Tom Hayden's Blog, page 39

Robert Greenwald in Pakistan on Drone Project

Brave New Film’s Robert Greenwald is in Pakistan to film evidence of widespread civilian casualties, including children, from US drone strikes. His full-length documentary film is projected for release in July. 

Big Advance for Dream Act Youth

The Obama victory has made a huge difference for young Dream Act applicants seeking reprieves from deportation – administrative approvals leaped from 4,591 in October, when uncertainty hung over the election outcome, to 53,273 by one week after Obama’s win. In all, one million young people are eligible for the program.

Voters Rejecting U.S. Drug War

Voters in Washington and Colorado strongly approved legalizing and regulating marijuana use like alcohol earlier this month, the first states to do so, putting new pressure on the Obama administration to ease off its aggressive campaign to enforce federal criminal penalties against states where voters have approved medical marijuana laws.

Why the U.S. Has to Go

"Nobody was alive to ask whether they were naked before they were burned or killed.”

- Testimony of Mullah Khamal Adin at preliminary US Army hearing into the killing of 16 Afghan civilians in Kandahar by Sgt. Robert Bales on March 11, 2012. Sgt. Bales was on his fourth combat tour of duty. 

Oliver Stone's Untold History

“Oliver Stone's Untold History of the United States” is a welcome antidote to the pablum of mainstream television and films with their repeated glorification of secret US agents in their war against shadowy terrorists. Unfortunately, however, Stone's history is as ideological and unbalanced as his movie making. The result is an attack on Barack Obama so scathing that one wonders why all those Americans just voted for him again.

Sticking it to Wall Street

It is unfortunate that Occupy Wall Street lost its momentum after the uprisings of 2011, because the election and its results have opened another opportunity to stick it to Wall Street and reform them for the next generation. As I wrote in The Nation:

“This year marks the first presidential campaign in our lifetime when the gluttony of Wall Street, the failures of capitalism, the evils of big money in politics and a discussion of fundamental reform will be front and center in election debates. No doubt the crisis that gave rise to Occupy will not be fixed by an election, but that’s beside the point. Elections produce popular mandates, and mandates spur popular activism. It’s time to organize a progressive majority.”

Progress in the Middle East and Latin America

American electorate against US intervention are being felt, if only marginally. Recent polling shows little or no American appetite for being drawn into a war on the side of Israel against Iran’s nuclear program and the Teheran regime itself. The election results are a stinging rebuke to Prime Minister Netanyahu, the Likud Party and the billionaire fringe headed by corrupt casino magnate Sheldon Adelson. Now the Israeli regime is “rushing” to make nice with Obama lest he engage in bilateral talks with Iran or “go easy” on the PLO’s quest for upgraded status at the UN. These are reasonable initiatives that the president should take in pursuit of a “grand bargain” over the Middle East, pushing a day of reckoning down the road.

Prevent an Imperial Presidency, Revise the War Powers Act

Peace forces have accomplished more these past four years than many are able to comprehend, due to their understandable bitterness over the proliferation of drones and civil liberty issues. The achievements made possible should not be forgotten, but instead built upon. As the Peace and Justice Resource Center and Congresswoman Barbara Lee advocated, President Barack Obama's re-election platform included ending two quagmires and reinvesting the revenues in rebuilding America, though a withdrawal from Afghanistan is scheduled more slowly than progressives would have preferred.

A Progressive Mandate

The Republicans and most of the mainstream media already are spinning the election as an affirmation of the same status quo, requiring a bipartisan consensus to avoid the fiscal cliff. This is a conservative self-serving spin. The election was a tremendous mandate for the incumbent president, given the depressing level of unemployment, a galvanizing win for Senate progressives, and a shattering blow to the Tea Party, the Christian Right, the Voter Suppression teams, along with the billionaires and their One Percent brethren.

Obama Must be Protected from Rising Threats

The threat of the virulent counter-movement against the Obama era will increase, not ebb, as the white Right fully experiences the loss of their sense of privilege with the decline of their voting power. As early as Spring 2009, the Homeland Security agency issued a report noting the rise of right-wing militia violence due to both the economic recession and the election of the first African-American president.