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Bringing Socialism Back: How Bernie Sanders Is Reviving an American Tradition |
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Tuesday, 15 December 2015 15:18 |
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Schwartz writes: "Socialism. For most of recent U.S. history, the word was only used in mainstream discourse as invective, hurled by the Right against anyone who advocated that the government do anything but shrink, as anti-tax advocate Grover Norquist once put it, 'to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub."
In truth, Bernie's more social democrat than democratic socialist, but he's still popularizing the term and channeling a backlash against inequality. (illustration: In These Times)
Bringing Socialism Back: How Bernie Sanders Is Reviving an American Tradition
By Joseph M. Schwartz, In These Times
15 December 15
The Sanders campaign is resurrecting socialist electoral politics and paving the way for a more radical public discourse.
 ocialism. For most of recent U.S. history, the word was only used in mainstream discourse as invective, hurled by the Right against anyone who advocated that the government do anything but shrink, as anti-tax advocate Grover Norquist once put it, “to the size where I can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub.”
How is it, then, that Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), a democratic socialist, has repeatedly drawn crowds in the thousands or tens of thousands in cities and towns throughout the nation and is within striking distance of Hillary Clinton in Iowa and New Hampshire? In a country that’s supposed to be terrified of socialism, how did a socialist become a serious presidential contender?
Young people who came to political consciousness after the Cold War are less hostile to socialism than their elders, who associate the term with authoritarian Communist regimes. In a Pew poll from December 2011, 49 percent of 18-to-29-year-olds in the United States held a favorable view of socialism; only 46 percent had a favorable view of capitalism. A New York Times/CBS News survey taken shortly before Sanders’ Nov. 19, 2015, Georgetown University speech on democratic socialism found that 56 percent of Democratic primary voters felt positively about socialism versus only 29 percent who felt negatively. Most of those polled probably do not envision socialism to be democratic ownership of the means of production, but they do associate capitalism with inequality, massive student debt and a stagnant labor market. They envision socialism to be a more egalitarian and just society.
More broadly, a bipartisan consensus has developed that the rich and corporations are too powerful. In a December 2011 Pew poll, 77 percent of respondents (including 53 percent of Republicans) agreed that “there is too much power in the hands of a few rich people and corporations.” More than 40 years of ruling class attacks on working people has revived interest in a political tradition historically associated with the assertion of working class power—socialism.
But at this point in American politics, as right-wing, quasi-fascist populists like Donald Trump, Ted Cruz and others of their Tea Party ilk are on the rise, we also seem to be faced with an old political choice: socialism or barbarism. Whether progressive politicians can tap into the rising anti-corporate sentiment around the country is at the heart of a battle that may define the future of the United States: Will downwardly mobile, white, middle- and working-class people follow the nativist, racist politics of Trump and Tea Partiers (who espouse the myth that the game is rigged in favor of undeserving poor people of color), or lead a charge against the corporate elites responsible for the devastation of working- class communities?
This may be the very audience, however, for whom the term socialism still sticks in the craw. In a 2011 Pew poll, 55 percent of African Americans and 44 percent of Latinos held a favorable view of socialism—versus only 24 percent of whites. One might ask, then: Should we really care that the term “socialism” is less radioactive than it used to be? With so much baggage attached to the word, shouldn’t activists and politicians just call themselves something else? Why worry about a label as long as you’re pursuing policies that benefit the many rather than the few? Is socialism still relevant in the 21st century?
Fear of the ‘s’ word
To answer this question, first consider how the political establishment uses the word. The Right (and sometimes the Democrats) deploy anti-socialist sentiment against any reform that challenges corporate power. Take the debate over healthcare reform, for example. To avoid being labeled “socialist,” Obama opted for an Affordable Care Act that expanded the number of insured via massive government subsidies to the private healthcare industry—instead of fighting for Medicare for All and abolishing private health insurers. The Right, of course, screamed that the president and the Democratic Party as a whole were all socialists anyway and worked (and continues to work) to undermine efforts to expand healthcare coverage to anyone.
But what if the United States had had a real socialist Left, rather than one conjured up by Republicans, that was large, well-organized and politically relevant during the healthcare reform debate? What would have been different? For one thing, it would have been tougher for the Right to scream “socialist!” at Obama, since actual socialists would be important, visible forces in American politics, writing articles and knocking on doors and appearing on cable news. Republicans would have had to attack the real socialists—potentially opening up some breathing room for President Obama to carry out more progresssive reforms. But socialists wouldn’t have just done the Democrats a favor—they would also demand the party go much further than the overly complicated and insurance company friendly Obamacare towards a universal single-payer healthcare program. The Democrats needed a push from the Left on healthcare reform, and virtually no one was there to give it to them.
What is democratic socialism?
So what do we mean by “democratic socialism”? Democratic socialists want to deepen democracy by extending it from the political sphere into the economic and cultural realms. We believe in the idea that “what touches all should be governed by all.” The decisions by top-level corporate CEOs and managers, for example, have serious effects on their employees, consumers and the general public—why don’t those employees, consumers and the public have a say in how those decisions get made?
