Fictional Franken and Obama's Fiction

Obama's embracing -- even while denying the existence of -- U.S. colonialism is crucial. Al Franken in his own backhanded way raised the issue of coming to terms with this in his satire "Why Not Me" about the making and unmaking of his presidency. In his inaugural address, Franken apologizes to the decedents of slaves, Native Americans, women and Japanese Americans for the multiple crimes of the United States. He then falls into great illness and depression, the burdens of the office being too great.

(I reluctantly cite Franken here. He is a joke -- was for the invasion of Iraq and yet was tapped by the "Air America" network after the invasion of Iraq as the great progressive voice. Even the choice of name tells the story -- "Air America". Just when the concept of nationalism desperately needed to be challenged, the new "progressive" network emphasized nationalism. Franken also swiped without attribution material from FAIR's book on Limbaugh for his book own book on Limbaugh -- and most of what he swiped happened to be my material.)

[originally published at husseini.org on Feb. 13, 2009]

Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz on Obama and Lincoln

President Barack Obama speaking at Annual Lincoln Banquet in Springfield, IL, 2/12/09 on the occasion of Lincoln's 200 year birthday, asked why it was that Lincoln was so devoted to maintaining the Union, answering that the United States had always been more than 13 colonies or 15 states, rather the United States. Despite being commander and chief of an ongoing war, Obama observes that Lincoln made sure that white settlers had land by creating the Homestead Act, that Lincoln himself came from a frontier white settler family who understood that settlers needed land.

Obama did not mention where that land came from, who were the dispossessed owners of that land. In 1862, Lincoln ordered the largest mass execution in US history: More than 300 indigenous Dakota farmers in Minnesota who resisted the white settlers who squatted on their land were rounded up by the military and condemned to death. Lincoln ordered that 10 percent of them, chosen at random, should be executed. During Lincoln's term, the Union army invaded Navajo country and force marched 10,000 Navajos from their alpine homeland to the waterless desert area of southeast New Mexico to be held in a concentration camp where nearly half of them died. Then, there was the massacre of unarmed, surrendered Cheyenne at Sand Creek in southern Colorado.

-- Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz
Author of the forthcoming "Home of the Brave" and the books "Roots of Resistance: History of Land Tenure in New Mexico," "Indians of the Americas" and "The Great Sioux Nation." She is professor emeritus in the Department of Ethnic Studies at California State University East Bay in Hayward, California.

[originally published at husseini.org on Feb. 13, 2009]

obama and lincoln

obama said that 
lincoln was great
because keeping the union
was needed to conquer the continent

obama outdoes bush's imperialist rhetoric
bush said that freedom 
is a gift from the creator
not for any one nation
obama says US is the Great Hope

obama talks of mountain top
as conquest
not spiritual

-- and obama claimed US 
not born a colonial power

ha!

appropriate that caterpillar bulldozers
would be today's appeal
economy to subjugate Nature
and destroy Indigenous Palestinian Homes

[originally published at husseini.org on Feb. 13, 2009]

Obama Trying to Take Shortcuts on Israeli's Massive Nuclear Arsenal and the Rule of Law

Transcript from CNN:

Question: Yes, thank you, sir. What is your reaction to Alex Rodriguez's admission that he used steroids as a member of the Texas Rangers?

Obama: You know, I think it's depressing news on top of what's been a flurry of depressing items when it comes to Major League Baseball. And if you're a fan of Major League Baseball, I think it -- it tarnishes an entire era, to some degree. And it's unfortunate, because I think there are a lot of ballplayers who played it straight.

And, you know, the thing I'm probably most concerned about is the message it sends to our kids. What I'm pleased about is Major League Baseball seems to finally be taking this seriously, to recognize how big a problem this is for the sport, and that our kids hopefully are watching and saying, "You know what? There are no shortcuts, that when you try to take shortcuts, you may end up tarnishing your entire career, and that your integrity's not worth it." That's the message I hope is communicated.

All right. Helen [Thomas]? This is my inaugural moment here.

(LAUGHTER)

I'm really excited.

Question: Mr. President, do you think that Pakistan and -- are maintaining the safe havens in Afghanistan for these so-called terrorists? And, also, do you know of any country in the Middle East that has nuclear weapons?

