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NEWS & LETTERS, February-March 2006LeadFrom Iraq war to New Orleans, Bush agenda spawns crisesby Olga Domanski The growing opposition that George W. Bush is facing has created a new climate in the country. It appears even in the ranks of Congress, on everything from his war in Iraq to the USA Patriot Act and now the outcry over the recent public revelation of his illegal spying on American citizens. Under attack, however, Bush's agenda, its imperial reach abroad and a drive to a single-party state at home, can become more dangerous. The shift in the momentum we are witnessing did not begin with the shocking disclosure by THE NEW YORK TIMES on Dec. 16. There James Risen reported that President Bush had secretly ordered the National Security Agency to eavesdrop on American citizens without obtaining court-approved warrants, which are constitutionally required. While it is true that front page story unleashed such a storm of protest that it led almost immediately to bipartisan calls for a congressional investigation, evidence of the shift arose much earlier with the growing opposition at home to Bush's war on Iraq. At the same time, in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, the nationwide wave of disgust at Bush's unconscionable inaction and the problems which persist today stand undeniably high in any measure of the shift of momentum in the Bush agenda. Whether the many-sided and growing opposition to Bush's agenda convinced THE NEW YORK TIMES to finally reveal secret information it held for more than a year, the war in Iraq is what towers above all else in the questions which have never been as numerous as today. COST OF IRAQ WAR We are in the third year of the Iraq war and occupation whose excuses have long been completely discredited. U.S. military fatalities recently rose past 2,000 dead and 15,500 wounded. These have contributed to the strong and steady turn away from the support Bush had continued to claim despite his up-and-down approval ratings through 2005. So has the great surge in the blood-letting that greeted the new year after a short-lived lull following the Iraqi parliamentary elections. The steadiest opposition has been waged by the families of the soldiers sacrificed for Bush's war. The most well-known protest, led by Cindy Sheehan, brought dissent directly to Bush's ranch last summer. Another protest was created to raise the consciousness of youth in the Latino immigrant community. It was organized by Fernando Suarez del Sola, the father of Guerrero Azteca. Del Sola declared, "I consider this the historical moment in the U.S. to achieve a radical change. Since the Vietnam War, voices have never spoken out against the government as strongly as today" (see A parent brings Iraq war home," November-December 2005 N&L). Support for this war has dropped faster than it had for either of the other two most unpopular wars in U.S. history, in Vietnam and Korea. A generation later, many are remembering that Vietnam was a quagmire, just as it has become clearer by the day that Iraq has become one also. Voices from below, including from within the armed forces, rose early and have kept growing. That kind of opposition between the ruled and the rulers is reflected, once it becomes serious, in cracks within the ruling class itself. Now anti-war sentiment is gaining voice within Congress. The most unexpected rumbling came from usually hawkish Marine veteran and 17-term Democratic Representative from Pennsylvania, John Murtha. On Nov. 17 he made a sudden call for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq. Just before that event Republican Senator John McCain--another decorated veteran--won a harsh fight with the White House to have a ban on torture passed. McCain's amendment passed with 90 votes in the Senate, and with 107 Republicans joining all the Democrats in the House vote. It was then that THE NEW YORK TIMES revealed Bush's clear abuse of power and opened wide questions of criminal activity from many corners. Arlen Specter, the Senate Judiciary Committee chairman, lost no time in condemning Bush's domestic spying as "inexcusable...clearly and categorically wrong" and in announcing that hearings would be held quickly. They are scheduled for February. And immediately upon publication of the disclosure of the NSA operation, Barbara Boxer, Democratic senator of California, for the first time suggested that legal scholars should explore whether Bush's authorization of secret spying was an impeachable offense. SELF-ARROGATION OF POWER The White House immediately launched an intense public relations "blitz." Bush defended his policy insistently by claiming Congress had approved the eavesdropping right after the September 11 attacks by authorizing "all necessary and appropriate force" against the groups responsible for the attacks. Congress authorized, he insisted, his bypassing of the secret courts that had been set up in the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act in 1978. A