Democratic socialists believe that human beings should democratically control the wealth that we create in common. The Mark Zuckerbergs and Bill Gateses of the world did not create Facebook and Microsoft; tens of thousands of programmers, technical workers and administrative employees did—and they should have a democratic voice in how those firms are run.
To be able to participate democratically, we all need equal access to those social, cultural and educational goods that enable us to develop our human potential. Thus, democratic socialists also believe that all human beings should be guaranteed access, as a basic social right, to high-quality education, healthcare, housing, income security, job training and more.
And to achieve people’s equal moral worth, democratic socialists also fight against oppression based on race, gender, sexuality, nationality and more. We do not reduce all forms of oppression to the economic; economic democracy is important, but we also need strong legal and cultural guarantees against other forms of undemocratic domination and exclusion.
What socialism can do for you
The United States has a rich—but hidden—socialist history. Socialists and Communists played a key role in organizing the industrial unions in the 1930s and in building the civil rights movement in the 1950s and 1960s; Martin Luther King Jr. identified as a democratic socialist; Bayard Rustin and A. Philip Randolph, the two key organizers of the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom were both members of the Socialist Party. Not only did Socialist candidate Eugene V. Debs receive roughly 6 percent of the vote for president in 1912, but on the eve of U.S. entry into World War I, members of the Socialist Party held 1,200 public offices in 340 cities. They served as mayors of 79 cities in 24 states, including Minneapolis, Milwaukee, Reading, Penn., and Buffalo.
Brutally repressed by the federal government for opposing World War I and later by the Cold War hysteria of the McCarthy era, socialists never regained comparable influence. But as organizers and thinkers they have always played a significant role in social movements. The real legacy of the last significant socialist campaigns for president, those of Eugene V. Debs and Norman Thomas, is how the major parties, especially the Democrats, co-opted their calls for workers’ rights, the regulation of corporate excess and the establishment of social insurance programs.
As the erosion of the liberal and social democratic gains of the post-World War II era throughout the United States, Europe and elsewhere shows, absent greater democratic control over the economy, capital will always work to erode the gains made by working people. This inability to gain greater democratic control over capital may be a contributing factor to why the emerging social movements resisting oligarchic domination have a “flash”-like character. They erupt and raise crucial issues, but as the neoliberal state rarely grants concessions to these movements, they often fade in strength. Winning concrete reforms tends to empower social movements; the failure to improve the lives of their participants usually leads these movements to dissipate.
In the United States, nascent movements like Occupy Wall Street, the Fight for 15, Black Lives Matter and 350.org have won notable reforms. But few flash movements have succeeded in enacting systemic change. Only the revival of a decimated labor movement and the rebirth of governing socialist political parties could result in the major redistribution of wealth and power that would allow real change on these issues.
For all their problems—and there are many—this is the promise of European parties like Syriza in Greece and Podemos in Spain. But the Syriza government retreated back to austerity policies, in part because Northern European socialist leaders failed to abandon their support for austerity. The election of Jeremy Corbyn as leader of the British Labour Party may represent the first step in rank-and-file socialists breaking with “third way” neo-liberal leadership.
Is Bernie really a socialist?
For Sanders, “democratic socialism” is a byword for what is needed to unseat the oligarchs who rule this new Gilded Age. In his much-anticipated Georgetown speech, Sanders defined democratic socialism as “a government which works for all of the American people, not just powerful special interests.” Aligning himself with the liberal social welfare policies of Franklin D. Roosevelt and Lyndon B. Johnson, Sanders called for restoring progressive income and strict corporate taxation to fund Medicare for All, paid parental leave, publicly financed child care and tuition-free public higher education.
Yet he backed away from some basic tenets of democratic socialism. He told the audience, “I don’t believe the government should take over the grocery store down the street or own the means of production.” But democratic socialists want to democratize decisions over what we make, how we make it and who controls the social surplus.
In truth, Sanders is campaigning more as a social democrat than as a democratic socialist. While social democrats and democratic socialists share a number of political goals, they also differ on some key questions of what an ideal society would look like and how we can get there. Democratic socialists ultimately want to abolish capitalism; most traditional social democrats favor a government-regulated capitalist economy that includes strong labor rights, full employment policies and progressive taxation that funds a robust welfare state.
So why doesn’t Sanders simply call himself a New Deal or Great Society liberal or (in today’s terms) a “progressive”? In part, because he cannot run from the democratic socialist label that he has proudly worn throughout his political career. As recently as 1988, as mayor of Burlington, Vt., he stated that he desired a society “where human beings can own the means of production and work together rather than having to work as semi-slaves to other people who can hire and fire.”
But today, Sanders is running to win, and invoking the welfare state accomplishments of FDR and LBJ plays better with the electorate and the mainstream media than referencing iconic American socialists like Eugene V. Debs. In his Georgetown speech, Sanders relied less on references to Denmark and Sweden; rather, he channeled FDR’s 1944 State of the Union address in which he called for an Economic Bill of Rights, saying, “true individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. 'Necessitous men are not free men.'”
