Published in Intrepid Report on June 18, 2012
Republished in Islamic News Daily on June 25, 2012
By Larry Pinkney
“Our problem is that people are obedient all over the world in the face of poverty and starvation and stupidity, and war, and cruelty. Our problem is that people are obedient while the jails are full of petty thieves . . . (and) the grand thieves are running the country. That’s our problem.”
—Howard Zinn
To be sure, neither the corporate owned Democrat or the corporate owned Republican parties are viable choices for the struggling everyday ordinary Black, White, Brown, Red, and Yellow people of this nation. In fact, these corporate owned parties are the antithesis to the needs and hopes of ordinary people in this nation, and throughout Mother Earth.
The American Heritage College Dictionary defines the word ‘insidious,’ in relevant part, as “Working or spreading harmfully—in a subtle or stealthy manner. Beguiling, but harmful; alluring.” Indeed, Mr. ‘Hope and Change’—Predator Drone—‘You’ll Never See It Coming’—U.S. president Barack Obama is the very embodiment of the word ‘insidious.’
Barack Obama’s secret negotiations with economic bloodsucking multinational corporations, his trillion dollar criminal ‘bailout’ of the corporate elite of Wall Street, his signing into law of the draconian indefinite detention (NDAA) horror, his ongoing wars in Afghanistan and elsewhere, his bombing of Libya, North Africa, his feverish clamp down on corporate and government ‘whistleblowers,’ and his infamous ‘Kill List’ are but a few of the horrible actions that Obama, has and is engaging in under the cover of insidious stealth and beguilement.
Obama’s flagrant violations of U.S. constitutional and international law have, in less than four years, far surpassed even the outrages committed by his predecessors. His constant tactic of baiting the everyday people with omissions, half truths, and outright lies has quite possibly been the most insidiously effective against ordinary people of any U.S. president—ever.
Due, in substantial measure, to the support of many ‘liberals,’ so-called ‘progressives,’ and much of the ‘left,’ who hypocritically refuse to hold Barack Obama to the same standards of accountability as they did his Republican Party predecessors, he has been able to hoodwink and emaciate the struggling everyday people of this nation. The Obama regime, from its very beginning, was (and continues to be) one of deception, subterfuge, political repression, and non-transparency. This is precisely why it was so crucial for the systemic power brokers (both Democrat and Republican) to have ensured that the ‘Obama brand’ was, in 2008, installed as the head of the U.S. corporate/military empire. The terrible damage that Barack Obama has inflicted upon the people of this nation and world is incalculable.
Back during the corporate ‘election’ cycle of 2008, relatively few people in this nation were aware of or willing to face the fact that an ‘Obama brand’ presidency would mean ‘More Of The Same—Only Worse.’ [Reference: An Obama Presidency—More Of The Same Only Worse, November 5, 2008] They were then too enthralled and allured by the corporate-backed, pro-Zionist, double-talking ‘Obama brand.’ However, it is clear now in 2012, that an increasing number of people are painfully awakening from their corporate-induced slumber. Notwithstanding the ongoing fake skirmishes between the corporate Democrats and corporate Republicans, stoked by the U.S. corporate-stream media and heightened by this current 2012 corporate ‘election’ cycle, the fact remains that the entire system is utterly corrupt and that the Democrats and Republicans are two symbiotically joined peas from the same systemic pod.
The time is here and now for everyday people of all colors to come to grips with reality. It is the political plantation/reservation corporate owned system of both Democrats and Republicans that is keeping us all enslaved economically, politically, and socially. We must follow the course of pragmatism versus cynicism by rejecting this entire corrupt political system. We must cease following the course of systemic cynicism and helplessness. Rather, we must seek out and find the ways and creative means to develop and bring about a political model that serves the people instead of pimping and emaciating them. Be assured that the Democrats and the Republicans will use every sordid means at their disposal to distort, subvert and crush the will of the people. But it is the people, just plain everyday ordinary people, who must recognize that we can no longer allow ourselves to be the cannon fodder of this hypocritical, repugnant, and unjust corporate-owned system.
It’s time for a change—REAL systemic change, brought about by we, the people. Yes, there will for a certainty be disagreements among we the people, for if there were not, someone would be lying. But do not allow our disagreements to continue to be used against us collectively. We must find the ways and creative means to collectively throw off the yoke of this system. We must do this thing in this long, protracted, and important struggle.
Turn off your televisions and turn on your minds! We’re not hamsters endlessly running on a spinning wheel going nowhere. It’s time to stop acting like hamsters and regain our collective wills and humanity.
Each one, reach one. Each one, teach one. Onward, then, my sisters and brothers! Onward!
Larry Pinkney is a veteran of the Black Panther Party, the former Minister of Interior of the Republic of New Africa, a former political prisoner and the only American to have successfully self-authored his civil/political rights case to the United Nations under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. In connection with his political organizing activities, Pinkney was interviewed in 1988 on the nationally televised PBS News Hour, formerly known as The MacNeil/Lehrer News Hour. Pinkney is a former university instructor of political science and international relations, and his writings have been published in various places, including The Boston Globe, San Francisco BayView newspaper, Black Commentator, Intrepid Report, Global Research (Canada), LINKE ZEITUNG (Germany), 107Cowgate (Ireland and Scotland), and Mayihlome News (Azania/South Africa). For more about Larry Pinkney see the book, Saying No to Power: Autobiography of a 20th Century Activist and Thinker, by William Mandel [Introduction by Howard Zinn]. (Click here to read excerpts from the book.)
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