Conscientious Non-Voting

The Case for Conscientious Non-Voting Part 7
Christ and Tolstoy

Since about 1979, the Christian church and the Republican Party of the US have “co-branded” patriotism and religion in the United States. That in and of itself is a series of strange events since and evangelical Democrat named Jimmy Carter was president at the time. The genesis is this; Carter supported the lawsuit that ended up at the US Supreme Court that forced religious colleges admit black students. Prior to that, evangelicals around the US had stayed out of politics since at least the time of the Scopes Monkey Trial in 1925.

Of course, this is not the first time co-branding has happened, nor will it be the last. It probably first happened in the Christian church in 325 CE when the Roman Emperor Constantine standardized the books of the Bible. Presto, the “Holy” Roman Empire was born. How the words “holy” and “empire” can be used in the same sentence is beyond my ability to comprehend. Other faiths co-branded religion and patriotism prior to 325 CE of course. The ancient Mayans did it in Central America before Columbus landed. Much of the Muslim world is doing it today. It is a sure bet that once an individual abandons reason for faith, and starts believing things like a savior being virgin-born; it is a short hop to becoming a tool of the state. Evangelical Christians, especially in the southern US, have been a tool of the Republican Party since 1979, plain and simple.

The Republican/Christian connection has been so well ingrained into the American political psyche that usually thinks of them as the same. It has been an amazing thing for me to witness over the last 29 years.

There is a bigger question: should Christians participate in electoral politics at all? I will be the first to admit that the Bible is a pretty lousy source document. Early Christian leaders destroyed “heretical” documents, especially those writing by the Gnostics. Only in the last 60 years or so are we re-discovering those documents and analyzing them. Further, early leaders altered combined writings and totally skipped the “missing” years of Jesus.

We know very little about the authors of the Bible either. It is, at best, a second-hand account of Christ’s words and teachings. Since it is impossible to know what Christ said exactly, we have to use our best judgment. All that being said, let’s go back to the original question, should Christians participate in politics? If one is to read Leo Tolstoy, one of the greatest writers and Christians to ever live, the answer is “no,” Christians should not participate in politics. Tolstoy’s most famous book during the latter period of his life is entitled, “The Kingdom of God is Within You.” The title is, of course, taken from Christ’s most famous sermon, “The Sermon on the Mount (TSOTM).”

One would think that Christian denominations would follow the most famous sermon of its founder before following other teachings. That would only seem logical. In fact, you would be seriously wrong if you made that assumption.

A quick Wikipedia search of TSOTM turns up some interesting information. There are 12 major schools of thought in interpreting the sermon according to McArthur. The one most closely associated with TSOTM are the “peace churches.” Specifically, these sects are:

Church of the Brethren,
the Mennonites
the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers)
Amish
Hutterites
Old German Baptist Brethren
Old Order River Brethren
others in the Anabaptist tradition
Doukhobors
Molokans
Bruderhof Communities
Schwenkfelders
Moravians
Shakers
Community of Christ
Churches of Christ
Jehovah's Witnesses
Seventh-day Adventist Church
Fellowship of Reconciliation



Most scholars would agree that these are smaller sects of Christianity. It’s hard to believe that the smallest subgroup of Christianity is the only ones following Christ’s most famous teachings.

Wiki also says there are no source hypotheses for TSOTM. I would disagree. There is a growing body of evidence that the origin of TSOTM is Indian. The “kingdom of God is in you” is an Indian thought not Jewish. Hindu and Yoga (and to a lesser extent Buddhism and Jain) philosophies share this idea. Non-violence is an Indian idea. In fact, TSOTM shares 4 of the 5 vows common to the Indian philosophies. It only sounds “unique” to Jewish ears of the 1st century. Since this sermon was written from memory years after it was delivered it is understandable why one vow may have been omitted.

Excavations of the library in Alexandria Egypt are stating to turn up Asian skeletons from around the time of Christ. We know that religious seekers traveled between the Middle East and India before, during and after the time of Christ. The Thomas Christians are a sect founded in India by Thomas the disciple. And, of course, there are “the missing years” of Jesus. He probably went to India or Alexandria and studied with Buddhists. Jesus was probably a Buddhist, get over it.

Tolstoy was very interested in TSOTM. He noted that there is a difference between the Christian church and Christ. He believed Christ was human, not divine. Heaven and hell were unknowable. In fact, he was ready to accept that Christ might not have spoken the words in TSOTM. Frankly, scholars don’t know who wrote those words. “Matthew” appears not to be one person, but many. The important element in Tolstoy’s mind is that humankind should follow the words even if Christ never spoke them. He firmly believed in TSOTM as a salvation for humankind, and he believed the Christian church strayed away from Christ’s teaching in 325 CE.

What are the key points contained within TSOTM that Tolstoy so firmly believed:

Live in peace with all men
Be pure
Take no oaths
Resist not evil by force
Renounce national distinctions

Today, we would interpret “resist not evil by force” as non-violence such as that as practiced by MK Gandhi, ML King, Reverend Desmund Tutu, Thich Nhat Hahn,Father Oscar Romero etc. Gandhi was a big fan of both TSOTM and Mr. Tolstoy and corresponded with Tolstoy after reading this book.

I have been deeply involved in the peace movement since late 2001. In that time, I’ve interacted with many religious people. For the most part, these peace-loving religious people practice the universal truth of non-violence. When we look at the spiritual leaders above, it is plain to see that once they make non-violence they pass into a higher state, call it what you will.

