Progressive Music Classics. "Everything That Rises Must Converge" by Shriekback

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By MARC McDONALD

Welcome to another edition of Progressive Music Classics.

The late, great Bill Hicks once lamented the decline of intellectualism in the U.S. This dumbing-down of America, he noted, started around the time Ronald Reagan was first elected. Hicks also savaged the pop music of the Reagan era and the increasing tendency of music stars to sell out to the highest corporate bidder (i.e. Madonna shilling for Pepsi, George Michael shilling for Coke).

"What kind of Reagan wet dream do we live in today?" Hicks once asked, in slamming the gutless, money-grubbing pop stars who sold out in the 1980s.

One wonders what Hicks would have thought about today's pop performers. After all, the situation is now far worse than it ever was back in the 1980s. Not only do today's pop stars have no problems whatsoever whoring themselves out to corporate America---but "selling out" rarely even generates much negative publicity these days. At least the likes of Madonna and George Michaels had Hicks around to condemn them back in the 1980s. Today, nobody seems to care.

And if all this wasn't bad enough, today's pop scene is as banal as it has ever been, thanks to the corrosive effect of the likes of Simon Cowell and the whole "American Idol" conveyor belt of soulless mediocrity that clogs up today's airwaves.

Despite Hicks' contempt for much of the music of the 1980s, I get the feeling that he might have liked a band like Britain's Shriekback. Not only did Shriekback never sell out, but their heady, intoxicating music was full of thought-provoking challenging ideas.

One of my favorite Shriekback songs is "Everything That Rises Must Converge" from the band's fine 1985 album, Oil and Gold. The album features phenomenal playing from bassist Dave Allen (whose skills powered the Marxist funk of his previous band, The Gang of Four).

"Everything That Rises Must Converge" is inspired by the 1965 short story of author Flannery O'Connor that addresses the racism of the 1960s in the American South. (O'Connor, in turn, was inspired by French philosopher Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, who, as Wikipedia notes, described "evolution as a process that leads to increasing complexity, culminating in the unification of consciousness.")

In recent times, Teilhard's ideas have been expanded upon by futurist Ray Kurzweil, who wrote the 2005 bestseller, The Singularity Is Near.

"Everything That Rises Must Converge" makes for a powerful, thought-provoking Shriekback song of the type that is sorely lacking in today's dumbed-down music scene. Today's music artists don't seem to have much to say beyond: "Be an obedient worker and a good little consumer, and don't question authority."

Incidentally, Shriekback are still an active band to this day. Their 2010 album, Life in the Loading Bay offers some of the finest music of their career.

Guns Only Give Americans The Illusion Of Freedom

By MARC McDONALD

Fact: America has by far the fewest restrictions on guns of any First World nation (as well as most of the rest of the world).

Fact: With over 2.3 million people locked up in prison, America has the biggest prison population and the highest incarceration rate of any nation on earth.

What's wrong with this picture?

Gun advocates often claim that guns play a crucial role in giving Americans freedom.

But the fact is, guns only give Americans the illusion of freedom.

America today is a nation is that is awash in guns. There are an astonishing 300 million guns now in circulation in America. But that didn't prevent our nation from turning increasingly into an oligarchy over the past three decades.

Does an abundance of readily available guns really give Americans "freedom"? I'm sure the very thought amuses America's oligarchy. After all, we saw who really controls our government in 2008, when George W. Bush bailed out the crooks on Wall Street with hundreds of billions of our tax dollars.

The true owners of America (the top .1 percent) hijacked democracy in America a long time ago. Today's U.S. government is nothing more than a concierge service to the Rich & Powerful. "Our" government no longer really serves the interests of ordinary Americans. It only serves the interests of the top ultra-wealthy elites.

The fact is, real democracy died long ago in America--and guns did nothing to prevent it from happening.

In reality, the oligarchy that controls the real levers of power in America isn't afraid of guns.

What the oligarchs are afraid of is an informed populace. They're afraid of high-quality public schools. They're afraid of organized labor. They're afraid of publicly financed elections. They're afraid of the repeal of Citizens United and the return of the Fairness Doctrine. In short, they're afraid of real democracy.

The true owners of America are afraid of any change in the law that is going to end the whole gravy train that has enriched them at the expense of the rest of us over the past three decades.

And they're sure as hell aren't afraid of a bunch of NRA types running around with pistols and shotguns.

Could the latter ever really protect America against a tyrannical government? It's absurd to think so.

Let's face it: pistols and shotguns aren't going to get the job done. Small arms will be no match against a professional military that has Predator Drones, aircraft carriers, Navy SEALs, nuclear submarines, stealth bombers, spy satellites, Abrams tanks and nuclear missiles.

