Hey Everyone,
Although we didn't get to prosecutorial misconduct, I thought last week's seminar was fascinating! I hope everyone enjoyed it as much as I did.
In class, we briefly explored the idea that as residents, we are
taught principles of American superiority and exceptionalism. We choose leaders
who are charismatic, as George Orwell so eloquently explains, and leaders who
can come to our rescue, rather than ones who show their humanness and admit
difficulty and thoughtfulness in decision-making. We want leaders who will
remind us how strong, brave, and free we are, in comparison to the rest of the (“uncivilized”)
world. Why is it that we love and praise our troops when they are in other
countries killing people, yet when they come home, we ignore them and do not
give them the proper medical care they so desperately need? We value people so
long as they are “productive members of society,” a euphemism for profit-producing
workers. As we have seen, those who prove not to be so are criminalized and
sent to prison, so that the rest of the population can function effectively.
On Wednesday, the United States
Supreme Court struck down a long-standing limit on how much corporations and
individuals can donate to federal candidates, parties, and action committees.
This is clearly a disastrous decision for Democracy and for everyone who has
hope in the electoral system. While many of us agreed that every citizen should
vote and should be concerned with their political system, wouldn’t this give
one a justifiable reason not to do so? If a billionaire can buy out a
politician or a political party, what difference would a single vote really
make? If our Supreme Court, the ultimate judicial body of the United States,
whose primary task is to uphold the Constitution and its democratic values,
endorses this, then what power do I have, in comparison? How can my single vote
compete with billions of dollars pouring into candidates’ bank accounts from
the Coca-Cola Brothers or from J.P. Morgan & Chase? At this point, can you
seriously argue that my vote matters? While I will continue to vote because I
want to practice the right that so many others are deprived of and because I
have a naïve hope that it will actually make a difference, not believing so is
legitimate and reasonable. In High School, I worked on the Obama campaign and
canvassed around Bay Ridge to encourage the Arab American community to vote, so
that we could have numbers in the elections, with hopes that candidates would
notice us and make an effort to work with us. However, such an effort seems
useless in light of the recent Supreme Court ruling. Even more so, my vote and direct advocacy for
Obama now makes me complicit in the wars and murder of innocent people around
the world, under his administration.
For those of you who disagree, consider
this: how would you convince a black man who has grown up and lived in poverty
his entire life, has been a victim of police brutality, and has been repeatedly
oppressed by the criminal justice system, that he can affect the results of an
election by reading the paper and casting his vote for "the lesser of two evils?" How can you convince him
that he is not just choosing another white guy to pass the same torch on to?
**You can watch an interview with Senator Bernie Sanders on Democracy Now! about the ruling here ** :
http://www.democracynow.org/2014/4/3/sen_bernie_sanders_supreme_court_undermines
**You can watch an interview with Senator Bernie Sanders on Democracy Now! about the ruling here ** :
http://www.democracynow.org/2014/4/3/sen_bernie_sanders_supreme_court_undermines
9 comments:
Life is just a pot of competing interests.
I respond to Leena’s powerful post with some words from Tony Benn; he says, “In the course of my life I have developed five little democratic questions. If one meets a powerful person--Adolf Hitler, Joe Stalin or Bill Gates--ask them five questions: “What power have you got? Where did you get it from? In whose interests do you exercise it? To whom are you accountable? And how can we get rid of you?” If you cannot get rid of the people who govern you, you do not live in a democratic system.”
I have, in my mind, asked these questions to the political leaders in America and Nigeria.
I received some honest answers--I cringe.
I recourse to Will Durant’s words to understand why I received the kind of answers I got in my imaginary exercise. Durant argues: “the political machine triumphs because it is a united minority acting against a divided majority.” In as much we blame the government for colluding with the billionaires in undermining political rights, the people must bear a greater blame for allowing such diminishing of political rights to occur.
Whichever way we choose to look at this issue, it’s our fault (blaming the victim as usual). While political apathy is justifiable, as Leena has shown, it certainly will not lead the U.S. towards a more democratic direction—if anything, it impedes movement in that direction.
My advice to the poor, oppressed black man you write about: Vote! And be politically vibrant in your locality. Use your voice to lessen the evil in whichever of the two evils you choose to dine with, and show them that money is not the only thing that talks.
