Get your own Free Home PageAmong leftists, dead communists are all democratic martyrs. Because this month is the 25th anniversary of the coup that disposed of Chile's Salvador Allende, you will hear the usual leftist bilge about Gen. Augusto Pinochet Ugarte.
The left version of history is that Pinochet destroyed democracy. The truth is he saved it.
Allende, with the backing of communists and socialists, won 36 percent of the vote in 1970 in a three-way race. He quickly began ``nationalizing'' copper mines and large farms and expropriating the major means of production. In other words, he created the usual communist program of state ownership.
Chileans, who have a long history of democratic governments, rallied against Allende and his communist pals and in midterm congressional elections in 1973 won 54 percent of the seats. So Allende, who was a minority president, then faced a legislature in which the opposition held the majority.
Allende, far from being a democrat, began to make plans to seize power completely, and it was at that point that the army stepped in. In other words, there was a military coup to head off a communist coup. Allende died during the coup.
While Pinochet and the Chilean armed forces ruled politically with an iron hand, exterminating or exiling the leftists, they also restored the Chilean economy. Pinochet brought under control inflation, which, under Allende, had reached triple digits. He brought in American economists from the University of Chicago and shrank the role of government in favor of the market, liberalized trade, promoted nontraditional exports, slashed fiscal outlays, privatized public enterprises, pruned social services and broke the power of the unions. This resulted in an economic boom from 1977 to 1981.
Pinochet, in a move that hardly fits the pattern of dictators, invoked a plebescite in 1980 that approved a constitution that would allow him to remain in power until 1988, when another plebiscite would be held. A majority voted yes.
Now, get this: In 1988, opposition parties defeated Pinochet in the plebiscite, 55 percent to 43 percent. And what did the man the left calls a dictator do? He accepted the results of the democratic vote, and, in 1989, free presidential elections were held, and Christian Democrat Patricio Aylwin won and took office in March 1990.
Now what dictator do you know who set up a plebiscite and, when he lost it, agreed to step aside and allow a civilian government to take power? Had Allende succeeded with his coup, Chile would have been stuck with a Stalinist dictator and the slaughter of non-communists would have been much greater than the casualties of Pinochet's war against the left.
Gen. Pinochet is a Chilean hero, who saved Chile from a communist dictatorship, revitalized its economy and peacefully returned it to a democratically elected civilian government. I hope Chileans appreciate what the old man did for them.
Of course, in America, with the left so prominent in the news media, Pinochet is continuously vilified, and all the communists are depicted as poor, innocent democrats instead of the thugs and would-be dictators that they were. The American left has never met a communist it didn't like and has consistently vilified anyone who frustrated a communist takeover.
The next time you hear American leftists whining about Pinochet, ask them why their other Latin America hero, Fidel Castro, has never given the Cuban people a chance to vote in a plebiscite concerning his rule.
Suggest they worry more about a true dictator still in power in Cuba than about a man who saved and restored democracy in Chile.
Urbanization of America is so complete now that if you mention the word ``hunt'' to most folks, they would think of that pretty actress Helen Hunt on television instead of woods and wildlife.
That is why the country is nutty.
Hunting animals and birds in the woods and fields is a real thing. Thinking a lot about people you don't even know except for their images on the screen is, well, kind of weird. Nevertheless the television is so pervasive that probably lots of people feel that they know actors and actresses better than they do the folks down the block.
Go ahead and call me a barbarian, but I am an occasional hunter. I have gotten to the point, though, that I don't want to shoot anything too heavy to haul out of the woods comfortably. That narrows it down pretty much to rabbits and game birds. I like squirrels too much to shoot them, though I used to.
Florida white-tailed deer aren't very heavy, but they aren't very easy to find either. I've seen more and bigger deer dead on the highways in one trip to Pennsylvania than I've seen in the Florida scrub while hunting them for 10 years or more. I think that in Florida there are a very few real deer but a lot of ghost deer who leave tracks and scat but are otherwise invisible.
But even as a boy, I never aspired to hunt in Africa. I can't even imagine what work it is to drag a dead elephant all the way back to the car. And what kind of car would you need to tie a dead elephant on the hood? Probably an 18-wheeler. But then, how could you see to drive? Furthermore, my daddy taught me that I had to eat anything I shot, and I don't have a freezer big enough to keep a ton of elephant steaks. No, African big-game hunting has always struck me as impractical. Besides, I don't especially care to hunt in places where there are critters that hunt you back.
I thought George the Cat Person who lives with me was big until I saw an African lion without the benefit of a cage between me and it. Seven hundred pounds of kitty cat is about 690 pounds too much, if you ask me.
But hunting in America is great, and if I were of an authoritarian nature, I would ban children from seeing Disney movies and require them all to shoot and skin a deer before they could get a drivers license. That would give them a dose of realism and protect them from fantasies. And it would certainly be much better for kids to shoot wild game rather than each other, which seems to be the end product of television- and movie-watching.