Sanders’ campaign rhetoric does occasionally stray into more explicitly democratic socialist territory, though. He understands the nature of class conflict between workers and the corporate moguls. Unlike most liberals, Sanders recognizes that power relations between the rich and the rest of us determine policy outcomes. He believes progressive change will not occur absent a revival of the labor movement and other grassroots movements for social justice. And while Sanders’ platform calls primarily for government to heal the ravages of unrestrained capitalism, it also includes more radical reforms that shift control over capital from corporations to social ownership: a proposal for federal financial aid to workers’ cooperatives, a public infrastructure investment of $1 trillion over five years to create 13 million public jobs, and the creation of a postal banking system to provide low-cost financial services to people presently exploited by check-cashing services and payday lenders.
Harnessing the socialist energy
While Sanders is not running a full bore democratic socialist campaign, socialists must not let the perfect be the enemy of the good. The Sanders campaign represents the most explicit anticorporate, radical campaign for the U.S. presidency in decades. Thus the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA), of which I am a vice-chair, is running an “independent expenditure campaign” (uncoordinated with the official campaign) that aims to build the movement around Sanders—and its “political revolution”—over the long run.
For us, even if Sanders’ platform isn’t fully socialist, his campaign is a gift from the socialist gods. In just six months, Sanders has received campaign contributions from 800,000 individuals, signed up tens of thousands of campaign workers and introduced the term “democratic socialism” and a social democratic program to tens of millions of Americans who wouldn’t know the difference between Trotsky and a tchotchke. Since the start of the Sanders campaign, the number of people joining DSA each month has more than doubled.
Though elected to both the House and Senate as an independent, Sanders chose to run in the Democratic presidential primary because he understood he would reach a national audience in the widely viewed debates and garner far more votes in the Democratic primaries than he would as an independent in the general election. The people most vulnerable to wall-to-wall Republican rule (women, trade unionists, people of color) simply won’t “waste” their votes on third-party candidates in contested states in a presidential election.
The mere fact of a socialist in the Democratic primary debates has created unprecedented new conversations. Anderson Cooper’s initial question to Sanders in the first Democratic presidential debate, in front of 15 million viewers, implicitly tried to red-bait him by asking, “How can any kind of a socialist win a general election in the United States?” The question led to a lengthy discussion among the candidates as to whether democratic socialism or capitalism promised a more just society. When has the capitalist nature of our society last been challenged in a major presidential forum?
Yet without a major shift in sentiment among voters of color and women, Sanders is unlikely to win the nomination. Sanders enthusiasts, who are mostly white, have to focus their efforts on expanding the racial base of the campaign. But, regardless of who wins the nomination, Sanders will leave behind him a transformed political landscape. His tactical decision to run as a Democrat has the potential to further divide Democrats between elites who accommodate themselves to neoliberalism and the populist “democratic” wing of the party.
Today, Democrats are divided between affluent, suburban social liberals who are economically moderate—even pro-corporate—and an urban, youth, black, Latino, Asian American, Native American and trade union base that favors more social democratic policies. Over the past 30 years, the national Democratic leadership—Bill Clinton, Rahm Emanuel, Debbie Wasserman Schultz—has moved the party in a decidedly pro-corporate, free-trade direction to cultivate wealthy donors. Sanders’ rise represents the revolt of the party’s rank and file against this corporate-friendly establishment.
Successful Left independent or third-party candidates invariably have to garner support from the same constituencies that progressive Democrats depend on, and almost all third-party victories in the United States occur in local non-partisan races. There are only a few dozen third-party members out of the nearly 7,400 state legislators in the United States. Kshama Sawant, a member of Socialist Alternative, has won twice in Seattle’s non-partisan city council race, drawing strong backing from unions and left-leaning Democratic activists (and some Democratic elected officials). But given state government’s major role in funding public works, social democracy cannot be achieved in any one city.
The party that rules state government profoundly affects what is possible at the municipal level. My recollection is that in the 1970s and 1980s, DSA (and one of its predecessor organizations, the Democratic Socialist Organizing Committee) had more than 30 members who were elected members of state legislatures or city councils. Almost all of those socialist officials first won Democratic primaries against conservative Democratic opponents. In the seven states (most notably in New York, Connecticut and Oregon) where third parties can combine their votes with major party lines, the Working Families Party has tried to develop an “inside-outside,” “fusion” strategy vis-a-vis the Democrats. But the Democratic corporate establishment will never fear progressive electoral activists unless they are willing to punish pro-corporate Democrats by either challenging them in primaries or withholding support in general elections.
The tragedy of Jesse Jackson’s 1988 campaign was that despite winning 7 million votes from voters of color, trade unionists and white progressives, the campaign failed to turn its Rainbow Coalition into an electoral organization that could continue the campaign’s fight for racial and economic justice. This lesson is not lost on Sanders; he clearly understands that his campaign must survive his presidential bid.