Now some words from Tolstoy himself on the ideas of government:


(NOTE: all page numbers are referenced from “The Kingdom of God is Within You”)


“To suggest to governments that they should not have recourse to violence, but should decide their misunderstandings in accordance with equity, is inviting them to abolish themselves as rulers, and that no government can ever do.” Page 110

The error arises from the learned jurists deceiving themselves and others by asserting that government is not what it really is, one set of men banded together to oppress another set of men” p. 111

“No one has an absolute right to govern others” page 116

“We are enslaved by the laws we set up for our protection, which have become our oppression” Page 118

“All state obligations…to which people appear to submit voluntarily, are always based on bodily violence or the threat of it….The basis of authority is violence” page 127

“All methods of appointing authorities that have been tried, divine right, and election and heredity, and balloting, and assemblies, and parliaments and senate-have all proved ineffectual” page 128

“Governments assert that armies are needed above all for external defense, but that is not true. They are needed principally against their subjects and every man, under universal military service becomes an accomplice in all the acts of violence of the government against the citizens….page 134

On oaths:

“For a Christian the oath of allegiance to any government whatever-the very act of which is regarded as the foundation of the existence of a state is a direct renunciation of Christianity” page 162

“Those who refuse to take the oath of allegiance refuse because to promise obedience to authorities, that is, to men who are given to acts of violence is contrary to the sense of Christ’s teachings.” Page 176


Elections and Christian participation:

“…elect others or be yourself elected, to take a pretended share in the government knowing all the while that the government will proceed quite without regard to the foolish speeches you, and those like you, may utter, and knowing that its proceedings will according…to those who have the army in their hands” page 167

Why should I go wasting my time and hoodwinking myself, giving to miscreant evildoers a semblance of legality by taking part in elections, and pretending that I am taking part in the government, when I know very well that the real control of the government is in the hands of those who got hold of the army? Page 167

“The Christian says: I know nothing about the form of government, I don’t know whether it is good or bad, and I don’t want to overturn precisely because I don’t know whether it is good or bad, but for the very same reason I don’t want to support it either. …All state obligations are against the conscience of a Christian…” page 176

“The progressive movement of humanity does not proceed from the better elements of society seizing power and making those who are subject to them better” page 189


One of the famous tennis-playing Williams sisters was asked recently if she was voting for Obama. She replied that she did not vote because she was a Jehovah’s Witness. I would disagree with much of that faith, but they do follow TSOTM better than most and that is what is most important.

She is in the company of Leo Tolstoy.

It is undeniable that, since 1979, US evangelicals have been violating the main teaching of Christ. Frankly, it is not understandable to me. Aren’t they the ones who believe that the Bible is the written word of God and are supposed to be following it? Early Americna Baptists insisted that an amendment be placed in the new constitution separating church and state, not to put religion into the state, but to keep the state out of the church. It looks to me like evangelicals could learn a thing or two from the peace churches.

by Joey King
jbkranger@aol.com

LaRive to Host Final Rally

Socialist Presidential Candidates Gloria La Riva and Eugene Puryear
to Hold Final Campaign Rally

Gloria La Riva and Eugene Puryear, presidential and vice presidential candidates for the Party for Socialism and Liberation, will be the featured speakers at a campaign rally on Saturday, November 1 at 5pm. The PSL has carried out a national campaign to say what the Obama and McCain campaigns won’t say: that the system is broken and can’t be fixed within the bounds of the profit-driven capitalist system. “Socialism is the only answer to the crises that poor and working people in this country have been living,” La Riva said. “We know what capitalism has in store for us in the next four years, no matter who wins next Tuesday: layoffs, cutbacks, police brutality and war.”

One aspect of the PSL presidential campaign has been to put a spotlight on the crisis of police brutality. For weeks, supporters of the La Riva/Puryear campaign have been collecting evidence of police abuse and brutality. The police brutality crisis is national in scope, but the criminal cops never face justice in the courts, and neither big business candidates wants to address it. "The crisis," Puryear said, "has reached epidemic proportions in New York and other cities across the country." Part of the program at Saturday’s rally will be devoted to presenting the evidence and witnesses that the PSL has collected.

Party for Socialism and Liberation presidential candidate Gloria La Riva, and her running mate Eugene Puryear will also be addressing real solutions to the economic crisis, including an immediate end to foreclosures, evictions and rent hikes. "The only bailout that my campaign supports is one that would bail out working people, not the bankers that are at the source of the problem," says La Riva. Speakers at Saturday’s rally will present evidence of what the economic crisis has already meant for poor and working people.

La Riva, and Puryear are active organizers in the movement calling for an immediate end to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. They call for the withdrawal of all U.S. military from the 800 bases it occupies around the world and to re-direct the billions wasted on war to programs that create jobs and pay for health and human services right here at home.

Come out to the Harlem YMCA in New York City on Saturday, Nov. 1 to hear testimony, presentations and reports that put the whole system on trial. Both Gloria La Riva and Eugene Puryear have been on separate speaking tours throughout the country, but they are converging in Harlem to address this forum. This is an exciting opportunity just three days before the general election.

The PSL Candidates are on the ballot in 12 states including, New York.

"No matter who wins the election on November 4 the crisis facing poor and working people will continue as will the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan," said La Riva. "The Democrats and Republicans are the political parties of extreme wealth in a criminal system of exploitation and oppression." The forum at the Harlem YMCA will present a truly alternative view: a socialist view.

