The Vital Realities for 2020 and Beyond: Writings on Water Wars, Nuclear Devastation, Endless War, Economic Revolution, and Surveillance Versus Freedom

By Roger Armbrust

This collection of writings by journalist Roger Armbrust focuses on national and international public policy concerns. Armbrust is particularly concerned with water resource policy, both nationally and internationally, the increasing likelihood of nuclear war, given the proliferation of nuclear powers and the destruction of nuclear treaties. Armbrust is concerned that the USA seems to be at war somewhere nearly always, a condition that enhances the power of the military-industrial complex in this country and abroad. Economic instability exacerbated by mounting public and private debt is another of his recurring themes. The continuum of government-and corporate efforts to stifle sustainable economic progress of poorer peoples leads to social instability worldwide.
 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Parkhurst Brothers Publishers Inc
• Release date: Feb 6, 2020
• ISBN: 9781624911453

Book preview

opposite.

The Vital Realities

Five Realities the Convention Speakers Wouldn’t Reveal

Roger Armbrust, September 9, 2012

Politicians are kind of like poets: It’s not what they say; it’s what they don’t say. The difference is this: Poets will give you a concrete image or a specific, and invite you to apply it to the universe and reality, the good and the bad. The universal shines through the particular, Aristotle believed. The country songwriter Tom T. Hall said you can’t write a song about ecology; you have to write about an empty beer can.

Politicians, however, will ply you with their alleged good specifics and the opponents’ bad to evil ones. They want you to apply that to the universe. And they don’t want you to even think about reality.

Through two weeks of Republican and Democratic propaganda, no one spoke of how they have failed us, or their low esteem in the polls. Only the possible worst of them, George W. Bush, suddenly and briefly became a decent politician: he didn’t show up at the Republican soiree, recognizing and silently signaling his failure through his absence. If only the others had joined him.

Here are five specific issues, five vital realities, they wouldn’t dare discuss concretely in their droning words. We should consider these in questioning whether America needs either of these men as president, or if you should keep your current Congress member and senators in office. Also, there are two solutions for taking back control of your country, maybe.

You’ve heard of all these issues before, but have you considered them all together? They all are linked, both in this column and in reality. Each of these specific areas seems to be growing dire. So, if you care, you’ll see a lot of red links to click and read. If you don’t care, then just accept what you get in the coming four years.

First the five realities you’ll surely be facing with the next president and Congress:

1. Water

Humans are made up of 60 percent water. The number of humans on earth is increasing, now at 7.04 billion, and projected to grow.

The earth’s fresh water is decreasing. The world’s aquifers are being diminished faster than nature can refill them.

The earth’s water is 97 percent ocean, salt water. China is looking at investing as much as $31 billion in desalination. America has invested $1 trillion in foreign military invasions but trails in desalination efforts. That needs to change.

2. Food

Eighty percent of the nation’s fresh water is used for agriculture, both crops and livestock. If population is growing and fresh water is diminishing, then logically humans will have less food to eat. We’re seeing this now in a worldwide drought the pols try not to talk about. Did you hear Obama or Romney talk about solutions for this?

Scientists said last month the world should look to a future as vegetarians, since there won’t be enough water and crops to supply food for livestock and humans both. (I’ll have a No. 5 veggie burger with fries, please. . .No, make that a No. 3 veggie burger.)

But there’s a problem with veggies: Genetically modified organisms (GMOs), i.e. the recombining of a plant’s DNA. Controversies abound over GMOs and food.

European countries and China have outlawed Monsanto‘s and other firms’ GMOs in food. India and Latin America are seeing a battle between traditional farming and corporate proliferation, including Monsanto’s GMOs in corn and soybeans, patenting of seeds and purchase of seed companies. Farmers in the U.S. have legally battled alleged intimidation by Monsanto.

The United States government, since at least George H.W. Bush, has catered to Monsanto and GMOs. In fact, Obama appointed former Monsanto VP Michael Taylor as America’s food czar, who is supposed to be our protector.

But an effort has begun in the U.S. to at least find out if GMOs are in our food. California’s November ballot includes a proposition requiring labeling of foods to show any GMO contents. Monsanto and other corporations are spending millions in opposing the proposal. What does that tell you about the safety of GMO food?

