On July 1, 1966, when thirty year old Norma Watkins bid farewell to her husband of ten years, her four young children, and the good life in Jackson, Mississippi, she was effectively engaging in a personal act of secession from the Magnolia State.  Not only did she say “good-bye” to days filled with tennis, bridge, and church bazaars, tasteful, noncontroversial volunteer work for the Junior League and the Jackson Country Club, but she also fled the racism, sexism, violence, repressive politics, and family intolerance, all associated with the so-called “Mississippi way of life.”  As Ole Miss historian James Silver wrote in 1963, Mississippi was indeed a “closed society.”

Ms. Watkins, my cousin whom I have not seen since 1957, has just published a riveting, soul-searching, brutally frank memoir about growing up in segregated Mississippi in the 40s and 50s, and becoming disillusioned with the state’s big lie – “Blacks are inferior to whites, and, therefore, deserve to be treated accordingly.”  In her new book, The Last Resort: Taking the Mississippi Cure, Watkins demonstrates an uncanny grasp of every nuance of what it meant to live in a state-enforced racially segregated society. Although she was the daughter of firebrand, racist Governor Ross Barnett’s personal attorney, she developed an empathy for the plight of her family’s black servants trying to survive in a culture in which literally everything was stacked against them.

Norma Watkins combines the story-telling skills of Mississippi writer Eudora Welty with the compassion and political passion of North Towards Home author Willie Morris and the psychological sophistication of psychotherapists such as Rollo May and M. Scott Peck.  Interestingly enough, the book was published as part of the Willie Morris Books in Memoir and Biography Series by The University Press of Mississippi.  Ironically, in 1962 when Governor Barnett tried unsuccessfully to keep African American James Meredith out of Ole Miss, Tom Watkins, Norma’s father, was in charge of Barnett’s legal team.

The setting for nearly half of the book is the family’s hotel and spa, Allison’s Wells, located a half hour north of Jackson.  Norma and her family lived there between 1943 and 1945 while her father was serving in World War II.  She and her sister Mary Elizabeth worked there every summer until they finished high school. Allison’s Wells was Norma’s metaphor for Mississippi and laboratory testing ground for her evolving attitudes about black-white relations in the South.  It was there that she had a chance to observe and ponder the Mississippi Caste system in which blacks cooked all of the meals for the elite hotel guests but were never allowed to eat with them or socialize with them.  It was at Allison’s Wells where the seeds for the radicalization of Norma Watkins were first sewn.

Notwithstanding her increasing doubts about the Mississippi form of justice, or lack thereof, Watkins allowed herself to be temporarily seduced by the lifestyle afforded the daughter of a prominent Mississippi attorney married to a successful white businessman.  By late 1963 she and Fred Craig, whom she married in 1955, had four children, but a happy marriage it was not.

By that time Watkins’s life was in a state of turmoil.  She had resumed her pursuit of a college degree, the James Meredith affair had taken its toll, racial violence was on the increase, the civil rights movement had reached fever pitch proportions, and JFK had been assassinated.  In the midst of all of this Allison’s Wells, The Last Resort, burned to the ground.

Allison’s Wells was Norma’s safe haven where she was loved and understood by her aunt who ran the place, all of the black employees, and the white hotel guests as well.  Life in Mississippi for Norma was effectively over once Allison’s Wells was gone.  She stood alone as the old system continued to implode.  She became increasingly radicalized and politicized as her personal life came unglued at the seams.  Norma had to go.

Then one afternoon in early July in 1966, much to the chagrin of her family and friends, Norma climbed into the blue Triumph convertible of her lover, a Jewish civil rights lawyer, and off they drove to Miami to a life of teaching, writing, and political activism at Miami Dade College.  Free at last!

Life is full of an endless series of secessions including birth, death, divorce, graduation, job changes, leaving home, ending relationships, and moving to another place.  Secessions are often painful, unpleasant, and unpopular with others.  Norma Watkins’s decision to leave Mississippi was no exception to the rule.  Although her decision was based on a strong sense of betrayal and moral outrage, she has written about it with honesty, clarity, sensitivity, style, and class.

The Last Resort reads like a well written classical Southern novel in the tradition of Harper Lee, Carson McCullers, and Eudora Welty.  Only it happens to be true.

My only regret about this compelling book is that it makes me wish that I had known Norma Watkins a lot better back in the 1950s when we grew up together in Jackson, Mississippi.  We might have had a lot to talk about.  My father’s job also depended on Governor Ross Barnett.  I seceded in 1957.

Thomas H. Naylor

June 13, 2011

Founder of the Second Vermont Republic and Professor Emeritus of Economics at Duke University; co-author of Affluenza, Downsizing the USA, and The Search for Meaning.  www.vermontrepublic.org.