number of stories soon emerged which revealed how seriously the legality of Bush's actions had been questioned at the time, but never publicly raised. New attention was now given also to an earlier, Nov. 6, front page article in the WASHINGTON POST. It revealed the FBI had issued "more than 30,000 national security letters a year." The letters ordered banks, credit agencies, telephone companies, and libraries that provide public access to the Internet to turn over financial and other records about anyone the FBI chooses, even those not suspected of any wrongdoing. It is no surprise that in the face of the swelling outcry about the disclosure of his secret spying, Bush's "defense" soon switched to the offensive. He moved to have his critics investigated, declaring that whosoever had unmasked his secret had committed a "shameful act." Less than half a dozen out of the 19,000 requests for wiretapping have been turned down by the secret courts since they were established by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act created. So why does Bush still feel the need to circumvent so-named FISA courts? Have there been even more transgressions involving domestic surveillance yet to be reported? WILL FISSURES GROW? How deep or how superficial are the differences within the ruling class? We cannot avoid measuring the Democratic and moderate opposition against the fact that they were aware of the "secret courts," which existed for decades, without ever questioning them. Even McCain's bill to ban torture was in the end endorsed by Bush because it still allows the administration to define torture as they see fit. Barbaric techniques like "Waterboarding"--to make a captive believe he or she is being drowned--has been used for years and can apparently still be used. Even the most impassioned of those speaking up, from McCain to Murtha to Boxer, were briefed years ago about the administration's "detention procedures" as well as NSA spying. GHOST OF NIXON It can be helpful to look to the mid-1970s when the kind of "abuse of power" now being leveled against Bush were the same charges then leveled against Richard Nixon. In 1974 the articles of impeachment drawn up against Nixon, which forced his resignation, focused on the abuse of his presidential powers based on warrantless wiretaps and illegal surveillance. The very Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act Bush is now charged with violating came out of the work of the special committee chaired by Senator Church that followed that experience. The purging of Nixon did not mean getting rid of Nixonism, a fact proved by the way Nixonism was followed by Reaganism, and Reaganism by Bushism. With each retrogressive administration, in a different period and with new intensity, it becomes ever clearer that repression will not be stopped until we uproot the whole dehumanized system. The 1972 Watergate break-in awakened the press to the dangers of Nixon's attempt to neutralize even loyal opposition. But his drive for a single-party state was already well-known to victims of spying and repression. They included civil rights leaders, especially Martin Luther King Jr., and the anti-war movement which escalated upon Nixon-Kissinger's high-handed invasion of Cambodia in 1970. STORM AFTER KATRINA That is why, important as is the crack within the ruling class today, what will be decisive is the growing opposition to the ravages of the war in Iraq and the continuing outrage over the disastrous response of the rulers to the victims of Hurricane Katrina. Both have raised questions about the very structure of U.S. society. The anger expressed today by New Orleans residents and others is directed not only against Bush but against the mayor, the governor, FEMA, the federal government, the Army Corps of Engineers, and the rightwing think tanks. The last are arguing that the Ninth Ward, the heart of the Black population, should be turned back into a swamp. Nor can this be separated from the first signs of a possible revival of labor activity. Foremost was the recent strike of the 33,000 transit workers in New York City (see NYC Transit workers defy anti-union law. The most significant aspect of the strike was that health care benefits and pensions for future union members, not wages, was the top issue. The Sago Mine disaster in West Virginia (see Bloody hands in West Virginia mine explosion) also reminded the country of the criminal disregard of U.S. capitalism toward human life and underlines the need for the total uprooting of a society which gives all importance to commodity production. It is in this context that the possibility of a "new climate" for the struggle against Bush becomes important to examine. Ending the ever-deepening crises we face--from the bloody war in Iraq to the life-sucking crises we face right at home--rests with the increasing opposition we see rising from below. That battle, it becomes more and more clear, will not end until we uproot the whole barbaric system. |
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