MORE FROM THE NATION
Editorial, "Madness of King George" :
"Contemporary experts as diverse as Jonathan Turley, a law professor at George Washington University and one of the foremost scholars of the conflict between the demands of national security and the Constitution, and Bruce Fein, a key player in Ronald Reagan's Justice Department, have identified the Bush Administration's wiretapping as a dangerous assault on our basic freedoms. Turley says, "What the President ordered in this case was a crime." Fein adds that Bush is claiming "more power than King George III had at the time of the Revolution, in asserting the theory that anything the President thinks is helpful to fighting the war against terrorism he can do." (more)
Medea Benjamin, "When Will US Women Demand Peace?" :
"Whenever I travel to international gatherings to talk about the war in Iraq, economic development and women's rights, the question I get asked most frequently is: "Where are the women in the United States? Why aren't they rising up?"
I hear it from women in Africa, who have lost funding for their health clinics because of the Bush Administration's ban on even talking about abortion; from Iraqi women, who are suffering the double oppression of occupation and rising fundamentalism; from European women, who wonder how we can tolerate the crumbling of our meager social services; and from Latina women opposed to unresponsive governments that represent a tiny elite.
The question is variously posed with anger, contempt, curiosity or sympathy. But always, there is a sense of disappointment."
(more)
posted by hysterical blackness @ 5:26 PM
1 comments
1 Comments:
Why aren't the women rising up? I'll tell you. It's because women are no less vulnerable to the politics and fear than men are.
After all, as bad as it might be to lose a son, a husband, or even a daughter in war, how much worse is the spector of a suicide bomber loose in the McDonalds where you and your children are having lunch (a regular occurance in Jerusalem)? As bad as it is to engage in aggression against innocent people overseas, how much worse is the idea of men from overseas entering your homes, your stores, your streets, intent on murder?
I'm not saying I believe these scare stories. I'm more inclined to the notion that, to a certain extent, the War on Terror is being manufactured to blunt our traditional War on Tyranny. I'm just asking, what's so superior about women?
As to why those who do march don't stick around; virtual slaves don't have the time to organize against the regime. Our tax and regulatory system has so consumed our lives that it is no longer enough to work to support our families. We have to work twice as much, to make up for the other roughly 50% of our income that goes to the government via the many varying taxes, as well as wealth lost to regulatory inefficiencies.
This is why two-income families are becoming the norm. Simply put, the female sufferagist is a thing of the past. Who has time to engage in political activism--or even political thought--when one has to work eight to five just to make ends meet *and* pay the tax man? That's not to mention getting in the shopping--this is coming from a man who buys his own groceries.
If you want to revive the female activist, you have to make the one income family not merely a possibility, but the norm, again. Women used to be a great reserve of labor that worked at its own discretion, whether it be providing labor when the men are away at war, engaging in political activity while the men are slaving away for The Man, or, heck, actually raising up an honest and upright next generation. Today, thanks to the "liberals," both men and women are half-slaves, and none of these things get done properly.
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