Although I can claim no kinship with McGill University Professor R.T. Naylor, whom I have never met, I am an admirer of his work as an economist, a historian, a criminologist, and a political journalist.  Even though he tackles very weighty problems, Thomas Naylor skillfully manages to find the humor and the irony in the dark side of life.  His latest book, Crass Struggle: Greed, Glitz, and Gluttony in a Wanna-Have World, is no exception to the rule.

Crass Struggle is about how the ultra-rich respond to the human condition, namely, separation, meaninglessness, powerlessness, and fear of death, as well as the devastating global social, economic, and environmental consequences of their behavior.  For those in the top 1 percent of the world’s population who own 50 percent of the world’s wealth, life is all about having – owning, possessing, manipulating and controlling money, power, people, and things – very expensive things such as precious metals, gemstones, diamonds, art objects, historical artifacts, rare coins, fine wines, Cuban cigars, scarce fish, exotic birds, wild animals, and elephant tusks.

To cope with meaninglessness and fear of death many of the super-rich spend their entire lives pretending they are invincible.  One of the ways in which they try to convince themselves that they will live forever is through conspicuous consumption.  They think they can spend their way into a state of never-ending self-actualization without paying any psychological dues for a life of unrestrained pleasure.  They live by the slogan, “I’ve got mine, Jack, and the rest of the world be damned.”

And damned it is, the world which supplies the super-affluent with their expensive toys, playthings, food, and drink.  Naylor describes it as “the low side of the high life, the bad side of the good life, or, more poetically, the underbelly of the potbelly.”  It’s all about the dark underworld which supports the world’s fat cats through debauchery, deceit, bribery, smuggling, fakery, forgery, tax evasion, and virtually every other known form of human criminal activity.

Through a series of well-documented riveting stories Thomas Naylor takes his readers on a global tour of toxic gold mines spewing arsenic and cyanide, diamond fields destroying lives and spreading human misery, purveyors of upscale seafood indifferent to dwindling supplies, operators of disgusting trophy-hunting expeditions, and dealers in exotic pets high on endangered species lists.  The combination of big money and affluenza gone amok yields very troubling results.  To his credit Professor Naylor does not conclude his book with a “happy chapter,” outlining a number of inane policy recommendations aimed at fixing the plethora of problems described in his book.  Rather he leaves us with the following somber assessment of the grim situation:

“Public exhibitions of gross self-indulgence by the ultra-rich lead not to  general outrage and demand for serious political action but to a populace of electronically lobotomized consumatons hopping into their 4×4s to exercise what has become the ultimate human right – the freedom to shop at the discount mall for what they are told is a bargain.  From class struggle to crass struggle: that is the defining feature of the times.  And the genius of today’s political economy has been to convert what used to be a potential life-and-death conflict between haves and have-nots into a minor disagreement between have-lots and wanna-have-mores.”

Through a collection of poignant, sometimes dramatic, authentic tales, Thomas Naylor enables his readers to peer into the soul of globalization, and it is not a pretty sight.  It’s not what the Chicago Boys promised us.  Or is it?

Thomas H. Naylor

May 20, 2011

Founder of the Second Vermont Republic and Professor Emeritus of Economics at Duke University; co-author of Affluenza, Downsizing the USA, and The Search for Meaning.  www.vermontrepublic.org.

Depending on your point of view, Osama bin Laden is either literally or figuratively dead in the water.  He has been officially removed from the international radar screen by the White House, all of which begs the question, “What will life be like in a post bin Laden world?”  Three possible scenarios, either separately or in combination, appear to be likely.

By far the most optimistic of the three scenarios would call for President Barack Obama to declare victory in the war in Afghanistan, bring home all of the American troops, reduce the Pentagon’s budget, cut the deficit, rebuild the economy, and strengthen the U.S. dollar.  Mission accomplished.  End of story.

Unfortunately, there is little evidence to suggest that this is what the Obama administration has in mind, all of which casts serious doubt on the original reason why we went into Afghanistan back in 2001 – take out Osama bin Laden.

A more likely scenario is that we will be told by our government that Al Qaeda is still very dangerous and we must continue to remain vigilant.  Al Qaeda is planning to blow up AMTRAK trains near New York, Washington, Chicago, and Los Angeles.

Since the risk of additional acts of domestic and international terrorism remains very high, we should increase government spending for Homeland Security and military defense.  We must continue to remain a military presence in Iraq and Afghanistan indefinitely. Since Israel is our only trusted ally in the Middle East in the war on terrorism, the unconditional economic and military assistance which we provide to it should remain unaltered.  The Islamophobic views of right wing American hate groups need not be challenged. The primary thrust of the second scenario is business as usual.