3. Energy

The world-meaning humans’ homes, governments and businesses-operates on energy. Oil, natural gas, vehicular gas. Electricity from water (yes, water again), solar and wind, and nuclear.

America daily consumes as much oil as the industrial world’s next five largest countries COMBINED.

The American military accounts for 93 percent of the U.S. government’s energy consumption, mostly through invading foreign countries to control oil and gas resources, though our government calls it expanding democracy.

We’ve seen deadly problems with nuclear accidents: Russia’s Chernobyl in 1986 and Japan’s Fukushima Daini disaster in March 2011. Scientists are still researching environmental problems resulting from both.

U.S. nuclear-energy plants continue to age, bringing growing environmental concerns. The Great Lakes’ shores alone are encircled by 37 aging nuclear power plants. Others operate near major metropolitan areas like New York City.

4. Military-industrial complex

War hero and Republican President Dwight Eisenhower was the caring leader who warned us about the military-industrial complex. We’ve seen deadly, torturous specifics of its proliferation under Bush, more under Obama and you can expect more under Romney. Neither Obama nor Romney touched these in their speeches. Surprised? These will include:

a. Continuing of endless war, war profiteering and weapons sales, and drones. Leon Pinetta, our Secretary of Defense, hopes to expand this.

b. Further eliminating of Human Rights – Killing without trial, spying without warrant, secret prisons, private prisons, quelling government whistle blowers.

c. Expandng police state-massive surveillance, quelling protests, controlling cyberspace and society.

5. Personal and Economic Health

You can’t really separate these since one affects the other. Candidates tell you they want to turn the depressed economy around. But they don’t want to truly regulate the big banks, or separate the commercial and investment banks as Congress did under the Glass-Steagall Act in the ’30s. In fact, Congress overturned it in the ’90s, leading to the 2008 economic meltdown and today’s depression.

And they don’t want to discuss with you dissolution of the middle class, America’s nearly trillion-dollar credit card debt, America’s trillion-dollar student loan debt, or American homeowners who were supposed to get relief from the bailout, but didn’t.

Two Solutions

How can YOU solve this? You’ll have to get organized, get educated, and get active so you can implement these:

1. Take back Congress:

You must take control of your Congressional delegation. Why? Because Congress controls the federal government’s purse strings. Without money, a president can’t invade foreign countries or support the military-industrial complex or growing police state. How do you fight the multi-national corporations and their Washington lobbyists? You vote, and you convince others in your Congressional district to vote with you.

Actually, Ralph Nader explained it about as simply as one can in a 2007 speech:

Each of you lives in a Congressional district. Each of you has two senators and a Congress member who you pay to serve you.

The average Congressional district consists of about 600,000 Americans. Research shows that, of those 600,000 Americans, about 2,000 truly affect your legislators’ votes on funding, laws and regulations. YOU need to be one of those 2,000. You can do that, can’t you? Sure you can. Your future and your children’s future depend on it.

2. Constitutional right of petition:

If you don’t replace your senators and Congress member, or if they won’t serve you but keep serving the president and military-industrial behemoth, you will need to exercise your right of petition to pass or change laws. This link is a look at that process. It’s slow and arduous. But the Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan invasions have been too.

If Solutions 1 and 2 don’t work, history shows you’ll see the securing of totalitarianism, or violent revolution. And we know where that leads by looking at Russia a century ago and currently in the Middle East.

Can’t happen in America? That depends on whether you get organized, get educated, and get active.

Prepare to Fight Fascism: 2017 and Beyond

Roger Armbrust, November 14, 2016

When Donald Trump takes the presidency next year – bringing with him the likes of Rudolph Giuliani and Chris Christie – you’ll need to protect yourself against efforts to turn our oligarchic state into a fascist state.

First, here’s why. And lastly, here’s how.

Why

Merriam-Webster’s dictionary defines Fascism: . . .a political philosophy, movement, or regime (as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition.