As In These Times went to press, the Sanders campaign only has official staff in the early primary states of New Hampshire, Iowa, South Carolina and Nevada. Consequently, the Sanders movement is extremely decentralized, and driven by volunteers and social media. Only if these local activists are able to create multi-racial progressive coalitions and organizations that outlast the campaign can Sanders’ call for political revolution be realized.
Campaign organizations themselves rarely build democratic, grassroots organizations that persist after the election (see Obama’s Organizing for America). Sanders activists must keep this in mind and ask themselves: “What can we do in our locality to build the political revolution?” The Right still dominates politics at the state and local level; thus, Sanders activists can play a particularly crucial role in the 24 states where Republicans control all three branches of the government.
Embracing the ‘s’ word
Sanders has captivated the attention of America’s youth. He has generated a national conversation about democratic socialist values and social democratic policies. Sanders understands that to win such programs will take the revival of mass movements for low wage justice, immigrant rights, environmental sustainability and racial equality. To build an independent left that operates electorally both inside and outside the Democratic Party, the Sanders campaign—and socialists—must bring together white progressives with activists of color and progressive trade unionists. The ultimate logic of such a politics is the socialist demand for workers’ rights and greater democratic control over investment.
If Sanders’ call for a political revolution is to be sustained, then his campaign must give rise to a stronger organization of long-distance runners for democracy—a vibrant U.S. democratic socialist movement. Electoral campaigns can mobilize people and alter political discourse, but engaged citizens can spark a revolution only if they build social movements and the political institutions and organizations that sustain political work over the long-term.
And because anti-socialism is the ideology that bipartisan political elites deploy to rule out any reforms that limit the prerogatives of capital, now is the time for socialists to come out of the closet. Sanders running in the Democratic primaries provides an opportunity for socialists to do just that, and for the broad Left to gain strength. If and when socialism becomes a legitimate part of mainstream U.S. politics, only then will the political revolution begin.
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Is Saudi Women's Vote a Step Forward? |
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Tuesday, 15 December 2015 15:12 |
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Benjamin writes: "The global press has been heralding the December 13, 2015, vote in Saudi Arabia as a breakthrough for women, since it's the first time in history that Saudi women have been allowed to vote. But is this vote really a significant step forward?"
A Saudi woman casts her ballot in Jeddah. (photo: AFP)
Is Saudi Women's Vote a Step Forward?
By Medea Benjamin, Reader Supported News
15 December 15
 he global press has been heralding the December 13, 2015, vote in Saudi Arabia as a breakthrough for women, since it's the first time in history that Saudi women have been allowed to vote. But is this vote really a significant step forward?
First let's consider the Saudi electoral system within the context of an absolute monarchy. The ruler is always a male and inherits his position. All powerful government positions from ministers to governors are appointed by the King. The 150-member Consultative Council, known as the Shura Council, is also appointed and has only advisory power.
The recent election was not for any body with legislative power. It was for municipal councils that merely provide advice to government authorities about local services such as parks, road maintenance and trash collection. And one-third of these council seats are appointed, not elected.
This election marks only the third time in the nation's history that Saudis--men or women--have been allowed to vote, and the first time women have participated. While heralded overseas, back at home, voting for municipal councils is greeted with a big yawn.
The hidden story about the election is the abysmal turnout. Less than 10 percent of all eligible voters bothered to cast a ballot and worse yet, less than 1 percent of all eligible Saudi women voted! Little wonder that of the 2,106 seats up for grabs, less than 1 percent of the winners are women.
Instead of just profiling the handful of female winners, the press should really be talking to the 99 percent of women who didn't vote. They would find that some women didn't vote because they found the process complicated or they couldn't get to the segregated polls, since they are not allowed to drive. They would find that some didn't feel it was worth their time, since the councils have so little power. And they would also find some women didn't vote because they were boycotting the election.
"How could I be elected if I can't drive, if I can't have the right to custody of my children, when so many issues touching our daily lives aren't resolved?... Women are half citizens in this country." said university lecturer Aziza al-Yousef. "I think we need to change the whole system." Al-Yousef is one of the few Saudi women brave enough to speak out in a country where voicing opposition can land you in prison, but her views reflect the attitudes of many.
Saudi women are still trapped in a male guardianship system under which all women are treated as minors. They are not allowed to marry without the permission of their guardians; unlike men, they do not have a unilateral right to divorce and often face discrimination in relation to child custody.
Women cannot obtain a passport or travel without the approval of a male guardian, usually a husband, father, brother, or son. Enrollment in education, at all levels, requires a guardian's permission. A woman can't be released from rehabilitation or prison to anyone but her guardian; if the guardian refuses to accept the woman, as often happens, she remains imprisoned.
Saudi men can have up to four wives and there is no prohibition against child marriage. A push by human rights activists to make it illegal to marry girls under 15 years old was crushed by the Grand Mufti. A prominent cleric and member of Saudi Arabia's highest religious council, Dr. Salih bin Fawzan, said that girls can be married "even if they are in the cradle.”
