Today is coronation day. I may have more to say about that shortly, but in the meantime, here’s an idea I got from Fred at Stone Court. Instead of indulging in stupid symbolic actions that no-one will see or stupid direct actions that no-one will be affected by, or blacking your web page out for the day (which, quite honestly, strikes me as taking the imperial pomp on its own terms way too seriously), why not at least do something that involves a bit of thinking and might provoke a bit of argument? In this case, the idea is to construct a “Fantasy Administration” that you’d like to see in place of the jerks who are being installed or re-installed over the next several days. You can take a glance at Fred’s; I sympathize with a lot of his choices (Howard Dean for President might be an ultimately limited platform, but it’s one I’d gladly take instead of the current mess). But my list is going to turn out a bit different, I guess:

• President: Nobody

• Vice President: Nobody

• Secretary of State: Nobody

• Secretary of the Treasury: Nobody

• Secretary of Defense: Nobody

• Attorney General: Nobody

• Secretary of the Interior: Nobody

• Secretary of H.U.D.: Nobody

• Secretary of Education: Nobody

• Secretary of H.H.S.: Nobody

• Secretary of Veterans Affairs: Nobody

• Department of Homeland Security: Dear God, nobody, please.

• Chief of Staff: Nobody

• Drug Czar: Nobody

You might worry, “Hey, the Constitution and the U.S. Code say we have to fill these offices with somebody, so why shouldn’t we put better people in place?” But I don’t recognize the legal authority of the Constitution or the laws passed under it, and neither should you. You might also object, “Look, you have to deal with political realities here, and even if everyone in your administration resigned on the first day, that’d just make Dennis Hastert President, and he’d appoint a bunch of people worse.” I’m sympathetic to that worry; I’m not a voluntaryist, and I don’t object to voting or office-holding as a defensive tactic against State oppression. On the other hand, worrying about the practical realities of implementing a fantasy cabinet seems a bit strained. If you really insist, then I’d say: any reliable libertarian will do, as long as she will enter on the understanding that her job is to step into office, repeal one or two things, pardon any nonviolent prisoners she can, appoint more reliable libertarians down the chain of succession, and as soon as her successor is confirmed, tender her resignation. With luck, this should mean an average term of somewhere between a couple weeks and a couple months per office-holder. Wash, rinse, repeat.

It just goes to show, once again: everything’s easier when you’re an anarchist.

P.S.: I want to thank Fred for calling his post Great Idea. In the same spirit, this post is passing along an idea; it is not the replication of a meme. There are no such things as memes. I will keep pointing this out until it becomes the anti-meme and puts this pseudoscientific mummery out of its misery. Just in case you were wondering.

Mythistory Monday is on a holiday break this week. Since today is the observation of Martin Luther King Jr. Day, I’m inclined to take a bit of a break from knocking knuckle-headed distortions of history for a bit of a celebration of something that most of us know.

There is a lot to complain about in the way that Dr. King’s life and career have been handled–both in the uncritical hagiography that has been made of his life and also in the way that that same process has obliterated so much of his real thought and political commitments from living memory that even hard Rightists who spent their college years fighting the civil rights movement tooth and nail, or happily working alongside those who did, can now come back and claim to be speaking in Dr. King’s voice by piously intoning a few words snipped from a single sentence out of his most famous speech. There’s a lot to complain about, but for it all, there’s a hell of a lot to celebrate too. Underneath the television specials and the holy martyr imagery, there is a real man, who has been put on a pedestal, who has been abused, who has been ignored at the same time as he is piously invoked, but who, after it all, cannot be struck out of our memory and who remains a testament, in living memory, to what is possible for this world.

That’s what I want to remember today: the living Dr. King. No holy martyr, but a real person, a Black preacher who found himself in the midst of the most profound struggles of American history. In spite of his work with the Montgomery Improvement Association and in forming the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, he was always more of an agitator than an organizer–a maker of speeches and a preacher of sermons who often showed up late in the game for campaigns that others had started. He was frankly prone to showboating at times, and frustrating on more than one occasion for the men and especially the women who did the long, hard, thankless work of organizing in groups such as SCLC and SNCC–from Rosa Parks to Ella Baker to Bob Moses to Fannie Lou Hamer. And yet also an indispensible man–not just as a symbol, but as a thinker and an actor and a moral guide, who gave long years of his life to the struggle to end Jim Crow, who remained, through that struggle’s greatest triumphs and its darkest hours, in the face of agonizing doubt and the ugliest sorts of violence, to a new kind of nonviolent politics on behalf of freedom and compassion for all. We must avoid the lazy politics of invoking Dr. King’s name as a way to deride just revolutions or calls for forceful self-defense; we have to be careful about how we universalize the lessons of the Freedom Movement; but I don’t think anyone can reasonably deny that the nonviolent politics that Dr. King and Ella Baker and others developed, drawing from and expanding on the past examples of Henry David Thoreau, Margaret Sanger, and Mohandas Gandhi, is a force that has changed the world–and changed it for the better.

