Peace for our time…

Peace for our time… 

 

This morning I had another talk with the German Chancellor, Herr Hitler, and here is the paper which bears his name upon it as well as mine [shows paper to crowd]. Some of you, perhaps, have already heard what it contains but I would just like to read it to you: " ... We regard the agreement signed last night and the Anglo-German Naval Agreement as symbolic of the desire of our two peoples never to go to war with one another again."

 

My good friends, for the second time in our history a British Prime Minister has returned from Germany bringing peace with honour. I believe it is peace for our time."

 

-       PM Neville Chamberlain, September 30, 1938

 

 

With unity we can do great things, important things. We can right wrongs, we can put people to work in good jobs, we can teach our children in safe schools. We can overcome the deadly virus, we can rebuild work, we can rebuild the middle class and make work secure, we can secure racial justice and we can make America once again the leading force for good in the world.

 

I know speaking of unity can sound to some like a foolish fantasy these days. I know the forces that divide us are deep and they are real.

 

-       POTUS Joe Biden's Inauguration Speech, January 20, 2021

 

 

By JM Hamilton (1-23-2020)

 

The Great Depression of the 1930s was not only an American problem but it was a global phenomenon.  And Europe and Great Britain were not immune.  Unemployment was high and people suffered miserably.  Politicians and leaders had their hands full.  And so it must have come as some relief when on September 30, 1938, PM Neville Chamberlain flew into London to deliver the news, a peace agreement had been signed with Adolph Hitler.  The German dictator had been threatening war, and the last thing the U.K. and Europe wanted was war.  So in exchange for tossing the Nazi dictator Czechoslovakia, Hitler promised Germany would behave.   

 

Later that day, PM Chamberlain declared that there would be, “peace for our time.”

 

Less than a year later, on September 1, 1939, Germany invaded Poland with 53 Panzer divisions.  Two days later, PM Neville Chamberlain called for war.  He was subsequently sacked and replaced by PM Churchill. 

 

The aforementioned history has been defined as the ultimate act of appeasement.  An authoritarian, who would not normally have risen to power in a stable Germany, climbs to power after a series of economic & political shocks: The Treaty of Versailles, followed by a period of hyper- inflation, and subsequently, a global Great Depression.  And the literal spark for the German dictator’s ascension to power: the symbol of German Democracy, the Reichstag, conveniently burns down.  Hitler declares a state of emergency and disbands the German legislative body and assumes all powers of the state. Thereafter, Hitler quickly rearms the nation, the economy takes off, and the German people are fed a diet of nationalism, rabid patriotism, hyper-militarism, and a cult of personality.  

 

And the ultimate evil: A fascist wouldn’t be fascist if some group of citizens couldn’t be demonized & made into a scapegoat for all the nation’s problems… this same group of citizens, those of the Jewish faith, would become the focal point of Hitler's hate & genocide. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Fast forward to the year 2021: from Hitler to Trump… the burning of the Reichstag parallels unpleasantly enough with the attempted coup of January 6^th and the attack on the U.S. Congress, by a deluded and ginned up band of Trump followers.  The U.S. economy is trashed under Trump’s watch.  The lower half of American society faced an unmerciful neoliberal economy even before the pandemic hit; and now, with a pandemic raging, underemployment and unemployment continue to rise.  Millions of Americans have given up looking for work, and an estimated one in four American children – in the land of vast wealth – live in poverty.  Thousands of small businesses are crushed, but Wall Street, fed trillions in welfare by the Federal Reserve, soars.  Wage & wealth inequality are obscene. 

 

Like Hitler, Trump has used fear -– a fear of others, of minorities, women, homosexuals, economic loss & a loss of status -– to manipulate Americans, and naturally, this fear turns to hate.  Former POTUS Trump even took over the Republican Party and demanded fealty from U.S. congress members, senators & governors, lest they incur the wrath of Trump and his mob. 

 

But unlike Hitler, Trump didn’t quite pull it off.  His coup attempt failed, the Congress is saved, and a new President Biden took the oath of office, amidst a Trumpian whirlwind of plague and economic chaos. 