However, as I mentioned, gun rights do serve a purpose in America: to fool the masses into thinking that we enjoy a lot more freedom than we really do.

You want real freedom? Try a place like Europe, where you'll find loads of freedoms that most Americans don't enjoy. In Europe, you'll find legal dope, legal gay marriage, legal euthanasia, strong workers' rights, 6 weeks annual vacations, the right to join a union without being fired, good public schools, unlimited speed limits on the autobahn, etc. etc.

Frankly, I think today's Europeans are more free in many ways than Americans are. This is reflected by the fact that Europe's prison population is tiny, compared to the astonishing 2.3 million Americans behind bars.

What's more is that in Europe, the continent's national governments by and large still serve the interests of ordinary people. They have to. Ordinary workers are informed on the issues in Europe. Either the politicians do right by them, or the people will take to the streets to demand their rights.

True, present day Europe has its share of problems (although I think many of these problems are exaggerated by the U.S. corporate media). Having traveled there recently, I've come to realize that Europe is more prosperous than many Americans realize.

The national governments of Europe may not be perfect. But overall, they at least make an attempt to serve the interests of ordinary working people. By contrast, in today's America, "our" government has nothing but contempt for working people.

Oh, and in much of Europe, you can buy a gun. Sure, you might have to fill out some forms first. You might have to deal with some red tape. And you'll have to demonstrate that you're not mentally ill. But yes: gun ownership is possible in many European nations. Which once again raises the issue of how "free" Americans really are, compared to their European counterparts.

For America's ruling oligarchy, easily available guns play a valuable role in maintaining the illusion of freedom. As the ruling oligarchy continues to hijack our democracy and loot our treasury, it really has little to fear from a population that is armed (but largely ignorant of the issues).

After all, the Rush Limbaugh crowd is never going to grasp the fact that the oligarchy is to blame for their declining standard of living. No, thanks to Rush, the dittoheads will just blame their woes on African-Americans, gays, poor people, illegal immigrants, and all the other usual scapegoats.

For America's oligarchy, easily available guns also have another useful function. They help keep the population fearful. Fear and ignorance are powerful tools in repressing America's working class.

America's easily available guns make for one other nice bonus for the Rich & Powerful.

Let's say that in the future a truly independent politician who is hostile to the oligarchy somehow manages, against all odds, to get into the White House.

Thanks to America's easily available guns, it wouldn't be hard for the oligarchy to get rid of such a troublesome politician. They could always turn around and blame a "lone nut" assassin. (They've done it before, after all). And they could always claim, "Well, it's so easy to buy a gun in America, the assassin had no problems buying his gun. It's just the price we Americans pay for living in a free nation."

Do guns really bring Americans freedom? I would argue that the opposite is true.

True freedom doesn't really come from guns. It comes from an informed, educated, politically active working class that isn't afraid to stand up for its rights. That is what the oligarchy that rules America is really scared of.

"Django Unchained" Continues Hollywood's Sad, Shameful Legacy of Dealing With Slavery Era

By MARC McDONALD

The critical adulation that greets every new movie by Quentin Tarantino is a sad commentary on our culture. Tarantino is an overrated hack who does nothing more than rip off ideas from vastly superior directors from Europe and Asia. He then waters down these ideas and re-works them into movies that are infinitely inferior to the originals.

Tarantino is hailed as a "daring" and "radical" filmmaker, when in fact his slick, commercial movies are about as daring and radical as a cup of Starbucks coffee.

Django Unchained, the latest Tarantino film, is receiving universally rave reviews, as well as big box office numbers. It has also drawn controversy (which no doubt has boosted the film's box office---as controversy always helps shift product).

I haven't seen Django Unchained and I have no intention of doing so. So why do I already detest this movie and urge my fellow progressives to boycott the film?

It's because I believe that the American film industry really has no business making mere "entertainment" movies about the slavery era.

Hell, America has never even honestly confronted this horrific chapter in our history. In fact, we are still in many ways a racist society. (The incredibly vicious right-wing attacks on President Obama over the past few years merely confirm how racist a nation America is to this day). We can try to pretend we've moved beyond racism as a nation---but we're really just fooling ourselves.

I believe most African-Americans will understand what I'm talking about. But many (if not most) white people won't---which serves to prove my point.

Django Unchained has drawn outrage from a number of notable African-Americans, including director Spike Lee.

"American Slavery Was Not A Sergio Leone Spaghetti Western," Lee recently Tweeted. "It Was A Holocaust. My Ancestors Are Slaves. Stolen From Africa. I Will Honor Them."