Schools are segregated and although Saudi women have made great gains in education--they now comprise 60 percent of the nation's college students--women are less than 20 percent of the labor force. Employers often require male guardians to approve the hiring of female relatives and most women are confined to jobs considered "appropriate" for their gender, like healthcare and education.
The Saudi government even tells women what to wear. In public places, women must hide their hair and cover their everyday clothing with an abaya, a thick, opaque and loose-fitting cloak that does not show off their bodies.
Saudi Arabia remains the only country in the world where authorities bar women from driving; even the most extreme interpretations of Islam by ISIS do not ban women from driving. Women who have challenged the driving ban have been imprisoned, fined, suspended from their jobs, banned from traveling, and even threatened with terrorism charges for public incitement.
In a system still characterized by entrenched patriarchy, voting for municipal council seats might seem like progress, or simply window dressing. "The Saudi government is using women's participation to its advantage, but so must Saudi women, said Saudi scholar Hala Al Dossari. "We have to seize opportunities whenever they arise. It's not like this vote is going to make significant change, but maybe it will inspire more women to keep pushing for greater rights.”
One of the positive things to come out of this election is more global attention on the heavy-handed rule of the Saudi monarchy. An upcoming activist-based Saudi Summit, which will be held in Washington DC March 5-6, is an effort to build a campaign to support Saudi human rights activists. Saudi women have long been fighting for more rights, and their allies abroad should do more to support their efforts and break the cozy ties between the US and Saudi governments.
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FOCUS: A Muslim American Veteran Was Widely Smeared With a Fabricated Story About ISIS Charges |
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Written by <a href="index.php?option=com_comprofiler&task=userProfile&user=31886"><span class="small">Glenn Greenwald and Murtaza Hussain, The Intercept</span></a>
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Tuesday, 15 December 2015 13:18 |
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Excerpt: "A RIGHT-WING BLOG called 'Pajamas Media' published an article on November 24 claiming that Saadiq Long, a Muslim American veteran of the U.S. Air Force, was arrested in Turkey for being an ISIS operative."
Saadiq Long. (photo: unknown)
A Muslim American Veteran Was Widely Smeared With a Fabricated Story About ISIS Charges
By Glenn Greenwald and Murtaza Hussain, The Intercept
15 December 15
 right-wing blog called “Pajamas Media” published an article on November 24 claiming that Saadiq Long, a Muslim American veteran of the U.S. Air Force, was arrested in Turkey for being an ISIS operative. Written by Patrick Poole, a professional anti-Muslim activist and close associate of Frank Gaffney, the article asserted that Long “finds himself and several family members sitting in a Turkish prison — arrested earlier this month near the Turkey-Syria border as members of an ISIS cell.” Its only claimed sources were anonymous: “U.S. and Turkish officials confirmed Long’s arrest to PJ Media, saying that he was arrested along with eight others operating along the Turkish-Syrian border. So far, no U.S. media outlet has reported on his arrest.”
Long’s purported arrest as an ISIS operative was then widely cited across the internet by Fox News as well as right-wing and even non-ideological news sites. Predictably, the story was uncritically hailed by the most virulent anti-Muslim polemicists: Pam Geller, Robert Spencer, Ann Coulter, and Sam Harris. Worst of all, it was blasted as a major news story by network TV affiliates and other local media outlets in Oklahoma, where Long is from and where his family — including his sister and ailing mother — still reside.
But the story is entirely false: a fabrication. Neither Long nor his wife or daughter have been arrested on charges that he joined ISIS. He faces no criminal charges of any kind in Turkey.
Instead, he and his family are being detained at the Geri Gonderme Merkezi deportation center in Erzurum, Turkey, evidently because he was placed years ago by the U.S. on its no-fly list. And the U.S. Embassy in Ankara has been working continually with Long’s family to secure his release, and, if he chooses, his return to the U.S.
A press officer with the Bureau of Consular Affairs, who asked to be identified only as “a State Department official,” contradicted the Pajamas Media claim. “We are aware of Mr. Long’s case and are providing consular assistance. At this time, we are not aware that he has been formally charged with a crime,” the official told The Intercept.
The Turkish government would not comment on the record, but a Turkish source with substantial connections to law enforcement agencies in Gaziantep also told The Intercept that Long has not been arrested, but is merely being held for deportation.
Long received substantial media attention in late 2012, when he was told he would not be permitted to board a flight from Qatar, where he lived, to travel to the U.S. to visit his ailing mother. When he arrived at the airport in Doha, he was told by an airlines representative he had been secretly placed on the U.S. government’s no-fly list (The Intercept’s Glenn Greenwald, then with The Guardian, was the first to report on that story, writing an article about Long’s situation after interviewing him in Doha; Long was then interviewed on Chris Hayes’ MSNBC show, along with his attorney from the Council on American-Islamic Relations, or CAIR).
