? Bin Laden and his zealots,
indirectly created by corporate foreign policy over the years, have
given the cynical American plutocrats a terrific gift, another lease on life,
and a hundred Reichtag fires' worth of political capital.
Unless we are prepared to move to New Zealand, or Canada, or God knows where,
abandoning America (and our world as we know it) we must get disciplined about
political work, and that means to learn to work more in groups and in larger
associations, and to seek political action well outside and beyond the ballot
box. It also means to visualize and create a whole new host of political structures.
For starters. we need a true populist program to reignite the masses’ imagination
and create a broad front
capable of challenging the power of the newly entrenched unholy alliance dominating
America, that of accumulated wealth and recalcitrant ignorance.
But before we can attain any of this in a significant manner we need to take
care of the media. In fact we may need to "walk on both legs at the same
time" advancing our political agerndas while we work tirelessly to reform and
bypass the mainstream media.
Where you come in
Cyrano is working to accelerate MEDIA REFORM and to CREATE new alternative
channels of mass information—both “conventional” --i.e., radio,
TV, etc.) and informal (audiotapes, e-magazines, cd-roms, and "viral" networks
over the Internet, anchored in specific websites such as cjonline.org).
We aim to accomplish the following vital tasks:
(A) Continue to document, analyze, AND mobilize against the outrageous performance
of the American corporate media;
(B) Set up forums and other political spaces to discuss and advance new models
of mass communication, and to explore implementation of same;
(C) Organize at the state and federal levels citizens’ task forces to contest
broadcast media licenses and make clear to the FCC that they can’t go on
giving the public’s right to be informed and responsibly entertained to
corporate franchisees who only look out for the bottom line and continue to degrade
the quality of mass communications.
(D)
Start drawing and collating
legislative proposals to revolutionize
the way mass communications
is generated and practiced
in this society, especially
by commercial entities;
(E) Cyrano Online is setting
up a special section devoted
entirely end exclusively
to questions of mass propaganda.
Our aim is to start fighting
back against the onslaught
of right-wing propaganda
and viewpoints, disseminated
24/7 and almost without challenge
through most of AM radio
(1900 stations+), most of
cable TV channels, and, due
to the intimidation from
the right (the hyprocritical cry
of “liberal
media”) even through the TV broadcast networks and PBS, which continues
to add right wing voices to its lineup while curtailing or eliminating liberal
or left voices.
(F) Initiate special citizens’ campaigns targeting diverse subjects,
from immediate political and informational objectives like, why
are jobs vanishing in every sector of the economy, to broader
goals, such as the preservation of the world’s Boreal Forests, the
last pristine forest band in existence, currently under assault by loggers...(most
of these trees are to end up as glossy catalogs, which, as we all know, are
probably the most obscenely inefficient method of commercial communication
around).
We need your help in the following ways:
Send
this message (rewrite
it to your own style
if you like) to at
least 3 friends in your email
list. If more, so
much the better. Ask
them to do the same.
If they do, even with
the basic multiple
of only 2, a huge number
of people will be reached. The
Right has been trying
this for some time
with terrific success.
And we all know what
happened on Nov. 2.
The idea here is to
create a VIRAL NETWORK
to plug into our education,
information and mobilization
needs, a network that,
united to similar fraternal
networks, plus oter
resources we may develop,
will be able to reach
many Americans in a
matters of hours or
days in spite of any
blockages or disinformation
put up by the system.
Consider
a donation, no matter
how small to Cyranos
Journal. Cyrano
is totally independent;
there are no rich,
shady tycoons
footing our bills,
as is the case with
the legions of smug
apologists and insidious
think tanks for the
Right. On our splash
page you’ll
find a new PayPal
button that is easy
and totally safe
to use for this purpose.
(http://www.cjonline.org)
This will allow us
to do more, and to
expand our panoply
of tools to advance
our message.
Sign
up on our volunteer
page and tell us
what skills you think
you can contribute
to these struggles. We
need all sorts of people:
professional communicators,
art directors, webmasters,
field organizers, you
name it.
Tell
you friends to visit
Cyrano's website, to read
and disseminate further
the basic materials
concerning the
current crisis,
and, in particular,
how false social
consciousness is
manufactured and
distributed around
the clock by the
system’s
defenders. The
Cyrano website is at < http://www.cjonline.org >
Lastly,
ask your friends to
send one message back
to us—any
message--at< cyranoeditor@optonline.net > We
need to have some rough way of
gauging our progress.
THE MOMENT TO ACT IS NOW.
Historically speaking,
this is the only remaining
civilized window of opportunity
we’ll get before things get really nasty.
After Nazism a generation ago, the Right has put
humanity in another big pickle. If allowed to do
as it pleases things will get worse and worse,
with endless wars all over the place, including
major conflicts looming on the horizon with re-emerging
powers such as China or Russia, and more social
toxicity, decadence and criminality at home, all
fed by a deepening spiral of job insecurity, longer
hours, the spreading mental rot of religiosity,
and eventually simply massive unemployment. It’s
not a pretty future. But
it’s a future that can be avoided if we take this country back from the
edge of the abyss. We are
the true patriots, not them. The better, higher,
more civilized ideals represented by the American flag are upheld by us, not
them. It’s high time we stopped yielding these powerful symbols
to the enemy. It’s time to get to work.
"We’ll see you on the beach!"
PATRICE GREANVILLE
Director, www.CJONLINE.ORG
PS/ Those of you who don’t mind reading political materials like these—and
I apologize for the length of this note—will enjoy Joe Bageant’s
newest column ( DINING WITH THE RHINOS, http://www.cjonline.org/bageantRhinoceros.htm )
an article that coming from someone who lives deeply in Bushland, is extremely
pertinent to the current discussion.