• Jason at Negro, Please links to his MLK Day post from last year, noting, sadly, that nothing relevant has really changed since he wrote it.

• David Grenier and Jeffrey Tucker remind us of Dr. King’s statement against the war on Vietnam:

  Even when pressed by the demands of inner truth, men do not easily assume the task of opposing their government’s policy, especially in time of war. Nor does the human spirit move without great difficulty against all the apathy of conformist thought within one’s own bosom and in the surrounding world. Moreover when the issues at hand seem as perplexed as they often do in the case of this dreadful conflict we are always on the verge of being mesmerized by uncertainty; but we must move on. …

  As I have walked among the desperate, rejected and angry young men I have told them that Molotov cocktails and rifles would not solve their problems. I have tried to offer them my deepest compassion while maintaining my conviction that social change comes most meaningfully through nonviolent action. But they asked — and rightly so — what about Vietnam? They asked if our own nation wasn’t using massive doses of violence to solve its problems, to bring about the changes it wanted. Their questions hit home, and I knew that I could never again raise my voice against the violence of the oppressed in the ghettos without having first spoken clearly to the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today — my own government. For the sake of those boys, for the sake of this government, for the sake of hundreds of thousands trembling under our violence, I cannot be silent….

  These are the times for real choices and not false ones. We are at the moment when our lives must be placed on the line if our nation is to survive its own folly. Every man of humane convictions must decide on the protest that best suits his convictions, but we must all protest….

  — Beyond Vietnam, 4 April 1967, New York City

• Rox Populi offers an MLK Random Reader, including:

  For nonviolence not only calls upon its adherents to avoid external physical violence, but it calls upon them to avoid internal violence of spirit. It calls on them to engage in that something called love. And I know it is difficult sometimes. When I say love at this point, I’m not talking about an affectionate emotion. It’s nonsense to urge people, oppressed people, to love their oppressors in an affectionate sense. I’m talking about something much deeper. I’m talking about a sort of understanding, creative, redemptive goodwill for all men.

  — Address at the Freedom Rally in Cobo Hall, 23 June 1963

• Amazonfemme gives us this from Dr. King’s acceptance speech for the Nobel Peace Prize:

  I accept this award today with an abiding faith in America and an audacious faith in the future of mankind. I refuse to accept despair as the final response to the ambiguities of history. I refuse to accept the idea that the “isness” of man’s present nature makes him morally incapable of reaching up for the eternal “oughtness” that forever confronts him.

  I refuse to accept the idea that man is mere flotsom and jetsom in the river of life unable to influence the unfolding events which surround him. I refuse to accept the view that mankind is so tragically bound to the starless midnight of racism and war that the bright daybreak of peace and brotherhood can never become a reality.

  I refuse to accept the cynical notion that nation after nation must spiral down a militaristic stairway into the hell of thermonuclear destruction. I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right temporarily defeated is stronger than evil triumphant.

  I believe that even amid today’s motor bursts and whining bullets, there is still hope for a brighter tomorrow. I believe that wounded justice, lying prostrate on the blood-flowing streets of our nations, can be lifted from this dust of shame to reign supreme among the children of men.

  I have the audacity to believe that peoples everywhere can have three meals a day for their bodies, education and culture for their minds, and dignity, equality and freedom for their spirits. I believe that what self-centered men have torn down, men other-centered can build up. I still believe that one day mankind will bow before the altars of God and be crowned triumphant over war and bloodshed, and nonviolent redemptive goodwill will proclaim the rule of the land.

  “And the lion and the lamb shall lie down together and every man shall sit under his own vine and fig tree and none shall be afraid.”

  I still believe that we shall overcome.

  — Acceptance Speech at Nobel Peace Prize Ceremony, 10 December 1964

• I close with two of my favorite quotes. Only one of them is by Martin Luther King Jr.; the other is about him:

  It is time to reorder our national priorities. All those who now speak of good will and who praise the work of such groups as the President’s Commission now have the gravest responsibility to stand up and act for the social changes that are necessary to conquer racism in America. If we as a society fail, I fear that we will learn that very shortly that racism is a sickness unto death.

  — Martin Luther King Jr., 4 March 1968

  And, on the subject of King’s real radicalism, and the role of radicalism generally in the struggle for justice, Malcolm X has this to say:

  I’ll say nothing against him. At one time the whites in the United States called him a racialist, and extremist, and a Communist. Then the Black Muslims came along and the whites thanked the Lord for Martin Luther King.