However, it is the third post bin Laden scenario which is by far the most insidious of them all.  It is based on the optimism and feelings of omnipotence generated by the recent high-tech stealth attack and assassination of Osama bin Laden in his compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan ordered by President Obama.  Clearly this demonstrated that the United States is invincible.  If we want to take out Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Fidel Castro, Hugo Chavez, Kim Jong Il, or Muammar Qadhafi, we no longer need to amass one hundred thousand American troops to be sent to some faraway place.  Instead, we can simply send the U.S. Navy Seals to do the dirty deed.  Surgically precise military attacks of this type by U.S. Special Forces are neat, clean, and bloodless with no visible casualties or body bags.  If a foreign leader does not play by our rules, then beware!

Through a combination of unmanned drone aircraft, so-called smart weapons, and high-tech strike forces the White House can order the assassination of any political leader anywhere in the world.  Muammar Qadhafi barely escaped such a strike in Tripoli recently at the hands of NATO.  No doubt his days are truly numbered.

Most likely what we will see in a post bin Laden world is a combination of all three of the aforementioned scenarios.  One can expect token reductions in the level of American troops in Afghanistan while maintaining a strong American presence in both Iraq and Afghanistan.  In the meantime the war on terrorism will continue onward and upward with increased government spending and reduced personal freedom.  And we will all be mesmerized by America’s high-tech prowess until someday, somebody, somewhere says, “Enough is surely enough.”

Thomas H. Naylor

May 12, 2011

Founder of the Second Vermont Republic and Professor Emeritus of Economics at Duke University; co-author of Affluenza, Downsizing the USA, and The Search for Meaning.

www.vermontrepublic.org.

There he was at Ground Zero in New York City, Nobel Peace Laureate Barack Obama, basking in the glory of the cold blooded assassination of Osama bin Laden in Abbottabad, Pakistan, which he had ordered a few days earlier.  It reminded me of the celebratory response of white racists in New Orleans in 1963, where I happened to live, to the death of President John F. Kennedy.  They were beside themselves, just like most Americans are about the demise of bin Laden.

But who was Osama bin Laden?  Was he a real person or was he the creation of President Bill Clinton and later transformed by Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama into an international pariah?

Few Americans recall that it was Bill Clinton, not George W. Bush, who introduced the world to Osama bin Laden back in 1998.  Without any evidence whatsoever, Clinton blamed the Muslim fundamentalist and wealthy Saudi exile for the simultaneous bombings of the American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania.  At that time Clinton’s presidency was deeply mired in the Monica Lewinsky affair, and he was in need of something to divert public attention away from his personal life.  Osama bin Laden,  said to be an international terrorist trained by the CIA living in Afghanistan, provided such a diversion, and he did so very well.

Clinton ordered military strikes against bin Laden’s alleged international terrorist training bases in Afghanistan and a chemical plant in Sudan which was thought to be producing biological and chemical weapons.  Even though the missiles aimed at the Afghan bases actually landed in Pakistan and the so-called chemical plant turned out to be an aspirin factory, almost overnight Osama bin Laden was transformed into a household word synonymous with global terrorism.  At least temporarily, he had become Global Enemy Number One, and Clinton’s political popularity turned upward.

Shortly after September 11, 2001, our government informed us that nineteen Muslim fanatics armed only with boxcutters had pulled off the greatest act of terrorism in history under the command of a charismatic, sinister-looking Arab, also named Osama bin Laden, from his high-tech cave in the rugged mountains of Afghanistan.  Without one shred of evidence, the Bush administration claimed that these Arab terrorists commandeered four jetliners, brought down the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center, severely damaged the Pentagon, and almost succeeded in destroying theWhite House and the Capitol.  And they did all of this because they “hated freedom.”

We were further told by Bush administration operatives that 9/11 was a special case of the terrorist activities of a global network known as Al Qaeda which was controlled by Osama bin Laden.  To combat this international network of money, weapons, and Muslim fanatics, the United States needed to launch a global war on terrorism.  Such a war on terrorism not only defined the Bush administration for the next seven years but resulted in illegal wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Pakistan, staggering budget deficits and no doubt contributed to a major financial meltdown.

Incredulous though it may be, the official U.S. government version of the 9/11 story has gone virtually unchallenged by our tepid media.  Anyone who has the audacity to question this utterly fantastic tale is accused of being an unpatriotic conspiracy theorist and not taken seriously.

Although the real perpetrators of 9/11 are unknown, it would appear that its purpose was to demonize Islam so as to justify a significant American military presence in the Middle East to hegemonize the supply of oil there.

Furthermore, there is little evidence to suggest that Al Qaeda is the tightly controlled, monolithic, all powerful organization we were led to believe by Team Bush.  Rather it seems to be a highly decentralized network in which terrorist attacks such as those which took place in Madrid and London, for example, were planned, organized, financed, and executed at the local level.  Osama bin Laden was not calling all of the shots from either a cave in Afghanistan or his alleged compound in Abbottabad.

