The government is currently debating a $700 billion bailout of distressed banks under a plan that initially proposed to give Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and the Bush administration unprecedented power. How did all this happen? The root of the problem can be traced back to the deregulation era that began during the Reagan administration.
Complaining about the weather is about as American as apple pie, sitcoms and rock and roll. But while the rest of the world has been noticing for years that our increasingly unstable weather is an initial sign of potentially devastating global climate changes, our nation's collective heads have mostly remained in the sand. Finally, over the past year or so, things have begun to shift a little.
The time has come to revolt against free market fundamentalism and the way it is destroying our society. The illusion of the capitalists' "free" market has long been revealed for what it really is: a mystification of class interest. When everyday people suffer from poverty, the ruling elite say, 'there's nothing we can do. There has always been poverty, we can't prevent it.' But when an edifice of greed, corruption, and illusory wealth begins to crumble, it's a crisis of the greatest degree. Hundreds of billions of dollars later, it's clear that our government will spare no expense to prevent the wealthy from losing their yachts, luxury cars and mansions.
Popular culture is the site of complex struggles between the forces of repression and those of liberation, British critical theorist Stuart Hall argued two decades ago. Movies and music, television and books all constitute the raw material of political imagination. Such cultural products not only engage the present but craft a narrative of the past. And what better way to blend past and present, culture and politics, than an animated documentary of the (in)famous Chicago conspiracy trial, one of the most well-known events of the 1960s?
Charlotte Dennett, who entered the race for Vermont Attorney General this week, readily admits that it will be an uphill battle. But the Vermont Progressive Party's candidate does have one thing going for her - an issue with the potential to mobilize voters upset about the Iraq War. At her first press conference, sitting next to renowned prosecutor and author Vincent Bugliosi, she pledged to prosecute George W. Bush for murder if elected and appoint Bugliosi as a special prosecutor to take on the job.Vincent Bugliosi & Charlotte Dennett
Copyright Toward Freedom 2019