Visit: VotePSL.org

The Flawed Economic of Nuclear Power

THE FLAWED ECONOMICS OF NUCLEAR POWER
http://www.earthpolicy.org/Updates/2008/Update78.htm
Lester R. Brown

Over the last few years the nuclear industry has used concerns about climate change to argue for a nuclear revival. Although industry representatives may have convinced some political leaders that this is a good idea, there is little evidence of private capital investing in nuclear plants in competitive electricity markets. The reason is simple: nuclear power is uneconomical.


In an excellent recent analysis, "The Nuclear Illusion," Amory B. Lovins and Imran Sheikh put the cost of electricity from a new nuclear power plant at 14¢ per kilowatt hour and that from a wind farm at 7¢ per kilowatt hour. This comparison includes the costs of fuel, capital, operations and maintenance, and transmission and distribution. It does not include the additional costs for nuclear of disposing of waste, insuring plants against an accident, and decommissioning the plants when they wear out. Given this huge gap, the so-called nuclear revival can succeed only by unloading these costs onto taxpayers. If all the costs of generating nuclear electricity are included in the price to consumers, nuclear power is dead in the water.


To get a sense of the costs of nuclear waste disposal, we need not look beyond the United States, which leads the world with 101,000 megawatts of nuclear-generating capacity (compared with 63,000 megawatts in second-ranked France). The United States proposes to store the radioactive waste from its 104 nuclear power reactors in the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository, roughly 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, Nevada. The cost of this repository, originally estimated at $58 billion in 2001, climbed to $96 billion by 2008. This comes to a staggering $923 million per reactor--almost $1 billion each-assuming no further repository cost increases. (See data at www.earthpolicy.org/Updates/2008/Update78_data.htm).


In addition to being over budget, the repository is 19 years behind schedule. Originally slated to start accepting waste in 1998, it is now set to do so in 2017, assuming it clears all remaining hurdles. This leaves nuclear waste in storage in 121 temporary facilities in 39 states--sites that are vulnerable both to leakage and to terrorist attacks.


One of the risks of nuclear power is a catastrophic accident like the one at Chernobyl in Russia. The Price-Anderson Act, first enacted by Congress in 1957, shelters U.S. utilities with nuclear power plants from the cost of such an accident. Under the act, utilities are required to maintain private accident insurance of $300 million per reactor--the maximum the insurance industry will provide. In the event of a catastrophic accident, every nuclear utility would be required to contribute up to $95.8 million for each licensed reactor to a pool to help cover the accident's cost.


The collective cap on nuclear operator liability is $10.2 billion. This compares with an estimate by Sandia National Laboratory that a worst-case accident could cost $700 billion, a sum equal to the recent U.S. financial bailout. So anything above $10.2 billion would be covered by taxpayers.


Another huge cost of nuclear power involves decommissioning the plants when they wear out. A 2004 International Atomic Energy Agency report estimates the decommissioning cost per reactor at $250-500 million, excluding the cost of removing and disposing of the spent nuclear fuel. But recent estimates for some reactors, such as the U.K. Magnox reactors that have high decommissioning waste volumes, decommissioning costs can reach $1.8 billion per reactor.


In addition to the costs just cited, the industry must cope with rising construction and fuel expenses. Two years ago, building a 1,500-megawatt nuclear plant was estimated to cost $2-4 billion. As of late 2008, that figure had climbed past $7 billion, reflecting primarily the scarcity of essential engineering and construction skills in a fading industry.


Nuclear fuel costs have risen even more rapidly. At the beginning of this decade uranium cost roughly $10 per pound. Today it costs more than $60 per pound. The higher uranium price reflects the need to move to ever deeper mines, which increases the energy needed to extract the ore, and the shift to lower-grade ore. In the United States in the late 1950s, for example, uranium ore contained roughly 0.28 percent uranium oxide. By the 1990s, it had dropped to 0.09 percent. This means, of course, that the cost of mining larger quantities of ore, and that of getting it from deeper mines, ensures even higher future costs of nuclear fuel.


Few nuclear power plants are being built in countries with competitive electricity markets. The reason is simple. Nuclear cannot compete with other electricity sources. This explains why nuclear plant construction is now concentrated in countries like Russia and China where nuclear development is state-controlled. The high cost of nuclear power also explains why so few plants are being built compared with a generation ago.


In an illuminating article in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, nuclear consultant Mycle Schneider projects an imminent decline in world nuclear generating capacity. He notes there are currently 439 operating reactors worldwide. To date, 119 reactors have been closed, at an average age of 22 years. If we generously assume a much longer average lifespan of 40 years, then 93 reactors will close between 2008 and 2015. Another 192 will close between 2016 and 2025. And the remaining 154 will close after 2025.


But only 36 nuclear reactors are currently under construction worldwide--31 of them in Eastern Europe and Asia. Although there is much talk of building new nuclear plants in the United States, there are none under construction.


What these numbers indicate, Schneider points out, is that plant closings will soon exceed plant openings--and by a widening margin in the years ahead. The trend is clear. From 2000 to 2005, an average of 4,000 megawatts of nuclear generating capacity was added each year. Since 2005, this has dropped to only 1,000 megawatts of additional capacity per year.


Even if all reactors scheduled to come online by 2015 make it, the projected closing of 93 nuclear reactors by then will drop nuclear power generation roughly 10 percent below the current level. Unless governments start routinely granting operating permits for reactors more than 40 years old, a half-century of growth in world nuclear generating capacity is about to be replaced by a long-term decline.