But to the surprise of many liberal Democrats who voted for Obama, the transition of the war on terror from Bush to Obama was virtually seamless.  The legend of Osama bin Laden was still alive and well.  Obama actually increased the number of American troops in Afghanistan and upped the intensity of the search for bin Laden himself.

Then on May 1, 2011, in the Situation Room of the White House, Obama gave the order for a special forces team of twenty-five U.S. Navy Seals to search out and kill bin Laden in the compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, where he had been hiding for five years.  Forty minutes later, we were told by the White House staff, Osama bin Laden was dead and shortly thereafter buried at sea.  No photographs or video recordings of his death, his body, or his burial at sea were made available to the American public.  However, President Obama assured us that he was indeed dead.  It was all an eerie reminder of Ronald Reagan’s famous expression, “Trust, and verify.”  But that was not to be.

We may never know whether Osama bin Laden was a real person or not – whether he was responsible for the bombing of the two American embassies in Africa, 9/11, and other international terrorist events.  Neither do we know whether he is dead or alive or, if he is dead, when he died.  But does it really matter?  Osama bin Laden was bigger than life!

What we do know is that he helped save Bill Clinton’s presidency and that his name and image were used to justify an international war on Islam – a war in which several thousand Americans and tens of thousands of Afghans and Iraqis lost their lives, not to mention the hundreds of billion dollars, possibly trillions, which it cost American taxpayers.  To protect ourselves from the terrorist threat engendered by bin Laden we have been willing to forego many of our constitutionally guaranteed liberties and turn a blind eye towards the abuse and torture of those accused of terrorism.  It remains to be seen whether the assassination of Osama bin Laden will help save Barack Obama’s presidency and pave the way for his re-election in 2012.

Whether dead or alive, the legend of Osama bin Laden lives on.

Thomas H. Naylor

May 6, 2011

Founder of the Second Vermont Republic and Professor Emeritus of Economics at Duke University; co-author of Affluenza, Downsizing the USA, and The Search for Meaning.

www.vermontrepublic.org.

In the brouhaha over whether President Barack Obama was born in Hawaii or not, few seem to realize, that in the eyes of many historians and legal scholars, Hawaii is not a legitimate state of the United States of America.  If the government of Hawaii had not been illegally overthrown in 1893 by the U.S. Marines through a classic act of Manifest Destiny and American-style gunboat diplomacy, Hawaii would still be an independent, sovereign nation today.

Notwithstanding a series of clever illegal moves by the U.S. government, Hawaii cannot be considered a legally bona fide state of the United States.  In 1898 the United States unilaterally abrogated all of Hawaii’s existing treaties and purported to annex it on the basis of a Congressional resolution.  Two years later the U.S. illegally established the so-called Territory of Hawaii on the basis of the spurious Organic Act.  After a period of prolonged belligerent occupation by the U.S., Hawaii was placed under United Nations Charter, Article 73, as a “non-self-governing territory” under the administrative authority of the United States.  Then in 1959 the U.S. falsely informed the U.N. that Hawaii had become the 50^th state of the United States after an illegal plebiscite.  Among those allowed to vote in this invalid election were members of the U.S. military and their dependents stationed in Hawaii.  In other words, Hawaii’s occupiers were permitted to vote on its future.

In November 1993, President Bill Clinton signed Public Law 103-150 apologizing to the 140,000 Native Hawaiians, who call themselves Kanaka Maoli, for the January 17, 1893, invasion of Hawaii deposing Queen Liliuokalani which led to Hawaii’s illegal annexation by the United States and eventually to statehood in 1959.  This apology implicitly recognized the unrelinquished inherent sovereignty and right of self-determination of the Native Hawaiian people.

Whether it was his intention or not, President Bill Clinton clearly raised the expectations of the Kanaka Maoli that one day Hawaii might once again be viewed as an independent nation-state.  The downtrodden Kanaka Maoli, who make up less than 12 percent of Hawaii’s population, “die younger, earn less, go to jail more frequently, and are more likely to be homeless than any other ethnic group in the islands,” according to the Honolulu Weekly.

If Barack Obama were born in Hawaii, and his birth certificate says that he was, then why has he shown so little interest in the plight of Native Hawaiians?  Bill Clinton has done a lot more for the Kanaka Maoli than Barack Obama, even though Obama pretends to be a compassionate liberal.

At one level, it matters not whether President Obama was born in Hawaii, Kenya, Indonesia, or Saudi Arabia.  The real issue is how does he behave.  Therein lies the rub.  Not unlike his friend Donald Trump, Obama has a very strong predisposition towards violence and war, caters almost exclusively to the rich and powerful, and palls around with the right wing government of Israel.