  — Malcolm X

• That first quote, by the way, I lifted from a remix of Dr. King’s speeches that I couldn’t possibly do justice to with a description. You really should listen to it.

All of these things happened while my parents were in college, not 40 years ago. Think of what Dr. King’s efforts, and the efforts of the countless heros–those whose names we know and the thousands of ordinary people who haven’t made it into the books or the teevee specials–have meant for the world in those few years. Yes, we are living through dark days, but think of what it was like just within living memory of today. As Dr. King put it: Let us remember that the arc of the Universe is long, but it bends toward justice.

I hope so. Happy Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

(Thanks, Tom Tomorrow. I got a million of ’em.)

George W. Bush, speech in Cincinatti, Ohio, 7 October 2002:

After eleven years during which we have tried containment, sanctions, inspections, even selected military action, the end result is that Saddam Hussein still has chemical and biological weapons and is increasing his capabilities to make more. And he is moving ever closer to developing a nuclear weapon.

George W. Bush, remarks to reporters, 3 May 2003:

We’ll find them. It’ll be a matter of time to do so

George W. Bush, interview with TVP Poland, 30 May 2003:

But for those who say we haven’t found the banned manufacturing devices or banned weapons, they’re wrong, we found them.

Washington Post, 12 January 2005:

The hunt for biological, chemical and nuclear weapons in Iraq has come to an end nearly two years after President Bush ordered U.S. troops to disarm Saddam Hussein. The top CIA weapons hunter is home, and analysts are back at Langley.

…

Duelfer is back in Washington, finishing some addenda to his September report before it is reprinted.

There’s no particular news in them, just some odds and ends, the intelligence official said. The Government Printing Office will publish it in book form, the official said.

The CIA declined to authorize any official involved in the weapons > search to speak on the record for this story. The intelligence official offered an authoritative account of the status of the hunt on the condition of anonymity. The agency did confirm that Duelfer is wrapping up his work and will not be replaced in Baghdad.

Scott McClellan, White House press briefing, 12 January 2005:

MR. McCLELLAN: … But the President is going to continue working closely with our friends and allies to confront the threats that we face —

Q How can he do it again —

MR. McCLELLAN: — and we continue to take steps to improve our intelligence. That’s what the President is going to do. We have very good relationships with countries across the world because of the President’s efforts over the last few years. He’s worked to build strong relationships with our friends and allies, and worked to make sure that we’re confronting the threats that we face. It’s important that we act together to confront the threats that we face. And it’s important that when we say something, that we follow through on what we say. That’s why the President is also —

Q Even if the information is wrong?

MR. McCLELLAN: — that’s why the President is also working to strengthen the United Nations and make it more effective. That’s something that we’re working on, as well, because it was very clear what the international community expected of Saddam Hussein, and he continued to defy the international community. It was a very unique threat that we faced in terms of Iraq. And in a post-September 11th world, it was a threat you could not ignore.

George W. Bush, 12-14 January 2005:

…

Further Reading

• GT 2004/10/06: It’s Official
• GT 2004/02/08: What you mean “We”?
• GT 2003/02/02: War hawks fail to make the case

For the past few decades, libertarian and Leftist critics of U.S. foreign policy alike — from Noam Chomsky to Murray Rothbard — have put a lot of work into documenting and exploring the subtle mechanisms of control that the American government has developed to ensure that our supposedly free press is still reliably at the service of U.S. government policy. What their efforts have have revealed is an interlocking system of interests and manipulation, which manages to effectively carry out the aims of an extensive propaganda system without taking on the formal structure of one.

But it looks like here, as in so many other places, the Bush administration is committed to bolder leadership than its predecessors:

• New York Times (2005-01-7): Bush’s Drug Videos Broke Law, Accountability Office Decides

  WASHINGTON, Jan. 6 – The Government Accountability Office, an investigative arm of Congress, said on Thursday that the Bush administration violated federal law by producing and distributing television news segments about the effects of drug use among young people.

  The accountability office said the videos constitute covert propaganda because the government was not identified as the source of the materials, which were distributed by the Office of National Drug Control Policy. They were broadcast by nearly 300 television stations and reached 22 million households, the office said.

  …

  In May the office found that the Bush administration had violated the same law by producing television news segments that portrayed the new Medicare law as a boon to the elderly.

  The accountability office was not critical of the content of the video segments from the White House drug office, but found that the format — a made-for-television “story package” — violated the prohibition on using taxpayer money for propaganda.

  …

  A spokesman for the drug policy office said the review’s conclusions made a mountain out of a molehill.