Two weeks after that wave of media stories in 2012, the U.S. government issued a waiver from the no-fly list and permitted him to fly to the U.S. But he was once again denied boarding rights 10 weeks later when he attempted to fly from the U.S. back to Qatar, forcing him to take a bus to Mexico in order to get home. His situation became a case study in the injustices of the secret, due process-free no-fly list aimed overwhelmingly at Muslims. The Pajamas Media report trumpeted this angle in its headline:
Pajamas Media headline. (photo: The Intercept)
In mid-November, Long attempted to enter Turkey along with his wife and daughter to explore the possibility of relocating there from Qatar, where Long has lived and worked for many years teaching English. Long had previously been stationed in Turkey as part of his 10-year Air Force service and thus knows the country well. The three of them were detained (presumably because he’s on the U.S. government’s no-fly list and other watchlists), told they would be deported, and were then moved to Turkey’s deportation center, where they have remained ever since.
From the start, U.S. officials repeatedly informed the family members of Long and his wife that they were being detained for deportation, not arrested or charged. On November 24, the day the Pajamas Media report was published, a security official with the U.S. Embassy emailed Long’s brother-in-law to say that the family “is being detained at the deportation center (Geri Gonderme Merkezi) in Erzurum, Turkey.”
Emails obtained by The Intercept between American consulate officials in Ankara and Long’s family members reflect efforts by a consular officer to facilitate the voluntary return of Long and his family from Turkey to the U.S. on commercial flights. On November 30, the consulate official wrote: “We are working with the Turkish government regarding your sister’s and her family’s departure from Turkey. We will contact you when tickets can be purchased.”
On December 2, the U.S. consular official wrote to Long’s brother-in-law: “We spoke to your sister’s husband today and are working with one of his friends to obtain tickets back to the United States for all of them. We hope to have them depart Turkey next week. We received a congressional inquiry today regarding your sister’s situation.” The consular official provided several flight itineraries on United Airlines from which they could choose and wrote, “We are waiting to hear from Mr. Long’s friend this morning to finalize the tickets.”
All of Long’s relatives have also been repeatedly told by Long’s Turkish lawyer, Harun Ozal, and by U.S. Embassy officials in Ankara that Long and his family were simply detained as part of the immigration process. “There are no local charges and they are being detained for immigration violations,” Long’s brother-in-law told The Intercept.
Long’s American attorney, Gadeir Abbas, similarly explained:
Saadiq and his family were detained by Turkey because they are all on the no-fly list, which means all of their names are in the Terrorist Screening Database — a database that the U.S. exports to governments across the world with the hope that doing so will make it as difficult as possible for the hundreds of thousands blacklisted to move about the world. This is what accounts for the family’s detention in Turkey, not the uncorroborated and unprofessionally reported smear that their predicament is somehow ISIS-related.
Abbas added, “Both the Turkish and U.S. officials have communicated to Saadiq’s family and their Turkish attorney that there are no charges against them in Turkey.”
Notably, when the right-wing site the Daily Caller published its own follow-up report on the Pajamas Media story, it refrained from claiming that Long had been arrested on charges relating to ISIS or even that he had been arrested at all. Rather, it was willing and able only to report: “The Daily Caller was able to confirm that Long, his wife, and their daughter were detained in Turkey.” That’s because Long was not arrested or charged with anything.
It is, of course, possible that Long may be arrested or charged in the future: by Turkey, the U.S., or some other state. But to date, he has not been. The article claiming he has been, resulting in the widespread smearing of Long as having joined an ISIS cell, is completely false.
From the start, there were all sorts of glaring red flags with this Pajamas Media report that warranted great skepticism.
To begin with, it’s irresponsible in the extreme to spread claims that someone has been arrested for joining ISIS without a very substantial basis for believing that’s true. That’s a claim that will be permanently attached to the person’s name. The people who uncritically spread this “report” had nothing approaching a sufficient basis for doing so, and worse, most of them simply repeated the assertion that he was an ISIS operative as though it were verified fact.
Beyond that, the only outlet to have “reported” this claim about Long and his family is Pajamas Media. Does anyone find that to be a credible news source, let alone one credible enough to permanently vilify someone as an ISIS member? The specific author of the report, Poole, swims exclusively in the most toxic, discredited, anti-Muslim far-right swamps — he’s a favorite of Frank Gaffney, last seen as the prime mover of Donald Trump’s “ban Muslims” proposal — and it is nothing short of shameful that so many people vested this anonymous smear with credibility.
But let’s assume that this fabricated report had been accurate. What would it have meant? Even the Pajamas Media story did not claim that Long had been convicted of being an ISIS member. It claimed that he had been charged with that: by the government of Turkey, which notoriously exploits terrorism accusations to imprison people ranging from Vice journalists to critics of the prime minister.
In general, only the most irresponsible people treat unproven government accusations as proof of guilt. That’s the lesson we were all supposed to have learned from the Guantánamo travesty, where large numbers of people were and still are imprisoned with no trial or due process of any kind, and many proved to be completely innocent. In this case, the government alleged to have accused Long of joining ISIS is particularly worthy of skepticism. Who treats unproven terrorism accusations by the Turkish government as gospel?