There are few experiences that can match getting up before dawn to find a deer stand, watching the day creep up on the forest and then going back to camp to chow down on fried eggs, smoked bacon, jalapeno grits, washed down with a Bloody Mary or two, topped off with a nap in a sunny spot. That's such a good life that you don't even need to see a deer to enjoy it.
My Dad was a fox hunter back in Georgia. The kind of fox hunting he and his friends did required no horses, let alone funny-looking red and white suits. They would drive out to a cabin near the Little River, turn the dogs loose, then go inside and play poker and sip bourbon while they listened to the hounds. They usually hunted all night, and my mother didn't mind, because she would always empty my dad's pockets of his winnings while he slept in the next morning.
Hunting is a great American tradition that ought to be preserved, but, to tell you the truth, if we don't shut down immigration and encourage some already here to leave (I nominate animal-rights nuts, among others) places to hunt will get few and far between.
Israel isn't Switzerland. Dr. Azmi Bashara, a member of the Israeli Knesset, asked Israeli officials for an accounting of the property, the money in the banks and the funds in the Muslim and Christian endowments, all taken over by the Israeli government.
Their answer? ``We don't know. We don't have those figures.''
Switzerland has gone to a lot of trouble to find dormant bank accounts of Holocaust victims and has acted honorably throughout. So, perhaps someone should file a class-action lawsuit against Israel on behalf of Palestinian refugees for an accounting and return of the money and land confiscated by the Israeli government.
In a long conversation I had with the Palestinian legislator, Bashara made three key points. But before we get into them, by way of background, understand that there are three sets of Palestinians. They are the same nation, but they are in three different circumstances.
One set are Palestinian refugees who are scattered around the world. These are people and their descendants driven out of Palestine by the Israelis in 1948 and 1967.
Another set of Palestinians are those who came under Israeli military occupation in the West Bank and Gaza in Israel's 1967 war.
The third set are those Palestinians and their descendants who remained in Palestine during the 1948 war and are now Israeli citizens. Bashara is one of them and is a resident of Nazareth. The Israeli government, Bashara said, took 85 percent of the property belonging to those people after they were allegedly citizens. They are still subject to racial and ethnic discrimination. The Israeli government spends exactly half as much money educating its Arab citizens as it does its Jewish citizens. But even Arab citizens who get college degrees cannot find jobs. He said the Israeli electrical company employs 25,000 people but that only six are Arabs.
So the first key point Bashara made is that Israel is not a true democracy. ``It is a state of the Jews, not a state of its citizens, '' he said. ``Technologically it is a modern state, but in its political culture, it is a medieval state.'' Bashara said the current prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, even ran on a racist slogan: ``Netanyahu is good for the Jews.'' Twenty percent of Israel's population is non-Jewish.
Key point No. 2 is that Israel, rather than seeking true peace, is maintaining an apartheid state. Israelis are free to travel anywhere. Palestinians are not. Even those Palestinians under Arafat are in isolated pockets surrounded by Israeli-controlled territory. They must get Israeli permission to cross from one place to another. Bashara said that can take three to four days sometimes.
``They are creating Bantustans,'' he said, referring to the apartheid South African government's policy of creating isolated and economically unviable ``homelands'' for the black Africans.
Both Bishop Desmond Tutu and South African President Nelson Mandela have verified Bashara's description and condemned the Israelis for it.
His final key point is that both major Israeli groups, Labor and Likud, are in agreement on the final outcome: no sovereign state for the Palestinians, no sharing the sovereignty of Jerusalem, no dismantling of the Jewish settlements, no Palestinian control over the water and no return or compensation for the Palestinian refugees around the world.
Bashara said the Israeli government has continued to confiscate Palestinian lands and to expand Jewish settlements all through the Oslo process. In the long run, he said, the world will not tolerate an apartheid state in the 21st century.
Well, now you know. William Jefferson Clinton is, as Sen. Bob Kerry said, one super-expert and skilled liar. I would say he's a world-class liar. I've never seen anybody else who can lie with such conviction.
Now for a pop quiz.
You have a man who is proven to have lied to his closest friends and supporters, who ruthlessly manipulated his people to peddle his lies for seven months.
Question: On what subjects and on which occasions can you trust him to tell the truth?
If you answer, ``None,'' you get an ``I'' for intelligent. If you say on any occasion, you receive an ``EG'' for extremely gullible.
Please remember that this entire business is 100 percent the fault of Bill Clinton:
-- He didn't have to have the affair.
-- Because he had the affair, he could have admitted it the first time the question came up.
-- He could have said nothing in public but told the truth in his sworn deposition.
If he had done any of the three, he would not be facing an impeachment hearing, the country would not have had to endure seven months of the Monica Lewinsky affair and independent counsel Kenneth Starr could have wrapped up his original investigation.
