I digress from my candidate review to briefly discuss a topic closely tied to my vote. First an excerpt from a blog I wrote in July 2007:
Exploiting people at a distance makes it much easier, wouldn't you say?
It would be much more difficult for me if on my way to buy a cup of coffee in the morning I had to walk by the impoverished hut of the coffee farmer who raises his family with scarce food, no education, no health care options, and no hope. It would be much more difficult for me if on my way to make a quick Wal Mart run I had to see the mother who toiled for pennies to make the things I purchased, see her holding her malnourished 4-year old boy that looks a lot like a thin, tired version of my own son. It would be much more difficult for me to enjoy the return on my investment if on the way to my mailbox for my earnings statement I saw across the street the stripped ecosystem and the newly unemployed natives sitting in the mud of what was once foliage.
But no, I am safely insulated from the results of my exploitation. I allow my willful ignorance to hide the fact that I am an oppressor of the vulnerable and that I am complicit in acts of gross injustice.
Lest we think these acts of gross injustice only happen outside the borders of the United States, I submit this column regarding recent events in Florida:
Palm Beach Post Editorial
Monday, January 28, 2008
It should have been shocking to hear that two weeks ago, federal authorities indicted six people from Immokalee on slavery charges. But most Floridians have learned enough in recent years not to be too surprised by revelations regarding brutal violations of human rights in the state's farm fields.
Still, the six arrests represent one of the most significant slavery cases the government has made. Federal prosecutors claim that Antonia Zuniga Vargas and five members of the Navarette family - Cesar, Geovanni, Jose, Villhina and Ismael - held more than a dozen Guatemalan and Mexican workers against their will. The defendants, who collectively face charges that could imprison them for decades, are accused of making the workers pick produce and then sleep in trucks and shacks. The migrants had to pay for food and showers and were threatened with beatings if they tried to leave. The abuse allegedly goes back three years.
The case came to light in November only because three workers, with fresh bruises from their beatings, were able to break out of a truck and tell their story to Collier County deputies. A dozen other slavery cases have surfaced in Florida during the past decade, but none with as many victims.
The abuses in Immokalee are further evidence of the nation's dire need for comprehensive immigration reform that will relieve millions of migrant workers from having to live secret lives and give them protections against exploitation. The arrests also validate the efforts of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers, an advocacy group that has exposed a half-dozen slavery cases and promoted a penny-a-pound plan with buyers to increase the wages of tomato pickers.
As politicians remain stuck on the issue, the Immokalee story shows that the state has more immigrants living as slaves, hoping to be freed. Washington's inaction remains shocking.
By the way, these are the people against whom I am supposed to be filled with outrage that they dare come into my country without permission. A mere quirk of heredity that I am even in the position of choosing such a selfish response.
Thursday, January 31, 2008
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
A devil in Angel's shoes
February 5th is primary election day in my state. I am happy with the primary system in my state. As a voter I am allowed to take a ballot from any registered party. This gives me a chance to view the whole field of candidates and take the action I believe in the best interests of the country, not just one party. Between now and the primary election, I will take brief looks at several candidates and offer my opinions and remaining questions.
Let’s go ahead and get the worst one out of the way: Mike Huckabee. The fact that he’s a southern baptist preacher is enough reason for me to refuse to vote for him, but that says as much about me as it does him, so I will look closer. My initial reaction to Huckabee is that as a baptist preacher he is most likely a racist homophobe who believes that he has a monopoly on the truth, especially when it comes to matters of faith. It didn’t take long into his campaign surge for confirmation to begin to arise.
Huckabee’s infamous Christmas commercial embodied the insidious arrogance of someone who believes they hold the exclusive truth about faith. In it, he says "what really matters is the celebration of the birth of Christ." To him maybe, but many disagree. Then to make it perfectly clear this commercial is not for everyone, he says "I hope you and your family have a magnificent Christmas" (So Jews, Muslims, Atheists, etc, go f*k yourself). The exact same scene and many of the same words, but universal themes of peace and love would have been more effective and less offensive. Even use the word Christmas, fine, but add something else. I have seen even George W. Bush handle this better his entire presidency, not wavering on what he believes but always being inclusive, even of atheists. From what I've seen of Huckabee, those groups are "sinners" and "clearly wrong" and I'm suspicious of someone that certain about things that are so uncertain.
