In praise of whistleblowers

Back in 1981, the US Justice Department did an inquiry into possible criminal activities of the National Security Agency, which in those long-before-Snowden days was a little known agency. Veteran investigative reporter James Bamford, now writing for The Intercept, got from a whistleblower one of the only two copies of the report and describes how he had to fend off all attempts by them to prevent him from publishing it. They failed, partly because at that time the Justice Department was not as subservient to the national security state as it has since become.
[Read more…]

What happens when Atlas Shrugged meets Lord of the Flies

Suppose you are the head of a big corporation that consists of a large number of retail stores all over the country aimed at the middle classes. You also happen to be a devotee of Ayn Rand, so much so that you can rattle off by memory huge chunks of her oeuvre, no mean feat considering her awful writing. Hedge Fund manager Eddie Lampert was one such person and when he became CEO of the merged corporation of Sears and Kmart, he put Rand’s ideas into practice.
[Read more…]

Why minority voters wait in lines

When I voted yesterday in the precinct where I have voted for the last 20 years, it was very quick as usual. I have never had to wait in line to get my ballot or to use a voting booth even in those presidential elections where there is a high turnout. The longest delay involves the person checking off the voting rolls having difficulty with the alphabet and locating my name.
[Read more…]

Let the rate of looting accelerate!

Wherever there are large amounts of ordinary people’s money, you can be sure that greedy wealthy people are eying it and thinking up clever ways to siphon it away into their own pockets. Money for public schools, pension funds, and Social Security are the prime targets for their rapacity. The assault on the first has been going on for some time with charter schools being a prime vehicle for diverting funds.
[Read more…]

“War is the enemy of the poor”

Tavis Smiley has written a book Death of a King about the last year of Martin Luther King’s life where he discusses what I have been arguing for a long time, that King, in the five years after his “I have a dream” speech in 1963 and especially in the last year of life had a much darker view of America, highlighting America’s abuse of power abroad (and condemning the Vietnam war) and its class war at home against the poor, and its endemic racism. His message became much more powerful and because of that he became vilified and marginalized by whites at that time and is ignored now.
[Read more…]

Shaming people to vote

So I voted today, as I always do. However angry I get at the rigged system that is currently in place, I have this unshakeable feeling that I need to go out and vote. But I do understand why some might feel that they cannot in good conscience vote using the lesser-of-two-evils doctrine and I oppose efforts to shame principled non-voters into feeling that they are somehow shirking their civic duty. This is why I never wear the ‘I Voted Today’ sticker that they give me.
[Read more…]

The strengths and dangers of hyperlocal social media

I had never heard of the app Yik Yak. It is a Twitter-like app that uses GPS location sensors to allow people to post their views (“yaks”) anonymously within a highly limited geographical area of 1.5 miles, thus making it a hyper-local social network. This enables people to comment anonymously on matters of purely local interest. You can read how it works here. The app is particularly popular on college campuses where people can share their opinions on what’s going on in and outside of class.
[Read more…]