Obama: Well, I think that Pakistan -- there is no doubt that, in the FATA region of Pakistan, in the mountainous regions along the border of Afghanistan, that there are safe havens where terrorists are operating.

And one of the goals of Ambassador Holbrooke, as he is traveling throughout the region, is to deliver a message to Pakistan that they are endangered as much as we are by the continuation of those operations and that we've got to work in a regional fashion to root out those safe havens.

It's not acceptable for Pakistan or for us to have folks who, with impunity, will kill innocent men, women and children. And, you know, I -- I believe that the new government of Pakistan and -- and Mr. [President Asif Ali] Zardari cares deeply about getting control of the situation. We want to be effective partners with them on that issue.

Question: (off mic)

Obama: Well, Mr. Holbrooke is there, and that's exactly why he's being sent there, because I think that we have to make sure that Pakistan is a stalwart ally with us in battling this terrorist threat.

With respect to nuclear weapons, you know, I don't want to speculate. What I know is this: that if we see a nuclear arms race in a region as volatile as the Middle East, everybody will be in danger.

And one of my goals is to prevent nuclear proliferation generally. I think that it's important for the United States, in concert with Russia, to lead the way on this.

And, you know, I've mentioned this in conversations with the Russian president, Mr. [Dmitry] Medvedev, to let him know that it is important for us to restart the -- the conversations about how we can start reducing our nuclear arsenals in an effective way so that...

(CROSSTALK)

Obama: ... so that we then have the standing to go to other countries and start stitching back together the nonproliferation treaties that, frankly, have been weakened over the last several years. OK.

Question: Why do you have to speculate on who has...

(CROSSTALK)

Obama: All right.

Sam Stein, Huffington Post. Where's Sam? Here. Go ahead.

Question: Thank you, Mr. President. Today, Sen. Patrick Leahy [D-Vermont] announced that he wants to set up a truth and reconciliation committee to investigate the misdeeds of the Bush administration. He said that, before you turn the page, you have to read the page first.

Do you agree with such a proposal? And are you willing to rule out right here and now any prosecution of Bush administration officials?

Obama: I haven't seen the proposals, so I don't want to express an opinion on something that I haven't seen.

What I have said is that my administration is going to operate in a way that leaves no doubt that we do not torture, that we abide by the Geneva Conventions, and that we observe our traditions of rule of law and due process, as we are vigorously going after terrorists that can do us harm. And I don't think those are contradictory; I think they are potentially complementary.

My view is also that nobody's above the law and, if there are clear instances of wrongdoing, that people should be prosecuted just like any ordinary citizen.

But that, generally speaking, I'm more interested in looking forward than I am in looking backwards. I want to pull everybody together, including, by the way, the -- all the members of the intelligence community who have done things the right way and have been working hard to protect America and I think sometimes are painted with a broad brush without adequate information.

So I will take a look at Sen. Leahy's proposal, but my general orientation is to say let's get it right moving forward.

[originally published at husseini.org on Feb. 10, 2009]

Nationalism without Culture

this inaugural makes me

miss the inaugurals of bush
with feisty, loving protest

as alice walker
on democracy now begins her remarks by saying 
obama's inauguration gives us a "chance 
to take our leadership position in the world..."

and she wonders why inaug 
not in june
if it were
revolutions might have been
in 2000 and other years

biden hilarious
talking about how americans 
built the monuments in dc
frank lloyd wright
argued we should build a new capital 
and need a culture

[originally published at husseini.org on Jan. 20, 2009]

Questioning Israeli Foreign Minister, Or Trying to...

On Friday, Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni came to the National Press Club where I work. I could say lots more about this, but I'd really recommend The Real News segment on what happened: "Israeli FM confronted at National Press Club: Journalists' microphones turned off when Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni challenged in Washington".

For more, CSpanJunkie has the entire "news conference" and a segment with the first four questions.

[originally published at husseini.org on Jan. 19, 2009]

Degrading King

King told us to judge people 

not by the color of their skin
but by the content of their character
as many obsess over Obama's skin color
and ignore the deep failings of his character

Obama as "black"
is acceptance of
racist "one drop" 
rule
revealing 
the speakers' collective poor character

it is infact not King who is degraded

[originally published at husseini.org on Jan. 19, 2009]