It Ain't Armageddon, But We Certainly Need A Judgment Day.

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This massive corporate oil dump in the Gulf Coast brings up so many things. First and foremost a feeling of complete helplessness. Seeing all those birds and fish being slaughtered, it's just a speeded-up version of extinction of species. Partly it exposes the irrational hopes many of us had that Obama could somehow make everything okay, when we know that it's the corporations who are in control, and all of our politicians are on the corporate payroll. It sears cynicism and despair into the flesh.

Part of me was thinking today, as I watched a parade of politicians before cameras demanding immediate government help, that I do not recall seeing national politicians out in front of cameras demanding help when it was the people of New Orleans whose lives were being destroyed. Now I hear politicians demanding the entire military and all its abilities (are there any left? Aren't they all in the middle east?) be sent to help. But again, I don't remember this level of concern after the levees broke.

No talk of criminal indictments. It just rubs it in our faces again -- these people can do anything they want, even murder, and get away with it. When a nation refuses to apply the laws to the rich and powerful, it is no longer a nation of laws, no longer a democracy. It is just a dictatorship. In our case, it is a corporate dictatorship. The lives of people murdered by corporations are waved off, like irritating flies at a summer picnic. Workers killed in a coal mine which refused to comply with safety orders: so what? Workers murdered on an oil rig? Yeah, what're you gonna do about it? People's lives, ability to support themselves, a big chunk of our ocean, land, all destroyed: so what're ya gonna do?

The Democrats and Obama refused to indict bush and cheney for international war crimes, refused to indict people who kidnapped, tortured, and beat to death, actually murdered others -- murderers without excuse -- but Obama and the Democrats did nothing. The AJ is not independent but is a lackey of the white house. There can be no justice when the Department of Justice is just a political wing of the next reelection campaign.

Wall Street? Not only have Obama and the Democrats refused to indict these criminals and throw them in prison and seize their assets, which is what they should have done, but Obama actually stood up and defended their looting, saying "Oh, they work hard." So do I, but nobody ever gave me ten million dollars as a little something extra for my efforts. You want to know who works hard? Coal miners work hard, but the government won't even enforce the most minimal safety standards to protect their lives, and when many are killed, the government refuses to indict. The head of Massey is a murderer, and he should be indicted as such, and tried, and convicted, and spend the rest of his life in a cell. Preferably without a window, so he can live just like those miners died, without air or light or hope.

I don't believe in Armageddon, and I think people who believe that nonsense are morons. We don't need to search supernatural texts or read tea leaves or look to the skies for an explanation of what is going on. It is all caused by greed and corruption. These wars represent greed by the oil industry, and corruption by our politicians. Wall Street is the same. Unemployment, the devastation of the world's economy, all the same: greed and corruption. The perpetrators? All white men. We know who they are, but our government simply refuses to enforce the laws against them.

Maybe we do need a judgment day, but skip the angels and the horns, forget about the heavens opening up. Judgment by a jury of 12. Demand criminal indictments. Let the drug users out of prison and make room for the criminals from Wall Street, the oil industry, and the politicians they own.