Hawaii became an alleged state of the United States as a result of a foreign policy based on full spectrum dominance and imperial overstretch – the same foreign policy employed by Obama over a century later in places like Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Pakistan, and Palestine.

President Obama’s benign neglect of the Hawaiian victims of American nineteenth century imperialism says more about who he is than the name of the country on his birth certificate.

Thomas H. Naylor

May 2, 2011

Founder of the Second Vermont Republic and Professor Emeritus of Economics at Duke University; co-author of Affluenza, Downsizing the USA, and The Search for Meaning.  www.vermontrepublic.org.

In stark contrast to the foreign policy of the United States, which is thoroughly grounded in the principles of full spectrum dominance and imperial overstretch, stands the foreign policy of four small European nations which are committed to political neutrality – Austria, Finland, Sweden, and Switzerland.  In addition to their opposition to war, these democratic, nonviolent, affluent, socially responsible, cooperative, egalitarian, ecofriendly countries share a high degree of environmental integrity and a strong sense of community.

The United States, on the other hand, has over 1.6 million troops on active military duty stationed at over 1,000 bases in 153 countries.  The combined active military force of the four neutral nations amounts to only 85,000 troops.  The U.S. has nearly 80,000 troops stationed in Europe alone, not to mention 36,000 in Japan and nearly 30,000 in South Korea.  Currently the U.S. is engaged in illegal wars in four Muslim countries — Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, and Pakistan.  It also provides unconditional military support for the Likud government of Israel in its war against the Palestinians.  Last, but by no means least, it promotes a highly racist war on terrorism aimed squarely at Muslims.

Switzerland has not been involved in a foreign war since 1515, and although it is heavily armed, it has remained neutral since 1815.  It has never been part of a larger empire.  Sweden became neutral in 1814.

Swiss foreign policy is based on four premises:  (1)  Switzerland will never initiate a war.  (2)  It will never enter a war on the side of a warring party.  (3)  It will never side in any way with one warring party against another.  (4)  It will vigorously defend itself against outside attack.

According to the Swiss constitution, every Swiss male is obligated to do military service; women are also accepted into the military service on a voluntary basis but are not drafted.  In case of an attack on the country several hundred thousand men and women can be mobilized within a few days.

Although Austria, Finland, and Sweden are not members of NATO, they are members of the United Nations and the European Union.  Even though Geneva is the home to many agencies of the U.N., Switzerland did not join the U.N. until 2002.  Although the Swiss do trade extensively with member nations of the E.U., the Swiss citizenry has consistently rejected membership in the E.U., even though the Berne government favors membership.

However, neutrality does not mean non-involvement.  Although the U.S. has the largest economy in the world, each of the aforementioned nations is ranked in the top twenty countries in terms of per capita income and each contributes a higher percentage of its Gross National Income to foreign aid than does the U.S.

In addition to the dozen or so neutral countries of the world, there are over twenty countries without armed forces.  They include Liechtenstein and Costa Rica, the latter of which abolished its army and became neutral in 1949.  Most of the other such countries are small island nations scattered throughout the world.

Under the doctrine of full spectrum dominance, the Pentagon claims the right to engage in pre-emptive military strikes against any country in the world which it considers to be a threat to our national security.  This policy is based on two aphorisms – “might makes right”  and “just be like us.”

The Pentagon can send its high-tech instruments of death – B-2 bombers, intercontinental ballistic missiles, and unmanned drone aircraft – anywhere in the world it wants to spread death and destruction, all in the name of freedom, democracy, and humanitarian concern.

The objective of the Pentagon, says F. William Engdahl, is not only to take control of the entire planet but the universe as well including land, sea, air, space, outer space and cyberspace.  At the root of all military encounters is the control of global supplies of oil, natural gas, minerals, other natural resources, and related pipelines and the prevention of these supplies from falling into the hands of the Chinese and the Russians.  Anyone who pretends that “peak oil” is not a problem should take a long, hard look at American foreign policy.  It’s all about oil!

To facilitate regime change in country after country the Pentagon gameplan calls for the use of propaganda and media control, the Internet and social networks, complicit NGOs, and so-called Color Revolutions such as Georgia’s Rose Revolution, Ukraine’s Orange Revolution, Tibet’s Crimson Revolution, and Myanmar’s Saffron Revolution.  What has been happening during the Arab Spring in North Africa and the Middle East appears to be more of the same.  Basically the idea is to make carefully controlled, sophisticated regime change plots appear as spontaneous democratic revolutions.  The Iranian demonstrations in 2009 were a case in point.

As further evidence of America’s policy of full spectrum dominance, the White House supports surrounding Russia with an anti-missile defense system, expanding membership in NATO, and demonizing and isolating North Korea and Iran.  Not a pretty picture.

