OpEdNews - Page 3 of Article: Myth America: A Stand-up Tragedy

After 2006 election, we were led to believe the bad times were over and the evil ones had been vanquished. What could be better, right? How about a Democrat in the White House? Well, those who want an idea of what life might be like under such a scenario need only to reflect back upon the years 1993 and 1994—when President William Jefferson Clinton was enjoying the "advantage" of a Democratically-controlled Congress.

In just two years, liberal hero Bill Clinton abandoned his pledge to consider offering asylum to Haitian refugees, backed away from his most high-profile campaign issue: health care, and reneged on his promise to "take a firm stand" against the armed forces' ban on gays and lesbians.

In 1993-4, Clinton presided over the invasion of Somalia (which resulted in some 7000-10000 dead Somalis), signed a little something called the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), increased Pentagon budget by $25 billion, fired Jocelyn Elders, dumped Lani Guinier, ordered the bombing of Iraq and the Balkans, renewed the sanctions on Iraq, ignored genocide in Rwanda, and passed a crime bill that gave us more cops, more prisons, and 58 more offenses punishable by death.

All this came before Newt Gingrich and much-hyped Republican "revolution" in 1994 (perhaps the most astonishing use of the word revolution in the history of the English language). Can someone please explain to me why the right wing didn’t love Bubba?

And I haven’t even gotten to the environment. In the first three years of the Clinton-Gore regime—two of which involved a Democratic House and Senate—Clinton and his green buddy gave us fun stuff like: The passage of the salvage logging rider, the continuation of the use of methyl bromide, the weakening of the Endangered Species Act and the Safe Drinking Water Act, the lowering of grazing fees on land, the subsidizing of Florida's sugar industry, the reversing the ban on the production and importation of PCBs, and allowing the export of Alaskan oil.

When Clinton and Gore ran for re-election in 1996, David Brower, former president of the Sierra Club, wrote an op-ed in the Los Angeles Times called "Why I Won't Vote for Clinton." In this piece, Brower declared that Clinton and Gore had "done more harm to the environment in three years than Presidents Bush and Reagan did in 12 years." That’s Bush the Elder, not Bush the Lesser.

I could go on for hours about the rest of Clinton’s reign, like the repeal of welfare, the telecommunications bill that further narrowed the already laughable parameters of public debate, the Defense of Marriage Act, and the fact that after eight years in office with no political price to pay, he still did not pardon Leonard Peltier. But I’ll just focus on one more Clinton gem: The Anti-Terrorism & Effective Death Penalty Act, signed into law on April 24, 1996. This USA PATRIOT Act prequel contained provisions that Clinton himself admitted "make a number of ill-advised changes in our immigration laws, having nothing to do with fighting terrorism." This unconstitutional salvo severely restricted habeas corpus and expanded the number of federal capital crimes—and the PATRIOT Act is mostly an extension its legal foundations.

For a little more two-party context, consider that John Kerry—Democratic presidential candidate in 2004—voted for Anti-Terrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act in 1996 and wrote parts of the PATRIOT Act in 2001, Hillary voted for in 2001 and both she and Obama voted to reauthorize the PATRIOT Act in 2005. Hooray Democrats.

With all the public outcry for Bush and the his gang, I’m wondering: Where was all the outrage for liberal hero Bill Clinton? Where was the outrage when he ordered 78 days of bombing over Yugoslavia in 1999, including the use of depleted uranium? (At the time, Secretary of State Albright asked: “What’s the point of having this magnificent military if we never use it?”)

Where were the simplistic Nazi references when Clinton blew up a Sudanese pharmaceutical plant to distract us from Monica’s cigar fetish?

Where were the Hitler mustaches when Clinton bombed Iraq in response to an alleged plot to assassinate Bush the Elder and ended up killing Leila Attar, that country’s best-known female artist?

If we want to provoke genuine social change, we must always remember that “anti-war” doesn’t just mean “anti-this-war” and it definitely doesn’t just mean “anti-Republican.”

“I think it is dangerous to confuse the idea of democracy with elections. Just because you have elections doesn’t mean you’re a democratic country.”
Arundhati Roy said that.
“If voting changed anything, they'd make it illegal.” Emma Goldman said that
“The next time someone tells you America has a two-party system, I suggest you demand a recount.” I said that.

In 2004, 65% of congressional races were uncontested and 58% of incumbent Senators who ran were unopposed. Overall, the candidate who raised the most money won 91% of those races.

In the words of the esteemed political philosopher Cyndi Lauper: “Money changes everything.”

As Ralph Nader reminds us, if the Democrats and Republicans were corporations, they’d be sued for and convicted of anti-trust violations.

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