Despite all the industry hype about a nuclear future, private investors are openly skeptical. In fact, while little private capital is going into nuclear power, investors are pouring tens of billions of dollars into wind farms each year. And while the world's nuclear generating capacity is estimated to expand by only 1,000 megawatts this year, wind generating capacity will likely grow by 30,000 megawatts. In addition, solar cell installations and the construction of solar thermal and geothermal power plants are all growing by leaps and bounds.


The reason for this extraordinary gap between the construction of nuclear power plants and wind farms is simple: wind is much more attractive economically. Wind yields more energy, more jobs, and more carbon reduction per dollar invested than nuclear. Though nuclear power plants are still being built in some countries and governments are talking them up in others, the reality is that we are entering the age of wind, solar, and geothermal energy.


# # #


Lester R. Brown is president of Earth Policy Institute and author of Plan B 3.0: Mobilizing to Save Civilization, available at www.earthpolicy.org for free downloading.


Data and additional resources are at www.earthpolicy.org


For information contact:


Media Contact:
Reah Janise Kauffman
Tel: (202) 496-9290 x 12
E-mail: rjk (at) earthpolicy.org


Research Contact:
Janet Larsen
Tel: (202) 496-9290 x 14
E-mail: jlarsen (at) earthpolicy.org


Earth Policy Institute
1350 Connecticut Ave. NW, Suite 403
Washington, DC 20036
Web: www.earthpolicy.org

The Flawed Economics of Nuclear Power

by Lester R. Brown

Over the last few years the nuclear industry has used concerns about climate change to argue for a nuclear revival. Although industry representatives may have convinced some political leaders that this is a good idea, there is little evidence of private capital investing in nuclear plants in competitive electricity markets. The reason is simple: nuclear power is uneconomical.


In an excellent recent analysis, "The Nuclear Illusion," Amory B. Lovins and Imran Sheikh put the cost of electricity from a new nuclear power plant at 14¢ per kilowatt hour and that from a wind farm at 7¢ per kilowatt hour. This comparison includes the costs of fuel, capital, operations and maintenance, and transmission and distribution. It does not include the additional costs for nuclear of disposing of waste, insuring plants against an accident, and decommissioning the plants when they wear out. Given this huge gap, the so-called nuclear revival can succeed only by unloading these costs onto taxpayers. If all the costs of generating nuclear electricity are included in the price to consumers, nuclear power is dead in the water.


To get a sense of the costs of nuclear waste disposal, we need not look beyond the United States, which leads the world with 101,000 megawatts of nuclear-generating capacity (compared with 63,000 megawatts in second-ranked France). The United States proposes to store the radioactive waste from its 104 nuclear power reactors in the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository, roughly 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, Nevada. The cost of this repository, originally estimated at $58 billion in 2001, climbed to $96 billion by 2008. This comes to a staggering $923 million per reactor--almost $1 billion each-assuming no further repository cost increases. (See data at www.earthpolicy.org/Updates/2008/Update78_data.htm).


In addition to being over budget, the repository is 19 years behind schedule. Originally slated to start accepting waste in 1998, it is now set to do so in 2017, assuming it clears all remaining hurdles. This leaves nuclear waste in storage in 121 temporary facilities in 39 states--sites that are vulnerable both to leakage and to terrorist attacks.


One of the risks of nuclear power is a catastrophic accident like the one at Chernobyl in Russia. The Price-Anderson Act, first enacted by Congress in 1957, shelters U.S. utilities with nuclear power plants from the cost of such an accident. Under the act, utilities are required to maintain private accident insurance of $300 million per reactor--the maximum the insurance industry will provide. In the event of a catastrophic accident, every nuclear utility would be required to contribute up to $95.8 million for each licensed reactor to a pool to help cover the accident's cost.


The collective cap on nuclear operator liability is $10.2 billion. This compares with an estimate by Sandia National Laboratory that a worst-case accident could cost $700 billion, a sum equal to the recent U.S. financial bailout. So anything above $10.2 billion would be covered by taxpayers.


Another huge cost of nuclear power involves decommissioning the plants when they wear out. A 2004 International Atomic Energy Agency report estimates the decommissioning cost per reactor at $250-500 million, excluding the cost of removing and disposing of the spent nuclear fuel. But recent estimates for some reactors, such as the U.K. Magnox reactors that have high decommissioning waste volumes, decommissioning costs can reach $1.8 billion per reactor.


In addition to the costs just cited, the industry must cope with rising construction and fuel expenses. Two years ago, building a 1,500-megawatt nuclear plant was estimated to cost $2-4 billion. As of late 2008, that figure had climbed past $7 billion, reflecting primarily the scarcity of essential engineering and construction skills in a fading industry.


Nuclear fuel costs have risen even more rapidly. At the beginning of this decade uranium cost roughly $10 per pound. Today it costs more than $60 per pound. The higher uranium price reflects the need to move to ever deeper mines, which increases the energy needed to extract the ore, and the shift to lower-grade ore. In the United States in the late 1950s, for example, uranium ore contained roughly 0.28 percent uranium oxide. By the 1990s, it had dropped to 0.09 percent. This means, of course, that the cost of mining larger quantities of ore, and that of getting it from deeper mines, ensures even higher future costs of nuclear fuel.


Few nuclear power plants are being built in countries with competitive electricity markets. The reason is simple. Nuclear cannot compete with other electricity sources. This explains why nuclear plant construction is now concentrated in countries like Russia and China where nuclear development is state-controlled. The high cost of nuclear power also explains why so few plants are being built compared with a generation ago.