Lee was right. Slavery was a Holocaust. It was one of the greatest crimes in history.

Millions of Africans died during the years of slavery. And the slaves who didn't die suffered a fate that was actually worse than death.

They were locked up in chains. They were forced to work long grueling hours for no pay at the barrel of a gun. They were beaten. They were tortured. They were raped. They were bought and sold like cattle.

Slavery was a horrific crime against humanity. And it was a colossal crime that white America has never honestly confronted.

Germany killed six million Jews during World War II. But at least that nation has made an effort to try to atone at least a little bit for its crimes. Germany has paid billions of dollars in reparations over the decades. The country has also passed strict laws to try to ensure that the nation never forgets its crime. (For example, denial of the Holocaust is illegal in today's Germany).

But America has never atoned in any way for slavery. It has never paid reparations. Indeed, America continued to oppress African-Americans long after slavery ended. America brutally oppressed black people via Jim Crow laws, as well as lynchings, and it treated them like second class citizens for many decades. Black people couldn't even vote in the Deep South, all the way up until the 1960s.

Indeed, Jim Crow still exists in today's America in some ways. The huge numbers of largely low-income black men who are serving long, harsh punishments in prison for nickel-dime petty drug crimes is evidence of that.

What's particularly nauseating about today's America is that so many white people continue to be racist, but deny it.

You've met these people yourself. They include your right-wing brother-in-law who rails against "lazy blacks collecting welfare" while you're trying to enjoy your Thanksgiving meal. These are the people who bizarrely believe white people are somehow the victims of racism these days. They also believe that no black person was ever mistreated in America after 1865.

I know a number of these people. They all listen to Rush Limbaugh's racist spewings. And yet they deny that Rush is racist in any way. Indeed, these are people who privately and routinely use the "N" word (and then publicly declare that they're not racist).

I have nothing but contempt for such people. In fact, I actually have more respect for old-school bigots who were at least upfront about their racism. I'd actually prefer a racist who is at least honest enough to openly use the "N" word and express his hatred for black people. I'll take a bigot like that any day over a typical Limbaugh listener who carefully dances around the "N" word and then denies his racism.

Slavery was a horrific crime. It is not something that America should be using as a topic for mere entertainment in another of Tarantino's overrated films.

It's a sad commentary on just how abysmal the art of cinema is these days that a mediocrity like Tarantino gets the time of day.

And yet critics line up to kiss Tarantino's ass. They over-analyze and over-intellectualize his films. They read a great deal of Deep Meaning into his movies.

But Tarantino doesn't deserve such critical devotion.

For example, consider all the critical commentary and analysis that has been prompted by Tarantino's heavy usage of the "N" word in all of his movies.

Actually, there's no mystery to Tarantino's love of the "N" word. It's nothing more than a crutch to prop up his overrated, weak scripts. The fact is, the "F" word no longer packs a punch, because of over-usage. But the "N" word still does pack a punch. It's still "controversial."

Anyone who thinks there's any Deeper Meaning to Tarantino's heavy usage of the "N" word is kidding themselves.

Critics also constantly praise Tarantino for being a "daring" and "risk-taking" director. But this is nonsense. There is absolutely nothing daring and risk-taking about Tarantino. True risk-taking directors don't enjoy movies that have blockbuster worldwide box office of over $300 million (like Tarantino's last film, Inglourious Basterds did).

Speaking of Inglourious Basterds, that film revealed just how full of crap those who champion Tarantino as a risky, daring director are.

If Tarantino were really a brave director wanting to make a war movie, he would have tackled the Iraq War. That whole evil, rotten enterprise would have been a perfect target for any director who wanted to make an edgy, risky film.

In taking on the Iraq War, Tarantino could have poked a finger in the eye of the whole jingoistic Fox News/NeoCon crowd who cheered the nation into war and who ferociously attacked anyone who dared question their beloved Commander-in-Chief. (We saw a glimpse of the latter when the Dixie Chicks made what was actually a very mild criticism of George W. Bush and received an avalanche of NeoCon hatred and death threats as a result).

Yes, the Iraq War would have been a logical target for any U.S. film director who wanted to make an edgy, brave, risky statement.

So which war did Tarantino target in his movie? World War II.

Yawn.

Like there haven't already been enough films about World War II.

Of course, with Django Unchained, Tarantino is simply following in the footsteps of other Hollywood directors who have a shameful track record of films set in the slavery era.

After all, Hollywood has almost always been dishonest and cowardly when approaching the subject of slavery.