• USA Today 2005-01-07: Education dept. paid commentator to promote law:

  Seeking to build support among black families for its education reform law, the Bush administration paid a prominent black pundit $240,000 to promote the law on his nationally syndicated television show and to urge other black journalists to do the same.

  The campaign, part of an effort to promote No Child Left Behind (NCLB), required commentator Armstrong Williams to regularly comment on NCLB during the course of his broadcasts, and to interview Education Secretary Rod Paige for TV and radio spots that aired during the show in 2004.

  …

  Williams said he does not recall disclosing the contract to audiences on the air but told colleagues about it when urging them to promote NCLB.

  …

  The contract may be illegal because Congress has prohibited propaganda, or any sort of lobbying for programs funded by the government, said Melanie Sloan of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. And it’s propaganda.

  The Nation Capitol Games (2005-01-10): Armstrong Williams: I Am Not Alone:

  And then Williams violated a PR rule: he got off-point. This happens all the time, he told me. There are others. Really? I said. Other conservative commentators accept money from the Bush administration? I asked Williams for names. I’m not going to defend myself that way, he said. The issue right now, he explained, was his own mistake. Well, I said, what if I call you up in a few weeks, after this blows over, and then ask you? No, he said.

  The Blue Lemur (2005-01-12): Columnist Bush paid to promote No Child law still on Bush fellowship board (via Wendy McElroy @ Liberty & Power 2005-01-12):

  Armstrong Williams, the columnist paid $240,000 by the Bush Administration to surreptitiously promote Bush&’s No Child Left Behind Law remained listed on the White House website as a member of the President’s Commission on White House Fellowships as late as Wednesday, RAW STORY has learned.

  The discovery, first reported by D.C. Inside Scoop, suggests that the White House has declined to sever ties with the discredited pundit. Williams was terminated by the company syndicating his column, Tribune Media Services, last Friday.

• Financial Times (2005-01-11): Allawi group slips cash to journalists (via Strike the Root 2005-01-11):

  The electoral group headed by Iyad Allawi, [U.S.-installed] interim Iraqi prime minister, yesterday handed cash to journalists to try to ensure coverage of its press conferences, in a throwback to Ba’athist-era patronage ahead of parliamentary elections on January 30.

  After a meeting held by Mr Allawi’s campaign alliance in west Baghdad, reporters, most from the Arabic-language press, were invited upstairs where each was offered a gift of a $100 bill in an envelope.

  Many of the journalists accepted the cash, equal to about half the starting monthly salary for a reporter at an Iraqi news-paper, and one jokingly recalled how the former regime of Saddam Hussein had also lavished perks on favoured reporters.

Welcome to the mainstream news media for the new millennium, in which Noam Chomsky has become obsolete: they aren’t even trying to hide it anymore. Interlocking interests and subtle mechanisms of control aren’t even the point anymore; the Bush machine and its clients now pass out government-manufactured news segments and lucrative tax-funded bribes for useful political commentators. The Bush League may not be making government smaller, but they are making radical critique simpler–may God help us all.

I mentioned here before that Roderick and I would be presenting an essay for the Molinari Society inaugural symposium on feminism and libertarianism. The symposium was excellent; besides a helpful and provoking discussion on our essay, I also got to hear excellent essays by co-panelists Jennifer McKitrick and Elizabeth Brake. Back home, we found that the discussion had spread ahead of us: some of our comments surrounding the essay have already stirred up an engaging, if sometimes frustrating, discussion/contrversy at Liberty & Power, involving folks who had gotten the chance to hear the essay in Boston and others who are still awaiting a look at the text.

What therefore you debate as unknown, this I proclaim to you: I’m glad to announce that a draft-in-progress of our essay, Libertarian Feminism: Can This Marriage Be Saved? This is a draft-in-progress of the essay, which we read in abbreviated form in Boston. Comments, questions, applause, and brickbats are all welcome–nay, encouraged.

The current debate arose from something that was actually fairly peripheral to our essay: the kind words we had for Andrea Dworkin in the course of drawing a comparison between her analysis of the relationship between rape culture and militarism and Herbert Spencer’s. And yes, we partly did that because it was fun and provocative, as a tangent, to draw the comparison between the oft-denounced and seldom-read Spencer, and the oft-denounced and seldom-read Dworkin. But while the remarks were mostly tangential, the issues raised in the controversy are important; both because Andrea Dworkin’s worth defending and because the issues under debate all come back either to central points raised in the essay, or else points that probably should have been addressed there. So if you’ve really been dying to find out whether libertarianism and radical feminism are compatible, why radical feminists should be radical individualists, why existing libertarian feminist projects are so often limiting when they come to really existing contemporary feminist efforts, and how putting the feminism back in libertarian feminism will aid both causes but make for some strange attractors … tolle, lege.

Fire away.