In an illuminating article in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, nuclear consultant Mycle Schneider projects an imminent decline in world nuclear generating capacity. He notes there are currently 439 operating reactors worldwide. To date, 119 reactors have been closed, at an average age of 22 years. If we generously assume a much longer average lifespan of 40 years, then 93 reactors will close between 2008 and 2015. Another 192 will close between 2016 and 2025. And the remaining 154 will close after 2025.


But only 36 nuclear reactors are currently under construction worldwide--31 of them in Eastern Europe and Asia. Although there is much talk of building new nuclear plants in the United States, there are none under construction.


What these numbers indicate, Schneider points out, is that plant closings will soon exceed plant openings--and by a widening margin in the years ahead. The trend is clear. From 2000 to 2005, an average of 4,000 megawatts of nuclear generating capacity was added each year. Since 2005, this has dropped to only 1,000 megawatts of additional capacity per year.


Even if all reactors scheduled to come online by 2015 make it, the projected closing of 93 nuclear reactors by then will drop nuclear power generation roughly 10 percent below the current level. Unless governments start routinely granting operating permits for reactors more than 40 years old, a half-century of growth in world nuclear generating capacity is about to be replaced by a long-term decline.


Despite all the industry hype about a nuclear future, private investors are openly skeptical. In fact, while little private capital is going into nuclear power, investors are pouring tens of billions of dollars into wind farms each year. And while the world's nuclear generating capacity is estimated to expand by only 1,000 megawatts this year, wind generating capacity will likely grow by 30,000 megawatts. In addition, solar cell installations and the construction of solar thermal and geothermal power plants are all growing by leaps and bounds.


The reason for this extraordinary gap between the construction of nuclear power plants and wind farms is simple: wind is much more attractive economically. Wind yields more energy, more jobs, and more carbon reduction per dollar invested than nuclear. Though nuclear power plants are still being built in some countries and governments are talking them up in others, the reality is that we are entering the age of wind, solar, and geothermal energy.


# # #


Lester R. Brown is president of Earth Policy Institute and author of Plan B 3.0: Mobilizing to Save Civilization, available at www.earthpolicy.org for free downloading.


Data and additional resources are at www.earthpolicy.org

Vanderbilt Adopts Non-Discrimination

Vanderbilt Adopts Fully Inclusive Non-Discrimination Policy

Recently, Vanderbilt University became the latest institution of higher learning to expand its non-discriminaiton plicy to include gender identity, thus banning all forms of discrimination against transgender students, staff, and faculty.

You can view the updated Vanderbilt policy by clicking here or by opening the attachment to this announcement.

Vanderbilt joins University of Tennessee at Knoxville (December 2007) and the Tennessee Board of Regents (February 2008) in adopting fully inclusive non-discrimination policies.

We want to thank the students, staff, and faculty at Vanderbilt who worked with the Tennessee Transgender Political Coalition to raise awareness among administrators of the need to expand the policy. The work that was done by so many will now ensure a safe and fair environment for all lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender students, staff and faculty at Vanderbilt University. We encourage the remaining institutions of higher learning, to follow suit.

With one of Nashville's largest private employers adopting a fully inclusive non-discrimination policy, we hope this will lead to a fully inclusive non-discrimination policy for all employees througout Nashville and across Tennessee.

Marisa Richmond
President


The Tennessee Transgender Political Coalition (TTPC) is an organization designed to educate and advocate on behalf of transgender related legislation at the Federal, State and local levels. TTPC is dedicated to raising public awareness and building alliances with other organizations concerned with equal rights legislation.

For more information, or to make a donation, contact:

Tennessee Transgender Political Coalition (TTPC)
P.O. Box 92335
Nashville, TN 37209
http://ttgpac.com
TTGPAC@aol.com
(615)293-6199

The Presidency: Do We Need It?

by Paul Barrow

I worked for a newspaper publisher several years ago during the Nixon administration who, as a zealous Republican, shared with me, a young naive, fledgling writer, his undoubtedly most coveted position that Republicans don't believe in a democracy. They believe, he declared, in a republic. I thought at the time, boy, that sure took balls to say. Don't live in a democracy and don't want to live in a democracy.

It took awhile for the realization to really set in that, if this is Republican catechism 101, there has to be a lot of people in this country who consciously do not want to live in a democracy. What that also suggests is that when we as progressives raise our voices of indignation, appalled by what we see as very undemocratic initiatives being unveiled with an almost predictable discipline from the White House, taking the moral high ground perched with our sad selves upon the fine pillars of democracy, it damm sure isn't good strategy. Power only understands power. Judy Ramsey, my Co-Director, pointed that out awhile back in another article. Our belief that moralizing will somehow persuade our masters to be a little more considerate of our views is like asking a slave in Georgia in 1789 to protest the immorality of his lack of voice in the matter of any contemplation of his being put up for auction. Obviously, that doesn't work very well if the person you're trying to lay a guilt trip on doesn't feel guilty. He doesn't, of course, because he believes in a different kind of morality.

The problem here is in the semantics we use to define what it is we've really got in this country. We have egg yolk and egg white, two very different properties, and we've scrambled them so much we can't see the difference any more. One part holds the very essence of life; the other something left over on the fringes that is viewed as parasitic to the rest. The distinctions between a republic and a democracy are obviously not lost on Republicans, but I believe that they clearly are for the rest of us. Half of us know that we live in a republic. The other half think that we live in a democracy and merely call it a republic.