Take, for example, the very first Hollywood feature film ever made: D.W. Griffith's sad, shameful The Birth of a Nation. This was an outrageously racist film that depicted African American men as stupid and as extremely sexually aggressive towards white women. The film also glorified the Ku Klux Klan.

Hollywood's other big blockbuster set in the slavery era, Gone With the Wind, was hardly much better. This was a film that glamorized the old Deep South. Slaves were shown happily singing, laughing, dancing and enjoying a colorful agrarian lifestyle. It was a grotesque distortion of the realities of slavery.

In reducing the horrors of slavery to mere entertainment, Tarantino is carrying on a sad tradition for Hollywood (and indeed American society in general) in refusing to honestly confront America's own Holocaust. It would be impossible to imagine, say, Germany making a similar film about the Jewish Holocaust.

I can hear the Tarantino defenders already, though. "But it's just entertainment!" they'll say.

The problem is that slavery is simply too horrific a crime to be the topic of a movie made for mere entertainment (particularly coming from a white film director). White America has never honestly confronted this horrific crime.

If Hollywood is to ever properly tackle the slavery era, it needs to do so with a respectful, dignified Schindler's List type film (preferably made by an African-American director). What we don't need is an profane, cartoonish, overrated Tarantino ripoff of a Sergio Leone film.

Check Out the "Jon Swift Memorial Roundup 2012"

By MARC McDONALD

My February 9, 2012 article, "How Ronald Reagan Unwittingly Laid the Groundwork for the Death of Capitalism," was featured in Vagabond Scholar's "Jon Swift Memorial Roundup 2012." If you haven't already, be sure to check out this roundup, which offers a lot of great articles from many of the Web's top progressive blogs. And also, be sure to check out Vagabond Scholar itself, which is one of our favorite Liberal blogs. Here's to a great 2013 for all progressive bloggers everywhere.

Great GOP Moments: Craig T. Nelson Sums Up Today's Republican Mindset in One Sentence

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By MARC McDONALD

A few years ago, actor Craig T. Nelson was being interviewed by creepy GOP nutcase Glenn Beck and he made a comment that was widely ridiculed (see video above).

"I've been on food stamps and welfare, did anyone help me out? No." Nelson said.

Nelson was praising the virtues of America's "capitalistic" society. Many commentators pointed out the contradiction of Nelson's praise of a dog-eat-dog capitalist system and his admission of collecting welfare while bizarrely claiming that nobody had ever helped him out.

What many of these commentators missed though was that there really wasn't any contradiction in Nelson's comments---at least in the minds of today's Republicans.

I've talked to many Republicans over the years. The vast majority of them claim to be hard-core capitalists, who support a vicious dog-eat-dog, survival of the fittest, Ayn Rand/wet dream type society. In a nutshell, they all are strongly in favor of shutting down all government programs with the exception of the Pentagon.

Oh, and almost without exception, all of these Republicans themselves have benefited handsomely from various government programs. They've always been the first in line to claim their food stamps, jobless benefits, Medicare, and various other government programs. In fact, many of them actually work for the government. They pull down lavish taxpayer-funded paychecks and enjoy amazing benefits and pensions that are light years beyond anything that any private sector employee gets.

The latter type of Republican is well represented by the likes of extreme Far-Right radio talker Mark Levin. Levin worked as a highly paid government employee for years, pulling down a huge taxpayer-funded salary back in the 1980s. Today, this hypocritical asswipe advocates shutting down everything in the government, except for the Pentagon. (It's nice to see Levin supporting the military now, considering that this chickenhawk never served).

Actually, there's no contradiction here, at least in the minds of the Republicans themselves.

Republicans claim to be fiscal conservatives and they ferociously oppose the government helping anyone out. But that only applies to other people. Certainly not themselves.

If many of the Republicans I talk to could remake Medicare to only benefit themselves and nobody else, they'd do it in a heartbeat.

The fact is, the Republicans I've talked to are in favor of lavish, generous government spending---as long as ALL the money goes directly into their pockets---and theirs alone.

The Republicans only throw a hissy fit if anybody else is benefiting from any government program.

The fact is, Nelson's comments neatly sum up the modern GOP mindset.

NRA's Absurd Scapegoating of Violent Movies, Video Games Doesn't Hold Up to Scrutiny

By MARC McDONALD

For five days after the horrific bloodbath at Sandy Hook Elementary School, the National Rifle Association went eerily silent. They slithered under a rock and nobody heard a peep from them until Friday. The cowards even temporarily took down their Facebook page.