This, of course, also defines Donald Trump, his professed philosophy, actions and where he plans to take us. Voters seem to think they elected (via the electoral college, not the popular vote, which he lost) a populist, garrulous, successful entrepreneur — a powerful corporate leader opposed to the establishment. That’s a media illusion developed through a decade on his reality TV show. It’s a corporate media that, first, loved him because of his TV ratings, then, second, began to attack him when they realized they had helped him become a viable candidate.

So, now, he is about to take command of the most powerful, war-aggressive military in world history, massive government spy apparatus and abusive federal legal system.

Trump, in his youth, was weaned by a real-estate father to be a business killer (his father’s term), and a winner and not a loser, according to PBS Frontline. In young adulthood, he was trained by the notorious lawyer Roy Cohn. Cohn made his name as a legal henchman for Sen. Joseph McCarthy, the notorious ’50s Red-Scare politician. Cohn represented Trump in business for years, pushing him to (1) never admit to anything negative, (2) propagandize every negative into a positive and (3) if anybody sues you, countersue. That’s not what you would call an honest life, but it is a way to help protect yourself legally.

You can get a clear view of Trump’s history, as well as Hillary Clinton’s — the formation of their thinking, philosophy, speech and actions — in the powerful PBS Frontline documentary The Choice 2016.

Trump has applied those three Cohn dictums in his aggressive business and political behavior for decades. And he will apply them as president. He’s let no one stand in his way. When he personally made millions off his failed Taj Mahal Casino in Atlantic City, he sloughed off the millions of dollars stockholders lost, saying they should have monitored their investments better, according to Frontline.

When the Trump Taj Mahal and other Trump-titled assets began to fail in the ‘90s, banks kept from busting him, deciding they’d lose all their loan money if they took his name off the buildings. He’s gone to school on that, no longer starting new hotel projects, but selling his name worldwide while others actually own and develop the businesses. He may say he’s doing the constructing, but he’s not. That, and his illusive TV persona, carry him to this day.

Can’t you just see Trump turning into a Vladimir Putin, secretly making billions off of others’ businesses when he’s president? He’s been groomed for it. And if anyone gets in his way, now he can implement presidential power to overrun them. Look for him to operate with policymakers globally, publicly pushing American nationalism, but in private saying, Let’s you and I make a deal. What’s in it for me?

The Constitution

So you’ll have to, first, be prepared to defend your Constitution of the United States and its Bill of Rights.

Think immediately of the First Amendment, and particularly the freedom of the press and freedom of speech. Recall that Trump, during his presidential campaign often ostracized members of the press — refusing to let them into his campaign functions — if he didn’t like their questions or articles about him.

President Barack Obama took great pains to control the press. His Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) tapped the Associated Press’s emails. We included this in our column None’s Well That’s Orwell. And Obama’s Justice Department also tried to intimidate all reporters by going after Pulitzer Prize-winning New York Times reporter James Risen, threatening him with jail if he didn’t reveal the name of a whistle-blowing source. We wrote about this in detail in our column National Security Depends on Press Freedom.

Trump will be ready to put all the government power available to him to carry Obama’s press intimidation program even farther. How far will a fascist dictator go? Just research Turkey currently under its democratically-elected president-turned-dictator Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Trump has also shown abusive disdain for minorities, immigrants, women and public protesters. And you can bet he’ll find ways to intimidate and jail them. And if he can’t pass a law to do it, he’ll simply sign a presidential executive order, and it will come into play before the public even realizes it.

Also, Congress has given the president broad emergency powers if he decides to declare a national emergency. These powers allow dictatorial control over the nation when the chief executive declares a national emergency. We wrote about the overwhelming emergency presidential powers in our column July 4: Our Independence Versus Today’s Emergency Powers.

Austerity and Police Power

Following the U.S. national midterm elections in 2014, we wrote the column As U.S. Austerity Deepens, Prepare for Revolution.

We saw the Millionaire Congress begin implementing its austerity, fighting health care, limiting unemployment compensation, caring little about hundreds of thousands returning military veterans from our endless wars with Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) and Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome (PTSD), leading to daily suicides.

As the new Millionaire Congress (Republicans and Democrats) further ramp up austerity, and Trump supports it, look for the nation to move even closer to revolution. Hopefully peaceful revolution, but probably not.