That's really a critically dangerous concoction to eat for breakfast because the metaphor goes astray through the implication that a republic and democracy are somehow merged into some sort of bland blob like imitation halloween puke that has no central core. It would only be correct if the appearance represented something real. What non-Republicans believe about democracy is the illusion that we all believe in democracy and also have some semblance of one. But when someone like Dick Cheney uses the word democracy, he means a republic, and he really means a republic.


While the liberals, progressives and Democrats and a few other fringe lunatics fume that this condition or that condition in society isn't democratic, the other half are saying, Well, so what? We don't live in a democracy, and we don't want a democracy. We live in a republic. A Republican's idea of democracy is what John McCain likes to call socialism. Equal what? Re-distribution of what? The other half of us believe that we have a democracy and simply call it a republic because we have a "representative" form of government. The other half know that we live in a republic and are actively constructing legal mechanisms that reinforce it and strengthen it with absolutely no illusions about it ever being a democracy. Does it make any difference?




This is a videotaped interview conducted by United Progressives Co-Director Paul Barrow with Dana D. Nelson, Professor of English and American Studies at Vanderbilt University, about her book Bad for Democracy: How the Presidency Undermines the Power of the People, just published in September 2008. 57 minutes. Watch the video
Dana D. Nelson has just published a book that demonstrates very clearly that it does. In Bad for Democracy: How the Presidency Undermines the Power of the People, she shows how presidents have been accumulating power very gradually over the entire course of American history. And there's where another illusion rests. We believe that they don't have a right to do it. It doesn't ever seem to register that the Supreme Court interprets law based upon Constitutional foundations that favor republicanism rather than either democratic principles or the contradictory and impossible effort to balance the branches of government that were put in place by the founders. The very idea that republics are better than democracies goes directly back to the founders' belief, from which the Court receives its authority, that too much democracy could be dangerous.


Article IV, Section 4 of the Constitution: Republican Government


The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence.


The inclusion of this reference to "domestic Violence" refers to nothing more than the possibility that the people might not like things being shoved down their throats. Republican government in the national government, to the founders, as proposed in Madison's "Virginia Plan," William Paterson's "New Jersey Plan," and Alexander Hamilton's "British Plan," all meant layered authority in a hierarchy that represented only superficially any differences from a monarchy, because it established a ruling class, elected or not, and gave the power to the chief authority, the president, to veto anything the people wanted, and at his own discretion. To people who are ruled over rather than who rule themselves, there's not much difference between being ruled by one man or one hundred men who conspire with one another to shape law to fit the views of that one man. Charles Frankel, a Columbia U professor, wrote in an introduction to a published copy of Rousseau's Social Contract, "As a matter of right, any pact of subjection, any agreement that one man or group of men has a right to command others, is but an acceptance of slavery and without moral justification."


Rousseau himself asked: "Where shall we find a form of association ...by which every person, while uniting himself with all, shall obey only himself, and remain as free as before?"


Democracy is self rule, rule by the people. In our republic, we sacrificed our rule for representative rule, and representative rule becomes slavery the more it deviates from our own will. With a bicameral legislature, our representatives -- the closest we have come to being represented on the basis of population -- sacrificed their rule to the Senate, which could veto their bills, and the Senate ultimately sacrificed its rule to the president, simply because he could veto everything. With that kind of system, bills don't get passed unless the higher branches of the ruling class approve them.


James Madison certainly proposed some amendments to the constitution that held an entirely different view, and would have been responsible, no doubt, for upending the entire constitution had all of them been accepted. In 1789 two states still had not ratified the constitution, and despite passage in others, it was certainly not with the blessings of the people, who had no voice in the matter, and a lot of menacing signs among the rabble were afoot, leading Madison and others to consider offering several amendments. Twelve, in fact, of Madison's proposed amendments, designed to appease the populace and get himself elected to office, actually reached the states for ratification. The first two of the twelve were rejected, and the last ten are now known as the Bill of Rights. What is much more interesting is what was contained in first of the two amendments that were rejected. Although the second ultimately was adopted as the 27th Amendment, the first of the two never could possibly have made it into this world:


"First, That there be prefixed to the constitution a declaration, that all power is originally rested in, and consequently derived from, the people."


That's the very core of democracy, and it was rejected, not by the people, but by their republican "representatives." They didn't believe that "all power is originally rested in, and consequently derived from, the people. They believed that it is derived from a special class, their class. They had to swallow the Bill of Rights, because that ensured their own safety and that certain elligible property owners, mostly themselves, would be treated equally but not many others. But they didn't have to swallow the absolutely horrendous notion that power is derived from the people.


Since then, we have grown accustomed to thinking that our form of government is both a democracy and a republic, when it isn't really possible for the two to co-exist at all, simply because you cannot distribute power unequally and call it a democracy, and not without the inevitable consequence that those who have the greater share of power will use that very advantage to accumulate more of it; they are rightfully quite paranoid about losing their advantages and see a continual need to insulate themselves from "the turbulence and follies of democracy."


A republic and a democracy have diametrically opposed propositions that form the foundations of their core ideas, and the fact that we don't seem to realize that has led to the kind of abuse Ms. Nelson so graphically points to One proposes that power should be concentrated in the hands of a few, led by one man. The other proposes that power should be distributed equally through the proposition of one person one vote.