Finally, the NRA's head ghoul Wayne LaPierre spoke up. And in his idiotic, error-filled statement, LaPierre fell back on the one of the gun lobby's oldest scapegoating tactics. He blamed Hollywood for its violent movies, as well as video game makers. He called them "a callous, corrupt and corrupting shadow industry that sells and sows violence against its own people."

Like all the NRA's claims, though, this one doesn't hold up to scrutiny.

As film director Oliver Stone noted, Hollywood movies are viewed all over the world. And violent video games are played worldwide.

If one takes a look at Japan's culture and society, one begins to realize how idiotic LaPierre's argument is.

After all, a large percentage of the world's most popular (and violent) video games originate in Japan. So does the often hyper-violent content of Japanese manga comic books and anime cartoons. Some of the later are so blood-soaked and violent, they could never be marketed in the U.S.

Japan also has a robust film industry. And as a long-time fan of Japanese cinema, I can safely say that many of the most violent movies ever made are from Japan. A good example is the ultra-violent movie Tokyo Gore Police from 2008.

Tokyo Gore Police may well be the most violent film ever made. A jaw-dropping, astonishingly blood-soaked and hyper-violent movie, Tokyo Gore Police makes the films of controversial "bad boy" director Quentin Tarantino look tame by comparison.

In fact, as fans of Asian horror/thriller/slasher films know, many of Tarantino's films are nothing more than watered down pale imitations of the best of Asian "extreme" cinema. Tarantino rips off many of his ideas from the best of Japanese cinema and waters it all down for an American audience that, in most cases, has never been exposed to the real deal. (Films like Tokyo Gore Police, as well as the hyper-violent Japanese masterpiece Battle Royale from 2000 sadly, rarely even get a U.S. theatrical release).

Despite its sometimes hyper-violent cinema and video game industry, Japan has astonishingly little real-world violent gun crime. For example, in the year 2006, there were a grand total of two gun murders in all of Japan.

Two.

In fact, most years, gun murders in Japan range from around 10 to 20. (This, in a nation of over 126 million people). When the number hit 22 in 2007, it caused a lot of national hand-wringing about the "soaring" gun murder rate. To put that into context, though, during that same year, there were 587 Americans were killed just by guns that had discharged accidentally.

Of course, Japan does have strong gun regulations. Unlike in the U.S., in Japan, violent and mentally ill people can't just waltz into their local Wal-Mart and buy all the guns they want. Japan even screens potential gun buyers to make sure they're not crazy (gasp! what a radical idea!).

The bottom line is that LaPierre's claim that the problem is violent movies and not sensible gun laws ignores what's going on in the real world.

Thanks, NRA Cowards, For The Connecticut Bloodbath

BY MARC McDONALD



Thanks, NRA, for fighting any meaningful regulations that could help keep guns out of the hands of the violent and mentally ill. Thanks to you, guns can be bought in America as easily as a loaf of bread.

We also appreciate your work on ferociously opposing the Brady Bill (which Ronald Reagan, by the way, supported). Rest assured, though, despite your crazy, paranoid fantasies, NO meaningful action will be taken on guns in the aftermath of this latest horrible bloodbath.

Thanks to you, dozens, if not hundreds of more children will be brutally slaughtered in the decades to come.

The NRA truly is a cowardly organization. For example, they cowered under a rock and waited nearly five days to offer any kind of response to the Connecticut bloodbath. How chickensh*t is that? If they had the courage of their convictions, they would have spoken up sooner.

If you're sick of the slaughter, consider boycotting the companies that are affiliated with the NRA.

And consider signing this petition which aims to pressure the Obama Administration to produce legislation that limits access to guns.

How easy is it to get a gun in today's America? Consider this (as noted by columnist William Rivers Pitt):

"Facts: Colorado, Oregon and Wisconsin allow guns on college campuses. Mississippi likewise allows guns on college campuses, as well as in secondary schools, polling places, churches, passenger terminals at airports, and bars. Tennessee, Arizona, Georgia, Virginia and Ohio also allow guns in bars. You can shoot a gun in Missouri when you're drunk, and as long as it's considered to be in "self-defense," you're within your rights. In Vermont, you can sell a pistol to a 16-year old kid. Montana, Idaho, Wyoming, South Dakota, Utah, Arizona, Tennessee and Alaska have all passed laws saying that guns made in-state are not subject to federal regulations. The Florida "Stand Your Ground" law has gotten a lot of attention after the shooting death of Trayvon Martin, but 24 other states besides Florida have enacted similar laws.

