SC's primary colors will be black and white

Greg Palast makes the case that a race card does trump a gender card. But maybe it's the union card we ought to be more concerned about ...

South Carolina 2000: Six hundred police in riot gear facing a few dozen angry-as-hell workers on the docks of Charleston. In the darkness, rocks, clubs and blood fly. The cops beat the crap out of the protesters. Of course, it’s the union men who are arrested for conspiracy to riot. And of course, of the five men handcuffed, four are black. The prosecutor: a white, Bible-thumping Attorney General running for Governor. The result: a state ripped in half -- White versus Black.

South Carolina 2008: (Today), the Palmetto State may well choose our President, or at least the Democrat’s idea of a President. According to CNN and the pundit-ocracy, the only question is: Will the large black population vote their pride (for Obama) or for “experience” (Hillary)? In other words, the election comes down to a matter of racial vanity.

The story of the dockworkers charged with rioting in 2000 suggest there’s an awfully good reason for black folk to vote for one of their own. This is the chance to even the historic score in this land of lingering Jim Crow, where the Confederate Flag flew over the capital while the longshoreman faced Southern justice.

But maybe there’s more to South Carolina’s story than Black and White.

Let’s re-wind the tape of the 2000 battle. It was early that morning on the 19th of January when members of International Longshoremen’s Association Local 1422 “shaped up” to unload a container ship which had just pulled into port. It was hard work for good pay. An experienced union man could earn above $60,000 a year.

In this last hold-out of the Confederacy, it was one of the few places a black man could get decent pay. Or any man.

That day, the stevedoring contractor handling the unloading decided it would hire the beggars down the dock, without experience or skills -- and without union cards -- willing to work for just one-third of union scale.

That night, union workers -- black, white, whatever -- fought for their lives and livelihoods.

At the heart of the turmoil in South Carolina in 2000 then, was not so much black versus white, but union versus non-union. It was a battle between those looking for a good day’s pay versus those looking for a way not to pay it. The issue was -- and is -- class war, the conflict between the movers and the shakers and the moved and shaken.

The dockworkers of Charleston could see the future of America right down the road. Literally. Because right down the highway, they could see their cousins and brothers who worked in the Carolina textile mills kiss their jobs goodbye as they loaded the mill looms onto trains for Mexico.

President Bill Clinton had signed NAFTA, made China a “most favored nation” in trade and urged us, with a flirtatious grin, to “make change our friend.”

But change apparently wasn’t in a friendly mood. In 2000, Guilford Mills shuttered its Greensboro fabric plant and reopened it in Tampico, Mexico. Four hundred jobs went south. Springs Mills of Rock Hill, SC, closed down and abandoned 480 workers. Fieldcrest-Cannon pulled out of York, SC, and Great America Mills simply went bust.

South Carolina, then, is the story of globalization left out of Thomas Friedman’s wonders-of-the-free-market fantasies.

This week, while US media broadcasts cutesy photo-ops from black churches and replay the forgettable spats between candidates, the real issues of South Carolina are thankfully laid out in a book released today: On the Global Waterfront, by Suzan Erem and E. Paul Durrenberger. They portray the case of the Charleston Five dockworkers as an exemplary, desperate act of economic resistance.

Friedman’s bestseller, The World is Flat, begins with his uplifting game of golf with a tycoon in India. Erem and Durrenberger never put on golf shoes: their book is globalization stripped down to its dirty underpants.

While Friedman made the point that he flew business class to Bangalore on his way to the greens to meet his millionaire, Global Waterfront’s authors go steerage. And the people they write about don’t go anywhere at all. These are the stevedores who move the containers of Wal-Mart T-shirts from Guatemala to sell to customers in Virginia who can’t afford health insurance because they lost their job in the textile mill.

And the book talks about (cover the children’s ears!) labor unions.

South Carolina is union country. And union-busting country. But who gives a flying fart about labor unions today? Only 7%, one in fourteen US workers belongs to one. That’s less than the number of Americans who believe that Elvis killed John Kennedy.

Think “longshoremen” and what comes to mind is On the Waterfront with Marlon Brando, the good guy, beating up the evil union boss. The union bosses were the thugs, mobbed-up bullies, the dockworkers’ enemies. The movie’s director, Elia Kazan, perfectly picked up the anti-union red-baiting Joe McCarthy zeitgeist of that era -- which could go down well today.