A one person one vote concept implies inherently an equal distribution of power. It implies that the people rule, not a republican oligarchy or a president. It implies that my will is just as important as yours. If the phrase "of, by and for the people" had been included in the Constitution rather than the Gettysburg Address, democracy might possibly would have had a chance to withstand the attack upon those principles faimilair to a democracy framed in the Bill of Rights. If our one person one vote system was structured so that the people rather than Congress voted on measures now before the House or the Senate, that would be a whole lot closer to anything considered self rule. The government would then have to expedite the wishes of at least the marjority of the people rather than simply ignoring them as they do now, for just one example, in continuing to advance our wars in the Middle East.


A democracy is concerned with the people and the general will. A republic is concerned with power and who holds it. A republic therefore is constructed simply to manage who holds it, not to manage the concerns of the people and how they prefer to live. We don't vote for what we want enacted into law. We vote for someone to make our choices for us. We simply treat our oligarchy to a game of musical chairs, but that's about it.


We believe that our representatives are elected to protect democracy for us, but it's quite the opposite. When you elect someone, you give them over to republicanism. You give them the freedom to make choices for you, not simply to express your will, but to express their own will even if it is in opposition to yours, simply because they see fit. They gain office by pretending to show an interest in representing your will, but they have complete discretion on whether or not to do that. They immediately become members of this capitol hill fraternity, this great smoking room on the hill, where the mission inside the beltway is to sustain power in the republic. People elected to Congress join a private club in which relationships become key to getting things done. Most realize after they get there, if they hadn't already, that Congress is a huge corporate money machine that will generate thousands, even millions, in personal compensation through mostly legitimate contacts and above-board dealings that are the recognized stock in trade between private industry and government. In order to sustain that, they join in a conspiracy to represent these interests, not yours, to advance their personal fortunes, to become multimillionaires through the advantages of office, and to insulate themselves from the prerogatives of the electorate. They begin serving the more powerful interests in Congress and the president and forget their constituencies at home, of which only 15 to 30 percent care enough to vote anyway in any typical senate or house race. Their lack of concern for their constituency is shaped by the opportunities they are afforded when in Congress to establish inroads into the fortresses of power, to gain influence, and to secure extraordinary privileges and benefits for themselves. It's the perfect pathway to becoming a member of the elite.


Unfortunately, my Republican employer was right: a republic, even if we get to select our king, is not a democracy. In a republic, as he defined it, the citizens are supervised and protected from their own tendency toward folly, even though they are allowed some freedom to direct their own affairs through "representative" proxy. And it is the president and the office of the presidency that is a true hallmark of republics, a chief authority figure at the top who has become the modern-day substitute for a monarch. It is that figure which primarily distinguishes a republic from a democracy. and it is in that authority that true power is derived, which, as John Yoo, the true Republican that he is, proposed, was handed to the president directly from the British royalty when they capitulated in the Revolutionary war. If James Madison was wrong -- that power is not derived from the people -- then John Yoo would be quite correct in assuming that leadership of our government was indeed handed over to us from the king. And that's the assumption that was acknowledged by the founders in rejecting Madison's first proposed amendment. Power to republicans is not and was never derived from the people. It is held in spite of the people, and at their complete expense.


Real democracies, it may come as a surprise to some of you, and as Dana D. Nelson has so clearly articulated, don't need presidents. Democracies don't hand the full weight of their accumulated and collective, unarticulated wisdom over to one man to articulate for them. Democracy is something we do, not something we have. It is when we ourselves engage the process and make decisions ourselves that we have democracy. Democracy, as defined by the Greeks meant (demos), "the people," and (kratos)," rule." In a republic, the people are not sovereign. In a democracy, they are.
Democracies and republics obviously stand at opposite ends of the spectrum of who rules. If you play chess and start out the game by giving away your queen, your bishops, and your rooks, what are the odds that you're going to be in the game very long?

Bad for Democracy raises many more questions than could possibly be answered in one review. Issues such as just how a government could work without a president is possibly the most intriguing, and needs further study and discussion, and hopefully we can get to that later. I urge readers to comment, and to buy this book and take on the challenge of studying these questions seriously, including the most important: "Do we need a president?"

Bad for Democracy: How the Presidency Undermines the Power of the People

University of Minnesota Press
Author: Dana D. Nelson
256 Pages
ISBN: 978-0-8166-5677-6
September 2008

Tent City Update

Tent City used to be a well-guarded secret among Nashville's homeless community where tents and carefully constructed shacks became homes and discarded couches and scraps became furnishings. The population remained under 25 until the summer of 2007 when the "Please Help, Don't Give" campaign was launched downtown and the homeless were forced to seek refuge away from the businesses and rising condos. Tent City's population soon exploded and Inner City Ministries (whose parking lot backs up to Tent City) started to notice the increase and contacted Public Works to see if they could help. Shortly after, there was an incident in Tent City where the police were notified which immediately prompted concern. Within days (and without warning), notices of eviction were posted all over the camp. The original "date of eviction" was set for Sept. 22 and stated that anything standing would be bulldozed, and anyone trespassing would be prosecuted. After various meetings (private and public), it was decided that Tent City would be allowed to stay open until Nov.1 (the start date for Room in the Inn), but that decision is now in limbo.

To complicate matters, there are contradicting stories as to who actually owns the property, and allegations that the camp is a "public safety and health hazard" (which is not a valid argument after the recent efforts to clean-up the camp and the additions of dumpsters and porta-potties). So much more could be said about Tent City's colorful residents, many who have called the camp home for over 5 years, but you can hear their stories from them.