What Clinton did was evidence of madness. He took a sexual dalliance with a young girl that nobody but Hillary would have cared about, and, by lying, he turned it into a massive problem -- not only for him but for the country. What Clinton did was clearly irrational, and I want to quote you a passage from a book about sociopaths (they used to be called psychopaths).
From a book by Dr. Ken Magid and Carole A. McKelvey called High Risk: Children without a Conscience, the authors write:
``These Trust Bandits (sociopaths) are everywhere. Most don't murder. A few even become powerful figures in the world, politicians or corporate presidents. Since they are not controlled by accepted norms and do not have consciences, the usual rules don't apply. This can give some psychopaths a so-called edge. But the mistake would be in believing that the murderers are the only ones who can hurt us. Nothing is further from the truth. It is what most people don't know about these people that is so dangerous. At the core of the unattached is a deep-seated rage, far beyond normal anger. This rage is suppressed in their psyche. These bondless men, women and children see those around them as objects, targets, steppingstones. Most lie, steal and cheat without a conscience, and they feel no remorse for their actions. If the suppressed rage ever surfaces, they are capable of much more than a con.''
Remember the vicious villification of Starr and everyone else who crossed him?
Seems like Clinton, doesn't it?
If you think not, read the complete Ken Starr report. Nobody -- I mean, nobody -- was so close or loyal or fond of Clinton that the president didn't ruthlessly manipulate that person. And even as he does his ``I'm sorry'' bit, which he has practiced all his life, you can still see the rage he feels toward Starr and anybody else who crosses him.
This guy is dangerous.
One Arabic newspaper in Egypt has reported that he is planning a military attack on Iraq in October, close to the date of the congressional elections. Clinton is a guy perfectly capable of killing innocent people just for public-relations purposes. He would not feel one ounce of remorse.
I've stated before that this president is a sociopath.
If you look at his life, what he always has done is nutty.
His actions certainly have shown a callous contempt and indifference to women when he's not playing the con job.
He needs to be removed from power.
The sooner the better.
Don't worry about the stock market, the saying goes. Just stay in it for the long run, and you'll be OK.
OK, but how long is the long run?
One should, as the old Greeks said, define one's terms. So just how long can the long run run?
Well, thanks to David Feldman, a businessman retired from the stock-brokerage business, I have an answer. In a letter to me, Feldman wrote:
``Remember the long-term nonsense. After the market crash of 1929, the year the Dow Industrials peaked at 381, it was 24 years before stocks saw that price level again.'' And Feldman knows. He was there through it all, and he thinks that the new depression started in the early months of 1998.
Feldman was kind enough to supply me with a few quotes to share with you so that you can see just how wrong corporate big shots and economic experts can be.
The market crashed in October 1929, but, despite the crash, Americans were given this cheerful news about the promising new year, 1930:
-- ``There are valid reasons to believe that the period ahead will round out a good year,'' said L.E. Pierson, chairman, Irving Trust Co.
Wrong.
-- ``I believe that 1930 will be one of the most soundly prosperous years in American history,'' said E.A. St. John, president, National Surety Co.
Real wrong.
-- ``There can be little that may indicate a serious or continued depression,'' said the president of Metropolitan Life Insurance Co.
Extra wrong.
-- ``Business is sound. The buying power of the country has been little impaired by the break in stock prices,'' said Dr. Julius Klein, assistant secretary of Commerce.
Starting to hear little echoes?
-- ``The general economic situation is thoroughly sound,'' assured A.W. Robertson, chairman, Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Co.
Talk about a misread of reality.
-- ``A consensus showed that the New Year (1930) will be more prosperous than for some time, with every indication of an excellent twelve months from a business and financial standpoint,'' reported the 6th Federal Reserve District.
Not to be.
-- ``We believe with President Hoover that the country and its fundamental business conditions are sound,'' said W.W. Atterbury, president of the Pennsylvania Railroad Co.
Gee, now where have I heard that?
-- And the New York Times reported, ``Bankers say ... that the full year (1930) will prove sound. Authorities in all branches of business and industry agree that already indications of improvement are seen.''
Must have been ghostly indications because 1930 and 10 subsequent years proved terrible. Feldman said that only German financial circles got it right, saying, ``Majority opinion here looks for depression.''
As Harry Truman was fond of observing, the only surprises are the history you don't know. So people who don't know history don't know how long the long run can be, don't know that all this talk of a ``new era'' is actually more than 60 years old. It was all said on the eve of the Great Depression.
President Clinton's recent ``economic'' speech at the Council on Foreign Relations was just banal baloney. His solution is still for Japan to restart its economy and ``be the locomotive that pulls Southeast Asia.'' What in the (expletive) does this philanderer think that the Japanese have been trying to do for the past five years?
They can't restart their economy.
Batten down the hatches, folks. Life is an ever-repeating circle.
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