No doubt some believe I am overreacting, but I think that only reinforces my opinion of the insidious nature of Huckabee’s demeanor about issues of faith. The trickery is amplified by Huckabee’s “victim” act surrounding the controversy of his monopoly on faith, claiming “aren’t YOU the one being intolerant” because people object to his bigoted view. I would say the same if a Muslim professed a belief that Christians were going to hell. I generally do not think that should be done by politicians over the subject of religion. It's stuff that is not needed in politics. In fact, I believe it's often a BS smokescreen. For the evangelicals in Iowa that voted for him, did they know anything about Huckabee's political beliefs? It probably did not matter because he only needed to say “I'm a Christian” in a way that “stood up” for their beleaguered bigoted view.
The Xmas commercial was simply the decorated tip of the iceberg. The following statement was made this month by Huckabee:
"I have opponents in this race who do not want to change the Constitution. But I believe it's a lot easier to change the Constitution than it would be to change the word of the living God. And that's what we need to do is amend the Constitution so it's in God's standards rather than trying to change God's standards so it lines up with some contemporary view of how we treat each other and how we treat the family."
Again it’s painfully clear that Huckabee is awfully certain he has the monopoly of truth, which is fine for your local demagogue but not a great feature for a leader in our government. I mean seriously, take the above statement, substitute Allah for “God” and Koran for “God’s standards” and it’s the Taliban. I beg you to tell me the difference.
I’ll move on to homophobia. The best that can be said of Huckabee in this area is that he backed off his call to quarantine those with HIV and AIDS. Wow, what compassion. Huckabee continues to publicly declare it a sin (even if he believes this, is he preaching or running for President?). Huckabee continues to equate gay and lesbian to pedophilia and bestiality. I don't need to add anything here; Huckabee will tell you himself of his judgmental nature and lack of compassion.
What about racial bigotry? There are some interesting ties between Huckabee and some racist groups, but that is not always indicative of the candidate’s own choices. A candidate’s reluctance to fight off unsolicited racist supporters is troubling, but we need not find a tie that loose for Huckabee. Read this outlandish statement from Huckabee also made this month in South Carolina:
“You don't like people from outside the state coming in and telling you what to do with your flag. In fact, if somebody came to Arkansas and told us what to do with our flag, we'd tell 'em what to do with the pole; that's what we'd do.”
I will not delve into the joking (I presume) threat of violent assault on others, though Huckabee does have a strangely brutal bent toward violent humor (joking about shooting people, slitting wrists, etc). The brazen racial bigotry in Huckabee’s statement is remarkable. South Carolina legislators specifically decided to fly that flag over the capitol in 1962 in a show of bigoted defiance, not in a dispute about state’s rights. Furthermore, I allow the esteemed Christopher Hitchens to make the most salient point concerning the flag:
Under this fiery cross of St. Andrew, the state of Pennsylvania was invaded and free Americans were rounded up and re-enslaved. Under this same cross, it was announced that any Union officer commanding freed-slave soldiers, or any of his men, would be executed if captured. (In other words, war crimes were boasted of in advance.) The 13stars of the same flag include stars for two states—Kentucky and Missouri—that never did secede, and they thus express a clear ambition to conquer free and independent states.
…
So slack is our grasp of history and principle that we seem unable to think of the Confederacy as other than "offensive" to blacks. … [The flag exalts] those who attempted to destroy the Union by force, and those who solicited the help of foreign powers in order to do so, and whose treason led to the violent deaths of hundreds of thousands of Americans.
Support of the Confederate flag is support of treason. Enough said.
It’s clear I will not be voting for Huckabee. I hope his campaign ends soon and the platform for his brand of harm is removed.
Let’s go ahead and get the worst one out of the way: Mike Huckabee. The fact that he’s a southern baptist preacher is enough reason for me to refuse to vote for him, but that says as much about me as it does him, so I will look closer. My initial reaction to Huckabee is that as a baptist preacher he is most likely a racist homophobe who believes that he has a monopoly on the truth, especially when it comes to matters of faith. It didn’t take long into his campaign surge for confirmation to begin to arise.