Elected labor leaders are, in our media, always “union bosses.” But the real bosses, the CEOs, the guys who shutter factories and ship them to China ... they’re never “bosses,” they’re “entrepreneurs.”

Indeed the late and lionized King of Union Busters, Sam Walton, would be proud today -- were he alive -- to learn that the woman he called “my little lady,” Hillary Clinton, whom he placed on Wal-Mart’s board of directors, is front-runner for the presidency. She could well become America’s “Greeter,” posted at our nation’s door, to welcome the Saudis and Chinese who are buying America at a guaranteed low price.

Black vs. white, men vs. women, grown-ups vs. children playing in the mud. We'll find out who won -- or lost -- this evening.

Thank you again, Senator Dodd

Mr. President, I've spoken repeatedly about the rule of law. The rule of law isn't some abstract idea. It's here with us. It's what makes this body run, and it has for more than two centuries. It means that we hear each other out. We do it in the open. And, while the minority gets its voice, gets its right to strenuously object, the majority ultimately rules. Standing for the rule of law anywhere means standing for it everywhere, in our courts and in the United States Senate as well. The circumstances are different, of course, but the heart of the matter is the same. Last evening, I believe, the Republican party forfeited its claim to good faith on this issue. They've left to stake their case on fear, unfortunately...."

So what's next on FISA?

(Senate Democrats), under the leadership of Senator Harry Reid and with the help of Senator Jay Rockefeller (a good friend of the administration earlier in the debate on this bill), refused to let the minority ram through its substitute on Thursday and are finally forcing the Republicans to find 60 votes to kill the debate, prevent the amendments from being considered, and just move on. This Monday at 4:30 EST is do-or-die time -- our first goal must be to urge a 'no' vote on cloture so that meaningful amendments can be considered. It could be the first time in recent history that the Democrats -- who claim to want to protect the Constitution -- stand up to the administration and say no. No more warrantless wiretapping of Americans, no more give-aways to the industries that fill politicians' coffers, no more hiding the unlawful acts of this administration.

If that means the so-called Protect America Act sunsets, so be it. As House Leader Hoyer and Senate Intel Chairman Rockefeller have noted, all current surveillance orders can be extended into 2009 even if the current law expires. The intel community won't be forced to end its current warrantless wiretapping and Congress will have the time to do, well, anything else besides pass this horrible Senate bill, which is really the worst option out there. If no legislation is enacted before the sunset, the law simply reverts to the surveillance statutes in place as of last July -- with the significant addition that plans authorized over the last six months may continue even if they have been authorized without appropriate judicial oversight.

As posted here previously, I make a point of calling Democratic Senators -- particularly in adjoining states like Louisiana and Arkansas in this case -- and kindly asking them to represent me, and the millions of other Texas Democrats who have no US Senate representation:

More than ever it is crucial that you call your senator and urge a no vote on cloture – especially if your senator is one of the twelve - Bayh, Carper, Inouye, Johnson, Landrieu, McCaskill, Mikulski, Nelson (FL), Nelson (NE), Pryor, Salazar - who voted with the administration on Thursday. All we need is to knock a handful of them off the administration's bandwagon and we'll have an opportunity to get this right.

Watson: Hello, MOTO (certainly not MoFo)

(State Sen. Kirk Watson of Austin was kind enough to write a guest blog for the Texas Progressive Alliance as we continue to push our TexRoots 2008 slate of candidates.)

A few months back a certain progressive blogger took note of a piece I had published. This writer responded with an entry that was mostly complementary -- I'd guess we agree about 90 percent of the time. But then, after hitting a point I thought was pretty inarguable, the writer called me a "MOTO."

Most of you who read Texas' great progressive blogs probably know what a "MOTO" is. I, on the other hand, had to turn to my 18-year-old son (and pop culture crutch) Preston, who steered me to something called urbandictionary.com. There, I finally learned the truth:

I am, it seems, a "Master Of The Obvious".

It was kind of a frustrating revelation, partly because it's true. But if I've learned anything at all in my year as a state senator, it's that what's so obvious to me (and to acronym-wielding bloggers) seems downright foreign to so many others -- particularly the Republican leadership in the Texas Capitol.

Here are just a few MOTO moments from the past few months:

•It's wrong for a governor to use a 39-percent mandate to rig state agencies in ways that benefit corporate contributors, privatize public roads, and ignore the real health and educational needs of this state.