 

Not since the Civil War has the nation been this polarized.  POTUS Biden, during his inaugural address, held out the cautious hope of unity for the nation.  And the unity POTUS Biden calls for is clearly something the nation should aspire to, at some future date.  But for now, at this moment, the United States can ill afford to make the mistake PM Chamberlain made… that of appeasement.  Our American would-be dictator, Donald Trump – and his band of followers – if given the opportunity, won’t make the same mistakes twice.  And even now, we know there are U.S. Senators, who aspire to take Trump’s place, as head of a right-wing mob.  Even now, there are well over a hundred members in the House of Representatives, who backed the coup and supported democracy’s overthrow.  These politicians – and their multinational financial backers - maybe far more competent next go around. 

 

The GOP would love to return to business as usual & bide their time; the GOP would love to sweep this whole episode under the rug.  And former Senate Majority Leader, McConnell, continues to act as if it's business as usual within the U.S. Senate.  The Democratic Party can ill afford to give treason the benefit of the doubt, not for Trump, the GOP, nor their corporate & multinational supporters. Billionaire financial backers who conveniently feign ignorance, as to the GOP’s hate filled trajectory spanning decades. 

 

The United States has been plagued by division, hatred, and racism, since the founding of the nation to the present day.  All of it blowback for the original sins of indentured servitude, slavery, and the most aggressive laissez faire economy the world has ever known (and the subsequent sins of Jim Crow and mass incarceration).  The United States dares not turn its back on this hatred; the United States can’t turn its back on this coup attempt and its perpetrators & accomplices.  They all must meet justice.  And if expulsion from government is the price some GOP politicians face, as a result of their crimes against the nation, then America will be better for it. 

 

If America attempts to forget these events now, we may not get another chance at democracy two or four years from now.  Our hopes for “unity” may crumble into Mr. Chamberlain’s blind faith in a “peace for our time,” as a dictator turns on the United States.  Clearly, the economy & plague – joined at the hip - must be addressed as well as oligarchy and monopolies; but the threat of dictatorship and the causes of same (especially the MSM and social media) must be addressed, simultaneously. 

 

There is much work to do. 

 

Copyright JM Hamilton Publishing 2021

Money Coup

Money Coup

 

On Wednesday, many chief executives had, once again, had enough. The National Association of Manufacturers called on Vice President Mike Pence to consider invoking the 25th Amendment of the Constitution and remove Mr. Trump from office. Many executives — including Mr. Cook of Apple, Mr. Dimon of JPMorgan and Mr. Schwarzman — denounced the violence, lamented the state of the country and called for accountability.

But after four years of much talk but little action, their words rang hollow.

“When people make political decisions for business reasons,” said Mr. Walker, “it can have heinous social consequences.”

 

-       After Riot, Business Leaders Reckon With Their Support for Trump – New York Times 

 

By JM Hamilton (1-9-21)

 

The curtain finally came down on POTUS Trump’s four-year, deadly, circus this week.  Trump’s base of support, goaded on by the dictator wannabe, attacked the US Congress in the hopes of intimidating, or forcing, lawmakers into not certifying president – elect Biden.  Among the collateral damage – including irreparable harm to the myth of America, as a beacon of democracy – was a Trump supporter, Ashli Babbitt.  The Washington Post reported that Ms. Babbitt, a U.S. Air Force veteran, had at one time supported President Obama, but had become an avid Trump supporter. 

 

Lost in the broken glass and tear gas, at the nation’s capitol, was news that the NY Stock Exchange had decided to delist Communist China telecommunication companies – linked to the People’s Liberation Army – only to reverse itself and move to maintain the listings.  A day later, the exchange reversed itself, once again, and finally, delisted the communist state-owned enterprises.  That Communist China (a country that has increasingly felt emboldened to strike out at many of the democratic & human rights principles Western democracies, allegedly, hold dear -- and with great impunity and seemingly, w/out repercussion) had state enterprises listed on the American exchange to begin with…  speaks directly to the myopic thinking surrounding the defacto Profit Motive First policy, that has betrayed the United States and the American people for the last forty years. 

 

The story of American crony-capitalism coddling a communist dictatorship, of course, reminds us of Mr. Trump’s first foreign travel, as a newly minted President nearly four years ago. At that time, with a platoon of corporate CEOs & C-suite toadies in tow, the American contingent inked trillions of deals, as well as, memorandums of understanding for future deals with the Saudi government.  American corporate overlords, on the junket, were said to be elated.  Any concerns or issues with the Royal House of Saud’s support for terrorism, human rights abuses, misogyny, and war atrocities w/ neighboring Yemen… apparently, given zero thought.  The bottom line after all, had been served. 