It is repellent to blithely assume that someone is an ISIS operative because they have been alleged by a government — with no proof or even a trial — to be one. But just review the links provided above of those citing this Pajamas Media story: that’s exactly what they did, including supposed journalists. “Hey CAIR, any comment on your good friend Saadiq Long being caught in an ISIS cell in Turkey?” the Toronto Sun’s right-wing columnist Tarek Fatah crowed. Note that there’s no indication this is merely an unproven charge; his guilt is just assumed. They all owe Saadiq Long and his family an apology.
The reason so many people were eager to mindlessly endorse this ISIS accusation is obvious. For his no-fly list challenge in 2012, Long was represented by CAIR. His story was first reported by The Guardian. And he was featured by a clearly sympathetic Chris Hayes in an MSNBC interview. So this entire episode started by this anonymous Pajamas Media claim became a means of attacking people who have defended Muslim Americans from the relentless assault on their civil liberties, as well as generally trying to discredit claims that Muslims are the victims of civil liberties abuses. Smearing Long as an ISIS operative was just a tool to accomplish that end. He, his family, and their reputations were just collateral damage.
Beyond all that, even if Long had, after 2012, broken some law that justified his current detention or arrest, it would not remotely undermine or even affect the argument made three years ago about his situation. No matter who ends up being placed on it, the no-fly list is a travesty of justice because it entails citizens being denied rights in secret, by unknown authorities, without any evidence or explanation, and lacking any transparency or real recourse to challenge it (just as due process-free imprisonment at Guantánamo is a travesty even if some of the people held there are actually guilty).
In fact, from the start, Long’s primary grievance was that the U.S. government had punished him but never charged him with anything, thus depriving him of the right to confront the evidence and challenge the accusations. As he told The Guardian back in 2012: “I don’t understand how the government can take away my right to travel without even telling me. If the U.S. government wanted me to question or arrest or prosecute me, they could have had me in a minute. But there are no charges, no accusations, nothing.”
Abbas, Long’s lawyer, made a similar point back then: “It is as if the U.S. has created a system of secret law whereby certain behaviors — being Muslim seems to be one of them — trigger one’s placement on government watchlists that separate people from their families, end careers, and poison personal relationships. All of this done without any due process.”
The point of the 2012 media coverage was not that Long was innocent: One can never prove a negative. The point was that it is unjust in the extreme for the U.S. government to deprive citizens of basic rights, such as the right to travel, without due process of any kind. As the original Guardian article stated: “Secret deprivation of core rights, no recourse, no due process, no right even to learn what has been done to you despite zero evidence of wrongdoing: that is the life of many American Muslims in the post-9/11 world.”
Ironically, the monumental injustice of the no-fly list has become a standard position within the GOP since President Obama began advocating its use to deny gun purchases. On CNN last Sunday, Sen. Marco Rubio sounded exactly like the ACLU, or CAIR, saying, “These are everyday Americans that have nothing to do with terrorism, they wind up on the no-fly list, there’s no due process or any way to get your name removed from it in a timely fashion.” Ben Carson made the same point on ABC News:
Well, as you, I’m sure, know, there are a lot of people on that watchlist and they have no idea why they’re on that list and they’ve been trying to get their names off of it and no one will give them information. … It’s really unfair that people can’t get a real hearing. And they get put on a list and nobody can tell them why they’re there, and they go through for years and years and they have to be tormented. It just doesn’t make any sense.
That was, and is, the point of the 2012 coverage of Long’s story: that the no-fly list is inherently unjust because it deprives citizens of rights based purely on government suspicion and without any due process. If Long ends up subsequently being charged with a crime, that does not alter that point at all. Indeed, Long has long been hoping for an opportunity to clear his name.
In many ways, what just happened to Long is a microcosm of the abuses of the 14-year-old war on terror. First he was denied basic travel rights based solely on secret government suspicions. Now, an anonymous government official smeared him as an ISIS terrorist. A right-wing website “reported” the smear. And from there, a wide range of media outlets and individuals with prominent platforms and all kinds of axes to grind explicitly declared him to be a Terrorist: no evidence, no trial, no due process, not even any charges. The fact that he’s Muslim and under suspicion is enough for huge numbers of people to declare him to be a Terrorist, and he will now live his entire life under that cloud.
That’s life as an American Muslim in the war on terror. But even more importantly, it’s reflective of the rotting media and political climate that now festers, in which unproven, due process-free accusations against Muslims, unaccompanied by any evidence, are instantly equated with proven guilt.
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FOCUS: The Official GOP Debate Drinking Game Rules, Pt. 5 |
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Tuesday, 15 December 2015 11:18 |
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Taibbi writes: "Expect lots of rhetoric about the need to even more fully arm the populace (children included), put immigrants in camps, register all watchers of subtitled movies, carpet-bomb any country with sandy terrain, etc."
The fifth GOP primary debate takes place Tuesday evening in Las Vegas. (photo: Scott Olson/Getty)
The Official GOP Debate Drinking Game Rules, Pt. 5
By Matt Taibbi, Rolling Stone
15 December 15
Wednesday morning is going to suck
 adies and gentlemen, start your livers.