•It's wrong for a lieutenant governor to wage a partisan campaign to ram through a voter screening bill that targets Hispanics and the elderly. It's worse to force a very ill senator to set up a sick bed outside the Senate chamber simply to block such a terrible, discriminatory proposal.

•It's wrong for a speaker of the House to stand before a body of democratically elected officials who gave him his office, and then declare he has absolute power to ignore them.

•It's wrong for Supreme Court justices to stretch campaign finance laws, or to ignore law and precedent in rulings that protect political contributors, or to take advantage of a politicized criminal justice process.

•And it's very wrong for a high court judge to slam shut the doors of justice as early as possible, especially when it means sending a man to his death.

All pretty obvious, right? Well, not to the people who've run this state for all these years. And that's where we all have work to do.

We are right. We are anxious to do great things for Texas, to restore opportunity, and to create reasons to hope for a better future.

But we can't just know that. We can't just talk to ourselves.

We can't assume it's obvious.

We must make it apparent to anyone who cares about this state and where it's headed, and we must remind them of the most obvious statement of all: Texans cannot trust the Republican leadership.

I'm talking about the political bosses, bullies, ideologues and figureheads that control the agenda, bury the opposition, and block any bill that runs counter to their dogma.

I'm talking about the folks who are more interested in taking irresponsible pledges than in solving Texas' challenges, who will deny the most verifiable fact if it doesn't conform to their ideology, and who will embrace every budget trick they can think of before they level with Texans about what people are worth to them.

I'm talking about the select group that's denied children health care at any cost, that's allowed our colleges and universities to become overcrowded, underfunded and inadequate, that's watched our highways deteriorate while forcing Texans to choose between crushing traffic and private toll roads, and that's denied and deferred environmental problems, leaving our children to fix them.

Here's what's most obvious: only the Democratic Party will bring about the positive changes that Texans need and demand.

That means we have to do all we can this year -- we must make it obvious -- that the people of Texas must challenge the so-called absolute power of the Republican leadership. Once we make MOTOs out of everyone, Texas will elect strong Democrats in 2008.

Dear Senator Corn-fed

I'm writing today to urge you in the strongest possible terms NOT to pass any wiretapping legislation that violates our rights as expressed in the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, OR that gives blanket retroactive immunity to the telecom companies who helped the Bush Administration commit violations of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

You swore an oath upon taking your seat in the U.S. Senate to preserve, protect and defend our Constitution. The Fourth Amendment guarantees our right to be free from searches of our persons, papers and effects without a warrant based upon probable cause. But the legislation from the Senate Intelligence Committee would allow "blanket warrants" for wiretapping -- blatantly contravening the Fourth Amendment's requirement for a warrant to "particularly describ[e] the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized."

The rule of law is also at stake here. It's quite clear that some telecoms, such as AT&T, helped the Bush Administration repeatedly violate the law of the land at the time (FISA). But at least one company, Quest, quite properly refused to do so. To grant the lawbreakers immunity after the fact would undermine the concept of equal justice for all and codify a Nixonian attitude towards the law -- "If the President does it, it must be legal."

So I ask to you take a strong stand against ANY legislation that grants retroactive immunity OR does not preserve our rights to privacy as guaranteed in the Fourth Amendment.

I also respectfully ask that you reply to my message as soon as possible with your views on this topic.

Corndog has never once responded to any message sent to him in the past six years, so I am not holding my breath this time. But if he does, I'll post it here.

Clinton and Obama must join the fight against telecom immunity

A letter from my good friends* Glenn Greenwald and Jane Hamsher:

Dear Friend,

John Edwards should challenge his rivals Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton to go back to Washington, DC and fight against retroactive immunity for the telecoms.

The Republicans are not going to let Harry Reid punt and extend the Protect America Act for another 18 months so it looks like the FISA bill is going to come back up again on Monday. Chris Dodd's objection to Unanimous Consent still stands, so they will pick up in the middle of the Motion to Proceed debate.

Without the help of the presidential candidates, we are doomed to lose this fight. And all their calls for change will ring hollow if they allow George Bush to railroad this bill through a supine Democratic-controlled Senate because of their absence.

You can email Senator Edwards directly at john@johnedwards.com.

Cheers,

Jane Hamsher & Glenn Greenwald

When last we were on the topic of retroactive immunity, Chris Dodd was still a presidential candidate. Clinton and Obama missed the vote because they were off campaigning.

I really don't want to see my future president failing to lead on an issue so critical again.

*They're not really my good friends, but maybe some day ...