A violent felon in Minnesota can regain their gun ownership rights if they successfully petition the court about having "good cause." In Ohio, a violent felon can retain their gun rights if they prove to a court that they have led a "law-abiding life." You can get your guns back in Georgia and Nebraska even if you've committed manslaughter and armed robbery, and in Montana, your guns will be returned to you if you didn't use a gun when you committed your crime. That seems to fly in the face of the old saw that says, "If you make guns criminal, only criminals will have guns."

Connecticut School Massacre: More Blood on the NRA's Hands

By MARC McDONALD

In the aftermath of the deadly shooting that killed 27, including 18 children, at a Connecticut elementary school, there's one theme you can expect the mainstream media to repeat over and over in the coming days.

That is: How could this tragedy possibly happen?

Actually, there's no mystery at all.

The problem is that America has practically zero meaningful regulations on guns, thanks to the assholes at the National Rifle Association, an organization that has had great success in pushing its extremist agenda on America over the past 30 years.

The NRA's vast power is the main reason that America today has far weaker gun restrictions than it did a century ago. For example, in my state of Texas, in the 1890s, it was illegal to carry a concealed gun, unlike today. Which raises a question: how, exactly, did Texans manage to get by back in the 1890s with gun laws that were more restrictive than what we have now?

One issue that I never hear discussed when there is a tragedy like this is (ironically enough) the Second Amendment's actual text. Oh, sure, the gun nuts regularly talk about the Second Amendment in a general sense. But nobody ever actually cites the actual wording of the amendment.

There's a good reason for this. Despite what the gun nuts would have us believe, the wording of the Second Amendment is very convoluted and vague.

Here is the text of Second Amendment:

"A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed."

Yes, it does contain the text, "the right of the people to keep and bear Arms." But the gun nuts tend to overlook the inconvenient words that precede the latter.

"Well regulated"?

Gasp! Who wrote this? Nancy Pelosi?

Needless to say, the gun nuts quietly tiptoe away from this part of the amendment.

So what, exactly, does the Second Amendment mean? Does it mean that the government can pass absolutely no restrictions on guns whatsoever (as the NRA would have us believe)?

I'm sure the gun nuts would emphatically say "Yes!"

The problem is the Second Amendment's actual wording itself. I don't claim to be an expert on the Bill of the Rights. But in reading the Second Amendment, with its reference to a "well regulated militia," I just don't see that the amendment forbids any and all restrictions on arms, despite what the NRA would have us believe.

I'd suspect that most Americans would agree with me on this point. In fact, if more Americans were aware of the actual wording of the Second Amendment, I'd suspect even more people would agree with me.

Amazingly, even most gun nuts seem to be unaware of the actual text of their beloved Second Amendment. Here in Texas over the years, I've had countless conversations with gun nuts. Without exception, every time I've asked them to quote the Second Amendment's actual wording, they've been unable to do it. And it's not like I'm asking them to quote a lengthy passage. We're only talking about one sentence.

It's interesting to note that, before the massive wealth of the NRA helped that group achieve its iron-grip on American politics, starting around 30 years ago, gun restrictions were not even that controversial in America.

The fact is, even in the Old West, gun control was accepted as necessary. The f*cking Old West!

The Hollywood image of the Old West, where everyone is walking around with gun holsters is pure fiction. We live in truly surreal times when even the Old West had stricter gun laws that we have today.

Incidentally, a predictable argument of the gun nuts is always "This shooter would have been able to get a gun regardless of any gun control laws." It's an absurd argument. It raises a question: then why have any laws at all in America, if there are always some people out there who won't obey them?

Yes, a determined shooter could get a gun, regardless of any gun laws. But in the real world, a few sensible gun laws can and will reduce easy availability to guns. The entire rest of the industrialized world is my "Exhibit A" on this point.

A determined shooter could get a gun in a nation like England or Japan, regardless of those nations' strict anti-gun laws. But in the real world, few shooters do, and as a result those nations (like the entire rest of the First World) has a fraction of the violent gun crime that the U.S. has.

Note: when I've pointed this out to the gun nuts over the years, it's always their predictable cue to bring up the race card. "But those countries don't have as many blacks as we do," they say.

In fact, in my debates with the gun nuts over the years on the various woes afflicting U.S. society, they always bring up this point as a last resort. "But America, unlike Europe and Japan, has black people!" they always claim.

This last point confirms my belief about a lot of these NRA/GOP types. They're racists, pure and simple. They prefer to scapegoat other people for all of America's problems. It's always amusing listening to them vehemently deny that they're racist. I mean, these are the same people who pollute their minds with Rush Limbaugh's racist filth, day after day and then claim that they don't see anything racist about Rush.