As Congressional gridlock continues to play out over the issue of the 2012 budget, few Democratic or Republican lawmakers seem to have the stomach to challenge the military-industrial complex lobby over the trillion-dollar military defense/national security budget.  For how much longer can we afford to play the role of the world’s policeman?  Is there no limit as to how much we are prepared to spend on the highly contrived war on terror?

Even though World War II ended in 1945 and the Cold War ended in 1991 with the implosion of the Soviet Union, we continue to have tens of thousands of troops stationed in Europe, Japan, and South Korea.  Why?  Why too do we continue to stockpile nuclear weapons and every other conceivable form of weapon of mass destruction?  Towards what end?

America needs a new paradigm – an alternative to its obsessive compulsive attraction to unlimited military might.  Maybe it’s high time we examine the nonviolent neutrality of small countries like Sweden and Switzerland?  Why do we always feel compelled to exercise the military option?

We need a big military defense budget, so the story goes, because we are a big country with vast strategic resources, many big cities, dozens of military bases, hundreds of defense contractors, and thousand high-tech weapons, all of which must be protected.  The more we spend on military defense the more we need to spend in the future protecting what we already have.  This type of perverse, self-fulfilling logic enabled the U.S. to justify spending $13 trillion dollars on the Cold War.  Today the war on terror is used to drive up the defense budget in much the same way which the Cold War did for nearly a half century.

Perhaps the military budget is so big because the country itself is too big?  Maybe we should consider the possibility of downsizing the USA as well as its military?  Both the American people and the rest of the world might benefit from the experience.  Towards that end we should:

1. End the illegal wars in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Pakistan  immediately.
2. Remove all American troops from Europe, Japan, and South Korea and close all but 100 of the American military bases scattered throughout the world.
3. Shut down NATO.
4. Not only encourage Iran and North Korea to shelve their nuclear weapons programs but insist that China, England, France, India, Israel, and Pakistan do the same, not to mention ourselves.
5. Terminate the missile defense program.
6. Discontinue all economic and military aid to Israel.
7. Cease being the arms merchant of North Africa and the Middle East.
8. Close the Guantanamo prison now.
9. End the embargo against Cuba.
10. Repeal the Patriot Act and the Military Commissions Act.
11. Reduce military spending to $200 billion annually.
12. Replace the Secretary of Defense and the Secretary of State with people who embrace peace, not war.  (Leon Panetta is not such a person.)

Above all, we should recall what economist Leopold Kohr said about military power in his book The Breakdown of Nations:

For whenever a nation becomes large enough to accumulate the critical mass of power, it will in the end accumulate it.  And when it has acquired it, it will become an aggressor, its previous record and intentions to the contrary notwithstanding.

Thomas H. Naylor                                                      April 25, 2011

Founder of the Second Vermont Republic and Professor Emeritus of Economics at Duke University; co-author of Affluenza, Downsizing the USA, and The Search for Meaning.

There will never be a really free and enlightened State until the State comes to recognize the individual as a higher and independent power, from which all its own power and authority are derived, and treats him accordingly.

Henry David Thoreau

“Civil Disobedience”

Henry David Thoreau, the iconoclastic, nineteenth century New England writer, has long been associated with simple living, solitude, independent thinking, environmental integrity, civil disobedience, nonviolence, and passive resistance.  But few seem to have noticed that he was also a card-carrying secessionist.

Best known for its influence on Mahatma Gandhi, Martin Luther King, Jr., the South African anti-apartheid movement, and the Eastern European anti-communist movement in the 80s, Thoreau’s famous 1849 essay “Civil Disobedience” reads like a secessionist’s manifesto.

His two-year stay at Walden Pond near Cambridge, Massachusetts between 1845 and 1847, on which his 1854 book Walden was based, was little short of a personal secession from his village, his state, and his country.  About personal secession Thoreau once said, “Some are petitioning the State to dissolve the Union.  Why do they not dissolve it themselves—the union between themselves and the State?”

In 1854, when the population of the United States was around 20 million, Thoreau thought the country was already too large.  “The nation itself is an unwieldly and overgrown establishment, cluttered with furniture and tripped up by its own traps, ruined by luxury and heedless expense.”  He called for a ““rigid economy” and “Spartan simplicity of life.”  “Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity!” he said.

Thoreau’s principal grievances with the federal government were over its de facto support of slavery and its participation in the Mexican-American War, both of which he considered to be immoral.

When a sixth of the population of a nation which has undertaken to be the refuge of liberty are slaves, and a whole country (Mexico) is unjustly overrun and conquered by a foreign army (the U.S. Army), and subjected to military law, I think it is not too soon for honest men to rebel and revolutionize.

During the first half of the nineteenth century before the Civil War, New England was a political hotbed for secessionists, most of whom were abolitionists.  Massachusetts Senator Timothy Pickering, a former high-ranking general in the Revolutionary War, was one of the most important leaders of the New England secession movement.