 

With Trump attempting his own beer hall putsch this week, Hitler style, many of the billionaires & CEOs – who had long supported Trump with mind numbing sums of cash and soothing words – found themselves running for political cover.  As reported in the New York Times, many Americans – including corporate brass & politicians - are beginning to ask why the crème de la crème of corporate America supported such a nasty creature, as Donald Trump.  And we know why, Trump has proven useful – despite running as a populist for the people – at delivering vast sums of corporate welfare for the rich and the powerful: trillions in tax cuts; deregulation – which always shifts known costs onto the backs of ordinary Americans; the plundering of public lands; and American labor's evisceration.  When it came to looting the government and the US taxpayer, on behalf of the 1%, Trump delivered. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

All of this points out the obvious… when the MSM discusses & writes about Trump’s attempted coup this week, they are really talking about his enablers & ownership, the American – and arguably, foreign - oligarchy. The very same economic royalty, who have conducted class warfare - and a money coup - against the American people for the last forty years.  The CEOs, billionaires, and Wall Street financiers who will happily do business with communist totalitarian regimes, as well as, authoritarian Middle East dictatorships.  Apparently, there is no country – or ruler - so repugnant that American billionaires & CEOs won’t get down in the blood & the mud with, in order to ink a deal.  

So it should come as no surprise then that these same robber barons would be willing to finance and support authoritarians & fascism in the US, so as to further their financial empires.  

 

Perhaps my tweet, the day Congress was sacked, sums up the plight the US democracy project, nearly 250 years old, now finds itself in:

 

As I watch events unfold, we see no billionaires or monopolists in the mob. 

 

However, this riot is exactly what neoliberalism & oligarchy funded & begot, often by plutocratically controlled propaganda arms masquerading as MSM news orgs: extremism, disinformation, insurrection, faction, and human misery & poverty befitting an emerging market nation. 

 

Can’t but help notice the Dow is up 481 points.  Our elected leaders should be proud, they did the donor class’ bidding & guided the nation directly to this moment. 

 

This week will long be remembered: as the inflection point, where the vile ramifications of America’s neoliberal money coup came knocking on Congress’ front door. 

 

 Copyright JM Hamilton Publishing 2021

An American Christmas Carol…

An American Christmas Carol… 

 

“This boy is Ignorance. This girl is Want. Beware them both, and all of their degree, but most of all beware this boy, for on his brow I see that written which is Doom, unless the writing be erased. Deny it!" cried the Spirit, stretching out its hand towards the city. "Slander those who tell it ye! Admit it for your factious purposes, and make it worse. And bide the end!" "Have they no refuge or resource?" cried Scrooge. "Are there no prisons?" said the Spirit, turning on him for the last time with his own words. "Are there no workhouses?” 

 

 

“If they would rather die,… they’d better do it, and decrease the surplus population.”

 

-       A Christmas Carol, by Charles Dickens 

 

By JM Hamilton (12-26-2020)

 

There may never be a more popular book written about predatory capitalism.  Written at roughly the close of the first industrial revolution and the beginning of the Victorian Era, Charles Dickens' book, A Christmas Carol, has it all: a greedy – banker – miser, ghosts and more ghosts, brutal poverty, a Christmas backstory, rapacious capitalism, denial, a love story gone bad, and of course, hope & redemption.  Published in 1843, the book is as resilient & relevant in its messaging today, as it was throughout the 19^th and 20^thcenturies.  And the author, Dickens, had real life experiences with poor houses, poverty, and crushing labor practices with which to draw upon. Experiences that became a familiar theme within the Dickens’ canon.

 

Christmas Carol came to mind because I found myself wondering, what would happen if the three ghosts visited the personification of America today?  What if the three ghosts visited the Ebenezer Scrooge of our times, Donald Trump… the billionaire president, who campaigned on helping ordinary Americans, but in reality, only helped himself and his ultra-wealthy donors?  Trump is also something of a businessman, whose parsimony & venality – like Scrooge - was, and remain, legendary.  

 

Would Roy Cohn, lawyer & mentor, now deceased, visit Trump like Jacob Marley?  Or maybe Trump’s idols would come calling… say Nixon or Reagan, wreathed in chains, dragging cash boxes, and shrieking & screaming warnings.  