Thank you. (Please pardon the excessive quoting)
Thank you Leena for starting off this post. Bravo James! Well said. There's nothing to add to James post.
As stated both by Leena and James, we can do our little part, no matter how significant it might seem, to try to have our voices heard. By choosing not to act, we are choosing. It is better to make a conscious decision than to have a choice be made for us.
We have to keep trying to affect the change we need and want. I probably sound like a broken record, but as hopeless as it might seem, we still cannot give up. There's an old saying, "drop by drop fills the bucket." Over a period of time, those seemingly insignificant drops, do eventually add up. If we are persistent, more often than not, it pays off. Thomas Giovanni's current career ascent is testament to this. He is now in a position to effect the change that he has been longing to see.
I love James's and Simonne's responses for being both critically engaged and hopeful, capacious philosophically while being succinctly expressed. Bravo!
I want to underscore their sentiment. Leena mentioned George Orwell in her post and I think he is the right person to summon here. His WHOLE point was that we must be activists not only in some large, obviously measurable sense (i.e. winning elections, setting ourselves on fire, massive organized boycotts) but activists on THE LEVEL OF THE SENTENCE. Clearly identifying what you believe and choosing carefully the language to best express those beliefs is an act of powerful political enfranchisement and public activism. If we don't say clearly what we mean (thinking clearly first), we will allow our meaningless language to "think our thoughts for us" which would be the same as letting the next guy in the voting line pull the lever for us or -- what is the same abdication of rights to me -- not showing up to the polls at all.
Anecdotally, all of the dissenting justices of the recent hideous SCOTUS decision were nominated by Democratic presidents. The ones writing in the majority, Republicans. So if you don't think your vote matters, explain that to me.
In response to the criminalization of the excess of our society, I believe reform is the only way to influence change. Standing idly while our fellow citizen is arrested for vagrancy or unproductively is just as unjust as personally slapping on the handcuffs (similar to Giovanni's point about the "blue wall of silence"). We need to decriminalize the use of marihuana. We need to remove the social stigma of nom-violent felony conviction. We need to remove many of the social and economic hurdles those who are released from prison face. These types of changes can only be created at the policy level, which is highly influenced by votes.
To Leena's point, perhaps I, along with James and Simonne, are naive, but voting is the only answers. The strength of the vote comes from the group. While one lone standing vote cannot make a difference, the voice of a organized group with the right to vote can make a huge impact. I believe your previous grass roots efforts are exactly the type of voting energy we need. If more and more people organized such efforts, our voices would be heard.
That said, the donation system was already incredibly corrupt before the passage of this unprecedented Supreme Court case; however, I now fear we will see far greater acts of representatives overtly serving industry interests. If the idea that corporate interests impeded true democracy, then we are in for a big problem. In the capitalistic democracy, enough money could potentially drown out votes. The future looks grim.
The challenges for those men and women returning home are such…To mending debilitated and sometimes invisible wounds, seeking an education or to find meaningful employment, stepping back into relationships with family and friends after an experience that sent home a different person. More than a million troops from worldwide military face physical, mental and social hurdles. Their return also presents a challenge for each state, and we as a country promise to support these men and women with all the promised benefits. It is important to estimate the required costs for providing necessary evaluation, diagnosis, treatment and management for combat veterans. However, forecasts regarding costs are ambiguous without knowing the number of veterans that will actually be diagnosed with PTSD, and without knowing the number of veterans that will seek treatment.
Also keep in mind that by definition, the lesser of evils is still evil. And yes, also by definition, the lesser of evils is less evil.
Thank you Leena for your post, building off of the voting debate between Professor Stein and Thomas Giovanni.
To respond to your last statement about giving purpose to the poor black voter, I agree that is hard to give him a believable incentive for making his vote matter. Voter identification laws, particularly in the south, have made it harder for minority voters whom are either undocumented or simply do not have a state ID to have their votes matter. Not to mention that felons can not vote which unfortunately takes out a great number of possible minority male voters. Even when said individual gets through the barriers of being eligible to vote, deciding among candidates is simply a choice of which candidate is a lesser evil, as most politicians never live up to the promise of making living conditions better for the lower middle class voter. I hate to sound pessimistic, but I would have to agree with Thomas Giovanni in that voting is a very discouraging process as a young, minority voter.