New England Federalists, who believed that the policies of the Jefferson and Madison administrations were proportionately more harmful to New England than to other parts of the country, thrice led independence movements aimed respectively at the 1803 Louisiana Purchase, the national embargo of 1807, and the War of 1812.  In 1814 New England secessionists expressed their opposition to the War of 1812 and the military draft of the Hartford Convention.

Thoreau, who was vehemently opposed to slavery, called for abolitionists to “effectively withdraw their support, both in person and property, from the government of Massachusetts.”  He told them that, “if they had God on their side, even though they did not constitute a majority, that was enough.”

In response to the question, “How does it become a man to behave toward this American government today?”  Thoreau presciently responded, “He cannot without disgrace be associated with it.”  Clearly a man ahead of his time!

As for civil disobedience, of which secession is a special case, Thoreau said, “If an injustice requires you to be the agent of injustice to another, then, I say, break the law.  Let your life be a counter-friction to stop the government machine.”  Thoreau actually spent a night in jail for not paying his poll-tax.

No doubt many anarchists have taken note of the following two statements by Thoreau in “Civil Disobedience”. “That government is best which governs not at all,” and “I simply wish to refuse allegiance to the State, to withdraw and stand aloof from it effectually.”

If Thoreau were alive today, it seems unlikely that he would have an e-mail address.  He was not convinced that we all had to be connected.

We are in great haste to construct a magnetic telegraph from Maine to Texas, but Maine and Texas, it may be, have nothing important to communicate…We are eager to tunnel under the Atlantic and bring the Old World some weeks nearer to the New, but perchance the first news that will leak through into the broad, flapping American ear will be that the Princess Adelaide has the whooping cough.

Perhaps the reason given by Thoreau as to why he escaped to Walden Pond says it all:

I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.

I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartanlike as to put to rout all that was not life.

Thoreau’s philosophy of secession was based on the premise that an individual’s moral principles have the first claim on his or her actions, and that any government which requires violation of these principles has no legitimate authority whatsoever.

One can only imagine what Thoreau would think of the United States today – a nation which has lost its moral authority and is unsustainable, ungovernable, and unfixable.  What would he think of a government owned, operated, and controlled by corporate America and Wall Street?  How would he feel about the illegal wars with Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya?  What about our unconditional support for the bellicose state of Israel?  Would he condone the torture of military combatant prisoners?  And, alas, the war on terror?

Henry David Thoreau was arguably the most thoughtful, nonviolent secessionist of the nineteenth century.  Unlike well known southern secessionists such as John C. Calhoun, Jefferson Davis, and Robert E. Lee, Thoreau’s message was not tainted by the scourge of slavery.

Modern day New England liberals who summarily reject secession as a kind of racist conspiracy, should re-visit Thoreau.  They just might be surprised at what they find.

Thomas H. Naylor

April 11, 2011

Founder of the Second Vermont Republic and Professor Emeritus of Economics at Duke University; co-author of Affluenza, Downsizing the USA, and The Search for Meaning.

Objective: To encourage (1) the nonviolent breakup of meganations such as the United States, China, Russia, and India; (2) the peaceful coexistence of a community of small, sustainable, cooperative, democratic, socially responsible, egalitarian, nonviolent, ecofriendly nations; and (3) the independence of small breakaway states such as Quebec, Tibet, and Vermont.

Possible Initial Members:

1. Bhutan (Gross National Happiness)
2. Bolivia
3. Costa Rica (no military)
4. Denmark
5. Finland
6. Norway
7. Quebec
8. Senegal
9. Sweden
10. Switzerland
11. Tibet
12. Vermont

Other Possible Members:

1. Catalonia
2. Cuba  (if it cleans up its human rights act)
3. Ecuador
4. Iceland  (if it becomes more financially responsible)
5. Palestine
6. Scotland
7. Sikkim
8. Spain
9. Sri Lanka
10. Venezuela  (if it becomes more democratic)

Downsizing Candidates:

1. Bangladesh
2. Brazil
3. China
4. India
5. Indonesia
6. Japan
7. Mexico
8. Nigeria
9. Pakistan
10. Russia
11. United States

There seems only one cause behind all forms of social misery:  bigness.  Whenever something is wrong, something is too big.

Leopold Kohr

The Breakdown of Nations

Neither its $5.4 trillion economy, its state-of-the-art technology, nor its military-like efficiency could protect Japan from the catastrophic consequences of the March 11, 2011 earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear disaster.  To be quite blunt, when you cram 127 million people into one large island and a group of smaller ones, all prone to earthquakes, you have few degrees of freedom when disaster strikes.  It’s all about human scale.