Huckabee’s infamous Christmas commercial embodied the insidious arrogance of someone who believes they hold the exclusive truth about faith. In it, he says "what really matters is the celebration of the birth of Christ." To him maybe, but many disagree. Then to make it perfectly clear this commercial is not for everyone, he says "I hope you and your family have a magnificent Christmas" (So Jews, Muslims, Atheists, etc, go f*k yourself). The exact same scene and many of the same words, but universal themes of peace and love would have been more effective and less offensive. Even use the word Christmas, fine, but add something else. I have seen even George W. Bush handle this better his entire presidency, not wavering on what he believes but always being inclusive, even of atheists. From what I've seen of Huckabee, those groups are "sinners" and "clearly wrong" and I'm suspicious of someone that certain about things that are so uncertain.
No doubt some believe I am overreacting, but I think that only reinforces my opinion of the insidious nature of Huckabee’s demeanor about issues of faith. The trickery is amplified by Huckabee’s “victim” act surrounding the controversy of his monopoly on faith, claiming “aren’t YOU the one being intolerant” because people object to his bigoted view. I would say the same if a Muslim professed a belief that Christians were going to hell. I generally do not think that should be done by politicians over the subject of religion. It's stuff that is not needed in politics. In fact, I believe it's often a BS smokescreen. For the evangelicals in Iowa that voted for him, did they know anything about Huckabee's political beliefs? It probably did not matter because he only needed to say “I'm a Christian” in a way that “stood up” for their beleaguered bigoted view.
The Xmas commercial was simply the decorated tip of the iceberg. The following statement was made this month by Huckabee:
"I have opponents in this race who do not want to change the Constitution. But I believe it's a lot easier to change the Constitution than it would be to change the word of the living God. And that's what we need to do is amend the Constitution so it's in God's standards rather than trying to change God's standards so it lines up with some contemporary view of how we treat each other and how we treat the family."
Again it’s painfully clear that Huckabee is awfully certain he has the monopoly of truth, which is fine for your local demagogue but not a great feature for a leader in our government. I mean seriously, take the above statement, substitute Allah for “God” and Koran for “God’s standards” and it’s the Taliban. I beg you to tell me the difference.
I’ll move on to homophobia. The best that can be said of Huckabee in this area is that he backed off his call to quarantine those with HIV and AIDS. Wow, what compassion. Huckabee continues to publicly declare it a sin (even if he believes this, is he preaching or running for President?). Huckabee continues to equate gay and lesbian to pedophilia and bestiality. I don't need to add anything here; Huckabee will tell you himself of his judgmental nature and lack of compassion.
What about racial bigotry? There are some interesting ties between Huckabee and some racist groups, but that is not always indicative of the candidate’s own choices. A candidate’s reluctance to fight off unsolicited racist supporters is troubling, but we need not find a tie that loose for Huckabee. Read this outlandish statement from Huckabee also made this month in South Carolina:
“You don't like people from outside the state coming in and telling you what to do with your flag. In fact, if somebody came to Arkansas and told us what to do with our flag, we'd tell 'em what to do with the pole; that's what we'd do.”
I will not delve into the joking (I presume) threat of violent assault on others, though Huckabee does have a strangely brutal bent toward violent humor (joking about shooting people, slitting wrists, etc). The brazen racial bigotry in Huckabee’s statement is remarkable. South Carolina legislators specifically decided to fly that flag over the capitol in 1962 in a show of bigoted defiance, not in a dispute about state’s rights. Furthermore, I allow the esteemed Christopher Hitchens to make the most salient point concerning the flag:
Under this fiery cross of St. Andrew, the state of Pennsylvania was invaded and free Americans were rounded up and re-enslaved. Under this same cross, it was announced that any Union officer commanding freed-slave soldiers, or any of his men, would be executed if captured. (In other words, war crimes were boasted of in advance.) The 13stars of the same flag include stars for two states—Kentucky and Missouri—that never did secede, and they thus express a clear ambition to conquer free and independent states.
…
So slack is our grasp of history and principle that we seem unable to think of the Confederacy as other than "offensive" to blacks. … [The flag exalts] those who attempted to destroy the Union by force, and those who solicited the help of foreign powers in order to do so, and whose treason led to the violent deaths of hundreds of thousands of Americans.
Support of the Confederate flag is support of treason. Enough said.
It’s clear I will not be voting for Huckabee. I hope his campaign ends soon and the platform for his brand of harm is removed.
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