Onward we march, to the fifth Republican debate, held this time at the Venetian in Las Vegas, beginning Tuesday at 8:30 p.m. EST.
This one promises to be a lively affair, with some pundits predicting a brawl between onetime snuggle-bunnies Donald Trump and Ted Cruz. Trump recently called Cruz a "maniac," prompting Cruz, who has depressed us all with his repeated overenthusiastic 80s pop culture references, to tweet back a link to Michael Sembello's "Maniac" song from Flashdance.
Ben Carson, returned from an extended trip abroad taken in the wake of a string of bizarre and controversial public comments – the campaign version of taking a semester off to "find yourself" – will need to do something drastic to stop his freefall in the polls. Even Republican voters seemed freaked out at the lack of foreign policy knowledge he displayed in the last debate. So expect him to try to force-feed references to things he's recently learned about the Middle East, like that it is hot and you need a passport to visit it.
Marco Rubio was being set up in the press a month ago or so to be the establishment challenge to Trump, but his numbers have plateaued. Ted Cruz cunningly went after Rubio in the last debate with a passing mention of sugar subsidies. Expect Rubio to turn the tables this time and focus his blowdried boy-rage act at Cruz, who is his chief obstacle to winning Beltway support in the fight to dethrone the Donald.
My colleagues in the political media are lately trying to gin up a story suggesting that Chris Christie is making a run in the polls, but this has all the feel of a fake D.C.-concocted narrative – nobody actually likes Chris Christie. Nonetheless, look for the Gov to go out of his way to act like he's really the comer in this race. He'll probably interrupt people and pull his loud, hectoring moralist routine even more than usual.
As for the rest of them, God help us. Trump's continued success puts the onus on the field to try to out-crazy the frontrunner. Expect lots of rhetoric about the need to even more fully arm the populace (children included), put immigrants in camps, register all watchers of subtitled movies, carpet-bomb any country with sandy terrain, etc.
The rules:
DRINK AFTER EVERY VIOLATION OF:
1. The doctor's note rule: Self-explanatory. Drink after any riffing on Trump's latest stunt.
2. The nuke 'em till they glow rule: Drink after any promise to "carpet bomb" the Middle East, or after any attempt to one-up Ted Cruz's recent comments about how, "I don't know if sand can glow in the dark, but we're going to find out."
3. The Obama won't say "terrorism" rule: Candidate complains that the president is afraid to use the words "radical Islam" or "Islamic terrorism."
4. The climate change denial rule: Complaint about the Paris climate change agreement. Shotgun a beer if it comes with a mention of how the nice local weather renders climate change talk meaningless.
5. The War on Christmas rule: Mention of "red cups," nativity controversies, etc.
6. The Reince Priebus rule: Mention of a brokered convention or use of the phrase "Let the people decide" in a discussion of RNC/Reince Priebus controversy. Double shot if the latter's name pronounced incorrectly.
7. The George Lucas rule: Gratuitous mention of Star Wars. Double shot if it comes with an impersonation or a sound effect (e.g., Cruz does a Yoda voice while threatening ISIS).
8. The I'm just a simple caveman rule: A candidate mentions that he/she is not a scientist, or generally derides higher education before proceeding to make a "common sense" point.
9. The wet blanket rule: Attempt by Kasich to implore his fellow candidates to be more realistic, followed by boos/catcalls from the audience.
10. The Hitler had some really good ideas rule: Salutary mention of Japanese internment, religious registries or other similar policies.
11. The I don't just believe in the American dream, I'm a product of it rule: Anyone talks about how they are the son/daughter/husband/wife of a humble bartender/maid/tow truck driver/whatever because dreams and opportunity.
12. The good guy with a gun rule: Self-explanatory.
13. The empty God platitudes rule: An anti gun-control candidate extends "thoughts and prayers" to the victims of Paris, San Bernardino or whatever other mass shooting we'll have in the next ten minutes.
14. The we're not racist rule: A candidate complains that people with "traditional values" are being accused of being bigots. Double shot if it's Rubio.
15. The Carly, interrupted rule: Carly Fiorina interrupts someone and/or uses a bogus statistic. Double shot if it's that "73,000-page tax code" line she continues to send out there at every opportunity.
THE EVERGREEN RULES
ALWAYS drink, in every debate, when:
16. Trump brags about how much money he makes.
17. Anyone says, "I'm the only one on this stage who…"
18. Someone says, "Any one of us onstage is better than Hillary Clinton…"
19. The crowd breaks into uncomfortable applause at a racist/sexist statement.
20. Any candidate evokes Nazis, the Gestapo, Neville Chamberlain, concentration camps, etc.
21. Anyone force-feeds an Israel reference into a question where it doesn't belong. Also known as the Ann Coulter rule.
22. Anyone pledges to "take our country back."
23. The Jim Webb rule: Candidate complains about not getting enough time.
24. Any candidate illustrates the virtue of one of his/her positions by pointing out how not PC it is.
25. Someone invokes St. Reagan. Beware, people, this is an every time rule again.
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don’t see much difference between Bernie and Hillary,” a friend said this morning over breakfast.