 

What of the first ghost, the Ghost of Christmas Past?  Would the ghost show Trump America’s ill-fated founding… complete with indentured servitude, slavery, and the slaughter of indigenous Americans?  Would the apparition take Trump to the slaughter of vast herds of buffalo with a singular purpose, to inflict genocide & starvation upon the original Americans?  Would Trump and the great spirit visit Andrew Jackson’s Trail of Tears?  Perhaps the Ghost of Christmas Past would show Trump slaves with severed limbs … limbs severed by their masters, so that they could no longer run away.  Maybe the ghost would hook Trump up with Christians – who fled England to avoid religious persecution – only for these same zealots to conduct their own jihad, upon entering the New World? 

 

Surely such a spirit would fly Trump back to the early industrial revolution with child labor, mangled limbs, obscene work hours, even more wretched working conditions, and of course, wealthy New England textile owners counting their profits. 

 

And the Ghost of Christmas Present?  Obviously, such a ghost would want to show Trump the refrigerated morgue trucks, and the thousands and thousands of American dead… thanks to Trump and the US Congress playing down the pandemic, or failing to adequately warn Americans (Congress, of course, was too busy managing their stock portfolios; besides notifying Americans of the coming plague might have harmed their trades).  Would the ghost break through to Trump after visiting the tear-stained cheeks of brave frontline healthcare workers, as they attempt to save lives, while worrying about the health of loved ones and their families? 

 

Might the Ghost of Christmas Present show Trump vast billionaire fortunes compounded exponentially to obscene valuations, as taxpayer funded backstops, debts, and welfare for the rich are being laundered in the stock market (thanks to Federal Reserve & congressional policy)?  And in the process bequeathing ordinary Americans endless decades of austerity, poverty, and foreclosure upon the American Dream.  Meanwhile, tens of thousands of small business owners watch their hopes vanish, and burn, from lack of support from the US government during the pandemic.  

 

Would Jack Ketch, and his good buddy, US Senator from Wisconsin, Ron Johnson, both be lurking near?

 

And who can forget the twins, contained within the Ghost of Christmas Present’s great coat: The phantom wraiths, Ignorance and Want.  Forever stamped upon a, seemingly, cursed America … always trillions for empire and endless war but never enough money for an affordable & quality higher education.  And always, a bull market in extreme poverty, no less so than in Charles Dickens' England.  What is the number?  Twenty?  Twenty-five percent of American children living in poverty & despair (the modern-day equivalent to Tiny Tim on an industrial scale)?  

 

All of this misery & suffering is nothing less than a public policy failure, orchestrated by an oligarchy looking to rid itself of surplus labor & population? 

 

And the final apparition, the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come… pointing to a darkened grave, unkept, unloved, & un-mourned?   

 

America’s fate?  

 

The United States’ riches looted by a rapacious oligarchy.  Her vast potential squandered upon endless wars and war profiteers.  The nation’s exorbitant privilege wasted upon endless Wall Street bailouts & colossal debts used to finance tax avoidance by the exceptionally wealthy.  

 

America’s epitaph: Privatized profits – for a privileged few; Socialized losses – a burden carried by all Americans, but the privileged few. 

 

The fate of all empires, an unmarked grave and an unread footnote contained w/in a dusty history book.  Would POTUS Trump be moved?

 

 

 

 

 

 

Of course, the best part of A Christmas Carol is that Scrooge does feel remorse, he reaches for redemption.  And he does appear capable of turning it around with genuine acts of kindness.  But not before Scrooge embraces denial and excuses, and he pushes back against a, seemingly, endless tide of apparitions, facts, and history. Like Scrooge, in order for America to redeem itself, it must confront its ignominious past and present; it must permanently retire the myth of American exceptionalism and seek out rebirth and redemption w/ genuine acts of aid, contrition, and redemption, particularly for the least among us. 

 

America must turn its back on a predatory version of capitalism & neoliberalism that has repeatedly failed, that only affords state aid and extraordinary welfare for the exceptionally wealthy, & ruin and scraps for everyone else; America must become a country where we look out for one another… and our government’s efforts are pivoted & redirected towards that endeavor.  

 

What Dickens’ book most reveals is how capitalism has changed very little, since early Victorian times; and in fact, if anything, it is growing far more abusive, and driving an ever-growing body count.  

 

 Copyright JM Hamilton Publishing 2020