During his campaign, Trump preached for more police control of the public, not less. Fear of revolution prompted the federal government under Obama to supply military hardware to local police forces. He reluctantly claimed to stop it late in his second term due to the public outcry. But expect Trump, flashing his mantle as Commander in Chief, to encourage greater militarizing of police nationwide.

Privatization

Internationally, American and European oligarchs have looked for chances to move into debt-torn countries and swallow up their public assets and natural resources at dirt-cheap prices, turning public services into private corporate operations. Washington has colluded with private corporations to do that, particularly in South America, as we wrote about in our column Why Ecuador REALLY Gave Assange Asylum.

That would be right up Trump’s alley. His top priority has always been making a deal, i.e. making money. And as president he’ll have national and global opportunities to secretly do that.

Cohorts will encourage it. Giuliani as mayor of New York pushed to both censor and privatize the arts, and keep the public from investigating budgets, but was stalled by federal court rulings. After his mayoral effort, he tried to privately control millions in a fund for families of 9/11 victims — until a group of police widows threatened to file suit. Christie, as governor of New Jersey, has moved water supply services from public control to the private sector.

These are the first issues to consider and respond to as Trump works to consolidate his power. We’ll be looking more at these and other issues — ranging from domestic to foreign affairs — as we move forward.

How

How can you defend yourself and your fellow citizens from the coming fascist onslaught? Peculiar Progressive for years has encouraged you to get organized (you can’t do it alone), get educated to each issue’s specifics and get active in bringing about change. It’s now going to take a massive effort to defend yourself, your children and your Constitution. It’s doubtful you’ll get much help from the Millionaire Congress — who could refuse to fund Trump efforts, but won’t — or from a conservative U.S. Supreme Court he’s about to make more conservative by appointing a ninth judge.

History shows that dictators move into power unexpectedly during economic downturns, coups d’etat, revolutions or states of emergency.

So, to your marks, get set, go.

Simplifying Trump and Seeing His Future

Roger Armbrust, February 20, 2017

Following the November presidential elections, we offered you our column Prepare to Fight Fascism: 2017 and Beyond. Within it, we gave you Donald Trump’s modus operandi throughout his decades of business life:

Trump, in his youth, was weaned by a real-estate father to be a business killer (his father’s term), and a winner and not a loser, according to PBS Frontline. In young adulthood, he was trained by the notorious lawyer Roy Cohn. Cohn made his name as a legal henchman for Sen. Joseph McCarthy, the notorious ’50s Red-Scare politician. Cohn represented Trump in business for years, pushing him to (1) never admit to anything negative, (2) propagandize every negative into a positive, and (3) if anybody sues you, countersue. That’s not what you would call an honest life, but it is a way to help protect yourself legally.

During his brief presidency, you’ve seen Trump stay with these three Cohn Core Principles. Let’s look at how he’s done this with two of the major issues he’s faced in his first weeks:

• From his court-failed, seven-Muslim-country immigration ban to the in-out dash of National Security Advisor Michael Flynn, Trump continues, and will continue, to see no fault or flaw in his own choices or actions. He never admits to anything negative.

• He immediately propagandized both the legally failed immigration ban and Flynn’s departure. Rather than admitting to a Constitutional problem with the ban, he blamed the federal judge for ineptness, referring to him as this so-called judge. In his rambling, ego-filled press conference last week, he refused to say Flynn lied to Vice-President Pence and the FBI about his contacts with Russia. Trump said, "Mike Flynn is a fine person. . .What he did wasn’t wrong — what he did in terms of the information he saw. What was wrong was the way that other people, including yourselves [the press] in this room, were given that information, because that was classified information that was given illegally. That’s the real problem.

• So, you see, this is Trump’s way of countersuing. When the federal judge says your presidential order is at fault, Trump responds: Well, you’re not even really a judge; you’re a so-called judge". When his national security advisor lies, he’s not a bad guy. It’s the fault of whoever leaked the info, and the press for revealing it.

You will see him stay with the Cohn Core Principles – the denial of truth and propagandizing of untruths — throughout his presidency, however long that may be, because they have helped him get whatever he’s wanted for