OK, I will concede one point. Yes, it is true that, for various reason, per capita, black people do more gun-related crime than white people do in the U.S. But if you do the math, this still doesn't account for the staggering disparity in violent gun crime rates between the U.S. and the rest of the First World.

So my message to the NRA gun nuts is this: take your extremism and ram it up your ass. (And do the same with your racism).

Oh, and despite what you retards believe, Rush Limbaugh is in fact a racist piece of sh*t. So is any gun nut who claims that America's shockingly high gun violence rates are mainly because of black people.

Thank you, NRA. The blood of these children is on your hands.

Five Lingering Unsolved Mysteries From the JFK Assassination

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By MARC McDONALD

It has now been 49 years since President John F. Kennedy was assassinated. Since then, thousands of books have been written about what is probably the single biggest unsolved mystery of the 20th century. After nearly half a century, it's becoming increasingly clear that we may never fully understand what happened that day.

I myself have long harbored doubts about the government's own seriously flawed version of what happened in Dealey Plaza. The 1964 Warren Commission Report has rightfully been criticized over the years for the inaccuracies and flawed information it contained.

The vast majority of Kennedy assassination books over the decades have concluded that there was a conspiracy to kill JFK. However, many conspiracy theories themselves have been debunked over the years. In fact, sloppy work by conspiracy writers has, in my view, damaged the quest for truth in the case.

Authors like Gerald Posner, who have worked to debunk conspiracies, have in turn been harshly criticized by the pro-conspiracy community. Posner's book, Case Closed: Lee Harvey Oswald and the Assassination of JFK was once praised as a solid rebuttal to the conspiracy writers. But in recent years, Posner has increasingly come under fire and his reputation has taken a beating (even among those who believe Oswald acted alone).

One problem that plagues works like Posner's book (as well as pro-conspiracy works like Oliver Stone's JFK film) is that the case is simply too vast and complex to be adequately addressed in a single work.

After reading numerous JFK assassination books over the years, both pro and con, I still keep an open mind about the case. I'm not 100 percent convinced, either way, although I do lean toward the theory that Oswald did not act alone.

In any case, there are still unresolved mysteries surrounding the JFK Assassination that haven't been adequately explained to this day. Here are five of them.

1. What happened to Mary Moorman's missing fifth photo in Dealey Plaza? Moorman is known for her famous Polaroid photo that captures the JFK assassination at nearly the precise instant the head shot occurred. What is less well-known, though, is that Moorman took other photos that day. One photo she took moments before the assassination reportedly depicted the sixth-floor window of the Texas School Book Depository. The photo was reportedly turned over to Secret Service agents shortly after the assassination and vanished from sight. It has never been published and it remains missing to this day.

2. Why was Oswald's handwritten note to FBI agent James Hosty destroyed? Oswald wrote a note to Hosty a week or two before the assassination. Within hours of Oswald's death on Nov. 24, 1963, the note was torn up and flushed down the toilet by Hosty. Hosty had claimed his superior, Gordon Shanklin, had ordered him to destroy the note. However, Shanklin denied this. The lingering mystery, though, is exactly what the contents of Oswald's note were and why the note was destroyed in the first place.

3. Whatever happened to the mysterious "Babushka Lady," who was seen in the Zapruder film of the assassination? Zapruder's film depicts a woman wearing a head scarf who in turn is filming the JFK motorcade at the moment of the assassination. Given that the Babushka Lady is very close to the motorcade, her film would offer invaluable evidence if it could be located today. The problem is, shortly after the assassination, the Babushka Lady and her film vanished from history. In 1970, a woman named Beverly Oliver came forward and claimed she was the Babushka Lady and that her film was confiscated by the FBI. But her story has never been confirmed.

4. What happened in the mysterious death of Oswald's friend, George de Mohrenschildt? A noted member of the Russian emigre community in Dallas, De Mohrenschildt became an unlikely friend of Oswald in 1962. He testified at length before the Warren Commission in 1964. In later years, he became increasingly depressed and distraught and believed the CIA was persecuting him. On March 29, 1977, de Mohrenschildt was contacted by an investigator with the House Select Committee on Assassinations, asking for an interview. That same day, de Mohrenschildt was found dead from a gunshot wound. De Mohrenschildt's death has been called a suicide, but its timing does seem mysterious.

5. Did Joseph Milteer have foreknowledge of the assassination? 13 days before the assassination, right-wing extremist Milteer gave tape-recorded comments to a Miami police informant that eerily predicted key details of the JFK assassination. Milteer claimed that a conspiracy to kill Kennedy was in the works and described a scenario in which the president would be shot "from an office building with a high-powered rifle." Milteer also predicted that, in the aftermath of the assassination, the police would arrest a patsy "to throw the public off." Amazingly, the Warren Commission gave very little attention to Milteer's interview. Milteer remains a shadowy and mysterious figure to this day. His 1963 tape-recorded remarks can be heard in the video above.