Japan is but one of eleven meganations with a population of over one hundred million people.  Although none of them are as wealthy, materialistic, racist, militaristic, violent, or imperialistic as the United States, all eleven of them are too big, too powerful, too undemocratic, too environmentally irresponsible, too intrusive, too insular, and too unresponsive to the needs of individual citizens and small local communities.

Thus it is hardly surprising that the 192-member United Nations, which is dominated by the United States, Russia, and China, each of which has veto power in the Security Council, has been so ineffective since its inception in 1945.  Nothing illustrates this better than the U.N. sponsored conferences on climate change in Kyoto in 1997 and Copenhagen in 2009.  Trying to come up with solutions to a problem as complex as climate change by assembling 178 heads of state, as was the case in Kyoto, or 193 in Copenhagen, is truly an exercise in futility.  The product of the 12-day Copenhagen conference was a nonbinding agreement in which no one was committed to anything.  The so-called Copenhagen agreement was a complete sham.  The process was replicated in Cancun, Mexico in 2010 with similar results.

The track record of big international governing organizations, such as the League of Nations or the United Nations is singularly unimpressive.  How many wars has the U.N. prevented?  Certainly none in Korea, Vietnam, Cambodia, Iraq, Yugoslavia, Afghanistan, Palestine, or Africa.  Global political problems are too complex for an assembly of two hundred international political leaders to sort out in a public forum. This is even more true if China and the United States refuse to budge from their positions of national self-interest.  Some have cynically suggested that the U.N. is little more than an extension of the U.S. State Department.

I believe it is high time for the smaller nations of the world to begin withdrawing from the United Nations.  The U.N. is morally, intellectually, and politically bankrupt. It is time for these smaller nations to confront the meganations of the world and say, “Enough is enough.  We refuse to continue condoning your plundering the planet in pursuit of resources and markets to quench your insatiable appetite for consumer goods and services.”  These small nations should call for the nonviolent breakup of the United States, China, Russia, India, Japan, and the other meganations of the world.

A small group of peaceful, sustainable, cooperative, democratic, egalitarian, Ecofriendly nations might lead the way.  Such a group might include Denmark, Finland, Norway, Sweden, and Switzerland.

What these five European nations have in common is that they are tiny, very affluent, nonviolent, democratic, and socially responsible.  They also have a high degree of environmental integrity and a strong sense of community.  Although Denmark and Norway are members of NATO, Finland, Sweden, and Switzerland are neutral.  Once considered classical European democratic socialist states, the four Nordic states in the group have become much more market-oriented in recent years.  Not only is Switzerland the wealthiest of the lot, but it is the most market-oriented country in the world, with the weakest central government, the most decentralized social welfare system, and a long tradition of direct democracy.  What’s more, all of these countries work, and they work very well.  Compared to the United States they have fewer big cities, less traffic congestion, less pollution, less poverty, less crime, less drug abuse, and fewer social welfare problems.

Three other small countries which might also join the party are environmentally friendly Costa Rica, which has no army, ecovillage pioneer Senegal, and the Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan.  Since 1972 the king of Bhutan has been trying to make Gross National Happiness the national priority rather than Gross National Product.  Although still a work-in-progress, policies instituted by the king are aimed at ensuring that prosperity is shared across society and that it is balanced against preserving cultural traditions, protecting the environment, and maintaining a responsive government.

This group of small, nonviolent, sustainable countries could evolve into the Small Nations’ Alliance.  Such an alliance might encourage the nonviolent breakup of meganations, the peaceful coexistence of a community of like-minded, small nations, and the independence of small breakaway states such as Quebec, Tibet, and Vermont from larger nations.  The Small Nations’ Alliance could become a sort of international cheerleader supporting breakaway nations.

We do not envision the SNA as an international governing body with the power to impose its collective will on others.  Rather we see it as a role model encouraging others to decentralize, downsize, localize, demilitarize, simplify, and humanize their lives.  Membership in the SNA will be open to those nations who subscribe to the principles of the SNA and are approved for membership by a consensus of SNA members.  The only mechanism available for enforcing policies endorsed by the SNA would be expulsion from the organization for noncompliance.

Membership would be open to both free-market oriented countries as well as democratic socialist countries.  For example, Cuba and Venezuela might both be possible candidates for membership provided they become more democratic.  Cuba would also need to clean up its human rights act.

The point of all of this was succinctly summarized back in 1957 by Leopold Kohr in his prescient book The Breakdown of Nations.  “A small-state world would not only solve the problems of social brutality and war; it would solve the problems of oppression and tyranny.  It would solve all problems arising from power.”

Thomas H. Naylor

March 18, 2011

Founder of the Second Vermont Republic and Professor Emeritus of Economics at Duke University; co-author of Affluenza, Downsizing the USA, and The Search for Meaning.