The new developments on unrestricted campaign funding only discourages the poorer voter from wanting to participate in the process. Unlimited campaign funding translates into having the richest voter having their candidate being elected. That means that that candidate will more than likely look out for the interest of their wealthier constituency than that of the poorer working class.
Spencer
One thing I feel is a problem is that we as a society believe we are trapped. I somewhat believe that some people in the U.S. support voting simply because its about the only thing we can do, not because we believe in its power, but because it’s the only bone the government is throwing our way to make us feel important. To anyone who feels this way I would have to drastically disagree.
I believe one of the major problems with voting in the U.S. is the culture that has been forged around it. Many individuals in the U.S. grow up being programmed by society to honestly believe that voting doesn’t matter, especially the power of one vote. I can remember the first time I learned in school about the Electoral College, how all of the students around me were up in arms about how it’s all just pointless. I think this attitude is much more dangerous than any amount of funding a politician can get. In my opinion, if we can say that private companies can essentially buy politicians now, I would argue that the only reason these politicians can be bought is because we stopped caring. Voting is a beautiful thing because it allows us to hold our representatives accountable for when they do not address our needs and interests. When we stop voting, we are essentially giving politicians the ok to do whatever they would like, because they are no longer being held accountable for their mistakes, among which can be blatant private interest group support (but only if we decide to make it an issue by voting against that individual at their next election).
Another cultural issue I think we face has its roots in capitalism. As a capitalist society personal self-interest, and advancing oneself economically, socially, etc. primarily drive the majority of Americans. I think this same mindset often translates to voting. More often than not, the immediate argument most people make against voting is about how one vote doesn’t matter, but when put into context, this is usually their way of saying that their own vote will not matter and that their needs will not be heard. To comment on this I would say that voting is not, and should not, be thought of on the individual level; voting is a team sport, only when people work together to advance the goals of the group can voting reach its full potential for impactful change.
Hello All!
The topics discussed above are all things I have thought about and questioned myself. More specifically, I have too at one point asked myself and many others if ONE or A vote really matters. Years ago, I would have said, No - one vote does not make a difference. In addition, when I learned about the Electoral College and their role in the Presidential election - I said, then why do "the people" vote in the first place if their votes don't count. Today, if you ask me does ONE vote or A vote matter, I would respond, YES! I completely agree with Michael and Anthony when they state that voting is a COLLECTIVE effort and should be viewed as a "team sport" as Michael stated. Of course, I'm sure some or many of us have felt discouraged in our political system before but as we have said many times, if we lose hope that the system can be changed (to not only benefit the rich) then what do we have to work towards, if anything? In light of this, as James somewhat shed light on the issue of blaming the victim, which in this case is the people, I believe that what you allow (as the people) is what will continue (in the government - policies, laws, etc.). We should not forget, as easy as it may be, that many before us have fought for change and achieved it. Think about slavery. Of course, I am not saying discrimination, prejudice, etc. is 100% non-existent in the United States because it is. Yet, the United States has made notable progress.
Ultimately, I strongly believe in the power of education and am hopeful in that the spread of knowledge regarding the issues discussed above will lead to the change we so desperately need.
I completely thought I had responded to this post already and apologize for replying so late!
Although I share similar sentiments with some of my fellow Verons in that voting is important for change, I do not believe it is the only avenue for change. I think our generation isn't as proactive as, maybe, other generations, but not because we are being "lazy" or apathetic, but more so because we have seen our current system try and fail, time and time again. I think our disdain in voting comes from this belief that our system ISN'T working, and therefore we should stop participating in something that isn't working. I hope this is with the intent to weaken the system in place, but because of the powers that be, this is only just giving more power to the very few that DO vote.
I think that we have to actively seek and create new avenues of eliciting change and being proactive in that without using the broken systems we have in place currently. Why can't we , collectively, bring upon some real *revolutionary* change? Yes, it would require some real work, and some real cohesiveness, but I think that over time, this can occur.
I also echo all of my fellow Verons with all of the other sentiments about voting and policy; they are all beautifully put.
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