There are 3 main directions that Tent City could go. (1) It could be left alone, allowed to exist organically as it has for years, (2) it could be turned into a "model encampment" with the additions of bathing/showering facilities, provisions for the winter, etc., or (3) it could be unjustly shut down, in which case we would do whatever we could to stand beside and advocate for the residents there.

What is happening here is that the poorest of the poor are being crucified once again. As far as some city officials are concerned my brothers and sisters at tent city have no voice and they have no power. Those city officials are wrong and they will soon find out that the poor do have a voice, and they will use that voice to speak truth to power and together we will expose the lies of empire. If you care about justice, if you care about mercy, if you care about taking one step closer to realizing the beloved community, then join us on Friday October 24th at 3:00 p.m. in front of the Metro Court House to challenge injustice, to challenge violence against the poor, to challenge the destruction of homes, and to challenge the criminalization of homelessness. Our community doesn't have to be a community of cruelty and death. Another way is possible and if we stand with our brothers and sisters together we can change the current reality. Let us pray for the conversion of the hearts of those in power, but at the same time let us prepare for direct action.

written by Nashville Chapter of
Christian Action Against Apathy (CAAP)

Appeal to the Peace Community

LET'S MAKE OUR PEACE WORK MORE RELEVANT


Recently there was a photo published of a protest in Minneapolis, if you were able to see the photo you would see a banner near the back that says Money for schools not for war. This is a message that should be appearing everywhere these days. Other similar slogans in our marches and vigils should be Money for jobs not for war, Health care not warfare, Convert the military industrial complex, We can't eat Star Wars, Build mass transit not endless war, We can't live in a bomb, and so on.

The peace movement is doing a pretty poor job of connecting the occupation of Iraq, now costing us $12 billion a month, to the public's concern about a declining economy, jobs moving overseas, and cutbacks in social spending.

By now people get the "No more blood for oil message." They've heard that slogan for five years. What are we saying today that is relevant to their lives?

Joanne Sheehan, regional organizer for the War Resisters League, arrived at our house last night for a meeting that we held about converting the military industrial complex. We are now doing preparations for a long-term campaign in our region of Maine about the need to transform Bath Iron Works from building destroyers (outfitted with "missile defense systems") to build rail, solar, windmills and/or other sustainable technologies. Our point is that research shows that spending money on weapons production creates less jobs than if we invested in any other kind of peaceful production.

Joanne worked on economic conversion issues in southern Connecticut where she lives back in the early 1990's when the issue was big in the peace movement. At the time the Cold War was ending and people all over the country began talking about the peace dividend and started thinking about converting military production facilities. Even the International Association of Machinists, which represents many of the military production workers, was a leader at that time in the peace-labor efforts to bring conversion into reality. The reason that conversion did not survive the George H. W. Bush Panama and the Persian Gulf invasions was because we didn't do a good enough job of getting the peace movement to internalize the issue as essential to our being able to stop endless war.

Weapons are presently the #1 industrial export product of the U.S. Today many local communities are economically dependent on military production. If we don't talk about economic conversion how will we ever end war?

Now is the moment that the public is really casting about for answers. They fear the economic future more than they fear "terrorism." They know that jobs are becoming scarce and that opportunities for their children are drying up. Many are very responsive to talk about converting from a war economy to peaceful production. Many understand conversion means good and reliable jobs, a cleaner environment, and a more humane foreign policy that ends the need to wage war for oil.

But is the peace movement talking about this? Is the peace community offering a transformative economic vision that builds a peace-labor-environmental-social justice movement alliance? Sadly the answer is no. By and large the peace movement is saying the same things we were saying five years ago - Bring the troops home now. That just does not cut it.

We all need to stretch ourselves and begin to incorporate a positive vision of an economy that creates jobs and lessens the need for endless war. We've got to begin to link with the average American citizen who is worried about losing their home, paying for education, buying food, keeping the heat on, and holding onto their jobs. We've got to begin to talk about how military spending is killing their future and our nation.


Bruce K. Gagnon
Coordinator
Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space
PO Box 652
Brunswick, ME 04011
(207) 443-9502
http://www.space4peace.org
globalnet@mindspring.com
http://space4peace.blogspot.com (Blog)

Presidential Debate Peace Rally

10.3.08 Nashville, TN: The Nashville Peace Coalition and the Coalition for October Debate Alternatives issued the call this week for a Regional Demonstration for Peace and Real Human Priorities on October 7, 2008 in Nashville at 21st Ave. So and Blakemore, less than one mile from the Presidential Candidate's Debate that evening. The demonstration is scheduled to take place from 4pm to 7pm and organizers say it will be a peaceful and non-violent expression of activists concerns that war in Iraq is not extended into the next Presidential administration. That evening at 5pm organizations representing various regional peace groups will be holding a press conference to call for an immediate end to the war in Iraq. Organizers of the event have expressed concerns that both Presidential candidates have made statements indicating support for a continued military occupation of Iraq and an increase in troop levels in Afghanistan. Both candidates have also indicated that they reserve the right to use military force against Iran if necessary.



The Nashville Peace Coalition is a coalition of organizations and individuals in middle Tennessee dedicated to promoting peace and ending war. The Coalition for October Debate Alternatives is a grassroots coalition of citizens and activists which has been meeting for the past year at the Nashville Peace and Justice Center to organize a grassroots response to the October 7th Presidential Debates. In calling for a regional demonstration, organizers with both groups have said that they would like to send a clear message to the campaigns of both the Democrats and the Republicans that most Americans want to bring the troops home now and they do not want a continuation of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.