Tea Party Played Key Role in Romney's Defeat

By MARC McDONALD

Shell-shocked Republicans are continuing to do a post-mortem on why Mitt Romney's bid for the White House was a flop. But in trying to understand their defeat, they really need to point the finger of blame at a section of the GOP itself: the Tea Party.

Since it sprang into action a few years ago, the Tea Party has prided itself on "re-energizing" the GOP base and returning the party to its core principles. And indeed, the Tea Party did inspire a lot of Conservatives who had been dismayed by the likes of big-spending George W. Bush (even though the Tea Party only started making a big fuss when President Obama entered the White House).

The Tea Party made itself into a force to be reckoned within the GOP. It was a force that could no longer be ignored by party leaders. Which meant that the "moderate" Romney was obligated to pick a Tea Party favorite as his VP selection.

Paul Ryan may have delighted the Tea Partiers. But his hard-line extremism scared the hell out of the rest of us. Far from enhancing the Romney ticket, it's clear that Ryan was a liability from Day One.

Ryan's presence on the ticket demonstrates that the GOP still hasn't grasped one of the cardinal rules of U.S. politics. That is: you don't screw with Medicare. No matter how much lipstick the GOP tried to put on Ryan's "voucher" pig, most non-Fox News-watching voters saw it for what it was: the first step toward ending Medicare entirely.

Frankly, the Tea Party should take much of the blame for Romney's failed White House bid. Yes, the movement did inspire a segment of the GOP. But in doing so, it poisoned the overall GOP brand.

In keeping Tea Party figures like Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann out of the spotlight during the GOP convention, the GOP tried to downplay the extremist crazies in the party that scared middle-of-the-road voters. Oddly, though, the GOP didn't grasp that it'd be a problem if a Tea Party extremist was given the VP nod.

Tea Partiers have long claimed that they're working to "save" America and return the GOP to its roots. But really, all the movement has accomplished is to damage the Republican brand and to make average voters wary of an increasingly extreme GOP.

Obama Wins Re-election: Eat It, Citizens United

By MARC McDONALD

I'm not sure how on earth President Obama prevailed over the array of powerful and sinister forces arrayed against him. But he did---and he's now going to be our president for the next four years.

It's quite an impressive accomplishment. Consider all the obstacles Obama faced:

1. "Citizens United" which pretty much handed over to rich & powerful corporations the right to buy elections in America. Obama somehow overcame the vast sums of money that the likes of ExxonMobil and Walmart and the Koch brothers were able to throw into Romney's campaign. I'm not sure how Obama prevailed. And I'm certain that, despite this victory, the threat to American democracy that Citizens United poses remains very real and ongoing. "Citizens United" will continue to threaten American democracy until it is repealed.

2. The vast GOP propaganda apparatus of Fox "News," Drudge, Limbaugh and the rest of hatewing radio. Despite their vicious and relentless attacks on Obama, somehow the truth prevailed.

3. Romney's constant flipflops and outrageous lies. Romney is the biggest liar to ever pursue the office of president. Considering that the mainstream media rarely even bothered to counter his lies, it's astonishing that more people weren't deluded into supporting him.

4. Various GOP dirty tricks. From the shenanigans involving voting machines in Ohio to the GOP's suppression of the voting rights of minorities, things turned out infinitely better than what a lot of us progressives had dared to hope for.

Congratulations to President Obama. Here's to another four years.

Fighting Back Against the GOP's Suppression of the Black Vote

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By MARC McDONALD

The GOP's suppression of the African-American vote is increasing with every election. It could well tip the balance of tomorrow's election to Mitt Romney.

As usual, the site ColorOfChange.org is documenting this sad fact of modern day American life. As the site notes:

"We're making a strong push to mobilize Black voters and our allies leading up to Election Day on November 6. We need people across the country to hear this message, and we need your help to spread the word. Help us get out the vote by sharing this powerful video demonstrating how our community has stood up against suppression efforts decade after decade, election after election."

Click here to get updates from ColorOfChange.org's efforts to fight back against the GOP's suppression of the African-American vote.

ColorOfChange.org is also teaming up with Video the Vote to find volunteers to help document voting irregularities on Election Day.

As the site notes: "By recording activity at polling places, you’ll help keep groups like True the Vote and their right-wing allies in check, and provide evidence in case they cross the line."

Go here to sign up.